Olaolu (Lou) Ogunyemi- Leadership Growth

Welcome to the Internal Shift Show. I'm Debbie

Longo, Transformational Coach. This show looks

at how the internal choices we make influence

the direction our lives and work take. Today's

conversation brings real experience into that

space, exploring how internal shifts quietly

change outcomes over time. We have a very special

guest today, Lou Oganami. Good afternoon, Lou.

Welcome to the show. Hey, thanks so much for

having me, Debbie. I'm very excited to be here.

Thank you. Thank you for being here. I would

just like to start with explain to me something

or a few things that happened in your life that

were negative, either a traumatic experience,

maybe at a job or home life or whatever the situation

is where you took that and you turned it into

a positive. So now you are a place and now you're

not there anymore. Now you're at this place.

So the end result should be how you came out

on the other side. And what's in between that,

what you say in between that is your story, is

how you put that all together, compile that all

together. Yeah. So thank you for that question.

One of the biggest things that I recognized is

that I was, I just, I hated rejection and I still

hate rejection to this day, but I've learned

how to deal with it better. And the reason I

say that, I start there, is because I was the

fifth to sixth children. It seemed like to me

growing up as a child, and I know this isn't

true now, but as a child, I had my two older

sisters who were close in age. I had my two brothers

who were close in age. Then there's me, and then

there's the little baby, my baby brother. And

I felt like the baby brother's in his protected

class, but he's like four years younger than

me. And then the other two were grouped up. And

so for me, I felt like I needed to almost like

find myself. and sort of explore ways that I

can grow and develop as an individual myself.

But one of the things I found is when I went

out growing up, number one, because of my name,

Olalu Okunyemi, out there in Ruston, Louisiana,

it wasn't necessarily something to help me fit

in. So the first thing that you have right off

the bat when I'm going to introduce myself, I'm

not even portraying confidence because I don't

really like my name. I don't really want to tell

people my name because I'm embarrassed. So when

I do tell them my name, now they're they're making

fun of me. And it just started this this weird

downward spiral, if you will, because. It was

my name at one point, then it was the gap in

my teeth at another point, and then it was my

weight at another point. It was always something

that was going on that caused me to feel like

I was a reject. started to pick up on and started

to learn is that because I felt rejected, I was

willing to almost do anything to fit in. And

that's where all the mischievous things came

from. That's why I was getting in trouble in

school. And quite honestly, if it weren't for

an assistant principal who decided that she wasn't

going to kick me out for something she could

have kicked me out for, I would have been kicked

out of expel from school. for something I knew

I shouldn't have done. My parents and my family

would never have approved of it, but I was doing

it anyway because I just wanted to fit in. And

I think that was a dangerous spot I was in as

a child, just trying to figure out how to grow

through not fitting in, feeling rejected, feeling

insecure in the person you are, not being able

to project any kind of confidence. And all those

days really resonated with me. And the hardest

part about it is that no matter how much people

were to encourage me at home, Anytime somebody

said it outside the home, especially adults,

would like sort of double down on some of the

things that people were saying. Were they making

fun or not? Or were they just saying something

they didn't think about it? I think when adults

said something that I heard my friends and my

buddies or the people I went to school with,

it really hit me in the heart, man. And that's

when I started trying, I started to believe some

of the things people were saying about me. That's

when they were making fun of me or the things

that they said that Maybe now you're not, you're

mischievous. You're bad. You're not, you're not

the good Ogden Yemen. You know, the rest of them

are going to be successful, but you're not going

to be one of the ones successful. When adult

tells you that is sort of weighed on me. And

quite frankly, I felt like I needed to start

living up to the standard that they were portraying

for me. One thing I will say though, and the

way I was able to sort of work through that,

this is specifically talking about my childhood.

Number one, one thing happened that was fortunate.

One of the guys that I was, best buddies with

that I was showing out to be be friends with,

he ended up dropping out of school in eighth

grade, really eighth going into the ninth grade.

So that's the first thing. And I say that's that's

fortunate. I put that in air quotes because obviously

it's not fortunate, but it happened to now leave

me a void, leave a void in my life. And what

filled that void was sports for me. It was coaches,

it was other teammates and things of that nature

that came in and started surrounding me and helping

me to point in a positive direction. And so I

think that really, when you think about the turnaround

and what happened, how did I take my life from

feeling like a reject and trying to do anything

to fit in to where I am or where I was, at least

through. high school and college. I truly believe

that turnaround point was having that extracurricular

activities and things like adults actually now

speaking positively in my life. Having parents

that, because it's one thing to hear it at home,

it's another thing when you get out of the home

to hear something else. And I think one of the

hardest parts for us, and really it's not just

me, it's my siblings as well, is when we were

growing up, I think the hard one of the hardest

parts when you're thinking about rejection is

to watch my parents separate. And that truly

did that hit that hit a home for me because I

think that when it when it hit that point, that's

about when I felt like, OK, now this is like

the this is the true ultimate test or confirmation

that you know what? My life is just not that

good. It sort of sucks. You know, you watch your

parents that you thought this thing was really

good and you watch them separate. And one of

the things that I had to learn, number one, is

that life happens. And when I started learning

about that and really started to accept the things

that I can't change, it became a little bit more

easy for me to adjust to. And so that's really

what I will say. That's a huge part of my story,

a huge part of who I am today. It's my childhood

and learning how to grow through some of those

adverse situations and learning how to really

grow through my insecurities that were causing

me or I was allowing them to have me do things

to just try to fit in. Yes, very good. So how

was your self -esteem during this whole scenario?

Yeah, my self -esteem was shot. And that's something

I practice today. And sometimes I look myself

in the mirror and I start to tell myself, allow

positive things, because I remember I recall

looking in the mirror and telling myself so many

negative stuff, you know, telling myself, dog,

look at you, who you think you are. And I smile.

Somebody will tell me my smile is beautiful.

You have a bright smile, man. You can light up

a room. And then another person would be like,

hey man, that smile is ugly. And I'll go in the

mirror and I will repeat that over and over.

So really my self -esteem was extremely low.

And I just didn't, I wasn't confident. I mean,

you can look at pictures starting off as, I used

to wear a cowboy hat when I was little, about

five or six, they used to be my thing, hat and

boots. I don't know, I was in that phase. But

if you were to look at the pictures as you transition

through the years, you'll see like this huge

smile where people are like, man, this guy smiles

big. And then you start going to those middle

school, junior high, maybe even early high school

years. And that smile is gone. That smile is

almost faded with just like this blank stare.

And in some cases, almost like it looked like

a mugshot, to be honest with you. And so, yeah,

that self -esteem was just it wasn't there. And

I just had to learn. So one of the things thank

you for that that was very very good. So one

of the things that I Teach is to look internally

within yourself Because I need to see not only

the things that are wrong right or I need to

see what I need to improve because if I'm not

feeling good or I'm negative or things are not

going the way that I want in my life because

I have a tendency to look outside of myself,

my environment. Am I happy at work? Am I happy

in my marriage or with my spouse? And so I have

the habit, I guess, of looking at that. And when

I see these things that I don't like in any way,

you gave a few examples of that. I want to be

able to create some type of willingness or just

a desire to look at myself? Is there something

that I could change? Is there something that

I could do in order to make my life and my surroundings

or whatever the situation is a little bit better

than what it is? So am I very negative? And one

of the things that is very, very big that a lot

of people don't even realize that they're in

is low self -esteem. Now, I'm going to tell you

a little secret. We have something called the

ego self -esteem ladder. So when my self -esteem

is low, my ego is high. I always want people

to say good things about me. I'm looking for

that that feedback where I constantly because

I want. to have somebody say something to me

or do something with me that's going to make

me feel good because I can't do it on my own.

And that's a big ego. But here's the thing. When

my self -esteem is high, then my ego is low.

And that's the whole thing. And guess what happens

then? I become more of a giving person. Because

when I have a high ego, I'm very, very selfish

and self -centered. 100%. Because I want people

to be nice to me. To say things that are nice

to me, right? In order to make me feel better.

So it's all about me, me, me. But if I have a

high self -esteem, I don't need anybody to say

anything to me. It doesn't matter if people like

me or not. I don't really care. I'll tell you

the truth. I just dismiss it. It doesn't matter.

That's another thing, too. I want to be liked.

I want to be liked. And like I said, when I have

a high self -esteem, it doesn't matter whether...

I just use this as one example. I mean, there

are tons of examples of this. No, it doesn't

matter. And then my ego is low. So now not only

do I need the recognition, recognition is one

word, but there's another word I'm thinking of.

I can't get it into my head, but not only do

I not need the recognition, right? Then everything

around me is fine. So welcome to the world of

perception. My perception now is completely different.

There's nothing wrong because my self -esteem

is high and my ego is low. There's nothing wrong

with anything. Because whatever is wrong or if

I feel upset or whatever negative feeling I have

it does not matter It does not matter and this

is a big big thing that a lot of people don't

know about They're not familiar with they don't

know what how to do it or they just don't understand

it. That's it What did you do? How did you know

to do this like you're talking about your positive

now? and the things that you did to become this

way. How did you know to do this? Did you have

any type of help, professional help, or you just

knew it yourself or self -help or books or something

like that? How did you just become this way?

Yeah, so definitely professional help. That was

not something that I was able to come to on my

own because one of the things that you talked

about, was important to me, and that was learning

how to control the things that I can't control,

looking internal and saying, man, I can make

some adjustments. And I'll give an example. Between

seventh grade and eighth grade year, I started

waking up at five in the morning. That's how

long I've been doing it. Because I said, OK,

I can control the perception, or I can at least

control my physical fitness. I control being

ready for a basketball season when it comes around,

a track season when it comes around. One of the

things that I will say that that did to me, though,

is it gave me this almost overconfidence. And

I think that goes exactly to what you're saying.

It gave me an overconfidence. And that is when

my self -esteem truly became low. Because now

that I've done this thing, I have now started

to say that, OK, well, now people are starting

to compliment me. And everybody's starting to

say, oh, look at you. You look great. You look

in shape and all this. And now I'm eating this

up. I'm eating this up. And now in my mind, I'm

now associating this thing I can do, this great

idea, this great exercise or whatever it is,

I can implement this. And because I can implement

this, I control all these things around me. And

in a way, I can almost control the people around

me in a way that I couldn't in the past. And

what that gave, as I said, it gave me a little

bit of overconfidence. And the problem with that

is now I have this perception that I can almost

control everything. And that was something that

I think it didn't come to a screeching halt until

my adult years. And that again, this goes back

to your question. How did I figure this out?

Well, I had external help and I had life circumstances

that taught me that there are certain things

that you can't control. For example, my son was

diagnosed with complex partial epilepsy. And

the way that we found out about this was quite

literally, I came home from work early one day

and I got a call that they couldn't wake my son

up. And at this point he's three years old, he's

at daycare. And luckily I was right down the

street. So I rushed down the street and he's

having, it wasn't even like a seizure I've ever

seen before. It was one that was just, it was

abnormal. And I'm sitting there like now trying

to get everybody. I'm telling the teachers, I

need you to do this, call the ambulance. And

I'm like working all these things out. And I

remember getting home and I think at that time

we had just had, we'd already suffered a miscarriage.

My AC had broken down. There's just a lot of

things going on. And I think at that moment I

had like this deep sob, this deep well. And in

some cases, I believe it was because I finally

was realizing that, dude, all these years you've

been fooling yourself to think that you actually

had control of these things. That there's nothing

I could have done to control my son from having

seizures. You could see it coming. That was a

hard part. You literally could see it coming.

You could feel it. You know it's coming. It's

something we never could place our hand on it.

what it was but we could see it coming but all

of a sudden it's like there's nothing I can do

to stop it I can tell they go lie down and relax

or hey man let's get the medicine ready and all

these other things, but it never did anything.

And I think once I realized that I had to let

go of control of some things, I think that's

when my self -esteem truly began to increase,

as you described. Instead of me looking and saying,

hey, my ego's so big, I'm overconfident, I have

all the control of the things going around me,

I began to understand that life circumstances

have now taught me that there's things that you

can't control. And once you learn to say, okay,

let those things go, that now you truly don't

have to worry about that external influence and

that external validation that people are giving

you. But to your point, it did start with people

coming and talking to me. It started with me

going to professional counseling. at through

my church actually we had counseling at there

and talk sitting down talking to people about

things going on it came with even my my brother

he's the one who called me and talked to me and

asked me a simple question which was hey man

how are you doing after all these things are

happening in my adult life yeah how are you doing

and i was like oh yeah i'm doing this i'm taking

care of the family i'm doing blah blah blah blah

i'm good man i'm taking care of it he's like

now now you're not going to convince me that

you just went through this traumatic event with

your son you just went through this miscarriage

with your child and now you're going to tell

me that you're good that don't even try man like

you're you're now you're trying to project this

this confidence and you and you wanted me to

come back to you and say man you you're powerful

man you're strong i know you're going to do it

but instead he came to me and said man there's

nothing wrong with crying dude there's nothing

wrong with letting it go because good and well

that you're not you're not good and if you continue

you put on this persona I think that you end

up breaking before you're able to completely

heal. And that was one of the things that truly

helped me over time as a child to understand

that these are things that you have to grow through

and these are things that you will learn now

as an adult that you can't control everything.

And I think that's really what happened is both

counseling and life circumstances that sort of

guided me in this direction. Yeah, so that was

good. So like I said, a lot of times people don't

know. People think that ego is good. They don't

know the difference. And they and now also another

thing when you were talking, I was thinking of

was that sometimes people that have low self

-esteem, sometimes when people say good things

to them, it makes them feel good. And that's

a good thing because they don't have the ability

to do it themselves. They don't want to or don't

have the willingness to look at themselves to

raise their self -esteem. But that's only going

to be temporary. That will not be a permanent

fix. So I'm looking for something permanent.

But another thing too is in your life and in

my life too, the cards are aligned where things

happened at a certain time. You were low point

in your life. You weren't feeling good. And that

is when you realize you created the willingness

and you were able to pick yourself up and reach

out for help and. different things, professional

help and different things and whatever else you

did, you could say it doesn't matter. But the

point is that you did things to help yourself.

You searched inside of yourself and you knew

that something was wrong and you knew that you

could do it. You could come out the other side

and not only did you think you actually took

the action, you took the action and you said,

I'm going to do this. This is going to happen.

It's going to be a good thing. And this is one

of the reasons why I have this show. This is

a big reason because I want people to see that

there is the light at the end of the tunnel,

that they could come out the other side, that

everything is not going to be doom and gloom

for the rest of their life. And if they think

that and they want that and they want to sit

in negativity for their whole entire life and

be horrible and sick and suffering, then that's

perfectly fine with me. I'm not looking for people

that I can't help. I'm looking for people who

want help. And this is just, I'm just saying

one example. There are tons of examples of this.

I'm just using this one example and elaborating

on that. So if I want the help, I'm gonna have

the willingness to get it right. And then I'm

gonna seek it out. That's the thing. So, I mean,

this is very, very good. Yeah, this is very good.

So how do you feel today? based on everything

that's happened, everything that you've told

me and the positive, how you came out the other

side. How do you feel this exact day to day as

a result of all of that? Yeah, I feel much more

prepared to deal with negative circumstances.

One of those negative circumstances are things

that I can't control, like things that happen

with my family or something like rejection. I

feel much more prepared to deal with it. And

one example is I actually got my first one -star

review at a children's book that I have. And

man, at first I was like, wow, and it almost

struck me here. But because I've dealt with that

sting of rejection, because I've learned that

I can't control other people, I started to think,

you know what? That's just one opinion. And the

only reason I was able to get there is by practice.

Going over and over rehearsing these things in

my mind rehearsing these scenarios and that was

one thing that I will say that that so right

now I think I believe that I can deal with adverse

situations a lot more Easier easily and at least

without doing without breaking down without saying

are taking a negative output life without going

and as you're talking about sulking and saying

well life is just hard and it's never going to

improve and If my parents did this and I'm doomed

to this, I don't ascribe to that because I truly

believe that I have the ability to control my

perception of what's happening, because that's

the only thing I truly can't control. I can't

control all circumstances, but I definitely can

control my perception and my reaction to what's

happening around me. And I think in that case,

it made me a lot more resilient and a lot better,

a lot more able to deal with these situations.

And quite frankly, I look forward to adverse

situations, because it gives me an opportunity

to practice. And more importantly, it gives me

an opportunity to look back at the old me and

say, man, look how far you've grown. And in some

of these circumstances, and some of these ways

that you would have reacted 10 years ago, or

even a year ago, this is how you would have reacted.

Now look where you're acting and you can see

the growth that it truly does. And as you're

talking about you learn to now encourage yourself

and not rely on somebody else to look at you

and say, man, you've grown. Now you're looking

at yourself and saying, man, I've grown in such

a way that I'm truly proud of myself. And that's,

I truly believe that's where I am right now.

It's just, it's not pride in an arrogant or boastful

way, but it's proud to say that I've now seen

the growth in myself and I'm excited about that

growth and I'm excited to share. and hopefully

help somebody else who knows who's in the same

predicament or have been through circumstances

to know that you're going to look back at your

old self and say, man, I'm happy that I grew

up. I'm proud of where I am. And I knew I could

deal with life's. uncertain circumstances. Very,

very good. Thank you very much. I appreciate

that. As we wrap up, this conversation highlights

how small internal shifts can create meaningful

change. If something from today stayed with you,

take a moment to reflect on how it connects to

your own direction and decisions. This has been

the Internal Shift Show. Thank you for listening.

Thank you, Lou, for being on the show. Thank

you so much for having me. It was a pleasure.