Articles
In the Spotlight with Tanya Geisler, featuring Theresa Reed
Theresa Reed (aka “The Tarot Lady”) has been a full-time Tarot card reader for close to 30 years. She is the author of The Tarot Coloring Book, an illustrated tour through the world of Tarot with coloring sheets for every card in the deck. In addition to doing private Tarot readings, teaching Tarot classes, and speaking at Tarot conferences, Theresa also runs a popular website—TheTarotLady.com—where she dishes out advice, inspiration and tips for Tarot lovers of all experience levels.
In the Spotlight with Tanya Geisler is a weekly live show that shines a light on some of the biggest mindset challenges facing leaders and entrepreneurs today in their lives and in their work.
This week's guest Theresa Reed (aka “The Tarot Lady”) has been a full-time Tarot card reader for close to 30 years. She is the author of The Tarot Coloring Book, an illustrated tour through the world of Tarot with coloring sheets for every card in the deck. In addition to doing private Tarot readings, teaching Tarot classes, and speaking at Tarot conferences, Theresa also runs a popular website—TheTarotLady.com—where she dishes out advice, inspiration and tips for Tarot lovers of all experience levels.
WHAT WE TALKED ABOUT:
The intersection of writing a book and the Imposter Complex
Tanya’s secret business weapon (hint! It’s Theresa!)
Theresa walks us through her writing process and the publishing process
How Theresa is a champion for her industry and peers
What Theresa has learned by stepping into her Starring Role
What Theresa would say to someone ready to rise above the pack
Pricing yourself as a creative or in the mystical profession
A live card reading
THERESA SAID//
Technically I’m a writer but I never considered myself a writer. I thought a writer was like Steven King.
Ultimately I was speaking in my own voice but then feeling worried about my own voice.
When you copy someone else, what is missing in yourself?
People want to take shortcuts instead of doing the internal work.
There is no fast and easy. Sometimes there’s fast. Sometimes there’s easy, but they are rarely together.
The meanest hate mail has never come from my clients, it’s come from my peers
Every time you take an evolutionary leap, there's always going to be someone threatened by it, jealous or they want to take some of it, but you can't get distracted by that.
Haters come from a very very small place.
Haters are sign that you've gotten to a new level, that you've struck a nerve and you're moving up.
You aren’t paying for your reading, you’re paying for my time, and my time is valuable.
We’ve got to bust through those glass ceilings and say NO! I will not be paid less than a man. Get paid ladies!
Sometimes we have to blow our own top, we have to get out of the stinkin thinking, and the only way to do that is to face the fear and dive in even if we can't see what's below us.
TANYA SAID//
Don’t mistake the depth of the power because it’s actually fun to do.
This is not going to shrink me. This is actually going to make me stronger
LINKS + THINGS MENTIONED//
“New levels bring new devils.” -Steve Maraboli
FIND THERESA
Theresa’s new book: The Tarot Coloring Book
Each week Tanya and a guest star (an expert in their zone of genius) take on a topic that is UP in their work, or in the work of their clients. (Can’t step into your starring role when perfectionism, procrastination, boundaries, comparison, people pleasing, diminishment, and overwhelm are in the way, right?)
Listen to In the Spotlight with Tanya Geisler on iTunes or where you listen to your favorite podcasts!
In the Spotlight with Tanya Geisler, featuring Lena West
Lena is the leading expert on how women entrepreneurs can successfully and sanely grow a business on their own terms. She is also the Founder of Crescent: The Mastermind Experience, the only business growth mastermind program created specifically for women entrepreneurs over 40 and CEO DNA, a custom methodology for helping entrepreneurs determine their most effective business model based on personality, values, strengths, and other self-knowledge factors.
In the Spotlight with Tanya Geisler is a weekly live show that shines a light on some of the biggest mindset challenges facing leaders and entrepreneurs today in their lives and in their work.
This week’s guest is Lena West. Lena is the leading expert on how women entrepreneurs can successfully and sanely grow a business on their own terms. She is also the Founder of Crescent: The Mastermind Experience, the only business growth mastermind program created specifically for women entrepreneurs over 40 and CEO DNA, a custom methodology for helping entrepreneurs determine their most effective business model based on personality, values, strengths, and other self-knowledge factors.
WHAT WE TALKED ABOUT:
Many people (especially entrepreneurs) still believe there is a one-size-fits-all road to success.
You don’t have to fit into a formula to be a successful CEO. You can create your own brand of CEO.
If we don’t know who we are and what our strengths and gifts are, we might end up “hiring ourselves” and failing to execute our vision.
Be willing to meet yourself for who you really are and don’t beat yourself up for what you are not.
Be aware that some people will cling to you because they want to siphon your energy.
LENA SAID//
Everyone has a gift of marketing. You just need to find out what your gift is.
You can be your own brand of CEO. Don’t exclude yourself from that pool because you’re not a dude who’s working in Silicon Valley. The definition of CEO has got to change.
For the past two or three years, women have really been stepping in and stepping up, and I want to continue that onto the business front. I want to say, “Listen. You can be your own brand of CEO. Whatever it is that you want to be your brand of CEO, it can be that for you. It doesn’t have to be somebody else’s stiff, cold, patriarchal definition of what someone who runs a company looks like and is like.
[Your personal CEO DNA] gives you the freedom to walk away from things that aren’t working and embrace things that will work. It is not based on my opinion of you, it is not based on what I think you can do, it is based on who you are.
You don’t have to suffer for success. You don’t have to do the “should’s.”
You can build your business however you want. Are there best practices? Are there rules of thumb? Absolutely. Are there guidelines? Sure. Does success leave clues? Absolutely. But you can build your business however you want.
I want women to release the feeling that they have to do things a certain way.
You don’t have to do a damn thing you don’t want to do. I tell people all the time: I do a lot of things I don’t like to do, but I don’t do anything I don’t want to do. And I don’t want that for anybody else.
People will want to be around you not because they love you or because they love who you are, but because they want to siphon. They want to draw from your energy because they have not yet learned how to cultivate their own. It’s your job to as the CEO to protect your confidence and to really exercise discernment.
We hire ourselves because we don’t know who to hire and we don’t have a system for hiring.
When you’re an entrepreneur, you’re not a “finisher” typically. Some people are “finishers” but I think there's a lot of shame… There’s a lot of articles out there that say, “You need to be able to execute, and you need to be able to get it done, and you should be able to wake up early in the morning, and you need to be able to finish your projects, and you need to be able to ship.” You don’t need to be able to do anything other than figure out how to get the stuff shipped, okay? Sometimes that’s you and sometimes, that ain’t you. Sometimes that’s you delegating the shipment to somebody else on your team.
[The person you hire] needs to be able to execute if you’re not an execution person. If you hire yourself, who’s executing?
Be willing to meet a side of yourself that you’ve never met and be willing to accept her, be willing to leverage her, and don’t resist anything that you might see that may be different than what you thought you knew about yourself.
People who want to drain your energy say things like “I just want to be around you. I just want to talk to you. Let’s just talk about anything.” Nope. If you just want to grab onto the coattails of my energy, I can’t have that. I need my energy for me, I need my energy for my family, and I need my energy for my work.
TANYA SAID//
One of the things you said [to me in my own session] that has been really helpful was, “Be mindful of the people who just want to be around you just because of your energy.” That has been tricky and it has been extremely helpful and clarifying for me..
From the impostor complex lens, people pleasing (super tricky, it’s one of the coping mechanisms for the impostor complex)... For the people pleasers that also have this kind of DNA, it’s tricky [to discern].
I think that oftentimes we give being in [our head] a pretty bad rap. Sometimes it’s appropriate to be in the head. Get into your body.
FIND LENA
Add Lena on Facebook and send her a message to book your own CEO DNA session!
Each week Tanya and a guest star (an expert in their zone of genius) take on a topic that is UP in their work, or in the work of their clients. (Can’t step into your starring role when perfectionism, procrastination, boundaries, comparison, people pleasing, diminishment, and overwhelm are in the way, right?)
Listen to In the Spotlight with Tanya Geisler on iTunes or where you listen to your favorite podcasts!
In the Spotlight with Tanya Geisler, featuring Michelle Ward and Laura Simms
Michelle Ward, PCC, has been offering dream business guidance for creative women as The When I Grow Up Coach since 2008. You may have seen or heard her in New York Magazine, The Huffington Post, Etsy, Newsweek, Freelancers Union, the Forbes Top 100 Websites for your Career List or 100+ other media outlets. She's the co-author of The Declaration of You, which was published by North Light Books, and the teacher of Create Your Dream Career and Ditch Your Day Job, which were watched by tens of thousands of people live on CreativeLive.
Laura Simms is an expert on meaningful work who challenges conventional wisdom by asking people to ditch their passions and start with purpose. She left her dream career to help people quit their dead-end jobs, find careers that feel like home, and start businesses that make a difference.
In the Spotlight with Tanya Geisler is a weekly live show that shines a light on some of the biggest mindset challenges facing leaders and entrepreneurs today in their lives and in their work.
This week's guests are Michelle Ward and Laura Simms.
Michelle Ward, PCC, has been offering dream business guidance for creative women as The When I Grow Up Coach since 2008. You may have seen or heard her in New York Magazine, The Huffington Post, Etsy, Newsweek, Freelancers Union, the Forbes Top 100 Websites for your Career List or 100+ other media outlets. She's the co-author of The Declaration of You, which was published by North Light Books, and the teacher of Create Your Dream Career and Ditch Your Day Job, which were watched by tens of thousands of people live on CreativeLive.
Laura Simms is an expert on meaningful work who challenges conventional wisdom by asking people to ditch their passions and start with purpose. She left her dream career to help people quit their dead-end jobs, find careers that feel like home, and start businesses that make a difference.
WHAT WE TALKED ABOUT:
The number one reason why people don’t start a business
Everyone experiences doubt when launching, but the people who DO build businesses are the ones that confront the doubt
The strengths and personality traits we gain from significant life events show up in how we run our business
It’s important to get paid for your best work so that you can keep doing it
You can launch your new services without being an expert
MICHELLE SAID//
They might convince themselves it’s money, it’s time, it’s my unsupportive partner, people don’t understand me… No. It’s your own impostor complex that you are not enough, you don’t have enough to offer, you’re not adding anything new to the conversation, you’re not different enough, you don’t have enough experience.
If you’re smart, you bring [your character and personality traits] into your business, you bring that into your branding, you bring that into your copy.
The best thing I’ve ever done for my business is to put myself on the page, everywhere.
I learned as an actor that when I tossed out all the rules… all of a sudden the energy of the room was different. People leaned in and noticed me. I was getting more auditions. More callbacks.
Your personality traits and personal experience all need to come into your business in order to build the type of business that you want, working with the type of people that you want to be working with. That’s where the gold is.
You getting paid for your best work that is of service to other people and the way you help the universe the most allows you to do more of it. If you don’t get paid for that, you do less of your best work and what the world needs and wants from you.
We have to take the pressure off of ourselves to be an expert before we start.
It’s hard for the impostor complex to show up big when you’re [working with] another brain.
LAURA SAID//
Most people who want to start a business care so deeply about wanting to help people. One of the big fears is… Even though I really want to do this, what if I can’t help people? What if I try to help people and I can’t get them all the way there and not only am I a fraud and I feel bad about myself, but what if I let them down? ...I want that question to propel someone towards excellence, not stop them from the pursuit of it.
The person who starts the business has the doubt. They choose to engage it, find out how to tackle it, they test things, they grow small, they get positive feedback, they get proof that they can make a difference. The people who won’t even engage that question? Those are the people who won’t start the business.
It’s so hard to see the value of these things that are just so inherent in who you are.
If there’s a monetary exchange [for your services], it doesn’t diminish the transaction. Sometimes it actually enhances it. Charging for it actually helps the other person make that change and transformation.
TANYA SAID//
Failures we want to amplify, but successes we want to discount. That’s when we’re aware that it’s the impostor complex.
Actual impostors don’t feel like impostors.
If you experience the impostor complex, then by definition you have strong values of excellence, mastery, and integrity.
Understanding what your brand of joy is, is critical. It’s your how… How you launch your business, how you speak about your business, how you do everything.
There’s something really powerful working in collaboration with somebody else. It’s not the giving over of power… it’s the joining of forces.
LINKS + THINGS MENTIONED:
90daybusinesslaunch.com (5 spots left as of this webinar! Registration closes June 16)
FIND MICHELLE & LAurA
Each week Tanya and a guest star (an expert in their zone of genius) take on a topic that is UP in their work, or in the work of their clients. (Can’t step into your starring role when perfectionism, procrastination, boundaries, comparison, people pleasing, diminishment, and overwhelm are in the way, right?)
Listen to In the Spotlight with Tanya Geisler on iTunes or where you listen to your favorite podcasts!
In the Spotlight with Tanya Geisler, featuring Julie Daley
Julie Daley is an educator, writer, consultant, and leadership coach who's led hundreds of people from all walks of life to develop their creativity and authentic leadership skills. Julie guides individuals from around the world in discovering and uncovering their authentic nature as creative human beings. She offers one-on-one coaching, courses and consulting in creativity and innovation, compassion and collaboration, as well as authentic feminine leadership.
In the Spotlight with Tanya Geisler is a weekly live show that shines a light on some of the biggest mindset challenges facing leaders and entrepreneurs today in their lives and in their work.
This week's guest is Julie Daley, an educator, writer, consultant, and leadership coach who's led hundreds of people from all walks of life to develop their creativity and authentic leadership skills. Julie guides individuals from around the world in discovering and uncovering their authentic nature as creative human beings. She offers one-on-one coaching, courses and consulting in creativity and innovation, compassion and collaboration, as well as authentic feminine leadership.
WHAT WE TALKED ABOUT:
As young children we are often embodied, full of life, and free until something or someone causes us to question ourselves.
As children, we easily know the truth about ourselves and what we want. As adults, it seems to be harder to identify what we want.
As adults, we tend to cover up who we really are and cut off our own power to better fit into society.
The body remembers everything, what it felt like to be young and alive.
We have to wake up and live embodied, but sometimes we are afraid of our true expression because it is powerful.
As the cells heal in the body, our ancestry lines also heal.
JULIE SAID//
The heart, when it’s awake and alive, is vaster than the body. For the heart to be ignited, you’re talking about your entire being ignited.
Nobody is paying any attention to me, they’re just dancing themselves. Why am I worried about it? So I started to let the joy come.
The body is in relationship to everything: to others, to self, to the earth, to nature, to animals… and right now, with you. Just looking in your eyes, seeing your smile, it’s like there it is again. It’s like everything is showing us and reminding us of what we are.
When I got shut down as a little girl, I stopped connecting in the way that I did because it was too painful. I made a choice that I would… believe the stories others were telling me rather than believe the story I knew was true.
Feeling your emotions, feeling what’s been stuck, feeling anger all the way to a ten out of ten…. Letting yourself have that human experience is another way you wake up.
I will pretend to be something else so that I am more palatable to society and culture.
Anything you do to cover [your true expression] up… is truly an “impostor-ized” way of being. It’s just not real. It’s not true. And then we become so afraid of the truth of ourselves that we believe the voice of the imposter. It’s dysfunctional and we believe it because we become so afraid of what we’ve forgotten we are, because it’s powerful.
The truth is not duality, it just is. It doesn’t even have a problem with the impostor. ...Like when you’re little, you’re just the truth.
Each cell of the body has the light of the divine in it.
We are healing a lot of that ancestral suffering and unconsciousness the more we wake up.
TANYA SAID//
That’s the same tension: it shows up when you’re walking around the dance floor.
I saw a picture of my house on Google and I recognized that the picture was taken three years ago. I said to myself, “That was a blink ago.” And then I realized, in another blink, she’ll be 16. And in two blinks, she’ll be 19. And I just sat there and just said out loud, “I’m sad.”
You’re always that person who’s like, “Can you feel it a little bit more?” And I go, “No, no, no! I’m too busy! I have too much stuff!” And you’re like, “Can you just feel it more?” And then we do. And we cry and we laugh and it’s a beautiful thing.
We are so terrified of this true self that we are.
The truth feels like a lightness, what exists without the veils and the shrouds and the guardedness.
LINKS + THINGS MENTIONED:
As She Is, a film about the feminine “The feminine has been hidden. She isn’t gone, she just has been hidden.”
FIND JULIE
Eros Podcast coming soon!
Self Study Programs (Belonging + Becoming a Force of Nature)
Each week Tanya and a guest star (an expert in their zone of genius) take on a topic that is UP in their work, or in the work of their clients. (Can’t step into your starring role when perfectionism, procrastination, boundaries, comparison, people pleasing, diminishment, and overwhelm are in the way, right?)
Listen to In the Spotlight with Tanya Geisler on iTunes or where you listen to your favorite podcasts!
In the Spotlight with Tanya Geisler, featuring Dr. Michelle Mazur
Michelle Mazur, Ph.D. delivers audacious breakthroughs for speakers who want to stand out, be the best-in-class in their field, and position themselves in a category of one. She is the CEO of Communication Rebel and the author of Speak Up for Your Business. The speakers she works with have gone on to book speaking gigs across the United States, raise 3x the amount of money expected for the launch of a charity, and speak in front of world leaders and First Ladies. She lives in Seattle, WA with her adoring husband, 2 obsessive felines, and a huge collection of Duran Duran memorabilia.
In the Spotlight with Tanya Geisler is a weekly live show that shines a light on some of the biggest mindset challenges facing leaders and entrepreneurs today in their lives and in their work.
This week's guest is Dr Michelle Mazur (like lazer). Michelle Mazur, Ph.D. delivers audacious breakthroughs for speakers who want to stand out, be the best-in-class in their field, and position themselves in a category of one. She is the CEO of Communication Rebel and the author of Speak Up for Your Business. The speakers she works with have gone on to book speaking gigs across the United States, raise 3x the amount of money expected for the launch of a charity, and speak in front of world leaders and First Ladies. She lives in Seattle, WA with her adoring husband, 2 obsessive felines, and a huge collection of Duran Duran memorabilia.
WHAT WE TALKED ABOUT:
The intersection between speaking and the Imposter Complex
How Michelle feels the Imposter Complex when speaking even with (especially with) a PhD
The balance between structure and flow
Facing the lie of “I have nothing to say.”
The gap between dipping your toes in and diving in
Going on an information detox
The barriers people put in place to keep from taking the plunge
What people are afraid of when it comes to speaking
MICHELLE SAID//
Speaking is like riding a bike. You’re going to fall off, but it’s about learning something and getting back on.
There can be diminishing returns when it becomes about how great you are more than the audience experience.
There’s a lot of noise out there and if you’re really listening, you will stop yourself from saying what you need to say.
If someone is already talking about it, it’s great because it means it needs to be talked about. It just needs your unique spin.
The way to lead in your work: realize you do have something to say.
It’s time for you to hear your own voice so you can bring out what’s unique about you.
It’s an identity change when you fully decide to step into the role of Speaker.
It starts with one step not being on stage in front of 1,000 people.
You don’t have to have it all figured out to make it happen. You just have to put a little skin in the game.
On pitching: Figure out what they need, wrap your solution around it
TANYA SAID//
When we focus so much on the audience experience we lose the honey of what we are there to talk about and deliver.
We want to stand on the shoulders of our leaders and give them attribution, but we should look at their work as a springboard.
The velocity has come from work that has been done by people before us.
Under the false equivalencies is really fear.
Trust the intelligence in the room
LINKS + THINGS MENTIONED:
FIND MICHELLE
Each week Tanya and a guest star (an expert in their zone of genius) take on a topic that is UP in their work, or in the work of their clients. (Can’t step into your starring role when perfectionism, procrastination, boundaries, comparison, people pleasing, diminishment, and overwhelm are in the way, right?)
Listen to In the Spotlight with Tanya Geisler on iTunes or where you listen to your favorite podcasts!
In the Spotlight with Tanya Geisler, featuring Staci Jordan Shelton
This week's guest is Staci J. Shelton. Staci is a performance consultant and fiber artist. She is passionate about people, process, and creativity…and knitting. Dissonance and liminal spaces are her playgrounds of possibility. Her work is helping leaders resolve inner dissonance productively so that they can work harmoniously and achieve better outcomes.
In the Spotlight with Tanya Geisler is a weekly live show that shines a light on some of the biggest mindset challenges facing leaders and entrepreneurs today in their lives and in their work.
This week's guest is Staci J. Shelton. Staci is a performance consultant and fiber artist. She is passionate about people, process, and creativity…and knitting. Dissonance and liminal spaces are her playgrounds of possibility. Her work is helping leaders resolve inner dissonance productively so that they can work harmoniously and achieve better outcomes.
WHAT WE TALKED ABOUT:
What is Unraveling?
The intersection between the Impostor Complex and Unraveling
Unraveling and internalized oppression
Portable Peace
Staci’s metaphor of knitting and life
What to let go, what to keep, how far to go back?
Staci’s Unraveling method
The distinction between self-doubt and the Impostor Complex
How to know when you are ready for unraveling
Positive declarations of worthiness
STACI SAID//
People aren’t broken, systems are.
I can’t always change the system, but I can absolutely help some people unravel that stuff, change the narrative, take some risks and get free.
Is it really true, or is it just something that you’ve taken on and adopted as your truth?
The fear: If I let it go, am I going to be sorry that I unraveled this?
What version of the “not good enough” myth are you living?
Before the truth can set you free you have to realize what lies are holding you hostage.
Unraveling starts with noticing.
I start to notice where my fight or flight kicks in and that’s always a good place to start [unraveling].
I don’t believe anyone comes here unworthy, I think we take on unworthiness.
I call my inner critic my inner terrorist, and I don’t negotiate with terrorists!
TANYA SAID//
It’s always a good day to unravel
Unraveling isn’t a method or a pattern, it’s an organic process.
With unraveling we go gently.
LINKS + THINGS MENTIONED:
FIND STACI
Each week Tanya and a guest star (an expert in their zone of genius) take on a topic that is UP in their work, or in the work of their clients. (Can’t step into your starring role when perfectionism, procrastination, boundaries, comparison, people pleasing, diminishment, and overwhelm are in the way, right?)
Listen to In the Spotlight with Tanya Geisler on iTunes or where you listen to your favorite podcasts!