From NASA Scientist to Holistic Healer: Mayim Vega's Transformative Journey

Confessions 2.15.25 Mayim Vega
===

[00:00:00] Welcome to Confessions of a Terrible Leader, where real leaders share the raw truth about the lessons they learned the hard way so you don't have to. Join our host, Laci Nelson, founder of Transcend Leadership Collective and former Terrible Leader. On this podcast, we invite you to step into the confessional and get real with the messy stories and behind the scenes reality of leadership.

Let's get to it. Hello, listeners, and welcome back to Confessions of a Terrible Leader. I'm your host and former terrible leader herself, Laci Nelson. I want to welcome Mayim Vega to the show. Welcome. Hello. Hi Laci. I am really looking forward to getting to know you. Your background is fascinating in its diversity.

So listeners, to give you a little synopsis, Mayim's career, it ranges from working at NASA in computer science. to holistic life [00:01:00] coach to entrepreneur and raising nine children. Did I get that right? Yeah, nine now. Yep. Yep. Raising nine children and a whole bunch of things. I didn't even begin to encapsulate in that.

Welcome. But Mayim, thank you for being here. Welcome to the show. I can barely wait to dig in and start to understand your journey in the process that brought you to where you're at today. So thank you for being here. Absolutely. And I love your podcast title, Confessions of a Terrible Weedle. It's like, ah, my goodness.

Right? Who could not relate to that? If you can't relate, the show is not for you. So I can't even begin to imagine. Can you break down for us? What was it like in NASA? Was that the stepping stone or the launch pad? For the rest of where you're at now? Give us the breakdown. I want to learn all about you.

Well, actually, through college, I was a telemarketer and I was a waitress. So I would say those were the stepping stones. I learned a lot of lessons in those professions, you know, especially how to deal with people. Because as a [00:02:00] computer scientist, I didn't deal with that many people. It was like me and my programming team.

There was four of us, and then we'd get together with the bigger team, which was maybe 12 of us or something like that. And then we'd get together for these big NASA events. where we'd have a cool scientist giving us his latest theories and things like that. I think confessions of a terrible leader, everything that you need to confess about really is what has made you great.

You know, the fact that you've overcome it. Yes. That's what makes you a great leader. Right. You can't be a great leader, in fact, unless you are first a terrible leader, I believe. I agree with you. The biggest learning comes in the mistakes, a million percent. So you started in your very first jobs, massive interaction with the public.

You were really interfacing with people all day long. What did you learn about human nature or what it's like to interface? I don't think there's anything that can replace waitressing as far as learning how to connect with people or learning about human nature. Under highly stressful situations, right?[00:03:00]

Yes! Actually, that's the best preparation for maybe motherhood. Honestly, I think the most stressful job that I've ever had is motherhood. Yeah. Not even entrepreneurship. Then you mix it together. Then it's like, Oh my goodness. I'd say my easiest job was as a computer scientist. Oh my, I love that. I'd say that's my most like relaxing job.

Yeah. It was research based. It wasn't corporate. So we weren't always under the gun to make money. We were more under the gun to help people, help research, help scientists, things like that. Yeah. It was a different kind of pressure which allowed for more creativity than brute force. Right. It's a different energy you bring to it.

Different energy. And also there wasn't the same kind of stresses. The stress was more like, how do I figure out this problem instead of how do I deal with difficult people, difficult children? How do I placate someone? You know, things like that. Okay. So if NASA was That's a nice relaxing job. What was the shift in your journey where you went, this [00:04:00] was great and now I'm ready for something different?

So I definitely don't regret any of my time at NASA or as a computer scientist, but I got married and then nine months later I had my first child and they had a great childcare program at NASA where I was able to go out of the security gate during my lunch period and breastfeed my baby. So that was really nice.

But I just felt innately that there was something strange about, you know, humans, the fact that we are the only animals in nature that have a child and then put that child in the care of other animals of our species for like eight hours, you know, for the majority of the day and then go back with them.

There's some mothers in nature who completely abandoned their young. And then there's also more natural is like, you know, when you raise up a child in like a pride or a herd. A community, a community, right? I felt like that was probably the ideal human way to raise children. And so I decided that I was going to stop working and do what I felt like was [00:05:00] best and most natural for my child.

So I started an entrepreneurial venture and I did mostly app development and website development and marketing for high tech companies. in the Silicon Valley, in cybersecurity, networking, things like that. It was a very kind of natural transition from computer science at NASA to working with high tech companies.

Yeah. That's why I did it. Two babies later, I had a newborn and a two year old, and then I had my business still. And then it was also just. Starting to get more stressful and I started getting really bad migraines, which I took, you know The the standard Tylenol and whatever over the counter right in the beginning and then at some point it stopped working And I was not able to work in my business anymore or take care of my children properly And then it got to the point where I couldn't even sleep anymore.

And that's when I decided, I asked my husband to rush me to the emergency room, really. And so, I thought I was going to die. I thought I was on my deathbed. I had never experienced that much pain. And I had given birth to two children naturally. It was worse than that. [00:06:00] And the doctor at first thought that I had a brain tumor.

But after, you know, a bunch of questions and tests, And a CT scan, she said that I don't have a brain tumor, thank God. Mm hmm. She also said that she didn't really have any answers for me and that I just had a really bad headache. And she gave me some Valium. Mm hmm. But I knew that that didn't really address the root cause of why I was having the migraines in the first place.

And I was just like, wow, this is crazy that. Yeah. All this. money poured into the medical system, her education, the hospital, the equipment, the nurses, the staff, et cetera. And they didn't have any answers for me. That's when I ventured to becoming a holistic healer. I started studying nutrition, herbalism, holistic health, getting certifications, and I was able to heal myself.

Now I'm able to help others basically answer things that the modern medical system could not answer for them. Yes. One of the things that is so compelling to me about your journey is going from what many would consider, and [00:07:00] forgive my colloquialisms, I don't know the right words to say it, but in layman's terms, going from what many would consider like a hard science into a mindset that's like, that didn't work, but now I'm very open to finding other solutions on a non traditional path that many would call soft science for lack of a better term.

I would love a better term if you have one. Was there any tension there for you, or was it just a very smooth transition of just logically what made sense? You weren't getting what you needed with the traditional pathways, so you said, I want to find something different. Walk us through that a little bit more.

Yeah, I love that question. And that's actually why I'm always telling people that I'm a former NASA computer scientist because, well, usually people who are herbalists and holistic healers, they can be looked down upon as someone that's just woo woo. Right, right. I'm definitely not woo woo. I'm very rational and very logical and that is how I approach my holistic health and healing practice.

There are a lot of different healing modalities and I do tend to stick with [00:08:00] things that I can both understand and explain to someone with a straight face. So if I can't explain it to you without a straight face, I'm probably not going to push it very much. I might mention it or something like that, but I just can't fully get behind it.

Everything that I teach and that I practice, there's science to it in terms of either there's research or there's a lot of established use of it. For example, herbal remedies have been used for thousands of years. And most of the pharmaceutical medicines are based on the properties of herbs. Right.

That's a no brainer. There's nothing woo woo about herbalism. It is an ancient and established art and science. Mm hmm. How we know it works is because it's worked for thousands of years. And that even pharmaceutical companies try to reproduce the capabilities of these herbs. The difference with the pharmaceutical alternatives is that they are more dangerous.

And they've isolated certain properties, so they're not as safe. And some would say that they [00:09:00] are more effective, but I would say that something that can hurt you easier, I wouldn't call that more effective. If it can give you side effects that are just as bad or even worse sometimes as the original problem, how is that more effective?

And also, they don't deal with the root cause. Right. I think that's really powerful reminder is getting to that root cause. So entrepreneurs, the audience that we are talking to, business owners, leaders, maybe they don't own it, but they're leading within it. It's a high stress, high pressure environment that produces a lot of symptoms.

That we often treat with medication as though treating the symptom is going to get to it. Something I'm very passionate about is fitness, wellness, nutrition. So I'm very much resonating with a lot of what you're saying and addressing the root is so critical. Because if you're just addressing the symptoms, then what's the point?

You might feel better, but you're not solving something in the long run. And also something that I find fascinating, if they'll be honest enough to answer, asking [00:10:00] doctors. Pharmacists, which I'm married to one, by the way. How many medications are you on? What drugs are you taking? And most of the people in the medical field that I know personally, their goal is to be on as little as possible for a lot of reasons.

Saying all of that, what are some of the common symptoms that you see in people that they come to you with and they think that's the problem, but it's actually just masking what's really going on, or not masking, throwing a red flag, and then they're taking a medication that's masking getting to the root of what's actually happening.

I wouldn't say there's anything common. It's not really a specific condition that I specialize in. I don't really say that I specialize in anything except for helping people to live a holistic life and become independent of the modern medical system. That's what my specialty is. I, myself, I battle with the migraines, like I told you, and also hypothyroidism.

I don't find that most of the people that come to me have that problem. They really come with a whole range of different [00:11:00] symptoms. But I think the root causes are often the same. They're the same. Oh, speak to those. What are the patterns you see? Well, I want to tell you the story about Dr. Weston A. Price.

It's going to illustrate my point very nicely. But before that, I want to talk about as entrepreneurs. Cause you mentioned, you know, the audience is mostly entrepreneurs, right? As an entrepreneur, as a business owner, let's say you want to accomplish a certain goal. For example, one thing that I want to do as a business owner of aruga.

com, the holistic life Academy, I want to reduce my sales calls, my discovery calls that I make, and I want. To only talk to super qualified prospects that already understand my values, my process. And they're like, yes, that's exactly what I want. And I just want to kind of make sure on that discovery call that we're a good fit.

Right. But they already want to be part of my program. Right. So let's say I go to some digital marketing company or agency and I say, Hey, you know what? I don't want to talk to a bunch of people who are still thinking about it. Don't really know who I am, blah, blah, blah, et [00:12:00] cetera. I want to avoid sales calls and I only want it to be like that.

Interview. I want it to feel more like they want to be one of my students. Yeah. It's not a job that I'm offering. It's an educational experience that I'm offering a mentorship. And I only want to talk to people who already know that they want to study with me. I'm making sure that I want to study with them.

Right. Yep. And they're like already maybe 90 percent sold. If I go to an agency and they say, you know what, that's really hard to do, almost impossible, especially with your niche, et cetera, et cetera. It can't be done. So as an entrepreneur, I hope most smart entrepreneurs are going to be like, okay, you don't know how to do what I want.

I'm not going to think, oh, you're the expert. There's nothing I can do. It's impossible. I just have to accept whatever you say, of course, that we wouldn't do that as business owners to any business coach or service provider. Why do we do that to our health? And I'm not saying you do or anyone that's listening, but there's people that do, there's people that they get really sick.

They go to a doctor and the doctor says this and they're like, Oh [00:13:00] man, I'm going to die in six months. That's what the doctor said. There's nothing I can do. And I don't care if you get two opinions from two medical doctors, because they're both medical doctors, right? Unless one of them is truly holistic and their approach is truly different from the other one, then okay, maybe.

But why not talk to an herbalist? Why not talk to a naturopath? Why not talk to a nutritionist? Why not talk to a chiropractor? Why not talk to an acupuncturist? Go to different types. Yes. It takes two of the same kind of experts and they both give you the same opinion, and then resign and then accept your fate.

No, if someone says that something can't be done, all it means is that they don't know how to do it and that applies in computer science. That applies in business and that applies in holistic health and healing as well. Now, going back to what you're saying, you know, the root, I was saying, no, there's not really root symptoms.

Everyone has different symptoms, but is there a root cause? Yes, I believe there is a root cause and it just manifests itself in different ways. And the story that I like to tell to illustrate this point is about a holistic [00:14:00] doctor and dentist by the name of Dr. Weston A. Price. And he is the author of the book, Nutrition and Physical Degeneration.

He's no longer with us. He lived a few years back. He traveled all around the world and he wasn't the only one who did this, but he's one of the ones that I quote most often because of his book that he wrote and he basically details his findings. So he traveled all around the world and he studied various people groups, native tribes.

who were not part of modern Western society in life and didn't have that lifestyle yet. And he found that they had excellent health. They didn't have the chronic diseases that we have, that we die of here in our modern technologically advanced society, like cancer, diabetes, heart disease, etc. they didn't have those diseases.

And not only that, but they didn't brush their teeth, yet they had perfect dental health. Their teeth were straight and they didn't have any cavities. And as a dentist, he thought that was fascinating. Yeah. And also their women, um, when we menopause at the age that we menopause, their women were still giving birth and their men were not complaining of back pain and dementia [00:15:00] and things like this, but they were still hunting and they were looked upon by the younger members of the tribe for their wisdom.

And so he also saw what they were eating. They were hunting mostly, and they followed the animals that they hunted. And that's what their diet primarily consisted of. Good, high quality, freshly hunted meat, fish, and things like that. And they also ate fruits and vegetables, although not a lot. That wasn't necessarily a big part of their diet.

And they ate seasonally, whatever was in season, whatever they harvested, not a lot of sugar, not a lot of grains, and they had excellent health. And also they were out in the sunshine. A lot of the time they had excellent community, you know, very tribal, very connected to each other, just very in touch with nature.

And they didn't have the kind of stress that we have. They had stress, you know, because they were hunters. Right. But they were more short lived, you know, while they were hunting. It wasn't this constant stress like we have, it's just a different kind of stress, right? And then he also saw that when these native tribes When they started adopting [00:16:00] modern Western lifestyles and diet, they also started adopting our sicknesses.

And so this is the root cause of most of our diseases, is that we are getting further away from our natural state of being and what our ancestors did and how they ate and how they lived. Yeah, that resonates a lot and also definitely believe in a lot of ways in studying the neurology of behavior and leadership.

I know our brains haven't caught up with our modern society. Our brains are not built to live the way that we live right now and we're doing the best we can. We're advancing so fast. Yes. Part of the problem. Our bodies can't keep up. All of our systems can't keep up. They're not designed for where we're living now and we're paying the price for that.

So what can we do in our modern world that we still live in with the pressures that we have? How do we do the best that we can in the situations that we're in? Where do we start? It feels so overwhelming. There's just so much that is not like what you just said. Where do we even begin? You know, [00:17:00] it's really interesting.

I think one thing is based on, there's some new research out in Japan. And it talked about how fast walking, so not super intense exercise, but when they tested people, if they had just done some fast walking, their minds were stronger. They could think and answer better than when they're just sitting down all the time.

And sitting is like the new smoking. It's the habit that all of us, all the terrible leaders are guilty of just sitting around all the time. Probably maybe in front of our computers and having zoom calls and, you know, whatever, doing whatever podcast interviews, whatever terrible leaders do. It also goes back to someone that I was speaking with that used to be in the military and he said that when he was learning in the military, and I don't know if this is all military, but this was his experience when he was in the military school and he was training for his profession that he was going to do.

He said that their learning sessions were only 20 to 25 minutes long and then they would break for exercises. [00:18:00] Push ups, sit ups, running, whatever. And then they would go back for another 20 25 minutes. That was the whole day. And he said that he had never learned so much and absorbed so much in his whole entire lifetime.

So I think that's one of the keys is just we need so much more movement. Yes. We also need more time in the sun. Mm hmm. Red light therapy is getting really big, and I think the reason why is because we are starting to realize how much we need the sun so much. Yes. You know, all animals do. I'd say if I could only say one more, you know, the big three, so movement, sun, the third one would be eating.

And most people know this, but I think a really good principle is to eat food that perishes. Yes. The more that we eat food that is shelf stable and can last there for years, the more unhealthy we will be. Like McDonald's food, it's reported to last forever. Yeah. I know a few years ago I instituted, not with the intention of improving my holistic health, but that was the effect, my exercising.

I like to lift weights and do [00:19:00] cardiovascular and walk and all of the things. I moved it to no matter the weather. minus a few crazy conditions, but I'm outside at least an hour to two hours a day between walking my dog and then doing my exercise. That was a game changer for me. I think the biggest difference was mood and mental acuity with spending that much more time outside.

Gosh, I know people might be like an hour, I don't have an hour to go. Start with 10 minutes. Walk around the block. Your dog will love it. If you have a cat, put him in a backpack. I don't know, but you'll all love it. Listen to a podcast while you're walking outside. Absolutely. That's great. And you know what?

It seems like a long time, but you're just adding years to your life. Yes. You're just enjoying your life a little bit more. Yes. Really? Yes. And now I take calls, client calls. Once I've established, you know, a good connection with a client, I will often say, let's do a walk and talk. We don't need to be in front of our computers.

Put your AirPods in and you walk, I walk. And those are some of the best sessions because they're moving. They're typically outside. And [00:20:00] when we're solving big problems, they get a lot of aha moments. I link it partially to the movement and being outside, that their brain is able to do that. Yeah, because you got your blood flowing to your brain more.

Yes. I mean, that just makes sense. Uh. Well, I'm going to switch gears and invite you in to the confessional to share your story, your one story. I'm sure you have more than one. All of us do. Your journey, I'm sure there's also way more than one, but the one you would like to share that was a mistake, a misstep, a learning moment, however you want to title it, in your own leadership journey that you went, oh, wow, I am not going to do it that way again.

And it has shifted the way that you lead today. And you are free to speak to any of the environments that you lead in. Mothering, entrepreneurship, leading a team, your choice, they're all equally relevant. Yeah. Okay. That's a big question. It is. I think what's hard for me is that I don't like to say that anything is [00:21:00] a mistake.

I'm like, there's no mistakes. There's only learning opportunities. Yep. And so I would probably say what is the biggest mistake? Okay. That I've ever had to face. Yeah. And that probably has to do with my leadership role as a parent and as a female, an entrepreneur, it's going to affect my business. Yeah. My status as a parent, even if you're a male.

Whether you're a man or a woman, your personal life is going to affect your business. Yeah. So I would say the biggest challenge for me was when we took in, so I have seven children of my own, we take care of two more that we didn't adopt ourselves. My husband's mom adopted them, but we decided to take care of them now versus we agreed to take care of them.

You know, if she passed away because she's much older, she adopted them. I think when she was. in her maybe 70s or 60s. So she adopted them when she was already very old. And so they wanted her to appoint someone before she could adopt them to take care of them. And we had agreed to do that, [00:22:00] but we decided that she needed help now, not later.

And so we took them in pretty much full time, but she lives next door. Okay. So she sees them every day, but they're basically with us most of their waking hours. But when we first adopted them, they didn't understand our family dynamics and it was very hard to incorporate them. And I didn't know how to do it successfully.

By the way, I also homeschooled. homeschooling them and it got really bad and it got to the point where I was ready to divorce my husband. It got to the point where I felt like I was not able to function in my business properly because of the stress and the added responsibility. And I felt like he was not providing me with any support or enough support.

And so, so that's when I got coaching. I got personal life coaching and we also got marriage coaching and I had done therapy. In the past, both marriage counseling therapy and also personal therapy with a psychiatrist and with a psychologist, different types [00:23:00] of experts. Coaching was different and I loved it.

It was so much better for me than seeing a marriage counselor or a psychiatrist. My experiences in the past with those types of professionals, and I don't want to say that there's not a place for them. I don't know if it's my personality, but it really helped me to cope. It really helped me to change my mindset and my husband, you know, we got marriage coaching together.

So it helped us to work as a team and approach problems together and communicate more effectively. My personal life coaching, it helped me to. Get rid of kind of guilt and turn my outlook into, you know, I, I get to do this. I want to do this. And that really helped. And it helped me get rid of a lot of negative self talk that I had around incorporating our two new children into our family.

And instead of feeling like, Oh, I have to do this. It's my duties, my responsibility. And I don't like it. It's hard. It was more like, I get to do this. I'm a good person because I'm doing this. And it really [00:24:00] helped. Words can't do justice to really the transformation that I experienced. And really, I guess my confession would be that I did not have the correct mindset to deal with these external, you know, new changes, new challenges in my life.

And I had to get coaching in order to get a new mind and outlook. I love that. Can you highlight for our listeners, what was the difference between therapy and counseling and coaching? What made them such different prescriptions for you? Hmm. Okay, let's do marriage coaching first. I felt like the marriage coaches really gave us tools to move forward.

They said things like, what are the things that you don't like about your husband? List them down. Now tell me how those personality traits of your husband, how they're actually. Good. How can they be good? Why were you attracted to those same personality traits? Yeah. And they would kind of reword it and reframe the things that I said.

And I'm like, oh yeah, like if we were both like me, then it would [00:25:00] be crazy. And if we were both like him, we would never get anything done. Yeah, great match, different things like that. So they gave us tools and helped us reframe. Now when we did marriage counseling, I felt like my therapist did a lot of affirming, affirming my beliefs, affirming my pain.

It was very helpful in healing, but I don't think that it gave us the tools to manage tough situations necessarily. For my husband, he really delved into his past and helped my husband to understand why he was certain ways. And I think that was really great for my husband and it helped him to understand the root cause of why he did certain things.

And I think together we were able to accomplish some things through therapy. Now, when it came to my personal sessions with psychotherapists and psychiatrists, They basically just they wanted to drug me up right away first or second visit. What are your problems? Okay, here's this drug Mmm, and then the way that they communicated with me was condescending and when I would talk to my life coach It was [00:26:00] not condescending at all.

It was always empowering. It was always let's flip the switch on what you just said and see how we can paint this in a positive empowering light so that you can have what you need. And so I guess my experience with my psychotherapist and psychiatrist was negative experience that my husband had with the psychiatrist was positive.

And for me, it was affirming. It was good with the marriage counselor, but with the coaches, I felt like it was a different level. It was a different thing. Yeah. I think there's a place for both. Sometimes I did see a trained counselor at one point and she didn't have any authority to prescribe drugs. So that was really great.

Just talking it out. Yeah, so that was the difference. Those were the differences. I hope I didn't offend anyone. No, I don't think so. It's good for us all to be challenged. One of the things that I try to do working with Mary is that we bring on guests that have different ideologies because of what you said at the very beginning in that it's really good to get a second opinion from a different school of thought.

Or an additional insight from people [00:27:00] that see the world differently. And I think largely as a society, we need to maybe relearn or learn for the first time how to engage one another when we don't have that alignment. And so even if someone is listening and going, Um, I don't know if I agree with that or how I feel about that, or that hit me a little bit funny.

Good. We all need to be exposed to ideas. that make us a little bit uncomfortable because it's how our minds grow and how we learn also who we are. Yeah, and I'd like to also say that I think there's too much classism in terms of profession. Yeah. We think that, or not we, but some people think that because someone has a degree or a PhD or a certain position in a company or something like that, that they are more worthy of respect and that they have more knowledge.

They certainly will have more knowledge in a certain space, right? Right. But that doesn't make them a better human being or more worthy or more valuable or more knowledgeable in other areas [00:28:00] or more helpful in other areas. areas. I think that's something that we need to get rid of. Yep. As a society is to appreciate every person on this earth, whether they have a title or a degree or whatever, they have value, they have knowledge to share and they can help people.

Yes. And they're smarter than you and me at something, right? Not all the things, but yeah, at something. Absolutely. Uh, thank you. We definitely have aligned core values on that for sure. Everyone is. It's a value and brings value. We just have to be persistent enough and humble enough to receive it. Thank you so much.

This has been such a great conversation. Mayim, if people want to find you, what is the best way? We'll drop all the links in the notes, but what's the best way to go about it? Probably just my website, www. arruka. com, A R U K A H dot com. And I have eight secrets to become a holistic healer. Okay. And that's how you get on my email list.

And then I also have a YouTube channel, youtube. com slash Aruka. I do talk about controversial subjects, so you may be triggered. I'm not sure where your [00:29:00] views are. Be forewarned. And it is up to people to decide for themselves, right? They can check it out and decide what they want to do. So I appreciate the warning label, but We're all grownups.

So thank you. Thank you so much for your time today. Thank you for being here. This was wonderful. I'm going to give you a follow myself and continue just following your journey and the impact you're having with people. So thank you. I appreciate you very much. Awesome. And thank you so much. You asked some really deep, hard questions.

That's good. That's good. I need more real conversations. Yes. I don't know how to have the other kind. So thank you for tolerating me. All right. Until next time, friends, go manage. Thanks for listening to Confessions of a Terrible Leader. If you're feeling brave and have your own terrible leader story that you'd like to share, head over to transcendleadershipcollective.

com slash podcast to fill out a guest application. We'd love to hear from you. Confessions of a Terrible Leader is hosted by Lacey Nelson and produced and edited by Fixation Point Productions. Music is [00:30:00] by Leif Olson and Mary Scott from the band The Number of Months. Confessions of a Terrible Leader is a free leadership resource offered by Transcend Leadership Collective.

If you are ready to refuse the limits of average leadership and join the leadership revolution, visit TranscendLeadershipCollective. com to check out our offerings for engaging workshops, strategic planning, and more. Thank you so much for listening. Don't forget to like, subscribe, and leave us a review.

And until next time, go manage like a leader.