This is the Rose and Shine podcast featuring the Swedish sisters Josephine Rose and Victoria Rose Olsen They used to stop from New York which experiences from our international lives and careers Hi, good morning. This is Josephine from Woodstock and good afternoon. This is Victoria sending from Stockholm. How are you?
Yeah, I'm doing excellent had a lovely day yesterday with our yearly art exhibition tour Which was me arranging and that was so much fun, but how are you in Woodstock? I'm thinking like festival 60s Yeah, no, it's lovely. We went to this lovely little house It's like lovely autumn colors Which is what we were aiming for when we went here and then yesterday. Yeah, we went into Woodstock and yes It's super cute, but it is a cliché like it's all shops with like Tibetan Like music or like is it called tie dyed in English?
You know these t-shirts in these crazy colors that you have dipped in water yourself and yeah So I was a bit surprised like it's really yeah It's really a pilgrimage you can see that people are coming here to buy Jim Hendricks LPs and them Which you have of course I've done in mass. Of course, of course No, we weren't really part of buying those things, but it's very cute But yeah very much they're living on the Woodstock era Okay, good for you and I have some great news that I wanted to share with you and all the listeners And that's that we ended up in the new and noteworthy list on iTunes this week. Yay, our goal We really set this goal and it happens. Yeah, so we have lots of new listeners these episodes Yes, and the cool thing is that we've checked the statistics and we have listeners from 51 different countries all over the world Yeah, wow, that's awesome.
Yeah, especially since the entire idea really with rose and shine came from the idea that we should create this global community So thank you everyone for listening in now Just go on to our home page rose and shine calm and which is our oh oh s and shine calm Yeah, exactly and read more and press join us so that you get all the newsletters and pepsheets and everything We would love to get you more involved actually absolutely. So did you see all the different Countries we have listeners from I mean 51 different countries, but I'm all continents, right I know it's so cool. That's really good. We have the UK, Sweden, US, Dubai, Ireland, Spain, Holland Really but everywhere from that doesn't really represent all continents But we did have this enough But that's where it's tough countries.
Yeah, yeah, so thank you everyone But I noted one thing you know how you always talk about that you feel like you're really a Mexican and heart and I've been told I don't always say that I am You kind of do and bragging about all your Mexican friends and I see that we have one listener in Mexico Oh, I know Sophia Sophia Kipasa and this is that was mass. Yeah, okay, so I was telling Sophia We need to get more. I'm sure she's the she's the listener until then I'm just gonna believe that you've been faking that Which is actually a good thing because today's topic is really about fake it till you make it They get to make it. Yeah, that's um, it's exciting you came up with this topic and I was immediately Intrigued and excited and talking about this we can come back to that later, but you just thought that was a brilliant theme straightaway But okay, so fake it till you make it so what it really does It's suggesting that by imitating confidence or competence or an optimistic mindset You can actually realize those qualities in your own life.
Yeah, so you become it's like thinking or believing Yeah, and you know, even though they're saying fake it till you make it sound like a new saying It's coming from our stoatless ideas already that to be virtuous one must act as a virtuous person would act We have Freud and Adler in the 20s that really created this therapeutic technique that is called acting as if So it's not just a trendy thing to talk about it's been for a long time on the top of mindset really for a lot of people They have been faking it before. Yes So if we talk about act as if it's really a common prescription and psychotherapy And it's really like if you want to feel happier do what happy people do smile if you want to get more work done act is a productive person I think that's great. I thought that was pretty that was I read that and I was maybe feeling a little bit unproductive on Friday Yeah, and that's like that could be interesting. I'm not it's not really giving so much meat to that comments But but yeah, we could we could dig into that.
I think this one speaks for itself It's just if you want to have more friends behave like a friendly person. Yeah, that's interesting I would say be a friendly person rather than behave one really Yeah, but then it's not faking it, right? Yeah, yeah, I guess you have to like kind of yeah Now I'm gonna act like a friendly person would do like they would talk to people and say nice things Yeah, and then I would say and if you do that, you're like realizing wow this feels really good So I'm gonna become a more friendly person, right? Yeah, but I think that the entire Essences that you know too often many of us we hesitate to spring into action because we want to wait until everything feels just right Or that we think they were like hundred percent ready But research shows that actually changing your behavior first or really going for it before you're of that hundred percent Can really change the way you think and feel yeah, and I was reading it one of our ours nine I would say at least a gurus he has to move it.
I am not your guru tony robins He's an amazing character But he has a lot of interesting and good books one of them is awakening the giant within and I think it is in this book that he writes about That a lot of us are waiting to we don't feel confident before we feel competent Meaning so a lot of us are waiting to get that feeling of confidence until we know that we can do something difficult or until we know that we I don't know. I are really good at something but he is really saying you should change your mindset or he has changed his mindset So he's confident from the start like that is the mindset. He's a confident that he can learn he can he can make things happen So he's confident before he is competent. Yeah, doesn't necessarily mean you know that he will I assume you know lie and say that he can do things that he can't but he has a confidence It comes in with confidence and really think that he can do something because also maybe experiences telling him that he can learn something and then learn on the job I'm thinking back on my yoga example from two episodes ago and keep learning You know, I of course I didn't feel confident really but I kind of faked my confidence and I went in and ran that yoga class, right?
And it kind of made me a better future yoga teacher, right? Yeah, I mean now you don't even have to go to this yoga teacher training I'm so excited to really learn how it's gonna work to really become competent Okay, so share with me fake it till you make it. Do you have any ideas of what have you faked? Well, what immediately comes to mind for me when it talking about kind of faking it is languages You know how you you don't really know a language and I think it's so Yeah, see and I'm like yeah because I don't speak Spanish.
It sounds fabulous. But it's like me and French like we we Yeah, so two examples come to mind One is so funny when this is actually when I was a only like 15 And we were traveling and I had my best friends and we were so fortunate because we always got to join each other's family vacations, right? So I would go with this family on a lovely vacation to Italy and we were driving down all the way from Sweden To go there and this family they're all super blonde and you know me I'm all dark and they had been practicing and gone to like courses in Italian all spring to really prepare for our vacation And then in the car down they were kind of teaching me like the common phrases and everything. Mm-hmm now once we then get to Italy It's so interesting because wherever we went together and you know they would really try their Italian But people they would immediately turn to me looking more like an Italian So and I of course you know quickly kind of got in the mood of this Italian that I didn't really know yeah, you didn't like that at all So I was just like really it was so much fun and people were like yeah, yeah, you're from Italy and I I learned a couple of phrases You know like no no I don't speak Italian.
I'm from Sweden and they're like yeah And everything but anyway that skill of faking languages came in handy Then when I got my first proper job after China and I started to work for Hilton in Brussels And really Hilton the corporate language was English But once you were sort of in the hotel it was French that mattered Yeah, so and for me, I mean I had been work done I'd done a trineship in Paris. I did speak some French Well, I mean I spoke French but not great Yeah So I remember it being so nervous for my very first workshop that I was going to do and it was an introduction program to Hilton And it was going to be in French right? So I had been practicing and practicing in front of the mirror all days, you know before yeah So here I was and you know the first session that I held was it was going pretty well But then one of the participants she got some kind of an attack She started to hyperventilate, you know She kind of fell on the floor and was like a big drama and everyone was surrounding her And she got this brown paper bag to breathe in and I was of course like super People do that they're brown paper and I've seen that in reality No, no that was my first time that I and only time really but there was a brown paper bag And she was sort of breathing into it She's all kind of so I of course wanted you know as the facilitator I wanted her to feel like really super confident or you know Relaxed and everything so I went up to her and I was telling her what I thought I was telling her was Breathe slowly breathe, you know like relax and everything So I kept repeating this but I could see on her eyes You know obviously could you can talk but she looked at me with kind of her panic kind of increased when she was looking at me And then I'm starting to listen to myself and I'm realizing that I'm not saying breathe calmly But what I'm saying is sweat calmly Keep on sweating so ugly And you know so there I got for faking it and you know and just when I'm like okay No, what am I really and then I sort of like slowly backed off from and thought that maybe someone else was better fitted to take care of her So not really making it but certainly making it. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah, that's it. That's it So but still I think really what I also started out my classes then for the first year whenever I had a class was really to Explain to the participants how little the words that you use really mean But actually it's your body language and tone and voice and everything that makes a difference So that was my little startup speech whenever I lived in France delivering Okay, that's a good icebreaker. Yeah.
Yeah, so But talking about language I mean we have lots of research and also within franking Covey on proactive language How important it is and it's been I mean Stephen Covey wrote about proactive language already in the 80s in the seven habits So highly effective people book but you know and a lot of people are what kind is this some kind of positivity course or what does this really mean? But actually now there's brain studies showing that you can really trick your brain into by using a proactive language by feeling more proactive, right? That's very interesting. So fake it and make it again maybe coming back to the Tony Robbins example I think a lot of it relates to confidence and coming into something with confidence And I think that sometimes being that confident and assertive person and people might disagree with me here But it's a little bit related to some male characteristic leadership skills like being that kind of assertive You know and I spoke to my husband about yesterday And I there were certainly some disagreement in the car from some of the men saying you know You're generalizing and so on But you know that's also interesting But one of the things that maybe we do as maybe as younger women and so on is that we come into situation and we appear really kind of smiley and friendly and I could sometimes probably take that approach like more being the kind of I'm here learning and being helpful being happy and being friendly Which is quite different from coming in and you know showing I'm in charge or I'm very assertive and I'm super confident So we were talking about this ones I think I was giving the example to you that someone was really surprised that I had a kid You know which made me like oh god They must think that I'm so young because obviously my age is not that surprising to have a child and not you know 21 Um No, and you were saying you actually referring back to I kind of a feedback that you got once as a younger person right which was around that kind of you think that you've done super well You've been holding I'm not gonna talk about you, but I was one I thought you know they've done really well They've been maybe holding being in a leadership position holding a training and being very smiley or so on But maybe the feedback was that it didn't really the seam as assertive or as leadership characteristic as um Yeah, maybe you can explain it the feedback that you received because I've yeah it's hard to tell your story So what I do remember was that this was um, I was running a workshop for lots of leaders And I got so many applause afterwards and everyone was really enthusiastic And then the most senior leader came up to me afterwards and said you try this was really great And you were great on stage, but however, you're so enthusiastic and smiley and it appears a little bit naive Right he wasn't going in the male or female approach But really saying like but really try to be a little bit more serious and and try not to put all your enthusiasm out there Which was really sort of an eye-opener to me because first I was well People loved it.
They gave me 10 out of 10 on the presentation Yeah, but I did actually eventually get what he meant because people didn't really you know It communicated great enthusiasm, but maybe not senior leaderships But then going back to what you just said and talking to the guys in the car on your way up to Woodstock Is that female and male? Is that different behaviors, right? Yeah, no exactly and it's hard to say and I think that Yeah, I mean because one of the questions would be I mean, maybe the smiley friendly Maybe we need to change the way that we think about that that you know a great leader can be smiley and and friendly You know, maybe that is highlighting characteristics that also could be good leadership characteristics rather than you know trying to kind of Yeah swallow those or make those less apparent in order to be more assertive or more controlled or more Definitely and I really think that this is an interesting take on it because sometimes in female networks, etc You get the training on how to become more assertive how to talk louder even how to talk with a deeper voice and all of those different things To be taken seriously, but maybe it's time to say hey You can be this bubbly spontaneous person and that should also be taken seriously And I think of a story I wasn't present but our mother told us about this and you were just receiving this scholarship From a big Swedish association and it was in the house in the concert hall where you normally give out the Nobel Prize, right? Yeah, so it was a huge audience and other people receiving different scholarships And the person presenting was reading out the motivation of the next scholarship receiver Which was you and you know, they were saying how you'd been in South Sudan and Afghanistan and sharing all these things And then you came up on stage with your beautiful gorgeous barbie hair and pretty little dress and everything.
Yeah, well, I mean lovely Mom was just so she said it was so interesting because she could hear she was in the middle of the audience And no one of course knew that this was her daughter walking up on stage However one went like what is that girl? Is she the one who did all of that? Of course immediately, you know, it was such a shock for them that you didn't really fit into their picture of what it should be like Yeah, or what you should look like, right? Yeah, no, I think that's really true and I think that's why you need women Maybe not in my case specifically here, but that's why you need women and female role models Yeah, and that's why you need female role models and women that are breaking, you know Not going the ordinary routes, but also in different type of industries They're not typically female because you need to see that these bubbly happy young Women can fit into taking on these extraordinary roles and jobs.
Yeah, basically. I agree I agree. We should keep our female leadership style and bring that more into the table But I do think there is something we can learn or lots of women I mean, let's not generalize and say everyone but lots of women can learn and this is research shows that men in general They are more confident about their ability to do things and they don't feel that they have to be 100 certain on What they know before they go out and say hey, I can talk about this. Yeah, right?
Exactly. Yeah, no There's the interesting Forbes article that came out quite a while ago I think that and it's about job applicants and it says that I'm quoting it here But men are confident about their ability at 60 percent But women don't feel confident until they check out each item of the list So before they have a hundred percent of the qualifications necessary for a job Women won't apply and men do it at 60 percent Yeah, and I think that's really really telling and I think that is where you know We could still have more confidence before being competent Yeah, and I think we should be um, we should learn from men in that way because otherwise we're just not going to be able to compete That's true. Yeah, and I think I've learned quite a lot from my husband there We're joking as well before this conversation because it's like where's where's it faking and where's it just like Completely pushing the truth But there's several times when together earlier on in our career where we have applied for Certain grants or certain projects and so on where you had to have all of these like professors on board in order to To apply but we couldn't really get the professors on board if we hadn't really received the grants It was kind of a chicken and egg type conversations And I think that earlier in my career, I don't know how would I come up on now if I was acting on it on my own But I think that he really pushed us into he was really brave and confident We can make it like if we get the Grounds we're going to get these professors and we did right? Yeah, but we didn't necessarily have people on board while we were applying for it So yeah It's basically really kind of pushing ahead anyways and believing that you can do it And then it's still it's not faking it in the sense that you don't have to put in the work I mean you have to put in all of the work and even more to make it happen But that's a great point.
Yeah, but there's confidence that it can so really yeah So what we're saying really and what you're saying here is that it's a way to self-motivate yourself to drive further And I think that's the key. It's it's a self-pep really, you know, okay, I can do this I can be on the stage or I can achieve this and not sit them wait until I can do anything perfect But let's go for it because there's seem to it's very often that we think that there will be other people knowing how to do this perfectly Well, but they don't they go out and they try it out and they learn and they get better, right? Yeah, I think there's an idea maybe I had like there's an idea that they're grown-ups out there They know how to deal with the problems in the world. They're not like we are the grown-ups.
Yeah, that's so scary But I agree I remember when I started working and I was looking at all these actually in that team It was mostly men in the leadership team. I'm like, wow, is this it? Is this how adult you get, you know? Is this from the lacan?
Yeah, but really all right So really the intention is that it's not that you should try to be someone that you're not but it's really Challenging yourself to say well, I'm almost there and I know much more than I think I can So let's just go out and make it happen and let's pep myself into this mood or into this learning or whatever it is Because then you really start to make a difference. Absolutely. So really what we wanted to share then that's faking it till you make it It's not about faking it. It's about being actually courageous It's about you know doing those things maybe pushing yourself out of your comfort zone.
Definitely. Yeah, we don't want to be You know from catch me if you can the movie which is based on the true story. What's his name? Josephine?
Frank Abingne Yeah, so he's obviously having this amazing life But I guess he's putting people at risk really by flying airplanes and being part of the surgery So we discussed this again yesterday, like yeah, no, he's so cool You know you can do everything and then we said yeah as long as you know you don't put yourself in a place where you actually like Rissing people like he was a surgeon and like airplane pilot. Yeah, so I guess the essence of this episode is not to become like him, right? That's not what you could be a little bit inspired. Yeah, you know, you can make anything happen if you um But then of course and I think isn't that one of the lessons in that movie as well though that he actually did take the bar exam Yeah, he did and you know you do have to put in some work as well.
It's not complete. Yeah, fake everything I mean if you think about the amount of work he put in to all the different things that he created You know he could have become a pilot usually or a surgeon etc But what I mean and what we're trying to say is okay Don't go into meeting and fake it or trying to be someone else But don't stop yourself go for it be who you are but work hard and and share those qualities Don't hold back really and on a shitty day You can go in front of your mirror and smile at yourself for like five minutes And studies show that that that is actually gonna send signals that you are gonna make yourself a lot happier Yeah, but it's true and it sounds so superficial, but it's definitely true And the same way is that the language that you use really makes other people Also feel happier around you and you know, you don't need to know all the answers It's also quite respectful to say hey, I don't know But what I do know is this and this and this and share that right And there's a lot of like dress for success and everything and I believe our dad always sort of taught us You know dress like it's much better to be the person overdressed and underdressed at a party or when traveling etc So yeah, for sure, you can show people around you where you want to be by the signals that you send out, right? Absolutely Now I think that's great and I think what we should do is we'll put we have so many good articles on this topic So we'll put them in relationship when we when we post them this episode on our website Yes, and then you can go and look into it and read a bit more if you like Yeah, so all of that all the articles and extra ideas and everything will always be in our newsletter Which you get automatically when you sign up to join our community on rooseandshine.com Yeah, exactly Also there you can download the pep sheets So the pep sheet is our idea of really once you've listened to an episode and you have perhaps a good laugh and then some nice thoughts and things that you think Hey, I would want to do this The pep sheets are there for some individual reflection that you can go back and ask yourself these questions and think where can you get a little bit more Courage and go and fake it and be a bit braver than you normally would right? Yeah, exactly They're all about kind of making this a bit more related to you So you can really draw the lessons and see where you are going to fake it.
Yeah, exactly So let us know what you think about this episode And don't fake it and also by the way, I forgot to say also join our challenge for this October month that is still going on Yeah, so we're giving a boost this month And it's all about boosting each other and boosting the the people that we work with and that we think are fantastic But that we might not always be telling to them that they are so we on an Instagram We are and we are boosting amazing people around us and we would love if you guys also did the same boosted people And then use the hashtag give a boost and tag that's rooseandshine. Yeah, so Until next week have a great week everyone go out and fake it till you make it and thank you for listening Thank you for listening. Bye. Bye