Your Mind Matters – Simon Van Der Wolf & Joolz, New Business – A Permanent State Of Crisis

It is now normal for banks, universities, schools and media all to encourage, teach, support and celebrate businesses, business leaders and in particular new businesses. In fact, all economies thrive on the development of business and are deemed to be the backbone of the UK economy. A study carried out by Santander SMEs I.e. small and medium businesses contributed up to 3,51% of all turnover generated by the private sector in 2018. SMEs. Small to medium businesses encourage innovate, employ independence and future success. But what does it take psychologically to start, develop and make a business truly successful? How does it affect your mind, your mental health? I'm Dr. Maria Kompinska and when I started Jongla's comedy clubs in 1983, I had £300 overdraft and a bicycle which I could sell if necessary. I lived in a bedsit. It eventually grew to a multi million pound enterprise. Today I'm in discussion about what is the cost of your mental health, starting and running your own business? And I'm delighted to be joined in the discussion by your Mind Matters with the theme are new business owners in a constant state of crises? But what do I mean by crises? It can be a situation that produces significant cognitive or emotional stress internally, it can be a turning point created by stress, or it can be an external event or affairs marked by the instability and the possibility of impeding changes and for the worse. I'm delighted to be joined by my two entrepreneurial guests, Julia Piper and Simon van der Wolf. Firstly, can I welcome you, Julia? Can I call you Jules? I think that's your preferred name. Excellent. We keep it casual. Tell me about yourself and some of your history. Ok, so originally I'm from Liverpool and I left home at 17 to discover the delights of the big smoke. I 100% sure what I was going to do, but I came down and I stepped into nursing to start with and then I went on to property because unfortunately there wasn't an awful lot of money in nursing at the time and of course all of my friends were all doing really well, they all had new cars etc, etc, so I decided to go into the industry and to specialise and go into lettings. And I've been, you know, I'm. I'm generally a very happy, successful person, I'm quite spiritual and although I'm engaged to be married to one of the most hard working, popular and kindest men on the planet, at age 54, I'm still fiercely independent. And my other half affectionately says that I'm a cross between a Dartmoor pony and a thoroughbred, because I'm never happier unless I'm going 100 miles an hour with my. So, you know, I, I decided a little while ago to embrace my wild and tame side and to, to do something with the time that I had when I was in lockdown. You know, I'm a great believer that you just need the right encouragement to be able to shine. And in truth, that includes me, which is why I wanted to talk openly about mental health and what happens when the status quo of your life changes and you have to adapt to another way of doing things, equipped or not. Yeah. And what did you create? You created something? I did. I created a. Basically a toy for children and it's a complete theater in a box and it comes with a sort of pop up theater. It comes with the finger puppets that go with the theatre and a storyboard so that, you know, an older child or mum and dad can read the fairy tale to the children. I've chosen classic fairy tales because I loved them so much when I was younger. And then really it was just from conception how I was going to get that out of my imagination and onto paper and into a box and then out to the world. Yeah. So this wasn't your first entrepreneurial enterprise then? It was my biggest. It was certainly my biggest. And I think because I've taken it from start to fruition, it is, you know, the kind of thing I'd like to talk about today. It sounds so wonderful and I wish I had had one of these when my children were small because I love the theatre, needless to say. So, Simon, can we come to you and give us some of your background, please? How long have you got? Yeah, all day. Well, it's been a bit diverse as you know. Started off basically working at the BBC, looking after Barbara Windsor and most of the EastEnders cast originally. Then I went into the MPs looking after them. I got involved with quite a famous chap who, who was involved in the Da Vinci Code book and so on and so forth. From there went off into mostly sports, played quite a bit of rugby, ended up playing for Fulham Rugby League club until I fell off my motorbike, which sent me on another. Another direction. And from there it was into professional wrestling, then into the movies and now I'm having my own CBD company. I have a coffee business and a soon to be roving gallery, if there was. So can I just ask you a couple of questions? You also did a PhD, I understand, in Roman history. I did indeed. Never used it, but yeah. What made you want to do that? What made you choose that? Because a PhD is quite intense. History was always a love of mine. You know, my parents always took us to historical places as a child and we spent, you know, a lot of the summer traveling around, you know, Stonehenge, Avebury, Lyme Regis and so on and so forth, all the way down to Cornwall. So this whole sort of prehistoric through to the Roman times always grabbed me. And obviously there's a lot more you can learn. There's a lot more written about the Romans times than there is about prehistoric times, obviously. So there's a lot more, you know, material to read. There's a lot more, you know, you've got more chance of finding a mystery of the Roman stuff than you have anything else. I even. I even worked on Time Team in the first series. And what did you do? Were you the researcher? No, I was just digging holes. I was only allowed to dig a hole. And that was ON actually, that's 30 years ago, believe it or not. And it was on trying to find the first Roman fort in the uk towards Canterbury, where. Yeah, it was fun, I enjoyed it. But, you know, there's a lot of people that study hard, come out with one thing and go in a different direction. Yes, went that way. Yeah. Fascinating. Coaches deciding to wear spandex for a living. Okay, well, we'll talk about that shortly. But let me ask the question of you first. Simon, come to you, Julia. Simon, do you believe that the mental state of most entrepreneurs is almost a state of crisis or a state of crisis where you wake up and you don't know which way it's going to go and it can be quite extreme. Is that how you feel? I think it's down to circumstances. I mean, entrepreneurs always start with the intent of a lot of self. Well, I think we have a lot of self belief. It depends who you've got around you as well. A lot of entrepreneurs are very egotistical in a way. Not in a bad way necessarily, but they want to do everything themselves. They're very, very loathed to pass things on to other people, which is. Which is a huge mistake in my book. You know, if you can share the burden, it certainly helps. Yeah, my opinion. But you know, as I say, the circumstances of what's been going on in the last year and a half, you know, we never know one day to the next what's going to happen. Only the corporations seem to have come out of this shining like as an example. I mean, I sell on a daily basis you know, through one of my stores. But, you know, it wasn't, it wasn't, you know, it wasn't a lot of sales during that point. It just seems people were just sat at home flicking through Amazon or similar and expecting things there within a few hours on the next morning for some unapparent reason, you know, and I think we all, we all kind of lost out during this period. There's very few businesses, I know that came out glowing. And yes, during this period it's been a very difficult, you know, because our hands are tied completely. You can't go and get stopped. You can't take stock to people, you can't really interact with people as you'd like to. So, you know, you can wake up with a different mood every day. But the key is to just try to be positive as you can. And we all know there's an end in cyclists at some point, in theory anyway. So I hope, yeah, you just got to be, you have to be positive as an entrepreneur. I don't, I don't, I don't run around in the mornings or not sleep at night worrying my, you know, what will be will be. There's nothing you and I can do that's going to change that. It's just, you know, you've got to go with the flow and come out the other end in the best shape possible. Great. And Julia, what about you? Do you think you're in the constant or. We generally, as entrepreneurs are in a constant state of crisis? I think, yeah, you know, what Simon actually said was very real. It really doesn't, it does effect around you, who you can turn to. You know, I'm lucky enough to have met yourself, Maria, on a number of occasions and you're always, you know, very free with advice. And that comes once you've said goodbye and you say, you know, you need any help whatsoever, then please get back in touch with that. I think that really does, you know, if you've got somebody like that or if you've got, you know, people who around you've done a business before and if you're brand new to it, you know, there is lots and lots and lots of information on the Internet, but it's really hard to know, okay, well, where do I start? Who do I go to? And it is all that. It's like a tick list. You've got to have a tick list to be able to keep the stress levels to a minimum. Otherwise they do, they, they completely go through the, through the, the roof. When you wake up and you in the middle of the night, you think, oh my goodness, I didn't do that. Or, you know, I shouldn't have sent that email. Or, you know, it could be so many little things or you're doing, you know, like I did when I started from scratch, you know, I literally was like, okay, well what do I do first? Yeah. And that came with its own stress. But as Simon says, it is a self belief and you know, the, I guess in a lot of ways for me, once I'd actually told people what I was going to do and everyone was so enthusiastic about was the pressure was definitely on to perform and to get to the end and be, you know, and, and be able to have this, this product. And then, and then it's, you know, I've actually found it more stressful knowing what to do with it. Now I have it because with the, with the whole thing finishing the way it does with lockdown, you know, could I get hold of any of the buyers, you know, all those kind of things there was, you know, do you email them? Do you try and get them on LinkedIn? I mean it has, that's been the most stressful thing for me, Maria, is. And what has been successful. I know your product is really well designed. Yes. And as I say, it's something that I would have loved to have had and even now I think it can be used in therapy, to be honest, but that's another story. But you know, sort of what did you find the most useful that you've sort of come out, come through this period of time that you found useful for yourself, especially with your type of product? Was it LinkedIn? Was it Facebook? I think yes, actually LinkedIn has been amazing because they are very clear and you know about what you can and what you can't do on LinkedIn and also just that introduction to people. So, yeah, LinkedIn has been amazing. And my family and friends, I mean, you know, in a lot of ways because they're the only people when I first started who I could, you know, talk to about the product and they've been brilliant because of course they were the first people to buy it as well. And what, sorry, what is the name of your product? It's actually called Jules's Puppets. Oh, Jules's Puppets. Perfect. Yeah. I mean it's again, there was a little bit of stress in the middle when I was trying to find a name because obviously the very first thing I had to do was find a graphic designer. Yeah. Which I managed to do and through. Am I allowed to say where I Found her. Yeah, of course, it's. It's called People per hour. And they are, you know, they were. They were very good. You know, obviously you can find them online and then you go through people's. What they've done before, you know, if they've got new reviews, that kind of thing. And I managed to find this wonderful graphic designer just through this company. And so it went from there. And she helped me with all of the, you know, getting the things out of my head and onto paper. Oh, fantastic. And also helped with. I knew what I wanted to call it, and I wanted to call it the Theater of Dreams. And I thought, brilliant. And we went down this road for months and months and months and months. And then I found out again through, you know, a friend that. Oh, have you checked that name against whether or not you can actually use it? Yeah, again. Oh, my goodness. So, of course, that I found out it belonged to Manchester United. Manchester United. Oh, really? And of course, they had everything, everything sewn up, you know, but, you know, you couldn't have a pen, you couldn't write it on your hands. We had to show it to somebody. I mean, it was so tightly. That was really stressful. Yeah, that was. And then having to then find a new name for the. For my dream was. Oh, that was really, really hot. Do you know, actually, you've touched on something quite, really important here, because I talk to entrepreneurs all the time, they're starting a new business, give it this name or that name, and then they realize that that name's taken. But it's not until they're further down the road, because somehow this is never addressed. No, it isn't. That's what I mean about a tick list. If somebody could do. If somebody could do a tick list of, you know, do's and don'ts, or. Or have you looked at this or have you done that? I think that would. That would be. You know, I mean, I think I'm thinking of doing it myself, to be truthful, it'll be a bestseller. Yeah, I think you're right. And I do think. What about you, Simon? How did you come. What the names of your products and how did you come by the name? Well, my product goes under something called Sublime Natural Products. And it. I have coffee, I have CBD oils, I have infused coffee with cbd, I have the patches, I have everything to do with cbd, but also a coffee. Standard coffee range, but I went for a more natural feeling. Name something that comes across, if you understand the word, there's a very calming I mean, you've seen my imagery. It's a very calming kind of natural feel to it. But again, you know, it's a bit hit and miss now because. Because there's a lot of people going to. They're just trademarking thousands of names. Yeah. And then you go to buy the website and it's like 1800 quid. Because it's quite a catchy website. You know, it's become a business. Yeah. Which I think is a bit unfair, personally. But in. In America, you. You use it or you lose it. So if you don't use your name within a year or that year, you lose the right to use the name. Yeah. It's not quite the same here, didn't it? Something happened. I can't remember who it was, but there was a big company, a new extension came out and some. Some fella went in. A bit like the mass toilet roll hoarding of the last. Yeah. He hoarded all the. All the names of the corporations. They all took him to court and he lost. Who lost? He lost the guy. Yeah. Yeah. He needs to, you know, because over in America, it's different to here and, you know, registering your name is different globally. So it's quite an interesting suggest thing that you've said there, Jules, but Jules Puppets is a great name and Sublime is a good name. Has that worked for you? Yeah, everyone likes the feel. It's a tree, you know, it's a sort of a tree of life. Yeah. Lovely. With the roots into the name. And, you know, it's just. It's just got a really nice, simple, simple. Well, the tree, symbolically, obviously, everybody recognizes it's also. Also the spiritual sense. Touching on what you said, Jules. You know, spiritually, it makes sense to people that it's a natural thing. But something you asked earlier off air, Jules, can you just go into cbd, explain that a bit more how it's used, what it comes from. So I was working. I lived in Budapest for quite. For many years, actually. And I was. I started working in fashion. Believe it or not, anyone who's seen me would wonder, why is the beautiful boy I look like a goal for most days? To be fair, I've got more colors than the rainbow, but I always tell people I'm colorblind, but I'm not. But I ended up working in the sports. Sports field, developing products for the sports world, I. E. Protein powders and amino acids and all sorts of weird, wonderful things. Chewy bars. And then I came across CBD and there was this massive hush on it. You know, it was kept quiet and it still is because the pharmaceutical companies don't want you to, to have it. It's a fact. It's, it's just been, it's just been clamped down on here through the Food Standards Agency, in fact. Yeah, but CBD is part of the marijuana. Well, it's, it's a, an ingredient technically of, of, of, of the plant. It's called cannabid oil. Cbd. And secondly, which most people probably know about it is the thc, which I'm going to try and pronounce this. It's the tetrahydrocannabinol, which makes. So also you have a legal limit which is generally 0.2% is the allowed limit. I heard rumors they're going to climb that less. But we only take products where it's virtually zero. I mean, you're not going to get high from these products. And you can't over, really over. So they say you can't really overdose on cbd. You're not going to drink a liter of it, are you? Unless you're stupid. But its effect is calming. The effect of CBD is it's strange enough, you have two inbuilt receptors in your brain. No one quite knows why you have them. It's the same euphoric state. I mean, I'll take a wild punt and say we've all been running before and we've had that second window. Mine's about after five yards now. But it's. You get your second wind and you're like, you feel really euphoric. I always thought it was the adrenal system, but it's not. It's the cannabinoid system or the endocannabinoid system. And that's what basically it gives you. It releases, you know, the receptors. The part of the cbd, the cannabinoid binds to the receptors and then you, it pumps itself around your body and has various pain. You know, it can help with pain, it can help with anxiety, it can help with, with tremors. It's great with Tourette's and different, different carriers, I. E. You have it in hemp or you could have it in coconut. Work in slightly different ways. The cannabid oil would always work the same way. But the carrier itself, the. The mct, which is called coconut, is really good for physical pain. Pulled muscles, you know, ligament damage, recovery. Basically it's very good for. Can I ask you then to move on to. I like the areas of the mind that you've gone into and especially Carriers. And that's such a vast subject. And I've been listening to the Power of Belief by Bruce Lipton. If you've not read that book, everybody should listen to it. It's such a powerful, amazing book talking about receptors and intellig receptors and so on. And people are now turning to new ways of dealing with anxiety, stress. Does it help with depression? Well, do you know? Yeah. Okay, so we're not allowed like any sweeping medical statements when it comes to cbd. You're just not allowed to do so. So what we have to say is that in some cases it is shown to work, but the problem always is the same. Same is you can pop into something like Holland and Barrett and you'll have 20 different brands on the shelf. Don't know what carrier to choose, what percentage to choose, how much to take or when to take it. Yeah, no one can tell you. So a lot of people are going in, trying it, you know, they're like, oh, I don't know what it's. I'm going to buy the cheapest one, which is very low, very low level, like 2%. And you know, body mass, sex, metabolic system, you know, it's all counts towards what you should be taking, the levels you should take. So a. It's first is finding the right combination. Definitely hemp for the brain. You know, it's great. It's great for sleeping problems. And sleeping problems are one of the things that evolve, I'm sure, you know, into other issues later, like stress and then anxiety. I believe a lot of it comes some sleep problems or they're mixing together. I know so many people that can't sleep have stress and anxiety. Well, that puts you in a state of crisis, doesn't it? In itself? Absolutely. How can you function anyway and think straight? If you're always tired, you know, and the body's always stressed anyway, then naturally. And how. And it's non addictive. Yeah, it's non addictive. Again, it's as I said to you, it's just like myself, as you know, I'm not anorexic by any means. The imagination. I'm a big. I'm a big fella, you know, I'm six, two. What am I, eight and a half stone? So I need to take 10% and I take it at night, which is when you should be taking it. Because there's a big misunderstanding with. Even vitamins is the same theory. People get up in the morning, they take their medication or they take their vitamins and immediately the body's looking for sustenance, looking for energy. Yeah. Grab the vitamin. It's going to use them in a different way. It's not going to use them for the purpose they need to be used for. Right. But if you take everything at night, when your body's relaxed and the body's healing itself, this is the best time to take anything. Yeah. And CBD especially, because it will go around the body will help. It will calm the whole system down. You know, it's perfect for muscular issues that are from the brain. I'm talking about tremors and, you know, epilepsy. It works for, it works for Tourette's, it'll work for Parkinson's. You know, it's not, it's not a cure. So you, you do CBD oil at night and then your coffee in the morning. Yeah. Or you would back it up because if you're on a high dosage. Yeah. It can impair you slightly. Yeah. High dosages by logic, of course. But if you need to function during the day for your job, then you just top it up with a. When there's patches now you can just stick a patch on it's slow release over eight hours. Okay. Just gives you that, it just gives you that painkilling experience as well. Because you know, as well as I know taking vast amounts of ibuprofen or, or coco, dry mall or anything of these will ruin your liver in the long run. It's going to ruin your body. I don't, I'm not. You know, I think everyone knows this is not pretend. You cannot keep taking synthetic materials your whole life and get away with it. You know, you've got to come off at some point and look for alternatives. Because as I'm sure everyone who's been in pain continuously, you end up taking more and more and more because your body just gets used to it and then it doesn't actually work in the way it should work and they keep swapping you around on different painkillers and so on and so forth. So I've worked with a lot of people in pain and I've given them the right combination and actually they're pretty stable now. Yeah. And I think it's something that you've pointed out a couple of things. One is that people get. The body gets used to. To taking certain medication. But secondly, I think it's also, when you take it, it's that the body also gets used to being awake. It forgets that it can sleep, so you have to re. Negotiate, almost renegotiate with your body that it's okay to sleep now. Well, and I think, I think the, one of the, one of the simplest things is everyone is addicted to their phones or their iPads and it basically the brain doesn't understand that it's not sunlight. Yeah. And it will not release the chemical copy. What is now as a chemical gets released to help you sleep. And it will not release it because you're looking at a screen, a lit screen. But also we've got the circadian model, this is internal circadian sleep pattern is longer than our 24 hour pattern. So if somebody, they did a, they showed this on television. But it's commonly known that if we were to live through our own pattern and our own sleep pattern, we wouldn't have a 24 hour clock, we would have a 26 or a 27 hour clock. So we now have to train ourselves and using CBD potentially can help us retrain ourselves. And I think discipline, it's almost like you've got to discipline yourself. And they do say if you're in stress, get up, make your bed, get up at the same time, even if you don't do the work, get up, get up early as if you're going to work and go to bed at the same time. Yes. You know, when you're working. Just coming back to the point of natural healing agents, I also know that people are turning to things like ketamine to help them. And I just like the fact that you've given a caveat, a warning that everything you take, whether it's medical on this intensity is to, it's got to be done under the correct supervision. Because I do know somebody who took medicine, you know, ketamine through a doctor who was an anesthetist and he shouldn't have taken it. It wasn't, it was prescribed correctly through a medical doctor, but not with a therapist or a psychiatrist. So you know, there's different agencies, different people you need to judge and help you through your mental health issues. Well, the psychedelics, I mean they've been proven now that one of the mushrooms is now they're micro dosing on them. Certain people with a lot of mental health issues. And also DMT is the latest one they're now looking at. Yeah. Because most of it is, it's a, I mean it's a quite a natural product, most of these, to be honest. They are, I mean the way that they're produced, however, you know, you know, it's. But it's infused into natural ways is what I'm saying. Because I've looked into that but I mean, you know, CBD for me in varying a waste. But you've got. It's a bit of a Maya now that there's so many products out there offering up so many things that people look at. Do I have a gummy? Do I take the oils? Do I have a patch? Do I have a pill, Do I have a drink? And I've seen recently one of the Dragon's Den is talking about your specially designed vitamin. And what people again don't realize is that if you take your specially designed vitamins today and for the week and then for the month, by the end of the month you'll need different vitamins. You'll need different, I mean, you know, sort of, you know, bio because you've topped it up, but you don't know how much because you're not really gauging your body effectively consistently. But if we're talking about what do we do without any of these. I do like the fact that we do occasionally and we do need things to help us because, you know, and the more natural I think what we're realizing, the more natural the better. But what do you do? Do you have self talk, Julia? Do you have something when you're feeling at the end of your tether and you know you're meant to be dealing with things and everything's got on top of you. Have you got a scenario that that's happened where you haven't got people to answer their phones or it's not going in the right way, you can't get people to respond to you? At what point do you get to the end of your tether and how do you get yourself out of that scenario? Well, for me, you know, I love nature and so, you know, my, my first step is to walk. And so that's what the one thing. But I have to do it on my own. I don't know why I can't go with somebody else and bring that because that just brings my stress with me. Okay, so I have to go for a walk and then usually because I'm out in, in space, I can then digest what it is I need to do next and maybe put it in some kind of form that. And the second thing I do is I learned a very long time ago to meditate and, and I find that very, very therapeutic. Like Simon was saying, I always, I tend to do it at night before I go to bed just, just for 15, 20 minutes. And then maybe if I wake up and I'm still, you know, a bit you know, in the, in the zone. Then I will do for 15, 20 minutes in the morning and it does again, it makes a huge difference to how I then deal with my day. How so coming to meditation, which I've, I used to meditate an awful lot, but I found what I found a little bit annoying when I was doing it. And so I'm not a big meditator, I'm a visualizer. So I do like visualization as opposed to just because I was told that you've got to free your mind. And my mind was constantly busy and then I realized you don't have to free your mind. You can allow all the questions to come in. You don't have to empty your mind. So how do you get, how do you do your meditation? Well, I tend to stick to guided meditations because a little bit like you, otherwise it's just, I feel like, you know, they say, oh, it's a cloud and you know, you know, just, just don't, don't worry about the cloud. But I can't help it. I'm like, what's in the clouds? I found that actually guided meditations worked for me and I've got my favorites. I've got 10. And I've, you know, talking about phones. I mean, although I don't take my phone to bed or they, you know, they're on, you know, they're on YouTube or whatever, the ones that I like. And there's definitely some really good apps out there. But yeah, I now listen to, to somebody telling me what to do rather than having to think, oh, you know, I've just got to get rid of that, that I do when I'm out walking. Yeah. So how do you de. Stress yourself? What do you use? Simon, what's your self talk? What's the crisis situations? I, I, I've always used spa, sauna and steam and you know, I go to the gym. I've gone quite a lot. I mean I trained a lot over the years as you know, for various things but like, you know, like everyone else got a bit out of shape during the lockdown. I'm back where I'm better now and I'm more driven to go where I want and I use that as my shape. I just like sitting in, you know, I lived in SPA country for 10 years, so I quite, I just love sitting in that sauna or steam and feeling warm, you know, and just, just, just getting my breathing and my heart rate as calm as possible. And I just, I just, you know, the body's not Stressing. I mean, I'm. I used to booze a bit, you know, because you can always turn to the booze. Yeah. I found. I mean, I can go three weeks without having a drink. You know, I, I find it's probably not the best thing for me now because I can never just drink one glass of wine. But what, what is it that pushes you to the edge? What is the part of the business? Well, I think it's not just one thing. Yeah. Just a multitude of things coming together for the perfect storm. Okay. Because at the moment, you know, there's so many things. It's like you've got to kind of try and control people around you that are in your business to a point. You've got to let them have their heads, obviously. You've got to let them. You know, a bird will never sing if you don't let it fly. But no one, unless it's your business, no one quite sees it the same way as you do when it's your own baby. Almost want of a better word. So you're always like chasing people around or if, if stocks late come in or the post office balls up the delivery or. And it can just be a culmination. Not one thing won't make me run around. I just don't see the point. But it can be a culmination. It's a number of things all at the same time. At the same time. And then it will just stress me and I'll just have get to get up and go for a walk because then I want to start shouting at people. I know, I know when I've hit my point because I'll, I'll just become obstinate and because I just, I just can't take any more information. So yeah, it's to get out, walk out the door, go and grab a walk out, go get coffee, rain or shine, come back, take a breath and I'm, I'm in a better place straight away. And what pushes you, Julia, my buttons is money mostly, you know, like Simon says, is, you know, when it's. Certainly when it's new and, and, and even when it was brand new, I never thought, I never even thought about how much it was going to cost. Yeah. I just didn't, didn't even think about it because I could afford the first bits and the second bits and the third bits, setting up the company, etc. Etc. And then suddenly it was like, okay, well where are you going to find, where are you going to find the £4,000 you need to get the boxes done. Yeah, you know, it's little things like that. And then, you know, I mean, obviously, you know, that I've, I've got a. I have another business with my other half. And so in the end, you know, we, we decided to, to, to do something together in terms of the money. So. But yeah, money's definitely my, my stress. Definitely. And money is such a big driver in business. Of course it is, because, you know, when you develop, people are interested. That's where it comes down to, isn't it? You know, I own the business, but which part of it am I going to sell? How do I sell it even to a partner? How do you do the deal in the partnership? You know, are you making enough money? So a lot of the conversations are about money. So how now that you've got to that point and over that point, how do you deal with it? How did you get to a point where you were going to accept sharing? How did I get. I don't think it was okay. I don't think it was a case of, you know, all. I just, I needed to, I needed to ask for that help. I needed, you know, to, to, to let somebody know that I was struggling. Yeah. If you like, because I was doing it all on. I wasn't doing it on my own because I did have people to talk to. But, you know, and certainly my other half has been brilliant. But, but it is really hard to actually say to somebody, somebody help me. Yeah, it really is. It's because they, you don't want to seem like a failure in any way, shape or form. You know, you, you want it to be a joy thing, you know, things. Yeah. And that you actually, you can cope with absolutely anything because you've done it before, certainly when you were younger, you know, things come your way and you've just dealt with them and bounced off. But, you know, you get a little bit older. Certainly for me, as I got a little bit older, older, it actually then became more of an issue for me in terms of asking for, for help. Definitely. And that in its own way brought its own stress. And then in the end, you know, obviously being a girl, you know, I'm not saying all, but being a girl, in the end, it ends up in tears. And then it's, what's the matter? You know, what can I have? What, you know, other people around you then saying, what can we do to help you? And then, of course, then suddenly you find there's a wealth of people who, you can, you know, again, you know, click into the bank the, you know, I'm taking out a loan or, you know, just. Just in general or, you know, okay, we can go down this road. We can go down this road. What would you like to do? You suddenly got choices again. Yeah, I'll come to you, Simon, in a minute. Just to take on that point of. About the female aspect of business, because it's not. It's only been recently that women have been given any real support in business. When I started in 83, it didn't even a. Didn't occur to me that I was a woman in business, that aspect. I just thought I was going to run the comedy clubs and that's that. I learned. I learned the game of business. And I say it's a game because you absolutely have to know the rules of every step of the way. And it's quite fascinating to. But was I sidelined because I was a woman? There's no question. I was sidelined because I was a woman. And was it done deliberately? Absolutely not. Was it because people didn't like me? Definitely not. But there were just. Were not that many women in business to turn to. So when in the early 2000s, when men used to go off. And this absolutely happened all the time when. And the men used to go off to strip clubs after, you know, events, from one business school event to another sort of meeting, the men used to go to strip clubs. I used to think, well, why do I want to go to strip club? Because I see the girls in the gym anyway, you know, in the changing room, in the gym. That's not my thing. So I used to go home to the kids. And a lot of women have other things on their mind by the end of the day. So going to that club where you continue the relationship, a didn't happen. B, also when we weren't geared in the same way to have that competitive nature. And I'm not saying I'm not competitive, because I am. And I'm sure anybody in business has a certain amount of competitive nature in them, but we're not competing to win always, which I think business and men in business understand, they just get it because that's how they were brought up in all their sort of sports and everything. And the whole interaction of banter and so on happens a lot more amongst men. And now I'm saying now, you know, sort of it's very much more acceptable that women are in business. But there still has the. I still have a beef that women are still not paid the same. And I was told that I couldn't get a loan from the bank unless I went in with my then, you know, now ex into his account, although it was my company that was made the money and he came into my company. But so there were these sort of obstacles that I had to come overcome, which demeans your own sense of self worth and your ability to make decisions and so on, because you're put on the back burner even though it's your company. Do you feel that now? Yes. Yeah, absolutely. And actually just, you know, a very short story. When I went to open my bank account for, you know, for Jouels puppets, of course they were, you know, I went in with my other half and they were like, no. Oh, is it going in your husband's name? No, really, it's my business, you know, so I would like it to have my name on the business, you know. Yeah. And. And for it to say exactly what it is. And with me, my other half is not involved in any way, shape or form. And I found that quite hard to, you know, and not get angry about it at the time, you know. Yeah, it's systemic. It's still systemic. Yeah. I'm glad we raised that. But it needs to be addressed and I think there's more to be done about that. But let's talk about keeping focus on your goals and also, how do you keep focus on your goals, Simon, and accept criticism. Do you accept criticism or do you go, this is my business, I'll do it my way? I don't care what you say. You're a fool if you don't listen to people. People, number one, whether you, whether you take in what they say, but you should always listen. I mean, there's always, there's knowledge technically is free and, you know, and. But what I've learned just to hit the point of what you. A little bit of what you're talking about before is I tend to work with more women because I just find them more professional, more driven and more open. It's just my opinion. And I also like people from different backgrounds, as you know, from the wrestling industry. The wrestling industry. Everyone kind of sneakers about it. But it's a money making. I'm sure billionaire Vince McMahon will take your. Laughing, funny. You know, it's an entertainment industry and it's about who makes money. It doesn't. You know, we've had this thing with transgender in the wrestling thing. People are. But if they make money, who gives a damn? Because it's about making money. There's nothing more important in the wrestling world than making Money. You make me money. I'm very happy. I don't care. At what point, then? At what point do you sacrifice your business integrity for making money? And I think this is a question that everybody in business has to question. I had to do it. You do it. I'll ask you in a minute, Jules. But what about you, Simon? Well, obviously we've. What I'm selling, I can't really do that because I'm on that almost on the cusp of coming across as a. Almost like a medical product, even though it's not. Yeah, it's still a food. But it's got to have integrity behind it. I can't. Do you know what I mean? It's got to be correct. And who decides that? Me. You make that decision. So have you got that lose money then? Yeah. So you've got that written down in stone. That's almost part of the DNA of the company. Yeah, it's got to be correct. Everyone who works with us from the. From the. From the sales team up has to. Has to have integrity and do it the correct way. We're not in this to win this for the long haul. If you start out correctly and carry on on that pathway, you know, there are things that can go wrong, but, you know, you've just got to go. I mean, you've got to go for it. I've worked in a couple of very dubious places in the past, and I've walked away from a lot of money, and I mean a lot of money, because I just didn't want to. Didn't want to deal with it. Didn't want to deal with the rubbish that went alongside it. And I was not putting up with it. And exactly what you were talking about, strip clubs and all that rubbish. Exactly that. And then. Yeah, and again, I'm not gonna go into it, but it's just something I don't want to be part of. I don't. I've never liked anything like that before. I don't find it amusing. I don't find this whole male egotistical stuff. Good. I like people with integrity and open sort of answers, you know? Yeah, that's perfect. And Jules, you know, how do you view your business? You know, because it's already showing signs of success. You're opening doors to all sorts of stores, and I think it's such a great idea. So at what point do you think you might make a change or what will be loose in your business and what is tight then? What will you not compromise on? Well, you know, for me I'm dealing with children and you know, as my base level and I'm dealing with the mums who are actually the best critics in the world. And you know, they, they, you know, they, they run their lives and they, they do jobs and they look after their kids and, and you know, I think women are amazing. So integrity is a really. It's one of those words, isn't it? It gets bandied around a lot. And I think that at the end of the day you just have to have an ethic to say, no, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna go to fall on any of the pitfalls of starting a new business. And if anybody's out there and they want some help, they can call me. Because there are, you know, I mean in either of your work, in anybody's work, you can do sort of things that are unethical, there's no question. And eventually, you know, sort of you can sell your delicacies. Soul to the devil. The Faustian move that they talk about a lot more now in music than they ever have before. You know, how do you do that? But I think if it's kept within the brand, that's why I like the idea of a brand. What is your brand? Who are you? And I do think what you said, Giules. There is a checklist actually for most people, if they understood where to look. I don't know whether they do that very well on television. They don't do it terribly well and I don't think they do it terribly well in business schools because I think they focus on the model and the money making model. And I think they must be suffering at the moment because they now have to create new money making models after what we've gone through. I think there is no one place, Maria, that's the problem. There's no one place to go. There's no directory like you were saying earlier. There's, you know, the banks are doing it, the universities, but there's no, there's no, you know, one place where you think actually I will be able to get that information from that point. Like that is with the government, uk, you know, so, you know, you put a few words in and usually you can get the help that you need. Yeah. Or companies house where you register your company. Yes. You know where to go. You know exactly where to go. Yes. Let's move on to. I want to discuss quickly global businesses and leadership in that respect, but also your own approach to leadership. Simon, what about global businesses that are now beyond the people's Wildest expectations that we can see. They're trillionaires. They have got so much money. Not only over here, you had Jack Ma in China. You've got all sorts of people making Bezos and, you know, Musk all making phenomenal amounts of money. Are they true leaders? Do you like them? Do you like business people being leaders? Well, unfortunately, what always tends to happen with these people, the more money they get, the more power they get, and the more they think. You can tell you how to live your lives. And, you know, you got people. I'm not, you know, Bill Gates and I say Bezos and I suppose, Steve Jobs to a point at the start, then telling you, you've got to be green and you've got to do this when they've just polluted everything themselves to get where they are. And that's a fact. You know, they don't. They don't give a damn about the working person. As far as I concerned. They're too far removed from the working person, you know, because they've. They've got untold amounts of managers and directors and, you know, they don't make the decisions. And he doesn't deserve what he gets. But as an example, Bezos, as far as I remember, he wanted to take the nappy market on Amazon, and it cost him something like a hundred million dollars in losses to wipe out all the competition. I mean, it's open. You can't see for yourself. I'm not making it up to wipe them out and take the nappy market open on Amazon. That's the kind of man, allegedly, I'll use that word. He is, I think, power, corrupt. And it always has done, you know, and it's like, what right have you, Mr. Bezos, got to tell anybody? I mean, you know, we all know there's a. You know, everyone's got a little dark side to themselves, as we're finding out with other people now, aren't we? For sure. And as I say, you know, you're not dealing with them, are you? You're dealing with the people that run each department now. Well, yes and no. I mean, it's down. I believe that. And I'll come back to you shortly, Jules. But I do believe that people can control more of this type of thing if they can be bothered to control it. I was always told off for micromanaging, and I like micromanaging. Not everything. I don't want to do the accounts. I want to just oversee the accounts. Yeah, there's definitely things you should oversee. Accounts. Customer, your customer facing for me, it had to be the shows. I had to make sure the shows were always correct, that they were, had value. So there's certain things you have to oversee and I do think we do. As you say, you give it to somebody else who decides on your behalf, under your name, potentially what they're going to do and they do not care. And that's what you're saying. Simon, what about you? What do you think about leadership and global leadership in business? Jules? Well, for me, I mean, the reason that the big, the big boys, the Amazon, the Googles of the world is because they've got lots of little people helping them make it successful. But also on the opposite side of that, they've also, they are making successful entrepreneurs now, even if it's only like Simon was saying, even if it's just in the nappy world, you know, they're making those people, those smaller businesses bigger and better by what they're doing. So, you know, you're right, they don't, you know, I don't think they, they care about us per se, if you like. But I do think that at the end of the day there's, there's something to be said for them because again, it's somewhere to go. It's that knowing where to go to make, you know, to put your brand on, to make it a success, how much time and effort you put into that. So, Jules, here we are. Flip forward five years, you're now super successful. Yeah. You've got loads of money, as Harry Enfield used to say with one of his characters, loads of money. What sort of leader would you be? I think, you know, obviously being on here today, it has really opened my eyes to the fact that, you know, my challenges, which were not that long ago, you know, and even, even through lockdown, was opening this new, new thing that I'd never done before. So in five years time, I can see me maybe doing training or, you know, and then, you know, obviously telling them why, why, you know, using why a lot rather than, you know, and to be themselves and to be authentic and to not be, be worried about failing. And would you like to have a global impact? You never know that. There's one little girl at the moment who's talking about climate change and look at her, she, you know, she's making a difference and that's. She is being subsidized, isn't she? Yes. You know, money makes the world go round. Yes. So how would you use your money? Hopefully for the best, hopefully for good things, you know, like they, I Mean, you know, the people on the television where they're given, you know, thousands and thousands of pounds and their expertise, you know, that would be. I'd be. If I could get enough money, I'd do that. Fantastic. And what about you, Silent? You're now super successful with your products, I think. I think the European market is my place because it's. Because I. I know them. I lived out in Europe for 12 years. I know various countries. I can speak quite a few languages. You know, I think that Europe is the place. You don't need to go any further afield than that. For now, anyway. I'm more. I'm more intent if I've got money, as even now is that I try to invest in people, try to bring people in, but they say I kind of mold it as it's. If they come in with. Coming with us, it becomes partly their business in their country to give them because they need to feel invested in something so they identify with it and they own it. A bit like John Lewis. It becomes a partnership. Yeah. You know, I actively always looking for people who are interested in. In sort of the wellness sector and the coffee sector especially. I mean, the two massive markets. And I've got a good product, as you know, and I'm doing pretty well with them now, but I'm always, you know, I want to work with interesting, entrepreneurial, driven people, but I do stipulate they still got their own life. And I won't let them. I'm not going to let them work 18 hours a day. I'm just not going to have it. You know, there's a way, a right way and a wrong way to do things. Yeah. I sometimes make enough money to live. I'd rather just make enough money. And that's where I'm happy. I don't really care for my good working ethics, that is. Yeah, I sometimes quite like working well. It's like when the show goes on, there's certain times if you're in the theater and you're doing the Puppies, Jules. But if you're in the theater, you have to work long hours to get the show on the road, and then you can take a break. And that's my modus operandi. Yeah. So I do things like, oh, I've got to get this done. I'll spend all my time doing that, and then I can take it easy once it's done. So what is the weakness you're going to work on, Jules? That. Because unfortunately, having for many, many years, you know, done late nights because I was in the property industry when I decided to do this something different. I did give myself the permission to finish at 6:00'. Clock. But I think, like you say, sometimes it's, you know, you can't just. You can't just finish at 6:00'. Clock. You have to, you have to move forward and maybe finish at 8 and then take a couple of hours off the next day. But I am finding that extremely difficult. Yeah, I think it is hard. What about you, Simon? What's your. I think for myself, it's really the lockdown made me try to do 500 things at the same time because you always look at different avenues. It's just to really focus on working more with people now, you know, and sharing more responsibility with people and bringing people in. Like I said, just very quickly. If anyone wants to see, they can go to Sublime, see CBD store on Instagram or sublimecbdstore.com they can have a nose at the product. But, you know, if anyone's, if anyone's feeling entrepreneurial, you know, contact me for either or and have a chat because I'm always looking for interesting people, you know, you know what I'm like. I like quirky people because I think they're more. They come up with great ideas. They're more, you know, they're more, you know, they're more driven, aren't they? I mean, some of the conversations we've had in the past and we, you know, and they will come to fruition one day. We know that. Yeah. You know, when the times are right for sure. Well, some people just don't want to take on the role of running their own business. Yeah, that's fine. So what was the thing that you didn't expect, Jules? What didn't I expect? I didn't expect people not to be there when I, when I wanted to get in touch with them. Good points. That scoffered me a little bit and it's slowed things down, but, you know, I've just. The whole joy of bringing something to life for children was really my driving force. But it was my. It was, you know, through my grandchildren that I got involved in this. And it has actually brought me and them a lot of joy. And that's, you know, that's enough for me right now. And what about you? What was unexpected for you? Two parts to that one is, you know, unexpected circumstances, the COVID and a lot of the rubbish that's gone around it. And still, in a way, it's very hard to, you know, you want to make plans but you're still a little hesitant even now. I think we had a conversation about this the other day. Do we take the risk? Because it could be ripped out from underneath you, but you still got to tentatively move forward. Yeah. So we're now going to finish. But I do know from our conversation today, our discussion, that you are both absolutely going to be super successful because not only with your integrity, your drive, but the quality which you oversee your products. It's definitely something everybody should get involved and everybody should buy. So thank you, Jules, Julia Piper and Simon Van Der Wolf. Wonderful names. And for me, Dr. Maria Kampinska. Thank you for joining youg Mind Matters.