Learning, listening, and laughing with Randi-Mae Stanford-Leibold - Author, Mindfulness Facilitator, and Counselor.

Julian Ho Podcast

Randi-Mae is a Mindfulness and Self-Care Instructor, Counselor, Author, Workplace Wellness Consultant & motivational public speaker. Randi-Mae Stanford-Leibold is an author, mindfulness facilitator and a professional speaker. She focuses on wellness in the workplace, compassion, self-care and personal development.

Questions:
1. Why the head? Tell us about your background in mindfulness, meditation, neuroscience, and mental health.
2. What has your heart? Tell us about your passions, hobbies, lifestyle & leisure activities.
3. What do you have your hands in right now? Tell us about your current projects and initiatives.
4. What soothes your soul? Tell us about your routines, rituals, habits that keep you high functioning for your family, friends, clients.
5. How has your spirit kept on with COVID 19, Black Lives Matter, and all the uncertainty of 2020.

Podcast Highlights:
- Her attempted suicide aided brought her to Mindfulness practice.
- Her lost of a supervisor to suicide sparked work on grief in the workplace.
- Self-experience AND Self-education are keys to counseling, teaching, coaching, and being a leader
- Taichi practice became a go-to
- Accelerator program outfitted her with the tools/skills/business acumen to grow beyond her capabilities
- "​Entrepreneurship is a spiritual journey "​
- Your foundation is created by life building you up and breaking you down
- When you want to know if something is right, you have to feel it - ask yourself "did I get goosebumps yet?"
- "Goosebumps is life saying yes". Goosebumps is the antenna to our union with life and the universe, perhaps our cosmic intuition.
- Having a counsellor allows you the time and space to dedicate truly and purely to self reflection and change
- (As leaders) we have the tools, but we too need a sounding board and mirrors, it allows us to remember that we are humans that need support", "we lead but need to be led, we too need to be held."
- What this world needs is collective action to lift each other up, lift our collective consciousness, engage, check in, trusting and embracing in the now."
- When troubled on unsure, remind yourself of the long lineage and ancestry that has also gone through their fair share of trials and tribulations.

Resources:
Wellnest - Psychotherapy
UofT Race & Healing Program with Aina-Nia Ayo’dele Grant, Allison Hill, Yami Msosa, and Randi-Mae Stanford-Leibold
Mindwell U - Corporate Mindfulness, Meditation & Mental Health Training