AJV (00:02): Hey everybody, and welcome to another episode on the Influential Personal Brand Podcast. As you know, I say this every time, and I genuinely mean it every single time, but I am so excited to have my friend and our, our guest on the show today, Michelle Chalfant. And there’s a couple of things that I think you need to know. So, before you settle in and go, is this the episode for me? I’m just gonna go ahead and tell you it is this is an episode for you. Because we’re not talking about unique or specific business tactics today. However, what we’re gonna talk about today is one of the most common and universal things that you require to be successful in business and in life. And it’s self-worth, it’s self-confidence. It’s the belief in yourself that you can do what you were put on this planet to do, what you were set out to do, most likely, whatever it is you’re doing which is why you’re listening to this podcast in the first place. AJV (01:03): So it is, I’m, I’m gonna say it’s like it’s not a traditional business tactic, but it’s one that is absolutely necessary in the space that we’re in. Building your reputation, building your personal brand, and doing it with authority and authenticity. So it is for you. So now you know this is the episode for you. So stay tuned and listen to the whole thing. I promise it’s going to be worth your time. Now, before we get started, let me just do a quick formal bio of Michelle, and then I will also give her a chance to introduce herself a little bit more casually. But she is a licensed therapist, a master life coach, and the founder and c e o of the Michelle Shon Company. She also leads this wickedly awesome podcast called The Adult Chair Podcast, which blends psychology and spirituality together, which is probably to me, one of the most foundational important things in all of our lives is how we’re connected spiritually, which drives all of our, our business decisions and life decisions. AJV (02:05): It also is globally recognized. It’s got millions and millions of downloads. We’ll put links to it, but you definitely wanna check it out. She also runs these amazing events. She’s got courses she does coaching. I could go on and on and on, but I think the, one of the reasons that’s so relevant to everyone who is listening is because these are the same things that you are doing. These are the same things that you wanna do. And so how do you go from not doing those things to doing those things? So, Michelle, welcome to the show. MC (02:35): Thank you so much, aj. That was such a warm welcome. I loved it. I feel like I’m joining a party. I’m like, oh, AJV (02:43): That’s how we should feel. That’s MC (02:45): Fun, . AJV (02:47): Alright, so help our audience get to know you a little bit. Like how did you get into this space of coaching and events and content creation and courses? Because being a licensed therapist and doing all these things, I kind of find is a little bit unique. Yeah. And you didn’t always do these things. So how’d you get into this? MC (03:08): Oh my gosh. Okay. So I was a licensed, I still am a licensed therapist for about 20 years, but about, gosh, 10 or 15 years in, actually moved to Nashville in oh seven and had to start my practice all over again because nobody knew me in Nashville, . So for me, I was like, okay, let’s go. I just went out, started offering free workshops, free and free courses, built a business really, really quickly because my style, what I realize now is my style is very unique. It’s not exactly traditional therapy, but it’s not exactly coaching. It’s kind of a hybrid model of coaching, therapy, consulting, teaching, the whole thing. So I built it very quickly and in 2013, I hired a guy by a friend who said, Hey, you need to use this guy to do your, your, your new website. I said, fine. We clicked right away. We started working together and he’s putting together my whole site and he goes, the way you work with people is so cool, it’s unique. He said, you should do a podcast. And this is in 2013, right? I’m like, what’s the podcast? I go, is that like that radio thing that people are talking about? He’s like, yes, you really have a lot to talk about. You know, this is a long time ago. This is 10 10. Is it 10? AJV (04:20): Almost 10 years ago? Yeah. MC (04:22): Yeah. It’s, and I said, okay, I don’t know. So he kind of hounded me for like a year. So the end of 2014, I said, fine, I’m doing it. So we launched the Adult Share podcast. And the podcast is all about teaching people how to be emotionally healthy adults. Hmm. It’s stuff I love to talk about. So it is, it’s a lot of self-worth. It’s how to have healthy relationship. It’s how to work through your fears, your codependency, whatever the heck, anything at all. That is what I used to what I talk about. So that happened the end of 2014. I did not even pay attention to the stats. I didn’t care about them, you know, I was like, oh, this is good. You know, I didn’t really wanna do it. I was like, I’ll do it for my clients. So it was fun to say to my clients like, Hey, you wanna learn how to set a boundary? MC (05:08): Go listen to number 15. You know, I just did a podcast on it. So anyway, that was the end of 2014. By 2018, 19, it’s really, you know, then the podcast rule is really growing and it’s taking off. It’s getting bigger and bigger and bigger. And I realized I’m like, I, I gotta, I need to do more. Because what was happening was my business that was already full-time. I was getting people all around the world hitting me up for sessions. Cuz I was also a coach at that time. I became a coach, I think sometime like maybe 2010, something like that. So I did that to my, to my trainings so I could see clients anywhere in the world. So I was getting reached out to, you know, from Germany to San Francisco to China. You know, people were like, Hey, can you, I wanna see you as a, as can I see you as a coach? MC (05:54): Well, I couldn’t cuz I was already full-time. So I said, let me create something for them that will appease them. Right? So I did a membership, I started a membership in 2019. I kept getting hit up. They’re like, well, we want more. We wanna, we want people that know how to talk about what you do . I was like, what am I gonna do? Those really inspired and I am a big meditation person. And I sat there for about two months and I kept hearing and becoming aware of the same thing. I kept hearing these words, teach people to do what you do. So with that, I said, I’m gonna create a coaching certification program and I’m gonna teach people how to do what I do, but frame it through their own per their own style. Right. So I, we launched that in 2020 and yeah. MC (06:39): So now we have this global, you know, people from all over the world are taking our certification program. We are now, this is the year. So we’ve run it since in the middle of Covid is when we launched it. If you can imagine, we launch it in September of 2020. We’re now in our third year now we do two pro programs a year. So we’re launching our next one this June in 2023. And it’s just, it’s such an incredible way cuz my mission is to bring healing into this world. Mm-Hmm. So I have this vision for creating this army of light workers, like these army of coaches that can go out into the world and really multiply what I’m doing. And again, it’s not all about me. I’m not the only person doing this work, of course in the world, but I love that we’re able to reach more people through our coaches. So that is where I, that is where I am today. So I’ve got a book, I’ve got, I’ve got another book coming out. I just gave it to my agent the other day. Congrats. AJV (07:30): Yeah. So when did, when did your first book come out? MC (07:34): Oh gosh, 2018. Yeah, so, so the first book really outlines the adult chair model. And then again, I do the live teachings, I’ve got the podcasts, and now the coaching program is, are really the biggest thing right now. AJV (07:48): And you have a new book coming out? MC (07:51): I don’t know one, I just gave it to him. He is looking at it. So I’m, I’m the beginning stages of that, probably am gonna say in the next nine months or so to a year. AJV (07:59): Okay. So I think one of the things I was trying to do as you were talking because a lot of people, what I have found, which will be very relevant to our conversation today, and I think this is really important because I see this no matter who you are, no matter what your business is, is we compare our step one to someone else’s step 1000. Yep. And we go, well this just isn’t working and you’ve been doing it all of six months. Or you think it needs to be happening faster, but yet MC (08:28): Yeah, AJV (08:28): Good things just don’t happen fast often. It takes time and work. So I was trying to capture this and I built a little timeline. I think this is important. So tell me if I missed anything, but I was trying to capture this. So one, you’ve been a therapist for 20 years, so let’s just pause for a second. Go . That’s an enormous amount of time building content and real life practice and doing this, right? Mm-Hmm. , this is ton of already pre-existing value education information. Like that’s a lot. 20 years is a lot. So then in 2010 you became a coach. So just a pause, that’s 13 years ago for everyone who’s listening. Then four years after becoming a coach is when you launched a podcast. Not the next day, not four weeks later. Four years later. Then a book came out four years after that in 2018, not four months. AJV (09:26): This is so important for everyone . Then after the book, you’re like, okay, now I’ve got a whole, you know, one, you have requests, right? You have demand, but also it’s like you’ve got frameworks, you’ve got everything built out. So then a membership in 2019, then a year after that, a coaching certification program in 2020 and now almost three years after that. A new book. Yes. That’s it. Okay. So I think that timeline is so important. for so true. So many, so many different levels. And I think there’s something that you said that resonated when me and I was listening to this. And we do book launches for our clients. So we’ll actually do the fulfillment of book launches. Mm-Hmm. It’s not, it’s not the main thing of our business at Grand Builders Group, but we will help people that we work with on the strategy, do the fulfillment and someone on our own team, cuz brand builders group as a company, as our own entities, only five years old this year. AJV (10:25): Mm-Hmm. . So we’re babies. It’s just still a baby company. Mm-Hmm. . But somebody had in our own company, on our own team, literally I heard ’em in a side comment going, well this is just amazing. We just started doing that a year ago and look at all these clients we have. We’ve had 12 people hit a New York Times or you know, a Wall Street Journal bestseller list. And I heard it outta the corner and I was like, we just started doing this. And they were like, yeah, like, you know, like Yj started doing this like a year ago and look at all this. I was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. We did our own book launch in 2010. We’ve been doing this for ourselves for 14 years. And it was like an aha moment for them of going, you did, what do you mean? AJV (11:09): And I was like, take the stairs. When we launched that in 2010, this was a grassroots hiding away in our closets into the wee hours of the morning . Like, what do you think we did? And there it was like, it was such one of those moments of, even in our own company mm-hmm. , I’m going, oh, this isn’t new. You’ve been doing this a really long time. But you look at where people are today and you go, man, I’m failing. I’m not, I’m not, this isn’t working for me. Should I be doing this? And we look at everything that’s happening all around us and we somehow don’t realize that there’s decades of work and experience and ups and downs wins and losses behind the scenes. Yeah, MC (11:52): For sure. People, people absolutely look at the 1% that are making it and doing so well and making the millions and millions of dollars. And they think it’s so easy and they don’t see all the struggles. In 2018, if I can tell you a little side story here about one of my biggest struggles probably was when, again, the podcast is taken off. I mean, I’m getting hit up constantly. Like, can I work with you? Can I work with you? Can you come to this country? Can you come to this? Like, I was like, I I can’t do it all. I need to hire a marketing firm really to help me. Mm-Hmm. , I, I knew I needed like online courses and I, you know, and I gotta do what I’m best at. And that’s the other thing we should talk about. But I can’t do it all. MC (12:34): I don’t wanna learn how to build a website. I don’t wanna learn how to build an online course. I don’t wanna learn how to build a membership. I don’t know how to do that. I’m not a tech person, but I can get up on stage and I can talk and I can write books and I can do all that. I’m gonna do what I’m great at. So anyway, I researched marketing firms and I said, okay, I need to hire a company. They can help me really launch this thing big time. And the one that I hired in August of 2018, I, I signed a contract with her and shortly thereafter I knew it. I was like, this was a big mistake. And I mean, it was horrible emails that went out. I had given her a membership. I said, these are the thing, these are the ones that I really like. MC (13:13): Well, she took one of them and copycatted it almost exactly like I looked at it when it was done and I said, this is someone else’s. I’ll get sued for the, like it was, I can go on and on. I’m not gonna go into it. But it was one thing after the next I’d signed a contract. I was stuck with her for six months. A hundred thousand dollars I spent on her. It was one debacle after the next, after the next, after the next, after the next. So that was from August through, I think it was December some or July through Dec. It was December 3rd is when it ended. I can tell you that’s branded in my mind. But I remember the day I was done with her, I was like, I am done. I’m not only done with this, I’m done with everything. She had just fried me out. MC (13:56): I had lost all this money that I had saved that I was so ready to launch my company. And I actually went out with one of my husband’s mentors that lives in Nashville. And I went out to breakfast with him and I looked at him, I was in tears all the time. I was like, I don’t wanna do co this business. I don’t wanna be an entrepreneur. It fried me out. I mean, I was done. And I went out with Richard and he looked across the table from me. He’s a guy that goes into companies. He’s worth hundreds of millions of dollars. And he looked at me across the table and he goes, Michelle, what’s going on? And I told him my whole story and he said, I said, Richard, I just lost a hundred thousand dollars. I am fried. I don’t wanna do this anymore. And he goes, so you lost a hundred thousand dollars? And I said, yeah. And he goes, so what? He looks at me, he said it as if I dropped $5 out in the parking lot, like I had lost $5. And I was like, what Speaker 3 (14:47): Do you, you hear what I said? MC (14:51): Like, that’s a ton of money. Goes are you’re an entrepreneur. Do you expect not to lose anything? And I said, yeah, you know, I researched her, other people I know used her and I, but I found out that the other people that had used her also dropped her. And I was like, I don’t know how I made such a bad mistake. I’m so intuitive. What’s wrong with me? And he goes, how do you know that you didn’t learn from it. Mm-Hmm. It wasn’t a mistake. And he made it sound like it was so not a big deal. He completely reframed my whole drama. You know, I was quitting my company. He goes, you can quit if you want, but I think you’re stupid. I was like, no, I’m stupid. I said, okay. So I left breakfast and that was when I got back on the horse and I was really done. MC (15:34): I mean, aj I was done and I spent the rest of that month. I remember I went through Christmas and I said, okay, what am I gonna do? Am I gonna stay or go? And I made the decision. I said, okay, I’m going to do this and I’m gonna do it in my own way and a different way. And that was then when I hired one of the best hired as I’ve ever hired, which I still working with her now. She’s my c o o and I hired her January 7th. And it has been full steam ahead ever since. But I’ve still made a lot of mistakes along the way though I’ve still lost money. Not a hundred thousand, thank God, but that’s expected. I mean, yeah. You know, AJV (16:09): I think that’s, that’s such a good reminder. And I’m actually, I’m pulling up something because I, I have like recently even been in the season, so I think you know this cuz we had to reschedule this podcast, but just five weeks ago to the day I had emergency gallbladder surgery, rush to the ER said, you’re not leaving here until this comes out. It was somewhat of a, a life or death situation. And I came out of that and I think part of it is like, it was a really big wake up call for me of like, whatever I think is big is not big when it’s compared to this mm-hmm. . And it was a, a deep desire and a longing to change my schedule, change my priorities but also paired with an, an unbelievable workload at this particular time. Brand builders group as we’re blessed, we’re growing fast. AJV (16:59): We have lots of teams that have two young babies. Mm-Hmm. Just a very busy season. And I feel like over the last six weeks I have been dropping balls left and right. I can’t catch a break in terms of, and it’s, and I think, it’s not that I can’t catch a break, it’s God trying to slow me down. He’s like, woman , like, what else do I gotta do for you to like slow down? And I’ve been really feeling a lot of like, oh man. It’s like, I don’t know if I’m just, maybe this isn’t the season for me to be doing this role in our company and that own thing. And it was a very similar thing to like you going out and having this breakfast and I, I pop open, I do a lot of like bible study reading through a bunch of people that I follow on, on the Gram. AJV (17:43): And I thought I was like, this was like very, very similar to that of going, man, it’s, it’s my own perspective. It’s my own perception of my situation. And when we’re too close to it, we can’t even see what’s happening. And I, I literally popped it up and this is the very first thing I saw on my phone. And this was just like last week, like super relevant to what you were just saying. And it says, God is saying to you today, you have been questioning yourself lately and wondering if you are really strong enough or good enough to do what I have placed in your heart to do. But let me remind you that you can do all things through me. Don’t let fear talk you out of your dream. And remember I am with you and you will make it. You can do this. And it’s so similar to like those breakfast conversations when I think we, we just give up too soon. We give up too easy because it’s hard. Running a business, pursuing a dream life is hard. MC (18:38): It’s hard. It’s really hard. And, you know, so we certify coaches now. Like that is a big part of what I do. And it’s so interesting cuz people get so excited about becoming a coach. I’m like, all right, now let’s, let’s talk about going out and building your business, you know, and let’s go get some clients and let’s go talk to people about what you do. And people are like, can you help me? , , I remember, I remember years ago, like 20 years ago, doing a lot of the MLMs, you know, and even that, it’s like you gotta go out and you gotta ask for business. And I have no problem. It’s easy for me. I love talking to people. Right. But I realize it’s really hard for people like to overcome that and really put yourself out there. AJV (19:21): So, so let’s talk about this for a minute. Cause I think this is a good transition because one thing I know is true, it’s like you wouldn’t still be in business if you weren’t going, I’m gonna tell people about this. And it’s like, yeah. The way that it has iterated and grown and evolved just p it, I love it because it’s organic and it’s like, I’ll do what my audience tells me they want from me. Right. Yeah. That feels true MC (19:45): To me. Yeah. AJV (19:46): However, a lot of people want to be coaches. A lot of people are coaches, wanna be authors, wanna be speakers, and a lot who are but I thought this was an interesting statistic is that the coaching industry is the second fastest growing industry in the world right now. It’s expected more than 20 billion in the United States. Just the United States this year. There’s more than I think 1.4 million people with coaches their title just on LinkedIn alone. There’s so many indicators of going, man, there is a deep desire, a deep longing for someone to be like, help me . Yes. And truly. And simultaneously for someone who’s hearing that going, I want to do this. I’m not a therapist, I’m not a counselor, but I can coach. I can mentor. MC (20:35): Yeah. AJV (20:36): Yet they can’t get clients. Mm-Hmm. . So let’s talk about how do you bridge that gap? And how did, we’ll just start with how did you bridge the gap? Like how did you go from therapists to full on coach mm-hmm. , speaker, author, podcaster, event host, all the things. Yeah. Membership. Right? How did you do it? MC (20:56): I really, again, I followed what the audience wanted from me. So I, people started asking me, is there a book on this? Is there a book on this? Is there a book on this? I’m like, sure I can create a book. So I wrote the book, you know, is there a live event? Can you do a live event? I love doing live event. Sure. I’ll do a live event. So I’d put together what the audience was asking me to do. But when you talk about like, how do you overcome that fear? I mean, I moved to Nashville and I didn’t know any, I knew nobody. And I had a a, a shingle. I, I could hang a shingle as a therapist. I had a private practice, I had a license, I could do it. But it’s like, I don’t know anybody here. There was no social, like, maybe, I don’t even remember when Facebook, I think Facebook might have been coming up, but it’s not anything like it was now. And it’s funny because I didn’t think twice about it. I really didn’t, I didn’t think it would be hard. I was like, all right, well I’m gonna go out and talk about what I enjoy talking about. I’m gonna go out and talk about again, like how do you have a healthy relationship with, with self and others? You know, how do you, how do you build self-worth? How do you love yourself? I’m just gonna go out and talk about that. How do you build a business? I would just go out And where AJV (22:03): Would you go? Yeah. Where would MC (22:07): Went to I, I and I, I went to the Brentwood Library, that was one of the first places I went. I hit up yoga studios. I was like, Hey, do you want a speaker to come in? Like I’d love to come and talk to you about this. I remember different schools would say, Hey, will you come in? Oh, I like what you’re doing. Can you come talk to my, we’ve got a classroom full of parents, or I’ve got a classroom full of, so I got a classroom full of so-and-so will you come talk to my mothers about this? Sure. I’d go to like the doctor’s office and I’d bring my business cards and I’d go, Hey, if you have anyone that needs any help at all, this is what I do. And I give them my cards. You just can’t be afraid to put yourself out there in that way. MC (22:46): And y it’s not like you’re asking for money in that moment, but you, this is where the self-worth comes in. You’ve got to believe in yourself in what you’re putting out there. And you need to believe that you have value. And I knew what I was doing was different for me. And I can say this cuz I’m a therapist. I think therapy is outdated. It’s a little archaic. And not to say that, hear me now, there are a lot of great therapists out there, but it’s interesting and I have heard that coaching is really taking off. But when I started my coaching program, I didn’t even know that. I was like, this is just what I wanna do. I wanna create something that’s really a crossbreed between both that has the best of both worlds coming together. And honestly, it’s more of like a consulting coaching kind of thing. MC (23:31): But anyway, you’ve gotta believe in what you’re doing. Hmm. And the way that I teach my coaches, like, they have such great success when they’re in the practicum hour part of it. They’re like, I really st I’m believing in what I can do do. Like, they’re walking away saying how great I am. So for anyone listening, you’ve got to believe in what you’re putting out in the world. You have to believe in that. Like what are you putting out there? If you believe in it, then, then, then when you talk about it, there’s an energy that you portray out into the world. And yeah. So, AJV (24:03): You know, it’s, I’m so glad that you said that because I, we all know this, we’ve all met, let’s just call ’em salespeople, right? Yeah. Because at the end of the day, we got a little bit of salespeople in all of us. Yeah. We need to. But it’s like, you know what it’s like to talk to someone who’s like, man, even if I don’t buy this, they, you are so passionate about this, I’m just like, totally, I wanna help you even though I’m not gonna buy it. It’s like, who can help? Yes. Who can I tell? Because you can feel it. It is, it’s an energy. It’s no, it’s an energy. But I think a lot of that just stems from one, they believe in it. Two, they’ve, they’re confident. Right. The, the confidence. Totally. You can, you can feel when someone is confident, even if they don’t know what the heck they’re talking about. AJV (24:48): It’s like when you say it like you do, it’s just so funny because I was just talking to my husband in the car driving home somewhere the other night, and I’m trying to remember what the word is, but I completely made up a word. And as soon as it came outta my mouth, it was like I was trying to say a very normal basic word. And then I got like tongue twisted in my head and I said the word, and then I was like thinking like, wait, that’s not a word. And I looked at Rory and I said, did you just let me say that? And he goes, babe, like you said it so confidently, I was wondering if I’d never heard this word before . But it’s like, you gotta just be like, I don’t care if you buy from me or not. AJV (25:23): I believe in what this is. And so I’m, I think this is like two things. I think a really important one is I wanna talk about how do you build that level of self-belief? Yeah. How do you build that level of self-worth where, you know, you are a little bit rejection proof. Yeah. And you don’t let the external things in this world impact you. So you give up on your dream. Mm-Hmm. specifically too early. But also I wanna make sure people heard what you said. I said, where did you go and talk about these things? MC (25:53): Oh AJV (25:53): Yeah. I wanna recap. If you do not write this down and humble yourself to the point of, if I really wanna do this, if I really wanna be this bus and be in this business, I’m going to have to show up at the Brentwood library. Yep. At the local yoga studio with sweaty people and yoga clothes. Yep. At schools with parents. Yep. At doctor’s offices who were like, I thought there was a no station slot on the door. Right. It’s like, but you gotta be able to go like the, anywhere I go, there is an audience. If you believe MC (26:27): Always AJV (26:28): What you do, and I’m imagining a lot of those were not paid MC (26:33): In the very beginning. I’m gonna say probably the first two that I did were not paid. And, but very quickly, again, there’s an energy, like I love showing up and speak. I, I get, I’m very excited when I speak. I’m like, oh, we’re so excited to be here. And then people would say, when are you doing this again? I’m gonna come back. I go, oh. So I always had the next one ready mm-hmm. . So when they’d ask me that, I’d say, oh, I’m coming back in two months. They’re like, where do I sign up? Oh, it’s right here. And that one is gonna be, you know, and I’d raise it to like $50 for the class. Okay, great. It was like, no problem. It’s always an energy. There’s just, it’s not about the words, it’s our energy. So the words are great, but if you don’t line up with what you’re saying, people won’t buy into it. AJV (27:19): And, and a little bit of it’s a plan, right? It’s like what? And a plan. Yeah. A plan, right? It’s like you gotta show up prepared. Absolutely. It’s, it’s, you gotta show up with the belief that they’re gonna wanna come back. Yes. That they’re gonna want more. So you better be ready and prepared. And how are you gonna give it to ’em? But stems from self-belief, MC (27:39): You have to show up. Like, they’d be crazy not to work with you AJV (27:44): Like, have you ? It’s, it’s a little bit of like yes, I am here. I know you’ve been asking where have I been your whole life. Here I am. MC (27:52): That’s it. AJV (27:53): . And MC (27:54): It’s not arrogant though, it’s just believing in yourself. It’s believing in what you’re putting out into the world AJV (27:59): And believing what you do can actually help the end user. Right? And, MC (28:04): And yes. And you’re gonna have people that are gonna be like, well that’s too much money. Or why would I do that? And that’s okay. That’s okay. Because there’re for, for those few people, there are like a hundred or thousands more that really want to work with you mm-hmm. . So you will have those people that will be like, oh, no way. You know, no way. Da, da da. That’s okay. You can’t buy into those people. You keep focusing on your goal and what is your vision and what is your mission. And if you stay on target, these little people over here that are saying these things to you, just brush ’em off and go, thank you anyway. AJV (28:38): Not MC (28:38): For you. Not everyone is gonna be for us. Right? Like, not everybody is, and that’s okay. AJV (28:43): Yeah. This is so, such a good reminder. So for, again, I don’t wanna recap, just if you didn’t catch it for the second time, one more time. you’ve got to be willing to talk about what you do everywhere you go. And if you’re going, well, man, I just don’t know where to go. It’s like, go to your yoga studio, go to your church, go to your kid’s school, go to whatever school is closest nearby, find a library, do something. Right? But it’s not gonna just fall in your lap. You gotta go find it. So now let’s talk about, well, how do we create this feeling of self-belief, this self-worth? And we had a a little bit of a conversation about this before we hit record on the podcast today. And one of the things that I mentioned is, I just hear this term so often that I, I, I wanna talk about it on the show. And I think it’s super tied to self-worth, self-belief, confidence, all the things. But this term, imposter syndrome. Mm. Right. And I dunno if it’s just like a really trendy term or do we really all suffer from it because of comparison? Like I, so I’d love to just unpack that with you mm-hmm. in the, in the conversation of how do we generate self-belief in ourselves. And so I’d love to hear from you like, what is imposter syndrome and how do you know if you have it? MC (29:57): Imposter syndrome is when we feel like we’re a fraud, it feels like we are not capable of doing what we are doing. It feels like I’m, I’m giving you all the ideas. You might have the, like you need more education, you need more training, you’re not good enough. There are people that are better than you out there. You shouldn’t be doing this until you reach this level, which the level keeps going up and up. There’s a never ending point to that. So yeah, really it’s feeling like a fraud. Like you shouldn’t be doing or offering what you are offering in the world. That’s what it is. AJV (30:30): Where does that come from? MC (30:32): You know what I had, you know who Stephen Pres Presfield is the war of art. AJV (30:36): Oh, yes, yes. MC (30:38): So great. Okay. So something that he said, which I love, and the war of art is all about resistance. And I had him on the show and he said to me, when you meet resistance, you know you’re moving in the right direction. That’s how you know, because that part of there we, we are, we are human beings that are filled with parts. So even though there’s one Michelle sitting here and filled with hundreds and hundreds of different parts of self, we’ve got a victim, we’ve got an inner critic, we’ve got a fraud, we’ve got an inner child, we’ve got all of these parts, right? So we all have it. And the more exposed we are and the more we put ourselves out there in the world, the greater the chance that we are gonna get judged or criticized for what we’re doing. So there’s that inner part of all of us that we have this fraud or this inner this or inner critic or this imposter that will say, don’t do that. MC (31:35): Get small, stay small. Don’t put yourself out there. So the way that you can turn that around is you look at and examine the thoughts or the beliefs that are coming up around this imposter syndrome or the fraud statements that you’re getting, all of the limiting beliefs. So you might hear things like, you’ll never be good enough. You are a loser. I’m not, I’m not lovable. You don’t matter. You know, whatever it might be that you’re saying to yourself. You look at those statements and those are the statements that you wanna go after. And you examine, you say, thank you so much, I appreciate it, but here really is what’s true. Mm-Hmm. . So what most humans do is when we have negative thinking, they push it aside. Like we just don’t wanna look at it. You know, people go home, they’ll have a glass of wine or a bottle of wine, or they’ll do whatever they can do to numb out. MC (32:27): Well, those beliefs don’t go away by numbing them out. It’s like putting a bandaid on something. You’ve gotta invite those beliefs in and get to know them. And when you get to know those beliefs, that’s how, how you then transform those beliefs. You can’t transform them until you get to know them. Mm-Hmm. . So humans will just say things like, that just feels horrible and we don’t really even know what the belief is. So slow down, stop what you’re doing, sit down and close your eyes and ask yourself, what is coming up inside of me? What are these beliefs? And if you give yourself even a few minutes, you will hear the belief like, I’m afraid I don’t wanna get judged. I’m gonna get criticized. And that scares me. And that’s, all of these thoughts are okay. And they’re so common. And that’s what people don’t believe. They’re like, I think it’s just me. I’m the only one in the whole world . Right. AJV (33:21): Definitely not, definitely not right. MC (33:23): People think, oh, this is just me. It’s like, no, you know, I have one that that says continue to get better, more trained. Like mine was like, you’re not trained enough. I mean, I have so many certifications, it’s ridiculous. , it’s like 30 like ridiculous amounts of training. And yet mine will come in and go, you need to get more now. Thank God I’ve worked with it enough now. It, it slowed me way down. But you can’t change those beliefs until you look at them. You gotta look at them and you’ve gotta decide what’s fact and truth today in this very moment. And that’s what, what the whole model of the adult chair is, is what I talk a lot about. And when we live in the adult chair, we live in this moment with fact and truth and these beliefs are from a long time ago. MC (34:09): So they’re coming up saying, you’re bad, you’re not worthy, you’re not good enough. And it’s like, well wait a minute, what’s the evidence of that? Is that true today? 2023 in this moment? It’s like, well, you know, I guess it’s not because this person likes me and this person loves me. And you know, you kind of, you challenge it, but you don’t fight with it. You have a conversation with it. And that’s how you start to morph and change that belief. And then it gets quiet and then when it rears up again, you go, I hear you. Thank you for, for that. I hear you. I know you think that I’m not good enough. I know you want me to not move forward, but I’m gonna move forward. We’re okay. And then it gets quiet. AJV (34:48): So I mean, it’s like just even being cognizant and aware and conscious of these is life altering. Totally. It really is. Like, as you’re talking, I was thinking about the last six weeks in my own brain of going like, man, why was I feeling that way? Like, what was the limiting belief that I keep saying to myself? Or I keep saying out loud. And it was like, as soon as you were talking, I was like, oh, I don’t exactly what it is. I have caught myself saying, I just don’t have enough time. Oh. Like a hundred times in the last six weeks because I’ve been healing and things are piling up and I haven’t been able to work at normal capacity and all these things. And I have allowed myself to go. It’s like I literally let this idea of, because I don’t ha I’m not working a full work schedule. I’m not capable of being the c e o. MC (35:40): Oh AJV (35:41): Yeah. And it’s like, but just even allowing yourself to go, let’s pause for a second and go, why am I feeling this way? It’s life altering. Cause the truth is, it’s like I have just as much time today as I did before. The days, like the hours of the day haven’t changed. What’s happening in those hours have changed. But it’s like a funny thing that if you don’t watch it and you don’t, you don’t stay on top of it. It’s like that will turn you upside down so fast. MC (36:08): Yes. These beliefs come in and instead of witnessing them, they, they kind of take us over and we get lost in them and we start spiraling down and we make decisions based on those limiting beliefs. And all of a sudden, you know, we’re not in a good place where if we can witness it and see it as a part almost external to self, so we can go, oh, there it is, there’s my fraud again, you can even give your fraud like a visual. Like you can see it as, you know, a little person or a little, little mony guy or whatever you, however you wanna see it. A blue blob, it doesn’t matter. But when it comes back, you can go there. You are, what do you want me to know? All that it’s coming in to do is to protect you. Like it’s intentions. Very good. Trying to keep you safe, trying to keep you from getting criticized and judged. You can go, thank you so much for being here. I’ve got this, I appreciate you being here, but really it’s okay, but you don’t let it take you over. You witness it and talk to it in that way. And that’s how you change it. AJV (37:07): And this right here is why the coaching industry is exploding. Yeah. Right? Because yeah, we need these reminders. We need to vocalize them, verbalize them, tear them down, figure out how to conquer. Yes. A lot of our own mindset. And I don’t think that’s new. I just think that, like, I know when we started our first coaching business in 2000 and oh my gosh, what year was that? 2006. wow. A long time ago. I just remember it was like the idea of having a coach was like in a very, they were very niche industries where it was widely accepted. I remember this is one of the most significant I memories I have from my late twenties. And I was at a b and I networking meeting, I don’t even know anymore. But I was at one of those and they were, you know, like networking hour, whatever. And they were going around and saying, you know, what do you do? And I said, Hey, my name is AJ Vaden, I’m a consultant and I remember this one guy looks me dead in the eye, laughs in my face and says, oh, you mean you’re unemployed? MC (38:08): Oh my gosh. AJV (38:09): And I was like, no, I mean, I’m a consultant. And he goes like, for real, like, you actually have paying clients. And it was like such a taboo thing of, oh, if you’re a coach, that means you don’t have a job. Like, I remember that. But like today, if you don’t have a coach, I’m wondering why not? I don’t know anyone totally doesn’t have one or who isn’t looking for one. MC (38:30): Yep. AJV (38:30): You know, and it’s, it’s completely different just 15 years later. So, okay, so on that note of like this whole thing of, because I really do think this lack of self-belief is the number one I believe regardless of what anyone else does, I believe, and I see it with my own eyes, it’s the number one reason and my personal experiences of why your business fails. MC (38:54): Yep. AJV (38:55): Because you stop. MC (38:56): Yeah. You AJV (38:57): Could. And a lot of that has to do with, are you going to be willing, confident enough to go and ask people for the business, even if they tell you no. So how do you build self-belief and self-worth? And I will just tell our audience right now before we get into this conversation, because this’ll probably be a part of us wrapping up because I’m a chatty Kathy and I could talk about this stuff for the next three hours, have to watch the clock. I’m like, oh, MC (39:22): Countdown, AJV (39:23): . You have put together this generous, thoughtful, extraordinary offer for everyone who is listening on the podcast today. And you have this awesome course mm-hmm. called the, it’s the self-worth bundle. Right? Yeah. And for all of you guys listening, Michelle has made this available for free to you today as being a listener of this show. So if you go to the adult chair.com/brand builders mm-hmm. , so the adult chair.com/brand builders, you can get this awesome self-worth bundle for free, which is going to be a much larger expansion on this conversation that we’re gonna head into right now. So Michelle, loaded question, how do we build self-worth? How do we get this thing? MC (40:11): Yeah. So, oh my goodness. So again, with self-worth, we wanna notice when we don’t feel good about ourselves, we wanna start slowing down and paying attention to the thoughts that we’re having. I love journaling and writing them down because, you know, we try to like master these things in our mind. So it’s like, okay, well I don’t wanna think that thought, I’m just not gonna think it anymore. No, that does not work. . You’ve gotta write it down and then look at it and then you can go, wait, is that still true today? Is it true? Is it true? And then you write ro you wanna write down what’s the evidence that that is not true. So that’s one, that’s one thing. The second thing we wanna do is start planting the seeds of the positive things that we want in our life. The positive beliefs. MC (40:59): So it’s hard to go from, I hate myself, do I love myself? But can you go from, I hate myself to, I like who I am today or I’m starting to like myself. So you wanna build that bridge to where you wanna go. So find beliefs that feel right for you today, and you start saying those to yourself. You look in the mirror and you say those back and forth to yourself. I like myself, I’m beginning to like myself more and look at it and then feel it in the body. When we feel these beliefs in the body, we’re anchoring them in. That’s what happens is again, we try to, to do this mental ping pong. It’s like, I don’t wanna think this thought. I’m gonna stop. I’m gonna have wine, I’m gonna watch Netflix, I’m gonna do, it just numbs us out temporarily because the beliefs are there until we really look at them and work with them. MC (41:46): Meditation is wonderful and this and this self-worth bundle that I put that I’m offering for you guys is for meditations. Mm-Hmm. And one of them is on limiting beliefs, is journaling prompts, all of those things. So you can re and it’s not gonna, does not take a lot of time, but it really is a way to get you started, to start changing your self worth so you can feel really solid about who you are. Because again, if you don’t feel Val valuable, then what you’re putting out in the world is gonna fe other people will feel that lack of value in what you are putting out. It comes from you, it comes from inside. So again, examine the beliefs that you’re having now that are in conflict with you and how you want to feel. Write them down, challenge them, figure out what’s true today. And positive affirmations are huge, especially looking in the mirror. That’s a great place to start for sure. AJV (42:38): So good. For sure. That’s one of the things that I wrote down that I heard in my brain that you said is, you know, it’s like what we really do instead of dealing with this stuff is we distract ourselves. Oh yeah. Right. It’s like we grab, grab the glass of wine, say, I don’t wanna talk about it right now, we turn on a show and we veg out. Yep. We just smacked ourselves and all the while we’re just pushing all this stuff down and never actually going. I should probably address that. Should probably figure out why that’s happening. Yep. And so I love this and I love that you’ve provided some frameworks and meditations to like, help people do some additional exercises. So y’all please go grab the self-worth bundle. We’ll make sure the link is in the show notes on this same topic. MC (43:23): Yeah. AJV (43:24): Kind of tied to business development because I think for any coach or any entrepreneur for that matter but I’ll, I’ll target this to the coaches right now. It’s like how, how do you get someone to be confident enough to go, I’m gonna go sell what I do, I’m gonna go ask somebody to pay me money to be their coach. MC (43:43): Mm-Hmm. again, it goes back to why are you doing what you’re doing? What gets you jazzed up? What gets you excited about doing what you’re doing? From my own coaches, I’ll say to them, why did you join this program? Like, what’s your why? If you don’t know what your why is, then you can’t go out and sell yourself and offer whatever you’re here to offer. And for my coaches, they’ll say, well, I wanna help you change the world. I wanna change the world. I wanna be part of that. This is the key though. I say, okay, those are great words. How does that feel? What does that feel like in your body? That again, anchors in this beautiful belief of I’m here to change the world, I want to change the world. When you feel it in the body, your whole body starts to expand and then there’s that energy and then it’s like, the words just start to come. MC (44:34): People have it backwards. You know, people ask me all the time too, like, how do I set a boundary? Can you give me the words? I’m like, no, I can’t give you the words because you won’t set a boundary until you feel worthy. Yeah. And you feel value. It’s, it’s a, you gotta go inside first. So no matter what job, no matter what business you have, you’ve gotta believe in it. You’ve gotta remember what’s your why, why are you doing what you’re doing? When you believe it and you believe that what you’re doing is really important in the world, not to everybody, but to, there are, there’s a target audience that really wants to hear from you. When you believe that that is how then you can go out and sell yourself. And again, challenge the thoughts that will come up and say, you’re not good enough though. MC (45:18): You, it’s alwa for me, it’s always about looking at the thoughts. What are the thoughts that are coming up? The thoughts are gonna come up to trip you up. It’s just is every human has these thoughts that try to stop us, get in touch with those. But again, more importantly, what’s your value? What’s your why? What’s your reason for doing what you’re doing? For me, it’s like my north star is I’m here to bring healing into this world. Everything I do is about bringing healing and to every human I can touch on this planet. That’s my thing. That is what I’m here to do and nothing’s gonna stop me, but I believe that for myself. So that’s what others have to do for their own business as well. AJV (45:56): Yeah. It’s like you gotta find that, that deep resonating belief of like, yep, I don’t care if you pay me or not, I’d still be doing this, totally doing this for the next six months. I’m gonna be doing this for the next 60 years. Totally. But you gotta kinda have that like longevity perspective in it. I love that. I think that’s, it is true. It’s like you gotta know your why and then you gotta know your who. Like who are you doing this for? Right? Yeah. Yeah. I think that’s so, so good. Okay, so two last quick things. And this can be rapid fire. We don’t have to like go into like deep dialogue if we don’t have time, but I, I think these are two really just quick things. Do. You mentioned earlier it’s like way in beginning and the early of the conversation of like, I just learned it’s like I have to do what I am best at and that’s not everything. Mm-Hmm. . So how do you learn to say, this is what I’m best at and this is what I’m gonna do and this is what I’m gonna go hire out. So it’s like what phase in the journey you’re going? Listen, you are no longer the person who can do all the things. MC (46:54): Yes. So this, again, I I, I go back to my body as a barometer or what that tells me. I’m very in tune with what I feel. And again, it goes back to energy. So if I am cha, if someone says to me, and let me give you an example, Wayne. In the beginning way, in the beginning in 2000, whatever it was 14, 15, I remember I was working with a guy that started the podcast with me and he goes, you need to start doing social media posts. And I was like, okay. And he sat down with me and he did a tutorial for me. Like he could do it in two minutes. I sat there, I remember like checking out , my whole body was like contracted. And I’m like, I don’t like this. Like I don’t wanna learn this. I’m feeling resistance. MC (47:37): Mm-Hmm. So there’s resistance from fear and there’s resistance because it’s just not my thing. I wasn’t afraid to do it. I was resistant because it’s not my thing. Like if you said to me, go write four meditations and start writing a book, I’d be so happy. Right? , it’s like, that’s what I wanna do. So the resistance came up and I tried to do the first social post on Facebook. I remember way back when it was crooked, the words were coming off of the thing. It took me an hour and a half and I go, I’m done . I’m not doing this. And I remember in that moment, this is when like oh my god, what was it called? Craigslist was vague. We supposed to ask, this is like 2014 or 15 or whatever. So I went in there, I hired an assistant like that day and it was so inexpensive and I said, oh yeah, she turned it around in five minutes. MC (48:24): I’m like, it took me an hour and a half and I go done. So look for that resistance. When you feel resistance, you’re not meant to do it. And I talk to a lot of people that’ll say to me, I’m gonna design my new website. I’m like, are you outta your mind? Hire, go to Upwork. Like, hire someone to do that. Do, do you wanna do websites, you know, for a living? They’re like, no, I don’t know what I’m doing. I’m gonna take a tutorial on YouTube. I’m like, you’re insane. Like, resistance. You hire it up. Upwork is my friend. So AJV (48:51): Yes, I love it. I think that’s like such a good reminder to all of us. It’s like, there are, there are so few things that only you can do, right? Totally do those things. Do those things. There’s a whole world of people who can do other things that you not do. So, all right, last question. We talked about this just a little bit, but you had mentioned a, a key part of what you do and all the things that you do is just teaching people how to be an emotionally healthy adult, right? Yeah. Yeah. So in as few words, as quickly as you can of going, I wanna be an emotionally healthy adult , what do I do? My husband really wants me to be an emotionally healthy, the adults. So give us some tips, give us some best practices. What does that mean? MC (49:35): Okay? The whole model is based on five tenets. I’m just gonna give you the five tenets, right? You gotta own your reality. That means get radically honest with yourself. What do you, what’s going on in your life that you’re not owning? Like, are you drinking too much? Are you in a marriage that you’re not happy in? Are you in a relationship you’re not happy in? So own your reality and live responsibly. Number two, you’ve got to learn how to feel your emotions. Because if we don’t, we project. If we don’t know how to do that, we numb out. So you’ve got to feel your emotions. Number three, we’ve gotta manage our triggers. We don’t project our pain on other people. When you’re triggered, here’s the key. When we’re triggered, it means that there’s an unconscious limiting belief that belongs to us, that’s rising up for us. It’s a belief that belongs to us. Yet what what we do is we get mad at others. Right? Stop it. Look at yourself. It’s a limiting belief. It’s a gift, honestly, that’s what I say. Triggers are a gift. So we gotta manage our triggers. Number four, build self-worth. Number five, you’ve got to learn how to set healthy boundaries for yourself. That’s it. AJV (50:45): Where do people go? Where do people go? How do they work with you? If they’re going, whoa, what you just said is what I need, where do you wanna go? MC (50:54): Yeah. Yep. You go to the adult chair.com, I’ve got the podcast. I talk about all this on the podcast. I have guests on. This is what I teach my coaches how to do. This is how I teach my coaches to work with other people, though, doing this exact thing. AJV (51:07): So, oh, Michelle, so much wisdom. This is, thank you. This is so awesome. So, I mean, I, I’m literally like taking notes both for all of you, for the show notes, but then for myself, right? It’s like this, this is what we need, right? This is what everyone needs, and that’s why I started this podcast. I saying, this isn’t a business tactics episode, but this is a necessary and required, universally applicable conversation that we all need to help succeed in what we’re doing, whatever that is. And then also to get your message out to the world. You don’t wanna be the world’s best kept secret. That’s not what we’re doing this for. We wanna get it out there. So Michelle, thank you so, so much for this gem of a conversation. Thank you. I will put all of these links in the show notes. And for everyone listening, don’t forget to grab the self-worth bundle and we will see you next time on the influential personal brand.