I was 10 years old and I was a drug dealer.
and I knew it wasn't normal. It was like my entire goal as a child was to escape that.
“So at some point, I gathered the strength and I made the decision where I said.”
Lisa Olavara is an endurance athlete, bestselling author, award-winning realtor, and motivational speaker. Through her work, she inspires others to embrace courage, pursue ambitious goals, and transform life's greatest challenges into opportunities for growth and lasting impact. The difference between me and a whole lot of people, I actually lived what I'm talking about. But I'm one of the anomalies who endured the kind of circumstances that I endured,
and actually overcame the odds. What are about the folks that can't get out that are still in it?
One thing we all have at the end of the day always is a choice. Very often, making the right choice
“is going to make you uncomfortable. So you have to...”
Welcome back to another powerful episode of Women in Power. The podcast. For Insights Access, I'm Ray Uteeras. Joining me today is... Who's joining me today? Lisa Ann Olavara. Highly said Ann, how are you? Over here? So Lisa, we literally just wrapped up your Women in Power episode. We did your photoshoot. We made you feel like a rock star. Do you feel like a rock star?
You know how I walked away feeling thinking and acknowledging to myself. If I can help one woman, just one, it's worth it. It's all worth it. One person. Well, I'm hoping that just one more person besides me, two people will watch her out. So two women that definitely need your words of inspiration. Let's talk about the journey, quite the journey. I mean, literally rags to riches. Shall we begin at the riches or
the rags? Or somewhere in between? Where would you like this start? Maybe maybe you start where you end, but yeah, I made it. You did. I did. You and I share something very similar. I lived in the Bay Area for about 10, 10 years and I look out for on larkin. I was in the fifth floor and there was quite an endemic of homeless folks. Needles everywhere. It was quite a scene. You came from that. You survived and thrived in that. Would you like to start there? I did. Yes. And so
one thing that's always important to me is for clarification and because there is a distinction,
we often use the term, overcome the odds very loosely. And there's, I overcame the odds and I spent time in prison and I was a drug addict and I heard all these people along the way, but now I'm behaving myself and I'm good now. I'm better. I've done this and that and I've changed. And the distinction for me that is important to me is that I truly overcame the odds, but I don't have a line of victims in my wake. Never smoke to join in my life. Never done a
“drug in my life. I didn't sway off the dirt road and sometimes you have to choose the dirt road.”
It's the harder road, but it can be more of the self-righteous road for sure. And it can be the road where you work really hard to get off of. And that's what I did. So I was able early on to
acknowledge our circumstances, but early on I made the decision that never what I ever partake.
That when I got out, I would never look back. When I was 10 years old, my mom was dating the town drug dealer and we would squat in various houses and I would have to stay home from school in the morning and wait for the people to come pick up their pot or their cocaine. I was 10 years old and I was a drug dealer and I would separate the marijuana seeds with the zigzag paper, tilt the plate, the dinner plate, and it seems to drop, roll the joints, fold the cocaine into
Triangles.
is long gone, so I'd walk to school having just dealt drugs at 10 years old. But you're 10.
“It's not fair to you. Did you know what you were doing was wrong? Did you know like this is drugs?”
This is bad. Yes, I did. And I knew for sure the situation was further, it hit home further because at some point the police came looking for the drug dealer and my mother hid him and that earned her an arrest. And so then I really understood as a little girl sitting in court, watching my mother come to the court room in an orange jumpsuit for harboring a criminal that the drugs are bad. And I'm going to get in trouble. It was easy to make a determination,
not only would I never partake in drugs. I wasn't going to be a drug dealer either because it
didn't look that sexy to me as a 10 year old. And the characters that came to pick them up, I didn't really care for them either. So I filed the drugs thing away in the category of what I won't be partaking in. So everything that was burned on me as a child. I made a decision early on to flee and I never looked back. Good for you. Folks are having a visual of what you're talking about. They're like, oh, it's just her and her mom. Like, no, there was this was quite the
colony. This was quite to the village. Talk about what it's like living in a car with five of your siblings. It's cramped. The quarters are tight. Yeah, the quarters are really tight. I my brothers were little. And so as four girls would sit across the back seat. And then we would lay our brothers across our labs. And then we would sleep like this. Cool. And that's just the way that it was. And it was like that every single night. But I was frustrated by that. It all bothered me a lot.
And maybe sometimes part of your survival comes from acceptance. I wasn't having it. And I wasn't going to accept it. And I knew it wasn't normal. And I knew it was like my entire goal as a child was to escape that. All I wanted was out. And all that stuff terrified me, disgusted me. And I wanted nothing to do with it. And my entire goal was to get out. Beacuse, we'll fast forward to the getting out part. But I'd like to rewind a little bit. What
about the folks that can't get out that are still in it? What happens to them? How do they get out? How do they have that download, that divine intervention that you had? How are you coaching these
folks to help them to get out? One thing we all have at the end of the day, always is a choice.
“And you have to make the choice. And we don't like to be uncomfortable as human beings. And”
very often, making the right choice is going to make you uncomfortable. So you have to agree and to tell yourself, I'm going to be uncomfortable. Even if it's in this is huge, overcoming addiction, that's not easy to do. I mean, honestly, some people can say triathlons in addiction. We'll get to that later. Yeah. So you have to acknowledge to yourself, I am going to physically suffer. Just like triathlon. Yeah. But I'm willing to do that because I want off drugs.
If the end of the day, you have a choice. And we all do. How did you start building out? How did you start not dealing drugs at 10? What was a transition now where the mind-body and soul started to unite and you were getting out slowly. You saw the light. You saw the path. And you're just running towards it. When was that? The very same drug dealer who my mayor may not have tried to find to have a chat with. He tried to assault me when I was 11. And I had had enough. He took a
coke bottle and hit it against the wall, breaking the coke bottle. He pinned me down and he cut
“my knee open. That's what this thick scars from. And he said stop fighting me. And I said never.”
I'll never stop fighting you. Cut me. And he did. And I went to the hospital. I showed my mom.
My knee was huge. And the insides were falling out. And I remember laying in the hospital in the bed
I stared up the ceiling.
for everything. Talk about that grit that stayed with youth. We had a moment even during off-camera
about who you were during middle school versus we were in high school and what you expected to be like in high school. We were quite the contrary to that. So one thing that I've learned about myself as an adult is I'm not a huge fan of humiliation. So I conduct myself as an adult with the type of lifestyle where I don't put myself in the position where I could be humiliated due to bad choices. Because I spent my entire childhood being humiliated and I hated the way that
I felt. And I made a decision to behave in such a way as an adult where I didn't find myself in circumstances where I was either humiliated or I humiliated myself. Do you want to talk about that? Because when you mentioned that high school story, I went to the exact same thing. I would say a food stamp, baby, but things weren't easy. And I had free lunch.
And I never liked to get my free lunch at high school because I knew what that meant. And the
hierarchy of pop with their kids in high school, which may absolutely not make sense. And I'm so sorry for folks who are living off a TikTok on a high score right out. That is terrible. Anyways, that is a whole new show. Yeah, so it was actually junior high. Yes, it was junior high.
“Your dark time was junior high. It's interesting because I honestly, I don't know another”
human being who actually has their cumulative file. So in California, that's the infamous file. That's going to go in your file. That's your cumulative file. And it starts at pre kindergarten. When you test into kindergarten and it goes through the 12th grade. For whatever reason, maybe because 30 or 40 years later, I'd write a book. I retrieve that file after high school. And it has every nitty, gritty, determinant, everything. So all the memories. I don't think I
remember. I know what I remember. And it's solidified in the notes, three poor cards, the teachers, the little paragraphs they wrote. So during the darkest days, before I was bold enough, to fight back when I was still little and timid, I was nonverbal, shy, fearful. And they said that something might be happening at home. We're not sure what that whole lot of digging into saved me.
“So a demonstration that no one is going to save you, you have to save yourself. And then right”
around the third or fourth grade, the script flips in the file. And it says Lisa Ann is very
sarcastic with her peers. Lisa Ann is very aggressive. And I'm like, well guess what y'all, Lisa Ann, I had enough. And she was fighting back. So at some point, I gathered the strength and I made the decision. And maybe it was when the leg was cut. Where I said enough is enough. I'm going to save myself. And it's all there in this file. It's shocking. And so in junior high, it's one thing when you're in elementary school. And it's just kids like you. And they know maybe that you're not like them,
but they don't say a lot. You're little kids. It's in junior high when it starts. And that's when
“they're making fun of your shoes. I remember we had nothing. And I found a pair. They were”
roller skates. And they were shoes on top of wheels, roller skate shoes. And I was able to take the wheels off and use the shoes as my shoes. And I remember somebody making fun of me because of those shoes. And the free lunch line, you know, it was noted that you were going to be getting free lunch. And I wanted nothing to do with that. And the kids were cooler and cooler and junior high. And I was able to reach out to my junior high school counselor. And I asked her,
you know, what did you know about me? And she said that she acknowledged the kids were cruelty. Oh, she said you were poor. You were very malnourished. And she said, but you were fiery. And they were afraid of you. And there was a boy who was making fun of me. And I beat him up. I did. And then in this file is a five page cursive written essay where I talk about why I might have beat the boy
Up.
And thus the super villain was born. Let's fast forward to today. And we just wrapped up filming
“your episode. 90 minute session. We learned a lot. Clearly not enough. I'm still learning more”
about you. What can folks learn about you in this episode? And in your book and in your future TED talk that they can trust me. And that they can count on me. And I didn't read about the stuff on Facebook or hear about it on TikTok. I lived it. And there's something completely different
than having seen it or heard about it or been to that country or experienced what happened.
And that's the difference between me and a whole lot of people. I actually lived what I'm
“talking about. And I'm one of the anomalies and not one of the lucky ones because I chose to”
save myself. But I'm one of the anomalies who endured the kind of circumstances that I endured and actually overcame the odds persevered. And that's the kind of person you might want to pay
attention to. Especially when you're running what 20 thrathalons or what was it? Ironmen. Ironman
to be clear because that is a different. Clearly. Yeah. So I'll be participating in the Ironman World Championships in Kona Hawaii in October. Yeah. So that will be in between. I'm going to
“dip in and do a Half Ironman in Santa Cruz. But Kona will be number 20. And I do want to cut a woman”
of power promo and call out Rudy and challenge him with a good time. I'm like, Rudy, see you in Hawaii. I love what you know what we really do in Ironman. We say how many of you done or when someone said, do you do an Ironman and then you get to say, uh, the 18th there's a huge difference between one and a whole heck of a lot of them. Yeah. It's quite the power you have there. Yeah. So it's, it's, but it is. It's different for somebody who says that, um, sure. You know, I've
read about it or I heard about it and somebody who has experienced it. Yeah. But you've experienced so much more and good for you for just seeing you. Wow. It's, it's quite the testimony. Yeah. And I'm proud of myself actually and I'm proud of the example for my children and um, for anybody who hears about what did my adventures or one of the things that, you know, I've done what involves people all around the world and just reaching out and my gift is
connecting with people and I again, I don't resent the childhood that I had because it gave me the capacity and the compassion to be who I am today and that's a good thing. Right. Well, we're going to end it right there. Thank you so much Lisa Anne Olineta. I'll leave you the Spanish last time as a ledger slate. Uh, it's been such a profound morning and spending time with you. I wish you nothing but the best of luck like you need it. And um, I'm a theater kid. Uh, we say break a
leg, which I sure is bad luck for for athletes. So uh, go get them Tiger. Thank you. Right on. Uh, that concludes yet another episode of the Women in Power podcast for Insight Success. I am Reggitiers.
