Michelle Theriault 00:00:00  There’s something so terrifying about trusting yourself before you’ve given it a chance. Like it doesn’t matter how many times you hear, you got to trust yourself. Trust yourself. Eventually, something clicked for me that made me go, oh, if it’s true for them, what’s true for me? What if I can actually trust myself? I actually remember the moment I had that and I decided, well, it’s real risky. I can trust these people’s wisdom for themselves, but like, for me, it’s risky. But I’m going to give it a try. From that point on, I was just hooked.

Katy Ripp 00:00:37  Hey there, fellow rebels, welcome to #ActuallyICan, the podcast where we say a hearty hell yes to designing life on our own terms. I’m Katy Ripp, a lifestyle coach, business mentor, and serial entrepreneur here to guide you through the wild ride, defying what society expects of us and embracing our authenticity. On this show, we dive deep into taboo topics like death, money, spirituality, entrepreneurship, unapologetic self-care, and personal development, all while swearing and laughing along the way.

Katy Ripp 00:01:09  Expect down and dirty conversations, plenty of humor, and a whole lot of exploration, leaving you feeling empowered to be your truest self. Whether you’re craving a good laugh, seeking unconventional self-care tips, or simply looking for some camaraderie. You’ve come to the right place. We only get this one short life, so buckle up and let’s design yours on our own terms. Ready to dive in? Let’s go. Okay. Well, Michelle, thank you for joining me today. Michelle. And I never can pronounce your last name. Right. So you do it.

Michelle Theriault 00:01:43  Theriault. It’s French.

Katy Ripp 00:01:45  Theriault. Theriault Michele is one of the coaches also. We’re going to get into her actual title here in a second. But from the Mind Rebel Academy. And if you’ve been listening for a while you’ll know that that’s where I got my certification for my lifestyle coaching business mentoring, but really full on, heartfelt, soul led coaching. This is always a funny story that Taryn, when I first talked to her, asked me how I found her, and I said I literally went on to the ICF website and looked for a cool name and like I never reached out to anybody else.

Katy Ripp 00:02:23  I clicked on Mind Rebel. I got into it, and then I was like, I booked a discovery call and I think I signed up that day and she was like, God, I spend a lot of marketing dollars. And to know that it’s just a link on the ICF, I was like, well, for at least one person. So welcome, Michelle. Thank you. So happy to have you. So Michelle was actually the lead of my cohort. And there are other cohorts I think we had. Wow. What do we have 13 or 14 hours maybe. She just said to me I’m not numbers or time, so don’t ask me. I think it was maybe 10 to 14. Maybe.

Michelle Theriault 00:03:01  I think you might be right somewhere in there. It’s funny. Human connections and energy. Stick with me. Time numbers, Like, I don’t know if it’s been six months. Three years, I don’t know.

Katy Ripp 00:03:18  Well, as a matter of fact, the MRA quote of the day was from Maya Angelou, which was, you’ll never remember how someone you’re I’m not gonna I’m gonna butcher it, but you’ll always remember how they made you feel.

Katy Ripp 00:03:30  So obviously that works for you. Yeah, yeah. So today I would really love to get into. Well, one of the things that’s so fascinating to me is I didn’t really actually know that much about coaching before I got my certification. Curious if that’s common. or even if you have that stat or if.

Michelle Theriault 00:03:49  Yeah, you know what? It’s I have seen two really distinct camps. There’s the camp of people who have been researching coaching for a long time. They’ve been on the ICF website, searching in a very different way than you, and they’ve been comparing schools, and they know enough about coaching and the ICF that they kind of know what it is. But there are so many people, Taren included, who went into coaching without actually truly understanding what it was saying. You know, I’m going to tell one of Taren stories for her, but she got into coaching because she thought, I give such good advice to my friends. She was the go to person. Friends would come to her, yeah, people would come to her and she would give them advice.

Michelle Theriault 00:04:39  And she thought, I am so good at giving advice. I’m going to go into coaching and I don’t know, like a week, two weeks, a month in, it became very apparent and it was very explicit. Coaching is not about giving advice. And she had a small little moment of, what am I doing here? That’s not what this is, you know. But I’m sure without skipping too many beats, the mind says, oh, this is what I’m good at. But in truth, you’re good at so much more. There’s an energy to coaching that, you know, I think she picked up a couple steps later and thought, oh yeah, no, the I am meant for this. I am good at this. Yeah.

Katy Ripp 00:05:17  She also does give great advice. Right. Like she can’t. You can be two things. Oh yeah, I went into coaching without ever being coached, not knowing what it was, and also feeling very ill about the word or the phrase life coaching, which this has been a topic of conversation among our cohort between you and I, probably between my other coaching friends that have, you know, that have sort of now become like a part of my own community straight from the mirror, which I always think like scream so much about the actual institution that you come from if you can bring people with you.

Katy Ripp 00:05:59  Right? Like if now you know, Catherine and Angie have both been on the podcast and they are a staple in my life now, and I always think that that speaks volumes because I, I’ve been to other workshops where, you know, I don’t have any connection to it at all. And then a really great other workshop gave me my best friend and business mentor and spiritual guide and this entire, like human that I connected with that I wouldn’t have connected any other way. So but in talking with both of them, they both have a different experience, of course, of coaching. But that life coach, I mean, everybody’s got a different thought process. When you hear life coach, one of the things that I hear often, and I would love to hear your opinion on this and or what your thoughts are is my life has to be perfect in order to be a life coach. Yeah. Also the mirror, which stands for the Mind Rebel Academy. If I didn’t say that already. And we’re going to leave all of this stuff in the show notes because I highly 11 out of ten recommend.

Katy Ripp 00:07:05  But also this kind of coaching isn’t industry specific. It’s just coaching. Yeah. And like heart led soul led coaching which you can apply to any industry I mean I apply it in my business mentoring which allows me to give advice. Yeah. But you know the health sector, the photography sector, the creative content sector that sort of thing. So when you hear life coach or you hear coaching at all, or you come up against that from people, tell me what your thoughts are about that. By the way, Michelle and Taryn have their own podcast. It’s amazing. It’s been on hold for a little bit, but that now you’re back and they have an amazing episode that’s called The Wild Wild West of Coaching. Yeah, fascinating. So we’re going to like just skim the top of this. But I’m going to put this in the show notes and I will make sure to share it. It’s one of the greatest podcasts about coaching of all time.

Michelle Theriault 00:08:11  Oh thanks Katy. Yeah. Okay. Oh, I could say so much about even just, you know, the images and the energy I feel when I hear or say the term life coach.

Michelle Theriault 00:08:25  So I feel the deepest sense of integrity and pride and joy and fulfillment with what I’m a part of and what we teach. And, you know, just like the essence of what coaching is, I have the warmest, purest appreciation for it. Like the definition of, oh, like integrity and pride. And I’m a part of this and I love that. And I still don’t know if I’ve ever really called myself a life coach, because even though I know and experience and live how beautiful this is, this like this craft that we learn and that we teach, there’s so much attached to the term life coach from the world, from, gosh, like whatever the coaching industry is, there’s so much attached to it that I’ve never really been able to take that phrase and wear it as a good descriptor for myself or what we do. There was a real I saw on Instagram just a couple days ago, and it was, I don’t know what podcast it was from, but it looked like a really professional podcast.

Michelle Theriault 00:09:38  It looked like these two women who are very put together, and they just they looked professional and like they knew what they were doing. And the little clip was someone saying, oh yeah, I know all sorts of people who call themselves life coaches, but I know behind the scenes I know what their lives are like. And it’s just this, you know, this farce. And I heard it and I was like, oh, oh, oh, ouch. Oh. Ouch. And I imagine anybody coaching would have heard it and go, oh, ouch. Because the truth is, I don’t know anybody who doesn’t have a piece of themselves or their life where they go, oh, I could do better. Oh, that’s not figured out. Like, who doesn’t have that? Who doesn’t have a piece of their life or their world or themselves that they think I could do a little work.

Katy Ripp 00:10:30  What a farce. Well, first of all, what were those ladies doing?

Michelle Theriault 00:10:34  I don’t I scrawls like scrawl.

Michelle Theriault 00:10:36  That’s like, oh, yeah.

Katy Ripp 00:10:37  Oh, yeah. Please don’t give me any more attention. Yeah. that part to me is so hard to swallow. And if you would have seen our faces, I mean, it is a little bit of a sting. And certainly for me, I’ve tried on 50 different names for what I’m doing. You know, I’ve tried business mentor, I’ve tried lifestyle designer, I’ve tried lifestyle coach, I’ve tried, you know, I’ve tried all of these things. But in the end, I’m at a space now that I think the information that I’m putting out is enough for me to be like, I don’t really care what you call me. Also the perception that somebody’s life has to be perfect in order to be a coach is just, it’s just so ignorant. I mean I think part of the thing that makes amazing coaches amazing is that they are relatable and they are vulnerable and they are I mean, they don’t need to share their whole lives necessarily. But like, I get it.

Katy Ripp 00:11:38  It’s why I did it. It’s why I had the calling so I could help somebody else. And usually that comes from some sort of experience in what you want to help with. Do you get that a lot? Do you get that from a like when people are curious about the MRA, are they like, am I coming in to be a life coach or people confused? I mean, I know your messaging is really good, but that’s because I’ve been on the other side of it now, and I know what it looks like to hold space for people, because that’s really what we are. Space holders.

Michelle Theriault 00:12:08  Yeah, exactly.

Katy Ripp 00:12:10  And what I’ve discovered as midlife women is where do you get the space to be held for you?

Michelle Theriault 00:12:18  hum. Yeah.

Katy Ripp 00:12:19  Where I mean, very few places. Do you get actual space held for you? Therapy? Maybe. Maybe you do. Maybe, maybe. But this is different to me. Well, it is different, by the way. Coaching and therapy are very different, but curious about, like when people come into the MRA.

Michelle Theriault 00:12:41  Yeah, I feel like this really connects to what we were saying about, you know, the fallacy of coaching is about just giving the best advice, right? So I think this perception that a life coach needs to have their life perfect and altogether in order to be a great coach for somebody else, I think is really connected to the idea that what a life coach is doing is giving advice. If coaching was really about just giving someone prescribed method, all of these steps you follow exactly, then maybe it might be true that the person giving this advice, giving these steps, giving this method should be able to implement and prove it in their own life. Like maybe that’s true, right? But because that’s not what coaching is, coaching is exactly like you said, the art of holding space for Another. And there’s so many purposes and uses and things you can do inside of that space, right? You can explore what’s challenging. You can find the clarity you’re looking for in any realm of your life.

Michelle Theriault 00:13:51  You can brainstorm and vision. You can process. You can challenge beliefs. I mean, the list is endless. What you might choose to use, the space being held for you for because that’s what coaching is. There are actual skills you can develop. There are muscles you can strengthen that allow you to get better and better and better and better at providing that space for somebody else. And what happens is, is that coaching enriches you, but the space being held for someone else is about whoever is in that space is the one flourishing. You know, that’s where the flourishing is. And, you know, if you’re doing something you love. Like I said, coaching someone else gives you benefits as well, but you are holding the focus on someone else and their life. And I think coaching should be judged on the quality of someone’s coaching or how good they are as a life coach. You should judge it on what’s happening inside the container that they’re holding for somebody else. Are they flourishing? What kind of transformation is that space they’re holding? Is that giving for the person being held inside that space? It’s almost like if you were to judge a plumber or like a carpenter on the renovations in their own home that they might not have gotten around to yet.

Katy Ripp 00:15:13  Shoemaker’s children never have shoes, right? Like I have. My husband is in the trades and we have trim all over the place. That’s not up and whatever, but nobody doesn’t hire him because they are aware that we don’t have granite countertops in our upstairs bathroom. Right. Like a very great Analogy. Yeah. One of the challenges I’ve come up against is it’s so hard to explain that container or explain that space to someone or quote unquote, sell that space until you get in it. Yeah. And then it’s sort of like, I just need you to sit down. I just need you to sit here, and I need you to be a little bit open. So, like, just give me a little bit of a crack that we can start, you know, peeling back the layers or opening the door a little bit. And then that’s where the magic is, right? Like in the space in the container, like you said. Yeah, but that’s hard to sell. It’s hard to get people in the door because there’s lots of skeptics.

Katy Ripp 00:16:13  And you have to be sort of up against the man all the time and up against like, what is this actually going to do for me? Or what is my transformation or what is my, you know, we’ve been sold all of these things on coaching and what’s your offer? What’s your transformation? What are you promising people? And one of the greatest answers I’ve heard is actually from you, which was like, I’m promising an exploration. That’s enough. And somebody who gets it will get it. It will be an amazing transformation if you allow yourself to do it. So it’s been one of the greatest joys of my life, to be able to hold that space for people also, because every time I hold space, I get something. It’s not meant to be totally altruistic, but like I always learn something and to be coached. I have had some of my biggest moments being asked the right questions, like sitting in a little bit of a longer silence than I’m comfortable with, and that’s that was the hardest thing for me.

Katy Ripp 00:17:21  Yeah, I want to jump a little bit because a lot of us are not. And by a lot of us, I mean Angie and Kathryn and I are But curious about your journey inside MRA. Taryn Watts is the founder of the Mind Rebel Academy and it was founded in 17. Oh, Katy, that’s a date.

Michelle Theriault 00:17:43  I don’t know.

Katy Ripp 00:17:45  Well, I think maybe it was 17. She can correct us if she wants.

Michelle Theriault 00:17:49  That’s the right ballpark, though. Okay.

Katy Ripp 00:17:51  Yeah, because it was well before the pandemic. So tell us, like your story. How did you. Come on, I would love to hear your journey because I haven’t heard it.

Michelle Theriault 00:18:00  Oh, gosh. Okay, okay. Well, Taryn grew up very good friends with my cousin, who’s like my best friend since I was born until adulthood. They went to school together. They were great friends growing up. So I’ve known Taryn in like a friendly manner since I was 16. Oh, wow. Yeah. So she’s been in my know that.

Michelle Theriault 00:18:23  Yeah. And just because of that family connection. There was always these lovely, friendly touchpoints, like weaving through the years of, you know, seeing each other, meeting each other. And Terence, always someone who, you know, you just are in someone’s energy and you feel, oh, I like you. Oh, I feel good when I happen to.

Katy Ripp 00:18:47  Be in that energy right now. Michelle. So I like you. Yeah.

Michelle Theriault 00:18:52  Same same. So that’s always existed, you know, like that history with Tara and of like you feel good long before she was a coach. Just, you know, you feel good. And she started after she did her coach training. Every conversation I would ever have with her. I didn’t know it at the time, but she was using her authentic listening on me. She was asking me powerful questions. She was giving me space to express and explore, and I didn’t even know it because I didn’t know what coaching was back then. But I did know that sitting with Taryn in these moments opened up these little doors in my mind or my perspective that made me think, made me wonder.

Michelle Theriault 00:19:41  And I love that feeling. I’ve my entire life, you know, sometimes it’s I go down book rabbit holes and I research all these self-help things or philosophy or religion. And so I love that feeling of, ooh, you just opened up possibility for me. And so I think I probably started associating her with that. And then she started running retreats and visioning nights, and I thought, ooh, yes, I’ll come do that. And, you know, I remember one retreat I went to and of course, actually, maybe every retreat I ever went to of hers, there’s tears, there’s aha’s, there’s release, there’s like epiphanies. And I would just walk away feeling like this. I love this, this, this feeling of new possibilities opening up old weights, falling away. Can’t get enough of that feeling. And so when she said, hey, I am starting a coaching school, I thought of you. Are you interested? I had no idea, like many people, what coaching actually, was it a vague idea? I just knew if it helped me tap into what she always helps me tap into, then I am so deeply yearning for it, because I was in a place in my life where I had just left a marriage.

Michelle Theriault 00:21:10  I had left a life as a stay at home mom.

Katy Ripp 00:21:15  Oh wow.

Michelle Theriault 00:21:16  Okay, I had blank slate my entire life and it was so scary to Blank slate my entire life. But there’s this thought that fueled me, and it was if I just blank slate my entire life, then what I build on, it better be so damn good. Yeah, it, you know, to put myself and my kids through that much upheaval, I can’t just build something half hearted with my life. And so the stars aligned with the timing. There was nothing I yearned for more than to know myself, know what I wanted for my life, and just to feel connected to those things that, regardless of what my mind said, just genuinely felt so good. It feels so good to get clarity. It feels so good to release the shoulds and the anything that constrains you. Yeah. And like those take me to the doors of stepping into the mirror and going through the exact same process that you did, you know, in its first iteration and being transformed by it.

Michelle Theriault 00:22:22  You know, I loved that I could learn the coaching skills and give that to somebody else and feel really like, oh, I’m good at this, I can do this. I loved that, but that doesn’t even compare to what coaching gave me. Selfishly, by holding space for others over and over and over again and in every coaching session. You know, I would mentally prepare myself, especially at the beginning, and say, okay, they have the wisdom, okay? They have the wisdom. I’m going to follow their lead, okay. Doing that over and over and over again and watching these conversations and also these people’s lives get better and better and better the more they trusted themselves. Eventually something clicked for me that made me go, oh, if it’s true for them, what’s true for me? Or what if I can actually trust Myself, and that I actually remember the moment I had that and I decided, well, it’s real risky. I know I can trust these people’s wisdom for themselves, but like, for me, it’s risky.

Michelle Theriault 00:23:30  But I’m gonna give it a try. And it sounds so cliche and cheesy to say life has never been the same, but it really hasn’t. My entire operating system is different, and from that point on, I was just hooked and some part of me, my brain didn’t know how I wanted to be a part of the MRA. But some deep unknowing, some some deep, instinctual part of me just knew, oh, this is the orbit I’m in now. I’m not leaving. This is, this is. This is where I am. And. Oh, gosh. And and so I’ve stayed and my presence grew into a role. And that role has continued to evolve. And it’s been oh, gosh, I know I’m skimming over a lot of details, so tell me to backtrack. But that’s the big picture of my entrance into the MRA. I was just.

Katy Ripp 00:24:22  Talking to another gal who moved to Australia right before the pandemic. Long story short, this is going to be very similar to your story.

Katy Ripp 00:24:29  Probably is. Her grandmother died while she was gone, right. Like she couldn’t get out out of Australia. And she said, I’m going to do this. This is my like, actually, I can moment and it better be worth it, right? Like, if I missed this, I’m going to make a go of it because it’s got to be worth it for missing saying goodbye to my grandma. Same idea. Right? Like this has got to be worth it if I just blew up my entire life or erased. Not erased, but, like, clear the slate for myself. This has got to be sort of worth it. And we’ve got to go all in on this and we’ve got to. I talked to so many people that feel that way, except the trust part, like the trust part is so fascinating to me. We will trust everybody else before we trust ourselves. So you said two things. One was trust and then the other one was intuition. How much of that has been like key factors in what you do?

Michelle Theriault 00:25:28  I’m drawn to trust first.

Michelle Theriault 00:25:30  Learning to trust myself is everything. I go the wrong way every time when I don’t connect to myself and then trust myself. It’s everything. It’s absolutely everything. I look back before I heard my inner voice and trusted my inner voice, and I see that my life was a shell of a life. And I don’t mean that in like, a depressing way. I my life was fine. I had happiness, you know, it’s it’s not super, like, depressing, but it’s a shell that was lacking. Oh, lacking so much true life force energy lacking so much, just a true shell. And I think back to all of those moments in my life through teenage years and young adulthood. And, and I think about all of the moments of anxiety and all of the moments of depression and all of the moments of just feeling so lost and disconnected from myself. And I asked myself a million times throughout my life, what am I meant to do? What is my purpose? I don’t know, and I just, I see how empty my life was without myself, you know, without myself.

Katy Ripp 00:26:49  Two of those things really like jumped me as like alignment. My body also loves to tell me when I’m out of alignment. Like she’s real good at it for lots of reasons, right? Like that’s when I have anxiety. That’s when I feel guilty. That’s when I have some sort of physical manifestation of like, something’s not right here. So you said before, like there’s a feeling, right? Like a or a or a little inner voice or whatever you like to call it a feeling or a or a voice that you’re listening to. You hear it, and then there’s a time to trust it. But I feel like, and maybe this wasn’t your experience, but for me, I heard that voice forever. But until I started to trust it and until I started to really align, I didn’t change my life until then, until I really started to trust myself. And people asked us quite a bit. Or did before, like when we had a lot of businesses going. We had, you know, 42 irons in the fire.

Katy Ripp 00:27:50  They’re like, oh my God, how are you guys doing this? All because Dylan, my husband and I were doing it all together. And I said, we just, like, always trusted each other. Like, we just trust that we’re going to, like, figure it out. And that has always worked for us. We just really trust that we’re going to be like in each other’s corner. But that didn’t really hit home for me until I started trusting myself and trusting myself in like, oh, I know what my values are now, and if I’m not in alignment with them, my body will tell me and I am listening. Yeah, because anytime that I’ve, like, fallen off the path, they’re like, we talked about this a lot in the MRA, right. Like where you’re sort of like on this path and then you like sort of go out into the ditch and then it just brings you back, right? Like I’m just going out into the ditch less and less. But I was living there for a long time.

Katy Ripp 00:28:43  I could see the path. I just couldn’t get out of the ditch. And I think that was the piece of trust, the trust piece when I finally started to trust myself.

Michelle Theriault 00:28:53  Yeah. You know, one thing I’m aware of as we’re talking about this is now it’s so obvious to me and to you right now, now that we’ve practiced the muscle of trusting ourselves, we’ve actually tried it out, proven it to ourselves that connections really strong and clear. You know, now I don’t doubt it. Now you don’t doubt it. But I am so aware that I heard that a million times when I didn’t trust myself and it didn’t penetrate. There’s something so terrifying, I think, about trusting yourself before you’ve given it a chance. Like it doesn’t matter how many times you hear. You gotta trust yourself. Trust yourself. I can remember, you know, there’s many voices I’ve like, heard inside or felt. I can still very viscerally remember the objection of half of my mind flaring up at the idea that I trust myself and saying, no, you’re too flawed.

Michelle Theriault 00:29:57  Look at the things you’re not good at. Look at your life. These people know way more than you. You’re weak. You’re too sensitive. You’re this. You’re that. Don’t trust yourself. your whole life will go off the rails. I remember that, I remember those words. I remember that feeling. I remember the crippling fear. And I think back now and I think had that sink in earlier, what could have got through to me. And I can’t think of anything that actually could have gotten through to me other than someone else gently holding that space for me and inviting me to start dipping my toes in. I don’t know any other way. Maybe there are other ways. I hope there are other ways, because I just think everyone deserves to trust themselves. But I don’t know how you cultivate that without just beginning to actually dip your toes in and through the support of others who are willing to hold space and not jump in and save you, or not jump in and give you advice or not.

Michelle Theriault 00:30:59  You know, just like holding that space and allowing, whether you’re holding your space for yourself or someone else is holding that space for you. I don’t know how to cultivate trust without that.

Katy Ripp 00:31:09  And there’s something really powerful in surrounding yourself with people who also feel that way. Like, you know, the cliche out there is, you know, you are the sum of the five people that you spend the most time with. Yeah. I would maybe say that’s true. Maybe it’s more like the energy you spend with. Because time is time. Time’s funny and finicky and fickle, but energy. I can tell when I am trusting myself about, like, who I’m around. And I’m guessing that was Terran for you for a while. And then you get submersed. And that’s what happened to me, honestly, inside the mirror. And we talked about this when I was with you guys. Like, I got so immersed in it because it was every week with the same people, but the same people had the energy of, we’re holding space for each other and we’re letting people fuck up and we’re letting people be themselves in a like, completely judgment free zone, learning how to do this for other people.

Katy Ripp 00:32:14  So there’s like something to be said about, you know, a school or an academy or whatever that is, but to also feel like, wow, I can really be myself here. And it’s because of the like company you keep are obviously you. You started there like you took the leap even though everything was like chirping in your ear, you actually took the leap. Was this a job? Was it a job right away? Was it something that you were being compensated for? Or was it like, hey, will you come on and try this with me? I’m just curious about like, how did that evolve? because you are very much a integral part now. So over the course of this, I mean, you were the first iteration of the coaching school, and now you’ve, like, Woven yourself into the actual institution. I’m so curious how that happened and if it was very gradual, if it was a, you know, like, oh, here’s an moment. Yeah, I always love to see like people’s journeys into, especially into a very I mean, at one point or another this was Terrans dream, but it’s evolved into something so much bigger and broader and inclusive and well, that’s my perception of it anyway.

Michelle Theriault 00:33:36  When I think about what I think about okay. Like what was that path. What, what thread did I follow. I really feel the hand of fate in that path to backtrack to when I was still in Coach Pathway, I was in the training. That was the first thing I had ever done in my entire life that I showed up for every single class.

Katy Ripp 00:33:59  Same.

Michelle Theriault 00:34:01  I’ve never done that before in my entire life. Not only that, I didn’t want to miss them. I didn’t struggle with showing up. I actually genuinely wanted to get on the calls, and that blew my mind because I thought I was very fundamentally flawed in such a way where I’m like, lazy, uncommitted, I don’t follow through. I have really weird fears and anxieties and it cripples me. And I just, I’m, I can’t function. I thought, I am so flawed like that. And here I was, without any effort or any trying, genuinely wanting to show up. I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.

Michelle Theriault 00:34:45  And that really continued to amaze me and stunned me. And I kept sitting back thinking, wow, is this gonna, like, wear out? Like, this is still going.

Katy Ripp 00:34:55  I still like it.

Michelle Theriault 00:34:56  Wow. And that was the first time I had. Maybe I experienced something like this as a kid that I don’t remember, but this was my first experience of ever getting to feel something that actually resonated with me and I actually wanted to lean into, which is so sad that I was in my 30s before I got to experience committing to something and engaging in something that I actually liked, but it was the first, and that energy continued. So after I was graduated, I didn’t think of it as a job. I just thought, I don’t want to lose touch with this. I want to stay in the material. So I said to Taryn at some point, hey, if you need some help, just let me know. I’m like, craving to open these books. I’m craving these conversations.

Michelle Theriault 00:35:50  I don’t want them to end. Let me know. And at a certain point, I think she let me come into the next cohort as like an assistant. And, I don’t know, I actually assisted her. I don’t know what I assisted with, but I was there for some kind of backup, and I maybe helped her navigate the zoom room.

Katy Ripp 00:36:09  And yeah, she could.

Michelle Theriault 00:36:11  You know, bounce things off of me. And I just loved it. And I didn’t think of it as a job, and I didn’t. I still didn’t even really think about it. I probably had little thoughts of like, oh, what if this grew into something? But mostly it was just I still just had that feeling. I want to show up and I don’t know why. And I actually had other plans other than the mirror for what I imagined. Okay, the MRA is what I’m enjoying, but my plan for a secure future. I was finishing my psychology degree. Like just.

Katy Ripp 00:36:43  Really okay.

Michelle Theriault 00:36:44  Yeah.

Michelle Theriault 00:36:44  And I was like, okay, no, but that’s my plan.

Katy Ripp 00:36:47  But I just like real. Yeah. Right.

Michelle Theriault 00:36:49  Yeah, that’s the real job. So I’ve got to keep doing that. But I like being here, so I’ll keep being here And Taryn had a family, sort of. Her brother had a medical issue and she had. And this was during Covid, and there was so much stress and so much fear and so much like worry in her family. And she had actually, it was a surprisingly little amount of time that she needed because she’s just such a work focused person. But she had a week where she just needed to step back and take care of herself and be with her family. And I said, I’ll teach class for you. I can.

Katy Ripp 00:37:30  Do it.

Michelle Theriault 00:37:32  And that’s how it started. And then from there it was like, oh, I think before that she thought, I don’t think it ever occurred to her. I think, I think she thought I have to do this all.

Michelle Theriault 00:37:41  And then the universe forced that experience. I don’t think anyone would have thought of it. But she sat back and it happened and it upheld it. And Miranda, did you meet Miranda in your cohort? Yeah. So we held it together. It wasn’t just me. It was Miranda and I. We held it, and she got to have the experience of. Oh, they didn’t drop it. Oh. What else is possible. And then it became a role and then it was maybe I’m letting go of this psychology idea. Maybe I don’t want to be a child psychologist after all because this is what feels good. What if it’s actually possible.

Katy Ripp 00:38:17  And clearly it was right. Did you finish your psychology degree? No, I had a girl. No, I mean, I’m into that. I said same before, but I and I think I told you guys this that I have never I’ve been through lots of expensive courses and I mean, I barely finished high school because I couldn’t go to class.

Katy Ripp 00:38:37  It wasn’t that I wasn’t, like capable. It was like I couldn’t go. Nothing held my attention long enough. And to have a 13 month weekly class with homework and things to do and things to do outside of the days hold my attention that long, says something. So that part is super interesting. So were you her first, quote unquote hire?

Michelle Theriault 00:39:04  Yes. And Miranda and Miranda at the same time?

Katy Ripp 00:39:08  The same time.

Michelle Theriault 00:39:09  Okay. Yes. Miranda and I, we supported each other. There was no role. We just started creating it. Yeah, it was the coolest. We probably got to have an experience that not many people have, because getting to work with Taryn is probably not the average experience, because she is like a master coach through and through, and without even being consciously aware of it, she brings that entire coaching perspective of curiosity and and really listening to someone else really like seeing and holding space for what wants to, you know, emerge and evolve in somebody else. She got to bring that into business and into leadership and into our interactions.

Michelle Theriault 00:40:03  And so I and and Miranda as well. But I’ll speak for myself. I got to experience this exploratory sort of experience of feeling out, oh, this is what I’m drawn towards. And then Taryn would go, okay, if it makes sense, let’s open more room there. And then I would feel something else and go, oh, don’t like it. And she’d go, okay, not for you. And so who gets to have that? I don’t know, but I feel like I am the luckiest woman in the entire world in terms of getting to the fact that Terrance, the person I collaborate with, because it also just helps that she is so self-aware and that she is, gosh, she’s able to put on that coaching hat, clear her lens, and help me sort out whatever it is I’m working through. So whether it’s like actually a work related challenge or if I’m trying to figure out the trajectory I want for my role or the mirror, or if we’re feeling out, you know, some big picture piece of the vision, no matter what it is, the coaching that she brings into all of the hats that she wears, it’s like I have my own personal support person through everything I’m working through.

Michelle Theriault 00:41:28  Like, she’s the CEO, she’s the founder, she’s the boss, she’s doing all these things and everything I ever encounter in the realm of vocation. Here’s this person who’s in my corner holding space for what I need to sort out. She asked me, what do I feel? What do I need? What wisdom is coming through? What do I want to choose? and she trusts it all. And my goodness. So like the way I’ve been able to evolve inside of the MRA and my role has been able to evolve inside of the mirror. It’s probably unlike most things that exists.

Katy Ripp 00:42:00  I mean, if we could just like cookie cutter, this is the way that female entrepreneurs heart lead human first. This is how it can be done. This is how you can do it differently. This is how you can, as a business owner, treat your staff, treat your partners, treat your vendors, your, you know, whatever that is, whatever that person is, treat your who’s have you read the book? Who not.

Michelle Theriault 00:42:26  How? No, but I just read 10X is Easier than 2x.

Katy Ripp 00:42:30  Yes. So who not? How fascinating. But same like if you can trust that everybody’s got the right intentions and we’re going to fuck up, there’s no doubt. But get people in the jobs that they’re meant to be in and let go of the rest. And also know that just because you don’t like a job doesn’t mean there isn’t somebody out there that loves it. I don’t even know what a good example of the thing. Well, I don’t like to do laundry. That’s clear. But like in my jobs, there are certain things that I’m not good at operations. I just am not good at it. I wish I was, I’m just not. And so I hired for it and the ability for me to step back and do the things that I meant to do, while the people that are meant to do what they’re meant to do are doing the things that I don’t like to do, and I’m paying them, it’s amazing.

Katy Ripp 00:43:26  it’s like this beautiful. Like when, when things just like, shift into place, I kind of feel like if you just, like, brought all the continents together, you know, like, they’d sort of shift into place. That’s how it feels. And I would imagine that’s how Terran feels is a founder is wow. And probably she was able to. And until stuff like that happens where you have to step back. You cannot do this on your own because you have to step back. A medical emergency, you’ve burned yourself out and now you’re down for the count. You have a family. I mean, whatever it is that takes the place of. We’re not saving babies here, like, this is just a job. I have to actually do something for somebody else or something else. And then you have people like you and Miranda that step in and just, like, figure it out because it’s all the right intention. It’s like a beautiful level of trust. And then the trust, I think.

Katy Ripp 00:44:24  I mean, to me it just keeps getting like, I don’t know, is it deeper, deeper and deeper? Like the more I, the more I step back, the more I let go, the more I can watch them shine or realize, like, that’s not you don’t like that you don’t have to do things you don’t like. I’m not going to make you do things you don’t like. We can find somebody to do things you don’t like, because if you don’t like it, you’re not going to do it very well. Yeah.

Michelle Theriault 00:44:51  Do you notice a difference between being able to assess, you know, like with your employees or the people you work with seeing the right who oh, for the role. Like do you notice the difference now about.

Katy Ripp 00:45:03  Your decision or the questions like the I mean, unfortunately or fortunately for them, they’re constantly getting coached. Like I have a powerful bank of questions just like lodged in my head. And I can catch myself and be like, we’re like, you know, she’s not ready for that.

Katy Ripp 00:45:23  Or like, this isn’t the time and place for that, but I can pretty much pick out what’s the I don’t know if I like, pick it out, but I can pull some things out of people, out of staff that I never used to be able to. I’d never. Because. Partly because my rebel mind would get in the way. Right? I would be fearful that if I said something, if I did something, and instead I approach almost everything out of curiosity now instead of mind reading. Of like, tell me what’s going on? Like, is this about something here? Is this about something at home? Tell me what’s going on. Where are you feeling it. In your body. Which always used to be like a weird question to me. And now it just, like, rolls off my tongue and I’m like, tell me like, throw stomach, shoulders like, what’s going on? Tell me, tell me what’s going on. And I primarily work with women, so we own a coffee shop and an ice cream shop.

Katy Ripp 00:46:23  So a most of the all my managers are women. all different ages though, and I find that powerful question Bank was such a huge resource for me. And I use probably 20 questions off of that list of 100, maybe. But religiously, where it just makes me a better, better might be a stretch. It makes me the founder or the boss that I want to be, which is different than what I thought I had to be. And we mentioned this a little bit before we got on here. Like, I want to do it differently. I want to show people that businesses can be very successful if you are leading with heart, period. I want it to look different. And so whenever I find somebody that’s really being heart lead with their business now, are there logistical things? Yes. Do I have to pay bills? Yes. Like yes. Am I doing everything I want to do all day long? No. Absolutely not. But when you see other women doing it right and making money and doing really good things with the money that they make it just it’s sort of like a breath of fresh air.

Katy Ripp 00:47:40  And that’s how I feel about the emirate. And I don’t even know that much about the business. But it doesn’t really matter. I don’t think it really matters. I think it’s really the integrity that comes through in the messaging and the vulnerability you guys have and the ways that it. I mean, even the admin there are very like every the messaging is very, I don’t know. It’s just so interesting. Like I think my credit card got hacked one month and I missed a payment for my tuition or whatever. And Don reached out to me and she was like, is everything okay? Are you like, you know, it was just like the it wasn’t the hey, you missed your payment. You need to get your shit together. It was like from a place of like, is everything okay? Yeah. Can we help? It was just like, the sweetest. I don’t know, there’s ways to do that. And we’ve all been in those situations where there’s, like, Ways to get things done that don’t have to be fear driven.

Katy Ripp 00:48:40  And I think now especially right, like you’re in Canada, we’re in we’re in the United States. So thank you for being willing to talk to me. But, you know, like we’ve got lots of fear on TV and fear everywhere right now. And it just doesn’t have to be that way. So I think that to like, see it done differently is so important for anyone thinking about a business. Anyone inside a business like this doesn’t feel right. Something doesn’t feel right, something doesn’t like I can’t trust myself in this space. Then something needs to change. And either asking yourself the questions or getting coaching.

Katy Ripp 00:49:23  And that’s a wrap on today’s episode. I hope you enjoyed diving deep into the world of living authentically with me. Before you go, don’t forget to connect with me on Instagram. Shoot me a message at Katy Ripp. I’d love to hear your thoughts on today’s episode and connect with you further. And remember, if you want more details on today’s episode, or just want to explore more about designing your life unapologetically, head on over to my website at Katy Ripp dot com.

Katy Ripp 00:49:47  There you’ll find all the juicy details and resources you need to keep the inspiration flowing. Lastly, if you’d like to join me on the show, whether it’s to tell about your experience of designing your own life, to share your expertise, or if you’d like to participate in lifestyle coaching live on air, don’t hesitate to reach out. Your story could inspire countless others on their own path to living authentically. Thanks for tuning in. Until next time, keep living boldly designing your life. And remember #ActuallyICan.