21. How to Make Meditation a Part of Your Everyday Life with Laurie Adams

Hi, I’m Natalie Ottosen and you are listening to The Mindset School for Soulful Entrepreneurs, episode number 21.

Welcome to The Mindset School podcast, a show for spiritual entrepreneurs who are ready to stop feeling stuck, reconnect to their soul’s purpose, and create a deeply fulfilling life and business. I’m Natalie Ottosen, transformational life coach, and reconnection healing foundational practitioner, and I can help you scale and grow a six-figure business from a place of inner authority, wisdom, knowledge, and truth.

If you are a spiritual entrepreneur and you are looking to take that first step towards your dream of running your own business, this is the show for you. Ready to step into your power and move forward with clarity and purpose? Let’s go.

Hello beautiful soul family and welcome back. I am really excited to share this episode today because I had the beautiful and amazing privilege of being interviewed on a podcast recently from a wonderful colleague of mine, her name is Laurie Adams and she has her own podcast, Fire Up at 55 Plus. And I had the wonderful opportunity of sharing with her audience about one of my favorite topics, meditation. In this episode, we talked about some of the struggles that women 55 plus have with starting the second act of their life.

And basically what happens when we start new routines or start new things and some of the issues that women in the later stage of their life have when it comes to starting these kind of practices. So I wanted to share this episode with you. I hope that this resonates and as always, if you have any questions, reach out to me @soulsistercoaching on Instagram and I hope you enjoy this episode.

Laurie: Today we have a compassionate expert to continue the discovery of foundational habits, you’ve had the chance to hear about on past episodes. I am so thrilled to say that transformational Master Life Coach, Natalie Ottosen will explain how mindset, especially through learning meditation, is a key doable support to life change at any age. Yes, meditation.

So many of us have a desire and intent to learn and practice meditation because of the proven benefits and yes, it can seem intimidating to start. Why is that? We’ll find out today how to overcome that intimidation from Natalie. As the grounded force behind Soul Sister Coaching, she has the experience and insights to help you take an easy step into this important process. So, good morning, Natalie and welcome.

Natalie: Hello. Thank you for having me.

Laurie: No, it’s so great. So I wanted to ask before anything else, if you could describe your background and what led you into energy healing and then to becoming a life coach and setting up Soul Sister Coaching and how you realized you had a talent for this? And if anything, during your own growing up years or development, relates to what some of these women might be going through in approaching change.

Please talk a little bit about that, maybe about starting your business or other risks or financial knowledge or just some insights that you’ve had over the time. I’m really curious to hear about this because you have such a unique healing way of doing things.

Natalie: Yeah, I’m a little bit different in my approach on how I coach my clients and kind of what led me to this journey and it kind of all started with religion. I was raised in a predominant religion. And in my 20s I ended up leaving that religion and kind of going a little atheist or not atheist, I would say maybe agnostic and also there was a lot that happened to me during my life. We all have experiences that happen to us throughout life and there was a lot of suffering, there was a lot of self-doubt, there was a lot of insecurities.

And I kind of talk a little bit about that on my website, all of the things that I went through personally through my own life. And then it was through therapy and working with my therapist, my therapist was like, “Hey, I would really like you to meditate because I think that this would be a great process to really help you move forward in your life.” And I was very resistant to it. And then it was through that process of meditation where I reconnected to my spirituality, I reconnected to God.

And then I kind of went on a mission of I knew I was always here to help people, I knew that that was my kind of my mission, my purpose, my passion. I thought it was going to be more the traditional route of therapy and maybe being a licensed clinical social worker. Or ultimately I actually wanted to go into neuropsychology and study the brain, no wonder, I love meditation. But life had other plans for me. I ended up having a son who was really sick and had some pretty serious health complications when he was born.

So I kind of had to put everything on the back burner, put everything on the side and we also ended up moving halfway across the country. We moved from Salt Lake City, Utah to here, Kansas City and if it could go wrong, it’s gone wrong. And so I kind of hunkered down and said, “I need to really take care of my kids and my family and support my family and all of that.” And so it ended up being a process where I was like, “What can I do on my own that can help people and take me down this path of really being of service in a different kind of way?”

And coaching kind of came screaming at me. And then I didn’t just do coaching, I ended up doing coaching and astrology and also energy healing kind of all at the same time. And I’ve just ended up expanding on that through these processes of learning these different things and kind of creating my own way that I help and heal my clients. So I really do incorporate the coaching, I incorporate energy healing and I incorporate the astrology and even human design into helping my clients really figure out who they are and become their best version of themselves.

Laurie: Wow, that is so interesting. It’s so cool to hear when somebody’s actually done all of this for themselves, and you’ve got in some unique directions and then are able to share that. Because there’s probably an awful lot of people who aren’t even aware of some of that and how they could benefit from it. So that’s really going to be helpful to them to get as much support as they need in addition to knowing more about meditation.

And when you advise women of this age, midlife and beyond, is there anything very common or stereotypical you observe about their ability to begin meditation without fear that they’re going to do it wrong? What are their common questions?

Natalie: Yeah, I think there’s a lot of fear around meditation, and especially in the older generation, I hear this kind of a lot that we get stuck in our ways. But there’s a lot of conversation, I’m stuck in my way of thinking, that comes up a lot. Or that I’m not doing it right, so that’s a common thing. I’m not doing this right, or I don’t know what I’m supposed to be doing. I’m not good at this. I’m never going to be able to figure it out. I don’t have the right environment. Maybe it’s even that it’s boring or I can’t sit that long or I’m too restless.

All of those types of things come up with my clients when we talk about meditation and my clientele is really kind of that 40 plus. So they really do relate a lot to your audience as well.

Laurie: Terrific. So when they’re starting something new like meditation, they don’t know what they’re not aware of. So what is something that’s uncommon or unknown to them that you, as the life and healing coach, see sooner about them that they don’t realize about themselves?

Natalie: One of my favorite things that I know about my clients generally before they know about themselves is this authority that we give away so much that maybe we don’t know or maybe somebody else has our answer. Even as a coach, you have my answer instead of me. We are our own authority and as somebody who was raised in a predominant religion and this religion specifically ties into women, their places in the home and your place is to raise your children and all of those types of things.

So pursuing your own dreams and goals and aspirations, it kind of goes on the back burner. You truly are your own authority. And so one of the things that I, a lot of times, can see before my clients can see is that inner wisdom, that inner knowledge, that inner truth that is inside of you. And also I think so many of these women have that purpose, that passion and that drive, and it’s been there all along and they also just can’t see it. They don’t see what is right in front of their faces because they think that everyone has this, everyone has this ability, everyone’s able to do this but it’s so often unique to themselves.

Laurie: Yeah, that is so valuable because I think people sometimes fear change because they’re going to turn into someone that they’re not, but they’re going to turn into someone who’s grown using their own potential that’s unique to them. And so your best life really can be your own life.

Natalie: And I think the more that we’re able to kind of go in and still the mind, really start listening to that inner wisdom, the inner truth, the inner knowledge, the more we’re really able to open ourselves up and expand in different levels and follow our truth in a whole new and different way.

Laurie: And too, you are that role model, meaning that you have done that, so they get some assurance from that too. When you talk about experts, they may not want somebody else really, truly not want somebody to be the expert and let themselves be the expert. But it’s great to have a guide who’s an authority, especially in an area they’re not familiar with to get them going.

And what do you have to say about that older mindset beyond just the fact that they haven’t done meditation, or they’ve let a lot of time go by without fully tapping into their potential? What about things you so often hear in the media about being invisible or being diminished in our culture? And how do you help them to get over people pleasing and all the things they should be doing that do make them somewhat invisible and don’t allow them to put themselves first and guilt? That’s a long question.

Natalie: No, I know and it’s such a good question. Oh my gosh, it’s such a good question because it kind of again goes back to that authority of listening to other people’s voices instead of listening to our own. And I think one of the most important things that I teach my clients is to really start listening to their own voice, to listen to their own truth and their own wisdom and to be able to discern that information that’s coming to them because I think that it’s not just important, it’s imperative. We have to start being able to make those decisions for ourselves of what is true and right for us.

And so when it comes to kind of that invisibility or that lack of confidence, that’s where you can go in and start questioning, well, what does it mean to be invisible and what does it mean to show up? What does it mean to be seen? And start breaking down some of those conversations of what does this look like for me? And if I could show up and be seen or show up and do me or show up in the way that I want to, what would that ultimately look like for me?

And then when you’re able to start building those confidences, confidence begets confidence. You start getting those micro, those mini wins where you just start building and building and building and bringing the meditation piece back in when you start building a meditation practice, we don’t call it a meditation perfect.

We call it a practice because as you step in and do that practice every single day those are some of the steps that you start doing to build that confidence for yourself to be able to move yourself forward in the direction that you ultimately want to go, especially if you’ve been a people pleaser. Especially if you’ve been putting other people’s needs and wants and desires above your own, which we do as women.

Laurie: Yes, we sure do. That’s why we’re on this podcast, so we can help people overcome some of that. But what I was going to say is that when you step into that confidence you talk about and then they really feel ready to put their toe in the water for meditation, how do you get them started? Or if someone even on this podcast, they’re not in coaching but they would like to get started with meditation, what are some easy ways to get going so they feel it’s doable and cannot be intimidated by it?

Natalie: Yeah, I kind of break it down into four steps and really, truly the easiest way to get started is to start small. I know from my clients and the people that I’ve worked with kind of what comes up for them, but it really is an act of starting small. And I use the analogy of running my marathon because I used to believe that people who ran were crazy, certifiably, you run, you’re nuts. And then my sister had this hare-brained idea one day and she was like, “Hey, listen, let’s run a marathon.” It was in St. George, Utah. And I was here at the time in Kansas City, and I was like, “This is brilliant.”

And I’d just had my son who’s now 14. So I just had him, and I was like, “This is a really good idea, well, it will get me moving again,” and all of the things. And I got my jogging stroller, and I got my shoes and my gear and everything. And I was like, “Yeah, I’m going to go run miles.” And the next thing I know, I ran to the end of the street, and I was like, “I think I’m going to die.” So meditation is very similar to that where we start with a minute, we start with five minutes, and we do our very best.

Meditation is not about going out and doing an hour meditation or sitting with mudras in a seated position and we’re doing all the things. It really is just maybe being mindful of our breath for just a minute, it’s that simple. And then we build upon that because again, it’s a practice. We have to work, we have to build just like any muscle when you start going to the gym, you don’t go out and start lifting 50 pounds with your biceps, you have to build with 10 pounds and then 15 pounds then 20 pounds, it’s the same thing. We have to build that muscle. And meditation brings up all sorts of stuff, so it can be uncomfortable. So that would be number one, is starting small.

Number two would be being consistent and comfortable. Again, there’s all these rules and what you need to do with meditation. I literally sit on my couch in my family room, and I meditate, I just sit there, and I meditate, but showing up consistently. Now, the consistency piece, I think it’s a beautiful thing to do this at a consistent time every day. With that being said, if you’re driving to the store and you’re sitting in the parking lot and you’re like, I’ve got three minutes that I can close my eyes and just focus on my breath. That’s meditation.

If you’re going out for a walk, if you have a walk that you take every morning, that can be your meditation. It can be anything that you decide that it needs to be in the form of meditation because there are so many different types of meditation, it’s not just one way. So that would be number two.

Number three is guided meditations are a very beautiful way to start because you have somebody guiding you through the process. Again, I would not do a long meditation. I would probably find somebody who does a 5 to 15 minute meditation, even those 15 minutes in the beginning can be very challenging. But finding a guided meditation where somebody helps take you through breath or helps you with a mantra, somebody where they’re redirecting back to the breath, those types of things are very, very, very helpful in the beginning.

And then number four would just be remembering that you’re doing it right and I seriously mean that, you’re doing it right. And the thing is, you’re going to think you’re doing it all wrong but there is no right or wrong in meditation, there truly isn’t. It’s just the process of catching thought or not getting attached to thought and letting thought come in and go. That is the process of meditation so that you can then become more aware of the thoughts that you’re thinking on a regular basis.

Because I don’t know if you know this, we have somewhere around 60,000 thoughts a day, 80% of them are negative. 92% of the thoughts that we thought today were the same thoughts we thought yesterday. So if we’re not learning how to manage our mind, our mind is running us, so meditation is just the process of being able to catch those thoughts. So those are four super easy tips to help with the meditation journey or the starting a meditation journey.

Laurie: So what kind of benefits, I know you talked about the benefits to you, what kind of benefits do your clients see as they begin to meditate?

Natalie: I love this because there are so many benefits to meditation. And I’ll actually send you a few articles that you can link in the show notes, one by the Mayo Clinic, one by NIH, and one by Positive Psychology. There are some really brilliant articles. But I mean there are so many different benefits to meditation, increased focus, compassion, empathy, bringing that sense of calm and peace, boosting your memory. It helps relieve stress and improve symptoms of depression and anxiety.

That was one of the main reasons I was doing meditation on a regular basis because I’m a highly anxious person. I have high functioning anxiety, so really helping me bring those levels down. It also helps with increased creativity. But my very three favorite things about meditation and what I’ve seen with my own clients is that it helps calm the nervous system. And as an energy worker, when we are able to go in and calm the nervous system, we’re able to operate in a completely different way.

So when we’re able to bring the nervous system down, we really just work differently. It helps build gray matter in the brain, so that’s amazing. As somebody who has Alzheimer’s that runs in my family, building that gray matter is huge. And then my favorite because I believe that this is a super power is that it helps build intuition. I had, like I said in the beginning, meditation helped bring me back to my spirituality and it really helped me start listening to this intuition.

Again, going back to that authority, that inner knowledge, that inner wisdom, that inner truth, it helped me start listening to that guidance so that I could start making decisions that were in alignment with me and what worked best for me. And then being able to take that and ripple that out to my clients and anybody else that follows me on social media or comes in contact with me or that I operate with on a daily basis.

Laurie: Wow, that’s wonderful. So during your efforts to change, anybody’s efforts to change anything, especially if they have been operating the same way. Perhaps being that people please or being the grandmother that will always stop everything and go babysit at the last minute or do favors for people or be the church volunteer, always giving. And then they start to do a little bit more self-care that takes a little bit more time and then they do something like meditation.

Well, some of their family might be saying, “Woohoo, what are you doing?” And what do you say to people who don’t have that support? I’m sure they get it from you and that’s great but it’s hard not to feel even a little bit foolish sometimes when you start this stuff.

Natalie: Oh, my gosh, I have the funniest story for you. So when I began meditation, which was 17 years ago, it was kind of when it wasn’t a popular thing, and I even get it. It’s still not everyone understands it, especially in kind of the religious realm even still today. I had somebody reach out to me and they’re like, “Well, who are you meditating to?” And I was like, “What do you mean, who am I meditating to? I’m not meditating to anybody, I’m just breathing.” But I do connect with my higher power. I do connect with whoever that is for you.

But I used to call myself a closet meditator because surely, I thought, and again, this is a thought, surely I thought, if anybody knew that I was doing this crazy thing right here, right now in this room, they were going to think that I was absolutely nuts and crazy. And so for a very long time, actually I didn’t tell anybody about meditating and I didn’t tell anybody I was doing it. Now I tell everybody who will listen.

But my husband would come into the room, and I would pretend I wasn’t meditating, not because he had a problem with it or a problem with what I was doing or anything like that. Because that was my thought about it, that was my own insecurity. So we can get in our own way and obviously our thoughts, they create our feelings and then actions and results. And so we have these thoughts about things based on what we’re doing and it’s our thoughts that we have to work through, it’s our own insecurities.

I had total insecurity about meditating and going down that path. And really when I just talked about it and had the conversation about it and the thing is, your people, they don’t have to tell anybody. We don’t have to tell anybody anything. We get to decide what we want to share or not share. Where was I going with that?

Laurie: Just the feelings they might have with other family members. I think too, you just said something that triggered something with me is that besides people pleasing and guilt, I mean I could list them all from my own life prior to becoming a coach, and I’m still transforming as we all are. But in the last two years I have had an awful lot of change that’s been really positive, but a lot of that for me was giving up apologizing because something happens and you’re like, “Oh, sorry,” it’s so automatic.

And I think something like starting meditation or any new path in life that others  maybe aren’t going to understand or support right away. You almost feel like you have to say, “Oh, sorry I’m doing this.” But of course you’re not and to overcome those thoughts too, yeah.

Natalie: Yeah, I did a bit of that in the beginning. And the more I got comfortable, again, it’s kind of building that authority of this is who I am, and this resonates with me and I’m standing in my truth and it’s okay maybe if other people don’t understand it initially. Again, it’s that confidence, it’s that authority, it’s kind of even those boundaries that we end up putting in place of this works for me, even if it doesn’t work for you and that’s okay.

And kind of going back to the story of my husband, I’m sure he was like, “I don’t really know what she’s doing.” But at the end of the day, meditation is a staple in his life now, he does it on a regular basis and it’s completely changed and transformed his own life. It’s helped calm his own nervous system and it helps him manage stress. He has a very high stress job, and it helps him manage his stress on a daily basis.

So you know this, I’m sure all your people know this, our brain is very resistant at first. It’s resistant to things that it doesn’t know and that it’s uncomfortable with. And especially when it comes to things like meditation, your brain’s like, “Oh, I don’t know about that. I think we should stay away from that. We don’t know what that is over there.” But it just, it really does help calm and retrain the brain and helps create those new neural pathways of peace, and again, that increased focus and that calm and that peace and those types of things.

Laurie: Wonderful. So now I’d like to hear just a little bit more about your life coaching program and business Soul Sister Coaching and how you address new clients, what they’re most interested in, if it’s meditation or something else and just what you offer to people.

Natalie: Yeah. So obviously meditation is a staple in my life and it’s something I help bring into my clients’ life as well. I really help women who 40 plus really find their purpose and help create profit with that. Because I was in a situation where I had started this coaching business back in 2016, so coaching, energy healing, astrology. And truly, I didn’t have enough confidence to really build that business myself at the time. We had a situation with my husband where he got sick, and I wasn’t sure if he was going to be able to work.

And so I jumped into real estate funny enough and became a real estate agent and turned it into a very successful business. At the same time, realized I didn’t like it at all, it wasn’t what I wanted to do. And so, interestingly enough, May 2020 during COVID, I was sitting on the couch, and I was like, “What in the world am I doing? I do not want to be doing this.” And so I made a decision right then and there that I was going to go back into coaching and build my coaching business and bring all these pieces together and help women.

I had figured out how to take their purpose and their passion, because for me again that is truly coaching and helping women find their purpose and then help them create a career with that. Because to me, there’s no amount of money on the planet that is worth not doing what I love, and I want to help women do that exact same thing and truly become their own hero.

Laurie: Yeah, and it takes courage to do that. But it sounds like for you, it was well worth it and also so well worth it for all the people you work with, so that’s a ripple effect. That’s really wonderful.

Natalie: Yeah. And especially your audience who are kind of in that second act of their life where family was the priority. My kids are older now. I still have a son in high school or he’s going into high school this year. So great, my baby’s going into high school. But that second act of life where I’ve been a stay at home mom, I’ve taken care of the family.

I’ve loved supporting my husband on his journey and now what do I do with myself? Where do I take my life and what do I do? And really being able to step onto that path and figure that out for myself, it’s amazing. And when we’re able to really, like you said, have that courage to do that, that’s a powerful process.

Laurie: So that just brought to mind another question I have real quick about meditation and that is, so for some women, I’m sure many women in our niche, it’s not just about setting up a new life for yourself where you’ll really be happy. But it means releasing things sometimes like in a long marriage, divorce or leaving a job that you thought you were going to have to stay in or finding a new job when you’re not sure you should do it. And that’s more almost traumatic in ways, how does meditation help that kind of situation?

Natalie: Well, think about the hamster wheel we get on in those processes where we just overthink and overthink and overthink and overwhelm and over this and over that. Meditation is such a beautiful tool in the process of helping us learn to really manage that mind, manage the monkey mind is what I call it and really help us get off that hamster wheel of the over whatever, insert word there. So I think being able to manage our mind, manage our thoughts and also I really believe it’s one of the greatest forms of self-care that we can do because we can’t fill from an empty cup.

We’ve all been on an airplane where the flight attendant says you’ve got to put your mask on first. And the thing is, is that if you’re over-stressed, if you’re over-anxious, if you’re overwhelmed, if you’re overthinking, all of those things, it’s very hard to manage the other things in your life. And you might be able to do it for a while, but eventually your system is going to overload, and you might crash ultimately. And that’s basically what happened to my husband, his system basically crashed and overloaded.

And so bringing the meditation piece in, and there are some incredible meditations out there, in fact. And this is one of the things I use with my healing clients, it’s there’s a binaural meditation that you can do that goes in and helps with the two different brain waves. You listen to it with headphones, and it helps kind of rewire the brain, it helps with anxiety, it can help with stress, it can help with overwhelm, all the different things. When we’re able to go in and kind of rebalance that brain, we’re able to manage those things in our life in a different way.

Laurie: It’s so interesting and innovative for a practice that is centuries old or something, I’m sure, meditation, that it can be used in new ways today. So before I ask you my traditional wrap up questions, is there anything else that you would like to say, especially about Soul Sister Coaching, because you do go beyond meditation, that you’d like our audience to know?

Natalie: Yeah. So I, again, do energy healing, so I do that in person and distantly. So that’s one of the things I do incorporate with my clients, and I do incorporate astrology and human design as well. So when you work with me, I kind of bring those pieces and those elements in and I really like to incorporate those with my clients because I think it gives us permission. I think it kind of gives us a blueprint of there was no mistake when you were made. And this is who you are and let’s embrace these things and embrace these parts of who you are instead of resisting and fighting against them.

And I also offer, I have my own podcast, The Mindset School for Soulful Entrepreneurs, I have that, and I offer tons of free value there. In fact, my first three episodes are all about my morning routine, mindfulness, meditation, and kind of getting started with that whole process. And a lot of what I talked about today I talked about on there. And then I have my Instagram page Soul Sister Coaching where I’m constantly offering free content all the time.

And in fact, by the time this airs, I’ll just have wrapped up my 30 day self-love challenge. And so that’s even something that you can go in and watch all those videos and complete that challenge for yourself as well because we just need more self-love. Who doesn’t need more self-love in their life? So those are the types of things that I offer. For me it’s all about creating community and bringing people together because I don’t think there’s enough of that and we are wired for connection. So the more we can give each other love and offer each other that I think is amazing.

Laurie: Yeah, and all that facilitates change in light of the fact that we have those 60,000 thoughts, 92% or whatever, are the same.

Natalie: 80% are negative, yeah.

Laurie: Yeah. So that we can really start rewiring our brains and more able to embrace new and change and be excited about it versus this is scary.

Natalie: Yeah, our brain’s wired that way. I don’t know why it’s wired that way but it just, it is.

Laurie: Well, they say it goes back to the caveman. That we’ve got a fight or flight or whatever, but it’s there definitely. I want to ask you some of the questions that I put in at the end of these podcasts. I just am such a reader and I always love to know what my guests are reading, whether it’s non-fiction or it’s about meditation or whether it’s just something you have found that you have on your bedside table or for a beach read or maybe something that’s really impacted you. So what book or books do you like to recommend?

Natalie: I have a few of them. Okay, so this was the game changer for me, this changed everything in my life, If Life Is a Game, These Are the Rules by Chérie Carter-Scott. It’s the 10 rules to being a human, and it changed my life. I saw that we’re here to have a body, we’re here to learn to love that body and then we’re here to learn lessons and we’ll repeat the lessons until we learn them. And then it’s all of those things of having grace and kindness and love and connection and all that but that was truly a game changer for me.

I love the Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz, that’s another one that I think is just fantastic. And then anything Esther Hicks, The Abrahams, The Law of Attraction, any of those kind of books I think are absolutely amazing or even Brené Brown, she’s amazing too.

Laurie: Yeah. Great. Well, you mentioned your morning routine. So do you have one that’s pretty standard that wouldn’t take three episodes? I definitely recommend they go back and listen to those because I just love hearing about the routine that works for you.

Natalie: Yeah. So this is something I’ve built over the last 17 years, and it’s actually is pretty quick and simple. And I talk about it in episode two of my podcast. It’s meditation, so I meditate every day. I write out three things I’m grateful for every single day. I write out an affirmation and I write it out 20 times a day. I do some sort of positive reading for the day and then I do movement and that is my morning routine. And I have coffee, I have a cup of coffee, I have to enjoy my cup of coffee.

Laurie: Coffee’s a common element, I have to tell you.

Natalie: But yeah, those are the things that I do every day and I do it in the morning for myself because I like to be able to start my day that way. I offer to my clients all the time, do something that works for you, and do it when it works for you. But I like to start my day this way and it works for me, and it’s changed and transformed my life.

Laurie: That’s great. And then is there anybody in particular other than the authors that you mentioned that you like to follow on social media or you consider a role model that is someone that maybe does kind of what you do or that you would like to develop maybe some characteristics that are like theirs?

Natalie: Yeah, I would say again, The Abrahams, Esther and now I’m forgetting her husband’s name.

Laurie: Yeah, I know, they’re the Hicks, How the Hicks.

Natalie: The Hicks, yeah. Brooke Castillo, honestly, is one of my mentors. I think she completely changed my life even with her own podcast offering. What she offered set me on a trajectory that really helped me understand my mind in a different way. So I would honestly say Brooke Castillo.

Laurie: And she is the head of The Life Coach School, the founder.

Natalie: She is.

Laurie: We both trained there, yes.

Natalie: Yeah, we both trained there, yeah, she’s amazing. And I love her philosophy. I love what she offers and how she offers it. And I got into her podcast way back in the day and I just, I binge listened to everything. I was like, “She is amazing.”

Laurie: That’s a lot. She’s got a lot.

Natalie: I know, I’m not even all the way through hers but yeah, no, she’s amazing. So it would be Brooke Castillo.

Laurie: Yeah. Well, and she does provide what you’re providing in that you help people take a turn and think, you know I always say use the word think outside of the box, but really think in a new way. I know for me especially when she talked about money, I was like, “Oh, money can be fun. There doesn’t need to be guilt around money, you don’t have to do certain things with it.” So yeah, just sometimes it’s just one sentence from someone.

That’s what I love about this podcast, listening to your podcast and to Brooke’s and to others is that sometimes it’s just one thought and it just hits you and resonates with you. And that’s what I’m looking forward to in consistent meditation practice, so when I talk to you again, I’m going to get that consistency part down because I do know that it really helps. But for people that have a mind that’s always been spinning, especially with me with my past career, it is a little bit of a challenge to just calm it down, it’s okay, you can focus and give yourself permission.

Natalie: Exactly. And here’s the thing I want to offer you. There’s no shame or judgment or guilt, if you miss a day, you miss a day, you just pick it up again. We put so much pressure on ourselves too. I did actually do a commitment through the Calm app. There’s so many apps out there too that you can do, the Calm app, Headspace. Headspace, I love Headspace. But you can track those, and I actually decided I was going to meditate every day for a year, and I did it. It was amazing, it was an amazing experience but then I took a break after that. I was like, “Okay, I’m just going to give myself a break.”

But always do what feels right and comfortable to you. And I just want to offer also, there are days where it’s like meditation is not happening today. I will sit and I’m like, “It’s not happening.” So you take it, and you leave it, you allow yourself to just trust yourself through that process and really putting down the judgment and putting down the shoulds of what you think you should be doing and all of that. And it’s just something that can help you and that’s it, it’s a beautiful thing.

Thank you for joining me for this week’s episode of The Mindset School. Ready to dive deeper into finding your purpose and create a deeply fulfilling life? Visit soulsistercoaching.com for more guidance and resources. See you next week.