The Ikonns

In today’s episode we chat with our long-time friend Naila Abbasova, a beautiful human being who goes after her dream life and wanders the world looking for meaningful life-transformative adventures. In this episode, we unpack Naila’s life journey and discover the reality of moving countries and secrets of staying joyful, optimistic and excited about life.

Naila Abbasova is a great example of being a “regular” person, working on a “regular” job, and then risking it all to move to London, find the dream job at Google, open a business and enjoy life to the maximum. Tune in now and join us in this very open, honest and vulnerable conversation.

Similar to Mimi, Naila was born and raised in Baku, Azerbaijan. At the age of 16, Naila and her family moved to Canada leaving everything behind. This huge step into the unknown future had a fundamental impact on her. As Naila arrived to Canada being a 16-year-old young girl brimming with confidence and inner power, she knew that this was her golden ticket to life.

“I have this obsession for standing out and being remembered. Nowadays, I want to be remembered for being happy, being the kindest person to anyone I have worked with, to be empathetic and make other people feel comfortable” – Naila

Being proactive and applying for multiple scholarships, Naila got the best university experience. Pursuing her obsession to be remembered for something big, she participated in different student organisations and travelled a lot around Europe. By that time, she became a real experiences catcher with innate desire to explore, to go out of the comfort zone and to bring joy to everything she does.

At the age of 25, Naila made a drastic decision to move to London. Stepping into what looked like a dream path after graduating from the university, Naila soon found everything that used to excite her becoming dull. After spending one week in Portugal surfing and doing yoga, Naila managed to find the peace of her body and mind. Looking at the calm waves of the ocean, she felt that she needed to move to Europe and escape the robotic lifestyle of Toronto. The next day she applied for her UK visa.

“When you move to a whole new different life, give yourself time to get adjusted to your new reality and let go the preconceptions of what you thought your life would be, and then start building something new without judging” – Naila

With survival mode kicked in to the highest, Naila moved to London, got the job at Selfridges and found a charming tiny flat few steps away from Regent’s Park. However, the reality of moving to a new country was tough, especially when it was her first experience of living alone. Dealing with loneliness, adjusting to the new realities and accepting the things she didn’t know, Naila realised that it was only her responsibility to program her life for the better.

Naila came to London with a genuine belief that everything would work out. And it did. Now, working at Google, designing her own clothing line and having endless meaningful experiences of observing the beauty of life and nature, Naila and her husband have finally found their comfort place in the city that never stops. Answering the question of how to stay excited and joyful about life, Naila advises to ask yourself whether you want to waste your precious time by being upset.

“On bad days I just have an “adult” conversation with myself and answer 2 very simple questions: Is it worth my attention? What is the worst that could happen at that point? And by going through the worst case scenarios I just move on from that. You need to understand that you have a choice whether to be happy or not, and eventually everything that happens is your choice and your responsibility only” – Naila

Here is what else we have talked about:

• Programming your mind for the better
• How to squeeze most of every experience
• Why childhood is a huge part of one’s personality and how it reflects on one’s adulthood
• How to get a scholarship
• How being honest, transparent and vulnerable during the job interview will help you get your dream job
• How to change the mindset of “I’m not going to get it” to “I will do my best and go for it”
• How to negotiate to get your dream apartment
• Why it is so important to be very precise with your desires
• How commuting to work can push you to change your life
• Reaching out for help during the most difficult times
• Being proactive in building meaningful and deep relationships
• Overcoming fear of being judged by people you love
• The power of networking

https://www.ikonns.com/podcast/episode48

As parents, seeing Alexa grow and develop so quickly, like others Alex and Mimi have seen the true magnitude of change. But to some people, change isn’t always welcomed so easily, some people fear change. Change can be a huge deal. This is the topic of today’s episode.

For the most part we don’t remember our early lives, but it’s in those moments seeing a baby grow into a child and develop a character and soul of their own, that you can truly appreciate how change is happening. Much faster than you could ever imagine.

“A lot of people leave comments on our videos, saying please don’t change... like that’s a bad thing” - Mimi Ikonn [4:00]

In meeting with an old friend Mimi asked ‘so what’s new’? She was shocked at the reply she was given ‘oh, nothing new’. Maybe for some of us we aren’t mindful that change is happening all the time, whether we perceive it or not, But things change, ALL THE TIME.

Change can be a good thing, but a lot of us naturally fear it. When we know change is coming it’s like being confronted with the flip of a coin. Will it land on the good side or the bad? So many chose to not flip the coin, avoid it as much as possible, staying right where they are. Safe and sound. In their comfort bubble.

“Paint a picture of where you’re going and know your journey, give yourself a roadmap to your goals” - Alex Ikonn [16:35]

Again it’s about reframing. Change could be giving yourself a chance at a new career and finding a new passion. Others might say ‘I got fired and lost my job’. Which in Alex’s case, is true, this actually happened. Proof of the importance of embracing change. He was so happy to be working in banking and would have probably stayed there forever had he not been fired. Lucky that wasn’t to be and life forced his hand and he got to choose a better life.

Understandably there are evolutionary reasons and our trible nature at play here, that we need to be aware of. Also the story we tell ourselves keeps us firmly rooted to the spot. Think about how many times you’ve said out loud ‘oh, i just don’t do that’ or ‘oh that is not me’? While often having never tried.

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate . Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us” - Marianne Williamson.

The process of transformation and trying something new is DIFFICULT, unfortunately it’s a challenge that a lot of people aren’t willing to work through by choice. After returning from their first trip to france, Mimi realised this. She set about completely renovating their home. Days and weeks of living in the mess reflected her own internal struggles at the time with mental health issues she was going through. renovating wasn’t going to be easily fixed in 1 day. Fortunately hard work and persistence paid off and the apartment looked as beautiful as she’d imagined. Eventually all the internal mentality hard work also paid off too. Remember not all change happens quickly and is usually a work in progress.

Here’s what we talk about today:

• From getting your heart broken to losing your job, there’s always a brighter side.
• Embrace change, use it to your advantage
• The only way to enjoy life is to not fear the change that is always happening
• Change at the speed of light, like Moores law, everything is getting quicker
• Be perceptive and mindful of what changes are happening around you
• People’s capacity to grow and adapt is one of life’s remarkable wonders
• Getting to the good is often through a VERY MESSY journey
• How to stop creating comfortable habits of staying the same
• Journalling, creating your goals and a road map to them
• Change leads to a better stronger you

Full show notes: https://www.ikonns.com/podcast/episode29

Lulu always had her life painted out for her, a product of tiger parents, she was going to be a Doctor. More specifically an optometrist. And failure wasn’t an option.

When a bad grade at school threw her a curveball, she swapped paths for pursuing a MBA instead. She worked as a business consultant for a brief moment and quickly realised this wasn’t her dream either.

After stumbling across Mimi’s Morning Routines video, Lulu was inspired.

Then she did what no one expected of her, she opted for a pay drop and applied to work with Alex and Mimi as a social media customer service assistant. This was a bold brave move!

Alex quickly saw potential in her and during a sit down meal, the principles and importance of prior preparation was proved. The spark in Lulu’s eyes was seen and she blew Alex and Mimi away with her ideas.

Lulu tells us how she had an ambitious 3 month goal of excelling beyond her role, from operational assistant to manager, then to CEO without real prior experience of what she was getting herself into. And how her starting job title only made her push harder.

She shares techniques about;

• Breaking the permission seeking role for an extreme ownership model.
• Obsessive book reading and how Jack Canfield’s Success Principles shaped her the most.
• Adding value is the main indicator of her success.
• Not playing the victim card.
• Always coming up with the solution by creating a motion of next steps.
• Being humble and not expecting that she deserves everything handed to her, allows her to grow.
• How having a curious mind and becoming an infinite learner keeps her in the game.

Her words of wisdom are beyond her age. We’ve loved chatting with her and learning how she’s developed processes that allowed Luxy to grow beyond our expectations, filling in the gaps we never knew that need filling. She’s an exceptional young woman.

Hope you enjoyed this week’s episode with Lulu, you can find out more about her and Luxy Hair here:

Luxyhair.com

Lululiang.com

LinkedIn

Instagram

Find the inspirational books Lulu mentioned here:

• Success Principles - How to Get from Where You Are to Where You Want to Be by Jack Canfield
• Scaling Up - How a Few Companies Make It...and Why the Rest Don't by Verne Harnish
• Traction - Get a Grip on Your Business by Gino Wickman

Also the tools she likes use that gets her ahead:

Trello.com - Trello’s boards, lists, and cards enable you to organize and prioritize your projects in a fun, flexible and rewarding way.

Slack.com - Slack is a collaboration hub, where the right people and the right information come together, helping everyone get work done.

Zoom.us - The next generation enterprise phone system