Welcome to the #piratebroadcast: 

Connect with Virginia Czarnocki on Linkedin:

linkedin.com/in/virginia-czarnocki

Connect with russ Johns on Linkedin:

linkedin.com/in/nextstepnext

For more information visit his websites:

russjohns.com

thepiratesyndicate.com

nextstepnext.com

Russ Johns  0:01  

Welcome to the #piratebroadcast, where we interview #interestingpeople doing #interestingthings where you can expand your connections, your community, #kindnessiscool and #smilesarefree. Let's get this party started. 

It's another beautiful day, wherever you are. I was thinking about this and thinking about the idea of  if you have nothing else you can control you can always control your attitude. You always have a great attitude. Virginia, how are you today?

Virginia Czarnocki  0:39  

I'm Pharaoh. Thank you. I couldn't agree with that statement anymore. Absolutely. You can show your attitude.

Russ Johns  0:46  

Yeah. Thank you so much for being on the #piratebroadcast and becoming a pirate. I just really I'm excited we've been connected through the the social media concierge group and and putting together Good stuff. I have been incredibly challenged with some of my time. I haven't been able to spend as much time in it as I would like to have spent. However, I just really appreciate all the things that you do, the talents you have, and the things the conversations you bring to the table. One of the things that I wanted to talk about and share with people is a little bit of your backstory, you live on the Cayman Islands, and you've dealt with online activity, some online business, and then you're in health and fitness as well. So 

Virginia Czarnocki  1:42  

Yeah,

Russ Johns  1:43  

Then you're an attorney on top of that, so it's quite a diverse. When you say it out loud, it's kind of diverse and it's like, Okay, how does that all tie together? Tell us, weave us the thread that brought that all together, Virginia.

Virginia Czarnocki  2:00  

Okay, so good today in a bad rate. The exercise thing is the I laugh because I go into exercise a couple of like into coaching people a few years ago. Whenever I started out I always used to think maybe I shouldn't do this, maybe I shouldn't do this. I'm not skilled enough. I went to university I spent X number of years there training. Then I did a traineeship. Then it dawned on me that fitness has actually been a massive part of my life for most of my life. In fact, I was about 15 whenever I first went to the gym, so exercise has always been a major passion of mine. Plus, as a teenager, I suffered from depression and suicidal tendencies. There you go. I've got it out in the open and I discovered that That being fit and healthy, keeps me on the straight and narrow. It became a real big part of my life. I've always loved to cook. I've always loved to take, like traditional things that people eat and put healthy spin on them, and just go to the gym and train. 

Russ Johns  3:20  

Yeah, 

Virginia Czarnocki  3:21  

Law is what I did. I came from a working class Scottish family. Nobody had been to university before, up pops this smart little kids and this smart little kid gets to the UK to do real in skill and become a lawyer. I became a lawyer. I can't say that I did badly. I definitely didn't do badly as a lawyer, but I needed to partner when I was relatively young. In fact, I got promoted to partner when I was pregnant. So that was kind of I'm here.

Russ Johns  3:52  

That's pretty impressive.

Virginia Czarnocki  3:54  

It just didn't float my boat. It didn't float my boat, no matter what When I go to no matter why achieved how much money I made, the position I got into, it just didn't float my boat. After 20 odd years I left and I sat about not quite sure what to do. I knew I wanted to do something else and I knew there was something else for me.

Russ Johns  4:20  

You just walked away one day and just decided that. I'm just I'm done with this.

Virginia Czarnocki  4:24  

I did. I did. It was so funny because they wanted to have a leaving party for me. Whenever I was going, and I had said some general, I'll come back for the leaving party because I didn't really know how I feel. I had nothing to go to. I had nothing set up. I just knew that I needed to go and explore my life. I put this sign on the door saying Elvis has left the room. I just left so I just left I said to everyone, yeah come back for this leaving party and I remember just walk it out, and a walk down the stairs and I had a fob to get back into the into the building again. I stood at the elevated at the bottom. I'd gone down the stairs and the elevator was next to the stairs and I took the key fob, which is really naughty. I'm sorry Maples, it was me I did it. I took the key fob and I dropped it down big gap between the floor and the elevator because it was like, This is Nordic Tom, absolutely not a ton because I tried to leave before. I tried to leave law before whenever I left in Scotland and move to Cayman, but I ended up back in it. But I remember shutting the door to the office and getting out to the carpet and thinking to myself, I'm free. I'm free to do whatever I want to do. The journey since then has been a major journey of self discovery. I'd like to tell people that it's a smooth road that you'll walk out. You'll all of a sudden start doing this thing. That's your dream and your passion. But you went, you're gonna come out and it's going to be a real roller coaster of ups and downs and being on 

Russ Johns  4:51  

The road to discovery is not necessarily smooth and paved, is it?

Virginia Czarnocki  6:18  

Uh, no!

Russ Johns  6:19  

You called me out once, a little while ago and I loved it. I've been really reflecting on it. I can hear your kind of almost the parallel story and what's your WHY? It sounds like the attorney thing was something that had to be done. It didn't fulfill your why and there was still something left that you needed to journey through in order to get to your why and 

Virginia Czarnocki  6:48  

Yeah. 

Russ Johns  6:50  

I could see how that could come together very easily.

Virginia Czarnocki  6:54  

Yeah, well, a very big part of my WHY is my mom. I look back at my mom who was quite a troubled woman who ended up committing suicide when she was in early 40s. I had quite a troubled relationship with my mom. It wasn't it wasn't an easy relationship at all. I was very much used to been a lot of her frustrations. I always remember whenever she died, she was 44. I remember looking at her thinking, I will never be you. I will never be that unfulfilled, dissatisfied individual who let society dictate to them. I'll never be that person who doesn't stay post, say to the books, and who doesn't explore things and live my life and mean none of us know how long we're here for. I believe that we've all got a shelf life and none of know what our shelf life is and for me, the worst thing would be To die without having, given everything that I want to try a good shot, whether I fail, whether I succeed, it doesn't matter. It's just trying 

Russ Johns  8:12  

It  is trying. Every day is a gift. I mean for me, every day is a gift and I'm not sure if I shared this but two years ago my son committed suicide as well. It's just like one of these things that you look and you think, how could? I've been in some very dark places myself and growing up and for now, it's like, I wake up excited and with gratitude, and I hate to go to bed because it's like, have I done enough? Have I put in enough today Am I doing, am I pushing forward because I have some ambitions and goals and, I have a place to go and I have people that love me and people care. I know that it's really as you're going down this path, sometimes the ending or where you're going isn't crystal clear. However, if as long as you have something that you enjoy, and you can focus your time on, I think that's a productive way of living. I think it's finding joy in your day is useful. Always.

Virginia Czarnocki  9:24  

Yeah, I think that's massive. I mean, I think you hit the nail on the head, the is that with any of this stuff, don't have a picture of what it's going to look like and your maidens. I think a lot of people whenever they're going like for example when you're going out to eat and you're deciding to embark on a leaf of entrepreneurship, if you go out there saying to yourself it's a million dollars, then you could be seriously disappointed. You may also find out along the way, that it's not the money that's driving you to, but you've set yourself this goal of x amount of money and you're not getting the A you become frustrated. Always have that there is a bigger picture. Always have your big picture, your big goal. At the same time, break it down into all the small things that you want to achieve, and focus on all of the small things. The more of the small things that you take off, the bigger the sense of accomplishment. I think the closer you get to really, ultimately want to be.

Russ Johns  10:26  

Well, I think too, it's much like you're exercising you have to put in the daily practice, you have to put in the daily motion in order. It's the tiny habits and the action that you take every day that allows you to get to your big idea. Even if you don't get to the big idea, it becomes a hell of a journey, regardless, right? Like, at least you put in the time and effort and energy to say I did a thing. I did this you'll walk us through one of the transitions that you had after you left. You dropped the key fob down the elevator shaft.

Virginia Czarnocki  11:12  

Have I failed.

Russ Johns  11:13  

Yeah, well, I mean, I failed more than I, you know, I want to. Yeah. I haven't failed because it all my lessons have accumulated to who I am today and I like who I am today. It's some of them were very challenging. I've been homeless, I've been in bad situations. I've been in places where I wouldn't normally want to be. It takes a lot of reflection and self awareness in order to decide, okay, because we every day we have a choice. We wake up. 

Virginia Czarnocki  11:54  

Yeah, yeah.

Russ Johns  11:57  

Unless you play the victim. card you have it ultimately, if you take responsibility for yourself, that's what that's what you can you know, you can't blame anyone. That's the downside of taking responsibility is you have no one else to blame but yourself,

Virginia Czarnocki  12:16  

oh no, you've got this complete 100% ownership you have to take or you have to take ownership because there isn't anybody else to blame for the situation that you're in. Yeah, I'll tell you when you can see how much of an imperfect story is, and how I'm still very much on a journey of working out whether I'm born in that age addiction. I'm quite content if that. I mean I'm still quite content. It's been an interesting journey. Whenever I left and I tried to work out what I wanted to do, I was completely lost because I've lost this sense of checking in everyday, of having all of these clients coming to me I had a massive practice as a lawyer, and I'd given it all away. Getting used to not checking in with my Blackberry everyday was really interesting. I had no idea what I was going to do. I was having conversations with people about setting up snack, snack box delivery company. I think it would have been a really good idea. What ended up happening is that I ended up thinking I couldn't do it by myself. I started having conversations with other people. Before I knew it, we were like 12 months down the lane. We were having all these conversations and legal documents, and I just got really bored with it. It was getting to a situation where I was getting so depressed by all that I would come drop the kids off at school and I would lay on the couch and snooze. I felt really bad about it because I just wasn't doing anything. I had a good 18 moths to two years of doing absolutely nothing and not knowing where I was going. 

Russ Johns  14:09  

Do you think it was a way of just taking a mental break a kind of a shift in your transition. I mean, everybody kind of has, especially if you lose your job. I've been ejected from a couple of corporate towers. Often, companies that don't I tell people, I've spent 25 years in companies that no longer exist. You've invested that time and there's like this, it's almost a mourning, it's grieving about the fact it's a vacuum that you're living in at that point in time. 

Virginia Czarnocki  14:52  

Abviously favorite day in a vacuum, I had absolutely no direction I had spent like 20 or years before Directed going into an office turning up and doing something? Yeah, it was it was tough. Then we had a bit of a catastrophe at home. We lost quite a lot of money whenever the bank went down the tubes. We were kind of in a bit of a dire situation. I had to work and bring income in and I had to work and bring income in really quickly. I turned to the one thing that I was good at. It took me a while of thinking, Okay, how can I make money and how can I make money quickly? Hmm. Well, you're very fit, Virginia. And I spent time in the, in the Territorial Army, the British Territorial Army when I was part of the treatment team. I was used to train people. I've that Yeah, I'm pretty good at getting results and getting people what they want to do. That was what I did. I started doing fitness classes and then I started shooting healthy recipes. Then it got really good and I got really successful and then I decided to sabotage it. As you do, I decided to sabotage it all and I ended up opening up a gym. I went in again with other people. I was doing perfectly well by myself. 

Russ Johns  16:24  

Yeah. 

Virginia Czarnocki  16:26  

Then thinking, gosh, maybe I need somebody else. I went in with other people and I had shut the gym so I closed the gym down because it ended up becoming too much. Then I did the same then I went back into that same little hole of what am I going to do know? Where am I going to go next?

Russ Johns  16:46  

You went to your cocoon.

Virginia Czarnocki  16:48  

I did. Then I joined London real because I needed to learn how to how to work technology. I ended up with I went to London real Joined one of thier courses, decided not to follow the curriculum No, I say not follow the curriculum. I ended up being one of the one of the most successful students and also bad. I became one of the most successful students that they had on the business accelerator course. I worked with him for a while is one of his lead instructors, and one of the senior instructors on his courses. That was all gone really well. Then I realized, you know, I'm living somebody else's dream here and not, my own dream. I left that I set up a Business Academy with a friend of Maine. That went really well to until I realized that I didn't really want to be at either. That wasn't where I wanted to be. We still continue to coach students that we had. I made the decision not to take any more of the students on and I'm right back to fitness again I'm right I'm still coaching fitness and it's the one thing that really floats my boat. 

Russ Johns  18:11  

Yeah. 

Virginia Czarnocki  18:13  

To be honest Russ I think I had a bit of an issue about it because I thought I was too good to be a fitness instructor because I've go on about it two degrees in a postgraduate diploma an apartment in a law firm.

Russ Johns  18:24  

You worked to hard to not be a fitness instructor, huh,

Virginia Czarnocki  18:28  

Exactly. But it's the one thing that I keep coming back to

Russ Johns  18:33  

It brings you joy.

Virginia Czarnocki  18:35  

I love it. I actually love it.

Russ Johns  18:38  

You love it. You're good at it. There's a there's a Japanese saying Iki guy?

Virginia Czarnocki  18:46  

Yes, yes.

Russ Johns  18:48  

It's your geeky guy. It's something that you are really into and available to you in People will pay you for it and people want it.

Virginia Czarnocki  19:02  

Yeah, well, it's a lot more than fitness because what I actually do is I help professional women, so middle aged professional women who are just a bit stuck, who I found that women tend to be full of energy and full of ambitions whenever they're younger. Then they go into a job. And it's difficult for corporate women, it's difficult in the corporate environment. I know whenever I was a part of that I was one of very few women in a hugely male dominated for men. It was a big fan too. At the time, I was the youngest. I had two children. The couple of other partners that we had, but older women who were married. There was one other one who was roughly my age but had no children. It was difficult mean and I worked in construction and projects and finance. It was always what works. My life became the children and being in the office. I kinda lost a little bit of a sense of me and my own purpose in my own way and my own visions. That's what so that's basically what I do I combine the fitness because what I found is that if you can teach people, and you can get them back a sense of physical strength, then with that physical strength, and that sense of well being, you can then begin to impact the mental health is male. I don't mean that from a psychological sense. I mean, you can take these women who've perhaps just closed themselves off to the dreams and their wishes and everything else and been so focused on family and job that they forget themselves. 

Russ Johns  20:54  

Yeah.

Virginia Czarnocki  20:54  

That's what I do. It's like reinvigorating so many of these professional women. Where are you? Stuck in a job in a great job, but you're maybe not being paid to the amount of money that you want to be paid because you've lost your confidence, or you're not as high up the ladder as you want to be because you've lost your confidence again. That's what I do. It's a lot more than just the fitness. But fitness is such a crucial part of it. It's always been such a crucial part of my own life. 

Russ Johns  21:25  

It's part of I think mental durability is a good way of describing it because if you're healthy and you're, you're happy and you're focused and you realize some of the things that you may not have that fitness gives you the confidence to really move forward it's like, Okay, I have the stamina to do that thing that I need to do in order to move it forward. I love that fascinating and I just really enjoy That story because it just excites me because anyone, it's available to anyone that's willing to go the extra mile. It's the willingness to actually take responsibility for your actions and do something. It's not easy. It's often very challenging on a regular basis to do something that is, beyond what you feel is your capability. With a coach, or someone that's at least a guide to push you in a direction and saying, you can do this, you here, here's how you're going to do this. Here's the roadmap. Here's what you're going to do. Now are you looking at the opportunity to turn you're now in this pandemic situation turning your passion in coaching to an online space? Where you can coach anyone anywhere and expand this because of the limitations of to speed?

Virginia Czarnocki  23:10  

Well, as long as you've been doing that I've already been yet I've already been doing that I made this watch that I closed the gym, don't I made the decision that was going to carry on do not on an online basis. I have already been doing that. It's working fine. It's interesting because I record my own workouts and I share my own workouts. There's we all have a lot of challenges. I'm mean, I'm a 50 year old woman and a 50 year old women going out into the fitness space when you're up against like 20 25 year old girls. Then you're thinking do I do this? Do I put this out there? Do I start to sell this and then I think to myself, well, why not? Because it took to five, I couldn't take most of your butts, are you going to be able to kick my butt at 50?

Russ Johns  24:06  

I think the wisdom that you bring along with that is is paramount in what you're promoting because you're building confidence in individuals as much as anything, right. You're just doing it through a vehicle of exercise and fitness. Health. That's a healthy way of building confidence is is a great way I just applaud you for it and I don't thank you. I watch you and I just think. I need to go ride my bike some more. You inspire me, I just like it. I just wanted to give a shout out to a couple people here Angie's here in the room. He's saying good morning, everyone. Pirates. Gabriel. Gabriel's an avid supporter. He's doing some online stuff he's actually doing a show. Every night at 7pm or Yeah, 7pm Central time. He's always on here. He just said, Wow, what a wonderful story I love. I love this.

Virginia Czarnocki  25:13  

Thank you. Appreciate that.

Russ Johns  25:15  

Then Randy over from Toronto. Hey, morning, Randy. hope you're well. I'll catch up with you later today. In Virginia, I know that I mean, this is really a powerful message to a lot of people that have an opportunity to to listen in and hear this and, I'll be sharing this out over and over again. However, I think there's some things that are really important for people to understand is a couple of threads is you do have an opportunity to change what you're doing even though you feel like you're stuck. You're not like Jim Rohn used to say you're not a tree. You can move you Something else. It's really important for people to understand and appreciate that there are things and circumstances that we can actually think about. Is there any epiphany that you've had that Was it a gradual thing that you said, You decided, hey, fitness is my jam. It's what I do. It's what I love. It's what I can teach. It's what people need, because it is what people need. I think that, other people are doing the same thing with what they love to do.  I love to help people broadcast. I love to build systems that allow this to take place. It's not for everyone. However, for the person that needs the help and doesn't want to deal with the technology. It might be an important part of their, their program. 

Virginia Czarnocki  26:55  

Yep. 

Russ Johns  26:57  

It's you just have to find something that brings You joy. Tthe whole package, it's like, okay, just enjoy their life. I mean, it's like we all have an expiration date. We don't know what it is. We don't know what our shelf life is. It's just take what you can and enjoy what you have and do what you can with what you have. 

Virginia Czarnocki  27:22  

I agree with that. definitely agree with that. No, no mean nothing. All I can say is that a healthy body really is a healthy mind. It comes in so many different ways. Don't look at yourself in the mirror than lie to yourself and see you late, the way that you work and you're going to be accepting the way that you look if it's not true. Because if you're lying to yourself, from a mental perspective, you're lying to yourself in every single way. How can you expect to be happy, if you're not happy if you're not happy within yourself, if you're lying to yourself. I always say stop, just stop some kind of movement and just move, you'll be astounded at how a healthy body can have a massive impact on your mind. This and I see this to women in particular. This is quite controversial in it, especially in this society today. We're taught to accept ourselves as we are. There's a big difference between accepting yourself as you are and being happy with who you are. A lot of women lie into themselves, and they're pretending that they're happy with what they look like and that happy with their situation because it's all rated society says it's okay for me to look Firstly, who cares what society says How do you feel and seeds and at the end of the day, we all control and own sense of reality. You're exactly where you want to be up that reality.

Yeah, the other thing I want to say is if you can be confident within yourself, that no matter what happens, you can deal with it. That's what I always see is the stronger you are mentally and physically, the more you'll be able to deal with anything that comes your way. That gives you the courage then to weep and do whatever, because you know that you can deal with it, so to speak to prepare awful it is and I've had some pretty awful things happen in my life.

Russ Johns  29:28  

Yeah. being resilient and being able to adjust in a adapt, I mean, and having the mental stamina to get through it and enjoy parts of it even.

Virginia Czarnocki  29:42  

Well, I read David Goggins book, I read David Goggins book, and I thought to myself, you've got nothing on me, you live that life. I'm happy to take my life and compete it with yours. So, we do mean and I honestly think that's the case with So many people is like, Look, you read these books and you think, well, what have you done yourself? What have you been through yourself? You're still here and you're still standing? 

Russ Johns  30:09  

Yeah. Well, I thank you so much, Virginia for being here. 

Virginia Czarnocki  30:15  

Thank you 

Russ Johns  30:15  

I apploud you for what you're doing and continue doing it. I look forward to long conversations in the future about it. I'm just always impressed with the stories people share on the pirate broadcast, and I look forward to future stories. I think we got a couple more wonderful people this weekend on pirate broadcast. So stay tuned, because #kindnessesiscool. #smilesarefree. And you #enjoytheday.

Virginia Czarnocki  30:47  

Thank you.

Russ Johns  30:48  

Thanks for having me in here. Appreciate you. 

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