Adulting - #103 Healing with Nature, The Philosophy of Yoga & Smart Investments with Cristina Lope

Episode Date: June 2, 2021

Hey Podulters! Apologies for the sporadic episodesi I hope you will forgive me. In this week’s episode, I speak to Cristina Lopez. Cristina is a neuro-performance coach, living and working in Madrid. I first met her about 8 or 9 years ago when I went travelling, and we reminisce a bit in the episode. We discuss the three things she wishes she had been taught in school, namely; learning how to heal and work with nature / speaking to nature, the philosophy of yoga  and how to leverage your own personal assets to create personal wealth/ learn how to be a smart investor over a corporate agent. I really hope you enjoy! Oenone Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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Gambling problem? Call 1-866-531-2600. Or visit connectsontario.ca. Select games only. Guarantee void if platform or game outages occur. Guarantee requires play by at least one customer until jackpot is awarded. Or 11 p.m. Eastern. Restrictions apply. See full terms at canada.casino.fandu. I hope you're doing well. I'm sorry the episodes have been a bit more sporadic lately. I've had a few things going on, so it's been a bit behind, but I hope that you don't mind. In this week's episode, I speak to Christina Lopez. Christina is a neuro performance coach living and working in Madrid. And I first met her about eight or nine years ago when I went traveling. And we reminisce about that in the

episode as well. Her three things are learning how to heal and work with nature, forward slash speaking to nature, yoga, philosophy of yoga, and sort of how that can change the way that you see the world, as well as taxes and leverage on your own personal assets to create wealth, rather to be like an agent of a bigger corporation. So we discussed these three things. I really love talking to Christina. I think she's such a lovely person. And I really hope you enjoy listening. As always, please do rate, review, and subscribe. Bye. Hello, and welcome to Adulting. Today, I'm joined by Christina Lopez. Hello, everybody.

Hello. Thank you so much for joining me. For people who don't know who you are, could you give us an introduction to you and your work and just more about Christina? Absolutely. So I currently work right now as a neuro performance specialist. And it's quite interesting when I kind of break down how I got here within my life journey, because I was previously living in London. I'm now based in Madrid, Spain, which is where I'm originally from. And I started my career actually in advertising after completing my degree in psychology. And after I basically did my first role within a creative agency, I then went through a very crazy shutdown of a business quite young when

I was like 21 years old. So I then got headhunted by an investor who kind of took me under her wing. And she was this Canadian woman who basically wanted me to shadow her in how she invested in companies and help her build the concepts of very young businesses. And through that process, I then saw how you're able to grow brands and grow them out of nothing, but also find the resource that it takes to make something profitable. And that took me into the Venture Capital Award for four years, where I started investing in companies and I was coaching a lot of founders in the process, but also going through a deep spiritual journey myself when it comes to how much I wanted to, I guess, go deeper in my own tools when it came to leading a business for the first time,

and also having to really optimize my lifestyle in the sense of knowing how to deal with building resilience and having to learn new things when I was very unaware of doing a lot of things I was doing at that time because it was like the first time I was building my own company. So that was a very interesting process, which then kind of brought me to realizing that I could build a model that could help other people, which is how I got into the whole neuroscience of healing approach to help executives, but also first-time founders. So that's kind of me in a nutshell right now, Anoni. This is so exciting to be doing this because, so Christina and I, it's really interesting, we met, how many years ago would it be now? What year did we go

there? Was it 2012? I think so. I remember I was, must have been around 20 years old when we did the Ecuador trip. So yeah, almost a decade ago. Yeah. So we met because we, when I finished school, I did a gap year. And one of the things I did was I went to Ecuador and we taught at this school. And Christina was on this trip. And I'm not, but how much younger, I think I'm like 18 months younger than you. But I remember when I first met you, I literally thought you were like the most incredible person I'd ever met because you've seen like your whole life. You had it together. You did talk about things I'd never had anyone talking about. You're just really clever, really interesting. And even though it's funny funny what you're doing now because I feel like you've always kind of been this person you've always been quite mentory in the way that you are around people you've got

quite magnetic energy in that way and you've also it to me always been quite spiritual anyway even before this that you're doing now would you agree with that you've always been quite spiritual yeah definitely I mean I think it's interesting too when it comes down to like spirituality altogether because we really define that for ourselves and I think at the time like I've always just been very tuned in to what I was doing you know and I think I think that that was a connection that's the way I've just always connected with the world but I never really defined it as spirituality until I went deeper into just understanding the whole philosophy, you know, but thank you. That's a very beautiful thing to say.

But it's so funny because I've been really bad at keeping up with Christina lately. And I literally thought, you know, when you almost, like you said, you have this feeling about someone. I just remembered about you the other day and I was trying to message you and I didn't even know that you'd left London. God knows where I've been. And I was like, oh my God, I just really want to speak to her. And what you're doing now, I think is so fascinating. And it's so interesting to think about how far we've come. Because that Ecuador trip, for me, you were such an instrumental part in me. Funnily enough,

starting to adult, I guess, you really gave me an insight into a different way of thinking about the world. You're very open-minded and you've kind of always been like that um and it's just so fascinating to look back at this point now I guess we were kind of adults then but we're like much more adult than we were um and see where that journey has taken us I definitely feel like I'm a completely different person do you feel what do you feel like do you feel like so much has changed for you or do you feel like you've always been a bit of an old soul in some ways I I mean looking back at where we were we were like kind of I guess it was the beginning of our adulting um lives really we were we were so curious we were so and that was something that I think connected us a lot like we were both very curious beings and our conversations would always

go off on a hundred million tangents when it came to all the questions that we had for the world. So I think generally that's been our guiding force throughout the last 10 years. If I reflect on who I was then, I was so keen to know more, to learn more, to experience more. And I think when now, although there's a lot of clarity I have in how I want to serve in this world, I would still say that my mindset is pretty much the same, you know, like of how much questions and how much I still value that evolution of life that I think is kind of innate in both of us really, because that's something I remember being very deep about our connection, how we both really enjoyed just,

you know, the adventure and the potential of what we could create. And I think that's very much defined in what we're both doing now, because we both have our own personal brands. And now that you're focused on comedy, and your book club and have this whole community around everything that you're creating, I definitely would say that many things and elements of who I was then still exist in me now. Yeah, I completely, it just, it's almost like it's all fitted together a bit more. And as I'm talking to you,

I'm just thinking about how amazing that actually was because we were together with like, no, everyone had come on their own. There was a guy who's the teacher. There was this really tall American guy called Ben that I remember I used to really fancy. Dorothea. Who else is that? I can can't remember but it was I do you know what I was like I actually don't think I've done anything Sam you remember Sam oh I forgot about Sam and there was there was some there was one guy who went to Bolivia I remember he told me he was that guy

he was the he was ginger he always wore a hat and we did the races with that oh yeah what was he called I can't really remember now I can't remember but I do remember Ben he was quite the character yeah and but we it was just such an amazing experience because it was like such everyone's different ages everyone's at different points in their life and the people that ran the thing that we were working out which now makes so much sense to me but at the time I thought it was obscene they'd both done really well in finance and they'd been like really high up in some kind of like finance company and then realized they were really disenfranchised and they separately moved to Ecuador to like help out on some program and then ended up meeting each other

in Ecuador and sort of like gave up the whole capitalist life and ended up living in this like really kind of salt of the earth way where they they lived in like a very modest home and like I remember the woman saying to me like I used to be like you and have loads of designer bags but one day you'll realize that doesn't mean anything and I remember thinking oh no she doesn't know what she's talking about because I was like that is so true I remember she made a comment as well remember we went to the rainforest and we we spent like we were in this beautiful hostel there was like two kids outside our bedroom and we literally had like the wildest adventure in the waterfalls and we just like we were literally in this paradise that

was in the middle of nowhere that we like ventured out and I remember when I came back it was like my last night and she made a comment as well she was like, I got very emotional because I always cry when I have to like go into these speeches. I'm getting a bit better at that now, but I still get so moved. I'm just like, oh my God, so grateful for this experience. And she made this comment that was so, that really stuck with me. She was like, I really hope that you're not just talking about the rainforest weekend that you've had, because we'd obviously, I'd been there a month or almost six weeks I think and we were there there was a lot that

was about the kids and the programs that we were teaching and everything but I think she had a very big like miss maybe it was a little bit of self-projection where she didn't really get our vibe or you know very much I think there was like a little bit of a disconnect there because she did make quite a lot of these comments that were just a bit like I don't know it seems to be a little bit of a self-projection of of maybe who she was yeah but I also think it's so funny looking back because I remember the timing like what is I just couldn't understand because the world to me was like just about to open up I'd never had like my own things and my own like I don't know the idea that she would have given all of that up like I would I would just loving doing it as like traveling and meeting new people and doing new

things whereas now I actually could understand kind of at some point when you've had enough of the city when you've had enough of like the grinds that were feeling like actually just being in nature and living a really simple modest life would be really desirable but when you're 18 you're like why would you do that yeah no absolutely I guess this is timing it's the cycles of everything yeah exactly um but I'm sure we'll do some more reminiscing as we go along and once we remember more but that leads us quite, well, on quite nicely to your first thing you wish you'd been taught in school, which was learning how to heal and work with nature and how to speak to nature. I don't know if I've learned how to do this truly.

So can you talk me through what you mean by that and what you've learned about speaking with nature? Absolutely. Okay. So I've been, I've always been very into like extreme outdoor sports when it comes to skiing and, and mountain biking and just, I'm not that much of a runner, but I love to like explore the outdoors and go on hikes and explore new regions right now, especially with the pandemic, we've been doing a lot of very interesting walks and weekend trips around Spain in quite like unknown places.

And it's been very interesting to like rediscover my homeland in that way. But it's what's made it and I've had quite a lot of experiences like this was actually one I had recently when I was in Catalonia and I was staying at a friend's cabin and we were doing a little bit of like a work but also soul retreat doing activities in mountains every day and he is quite extreme when it comes to sports and he decided to take me and I was with four other three other boys at the time up this mountain that was absolutely crazy because for someone who is not an experienced mountain biker I literally had like one meter space and I was on the edge of a mountain and it kind of got to a point where I had to continue you could only continue going up you couldn't really stop and like reverse because that would actually be more dangerous it kind of you kind of have to go with

the flow of the land when you you get a certain point. And I remember I was literally like having a little bit of a panic attack. And I had a self-reflection moment where I was like, what is it about this? That's scary, really? Like what's really scaring me? And it just made me realize how the mountain is a lot more powerful than I am. And that is when it kind of hit me because I've always like had this relationship where when I'm skiing, I ask the mountain for protection. I have this dialogue that I think create kind of intensifies the whole setting in many ways when you're just showing respect for what you're doing and where you're doing, but you're also, you know, it's like in

Peru when we were doing the climb to Machu Picchu at one point, which was a couple years ago, I learned a lot too about the power of Pachamama, the respect that you have for Mother Nature. She is everything. She's a provider and you're a part of her. So whenever I do these extreme and have these extreme experiences in nature too, I start realizing how actually, if I don't respect and honor her, then there is no significance to what this is really about, because it's not just about the action and the sport. There's a connection, there's a dialogue that you need to read into that connects you a lot to that moment. And when it comes to the dialogue with nature, that's something that I found has helped me enjoy and also feel protected when I'm in certain situations that feel like that create

fear in me in many ways. But then when it comes to healing with nature, that I think has become a whole new world where a lot of different people come into my life and introduce new tools like working with essential oils and have taught me new ways of just connecting deeper with how you can use nature in your day-to-day and finding your balance and it's really amazing when you go into that whole world of you know how nature is speaking to you and all the elements that exist that were not traditionally taught in school that I think are so beneficial like working with plants and understanding the plant medicine and botanicals but also the language that happens within ecosystems on their on its own it's like a

world that's endless you know it's it's ongoing and it's just so beautiful and once you tap into it I feel like you just can't stop it just becomes never-ending you just get so it's it's so beautiful and once you tap into it I feel like you just can't stop it just becomes never-ending you just get so it's it's so beautiful because it's so so much part of who we are you know you've always been to me someone that's been very like open-minded and also very present I even can remember when I first met you you'd you talked to me about like sexuality or something and I remember being like 18 like wow this girl's this girl's so interesting. Like she just does it. She just says anything and like does, has no guard around certain things. But when it comes to nature, I feel like a massive block for people is they're going to feel like, well, I'm going to feel really stupid if I say like,

mountain, will you protect me? Did you ever have, did you have to overcome any sense of self-consciousness in feeling like you could have this relationship with mother nature or have you always been that open-minded to that sort of holistic approach to life what do you think because I think that's the barrier for lots of people when it comes to things like this it feels too alien to us yeah I mean a complete respect for certain people that might think this is absolutely ridiculous thing to do and but I do think like there's more to it because there's a dialogue that already exists when you think about like how we're already part of the earth you know like everything that we're made up of is on a cellular level is part of what's in nature and so

really you're just talking to yourself and if you think about it like this is not something you need to preach you're just like think of all the internal dialogues that we have where we're just, you know, having the most outrageous conversations and thoughts. Like it's kind of something that you can keep to your own. I'm not really preaching for everyone to like start going out in the streets and talking to all the trees and just being like, hey! There's just, there's a beauty to like acknowledging, I I think, what exists around you. And more than anything, it can be an internal practice. But the real tool here is just to acknowledge what nature can give you. Obviously, it's so personal to what excites everyone.

The other day, I have a friend of mine who came to visit me, and he is a fanatic of trees. He knows every tree type and, and how they, and their cycles of life and everything. And I just thought it was so beautiful because when he's like exploring the world, he just, you know, he has this relationship and appreciation for every single type of tree and he knows every single type of tree. And I just thought it was so beautiful to meet someone that had that hobby and that curiosity. And it's just pretty much like it could exist on so many different levels. Some people have it with flowers, some people have it with cactuses or cacti, and some people have it with herbs as well when it comes to cooking cooking so I think it naturally exists in quite a lot of people and if you just explore and take it a next level in you could really develop this beautiful like sense of just you know going deeper with it so it can take you somewhere else as well

I think it definitely comes from that idea of being present I remember when I went to Japan a few years ago for a work trip and we went to this forest that had these like ridiculously tall trees. And, you know, sometimes nature sort of like takes your breath away and you realize how small you are. And then it sort of like smacks you in the face how incredible the world is. But even if you're not normally, if you're someone that's quite not present in those situations, sometimes you can't avoid it. Like I also think the same thing kind of happened when I went to the Blue Mountains in Australia. There's certain landscapes or certain things that you see, where, like you said, you kind of realize how powerful they are. And no matter who you are, what your frame of mind is, you're kind of rocked in that moment. And I feel like you're right.

If you could learn to appreciate that, even like watching the rain or like watching the trees swaying, I feel like it does happen a bit more as you get older where you kind of start to all the things that were really boring when you were little like my mum would be like oh just look out the window at the flowers whatever and now I'm like oh I love it yeah no definitely I think it's it's something that we've become like that that's why I feel like if we were taught it and are able to see it as a dialogue as an extension it doesn't look like a forced activity because I remember too like my mother like being a yogi would always be like you know like look at nature and take it in and at the time I didn't quite understand what she meant and now I think like we've evolved to really appreciate that

especially now that like our whole lifestyles are changing in the sense that we're wanting to spend more time outdoors. We're appreciating what nature can give us from this whole pandemic that we're living that's made us really appreciate what we are able to do. And we're able to be active and connected to what's out there, you know, beyond what we had before and how we had that connection before. I think that's definitely given us a new awareness in itself. But I do feel like we never were taught exactly like what the tool of nature could be. And I think in many cultures that exists in the indigenous cultures, and it they have this whole like understanding of how nature is the protector and the provider and I just think in certain cultures in in Europe for example that's something that's not really part of what we've inherited but I think if we were

able to bring that back it'd be such a beautiful tool to give our kids you know just like you know sit by a tree and let her ground you and let her give you that sense of peace and let her show you like, and give you that guidance without you having to consciously force yourself to come up with a solution. You know, little things like that, where it's like, okay, you have that safe space and it's right there. I agree. I think, I think especially in our culture, like the way we're brought up, it's so, there's so much dissociation, like everything is kind of about the new age technology or like it's just there's no real sense of importance for nature in that way um and it's interesting because I feel like I remember reading or listening to someone talking about how a photographer maybe

from like National Geographic or something had gone and visited a certain tribe and they were talking about the weather and there was this woman and she's like no it's definitely going to rain today at 3 p.m and all the crew were kind of like well it's not because the weather thing doesn't say that and then lo and behold at 3 p.m it started raining and then the next day they went back and she was like oh this is going to happen and they were like they just know the land so well that she can touch the soil look at the sky touch a leaf whatever and she knows exactly what's going to happen with the weather better than any of our kind of like technological weather reading map things could ever do and it's exactly what you said it's just that we've become so just

disconnected from nature and I that's something that I actually really need to tap into and do but again I think that I've got that maybe it's like a British self-consciousness and a lack of openness to certain things that I forget to like try and I love that what you just said about sitting with a tree it makes me feel bad for the times that I like go on my phone when I could just like you say just sit and be with nature. Yeah I mean I guess it's like the simplistic like the simple oasis that we can build for ourselves that sometimes we feel we need to, you know, go on a trip or go on a retreat when really, like it's actually a lot more simpler when you see it as an extension of who we are instead of it being just part of our surrounding. And that's when I think your practice deepens with it.

And there's actually a book I can recommend if you do want to learn about nature signs. It's a book I started reading quite recently. It's called The Lost Art of Reading Nature Signs. And it's written book i started reading um quite recently it's called the lost art of reading nature signs and it's written by a uk he's actually british and he's like a natural navigator so he gives you the tools on knowing how to like interpret wildlife and tracking and reading the hills and how like what the mountains can dictate but also like you said with the weather and how certain like sort the how the texture of the soil and everything all plays a role in showing you how nature um is speaking to you to give you to basically be able to predict what's coming but also see what's happened because if you think about it's all storytelling

you know when you start reading into it so you mentioned briefly I've just written that book down I'm definitely gonna read that but you mentioned briefly before that your mom was a yogi and I came to know you as a dancer um and you were always loving movement from from the first time I've met you and you said that you really wish that yoga and the philosophy of yoga was taught in school as your second thing which I think kind of this also ties into the thing you said before which is a very kind of like spiritual present way of being do you think that you like your parents kind of brought you up to a bit like this anyway and then you've kind of further deepened that understanding or have you come to this more on your own as you've got older I think I mean with yoga my mother's definitely been the main introducer of that practice into

my life but I was quite young when she was at like her peak in teaching now she's teaching but obviously a lot less considering the circumstances it's more for like her herself where she's like deepening her practice. But when I first got introduced to yoga, I kind of rejected it. And there's actually in the sense that I didn't really understand it. And then when I saw how a lot more people around me were finding this beauty in it, I got more curious to try out new styles of yoga because a beautiful thing about it. And I think like when you first asked me the question, it was more of like the philosophy because a lot of people mistake it as, as a movement practice when it's actually the art

of breath and the art of like ultimate source connection. And it's one of like, it's one of the most prehistoric languages that we have when it comes to the mind-body condition. So when I was in London, I actually went to like all the tri-yoga workshops there and in a different, there was a Marylebone studio right now that I cannot remember when I was, that I used to go to a lot that was also incredible. But I would learn and I would do Ashtanga, I would do a Yengar, I did Scaravelli yoga, which is part of elongating the spine. And I got introduced to this whole new world of how you're able to connect with moving your body in new ways, but also finding that breathing connection, whether you're just like moving a muscle or whether you're just doing a slight, you know, restorative pose.

It's incredible how like when you find that connection with yoga, it transforms pose. It's incredible how when you find that connection with yoga, it transforms you. It transforms the whole way of how you read your body and how you can tune in with the cues of what your body is trying to tell you. And that's when I found this whole awakening with it. But it kind of was part of my own curiosity that led me there. My mother played a role in introducing it to me, but I wouldn't say it's because of her that I deepened my practice necessarily. There is actually, there was one class I did with, I believe you know her too, because I remember you posted a couple photos with her, but Shauna Virtue, I went to one of her workshops. She did a class, I think, with

a charity. She was doing a charity event in London at the Google offices. And this was quite a long time ago, I would say. It was a couple years after I met you. And I remember you were still at uni. And at that time, I was working at my first position and I went there. And through that workshop she was so good at reinforcing the breathing connection that that's when I left and felt that bliss when you get out of a class and you're like wow like I think I've understood you know the purpose

of this practice Shona is incredible um yeah I love her she's so good but I had the same experience I'd never done the I'm probably gonna say it wrong but Ujjayi how do you say is it Ujjayi breathing ocean breath yeah and I hadn't done that before because I think a lot of the yoga classes I went to they're kind of sold to you like you said like movement it was about exercise it's like getting it out and like kind of do the workout and when I first had like a yoga instructor that taught us how to do the breathing was really hot on the breathing and then it becomes like and also that it's not that it's painful but it's a lot more kind of like skilled and still and controlled um in like a full sensory way like exactly what you're saying where it's almost like you're kind of meditating by by proxy of the fact that you're like trying to breathe and do everything at the same time that your mind just kind of empties.

And I'd never really had that before. And then it definitely does feel, I need to do it more, but it does become, like you say, more of a practice and something that has a different meaning than if you were just going to go to the gym and do like a workout for the sake of getting sweaty or something. Yeah, absolutely. Like it just creates more of an intention, you know, of like why you're doing what you're doing and knowing the benefits, which like there's a right or wrong with it either, because a lot of people just do yoga for the physical benefits and like just to have that movement like integrated in their routine, which is absolutely fine. You know, there's no right or wrong way when it comes to how you embrace yoga. But that's why I think if we were taught the philosophy of how it also

can be a healing tool for us, it could be really powerful. I definitely want to be able to introduce that whole philosophy of understanding the mind-body to my kids beyond it just being about a downward dog and a sequence but everyone responds in different ways you know depending on what what their level of awareness is as well so it is very personal so I'm interested to know more about your coaching and how all of this comes into play because I think I can remember when you first got that first job was it with xbox or something x xbox was actually one of our clients but it was a company called engine group I think I remember because I remember you doing something it was years ago it's like probably maybe one of the last times I saw you and you were talking about it and it was so

interesting to me because we were talking about how advertising is so tied into type psychology and how like people's brains so even back then this bubbling idea of like neuroplasticity and I guess the stuff you're working in now you were already kind of talking about it and doing it even though at that point in time you were actually working in something which looked slightly different from what you're doing now so how has that evolved and I'd love to know how you're putting all of these things whether it's the yoga whether it's the spirituality or the nature how do you add that into the work that you're doing now and how does that kind of change the shape of what that kind of role would have normally looked like I guess

in a more traditional way of being applied I would say I mean I guess when I first, a lot of it was about understanding the universal truth of why we do what we do. And that's a very big part of advertising. You're trying to inspire, you're trying to educate, but at the same time, you're trying to understand what people care about. And I think that's also the beauty of the digital world right now. For me, social media has become such a cultural tool and how we understand so many things and when I first started my coaching business it was kind of like a bold like pivot because I was working in a way in finance but investing in companies that wanted to basically reinvent industries for the better. So it was

very technological focused, but obviously a lot of it, sorry, I'm losing my voice right now. Excuse me. There was a lot of companies that we were looking into that were very interesting in the sense of how they were trying to solve really big problems across many different sectors. And when I started doing my coaching, I basically just wanted to focus more on the human level beyond it being about concepts and businesses and having to necessarily make it about an external service or product. Because I started realizing how there was a very big disconnect too. And a lot of like these innovators, they had such high pressure, like routines.

And it was very difficult to do what they were doing. I had a lot of respect for founders and I still do because to build and manage your own business, whether you're an influencer or have your own startup or ready at mid stage, like there's such an emotional like rollercoaster that goes with that. And for me, I wanted to play a different role in how I was helping founders build their businesses to really go deep with the internal work as well. And it was just something that was making me feel very

disconnected to the work I was doing. So like you said, there was a very big connection between everything because although it went from advertising to venture capital to then leadership development in a way, everything was focused on the psychological foundation of what we need to feel connected and what tools we can apply to achieve that successfully. But also to take full authority because at the end of the day, I did study psychology and neuroscience at university, but I didn't go into clinical psychology for the purpose that I felt like it created a codependency. And one, one thing I love about coaching as an industry, and I, there's a lot of, there's many different types of coaches now. And obviously anybody can get into the field

of coaching when it comes to getting your certifications. And there's endless courses. But I think one thing that's very powerful is like right now, in particular, there's so many different niches. So you can hire coaches now for imposter syndrome, or for mastering your heart trauma, or going deep with family constellationsations or going deep with essential oils, you know, and there's all these different guides that I think can help so many different types of people and create these experiences that kind of allow you to take what you want from it. And obviously in traditional therapy, you can do the same thing, but it's structured in a way where I sometimes feel

like when you're doing like traditional psychology techniques and psychoanalysis and even like medication in certain ways, there's always a codependency in the traditional world, which I know still helps

a lot of people. But that's why I think coaching now is creating a whole new opportunity for us to take more authority of our own healing processes. And right now, a big focus for me is basically to help contribute in my own way through what I'm learning and what I'm being taught as well from the guides that I work with and continue delivering my programs to clients who are attracted to my work and committed to doing it for themselves. Because more than anything, it's all about teaching you how to become your own self healer. I love that description. And also I think it's so interesting that it's like, it's becoming people now are becoming more and more open to having coaches

because it's interesting how people are so open to having like personal trainers to like coach your body but coaching your mind maybe 10 years ago wouldn't have been quite as like not commonplace but what's the word like not trendy either it's just people are more open to this idea that mentorship or coaching can be really transformative and that it's a really positive thing rather than thinking like oh god I don't need a coach like there's always so much more that we can learn about ourselves and our brain um and like I'm really interested in this idea of like like your neuro performance like and neuroelasticity which is something that like Shona Virtue was talking about a bit as well but just this idea that there was so many

like nooks and crannies of our brains that we don't exercise that we don't have access to or that we have blocks on and you can actually work with someone who can open like free up that space basically in order for you to be able to achieve and do more have I butchered that would you is that kind of right no absolutely I mean at the end of the day like the brain we can always train to create new neural pathways of connections that allow us to just improve our cognitive capacity but a lot of the work that I do is very much focused on the subconscious because a lot of the time we're very limited by our subconscious beliefs and blocks that we pick up from our life experience and I think when we're able to to be aware of what we're holding on to and the patterns in our behaviors and actions that we know are limiting our growth, that's where the root of the work has to begin. is very much related to movement and breath. A lot of neuro performance work

is basically rooted in our understanding of the conscious and subconscious dialogue. Because a lot of the time too, we're thinking many things, but then there's a root that underlies a lot of the motives that we create and a lot of the stories and narratives that we hold onto as well.

So it's really interesting that by working in this way, how you can unravel so much of what isn't true. And that essentially is what helps you create new understandings on a thought level, because you're challenging your old storylines to create new ones. Do you? located in Ontario. Gambling problem? Call 1-866-531-2600 or visit connectsontario.ca. Select games only. Guarantee void if platform or game outages occur. Guarantee requires play by at least one customer until jackpot is awarded or 11 p.m. Eastern. Restrictions apply. See full terms at canada.casino.fandu.com. Please play responsibly. Do you find a pattern with your clients or like, is there anything the people that you tend to work with that you see comes up more and more again? Like you, I think you mentioned early imposter syndrome, but I would imagine that that's something that holds a lot of people back. That's a self-limiting

belief that means, you know, you can never go for it because you feel like you're not good enough. What are the kind of most common things that people sort of come to you to deal with or to unravel? Good question. It's quite difficult to pinpoint that because I create personalized programs are usually six weeks long and they ultimately it's to heal physical and emotional blocks but that exists on so many different levels but the majority of my clients right now are mostly women a lot of them are very entrepreneurial and they're very just committed to like being like authoritative in their own healing process so I think what attracts people to my work and I don't do that much marketing when it comes to the clients that I serve a lot of them find me through word of mouth or get recommended

through the teachers I've worked with who are also guides in themselves but they're like part of this community who like host retreats all over the world. And they kind of like all serve their, their following in a way, but at the same time, a lot of them aren't even on social media. You know, they, they don't follow the traditional model of how they attract clients. Cause a lot of coaches right now, like you see it quite a lot on Instagram. Like there's, there's a, there's definitely like a trend and all the content looks the same. And, and some of them in how they're like, basically marketing their message, but they're still appealing to their audience. But there's a certain like lack of authenticity, I think, and like the modern age healing approach when it comes to the content driven model. And a lot of the people I work with don't actually push that because they know that

there's this whole energetic transaction that comes with knowing who you're supposed to serve and who you're not supposed to serve. And I think what's very interesting is when you're aware of and completely and understand who your target client is. And for me, it's mostly people who are committed to helping themselves, you know, so I don't really restrict it or have this certain profile in mind. But a lot of who I attract are women who were like me three years ago, you know, like, they're women who I connect to because we've shared similar journeys and they're looking to overcome things that I might have already overcome. But at the same time, it also doesn't have to be that personal because I'm a facilitator. I've

been trained to be a guide. It's not about me imposing anything of my life experience on anybody else. It's more just like, I can help you and teach you with these tools that apply to your particular context of whatever it is that you want to overcome. And that's how it works. Because a lot of the time too, there's, there's this issue in the coaching world where it becomes too personal, you know, and that's when you have to be careful as well with like the people who, um, who you work with and how they make you feel and whether you have this like feeling of safety when you're around them and able to embrace your vulnerability fully, because there, that is something I've identified when it comes to, even in the spiritual world,

the spiritual ego that can play a very big role in how people teach and they teach from a place that isn't necessarily fully open so interesting it makes me want to come to you for coaching but you you do have there is something about you even before like now I'm much more open to talk about energies and thinking about spirituality and stuff but when I was younger I kind of would be a bit I guess quite closed-minded about those things but when I met you you were one of the first people that I was like wow there's something there is you have like got an aura and there is something about you that's really non-judgmental and very kind and like you said very inquisitive and so I do think I do believe now through meeting people like you and as I've got older I've got more open-minded about those things but you do have

something about you which is like very pure in a which is a weird is that a weird word I'm just trying to think of the right phrase thank you my love thank you but so it makes sense to me that people that you know seek you out would would find you if that makes sense yeah I mean more than anything it's just like it's very interesting too on how my like how they come into my life and how I come into theirs like there's this timing with it too that I sometimes find absolutely incredible of how like certain things happen and a lot of what's very interesting too is recently I've been actually coaching a lot of my very good friends and at first I never thought I would do that. But they've come to me asking to learn. And at first, I was like, should I like allow this into my life? Should I play this role in my inner circle? Is this something that I want to do? But I've actually realized that it's a beautiful way to help, you know, the people that I care about the most. And in my training, even they said, like, be very careful about whether you when it

comes to friends and family, because you don't want to play this role constantly with the people that you care about the most. And I took that in. But then I started realizing how, you know, if really close friends of mine and people who I love, want to go deeper with this journey, why not, you know, at the end of the day, it's got nothing to do with me. It's just got to do with what I can show them through the learnings, through the practice, through the teachings. And at the end of the day, that's all it is. It's an exchange of information and you holding space for wherever someone is at, at that moment. And I think that's actually a beautiful thing.

I agree. I think, but I completely understand why you'd have to be cautious. I think that's actually a beautiful thing I agree I think but I completely understand why you'd have to be cautious I guess it's like anything um but yeah I think if you're in the position where you don't think it's gonna it's not gonna be harmful then I definitely think that's such a nice thing to go through with your friends yeah yeah so the third thing that you spoke about which I think is really interesting um is learning about how to be a smart investor rather than like a corporate agent. So learning how to create your own life, be an entrepreneur, do something on your own terms, I guess. And I agree. I think that it's becoming more and more commonplace, I guess, with the advent of social media, with this ability to sort of like self-create a brand and monetize.

But it definitely wasn't something that I ever knew when I was in school I could have ended up doing did you have do you think you've always had a vision of wanting to work on your own terms and do your own thing or did it feel more accidental than planned um I guess I didn't really know until I started working and I started seeing this whole like disconnect. I had really bad bosses, like in all my jobs, which was actually a blessing because it taught me a lot about how to show up for it came to how I create and how I want to you know put myself out there in different companies like especially when I was in like doing my internships and stuff when I was a teenager and all these things because I was always working like from the age of 14 I had all types of jobs and that started suddenly made sense

to me that like you know at the end of the day and it was the same thing I guess with the whole coaching focus as well of like I really hated the idea of being codependent and I guess after working and seeing how you can be managed by other people and how that can restrict you in certain ways but also at the same time help you and enable you and many others because I know also like people that had really positive experiences with their management and you know and many others, because I know also, like people that have had really positive experiences with their management. And, you know, in many ways, they've had the mentors that they've needed to help them work up through their roles in certain industries. But then there's this, there's still that codependency that plays a role in them not feeling free on a soul level. So I think for me, like that point came up because smart investor in the sense of knowing how

to manage what you have and leverage of that on like when it comes to your personality and your character. But I also think like what I meant by that too is like if we were able to learn what would make something sustainable for the long term beyond just working for these industries. And, you know, we were basically trained to go into this working system, which is why the majority of people choose finance because they associate that with stability. But then there's also so many other creative industries that are now completely booming and now with technology as well like the whole frenzy of innovation that gives you opportunities to create and be part of something bigger is attracting a lot of our generation too so I think like for me the main purpose of

of that response was to just be smart and how we invest our time, energy, and money. So we're able to really, you know, build something sustainable for ourselves that goes beyond what we think we're supposed to do and not necessarily rush into like owning houses and, you know, kind of try to tick off all the boxes that comes with, okay, so now I've had the job and now I have the business and then I have the husband and then I have the house. It's like, how can we build personal portfolios of like, that's going to give us ultimate freedom? Because at the end of the day, there's still that mentality of like, okay, we associate these things with freedom, but we're still tying ourselves down. And it doesn't in the long term become this you know

expansive way of living and investing if that makes sense no it makes total sense and it's so interesting you said about buying a house because it's a conversation that I've been having with Matt recently a lot where I'm like I just don't feel the need to buy a house I get this pull to do it because lots of our friends have either bought or people are starting to buy and suddenly feel like oh god I should really like think about saving up for a house but really yeah investment wise it's never it's never really the best investment now anyway if you're looking at it from just like a monetary point of view but also the idea of buying a house I kind of I'm like I don't know why I need that why that would help me in my in my place in my life right now but

um I was just thinking as you were talking how it's so interesting that all of this sort of like bleeds into each other because I think in order to be, to take the leap to do something entrepreneurial, you kind of have to have enough self-belief and self-motivation to think that you can go and do it on your own, which comes from having, I guess, dealt with a lot of those self-limiting factors. And I was thinking about how I always used to think when I used to see, because you had, you went to uni in the UK, but you have friends from all over Europe and you'd always be seeing people in different places. And I used to love how kind of like nomadic you were. And you would

be like, oh, I'm going to go see in so-and-so in this place. And you're so good at meeting people. And you've always been very good at creating connections. And I just always found that fascinating to watch how you kind of could just be so free, like free exactly like you said. And it's such an incredible trait to have. And I wonder if part of that is because you had lots of friends from different countries. And so you were given, I don't know, do you think that's just who you are as a person? You've always been like that. I think it definitely comes from being like internationalized my upbringing. Cause at the end of the day, my mother's Bolivian Dutch, my father, Spanish and German. So like, I've always felt

culture. Like I was a woman of the world. Like I never know how to define when people ask me where I'm from. I've never been attached to one particular city, even though I was mostly raised in London. But London in itself was a very international place. So in many ways, I always had this cultural diversity in me that I think made me so curious to connect with other cultures. And that's definitely played a very big role, I think, in why I want to see the world and connect with so many different types of people, just so I could learn more about what's out there and what exists, you know. And I think that self-belief aspect, too, of like being able to create these opportunities for yourself.

In many ways, like the more you see see like the ways that you see people live can and the more you travel I think open up your mind to the potential beyond what you see around you and what you see your inner circle doing in certain city-like cultures because that's actually a big reason why I left London in the first place as well was because it all started feeling a little bit too repetitive you know there was a huge focus on like how much like how much people were working and every dinner and social interaction I would have would always be focused around what are you working on what are you doing and we would spend most of the time just talking about work and then when I came to Madrid and I wasn't even aware of it at the time, because it was

more of like when I reflected on the lifestyle and culture, coming to Madrid, I started seeing the huge shift in how I hear everyone's just talking about life, where they want to go, where they've been, what they're living through right now. And it just became a lot more like, I started seeing the big contrast of what I came from in London. And it was a mentality I also was a very like, that was a very big part of me, like I was very much like my self worth was very associated to what I do. And it took me quite a while to break that down. Because here, when I started building this coaching business, obviously, it was taking me and it does take a long time to be able to get to that place where, you know, suddenly all your programs

are where you want them to be and your client flow and everything. So a lot of the time I had to surrender and understand that like, actually what I'm doing is creating and I'm the creator of my own reality. And this has nothing to do about how hard I'm working or what my job is. It's more about what I feel like doing so I can serve from the most authentic place possible. And I think that was something that London was kind of overwhelming me in that sense because everything became about the external validation in many ways, but it was very subconscious. But I started seeing it all around me and I still do when I speak and call my girls from London like the first thing they want to talk

about is always work it's so funny you say that because I feel the same and I'm I've actually been talking about this with my friends as well and I think the pandemic for me especially I lost like huge chunks of things that I would normally do like for instance my like in-person events and my book clubs and comedy and live podcast events and those arms of my work I love the most because I love being around people and suddenly my work got reduced down to just Instagram and that for a bit made me feel really down because I was literally attributing my whole self to being an Instagrammer and I couldn't work out why I was feeling so shitty when nothing was going wrong and I felt really really lucky really grateful like I was in one of the best positions in a pandemic. Like I was living with

my boyfriend. I was happy. I still was working, but for some reason I was just so low. And I realized it's because I was doing exactly what you said. I tied all of my identity into my work. And then my work wasn't serving me because I couldn't do it in the same way as normal. And I couldn't figure out who I was beyond the work that I was doing, which I didn't think was good enough or fulfilling enough or like representative of who I am. And I'm still trying to come out the other side of that, of being like, like working in a creative industry, your hours aren't nine till five. Like sometimes I might work back to back all week, literally not have a minute off. And then there might be other times when I will only have to do like 15 hours a week and that's it. And then in those down times, I will like find things to do, to work, to make feel like my time is valuable because I feel so guilty.

If I have like a spare three hours, I feel like I need to fill it rather than enjoy it. And I definitely think that is a London thing. But I also just think it's interesting. I'd love to come to Madrid and like feel that cultural difference because London does start to feel very small as well after a while I think it feels like it's the grind and it's drinking and it's going out and there's not much nature and there's not much um yeah I don't know I'm definitely it's interesting you said that because

I that's kind of I'm trying to go through that at the minute myself and figure out what does what does living mean beyond working creating inverted commas success I haven't really found the answer there's something um there's something very um that I've also cut out from my vocabulary altogether and it's to define my life as busy because I think busy as a word and as a state of being is always associated with chaos like and people like to overuse it so it's like oh my god I'm so busy I have so much going on it's like you and I feel like when people use it they don't realize it but they're acting very much out of control of their time. And when I have what you just explained, let's say if I have three hours free, I don't see that as time that I'm not using wisely because that's time that you can then focus on doing the internal work or maybe, you know,

setting up a routine where you might be able to do a longer movement practice or maybe chores and life admin that you've been letting go of for a while. So all of these things, I think, like at the end of the day, that time, if you give it purpose, then it's got nothing to do with you being unproductive. But I think, and then I went through this myself as well, where I would feel unproductive

if I wasn't completely back to back. And that came from the London mentality because I was used to always being on the go. And although I was like enjoying everything I was doing, when I had to slow down to really build this business that I'm now running and build it from a place of my truth, I had to stop. And the pandemic, I think that's also caused a lot of resistance has also, you know, the world has never stopped before either. And I think that's also taught a lot of people to like tune in to why they're doing what they're doing. And I see like huge shifts now in what people define as their purpose in that process, because there's, and I did a podcast on this recently as well

with a friend of mine who asked me a similar question on people are working from home and they suddenly start realizing that they don't like what they're doing. They just liked the routine of it. They liked being in the office and being with their colleagues. But when it comes down to how they're serving through their work, it has no meaning. And when you're on your own and having to do that for a prolonged period of time, you start realizing how actually, how I'm really dedicating my time into serving this world isn't really there for me anymore. And that's happened to quite a lot of people in my circle. I'm so fascinated by what you said about the busy things. This is another thing that I've really kind of jostled with in that like, I feel like I have to be busy to be

worthy, but not just with work, like with social calendars. Like I, sometimes I don't want to go out on a Friday night, but I feel like I'll have a great time when I'm out with my friends, but I feel like I've somehow, I'm not doing it right if I'm not out like four days of the week socializing also that is partly because we've obviously had a backlog of not hanging out with people because of the pandemic but this busyness thing has been something that's really and it didn't used to get to me but it's something that I feel a lot of like shame around it if I'm not so in need if I'm not so like my diary is so blocked out I couldn't even fit in a coffee that's kind of like I want to be that busy and yet if I was that busy I'm

sure it would feel like hell but there's definitely like a currency or there's some kind of like it's seen as a really positive thing like you said but it's actually that's the perfect way of putting it you're just not being good with your time but it's weird that it's become such a badge of honor and it's definitely a British cultural thing and it's weird that it's become such a badge of honor. And it's definitely a British cultural thing. And it's definitely more centered in London, but because I'm in London right now. It's very American as well. It's very American in the sense of like productivity is work and busyness is productivity.

And I think like more than anything, like you can still have a lot going on, but I think it's, it's how we use the vocabulary around what we're doing so like the way I rephrase it because I do have like cycles too especially right now where there is a lot of things happening there's a lot of things I need to focus my attention on so but I just focus out I build the momentum on the excitement not around the time. Like, how do I say this? Not around the momentum of like having too much, you know? So it's not like excess things to do, but it's more of like, I'm so excited that I have

this many projects right now that I need to channel my energy into. So you're creating like a new tone around it instead of it being about, I need to do this and you do this and you do this and you see this. And I'm because then when you start thinking about why you want that momentum, it doesn't actually feel that good. You know, when you're going from so many different things, from whether they're work or social commitments, that's just exhausting. You know, it's a completely, you know, it's misaligned to what we're here to do when it comes to the sense of ease that most of us are seeking and wanting to connect to most of the time. We're blocking ourselves by creating these ridiculous routines. Totally. And I've spoken about this a lot on the podcast, but it's

this thing of like, especially as someone who's creative, for instance, like if I need to write a comedy show, I need to take time off from everything else and just concentrate on trying to write the comedy but because of this immediacy of like social media of hot takes of like immediate content we forget that like people who write books we do do paintings we would do anything anything creative no matter what form it is you can't just do that in like a half an hour time slot that you've blocked out and then come back to it tomorrow like that's not really how creativity works it needs room to breathe space it might need you staring at a wall for an hour to come up with something or walking through the middle of London the other day I got I had a meeting and then I just went on my own that's when I thought of you I went on my own and I had a coffee

um in Christopher's place wherever it's like down past Bond Street where I remember we'd gone for lunch and I just sat and I watched these women talking for ages. And then I was like writing poems on my phone and I was like, oh God, we need this like stillness and actual, not boredom, but like a lack of direction. Sometimes I think in order for your brain to wander, in order for you to create. But if we keep putting like such an onus on busyness, then you never get that space.

And then you'll actually, you kind of never do do anything so you'll keep up the like certain productivity side of things that you have to do so you can keep the ball rolling but you'll never have like a big creative breakthrough I don't think and that's kind of what was happening to me I was like so focused on making my life this busy nine to five making me be productive that I wasn't actually creating anything at all yeah very interesting very interesting self-reflection but I think have you ever wondered like where you got that from or where you learned it from because I feel like a big role for me that that's that's come from my mother a lot she's always said you need to be busy you need to be busy since I was younger you know when it came to like summer camps or whatever, it was always about keeping me busy. Even when it was out of my,

you know, I didn't have a say as a child because it was like about having activities and going to camps and staying active as a child. So where do you think you learned that yourself? I think it's definitely apart from that because I think my mum always used to be like oh you're like call me lazy not in a mean way but just because I would want to like chill and she would see being because she her family she was brought up like from not a very well family and they would have to be like constantly doing chores and helping out around the house and like me not being busy to her was like a sign of she'd never had that luxury and so it was quite I think confusing for her if we just

wanted to like watch tv it would like went against she's always busy my mom she's constantly like cleaning she can't sit down she just can't sit down at all um because her brain has been so wired to be like making sure you're doing everything like the idea of like sitting down and not doing something for half an hour really confuses her she like still to this day so I think that's part of it but I also think it's the culture of like any kind of program you watch with anyone successful everyone's like rushing around or if you read a book they're like so booked and busy and they haven't got a minute and they're hopping on a flight to a plane to whatever and so I sort of characterize success as

being this busy ideal whereas I guess if I'd grown up years ago when people were artists lying around eating grapes I don't know what they were doing but I imagine you would have a much a very different like like back in the ancient Greek times when they really like loved laying around and luxury and leisure we've like lost all sense of leisure as being like a valid use of time I think very good way to phrase it I do think we've we've taken it for granted now you know like also what the self-care practice really is like are we what are we doing it for is it also just become part of our routine or is it something that we're really fully enjoying in itself, you know, because I feel like even now people are taking their whole fitness approach to life as well as just like, are you squeezing the hour to

train instead of enjoying it as part of our, you know, what we need to give ourselves sometimes? Like, what about the busyness that comes with our own self-care routine in itself? Like, why is that not overlooked? Why is that not considered as part of the work? Yeah, I agree. It's funny. It's like once I, when I obviously used to be more fitness related on Instagram, it kind of ruined it for me. And now that I don't talk about it, I love going to the gym because it's, it is, it's for me again. And I do it when I want to do it. And it's not got, um, not an ulterior motive, but it's kind of like, it is just for me. and I do it when I want to do it and it's not got um not an ulterior motive but it's kind of like it is just for me and I feel like so many things we accidentally commodify even if you're not like an influencer even if it's that like every time you go to a yoga class you put

a story up of it I do think it does something to your brain and how you're interacting with those things um if you will kind of if your natural inclination is to kind of like snap like put a pitch I try not to do that especially in social things now I try not to take stories and stuff as much as I used to always do it and then I'd be like actually that's weird because what what's like my motivation here and like how does it change my experience of it if I'm seeing it kind of through my camera lens rather than actually experiencing that moment or that conversation. Definitely. It is very powerful because I've also like recently gone through, I think when you're in the world of content and that's something that I used to give a lot of

importance to as well. And recently I've just become more of an observer where I use it as a tool to learn and post when I feel like it. But I used to also get very religious about like how much, how active I needed to be, you know, to, to engage. And I think now it's gone to a point where it's like, if you really, when you reflect on the intention of what you're posting and what for, then I think it creates a whole different feel too around, you know, why, what it is that we're trying to, to inspire through the content. Because I think before I would feel like I needed to always just show up. And I think that created this unnecessary pressure too, on like how much I was doing that actually

didn't mean that much in the moment you know like it was present things that were for me not necessary for me to share and someone told me this the other day because they like I didn't think about it before where I was like she was like I do I always post for other people it's not for me it's for other people you know and she was she's not an influencer or anything at all but she was like that's what is this is about other people oh it's always about other people what's your perspective on that that's so interesting the showing up thing has been a massive thing for me where I would think that part of my role was again like I owed it to these people to be posting certain things throughout my day whatever and now I've got to the point where I'm like actually I don't want to come to my page and

share something unless I'm like something I really want to share so whether it's a book review or it's like an outfit I wore even if it's something that's not like important I'm not going to like take time out of my day to falsify something and that's taken a lot to switch my mind because a lot of your value especially when you're online it feels like if you're not there then you don't exist and it can kind of especially because I've done it for so long it was a really hard cord to cut but when I did it I now find it really hard to show up unless I really want to which is an amazing boundary and also it means that the work that I do the things I come through are coming at me um in a better way because it's that thing of like, you get what you put out. So if you're putting something out that you actually never really intended to do, or you're only doing it for the sake of it or whatever, you attract then

something on that wavelength. And I found that the more boundary down with my work, weirdly, the more valuable the things that come to me are because it means more, because it's less flippant, because it's exactly what you said in the message about like being an agent of it's kind of like instead of allowing yourself to be sucked up and doing things because that's what you think you have to do be the hamster on the wheel constantly running all day sometimes you can take a different path and it serves you more of course I agree with what that person said to you like every time we put something online there's the element that we're sharing it and we're giving it to others. And it is for a sense of whether it's to better your work or whether it's to share something you've learned or whether it's whatever it is, it's not going into a vacuum that's hidden, you know, people are going to see it. But I think that the way that that work has been created in the time offline can be different if the design, if it's like um am I making any sense in that answer yeah I mean I guess what you're getting at that it's like what how I'm interpreting your

answer it's like this is an act it's an active conversation you know so like there's still there's still something very powerful in in sharing for others and seeing how they respond and I think like a big part of how you and how I've seen you evolve from going from the personal trainer to Anani as her in her essence, you know, through everything that you do, and everything that inspires you and how you've like, reinvented yourself in many ways, is a natural cycle of who you are. And I think in many ways, like your content, what I've seen and how I've seen you evolve is just part of where your growth is, you know?

And that's the most authentic way to build, to do this type of thing and to see who responds to that. Because if anything, like there usually isn't an expectation. For some people there is, but I feel for like the nature of what you've built and how I've seen you develop, that has always been like, wow, like this is the response to what I care about and what I want to share with the world. So in many ways, I, I think like, yeah, I understand what you mean. I think, and, and sorry, I know it's been over an hour,

so I will wrap it up soon. I think, and I'm sure you'll have found this with your work, but it is amazing when that happens, when sometimes you take a leap of faith or sometimes you do something, whether it's setting up your coaching or doing something that really feels like this is such a risk. And with anything like that, it is always a risk. But all you need is one person, that first client to be like, I want to work with you or that first person to say, you know, I want to share this thing that you've done. And then it kind of once

you it's exactly what you talk about with your coaching but once you kind of allow yourself to believe that that can happen again it may take years like I'm like you said with your coaching it's the same with me it took years for me to fall in step with this and even have it as like a viable career to to live off really there was like at the beginning I really wasn't making enough money and there was so many times when I almost quit. But every single time I've made a risk, especially every time I said no to a really big thing, like whether it's like a really big brand deal, like someone wanted me to write a book and they feel like such big things to say no to. It's always the no's that I look back and I'm like, oh, wow, I'm so glad I said no, because then this thing happened. And so I guess it's always about

staying true to yourself and trying to keep as you speak about a lot like keep with that inner voice and trust that intuition over the thing that you think is going to kind of serve you really quickly let that kind of be your guide always absolutely and I think like for anybody who might be content creators too like the biggest thing that I've learned and for me although I'm not overly active in Instagram it's a big part of what I love to do and talk about when it comes to what I'm building there is many things I do that are related to building content like right now I'm very much part of a mental fitness game that I'm helping launch and building partnerships for because it's a platform I think could really help serve the neuro performance of a lot of people. And it's just crazy because

since I moved back to Madrid, that was a perfect opportunity that I wanted to, that I was trying to find. And it's taken me a pandemic and two and a half years for it to show up. And it was exactly what I was looking for without knowing it at the time, because I was just trying to find an aligned partner of like, how can I really help build something with all the skills that I have and leverage off a platform, you know? And so many things happened in between that I also had to say no to and had to rethink. A lot of opportunities came my way that were asking me to come back to London, but I just knew that I needed to stay here and I knew I needed to continue building, even though I was going through a lot of cycles too, where I was a bit concerned about how I was going to make the business work because there was so much I needed to refine in

the content and the courses and in the partnerships I was doing as well to continue building on the knowledge and being able to share this type of work with the right people. And so I totally agree with you. We have to be selective and follow our intuition always in this growth process, especially when it comes to content-driven models. Completely. And I'm so glad that that came your way in the end I feel like it's always that it's always normally when you're feeling like you're at a breaking point and that whatever it is isn't going to happen and then suddenly like a crack in the clouds it comes through and you're like oh my god thank the lord that that's happened um I've loved talking to you so. I'm sorry that I've kept you for so long.

Absolutely not, my lady. It flew by. It feels like 10 minutes. I know. It does feel like 10 minutes. If you want to point people in the direction of your work, or is there anything you want to share? Where should we be coming to find you? How can people get a hold of you? Is there anything you want people to look at etc you guys can find me on christina lopez on instagram and if you want to trial some awesome mind games as part of your mental fitness program you can also find me on cognitivefit.com amazing well thank you so much for joining me it's been so nice to catch up but we'll have to do a proper non-recorded catch up as well. Absolutely.

I can't wait to see your face. Thank you so much for having me, my love. It's been a pleasure and I've really enjoyed this conversation. Oh, thank you so much for coming on and thank you everyone for listening. Bye. We'll be right back. winner by 11 p.m. every day. 19 plus and physically located in Ontario. Gambling problem? Call 1-866-531-2600 or visit connectsontario.ca. Select games only.

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