RV (00:07): Hey brand builder, Rory Vaden here. Thank you so much for taking the time to check out this interview as always, it’s our honor to provide it to you for free and wanted to let you know there’s no big sales pitch or anything coming at the end. However, if you are someone who is looking to build and monetize your personal brand, we would love to talk to you and get to know you a little bit and hear about some of your dreams and visions and share with you a little bit about what we’re up to see if we might be a fit. So if you’re interested in a free strategy call with someone from our team, we would love to hear from you. You can do that at brand builders, group.com/pod call brand builders, group.com/pod call. We hope to talk to you soon. RV (00:54): How much of the work that we do at brand builders is helping people to clarify their position and understand and present who they are in the marketplace in a way that’s really, really clear. And people often think they have a copywriting issue, right? Like what are the words I use to tell people what I do? And, and they often don’t realize how deeply connected the words on their website are to their own personal life and their personal story. And that’s what we’re going to talk about today with someone who I think is one of the masters in the world at that specific topic, her name is Celine de Costa. She is a fairly recent friend of mine and she is a brand story and life design coach. She’s also a contributor to Forbes, which is how we met. And I think she does a lot of this, the deep work with people of understanding how their past connects into who they are and who they’re supposed to be and turning that into a story. But anyways, she is absolutely wonderful. She’s in Bali has been in Bali for the last couple years, and it’s just really been a bright spot of someone that I’ve run into here, you know, networking through the world. And I’m so glad for you to meet her and welcome to the show saline. CDC (02:07): Thank you. That was a beautiful introduction. I’m extra excited. RV (02:11): Nice. Well, so, so yeah, I guess a good starting point would be to just tell us like what you do and, and why there is a w w cause one thing I love about you is I feel like what you do is just like a very specific thing that is really important and it’s, it’s, it’s really meaningful and a lot of people struggle with it. And I love that. I love finding people who really feel connected. I mean, that’s what we teach people to do, find their uniqueness. And I, when I look at you and your brand, and that, I really feel like you’re living in your uniqueness in this really wonderful position of strength and power, but explain what it is you do and why, why there’s a need for it. CDC (02:54): Yes, of course. So the super condensed version is I help people tell their story. And the way that that manifest is I specifically work with people in leadership roles to help them connect to the story of who they are, not who they think they are, not who they’ve been conditioned to believe that they are, who they really are at their core. And I help them communicate that to the outside world so that when they show up in their brand in their company and they share what they have to say, their vision, their why, their values it’s packaged in a story that deeply connects to the hearts of their audience. And because of that, it helps them grow their influence. It helps them grow their income. It helps an impact more and more people. So this is really, really powerful work. And you’ll see in this episode that I’m very, very passionate about because when it comes to, you know, building your brand, to putting yourself out there in the world, it’s really important to understand yourself and your uniqueness, your gift, your X factor, and all of that. CDC (04:09): Your story is the map. It’s the treasure map to everything that you are. It contains all the codes of what’s important to you, why it’s important to you and why it matters and why you want to help the people that you want to help. It’s all encoded in your story. So I really help people go through this beautiful, powerful explanation process to help them understand what it is and how do you transform that into a message that you can share in the outside world that is going to get you results in your life and your business. Hmm. RV (04:40): Yeah. I love that. And I love how we’re going to think. We believe the same thing there that Speaker 4 (04:48): So often RV (04:49): People look externally to figure out what the story is. They should tell, they go, well, what am I compared to my competitors? Or who am I supposed to be? Or like, and they’re not looking internally, which I think are probably some of the mistakes to go. Like, like you said, your story is the treasure map. I love that. So why don’t we do that? Like what, what is, what is the, what is the roadblock or the cause of that, like going, you know, I come up with these kinds of artificials, you know, words are this artificial kind of surface level story that I tell the world, why do we, why do we do that instead of connecting and going in deep into who we actually are, and then bringing that to the surface, CDC (05:38): Rory one word conditioning, and I’ll explain that. So many, many, many, many of us, I would say most of us grew up in certain circumstances where, because of our environment, because of our society, because of the way that we grew up, we were conditioned to believe certain things about ourselves and we all have. And the reason why your story is so unique, because we all have our own unique map. And my map is not your map. It’s not someone else’s map. It’s, it’s really like your map. And so for example, and you know, I can, I’ll, I’ll, I can speak to my own experience, which is that growing up, I grew up as an immigrant, the us conditioned to believe that if I wanted to be successful, I needed to work really hard. I needed to get this kind of job. I needed to climb a corporate ladder in this kind of way. CDC (06:30): And so ever since we’re children, we have all these beliefs, these habit patterns, these complexes that we come to believe is true, and that shape our reality. So a lot of you know, the big, the big journey of coming into yourself and really revealing and remembering your true identity is looking at all the things you assumed to be true a lot, which are in your unconscious that are not even conscious to you, looking at those things that you assume to be true about who you are and actually being, questioning them and saying, is this true? Is this actually who I really am? And I’ll give you an example. You can be an extremely successful entrepreneur. You can make lots of money, get featured in lots of places. And at your core still feel that you are unworthy of your success. You can still feel empty. CDC (07:22): You can still feel like you’re overworking because you keep need to prove yourself that you need to prove to other people that you are this person, which keeps you in this condition loop of generating lots of success, but without ever having fulfillment. So when we look at your story, we need to not only look at the amazing things you accomplished and the heroic things you’ve done and how many people you help and all the beautiful things about you. But we also need to look at what are the pieces that the beliefs and habit patterns and complexes that you hold about yourself that are holding you back from that next level of success. So it’s really looking through the lens of, okay, here’s my talents or my skills, then what is unconscious and how do we bring what’s unconscious into the conscious so that you can heal it, release it, let it go and rewrite the story from the inside out once and bra. Mm. I love that. So RV (08:19): How do we do that? Or like, how, how do you, how do you take yourself on that journey? So part of it is awareness to go, oh, interesting. I might be defining my business, my personal brand with words that I think whatever the public understands versus telling my own story. And you wake up to that and then you wake up to the idea of going, w what I have been telling myself, maybe isn’t true, or what, I’ve, what, I’ve, what the world has told me, which I have now accepted or taken on. Maybe isn’t true. And then I hear you saying kind of the part is to question, who am I really like to question all those foundational assumptions? What happens? What happens next? Like what happens after that? CDC (09:04): Yeah, of course. So the first step is especially, you know, when you’re your personal brand, you’re an entrepreneur you’re, you’re growing your, your brand and your company. You have goals, you have things that you want to set, whether it’s, what is that next income goal? What does that next you know, how do I get known more in industry? How do I grow? How do I help more people? There’s always something that you want to get to. And there is a reason why you’re not getting there. And so what happens is a lot of times, and this is how we go down the hamster wheel of more money, more success, more fame, and then not actually matching that internal story and that feeling of self-worth or, or wellbeing from within. And so we, you, you first start with, where do you want to go? CDC (09:49): Where do you want to end up what’s that next milestone for you? Because I, you know I’m not going to say, okay, where are you got to go meditate? And now, like, really think about all these things that you want to like fix about yourself and, and which are unconscious to you. And to begin with, and to sit there and question the truth of who you really are. I mean, yes, you can do that at a, at a monastery there’s many, if you want to go do that amazing. But a lot of us, you know, we got to do. We got places to go and we want to accomplish really amazing things in our lifetime and still feel good while we’re addicts. So setting that goal of, okay, here’s, I’ll, I’ll use a really simple one which is here is the next level of income that I want to hit in my business. CDC (10:30): That that one is common for many people. So the mistake that a lot of people say make is that they will want to find the next hack, the next strategy, next thing that they can do, oh, let me implement this funnel. And let me implement this strategy. And like, this group is saying that I should be doing this. So let me do that. Let me hire a copywriter. So we’re still looking for an external solution for what is an internal symptom. And so you’re gonna, you know, you might find some that funnel that will make you more money, but again, you might feel like you’re still overworking. You’re still stressed out. You’re still unhappy. So looking at your goal, it’s important to realize what is actually on my way. And it’s not the thing that you think it is, and it’s not going to be an external band-aid, but what is actually in my way, and what you will find is that usually what it comes down to is that there is something around your money story that you don’t believe you’re worthy of that next level of success. CDC (11:28): That there’s a part of you that believes that if you do make that next level of income, you are going to have more responsibility and you don’t feel like you can handle it. You might feel like you don’t have the capacity to hold that kind of money or you’ll lose it. So obviously I’m giving a few examples. There’s 1,001 ways, which is all going to be found in your story, but you have to look at the reason, you know, when my clients come to me and they’re like, okay, I want to tell my story, help me tell my, and we look at what their goals are in telling their story, which ends up being around the realms of influence income and impact. The first question I ask them is why are you not telling your story in the first place? What is holding you back? CDC (12:09): And then I’ll get back some answer that is along the lines of, well, I don’t think my story is interesting enough, or it’s too boring. I’m really afraid of what people will say about me. I’m afraid that my peers will reject me or ridicule me. I don’t know where to begin. I feel like there’s so many pieces and I don’t know how to string them together. So those are a few examples. And then if we dig even deeper and ask the question, why are you afraid that your peers are going to judge you? Why do you think your brand is boring? And we dig a layer deeper, and then you start to see that there’s all these little stories that were formulated often. We were young around, well, you know, growing up, I was, you know, this is common for people like in, in the like UK or New Zealand or Australia where there’s like that tall poppy syndrome where it’s like standing out. RV (13:00): Explain what tall poppy is for the Americans that listen, because that’s a really interesting concept. That’s, that’s UN it’s it’s it’s counter-cultural it’s counter American culture. CDC (13:11): Yes. Yes. So tell poppy is a syndrome where basically you know, if you look at a poppy field and you have a poppy that stands out it’s, you CA everybody needs to be the same. Everybody needs to be equal. And if you stand out, you’re going to get made fun of or alienated because essentially you’re, you’re not with the tribe. You don’t, you’re not doing what everyone else is doing. So classic example is growing up in a small town and you have these huge dreams and huge ambitions, and you want to go travel the world and everyone around you is not doing that, or they’re perfectly content with their everyday mundane life. And and then you’re getting made fun of, or shamed by your colleagues, your peers, your family, because you’re dreaming about something bigger than what you have. And so now it’s like, oh my God, look at Rory. CDC (13:58): Like he wants to grow this big company and travel the world, what a loser, right? So you get this almost like, and I know in it for Americans, it’s very counterintuitive Judah, but the reason why I bring this up is because someone, for example, this is super common in Scandinavia, super common in Oceania in the UK where you’ll get a successful, you know, I’ll get a very successful businessman, a business woman who grew up in one of those countries, and they don’t want to show, have a beautiful story that they’re sharing their irons because they don’t want to stand out. They don’t want to, like, they don’t want to be unique because they have these deep rooted fears and from childhood where they were taught and conditioned that if you stand out, you will lose friends. If you stand out, you will be alienated. So you carry that with you. And even if you do leave your small town and do amazing and start an amazing business and make lots of money, you’re still carrying this old internalized story of, I cannot stand out too much or I’m going to get alienated. So that willfully, you know, that’s just one small example. There’s so many different ways. There RV (15:08): Are so many of these, I think of like like in the Christian community, there is this massive, massive story that it is holy to be poor or that to be, to be holy, you can’t have money, or if you have money, then you’re not dependent enough on God. And so it’s like, if, if you even pursue making money that somehow you’re not spiritual, or you’re not a good Christian, or you can’t follow Jesus because you’re chasing, you’re chasing chasing money. And that, that is an example of a story that is just, you know, very deep rooted in people which is funny because scripture doesn’t actually say any of those things, but it gets it, it gets translated or assumed. You know, so like the Bible does say that you can’t, you can’t serve two masters. You can only serve one, but that doesn’t mean you can’t serve one and half of the other. RV (16:08): Or, you know, it’ll say, you know, you shouldn’t have a love of money. A love of money is the root of all evil, but a love of money. And having a lot of money are not the same thing. So I, and the tall poppy thing is fascinating. I remember when I spoke in Australia was the first time I had heard this and they were like, yeah, the tallest poppy is the first to get cut, which was like, you don’t want to be the number one you don’t want because you’re, you’re the one that gets criticized and, and, and ridiculed and all the things that you’re saying. And that was so counterculture to me as an American going, what, like, I go, what a weird way of thinking. And yet in our own life, or like, in my own life, I have, I have silly beliefs about myself that hold me back. RV (16:51): That if someone else heard them, they would be like, that’s so silly. Like, how do you not think you’re good enough? Like, you’ve done all these amazing things. They’re like whatever. So you, so you, so basically you’ve started out with what you want. You figure out what’s really holding you back, which is not it’s, it is very often not a, a technique or a strategy or a tip. It is more of a a mental block, a story, and then you dive in and go, okay. And then as you do that work, does it just kind of start to surface and you go, well, I guess I’ve always thought if I had money, my family wouldn’t love me anymore. Or if I became successful. And, and is, is that basically is that most of the work is just identifying the story or is there more, more, more to it? CDC (17:42): There’s more so I have you know, when, in my work with clients, I have a four-step and it is called unlock and body design and amplifies. So unlock is really the phase as the name suggests is where we need to unlock what’s going on. What’s blocking you. What is in the unconscious and bringing conscious. There’s a really amazing quote by Carl Young. And I might not, I might not be saying it verbatim, but it’s something along these lines, which is until you make the unconscious conscious, it will rule your life and you will call it fate. So the first phase is really understanding what is ruling your life unconsciously, that you’re just calling fate, and you’re just allowing to dictate the way that you’re showing up in your life, in your business and your messaging. So the online part is really understanding, yes, there’s all these little niggly stories that are holding you back, that we, the moment you start to bring them from the unconscious, into the conscious, you can actually do something about them because when they’re unconscious, they’re just operating on autopilot and screwing up your goals and, and, you know, and, and getting in your way. CDC (18:49): But when you bring into the conscious, then there’s a process that I teach to really start to dissolve them on a mind-body level, because a lot of times, without going deep into neuroscience these things are so visceral, very, they’re so stuck in your body. There’s almost overpowering, which is why some people, you know, when they, it comes to like your money story, it’s not just a thing, a thought the story is like, it’s an emotion, it’s this, this your heart beating faster, it’s this gut wrenching feeling in your stomach. So there’s a lot of processes that come into play to actually really be able to release this so that it stops having you grip on you once and for all like on a mind body somatic level. And so the next piece is the embodied. So once you, you, yes, it’s Superman. CDC (19:34): And I can literally do a whole podcast just on the neuroscience of this, but I’ll, I’ll, I’ll, I’ll keep it high level for, for this. And so now that you have identified, okay, here’s all the internal stories that I’m telling myself, they’re disempowering me. Well, the next step is all right, cool. What are the ones that are going to empower me? Because you know, the, and this is true for not just for your story, but for any venture that for you to overcome a fear for you to overcome an obstacle, your willingness and desire, and why needs to be bigger than the thing you fear your vision needs to be bigger than your fear. And that’s how people are able to do really scary things, really uncomfortable things. Even, even when they don’t want to do it is because that Y is bigger. CDC (20:17): And this is the piece around embodiment, which is, you need to understand the you need to embody your story before you tell it, like it needs to be who you are, and you need to feel it in your body. When people ask, how do I get confident telling my story saline? How can I get in front of a stage and really feel like what I’m sharing is true and authentic. It’s not a script. It’s not something a copywriter has written for you. It’s not a five page manifesto that you memorize and read. It’s actually remembering and connecting to the big reason why you do this. So in this space, it’s really understanding what is that bigger? Why, what is that big, overarching, right? Of why you’re doing this. A lot of entrepreneurs confused there wa there what, with our, why? So I’ll ask people, what’s your why? CDC (21:03): And they’re like, well, I want to help women build better businesses. I’m like, no, that’s what you do. It’s not why you do it. And oftentimes your why is not even what you think it is your, why might be, I want to be a role model for my child. I want to, you know rediscover what it means to be a human living, a spiritual experience. And then you’re like, well, I sell socks. So what’s, what’s the connection. There is a connection. So you always need to go back to your why and then be like, okay, what’s your vision? RV (21:33): What is a spiritual experience? Just for anybody? It just, as a random side note, I mean, fuzzy socks on your toes, like that is a spiritual experience, but, you know, as you’re talking, it also occurs to me that like, you know, everyone’s like, oh, I need to hire a copywriter to write copy for my website or for my funnel or my, whatever, whatever my press kit. And then they get the copy back and they go, this copy sucks. And in reality, it’s like, it often has less to do with the copy. And it has more to do with either the copy doesn’t align with my identity, because I’ve been too scared to share who I really am with the copywriter or the copywriter might be writing it even in a more aspirational sense than I believe to be true about myself. And so there’s an emotional disconnect and we blame the copywriter and it’s like, well, really it’s our own, it’s our own internal work that hasn’t been resolved here. RV (22:26): And, you know, when you hear about the embody thing, you know, I think of like athletes and I think of, you know, Kobe Bryant, Michael Jordan tiger woods. Like whoever you hear these athletes talk about visualization and like experiencing the game in their mind before they go out and play it. And they, the brain cannot delineate. The brain has a hard time delineate between what is real and what is made up like dreams are very real. Your body responds in a physical way to a dream, even though it’s not quote unquote real and using that in our advantage. I love that. So basically we’re now going to go, who do I want to be? And how do I experience that? You know, start to experience that now, before I even begin CDC (23:14): [Inaudible] and getting very clear on what your values are, who it is that you want to serve what is it that you want to create? And this is really connecting to your soul and really understanding and what, like you’re saying, you’re hiring, you’re dumping all this money on copywriters or brand experts or whatever. And then basically, you’re, you know, if someone’s just copywriting something for you and you, they can be the best copywriter in the world, but how can they know what you want? If you don’t know who you are, if you don’t know how to articulate and why this matters to you, you’re going to give them some kind of like, oh, I think this is what I’m supposed to say. And they’re going to come back to you and they might do an amazing job, but you’re not going to connect with it because you, yourself, aren’t embodying the story of who you are. CDC (23:58): So once you figure it out, you’re like, okay, this is who I really am. And by the way, Barry, I love the example you said around you know, visualization, because it has been scientifically proven that the brain does not know the difference between imagination and reality. Like it just, it, the subconscious cannot differentiate. So our visualization is really powerful. And when it comes to the embodiment work, not only is it powerful for you to become more confident for you to get, become more clear on who you really are, but also when you’re working in a team or you’re hiring contractors, you actually know how to direct them in an, in a way that isn’t is like, you’re transferring your authenticity to them so that they can actually do something with that instead of them having to do a bunch of guesswork around who you are and what you do based on their filter of the world. CDC (24:45): And so once you’ve done the embodiment work, then we move into the design piece. So the unlock and embodiment is all about the internal story, clearing out the gunk, clearing out the that’s holding you back and reconnecting to the bigger, why the vision, the values, the truth of who you are. And now that you have that connection, now that you’re anchored into that into what you would call, you know, the brand DNA and like really that the soul, the essence then you’re like, okay, now what is the story that I need to tell? And this is the part where I work with people to help them design a bespoke story that aligned with RV (25:22): Theirs. It means customized for those of you Martin’s out there. CDC (25:28): Yes, I have an American accent, but I’ve spent quite some time abroad. So sometimes I get lost in other terminology. Bespoke RV (25:35): Bespoke also means you can charge twice as much for the suit. If someone is, if there is a tailor selling you a piece of clothing, so be aware of the, the word bespoke means you can, you can charge, you can just charge more CDC (25:50): Premium. Yep. I love it. Yeah. So this really beautiful practice premium story. And and now we look at, okay, what are the parts that I want to talk about? What’s my hero’s journey. How do I tell my story of, you know, overcoming obstacles and achieving success and being able to essentially what I say, you know, the easy way to explain it is what’s the story of you going from being lost, Luke Skywalker, to bad-ass Luke Skywalker, to being Yoda, and how do you show people, your audience, and now you’re Yoda, and you can help out all their Luke Skywalker’s out there. And what’s that for brand story that you can then transfer into your social media, into your website, into your sales page. It goes everywhere and it’s uniform. It’s not like all over the place. And a really scattered it’s becomes a very coherent narrative that can live in a five page manifesto. CDC (26:43): You feel like it, but what makes it really powerful brand story is that it’s a narrative of the emotions and the facts that you brand and bays. And it doesn’t have to be, doesn’t have to be constrained to a document because now it’s an essence. It’s just a story that permeates everything that you do and all your messaging. And when you have that story, that beautiful, premium, powerful, rounded story. Now you can take that story and do where a lot of people want to just skip ahead to this step or eight. Now you go and you amplify the hell out of it. You know, you get in front of Forbes, you get that TEDx, you publish that book. And you just, you know, just put fire on the gasoline, but a lot of people want to just skip ahead to that. And then they’re like, why isn’t Forbes picking up on my story? Like, why doesn’t TEDx you answer me? Like, why am I so stopped writing my book? And it’s like, well, I’m not surprised because you’re, you’re just trying to skip ahead to the part where you get the fame, the glory, and you know, the influence, but you haven’t gotten clear on what is that deeper message that you’re delivering with to the world. And the way you get clear on that is getting clear on it, first meeting yourself, and then you amplify it out. It’s an inside out process. No, RV (27:55): Amen. And that I think is the much harder work. It’s the much rare work. It’s the more difficult work that less people are willing to do. But so many of the, the biggest influence of the, of the world have experienced deep pain and they’ve been able to walk through it. And that’s what gives them the foundation and the power to go out and then amplify a message. So well, this has been awesome. Where do you want people to go saline? If, if they to learn more about you and to connect up at the risk of having all of our brand builders group clients leave us and go work for you and us going broke and living in the gutter. Cause this is really, really beautiful and wonderful. And I really believe in what you’re saying. No, but in all seriousness we we’d love for, for people to, if, if, if what you’re talking about is speaking to them, we’d love for them to check you out. Where, where should they go? CDC (28:46): Yeah, absolutely. So the first place I would direct you to is my website. The only thing you need to do is know how to spell my name, right? Cause I know this people get there’s a lot wrong. It’s a one L two ends. So it’s C E L I N N E D a C U S T Selena costa.com. And there, you can learn everything about my programs, how I support learn a bit more about me as well, and this work that I’m doing and as well, if you want to reach out and contact me for any questions you can do everything is in the website. So number one, I would direct you to go there. And then number two, I will also direct you to go and follow me on Instagram at Celine D’Acosta. If you’re listening to this and you’re like, wow, I really want to know, how is this done? CDC (29:30): How has this executed, what is this story thing all about? Or you want more tips, more advice then every day I’m posting some posting talking about this. And not only that, but also showing, showing you, not just telling you how it’s done. So and also some fun stories showing you Bali life and my beautiful ocean views. So selfishly also a little bit of lifestyle and there’s also definitely go at, hit a follow on Instagram. If you have any questions for me, feel, feel free to DM me. And and yeah, we’d love to connect. RV (30:00): Awesome. Well thank you for the work that you’re doing and helping people get clear on, I think it’s, it’s inspiring and it’s, it’s much bigger than just telling, coming up with words for a website. It’s it’s the real impact is the healing. I think that it has on each individual person and from that, it gives them the power to go out and help other people. So really important. Thanks for your time is so great to see you. We wish you all the best. CDC (30:28): Thank you so much for having me today.