Rich in Differences Podcast

Is it possible to acquire clients with neither a website nor business cards?   Today’s guest, Nikki Berkel, offers actionable strategies for marketing your business when you’re first getting started. She shares her recent decision to fully transition from being a corporate employee to becoming a full-time life coach. Nikki says that she gained the confidence to make this big leap by taking time beforehand to establish a system for herself that ensures she wouldn’t be leaving the “comfort” of employment only to dive into something she wasn’t fully equipped to handle. She researched like crazy, which included attending countless webinars and reaching out to established coaches for advice. In the end, she was able to cultivate the mindset, skillset, and courage she needed to finally pursue her passion full-time.   Because of her desire to get her name and message out there as efficiently and effectively as possible, Nikki stuck to two principles: 1) Be honest with people; 2) Don’t make assumptions. Both of these principles, for Nikki, come down to not overthinking the process. The entrepreneurial journey—especially when you’re just starting out—is plagued with challenges, setbacks, and misconceptions. (Those misconceptions include needing the perfect website and business cards to become successful in business.) According to Nikki, as long as you build an authentic relationship with your customer and do great work for them, you will weather the storm of uncertainty and go far.   Just as she simply reached out to successful coaches for advice, Nikki wasn’t afraid to contact other brands and businesses to ask if they needed her services. She kept a log containing all her prospects. By focusing on the “yes” prospects and accepting “no” prospects as part of the journey, eventually she found recurring business. In her own words, “I went out to people who I knew in general could use this help, and I asked them if I could help them.”   Finally, at networking events, Nikki would collect business cards—not so that she can then hand out her own cards, but in order to be able to jot down people’s email addresses, in turn creating an email list.   By focusing on honesty, relationships, and service, Nikki was able to quickly scale her business without business cards, and while having a website that is only “85% complete”. After all, a fully-booked calendar looks much better than the greatest website in the world.   Connect with Nikki at: Website: www.nikkiberkel.com    

If you’re an entrepreneur looking to build your brand in today’s internet-powered world, you need a website and WordPress can help you do just that. Today’s guest, Sara Obando, says it doesn’t matter how many followers and fans you have on social media—those are platforms that you don’t own. Should they disappear, your content and audience will disappear along with those platforms. A website, on the other hand, is something you uniquely own, and it serves as a hub for anyone who wants more information on you and/or your business. Creating your own website is not as scary a prospect as most people imagine. Simply find a host (such as Wordpress or Squarespace), set it up, and you’re good to go. Using the services of a website builder that comes with a host—such as Bluehost—is even better. Listen in as Sara offers advice on choosing the best website-creation platform for your needs, myths around Wordpress, teaching yourself to build a website when you’re not a techie, and determining which Wordpress plugins your website needs. Resources: Wordpress Ready Go: Checklist and workbook filled with strategies for scaling your WP website. Included in the workbook are steps on how to implement Sara’s tips. Grow Together Mastermind: A community designed for budding entrepreneurs looking to build their brands as effectively as possible. Sara's Blog: A great place to get free educational information on how to use, set up, and audit your WordPress site! Plugins Mentioned: Woocommerce—for versatile ecommerce tools ConvertKit—for your mailing list ActiveCampaign—for your mailing list MailChimp—for your mailing list Tasty Pins—for optimizing your images for both SEO and Pinterest Yoast SEO—for all things SEO Connect with Sara at: Website: www.saraobando.com Facebook: @saraobandoweb Instagram: @saraobandoweb Pinterest: @saraobandowebstudio  

Sometimes, all you need to take your business to the next level is a change in attitude.   Courtney Bates shares her ongoing journey as a direct sales distributor for the skincare brand Neora. Courtney has had her share of funny looks thrown at her for being involved in direct sales, especially considering her career as a speech pathologist. However, what started out as a fondness for Neora’s products turned into a passion for empowering families with business ownership.   Listen in as Courtney discusses how to nurture an attitude of gratitude. Such a seemingly simple shift in the way you think, in her experience, has led to a life-changing opportunity to leave an impact on countless lives.   Major Topics in the Conversation The biggest and best opportunities tend to be the most unassuming at first glance. The importance of having a system in place around which to scale your business Finding the right business for you is also about finding the best way you can make a positive impact on those around you. How a gratitude journal can serve as your shield against negativity Setting goals for your business Reframing negative thoughts Tips for new direct sales distributors How to promote your product/s without being pushy   Special Moments in the Episode [3:51] How a seemingly insignificant decision can turn into a business that touches many lives   [7:57] Staying positive as you work towards your business goals   [9:39] How to write a gratitude journal   [12:09] Strategic goal-setting tips   [17:07] Advice for those new to direct sales   [22:00] How consistent, ethical promotion of your product pays off in the long-term   [23:34] How your attitude toward your business affects every aspect of your life   Links: Email: courtney.bates@neora.com Facebook: Courtney Bates Instagram: courtneybates11   Transcript below   Intro: Welcome to Rich in Differences with your host Brooke, where we discover what works for you in life health and business. We are not Legos and one size does not fit all. So, grab a good drink and come listen to different perspectives as we see what sticks for you.   Brooke: Alright welcome to Rich in Differences, and today, we will be talking with the beautiful Courtney Bates from Neora. Did I say that right?   Courtney: You did.   Brooke: Excellent. On topic of setting business goals and staying positive in your business. So, a little bit about Courtney. Courtney has always enjoyed helping other people succeed. She has worked as a speech-language pathologist for 16 years, helping people return to and enjoy their lives. Now, she is focused on her true passion, which is helping other women start their own businesses so they can make the gains they want in their lives. She's a wife and a mother of 4 children and 2 pugs, she enjoys traveling with her family. You can catch her on her morning run at 5:00 AM or in the afternoon on her new peloton. Alright, Courtney you have to tell us what you think about the peloton now.   Courtney: Oh my goodness, I love it so much. I have never been a workout at home kind of person, but I am loving it.   Brooke: Awesome, awesome. And how long have you been doing it? Courtney: Well, just like a week now, I just… it just came in the mail sparkly and new, but I am it. I've been using the app a little bit before I ordered the bike to use… see how I like the coaching with my runs and that kind of thing, and really like that and noticed it was pushing me harder than I pushed myself. And that's what I'm seeing on the bike and that saving me the time of like the drive time of driving to the gym and that kind of thing, so it’s saving me an hour a day, so I'm loving it.   Brooke: Good, because I was seeing about anyone too, so I've been asking people.   Courtney: Well, I can pass a code along to you if you decide you want one.   Brooke: Awesome. Alright, Courtney, so we just heard a little bit about yourself, but how about you tell us a little bit about your business and what started you or your journey.   Courtney: Okay. Probably about 5 years, ago a friend had given me a bottle to try and I basically just tried it, you know, to be nice and, you know, I was like, “Okay,” and used it for a week and really kind of liked it. You know, I feel like I always tried to have good skin, you know, since my first pimple, my mom was, you know, buying me good skincare., but I really never liked my skin until I tried this and noticed it was really addressing all of the things that I didn't like about my skin, you know, that I was still fighting adult acne and starting to get… I was at the time 35, so I started to get signs of aging, that kind of thing, and it was addressing all of those. So, ended up, you know, going ahead and buying the bottle and loving it and then kept using more and more of the products, and everything I tried, I loved. And then it got to the point where I was like, “Wow, I'm spending a lot of money on this.” So, I think, as most people in this business do, I started just to get my products for free. I saw a way to, you know, save myself a little bit of money and thought, “Okay, well, I'll get my products for free and share it with a few friends. And if I make, you know, an extra 100 bucks a month, that's awesome.” At the time, I was a single mom and so, you know, $100 sounded like, you know, a good deal for me, and plus, you know, saving on my skincare.   So, when I first started, I kind of did it underground almost, you're in the closet. Like, I… you know, my day job is I'm a speech therapist, and I was like, “Well, what will people think if I'm, you know… you know peddling skincare and that kind of thing?” So, you know, I would share it with a few people, but I wasn't super open about it. And went on like that for a while, you know, did just enough to get my products free and that kind of thing. And then I would say about a year ago, I really started plugging into the system, because I was kind of drawn to the other women in the group. You know, they're all… they all have a lot of good energy, they're all very positive, uplifting people, and plus, I was kind of noticing that this business is kind of fun.   So, last year… I would say last summer, I really started plugging in and doing the things they were telling me to do. I finally like kind of came out of the closet and started sharing with people the business aspect of it. You know, I never intended to build a team or anything like that. So, as I started doing those things, my paycheck started to grow and I, you know, obviously really liked that. But the thing that I liked really even better than that was that, so all these friends are kind of joining me on my team and I'm seeing them start to succeed with their goals, you know? I'm seeing people that maybe kind of had negative attitudes before turn into more positive vibrant versions of themselves, and I'm seeing friends that were maybe not able to afford, you know, soccer lessons or dance lessons or, you know, a special night out with their husband, you know, now have extra money in their pocket to do those things.   So, even though I started this business because I really loved the products and just wanted a deal, it's turned into a whole nother thing for me. You know, it's kind of become my passion to like watch and help these other women and these other friends build something of their own, you know, that's going to contribute to their families and, you know, help them meet the goals they set for themselves and help them dream bigger and, you know, make bigger goals and think about what bigger goals they can have for themselves other than, you know, just the day-to-day thing.   Brooke: Excellent. I love it because I feel like your story is very common. Like, we all kind of start… because I've been direct sales before, and usually started with a friend trying to get me to try something, because we all start with our first people that we know.   Courtney: Right.   Brooke: And then I went, “Oh, I love this too,” and then like spending… spending the extra money and then being like, “Okay, there’s got to be a better like a cheaper way to do this.”   Courtney: Right, right.   Brooke: You know, and then starting like a business part. And I have watched many of my friends go on to do like amazing things with their business and afford… be able to afford more and more, like you said like, you know, the date nights or paying off debt.   Courtney: Right. Brooke: I had like one good friend who paid off a lot of debt with it, I mean, it's a beautiful way to make money, it's a business. Courtney: Right, right. And I think that's part of kind of when things starts switching in my head. Like, initially, it was just kind of this thing I did to get my free product, but then once it kind of switched in my head that, “Oh, this is… this is a business, this is a real thing. You know, this isn't just, you know, Courtney's little fun thing she does, you know, this is a business and it's bringing in income to my family and it's helping me meet these awesome women and helping me grow my circle,” and it's a real thing that deserves merit and doesn't need to be hid in a closet, you know?   Brooke: Exactly, I completely agree. And I'm so glad you come on here to talk to us about it.   Courtney: Yes, yeah.   Brooke: (unclear) [07:55] feeling that stereotyped. So, I know you wanted to come on here today and talk about the importance of setting business goals and staying positive and moving towards them. So, let's hear them truth bonds, Courtney. Courtney: Alright. So, like I mentioned, I think around last year, this time last year, I really started seeing my business grow. And that was just kind of plugging into the system that Neora has set out. And then at the beginning of this year, you know, I was kind of stagnant, it had grown, but was kind of at where it seemed like it was going to be. So, I really kind of started taking a bigger look at my business and what… at that same time, I started taking a bigger look at myself. Looking at my business in my life, one thing I noticed was, you know, I've got this amazing business the has the ability to go, you know, the sky's the limit. And I have this amazing life, you know, I've been remarried for a couple years, my family life fantastic, you know, everything is good and great, but yet I was waking up each day like just not feeling it. Like, I feel was like, “My life is wonderful, why don't I feel joyful every day?”   And when I started taking this good hard look at things, one thing I realized was that I was waking up each day looking for the negative and then what was going to go wrong and, you know, planning out my head that all the contingency plans for when something went wrong, what we were going to do to fix it. I had solutions for problems that didn't even exist and, you know, that's what I was spending my day looking for it was what was going to go wrong. So, that was the first thing I noticed I needed to fix.   So, one thing I did to fix that was I started a gratitude journal. And I know we've all heard about those for forever, like I can remember sitting in my dorm room listening to Oprah talking about gratitude journals. And, you know, to me, it was always probably something those other people do and I can do that in my head if I wanted to, but there's something powerful about, you know, writing down 5 things each day that I'm grateful for. And I don't write down, you know, 5 big things, like I'm not writing down, “I'm glad I have a roof over my head and I'm glad it, you know, my husband loves me,” I mean, I try to find little things in each day, you know, like, you know, “The dog didn't poop on the carpet… carpet today, I have 2 bugs. You know, the kids didn't talk back,” or, you know, “I got a good night's sleep, you know, got my workout in in the morning,” little things like that.   And what I found that does is, so each day as I'm going through my day, I'm looking for the good in it all day long because I know I'm going to write it down. I always do my gratitude at night before I go to bed because I know that night, I'm going to have to write 5 things down. So, instead of, you know, being on guard all day and worrying about problems, I'm looking for what's good in the day. So that's one big thing that's kind of helped change my attitude that's flowed over, you know, both in my family life and my business. I think in general, it's helped me become a much more positive person, which also I think has helped to grow my team.   I think at the beginning of the year, I had maybe 2 or 3 brand partners underneath me, and now, I think I have like 12 or 13 on my team. So, since the beginning of the year, something has massively changed. I mean, all the girls that have joined me are all… they're all people that have been in my life, you know, for a long time. So, something has changed with me and, you know, I think now I'm a firm believer that energy is a thing and the energy you're putting off is what you're attracting. So, I feel like the whole change in my attitude and the positive thinking and the positive energy I'm putting off is pouring over into my business. So, that's one thing.   The other thing with growing my business is I set a goal for my business; I think that's a big thing too. Because, before, I was, you know, just kind of playing at it, and whatever happened, happened. If we had a good month, you know, great, if not, that was it. And, you know, I read the quote that, “You can't, you know, hit a target you can't see.” I started writing down I need a certain volume number to hit a rank that I wanted, so I started writing down that volume number in my journal each day along with my gratitude. And it was about double of what I had done the month before, so I'll just… I’ll use real numbers here, so I needed to hit $11,000, I'd hit $6000 the month before. The therapist in me thought, “Well, let's write down $8000 because that seems like a decent jump for a month.” But then I wrote it down for one day and you can see in my journal where I crossed it off, and the next day, I started writing down $11,000. Every day, I looked at it, I wrote it, I visualized it, I saw that number in my head, but that was the number I was going to get.   And I did get to it by the end of the month; kind of a funny story with that. The last day of the month, I was traveling with my husband and we got up the morning before, he's like, “How far off are you?” and I said, “Like $2000,” he's like, “Oh, I'm sorry babe, you know, it's… you tried really hard,” and I'm like, “No, no, we're not done yet,” I'm like, “I… you know, you don't have to believe in me, but I believe in me. And I don't want to hear any negative thoughts, you can't say anything negative all day.” That's the other thing that I think has made a huge impact is the positive thoughts. Because you're always going to have them, whether it's in life or business or whatever, it's really powerful when you figure out how to reframe those thoughts from negative to positive.   So, you know, I'd look at my volume somewhere during the month and think, “Well, I'm just not going to have enough, I'm not going to have enough people order from me,” and then I would, you know, pause and turn that around quickly to something positive. So, I would say, “I have wonderful products that help people, they're going to come to me wanting to get them or wanting to purchase them.” You know, I might have a thought that, “Well, I need to have some more brand partners underneath me or sign up with me,” and then I, you know, would make the negative thought was, “You know, nobody who wants to join me here,” and I would turn that into, “I'm a positive person, I'm a happy person, I'm excited to do this business. People are going to want to do this business with me. They're going to want to be with me and share my energy and benefit from that.”   I think that was really, really powerful for me to be able to turn anytime I had a negative thought into the positive thought. And it's a process, like I would have to stop myself and think, “Okay, you're not going to think that,” and, “What are we going to think instead?” I even went as far as to write down several things like thoughts that are occurring negative thoughts that I would have, and then write down a phrase I could reframe it with whenever it came along. So, I think all of that has culminated in my business growing tremendously over the past 6 to 7 months. But like I said, I feel like the attitude portion of it and studying a goal has made the biggest impact on it.   Brooke: Good, excellent, I love it. And what I like is that you putting out the positive energy, the reframing of thoughts, the being aware of your goals, I like how you talk about it like you look at your months and be like, “Oh, well, you know, this is just what it is this month,” and now it's like, “Now I have a goal and I'm going to get to it.” And not only that, I think just your story about your husband on the last day of that month being like, “I'm so sorry,” and you being like, “No, no, no, we're not done yet, I got a whole damn day, okay, to get this,” and then you did it, right?   Courtney: Right.   Brooke: I mean, that makes a huge difference. I mean, if I was to say look at the person who sits over here and goes, “Oh man, I just, you know, I’ve got a day, there's just no way I'm going to do it, I just didn’t make it this time,” versus, “No, we still got a whole day, we can do this,” and then you can probably tell which person is probably going to make that mark versus the one who won't. I mean, so…   Courtney: Right, yeah. And the funniest pat was whenever we did… when I did hit that goal, it was like at 10 o'clock that night, we were out on the town in Washington DC literally riding around on scooters, and he abut fell off his scooter whenever I'm like, “We hit it!” So, yes, the attitude is everything with that.   Brooke: Yes. So, what is one piece of advice you would give to someone who is new to the direct sales business?   Courtney: I would say stay out of the closet, that was my biggest mistake, you know? Be… you know, first of all you have gotten into this business probably because you love the products and you're somewhat passionate about it because, you know, you wanted… you wanted these products bad enough that, you know, you bought into it to some extent.   Brooke: Yep.   Courtney: And, you know, just own it and realize that this is a real business, this isn't, you know, a plaything that you have to hide. You know, I remember thinking, “What will my mom think?” you know, my mom was always really proud of my education and my degrees and, you know, she would be my biggest critic, and so I almost didn't want to tell her to begin with. But I think you just have to believe in yourself. And, you know, part of growing this type of business is sharing it with others, not just the product, but the business. And like I said, I kind of hid the business part for a while, I didn't really offer that up to share with other people, I would offer the products but not the business. And I would be so much further ahead right now if I had shared the business to begin with. And the funny part is is that at this point, the business is the part I love. Yes, I love the products and I'm passionate about it, but I'm even more passionate that my favorite product that we have is the business at this point. So, I would say, you know, share that… that part right away. Don't just look at it as, you know, “I'm going to sell these products,” look at the whole picture.   Brooke: Yeah. So, I know like pretty much with any business owner, regardless of whether you're direct sales, service provider or anything, one of the biggest fears that comes up as, “I'm promoting too much, I'm becoming annoying.” And it's really something it has… you have to like… like, you have to actively become aware of that, in order to sell anything, you have to actually promote it. If people don’t want what you're selling or offering, they're not going to purchase…   Courtney: Right.   Brooke: … anyways. And so… and I just wanted to say that I have… like I said, I have plenty of friends that are direct sales, and I see their videos, they do lives, depending on which business they’re in, they'll be doing lives and never once am I like, “Ugh, here she goes again selling her stuff,” like it… that never crosses my mind. I'm never like, “She's annoying for traffic to run her business.” So, you know, from me to you, I would say, like all direct sales, like do not be afraid to be out there promoting your business. If people don't want your product, then they'll scroll on, they’ll move on. The people who do, those are your people and they're going to be coming for your product, and it's… it's okay, right?   Courtney: Right.   Brooke: Trust me.   Courtney: And that's kind of what I've told the girls that I work with too because I… you know, as being a leader, that's one of the main questions I will get, you know, they’ll be like, “I don't want to bug people.” And I used to be like that too, but one thing I remind them is, “You have your own reason for doing this, these are your goals, they're not their goals. So, you know, you have to do what you have to do for your goals, so you can't worry about what other people are thinking.” Brooke: Yeah.   Courtney: And like you said, I don't think there's hardly anybody out there that's like, “Oh, she's awful, she keeps posting that stuff,” you know?   Brooke: Yeah.   Courtney: I just don't think people… never have I had somebody say something negative about that, you know? Occasionally, like my husband's friends or something might make a joke about my, you know, skincare business, but whatever, you know?   Brooke: And it makes me stop… and it makes me stop scrolling. Because I will at least look and be like, “Okay, let's check out the board before and after photos. Let's see what's going on. What's the sale this month?” I mean, and sometimes, it's very, very… it happens enough to me to be like, I will be like, “You know what? I'm going to go ahead and try this because I keep seeing it, I've been eyeing it for a few months.” And here's the other thing, we have what we call… we call them in my industry lurkers, but they're the people who they follow you. Now, you may never hear from them, you may never know it, but all of a sudden, out of nowhere, will be someone that you never expected being like, “I’d like the purchase something from you.”   Courtney: Right.   Brooke: Because they've been following you this entire time, even though you had no indication that this person was even slightly interested in your product. So, someone is always looking and every… someone's always watching and someone is always curious.   Courtney: Right, exactly. I was telling my team the other day that I had somebody contact me through Facebook the other day, and somebody I've known for years, but she has never liked commented on any of my posts, never liked any of my posts. I believe earlier on, I'd sent her a message, didn't respond to it, and then the other day, just sent me a message herself and wanted to purchase several things. So, yeah. Brooke: Exactly.   Courtney: Yeah. And the other thing too like, you know, I mentioned my husband's friends occasionally will crack a joke or something, and the funny thing is, now he's the first one to whip around and be like, “Listen, you know what that skin care business does for our family?” And, you know, he's the first to put them in their place kind of thing. So…   Brooke: Yes, alright. So, where can people find you these days if they want more of the great Courtney Bates and her great skin care products?   Courtney: Alright. Well, my Neora website is courtneybates(so, c o u r t n e y b a t e s).neora(n e o r a).com. On Facebook, I’m just Courtney Bates, and on Instagram, I'm CourtneyBates11 all one… all one word. So…   Brooke: Well, the good news is is all that, I’m going to put in the show notes, so…   Courtney: Okay.   Brooke: Yep, you can just go below and click on it and it'll take you right to her site.   Courtney: Perfect.   Brooke: Is there anything else you would like to add, Courtney, before we head out?   Courtney: The only thing I can think of some of the tips that we've talked about here today and stuff. Even if you aren't, you know, in direct sales, I just want to say that I feel like those changes that I've made, you know, the gratitude, the reframing negative thoughts, those haven't just affected my business, those have affected my whole life, my…   Brooke: Absolutely.   Courtney: … my relationship with my kids, my relationship with my husband. You know, if mom’s walking around, you know, grouchy and looking for the bad every day, that's a lot different than when you have mom walking around happy, looking for the good things…   Brooke: Yes.   Courtney: … each day. So, you know, I think it's good, valuable lessons. The setting a goal, you know, I do that in other areas of my life, not just my business, you know? My peloton has to do with that, so… so I just think… I think it's good tools that you can use throughout your life in different spaces, not just necessarily business.   Brooke: Absolutely, absolutely. It definitely just… it all works together.   Courtney: Yes.   Brooke: Life is not in a vacuum, sections of our lives are not in vacuums, they are all happening at the same time, so yes. And there will be a freebie that is coming from Courtney that will include… it's a worksheet and it's all about taking your negative thoughts and reframing them to more positive thoughts, and a gratitude section for you to start writing down your 5 gratitude statements of the day. And you'll also be able to get that the show notes as well. Download that and use it for your own business going forward.   Courtney: Awesome.   Brooke: Alright, Courtney, well, thank you so much for coming on today and I hope we get to talk to you again about some new topics going forward.   Courtney: Alright, thank you so much for having me, I appreciate it.   Brooke: Alright pop-tarts, that's it for the day, thank you for listening. And as usual, we will leave a message to my dad. Hey, Dad, I haven't talked to you in a while, so I miss you and we should get together sometime to do lunch. And, yeah, I could call you and ask you, but it's much more fun to do it over the internet on a podcast. Love you!  

Do you have a business goal? Do you just want to start your business? Well then I hope you are ready for this episode.     In this episode Barbara Grochowska discuss the three elements you need to reach any goal, but especially a business goal.     We will be discussing:     Gaining clarity! How and why you need it when starting on a journey. Making a plan! Do you understand the steps it will take to get you to your goal? Execution! You can’t reach that goal if you aren’t setting yourself up for winning by creating great habits from the get go.     Episode Mentions:     Neuro-linguistics Programming (NLP)     Tony Robbins     Positive Psychology     Atomic Habits by James Clear     Working with Barbara Grochowska:     Website: https://www.barbaragrochowska.com/     Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/BarbaraGCoaching/     Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/barbara_grochowska/     Email: barbara@barbaragrochowska.com     Free Goal Setting Cheat Sheet: Here!     Read the Transcript Below     Welcome to rich in differences with your host, Brooke, where we discover what works for you in life, health and business. We are not Legos and one size does not fit all. So grab a good drink and come listen to different perspectives as we see what sticks for you.     So thank you for listening to rich in differences. And today we have guest speaker Barbara Grochowsa. She's hailing from London today where is extremely hot. Thank you for being with us. Barbara.     Thank you for having me, Brooke.     So I've interviewed Barbara before for one of my classes and she is amazing. She is a great teacher and coach so I can't wait for her to teach her lessons for today. I'm going to read something that I found off of her application that I felt was very insightful and very much how most of us feel in the, in the service space industry. Is it okay if I read a part of your, your application answer Barbara?     Yes, Absolutely.     All right. So she wrote to me in the application. I've lived a great part of my life on autopilot pleasing people. And going through the motions of every day and at last I had to wake up call, which made me become brutally honest with myself and what I wanted in life. I didn't have the skills at that point to change the things around as soon as possible, but I was determined to pave my own way to my ultimate freedom and being control of my life, which I feel like, a lot of us have that moment. And I love the fact that you bring up, bring up the point, like you didn't have the skills at that time, but you're a willing to get the skills in order to go the path you wanted to go. What happened at that time and what did you end up, you know, learning or creating to help yourself move forward on your own path?   So at that time when I realized, and I was living on the autopilot,  I was married, I had a beautiful house. I had everything that I wanted to have, when I was in my twenties and I thought, I just hit a jackpot and I was happy at the time, but everything came down to pleasing people. I  was pleasing people instead of just being myself. I just got into the part of my health, my ex-husband’s family and hoping the things work out and also the thinking of like everyone was getting married around me. Everyone was getting, you know, buying houses, going through different things. And I felt like, Hey, I need to do that too because everyone else was doing that. But then there was some problems in my marriage and before, actually I turned 30, I got divorced and that was the best up call for me because that opportunity helped me to realize that I really need to live my life. I literally didn't know at that point what I'm going to do, but I felt such a beautiful freedom of the, I can do whatever I wanted to. No one's going to stop me. Obviously at that time, you know, it was like I was, everything was new for me at that point and I just, you know, I wasn't exactly sure what that's going to be, but I knew I just going to do something, just something, like extraordinary, something that I haven't done before and not to worry about, you know, all the people, other like part of the family. They were judging me. So he was really, I really need that, like the wakeup call because that's why I was able to find my identity, my voice. Cause during that time when I was married, you know, it was just following others and as I said before, placing people.     Yeah, no, I totally understand. I've definitely been there with the pleasing people in the divorce and finding out afterwards, like after your divorce, realizing I can do whatever I want to do. I can be whoever I want to be. There's, you know, I'm not having to change myself or twist myself into something I'm not in order to make other people happy. So I totally appreciate that. What did you end up deciding to do?     So I felt at that point I'm just going to be a rebel. I went parsing a lot hard and loud and I actually, I moved countries for like six months. I just needed a break from UK. So I actually moved to New Jersey and stayed with my sister and I thought that time, who helped me to figure out my next step in life. Because at that point I just quit my job. I still, I was at the uni, but it was everything online so I could just take the study with me. But then, you know, as much as I had a lot of time to thing in insights, I just didn't, it didn't feel right for me over though. Like I just couldn't, I couldn't get the idea. Maybe I put, I think I was putting too much pressure on myself as far as trying to figure out what's going to be next for me in life. So after that I decided to go back to London and then, you know, it's not like I figured out right away, the moment I touched down in London that yes, that's what I'm going to do after what I think after a couple years I was, I got a path of self-development and I started listening and reading more about that and about, you know, how we can change our mindset and, and you know, all of those great things that we can, you know, enhance our life experience. It was my friend’s influence as well. I was talking to him, um, about becoming a coach and he's kind of, I think, you know, these are traits that place for people in your life that had just come in and they teach you a lesson and then, so sometimes they were spies, sometimes they will go, and he was one of those friends, he just, you know, introduced me to like the NLP and coaching and introduced me to different parts of service developments as well. So that's what I started, you know, getting more into coaching. I mean, I wasn't coaching at that point, but I was, I started researching and I thought, Whoa, you can actually make money coaching people. Because before I was, I was pretty ignorant when it came to coaching and self development, I was just, I had this kind of, you know, background where you should have figured out, you should figure out all the things, how to live, how to take care of yourself and so on. And you know, is it the black and white? That's it. Thanks to him actually. And I was able to see that, it's not the point, it’s not the case and there is so much more to life. The exploration of your bribe and yourself. It's so much beautiful when you take a time and you are actually willing to do the work as well. So that's where I decided to pursue this coaching path. And I liked, you know, the neuro linguistic programming. I found it very, you know, fascinating. And I was at the same time, I was, watching a lot of YouTube videos with Tony Robbins and all other, you know, influencers who they're, um, pioneers in this app development. And that was just like fascinated about it. I was just like, wow, I really want to do that. And even though, you know, looking back, even before I got married, I used to, you know, I like to inspire people. I like to, you know, bring the positivity into life and so on, but didn’t actually paid attention to that. So actually, you know, I looked into becoming a coach then I couldn't just go in and do the coaching because I didn't, I literally didn't know where to start. So I had to, I started researching, I hired a coach to help me to build my online business too. Honestly, it's, it's so hard when you haven't done anything like that before. It is so important to get a mentor or you know, some training course to find out how to do that because you can try to invite everyone in the world. But it's just so much time consuming. But if you can…     She's laughing cause I'm over here shaking my head vigorously. It really is hard if you don't have someone there to kind of help you guide the way some.   Absolutely. And then I came after that, I came across something really cool because I didn't want to only focus on motivation. I also wanted to combine like healthy living as well because for me health is so important. And since I remember I always make, I used to make like different things in the kitchen, like put all the like superfoods into my, in some nice movie like exercise during fasting and so on. And it was cool. I really enjoyed it. So I really had to make this decision, you know, am I going to be a coach who is just to the left coaching and just do it with the mindset, Oh am I going to be health coach? And I felt, you know, I couldn't, you know, at that point I didn't know I could just merge them. And the training that I did actually last year, it helped me to combine both of them and actually even enhanced that pretty much at the moment, human potential coach. So that involves everything like the mindset that have hacking positive psychology, everything to enhance, you know, your persona to help you find out who you are and how, you know, how you can perform at your best in your life. That, you know, I had to, you know, this course was this, this training was amazing. Helped me to acquire the skills that I needed to work with people. It gave me the container, how to actually hold the session with both the clients, how to work with them and you know, how's actually listened to them and how to read them. Because, you know, life coaching. It's not that you go into tell someone you have to do this and that and you will be fine. It's like exploring this person to find out exactly what's going on and, you know, direct and, or using the powerful question to have him or her to find their own path because me telling them what they're going to do is just, it's not gonna work because what has worked for me if I work for them, they need to find their own solution.     Yeah. So that was my journey of finding the skills [inaudible], It's just, that was the beginning of my journey because I learn every single day. I learned something different. I read different books to learn to, you know, to serve better as well.   Oh yeah. It's definitely a continuously growing yourself as well. Your learning doesn't stop. No one's learning stops.     Yeah, exactly. If you don't, there's no growth, as someone said.     Yes. Okay. So you are going to come on here and talk about on getting clarity on your goals and creating plans and steps and executing, which I'm sure is something that you've obviously utilized in your own practice in order to get ahead in your own practice. So what would you like to say on those steps?     So the first step would be to actually find exactly what you want to do. You need to find the clarity. It's, whatever it is. If it's in a business or there is something, a personal thing, take a time to actually find what you want to do. Describe it. Like be very precise. If you for example, struggling with that to find what that is. Take a time, just go unplug from everything. Just go for a walk or meditate, whatever works for you. Take a time, visualize that. Visualize what that is you want to do. Because if you don't have clarity, there's no point. You won't be able to find the right steps to get there. Because, it's just doesn't work that way. Otherwise you could just go into, go from one point to another one and then you cue. You would keep changing mind all the time. So the next step, is they have to be very honest with themselves on where they are right now and say, you know, the gap between where they are right now and the place where they want to go or what they wanted to, and from that point they need to write down what skills they need, what it's required to get from that point to where they want.   I agree.     Yeah, it's theirs. I don't know. For me personally, it took me a while to find the clarity, but then the moment I did, I was like, there's no, there was no distraction. I was just pretty focused on what I wanted to do and that was my path and it just took me way, you know, shorter time to get where I wanted to go. The third step to, you know, to reach the goal. This is, I think that will be the hardest part because there's some of elements you need to, yeah, to make sure you get there. You need to break down the goal you need to decide what will take you to get there, like you need to sit out like [inaudible], for example, how much time you need to put into your work each day. Can you do that? I was actually, last time, I just finished everything I broke, which is called atomic habits. I would just recommend to everyone, cause this book tells you exactly how to design the habits that, you know, there might be a small ones, but with stacking them over the time will help you to develop the daily routine. But you don't need to force yourself where you don't need to try to look for the motivation of doing the steps necessary steps to get where you want to go. You know, motivation, what works for a very short time. But if you've got the system down is like on, it's kind of, it's afterword becomes as a autopilot, but it's the good of the pilot to just, you just, for example, you get up in the morning and if you want to get fit, you get up, put you a running gear on and you're out of the door or just go into the, to the gym and you exercise and so on. So you need, you know, this is the part where we, people have to like break the goals, decided what's the rituals, habits they need to adopt for them to get where they want to go.      All right. So this reminds me of kind of like going to college. So anybody who's been to college or even in high school, they used to do it to bring you into the guidance counselors office and y'all would go over what classes you're going to take and what's your goal. And like in college you do the two, like, what are you majoring in this year? And so here are the 120 credits you need in order to major in this. And it's kinda like it sets up the steps for you and you know where you know what the end goal is and you know everything you've got to do to get to the end goal. And a lot of times that's exactly how you need to be in life as well. Like here's my end goal. Like you said, what are all the steps I need to take to get there? And then I need a schedule that in my life so I can be making that progress. I always just reminds me of like going to college and how a lot of times we don't do that. We don't treat it like we're trying to get a degree and that we have to have these markers in place and we have to make the time to get those, reach those markers and then eventually we do hit our goal. And so that's us what those kind of reminds me of. It's like, remember when you had the, you know, go to college and you had the schedule and you had the plan and you had to show up and you know, you had to have all that in place or else you are never going to graduate with your degree.     Yeah, absolutely. It's like you becoming your own parents, because it can be wishy washy. Like, ah, I'm just going to do it tomorrow and then the tomorrow comes and it's not fair. Like now there is no negotiation. You just get up. Don't make a shake, sit down and do what do you need to do. And you know, I kind of I miss on one side, however, I didn't miss that. Being in college, you actually know you don't, you don't need to do the work you sat because you've got the major and you know exactly what steps they, the steps were given to you. You're on your own. Yeah. You need just figure out yourself, but then you can make your so much fun as well and enjoyable at the same time. Yeah. It's just, it's all about mindset as well.     All right, so you kind of, I'm pretty sure he talked about this a little bit because you said that you determine what you wanted to do and then you knew kind of the steps you wanted to take. So my question had been like, you know, what happened to get you started? Or maybe what happened after you started your journey and you created, you got clear on your goal, you created your plan and you started executing it. What are some of your outcomes from it?       Oh, that was, I'm just slapping it. It was just like love, hate relationship with my goal, pretty much. I really had to be honest with myself. I provided massive vision of myself of what I want to do, what I'm up to, what I want to have and what I want to be in like in five years, you know, I had to be very specific because if you're not specific, it just kind of do things, whatever I feel like. But when I decided whatever you wanted to either designed it designed like the steps of, you know, what would go into take, what would take for me to get the, and you know, it wasn't easy to follow through and I'm still in the process, you know, it's, even though I've created some sort of system, it's, this is something that I'm still working on. You know, that there are good days, bad days, there's some days that are really struggling to get up in the morning and just, just get all with this task and just do what I or I supposed to be doing. And during those times I've really, I take a time to remind myself what I'm working for, this is the, that is my motivation. Because I've been doing that for quite some time now. I've developed the ritual like even a morning ritual where, for example, in the morning like I get up like five o'clock in the morning, go for a run. Then when I came back, come back that I have some time for myself, and then I spent at least hour to answer my CO's or emails and then having my breakfast and then go to work. And then in the evening, I tend to work with my clients. When I look at it right now. Or even when I looked at it like let's say two years ago, I thought, well, what's happened with my free time? It's like, what's happening with me? Meeting with friends, actually being so scheduled, being so organized, giving more freedom of, you know, spending actually creating the relationships that actually matter to me. Not spending some random times with people that I don't like, or they don't happy to grow or they know they criticize or something like that. They don't believe what I do. So that was, that was, you know, I love, I love that. I have to say, as I mentioned before, the good days and bad days and having the, you know, visualization practice helps a lot. So yes, I'm just thinking of who else helped me to actually create that. Yeah, what's happened? Sorry.   No, I was going to say, I know you gave some pretty good ideas. Being honest with yourself. That's a big one. Most people just think that they're going to create a plan and then they're just going to fit it in. Like I'll just make it work and that's just not how life works. You actually have to create a schedule and plan it in and also you know, understanding that this plan is a, like a living, breathing thing. Like it may not be exactly as you created it, you know, two years ago. So you probably are going to adjust it to fit as you grow and your life changes. It also will have to adjust as well and showing up and making like it sounds like you have like set hours. Like this is what I do now, and I do this every day or at least is to the best of my ability and you know, everything else you know that has to wait. You know, like this is business hours for me, so you know, you are calling me up and saying you need a ride to the airport. This really isn't going to work right now because I'm working, you know. So it's like the idea of also being strong in your, the times you are set and keeping to them as well. So I feel like you've given a lot of information, but if you got more we'd be more than happy to hear it.     Yeah. Actually, you mentioned about the scheduling. We are so happy with doing that to do list and thinking like, Oh, we're gonna crump all of it in one day and it's going to be brilliant and I got to move so fast into achieving my goal. It doesn't work that way as much as much we could have such a good intention to, you know, to do as much in one go, but Hey, that, you like, I'm so guilty of over-scheduling hoping that you know, our monitor that and you know, that's going to have to get it done in the next week. Oh actually, you know, this actually doing the projects or the goals that they want to achieve. Like normally achievable within a month. I was planning, Oh let's just do that in one day or one weekend. No, you have to be realistic. You work at, you will burn out you will hate the process. So fear artistic of how much time each task is going to take. And for example, if you finish, don't feel bad about that. Sometimes things happens. You have another day to complete that.     Yes. Grace to self.     Yeah.     It's important to show grace to self as much as we show grace to others. All right, so I know you've given already some ideas, but if you were to teach someone how to start this, like what exactly would you say? Like should be like their first steps in getting started. Do you have like, like grab a journal, grab a planner or like how would you teach someone to sit down and do this, you know, get clarity on their goals, creating a plan and then executing.     Hmm. So the first step would be I would recommend everyone to just unplug completely. Not to like turn off the TV, turn off you YouTube, you don't want to have an influence or anything like that on I think to disturb you and even like going for a walk, just go for a walk, clear your mind and think of what you really want. If it's for example, if it would help you to put the words on the paper, do what it's because only that way you can find the clarity of the goal. Obviously with the time it might change, like slightly different direction but right at this point unplugging, cutting out on the distraction on side to side. It's the first step to actually to get the, you know, the get the clarity on the goal.     Okay. That's it and it's excellent. I totally agree and I think it is in part like you brought up like, it's important to bring up, like you said, like it can change over time. I feel like a lot of times we get stuck on this idea that once I write this down, this is it. This is all I'll ever do, and our brain goes, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. What if we want to do this? Who do we want to do that? Oh my God. You know, you're, you're cutting everything else out. But the truth is you've got to start somewhere though. Once you got landed somewhere, as you grow, you can pivot as necessary when you're ready or when it's appropriate to. So don't get locked up in the idea that this is it, but you do have to start somewhere. So yeah, getting away and making some sort of decision like this is what I'm going to focus on right now is very important to get in getting started on that journey because I'm the world's worst with that.     Oh God. I think I, I'd like to add to that point that that's, that is don't chase every tiny object on the way. And now everyone, there's so much noise out other, you know, people though you think different things, just be unique. Be yourself. Find the thing that works for you. That's it.   Barbara, how can people work with you these days?     At the moment I provide one on one coaching so they can just go to my websites and just book their discovery session so that can had the testers, a taster as well of my session, my coaching style. Excellent.   And take it from there.     All right, so I'm going to put her website information down below in the show notes so you'll be able to find her if you want to work with her. And are you on any social media these days, like working people kind of maybe follow you in your work?     Sure. So I am on Instagram, which is BarbaraGrochowska, G R O. C H. O. W. S. K. A. I know it's a hard run, and I’m on the Facebook because well, which is, I couldn't get the same [inaudible] but it's Barbara G coaching. That's the another place people can find me as well.       Excellent. And again, I'll put that down below in the show notes so you can just simply click on the link and go right to her, right to her page and her information. All right, Barbara. I believe that's it. I appreciate you coming on here and chatting and teaching us all about your steps and your journey. I think your journey is great and I love how raw and honest you are because truth is none of us have it all figured out and it is a work in progress for the rest of our lives essentially. It never gets completely figured out. So thank you for coming on here and chatting with us. Thank you so much for having me. All right, pop tarts, us all for this week remembers send in your thoughts, your feedback, your ideas, your questions, and your drink of choice, whether it be alcoholic or non alcoholic, and be sure to send in the recipes so you can be featured on the show. And don't forget, subscribe. So you can be around for when I feature you on the show and it gives some good content. Here's to another week. Cheers.    

If you’re the kind of person who is scared to create social media content on the fly or just doesn’t have time to do all of that copying and pasting (plus brainwork to come up with that perfect viral post), there’s an answer for that, systems   As Brooke explains, the key to creating a consistent online presence is having the right system. You want a system that makes it easier to create content while saving you time. You also want a system that will let you schedule ahead of time, because life happens.   A social media management tool can do all of this...and a whole lot more...    Listen in as Brooke shares how using a system and the right social media management tool allowed her to maintain a consistent online presence, no matter what was going on in her personal life at the time.   Major Topics in the Conversation What is a social media manager and what are some common ones? Why your business needs a social media manager tool like Hootsuite or Buffer Behind-the-scenes look at Brooke’s system for managing her social media Why your social media system should focus on your needs Keeping a social media presence when you’re not prepared to post   Special Moments in the Episode [0:30] What is a social media manager? What are some examples?   [1:02] Why use social media managers?   [2:18] How to use social media managers as a business   [6:00] Using social media managers to create a consistent presence...when your life hits an unexpected turn   [8:04] How do you social media?   Learn more:   HootSuite   Buffer   MeetEdgar   Canva   AirTable   Kori Linn - Burnout Specialist and Coach   Janice Chaka - Podcaster and Travelling Introvert     Free Training - Eclectic Entrepreneurs   Unsplash.com - Royalty Free Photos     Brooke's Social Media:   Facebook   Instagram   Pinterest     Disclosures    *Disclosure: Some of the links above are affiliate links, meaning, at no additional cost to you, I will earn a commission if you click through and make a purchase. *   **Rich in Differences Podcast is not intended to diagnose, prescribe, treat, or cure any disease, physical or mental. Any advice given on the Rich in Differences Podcast should not be construed as a prescription, a promise of benefits, claims of cures, or a guarantee of results to be achieved. The information, instruction or advice given by Rich in Differences Podcast is not intended to be a substitute for competent professional medical or psychological diagnosis and care. You should not discontinue or modify any medication presently being taken pursuant to medical advice without obtaining approval from your healthcare professional.   As a listener/reader, you must take complete responsibility for your own physical health and emotional well-being.       Transcript Below   Welcome to Rich In Differences with your host Brooke. Where we  discover what works for you in life, health and business. We are not legos and one size does not fit all. So grab a good drink and come listen to different perspectives as we see what sticks for you.   Welcome to Rich In Differences. This is your hostess with the mostest Brooke. And today we're gonna be discussing systems in particular social media managers. I am in love with social media managers. So what is a social media manager? It is something like Hootsuite, Buffer, MeetEdgar and it's essentially a website you go to, you sign up for it and you link your social media accounts to it and you're able to create posts and schedule posts to be posted in the future. And the application itself will do the posting.    So it's like do all the setup and then the system just does it for you. And this has been a game changer for me. I dislike creating social media by the seat of my pants. I am definitely a planning and organizing type of gal. And if I have to try to come up with witty or you know very thoughtful posts out of nowhere I don't enjoy it and it doesn't come off as true to me. So I use social media managers to help me plan out what I want to post and then it gives me the ability to be as creative and as in-depth as I want to be.   So I want to think about someone you follow that their post always seems really thought out really well written and they post quite a bit. And you're probably thinking "my gosh how does she or he come up with all this content and how are they so consistent with it" more than likely they are using a social media manager. So here's how I use it. You're going to get a very in-depth look in behind the scenes of how a person may use a social media manager in their business.   So we're going to go with the idea of guests interviews because it's what I do. When I have a guest interview coming up I look at first off who's coming up? What are they talking about? I listen to the interview, I've probably heard the interview five hundred times before it's even put out into the world. And I look for certain things like I'll sit down and pick out quotes and look for amazing pictures on unsplash.com, which by the way is an amazing web site. If you are looking for royalty free photos and I will jump on canva.com I'm a canvas beast and I will create social media posts for my Facebook, Instagram and Pinterest accounts. I'll take these pictures and I'll put them with the quotes and just create something fun to put out there, just for this one episode. I'll also research any sort of articles that I feel like are relevant and if my guest speaker is someone who blogs or does podcasts themselves or puts any sort of media out into the world I'll see if I can find something that's relevant and I'll collect that as recommended readings. I will also create a blog post of my own from the episode and any other information. So if they're giving me a freebie that's something I'll collect and I take all this information and I put it into my Air Table because I use AirTable.com for my podcast, everything podcasting is put in to my Air Table and I will go on to my social media manager and I will sit down and schedule out about two weeks worth of posts just on this single episode for this guest speaker. It allows me the time to actually sit down and also research like for example hashtags, if I'm doing Instagram then I'm going to want to have relevant hashtags for this guest speaker.    And again all of that information goes right into my Air Table next to their episode. And so all this information is right here at my fingertips and I simply go into my social media manager I click Monday at 11:09 A.M. because my social media manager says hey this seems to be the time that most people are looking at your post and I post a quote. Then Tuesday maybe I post a recommended reading from my guest speaker and Wednesday I'll post their freebie that they're giving out. And I'll do this all the way up to the time of their episode.    And this again allows for me to sit down and really think things out and really put my own creative spin on how I want to market this episode. For example Corey Lin's episode if you were to look at my social media at that time I had quotes right, but her quotes were on pictures that people were writing in notebooks. And then I have Janice Chaukas episode about podcasting and her pictures were different and she didn't really, we didn't really, do quotes we did tips. So I really get to sit down and put my creative spin on this and that gives me the time and the space to do so, then I'm putting something out the world that's more like me.    The second thing that having a social media manager does is it allows you, and allows your business to keep going when things do not go well for you in life. So here's an example. A little over a week ago my grandmother passed away and it was very unexpected and my entire family including me was in shock and grief set in pretty quickly and my life came to a standstill. She was a huge part of our family. She was always there for us. And you would, we would call her the matriarch of our family and so her passing was a big, big deal. And for me and I'm sure for the rest of my family life kind of just went still. And that includes my business. A few days after her passing I started getting notifications on my phone about people liking my Facebook posts and making comments and I thought to myself but I'm not making any posts. What are people liking and commenting on? And I opened up my Facebook and lo and behold there's all my scheduled posts.    I had completely forgotten that I had scheduled weeks worth of posts already. So essentially I schedule about a month's worth of posts and so I kind of just honestly just forgot about it all in my grief and shock. But the social media manager did what it was supposed to do. It scheduled or sent out the posts that I had scheduled. And so to the rest of the world my business look like it kept going. Even though behind the scenes it had come to a complete and utter standstill.    So a social media manager allows you to also be prepared. And I wasn't even thinking about that when I started using one, for when the inevitable happens. Something in your life will happen that's going to cause you to come to a standstill. That's life. And so having good systems in place kind of allows for your business to keep going even though you may not be at that time. And if you are a natural planner or organizer this is really going to resonate with you. If you're finding yourself having a hard time keeping up with your social media this may be a good option for you.   As a matter of fact why don't you let me know how you do your social media? What works for you? Are you a fly by the seat of your pants type of person? Do you use a program? Do you hire someone? How do you do it? There is no wrong way. There is just simply what works for you.   All right pop tarts that's it for today.  And today I'm going to leave a message to my nanny who passed away.   Hey nanny I already miss you. I have to say you were the most honest person I have ever met. I'm not quite sure how you treated the rest of the family but I can safely say that you never sugarcoated anything for me and you helped me have a good footing in the real world in the realistic side of things because of it. I hope you're keeping an eye on all of us and I love you.  

It seems like everyone, their mother, and their cat is starting a podcast these days. That being said, finding good advice for starting a podcast isn’t easy. With so many gurus and courses, it can be overwhelming for newbie podcaster.   That’s why we sit down with Janice Chaka, host of The Traveling Introvert podcast, who shares the stories, humor, and advice she gained from 2 years as a successful podcaster.   Unlike most “newbie podcast advice” people, Janice focus in this episode is content. Janice shares how she continually finds ideas for her podcast, and why goals (as well as boundaries) are important to your life as a podcaster.   Major Topics in the Conversation How do you capture ideas for future episodes? Why the first 7 episodes are critical to your podcasts;s growth Why your first goals should NOT be vague like “get more followers” How to set realistic (aka SMART) goals as a podcaster Why you don’t need to be on every social media channel to succeed Why follower count isn’t everything Finding the right-sized podcast mentor for you   Special Moments in the Episode [2:43] How Janice captures new ideas for episodes [3:34] What makes Janice’s podcast a success? [6:20] What tips would you be a newbie podcaster? [6:44} Where are some places new podcasters can get help? [12:00] What is your business’ pain point right now?   About Our Guest Janice Chaka is a podcaster, introvert coach, mentor, speaker, and founder of The Career Introvert. She is also the organizer and host of the Podcast Virtual Summit and the Get Your Podcast Started Facebook group.   Learn more:   Email   FREE resources   Janice Chaka on LinkedIn   The Traveling Introvert Podcast   The Career Introvert website   The Career Introvert on Instagram   The Career Introvert on Twitter   The Career Introvert on Facebook   Get Your Podcast Started Virtual Summit   Get Your Podcast Started Virtual Summit Facebook group   Other Resources   Podcast Movement Anchor Libsyn iTunes Pat Flynn’s course WhatsApp       *Disclosure: Some of the links above are affiliate links, meaning, at no additional cost to you, I will earn a commission if you click through and make a purchase.     **Rich in Differences Podcast is not intended to diagnose, prescribe, treat, or cure any disease, physical or mental.   Any advice given on the Rich in Differences Podcast should not be construed as a prescription, a promise of benefits, claims of cures, or a guarantee of results to be achieved. The information, instruction or advice given by Rich in Differences Podcast is not intended to be a substitute for competent professional medical or psychological diagnosis and care. You should not discontinue or modify any medication presently being taken pursuant to medical advice without obtaining approval from your healthcare professional.   As a listener/reader, you must take complete responsibility for your own physical health and emotional well-being.   Transcript Below   [00:00:04.390] - Brooke Welcome to Rich In Differences with your host Brooke. Where we discover what works for you in life health and business. We are not legos and one size does not fit all. So, grab a good drink and come listen to different perspectives as we see what sticks for you.   [00:00:21.580] - Brooke Welcome to Rich In Differences and this is Brooke your host. I have with us Janice Chaka as our guest speaker for today. She's giving me the thumbs up because I actually got the name right.   [00:00:33.500] - Janice Yes you did. Nailed it as I said you would.   [00:00:37.060] - Brooke Thank you. Thank you. So Janice has a podcast called The Traveling Introvert. Could you tell us a little about your podcast. And how long you've been doing it.   [00:00:45.640] - Janice I have been doing it two years. Just I think it's time around now because something came up and I was like, oh it's it's been two years and a little bit about it. It started off, It's basically me ranting into the void for five minutes about whatever might have popped up in my life. Normally it's either HR related, travel related, or like running your business related. One of those three topics but super, simple, quick. People have said it's like having a quick coffee chat or like over the water cooler complain with me.   [00:01:16.990] - Brooke I could see that. Would you call yourself an introvert?   [00:01:19.420] - Janice Most definitely. I'm actually dreading the fact that when this comes out won't happened but I've got a conference coming up where normally I can go in and out of the conference and take breaks and they tell me "No actually we're going to livestream it. So no one can go anywhere."   [00:01:32.410] - Brooke  Oh no.   [00:01:36.300] - Janice Yeah.   [00:01:37.660] - Brooke Outside your comfort zone?   [00:01:38.970] - Janice  Oh yeah.   [00:01:43.330] - Brooke So is your podcast the same as it was when you first started or did it evolve over time?   [00:01:48.760] - Janice I like to say it has evolved as I have grown as a podcaster. However, yes we've got a tagline on the end that's slightly different and that's changed as I've pivoted in my business. I now get people who write in and ask me questions that I get to answer on the podcast. So that's changed. Apart from that it's still basically therapy and me venting into the void.   [00:02:14.830] - Brooke That's probably why so many people relate to it! I will be honest, that's what I'm looking forward too, I'm looking forward to getting people's responses and being able to answer their questions as well. So that must help with material and content creation?   [00:02:29.460] - Janice It does and then stuff just pops up every day and then your like, "oh I didn't see that coming". Well I'm gonna I'm going to talk about that. There's a podcast in that. Now my partners got to the point where they're like "Oh this thing happened. Your going to podcast about this arent you?"   [00:02:41.770] - Brooke Do you keep notes on your phone of all the different things that come up?   [00:02:45.970] - Janice Yeah normally. So I have a friend who I have an ongoing WhatsApp voice conversation with.   [00:02:51.480] - Brooke OK.   [00:02:52.130] - Janice So I will message her. Just because I'm better with audio, so it's saved and then I might make a note. I have a project management thing that I use and so I have a list of episodes. I could write "talk about so and so" and it will go in there. To answer your question, yes. Always have a place where you have notes because ideas and stuff come up randomly so you should have one single place where you always put the stuff.   [00:03:15.160] - Brooke I think mine's just notes on my phone, and it always happens and I'm driving too. So it's the safest time for me to be making notes in my phone.   [00:03:21.500] - Janice Voice memos, voice memos rule.   [00:03:26.860] - Brooke  Yes. So what would you say has been the number one reason your podcast has been a success.   [00:03:33.660] - Janice Wait my podcast is successful?   [00:03:35.220] - Brooke I would say so. Come on now, if you have people coming in with questions, I would say it's somewhat successful.   [00:03:43.240] - Janice Well I'll tell you what for the first three months I didn't tell anyone it existed, it was just for friends. Why is my podcast successful? I think it is because what you listen to is kind of what you get. It's also like when people coach with me I'm very much like if you want sunshine and flowers and unicorns. I'm not that person. Here's my podcast, this is what it sounds like, this is what you get. If you don't like it, now's not the time to sign up. I think it's been successful because a couple of things happened one I went to podcast movement and Glass box were running this competition and I won the competition and so I got free advertising for a week. That helped.   [00:04:20.320] - Brooke Oh wow that is awesome.   [00:04:23.030] - Janice Yeah thanks. Glass box.   [00:04:24.320] - Brooke Yeah.   [00:04:25.720] - Janice So now I use them religiously. I also think I've gotten better at telling people. I have a bag, a swag bag that I walk around with and so people are like well (the Traveling Introvert) that's an oxymoron. Introverts don't travel and then I have to go and school them and then we come back and listen to the podcast.   [00:04:41.800] - Brooke Aww nice, that's clever.   [00:04:47.430] - Janice Yeah I don't know, people seem to like it. Thank you people I appreciate you. It's real, it's just me and I think people get value from it.   [00:04:55.390] - Brooke Yeah, I could see that totally. So when we first talk you mentioned the concept of pod fade which is something I actually had never heard of. So I imagine if I've never heard of it others have probably not heard of it either. So would you care to describe what pod fade is?   [00:05:11.290] - Janice Oh I wish I had the dictionary definition. I'm sure Urban Dictionary has this somewhere but basically when your podcast starts you're all excited and you pump out a bunch of episodes and then life happens. And you slam into that like a truck. And you're scared to sort of get back on the horse again. And so there's maybe seven to ten episodes out there, something happens and then you stop podcasting and now you've taken a break. You're scared to go back because you think your listeners will be mad at you or you get overwhelmed or whatever it is.   [00:05:40.570] - Janice  And then you stop podcasting and there's some statistics with Anchor and with Libsyn. Anchor is a free site that you can use, I think over 64 percent stop after seven episodes and then with Libsyn I think it's a huge percentage. So if you go and look and I choose for example Itunes is which is the graveyard of podcasts you'll see a lot that are still new and noteworthy but haven't actually done anything for the past year.   [00:06:07.750] - Brooke That's weird.   [00:06:09.790] - Janice They say their working on that. So it might be fixed but it's been an ongoing process. Because people are like "I want to be on new and noteworthy" and the rest of us are like no it's not a thing.   [00:06:19.750] - Brooke Yeah ok. So if someone wanted to start a podcast what would you recommend in order for them to avoid the pod fade?   [00:06:29.290] - Janice  One thing? Because I could go on about this.   [00:06:31.600] - Brooke I mean you can give as many tips as you want, I am listening. Right here.   [00:06:39.280] - Janice Most people who start it might deal with their business, some people start as a hobby and that's that's awesome because then you're just rambling on about Game of Thrones or whatever it is that you're doing and your goal is much easier if you're doing it as a hobby. If you're doing it with regards to your business your business goals and your podcast goals should intersect in some way shape or form. Or why are you doing it? With those goals they should be a way to measure them. Make sure to measure. We all forget about the smart goal thing all of the sudden when we become podcasters "I want listeners" and that's not a goal. I mean it can be a goal but that shouldn't be what it is. Can we have someone email you and ask you a question? It doesn't have to be a huge audacious goal. It could just be someone's listened to me and I've provided value and so they've felt compelled enough to get out their phone and actually sent me an email like that takes more effort, that's more than a ticking like or follow that's actual commitment. Keep it whatever works with you, I was super stoked when someone emailed me. It's like someone actually listened to me and they e-mailed me from the other side of the world, because that's the other thing people forget anyone can listen to you anywhere. So we tend to make a podcast very focused in a specific geographical area and you don't have control of that. You can't be like only people in the US can listen to your stuff or only people in the UK.   [00:07:54.750] - Janice Yes to stop pod fade make sure that it fits in with your lifestyle not the other way around. Most people will find that their podcast take over their life with editing or social media and all that good stuff. So beforehand do an intro or test episode where you fiddle with everything and figure out what works. Figure out: how you want your sound to be, whether you want music in between, jingles, intros, outros, how long all of that takes, how long the editing, takes how long your social media takes, and then you'll know exactly how long each episode is gonna take you and then you look back at your life and your calendar and your like. Uhh. And don't do that "I'm gonna make it work" thing because that doesn't leave room for error, children, hurricanes, life, getting a new job because that sucks you up for 90 days too.   [00:08:37.840] - Janice And the systems and workflows write down everything that you do. It can change over time. But when you're recording, OK I have to switch this on, this toggle has to be this setting, I need to check all of these things to make sure it all works. When you have it all written down there's less decision making for you to do and less time for your brain to be like. I don't know. I'm confused. So workflows systems automate as much as you can. Don't go and try and be on every single social media platform. Pick one, do that for six months and get it down, get it automated get a system then move on to the next one. We have enough hats on as it is as podcasters. But the main thing is the goals. Because if those two don't work and then you come back six months I was like Well I don't have 18 million followers how do I get more followers. And it's not necessarily the amount of followers you have it's how engaged they are and how invested they feel in the podcast.   [00:09:27.490] - Brooke All right then that was a lot. I liked all of that. I'm going to have to go back and write all these down when my microphone can't pick it up. All right. So if someone wanted to start a podcast where would you recommend they start?   [00:09:45.340] - Janice All right so there's two schools of thought here. Obviously I'm going to say you should come and join my podcast group. That is what I should say.   [00:09:53.080] - Brooke Yeah.   [00:09:53.200] - Janice That's the "get your podcast started" group on Facebook and now on Facebook you can personalize it so you literally just look for "get your podcast started" groups and it will magically appear. A lot of people go with Pat Flynn because he is the O.G. of podcasting and he has a course and it's all free and it's all him. But he also has a huge team behind him, and production, and money. Not everyone has that luxury. Try and go with someone who is in line with what you're doing or has done what you've done and it's just a little bit ahead of you. Not like all the way up ahead of you so they're making the same mistakes that you have made and it's in recent memory rather than oh I did this thing like five years ago when I talked to the president of X Y and Z.   [00:10:32.150] - Brooke I like that. Then it's a great piece of advice. Getting someone who's just a little ahead of you. So they do remember what you're going through because sometimes I do feel like a lot of people who are veterans do forget. And then they have great advice but the advice is for where they're at. It's not for where a new person is at and I feel like that's easily forgotten sometimes. What is the one thing you wish you knew when you first started running a business?   [00:11:00.830] - Janice I suppose to be prepared for this and I thought about it and there's so many things. The biggest, biggest, biggest thing and I'm not really a huge mindset believer but we go through our lives starting at school, and we get told what to do. WeSome of us go through university, we get told what to do. We have a job, we get told what to do. But if you're a business owner yes you have clients who tell you what to do. But you actually have the power to tell them no. No that's not how that works. And we forget this and we feel beholden to the paycheck the money that oh they're gonna ruin my reputation and all these other things but I wish that earlier on in my business career in my life I realized that I could push back and I could say no. And it's almost a self worth thing. Because you're scared to say no to the money, you're normally in such a stage where you want the money and so you say yes to everything and that ruins you quicker than anything else because then you're not happy when you're working and that's one of the things you want to be. I mean you don't want to be over the moon happy but you want to be okay working. So when becoming your own boss and treating your business like a business remember: you are the CEO, you're the strategist behind your business.   [00:12:03.800] - Brooke Absolutely. So what is one fear or thought that keeps coming up for you as a business owner?   [00:12:09.050] - Janice We kind of talked about this earlier, my newsletter. Not my zone of genius. I have a list. Technically I have a list for my podcast as well and that's a whole other thing. I know kind of what I want to write but part of me is like how personal do I want to get? Because I don't, I'm a very private human being. But people keep going on about the no trust thing it's like how much is too much and how much is too little? How often to write. Because I committed to messaging every Thursday and I committed to doing a rolling stock of different topics but right now I'm really focusing on this one topic. So all I want to do is write about this one topic. Do you guys mind? So I'm getting feedback because sometimes as often as you might be asked hey click this link or this link some people just read the email and don't respond to you or give you feedback. And as business owners we want to get better and we want to do stuff that works for you. But if you don't tell us and communicate with us we're not gonna do it. So every time I get a feedback form from any company that they specifically like ask "hey Janice we want you to give feedback". I will do it because that's what I would want as a business owner.   [00:13:10.400] - Brooke Awesome. Thank you. So how can people work with you these days?   [00:13:14.880] - Janice So having said that email is my choice communication. People message me on Facebook and I'm like "I'm not on here." I even have a message on my Facebook page if you message it says "Hi I'm out helping other introverts, I check this maybe twice a day, email me." Email me at: Janice@thecareerintrovert.com you can find me at thecareerintrovert.com,  Facebook: careerintrovert, LinkedIn: Janicethecareerintrovert anything careerintrovert appart from like Snapchat, I'm there. The best way to contact me is email though and if you want to work with me this is what I do. I help people launch their podcast, less overwhelmed with goals, with systems workflows. Because one thing about podcasting is you want to be consistent and the only way not the only way but my way of doing that. There's many ways to do. The thing is to have systems and workflows in place and obviously record in advance so you have a batch of stuff so that you can still live your life and it fits in with your lifestyle. I had someone ask in my group the other day "why are your podcast episodes so short" and I was like "because it fits in with my personality which is short and sweet." It fits in with my lifestyle. I travel a lot so I need to batch record and I'm going to do that like five minutes here five minutes there and then be done with it. I didn't want to spend a lot of time editing there were lists of things I didn't want to do. So that's how my podcast is the way it is. So I help you with all that I help you with workflows, I help you with systems, I help you with your goals and making sure they're in line with your business and your podcast and all that good stuff. That's pretty much it, amplify your voice. Mainly introverts but I also work with extroverts because I like people.   [00:14:52.820] - Brooke I was going to ask you where can people follow you. But you kind of answered all that in the first question as well. I would probably say because your a podcaster the best way to kind of get to know you and follow your work is probably through your podcast.   [00:15:04.020] - Janice Oh yeah.   [00:15:04.900] - Brooke So all of this information is going to be below in the show notes: where to find her, how you can work with her and all of that. You don't have to go find your pen and paper right now. I believe that is it Miss Janice, I think we answered all the questions I have written down here.   [00:15:18.530] - Janice Thank you.   [00:15:19.530] - Brooke All right Pop Tarts that is all for this week. Remember send in your thoughts, your feedback, your ideas, your questions and your drink of choice whether it be alcoholic or nonalcoholic. And be sure to send in the recipes so you can be featured on the show. And don't forget to subscribe. So you can be around for when I feature you on the show and to get some good content. Here's to another week. Cheers.  

For many people, taking the time to sit down and write on a daily basis is something we just don’t have time for.   Yet, a daily writing ritual is a powerful tool if you are looking to change your thoughts and your life.   The best part is, you can see a massive life transformation with just one sentence in a day.   In a conversation with coach Kori Linn, we learn how to leverage the simple practice of daily writing and different ways you can adapt it to work for your life.   Major Topics in the Conversation The daily writing ritual Kori Linn started in 2011 that changed her life How to adapt a daily practice to your life The importance of getting your thoughts on paper-so you can work with them The power of taking small steps to make big transformation   Special Moments in the Episode [1:37] Why Kori started a daily writing practice back in 2011 [2:20] How Kor’s daily writing practice evolved and adapted [3:48] The reasoning behind a daily ritual [4:20] Getting those ideas in your head on paper [7:38] How do you get started with a daily ritual, like writing practice? [11:00] Why small steps lead to big life shifts [12:51] Kori’s upcoming projects   About Our Guest Kori Linn is a burnout coach with experience working as a freelancer, in the corporate world, and other experiences. She uses those experiences and her creativity to build programs and coaching sessions for women at risk or already experiencing burnout. She is the founder of Kori Linn, LLC.   Learn more:   KoriLinn.com Kori on Twitter Kori on LinkedIn Kori on Facebook   Other Resources   The Artist’s Way by Julie Cameron What are Morning Pages? (Julia Cameron’s website) Gratitude Practice, Explained (Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence) Daily Writing Practice (Kori Linn’s Freebie Created for THIS Podcast!)   Subscribe To Rich in Differences Podcast Itunes Stitcher Google Play Spotify   **Rich in Differences Podcast is not intended to diagnose, prescribe, treat, or cure any disease, physical or mental. Any advice given on the Rich in Differences Podcast should not be construed as a prescription, a promise of benefits, claims of cures, or a guarantee of results to be achieved. The information, instruction or advice given by Rich in Differences Podcast is not intended to be a substitute for competent professional medical or psychological diagnosis and care. You should not discontinue or modify any medication presently being taken pursuant to medical advice without obtaining approval from your healthcare professional. As a listener/reader, you must take complete responsibility for your own physical health and emotional well-being.   Transcript Below   [00:00:04.200] - Brooke Welcome to reach in differences with your hosts for rediscovering what works for you in life. Health and business we are not like those and one size does not fit all. So you grab a good drink and come listen to different perspectives as we see what sticks for you.   [00:00:20.910] - Brooke Hi Kori. Thank you for joining us today.   [00:00:23.370] - Kori Hi Brooke. Thank you so much for having me.   [00:00:25.890] - Brooke So Kori, I have to ask what is your drink of choice today?   [00:00:29.790] - Kori Well it's still morning on the West Coast where I live. So right now my drink of choice is coffee. But if you want to talk about my favorite drink right now I'm very much into. Rosé.   [00:00:44.310] - Brooke Ohhh. That's nice. I like rosé.   [00:00:45.740] - Kori It's a nice summer drink. I like it all year round. But it's summer now.   [00:00:50.310] - Brooke Awesome. Right now I am having Pinot Grigio because we recently just hung a flat screen TV up on the wall and that was quite an ordeal. So I'm drinking afterwards.   [00:01:02.370] - Kori Very nice.   [00:01:21.960] - Brooke Awesome. Thank you. So Kori can you tell us a little bit about yourself and what you do?   [00:01:26.670] - Kori Yeah I would love to. So I'm a life coach and I live in Seattle and I work with women who are experiencing or at risk of burnout. But my background is actually in creative writing and so I've had a creative writing practice that I do in the morning since 2011 and I've incorporated that into my work as a coach and my clients as well.   [00:01:49.740] - Brooke Wow. 2011 that is a really specific time. Can you tell us like What made you start doing a daily writing routine back in 2011?   [00:01:57.690] - Kori Definitely yeah. I remember it was 2011 because it was the summer after my first year of graduate school. I was studying at the University of Washington getting my math during finals in creative writing and having a really hard time. And so I read The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron which is a great book.   [00:02:17.610] - Kori It has lots of useful stuff for mindset and for creativity. And one of her recommendations is a practice called morning pages. So in the beginning I did morning pages in her style. And then as the years went by I really turned that practice into something of my own design.   [00:02:36.270] - Brooke And exactly how was it turned into your own design?   [00:02:39.570] - Kori That's a great question. Over the years and especially the more I learned about life coaching and coaching concepts even before I was a coach the more I would kind of create very specific prompts for myself. And Julia Cameron style you literally just get up and write anything. It can be anything at all for three pages first thing in the morning but I wanted to focus on specific things like the way you can use a gratitude practice to rewire your brain to pay more attention to positivity. So I started doing prompts about what's going well, what do I like, and what do I love, where was the light showing up in my life and at some point I would also create containers for what we would typically consider the negative feelings because I wanted a space to feel those in a very specific way so I would create that space in my morning pages as well.   [00:03:33.930] - Brooke Thank you. So what changed?   [00:03:36.030] - Kori That's a great question. Yeah. So when I began my writing practice first of all I was a little bit horrified at all of the thoughts that were in my head. I remember the first set of morning papers I did that for the first three pages were just three pages of me listing all the things I thought that I was failing at like in life. So a little a little melodramatic maybe but that really was what it felt like for me then. But the first thing that I learned from morning pages was how to write without censoring myself and because I was in a creative writing program that served me really well. I remember going to a class after that where we did a free write for like five minutes and I just had a ton of stuff on the page because I'd gotten very into that practice of just keep going. Just keep going.   [00:04:26.130] - Brooke All right. And so as you continued to do it what else changed. Like as you continue to move forward how did it evolve? Did you evolve any? Did you change your thoughts change?   [00:04:39.570] - Kori Yeah. Well it's interesting because in the artist's way Julia Cameron does talk about like changing your thoughts and developing new thoughts. She doesn't talk about it in the same way as life coaches but there are a lot of ways in which doing the work in her book was like my pre thought work. And for listeners who aren't familiar with thought work is just the practice of noticing meaning and sometimes changing the thoughts that we're thinking and creating new thoughts on purpose so that we can create different results in our lives.   [00:05:11.550] - Kori Julia Cameron kind of was my prerequisite that I didn't realize was a prerequisite. So I did see all these changes and in the eight years that I've been doing this practice I've gone from being in grad school. And then I was a bartender and then I was a freelance writer and then I was in corporate America and now I'm a coach. So this is a tool that's gone with me through so many different phases of life and that has really helped me understand myself and what my mind was creating. And then when I got into some of those changes that were more difficult for instance going and working in corporate America when my old story was that I didn't have the right background for that it really required learning to tell my story in a new way. And all the practice I had this morning pages helped me get a handle on that.   [00:05:59.810] - Brooke OK so what would you say is the biggest benefit from doing daily writing practice?   [00:06:05.870] - Kori The biggest benefit to me of having a writing practice at all is that you create a relationship with yourself and a space to have that relationship. And when you get things on the page you can really understand them in a different way than when you're just thinking them in your head when you're thinking you can be very immersed in your thoughts when you put them on the page you can see them much more clearly and then you can work with them. But then the other thing that really happened for me is that having this practice over so many years has allowed me to see all the different things I can do with writing. Now my writing is very directed and there's a freebie that I am sharing with shows like the very specific question I ask myself now.   [00:06:50.540] - Kori  But it's very much about helping my brain rewire to see all the data of the things I am doing that are working towards creating the changes I want to see in my life. And that's a way to help you notice what's working and feel better about that. And it feels good to do that but it's not just about feeling good. It's about the fact that when you feel good and notice what's working you do more of what's working. So it's really a tool that actually creates real world changes in my life.   [00:07:22.610] - Brooke That's awesome. That makes me when I start writing daily now in the morning. I don't do that but that does make me want to to start doing that because it would be interesting too to see that to see your thoughts and your right about the idea of being immersed. I like the way you put that being immersed in your thoughts versus being able to see them on a piece of paper is like almost the difference between standing in the middle of the road and standing on the sidewalk.   [00:07:48.680] - Kori Yeah.   [00:07:49.400] - Brooke So yeah I like that.   [00:07:50.600] - Brooke  I know it's good. To me it sounds silly to ask the question how would you teach someone to start doing a daily writing practice because it sounds like it's in the name, like a daily writing practice. Is there some tips or advice you would give because you know there's a lot of us to start the writing and then we stop or we just feel like just writing just just don't got the time for writing. So yeah. How would you go about teaching someone how to start a daily writing practice.   [00:08:18.020] - Kori Yeah I think that's actually super important because on the surface level it's like yes if you want to write then you sit down and write but what we know as coaches is that it's not that simple. There's all kinds of things that people want to do that they aren't doing all the time. I'm sure even us included that's part of working with the human brain and being a person in the world. So my number one piece of advice would be to create consistency first. So for instance if all you can commit to is writing one sentence a day. I love that I'm like "This is a great one sentence is plenty." People have a tendency to dismiss small steps but everything big and amazing and beautiful is made of tiny steps, tiny movements. So some coaches call this minimum baseline I like to call it too small to fail because I think that's funny and when things are funny it helps me to do them. But the idea is I want it to be so easy for you that it's easier to do it than it is to avoid it. You know what I mean.   [00:09:29.180] - Brooke  Yes   [00:09:29.710] - Kori Yes. So if all you do is write one sentence then I want you to like give yourself a gold star, maybe literally, go get some stickers that you like that kind of thing. But when you do something small and then like really notice like I'm doing it I'm doing it. That's how you create a new habit and a new pattern. And once you've successfully done that for a week, two weeks, maybe even three weeks then maybe you go up to two sentences and again people always are like that's not anything but it actually is because one sentence a day is three hundred and sixty five sentences. Obviously in a year. And when we get like these grooves of habit begun it's much easier to ramp them up.   [00:10:16.550] - Brooke That's awesome. And this reminds me of when I teach my pole classes I have to teach the women the same thing but in a more physical way. Just because you come to class and you can't already climb the pole doesn't mean that you'll just you're never going to be able to get there. And a lot of on start with not even being able to do the first exercise into it fully and they think I've done nothing. And I say "no you've done plenty." You've done a lot. Because that one little motion that you did was enough to start building the muscle you need to make it through that first step." And sure enough after a few repetitions, a few classes, now all of a sudden they're going to the next step. No matter how small it is it is still progression. So in all progress builds on itself. So I just had to throw that in there because I love seeing how my physical classes translate into the coaching side of it too.   [00:11:15.650] - Kori Yes I totally agree with that. I think I think it's a cultural story we have. That in order to make progress you have to do something big. And if people learn nothing else from me I want them to learn that they can make a monumental change in their life by starting with a very extremely tiny movement or choice today and learning to celebrate those tiny shifts and those tiny new habits is one hundred percent how you get to the big transformation.   [00:11:53.630] - Brooke Yes I totally agree that.   [00:11:55.790] - Kori Julia Cameron in her book the way she teaches the morning pages is like I said you just write three pages. And I was able to start like that. But I do not recommend it because it took so much willpower for me to do those three pages. That's why I think that the starting small approach is so powerful because just because you can do it the other way doesn't mean it's fun or enjoyable or that you get better outcomes. I think I think you don't get better outcomes. I do think you get the best outcomes by starting small.   [00:12:25.910] - Brooke So Kori where can people find you these days?   [00:12:28.760] - Kori People can find me online at www.korilynn.com. I am also on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and Instagram. And it's the same spelling everywhere.  I love to connect with people.I love to talk obviously about lots of stuff but mostly coaching and writing   [00:13:00.380] - Brooke Awesome and so below we will have all of her information in the show notes so you can simply go online and click on her links. How can people work with you these days?   [00:13:11.090] - Kori Right now I'm working with people one on one. My main program is called Learning Burnout and it's all about de-programming burnout culture and reprogramming on purpose so that you can live the life you want to live.  I think what is really important to know about that is for most people, for me or my clients, we still want to work really hard. We still want to crush it at work but it's about learning to show up and work really hard in a sustainable way and not a way that leaves you feeling overwhelmed exhausted and depleted. And I do that work all online so I take clients from everywhere in the world. I just had a client in the Netherlands, that was super fun. She was my first international client and then I'm also developing a new program called Fall Back in Love and it's for people who aren't necessarily burnt out but they don't feel as in love with their career and their work as they want to and they know that they could. So it's about recreating that feeling of love but in a job context which I think so many people want and yet we don't know how to get that we don't know how to figure that out. So that's an upcoming offering I'm working on.   [00:14:34.940] - Brooke Great. And what we'll do is when an offering is available I'll go ahead and add that to the show note so people can find you that way as well.   [00:14:45.260] - Kori That sounds amazing. Thank you so much.   [00:14:47.810] - Brooke Thank you. And I appreciate your time.   [00:14:50.070] - Kori Anytime. I love chatting with you and your audience and it's just super fun to have these conversations. So thank you so much for having me on the show.   [00:14:59.660] - Brooke All right. Pop Tarts is off this week. Remember, send in your thoughts, your feedback, your ideas, your questions, and your drink choice whether it be alcoholic or nonalcoholic. And be sure to send in the recipes so you can be featured on the show. And don't forget to subscribe so you can be around for when I feature you on the show and it get some good content. Here's to another week. Cheers.    

Do you ever find yourself comparing your business or yourself to other people? Comparing our  businesses against those around us is as human as it is ubiquitous. With social media, this phenomenon has reached new levels. We see everyone’s biggest hits and massive business breakthroughs every day. It’s easy to get trapped in other people’s good news. Often times, seeing all these things are harmless, but sometimes it can be destructive. But can a pattern of comparing our businesses or ourselves to others have harsher effects on how we perceive ourselves? Yes, it can. When you start looking around for what other business owners are doing, you fall into a compare and despair mentality trap and you begin to feel like a loser. You eventually lose the energy you had going, you begin to doubt yourself and your business strategies, and finally you begin to spin. In today’s episode of Rich in Differences we’ll talk about the compare and despair mentality in running a business and also the importance of following our journey. Episode Spotlights Example of Compare and Despair Scenario As a pole dance instructor, I find that a lot of times my pole dancing instruction has a lot of good similarities to what we learn in real life. It puts it into a more physical idea versus just a mental idea. Let’s say I'm teaching 10 girls how to climb a pole. I will give them the instructions and we do it. Then I’ll explain it again and do it a second time because people rarely get things on the first try. But then I’ll always have a few girls who just don't seem to understand what I'm saying and that is totally normal. I’ll ask them like, “Do you just not understand? What's going on?” They're like, “Well, we just don't get it. It doesn't make sense.”  Or, “I'm having a hard time.” So, is I'll drag one of my more advanced students over to my pole and I'll say, “All right, I want you to teach it.” They'll teach it their way and all of a sudden, the few girls that weren't getting it, they'll start getting it. They totally understand now what to do. Here's the thing, me and my advanced students were teaching the exact same thing. We were both teaching how to climb a pole. Yet, my version of the instructions did not reach to everyone. Those who didn't get it, got it from her version of the instruction -- the advanced student's version of the instructions Discover What Sells Your Business We can all be teaching the same thing, but that doesn't mean you're going to get every single person. When you really learn that what sells your business, especially if you are a service provider, is you, the better off you'll be because there is enough business for everyone. While you know someone who might have a prettier website than you or a better opt in or better pictures or more advanced like tech going on their website, they're only going to reach their people. They are only going to communicate well with the people who can hear their instructions. That's not everyone, just like in my class, not everyone understands my instructions. The best way to get everyone on the same level is to include different versions of those instructions.  You're just a different version. You're out there you're saying it your way. You’re packaging it your way. You're handling it your way and the people who hear you and who resonate with you, they're going to be attracted to that. Your Vibe Attracts Your Tribe. That's getting clichéd, but it's true. Your vibe will attract the people who want to work with you. When you look at other people, you have to remember that that's their journey, and they're attracting the people that want to work with them. Your job for your business is to get out there and attract your tribe. Sell it your way. Use your mannerisms and be you. How to Beat the Compare and Despair Mentality When you start to feel the compare despair mentality creeping in, take a step back and remember that you are on your own journey. You're out there to get your own customers and those customers are meant for you. Remind yourself that there is enough business out there for all of us. We like to discuss the abundance mindset and coaching. But a lot of times we forget that when we're in our business. In our business, that's when scarcity mindset really kind of creeps up on us if we're not careful. This is one of the ways that scarcity mindset shows its face. You have to remind yourself, there is enough for all of us. Resources: Free Resource Library Course: Mindset Matters Looking to create your own course: Membervault Looking to collaborate and take some useful classes: Eclectic Entrepreneur  Subscribe To Rich in Differences Podcast Itunes Stitcher Google Play Spotify    *Disclosure: Some of the links above are affiliate links, meaning, at no additional cost to you, I will earn a commission   **Rich in Differences Podcast is not intended to diagnose, prescribe, treat, or cure any disease, physical or mental. Any advice given on the Rich in Differences Podcast should not be construed as a prescription, a promise of benefits, claims of cures, or a guarantee of results to be achieved. The information, instruction or advice given by Rich in Differences Podcast is not intended to be a substitute for competent professional medical or psychological diagnosis and care. You should not discontinue or modify any medication presently being taken pursuant to medical advice without obtaining approval from your healthcare professional. As a listener/reader, you must take complete responsibility for your own physical health and emotional well-being.   Transcript Below [00:00:24.070] This is your hostess with the mostest Brooke. All right. So I recently got a message today. I say recently got a message today. I recently got a message and it happened to be today from a young lady who was talking about her compare and despair mentality in running a business. And they got me thinking about really how common that is. And even I can be drawn into that trap. And I just wanted to come on here today and let's talk about our journey and the importance of following our own journey.   [00:01:00.550]  There is enough business out there for all of us. There really is. And what I explained was I'm a pole dance instructor and I find that a lot of times my pole dancing instruction in my class. It has a lot of good similarities to what we learn in real life. It puts it into a more physical idea of the version versus just the mental idea. So let's say for example I am teaching 10 girls how to climb a pole and I'm given the instructions and I've been doing this for many many years so I got the instructions down pretty well.   [00:01:39.070]  And I explain them and we do it. And then I explain it again and I do it a second time because, you know, people rarely get things on the first try and rightfully so, it is the beginners class. I teach beginners class. I probably should have mentioned that. So they'll, you know, it takes a few times and that is totally normal. But then I always have a few girls who just don't seem to understand what I'm saying. And again that i s totally normal since I've been doing this for years I totally recognize signs and I ask them I'm like, you know, do you just not understand like like what's going on and the like well we just I just don't get it.   [00:02:13.840]  You know does it make sense or I'm having a hard time. So what I'll do is I'll drag one of my more advanced students over to my pole and I'll say all right I want you to teach it and they'll teach it their way and all of a sudden  the few girls that weren't getting it all of a sudden they're getting it like they totally understand now what to do.   [00:02:35.230] And here's the thing. Me and my advanced student were teaching the exact same thing. We were both teaching how to climb a pole. Yet, my version of the instructions did not reach to everyone. And those who didn't get it got it from her version of the instruction. The advanced students version of the instructions. We can all be teaching the same thing but that doesn't mean you're going to get every single person.   [00:03:10.570] When you really learn that what sells your business, especially if your service provider, is you. The better off you'll be because there is enough business for everyone. And while, you know, someone who might have a prettier website than you, or a better opt in, or better pictures, or more advanced like tech going on on their website,  they're only going to reach their people they're only going to communicate well with. The people who can hear their instructions and that's not everyone. Just like in my class not everyone understands my instructions and I have learned that the best way to get everyone, you know, on the same level is to include different versions of those instructions.   [00:04:04.450]  So you're just a different version. You're out there you're saying it your way. You're packaging it your way. You're handling it your way and the people who hear you, who resonate with you, they're going to be attracted to that.  You're going to attract your tribe. Your vibe attracts your tribe. And I know that's getting cliche, right, but it is true. Your vibe will attract the people who want to work with you. So when you look at other people you have to remember that's their journey and they're attracting the people that want to work with them. Your job for your business is to get out there and attract your tribe. Sell it your way.   [00:04:51.090]  Use your mannerisms. Be you. So this week when you start to feel to 'compare and despair' I want you to take a step back. All right, I want you to remember that you are on your own journey and you're out there to get your own customers and those customers are meant for you. OK? And to remind yourself that there is enough business out there for all of us right now. I know we like to discuss the abundance mindset in coaching, but a lot of times we forget that when we're in our business. In our business we start to really see that scarcity mindset really kind of creeps up on us if we're not careful.   [00:05:30.960]  And this is one of the ways that scarcity mindset shows its face. So you have to remind yourself there is enough for all of us.   [00:05:40.190] All right Pop Tarts. That's it for now. As usual we're going to leave a message to my dad. Hey dad, I saw you in an awesome shirt today. I wonder who bought that for you. She's got some really good taste. Love ya!    

Emotions are an essential part of our lives. One minute we are happy and laughing, the next frustrated or the next discouraged. Our emotions whether good or bad, high or low they have a tremendous impact on our physical, mental, and emotional health.   How can you control the damaging emotions like anger, temper or resentment?   In general, emotional control is not something that is taught to us. As we get older, it really starts to affect our decisions and it affects all every aspect of our lives including our business. If we don't understand how to get a handle our emotions, then we end up being ridden by them.   In this episode, we'll be discussing three techniques to teach you how to gain control of your emotions. We're going to learn how to get out of the road and onto the sidewalk with your emotions.   Imagination Time Imagine standing in the middle of the road and there are several cars and trucks headed your way. These trucks and cars represent your emotions. If you don't know how to get to the sidewalk, then you are in serious trouble.   Usually, we’ll let those trucks and cars run us over, leaving us desperate to make any quick decision that will get us out of harm's way, the quickest. Even if it is not the best decision, no one has time for rational thinking while standing in the middle of speeding traffic.   Now, imagine yourself standing on the sidewalk looking at those passing cars and trucks. It's a different point of view. Notice that the cars and trucks or your emotions have not stopped their travel. They're still going to happen.   Now you're observing the traffic instead of being in the middle of it and you can make better decisions based on that traffic that is passing by.   How do you learn how to do that? We're going to be discussing the 3 techniques that I was taught is still used today to keep me on the sidewalk and not in the road.   Three Techniques on How to Gain Control of Your Emotions   Breathing We’ve all heard about deep breathing. But sometimes we need a reminder and sometimes we need to actually do it instead of just saying in our heads, “Yeah. We already know this” You already know it, but do you actually do it? Make note of how you feel -- your physical awareness. How's your heart? Where's your mind at? Do you feel heavy? Do you feel right? Do you feel happy or sad? Then take three deep breaths. Now make note of how you feel. More than likely there is a difference. Maybe you feel calmer. Your heart slows down. Maybe your mind quiets a little. Maybe your shoulders relax. Breathing is an amazing technique and it's best used when you're in the middle of an emotional situation in which you need to gain back control. Deep breathing, you can do it anytime. And no. You don't have to do 10 deep breaths. You should take three deep breaths or one huge breath. That's enough to stop the physical reactions that are happening in you. That's what deep breathing is good at. It stops the physical response. If you're a woman, more than likely, you have this wonderful skill of crying when you are frigging angry. This helps slow down or stop the crying. When you feel that big old ball of emotion coming up, take a deep breath and it will slow it all down.   Grounding When people hear grounding, they think of, “Take your shoes off and go stand out in the grass,” or, “Go for a long walk in the nature.” But when you're in the middle of something that's causing you to be emotional, more than likely, you don’t have time to take off the shoes and go stand underneath the tree. That's not to say that those aren't good ideas, but they're not the best ideas when you need something to work now. These techniques are meant to teach you how to deal with things now.   What to Do For Grounding Wiggle your toes and feel the sensation of your toes wiggling together. Once you've honed in on the sensation of your toes wriggling together, that skin to skin contact, now try to feel the solid ground underneath you. This is a very good way to ground yourself when you don't have time to take a walk. So, take a deep breath and then start wriggling your toes. While breathing stops the physical emotions, grounding stops the mental reactions. When you start becoming energetic in your head, you start to leave your center. You start to go off into another place. It's hard for you to concentrate on what's happening now and in a calm manner if your mind is going 100 miles an hour and floating off into different areas, because you want to be prepared to defend or you’re having a bad memory, or whatever the case may be. Grounding takes you from all over the place and brings you back to you again. It brings you back to center and back to the present. It's a wonderful way to come back to yourself and not be drugged around by your emotions.   Physical Awareness Physical awareness is all about learning how to feel your emotions. That means when you are feeling anything, actually describe how it feels. Does it feel like a hard knot at the bottom of your stomach? Does it feel like a heavy weight upon your chest? Is it large? Is it small? Is it a hairy ball that's stuck in your throat? They can't seem to get out of the way. Is it warm? Is it cold? Is it dark? Is it light? Is it sharp? Is it smooth? Really get into what that emotion feels like. What happens when you do that, it teaches you to understand what is really happening versus just assuming you know what is happening. For example, every emotion has a spectrum, but most of the times you won't ever hear anybody talk within the spectrum. A lot of times we hear people speak in the vague. Like, “I'm angry, I'm sad. I'm happy.” Most of the time we don't hear people talk about their emotions in a defined manner. Like, “I'm disheartened, dismayed, displeased, disquieted, edgy, concerned. I feel dejected, detached, or I'm feeling interested, intrigued, invigorated, involved, gratified, hopeful, inquisitive and I’m feeling pleased and pleasant and perky and peaceful, overjoyed enlivened, engrossed, amused, alert, affectionate, adventurous, absorbed, confident, contented, cool, curious, and dazzled, and delighted, eager…” the list goes on and on. Each spot on that spectrum has a different way it feels, but you can't understand the differences and how an emotion feels on the spectrum, if you can't even identify how the base or the overall emotion feels. Physical awareness gives you that skill. It gives you the skill to start to define what's actually happening. Are you actually angry or you just nettled? Are you happy or do you just feel content? These are all important. When you understand what's actually happening on inside, you're able to make better decisions. Summary All of these things will help you remove yourself from the road and put you onto the sidewalk. Emotions, they're going to happen. Feelings, they're temporary, but they're going to roll through like those cars and trucks. When you stand at the sidewalk, you can get a good idea about what's coming, and what to expect, and how to best prepare for it, and how to cross the street if we need to. We can't know these things if we don't understand how to slow our physical reaction with breathing, how to slow our mental reaction with grounding, and how to truly identify what is going on the inside. When we do those things, we can make better decisions in life and in our business. Fear is a great example of this. Fear, for most of us, is a big old, scary monster. A lot of times we don't know how to move through it. Through these techniques, you can learn how to identify fear and the different types of fears and know what to expect when they come. Instead of running and hiding, because you’re being eaten up with fear, because you’re standing in the middle of the road getting hit by the cars and trucks, you’ll be able to see the path through. Always take time to really hone in on what's going on inside of you because you are going to know best about what's happening and how to handle it. Resources:   Free Resource Library Course: Mindset Matters Looking to create your own course: Membervault Looking to collaborate and take some useful classes: Eclectic Entrepreneur    *Disclosure: Some of the links above are affiliate links, meaning, at no additional cost to you, I will earn a commission if you click through and make a purchase.    **Rich in Differences Podcast is not intended to diagnose, prescribe, treat, or cure any disease, physical or mental. Any advice given on the Rich in Differences Podcast should not be construed as a prescription, a promise of benefits, claims of cures, or a guarantee of results to be achieved. The information, instruction or advice given by Rich in Differences Podcast is not intended to be a substitute for competent professional medical or psychological diagnosis and care. You should not discontinue or modify any medication presently being taken pursuant to medical advice without obtaining approval from your healthcare professional. As a listener/reader, you must take complete responsibility for your own physical health and emotional well-being.   TRANSCRIPT BELOW   Hey, everyone, welcome to Rich in Differences, I'm your hostess with the mostess, Brooke, welcome. This is our first full episode so I'm excited to get started. Actually, this episode is going to be one of three. I figured I would start with a three-part series because these first three episodes are what I teach anybody I coach. And these three things were taught to my, by my own coaches and therapists. Believe it or not, we coaches, get coached too, all right. So, what I'm going to be talking about in this three-part series is emotional control. I don't believe this is something that is taught to us, in general and as we get older, it really starts to affect our decisions, especially in our business, it affects all of our lives. I don't mean to be like, especially in business, but this is a business podcast. However, that being said, this is totally valid for everyone because our emotions follow us through every aspect of life. If we don't understand how to get a handle on them, then we end up being ridden by our emotions. So, in this episode, we'll be discussing three techniques to teach you how to gain control of your emotions. Now this will be part one of a three-part series and in this episode, we're going to learn how to get out of the road and onto the sidewalk with your emotions. All right, imagination time, don't roll your eyes. Most of you are probably driving right now so you have all the time in the world to picture in your mind's eye when I'm about to describe to you. Now, imagine standing in the middle of the road and there are several cars and trucks headed your way. Now these trucks and cars, they represent your emotions, and if you don't know how to get to the sidewalk, then you are in serious trouble. As we usually are with our emotions, we'll let those trucks and cars run us over, leaving us desperate to make any quick decision that will get us out of harm's way, the quickest, even if it isn't the best decision. No one has time for rational thinking while standing in the middle of speeding traffic. Now, I want you to imagine yourself standing on the sidewalk, looking at those passing cars and trucks. It's a different point of view. Notice that the cars and trucks or your emotions have not stopped their travel, they're still going to happen. But now you're observing the traffic instead of being in the middle of it, now you can make better decisions based on that traffic that is passing by. So, how do you learn how to do that? Next, we're going to be discussing the three techniques that I was taught, is still used today to keep me on the sidewalk and not in the road. Alright, pop tarts, we're going to be discussing our first technique, breathing. Now, don't roll your eyes, right, because we all know we've all heard breathing, breathe, deep breath, it's all good for you. But sometimes we need a reminder and sometimes we need to actually do it, instead of just saying in our heads “Yeah, we already know this.” Yeah, you already know it, but do you actually do it? So, right now, I want you to make note of how you feel, your physical awareness. How's your heart? Where's your mind at? Do you feel heavy? Do you feel light? Do you feel happy, sad, like, where are you at? And then I want you to take three deep breaths with me. All right, you ready? Here we go. In. Out. In. Out. One more time, in and out. Now make note of how you feel. More than likely there is a difference. Even I feel calmer, your heart slows down, maybe your mind quiets a little, maybe your shoulders relax some. Breathing is an amazing technique, and it's best used when you're in the middle of an emotional situation in which you need to gain back control. Deep breathing, you can do it anytime. And no, you don't have to do 10 deep breaths, I do not do 10 deep breaths and I can't imagine what I would look like if I was in the middle of a heated discussion be like, we got to hold on a second, I need to take 10 deep breaths. I mean, I usually do one to three, usually is one, huge one, if I'm being honest. And that's enough to stop the physical reactions that are happening in me. And that's what deep breathing is good at, it stops the physical response. So, if you're a woman, more than likely you have this wonderful skill of crying when you are frigging angry. This, this keeps me from crying. When I feel that big old ball of emotion coming up. I take that deep breath and it slows it all down. The next one is grounding. Now when people hear grounding, they think of, take your shoes off and go stand out in the grass, or go for a long walk in nature. But when you're in the middle of something that's causing you to be emotional, more than likely, you don't got time to take off the shoes and go stand underneath the tree. Now, that's not to say that those aren't good ideas, but they're not the best ideas when you need something to work now. And these techniques are meant to teach you how to deal with things now. So, what can you do for grounding? Wiggle your toes, and I want you to feel the sensation of your toes wiggling together, and once you've, kind of honed in, on their wiggling, or not really so much the movement but the sensation of them wiggling together, that skin to skin contact. Now, I want you to try to feel for the ground underneath you. Can you feel the solid ground beneath you? This is a very good way to ground yourself when you don't have time to take a walk. So, sometimes we don't have time to take that walk. So, take a deep breath and then start wiggling some toes. Grounding is good because it stops the mental reactions. While breathing stops the physical, grounding stops the mental. So, what does that mean? When you start becoming energetic in your head, you start to leave your center, you start to go off into like another place and it's hard for you to concentrate on what's happening now and in a calm manner. If your mind is going 100 miles an hour and floating off into different areas, because you want to be prepared to defend or you're having a bad memory or whatever the case may be. So, grounding takes you from all over the place and brings you back to you again, brings it back to center, brings you back to present. So, it's a wonderful way to come back to yourself and not be drugged around by your emotions. Next up we will be discussing physical awareness. Alright, so we just finished discussing grounding, but this last one I bet you've never even thought of. And you're probably thinking I'm crazy, God knows I thought I was crazy when I first did it. Physical awareness is all about learning how to feel your emotions. Now, what does that mean? That means when you are feeling anything, actually describe how it feels. Literally. Does it feel like a hard knot at the bottom of your stomach? Does it feel like a heavy weight upon your chest? Is it large? Is it small? Is it a hairy ball that's stuck in your throat? That can't seem to get out of the way. I know some of you just laughed at that, because God knows I just laughed at that in my head. Is it warm? Is it cold? Is it dark? Is it light? Is it sharp? Is it smooth? Like really get into what that emotion feels like because what happens when you do that, it teaches us to understand what is really happening versus just assuming you know what is happening. For example, every emotion has a spectrum but most of the times you won't ever hear anybody talk within the spectrum. A lot of times we hear people speak in the vague, so like, I'm angry, I'm sad, I'm happy. Most of the time we don't hear people talk about their emotions in a very defined manner. Like I'm disheartened, dismayed, displeased, disquieted, edgy, concerned. I feel dejected, detached or I'm feeling interested, intrigued, invigorated, involved, gratified, hopeful, inquisitive and feeling pleased and pleasant and perky and peaceful, overjoyed, enlivened, engrossed, amused, alert, affectionate, adventurous, absorbed, confident, contented, cool, curious and dazzled and delighted, eager, the list goes on and on. But each spot on that spectrum has a different way it feels, but you can't understand the differences and how an emotion feels on the spectrum if you can't even identify how the base or the overall emotion feels. Physical awareness gives you that skill. It gives you the skill to start truly identifying what's actually happening. Are you actually angry or are you just nettled? Are you happy or do you just feel content? These are all important. And when you understand what's actually happening on inside, you're able to make better decisions. So, all of these things will help you remove yourself from the road and put you onto the sidewalk. Emotions, they're going to happen, feelings, they're temporary, but they're going to roll through like those cars and trucks. But if when you stand at the sidewalk, we can get a good idea about what's coming and what to expect and how to best prepare for it, and how to cross the street if we need to. But we can't know these things if we don't understand how to slow our physical reaction with breathing, how to slow our mental reaction with grounding and how to truly identify what is going on the inside. When we can do those things, we can make better decisions, in life and in our business. Fear is a great example of this, fear, for most of us is a big old, scary monster. And a lot of times we don't know how to move through it. But through these techniques, you can learn how to identify fear, the different types of fears and know what to expect when they come. I used to be, I would get so nervous about doing anything regarding asking someone who I thought was a mentor, instead of a peer, to help me on something. And I would have these fears of like, “this person is going to think I'm stupid. They're going to hate my idea. Oh, my God, what are they say? No.” And I would talk myself out of it. Like, I'm pretty sure there's a lot of people who do this. I'm not the only one. But when I learned how to use these techniques, I saw fear coming a mile away. So I needed to ask someone for help regarding one of my programs, and I was hoping that she would be willing to give me some advice, though, she definitely did not have to. And as I sat in the chair waiting to speak to her in her office, I started, I had started to have those thoughts. But then it was interesting. So, instead of letting those thoughts just sit around in my head, beating me up, it literally was like I had stepped onto a sidewalk. I was like, “Oh, look, there's fear.” Then fear come to say what it needs to say. So I tell fear “You know what fear? I think we got this. I don't think this is going to be the end of the world, and even if they do say no we're going to go ahead and do this.” And I just went ahead and did it, regardless of the fact that fear had come rolling on through. So, I made a better decision, instead of running and hiding, because I was being eaten up with fear because I was standing in the middle of the road getting hit by the cars and trucks. I was able to say, I see you, but I think I can see the path through, and I think we're going to make it so I'm going to go for it, you know, and I did, and I got the yes. So, always take the time if you can to really hone in on what's going on inside of you, because you are going to know best about what's happening and how to handle it. In the next part of the series, we're going to be discussing how to take back control of the bus. A lot of times our emotions are the ones driving that bus instead of the bus driver i.e. you. So in the next part of this series, we will be talking about, taking back the bus. Be sure to subscribe and join our Facebook group, Rich in Differences, where we will collaborate to see what works best for you and your business. Have any questions you would like to be answered in an episode, be sure to email me or ask in the Facebook group. Alright, pop tarts. At the end of each episode, I'm going to leave a special message to my dad, my biggest fan. So, here goes “Hey, Dad, call me if you want to go to lunch sometime this week. Love you.”  

In the bus of your life, which one would you rather be? A driver or a passenger? Many people are passengers on their bus. Only few people are driving the bus and are in control.   In the last episode, we talked about how to get out of the middle of the road and get on the sidewalk with three techniques of breathing, grounding and physical awareness. Today, we're going to be discussing how to become the bus driver of your life, instead of a passenger on the bus.   Imagination Time   Imagine a bus that's full of passengers and a bus driver. The passengers on this bus are your emotions and the bus driver is you.   Who's driving the bus? Is it you or is it one of your emotions? 9 times out of 10 it's an emotion.   When we lack the ability to calm our mind and listen to our emotions, they tend to take over our buses and drive to whatever destination or whatever route they want, regardless of you and what you want.   All emotions are valid. If you're ignoring what is going on, they're going to become stronger and louder.   Let's discuss the monster under the bed versus the stranger coming into your window. Think about your four-year old even if you don't have one.   When they come out of the room and they tell you there's a monster under their bed. Do you believe there's a monster under their bed? No. You calm down the child. Maybe you check under the bed for them and then you send them back to bed.   Imagine the same four-year old comes out and tells you someone is wiggling their window. Is it possible someone could be trying to break into your house?   Life is full of ‘monsters under the bed’ fears and ‘strangers breaking into my window’ fears.   If you don't know how to identify which is which, then you will react to all fears the same way.   How to Identify Fear   Listen to what your emotions have to say.   Emotions have a point, they exist for a reason. We'll keep going with the fear theme.   Fears point is to keep you safe. That's all it wants to do. Anything even slightly outside your comfort zone will send it into panic mode.   Think of the four-year old child. The child will respond to the monster under the bed the same as someone wiggling their window.   You have to know the difference of which fear it's worth looking into and which is worth just soothing the four-year old and putting him back to bed.   We want to get to the point of being able to recognize which is which, so we can respond appropriately.   How you respond is key. When you listen and respond to your emotions, your emotions feel that they are least being heard, and will continue to let you drive the bus without a full blown coup.   What Happens When You Start Listening to Your Emotions Versus Just Trying to Ignore Them.   They become less monsters in your head and heart.   They become what they simply are: an emotion.   Emotions are temporary. They're only here for a time and then they move on.   Some cars drive slower than others, but they do move. Imagine yourself driving a bus and fear has something it wants to say. Instead of freaking out and just letting it take the wheel, you ask it to sit up next to you in the passenger’s seat.   Your emotion is allowed to tell you what is going on. It is here you get to decide the next steps. Does this fear need further investigation or action like a stranger coming through your child's window?   Or is it a false alarm like the monster under the bed and it just needs to be soothed made to understand that you've heard it, but you know better and that will be moving forward.   Either way you get to make the decision, not the emotion.   Practice the techniques from episode one and then also start incorporating listening to what your emotion is trying to say.   All that's on that bus is different versions of you just trying to give you input. If you can learn to hear what they have to say, you can make better decisions on where to take that bus. What routes to take that bus. How fast or slow to drive that bus. When to drive that bus and when to stop and slow down.   All of it is just feedback and you can learn that your emotions are friendly tools that you can use to better understand yourself and how you are reacting to the world.   When you're armed with that type of information, you can make more empowering decisions.   Resources:   Free Resource Library Course: Mindset Matters Looking to create your own course: Membervault Looking to collaborate and take some useful classes: Eclectic Entrepreneur    *Disclosure: Some of the links above are affiliate links, meaning, at no additional cost to you, I will earn a commission if you click through and make a purchase.     **Rich in Differences Podcast is not intended to diagnose, prescribe, treat, or cure any disease, physical or mental. Any advice given on the Rich in Differences Podcast should not be construed as a prescription, a promise of benefits, claims of cures, or a guarantee of results to be achieved. The information, instruction or advice given by Rich in Differences Podcast is not intended to be a substitute for competent professional medical or psychological diagnosis and care. You should not discontinue or modify any medication presently being taken pursuant to medical advice without obtaining approval from your healthcare professional. As a listener/reader, you must take complete responsibility for your own physical health and emotional well-being.       TRANSCRIPT BELOW   Welcome to Rich in Differences, I'm your hostess with the mostess, Brooke. Hey pop tarts, hope you had a wonderful week and I'm back again to do part two of our series on emotional handling. So, last episode, we talked about how to get out of the middle of the road and get on the sidewalk with three techniques of breathing, grounding and physical awareness. So, today, we're going to be discussing how to become the bus driver of your life, instead of a passenger on the bus. Here we go again, with this imagination. Imagine a bus that's full of passengers and a bus driver, the passengers on this bus are your emotions and the bus driver is you. Now, I want you to see who's driving the bus, is it you or is it one of your emotions? Nine times out of ten, it's an emotion. When we lack the ability to calm our mind and listen to our emotions, they tend to take over our buses, and drive to whatever destination on whatever route they want, regardless of you, and what you want. So, all emotions are valid and if you're ignoring what is going on, they're going to become so strong that they will take you over. Let's discuss the monster under the bed versus the stranger coming into your window. Think about your four-year-old, even if you don't have one or want one. And they come out of the room and they tell you there's a monster under their bed. Do you believe there's a monster under their bed? No. You calm down the child, maybe you check under the bed for them and then you send them back to bed. Now, imagine the same four-year-old comes out and tells you someone is wiggling their window. Is it possible someone could be trying to break into your house? Oh yeah, there is. So, a real fear is started. Life is full of monsters under the bed fears and strangers breaking into my window fears. If you don't know how to identify which is which then you will react to all fears the same way. Alright, so what do you do? You listen to what your emotions have to say. Emotions have a point, they exist for a reason. So, we'll keep going with the fear theme. The first point is to keep you safe, that's all it wants to do. Anything even slightly outside your comfort zone will send it into panic mode. Think of the four-year-old child, the child will respond to the monster under the bed the same as someone wiggling their window. But you have to know the difference, which fear it's worth looking into? And which is worth just soothing the four-year-old and putting him back to bed? So, we want to get to the point of being able to recognize which is which, so we can respond appropriately. But that is the key: how you respond. When you listen and respond to your emotions, your emotions feel that they are least being heard, and will continue to let you drive the bus without a full-on coup. So, what happens when you start listening to your emotions versus just trying to ignore them? They become less monsters in your head and heart, they become what they simply are, an emotion. Like in episode one, the emotion will drive on by, emotions are temporary, they're only here for a time and then they move on. Some cars drive slower than others, but they do move. So, imagine yourself driving a bus and fear has something it wants to say? Instead of freaking out and just letting it take the wheel, you ask it to sit up next to you in that seat that is like just behind the driver but to the right. You know, which one I'm talking about. Here, your emotion is allowed to tell you what is going on. And it is here you get to decide the next steps. Does this fear need further investigation or action, like a stranger coming through your child's window? Or is it a false alarm, like the monster under the bed? And it just needs to be soothed, made to understand that you've heard it, but you know better and that we will be moving forward. Either way you get to make the decision, not the emotion. So, practice the techniques from episode one and then also start incorporating listening to what your emotion is trying to say. Really, all that's on that bus is different versions of you, just trying to give you input. If you can learn to hear what they have to say, you can make better decisions on where to take that bus, what routes to take that bus, how fast, how slow to drive that bus, when to drive that bus, when to stop and slow down, all of it is just feedback. And you can learn that your emotions are friendly tools that you can use to better understand yourself and how you are reacting to the world. And when you're armed with that type of information, you can make more empowering decisions. In the next episode of this three-part series, we will be discussing the last part of emotional handling and that is talking to another person and the importance of getting some outside feedback. All right, be sure to subscribe and head on over to the Facebook page and get some engagement going. Let me know how I can help you, ask questions, see if there's someone else in the group that could possibly help. We're all here to support each other. That's the point, is I want you to be able to be the best business owner that you can be. Man,that sounded like we were in kindergarten there for a second. All right Pop Tarts, as usual will be leaving a message to my biggest fan my dad. Hey, Dad, yes, yes, I do have to call you out after every episode. Love you.      

Do you always allow your emotions and fears talk you out of taking decisions and risks that could be valuable to your life or business? If so, you're not alone.   Emotions are important. They can impact the decisions we make and compel us to take action, both small and large, about our lives. Our emotions control how we interact and talk to people, how we spend our time, as well as how we handle opportunities and challenges.   In this episode, we’ll discuss the importance of collaboration and talking to others. In the last two episodes, we discussed a few techniques and ideas for learning emotional management. But how do you know what is normal and what is not? Listen in!   Episode Spotlights   In order to determine what is normal or common, you need to talk to each other and be willing to be vulnerable.   It is very easy to get immersed in your own thoughts and emotions and it can become hard to differentiate between what is normal or common, what is a personal issue, or something you should truly be concerned about.   Five Common Fears Among the Business Owners:    Fear of failure  Fear of success Impostor syndrome Perfectionism The inner critic   You’ll be amazed at the number of people who walk around scared they’re going to fail.   If you spend your day thinking negative thoughts, you’ll be depressed and end up thinking that those statements are true.   By sharing your thoughts with others, you’ll realize how normal or how common those thoughts and fears really are.   Fear is normal, but you need to learn that not all fears require you to stay up all night long hating on yourself. Actually, no fear should have you doing that.   When you have someone to bounce your inner turmoil off of, you can start to see what is really common and maybe what isn't.   Then you can make better decisions on how to handle it when those emotions start to come up in predictable ways and common situations.   Collaboration and talking to others is important because you begin to see the things worth looking at, and the things that you can turn away from.   Resources/Links Mentioned in This Episode    Website: Rich in Differences    Rich in Differences Facebook page    Brené Brown: Website     Ways to Subscribe to Rich in Differences Podcast:  Itunes    Stitcher    Google Play    Spotify     Looking for some FREE Resources:  Free Resource Library    Eclectic Entrepreneurs   Some great resources for business that I personally use  MemberVault   *Disclosure: Some of the links above are affiliate links, meaning, at no additional cost to you, I will earn a commission if you click through and make a purchase.   **Rich in Differences Podcast is not intended to diagnose, prescribe, treat, or cure any disease, physical or mental. Any advice given on the Rich in Differences Podcast should not be construed as a prescription, a promise of benefits, claims of cures, or a guarantee of results to be achieved. The information, instruction or advice given by Rich in Differences Podcast is not intended to be a substitute for competent professional medical or psychological diagnosis and care. You should not discontinue or modify any medication presently being taken pursuant to medical advice without obtaining approval from your healthcare professional. As a listener/reader, you must take complete responsibility for your own physical health and emotional well-being.     TRANSCRIPT BELOW   All right, Pop Tarts, welcome to Rich in Differences, I'm your hostess with the mostess, Brooke, and this is part three of three of our series in emotional handling. Man, I'm going to tell you, I got like notes and it is really hard to like, look at my notes, and then also have like a frank discussion, because part of me is like, go back to the notes, Brooke, because you're going off, onto another, you know, tangent. And then a part of me is like, but this is serious, too. Oh, my God, problems of a podcaster. All right. In this episode, we will be discussing the importance of collaboration and talking to others. In the last two episodes, we have discussed a few techniques and ideas for learning emotional management, but how do you know what is normal and what is not? Okay, now, I do hate saying normal because there is an argument for well, who can really say what is normal. However, for the sake of time, we're going to go with the word normal and common, because I believe we have a slight idea about what I mean. In order to determine what is normal or common, we need to talk to each other, we need to be more willing to be vulnerable, Brene Brown anyone? We need to be talking to each other. It is very easy to get immersed in our own thoughts and emotions and they can become hard to differentiate between what is normal or common and what is very much a personal issue, or something we should truly be concerned about. Remember, monster under the bed versus man coming through the window. So, fear, again, is such a great example, especially when it comes to us business owners because so many fears loved to be activated when we're trying to run a business. So, as a business owner, in our life, we all experience fears. But in business, there are five common fears that show up among the business owners I work with. They are: Fear of failure Fear of success Imposter syndrome perfectionism inner critic. Be sure and go and comment which one plagues you the most. Mine would probably be the fear of success, which is interestingly enough, a fear that is not very much talked about. You would be amazed at how all of us are walking around scared we are going to fail. Thinking no one wants what we have to sell. Who are we to teach this idea? And we walk around hearing our moms, dads, partners, critical friends voice judging everything we're doing. Imagine a day and you might already be here, where you spend it thinking thoughts like, “I suck, and this is never going to work. I can't do this. I'm not smart enough. What if no one buys my program? What if people see that I'm not a million-dollar badass yet? Why would anyone listen to what I have to say? It's already been said by better, more well-spoken people.” All day you thought this to yourself, by the end of the day, I bet you would be depressed and absolutely positive that all of these statements are true. You would go to bed thinking you are truly a loser that does crap work and that no one wants to buy your crappy product. All right, let's change it up, now. Now imagine a day where you start to have the sauce and you call your business bestie or go to my Facebook page, Rich in Differences and say, “I am going out of my mind. I am totally thinking that my work sucks, and no one is going to buy it, I mean, who am I to be teaching any of this? I mean, so and so is already teaching something similar and makes millions, how will I ever be able to compete with that?” And then your business bestie goes, or me because if I catch you in the Facebook group, I'm going to be telling you, “Damn, first off, breathe. Second, do you know how many times I have had those same exact thoughts? We all have those thoughts, especially when we're about to launch something new into the world. I remember so and so talking about herself eating a gallon of ice cream scared to death that she was going to fall flat on her face regarding this deal.” Do you think you would go to bed feeling anywhere near as bad as the first scenario? Fear is normal. But you need to learn that not all fears require you to stay up all night long hating on yourself. Actually, no fear should have you doing that. But you get the point. When we have someone to bounce our inner turmoil off of, we can start to see what is really common and maybe what isn't. Then we can make better decisions on how to handle it when those emotions start to come up in predictable ways and common situations. Because emotions can be predictable if you're paying attention, which you will learn and Episode one and two and if you're doing those techniques. Each time I go to launch anything, the night before I have butterflies in my stomach, I get a little sweaty if I'm being honest, but I don't let that rule me. I know I'm nervous but I'm no longer thinking that I'm terrible, my work is terrible, or everyone is going to hate it, being nervous is normal. So, collaboration is important, talking to each other is important. Because we begin to see what are the things worth looking at and what are the things that we can turn away from? Go to my Facebook group, start a conversation. Have a question, have a fear, not sure what your next steps are? Not sure if you're in the right mental space for your launch? Or wherever you are in your business. Come talk to us and come see how normal or how common those thoughts, the emotions, those fears really are and let us help you. Because that's what this podcast is about, it's about helping you. Alright, pop tarts, that's it for the day. I hope you enjoyed this three-part series. Be sure to subscribe, and come on and tell me what you thought, tell me if you're doing it, tell me if it works, tell me if you think it sucks. I mean, come on, I need to know what's working and what's not working for you. Or if you have any ideas or questions or thoughts or whatever, and just hit me up. Alright, pop tarts, we're going to leave a message to my dad. Hey dad, so glad you listened and no I'm not embarrassed by the fact that you actually like some of my work and it is okay to tell me that and it's okay to like my post, appreciate your support. Love you.  

Are you having a hard time overcoming hard times in your life? Times can be hard and unbelievable situations can happen making life unbearable. Fortunately, there are strategies you can us to overcome difficulties and hard times and succeed.   Our guest today is J'Anmetra (Jojo) Waddell. She is an award winning transformational coach, two times best-selling author and seasoned entrepreneur with over 20 years of experience. Jojo is an advocate for domestic violence survivors and victims.   Additionally, she is the founder of Bare Your Hair and Wanddel Consulting Services. She is the only Live Past the Crazy specialist, and she has come on today to talk about the five keys to living past the crazy.     Episode Spotlights   Why Jojo Created the Five Keys to Living Past the Crazy.   She knew crazy first-hand and she hated when people gave her generic answers, “Oh, Jesus will fix it. It's going to be okay. Pray about it.”   She needed somebody to say, “Jojo, today this is what you do. And tomorrow, this is what you do.” She needed steps of how to stop what was going on.   How Jojo Created the Five Keys to Living Past Crazy   After the crazy in her life had stopped, these were things she was consistently doing all the time to keep the crazy at a minimum.   Crazy can be defined many ways. Her crazy was an abusive husband.   The crazy might never to go away, but she can handle it a lot better with the five steps.   What Changed When She Started Implementing Her Five Keys.   She became more clear   It helped to get some of the ideas and thoughts out of head onto paper   They keep her calm, centered, and keeps the crazy away.   She started to value her mental space and her mental quiet time   The Five Keys to Living Past the Crazy   Develop a personal mantra   Write a journal   Develop a daily goal   Start each day new   Find a purpose partner   How to Start Using the Five Keys   Be committed, not interested   Start daily a writing routine   Talk to yourself positively every day   Value your quiet time   Find people who are going to genuinely support you   Resources/Links Mentioned in This Episode J'Anmetra Jojo Waddell’s books on Amazon Contact Jojo:    Website: Be Fearless    YouTube Channel: Fearless Morning Show    Facebook page: Fearless Morning Show.    Instagram: @JanWaddell    Twitter: Janmetra    Email: elizabeth@livepastcrazy.com janmetra@livepastcrazy.com   Check out JoJo's Freebies right here:   Daily Mantra Reading List 5 Keys to Living Past the Crazy   How to work with JoJo  Retreats: Girlfriends Retreat  August 23-25th - Clearwater - Florida  PROGRAMS/SPECIALS 1:1 Coaching (4 weeks ) Meet once a week $97.00 normally $397 open for 20 people. Topics for each week 1. Mindset 2. Foundations Matter 3. New Rules to New You 4. Strengthen your voice by speaking your truth    Live Past Crazy Blueprint- $49.99 Ways to Subscribe to Rich in Differences Podcast: Itunes Stitcher Google Play Spotify   **Rich in Differences Podcast is not intended to diagnose, prescribe, treat, or cure any disease, physical or mental. Any advice given on the Rich in Differences Podcast should not be construed as a prescription, a promise of benefits, claims of cures, or a guarantee of results to be achieved. The information, instruction or advice given by Rich in Differences Podcast is not intended to be a substitute for competent professional medical or psychological diagnosis and care. You should not discontinue or modify any medication presently being taken pursuant to medical advice without obtaining approval from your healthcare professional. As a listener/reader, you must take complete responsibility for your own physical health and emotional well-being.   TRANSCIPT BELOW   Interview with Janmetra Waddell 
00:00 (Intro Music Playing) 00:04 Brooke: Welcome to Rich Indifferences with your host, Brooke, where we discover what works for you in life, health and business. We are not legos and one size does not fit all so grab a good drink and come listen to different perspectives as we see what sticks for you. 00:21  Welcome to Rich Indifferences and today we have guest speaker, Janmetra Waddell or AKA JoJo. Janmetra is an award-winning transformational coach, two times bestselling author and seasoned entrepreneur with over 20 years of experience. She is the only 'live past the crazy' specialist and she has come on today to talk about 5 Keys To Living Past The Crazy.  Welcome, Jojo, and thank you for coming on. 00:47 JoJo: Hey, Brooke, thank you so much for having me. I am excited to be here.  00:53 Brooke: Me too. I cannot wait to hear what you have to say about this because I believe we all definitely live the crazy life, for sure. So JoJo, what is your drink of choice today?  01:04 JoJo: My drink of choice today would be a strawberry margarita with the mango swirl in the center. 01:12 Brooke: Mmm. That sounds good. 01:14 JoJo:  I didn't start drinking till I was 35 and then I discovered those. 01:17 Brooke: They're great. Wow! I am just drinking straight-up sweet tea, which sounds really lame compared to yours. Oh, 35? 01:33 JoJo: Yeah, and then I was watering down my wine so I would put cranberry juice in my wine.  01:41 Brooke:  That's an interesting way of doing it. 01:43 JoJo: Yeah.   01:45 Brooke: All right. So let's start at the beginning of your story. What made you create the 5 Keys to Living Past the Crazy? 01:56 JoJo: The reason why I started was because I knew crazy firsthand and I hate it when people gave me generic answers: "Oh, Jesus will fix it. It's going to be okay, pray about it." I didn't need that. I needed somebody to say, "Jo Jo, today, this is what you do. And tomorrow this is what you do." And I needed steps and I didn't need generic jargon and people to talk to me. I needed somebody to show me the steps of how to stop what was going on.  02:30 Brooke: I completely understand and I have had similar experiences where all I wanted was an actual step to take and not an idea and that, yeah, that makes all the difference in the world.  02:43 JoJo: Hmhm. 02:44 Brooke: So, did someone come and teach you this or did you create out of like, did you just take from your own experience and say, "This is what I'm going to start doing to help myself" and then create the 5 keys or like, how did all that come about? 02:58 JoJo: For me, these were things that after the crazy in my life had stopped, these were things I finally started to take notice of that I was consistently doing all the time to stop. And crazy can be defined anyway --- your crazy doesn't have to be my crazy. Mine was an abusive husband. And so your crazy could be the kids, the husband, the job, the commute; it could be whatever. But I realized it was the same things that I was doing over and over and over again that help keep me on track and keep the crazy at a minimum. I don't think it's ever going to go away but I can handle it a lot better with my 5 steps.  03:42 Brooke: So what changed when you started implementing your 5 Keys? 03:48 JoJo: Some of the things that change for me, I became more clear because when you're in crazy, the first thing that you don't ever do is grieve. You never grieve so then you can't think straight so you're always in straight panic mode. So that it helped me to get some of my ideas and thoughts out of my head onto paper. So I was able to think clearer, I was able to slow down the crazy and then realized, was I willingly participating in crazy? Like sometimes, you know you're going to talk to that one person that makes you want to cuss in 2.5 seconds but yet, you talk to them. So, was I willingly participated in crazy? So I had to think about that and then I started to value my mental space and my mental quiet time.  I became and I still am very protective, on Sundays, I will bite your head off if you interrupt my quiet time or my mental health time and it has just become things that has, you know, they keep me calm, they keep me centered and keeps the crazy at bay.  04:50 Brooke: Thank you. So let's talk about the 5 Keys. 04:53 JoJo: Yes. 
04:53 Brooke: What are your ‘5 keys to living past the crazy’? 
04:57 JoJo: Well, the first key is for me. Is I had to develop a personal mantra. Like I had because my abuser called me all these crazy names and I wouldn't look in a mirror for like a year, almost two years, I never looked in the mirror. And so I had to develop my own mantra. So it is now on my bathroom mirror in his words as quotes that I have that I say, when I'm having those really bad days, I have a basic one that says "I look good. I feel good. I am good." And I'm going to say that until I'm ready for it. So the first one is just developing my personal mantra. That's for me. The second one is, I journal. I write down everything that I think I'm feeling. So then I can ---because I like to check myself before anybody else brings anything to me: "JoJo, get yourself under control first." So when I'm journaling it, I can put all that down and see maybe where I went wrong or are my feelings really in or did somebody really hurt me.   And the third one is, 'develop a daily goal'. It doesn't matter how big or small. When I had postpartum depression if I brushed my teeth that day, I was excited, "Hey, Jojo, you brushed your teeth today" and I celebrate all of it and I just took it for what it was. I wasn't trying to be anything great.  And then I had to start each day new. I could not hold on to the fact that I stayed in bed and cried all day yesterday. That was yesterday; I deserve to sit in the bed and cry all day. Today is a whole new day. I get to do something different and then I would just get excited about that.  And then the fifth one was, I called them 'Purpose Partners' now, but in the beginning, I just called it my support system because my family was 400 miles away.So that meant I had to find friends to become my support system. And so now I call them 'Purpose Partners' and that's just people who I can call and say, "I'm having this crazy thought or this bad day." And they don't hesitate to pick me back up, instead of giving me their mantra or their dissertation of what they think and I don't have to worry about that. 07:14 Brooke:  Awesome. Thank you. How would you teach someone to start using the 5 Keys?  07:20 JoJo: The first thing I would do is ask them if they're interested, they're committed. I think that question is so important and I learned this the hard way if you're interested ---and I always talk about myself first, third and past tense, all versions I talk about myself. So I'll say, "JoJo, if you're interested then every excuse you have is valid." Meaning: I'm tired. I'm sleepy. The kids got on my nerves. My husband aggravated me. I hated the commute.  So if I'm interested, every excuse I have is going to stop me but if I'm committed to living past crazy, there's no excuse that's going to stop me. It doesn't matter that I don't like the children, I don't like the husband, I don't like the cat, the dog, I don't like anybody, doesn't matter; I'm committed to living past crazy. So the first thing would definitely be to make sure that they had been committed and not just interested because that's important because if not your style.  And then, of course, the daily journaling; talk to yourself. We talked to ourselves all the time. And I think people are afraid to say like I have a full-blown conversation with me, myself and I, every day on the way to work. I talk to myself, "JoJo, girl, I can't believe you're doing it."  "I know."   But when you do that you find the answers there and then I value that there won't be the value of quiet time. We always say we don't know the answer, I can't figure it out. Well, if you think about your morning; you wake up, you turn on the TV and you're listening to the news. You're yelling at the kids, you get in the car. You drop the kids off, you sit in traffic, you yell at people, you listen to the radio, you talk to your mama, you get to work and you're talking to people. You get back in the car, it's the radio, somebody's calling with something urgent on the way home. You got to stop at the store and then you get in. You got to yell to get the kids in the bed, get them to sleep. Cook food and do all the mommy things and then heaven forbid if you got a husband, you got wife things where you ain't even wash clothes.  You haven't done any of that and then it's 11 o'clock and you're in the bed and you're watching the nightly news and then you're like, "Okay, let me think about myself." and that's the last thought you have before you wake up in the morning. And so, that quiet time just allows you to be quiet so that you can hear the answer because the answer we're looking for is there but we're so busy blocking it out, we can't hear the answer. So definitely the quiet time.  And then the last would be those 'Purpose Partners'. Finding people who are genuinely going to support you, who are there for you and that everything that you're asking for, you're willing to give back. Like if I'm going to be this great friend to you and support system, I want it back as well. So just be willing to give what you're asking for.  10:04 Brooke: I love listening to you talk because I think it's so funny like the talking to yourself. So like when I got a divorce, I started seeing a therapist. Something she had me do, and she still will, is if I'm having like something, like there's a disconnect in me, like two sides are warring, she'll make me have a conversation with myself. She's like, "Speak to this side."  And then, "What is this sides response to that?"  And so, what I've learned is it makes you respect all sides, instead of trying to get rid of it because it's not going away, it's part of you.  10:37 JoJo: Yeah. It's a part of me. Like I've learned to love all parts of Jojo. Like I love all of me. There's the crazy side, the nerd, the funny, the part that thinks I can sing in a rock band, even though I can't sing it all. I love all parts of me. 10:55 Brooke: Yes. I call it 'the committee of Brooke' now. Like it's a real committee now, you know. But if you don't have someone who's ever done that, they look at you like you were crazy. Like, you what? 11:06 JoJo: They really do. Like you really can't, I was like, yeah. Me and myself, we have great conversations all the time  11:13 Brooke: Exactly. All right, JoJo, so how can people work with you these days?  11:19 JoJo: If you want to find me, of course, I'm on all social media and I know my name is so difficult to remember but if you type in 'Live Past Crazy Specialist', I promise, I'm the only one and I'm going to pop up. The website is livepastcrazy.com. But if they want to work with me, they can go to bit.ly/waddellspeaks. And then that's just a short conversation piece that we can have or talk about. Because sometimes I'm a firm believer, people don't want an answer. I mean, they don't want you to give feedback. Sometimes they just want to answer and they just need a safe place to come and vent. They don't need you to give a dissertation. I just need to share my thoughts and with me sharing my thoughts, I figured it out all by myself. I just needed a safe place for somebody to come to listen.  And so a lot of times, as my youngest daughter says, "You're a space giver." So I'm a space giver. I allow you that safe place just to come and talk and I cannot talk, it's totally up to you, how you want it to go. But just so you can share your thoughts and feelings and then we can decide how we're going to go from there. 12:29 Brooke: Excellent. So where can people find you these days?  12:33 JoJo: They can find me on all social media; Facebook. I am Janmetra JoJo Waddell. We also have a YouTube channel with over 410 shows. So you can binge-watch all the Fearless Morning Shows. So if you type simply type in 'Fearless Morning Show." And then, of course, we had the Facebook page, Fearless Morning Show, Be Fearless Incorporated Show, a group on Facebook. And then, of course, the website is livepastcrazy.com  And I think that's everywhere. Of course, all social media; Twitter, Instagram is just my name. 13:05 Brooke: All right then, excellent. That's a lot of good places for people to find you and the fact that you have so many episodes, that's a great way for people like you said to binge-watch and really get to know you and your style. 13:17 JoJo: And they could pick a topic. I have the topics there so you can pick whatever you want to listen to.  13:22 Brooke: Excellent. Thank you. Thank you so much for coming on the show. It was a blast talking with you Jo-Jo.  13:28 JoJo: Thank you so much for having me and I don't know why I sing endings of everything but I sing them. Thank you for having me. I had a great time and I think it's because I can't sing that I habitually try to sing all the time. So thank you so much for having me on the show. I have truly enjoyed sharing the 5 Steps To Live Past Crazy with you guys.  13:52 Brooke: All right, Pop-Tarts.That's all for this week. Remember: send in your thoughts, your feedback, your ideas, your questions, and your drink of choice; whether it be alcoholic or non-alcoholic and be sure to send in the recipes so you can be featured on the show. And don't forget subscribe, so you can be around for when I feature you on the show and to get some good content. Here's to another week. Cheers.

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