S13E06: Why greatness can’t be planned, with Wendy Strgar (CEO, Good Clean Love)

Wendy Strgar
God, do I even wanna try to do anything else again? Because these are really hard questions, and I don't know that you ever arrive at a final answer. I think there are these questions that are these work in progress. And every day, you try to be a little bit more sensitive and hold yourself, right, like moving from the impostor to the founder, to the vision syndrome, Right? Like, where you actually trust the vision is something that belongs in the universe and that if you keep holding it, the structures will arise up to to meet it. So that's the that's the inaction thing. Right? Like, is it me that's gonna do it? or do I just have to hold it?

Richard Medcalf
Welcome to the Impact Multiplier CEO podcast. I'm Richard Medcalfe, founder of xquadrant. And my mission is to help the world's top CEOs and entrepreneurs shift from incremental to exponential progress and create a huge positive impact on our world. Now that requires you to reinvent yourself and transform your So if you're ready to play a bigger game than ever before, I invite you to join us and become an impact multiplier CEO.

Richard Medcalf
Wendy, it's a pleasure to have you here today. What I know about you is you've built a national US brand in the form of GoodClean Love from your kitchen with only a 6 figure investment. You've painted scientifically advanced biometric information formulas for sexual and women's health care and prompted change in FDA regulations along the way. You've created a biotech spin off, a build a community of over 10,000 health care practitioners. You've know you've been named as a top 25 consumer health tech CEO back in 2020 and recognized three times as one of the world's top 100 impact CEOs. So you're the kind of person that I love. You may out there, you're making an impact in the business sense. And on the broader in the broader world, so I wanna jump straight in What I know about you is you wanna shepherd as many life changing products into the marketplace as possible around biome Health. So you might have to explain to me what biome is, but I wanna know,

Wendy Strgar
like, where does that drive come from? Right? Why is this so important to you? Yeah. Well, because I think anyway, great to be here, Richard. Thanks for having me and really admire the work you're doing. So thanks for finding me. So I I I I mentioned this, I think, in my notes to you, and I think it's really sort of the frame that I work from, which is that, you know, if you're awake in life and, you know, I you mentioned you have children, and that's some some of the ways that we that we discover problems most deeply, right, that we wanna resolve our help with. And and one of the most profound problems that will deal with our is their health, whether it's their physical or emotional or their their mental health. And so finding product or just still developing products that help us feel better in our body, also help us function better emotionally and mentally. And so that's been a real driver for me just in terms of problem solving. And, you know, the biome, but I'll just give you this kind of quick answer. You know, we know a lot about the gut biome because we've been talking about it for years years years. And in fact, probiotics is a bigger industry now than antibiotics. whoever thought that would happen in 30 years. But the truth is that the biome doesn't just exist in our gut. Right? Like, we know that when we have the right back interior in our gut, then our immune system is functioning at its highest. And when people have a lot of gut dysfunction, They're not just sick in their gut. They have all kinds of other diseases. Right? Well but the biome starts in the eyes and the sinuses, and it goes all the way down through your reproductive organs and your rectum. And so there's multiple biomes. And the tissue that makes up the biome, whether it's in the sinuses or the gut or the heart or the the the rectum is all the same mucous membrane. but they all in each of these areas has a different set of bacteria that makes them well. So it's not the same gut bacteria that that makes the sinus as well. Right? They're all the mouth, the oral biome is like a huge white space that people don't understand and that no products have been developed for for oral health, which is to say growing good bacteria in our mouth just like in the work I do around vaginal biome, which is something most women don't even understand. They have a vaginal biome. But if you don't have the right bacteria in your vaginal biome, you're not only gonna have more sort of local conditions but you might have many other conditions that you don't understand why is this happening. So really, you know, there's bacteria, you know, the COVID sort of made us anti viral antibacterial everywhere. But, really, what we wanna do is live with bacteria in the healthiest way, and our bodies are magically designed to do that. but we don't really spend a lot of time scientifically even thinking about how do we cultivate the strongest bacterial profile in these different biomes such that we don't need antibiotics anymore.

Richard Medcalf
So fascinating. Thank you for that that that explanation. It's fascinating. And so, yeah, you'd be looking at, you know, whole body health in so many ways. But how did you get into that? Like, what was it that set you on this mission? I understand that you, you know, you wanna create this positive impact But why in this field? Why would this business

Wendy Strgar
what was the origin? Yeah. You know, I don't know. I I I think I wish I could tell you I had this beautiful plan. But I I what I would say to you is that I am a really active learner I'm really always trying to learn something about the universe and the world that I live in. And because I'm always trying to learn and I'm also not an active planner. You know? My son gave me this book, which I highly recommend to everybody I and it's probably reversed on the screen, but it's called why greatness cannot be planned, the myth of the objective. And it's by these 2 AI professors can Stanley and Joel Lehman. My son's a computer scientist out of Berkeley, and probably the smartest person I know right now. I say he got smarter than me in college. He always says he got smarter than me in middle school, but that's not true.

Richard Medcalf
Yeah. I've heard about that book.

Wendy Strgar
It's gonna be interesting counterintuitive book. Yeah. Well, I think it's I mean, this is what I would say to you about my entire assess is which can wrapped up in this book, which is that if you don't have an objective and that you're trying to get to and you're not planning for a specific solution, then that is how you will find what is all around you in front of you. And that's how I came upon all of these ideas about about Biom. Right? Like, I didn't set out to solve that problem because I didn't know that was the problem. Right? When I first started my business, I was trying to find products that didn't make me sick so that I could continue to be sexually active in my marriage. because I knew if that stopped, I would stop like, my marriage would stop working. And and I had 4 children, and I had all the reasons that so many women have where they stop being interested in sex, and sex is painful. And so that's how I started on on good clean love, the journey. was trying to solve problems for me to remain, you know, in a marriage that worked.

Richard Medcalf
That's amazing. Yeah. So it was it it came out of real curiosity.

Wendy Strgar
Over time, I I was very fortunate to meet a biophysicist, who taught me everything about vaginal biome Health. And, you know, he was involved in a study that good clean love got included in in 2010 to try to develop a buffer gel for HIV and STDs. It was right at a time in the in America when they they couldn't get a handle on those diseases. And so they were trying to develop something that would make the bio more defensive to diseases like that. And that's when they learned that every product on the market was actually making people sick. so that they couldn't fix the things that were on the market, that, really, there was a whole different science that needed to be developed, and honestly, that's what I've been trying to work on in sexual health ever since.

Richard Medcalf
It's amazing. I love the way that you've you followed these this thread. Right? You've what you found the thread. You call it? But it's like it's actually bread it's like bread crumbs.

Wendy Strgar
Right? And that's really you know, I tell the to my son and whoever listened to me every day. It's like we don't know where we're going. And if we could give up the idea that we do, and we could just look at the signs around us, we will end up in a place that is much closer to what we're really trying to do. than if we have this objective reality that we're trying to land at. Because what happens is when you're trying to sort of direct yourself to a specific place. You miss all the signs around you. Right? And and that is really what Every day were given in this sort of universe universal kind of grace filled way were given these these signs oh, look at this. Oh my gosh. I didn't know about this. And then that's what shows us where the next step is. And in the corporate world that makes people uncomfortable. I just wanna say they want everyone wants to believe we know where we're going. You know? And I think it's actually the thing that that prevents us from seeing a lot.

Richard Medcalf
Yeah. It's fascinating. My own my own journey is like that. I mean, I'm a I'm a strategist. You know? So I've been really trained in many ways to set goals and go for them. And I've been living in my own business and my own life. One of my mentors said to me, opportunity was always way closer than you think. And so often, we're so searching out for this thing over here. We just don't see -- We don't see anything around.

Wendy Strgar
Right? And So, you know, I mean, I that's why I always try to lead with questions. Like, when I first started my sexual health business, good clean love, You know? I knew that the formulas that were on the market were not the right formulas, partly because they made me sick, and they made so many women sick. And then as I met this biophysicist, I learned why they made people sick. And it's all kinds of scientific reasons about osmolality and and pH and things that I I I mean, I'm not a scientific scientific thinker by training, but by curiosity. And so so that's how I that's how I learned about those things. And, honestly, sometimes when you're trained specifically like with an MBA, or a specific science degree or an entrepreneurial degree or whatever. In some ways, that training makes you makes you more I don't wanna say jaded, but cautious. Right? Like, it tells you that there's this frame that you need to work within. And if you don't have those frames built into your mind, you're kind of like a kid in a playground. Right? Like, you you you know, I can play in science in a way that scientists don't because I'm asking these these child like questions. Well, how would this work? And then it's sort of amazing when you meet the scientists. They're like, well, that's a really interesting question I never asked. But then sometimes there's answers. to those questions. And that's where the goal is. You know?

Richard Medcalf
Yeah. Absolutely. But, yeah, innovation is coming from those matching of mixing of disciplines. Yeah. It's brilliant. I let me talk a bit more about that. Yeah. I know that you're a disruptive game changing kind of leader visionary leader is what we've been talking about. You're not just following a path that's being laid out. You're gonna see the thing on the left field. You're gonna take go away your curiosity. takes you. And so as you've been building your your your business, your b corp, and and and these other these other parts of your portfolio. I can imagine you can get quite far ahead of your investors, your employees, your community, you see things that they're not yet seeing. Often see it. Right? When you've got visionary leaders, it can be hard to get everything from your head. into a way that other people can kinda really grasp and move on. So kind of what's your experience of that? You know, how does that show itself up for you. Yeah. You know, that's a really great and hard question.

Wendy Strgar
Hard because it's personally such a I don't wanna call it traumatizing, but it's a it's a bit it's one of my biggest challenges, truthfully. Because what I've learned especially recently is that that people can only see what they're ready to see. And and if somebody comes to you with a class then you have actually a little moment where they can receive something from you. But without a question, you're just talking at somebody. You know? And if somebody is accustomed to, like, having 3 plates around them, and suddenly you're coming to them with 20 plates, that are all like actually spinning in perfect precision in your mind, but they're accustomed to managing 3 plates. you will be very overwhelming to them, and that doesn't matter. So I'm not just talking about employees that work for you. I'm talking about investors. Right? Like, you know and I don't know if this is a gift or a curse, but, you know, early on, I I stopped being concerned about what other people were thinking about me and just tried to think about what I needed to know. and how I was needing to see the world. Maybe that was actually a a mistake, but I couldn't actually juggle wondering what all these dozens of people were thinking and also have creative, innovative thoughts. I just didn't have a big enough brain for that. You know? I mean, I I think there's a lot of other people. I think most people actually spend a lot of time thinking about what other people are thinking. And I think, like, you know, artists and innovators tend to spend less time with wondering how other people are perceiving them. I think I have a particular deficit at that. which has cost me dearly. But I I don't think that's where the interesting thing is. I've always considered adults to be mature enough to sort of come to you and say the thing they need to say. And in fact, that's not true. They won't actually do that. And so you do have to have some of that skill of trying to read people's signs, but I don't know if you can really convince anybody of anything. truthfully.

Richard Medcalf
Well, there's a few things she said there. I think the first thing is, yeah, I feel that. I think a lot of people I've worked with would say I mean, I'll I'll speak to myself. You know, I've had to be careful not to start editing myself because when I was a young guy, I could be quite blunt, though. You know, say, in VertuCom as inappropriate things because I just wanted to, like, be direct to get things out there, provoke people, push the people's thinking. It's a gift of mine. It's to push people's thinking. But you have to do a pat disrupt sometimes. You have to shake the status quo, and the danger is sometimes that backfires And then the but the the hidden danger there is you then suddenly close down and try and be more respect, you know, fit in more, and that actually lose your power. It's really important, I think, not to do that.

Wendy Strgar
But I think what I what I also think of -- -- that balance or that juggle. I don't know if it's a balance or a juggling is like I mean, it's the reason that there are so many great artists that like, I think about Van Gogh. You know? And he just did him. He was just doing him, and nobody could get him. And it was like, way after he died that people saw his genius. You know? And he probably never even thought of himself as a genius. He just had to express what he had to express, and it's a lonely life when you're in that place, you know, where people don't understand you. You were talking about another tool that people use to sort of understand people's contribution, and I don't know if you've ever seen this predictive index. It's another way that is sort of legal for people to sort of understand how people will contribute in a team. And so, anyway, I had never seen that before, but unlike so unlike 3 standard deviations off the chart. And so when somebody interpreted my my score, they're like, do you you know how nobody gets you, Wendy? That's because you're, like, over here, like, a venture off the chart. You know? And so, yeah, like, when I try to modulate that for other people to to to fit in, I don't have any great ideas anymore. I can't see. You know? So so it it's a challenge. It's a real challenge to to witness in a big way what's happening and to to bring that into a funnel that people can act on it. And I think, actually, that's the biggest miracle of what I've accomplished in my life. is the ways in which that has worked. And I and I wish I could say, oh, here's my plan. How I did that? But there isn't really a plan. There's this magic alchemy that happens with people sometimes. Right? because you do need people. There's this Everybody talks about how do you manage people now. I can't tell you how to manage people. I can tell you that there have been moments in my life where I've been blessed with people around me who forgive my extravagance sort of out there in the world. and who help and work with me both as consultants, employees, all different people. Right? And that's the richness you know, of it is when you can have fun with other people trying to make things better. And I think when they understand how they really are contributing to making life better for people. Maybe that's all they need to understand. They don't maybe need to get your whole vision. You know? But Usually, I think that's what captured people with me was that they understood enough that I had good intention and goodwill. And and so that's how that worked. But, you know, you you you bring money into that, and it changes the dynamic really extensively.

Richard Medcalf
So that happened to me recently where I -- Let let me pause here for a second. I wanna just start down and capture a couple of those points. So I heard what I heard there was understanding enough of the vision and your impact. Right? That's what people needed. They needed something. told him something, and this is how I can make a difference. You talked about editing yourself, and I think and fitting in and the dangers of that. I have a distinction of fitting in versus belonging. And so my community is always trying to make that distinction. Like, don't fit in because then you're gonna just bring us down to some average. loan commerce denominator. But you can belong and not fit in, and that's okay. In special groups,

Wendy Strgar
Right? In special groups, either groups where you I think leadership in some ways is that art of how to people how do you make space for all different people to belong to something? And and it's usually around something that Everyone can take meaning out of. Right? Like, in some way, there's some altruism, even the least sort of sensing feeling person. Right? This the the highest level strategists can think to themselves, okay, I'm doing this linear sort of thinking, and and and I belong to this community that's, in my case, was trying to make health better for women. yeah. So you're right. It's all about creating that he's creating that community, you know, creating boundaries around, like, ex agreements around what are we doing here is coming together.

Richard Medcalf
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Wendy Strgar
Yeah. I you know, so we're a b corp. And, you know, for me, what that means is that it just provides you a context that you can make decisions for multiple shareholders. Right? All different kinds of like, whether it's the environment or your employees or you know, but that you can that you're responsible to to the universe of things, not just to investors and their money. And so in Oregon, there's actually a benefit corporation, which reflects the B Corp status. It's legal. So it's also a legal protection to make those decisions. But for me, I I feel like when I'm doing work, I wanna make as little damage while I'm working as possible. So for instance, we use sugarcane tubes, which is a bioplastic. on all our packaging because I used to have nightmares at night about all the plastic I was making to to fill for for lubricants. You know? So whenever I know that I'm doing something that's that's wrong. Right? Like, we don't need more plastic in the world. I try to do it in a better way. So even if sugar can't cost more, which, you know, it's only marginally more, it's better. Right? So so I I I I'm always thinking what's better in this problem solving way. And then I I just trust the money thing to work out. So that's what I mean by, you know, you if you're having to make a decision and you are not using money and your finances, as a mechanism of deciding what's the best thing to do, you will always know the best thing to do. But as soon as you bring money into that equation, You often will lose sight of what is the most important thing. You know?

Richard Medcalf
Yeah. So that's what that means. Yeah. Beautiful way of playing it. Right? It's really saying that money clouds that decision making process because we get attached, and we get fear and greed and coming in, and we don't see what the long term what what the right decision is, quite simply.

Wendy Strgar
I think if you're trying to build value That's a very different experience mental experience than trying to build wealth or money. Right? Like, so, you know, value creates its own wealth, and value comes from choosing things that are important. Right? Like, pushing forward the importance over, like, what we have to do every day. So everything that I did at good clean love You know? And learning how to be generous. You know, we know that that for many people, the more wealthy they become, The more protected they become. Right? The more afraid they are of losing what they have. And I think that's true at a corporate level too. Right? So we stop being more generous, whether it's to the our employees or to, you know, b corps have a responsibility of giving to, you know, whatever it is that that is resonant with you. So we have a huge giving program. This year, we were launching our 1% for the planet, which is such a cool group of human beings who are really trying to give back. And You know, when you consider the kind of problems we have on this planet right now, seems like 1% is barely enough. But, you know, just that we all are owning and being responsible for what we do and trying to improve things. And so, you know, we can't make those decisions based on our finances. We can only make those decisions based on what we know in our heart is the truth. And so investors don't always like that. I just wanna say, they want you to really be most concerned with the bottom line, you know, the bottom bottom line, how much money is left. And And I have never I mean, I wasn't trained in that science, economics. And Sometimes I wonder if I if I should have been, but I think I would have really missed a lot of what I was really here to contribute if I if I had done that.

Richard Medcalf
So how do you deal with investors who are pressurizing you for short term Cash.

Wendy Strgar
I would say that that's a work in in in progress. We are we are working on that. You know? It's like the more money that's involved, the more challenging, that dynamic, you know, whatever, Richard you for all the people you've worked with and all the ways you've been involved in all the places you've been, you know, this this story, the classic story of investment that comes into company and whether it's for acquisition. And then, you know, the brand is still in the world, but it's nothing like what the brand was. before or, you know, or even when investment comes in and changes the the way that the company functions and and what becomes important to it. It's this is this is, I think, the biggest challenge that we that we face collectively is how to integrate money into what is already valuable. Right? And not changing the core of what that value is, because there's more money to resource it. So I think that I have been naive in my past that that everybody will embrace this way of doing things once they understand it. And now what I would say to you is that unless people come to you with a real question in their heart and mind, you probably have very little space to impact how they're gonna think.

Richard Medcalf
Yeah. Well, I love I picked up what you said that earlier on. that when you have a question that gives you all when somebody has a question that gives you this window opportunity to to influence them,

Wendy Strgar
To provide something. Yeah. And it's probably the only time, I think, where you can really do that. I mean, think about even if you have children. You know? You can be talking talking at your kids, and that's all it is. Right? Like, you're trying to put something on them for them to hear something or get something. But, really, it's these moments where they're like, hey. Why is this like this? Or I don't understand or you know, especially when they're having an emotional moment and they ask a question, then that's an open vessel that you can pour something into Whereas you might have said a million times before, you can't run right here because you're gonna get hurt. Well, then they get hurt, and they're like, why did I get hurt there? Well, remember I was saying this? No. They couldn't hear that, and that's true about adults too. You know? maybe even more true because we're more defended the older we get about what we think is true.

Richard Medcalf
Yeah. That's right. One of the things I do with my clients is I help them lean into better questions, bigger questions. That's a real art. You know, helping people actually ask themselves new sorts of questions. because then you become open. Because you're thinking about a new quest what if dot.dot.

Wendy Strgar
Yeah. Nope. For sure. The less thing I just wanna tell you too because I don't know if we're gonna run out of time, but I've spent a lot of time in the last year, I was always a big doer. I just wanna say that that my that my somebody said to me in France, actually, when I lived in France in my twenties, and they said it in French. You focus to the fair. You know? You got you have to keep making things. You just have to keep doing things all the time. Don't stop doing, you know, was what they said. And so I I I really came to believe that what we what we actually do in our life is what makes our life. So I was really an action girl. Right? and and and a high level multitasker when I had 4 children. Must have been must have been with 4. But lately, what I've been realizing for a lot of external reasons that have pushed me into this this moment is that the space of inaction is such a powerful place when we can stop and wait to see what's really happening to see how other people are gonna interact in a moment. There's so much doing that goes on without doing anything. and I would never have known that if I hadn't come to this moment. I'm I'm actually astonished by it every day. How many things happen without me actually pushing or believing that it's my agency making things? Can you give an example? give an example of how that works out? Well, I don't know how it works out yet. Oh, one one example of how you've experienced that. One of the things that's always been very important to me is agency, you know, to know what it is that we actually truly have control over. And I think as a leader, it's a big question to ask yourself, you know, what is it that you're really doing here? You know? Or who's doing the doing? I guess is the question. And, you know, and I've always had a long healthy relationship with with the impostor syndrome. Right? Like, not really knowing if this was me ever that was doing something, you know, because truthfully, I'm just not terribly competent in a lot of business skill. You know? I still don't do Excel sheets and things that that many people expect. And so I had to rely heavily on people around me to accomplish or or to actually make my vision real, actually, is what I would say. And so there's a way that you that you know that you're you have these thoughts but that many things are becoming manifest around you. And so you're I mean, I was profoundly deeply grateful always and still am to the people that that worked with me to make things real because, you know, execution is 910ths of the law when it comes to business. Right? You can have a great idea. So, anyway, now I just kinda wonder how much did we actually do and how much did we let happen? And I don't know. I actually don't know the answer to those questions.

Richard Medcalf
Yeah. They they they are fascinating questions. I thought about that in my own business. You know, if I actually stopped and thought, well, where did 80% of my own business come from last year? You might care. We come through a couple of random conversations, right, or things that you didn't even expect.

Wendy Strgar
Despite all the other marketing and other things that I might have done, which is this greatness this whole greatness cannot be planned. Every year, we would I mean, I would go along with it because everybody else wanted to do this business planning exercise, but it never happened that way. Like, the things never went the way we put it down on paper. It was always things that we didn't see coming that were these opportunities around us that I was always scanning for that were the big breaks. always every year. Yeah. That's a great it's a great it's a great insight. And and I think that I think that organizations that don't have that and really rely only on planning, those organizations will only ever produce exactly what they believe they'll produce. Right? That be it becomes sort of a self fulfilling prophecy.

Richard Medcalf
Yeah. It went to the invitation. Yeah.

Wendy Strgar
Yeah. I mean, they think it's great because then they're planning it, and then they're trying to execute against their plan. But I think that the world is so much more abundant and full of grace than that, and and that's where all my best ideas come from, truthfully. It's not for me. It's things that that landed me from just being awake.

Richard Medcalf
I try to just be awake every day. That's beautiful. Well, that might be a great place to start to think about winding up. I I guess the question I I love to ask with ask it, therefore, is is you know, what think what would multiplying your impact look like for you, Wendy, over the next few years? You know, what impact would you love to make that still still seems out of reach? You know, still seems impossible most. What would that look like?

Wendy Strgar
Yeah. I have some new dreams about that. And, again, it's, like, not things I've planned, but things that just keep showing up. But, you know, my daughter, this kind of aside story, but she had to have brain surgery in February. And it was, yeah, it was really astonishing and terrifying and really fast, but You know, we have I was mentioning to you about the biome is like we have an oral biome, and we have normal oral bacteria that's not supposed to go in your brain. Right? There's a whole blood brain barrier. Like, the brain doesn't even have white blood cells. But in any case, She had oral bacteria in her brain, and it became as an abscess. And she could have died of it, honestly. And so now, of course, I'm really thinking about the oral biome a lot. But there's no products in the market about how do you grow healthy good lactobacilli in the mouth so that you I mean, it's a very rare event, but we do know that oral bacteria really affects the heart That's how people get heart disease. It really impacts women who are pregnant in a very negative way. I mean, What happens in our mouth affects our whole body in really profound and diabetes, one of the key sources of diabetes is your oral bacteria. I mean, it's kinda crazy actually how many diseases come from. And so I wanna develop products for the oral biome and other biomes where we're not thinking in the same way the vaginal biome, all the products on the market that, like, People use for sexual health or other things, almost all of them kill all the good bacteria in the vaginal biome. and our products don't, and that's why they're so effective. But I wanna develop products for other untouched biomes. that are really important. So that's kind of my my and, you know, it's almost always like somebody I love, who has a problem. And then I think to myself, how could I touch that problem in a way that that would be meaningful? And so that's what's made me think about all these. Really like elevating what how we think of medicine not just as killing bad bacteria, but how do we make our own structures stronger so that we have more good bacteria to manage the bacteria that's out there.

Richard Medcalf
So that's my dream. Yeah. I love it. I love that you're really expanding out from all this other areas and seeing how can I help more people at scale. It's beautiful to see. The second question, and that's the final one to leave you with here is what's what are you gonna need to do yourself or how are you gonna need to shift who you are to multiplier your impact? Right?

Wendy Strgar
So what's the next level of Wendy coming through, shall I say? Well, hopefully, I'll have some answers that arise in me to some of the good questions I asked about, you know, how get how am I going to modulate that space between All this stuff that happens in my head and communicating that more effectively outside of me Right? Like, how will I become more sensitive to the moments when somebody's asking a question that I can give something that's concrete enough for them to hold on to. I think that's an important question for me. And how You know, how will I relate with value and wealth? is sort of in a more elevated way, such that that I can anchor these visions to more people, you know, to more stakeholders. Those are the Those are the key questions, right, that I have in developing more teams, more more people around me as employees or contractors and thinking about what kinds of investors I would bring into these activities, what kinds of conversations would I know that I need to have with these people in order that I wouldn't run up against the same barriers I've had in the past. Yeah. As creating this expectation. I think that's how trying to think about it. But some days, I think, god, do I even wanna try to do anything else again? Because these are really hard questions And I don't know that you ever arrive at a final answer. I think there are these questions that are these work in progress. And every day, you try to be a little bit more sensitive and hold yourself, right, like moving from the impostor to the founder to the vision syndrome. Right? Like, where you actually trust the vision is something that belongs in the universe, and that if you keep holding it, the structures will arise up to to meet it. So that's the that's the inaction thing. Right? Like, is it me that's gonna do it, or do I just have to hold it? And I don't know. I'll let you know. Yeah. It's a beautiful question. And I I think there is for me, there's always some of bow you know, a bit of both. Right?

Richard Medcalf
I suspect. And and, possibly, when we're tempted to rush, we need to wait. We intended to wait. We perhaps need to move into action. The question I'm always ask is asking is, it's not so much about what do I need to do differently, but it's what do I need to be differently? that's gonna shift my way of doing. I think that's almost where that -- That's everything. I mean, I think that's everything. Honestly, because you hold the space differently. Like, you know, I've had a lot of really profound spiritual development time. recently. And and and I know that I know this one thing I do know is that the way that I hold myself and how I think about myself and trust myself, it impacts everything that happens in that day. Of course. And that's a beautiful let's let's leave it there, and it's beautiful place to end on these reflections. If people wanna find out more about you, and Luekeen Love and your your, you know, your other your other ventures. Where should they go to do that?

Wendy Strgar
So good clean love .com. I have a very huge blog on there called Make Him of Sustainable. And I have a couple books that are out that you can get on that website or on Amazon. One's called Love That Works, and one is called Sex That Works. And I'm about to put out my last book this year called Life bewildered, which we can talk about some other time, but brings up many of these same questions, honestly. And I have a new business that I'm spending a lot of time on lately, which is called VaginalBiome Science, and some more things to emerge here. in the in the next couple of years, I think.

Richard Medcalf
So exciting. I'm gonna be paying attention because you have different things. hey. Wendy, it's been a pleasure to speak to discuss these different areas, this sense of knowing, this sense of, you know, what it means to be a a visionary leader, you know, dealing with investors, having having this question led approach, solving your solving your own problems is a way of discovering a new future and and leaning into a new vision, you know, focusing on value rather than wealth, as a as a primary kind of driver.

Richard Medcalf
I think we've covered a lot of interesting ground, so I just wanna say thank you for a fascinating conversation and look forward to continuing the journey.

Wendy Strgar
Yeah. I really enjoyed it, and I'm really so honored, Richard, to be among the CEOs that you interview. So thanks so much for reaching out, and thanks so much for this opportunity. You know, I think you said it before, but, you know, when you have a capacity to do in life, you're obliged to to make things better. And so I am grateful every day for the opportunities I have to do that. Perfect. Thank you, and Goodbye. Thank you.

Richard Medcalf
Well, that's a wrap. If you received value from this conversation, please do leave us review on your favorite podcast platform. We deeply appreciate it. And if you'd like to check out the show notes from this episode, head to expodrant.com/podcast where you'll find all the details. Now, finally, when you're in top leadership, who supports and challenges you at a deep level to help you multiply your impact. Discover more about the different ways we can support you at xquadrant.com.