This was FUN to create! We're getting super dooper pragmatic with the five things that are essential to selling your coaching offer, including the one thing that makes everything else possible (spoiler: it's Self-belief).

I'm also sharing how I have applied the 5 Things and already sold four spots in Ripen (a programme that does not yet have an active sales page). 

Resources for you:

• If you want to chat more about Ripen apply here. 
• And if you want a gentle nudge out of self-doubt, meet Betty the BeliefBot - a customer GPT that helps coaches get unstuck within 15 minutes!
• Let's get connected on The Gram: @saspetherick

The short answer is ABSOFUCKINGLUTELY YES! And in this episode, we explore why when the world feels increasingly dark, heavy, overwhelming and sad, our collective coaching work really really matters - not in spite of the heaviness, but because of it. 

You’ll hear why our work is part of building the new world that’s trying to come through. Plus I have five non-typical approaches for supporting yourself.

And if you’d like to feel replenished and supported as you do this work, come join us inside The Coaching Well →

As a highly sensitive person, Sam Dhu believes it is possible to be deeply ambitious and successful AND soft and sensitive at the same time.

Sam is a Psychotherapist, Mentor, and Facilitator of Permission. Mum to eight-year-old, Amelie and two-year-old Frankie, and passionate advocate for being radically kind and compassionate to yourself.

Sign up and get episodes sent to your inbox:

We chat about how to acknowledge our individual capacity to create a life that feels "soft and successful." Many of us don’t have time, the capacity (and maybe even the desire!) for traditional approaches to achieving success, and rather than making ourselves wrong, we can be much more creative in how we do this on our terms.

Sam shares her journey of embracing her ADHD diagnosis and how the more she has accepted that her brain and nervous system have unique needs, the more successful she has become.

This is where things get really fun: being compassionate with yourself when something isn't working or it's feeling hard, opens you up to your individual, unique needs, so you can get curious about what does work.

This is such a reassuring and nurturing conversation for anyone who wants to create success on their terms. I just know you’re going to love Sam!

Resources for you:

Sam mentioned these assessment tools for sensitivity and neurodivergence:

* Highly Sensitive Test self-report

* ADHD self-report

To connect further with Sam:

* Website

* Find Sam on The Gram

* If you are looking for support, this looks delicious: Slow: the Mastermind

Tamu’s work combines somatics, social work and spirituality with science and soulful systems. She is person-centred, evidence-based, trauma-informed, human-paced, nurturing, intuitive, loving and playful. Her holistic approach to supporting the bodies of her clients makes Tamu’s work rich and deep and unique – just like her.

We explore how can do our inside work – to take care of our multitudes, our developmental edges, how we have more joy, more meaning, more orgasms.

This is such a joyous fizzy conversation about our humanness!

Links:

• Tamu on Instagram @livethreesixty
• Tamu's website

Success is one of the core risks that self-doubt holds us back from. 

It’s a sneaky risk because so much of our culture assumes that we are just supposed to want success!

In this episode, we explore how the risk of success shows up and how to recognise that this might be something you protect yourself from. 

I’m also sharing three really practical steps you can take today, to feel less discomfort and to change your relationship with success.

Creating success on our terms provides us with amazing opportunities to create work that reflects our values, that allows us to experience pride and joy, help us to grow and our self-concept to expand. 

If your relationship with success could do with some love - this episode is especially for you.

If you notice that you really need external validation to make decisions, to feel like what you have done matters, this episode will help.

First – nothing has gone wrong! Seeking approval and affirmation and recognition is an entirely human tendency and it helps us feel connected to other people. This only becomes problematic when we feel dependent on the blessing of other people to do anything.

In this episode I share why some of us have a hunger for validation from other people, what we are really doing when we seek external validation, plus: three really simple practices to help you begin to validate yourself that will dramatically grow your self-trust.

Claire Mahon is a global human rights lawyer who has worked as an advisor to world leaders, Presidents and heads of global agencies, and has run a global consulting practice for over 20 years. 

In late 2018 she gave up her business, her life in Switzerland and her salary to move back to her hometown of Rotorua, New Zealand, to stand as a member of parliament in the 2020 election campaign for Jacinda Ardern’s Labour Party. She went ALL in and the results were never guaranteed…

In today’s episode Sas talks about mindset work – what it is, exactly how she uses it with clients, and how you can use it to support yourself.

Sas also addresses the ways in which mindset work has misunderstood or used in unhelpful, and potentially damaging ways.

If you are interested in learning how to think in ways that support you and help to minimise your self-doubt, this episode is for you!

This episode is for anyone who knows they have some untapped potential inside them but maybe you don’t know what to do or your self-doubt is getting in the way. 

In this episode Sas talks about the aspects of self-belief that helped her grow her business by 300% in 12 months! There are three practical, actionable steps you can take to start to bring your potential into the world.

Links:

The Self-belief Coaching Academy.

My podcast interview with Ellie Swift: Swift Online.

The Bold Type.

It was such a treat to interview family psychologist Julia Goodall and money coach + mentor Ray Dodd - two members of the Self-belief Coaching Academy. 

Julia and Ray talk about what it has been like to become learners, the process of practice coaching and what has changed for them and their work as a result of becoming Self-belief Coaches.

Both of these women have come to Self-belief Coach training from wildly different backgrounds, settings for their coaching work and life experiences. If you are thinking about SBCA, this is a must-listen!

Links:

• The Self-belief Coaching Academy 
• Ray Dodd
• Julia Goodall
• Lisa Mabberley (the third and deeply valued member of the ‘Practice Pod’, Lisa was unable to attend).

What makes coaching really good? How do coaches create the conditions for the client to get what they came for? Why is coaching so hard?! 

In this episode Sas shares her thoughts on what coaching mastery is, and the three elements that add rich substance to the coaching experience. 

This episode is going to be particularly helpful for coaches listening in, and if you are thinking of working with a coach, this will help you know what to look for.

ALSO:
The Spring 2021 class of The Self-belief Coaching Academy is open for enrollment. This 20-week programme is evidence-based, trauma-informed and specifically designed to equip you with proven tools to support your clients with self-doubt. 

Especially for all you coaches listening in – this episode is all about Coaching Supervision. 

Kristina Sheppard joins Sas to talk about supervision for coaches: what it is, how it helps us develop mastery, deepen our presence and become more aligned to the coaching work we love. 

Links:

• Kristina on Instagram @becometheauthorofyourlife
• Kristina’s Super-Vision Academy

The Spring 2021 class of The Self-belief Coaching Academy is open for enrollment. This 20-week programme is evidence-based, trauma-informed and specifically designed to equip you with proven tools to support your clients with self-doubt. 

Building on the last episode Sas shared a new coaching concept she has developed, called The Four Faces of the Protector. 

In Part two Sas shares how to begin to interrupt the ways that your particular protector holds you back. To be most effective, each of the Four Protectors - The Critic, The Martyr, The Scapegoat, and The Bystander - require specific approaches. Sas shares them all here.

Links:

• Episode Guidance: The Four Faces of the Protector
• Take the quiz and uncover your Self-doubt Archetype!
• The Self-belief Coaching Academy

Content note: This episode includes discussions around intentional weight loss and diet culture, and contains swearing.

This is the first in a new podcast series called The Body Stories with my beloved friend and fellow coach, Ali Shapiro. Over the next year, Ali and I will have an occasional and ongoing conversation about the nuanced relationship with our bodies.

Ali is a deeply experienced coach whose work sits at the intersection of food, psychology, and behaviour change. Ali holds multiple certifications in integrated nutrition, and her master’s degree is in human behaviour. She has over a decade of work with clients and founded the ‘Truce with Food’ coaching methodology. This work is Ali’s love language!

To give you some context for this episode: I first went to Weight Watchers aged 11, thus began my on-off ‘its complicated’ situationship with the worst of bad boyfriends: diet culture. It’s been hard won, but these days, I have an appreciative and compassionate relationship with my body, and I feel so free of diet mentality.

I also have a complex heart condition, and losing body fat will reduce the burden on my heart. At age 51, I want to lose weight in order to build a strong body that my 81-year-old self will be so proud of. As I embark on this process of intentional weight loss, a lot of old stuff has come up. So far, this process has contained a lot of surprising realisations, story rewrites, and tentative healing.

In this first episode, we set the scene for this ongoing conversation. We talk about:

* Diet culture as “thin at all costs”

* Feeling peace within our bodies

* What does it mean to trust your appetite?

* How I’ve changed my eating habits

* Why restriction is different from deprivation

* Doing the “good thing” vs actually feeling good

* Finding satisfaction in our day-to-day

* Letting go of the Weight Watchers “walk of shame”

This podcast series was sparked by our private chats where Ali’s support has been rich with insight. Our conversations felt so nourishing I invited Ali to make this a public chat.

These are tender conversations, and at times, I will be in the coaching client seat. Our hope is that listening in will spark your own exploration of your body story.

Mentioned in this Episode:

* Connect with Ali here.

* Ali’s upcoming program: Your Emotional Eating Blueprint: Why Am I Eating This Now?

* That Sugar Film

In this episode Sas shares a new coaching concept she has been developing over the last six months. The Four Faces of the Protector provides you with a framework for understanding how your protective self-doubt holds you back.

In Part one Sas shares how she developed this concept, and how you can use it to better understand your self-doubt. This is for anyone who doesn’t experience their self-doubt as an inner critic (and if you do!).

Links:

• Episode Guidance: The Four Faces of the Protector
• Take the quiz and uncover your Self-doubt Archetype!
• The Self-belief Coaching Academy 

In this episode Sas explains one of the greatest resources you can call on when your self-doubt is activated: your Healthy Adult Self. 

You may not even know you have this! 

Sas talks about this part of you, why it matters and the core qualities your healthy adult self is in possession of. She’ll also show you a really simple way to begin to build a relationship with this aspect of you. 

Links + Resources:

• Take the quiz and uncover your Self-doubt Archetype!
• The Self-belief Coaching Academy

Most of us drastically underestimate what we are capable of. In this episode Sas talk’s about the difference between intentions and goals.

Pursuing meaningful, compelling goals and living with intentions that are rooted in our personal values are powerful ways to heal self-doubt. But did you know it's super easy to use goals and intentions in ways that actually increase our self-doubt?

Sas explains how to know what would best support you.

Links:

• Take the quiz and uncover your Self-doubt Archetype!
• The Self-belief Coaching Academy 

Courage + Spice is back! In this episode you’ll hear an update from Sas on what she’s been up to and what’s coming in 2021. 

We’ll also explore the relationship you have with your goals - particularly the role self-doubt plays. Sas shares the five different types of approaches that we tend to have with goals. So if you feel like it would be fun to try something new this year – to see what is possible, this is a great place to start.

Links:

• Take the quiz and uncover your Self-doubt Archetype!
• The Self-belief Coaching Academy 

The podcast for humans with self-doubt is back in your earholes! Listen in to find out what to expect from the new season from host Sas Petherick

Because of the emails and messages, you all send me I know that if you are listening to this podcast, you are interested in your own development as a human and you tend to be self-reflective (which is one of the best things I believe anyone can be).

And I know many of you are also coaches and therapists - I work with a lot of colleagues to help set up a sustainable practice and navigate the inevitable self-doubt that crops up when we embark on putting our hearts work in the world.

So as a self-reflective human or a fellow practitioner, you are more likely than the average bear, to seek out coaching support.

This episode is designed to support you to make good choices if you are 'coaching curious' — to understand a bit more about the value of coaching and how to get the most from a coaching experience. 

Curoius about coaching? Take a look at Coach Match, where you can coach with experienced practitioners who have trained at the Self-belief Coaching Academy

In the last couple of episodes, we have been exploring our unhealthy, unhelpful, often unhealed beliefs: how to recognise them, the benefits of changing them. We've looked at the most common types of negative self-talk (called Cognitive Distortions), and we've looked at the beliefs of Cognitive Restructuring - changing the meaning of what happens to us, so we can impact how we feel emotionally and what we do behaviourally.

In this episode, we are bringing these ideas together. I'm sharing a practice called Belief Busting that I have developed over the last few years, specifically to help folks who are held back by the beliefs that create and sustain self-doubt.

Usually, I teach this in my programmes, or with private coaching clients. But I want to share this with you so you can learn how to coach yourself. This episode is a bit like a workshop cum coaching session!

Download the Belief Buster worksheet

Cognitive Restructuring is based on the principle that how we feel emotionally and what we do behaviourally, is not the result of what happens to us, but instead, it’s down to how we think about what happens to us. 

This means that we can change how we feel and what we do by changing what we believe about what happens to us.

Practising this is freaking ace!

It helps us to slow down and become more aware of our negative self-talk and unhealthy beliefs. This makes it so much easier to unpack unconscious beliefs so we can intentionally and consciously change them. 

This is part two of a three-part podcast mini-series! Next week I’ll walk you through a cognitive restructuring process so you can use this in your life.

Your voice is the one you hear most often, is it kind?

So much mental and emotional suffering comes from the way we talk to ourselves in our own minds.

Over time, the beliefs and behaviours we repeat to ourselves become habitual. Just like we all have physical habits—brushing our teeth before bed, twirling our hair when we’re nervous —we all have psychological habits too.

One of our common psychological habits is the way of talking to ourselves.

This episode is all about the most common types of negative self-talk (sometimes called Cognitive Distortions), and some strategies you can use to identify and start to change your own unhelpful negative voice and upgrade your self-talk!

Unconditional Self-acceptance means that we fully and unconditionally accept ourselves regardless of our competence, and whether or not other people approve, respect, or love us.

With self-acceptance, if we mess up, we understand that we’ve messed up. That’s it. No unfavourable judgement. No feeling bad. Hence, no constant fluctuation in self-worth. We start to experience the world differently. If we don’t get what we want, we are still ok.

With unconditional self-acceptance, you are interested in learning from specific beliefs, behaviours and outcomes but your unique you-ness is never up for debate. You become the constant in your own life.

In this episode we explore what Unconditional Self-acceptance looks like, it's many benefits and importantly: how to begin to cultivate it!

Tamu Thomas is a transformational somatic leadership coach, the eldest daughter of West African immigrants, a mother, a speaker, and now a published author!

Tamu’s first book, Women Who Work Too Much, helps overachieving, overfunctioning women set boundaries, find joy, and flourish.

This conversation was a balm, and I suspect fellow Gen X women in particular, will feel seen and understood. We are the generation that grew up being told we could have it all. Now, we find ourselves in our 40s and 50s—often our most creatively fulfilling years - doing too much during menopause while parenting teens and caring for parents and wondering why we are so bloody tired.

In this conversation, we discuss natural (rather than toxic) productivity, radical rest, and why work (not overwork) can be a positive thing.

This is such an important conversation for those of us who have blurred the boundaries between work, rest, and play (me, too!).

Resources for you:

Women Who Work Too Much by Tamu Thomas

Tamu on Instagram @tamu.thomas

Tamu on TikTok @tamu_thomas

High self-esteem is something many of us desire, its the source of a squillion Pinterest quotes, we tend to worry if our kids don’t have enough of it, it seems to be the secret to professional and personal achievements which is probably why parents, teachers, therapists and coaches bang-on about its many benefits.

But does self-esteem actually make us happier, healthier, more successful?

In this episode, we go on a magical mystery tour of the self-esteem movement: where it came from, the surprising research findings and how self-esteem moved out of the realm of psychological research and into Infomercials and Oprah guests.

Self-doubt is often characterised as an inner-critic or self-saboteur, but its SO much more sophisticated than that!

In this episode, I introduce the concept of The Protector: a characterisation of self-doubt that you can meet with creativity and compassion.

I share five key aspects of this part of your psyche including ideas for how to develop your relationship.

A personal episode for me this week. I share how I have come to really own my preferences: from NOT camping to learning how to say a clean and boundaried 'no'.

Twas not always thus! I sometimes joke that I am a Recovering People Pleaser, but I don't want to make light of what has been a huge developmental process. To own our preferences we must make peace with the possibility that we will be disliked, we'll create tension and conflict, and we may be rejected.

But even though all these things have happened, it's still worth it to be me, in every context, all the time.

In this episode, I share how I uncovered the root causes of this aspect of my self-doubt, how healing these events was just the beginning.

In this episode, I share why it's easy to get confused between your gut feeling and your self-doubt.

This is particularly tricky when we are learning something new!

Using Broadwell's model of competence we explore when your gut feeling is most reliable and how to tap into what it's telling you.

It's episode 50 and two years since beginning the podcast! I thought it would be fun to revisit the very first episode: The Five P's of Self-doubt.

In the first episode, I (somewhat tentatively!) shared my framework for how self-doubt works - how it responds to psychological risk and how we use the Five P's to keep ourselves safe from that risk. In this episode, I share how my theory has evolved in the last few years.

I've been exploring the concept of psychological risk, looking at how this operates and the consequences of it. These findings have updated my original framework, added an additional 'P', and led to this episode. 

If you have a vociferous inner-critic, this episode is for you!

Everything outside of you, is neutral. It just IS. How you experience the world, is how you interpret it. Usually, we don't just have an experience, we have a lot of thoughts, feelings, judgements about the experience!

In this episode, I share how most of us were never taught to be consciously aware of how we interpret neutral reality. Plus I share a practice for you try!

The question I am asked The Most about my work is 'how can I feel more confident right now?' And in this episode, I'm answering the question!

Most of us want to feel confident so we can do and say what we want to do and say. We have some imaginary version of what would be possible if we had more confidence: who we would be, much more awesome our lives would be. But what most of us don’t realise is that confidence is a consequence of other things. It never comes first.

I'm sharing how I have come to understand the process by which confidence is cultivated, how I see this process as a pyramid.

There are five layers on top of each other - like building blocks - and confidence is the final block at the top of the pyramid.

In this episode, we explore a concept from developmental psychology that our growth as adults is partly about increasing our capacity to understand, reflect on and respond to two key psychological states: sameness and difference.

I see the infinity loop as symbolic of this process that we are always moving through: one loop is sameness which represents safety, stability and peace; this is where we feel settled, where we integrate and consolidate what we learn out in the world. The other loop is difference, which offers us the stimulation of energy, complexity and newness that we need to grow.

We explore what happens within these states, how we get stuck and why self-doubt is integral to keep moving.

Julie Parker is the Founder of The Beautiful You Coaching Academy where she passionately trains and supports heart centred people to become life coaches. Julie has inspired thousands of people on stages all over the world and is the recipient of numerous leadership and women’s business awards.
 
 Julie is also the Co-Founder of Priestess Temple School and host of the top ranking Priestess Podcast.

We talk about growing up in rural Australia, the gift of being raised by excellent mothers, beginning work as a social worker, the mentors and teachers that shaped us, how our world is calling forward a new model of leadership that is cooperative, inclusive, vulnerable and imperfect. This is one of my favourite interviews!

Sarah Vermunt is the founder of the career coaching company: Careergasm. She is the author of two books Careergasmand Career Rookie: A Get-It-Together Guide for Grads, Students & Career Newbies. She helps people figure out what the heck they want so they can quit jobs they hate and do work that feels good.

In this conversation we talk about the courage it takes to admit when your work feels like someone else's dream job, how to begin to uncover what you really do want to do, and why you never have to monetise the hobbies and interests you adore. I just know this will be the spark you need to start thinking about how you want to feel in your work!

Have you ever daydreamed about a different potential future for yourself?

Perhaps your imagination offers you an entirely different job, country, or relationship?

It might be that your life looks the same on the inside but feels entirely different to you.

This might be a creative way to spend time on a drive or in a queue, and it could also point you towards an entirely new direction.

In this episode of Courage and Spice, we are exploring this sometimes magical connection with Your Future Self. We explore:

* How to connect to yourself years from now

* How to use this envisioning exercise when we want to make a life change

* When this exercise isn’t helpful

* How to decode the breadcrumb trail your imagination offers.

I also share a quite magical experience of connecting to my future self years before I even knew what it was, and how my vision was a giant metaphor for life now.

If you have a feeling that something new wants to emerge in your life, this episode is for you!

Please do share in the comments what your Future Self is up to ✨

Resources for you:

* Self-belief Journalling: make a cosy date with yourself and your journal to explore a topic designed to help you grow self-belief. Our next topic is intention!

* Write a letter to your future self.

* Wishcraft by Barbara Sher

* Rethinking positive thinking: Inside the new science of motivation by

Gabriele Oettingen

* Hal Hershfield in conversation with Scott Barry Kaufman: The Psychology Podcast

Mary Beth LaRue is a yoga teacher, mentor, writer, and the co-founder of a yoga-inspired coaching company, Rock Your Bliss.

MB has been a yoga teacher for over a decade teaching thousands of people on stage at Wanderlust Festivals as well as designing custom yoga programs for rehabilitation centers, homeless shelters and the Down Syndrome Association of Los Angeles. 

Originally from Iowa, MB lives in Silver Lake, Los Angeles with English bulldog Rosy, husband Matt and together they are growing a family through foster adoption. 

MaryBeth and Matt are parents to Baby A, their story is one of deep courage and the willingness to live with uncertainty every day. I just know you are going to be so touched by this tender love story.

Jessie Harrold is a women’s mentor, wilderness quest guide, doula, and author of the book Project Body Love: my quest to love my body and the surprising truth I found instead.

We talk about Jessie's quest to reclaim her identity after her big dream of becoming a doctor didn't pan out, how she has since carved out work of real meaning, and how she has learnt to be in her body.

Mike Aspinall is craft fanatic. You might know him as The Crafty Gentleman - his website was recently named one of the UK’s most popular DIY sites, you may have also seen him hanging out with the likes of Kirstie Allsopp or at a craft event across the UK.

I love his enthusiasm for crafting and his belief that making should be open and accessible to everyone.

We talked about following your curiosity, the importance of retaining a sense of humour, how running a business requires us to be clear on our personal values and why running a craft-based business alongside a day job has multiple benefits.

When she was 4 years old Sylvia Mac suffered 3rd and 4th degree burns over my back and various parts of her body. She was put on life support and was not expected to live. But she pulled through only to face years of surgeries and skin grafts as her body healed. The unseen scars of PTSD took much much longer to recover from.

These days Sylvia campaigns for those with body disfigurements by raising awareness through her not-for-profit campaign group, Love Disfigure.

For this year's Mental Health Awareness Week theme of Body Image, this is the story of a woman who has one of the most spectacular body images I know of!

Maliha Abidi is the artist and author of ‘Pakistan For Women: Stories of women who achieved something extraordinary’.

Pakistan For Women shares more than 50 real stories of amazing women who belong to Pakistan and have achieved something extraordinary while making a difference.

Maliha celebrates women from mountaineers to astrophysicists to educators, and advocates for the idea that if these Pakistani women can achieve their dreams through hard work and dedication, so can every girl reading their stories.

Maliha’s story is one of courage and self-belief too. Of growing up in the beauty of Karachi, moving to California as a teenager and then to Britain as a new wife. She offers encouragement to artists everywhere to delight in your creativity. 

This conversation was recorded a few days after the massacre at the Mosque's in New Zealand: a poignant aspect of a conversation between two women: one a kiwi and one a Muslim.

Ruth Allen is a counselling psychotherapist, outdoor therapist and writer interested in solitude, silence, movement and narrative. She is also an organisational trainer, endurance runner and mountain addict.

Last year Ruth ran the entire 350 km length of Bosnia and Herzegovina across the mountains. Solo and unsupported, wild camping across the country. One woman, with a tent and stove. Ruth’s storytelling of that journey was profound and compelling and brave.

In this episode, we talk about Ruth's trek, the existential doubt that resides somewhere underneath our self-doubt, the importance of ritual for integrating our experiences. And the dance between the numinous transcendent moments and the mostly mundane aspects of our everyday human existence.

I first discovered Kat Goldin through Instagram. I could scroll through Kat’s images of Scottish sunsets, comedic goats and Major Tim the dramatic peacock all day.

And then last year she taught me how to make sourdough bread and in no small way changed my life.

Kat lives at Gartur & Stitch farm, on the edge of Loch Lomond with her family of human, feathered and furry beings. The tagline on the Gartur & Stitch website is a quote from poet Mary Oliver: 'Instructions for living a life. Pay attention. Be astonished. Tell about it.' This is exactly what Kat does so brilliantly. A born storyteller, we get to see that this small farm is a universe unto itself. From the Farm studio, Kat & Kevin teach folks how to raise goats, make cheese, carve spoons, forage for food. And make bread.

I have some idea from her writing, that this life has been a long-held dream of Kat’s. 

We talk about how Kat dreamed of her farm a decade before she saw it, and what it has taken to create a viable business from a team of wayward goats.

On the 20th of December 2018, my heart stopped working. I collapsed on the kitchen floor. 36 hours later, I was having emergency surgery to repair my heart which was completely blocked.

I want to reassure you that as I record this episode almost three months later, I feel very very well.

I know for a lot of us navigating through self-doubt, its the things we are fearful of - the thing we are most afraid of happening - that our self-doubt is trying to protect us from.

We often work really hard to avoid our fears at all costs. But I have learnt that fear is a curious beast when it is the only natural emotion to feel. 

I wanted to talk to you about what I learnt in those 36 hours, mostly about the nature of fear. And how I am making sense of it all now.

Paul Jarvis is the author of Company of One: Why Staying Small is The Next Big Thing In Business. He also makes software, teaches popular online business courses and for the last two decades has been a web designer.

Paul has worked with professional athletes like Steve Nash and Shaquille O’Neal, corporate giants like Microsoft and Mercedes-Benz, and entrepreneurs with online empires like Danielle LaPorte and Marie Forleo. And he's written for Wired, USAToday, Fast Company, Forbes and loads of other snazzy publications.

Paul has one of the most thoughtful newsletters for business owners on the internet - I highly recommend signing up for his Sunday Dispatches.

We talk about what it has been like to grow up with the Internet, why growth isn't always the best thing for your business, why simplicity and elegance are solo business owners' greatest tools and how to find your 'Rat People'.

Lottie Storey has spent the last 15 years as a writer. She is currently the editor for the Beano Parents website, contribute regularly to magazines like Mollie Makes, Project Calm, Simply Vegan and In the Moment, and she has a podcast in development coming out in 2019.

We talk about the process of finding your writing voice, what it means to be a writer, how Lottie first got published and what freelance life is like as a busy, engaged parent of five. Lottie also shares the impact of finding her writing voice in other areas of her life; advocating for her own needs and those of her fabulous son, Ted.

We recorded our conversation at my kitchen table with Bohdi snuffling about on the floor, so its lovely to invite everyone here.

If you love the idea of communal learning and connection, if you are looking for like-minded souls, if you have incomplete online courses on your laptop: listen in!

I’m excited for you to get to know Sally Burns. We recorded this chat before ‘The US Situation’ - I guess we need to start calling it what it is - The Coup by tech billionaires.

To know that Sally is thoughtfully building an alternative to everything they stand for, fills me hope.

Sally is an e-learning expert and ecological thinker. Her work involves reimagining the ways we commune and learn online, away from algorithms and ads.

She’s the Founder of The Portal Collective, an online space where people can gather to learn and grow in a meaningful community. The entire site and its ethos is so beautiful! It feels like wandering through a verdant garden.

Sally also offers support for non-profits, coaches, and educators who want to host their work on a learning platform that is very far from big tech. I think this is a really exciting development for course creators!

We discuss the importance of collaborative, co-created learning experiences that prioritize emotional safety and mutual care. We expand on the broader implications of community, collective action, and the role of imagination in creating a more connected and equitable world.

This was such a hopeful and wildly nourishing chat.

More resources for you:

* The Portal Collective

* If you are a Course Creator - check out the Portal.

* Sally on Instagram

* Combining by Nora Bateson

* Love this? You might enjoy my conversation with Niki Wickes.

Rabya Lomas takes play really bloody seriously. She is a multifaceted woman who happens to be of dual British and Pakistani heritage, working full time as a project manager with an enthusiastic interest in Playful Living. Rabya's instagram feed is one of joyous fun - from pancakes and bubbles, a stairway of dreams, to imaginative ways with coffee beans - she is always looking to share and help others find their play so that can show up happy to their lives.

And this is not some whimsical frippery. Rabya believes there is power in play.  When we are engaged in play with our minds and bodies we are wholly free in those moments.  Free to explore without expectations or outcomes, free to discover yourself in those moments, free to unlock creative potential. and every piece of research I have read agrees with her!

We talk about what it was like for Rabya to grow up in her British Pakistani family, how she chose love over expectations, how she is learning to navigate her multifaceted self online and in real life, and why play matters SO much in these interesting times. 

Beth Kempton is one busy woman! She runs three different businesses all of which offer tools, resources and online courses for living an inspired life.

Earlier in her career Beth worked with UN agencies, global brands, and NGOs all over the world, advising on corporate social responsibility and instigating projects that have raised over $10 million for charity. She also earned a Master’s degree in Japanese.

Beth’s second book ‘Wabi Sabi: Japanese wisdom for a perfectly imperfect life’ (Piatkus) is out now. She shares lessons inspired by ancient Japanese wisdom, gathered throughout a twenty-year love affair with Japan.

We talk about how to sink into your own wisdom, how to following the labyrinth of life and to embrace the perfection in imperfection.

Ngaio Anyia is a singer, songwriter, DJ, writer, poet, a columnist @bristol247 and leads inclusion and social justice projects in Bristol. Ngaio closed the Shangri-la stage at Glastonbury in 2017 and is a Jill Scott, Erykah Badu mashup for the #metoo generation! 

Ngaio’s music is an expression of her advocacy work - she helped organise the black lives matter march in Bristol in 2016 and is currently leading the Inclusion Project for Artspace Lifespace and The Invisible Circus here in Bristol.

We talk about Ngaio's experience of learning how to be an ally and advocate in her work. Of how she keeps opening doors for other women of colour. Stay listening to the end for Ngaio's latest single See Them.