[JOE SANOK] This is the Practice of the Practice Podcast with Joe Sanok, session number 795. I’m Joe Sanok, your host, and welcome to the Practice of the Practice Podcast. I am so excited that you are joining me today. We cover all those things that we never learned in grad school or maybe even learned along the way about the business of private practice, that stuff about starting, growing, scaling mindsets, things like that. That’s why I’m really excited today that we have Michele Molitor. Michele is an executive coach. She’s also the founder of Nectar Consulting and the author of the book, Breakthrough Healing. She works with professionals in various fields, bringing over 30 years of experience in regards to intuitive insights, strategic actionable ideas, and ways to achieve their success. Michele, welcome to the Practice of the Practice Podcast. So excited to have you here on the show. [MICHELE MOLITOR] Hey, Joe, thanks so much for having me. It’s great to be here with you. [JOE] Yes, yes. Well, I would love to hear, I know that, your story starts with a bit of a career transition. Why don’t we start there as to what was going on and how you got into this coaching world? [MICHELE] Sure. So in my former life, I was a creative director and graphic designer and web development. I had just moved to the San Francisco Bay area to come to work for a hot.com startup. We were going to IPO the week I started, I was like, oh, I’m going to be a millionaire. I have a golden ticket oh, except the market crashed instead that week, literally. I was like, oh, darn my G. But we kept toiling and I was working 70, 80 hours a week and growing my team that I had around me. Ultimately I ended up getting bullied out of my job by two guys that I hired for my team and it was really, really devastating. Over time, they chipped away at my confidence and created a massive case of imposter syndrome and ultimately it led to me getting fired, and I really was just left in a puddle. To make matters worse, the day I went home and called my mom to tell her about my bad day she’s like, “I’m sorry that you lost your job, but our friend is dying.” I was like, whoa So it was a really quick reality shift. I was like, so what? I lost my job, my good friend is dying. So I decided that I would figure out what I needed to do and move forward and I had a little vacation there, and I came back a couple days later from my vacation to find out that my friend had passed away. The tragedy of it was that he allowed himself to die. He was a gay man in a small town, and he was afraid to come out for who he authentically was and so he allowed himself to die. So I promised to him and to myself and to my higher self in that moment that I would not let fear rule my life, and I would figure out what I needed to do and put my big girl panties on and get on with getting on. In the process of all of that, I discovered coaching to help me figure out what my next steps were. That really was a pivotal moment for me, because what I really found was my true life calling. So I went on to get trained and certified as a professional coach and started my own business in 2001, and I’ve been doing it ever since. So along that path, Joe, I’ve been quite the learning junkie fueled by my imposter syndrome, do I know enough yet, do I know enough yet, do I know enough yet? I also am trained and certified as a hypnotherapist and so over the last many years, I’ve combined those two modalities together into what I call rapid rewiring. I’m able to take a real insight out approach, helping people get at the deeper subconscious blocks that are getting in their way, that are preventing them from growing their business, from expanding their lives in many different ways, improving their relationships, their health, their wellbeing, et cetera. So I’m super passionate about my work and delighted to be of service in this way to help people let go of the junk in their trunk they don’t need to carry around anymore. [JOE] Now, when you were making that transition into coaching I would love to hear, you have so many different certifications, how much of that was just wanting to build your education and your knowledge set? Like we all need to have a certain baseline of knowledge, and then how much of it was helping overcome some of that imposter syndrome to just almost overdo it in regards to certifications? Like, I see that all the time with people where they, when they don’t know what to do, they go back to school or they go back for another certification. It’s like that’s not really the, I don’t think your clients even care if you get even more letters after your name. So maybe talk about for you personally, when you were getting those certifications, when you were taking that learning, how much of it was your own just learning and wanting to have a baseline versus combating that imposter syndrome? [MICHELE] Well, for the first several years, it was definitely overcoming imposter syndrome, but I had stepped into a whole new field. So there was a lot to learn, and I’m fascinated by how humans tick and work and think. So the first several years of my practice, it was, yes, can I have another workshop, please? Can I move more of my own stuff out of the way so I can be the best coach, the best practitioner that I know how to be for people? Then beyond that, it was just delving more and more into aspects of neuroscience and somatics and quantum energy and all of those other multiple layers of what makes us human beings because our minds are such a fascinating place and how our thoughts impact our bodies and how we move through the world. So it’s just a joy for me to sit and study and learn now not because I have to, or I think I need to, but just because I absolutely love to learn about new stuff. [JOE] Yes. Now, when you think about the average person whether it’s clients that people listening to this may have, or even people that are listening what shakes them up? You talk about being unshakeable but what are some of the things that right now in this, we’re in this, I wouldn’t call it a lull with the pandemic, but I mean, there’s spikes and uncertainty in the world and many things that can shake us? What’s the average person worried about, anxious about, what’s shaking them? [MICHELE] Well, gosh, there’s such a myriad of things, from uncertainty in the economy to climate change, to just being able to safely go out into the world. I think all of those things have created a global sense of anxiety. It seems to have maybe calmed a little bit since we we’ve come out of 2020/21, but it’s still there. I think we all have a covid hangover. We got some PTSD from it for sure and it just creates this underlying sense of anxiety, which fosters our self-doubt, our lack of trust in ourselves, or lack of trust in others not necessarily believing in ourselves. That’s what creates that wobble in us, am I safe to do this? Can I trust myself to make this decision or go here or do that? I’ve just seen it expand exponentially over the last three years, which is why I created my How to Become Unshakable program. It’s really about identifying that deeper level of self-doubt that’s running you. I’ve identified five different self-doubt archetypes, and the more you can understand the doubts that are clouding your vision and your perspectives, the more you can move them out of the way and start to step back into your confidence, trusting yourself, trusting your intuition, and really reclaiming your confidence, standing up for your value and your worth, and being able to speak your truth. I think a lot of folks have lost parts of themselves over these last few years because of everything that’s been happening globally. So it’s really fascinating to see, but I’ve seen it through a lot of my clients. [JOE] Well, let’s go through those five self-doubt archetypes. I’d love to hear those. [MICHELE] Sure. There is the fearful follower, the procrastinating perfectionist, the anxious avoider, the shape shifter, and the reluctant resistor. What I’ve found is that, similar to the love languages, the five love languages, and we all have facets of each of those love languages, but there’s typically one or two that are most prominent that we operate from. It’s similar with the self-doubt archetypes. So when I talk about them, people are like, oh, I recognize that one and that one within myself but there’s usually the one who’s leading the charge. So each one is a little different based on the wounds that we’ve gathered over our lifetime and create this sense of self-doubt and the head noise, if you will, that we carry with us. [JOE] Will you drill into each of them a little bit? [MICHELE] Sure. So the procrastinating perfectionists, these are the folks who are afraid to get it wrong, so they will keep going, keep tweaking and adjusting till they get it just right because they’re afraid to be judged or ridiculed. The shape shifter, this is someone who oftentimes has had some level of deeper trauma or abuse as a child, and they shape and mold themselves to please those around them to stay safe. It’s a protective mechanism that they have created for themselves. The reluctant resistor, these are the folks who are reluctant to own their own value and worth their expertise, despite all of the accolades that they may have already achieved, because it’s never quite enough. They’re fearful of believing in themselves let alone putting themselves out there to be more visible. Let’s see. Our anxious avoider, this is my favorite. This one was mine that I took years to come overcome. The anxious avoider is the one who wants to hide out and not move forward or take steps forward because there’s just the fear of being judged, of being abandoned, of being not enough, is so overwhelming that it has them freeze and get caught in place. Then which one did I miss? Fearful Follower is the person who knows that they have a level of expertise, and yet they’re still not willing to put themselves forward because they don’t quite know enough yet. They don’t have enough letters after the name, or at least they tell themselves that, and so they hide out in the shadows and don’t allow themselves to shine fully. Each one of these impacts all areas of your life, but I found specifically that it shows up and how you present in your career or your business how you’re communicating effectively in various relationships, how you are dealing with conflict or not. It shows up in how you deal with money and abundance. It also shows up with your overall success and what you’re willing to allow yourself to have or not because of these different areas. So the more you can understand them and which one is the core driver, the more you can quiet them by counterbalancing it with evidence of the things that you have accomplished and who you are and getting clear on what makes you uniquely you and enabling yourself to love yourself for all of those facets. Because we all have had different traumas, different events in our lives that have shaped and molded us to become who we are. When you can learn how to take your greatest pain and turn it into your passion and purpose, then that’s a place of real joy and satisfaction because you’re operating from a place of service that’s truly aligned with your values and who you want to be in the world. [BRIGHTER VISION] When you’re in private practice, it can be tough to find the time to even review your marketing efforts, let alone to make improvements where needed. Whether you are a seasoned clinician with an existing website in need of a refresh or a new therapist, building a website for the first time, Brighter Vision is the perfect solution. By first understanding your practice and what makes it unique, Brighter Vision’s team of developers are then able to create you a beautiful website that will attract your ideal clients and get them to contact you. Better yet, they also provide unlimited tech support to make sure it’s always up to date and professional Search Engine Optimization to make sure you rank high in online searches all at no additional cost. But best of all, we’ve worked with them to create a special offer just for Practice of the Practice listeners. Get your first three months of website service completely free. To take advantage of this amazing deal, head on over to brightervision.com/joe. Again, that’s brightervision.com/joe. [JOE SANOK] Do you find certain industries tend to have more like a particular archetype that’s drawn to those industries? [MICHELE] Oh, that’s a great question, Joe. I hadn’t looked at it through that lens, but I will [JOE] Excellent. Well, because I was also wondering like if there’s certain — [MICHELE] Done my research. [JOE] Yes, I mean also like, are there certain Enneagram types that maybe are drawn to certain things or even are, does one gender tend to sway in one way or another because of societal expectations or like those nuanced things make me wonder how it looks in different cultures or different communities. So yes, that would be interesting to know if even like our therapists predisposed to certain things because when I think about those, the paralyzed, was it paralyzed perfectionist? Was that what it was? [MICHELE] The procrastinating Perfectionist? [JOE] Yes, I mean, I think at least what I see is a lot of people that have gone through higher education and like say, get a doctorate, and they had to have a thesis and they had to have their dissertation, that they’re trained to do it perfect. So if you don’t, it’s you may not pass your boards, you may, do not do this. So I just wonder if there’s certain ways of thinking that are more apparent in certain industries, [MICHELE] That’s a really, really great point. I will definitely have to look at that because it’s always fascinating to me how we do get caught in these different perspectives of ourselves. So I have, you can look at these and see how someone who’s more of an extrovert or an introvert might be impacted in different ways by these archetypes or someone who’s more big picture thinker versus down in the details thinker. You can align these in different ways to say the DISC or the talent dynamics assessment profiles and different way shapes and forms. So there’s lots of different ways to slice it. But you’ve expanded my perspective on some things that I need to look at further. So I’m super excited about it. I’m like, ooh, maybe, maybe there’s a Ph.D. in me in there for me for that, huh,. [JOE] Yes. Well, and I wonder, so when people first identify this, I mean, it’s one thing to identify, it’s another thing to take action, change our mindsets, challenge just ways that we’ve been taught to think. So what do people do after they identify what self-doubt archetype they have? [MICHELE] Sure, absolutely. Well, once you identify it, that’s half the battle. Then you start to look at and pull apart what’s the evidence that you’ve been telling yourself to support that belief versus the opposite of that evidence. So for example, if you think you’re a shapeshifter, you’re masterful at juggling multiple roles just to please others, and you can see while I do that here and here and here and here, yes, I’m a great shape shifter. But then by taking in another layer deeper, well, what’s the reason, what’s at the root of why you’re having to juggle and please multiple people. That’s the place that I’m able to take people through my rapid rewiring because we’re able to get at the deeper subconscious levels to see what those root causes are. Then from there, you are looking for new evidence of, well, what makes me confident, what makes me unique? So my How to Become Unshakable program, it’s a seven week online program that helps people go through this at their own pace. There’s a ton of exercises that they go through to first uncover those old beliefs that have been the driver, have been driving these actions and behaviors but then to really flip that, I call it a quantum flip because just like in quantum physics a particle that is going in one direction can, on a dime, literally flip and go the other direction. So you can do that with your beliefs as well. If you can tell yourself, I’m not good enough, you can just as easily tell yourself I am good enough. Then it’s a matter of telling yourself that over and over and over again until it drops into your subconscious, literally rewiring your brain with new neural pathways of, oh, I am enough. Why did I ever think I wasn’t enough? Oh, because so-and-so told me that when I was this age or that age, but I know that not to be true now because I’m standing here in this adult perspective in this present moment and can see the evidence that I am enough. That alone, shifting your perspective is what can help empower people to then move forward more powerfully, more confidently, and to stand in their own value and worth in a way that perhaps they’ve never done ever before in their lives. [JOE] It makes me think about like the research on the default mode network in the brain, and how they’re finding that, whether it’s breathwork sessions or psychedelics or different things that can help rewire the brain if adding hypnosis might be tapping into that same sort of thing in regards to rewiring of the brain. [MICHELE] Yes, hypnosis has been proven to be very effective. It has like a 93% effectiveness rate. So part of the tools that I use, I combine a variety of different tools together in the work that I do. Hypnosis is one of them. When you’re able to access that subconscious part of your brain, which is 90% of your thinking power, all the memories, all the things that have ever happened to you are neatly stored there. So when you can get at the root cause that moment in time where you made a choice about yourself, oh, I have to do this to protect myself. I have to be a certain way to stay safe, because our brains just want to keep us safe, so in identifying those moments, then you can start to re rationalize it. Well, I’m not in that place. I’m not in that space. I’m not in that situation anymore. I’m here and now and in this here and now I am safe and I am enough and I can believe in myself. Then part of what I create is a customized recording with Binoral Beat Music and a whole series of words and phrases that I weave together based on the individual conversations I’m having with a client. Then they listen to that recording every night as they drift off to sleep because your brain is always listening. So by listening to it, your brain loves repetition, so the more you listen to it, the more those new empowering thoughts and beliefs are sinking in at that much deeper level, building those new neural pathways. So over a period of typically 20 to 30 days, someone is able to start seeing themselves in a whole new perspective, which then starts to shift their behaviors and their attitudes not only towards themselves, but towards their business, towards their relationships, towards their career, in whatever shape or form that might be. So it’s a combination of things that helps create that much deeper level of learning and transformation, which is why I love it, because it is so powerful. [JOE] I would love to hear the business side of how you think through things and how important has it been to take what you were doing with people and codify it and put it into systems or courses or products? Maybe talk a little bit about that because I think a lot of therapists, they listen, they are doing great work in the session, but they don’t always think, hey, I could turn this into an e-course or I could turn this into some sort of handout or some sort of system. Maybe talk about that process of codifying what you do into something that goes beyond just your one-on-one work. [MICHELE] Yes, absolutely. So you take all of the knowledge that you’ve gathered over the years, the wisdom, and for me it started with writing. I just started writing articles about different topics, and then those articles started morphing into different master classes where I would expand on a particular topic. Let’s talk about your relationship with money, let’s talk about your relationship with yourself, let’s talk about these various things. Then each of those, they all become assets that you have in your library, if you will, of things that you can start to offer to clients, whether it’s a free masterclass or a paid masterclass. Then from there I saw, well, gosh, I have this body of information. How can I take all of this and pour it into an online program that can then be shared with a lot more people versus just the one-on-one work with me individually? So there’s different tools you can use to create courses. I have a whole catalog of stuff in a tool called Kartra. That’s great for memberships and email generation, et cetera. Another tool that I use is cajabi. It’s specifically for the course, the courses that I offer. Because they have different strengths, just like humans. All the different software programs out there offer different strengths and tools that you can use. So for all the folks who are listening who want to start creating their own library or take the library that they already have and put it into an online space so that then they can then serve more people, do your homework. Find the one that is best suited to what you’re trying to do. Is it just writing? Is it creating masterclass? Is it creating variety of online courses or tools or workbooks that are going to speak to your expertise and to your target audience? So it’s been a process. But I write a lot, let me put it that way. I’ve had colleagues that I’ve hired to help me with social media, et cetera and they’re like, “Michele, you have more content than anyone we’ve ever worked with.” I was like, yay, I win a prize. [JOE] Well, I think that just finding the things that you’re saying over and over and saying, well, how can I give this to a different audience that maybe can’t work individually with me or wants to work at a self-pace, or it becomes just an add-on to the coaching that you’re doing to be able to have just that library as such an asset. I know that when, whether it’s a consulting package or people joining one of our membership communities to be able to say, yes, we have 30 plus e-courses that you get access to as part of your $99 a month. That’s a huge asset that goes beyond just one-on-one time with someone or something like that. So great that you’re doing that, Michele, the last question that I always ask is, if every private practitioner in the world were listening right now, what would you want them to know? [MICHELE] Gosh, first of all, thank you for the good work that you’re doing. We’re in trying times right now, and I would say we’re in a global mental health crisis that we’re finally acknowledging. So I really appreciate the brilliant work that each of you are contributing to others in the world who need your assistance. Then beyond that is to remember that when you get caught in your own head noise and your own fear or self-doubt because of what’s happening in your own life is take time to pause and to breathe and recenter yourself and know that everything’s unfolding in its own perfect timing and that you are enough and you can do this and you’re brilliant and talented and keep doing what you’re doing because the world needs you. [JOE] So awesome. Michele, if people want to connect with you and connect with your work what’s the best place to find you? [MICHELE] They can always find me at michelemolitor.com. It’s Michele with one L and LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram on Facebook. You can come play in my Rewire for Success group and share and contribute your brilliance there as well. Everyone’s welcome and yes, I am always happy to have a complimentary discovery call with folks who are curious about this work, who are ready to let go of some nagging old beliefs that no longer serve them and see how you can let that go more easily, more quickly than you might be able to do on your own. [JOE] Thank you so much for being on the Practice of the Practice Podcast. [MICHELE] Oh, my sincere pleasure. Thank you, Joe. [JOE] I just love the idea that you all have all these ideas inside of you or just natural approaches to how you’re doing therapy, how you’re in the session that you could turn into a book, you could turn into a course, you could turn into a membership community. We’re so excited to continue to support people all the way through. Our audience Building Academy is one area where folks really have been taking that knowledge inside and growing. That’s a six-month milestone based program. The next cohort doesn’t start until March but then after you do level one of Audience Building Academy, then you can come into the membership community. It’s just an awesome thing to see, to see people taking these amazing skills that you have in session and turning it into something that can help the world on a broader scale. Also, we couldn’t do this podcast without our amazing sponsors. Brighter Vision is the premier website designer out there where you pay a low price every single month for your website, but you also get that support, that hosting all of that. Recently we actually had our website go down. We had a dedicated server, so we’ve way outgrown what a Brighter Vision website would be. We had a dedicated server and then that host sold to this big corporation and it was a complete train wreck and our website was down for a couple days and our internal IT person had to work with them. But if it had been a Brighter Vision website and it had been down, I’ve had friends that they went, their site went down and they were able to just call Brighter Vision and by the end of their counseling session it was back up. Again to have someone behind the scenes doing that for you is so amazing. If you use promo code, [JOE], go over to brightervision.com/joe, you’ll get a handful of months for free. They also give you some free SocialGenie, which will help with your social media. They’re a great company, so check them out today. Thank you so much for letting me into your ears and into your brain. Have a great day. I’ll talk to you soon. Special thanks to the band Silence is Sexy for your intro music. This podcast is designed to provide accurate and authoritative information in regard to the subject matter covered. This is given with the understanding that neither the host, the producers, the publishers, or the guests are rendering legal, accounting, clinical, or other professional information. If you want a professional, you should find one.