Shizu was inspired to create Apothékary after a date where she felt the need to drink wine socially but didn’t want to. She wanted to create a non-alcoholic alternative that felt good and supported well-being, leading to the creation of products like Wine Down.
Apothékary uses a double extraction process where herbs are first distilled in alcohol to extract compounds, then the alcohol is evaporated. The final product is preserved in glycerin, a low-glycemic preservative, making it alcohol-free and long-lasting for up to three years.
Shizu emphasizes shifting focus from productivity as a measure of success to cultivating eulogy virtues—how one wants to be remembered. She believes in aligning energy with community, family, and personal fulfillment rather than just career milestones.
Wine Down is a sedative herbal blend designed to help with relaxation and sleep. It contains herbs that promote calmness and support staying asleep, making it a popular non-alcoholic alternative for winding down.
Shizu sees the transition from founder to CEO as a shift from creative, hands-on work to managing teams, processes, and investor dynamics. She notes that many founders struggle with this transition as it involves less creativity and more operational focus.
Apothékary sources herbs from 22 countries worldwide, ensuring they are 100% organic. The company works with suppliers who provide certificates of analysis (COAs) to verify purity and quality, and they use four co-packers globally to manage their supply chain.
Blue Burn is Apothékary’s top-selling tincture, supporting metabolic health and cortisol regulation. It contains potent herbs like Oregon grape root, which has berberine, known for maintaining healthy blood glucose levels and supporting weight management.
Shizu describes Vipassana as a transformative silent meditation practice. She notes that the first day is challenging as you process unfinished thoughts, but by the third and fourth days, it becomes cathartic, allowing for emotional release and self-reflection.
Shizu believes eulogy virtues—how one wants to be remembered—are crucial for living a meaningful life. She contrasts these with resume virtues (career achievements) and emphasizes the need to shift focus to legacy and personal fulfillment as one matures.
Shizu plans to convert her family’s 20-acre property in Vancouver into a retreat center featuring a Japanese bathhouse, plant medicine, and farm-to-table experiences. The project is part of her five-year goal to create a space blending wellness and Japanese culture.
Welcome to the Almost 30 Podcast. I'm Lindsay. And I'm Krista. And we're your hosts, guides, and friends on this path. Almost 30 is not about your age. It's about the feeling. All of us are almost something, seeking community and resources to support the rumblings of transformation within us. Our conversations are deep dives, shepherded by our insatiable curiosity and desire for connection, enduring inspiration, and a sense of levity that we can all benefit from.
from. We're looking to find the magic in the human experience. Buckle up, baby. Your evolution is waiting. Hello and welcome to Almost 30 Podcast. Hi, everybody. It's Lindsay and Krista. Welcome to your favorite show. Welcome. So glad you're here. OGs, what's up? Glad to have you. Noobs, welcome. Welcome to Almost 30. You don't need to be
30 or almost 30 to listen. You can just be yourself and enjoy a show that was started when we were almost 30. I met someone the other day. I think it was... Yeah, it was an Uber driver. I know you've had this experience where they're like, I'm going to listen to your show. He like subscribed right in front of me and I was like... Oh, those are my number one subscribers. Yeah. And I'm always...
dying to know what they think. I know. I need to, I know we need to follow up. Yeah. Follow up without it being like, Oh, are they my new, my new best text friend? Yes. Yeah. Yeah. That's the whole thing. It'd be dangerous. Cut it off. You don't want too much. I've had an Uber drivers pitch to be on the show. Oh, I like that. You know, they're like, Oh, even my personal trainer that I worked out with in New York, in LA for like two seconds pitches once a week. He's like, when am I going to come on?
I'm like, leave me alone, please. Sometimes I like, I get annoyed with the lack of awareness because if you don't know our show and then you pitch and it's like so not a topic that we would talk about or it's just kind of far out beyond. It's just like not for our show. 100%. I get pissed. Hey, this needs to be reciprocal. Yeah. Are we a fit for you? Are you a fit for us? Yes. Yes.
Yes. We don't like what? And then also, if I'm paying you for a service, part of that service is to not pitch me. Yeah. Part of that service is to focus on me. Not what you can get out of our relationship as my trainer, but just to focus on my glutes. I know. And building a dump truck ass. Yeah, truly. That I'm trying to build. How's it going?
It's actually been great. I'm sure. I've noticed the difference. It's, you know, we're small gains, but it's actually been really fun. I've been lifting. I've been lifting three times a week.
And I'll do sprints maybe one day every two weeks or I'll do something else that other day, yoga, whatever. But I love it. I love lifting. Oh my gosh, I love it. It feels so, so good. Yeah. It's like slow, intentional, hard. Yes. I don't know what it... And you just don't get too tired. Yeah. I'm not too tired. I can go in and out. I can shower. Sometimes I can not shower. Yep. I don't... It's not strenuous. Like it doesn't mess with my...
hormones. Like I feel like when I used to do SoulCycle at 6 a.m. Starving. Starving because you just spike your cortisol, then your blood sugar is all messed up. And it's just been nice to feel like I get a good workout in, but I still feel like I have steady energy levels. Not like I'm just blowing all my energy in a workout. And I feel like you're more connected to your body when you're lifting like that. You can kind of feel every muscle group. Yes. And it's also where I meet men. Yeah. My gym. Gym is my spot. Yeah.
It's my favorite spot. All the guys at my gym thought I was foreign. It's all good. Do you like quote dress up every time meaning like have like a really good outfit? Like what's the vibe? I would say yeah. Yeah, for sure. I would say I have a good outfit. I've just invested more in my gym outfits now because of that fact. I don't wear makeup ever but...
I'll run a brush through my hair and I'll put on a good set. Yeah. That's my... Yeah. That's my move. Yeah, I like that. Yeah. It's not trying too hard, but it's like... Yeah, it's like I'm... Watch me. I'm here. And then sometimes when I have the spray tan pop and that's when it really... That's when they really go crazy. Ha ha!
Because they're like, where is this orange person? Where's this Teddy Graham from? Dude. Where's this Teddy Graham from? I was watching something the other day and I was like, does this guy know that his spray tan is like absolutely popping orange? That is a no for me. Like on TV. Wow. You know what's a no for me at the gym? When men are on their phones the whole time at the gym, that is such a no for me. Oh, that's so true. That is so unattractive to me. Get off your phone. Get your reps in. You know, evolutionarily, I think...
I think part of what I don't like about that too is like the position of the head. Your neck is down. You're looking at your phone. It's very like beta. Say no more. There's nothing attractive about it. I think there's something evolutionarily that's going to happen.
I don't know. No, 100%. My thing too is what I'm finding really attractive is men with restraint. Discipline, restraint. Discipline and restraint. Totally. I know I have an hour for the gym. I'm going to be at the gym for this hour. I'm not going to be texting willy-nilly. I'm not going to be doing all these things. I'm like, if you can't control yourself and focus for an hour at the gym, how am I going to think you're going to focus on me for a two-hour dinner? Yeah.
Get your reps in and get out of the gym. Be present. Be in your body and focus. Yeah. It's like also you're not taking your workout seriously. A hundred percent. I just like it triggers me. I'm like get a life. Yeah.
Stop. Okay. Today's episode, I'm actually really excited about this one because... I use their products every day. Oh, Apothecary is amazing. Amazing. Really unique herbal blends that are really, really delicious. Also amazing for like the sober curious lifestyle. So they have a blend called Wine Down, I believe. Yes, I have it in my suitcase. It's one of their most popular blends.
And amongst many other ones, they, you can add this to a sparkling water. You can add it to water. You can add it to your little juice mocktail. Like it's just, I think I had a moment where I was like, do these things really work? You know? And I told myself, I'm like, okay, we're going to incorporate this over the next month. And I have noticed such a difference, not only in just like
my nervous system at night especially, so I'll do the wind down. I just feel a bit more clear. I've replaced-- I only have one cup of coffee a day, but I've replaced a few days of coffee with one of their herbals for energy.
And it's just been, it's just so different. It just hits freaking different. Yeah. And they're very powerful. They're like a very concentrated blend. I love them. So it's holistic healing, basically using nature's most potent ingredients. This is herbal medicine. It has over 5,000 years of history with natural remedies that really target the root cause and not just the symptoms.
I take my supplements, I do my thing, but having their tinctures is like a different experience. It's a flavor, it's a taste, it's a moment. And so whatever supplements I can take can keep my body really well, but having these on hand so that I'm feeling good all the time, not that I'm like getting sick and then trying to feel better. I keep in my car two to three of them so that when I'm going places, I can take it before. So I will do the rose tinted glasses,
which is their mood and skin support for a little mood booster. I'll have in my car before I'm going on a date or hanging out with friends. And then I also have their take the edge off, which is a stress and tension relief. I will use that before bed. That one's by my bed. And the one that I really love for when I go out to eat is their sugar kick. So sugar kick is...
has these really powerful Japanese-inspired botanicals that have been shown to mitigate blood sugar spikes. So it really helps maintain normal blood glucose levels. It supports digestion. It improves stress, fatigue, and longevity over time. So I will have this in my car to do when...
I take it before I go to a dinner because you're supposed to take one dropper full 10 to 15 minutes before eating. Then I'll eat my veggies first, then my protein and my carbs and continue my glucose goddess lifestyle. But it's just like, it's just the best. It helps my digestion. It's been amazing. So I just love having these around. I'm excited to take them. I have them in my purse right now. Like I love their products. The best. What do you think is their top selling tincture?
I think there's a blue one that's like feel the burn, that blue one. Okay, I have that one too, you guys. I forgot what the name is, but I use that one. It's Blue Burn and it's basically a metabolic health tincture. So metabolic health is very popular to talk about right now for good reason. Our metabolism just affects everything. So this supports healthy weight, improved endurance at the gym, improved energy, and
Yeah, it's their top seller made with really potent herbs. One of those is the Oregon grape root, which has an active compound berberine, which it actually recently gained recognition for its ability to maintain healthy blood glucose levels. So this is something that you guys might know about.
just in terms of like glucose spikes and how that can create a bunch of havoc in the body, um, especially just accelerates aging. Um, so yeah, this is their, their top tincture, but I had such a good time with Shizu. Um,
She said she was an open book. So we really got into so much, not only the brand Apothecary, what inspired it. We talked about, you know, very specific herbal remedies for different symptoms, different conditions. But we also talked about her dating life. She's single and dating. We talked about just this experience for her of...
returning to her roots, her family roots in Japan. She is building a house there and just kind of what that means to her and just that journey. We talked about her life, prior life in corporate America. She worked at Goldman Sachs and then went off on her entrepreneurial journey. Which I think is so, I just love these type of stories for women in our community because so many of them
are in jobs that are unaligned. They want to do something in service. They want to do something in wellness. They want to do something they're passionate about. So to listen to a story from a woman like this can be so inspiring, help provide clarity, especially for people that feel lost, that feel like they want to find their purpose, that feel like they want to do something with meaning. It's always good to hear stories from people like this.
In her first company that she started, she had a business partner. And she just talked about kind of the journey with that and just kind of recognizing what was working, what was not, and how she was going to do it differently with apothecary work.
But we just had a blast. Her parents actually live in Vancouver, I believe now, and she's kind of working with them to build like a retreat on their land. So we kind of talked about that dream and what she's doing there, how it relates to apothecary as well. So I think you guys are going to love this conversation. We, yeah, we really, we really went everywhere and she's just such a light, like she is a
so much energy for her dreams. You know, you can kind of feel that there's kind of this unlimited focus and pursuit, especially with this because she just loves it so much. So I'm excited for you guys to try Apothecary. Okay. So let's list the things that we like. So rose tinted glasses I keep in my car. I also have blue burn in my car.
And then I have the sugar kick in my car that I do around mealtime. And then by my bed, I have the wine down and take the edge off. But these are, you guys, I just, I love these. They taste good. They're so easy. They work right away. It's different than taking your supplements. Like these are herbal remedies that support your health all year round. Yeah.
And these are great, as I said, like if you're someone who just prefers a little mocktail, say during the week or whenever, to have these on hand, to bring these with you. Maybe you're at a restaurant, you order a club soda and you add some of the apothecary tincture of your choice. Yeah.
It's just a different way to vibe. Yeah. There's one with bitters in it that I've brought to dinner. I brought it to San Vicente Bungalows last week and we put it in our soda water and it was like digestion supporting bitters. It was so bomb. There's a skin support tincture. It's called The Honest Youth that I really, really love. And there's clinical research behind that too. They've done some studies. So
Yeah, I'm excited for you guys. Thank you to Shizu. We adore you. You can find Apothecary products at apothecary.co and you can use our code ALMOST30 for a discount. Ooh, you guys. Let us know which one you get, especially for my sober, curious girlies.
We love you guys so much. Thank you for being part of our lives. Enjoy this one. Send it to a friend. If you want to talk about herbs, you want to talk about finding purpose, dating, whatever it is. We're grateful for you. We have Morning Microdose, which is our Clips channel. And then you could find us on all socials, TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube, Almost 30 Podcast. Yeah, baby. All right. We'll see you on the other side. Enjoy this one. See you soon.
It is the new year and I'm sure y'all are dedicated to brighter, healthier, younger looking skin and done in a way that is actually healthy for our skin and for our bodies. And I have an incredible product line from a really impressive and science-backed brand. It's called One Skin. Probably heard about them. I feel like all my skin gurus out there are talking about it. And I'm
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I also love that this routine is super, super simple. So the prep cleanser is amazing. And then I move on to the OS1 face. And this is a great cream, non-pore clogging, just incredible for youthful looking skin. I got my husband on it. I got my mom on it. And I will also do the eye cream, which is
One of the, it's probably the best I've ever used. I'm pretty picky with eye cream, but it just leaves my skin under my eyes feeling smoother and more hydrated.
it's really incredible. And then I'll literally lather my whole body in the OS one body moisturizer. Um, I also love that you get cartridges to refill the packages that you originally received. So it's saving just a lot for the environment and just makes, um, refilling super, super easy. Um,
We've done an episode with the founder of One Skin, Carolina, and I think you're going to be blown away by the science behind this product line. So we're gonna start on the cellular level when it comes to our skin, not just focus on the surface. That's not where the change happens.
So try out OneSkin. Our listeners get 15% off your first purchase by using the code ALMOST30 when you check out at oneskin.co slash ALMOST30. That's O-N-E-S-K-I-N dot C-O slash ALMOST30. Use the code ALMOST30 at checkout. You'll get 15% off. Enjoy. Yo, the human body is freaking amazing. Honestly, it can repair and grow in ways that are still pushing the limits of what science can explain even in 2025.
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Okay, I'm so excited to be here in person with you. Likewise. I've been such a fan of your podcast. Thank you. That means the world. And I've been enjoying your products like nobody's business, which we'll get into later. Apothecary is just such a beautiful brand. You know, I think in a time and space where, you know, we're kind of inundated with products, I feel like I and probably Krista too have become very attuned to
when products have like a very beautiful resonance to them because so many don't. No offense, but so many don't. So I'm just really thankful, you know, and I can imagine just the blood, sweat and tears that went into this brand. And I'm excited to talk about it. But we were kind of kiki-ing before hopping on here and I was like, okay, there are other things that I kind of want to get into with you, not only as
a founder of a company, but just someone who's like, you know, very self-reflective as you evolve as not only a founder, but a person, you know, in this space and what it means to really like be an integrity and move about the world in that way. And you specifically mentioned, and I kind of want to start here and then we'll navigate, but you were talking about
Just this idea of how productivity for you has become less of like the badge of like, you know, I'm successful or I'm happy or, you know, I'm a good person if I do the most. And it's really shifting for you. Can you talk to me a little bit about that?
that and what life has been like before this like recent revelation. Yeah. You know, and I think it's probably a reflection of me turning 35 recently where I'm like, oh, okay. Like here we are. And they say you have like a spiritual age where it's like the, it's the first number you think about when you kind of look back and if someone says, how old are you? I think of like 22 was like that answer. And that was when I started my career working at Goldman and I
I think that age was also the time where, you know, it's like, go, go, go, like build your resume, build your career, climb the ladder, make a lot of money, girl boss. Yes, that was such a girl boss time. It was such a girl boss time. And I think the girl boss era, I mean, it quote unquote has ended for a while, but I think that there's still this lingering, okay, so what is the middle ground between girl boss and leaning completely out and being passive and
And then now with the weeks of like the election news and everything, I think that there's bigger conversations about like female identity. And I think for me personally building this company, I never imagined building the company to where it is today in terms of people. We're 60 people. We ship globally. We have an incredible list of investors. We had Shiseido just become an investor in the company and like,
All things that like I never would have imagined possible in my lifetime. But now I feel like it's a shift in where I want to spend my energy and focus because that's where your focus, your energy goes. And I want to shift a little bit more into like community and family and just, yeah, just a shift. Yeah. Do you...
Do you feel like it's because you reached a certain level of success and it's satisfying there and you kind of want to shift into other things? Or can you talk about that a little bit more? Because I think a lot of people feel this, but they don't necessarily feel clear about that.
the why in order to make the next move. Yeah. I don't know. I think, quote, I think in the world of entrepreneurship, success, quote unquote, is an exit or some sort of big like exit and then you're fully done the business journey. But I actually would argue that
Like, you know, if a business is performing really well and say, you know, it's profitable and the team is really happy and you're involved in your, you're leveraging your greatest strengths and you've hired just incredible people to manage the day to day, why would you sell it? And I think the definition of success has always been evolving. I've sold my first company and I was so lost after the first company. I think that happens a lot to founders too, is like,
you kind of lose that like reason for waking up after you sell your baby, quote unquote. So I don't think it was because of success. Maybe it's because I face planted many times in the last like, you know, two years. Can you talk about that? Yeah. I mean, I think like there's just been so many moments where I think of, you know, where we were growing, you know, we've doubled our business every year, which takes,
an incredible amount of grit and focus and sacrifice. And I've been single for like basically the last five years since running Apothecary. I've moved seven times in the last five years. I recently just moved back to New York and kind of been like living out of three big bags for the last five years. Yeah.
Just like no way to live. Truly. I know there's like, so there's probably some people that are like, minimalism. That sounds good. Right. Yeah. To not feel that.
And let me know if you feel this way, like that groundedness and a place or like that, that sense of home, that like that root chakra, you know, stability. Absolutely. Yeah. It can take its toll. Absolutely. And just, but there are things that I have where I'm like, this is what home means to me, or this is how it should feel. Um, you know, they say, yeah, you can have like your laptop and work anywhere. I'm like, yeah, I kind of just want to like
buy a home, you know, so buying my first home in Kyoto in Japan of all places. Wow. Yeah. It's kind of like a spiritual escape. Yeah. Oh, I can imagine. I can imagine. Are your family's roots there where,
Yeah, most of my family's in Japan. My parents are based in Vancouver. We have a farm in Vancouver where they live and we grow herbs and vegetables and bees and a meditation studio and dojo. My goal is to convert that into a retreat center.
So we can do plant medicine and Japanese bath house. And that's like a five-year goal plan. I mean, I'm in. Yes. I mean, there's nowhere like it, you know, in BC at least. Is this something that is a business for them or is that just... Yeah. Right now the farm is a business. Yeah. But we would...
I'm in the process of like mapping out, like, you know, we have to, it's 20 acres and one side is complete farmland. The other side needs, it's, it's a complete, um,
pile of grass and we have to actually level it up because it floods when it rains. And then that's two years just to level up the field, literally level up the field and then start to build on top of that from like construction. But it will be very Japanese inspired and like a, I would say like an onsen, which is like a Japanese bathhouse. Yeah. How cool. Yeah. Farm to table, all of it. And that slow process, I guess,
I'd love to kind of pull up on, on that concept of like you said, that's five years out. Yeah. And I think we're in, you know, a time within our culture where immediate gratification is kind of the thing. Yeah. Um,
I think for me, it stems from, you know, just this life and world online where we're getting these really fast instant hits of gratification when we post something or we're getting so much information at a really fast rate. What's your relationship with time and process, you know, whether it's creatively or professionally? Yeah. Because I struggle. I struggle with this. I love time.
the process of things. And I actually don't care as much about the end result, but that doesn't really work in our, in our day and age. So your process, like creating the content. I just love, like, I love being creative, you know, and like thinking about marketing it and making it successful or as many eyes on it as possible stresses me out. Yeah. So, Oh, definitely. I mean, I did my first tick talk two days ago. Oh, wow. Congrats.
Two days ago. I haven't forayed yet. Well, it was a green screen of all things, which I thought was actually really easy to do. But it was for our Alta launch. And I was like, I don't know how to do this. I'm freaking out. I'm a millennial. Like, don't make me download TikTok.
Like I never even had TikTok. So I think to answer your question, but like, I'm actually like, I only go on Instagram during the day on my desktop. And so that allows me to be very focused on like my, my, um, like what I need to be doing during the day, not Instagram, unless there's like live stories going out or launches. Um, but outside of that, yeah. Social media is kind of like, I give myself like two hours, usually after hours and, um,
it's kind of it. Yeah. Wow. But otherwise time just kind of sucks you up. I think we're social. Yeah. Do you feel like, um, yeah. Do you, do you find a sense of like peace and purpose when you have say a project like your parents, uh, property and, and building that out? Like it's outside of apothecary right now, but maybe it'll be connected. Um,
Yeah. I think finding purpose outside of work is so important, but can you, can you talk to me about that? Yeah, I think. So one thing I think about a lot is my mentor told me when I was in finance, he's like, you need to be thinking about your life in two ways, your eulogy virtues and your resume virtues. And.
And he's like, you are very focused on your resume virtues, which is good. This is where you are in your stage of life. But at one point, you're going to feel a shift in your body or in your mind and your energy that it will be time to shift towards like your eulogy virtues, which is how do you want to be remembered when you die?
And in the Japanese culture, at least like there's shrines everywhere. Um, we have shrines in our houses for people that have passed and we, um, give membranes every morning and we kind of play a little gong and then we give food every morning. Mm-hmm.
And it's this idea of like being really close to death so that it allows us to be very alive. Wow. And we never really forget that. So I think that eulogy virtue is sort of like something where I really, really think about the most in terms of how do I want to live my biggest and largest and most beautiful, I guess, like life output. And that can be in the form of work.
It can be in the form of community. It can be in the form of another business. I don't know. Yeah. It just like comes quite naturally. Yeah. Yeah. It's a beautiful, it's a beautiful concept. And I feel like overall we're like very afraid of death. I think in our culture, in the American culture. We don't talk about it. We don't talk about it at all. Yeah.
Yeah, I think since becoming a mom, I feel more close to death in the sense... Fascinating. In the sense, like, I just think about my own mortality more because I have now a child. And so...
Yeah, I think at times it's caused me a little bit of anxiety. And I think feeling that anxiety has shown me like, oh, wow, you're uncomfortable. That's so interesting. Do you think about your mortality because of like one day, you know, like, yeah, like I'm not going to be here. I think just the worry of what if something happens or something.
just taking my health even more seriously than I already do to make sure that I'm as, you know, vibrant in my well-being as possible for as long as possible. I think that health span is really important to me. Yeah. Yeah. It's such a trippy, trippy feeling. It's not always fun, to be honest, but I...
It's also beautiful, you know? So like to that point of just being so close to death kind of brings you to this like ultimate presence. It's an ironic thing, but it's like death is actually the only for sure thing that will happen in our lifetime. Everything else that we worry about is not for sure. So this is, I always think to and tell my team too, like whenever we feel anxious, don't borrow trouble.
let's not borrow trouble from tomorrow. Yeah. Like what's the point? Truly. And I just, I, those two words have always kind of resonated when I start to spiel and live in the future. Yeah. Are there any other aspects of, uh, the Japanese culture that we can glean wisdom from in terms of things that maybe you lived, you still live by? Yeah. I mean, I, I'm still a learner of the culture itself and, um,
we recently filmed a documentary in Japan, kind of tying a lot of the different elements of nature. And the theme is on nurturing your own nature because we all have water, fire, earth, air inside of all of us. And how do we actually like use them to again, like nurture our own nature and feel our best selves. Um, so for me personally, like we kind of
I look at like forest bathing, which is called Shinnyoku. It's like probably one of my favorite pastimes. Moving to New York has been really difficult for that. So I think I'm going to move to Brooklyn actually next year. Yeah, I'm in Brooklyn Heights and we have...
We have more trees. Yes. Which is nice. Just more trees, you know? Yeah, it's true. I'm a tree gal, not a water gal. But forest bathing is a huge one where you just allow, like you can literally take your shoes off and you walk in the forests and in the moss and you're covered in like the trees and the wisdom of ages and thousands of years and the smell of the cedar is just...
like you, you can't, yeah, you can't forget that. Um, so that's one modality. Zazen has been a huge impact on my life and Zazen is an active form of meditation. And, um, when I say active, it means like you have guided work that you're doing while you meditate versus just sitting and passively kind of doing breath work. Um, so Zazen has been a huge part of
my life. And I try to do at least like a seven day Vipassana at least once a year, usually around Christmas to New Year's. Beautiful. Yeah. What in terms of the active part, is it writing or movement? Yeah, it's, it's, it's not writing. It's more like there are prompts. Yeah. For like reflection, what you need, where you're at during the day while you're doing it. Cause it's usually an eight hours as in.
So usually at a midpoint around like the three hour mark, you'll get like a different sort of thought process or shift in energy. How do you, yeah. Can, can you describe that? Cause I feel like there's maybe there are a lot of people out there who would love to do even just an hour of meditation. Yeah. Um,
But a more extended feels a bit daunting. Describe the shifts you've experienced within those eight hours and even just over time doing this more than once. Yeah. So my first Vipassana was in 2022, I believe, like right after COVID. And it was like one of those moments where I'm like,
I need to get out of like this rut. Like, you know, COVID did, I think like a 180 on so many people. And I did it in Everett, BC and it was a seven day Vipassana. So Vipassana is a no talking silent meditation for seven days. Usually if you start, you can do up to 10 days. And so the first day is really hard because you're, you, you, you lock all your, your keys, your ID, your phone, your,
You throw it all into a little box, into a locker, and you're given a set of clothes and a bed that you're sharing a room with with somebody else. Okay. Because it's all... So this is a Dharma Vipassana. So if you go on, just Google Dharma Vipassana, you'll see it. And it's free. It's donation-based. But because it's free and donation-based... Minimal. It's minimal. Yeah. But that's also all you need. You don't need anything. True.
You're just sitting there for 10 days. Wow. And, uh, but the first day is so hard because you're still coming, you're coming in,
with all the things from yesterday, which is probably a bad call. Or maybe you had a fight with a significant other. Or you didn't say goodbye to somebody before you were leaving for 10 days. So all these thoughts are going through your mind on that first day of unfinished business. So you're living in the past. And then I think on the day two, you start to untangle the past. So you're starting to do the work.
And then physically you start to feel your knees are really sore because you're in sitting and you see, you look around and you see, oh, wow, this person is clearly a second or third timer because they brought their own cushions.
And so you can like, you start to really learn as you go. The third and fourth day, I would argue, are the most cathartic days. You just start to cry. At least for me, I just started to cry. And that's because I think you're in the process of grief and letting go and just not fighting the fight.
anymore. And then you realize how tired you are. You know, I'm sure you get that feeling in silence. And it's like the sneaky, you don't realize how much you're fighting on a day on a daily basis or how much you, uh, don't express yourself or how much you are holding resentment towards yourself or another. Like we do a really good job of
like doing our best. Yeah. And I think doing our best sometimes masks the things that we really need to tend to. Totally. Yeah. Yeah. And you realize like, oh my God, I'm so...
Yeah. And it just comes at the most random time. Like sometimes it's Shavasana and yoga and you're like, oh, I'm starting to cry. I know. I've been there. Yeah. And I didn't even know Vipassana. Like I, yes. Yes. It's because you're finally in like some sort of rest. Yes. State. Yes. And you're able to, at least in my experience, like feel. Yeah. Yeah. And be in your body. Yeah. And it goes to your question earlier of like social media and quick fixes and adrenaline. Like,
I worry about this next generation because I'm,
you know, and I worry about myself too, but I think to some degree I've had, I'm born in a time where I've had a world of no phones. Sure. I think you did too. Yes, I did. But this later generation is just born on them. And so it's a different life and relationship with our social media. But I do think rest and decoupling the nervous system and letting it deregulate and allowing ourselves some peace and quiet just opens up so much
So many things. And so I think if someone is starting out with meditation, maybe the first thing is to just start with stretching and relaxation and peace and quiet. Because if you can't get comfortable with that,
Probably can't get comfortable with sitting for eight hours a day. I feel like people go from zero to a hundred with this stuff and they're wondering why they can't meditate. Totally. Totally. I love that recommendation. Just kind of taking the small steps to get there. Yeah. It's so funny that, that scene you described of putting your phone, your wallet, your keys, all the things in the box. It's like, I immediately felt how much energy we put into those things, especially the phone.
And so when it's far away from us, it's almost like when I like leave my child and I'm like, oh, that's like, this is a weird feeling, you know, because they're a part of you. And like our phones have become so a part of us. Totally. That when we are away from them, it is this like...
very yearning feeling or just very uncomfortable feeling. Mine, I think over time, I'll put my phone in a drawer somewhere usually just to forget that it's there. And I forget pretty quickly now, which is nice. The yearning feeling isn't as strong as it used to be. But I had to do that time and time again. And I realized, oh my God, I feel so much better. I'm remembering things
more quickly and clearly yeah I'm more productive if that's on my agenda uh I can connect with people you know it's just like so many benefits of just yeah putting it somewhere out of sight out of mind I think it's so true there's um there's an app called brick have you heard of this no um it's like a 3d printed um little gray nugget you just put on your fridge and it will um
only during the hours that you needed to let you touch certain apps. Otherwise, it's like paused. Everything is paused. And so it allows you to just like redefine like, you know, where you want your attention to go. Oh, that's cool. It's really cool. And you can kind of assign it or they assign it for you? No, you assign it. Okay. Yeah, you assign it. You set the hours and then whenever you put it on the phone and put your phone on the brick on the fridge, it's in that mode. Wow.
Yeah. Okay. It's pretty cool. And it's a cool way to just become more conscious of like, wow, I'm going for my thoughts. Absolutely. I mean, I'm obsessed about actually. Yeah. I think I'll get that. I'll send it to you. Okay, cool. That's awesome. Okay. I wanted to shift gears a little bit and talk about, because there are a lot of people out there who are in the corporate world. And I know that's where you're coming from earlier on in your career. Can you describe like your experience
mental and physical state of being during that time because I know you've had a health journey. So take us back there. Yeah.
Yeah. So I graduated in 2010 and I started my career working in Wall Street. I was at Goldman for about two and a half years and I was on the trading floor there. It was my first and only job. And I have so many things to say about whether that was good or bad that I've never really worked a normal job. I've
I often go back to this idea of like startups and what the hardest thing to do. One of the hardest things to do is to hire for a role you've never worked in. And I always think about that feedback because how will I hire a CMO if I've never been a CEO? And so as a founder, I think I often think about, wow, like if I could look back
at all my experiences or could have made any differences, I probably would have worked in corporate a little bit longer and played a little bit more of a different, played more roles so that when I were to be in this position, I would know what to look for. Because I've made so many mistakes on hiring. And, but yeah, I think like working at Goldman and getting that finance experience was,
incredible. Like, I think we never would have been able to fundraise if I never had that Goldman experience or the network of investors and people that wanted to support, you know, kind of what we were building as well. So yeah, my husband was there for a little bit and he always says like, it's really great to come from Goldman. Yes. Yeah. We're all like leaky in that way too. We're like Goldman, Goldman, Goldman. Yeah. Yeah. But, and he's not there anymore. And, um,
has his feels, but it's like, he was like, you know, it's a, it's a really great place to kind of learn. Absolutely. The, the foundational pieces of being, you know, in a lot of different types of business. Yeah. It's, it was an incredible, like learning how to invest in a company, learning how to read financial statements. Um, I often think like when I talk to investors, I can probably out talk them in terms of investment and, um,
like just the language. You know, most investors have never also run a company before, nor have they actually, you know, venture capital investing is,
a lot of this, you know, it's, you're betting on a tiny little business to eventually become a billion dollar business. It's mostly gut feel, not anything very rational. Sure. So I, I tend to think of, um, like how do we leverage those skills of investing in real big businesses at the time and start to build and like a great company. Yeah. And at the time, like your, um,
Do you feel like you were running yourself into the ground physically, mentally? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You know, in trading and back in 2010, like there were no real boundaries or work life balance even at that point. So the still like get their first thing in the morning before everybody else does leave before leave after everyone else does. That has definitely existed. I don't think it was as bad as investment banking, but.
it was still pretty bad in trading. So I'd be up at four in the morning every day, be on the trading floor by like five.
Wow. Yeah. And I lived in Tribeca, so I could just bike down to 200 West Street. Yeah. Yeah. And yeah, but it was like super stressful because you just had everyone yelling at you. Everyone's yelling all the time. Why is everyone so mad? Totally. Totally. And was it like male dominated? Yeah. Yeah. It was all like white male, Princeton, Dartmouth, Stanford, Harvard. Yep. Totally. And I was like, I'm from UBC. Yeah.
Where's that? And you're so young. Yeah. You know, did you feel like you had to like pick your professional track early or were you encouraged to like...
do whatever your heart desires. I think, well, my parents were, you know, they were immigrants from Japan and they were, they struggled. My dad was a farmer and failed and dropped out of college. My mom was a photographer. So we came from zero money, but they worked really, really hard. And, and,
I think for them to work really hard and put us into school, they wanted the best lives for us. And for me, it was like, okay, then I want to pursue business. And if I'm going to make a lot of money and do all that, then I want to go into finance. And if I'm going to go into finance, I'm going to go to New York and I'm going to be at Golden. And I think the power of manifesting is really true. The, the,
You know, Goldman does not recruit at the University of British Columbia in Canada. And so I decided to email somebody that I knew worked at Goldman Sachs on the trading floor in New York that was Canadian. And I was like, OK, I'm going to email this guy. His name was Ted Goldthorpe.
And I emailed him. I was like, hi, Ted. Like, I'm going to be in New York. I would love to pitch you like an investment idea. I'm a student at University of British Columbia and like would love to just like buy you coffee for 10 minutes. And he's like, sure, let's do it. Two o'clock, like next, like Monday. And I was like, oh shit, I have to book a flight. And that day I arrived turned out to be an eight hour interview. And I met everybody on the desk. It was literally, no, I'm not joking. It was like,
One meeting with Ted turned into, hey, meet my other colleague. Okay. And then meet this person, meet this person, meet this person. And I ended up meeting the entire desk, which was like eight people. And I remember just having one glass of water in a boardroom.
And it was like five o'clock at the end. And I was like, I'm hungry. And I was like, I've talked about this freight car America stock now for eight hours. And then they called me the next day to come back the next year. Yeah. So. Oh, that's pretty amazing. I mean, it's just the power of trusting, trusting that instinct, trusting the vision and also not feeling like I have to, you have to,
do the correct steps to get to where you want to go. I think we can get so tripped up in, you know, whether it's professionally or personally, we've seen it done a certain way and we think we have to go that way. Totally. That's so cool. Totally. Yeah. I mean, I think
everybody told me not to leave Goldman though. Yeah. They're like, why would you do that? Like become an associate, go to private equity. You're crazy. And, uh, but I quit and I moved to Africa. So I lived in Mozambique for a year. Yeah. That's like, I didn't know that part of the story. My life is very tangentially weird. Wow. What inspired you to move there?
I was always interested in like impact investing and kind of like sustainability and agriculture. And I climbed Kilimanjaro during one of my vacations at Goldman. I was like, I love this place. Like I just love emerging markets. Yeah.
So I quit and hopped on a flight to Maputo and lived in Mozambique on a banana farm for about nine months. Yeah. Were you working on the banana farm? I was volunteering. Cool. Yeah. So we got like $30 of per diem a day. And it was like a year of a nervous system reset. Oh, I can only imagine. It was like you had a Nokia phone back then. Remember those? Oh, yeah. Like the snake game. I love those. Love that. Love it.
Love it. And like my kids getting a Nokia at 18. Wow. Yeah. And what did you learn there? Oh, so much. Oh, and you were alone. I was alone. But you met a bunch of a lot of expats. Yeah. Yeah. We, I think expats tend to attract one another, but I mean, I think I learned like
I mean, so much. It was inspiring for me to create my first company, you know, that experience and watching so many of the entrepreneurs, which were mostly farmers on the ground. Your first company just for people to know. It was a drink, J-R-I-N-K, which is a cold, it was a cold pressed juice brand. And yeah, but I think of my time in Africa was a time of reflection and what I really wanted to do and kind of that shift in resume to eulogy virtues, I would say. Yeah. Yeah.
I'm an old soul. I think you're an old soul too. Yeah, for sure. But you're definitely an old soul. Oh my goodness. With many, many lives. Yeah, many, many. This episode is brought to you by BetterHelp. Okay, y'all, what do you want your 2025 story to be?
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Oh, that's a great question. I have no idea. How do I find out? Well, if I asked you like, how old are you instead of that? Oh, 27. Okay. Oh, interesting. What happened at 27? I don't know. I mean, I was definitely starting my Saturn return, but I feel it's funny because I feel like healthier now than I did then. But I think there was like a, like just a point in my youthfulness that I feel like
I still feel that kind of vague, but that's just the number that always comes to me. Like I, cause I'm 37 and I'm like, I love getting older. I love, I don't, I don't mind sharing my age and doing all the things, but
Yeah. I always feel younger. Yeah. No, I think it's a beautiful thing. What's your spiritual age? 23. Yeah. Which was like when I first started the business. Yeah. The first, the first one. But I think it's usually like a big life change happens around that where you're just like, I moved to LA. That was the move. Okay. That's probably a big one. Yeah. Moving countries, moving cities is like, I think a big one. I think so too. Yeah. Okay. So after your time in Mozambique,
come back yes went to dc okay to where um i lived in dc and i started drink they um so that was because i was working at the world bank for two months and i did not last long there i was like how did i go back to finance and the most corporate corporate governments you know kind of
I was grateful, but... Did you just want, like, stability? I think I just wanted a job to kind of come back to you and come back to the U.S. Because I realized living in Africa was...
I think sometimes when people leave and when you're surrounded by expats a lot, I think you naturally, I started to ask myself, am I running away from something or am I running to something? Um, and I realized at least my journey to Africa was probably running away from something. Yeah. So it's like, okay, time to go home and, um, start to build the first company. I had a co-founder that did not end well. Oh, wow. What happened? Yeah. Um,
You know, we were best friends at Goldman and kept in touch for many, many years. We built Drink for the first...
three years or so together. And we were really different in terms of like where we managed on the businesses and that worked really well. But at one point she was like, you know, I want to go back to California and like get her MBA. And I was incredibly supportive of that. And so we ended up just like parting ways. But I think our board and our investors were not really happy with the choice of a co-founder leaving and owning the equity that she did. And it
It just got really difficult. It's hard. Yeah. Especially when you have investors involved. Sure. Yeah. And somebody has as much equity as they do. Yeah. So, you know, and I think that building friendships...
Building a company with a good friend, as I'm sure you know with Krista, there needs to be rules around that. And there needs to also be some sort of guidelines. We never started that company thinking that it would ever be worth anything. So that naivety is beautiful in many ways because then it just makes you take the risk. Once you start, there's so many...
I mean, it's like worse than a divorce. Wow. Yeah. I've helped so many founders now untangle founder breakups. Yeah. Yeah. Krista and I talk about that concept of like, we have a lot of people who come to us and say, oh, we want to start a potter company with our best friend or with my best friend. And, you know, we're supportive and also we're
be cautious, you know, think about this because, um, we've had to do so much work together. You know, we've had many coaches, therapists, et cetera, to, to hold our hand through some of our hardest moments together. And, you know, we have, both of us are old souls and we've lived many lives together. So there's kind of that karmic connection as well. Um,
But it's not for the pains of heart. It is not. Because there are some decisions that need to be made that are more focused on the business than your relationship. Yeah.
Um, yeah, it can get super, super complicated. Um, especially when things aren't going well. Yeah. More so in, in, of course, like everything, anything. Yeah. Yeah. We never want to talk about the bad stuff. Yeah. The highs and the lows of being an entrepreneur and let alone, you know, being an entrepreneur with your best friend or are so real and how, how have you been able to find kind of a
a neutral ground now if you found found one because we've we've also just experienced so much of that where it's like you know catch us on a day where things are going amazing yeah yeah and then on the next day we're like yeah burn it all down we're done right we're done you know I did not start this company with a co-founder this time yeah I think I um
I was like, I'm never going to do that again. I mean, then I'm like, but that's like trauma right there. So I'm never going to say never. But with this one, I was like, I have a very clear vision. It's somewhat of an adjacent product to my first company,
I was able to raise money alone. I can hire for incredible people around me. Because one of the biggest pieces of feedback I got with the first company when I had the co-founder was nobody knew who was the boss. Or nobody really knew when one person said X, what the other person would say. And I hated that. It's like, oh, but she said this. What do you think? And then I have to go to her. And then it's like a separate conversation that always needs to be had. I'm like, I don't really want to...
Run my ideas by somebody else. Kind of bossy like that. Yeah. When's your birthday? November 16th. I'm a Scorpio. Of course. Oh, just the other day. Just the other day. Amazing. Yeah. But Scorpio energy is real. Yeah. What's yours? I'm a Virgo. Virgo. So yeah. I feel you though. Yeah. And Krista has a lot of Virgo too. And our almost 30 is a triple Virgo. Oh, wow. So it's a whole vibe. That's a whole Virgo vibe. Yeah. I feel you and just
having that autonomy to just...
make a decision even if it's risky and be like okay yeah and i think you can have faith in yourself exactly just like have confidence that you will be able to figure it out yes if you truly believe you need a co-founder then obviously hire look for somebody that has different skill sets or can compliment but don't bring in someone just because you need a crutch or because you need someone emotional to rely on sure that's like really dangerous sure and um
Yeah, I think that there's naturally one day going to be a shift between a founder towards a CEO as well. And I think that shift is also not that natural for most founders. Does that happen a lot? Founder to CEO? I think so. Yeah, I think like... So...
When I look at my journey, you know, drink was a quarter of the size that apothecary is today. And I spent nine years building drink and I spent four years building apothecary. So I think like trajectory and scale is,
Apothecary is just at a much larger size. But what size means is like you have teams and hierarchies and processes and people and board meetings and corporate governance and investor meetings and investor updates. And it's not actually that fun. It's very...
not creative anymore. And I think most founders like to tap out at that stage because you're not the zero to 10 anymore. You're at like the 50 to a hundred million grind, which is often a grind because you're dealing with like regulatory, you're dealing with investor dynamics and fundraising again and again, and then people quitting and then people hiring. And so it's
It's that transition from founder to CEO because I think you have to take your founder hat off. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Do you ever feel that way? Yeah. And we're co-CEOs, we're founders, but obviously on a much smaller scale, I have a smaller team. But yeah, I think I have, I think we both have a desire, I'll speak for myself, to...
not be in the weeds so much. Yeah. Agreed. To just be like the visionary and, and how, and we do have a, you know, an incredible team. So it's probably on us, you know, to kind of pull ourselves out of the weeds. I think it's that for control. It's true. Um, it's very true. Yeah. And just the ever changing landscape of podcasting in particular. Um, I don't know how you feel in, you know, the space that you're in, but it's,
it's saturated. Um, there's just some like agencies that come between us and the brands and then it just becomes less personal. And then there's, you know, just the keeping people's attention, you know, all of that. Yeah. It's really interesting. A hundred percent agree. I think, uh,
I think in consumer or in like supplements, there is definitely a lot of competition. But I think the real ones start to stand out because the small ones die. Yeah. And I think we saw that over the last two years because funding started to really dry up and interest rates were so high and
I think like the real brands continue to like kind of like just live and survive on and last month kind of just disappeared all of a sudden. Yes. It's so many copycats over COVID. Oh, I can only imagine. People that literally copy your brand.
Like the label, the sticker, the names. And I'm like, wow, the audacity. Do you have someone like going out to kind of like pluck those? We do. We have our lawyer who sends like cease and desist letters and stuff. But like even that, that's like energy. I know. It's just like it's not part of what I want to be doing. Of course. Yeah. Of course. You know, again, part of the job. Yeah. It's part of what happens when you –
are successful and people do love their brand. It's like people, you know, want to want a piece of that. Yeah, we feel that. Let's shift. I would love to talk about the products in particular. I would love to talk about just the power of herbs as medicine. And I also want to talk about
How fun it is to not drink as much alcohol anymore and replace it. The wind down is amazing. It's my favorite. We just did a clinical study on that. No way. Yeah. So this is a big milestone from like herbal medicine and apothecary milestone because, you know, for so long, I mean, herbs are.
you know, 5,000 years or more, you know, from Ayurveda to TCM to Japanese kumple medicine. It's actually the most, the first documented form of medicine is Ayurvedic medicine, but the traditional healthcare and what we know today in the U S is a lot of that has been actually inspired by traditional herbal medicine as well. Like Advil, for example, comes from like, if you look at the very basic, um,
root of that compound. It's from a plant. It's inspired by a plant, but then it's iterated and iterated into synthetic compounds. So it works quicker and faster, but herbs are incredibly powerful. And if anything, it gets to the root cause of illness versus just trying to
bask or treat the symptom. And so what we do at Apothecary is really aiming to get to the root cause of our stress in particular and how stress shows up in our body. And for some people, stress shows up with libido, stress shows up with high cortisol, stress shows up with lack
of sleep. Stress can show up with low metabolism. So that's kind of why we have a variety of different products that focus on, again, like a different need for how stress shows up in your body. But Wine Down is one of our hero SKUs. It's like a non-alcohol alternative. I was inspired by that from going on a date where I was like, I am so tired of drinking this glass of red wine that I don't really want to drink, but I feel like I need to bring something.
Yeah. And then you feel off. Like you just... Yeah. And it causes... You know, I still have... I drink every once in a while, but I've drastically reduced how much I drink. Yeah. And...
I just realized how much anxiety drinking was causing me. Totally. So especially when I was dating, I was, you know, I have a few drinks on a date. And then the next day I'm like, why didn't you text me? What's going on? Was I horrible? I was going to ask, was anxiety the after or during? Oh, no, during. I'm Lucy Lindsay. I'm like, this is amazing. Lucy Lindsay. I love Lucy.
I'm like, this is fun. You're hilarious. You're so good looking. I actually think I love you. Yeah. Can we define the relationship now? Yeah. Yeah. Oh, that's such a fascinating point. For sure. Like just...
The alcohol would help me. I'd look at them and be like, wow, that is fascinating. So it's after the fact. So, and then the next morning I'd be like, what the heck? Yeah. Oh, wow. But anyway, I feel like the alternatives are what is in it to kind of give that feel good. Yeah. So with wind down in particular, it's like, it's, I mean, it's going to be a more sedative herbal base. So all of our formulas in general are mostly going to be like
powerful herbs. But we go through a very special double extraction process, unlike all other tinctures, because most tinctures have cane sugar or alcohol.
as the distilling base. So if you find like, if you take a dropper, like CBD, for example, it's oil-based. Not everyone wants to take like an oil product. But other tinctures, like if you find them in amber bottles or blue bottles and you taste it and it has alcohol, it's because it's distilled in alcohol.
Or if it's really, really sweet, it's distilled in cane sugar. But we go through a double extraction. So we distill the herbs. We extract sort of the herbal compounds out of it in alcohol. And then we evaporate the alcohol out. That's the second stage. And then we preserve it in glycerin.
which is a low glycemic preservative that allows the tincture to live on for three years. So my personal favorite during the day is like Take the Edge Off, which has like nervine-based herbs. And it allows for like all day stress relief. But Wine Down in particular is a sedative herbal base. So it actually makes you fall asleep and allows you to stay asleep. Which is nice. Yeah, which is wonderful. But I always encourage people when they're first starting out to take the tinctures directly on their tongues.
Because mocktails are fun. But, you know, if you put the tinctures into like water, you're just not going to taste any of it. Sure. Yeah. Sure. And the, is there, with herbs, like is there too...
too much that you can do? Yes. Yes. So there, there is a diminishing return scale at some point. So we always suggest to people take one full serving, which is three full droppers, uh, once to three times a day, and they can vary based on what you take. So if you, in the morning you want to take like mind over matter, which is our, it's a powder formula, but you can take that with coffee, for example. And then you can take something midday for like a little mood boost. And then one at nighttime for like a sleep support.
That's usually what we would recommend. But we know some people probably take and combine the different tinctures. So they might do two full droppers of wind down, one full dropper of take the edge off. But what's really fun is just like people can be a little bit like their own mixologist with this. Like we wanted to make wellness less stuck up and less like not approachable. We just want it to be fun and colorful.
It is so fun. I know the brand is, yeah, I feel like even the word apothecary, you know, having your own little apothecary in your home is one of my favorite things. Oh, I love to hear that. Because I feel like it's, it is really, it kind of brings me back to like a very domestic grounded moment where I can open my cupboard and like,
just kind of create a little concoction that intuitively I feel like I'm needing right now. Yeah. So yeah, and it's more than just the concoction. It's like the act of doing that I think is...
bringing us back to what we know we really need physically, mentally, et cetera. And then also being more connected to like what we put in our bodies rather than like just mindlessly eating or drinking or numbing out or escaping via those things. So yeah, I think it's just been a really beautiful like ritual too. Yeah. A moment of you and quiet, calm, again, peace, calmness, maybe cry a little bit while you're doing your apothecary.
What's the most popular? Now it's Blueburn. Okay. So I heard that. I was like, dang. Okay. Tell me about Blueburn. Blueburn is like, we never call, we never marketed this, but people like to call it this. It's a natural Ozempic. But that's again, like why we don't call it that is because people are still learning about Ozempic. We're still all learning about Ozempic.
But we like to call it, it's a metabolism and weight support danger, but mostly metabolism and cortisol support because cortisol impacts our metabolism. And if it's not regulated, then our metabolism will slow. And most women nowadays in their 30s are having premenopause. We're getting more stressed out. It's honestly stress. It's all impacting like our adrenals, nervous system, and cortisol levels. And
And so I think like our hormonal, that's why like women's health and hormones are all of the rage, especially this year. I have never seen it happen this year. Oh yeah. It's been over the last few years, we've talked a lot about hormones and mainly like going off the pill. Yes. Um, and that's, that's one of our most talked about topics. Um,
And yeah, I'm really, I'm thankful people are talking about it, getting their hormones tested, understanding more what's affecting their hormones. Because, you know, whether it's infertility rates or people don't have regular periods or, you know, the body is speaking. Absolutely. One of our most popular blog posts was coming off of the birth control. No way. Yeah. It was coming off of birth control and using herbs to support my hormones.
Wow. And what was your experience with birth control? I never took birth control. Yeah, I was always just using protection. That's awesome. I never, never took it. Isn't it interesting? Do you think it's like a cultural thing, you know, whether you were in Canada or elsewhere, like where it's just not a thing where there, because I was, I think I was prescribed it
Because for my skin, I definitely started having sex with my high school boyfriend. It was like that rather than telling me, hey, so if you go on this. That's so interesting. Like birth control for your skin. Isn't that hilarious? It's hilarious. And it's like so bad. It's disturbing. It's horrible. Yeah. So to answer your question, though, yes, I absolutely think both Canada and Japan are
anywhere but the U.S. Yeah. Things are just not prescribed as easily as they are here. And birth control is probably one of the biggest ones that, you know,
you know, pharmaceuticals make money on. Yeah. Yeah. But I am so glad. And that's one of the good things about social media is that the educational virality of things like hormonal and birth control and better periods and cycle balancing and that conversation has become much wider. Yeah. And I do want to say there are a lot of different conditions that birth control can help. Um,
And we've heard from a lot of you out there who have benefited your symptoms from taking it. So just noting that. But I think my whole thing is having informed...
Just being informed about the risks. Yeah. Especially in high school. Oh, my God. Of course. What do you mean? I mean, it's like you don't have as much information or life experience even at that point. I thought it was cool. I mean, yeah. I was like, oh, I'm a woman now. Right. I'm cool. Like, this is what, like, women do. Right. I'm an adult. Right. Like,
And I have to take this at every X period of time on the dot. Which I did not. I was so bad at it. So bad. But like, but also like the laxness I had around that was probably disturbing. I just popped like two or three if I missed a couple days. That's amazing. That's amazing. I mean, that's bad. I hope that's.
But I had no, I had no, I missed three days. Yeah. No connection to whether that was harming. Right. I did always feel weird taking a pill every day. Yes. Like I didn't, I didn't like it at all. Yeah.
So I think that was my body or intuition saying like, hey, I think there's something off here. But yeah, a lot of people are rethinking. Agreed. And to the pill point, I think that's also like most supplements do a lot of capsules and pills. We will never do capsules and pills. Tell me more. I just, I always thought I was dying a little by taking a pill. Oh, wow. Like I'm just kind of like, blip, blip.
Like, yeah, what is in here? I don't know. I don't taste it. I'm just going to pop it into my mouth. Yeah. And to your point, like, oh, I missed three days. I'll just pop three more. It's like, wow, what's really inside. So that's part of with tinctures. Like, I want you to taste it all. Put it all over your tongue. Just taste it. Love that. And know that it's pure.
And that you get to try everything and have fun with it versus again, like in supplements, most things are in capsules and pills, but it just feels like. And you just kind of trust what's in there, I guess. Yeah, I guess. Exactly. Yeah. Is there anything that we need to be aware of? Like when sourcing herbs, like.
You know, I know you guys are doing your due diligence, but if we are kind of working with herbs, is there anything that we should be aware of? Yeah. I mean, I think, you know, it took us 12 months before the business launched to find the right suppliers. And honestly, that is like a constant shift and change in negotiation. We source from 22 countries worldwide. Whoa. Our supply chain is insane. That's crazy.
And then we work with distributors to bring in all of them. And we have four co-packers around the world. So one in Germany, one in Montana, one in Long Island, and then one in Texas. And so they order these ingredients now for us. But in the beginning, when we were much smaller and we couldn't afford that, we would order those different ingredients. And then like...
shimmied around the country to the different co-packers and stuff. But so luckily things can happen with scale, but I do think like ingredient sourcing is, it's so important and finding suppliers that A can keep up with your demand, but B like they all have certificate of analysis. Like that's really important.
So I think when you are going into your herbal diligence or sourcing, always ask for a COA or certificate of analysis. Okay. And that's usually like a third party tested audit of that ingredient or that herb to show like lead content, if any, um, uh, uh, just like quality of iron, uh, purity, because some things like coconut powder, for example, can have malodextrin inside. And so that's just because it like helps to clump it. Hmm.
But there are also all these additives and many different ingredients. So just do your research and just know like what is pure and what is not. Should it be organic? Oh, absolutely. Yeah. We're 100% organic. No question here. When we first started, I can't say that we were 100% organic, but now we are. Cool.
That must have been hard to kind of. Yeah. So we are limited sometimes in like which ingredients we can use. So we have an exciting partnership coming out in May with Oishi Berry, which is like that strawberry kind of brand. Okay. It's like omakase strawberry, but allows us to test these partnerships in a very small way because we can't get that ingredient necessarily for like, you know, evergreen launch that can stay forever. Okay.
How cool. Okay. Let's do a little quick fire of herbs before we wrap up. Great. This is not a test. Relaxation, stress management. You mentioned wind down. What are the specific herbs that we can kind of...
focus on? I mean, I love a good sleepy herb. So I would probably go with like rhodiola for me personally. That makes me really kind of Zen out. I love a good ashwagandha, but sometimes ashwagandha, if I take it with a different herb will actually be an upper. I've heard that. Yeah. Okay. So like
It kind of depends. So what adaptogens basically help your body adapt. So if your energy and like your hormonal and your, your adrenals are already up, then you need downers. But if your natural body's already down, you need an upper to kind of get you to that homeostasis. And so stress doesn't mean always down. It just is, it's homeostasis and it's a feeling of calm. You don't want to be so down that like you need to then crash to get back up.
So you just want to be in this like steady middle ground of steady stress and steady like presence. Um, so for me, you know, rhodiola usually does the trick for me. Um, ashwagandha most times does the trick for me. Um, and then motherwort is actually another herb. Um, it's like a plant, but it helps with sedative sleep. So it just kind of like helps me knock, knock, knocks me out. Okay, great. Yeah. Um,
What about for energy? Maca. Okay. I love a good maca. Have you had maca? I've had maca, yeah. It's my favorite. Love it. Yeah. I just like the taste of it. I add it into coffee and it just tastes great. It's a little nutty. Yes. Yeah. It's a root, but it tastes nutty for sure. And it has this kind of creamy factor. Also love lion's mane. Mm-hmm. Yeah. For focus. Like a mushroom for focus. Love that. For...
I don't have this written down, but like pleasure, getting you in your body, like just kind of feel good. Yeah. Not necessarily like a... Libido? Caffeine? Yeah. So for me, that's probably anything that like sparks feminine energy. And so I actually don't know if I would take something ingestible for that. For me, I think it goes...
to scent. And mainly because the fastest way to knock your body and system into the present moment is through scent. I didn't know that. Yeah. So it's, I learned that through Zazen where if you're finding like your brain is shifting elsewhere, you just want to smell something. So it gets you totally back to your present moment. And so I think with feminine energy, I would go to like rose or florals and something like really, um,
heart opening and capacity opening. Yeah. Something floral. Love that. Yeah. Um, speaking of feminine energy, I would love to round out with that. I, I feel like we briefly touched on this before we hopped on, but what does it feel like for you to, what does it look like and feel like to just be more in your feminine? Yeah. I can imagine as a founder, um,
someone who's just been in building mode for a really long time that being in the masculine potentially comes more naturally or that's just where you've been. I really relate to that. Yeah. And I also relate to kind of just leaning more into my feminine in recent years. What does that look and feel like to you? And do you feel like there's a future in which like we can
Be that. Embody that more often. I mean, I hope so. I certainly hope so. And I think it's up to us to write those rules. And it's kind of why I wanted to buy the place in Japan is because I think there's such a beautiful thing about being anonymous and rewriting your story. Completely. And telling your story in your own words, not what the press has in Google, not what someone...
preconditions in their brain, like just the ability to share who you are, like who's Lindsay and you just meet someone at a restaurant, like, you know, to start from square one. And so that's kind of where I'm at is like redefining how I would like to describe who I am in like a totally anonymous setting. But I do, I am so proud of all the things that I've done and built. I just think
it's also a different stage of how I want to manifest this next chapter of 35 plus and building and attracting kind of what I need in this next stage. Hopefully get a dog, be closer to trees and maybe find a good guy. We'll see. Or he'll be lucky to find a good girl. Exactly. That's what I was going to say. How's dating been? It's been good. You know, I've got to say,
Dating in New York is far better than dating in L.A. Oh, I completely agree. I mean, like I. I completely agree. Dating in L.A. was horrible.
like tell me more i live so i live in venice are nodding okay yeah we lived in venice too yeah oh you did okay so venice is like a peter pan like just a bunch of everyone's great look good looking everyone's too good friendly too good looking but like no one's gonna go to silver lake for a date from venice oh you lived in silver lake no i lived in venice but like if i match someone in like oh i see i see yep yep yep um yeah like in in silver lake or echo park
Not happening. Yeah, not happening. Not happening. That's literally on the other side of the world. Yeah. So like you're limited to like, okay, Mar Vista, Santa Monica, Brantwood. And I'm like, I'm not also that into like,
Yeah, same. Yeah. So moving back to New York has been really great in that respect. There are pros and cons to both. Totally. For me, like I'm from the East Coast, so I do like that East Coast energy. I like the New York... Hustle? Yes and no. Yeah. Because...
That's a lot too, to totally, I mean, my husband is, is in that, you know? And it's like, I'm more out of it now. So it's interesting to kind of like where he dips into my world. He's like, Ooh, this feels good. And I'm like, sometimes I'll dip into his world. I'm like, that's nice for five minutes, but I'll be over here. I'm often out, but yeah, I totally, to go back to dating, I very much remember that feeling. And I like, you know what I felt? Tell me if you've felt this where
I felt like the guys in LA did not see me. Like literally it felt like they were like looking through me and this is a generalization. I had a few really amazing people that I met, but, um, that's so interesting. It's almost like they were like,
wherever they were looking, it was kind of like they were just thinking and looking at themselves. Oh my gosh. Do you know what I'm talking about? That's crazy. So I dated in LA for about two years. I was there for three years. I dated for about one and a half to two years. And then I just stopped because I was so turned off. But I hear you. Like, I feel like most people in LA though, kind of, kind of just like into them
Yeah, self-obsessed, for sure. Generalization. Generalization, yes. And I met some incredible friends there. But I do think New York is probably a little bit more of my energy. Yeah, completely. Just a different... But people here always have options. And I just want someone that's like, hell yeah or hell no. Completely. Like, I don't want a maybe. A maybe is a no. Yeah. Yeah, it's a very interesting thing where it's like...
you know, you could meet someone incredible. Yeah. But then there's a part of your brain that goes, yeah, but I could also maybe meet someone even better tomorrow. Yeah. And there's always that thing. I had that. I definitely had that. What made you want to settle down? You know, I was single for so long. Everyone knows that story. And I think I just got to the point where
I was so good, but like with me, you know, like we go on solo trips all the time. I just had done so much therapy. I was just like, if, if I meet no one, I am good. You kind of get to that point of like kind of grieving that where it's like, maybe I won't meet anyone. And then when we, I reconnected with my now husband, um,
It was so clear. Yeah. Which was so weird. On the first date or was it just a reconnecting and it wasn't even a date? It was the reconnection. Okay.
call it a date sort of, but I wouldn't call it a date because I thought he had a girlfriend. Okay. He doesn't, didn't know my status. Yeah. Um, but I was so clear when I sat down across from him, I was like, Whoa, this is so crazy. Wow. And like all of my other, all the bullshit that I had in the past of like, well, like, no, he can't be my husband because of this, this and this. Yeah. Just disappeared. Yeah. And I think it was the connection with myself. So first that really helped me.
clear, ecstatic. You know what I mean? I do. I do. And I also think it's like, I think learning how to date better
And learning how to date more thoughtfully moving forward. Like, do I like this person? Yes. There's always this like back of my head. Does he like? Yeah. I hope he likes me. Will he? Yeah. Like, no, no, no. Do I like him? Yes. And I have so many friends. A lot of my friends are older, but like, like the mid 40s even. And she's dating like 20 year olds. She's like, the young guys are actually much more respectful. Oh, interesting. And they like opt in to date older women because they're like old souls at heart. Sure. And, but they really respect women.
versus like the generation that like might be my generation. They have more traditional kind of like views on what men and women quote unquote should be. Yes. Yes. Completely. Fascinating world. Fascinating. And I think that's a great place to be in where it's like,
This is fascinating. Yes, exactly. I'm curious about this. Just being like, wow, we get to live in this world and do the thing, build what we're doing, date how we want. And knowing that it truly is, I believe like,
the divine timing of everything is very, very real. And I know that's really annoying to hear. It's been annoying for me to hear over the years, but every time I'm like, wow, yeah, makes perfect sense. Well, your story is inspiring. Oh, thank you. Yeah. Thank you. It's been a long, long road, but you know, it's worth it. Yeah. It's worth it in the end. Well, this has been
Thank you. I love this. Oh, my God. I've been listening to the podcast for the last seven years or something. Oh, my gosh. No way. For a long time. Oh, that means so much. I think I was like during my first company and everything. Sure. So thoughtful, spiritual, but not overly like spiritual. Business, but not business. It's like the podcast where I don't want to be on like business mode. Yeah. Yeah.
Oh, I appreciate that. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. Well, this is the best. Apothecary is incredible. I'm going to link all of my favorites down below. So wherever you're listening to this, we'll be in the show notes and we have a discount as well. So enjoy that. But thank you for being here. We appreciate you. Thanks for listening. Bye.
Thank you so much, Shizu. We appreciate you being here. And again, you can get a discount at apothecary.co. That's apothecary with a K and use our discount almost 30. All right, guys, we'll see you on the next one. We love you so much. Bye. Bye.
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