Episode 30
How I became L2 and started hating meetings
I hate meetings. I hate them so much.
Which is very awkward for someone who runs multiple businesses and technically needs them to function as an adult.
In this episode I am unpacking why meetings make me irrationally angry even when they are useful, profitable, and with people I actually like. Why does my brain treat work like an interruption to my other work? Why do I get mad at my calendar for existing? And why do I wake up thinking I can cram 72 hours of tasks into an 8 hour day and then resent anyone who dares to speak to me?
Brains are weird. Bodies are weird. Doors are definitely weird.
Stuff that helps you become awesome even if you're different: https://stan.store/elletwo
My grown up job: https://lbeehealth.com/
Timestamped summary
00:00 "Losing L2: Rediscovering Identity"
05:35 Taking Back Power with elletwo.com
09:16 Reflecting on Productive Conversations
12:36 Doors, Narration, and Love
16:02 "Hyper Awareness of Doors"
16:53 "Awkward Doors and Thresholds"
Transcript
If you find me and I'm grumpy, it could be a lot of things.
Speaker:It's going to be awkward anyway, so make it more awkward, because that at
Speaker:least makes it fun. I hate
Speaker:meetings. I hate them so
Speaker:much. All right, here we go. I'm going to pretend I'm pushing record,
Speaker:because that feels right. Okay, I'm pressing record. Boop.
Speaker:Hi, everybody. I'm Lauren Howard. I go by L2.
Speaker:Yes, you can call me L2. Everybody does. It's a long story. It's
Speaker:actually not that long a story, but we'll say save it. So this is a
Speaker:question I get a lot, probably for very
Speaker:reasonable reasons, because I go by L2. I really
Speaker:don't care what people call me. Lots of people call me Lauren. Lots of people
Speaker:call me L2. If you call me L2, I will respond to it. That's kind
Speaker:of weird. Like, most adults don't go by a nickname that includes
Speaker:a number. Unless you're like, it's not a number, but unless you're like,
Speaker:Kesha Dollar Sign. And she doesn't even go by that anymore. She has evolved.
Speaker:So it is a little bit strange, which is fine. But I do love
Speaker:it. And I get asked how that started a lot.
Speaker:And there's the way it started, and then there's the way that a lot of
Speaker:people assume that it happened. And the way that
Speaker:people assume that it happened is actually very sweet, and I really enjoy it.
Speaker:But I say at the beginning of every podcast,
Speaker:that's another story for another day. So I guess today is that day, because I
Speaker:will tell you how I became L2. It's not that interesting, but there is a
Speaker:story about kind of agency and taking back your power that is kind of interesting.
Speaker:So I started at a job shortly after my dad died. I was the
Speaker:second Lauren on a team. So that really is, like, the
Speaker:whole story. I was the second Lauren on a team. There wasn't a whole lot
Speaker:to tell us apart with, and so they started calling us L1 and L2, and
Speaker:I became L2. I am still very close with L1. She
Speaker:has always been a part of my life. She will continue to be a part
Speaker:of my life. We were thrown together in the world's. One of the world's most
Speaker:bizarre situations, and it just stuck. And so to this
Speaker:day, she is somebody that I turn to when I need to be talked off
Speaker:the ledge. And same for her. L1 and L2 will always be
Speaker:a thing. And people to this day still call me
Speaker:L2. And I, you Know, often tell people
Speaker:to, first off, like, nobody forgets it. There's lots of Lauren
Speaker:Howards in the world. There are not a lot of L2s in this world. There
Speaker:was an L3 in Star wars, but that's different. So for five years,
Speaker:basically, everybody I worked with called me L2. A lot of our
Speaker:clients called me L2. And if you've been following
Speaker:me for a while, you know that I kind of left that job unceremoniously and
Speaker:had a lot of my identity wrapped up in it. I wasn't sure who I
Speaker:was without that job. I had been convinced prior that I was going to retire
Speaker:from that job. It was, like, a whole thing. And that part
Speaker:of the struggle that I had once I left was that I didn't know who
Speaker:I was. I didn't know what my identity was. I didn't know who I was
Speaker:allowed to be. I thought I was gonna have to give up this name
Speaker:that had been mine for so long. And it was like.
Speaker:It was a silly thing to be devastated by, considering the gravity of
Speaker:the whole situation. But it really did feel like they had now taken everything from
Speaker:me, including my name. It felt like that huge.
Speaker:And so it was a couple days after I left,
Speaker:and I was feeling my way through, and for some
Speaker:reason, that was, like, stuck in my head that this was a problem, and this
Speaker:was, you know, I wasn't going to ever get to be myself again. And actually,
Speaker:a colleague called, and then a former customer called, and both, when I
Speaker:answered the phone, said, hey, I'll do. And I was like, oh,
Speaker:I get to still be that person. Like, they're still going to call me that.
Speaker:They don't think that that's changed. And it felt like there was something that I
Speaker:got to keep. There was something from this really horrific experience with
Speaker:burnout and a toxic work environment and so much workplace trauma
Speaker:that was mine that I got to keep. So
Speaker:at that point, it flipped the switch in my brain, and I started. You know,
Speaker:once my brain turns on, I kind of have a tendency to start pushing buttons,
Speaker:because it's, like, my thing. I like to push buttons. I realized, no,
Speaker:I don't have to only be that person in that role. I may have learned
Speaker:lots of things in that role. I may have done a lot of important work
Speaker:in that role, but I am not only that person in that role. I have
Speaker:an identity that is independent of that role. And I can be this person,
Speaker:this Persona that I've become in this role as well as
Speaker:out of it. And so I Was like, okay, that's who I am. That's my
Speaker:name. They don't get to have that. I went online
Speaker:and playing around with different combinations of L2
Speaker:and bought L2.com once I figured out how to spell it and what it should
Speaker:look like and spelled it out, which probably most of you have seen now. E
Speaker:L L e t w o ell2.com. So I
Speaker:have my name, L2, and then I have my brand, L2, spelled differently.
Speaker:And one of the weird things is that I had basically,
Speaker:for the better part of a decade, actually longer than that, probably almost 15 years,
Speaker:used a work email as my primary
Speaker:email, which was stupid, by the way. Don't do that. But it. It just
Speaker:felt really important to me to be sending emails from
Speaker:a work domain to show it just. It felt very grown up.
Speaker:And even in my early 30s, apparently I needed that kind of confirmation.
Speaker:So part of the goal, because I had been sending
Speaker:emails to deal with the work separation and all of the paperwork and whatever,
Speaker:I'd been sending emails from my personal email, which felt like I
Speaker:didn't even have an email in my married name. My email was my
Speaker:maiden name because that was how infrequently I had used it since we had gotten
Speaker:married. And so just. I don't know why, but that particular thing made me feel
Speaker:so, like, small and insignificant. And so I went out and
Speaker:filed L2.com and I went and made
Speaker:Lauren2.com and then changed
Speaker:over all of the negotiations and the paperwork
Speaker:and the documents to my new email with what
Speaker:was kind of a tenuous, somewhat acrimonious
Speaker:situation. And all of those new emails came from
Speaker:requesting documents, asking for updates, et cetera. All of it came from
Speaker:lauren@l2.com, which I know they noticed, and they must have
Speaker:noticed, because who wouldn't notice that? That's a little weird. It was
Speaker:like taking back my power. It was like finding the pieces of that identity that
Speaker:I wanted to keep telling them they could have the rest. I don't want it.
Speaker:But this part I'm keeping, and you can't take it from me. And we are
Speaker:coming up on five years of buying that
Speaker:domain and becoming this
Speaker:company, organization, plan, whatever, l2.com and
Speaker:being able to send emails from my own name, the name that I
Speaker:picked, the name that I was given, the name that became my brand,
Speaker:the name that I built with my own hands over time,
Speaker:all of it@l2.com, which was
Speaker:my way of taking back everything that I
Speaker:felt had Been taken from me by making me feel small, by making me feel
Speaker:insignificant, by making me feel like I didn't belong, by showing me the
Speaker:meaning of what it means to call a woman. Difficult
Speaker:impact of that, all of it. It was all
Speaker:wrapped up in this one domain that I got to keep that was mine, and
Speaker:nobody else was gonna take it. And that's where it came from.
Speaker:So there is one thing that I have learned about my career that I don't
Speaker:think is ever gonna change. And I don't know if this is being a painful
Speaker:introvert. I don't know if this is being baseline,
Speaker:antisocial. I don't know. But I hate
Speaker:meetings. I hate them so
Speaker:much. Even if there is something I
Speaker:need to accomplish, even if it's a thing that
Speaker:I'm excited about, even if there's an opportunity to make
Speaker:money from the meeting, even. It doesn't matter.
Speaker:It doesn't matter. I hate them. Especially
Speaker:if it's a standing meeting. The first couple of times, I'll be great with it.
Speaker:And then, like, the third or fourth or sometimes fifth time,
Speaker:I can't do it. I just can't do it. I hate it. I start to
Speaker:feel trapped. I get angry that I have to attend. And
Speaker:so the other day, I was thinking about why. Because, like, I hate it until
Speaker:I'm on it. And then when I'm on it, it's fine. I will, like, avoid
Speaker:it and come up with every reason not to attend and be really,
Speaker:really miserable about it. Then I get on it, and it's fine. And it was
Speaker:never a problem. And it was never going to be a problem. I think I
Speaker:can remember, like, one time ever that I've been on it, it was a problem,
Speaker:or that, like, I had an actual issue and, like, had a visceral reaction to
Speaker:being on the call. For the most part, it's just, like, the buildup. And then
Speaker:when I'm on it, it's totally fine. But I was trying to think about it
Speaker:the other day because I had a couple of things in the afternoon, and I
Speaker:was so annoyed that there was anything on my schedule that afternoon. And, like, I
Speaker:run multiple businesses. I have to do work and stuff. And,
Speaker:like, the meetings are part of that work. But I realized
Speaker:that I get so frustrated when I have a lot to do and my work
Speaker:distracts me from my work. It makes me so
Speaker:bad. I just have a list of things, and all I want to
Speaker:do is cross things off the list of things that I have to
Speaker:do, and I want to do it in
Speaker:organized fashion. And I want to feel productive. And if I have to stop what
Speaker:I'm doing and talk to your stupid face, then I don't get to get things
Speaker:done off of my list. And I live and die by my
Speaker:list. Now, mind you, I like the calls I
Speaker:go on almost every time I either meet someone nice, we work
Speaker:on something, we get something done, we come up with an idea, we finish an
Speaker:idea. I get information that I need. Like, they're always
Speaker:productive. It's not like I'm put on, you know, stupid
Speaker:things that don't require my attention. Like, it's not
Speaker:that. But I was trying to figure out last
Speaker:week why I was so annoyed that I had a bunch of
Speaker:people I had to talk to that day. And I was like, it doesn't have
Speaker:anything to do with the people I want to talk to them. Doesn't have anything
Speaker:to do with the topics or things I picked. It doesn't have anything to do
Speaker:with putting on pants, because I don't do that. Not hard
Speaker:pants, at least. It is the fact that my work is
Speaker:distracting me from my work and that is annoying to me.
Speaker:And I don't like it. And I just want to sit in a
Speaker:corner and be productive and cross things off my
Speaker:list and not have to be distracted
Speaker:by anything, including my actual job.
Speaker:And so if you find me and I'm grumpy, it could be a lot
Speaker:of things. First off, feed me. That's usually it. But then if
Speaker:that doesn't work, just know that there's a
Speaker:likelihood that I. Not even that I'm in the middle of talking to people.
Speaker:Because when I'm in the middle of talking to people, I'm great. But there's a
Speaker:likelihood that I have to talk to someone at some point. And that
Speaker:means that I am not going to be able to accomplish the inhumane number
Speaker:of things that I put on my list that day. That's another really important point.
Speaker:There is never a possibility that any human being, even somebody
Speaker:who is hyper productive like I am, there is no possibility that anybody is ever
Speaker:finishing all the things on my list. It is not like
Speaker:I'm not getting enough work done because I have this phone call. I was
Speaker:never getting that work done. I wake up in the morning and I'm
Speaker:like, I could probably do 72 hours of work in the next
Speaker:eight. That's probably reasonable, right? I have a time turner.
Speaker:It's fine. I can do this. I'm literally mad
Speaker:that you're distracting me from the things that I was never going to be able
Speaker:to get done. Never. I was never going to be able to get it done.
Speaker:But that's not how my brain feels like you are taking me away from very
Speaker:important things for other very important things that I need to be doing.
Speaker:Anyway. Brains are weird. Friends. Brains are weird.
Speaker:And now we'll go to Alison, who has this week's
Speaker:small talk. I never know how to navigate a door. When someone
Speaker:else approaches it at the same time, I want to be polite
Speaker:and hold it for them. How do you do that? If you're
Speaker:approaching at the same pace and will arrive at the exact
Speaker:same moment unless you run ahead and try. To open it, but then it looks.
Speaker:Like you're being rude and obstructive. Or if you're partway through the door
Speaker:and neither of you really notices each other until you're kind of in
Speaker:the doorway and the door opens in. And now you
Speaker:what? Push past them to hold the door and ease the rest of the way,
Speaker:Reach your arm up over their head and hold it while looming over them. Maybe
Speaker:that's just a me scenario because I'm a damn Amazon. Do some kind of tuck
Speaker:and roll to prevent awkward groping. And do your best to
Speaker:look less weird by swinging the door open gallantly
Speaker:and grinning magnanimously. So I have to start by
Speaker:saying, whoever you are, I love you. Please, please
Speaker:come be the Morgan Freeman of my existence and just narrate my life
Speaker:with whatever energy that was. It's really important. So
Speaker:I actually have two answers to this. And I actually do have answers to this,
Speaker:which is wild, because I didn't realize that I have answers to this, but I
Speaker:do. Like, if you had asked me if I had positions on doors, I would
Speaker:be like, what? I do have one position on doors, which
Speaker:is that they should not be stupid expensive. Because one time we thought we needed
Speaker:to replace the front door in our house, and Kyle had some salesman
Speaker:come over to bring us, like, I don't know, door
Speaker:samples. I don't know how this works. Anyway, the guy was, like, showing
Speaker:us all of these, like, very fancy doors. I didn't know fancy
Speaker:doors were a thing. I was just like, I want it to look like the
Speaker:one that it does. And I wanted to close and lock and, like, stay locked.
Speaker:Those are my requirements for a door. Anyway, bro wanted,
Speaker:like, $8,000 for a front door,
Speaker:and I was like, will it raise my children? What makes a
Speaker:door $8,000? Or like, we're not talking about
Speaker:a castle. We're not talking about a fortress. We are talking about my
Speaker:suburban house. So I have thoughts on expensive
Speaker:doors. But on navigating doors I also have thoughts.
Speaker:So my approach to this is very similar to
Speaker:my approach to almost everything, which is it's going to be awkward anyway. So
Speaker:make it more awkward because that at least makes it fun. Just
Speaker:like acknowledge the fact that this is awkward. Do
Speaker:whatever. I tend to be the one who always holds the door open and I
Speaker:will explain why I grab doors all the time. I'm like super
Speaker:aware of where doors are and if they're closing too fast and if there's somebody
Speaker:in it, there actually is a reason for that. And so I tend
Speaker:to be the one who grabs the door. There are lots of times where
Speaker:gentlemen making an attempt to be chivalrous will like stand behind me
Speaker:and be like, nope, you go first. And that, that does happen fairly frequently. And
Speaker:usually I'll just be like, oh, thanks and go. Or I'll say, no, you go,
Speaker:because I'm waiting for somebody or something. But like, it is a
Speaker:universally awkward situation. Even for the
Speaker:smoothest, most put together of people, it
Speaker:is 100% an awkward situation. I think the only difference
Speaker:is that like most people forget after they've had the
Speaker:experience that it was an awkward experience until the next time you end up in
Speaker:that situation. Whereas this appears to be a thing that is popping up
Speaker:again and again in your existence and it's bothering you, which really kind of
Speaker:tells me everything I need to know. But it is like, just acknowledge that
Speaker:it's awkward. Just be like, I'm going to grab this. Or if
Speaker:you do rush ahead of them to grab the door and you stop and hold
Speaker:it open for them, like they'll get it. Sometimes they'll stop and say you first.
Speaker:And then you can make a decision as to whether you're actually going to go
Speaker:first. It is a universally awkward experience and there is
Speaker:no way to resolve that. It's not like when you get to a stop
Speaker:sign, a four way stop. And like there's actually a rule on who goes first
Speaker:in that situation. We don't have that for doors. There's no door laws.
Speaker:You just have to figure it out. And so just do what's
Speaker:nice. Assume the person maybe could use some
Speaker:help. Hold open doors for people. Be
Speaker:aware of where doors are behind you and the
Speaker:maximum of 10 awkward seconds that you're gonna have
Speaker:navigating, traversing that doorway with another human being.
Speaker:So you can handle 10 seconds of awkwardness in a door. But
Speaker:I will say that I think I knew this, but I haven't really
Speaker:processed it for a while. But I am hyper aware of doors as well
Speaker:as door mats and where, like, how doors swing
Speaker:open and close. But that's because of my dad, because he had
Speaker:ambulation issues for a long time and he actually tripped in a lot of those
Speaker:situations and fell, like, traversing
Speaker:threshold. And so I became really, really
Speaker:super aware of, like, every time we were walking through a
Speaker:door with a threshold, if the threshold was raised, if there was a place that
Speaker:he could trip, if somebody wasn't holding the door, if the door was going to
Speaker:close too quickly and hit him. Like, it literally. It's part of the reason why
Speaker:I always hold doors to this day, because my
Speaker:brain is so trained to hold open the doorway and make sure all the disabled
Speaker:people get through the doorway. And I'm not using, like, disabled flippantly. Like,
Speaker:literally the disabled people needed to get through the doorway safely. I mean, I have
Speaker:very distinct memories of him falling in multiple doorways,
Speaker:either because, like, a rug came up or because there was a threshold that wasn't
Speaker:well marked or, you know, he had poor vision. And so we
Speaker:were always looking out for things that were, like, not even places he could trip.
Speaker:And so I am hyper aware of doorways
Speaker:and thresholds that could become problematic. But
Speaker:back to your original question. Doors are awkward, and so
Speaker:just lean into the awkward.
Speaker:As a beverage goblin, I always have multiple drinks on my
Speaker:desk. Some of them I need to throw out because they're from yesterday. Some
Speaker:of them are in the way that we do. One for
Speaker:caffeine, one for flavor, and one for hydration. And for some reason,
Speaker:they always sit there. And my lack of
Speaker:depth perception tells me every time that I can definitely
Speaker:swing the arm out without touching the drinks. The number
Speaker:of times that I have gone from podcast recording to
Speaker:steam cleaning my carpet because I
Speaker:have terrible depth perception. It's a pretty high number. It's a
Speaker:borderline embarrassing number.
