Ep #82: Getting Back to Basics with Barbara Churchill

You are listening to episode 82 of The Confident Coaches Podcast, the one where guest Barbara Churchill brings you back to the basics. Let’s go.

Welcome to The Confident Coaches Podcast, a place for creating the self-confidence you need to do your best work as a life coach. If you want to bring more boldness, more resilience, and more joy to your work, this is the place for you. I’m your host, Amy Latta. Let’s dive in.

Hey coach, how you doing? I’m excited to have you here today. It’s June. Does this year just keep flying by faster and faster? It sure does. It’s June and the Confident Coaches Mastermind starts in just five weeks. Are you ready to apply?

You know what, you’re going to be ready after today’s interview. I cannot wait. I am talking to Barbara Churchill today. Barbara was a CCM, Confident Coaches Mastermind client from last July. So a year ago, I was talking to her and bringing her into the mastermind.

And her story of where she was in 2018 and where she was when I met her in 2020 and where she is now, holy moly, do not get whiplash. This should come with a whiplash warning. This should be like one of those rollercoasters that comes with a whiplash warning.

Lock yourself in, my friends. Strap in because this is a gem of an interview. Barbara is going to tell you about hitting six figures, and then hitting bottom, and then coming back again. All by getting back to the basics. It’s so good. Let’s go.

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Amy: Okay coaches, I am so excited today. I have a brilliantly smart and beautiful and fabulous guest on today. A former client of mine, Miss Barbara Churchill. She was in my July class from 2020 and I think her story is going to knock your socks off.

Barbara helps high-achieving professional women stop procrastination, perfectionist, and people pleasing, and skyrocket their confidence and trust in themselves. She is also certified with The Life Coach School, like I am. I actually remember first seeing Barbara on my radar when I was at my very first Life Coach School mastermind event and there was 60 of us in the room and 12 people on stage who had hit six figures in a year as a coach, and I remember seeing Barbara on that stage being like, look at her go, I want to be one of those coaches one day.

So I am so excited to have her on because I think when you hear about Barbara’s background, some things that have happened, and where she is now, let me let her tell her story. Alright, Miss Barbara, how are you?

Barbara: I’m doing really good Amy. It’s so good to be with you. Thanks for having me.

Amy: Absolutely. So why don’t you give us a little bit of why do you coach, why do you love who you coach?

Barbara: Yeah, sure. I mean, I’ve been an entrepreneur most of my life and a businesswoman most of my professional career, and becoming certified was the next logical thing for me to do with the businesses that I had because people were always coming to me and saying, “Well, what should I do? How should I do this? Or hey, I want to bounce something off you.”

And I thought, shoot, I’m coaching these people, I should just get certified and be a coach. So I did that. I went through The Life Coach School and oh my gosh, it was like the heavens parted and all the stuff because what we learned there is so powerful. It feels simple but it is so profound.

And I thought, you know what, I have to bring this to other women, I have to share this. This can’t be a secret. So I wanted to zoom in on kind of the confidence piece because it has always been this worthiness piece for me has always come up in my life.

I was raised in a pretty dysfunctional family with alcoholism and all of that stuff, so there was that underlying threat and confidence was always something I was striving to find. And I was of course looking outside of myself for it, looking for achievements and all of those things.

So when I started coaching women and I found really how to get that confidence and experienced it myself, I was like, yeah, I’m going to share this with as women as I can because all the crap that’s in our heads, I want them to understand that’s just thinking. And we can change it. We don’t have to live at the effect of our brains.

Amy: That right there I feel like is the secret to the universe.

Barbara: I know.

Amy: Wait, what? You mean what happens in my brain doesn’t just happen to me? So were you coaching confidence before you started the Confident Coaches program?

Barbara: I was. And I started with this thing, women and worthiness and all that kind of stuff. And helping them understand that worthiness has nothing to do with your value as a human being. I mean, you are worthy just because you breathe. So when we’re born, that’s where we start.

But we’re never taught that and society certainly doesn’t support that. So we get all of these messages that we have to achieve, achieve, achieve, we have to do this, we have to make people happy, we have to do all the things. It’s like wait a second, time out.

We get all mixed up in our heads and we’re following all these beliefs that just don’t align with who we are as people or who we want to be, or we’re thinking the outside world is going to make us happy. All of that stuff. So I was like, we’re going to dive in, we’re going to take that apart.

Amy: Right. Well you know I’m 100% on board on all of that. The whole worthiness conversation of how we – it’s something that I teach in the mastermind, that worthiness scale, where is this line that you could ever possibly cross where you lose worthiness as a human? And of course the secret answer is there is no line.

Barbara: Yeah, you are born worthy. But the messaging we get in our lives is we have to prove our worth. It’s so backwards. And we don’t. We really don’t. We just get to add whatever we want to add, the value we want to add to the world, and figure out what our brilliance is and then go forth and share that.

Amy: So let me ask you this. So I first saw you, again, you first popped up on my radar, that would have been – my goodness, maybe the summer of 2017 I would have first seen you up on that stage. And so after that, we ended up meeting again in a group together. How did you find me? Where were you when I popped up on your radar as like, this work that this woman is doing is something that I need?

Because from the sounds of it, you had a six figure, you coach confidence, you’re speaking the lingo, you’re doing the work, you’re 100% on board. So tell me a little bit about that.

Barbara: Yeah, I was really good on paper. So I’m looking at my life coach thing, it said 2018. That’s when I got my 100K club and above award. Here’s what’s fascinating. When you think that your success is going to bring you confidence, when you think something, you achieve will then make you confident, you’re always going after achievement, achievement, achievement.

So I lived in the A line. All of us coaches, we know what the A line is. The action line. And I thought okay, actions are going to give me what I want. So I totally lived there. And what happened was after that, I had some pretty big life changes happen in my personal life.

And one of them was when I lost my mom. It was right before the pandemic hit. And she passed away in her home and we found her a couple days later. And it was really, really a difficult time. And I met you at a group in that February and I just loved your energy, I was listening to you asking questions and asking things, and I thought, I got to look this woman up.

So of course I was supposed to be listening but what am I doing? I’m looking you up. And I was in this group because I thought there was something wrong with me, I was at my breaking point, I was like, I should be able to get my act together here, I should be able to do this. I was should-ing all over myself.

And feeling just in the spiral of such a huge piece of lack of confidence. I mean, the self-doubt – I mean, I’ve run three different businesses successfully. But these personal things, I allowed those personal items, and they were large mind you, but I allowed them to really take me down.

So when I looked at your program, I thought this is where I need to be. I need to get back to basics. That’s what just kept going back through my head. I need to get back to basics. I need to practice the things that got me to where I am. But not just practice those, really take it to the next level. And I remember being on the phone with you on a consult and you were like, “Why are you signing up for this?”

Amy: By the way, everybody that’s listening, trust the people that are coming to you. It tells you the lack of confidence I had in me in that moment of like, Barbara, you look really great on paper.

Barbara: Yeah. And I’m very proud of my achievements and everything, but you know what, at that time, the ground, I felt like the ground underneath me was just shaking and the whole foundation was really moving.

Amy: So I have a question about that. Why do you think that is? Knowing what you know intellectually, why do you think that foundation felt so shaky at that time? What do you think changed in your thinking? A woman who’s built three successful companies, and you’re right, it was the wrong mastermind stage – my second mastermind, so 2018. Now I remember. Why do you think that foundation got shaken up? What do you think was going on up here?

Barbara: Well, I made certain things mean certain things, like I lost my mom. When you lose your parent, it doesn’t matter what kind of relationship you have with that parent, that is a large loss in your life. Finding someone a couple days after they’ve passed away is not a pretty sight either.

And then I had another large issue happening in my personal life at the same time and my brain, I allowed my brain to just run amuck and tell myself this is just too much, I can’t handle this, how can I work, how can I do my business. And then once you start in that spin cycle of negativity, you just go.

When you aren’t managing your mind, when you aren’t standing back and observing these thoughts that are coming in and putting them in check, it’s like a toddler with scissors. No good can come from that. So I’m not diminishing the impact of these losses. What I’m saying is I allowed them to overtake my thinking, my confidence, my thinking about myself, my thinking about my business, my thinking about how I can deal with things. All of that.

And I think that’s very common, at least with the women that I coach. It’s very common that we allow these outside circumstances to really take their toll and it’s not that they aren’t big and important, it’s that you make them mean something that they absolutely don’t mean.

Amy: I love that distinction right there. Because we’re actually recording this the day after the anniversary of my own dad’s passing. So there is something foundation shaking about losing a parent and you’re right, no matter the relationship. And I understand that.

And I love this distinction. It’s not that the event that we – the event isn’t as big of a deal as I’m making it out to be. No, but I love this question, what am I making this event mean about me and who I am? And still holding space that the event in and of itself can be an event that we are going to grieve through, we do need to process our emotions through.

Barbara: Yeah. I empathize so deeply with so many people who lost loved ones that you cannot have that closure of a celebration of life and everything. You’re just kind of in this – your brain tells you you’re in this limbo, you can’t move forward, you can’t grieve, where are you?

And again, it’s just the observing of that and saying, you know what babe, it’s okay, it’s really okay. These are weird times. You can grieve, you can deal with all of these things, you can. I got you. It’s okay.

Amy: Yes. I think that is really important. It’s not that we – I’ve heard this on the flip side, like oh, so I’m just not supposed to be knocked down by this, insert devastating event, tragedy event, and we can argue semantics on what’s a circumstance. But life is 50/50. There’s 100% of the time, we are going to have – I think about this even just my day yesterday.

I taught for my coach’s guest instructor, it was my son’s 15th birthday, it’s also the anniversary of my dad’s death, and my dog has a torn ACL and he had to go to the vet and we had to get him fixed. That happened just in 24 hours.

Barbara: Right. And I think the big thing for me was that I forgot to practice not judging myself. That self-love piece that comes in, it’s like I should be able to handle this, I should be able to handle everything that’s coming at me. Really? What if it’s okay to just have a few days where you’re just like a puddle and that’s okay? Just feel it, do whatever you want to do, if you’re going to eat chocolate all day, fine my friend, just make sure it’s really good quality.

Amy: Yes.

Barbara: I mean, just feel really shitty, be okay with it. No one is going to freak out if the social media post isn’t done or the article isn’t written or whatever it is that’s on the plate. Right now, what you need to attend to is you and you need to really just scoop – I needed to just scoop myself up and love on myself. And instead, I beat myself up.

Amy: Right. Why do you think you did that? What was your flavor of beat yourself up?

Barbara: Well, listen, everybody goes through this. There are people that are worse off than you, the old yada yada, all of that. Listen, you can handle this, you can handle this, your mom lived a good life, she was 87. I mean, I should be able to be stronger, better, bigger, faster, whatever. It’s all the shoulds. And it’s such a crock.

Amy: What do I have to complain about?

Barbara: Yeah. And totally denying that listen, these were large things. And it’s okay. It sounds so basic but so many successful women who have a lot on their plate, they don’t allow themselves the space to feel what they need to feel in order to function. So we just take it and put it in a nice tidy box and we think that we’re going to revisit it someday. Yeah, I know, right?

And then what happens is we never go to that box and it just keeps getting more and more full until it explodes. And then we go, what is happening? Well, we really need to be taking care of ourselves in the emotional way. There’s so much about self-care and all of that stuff, pedicures and manicures and massages and all of this and hey, go for a spa day, or just sleep in or whatever.

What about your emotions? Are you allowing those? Are you feeling those to their fullest so that you can process and release them? Instead of carrying them in your body somewhere because they’re going to come bite and bite your ass if you don’t.

Amy: You know, it’s so funny, I want my listeners to know that I can see Barbara on the screen and I didn’t realize it until she said feel it in your body and release it, I didn’t realize that even just right now, my shoulders were a little tense and my teenage son’s just gotten home from high school, he was making a little bit of noise, I was flagging him.

And just her reminding me in that moment, and that’s really – sometimes it’s as simple as just having a reminder. In that moment – there’s a sign behind her that says just breathe. Yes. Just as you sat there, oh yeah, my shoulders are tight, I’m tense, why am I tense? Just be here with Barbara here in this moment.

And our ability to do that repeatedly over and over again to just be with wherever we are in that moment, that is actually going to get us farther than trying to resist that and power through it and tell ourselves, listen, get over it, move on, put this in a box, we got stuff to do.

Barbara: Yes, because that puts us in the action line. Because it feels better to do something. Then you feel useful. I’m doing something, I’m taking action, I’m doing something. When you allow yourself to feel and you give yourself that space, you are doing something. You’re doing one of the most loving things you can do for yourself.

Amy: So good. What are some of your favorite – do you have certain practices or things that you remember to do for yourself? Just right there in that moment, you just even saying it out loud reminded me to take a breath. But do you have any favorite practices or rituals or routines that you follow to really help that feelings practice?

Barbara: I make it a practice every morning to get up, I have these stack of books that are these daily reads that I do. Because I want to start my day with the right mindset. I don’t want my feet to hit the floor and I’m already thinking of my to-do list and 45 things I need to do. That isn’t going to get me anywhere. It’s going to get me in that overwhelm space.

So I have these beautiful books that I read that are a little bit spiritual and just – I read the daily reads and most of them are dogeared because I’ve been reading these same books forever. But isn’t it funny how you find one thing and you’re like, oh my god, I never read that before, of course you did. You’ve had this book for 10 years.

Amy: I know. I’m like, oh yeah, I read that book years ago, I should probably pick it up again.

Barbara: I know. And then I do some tapping, EFT tapping, and I have scripts that I follow because tapping is like acupuncture, only in motion. So if you’ve ever thought of tapping, you can Google it, and I just have some scripts that I go through and I find it really beneficial. Acupuncture I’ve never gotten any benefit from but tapping on the points I have really gotten benefit from.

Amy: Interesting. I have done some acupuncture but I’ve never really – I don’t know what tapping is. I’ve not tried it, but I’ve never made it something that I do.

Barbara: For me, it’s super beneficial and you have certain points and they guide you through it. But it’s the script and it’s the saying of the words out loud and the tapping, the meridians or whatever were tapping but it works really well for me. I always feel energized and just – I don’t even know what the word is. I just feel better. I feel like okay, solid, here we go.

Amy: Love it. Anything else? What else do you like? So the books that you love to start with every day, EFT tapping…

Barbara: I also do some exercises. And I also – I get out in nature a lot. That’s important to me. I got to breathe some fresh air, especially this time of year when everything is blooming. I love that. Lilacs are on right now and oh my gosh, I can’t fill my lungs enough with that smell. I absolutely love it.

I do my thought work and that sounds so basic but it’s so important. I spend some time with my thoughts, not just doing a bunch of models but really paying attention to what do I want to think? What do I really want to feel right now?

And in your program, we talk a lot about future self. And I loved that. I totally loved that whole section on it and I have my book, I have my huge notebook with all the dodgers and…

Amy: It’s like, tabs, there’s sticky tabs all over it.

Barbara: So many.

Amy: So happy right now.

Barbara: So many. But you know, when you do that, when you really think of who do you want to be and all of that, it’s – for me, it wasn’t like – I always used to think about that in the future. Who do I want to be in the future? And it was more kind of a dreamy, oh, it would be nice to do this. It was more fantasy-like.

But now it’s reality. Who I want to be in the future, I am that right now? And my future self, I named her Grace. What does she do every day? There’s a 14-point thing, and then I described her, and I read that to myself and it’s like – I don’t have any tattoos, but I’m considering getting a tattoo with the word grace because it means so many good things to me.

Amy: It would make me so happy to see you getting tattooed.

Barbara: You’re so sadistic because those hurt. I’m just kidding.

Amy: I know. I have one right here.

Barbara: Oh, you do. See, and I was thinking about that’s where I would get it.

Amy: It’s excruciatingly…

Barbara: I hope they write fast. Grace is only five letters.

Amy: I have a lotus flower. Maybe it’s a little more intricate than a five-letter word. But yeah, it’s actually just really funny because I think even the tattoo thing, I really want to get my nose pierced and I’ve started doing my nails more, which it’s not so much as a form of self-care, like let’s go mani pedi, as much as it is that future version of me.

I think she has a little more flair than the Amy Latta who’s been walking the earth for the 40 years previously, or at this point almost 50 years previously. I think she shows off a little. I think she…

Barbara: Yes, she does. I will tell you she does. Yes.

Amy: This is one of those things when people talk about worrying about getting older, I’m like, don’t worry about that. I love that so much of this is becoming so much more mainstream and younger. People are learning about these things younger and younger, but I think it also comes with a lot of willingness to tap into and really believe in a version of yourself that you’ve never allowed to be seen before. There is a little bit of…

Barbara: I think in your 40s, and this is just me, but I think in your 20s and 30s, you’re all about achieving and reaching and getting there and all of that. In your 40s, you’re going to go okay, I’ve done that, now what? Is this is? You start to question, is this really – there’s a deeper need. We need more depth in our world. We need more connection, we need something – what is our purpose? Kind of questioning that.

In your 50s, you’re really just hitting your stride and you don’t care what people think. I mean, you just don’t. If you have an opinion of me and it’s really crappy, okay fine whatevs. I don’t care. I don’t care.

Amy: It’s so good. I think this conversation is good because I think when we’re talking about confidence, becoming a more confident person, it shows up in different ways. Because other people’s opinions are way bigger of a deal in your 20s and 30s than when you’re in your 50s, but here you were, you still had a confidence shaking – your confident foundation was still shook. And it wasn’t really about other people’s opinions. It was a whole other facet of confidence.

Barbara: It was. But I made it mean – when you’re in that spin cycle and you don’t put the brakes on, you just go. You go wherever your brain’s going to take you. And I made it mean a lot of things about myself. And yes, I had success and I’ve been successful, but now, of course, your brain brings you back to wow, see, told you it wouldn’t last, told you you weren’t good enough, whatever it’s going to do to find evidence to prove whatever it’s currently thinking.

And when you don’t check in and say wait a second, that’s not true, and go look for evidence to the contrary of all of your successes, then you sit with that, and you start to really believe it. And it was so beautiful to be in the space of the mastermind because not only doing the solo work and doing the worksheets and really taking the time, but listening to other people say the exact same thing.

There’s such a beautiful support and power in being in a very small group of women that you so admire. And you know, from the outside, everybody’s oh my god, I would never think that you lacked confidence. Well yeah, but we always compare our insides to other people’s outsides, which is comparison never works anyway. But we never really know what’s going on inside anybody.

So that was such a great thing to not only have that oh my gosh, that’s happening to her too, that feeling of alright, we’re in this together. Then the support that we can give each other and say listen sister, I have so been there, I get that. You and I both know intellectually that this thinking isn’t serving us, so let’s really get it down into our bones that what do we really want to believe.

Amy: 100%. It’s what I love about the mastermind I’m in and why I created the format that this is. A, you’re hearing other people get coached on something that you think you’re the only one on Earth struggling with, so not only am I not good enough, I’m the only one who’s dealing with this problem. I am the unicorn in the world.

Barbara: Of the seven billion people that are on this planet, I’m it.

Amy: I’m it. The only one that thinks they’re not worthy enough and not good enough, even though that’s literally the human condition to find right there. But then also you’re right, I think one of the things that I love and what can happen so much is that when you have those peers, I’ve created these tools and I created that workbook and I’ve created these modules, but hearing you all repeat them back or filter them through your brain and your experience, it just elevates the coaching completely.

Barbara: Oh yeah. And I think sometimes people are afraid to say – if you’re a coach particularly, and I really want your listeners to hear this, if you’re a coach and you are concerned that people are going to look at you differently if you go into a confidence mastermind, they’re going to look at you like, “Oh my god, why would I coach with her? Because she lacks confidence, she was in this mastermind,” no, no, no.

And I will share with you, that was my first thinking because I told Amy, I was having all these breakthroughs and I’m like, yeah, make me anonymous. Because my brain was saying, “You coach confidence, people aren’t going to hire you if you don’t have any,” which was all untrue.

I want your listeners to really understand is this is such an amazing thing. This is like getting your Masters. This is like going for the next level of education, only it’s on yourself. So of course people are going to hire you because you’re such a badass and you go in and you dive in and you’ve done all the hard work, you’ve lived through the gunk, and you’ve experienced it all, so you can of course help them with whatever it is that they present with.

Amy: It is so good. I did forget that. You’re right. The bulk of the mastermind, you were like, you can share the small things but do not put my name on it.

Barbara: Don’t put my name on it.

Amy: I even had my video producer Matt, he put some videos together and I was like, oh, I specifically told you don’t put Barbara in there, don’t put Barbara in there. And then I was like, wait a minute, I really want her on the podcast though, I’m going to ask.

Barbara: I think my experience – it’s so lovely to hear everybody’s success stories. And I think sometimes our brains use that to punish ourselves. Well okay, that gal made $100,000 in six months, that gal doubled her business in three months.

And then we go, “Well, I’ll never get there.” I think it’s so important to go, yeah, you know what, I’ve had a lot of success and then I didn’t. And I spiraled and I reached out for help. And now I’m back at an even better level. I like myself way more now than I did before because I like who I am, I like how I present. I am not perfect, I’m not trying to put that Instagram, Facebook perfect filter on my face.

This is who I am. This is life. It’s the good, the bad, the ugly. It’s all life and we all get through it if we just allow ourselves to be human. And I’m here to tell you here’s what fun, Amy. When I started being myself and being human and I would drop the F bomb every once in a while, and I would just do whatever in my writing and in my emails, I was signing clients. That’s when I started signing clients. That’s when I started really turning the corner. Because I only had one client the first six months of 2020. One client.

Amy: I remember.

Barbara: Holy Hannah, and then I just…

Amy: After six-figure years, after having that success. I want everybody to understand what she’s saying. She was on the stage in 2018 as a six-figure earner, and then in the first half of 2020, two years later…

Barbara: I had one client.

Amy: One client when we started working together.

Barbara: Yeah.

Amy: And this is what I just wrote down. It’s like, the success plus the confidence equals liking who I am here. It’s just the confidence.

Barbara: It’s just the confidence. It’s not even the success because here’s the thing; I like myself regardless but I will tell you, when I started having fun in my business, and I started thinking about my clients, and how can I help them instead of worrying about oh my god, I’m not doing this, I’m not doing this, I’m telling you what, if I dated me, I would have been like, really, you are so boring because all you say is the same thing.

It’s like yeah, no, sister, get a new tune. So when you make that shift and you start really liking yourself and you like what you have to offer and you are offering it to people and they’re like, yeah, I fought the thought thing for a long time because I was a unique snowflake. Yeah, it works for everybody else, it won’t work for me, I have to be action driven.

And that’s all the thinking that I was brought up with. When you choose your own thoughts, when you decide, I do get to choose my own thoughts and I don’t like that, I don’t like that thought it doesn’t work for me, I’m going to choose something else, then all the clients started coming. And then I was like, well shoot.

Amy: So good. So some obstacles to confidence really was where you were, there was something wrong with you, you were should-ing all over the place, tell me more about – and I know that we’ve had this conversation before, so how did you overcome that? I know going back to the basics. So what would you say that is? If somebody’s saying great, how do I go back to the basics? What does that mean?

Barbara: Totally start doing thought models. I mean, that is as basic as it gets. You need to understand…

Amy: Wait, you mean pay attention to what you’re thinking?

Barbara: Yeah, there you go. We’re not going to do…

Amy: That can’t be the answer.

Barbara: But that’s what I always thought. I totally thought, “Come on, I’ll do my models but really, that doesn’t work.” So how effective were they, right? They weren’t.

Amy: Here’s my paper, I turned in my homework. I have the A.

Barbara: That’s right. I did all of the equations in the math problem, I got them all right, they work, here’s the circumstance, the thought, the result, it’s all done. But you have to integrate it. And you have to take time to do it. So we’re not doing models just for the sake of doing models. We’re doing a brain dump, we’re picking out a couple of thoughts, and then we notice, you know what, this one keeps coming up, this one better be looked at heavy.

You’re always going to get what you’re getting if you don’t do any changing. And that’s the thing. It’s not difficult. This is very simple to do. Our brains don’t want us to grow so our brains are going to tell us all the time, no, you don’t have time to do that, no, you really need to take action, no, you really should be doing this, you should probably figure out a Facebook ad.

No. You know what, screw all the Facebook ads and everything else. Figure out what you want to think. And then go from that. Feel that way. And watch what happens. Honest to god, I’m like the poster child for fighting this as long as possible. I’m sure Brooke Castillo looked at me and shook her head more than once. Because it was like, listen…

Amy: She 100% looked at me and did it too.

Barbara: I know, right?

Amy: I’ll wait for you to figure out.

Barbara: You can just fight this as long as you want. I, on the other hand, am making money hand over fist. So you know, whenever you want to join me, come on in. But that’s what it is. It’s getting back to basics and it’s allowing yourself to feel and understanding that there is no arrival.

I think that’s such an important thing to know. Because we look at other people, we look at all the coaches out there and we think, “Oh my god, when I get to $100,000,” everybody wants to get to $100,000. You guys, it’s the hardest money you’ll ever make. Because you make it hard. And I’m here to tell you, I totally made it hard.

$200,000, half a million, whatever, that’s a lot easier because you’ve already made the first 100. So you just lather, rinse, repeat. But do the work, do yourself a favor and figure out how you want to feel. And make it more fun.

Amy: I want to be really clear here. People are still like, wait, she didn’t answer the question. She 100% answered the question. What does it mean to get back to the basics? Look in your head. Dump your thoughts on paper every single day. Find the ones that keep coming up. Really truly see – if you’re new to the podcast and we’re talking about the model, I have other podcasts on it.

But it’s your thoughts are driving your feelings, creating your actions, and creating results. Really pay attention to that. Understand that you have a choice. Her feelings practice that she talked about, how she really gets in touch with her feelings and really feels the negative thoughts she’s creating and the positive thoughts that she wants to be creating. Barbara is flat out telling you that’s what the basics mean. You all right now are being like, wait, I must have missed something. You didn’t miss it.

Barbara: That’s what I mean. When it’s so simplistic, our brains try to complicate it and say okay, there must be something else. She did something different because, and I’m going to wait for that. No. Find the thoughts that aren’t serving you because you’re thinking it every flipping day and create something new.

And I will tell you too, the other part of the basics was – I love this, and I use this with my clients all the time. Start a thought with it’s possible. Because when you start a thought with it’s possible, it just feels lighter. You don’t have to truly believe it. You don’t have to believe whatever you follow those first two words with, but it is possible. It may not happen but it is possible.

Amy: I actually have a client, she’s one of my last one-on-one clients, and it’s as far as we ever got her brain but it became a joke. It’s possible. Like fine, it’s possible. And now here she is, over a year, almost two years later and she’s like, oh my gosh, it actually was possible.

Barbara: But for me, that was the stepping stone that I needed. Whenever I want to start believing something new, because my brain’s going to resist it, I would say, okay well, let’s just start with it’s possible, and let’s just try that on for size and practice that for a little bit. Because it feels better. It just feels better.

Amy: Right. And your feelings drive your actions. If you’re like, this is what I want to believe and I just don’t, as soon as you put it’s possible in front of it, you feel just a little bit better and you take just a slightly better action than if you would have not done that.

Barbara: Well, not only that, but ideas come to you easier. You’re opening up. Our brains use so much space and energy to resist. It’s unbelievable. And when we just put that aside and we go, well, it’s possible, or what’s possible, or I’m curious, wow, then all of a sudden, all the stuff comes and you’re like, wow, that was cool, that’s a great idea, maybe I should try that, and then you just go with that. You know, it’s amazing. And I am such a firm believer now that it is, it’s all in your head. It’s all what’s happening in your head.

Amy: I love doing these interviews and people are like, wait a minute, did she just tell me it’s my thoughts? Okay, so we know big fan of the future self work, so becoming your own best mentor. That’s the third step of confidence. And getting back to the basics. Was there anything that you feel like you had to figure out on your own?

Barbara: It’s really interesting, and I think I alluded to it maybe a little bit earlier, but when I would dream about something, it was more like wouldn’t that be nice? But I never really believed it. It was like a fantasy. So you kind of daydream and you fantasize about things.

But I never thought that dreaming could be so solid, absolute believe in it, believe in it before it happened. So when I wanted to create the business that I really wanted, I would always just, “Well, maybe, and it would be nice,” kind of la-la, but I never believed that hey, this could truly happen. This could absolutely truly happen, instead of just kind of a nicety.

Amy: So it’s like dreaming – it’s still dreaming but you shifted it more from that’s a fantasy to this is a future reality.

Barbara: Wouldn’t it be nice if, oh, that would be so nice if, everybody’s like, I’d love to go to Italy, wouldn’t it be fun? But nobody believes they’re going to go or whatever. Well, no, I mean, here’s the deal; yeah, I’m going to be doing this. I am going to build my business to this number this year and this number next year, and in five years, I’ll be here. And yes, it’s a dream but it’s more of a reality. Let’s try to figure out a new word. Dreamality. I don’t know if that’s a word, I just made that up.

Amy: She’s coined it right here.

Barbara: I just made it up. And when you firmly start to step into that belief, I think it was believing ahead of time. We talk about that too. And I didn’t get that concept. That was just like, I had such a huge question mark above my head. I was like, what are you talking about? My brain hurt with that one.

And then I thought, oh, that’s the dreaming piece. That’s the dreaming piece and you not just dream about it, you believe ahead of time. You don’t have the results yet. You don’t have it yet. But you totally believe that it’s a done deal. And then how are you going to get there? Just go do it. Just go do it.

And that for me was something that I really worked on and I had a lot of scratching of the head and whatever, and then as is with most things that we resist, when we let go of the things that we’re resisting and we try a different avenue, then, oh wow, look what happens, things open up, stuff starts to shift. Just get of that damn resistance. It’s just such a drag.

Amy: That Italy trip thing, it’s kind of like the difference between oh yeah, wouldn’t that be nice, someday I might go to Italy, versus the person that says, “I am going to Italy.” And they start looking up areas of Italy that they want to visit. And they start looking at sample itineraries. They haven’t even bought a ticket yet. But they start visualizing. Maybe they even buy an outfit or something that they know that they’re going to wear when they get into that trip.

Because they actually believe that it’s happening. It might be a year or two or three out still. And I realize that in times of COVID, we actually don’t know when we can travel. But that aside, and I think that’s kind of that difference between like, yeah someday, wouldn’t it be nice if the thing I want is going to happen, versus no, this business is 100% happening, what small things can I do today that make that inevitable?

Barbara: And I think the other thing just popped into my head and it’s so true for me, the other thing is we put this timestamp on when it has to happen. What do you mean it has to happen? Well, if it doesn’t happen in a year then it’s never going to happen. What? What if it was okay – I mean, if you really want to go to Italy, what if you went in 10 years? Is that still going to be okay?

Amy: It’s worth 10 years.

Barbara: I think I did. I was there three weeks, I ate my way through, I’m telling you. And I will just say for your listeners, just as an aside, when you hear people say they go to Italy and they lose weight, it’s totally true. I ate gelato every freaking day, pasta, pizza, everything, I lost weight, because you walk around. That’s my little aside.

But we put this timestamp on things and isn’t it okay – I mean, if you want to make half a million dollars a year, and you tell yourself, okay, it has to happen this year and you don’t make it, does that mean it’s never going to happen? What if you made a half a million dollars in five years? Would that still be okay? Because if it’s not, send it over my way.

Amy: 100%. We’re really dealing with this in – I’m in a coaching group right now that’s a two-million-dollar oriented group. And the work of are you willing to keep doing this work and believe that it’s inevitable if it takes one year? Two years? What if it takes three years? And so just being able to – as soon as you make it okay that it’s going to take as long as it’s going to take, you can actually get there faster because you’ve stopped saying it has to happen by a certain date or it’s not worth it.

Barbara: Yeah, and you aren’t graspy.

Amy: Right. It’s like we chop off our nose to spite our face, we shoot ourselves in our own foot when we put this deadline. I have this all of the time where it’s I have to have x number of people in by December, and this literally did happen in 2020.

I need to have the people in the door by December 31st so it hits my books then. Okay, and it didn’t happen. And then two weeks later I had everybody. Am I really upset? No. I’m fine.

Barbara: Yeah. It’s like, oh, you know what, you guys are two weeks too late, I’m sorry, you can’t get in.

Amy: Nope, can’t have you, sorry. I closed up shop when I didn’t hit my goal by December 31st, I decided to pack it all in. And yet we do that all the time when we don’t sign that client by Friday or we don’t sign those number – or we don’t sign it by the end of the month, or yet another month where it didn’t happen. I guess it’s never going to happen, it should have happened by a certain time. As soon as we let that go, I wonder how it’s going to happen, it’s possible for it to happen, I’m so excited, I’m going to start acting like it’s already happening.

Barbara: I have to tell you, so when I started signing clients, I let go of the how because I’m just doing the things, doing my work, doing my thought work, all that stuff, feeling good. I had no idea where these women were coming from. And I would have consults popping up on my calendar, I’m like who is this person? I don’t know who you are.

But hey, I’m really happy you’re on my calendar. I had no idea. Somebody saw me speak three years ago. What? Okay, wow, I’m so happy that it was memorable for you, right? So I don’t care how they get on my calendar. I just am totally believing that they are getting on my calendar. And it continues to happen all the time.

So when you just let go of that stuff and you just totally believe this is happening because I’m in this for the long haul, I’m not just doing this for five years and then I’m out. I don’t have to make all my money in the next two years. No. I don’t ever want to retire, I don’t even know what that means. I have so much fun doing this and I love impacting other people, and I learn just as much from them as they learn from me. It’s just such a privilege, and just the deepening of all of that.

Amy: And I just even think about what you said there and how lucky all of us are to even have something that we do day in and day out that we feel that way about. Because I spent the first 10 years of my work life in corporate marketing and I guarantee you, I never felt that way. Did not feel that way at all. I was like, ugh, when you want to retire and you’re 28, that’s not a good sign.

Barbara: Oh my gosh.

Amy: You’re like, I really got to do this for 40 more years, huh. So we know that – so you started 2020, the first half of the year with that one client and a whole bunch of emotional should haves, not doing enough, not worthy enough. I’m going to go ahead and let you brag on yourself a little bit. What did you end up creating, my friend?

Barbara: The last half of 2020 I made – in those six months, I think I made $70,000. And then I think in – yeah, I just checked it. In the 11-month period, I made $125,000.

Amy: Holy cow.

Barbara: So I’m on track this year for $200,000.

Amy: For 2021?

Barbara: For 2021, yeah. And I’m having fun.

Amy: And you’re having fun.

Barbara: I’m having fun. Here’s a concept. And I’m a fun gal. I mean, seriously. I like to have fun. I like to tell jokes, I like to laugh, all the things. But in my business, I was so freaking serious. The have to’s and the shoulds and the got to’s and all that. When you get graspy and all that, everything dries up. Everything dries up.

You just got to allow. And I had corporate clients coming back to me. What? I had just let them go. I’m like, okay, love you, you’re difficult to deal with, you canceled everything last year, okay, love you, whatever. And they’re coming back, “Hey, we’d really like you back and we’d like you to do two of these,” and blah, blah, blah. And I tell them what the price is and they’re like, fine. And I’m like, yeah, cha-thing.

Amy: So good. And what I love about this story arc is here’s success, the way I think it’s supposed to look, but without that really liking who you are no matter where you are.

Barbara: That’s it.

Amy: I really think that’s your story, Barbara. Really liking who you are no matter who you are.

Barbara: And I think too, so many women and I know this is for my clients because they’re such brilliant women, as are your clients, and of course, you know, I’m one of them. But really liking who you are is absolutely essential for any kind of enjoyment of the success that you create. Because my clients are very successful, some of them you would definitely recognize.

And they don’t know how to love themselves. They don’t know how to look in a mirror and say, “Damn girl, love you, look at you, you’re just amazing the way you are,” and believe it. It’s not just a mantra kind of thing. It’s really liking who you are. And that shows.

That, you exude that and people are attracted to that. So even if you aren’t seeing people face to face because we’re in this Zoom world now, even if you’re not doing that, if you’re doing any kind of video stuff and it’s out there, or a podcast or anything, your energy that you bring, the fact that you really love yourself, like yourself, I tickle myself all the time. It’s hysterical. I make myself crack up all the time. If no one else is laughing with me – that’s an after five podcast.

Amy: That’s the wrong podcast.

Barbara: We both have a friend that has a podcast, perhaps we should go on that one.

Amy: I do have a vision of confidence in me, or in the bedroom, yeah. That’s future Amy’s work right there.

Barbara: Totally.

Amy: And I get what you mean. I love cracking myself up.

Barbara: I think I’m hysterical.

Amy: That’s the point. I think if you think you’re hysterical and if you like yourself, and for those of you that are like, I don’t know how to do that, this conversation is coming back full circle of the – when you were talking about women and worthiness and valuing ourselves, that’s all part of the having our own back section of the confidence program.

But just remembering I like myself even when this amazing thing, I like myself even when this not so amazing thing, and just seeing your likability, your lovability, your value, and your worth never changes no matter what’s going on on any given day.

Barbara: Totally.

Amy: So good. So do you have any nuggets or anything you want the listeners to walk away with?

Barbara: Oh my gosh, that could be a whole ‘nother podcast. I think the biggest thing for me is that you don’t change your life by doing things all the time, by the A line, by taking action, by executing. That’s what we are rewarded for in society, but you don’t change your life from that place.

It really is what are you thinking, what are you thinking on purpose. Not just the autopilot thinking, like the bottom of a news show where the scroll keeps going and it just keeps repeating. It’s what are you thinking on purpose and what are you feeling in that? And allowing that.

And man, just choose to believe – take the time really to just look at your thoughts objectively, choose what you want to believe in, and do it right now. So if you want to believe in yourself, if that’s a wish of yours, just choose to do that now.

Believe in your dreams now. Believe that they’ve already – they’re already a done deal. Believe it ahead of time. Believe it’s just ready for you because that’s what makes a huge difference. Don’t worry about the how because that will come. You’ll figure that out. But right now, just totally believe that whatever it is that you want is already here, and operate from that place.

Amy: Yes. How can people connect with you or anything else you want to share with our listeners right now?

Barbara: You can find me at barbarachurchill.com. That is where I land. I’m also on Instagram and Facebook and LinkedIn. I do have a worthiness manifesto, it’s all around leadership because the women that I coach are typically accountants, CPAs, lawyers, or in the corporate space and they have teams that they lead.

So if you want to go to my website and download that, you can. Certainly find me on social media. I am going to be doing a webinar in the next month and it’s all about the five top lies imposter syndrome tells you and how to stop believing them.

Because oh my stars, this is gold. I mean, my clients are like, coming to me with these all the time and it’s nope, your brain is believing this. So if you do want the worthiness manifesto, or you start to follow me, then I’ll be sending out the information for that.

Amy: So good. And guys, so her website was right there and we will have all of those links in the show notes so that you can make sure that you don’t misspell anything and you can connect with her. Barbara, that was amazing.

Barbara: I am so honored to be here. Amy, you know I adore you. Any time you need me, any place, anywhere you are, I’m there.

Amy: I think that your story is something so many coaches need to hear right now because I think they think, oh, there’s some magical destination that I am going to reach, and everything will be okay then. And I think that this right here, learning how to like who you are no matter where you are is the golden ticket for everybody, and you are a brilliant example of that.

Barbara: I think the magical destination if you want to call it that is inside of us. Of each of us. The magic is in me. And I figured that out, and so I really hope your listeners figure that out too.

Amy: So good. Alright my friends, well Barbara, thank you so much for being here with us and I can’t wait to connect with you again soon.

Barbara: Alright, thanks Amy.

Amy: Bye.

—

See? What did I tell you? Oh my goodness, that was so much goodness right there. I love how Barbara’s story really illustrates that confidence does not come from the success that you create. It’s not waiting for you.

And how she was confident or so she thought, but it was all confidence coming from the A line, from all of her actions. Not through what she was really believing about herself. Because even though she was looking good on paper, she was still trying to prove her worth. And she was still should-ing all over the place of what she should be doing, what she should not be doing.

And then when life handed her life on a platter, as it will often do, boom. And just that realization that getting back to the basics, practicing the things that got her where she was. And what she said here, I wrote this down. “You don’t change your life by action all of the time. It’s your thinking on purpose that changes your life.”

And ultimately, learning to really like who you are. Friends, this is what I love about confidence coaching, and in each of these interviews that I’ve brought to you this past month, the success, the clients, the new programs, the money, it’s great. Don’t get me wrong. It’s super fun. But that doesn’t make you more confident.

You learning to stop believing what you don’t have to, you learning to believe what you do want to believe about yourself, and learning to take the next best step from that place, that’s confidence. And it’s so simple. We overcomplicate confidence all of the time and it’s really not that hard.

Confidence is the foundation of your life coaching business. It’s not an option. It’s necessary. Because confidence isn’t some magical carrot waiting for you at some mythical finish line. It’s actually super simple and it’s available to you right now no matter what your clients look like, no matter what your calendar looks like.

And creating the confidence now is what’s going to guarantee that success without the hustle, without the extra frustration, without the constantly questioning yourself. You’re going to do that anyway, but you’re going to have the tools to work through it.

And I’m going to teach you those tools in Confident Coaches Mastermind. Applications open this month so make sure you take me up on that free offer at the end of this podcast because not only are you going to get the free training, but you’ll get the emails that say hey, July mastermind is open.

So connect with me, sign up for that free training, make sure you’re connected with me on Instagram @iamamylatta because like Barbara, getting back to the basics is what you need to feel more confident. Alright coach, I can’t wait to see what you create this week. And until next time, go to epic stuff.

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Thanks so much for listening to The Confident Coaches Podcast. I invite you to learn more. Come visit me at amylatta.com and until next week, let’s go do epic stuff.