In that moment she made the decision to go on the date just to see what it was like to be with someone who didn’t like Her. The guy was hang down miserable the whole time.

“I felt not wanted, invisible, humiliated, hurt,” says Myers. Then she looked at him and saw something surprising. He was really hurting. Myers’
inner strength surfaced and she said do herself, ‘I can handle this.” A few hours later she asked him if he wanted to take her home.

“Yeah.”

This event catalyzed a key world view for Myers and became the early seeds for her work with women and leadership. “I knew I had to love and accept myself and continue connecting to who I am as a person and to connect to purpose.”

When she got home Myers took out some paper and made a line down middle. On one side she listed what was good about herself. On the other side she listed what was bad. On the “good” side she wrote. “I’ve got smarts. I’m not pregnant. I’m not sexually active. I do my chores. I follow rules. I go to school. I’m a nice person.”

On the “bad” side she wrote…well, nothing. “I had a really hard time finding something wrong from the inside out. I don’t like to dust and mom wants me to dust. That was a pivotal moment for me then. Writing became a powerful tool for self reflection.”

Today Myers keeps the essence of what’s on her list in mind. She stays focused on bringing out who she is no matter what she looks like on the outside. Even when she glances down at her sagging stomach, which she calls her “kangaroo pouch”, the aftermath of having quadruplets. She stops herself and says, “No. I make an offer in the world. I make a difference.”

Another practice she began after breaking her back kick boxing was to imagine a tea candle inside herself right below belly button. She took pain killers, as the pain was extreme, so she could continue to work as she was on the speaking circuit. Some days on stage the flame was tall and strong. But on other days it so small a light wind could kick it out.

At those times she would say to herself, “No DeeDee. How can you feed the flame?” She kept visualizing what she wanted with her kids. Myers says that we can locate virtues inside our bodies. For example, she houses courage in her diaphragm. That’s where she goes to find the energy to do a handstand in Yoga. Continuing to find the places where we house strengths can be self generative. By locating those parts we continually connect to what’s good in us.

This is not just an occasional practice. Myers practices being in the mind-set that her body is fulfilling on what it’s made for. “I go home everyday and ask myself, ‘Was this a day well lived?” She also envisions a happy future that helps drive the present. She’ll be 68 when her quadruplets graduate from high school. What’s important to her is to be able to run, laugh and enjoy her children and that she can also live fully in her body and be alive, alert, healthy, happy.

Deedee Myers is an executive leadership coach who supports sustainable changes for individuals, teams and organizations. She is a motivational speaker and author, teacher and coach on leadership practices, effective coordination in teams and living a life of Purpose and balance. As a former triathlete and ultramarathoner Deedee is well schooled in pacing as CEO of the Advancing Leadership Institute, and mother of 9 including twins and quadruplets.

Bookmark It

DeeDee Myers

“That was a big of a grab for me,” says Myers. “My reaction was to get really small and invisible. But part of me was curious. My mother asked me to wear lipstick and light make up. She took me aside and said, ‘This is not fair but people will judge you by what you wear and how you look. Never get fat. Always be healthy looking. Take care of your hair.’”

Her mother was a prestigious banker’s wife who entertained frequently. Although she had twelve children she didn’t look like a “drudge housewife”. The house was always neat and tidy. Her hair was done, her clothes were clean, ironed, and pressed. She had a motto: Always be dressed for company.

This is a script that has played in Myers’ head since the day her mother first schooled her on how she needed to present herself to the world. But today Myers has a different take on it. “It’s the same script,” she says , “I just have a new story. Now I see it as an invitation to always be ready, to extend for what you want, for what’s needed. It’s a lesson to be ready for anything.” That anything can mean stares at the yoga studio and strangers boldly asking, “How are you going to do downward facing dog?”

So Myers shows them and asks if they have suggestions. “At first I didn’t know whether I should try to explain or just demonstrate. I allow people to breathe around their own stories.” When her yoga class recently undertook handstands, Myers had some moments of confrontation with herself. She got jealous and “pissy” that others could do handstands while she couldn’t.

The internal dialog she was running said that this was just too hard. She wanted give up…and cry. Then she said to herself, “You’re 55 years old, how can you say this is the hardest things you’ve ever done when you’ve delivered quads?”

The other thing that happened inside her head is that Myers coached herself. As CEO of DDJ Myers, Ltd. and co-founder of the Advancing Leadership Institute, she’s in the business of giving others advice about how to move through difficulties. So she asked herself what advice she might give herself from a coaching perspective. She said she would try it a few ways and then would ask for help. So that’s what she did.

The next day she told the instructor, “I’m going to do a handstand today.” She spoke it like a declaration.

Startled, he first said “Good,” then asked, “A one handed handstand?”

“No. A two handed handstand one-handed.” Now she calls extreme challenges her “Handstand Moments” and she still has plenty of them.

Like the day she she found a little lump on the tip of her nose. She put off going to the doctor. When she finally had an exam the doctors said it was cancer and scheduled her for surgery. She had a young intern and his team working with her and they initially said they wouldn’t need to cut to the bone, that it was minor. But that assessment turned out to be inaccurate and she had to return to surgery to have her nose cut to the bone.

“At first I didn’t want to look,” she said after the surgery. “I had a hole in my nose.” But every day she told herself to look, and to find the lesson, to love who you are. She started by taking off the bandaid for a moment. Then for a couple minutes. Then twice a day. Each time she looked she said that she “kept locating who I am and loving who I am. We have to locate who we are on the inside, to find what’s good in us.”

Deedee Myers is an executive leadership coach who supports sustainable changes for individuals, teams and organizations. She is a motivational speaker and author, teacher and coach on leadership practices, effective coordination in teams and living a life of Purpose and balance. As a former triathlete and ultramarathoner Deedee is well schooled in pacing as CEO of the Advancing Leadership Institute, and mother of 9 including twins and quadruplets.

Bookmark It

Photo by Aleksandra P., Poland

I’m not.

Last week I performed an experiment. I took off my clothes at my friends house in front of her and her 15 year old daughter.

Why? Because I want to feel completely unencumbered by my body.  I asked permission, of course. And wore good underwear. My friend, being a good sport, said, “Sure, in the kitchen while I cook up the meat.” So we poured ourselves a glass of good red wine, seared some flesh, and heated up the room.

I remember reading about a man in a Tantric workshop who was crippled, yet, when he took off his clothes in front of the group with no artifice everyone saw him as luminous and beautiful. This is what I had in mind for me, in the kitchen. No strip tease, no attitude, no artifice. I wanted to be relaxed and easy, like I am at home in front of my partner, Will, in bright daylight.

At first my friend and her daughter didn’t really look. Then they glanced in my direction once in a while. Then finally they drank me in bit by bit. No one said anything about a particular part. No one threw up. I had wanted to walk around, but I found myself rooted behind the table and chairs. That’s as comfortable as I could get.

But I did it.

The next morning I told my sweetie, Will, what I had done and his reaction was not what I’d hoped for. “You don’t just go to other people’s houses and strip off all your clothes.” He was furious. I was deeply disappointed. He wouldn’t speak to me. I let him be while he thought things out.

That night, before bedtime, we talked. Will said he felt it was a breach of our intimacy and that I had shared something that was meant just for us. For me it was a daring investigation into how I see and live with my body; a personal test.

“What’s next?” Will said. “Nude hot-tubbing with the guys just to see if you can do it? Lady Godiva-ing around your Aikido Dojo?” I can understand his point of view. And by the end of our talk I think he understood mine. I don’t feel the need to escalate. It was a mini milestone for me. For the moment I feel complete.

Bookmark It