Hello, travelers. My name is Grace
Simmons, and this is the Random and
Wonderful Podcast. Settle in and listen
to stories of wanderlust and
transformation as you gain tips to
inspire your next travel experience. The
Random and Wonderful is brought to you by
the Amethyst Palaba Hut, LLC.
Hi, everyone from Podcast Movement in
DC. I'm your host, Grace Simmons, and
welcome to the Random and Wonderful.
My guest today is going to be Heike
Yates, and we're going to talk about
travel, pursuing your spark. It's going
to be amazing. So let's get into it.
Yeah, let's go. This is awesome. So thank
you, first off, so much for joining me
today. I'm excited because this is like
our first live,
like official chat, actually. We've been
kind of talking that he's doing the other
we met last year. Yes. And so I'm excited
to get this started. So please tell me
and everyone, how exactly did Pursue
Your Spark start?You know,
Pursue Your Spark started as a
long history of it, going
through iterations and how do I
want to talk to women?And it's like in
my podcast. It's like or trying to figure
out the right angle of do I want to talk
about menopause?Do I want to talk about
other things that are interesting to
women in midlife?And what I come across
is a lot. Women dim their
light when they get older. Yeah. YeahAnd
so when you think about dimming your
light, what's will be the opposite is
igniting your spark. But then you have to
also pursue the spark. In
order to ignite it, if you're not sure
what the spark is for you
specifically, you don't know what you're
going to ignite. So it's like,
OK, let's figure out what it is
that we want from midlife.
Wherever we are in midlife, and I think
we talked about that, it's between 40 and
80. So midlife is not just being 50
and it's somewhere in the transition
from. Perimenopause through menopause and
postmenopausal just to give it a more
confined idea. And
I think that's a really a time every, at
least in my opinion, every 10 years I
feel, and I'm 63, women
go through something else has to
change. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's
unfortunate. I do like that there's a
breakdown, though, in the difference
between igniting and pursuing, 'cause
like you said, you maybe. understand what
that spark is, but it's so important to
be able to like continue those steps of
pursuing, right?Because if you just see
you have that great moment and you don't
do anything to follow up, it fizzles and
it goes away. Yeah. And then you feel
potentially left behind, sad. Yes.
And you're unhappy. And a lot of times
when we look at these patterns too,
divorce happens because somebody in the
relationship is not happy. Yeah.
And so I I feel it's a good way to really
look at yourself and
see, what do I need?Where am I in this
phase of life?Okay, as someone who then
is coaching people on this path,
how do you navigate self-doubt
or hesitations when it comes to maybe
business or personal?How do you lead?
I would first say it's to be honest with
what you really want. Okay.
And that's the biggest hurdle, 'cause a
lot of women don't want to really look at
what the problem is. And self-doubt
creeps in and we just keep thinking about
it. It's three o'clock in the morning,
yeah and we're not quite sure if we
can do things, if we should take action,
if what happens, what is the consequence
of if I do the things that I want to
do. Yeah. And soThe first thing is really
be honest with you, and that can go
different ways. It can come through a
conversation with a friend. It can come
through journaling. It can come
maybe on a big bike ride where you're
riding through the woods and you call.
Clarity. Yeah. Clarity. Yes. Yeah.
Getting clear on what it is that you
want. And instead of focusing on the
negative, which is our self-doubt. So
quick. Yeah. So quickly to focus on.
The things that you maybe need to fix
versus how can I use my strengths to
better who I am, where I'm trying to go.
And it's so beneficial to get that
initial understanding. That's wonderful.
Yeah. So besides
being coaches and podcasters, you and I
both share a love of travel. So
I am curious, do you have a
story or maybe a trip that left like a
really heavy impact on you?Oh, I got a
whole bunch of stories. My
thing is, or has been for many years now,
that whenever I have a round birthday,
umm I don't remember my 30th birthday
because I was in a different relationship
about my 40th, my 50th, my 60th birthday.
I always did something that was
super memorable. So instead of getting
gifts or going out to an expensive
restaurant, it's about taking a trip.
So which one would like to hear about the
story about dancing Argentine tango?
In Buenos Aires. Or would you like to
hear about my 6 for 60 in
Hawaii?Oh, 6 for 60. Six for six.
Yeah. Excellent. All right, here you go.
So my 60th birthday is starting to roll
around and my husband and
we're talking about maybe going to
Hawaii, you know, for a week of
vacation. And then we're talking and he
says, you know, I found this really cute
two-bedroom apartment. It's right on the
water. It's right outside of, what's
the town of the big island, the big land
of Hawaii. And he said,
Devil, here's what we're going to do. My
gift to you are six for 60. And I
was like, What's that supposed to mean?
And he says, Six weeks of
vacation in Hawaii. Oh
my gosh. But the caveat is,
we didn't take the whole six weeks as a
vacation, so what we did is,We had one
week where we worked and then one
week where we took vacation. OK, OK, it
was fantastic. So we got
there. We had this really cute
two-bedroom apartment. And
one room was set up as his office because
my husband had to work too. So he got up
at 4:00 in the morning, the one week we
worked till noon. I put all my clients on
Zoom. So I would sit on the floor in the
living room with my laptop on a chair
and we would do Pilates or whatever this
person wanted to do. And the people are
like, where are you?And I took my laptop
and I was like, oh, look at the lights.
There's the beach and like, Oh my
God. And so it was great
because we both continued to earn money.
So it was not no income for either of
us. Yeah. And six weeks, it's a long
time. Then we took the second week where
we, well, let me finish the first story.
So it's when we got up at 4:00, we both
worked till noon. And then at noon we're
like, what do you want to do?Do you want
to go for a run on?The highway, you know,
the street right in front of us where
they do the Ironman or do we want to go
swim or do we want to go for a bike
ride?Because we brought our bikes. We're
triathletes, so we brought our bikes. My
goodness. And so we biked the
highway, you know, we're like, OK, So
what we're going to do?And then we we did
whatever the work I was, came home, had
lunch or did the other way around. Then
it was nap time and then we did whatever
we wanted to do. Go hiking. We learned
about the local fish market. We knew
where the bread place in the hills was,
that they came a couple times a week
and brought their fresh baked goods.
So you always became a local. So the fish
guy, the fish guy said, here, give
me your number. I'll text you when we're
at the shopping center so you know when
the first fish is here. I'm like, yes,
that's amazing. And then the
second week. When we were off, we would
take our bikes and we go, we sleep in,
have breakfast, even though I
intermittent fast, but that was like, I
don't care about that. We need some
energy next time, because intermittent
fasting is not restrictive. So we would
drive to the other side of the island or
explore other parts of Hawaii.
It was the best. And on my actual
birthday, we had bao bao, two balloons,
one six, one oh, and we walked down
with the balloons in hand. Down the
street to a little beach where we, my
husband and I did a little photo shoot,
you know, like, ohh yeah, cute. You
wouldn't believe the people. They're
yelling out of their car, happy birthday,
yay, go party girl. This is
great. And then we got to the beach and
we're starting to do our thing. And this
woman comes up to me and she says, 60.
Your life is just starting. You're gonna
have work on after 60. Yeah. So
that's my 6 for 60 story. I
that's amazing. Six weeks, first
off. But I like that there's an
alternative. Like you have that nice
stagger, even though it sounds like when
you were working, that was still super
fun. Like you weren't ignoring the fact
that you had, you were in this paradise,
of course. You got up in the morning and
then my husband would always say. Oh, I'm
going to have breakfast on the lanai,
which is the balcony. But the
peacefulness and the ocean and
the environment is so tropical and people
are super duper friendly and
you know, and we did the things that we
physically loved doing and
we had such a good diversity on it as
well. So it was not just hanging out in
the beach. I mean, we went snorkeling
with the dolphins. It was just
fantastic. Yeah. I highly recommend it.
6 for 60. I love it. 3 for
30. I don't care. Yeah. No, whatever
it is, it should be multiple weeks of the
I I think would be ideal. I know. Wow.
I was going to ask actually, since you
guys are triathletes, how are you
incorporating?Like, are you purposeful
about incorporating Wellness into your
vacations or is it just a habit?Like
this is just what you're doing?We are
trying to incorporate. We are
not going to the gyms. So we
are like, no, we're on vacation. We want
to be outside because oftentimes we're
either, well, oftentimes we're either on
the beach or we are in the mountains
somewhere. So if there's some like
physical activity included, there's
always hiking involved. There's
it's built in. To what the vacation is.
Does it look different than when normally?
Yeah. I usually don't plop down and do
Pilates math work. I'm like, uh, I'm just
on vacation now. And that's what I
recommend to everybody. It's like, don't
worry about it. Just do something. You
know, if you're in a in a city and you're
visiting on a city trip, right. You'll
walk a lot. Yeah. That's exercise too.
Yeah. And so it's built
into what we do. And that's when we went
to Hawaii, we're like, this is.
The island where they had the Ironman.
OK. And we just and he my husband took
the bikes apart, put them in a container,
put it back together. OK. Because I was
going to ask you. I was going to ask you
about those bikes later. Oh wow. So well,
you can transport them. You just need
like a big suit. Yes. Where it fits in
and you take it apart and then you put it
back together. And he knows, thank God he
knows how to do that. I couldn't do that,
but. So yeah, we're we're trying
out different things when we're on
vacation. And so the biking was great
because we could say we biked for all the
Ironman people were biking. Yeah. I mean,
we didn't do the whole route, but it was
just fun to be out there amongst the lava
fields and biking up the road and
and just enjoying the life with the
locals too. So you become less of a
tourist. Yes. YesAnd like I said, you
know, the guy texts about the fish. We
knew on Wednesdays the fresh bread was up
in the in the hills or up in the hills.
That's cool. You've gone from a tourist
to an actual traveler, which is really
neat. When you are.
Well, now I've forgotten my question.
Actually, there's something you just
said. I forgot. All right.
What do you hope to get out of
your trips?I love
adventures. OK. That's was also
initially. What brought me to the States?
I'm originally from Germany. And
what?I got bored living in Europe. Yeah,
I know people. You can laugh all you
want. What?But I was always saying,
oh, I want to do Europe when I'm old,
assuming that I would live in Germany,
but I don't. So I still have a lot to see
in Europe, but that's fine. But I wanted
adventure. I wanted something different.
OK. You know, when you think of Europe.
For an European, OK, you speak different
languages in in within 8 hours
and you eat different foods within a in
the same 8 hours of traveling by car.
Here in 8 hours, you're in Virginia from
DC. Still in the same place.
Yeah, you know, nothing ever changes as
far as it's the same. But travel, I
find it, I find it interesting to learn
about other people, how they do things.
What they eat, what they drink,
how they do life. That's really
why I love traveling so much is
and just experiencing. And even if you
say I go maybe up to Maine, my husband
hasn't been up in Maine. OK. And I said,
you will feel it's a little different.
They eat different foods. They speak a
little bit different English. Yeah. And
it's it's a little, it's the ruggedy
water hills and all that. And so
that's new and it's different. OK, OK
I do remember that question, though. I
was going to ask, when did you notice
that you were able to find a balance
between actually fully immersing
yourself into a vacation and then
separating the work?Has that always
been?OK, like a switch. It's like, OK,
you do this,
compartmentalize it, right?
You do this. OK, we're done with this.
Now we're going to do that. It's no
turning on a computer. Not looking at
emails. And you know, I have my out of
the office on my phone, on my e-mail
thing. I was like, I'm not looking at
this. And I told my husband too, no
Slack. OK. You are not available. This is
vacation. Yeah. You're not available.
Unless it's an emergency. But other than
that, they have to wait. Is this like a
process that you had to
enforce or was it something like you've
always had those good boundaries?Oh, God,
no. All right.
Oh my God, no. I love, love, love my
work as a health fitness coach and my
podcast and all this. I can work
all week long. I love what I
do. And I had to really,
my husband actually pointed that out. He
says, you know, it's 7:00 in the evening,
you're still working. We started at 7,
you're still at it. Like, oh, let me just
finish this canva. Let me just get this
done. And he says. Well, it's 7 o'clock.
We want to eat. We didn't prepare
anything. The same with the weekends. And
I would say Sunday, I was like, oh, I
just quickly, three hours later. Right.
Three hours later, I'm still at it. But
he pointed out and he said, you know,
your work's taken over our lives.
I know you love what you do. And so that
was a wake-up call for me to say, hey, I
can't neglect my relationship. I can't
neglect my off time. So
the dealio is now that we stop
the latest at six and work on
the weekends only if it's something that
has to be done on Monday. OK. I mean,
other than that, we're not working.
Wow. I'm glad he called me out on it.
Yeah. YeahI would have not. I didn't
think of it as work. Right. Because
you're enjoying what you do. You're in
it. I need to end this podcast episode
really quickly. 4 hours later. Oh,
OK, cool. OK. Because I'm always, I know
sometimes, like you're as a coach, right?
You're able to give some people advice,
but you yourself can kind of be stuck
into the process of it. And so I'm always
curious, like, at what point do you
realize?I should take my own advice
and sort of like you said,
compartmentalize or set those boundaries.
So, OK, that's really key, definitely.
And I'm glad that he pointed it out
because I'm sure I would have burned
out big time at some point
and our relationship would have suffered,
my health would have suffered, but I
didn't see it. So I'm glad somebody said,
hey, did you notice?
And I'm like. No, I'm I'm not doing
this. But then I had to be honest with
myself, and I did it. Yeah. So
it's like, we call out our clients, you
know?It's It's not calling out, it's sort
of lovely saying, hey, did you
notice?It's accountability.
Yeah. YeahYeah, are you loving yourself?
Are you doing, you know, paying attention
to your health?Yeah, exactly.
How, like what is one of your favorite
wellness practices?So if you were
to, yeah, a good way
for you to like decompress. Okay. What's
your go-to?It used to be running. Okay.
So about three years ago, I
started having severe knee pain. I mean,
I've been a runner for since, I'd say
2008, so for a while. And
I got into running and every now and then
my knee would hurt and I'm thinking, oh,
you know, I just ran too much and I did a
lot of running. You know, I did
marathons, I did ultra marathons and
things like that. But my knee is kind of
getting cranky. But at some point my knee
was really, really bad. OK,
so I went to the doctor after all my own,
like trying to fix my knee things.
I said, OK, let's see what it's at. And
so I have severe arthritis in one of my
knees. OK. And at the point the doctor
said, oh, you should make an appointment
now because we have a three month wait
for a knee replacement. I was in so
much pain. I was like, Please sign
me off. My oh my gosh is 30 months.
And I said, I have three months. I was
like, No, it's weight. So I went to a
friend of mine who is chiropractor, but
he does other techniques too. And so he
looked at my gait. He looked at what
exercises we can do. I stopped
running and he says, Just eliminate
impacts. Right. Right And
it's now over two years. over two
years, that I have not
gotten a knee replacement. I have managed
my knee pain with biking and swimming and
strength training and Pilates and
stretching. And so far, knock on wood,
I am not getting a knee replacement,
but I had to replace my running,
which was my go-to for de-stressing.
I missed it so much.
I said, what am I going to do?I
identify being a runner. I know people
identify with something you're part of.
Like I was part of the Montgomery County
Roadrunner crew and I was one of their
coaches. They were, they were my gang,
they were my people. And suddenly I had
nobody. It's just me and my lousy knee.
No, no, like me, you let me down.
And so, but I know I've heard other
people feel that way too. You get let
down by your body. And you don't know
what to do. Umm So I said, all right, I
love biking, so I bike more. And I
started embracing swimming, although I'm
a really not good strong swimmer. I
mean, it takes me forever to get from one
side to the other, but it doesn't matter.
It helped offset the stress on the knee.
And so it didn't become my go-to to
de-stress. My go-to is now hiking.
And I'm hiking. Really fast. My
husband's like, you could almost run
this. But it's it's like, OK, let's go. I
want to work out. Yeah, I really need
this. And then has helped me
transition from
missing my running and helping me
decompress. Because as a runner, I always
say, you put your shoes on, you go out
the door. After three miles, all the
world's problems are solved.
Yeah. For the non-runners,
I get it, but wow. So whatever it is you
do, I mean, biking, I always feel, is is
a little more dangerous when you're right
on the roads. You have to really pay
attention. Yeah, and you can't-- And you
can sometimes space out and go, yeah, I'm
just going to whatever I'm thinking
about. But yeah, so that's--
Wow. When you're hiking, are you, is it
just local?So in Maryland, or are you
like going to different locations?Well,
we have two of our favorite locations.
One is the Rock Creek Park. I love
it. We're literally 10 minutes drive
from there. The park is beautiful. It has
all kinds of different trails. And
sometimes we go out to Gaithersburg, who
also has, it's a hidden
agenda with that one. It's part of the
extension of the, I can't think of the
system, but it's part of the Appalachian
Trail. Partially, but it's it's
near Gaithersburg where the Quince
Orchard High School is for all the people
that are local. And there's a trail
that goes in either direction, like all
over the place. And I can't think of the
name, right?Muddy Branch Trail.
And there's a whole trail system out
there for anybody. Wow, okay. But
we're combining this and I don't get paid
for that. There is an Italian
deli. Near Quince Orchard High School on
in Dart on Dartstown Rd. Gemelli,
they have the best Italian
Subs. The best. I love that
thing in a Nagento. That's a wonderful
recommendation for food. Yes. So
Google Gemelli's and the trail is not far
from there. You can work off the pasta.
I like that. And they have really good
Italian Subs and real Italian food
and wine and what pizza. They have really
good pizza. But I was like, my husband
was just mentioning it the other day and
he said he didn't say we haven't been to
the trail in a while. He just said we
haven't been to Jigmel this in a while
and we can go to the trail at some point.
Sure, there are so many unique places. I
think I've always gotten excited about
traveling outside of Maryland and just
checking all these other places. But
there's so many little hidden spaces in
Maryland and. I am enjoying
discovering them. Like, hey, we don't
necessarily have to leave, right?I can
spend a weekend and just check out these
little locations. Even if I'm not hiking,
they have wonderful trails that you can
just walk along and just spend some quiet
time in nature, which is so healing for
the soul. And we have so many around we
just don't know about. Yeah. And there's
on the, I think it's called the REI app.
Oh, OK. It's a free app where you can
download it and you can get all the trail
systems in Maryland. I think even other
places, but I'm not quite sure where you
can just say, you know, this is a
beginner trail, this is a more advanced
trail or this. I just want to do 3 miles
walking. I like that. And so it's
difficulties, which is what I like
because not everybody wants to go hardcore
And I was like, yeah, but you want to do
something good for your art. Do you want
to?You know, I always say, you know, when
you walk, you get a little bit of a butt
lift because you're using your your butt
ski a little bit more and your legs are
stronger. Get those calves looking right.
Heck yeah. That'll look good. Exactly.
So as we wrap up, we are here at the
Podcast Movement. Have you heard anything
that has maybe helped or that you're
going to take away with you for your
business?Or maybe something that you
heard and you've decided to not do
anymore?That's a good one. Oh,
there's there's some good Nuggets.
I think what I
learned more than anything is that
there's a big industry that supports us
podcasters. We don't have to grab
them all. We don't have to buy all of
them, but they're there for us at our
disposal. So we're not alone when it
comes to difficult technologies. and
programs or even time constraints. You
know, it's like you have an a podcast
episode and you don't have time to
transcribe things. Right. You know,
there's help for us there and you just
have to find connect with the right
people that generate
for you what you want the way you want
it. And the other thing that just came
out of the keynote speech where
the speakers were talking about, Is
podcasting dead?And they said,
Look at all these news. All these
executives are saying, yeah, podcasting
is dead. But they're like, podcasting is
alive and well. Stay
consistent with your
episodes and your production, just like
you are with your health and wellness.
You don't get any reward or any
more people or get healthier if you're
not consistent with your episode.
Let your audience know. When you're
publishing. So if you're publishing
episodic or you do every week or I do
every other week on my podcast, they need
to know so they can wrap their head
around it and want to have the right
explicit essence. But stick with it
and don't give up because somebody said
podcasting is dead. Yeah, I like that.
That's pretty good advice. We got went to
this last year and I think the lesson
that I learned was having conversations.
I think I've gotten a little bit more out
of it. Like you said there, you don't
know what other people are interested in
or like what skills they have or maybe
the tools that they know that you maybe
never heard of. And so I've been getting
a lot out of like, OK, what are you doing
with your podcast and how is that
contributing to your business?And it's
been, well, this is only like our second
day. And I'm like, OK, I'm feeling pretty
full. I'm loving this. I'm like looking
at my schedule today. I'm oh, I'm going
to have this league and talk to someone
later. I'm going to attend this session.
Oh, let's see what they're doing. And
it's it's really fun. It's also,
I think for us, being
solopreneurs, it is
a feeling that we're not allowed. Oh my
gosh, right. That there are others that
suffer the same as we. Yesterday I
went to a roundtable or brain date
discussion with the leader of them was
somebody from NPR. And I'm talking about,
you know, the challenges that I have
growing my podcast. And then he talks
about his NPR situation. And I looked
at him and I said, you're so big, you
have the same problems we have. And he
said, just on a larger scale.
So I was like, I'm not alone. Even the
big guys have trouble.
We're all learning. We're all growing.
That, I think that's absolutely
incredible. Well, thank you so much for
waiting here. Before we finalize, do you
have any questions for me?What made you
want to start a podcast?I like
storytelling. And so I
wanted to make sure that I have a place
to, like, keep a collection of stories
and podcasting kind of became that. So
instead of me just recording little voice
notes and telling my friends, I was like,
well, let's just see if somebody else
wants to hear. And it started with the
friends that I have and of course, and
then randomly someone would be like, if I
was not consistent, Grace, where's your
next episode?And I was like, oh, oh, OK,
sorry. I mean, thank you, but sorry, you
know?And so I think I kind of got into
that, but it was just that storytelling.
I've always loved to tell stories. And
now when I get to do interviews, I get to
hear other people's stories. And just
like one of the speakers yesterday was
talking about how talking to someone and
like you are learning their story,
getting to know them, and you kind of
fall in love with people, like the person
or the people that they are, the history
that they bring. I enjoy all of that. So
podcasting has been like. I don't know,
it's been a really fun gift. Do you have
a favorite story that we have time to
tell?I can tell you about my skydiving
story. That's it. That
was actually, so my skydiving, my cousin
was graduating from law school and
her gift to herself was she wanted to go
skydiving. And I was like, sure,
why not, you know?And we get on this
plane and I'm just trying to like keep my
wits together. You know, you're like too
nervous to realize that you're nervous,
didn't click. until we got up into the
sky and we're leaning out and you're like
tandem, so you're strapped with someone
else. And they open the door and like you
know the first people hop off. And I was
like, oh, sign me up for this. Why am I
up here?You know But of course, you're
way too late to back up. So we get on the
edge and you just fall out of the
plane. Forward to backwards. And you're
falling backwards, 'cause you have to do,
there's like a little banana thing. Yeah,
I don't. I don't know. I may have blacked
out. You just just fall forward, right?
And then I remember just screaming
for like what felt like 5 minutes
and I had to take a really deep breath
and then continue screaming. I was like,
I think I'm good. I'm why am I still
screaming?I think we're fine. And I was
able to like, you know, get the tears out
of my eyes and just look around at
everything. And it's just gorgeous
green, that beautiful blue lakes. You can
see some farm like we're in Florida. So
it's just a beautiful blend of like color
and water and the sky was blue
and they open up the parachute and now
we're just gliding. And I remember just
being like, God, this is so
nice. I am
so grateful to be here. I am
enjoying like it was a wonderful
conversation, a moment of just being
like, I'm so happy to be alive and I
appreciate the life that I have, so.
Yeah, that's that's like one of my
favorite stories. I love it. Thank you so
much. Not that I would jump out of that.
I'm like, I'm a phobia with height, but.
Okay. But I admire the the
bravery of you to to be willing to do
that. It was incredible. It was
incredible. Yeah. That's like the
only word that she and I could come up
with. Like, we just, it was
life-changing. See?Absolutely. That's
what adventures are all about. Yes. Yes
And travel, right?And travel. Yeah. And
traveled from high up to down. I
sure did. Look, kicking and screaming.
Literally. OK. Well, thank
you so much, Iggy, for joining me today.
I am so glad that we're able to have this
live session and get this chat. like
finally make our official interview.
That's exactly right. I mean, we've had
like our personal interview at bar and at
whatever else, at the golf course. So I'm
glad. Super. My pleasure. Thank you so
much. Thank you.
Hey there, Grace here. I hope you enjoyed
today's episode and gained some useful
takeaways. Thank you so much for
listening and staying until the end.
Don't forget to rate the show or share it
with some friends. Have a wonderful week,
take care, and remember, be bold, be
curious, be ready to tell your story. You
never know who needs it. Bye-bye.