Krati Mehra: Discovering my inner strength and outer confidence.

Krati Mehra is a women’s empowerment coach, host of a successful podcast, On Her Terms. Krati is on a quest to show the world what truly determined women can do. Armed with her background in Psychology and the experience of working with women from underserved communities, Krati ditched her corporate career to be her own boss and live a life of value and impact. She now works with female business owners and helps them be bold & play big, communicate with confidence, and use fear as fuel. It was an absolute pleasure to have her on the show, I really hope you enjoy this episode.

Trigger warning: In this episode we discuss Krati's experience of depression, so you may want to skip this episode if you are struggling right now. 

Follow Krati on Insta:  https://www.instagram.com/mehra_krati/

Find out more of what she has to offer here:  http://kratimehra.com

And subscribe to her brand spanking new You Tube Show: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCp6eEg5f5yS621RhJ_2IMw

On her Terms Podcast: https://www.kratimehra.com/on-her-terms-podcast/

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Transcript

Speaker A: Hello.

Speaker B: Hello and welcome to The One Thing, a podcast where I talk to fabulous females about the one thing that made them step out of their comfort zone and change change their life for the better. Because it's only by taking brave steps that we truly grow as a person. I'm your host, mum, social media manager and general soul searcher Vanessa Carlos. And every week I'll be introducing a small business owner, a blogger or a creative to discuss their One Thing.

Speaker C: Hello my loves. Before we start this wonderful interview with Karate, I just wanted to talk to you about my new Facebook ads toolkit. It's free, it's live on my website and it will give you everything you need to create a super successful Facebook ads campaign. All you need to do is pop into my website, add your email address, you will be added to my newsletter list as well, where you will get my biweekly newsletter, which is pretty much my podcast, but in newsletter form with added tips and stuff that I like on the TV and in podcasts and in books and all that kind of chisel. Anyway, enjoy. Karate Mirror is a woman's empowerment coach, host of a successful podcast on her terms and a massive superhero nerd. So we get on really well on a quest to show the world what truly determined women can do. Armed with her background in psychology and the experience of working with women from underserved communities, cardi ditched her corporate career to be her own boss and live the life of value and impact. She now works with female business owners and helps them to be bold and play big, communicate with confidence and use fear as fuel. Now, fear and how she came to run her business is the main type of conversation here. Some trigger warnings. There is a lot of talk about depression, so if you are feeling at all depressed, maybe give this episode a miss. But there is certainly a happy ending. She's an incredibly inspiring lady and I really, really hope you enjoy this episode. So, without further ado, let's welcome karate into that one thing studio.

Speaker A: Hello Cartie. Welcome to the Wednesday.

Speaker D: Thank you so much for having me, Vanessa.

Speaker A: Lovely to meet you. It's so nice to have you here. Now, are you 330 in the afternoon in India right now?

Speaker D: Yes.

Speaker A: And I'm 11:00 a.m Here and I'm such a morning person, so I'm really, really grateful, honestly. There's been some podcast where it's been like 05:00 p.m. In the evening and I'm literally like running out of energy.

Speaker D: Oh yeah. No, for my podcast, I used to like I have been working till like a few weeks ago. I have been working through the night. I would work till and I would go to sleep at around like at 06:00 a.m. In the morning because the time zone with the clients, with the collaborators, with podcast guests is just so far apart that I was like, I'll have to work through the night. And then my health started suffering. Everything was so chaotic in my life and I was like, dude, I'm losing like chunks of hair and I'm so stressed out because my sleep quality is so bad. And I found out apparently that people who work night shifts, who work through the night, like working through the night shift is like a carcinogen. It's as bad as smoking. Yeah. And I was just doing it. Okay. Now I get up at 04:00 A.m. In the morning so that if someone has to record with me, I can do it then. And I sleep at 09:00 P.m.. So now if anybody wants to stay up and talk to me, I'm like, no, it's bedtime. And everyone's like, Dude, it's 09:00 P.m.. What are your child no, sorry. No.

Speaker A: 04:00 a.m. That is insane. That is NAD.

Speaker D: Yeah, if I sleep at 09:00 P.m., if you sleep at 09:00 P.m., you're getting 7 hours of sleep. Even if you are getting up at 04:00 A.m., which is perfect, your body gets up on its own because I don't need more than six and a half hours of sleep. So my body I don't even need an alarm clock. I'm up at 04:00 a.m. Feeling awesome.

Speaker A: By the way, how old are you?

Speaker D: I'm 31.

Speaker A: Okay, got. You look younger. I was.

Speaker D: The girl, she's so young. That's why she doesn't need that much sleep. I'm like, oh, bone.

Speaker A: Striking myself out of bed. If you don't mind me asking. Sorry, I know that was a really big question to ask for.

Speaker D: Why did you believe that? I've never quite understood why people think it's rude to ask somebody's age. I mean, it's your age.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker D: Do you have an explanation for this? Cause I've never understood why people think that's rude. Why is that rude?

Speaker A: I don't know. Maybe it's like maybe it's a cultural thing. I mean, I always think of myself personally, like inside myself is younger than my body is actually aging. Right? Like you always have that thing in your head that you're kind of mentally 29 when actually you're not.

Speaker D: Well, there are times when you are doing things so goofy you have to stop and remind yourself, dude, you're an adult, stop doing **** like this. But I would really like to change this because men are so okay with sharing their age, but it's women and I think it has something to do with insecurity. Like they're going to think I'm older. I would like to really do something to change that. So you're 50, so you're 60. What the **** does that even matter?

Speaker A: Do you know what I think, as well as another thing, I think it's a patriarchal thing as well, because women have always got to be seen as kind of slightly infantile, always useful. You've always got to kind of make yourself younger, make yourself smaller, when really you should be proud of being okay. I turned five.

Speaker D: Awesome. 45 years of experience.

Speaker A: There you go. Right?

Speaker D: Awesome. I think you did a cool thing there, because I think let's remind each other to be proud of our age. Stop hiding it. Stop being so insecure about it. Because it may be a patriarchal thing, but the power is in our hands. We can change it. So let's change whatever narrative is playing around that, and let's just be proud of our age, however we may look. Bad hair day or bad skin day, whatever.

Speaker A: Who cares? Exactly. Good hair day for you, by the way, today.

Speaker D: I think it's the sleep. Yeah, sleep I'm getting it no product, nothing.

Speaker A: Just it yeah. None of these through the night. That is bonkers. That is absolutely bonkers. So, anyway, I'm really, really pleased you're full of energy, and we're ready to start this conversation. I'm going to start, actually, because before I came on, I always have a quick look at everybody's Instagram feed, because obviously that's what's going on in your brain at that very moment. And I always have, like, a quick look through, and there's one post that really stood out to me. It's a little bit further down, but it's actually perfect for what we want to talk about today. So I'm going to read it to you. Okay? Okay. This is you. This is what you've said. The woman I am today is grateful to the girl I was yesterday. The risks she took, the pain she endured, and the love she shared built up the best part of me.

Speaker D: Thank you.

Speaker A: It's so lovely. First off, massive, massive hand claps. Right? And then secondly, I can really feel that kind of right. I was in the ****. And when you're in the ****, sometimes you feel like there's no way out of the ship. But for you to be grateful for the ship to make you into the strong woman you are today, who's decided, yeah, I'm not going to work through the night. I'm actually going to work to a time that's going to benefit me, and it's going to make me a better business person and a better person altogether. Yes. Big, big handcuffs. And it kind of leads us on to your one thing, which is a little bit kind of deep and slightly dark, and there's going to be a bit of trigger warnings going on for people that have a sort of depression. And I want you to know, are you all comfortable to go ahead and talk about? Absolutely, yes.

Speaker D: Let's go ahead.

Speaker A: That's good, because I want you to go back to the beginning and why you think you got depressed. What are the main kind of feelings around this?

Speaker D: I don't think there's a perfect answer to this. There's an exactly accurate answer to this. My therapist told me that this has been happening like this was building up. So you probably have been depressed for many years, but I think it was just like when growing up, I didn't really have any friends. I grew up without press. I think I made my first real friend when I was 21 years old. Oh, I'm sorry. No worries. I had books, so my books were my whole world. I had **** done off imaginary friends, I had older egos, I had superheroes. So I was always lost in my own world. But that also meant that I never quite fit in. It's the same distinct story with everyone just plays out differently for all of us, looking for that sense of belonging.

Speaker A: To people that don't fit in, right?

Speaker D: This is something I've learned ever since I started doing this work. The podcast, the coaching, everyone had at some point. And then I felt like, we don't belong. Every single person in this world, the people who get bullied, the people who bully, the people who are the popular ones, the people who are the learners, everyone has at some point in time felt like this. Some of us survive it better than the others. So with me, it was always like I started recruiting into myself. And I thought that was a source of strength because I didn't care what the world thinks. But obviously I did care. Which is probably why I always felt like a sense of disconnection with everyone because I was cautiously retreating to myself. Yeah. And then I went to London and there suddenly I started making friends. When I was in London and I found out that I was actually popular, people liked me. I didn't no longer straighten my hair. I let my curls be as they were. And everybody loved it here in India. Everybody criticized my curls. Everyone was always like, yeah, like, I got a lot of slack in India for just being myself, even from my family.

Speaker A: They own taste, right? That's just them.

Speaker D: Like my mom would say, just don't leave your hair open. You have such a lovely face.

Speaker A: Tie it back.

Speaker D: It's stuff like that. I mean, she was saying something nice, but at the same time like, no, let it be like I'm someone who cares very little about dressing up. So with me, it's like just the least amount of work so far as my appearance is concerned, besides the high cystic acne. So the less attention I give to my physical appearance, the better it is for me. But anyways, just going to London, I found, like a completely different version of myself there. But then as soon as I was there for my masters and I got back to India, it was like the same **** happening all over again. And suddenly there was like this very weird identity crisis that was happening. I wanted to continue to be that socially popular, cool, funny girl I found in London, but I just there was like a constant internal war going on and things started to get really bad. I started having migraines. My body started to really suffer through it. And I started taking pain pills, and then I was, like, taking sleeping pills. I didn't even realize. And that started happening. And then my anxiety started getting completely out of control. I think that was how it really blew up. Like, the depression thing blew up, and then I was having hallucinations and all of that. So eventually, of course, I had a massive breakdown. I passed out in the middle of the road, and that was like the turning point. But I'm so grateful for it.

Speaker A: Wow.

Speaker C: So sorry.

Speaker A: That's horrific. That must have been so scary for you.

Speaker D: That was very scary because it was 09:00 p.m. At night, and I was on a deserted road, and I woke up, and I remember feeling, like, overwhelmingly grateful that I wasn't waking up in the back of someone's car. I was just passed out. Yeah. And that was very, very scary. I've never been that scared in my life. But I will always consider that to be the best moment of my life because that interior was so overwhelming that when I got I had to drag myself back home, back to my apartment. I lived alone, thankfully, so nobody else knew what was going on. I hid it from everyone. My parents didn't know, what my friends didn't know, and I passed out in the bathroom eventually that day, because I was so exhausted, my body was like, we can't take this anymore. We're done. And when I woke up the next morning, I was like, this cannot be my life. I couldn't recognize the person I'd become. I always look back to that day, to that moment, and consider it to be the absolute best moment of my life. Because that was when I decided, I'm going to change everything. Everything's going to change from this day forward.

Speaker A: Yeah. Because what we have to remember as well is that the party in London was exactly the same person as the one in India. You were exactly the same person, but the circumstances had turned you that way. But you were the same girl. You were popular in one country and unpopular. You were still the same girl with the same face, the same appearance, the same thoughts, the same feelings. Everything was the same. But it was the situation that must have just killed you. Oh, my goodness.

Speaker D: Yeah. But it's always like, when you think about your life at any point in time, you always credit the bad moments of your life for the maximum amount of growth you have. It's never really the triumph of our good parts of our life that we look back to and think, I'm so glad that happened. Yeah, that was great. And that gave me such a high, and I felt so great in that moment. But it's always the failures, the setbacks, the falls, the breakdowns that we look back to and think, I'm so glad that happened or I wouldn't be the person that I am today. Yeah, I think there were a variety of reasons why it happened. I think I was also very hard on people around me. I just expected too much because, you know, when you're younger, you don't understand that everyone is going through something. It's not just you.

Speaker A: Oh, absolutely.

Speaker D: Yeah.

Speaker A: It's definitely like a kind of a teenager. I mean, I've got a young daughter who's eleven and she's kind of reaching that stage all about her and her whole world is about her and everything that surrounds her. And all I can say to her is like, you wait, darling, it's not all about you. I'm so sorry, but it's not.

Speaker D: You don't want to say that, do you though? You want to make room for all of her emotions, but at the same time you have to like sneak in those warnings just so she knows what's coming. Right?

Speaker A: I know. And you think you're invincible, but then, yeah. It is interesting how the hardships shape us a lot more. Like, you always think of like it's almost like if you have a review in a store, it's always the negative reviews that stick, right?

Speaker D: Yup.

Speaker A: No one ever remembers the good reviews. It's always that one negative review. It's one person that sticks in your mind and you think, right, I'm not going to go there. And it's the same with us, with our failures, if we let them kind of implode inside us. But really you've done the right thing. They're just kind of learning from it and learning your way through it, I think. And that's why I loved that Instagram quote. I thought I was so proud. I really did. Also, you said in your email that you took your time to rebuild yourself and discover how you want to live your life. Do you want to go into a bit more about that? Because that's nice how you took your time. It wasn't sudden.

Speaker D: Yeah, no, it couldn't possibly have been sudden. As I said, I realized that things have to change. So then the next three months were all about getting like, stopped. I had to stop taking those pills, which couldn't have been I couldn't have done that overnight. I found the right people. I was very lucky in that I think when I sort of got that resolution solidified in my brain that I'm going to change everything. I think my guardian angel just woke up and she's like, I'm going to help her because this is the magic of the universe. I started meeting exactly the right people. The first person I met, I thought I was an addict because I was taking these pills on movies. And you read in books how hard related to give up an addiction and like, so much power to anyone who spots through that. But the person I met told me, you're not an addict. It's how your body is coping you just got to change that. You just have to reduce the dosage. And I was fine. Like, in three months, my body was a lot stronger. He also made it mandatory for me to attend support groups, meditation groups, therapy. And I think it just I realized the biggest thing that had really ruined that had led me to that place of this absolute darkness was the fact that I, in a defined way, I always thought that I am a rebel. I'm a rebel. I don't care what people think of me. But in reality, I had given too much time and mental space to what people were saying about me. And I finally reached a point where I was like, I'm good or bad. However my life pans out, it will be because I wanted it to be that way. It will no longer be because someone says something nice. And so I decided to do more of that, or somebody said something horrible to me, and I spiraled and went and changed **** in my life. So from that point forward, it was like, okay, what do you want to do? And I had to really figure out what was it that I wanted to do, how I wanted to show up. Do I want to be a goofball and let everyone think that, yeah, she's funny, and she's just always very light hearted and very laid back. I wanted to be to show up, show more of my serious side, because we all have so many sites to ourselves, right? But we on one of one characteristic or one personality. Traitor really stand out because we, I think, connect with that site more. And I just was like, Let it all fly. I'm going to show up exactly as I am. No more holding myself back. No more mincing words. And if people are uncomfortable and they can't stand to be around me, then they should leave. Respectfully, they should leave, and that's okay. No problems there. And another decision that I made was never, ever judging other people, because I realized that that was another problem with me. I judged others just as much as I was feeling judged. And so I took my time with that. I really worked on my value system. I really worked on how I wanted to show up in the world, how I wanted to connect with people. My relationships were not in a good place at the time, and I remember finally breaking down in front of my mom and telling her, do you want me in your life or not? Which is a very bizarre question. She's just like and I found out that there were so many misunderstandings, so we had to work through that. Of course she loved me. She had always been in my corner. But when you are in that place in your life, you very communically. Forget all the good that this person has done for you. Only remember the things that hurt you.

Speaker A: Again, we make it all up again, right? Absolutely.

Speaker D: 100%. Yes. So I think it was like those two years were all about me. I took a job in a company where it was a really nice company, because up to that point, I had gotten jobs that were not very good, like very toxic work environment. But as I said, it's the magic of the universe, because this job opened. Oh, my God. I went to the interview and this person asked me, what have you learned? Like, they always say, you should never criticize your previous companies and your previous bosses. My previous boss had been such oh, my God, it has been such a negative environment that when my new boss, my new potential boss, asked me, what will you not put up with? Like, what kind of environment you want? I told him very clearly, if anybody is ever rude to me or yells at me, I'm going to make a case out of it. I'm going to go to HR. I'm going to escalate it like crazy. And I'm telling this person who is thinking about hiring me, he's probably thinking.

Speaker A: He'S probably thinking how refreshing that someone has actually been honest. Right?

Speaker D: I didn't quite say it that aggressively, but I'm very clear to him that I'm not going to put up with any kind of obnoxious behavior. I have boundaries. I expect them to be respected. And I got the job, and the environment was so great in that place. I made friends, and it was just such a pleasant environment. It's like the magic of the universe. That's what I needed. I needed to not go home with that stress going with me, because I was working on myself at the time. I was doing yoga in the mornings, meditation. I was working with support groups. I was volunteering so that I can help other people. And those two years were like it was just like me learning to be a human being, learning to be a woman.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker D: And it really paid off.

Speaker C: Would you say that those four things.

Speaker A: Would be crucial for someone that is trying to kind of get back from any kind of darkness that they've had in their life, like a meditation, yoga, working with other people, being like an act of service, doing something for nothing? Do you think those I think those things really, really helped you.

Speaker D: They definitely helped me a lot, I think, because they sort of allowed me to they gave me permission to be more of who I've always wanted to be and not constantly try to imitate other people who I thought were more successful than me. But I don't know if those are like I think meditation is almost I do consider meditation to be almost necessary because or if not like the conventional kind of meditation, but some kind of practice, it just leaves you alone with your own energy that allows you to very deliberately bring awareness back to your own thoughts, to your own body. So I do believe that's necessary, but I think each individual, I think the most important thing is selfawareness and understanding what it is that you need and how you can sort of nurture yourself. So if your idea of self nurturing, I don't know if that's a word or not, but if your idea of doing that would be ice skating, then by all means do that, would be hanging out with friends, then do that. Just make sure that it's not more of the same old, same old, and then you're not doing more of what has got you to that dark place. If you're in a dark place, things obviously need to change. And I was so completely in a dark place that clearly everything has been doing up to that point was dysfunctional, was not working, everything had to go. So, yeah, I would say change things like figure out what it is that would work for you. But yeah, if you can include a meditation practice, definitely do that. And if you can volunteer, if you can make yourself present with other people's pain, I think that is something that gives you a lot of perspective and I think it just opens you up to this connection that we share with the rest of humanity because that sense of isolation starts to go away. That is how it worked for me. I was part of everyone else's pain and everyone else was part of my pain. And suddenly it was like the Lord wasn't so heavy anymore.

Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely. And podcasting helps with that as well, isn't it? Even when we talk to people from the other side of the world. Right? It's absolutely amazing.

Speaker D: The best.

Speaker A: An absolute gift. It really, really is. Do you think as well, now you're kind of practicing this authentic, dishonest, disserviced, first person, that you're getting better sales and you're actually getting better clients because of that?

Speaker D: My business has been changing a lot in the past few months, I think, because I've really been trying to be more authentic and less about what everyone else thinks I should do. But yes, I would say that that definitely matters because my emotional investment is extremely high. The reason that I work with women exclusively now is because I've been very heavily influenced by the struggles that I've seen my mother go through. She's always sort of shrunk herself. She went through a lot of difficulties and she's such an amazing woman. But I see herself constantly putting herself down and I see a lot of women do that still. We sometimes we make it that the men are doing this to us or whatever. Like the childhood did it. But the thing is, whoever did this to you, whoever brought you to this place, you let it happen, right? Maybe you were a kid and you didn't have any awareness and that's completely understandable. I have nothing but compassion for those people. I've been there myself. So no judgment here. But the thing is, if you continue to let that thing happen to you, well, then that's your responsibility now. So I know that there are circumstances where and you really have no control. But if we like, if you open up YouTube or you open a news channel, you will find women out there who have survived and actually won over triumph situations that are beyond imagination. So there's nothing you can't beat. And I really believe that so far as women are concerned, I don't believe in men versus women. That is not what I'm about. But I do believe, and I don't know if that comes across as sexist or not, but I do believe that when women really wake up, I think women, just because we have been repressed for so long, that now that we're waking up, that process is still going on. There is so much power that whatever you have done, whoever you are, in whatever place of life you are in, there is so much more you can do now if you want to just let go of all of those narratives. I believe that so strongly, so far as women are concerned, that I really believe that they have so much power. So that belief really does allow me to show up for my clients in a way that's not quite there. If I'm working with men, my compassion is there, my need to help them is there. But the emotional investment that I bring when I'm working with women is completely different. And of course, that comes across whatever content I create, whoever I'm talking to. And I think that definitely does influence how many women, female clients I can attract. So I would say that yes. Besides, if you are showing in authentically or if you're doing things that you don't quite believe in, there is going to be a lot of resistance there, which is going to make things a lot harder for you, which will in turn mean you won't be able to attract as many clients as you want to. So you're like doing really, really well if you're someone who's thinking right now, yeah, well, I only qualify for advice and I don't quite let my inner authentic person show up, but I still have a lot of profits and my business is doing well. Then I'm telling you that however well your business is doing, there's so much more you're leaving on the table to show up as you are. And I think that makes a huge, huge difference.

Speaker A: I think women respond really, really well to authentic stories because they see so much of themselves inside that I think there's been a lot of unlearning over the past two, three years. An awful lot of unlearning with everything for women, for white people, for just like everything that's going on in the world at the moment. I mean, I know in the UK at the moment, we're having a heck of a lot of unlearning to do and there's an awful lot of resistance to the old way of doing things, is trying to kind of creep back in, but then there's so much resistance pulling away from it as well. So it's a really heavy time, but it's also quite an exciting time and I think we can only be positive that change is happening at the moment. And you're doing an awful lot towards that as well with women because I really think we give ourselves a hard time, don't we?

Speaker D: Yeah, absolutely. It's true that women are emotionally, they're more sensitive, they're more reactive, which is, I think, a great thing if you're letting your emotions run you. If you were to run your emotions, I think, because anyways, everything you do and everything you don't do, it's all about emotions. There's really nothing in your life that you do that has nothing to do with emotions. So the thing that you need to do is you need to run your emotions instead of letting them run you, like weaponize them, use them to drive transformations that you want, instead of letting your emotions direct you and push you into doing things that are really not serving you. So, yeah, you want to throw a fit when you fail or when you do something that makes embarrasses you, by all means, throw a fit, go ahead and do that. But then use all of that energy to actually do something that, by the time that chapter is over, makes you stop and makes you think that, yeah, I really made good use of that storm that I was in. It happened for a reason. It led me to where I am now and that's awesome. And I'm in a great place and watch as I make something big out of this as well. I think that's important.

Speaker A: Yes, absolutely important, isn't it? My goodness me. So you've mentioned your YouTube channel and it's in the works at the moment. Is there any kind of sneak peeks you can give us? Anything that's going to be on there?

Speaker D: Oh, my God. Okay, I haven't really announced it all of this yet, but tomorrow I don't know how this is like, when is this going to be released and when people will be hearing it.

Speaker A: It will probably be sort of end of September, I would have thought early October.

Speaker D: Yeah. So I made some business decisions that were that I relied too much on what everyone else was telling me to do and I went against what my intuition was telling me to do and I think I'm now paying the price for it because I just recently, like, I found out a few months back that somebody else has a trademark for my podcast. I had rebranded My Podcast in May. So frustrating. Which means I have to rebrand it all over again. And I have just like wasted money, time, energy. And I don't know why the branding agency didn't check and I myself didn't check. It really was bad decision making on a lot of ends. But the thing is that when I was picking this name, this name, I did not come up with myself. The branding agency came up with it as the botus agency, and I didn't like it. But we ran it by a group of like 30, 40 people. And they tell you, I'm sure you've heard of this advice as well. Validate your ideas, validate your ideas. So I was like, okay, let's, you know, put it to a vote. And this name had majority votes, but I didn't like it. But I went ahead and I used it anyways. And when I got that email, by that time, when that email showed up in my inbox, I was already thinking this to myself, that this is not how I should be running my business. I should do what the whole thing about working through the night, like listening to all the coaches out there and just advertising and branding in a way that's not right for me, that didn't quite feel like, yeah, this is me. This is how people should perceive me. And then that email showed up and I'm like, okay, you know what? Just pause, pause. It's like the same thing I did when my depression happened. Obviously then it wasn't like a deliberate decision. It has to be done. But again, it was like, hit pause. I don't give a **** if I'm not showing up on social media and everybody unpolish me, but whatever happens, I have to step away and I need to think. So the last time we considered doing the YouTube channel, there was so much resistance in me. That was two years back when I started with my coaching and everything. Like, I went all in with my business and there was so much resistance because I really did not want to do YouTube back then. But this time around when I considered it, the coach I was working with told me, no, no, no. Instagram? Is it? Do instagram? Don't do YouTube. That's too much of a beast for you. But I wanted to do it. The energy in my body felt good. My body told me, Go ahead and do it. You'll be fine. You can manage this. And then the podcast thing happened and I was like, you know what, I'm going to go all in. I'm going to do YouTube. I'm going to share some of my and again, I'm going to rebrand my podcast all over again. You've got to listen to your intuition. You have to be true and authentic to yourself. Anyways, the podcast is going to change. It's going to show up in a different way now. I'm going to do what I wanted to do originally with it. I ended up doing what everyone else thought I should do again, that **** is not going to help me. Yeah. So with the YouTube, I'm going to do videos and just really take up topics that I think serve my clients that will hopefully serve with women who are not yet ready to work one on one with me. So if you're not ready, that's fine. But I'm going to make content that I think will help them, that helped me. I'm going to make it for the crappy that went into depression and ended up like, you know, so frustrated, so unhappy with her life. So I'm going to make all that content and I'm going to share like my podcast gets video recorded, so I'm going to share video snippets from the podcast as well. Because the world is filled with incredible women and any time a guest shows up on my show, I go all out to really promote them because.

Speaker A: Well.

Speaker D: I think most women do that. But obviously I know there are certain people who have this limited mindset where they believe that if she gets said that, I won't.

Speaker A: Oh my goodness, we have to get past that.

Speaker C: We have to get past that.

Speaker D: Every booking, yes, there's abundance in the world, there's abundant everything. So whatever it is you're reaching for, it's fine. And you've got to help your fellow women, you've got to help your fellow men, you got to help everyone show up as like, if you see something really awesome in someone and if you have the opportunity to help other people see it too, you have to do it. You gotta do it. I think that's very important. So I love promoting the guests who show up on my podcast. There has been a couple of exceptions when perhaps they said some things that I couldn't in all conscience promote because I didn't agree with those ideas.

Speaker A: Have you ever had that before? Yeah, it happened.

Speaker D: Right. That's a hard decision to make for you then. You have to be again, it's like I have to be true to myself. I have to be integrity with what I'm about. So then, except for those couple of moments, apart from that, it's been so much fun doing that so that YouTube will give me more of an opportunity to do that which I love and we'll see what else I can do to serve my audience, what other persona I want to take up.

Speaker A: You haven't got your rebrand name or anything yet then? No.

Speaker D: Good God, no. I'm going to take my time with it.

Speaker A: Yeah, do it.

Speaker D: Not yet.

Speaker A: Okay, so we'll hold firm, but don't worry guys, by the time this comes out, you'll have all the names, all the links, and everything will be in the forecast notes so we can follow everything. But in the meantime, your instance, there your Facebook's, there your website. Is there is there anything that you can point anyone to on your website that you think is like a really good starting off point with working with you.

Speaker D: There's my podcast. So my podcast already has about 85 episodes, so definitely dive into those. And there's my newsletter. Subscribe to my newsletter because I'm now being very candid in my newsletters. I'm very spilling all the secrets, spilling all of my stories in my newsletter. And I'm always like my opportunities, any opportunity that I can give you to maybe learn more. If my style of coaching works for you, if my the way I interact works for you, then I give opportunities free and paid both to connect with me further. So the newsletter is a good place. Then there's the podcast and the Instagram again, because there's it lives, and there's so much happening on Instagram. I would say that I'm not as present on Instagram right now as I should be because, again, I'm taking my time.

Speaker A: You can't do it all.

Speaker D: Yeah, I can't. And again, I have to also, like, I have one person who is working for me. I need to hire more, which is you got to get that connection right. You have to work with people who can really get your message. Right now, it's all me with one other person who's awesome. So, yeah, just like, if you want to connect with me, those are the places you'll find me. Otherwise, drop a DM. I'm all for. If you're having some struggle in your life, drop a DM and you will find me completely in your corner. Even if you're not yet ready for, like, a one on one commitment. I've been there. I know how it feels. When you're in that space where everything seems too much, then I'll show up for you in whatever capacity I can. So just drop a DM.

Speaker A: And that would be I love the DMs. I'm probably too far deep into DMs, to be honest with you. Like, I can spend hours in the DMs, just back and forth, but I think it's just because I like to chat quite a lot, as you can probably see. But, yes, those are the best, don't they? Those kind of seem conversations that can kind of go on for, like yes, absolutely right.

Speaker C: Absolutely.

Speaker A: Okay, so it's all coming it's all in, like, a kind of a regenerative stage at the moment. Everything's kind of stewing nicely in sort of various bits. So yeah, exciting times for you, right? Yeah, exciting times.

Speaker D: Hopefully everything will show up as it should, and it will resonate with the people who don't need those content. That content and those services.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker D: Okay.

Speaker A: So when you are coaching a lady, how do you like to start with them? What's the whole process you go through when you're coaching a woman?

Speaker D: Okay, so I like to start do, like, an audit as an understand exactly where you are, where you want to go, and what is it that's holding you back? Because a lot of the times we think exercise thing is holding us back, but there's a lot of a lot else that's going on that we don't quite realize. So I like to do a very deep dive into that, get it down. Like, we obviously have video recordings so that you can play back the session. So we do all of that. Then I give them time to sleep over it and come back again the next day or the next session, of course. And then we reassess everything we've gathered, and from that point forward, we start working on the priorities. Because if there's something you want to do with your look, self work is obviously an ongoing thing. You never really stop, right? But there's always something that are sort of showing up in a way that's creating most chaos in our life. So that's where we would start. For me, that's unless my client wants to go about it in a different way, I always recommend starting with your personal identity. For me. Understanding who you are. How you want to show up. What do you stand for. That's very important. Because if you don't know who you are. You're going to be very. Very vulnerable to every external force. All the external noise. People telling you every criticism is going to find.

Speaker A: Like.

Speaker D: It's going to burrow into your soul. And it's going to start affecting how you show up. You're going to shrink yourself, and you're going to play small if you don't know who you are. And so that is something I believe that you should work on from the very beginning. So we start with personal identity, because that has a lot to do with confidence and a lot to do with how you show up. Then we move on to emotional. Emotional intelligence, emotional management. I help women. My primary focus, so far as emotions are concerned, is teaching you how to sort of focus your emotions, weaponize them in a way that if fear is very dominant in your life, then use that fear to drive action. So we're gonna, like, turn everything into a positive direction. So we use emotion as fuel. And there's another thing that I focus on very heavily, is creating systems. Systems that can help, that can move you forward, that can supercharge your efforts so that there isn't as much resistance. But mostly I think the sessions are really just about just helping whoever it is that's on the other end of being. If it's in person, then other on end of the table or otherwise other end of the zoom call, right? And it's just like I let them take the lead, and I just want everyone walking away from those sessions. Like every woman who spends time with me, even if it's not in a session, I wanted to walk away feeling powerful. That is my focus. Feeling like the possibilities are endless. And whatever possibility you are trying to reach for, you have the power for it. You just need to do some work to get it out. And like, you know, it's like a super typical superhero saga. You go from believing, I've got nothing, I don't belong, I'm never going to be able to do this, and then suddenly finding out all of these powers. But then you have to but then they're so immense and they're so huge. You have to learn how to channel that.

Speaker A: Guided through it. As soon as you said systems, my whole body relaxed. It's so good to have a system in place, right? It's such a relief. It's such a relief. I remember when I first started my business about nearly eight years ago now. And because my life was so chaotic, I was a new mom, so I had lots of baby stuff going on. It was a real scattergun approach, right? Everything was just like, oh, let's just pile it all in. It's pilot all in and then eventually getting those systems in place. Oh, what a relief that was. My goodness, right?

Speaker D: Yeah. I have such admiration for women who juggle, like, motherhood with their jobs and their careers. Not just women, but men as well. Men who do that. Anybody who's juggling. Being a parent is such a huge thing. I don't know about it, but I'm a kid and I have a mom who is a super awesome parent, so I know what that's like. So that is such a huge role to play and then to run a business and oh, my God, that's after.

Speaker A: You fit it all in, you just fit it all in. Right? That's exactly what women do. We just get on with it, I think, and that's what we need to put ourselves on the back for, regardless of whether we treat ourselves and each other well. I think we really do just pull our socks up and get on with it. Hand claps around. My goodness me. Okay, so YouTube coming out. We can have a look on your Instagram. We can have a look on Facebook. I know. If the Facebook's there, we kind of use it for other stuff. It's almost like the nana now, isn't it? It's like the Nanner of the social media world. We kind of need it to run ads on. And there's.

Speaker D: That'S an awesome way of looking at it.

Speaker A: I know. That's how I see it. I totally see it. And then, like, Instagram is like, I don't know, like the sort of slightly 430 something.

Speaker D: Then you've got on a sugar high.

Speaker A: Yeah. And then you've got the teenage TikTok kind of pouring away at everybody.

Speaker D: TikTok is banned in my country.

Speaker A: Is it really interesting? My goodness. It's probably for the best, to be honest with you, because it's all nonsense. I've looked at it all for nonsense.

Speaker D: So really, this is my problem with Instagram also, like the promoting reels and everything. But I have so much to say on everything, like every topic. How are you you can't coach someone on even the smallest topic in 90 seconds. I'm not that much of a genius. I know that there are people who do it very well. I am not one of those people. I am not that good at it.

Speaker A: Nature is a happy home. Then it's definitely going to be your happy home. And then you could just grab little screen grabs and stick them on your Instern.

Speaker D: Yeah, that's exactly what you said about systems. You have to have a system that supports you instead of you carrying all of it on your back and then fully realizing that you're dying under here.

Speaker A: Absolutely. Do you know what? I can't believe we've nearly got to the end. This is, like, the final question, but it's a good one, actually, because it's the one I always ask, and is there anything left in your business life or your personal life that you've just got to overcome your fear of? And you've got two. You've got, like, a biz one, and you've got a personal one where you've got a couple of personal ones. So let's just go through them all. Let's start with the biz one first. Go for it. What's the I think that's the best.

Speaker D: One with the business. I'm already doing it because that was, like, ignoring all the external noise and just do what I think is best for me and my audience. So I'm already doing that. Another thing was that was sort of a spillover for my personal hangups, was because I spent, like, about seven, eight years of my life in a very bad case of Cystic acne. So that was seven, eight years of constant ridicule, humiliation, being horrendous that I'm the most unattractive person in the room, which meant that I have avoided being on camera for the longest time. And that is something that I'm beginning to like, I'm starting to overcome that I have stopped caring so much about it. But earlier, it was before I started my business, before I started doing Instagram reuse. It was in a defiance sort of way. I don't give up on what anybody thinks I'm going to show up as I am, which meant not even, like, brushing my hair, because making the slightest effort meant I care. So that was, like, a very juvenile way of going about it. Now it's like, now I'm reaching a healthier place where I'm like, I do care, but at the same time, my appearance is not going to hold me back from showing up. So, yeah, recently I'm learning how to use makeup. I'm never going to be one of those girls who, like, pile on makeup. I've never learned how to use makeup. I'm 31 years old. Never learn how to use makeup.

Speaker A: It's all self care. Yeah, I like self care.

Speaker D: I decided, like, okay, let's just learn one product. It just makes you look like you've made an effort. Let's just do that. Nothing more eyeliner one little product. So yeah, that was, like, such a huge fear with me. Anything to do with my skin, with my appearance, working on that.

Speaker A: That is something that's amazing today.

Speaker D: I think that's zoom for you. That's not I do have scarring from my cystic acne time, but again, I don't much like it doesn't bother me all that much.

Speaker A: There's nothing there. There's literally nothing there.

Speaker D: It's doomed for you, trust me. I have that option that touches up appearance so that I don't have to worry about it, so that I can just show up and just focus more on.

Speaker A: So you know what? I went through a bit of a kind of a self pair journey over the last couple of years, and I had to make a really horrendous confession to a friend of mine who's, like, a beauty influencer. Okay? So she gets stuck constantly, and I had to make the worst confession to her because I was a busy mom and I had a business, and blah, blah, blah. I just used to wash my face with the first thing I found, which would usually be hand soap. Appalled by this. Just like, what are you doing to your skin? I was like, Just grab, like, the carex and just give it a no. Put down the carex. Please put down the carex. Your skin is worth more than carex, believe me. Yes. So now it's like a completely different story. Now there's, like there's, like, potions and unctions and things going on. I will take a good 25 minutes cleansing my face in the evening, and it's one of my favorite things to do. I bet. I bet. Yeah.

Speaker D: And he'll look great. So he's definitely paying off.

Speaker A: Thank you very much. But yeah, just that kind of little, like, micro bit of self care. And it is literally like washing your face, right? Yeah. But rather than taking seconds to do it, getting out the oil and cleansing it properly and then cleansing it again, and then putting on a moisturizer and then just doing the whole thing, and it's lovely. It's like a ritual, you know? Yeah. And that is like a form of meditation, in a way, I suppose, because you are focused on being present with yourself.

Speaker D: I agree.

Speaker A: Yeah. It's been a big deal. Don't wash your face with care acts, listeners. Please don't do that. Your makeup journey will kind of I.

Speaker D: Have a lot of dysfunctional narratives around wearing makeup and just, like, hearing about how you look, because when I was growing up, my mom was very like, no, focus on your studies. Why are you don't care about that stuff? Because there's, like, a whole story there as well. But let's not go into that now. My mother's like, you're going out. Why don't you put on some makeup? And I'm like, fine. And now she curses out herself.

Speaker A: Why?

Speaker D: I need to brainwash her.

Speaker C: It's a fun thing.

Speaker D: When I see those YouTube videos. It looks hard to me, but it also looks fun. Yes, definitely. Sometimes I'll be pro at it.

Speaker A: No, that's isn't it. Honestly, you don't have to get into the whole weird contouring thing or anything like that. You don't have to look at those things because that's scary. That's honestly terrifying and I don't think anyone in their right mind has time for that. Seriously, nobody has time for that stuff. But, yeah, just a bit of eyeliner here and there, bit of lipstick, if you feel like it in the evening. Brighten up your face a bit. I'll be waiting for those makeup tutorials from you on YouTube. That's brilliant. I love it. It's an absolute pleasure to have you cartie it really well.

Speaker D: My God, this was so much fun, I didn't even notice the time.

Speaker A: I know, it's whizzed, right? It's absolutely whizzed. And, yeah, best of luck with everything. I'm going to be looking out for the YouTube, everybody. Look out for the YouTube. You've got so much to offer. You're looking radiant and.

Speaker D: You'Re very kind. This has really energized me, this conversation.

Speaker A: There you go. Ready for the next couple of hours work?

Speaker D: Oh, God, yes, absolutely.

Speaker C: Hello. Welcome back. Wasn't that a lovely conversation? McCarty? I really, really enjoyed speaking with her and I really, really hope you'll find our conversation useful. Just a quick added extra. You know how she was talking about her YouTube channel and how at the time we spoke that it wasn't kind of burst yet. Well, just to let you know, it is now well and truly in the world. I'm going to add that link to the show notes. So please go along and have a little look and follow her YouTube channel, including all the other bits and pieces that we spoke about. Yeah, so next week, I'm going to do another bite size episode. And what I'd really, really like is if you could drop me a DM on Instagram or you could send me a quick email and tell me what.

Speaker A: You want me to talk about.

Speaker C: Do you want me to talk about Facebook ads? Do you want me to talk about marketing in general? Do you want me to talk about podcasting and how I audit and edit my podcast? Audit, edit my podcast? Any of those questions be great? Or you want me to talk about my business story a little bit?

Speaker A: Probably not. You can probably have a look at.

Speaker C: My episode where I talk about that, so maybe not that so much, but anything bizrelated. Please feel free. I would love to hear from you. So until then, I'll see you next week. Take care. I love you lots and goodbye for now.

Speaker B: Thank you so much for listening to that one thing. And please don't forget to rate, review and subscribe. It really helps to get my little podcast into the universe and I'll be forever grateful.