SAMIA: Hello, Salam, Shalom, Namaste, Sat Sri Akal, Aloha, Holah, Ciao, Bonjour and Buna!It's really really amazing to be with you and I'm so so happy that you have joined us today and I know you will be really really happy you join us today as well because I have a very special person... Shoshana... who's a Success Financial Coach and we're going to be having a fabulous conversation today. Welcome Shoshana... 

SHOSHANA: Thank you... thank you so much for having me… I'm so excited to be here…

SAMIA: Yes... it is really really awesome to have you... and will you just jump right in and tell us more about who you are and what you do…

SHOSHANA: Oh thank you of course... Hi everyone my name is Shoshana Kolodny and I'm a Success Financial Coach... I really help my clients achieve the impossible right… it's like things that we all dream of achieving and how do we actually do it... So that's what I help my clients do and I have a unique background which helps me help them be even more successful... I am a financial professional and I do have my financial license. So I have a great mind and business understand finances and really understand the meaning of financial freedom...  and then I'm also a money mindset coach which I help you overcome all those money blocks that we were taught as growing up which our parents didn't mean to but somehow are suddenly ingrained in us and I hope you understand that your value and in order to really understand your value to invest in yourself financially and emotionally… 

SAMIA: Very very cool... and I can see how because of what you do what you aim to help people with self-confidence is like a huge thing that you teach and work with people on... oh my gosh and my gosh... I really really appreciate that about you because our self-confidence is such a core core aspect of what we need if we're going to have any kind of success in our life... So tell me more… like what is a big problem that you see your clients struggling with when it comes to this issue of building up your self-confidence… 

SHOSHANA: Thank you...  so yeah so I like to say self-confidence is our foundation of a real successful business right... We all need a great strong foundation in order to be able to grow our business and where I really started and really felt the need to empower Mompreneurs with the self-confidence is when I was... I helped create/start a non-profit helping families suffering from postpartum... What we came to realize while doing it is that Moms really carry the burden on their shoulders about raising the next generation… and many different issues really starts the path to postpartum and if any of you are Moms I'm sure you all agree with me right and what was the major common denominator across the board that we found was really it was all the root cause was from stress... and the as we know the largest stress factor in our country is financials… money... Not really understanding money not really being able to grasp how money really works and as we all know we all worry about will we outlive our retirement fund well we have enough money in retirement and especially as moms they were very worried about how are they going to feed another child how are they going to put another child through college right so that's when the stress kicked in and there went their self-confidence that they got this and they can actually do what it is they desire… and really their desire was to raise a healthy child right... so that's when I realized that self-confidence the belief in yourself is truly truly so important to be able to achieve what you want to achieve… 

SAMIA: OMG... you brought up so many so many like excellent points and the relationship between the self-confidence and the stress factor... I would love to explore a little bit deep… more deeply around that yeah... just tell me more...

SHOSHANA: So when we are stressed right what is our reaction... our reaction is that we're not good enough... our reaction is that we don't have enough to actually achieve what we want and that's you know it's like that stress cycle ball that like the hamster on that wheel right just running around and around and around... and one thing leads to the next and leads to the next right and it's that self-doubt that kicks in that not worthy enough and it causes stress and then when we have that stress but we start to feel are we enough will we ever be able to get out of there and it's that whole negative cycle that we tend to go on... So that really destroys the self-confidence…

SAMIA: Yeah yeah… because you just don't have the time to process… like because of all the stress you don't have the time and the energy to process what's happening with you and around you in the best ways… like even if in general you have good skills in terms of you know what you do how you do it but when you're in a stressful situation that all of that begins to break down... So I can see the relationship and what you're talking about… 

SHOSHANA: Yeah... and really it all starts and ends with our belief in ourselves with our value in our self with our ability to see ourselves as successful humans and if when we're in that stress cycle our focus is too narrow to be able to see wider and that's where the self-confidence goes out of the window and that's where I bring it right back in to be able to start the success cycle right and that's what I teach people is to get off that hamster wheel and get onto the success cycle wheel and because it's the same thing it's a once you feel that you have self-confidence you start that success cycle of believing in yourself of actually being able to take action when you take that action you actually build your self-confidence which actually believe in yourself and you go down that success cycle which is the cycle to be able to achieve the impossible… 

SAMIA: Oh I love it... I love the idea of the success cycle… you just reminded me about a concept that I learned when I was studying with my happiness coach... and we talked about the upward spiral... It's like an actual real thing there's actual research that's been done with like brain imaging and so forth and it very clearly establishes that people can either go in like a downward spiral where you know something bad happens… you're not able to cope with it for whatever reason usually because you know some stressful situation and you don't have the capacity in the moment to cope with it but then unfortunately… you… if you don't get that break you don't get that time things just keep getting worse worse worse worse...

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SAMIA: ...so you know if you don't get a break and you know unfortunately you just get caught up in this downward spiral... it can get really really tough to get out of it... but the good news is that you can also get caught up in that upward spiral where one good thing happens and it builds into this like positive upward momentum where more and more and more good things begin to happen for you so when you were talking about the success cycle I was reminded of the upward spiral I learned about… 

SHOSHANA: Yeah that's right... that's what it really is right... it's like we get people off the downward spiral and we get them up onto the upward spiral and when you're on that upward spiral it's amazing what you can actually achieve… 

SAMIA: Yeah... yeah... Okay so what are some of the I guess things for people to be aware of if they're feeling like they have been caught in a downward spiral... what do they need to become aware of that they can then begin to create change around so that they can then begin to get more caught up in the success cycle…

SHOSHANA: A great question right... So like I said I believe self-confidence is a strong foundation and a lot of us women don't feel very confident in… out there in business especially because everybody says it's a man's world but we really know it's not a man's world we can do exactly what the men can do if not even better right but we have to believe that and feel that... So the first thing that we really have to do is create that self-confidence... and if you're not feeling confident at the present moment don't worry I have great tips for you and I will share with you how to build your confidence…So the first thing that you have to know is that when you try to do something new... the brain goes into fear factor right it freezes and it's like help I don't know what to do you don't know how to do this stop this you're gonna fail right... so we got to show the brain we got to create evidence in our brain that we actually have the ability to do something new and different right …and when we create that evidence that's how we're creating confidence in ourselves by showing the brain we can do something different… so create that evidence what do we need to do to create that evidence... So I'm going to share with you the first step that you need to do but you have to know that this first step you have to take it a tiny little step don't jump in into the deep end of the pool… take it one pinky toe at a time to create that evidence... And what is that evidence is keeping a promise to yourself... make one promise and keep it to yourself for five days in a row right... so like I tell everybody if that promise if your promise is to get fit don't promise yourself that you're gonna exercise a half hour every morning five days in a row… it could happen but realistically that first week it's not gonna happen right but if you say that you're gonna do some sort of movement for five minutes a day five days in a row that's how you're gonna create evidence because that is something that you can keep... again getting up earlier in the morning right so don't say you're getting up a half hour earlier in the morning or an hour earlier in the morning… you can work yourself up to it but for the first five days get up one to five minutes earlier in the morning and that's how you're going to create that evidence in your brain right that's keeping that promise to yourself and that's the creating evidence and that is creating confidence… think of it... how are you gonna feel by exercising five minutes a day for five days in a row... it's gonna feel phenomenal you're suddenly gonna feel like you're on top of the world that you can accomplish everything... Amazing that was your first step to self-confidence...

SAMIA: I love it I love it... and now you're reminding me of more amazing things that I've learned from my teachers... So one thing that it reminds me very very strongly of was when I was learning with one of my coaches Raymond Aaron... and he has this like really amazing system that he teaches for goal setting and one of the key key aspects of it was exactly what you were talking about that you know because you want to build trust in yourself you want to build self-confidence in your in yourself… you want to… if you if you make a commitment to yourself you want to keep it and he was like one of the biggest mistakes people make like you said was they'll jump off into the deep end or attempt to do that and then they struggle... And so he actually recommends that you break down any goal you have into three different levels... you say okay at a minimum I'm going to do this so for example if you're waking up in the morning earlier be like at a minimum I'm going to wake up one to five minutes earlier in the morning but maybe you know then you also send set a second goal where you say but I will try and challenge myself and see if I can wake up 10 minutes earlier and then I will also set an outrageous goal for myself and say like I will try and get up 30 minutes earlier... but at the minimum I will get up one to five minutes earlier and as long as you meet your minimum goal you can mark yourself off and give yourself a on the back and be like... yay! I met my minimum goal... but oftentimes when you meet your minimum goal you're so encouraged and inspired and happy and excited that you keep going you know like and next day you might actually wake up 15 minutes earlier and that's like a bonus and maybe you're so excited and empowered by that the day after the day after that you wake up 30 minutes earlier but that's again just like a bonus… it's not... like if you don't meet outrageous goal or you don't meet the challenge goal it's all right you still met your minimum so you know like and then over over time once the minimum becomes really easy to meet you just up the game… your challenge target can become your new minimum you know like that kind of a thing... 

SHOSHANA: Yeah yeah that's right... right… And you're building that confidence one step at a time and that's how that confidence muscle grows right and that's what we want to do is we want to grow that confidence we want to build a new evidence pathway in our brain to show our brain hey we got this we can do new things even so there's scary right... how can we do new things because we just did it and we kept the promise to ourselves for five days in a row so now we could do new things so that is like your first first stepping stone to self-confidence... is really that stepping stone… And do I have time for a second tip... yes please…So the second tip that I tell everyone and I tell my clients is... we all have some things we love about ourselves and some things we don't love about ourselves right... So let's concentrate a minute on the characteristics that we love about ourselves right let's find those characteristics let's find what it is that we actually love about ourselves… how we are great listeners how we're very productive how we inspire others let's go let's make that list of things that you really really love about yourself… share with me Samia one thing that you really love about yourself... 

SAMIA: Oh my gosh... I love lots of things about myself and I think one of the things I love about myself most is how much I love to learn... because like for me it's so much fun to be learning something new but I am also aware of like how it helps me to grow and I just love knowing that I'm continuing to grow and become better and stronger... so I just love learning and I love how much I love learning… 

SHOSHANA: Amazing amazing… that's so beautiful thank you right... So now we got to celebrate what we love about ourselves we got to  celebrate it we got to be proud of it right… how do you suddenly feel about celebrating what you love about yourself suddenly you're feeling oh I got this I got this right... I can do something new I can do something scary you are in the right mode the right success cycle mode of doing things right.. so we want to go there and stay there right so we're going to create that list of 5 to 10 things that we really really really love about ourselves and we're going to be very consciously celebrating them and every time we do anything that we love about ourselves you got to celebrate it you got to acknowledge it you got to be proud of it and you go to say hey look this is what I'm doing this is what I'm good at and this is what's gonna move me forward in my business... and that's how you continue your success cycle...

SAMIA: That is so cool you know and I mean my gosh... it's making me think a little bit about... do you distinguish between self-confidence and self-trust?

SHOSHANA: Do I distinguish... so the more… it's they're related to each other tremendously right... so the more self-confidence that you have the more self-trust you have... the more self-trust you have the more you can build your self-confidence right... So if you're not going to keep promises to yourself you're not going to have self trust... and then when you don't have that self trust it's very hard for your brain to allow you to do something new because it's going to say hey guys we're gonna fall flat in the mud nobody likes to fall flat in the mud face down right... so yeah they're very much related and they're intertwined in the success cycle… 

SAMIA: Yeah thank you thank you for talking about that for a bit... And okay I have another question... So you know when you're talking about being in stressful situations and how that can really impact our self-confidence and we're talking about helping entrepreneurs… or as entrepreneurs one of the things or a context within which I know I can get very stressed and I think a lot of us can get very stressed... moms can get really stressed… is in the context of having to deal with other people who are maybe not listening to us… who’re not cooperating with us.... you know we need to get things done... And so how do you sort of deal with that stress how do you manage that stress in a way that you know allows you to stay grounded in your self-confidence…

SHOSHANA: It's a very very good question... And that's a question really proof to me that I did not have the right self-confidence I needed as a mom and certainly not as an entrepreneur... I was... I used to be very scared to ask people to do anything for me… I was scared of their reaction of how they would say no... of how they wouldn't listen …of how I wouldn't be able to express myself properly… so I didn't... and guess what… Then the frustration built and the stress built and when I finally said something it never came out with confidence and it always came out with frustration right …and then I wasn't a good leader I wasn't a good listener I wasn't good at expressing myself right and it really did not serve me or my business or my family in a positive way right and it just continued in that stress cycle... So the first thing that you have to do is that when you're feeling that way is you have to remove yourself from the situation you have to take a deep breath... breathe in breathe out... and say okay now I have to be able to express myself so that my team will be able to understand what I'm trying to tell them right …and I'm gonna go simple right I'm gonna say as a mom we have to be able to express ourselves to be able to ask our child to make their bed so they actually go ahead and make their bed right... 

SAMIA: Yes...

SHOSHANA: ..and right... like that is I think the easiest example to use is to be able to say to your child go ahead and make your bed... now if you are going to go with that expectation that your child is going to mouth you back and say no mom I don't want to why do I have to this is not what I should be doing and all the rest of it how are you walking into that situation… you're walking into that situation very very stressful and when you're finally gonna say hey kiddo can you please make your bed you're not gonna say it that way you're gonna say go kiddo do your bed already like go go go go right... and because you're expecting an argument back so that's the way you're expressing yourself… but if you take a deep breath in and you breathe and you say okay I would like my kiddo to go make his bed I am gonna know that my you know and I  am expecting my child to say of course mom and go make their bed I am gonna be able to say hey kiddo can you please go make your bed... and my child will say sure mom and go and do it right …do you see the difference of the way I asked that question...

SAMIA: Yeah... Absolutely and it also made me think about you know all the research on how our expectations actually have a causal impact on how other people respond and react to us... and especially when we're thinking in the context of children or when we're thinking about you know in the context of working as a team leader and how we treat our team members it totally impacts their energy and how they will respond to us... and you know and oftentimes you know when we go in with the expectation of really not just being self-confident but also being confident in the ability and the capacity of our team members or our children and really respecting them and their abilities and trusting them to do the right thing and you know… it really it really inspires them to sort of raise up to meet our expectations and that produces way better results than screaming and shouting and so forth… 

SHOSHANA: That's right... yeah yeah… and then it also produces our ability to be able to do it again and again right it's like stay on that cycle of actually you know the soft communication the impactful communication… 

SAMIA: Yes and I think that's like one of those things that women are naturally usually much better at... and so that's something we can really you know love about ourselves and be so happy that we have that talent and that skill and that learning... I just love it…wohoo… 

SHOSHANA: Are you up for a third tip…

SAMIA: Sure absolutely... 

SHOSHANA: And my third and final tip is... from one of my favorite authors Kamal... I forgot his last name you'll have to look it up for me... but he has a great book called "Love yourself like your life depends on it"... and we got to love ourselves like our lives depend on it and that's what helps build our self-confidence... 

SAMIA: Yes oh... you just brought up one of my other very very favorite topics to talk about because when we think about loving ourselves there is like such depth you know… it's not like there's just one way to love ourselves there's like so many different ways that we can love ourselves and because love is wow such a expansive and in fact infinite… both feeling but also action you know… and so how much we can love ourselves how we can love ourselves that's also... it's just infinite infinite capacity infinite possibilities and it's just so... ah… I love loving myself... tell me more about how you love yourself…

SHOSHANA: You know I have many different reminders that I set to practice self-love on a daily basis right... it's a practice of self-love and I took most of my tips of self-love from Revol… Kamal... I forgot his last name... but he has a great book and it's called "Love yourself like your life depends on it" and he gives you really breaks it down what to do on a day-to-day basis but starting with first thing in the morning we all do the same thing we all look in the mirror to brush our teeth… now either you could spend that time looking in the mirror to brush your teeth and saying oh my god there's a new wrinkle and a new gray hair and a new stretch mark or you could look at yourself in the mirror and say "I love myself" and start your day just actually loving about yourself... oh I love my brown hair... I love my eyes... I love my smile... I love that I'm so strong… 

SAMIA: Oh I love that... and you know I remember when I first started a similar kind of practice... it was… it felt a little awkward and cheesy and just fake to be looking at yourself in the mirror and saying these things… but you know if it makes you feel better makes you feel happier why not... give it a try... 

SHOSHANA: That's right and over time you're going to build that muscle of actually enjoying that time really looking in the mirror and seeing all the wonderful qualities that we have… 

SAMIA: Yes... and this was like really important for me to do you know because I'm a trauma survivor... I'm a survivor of child sexual abuse… and for a long time I actually had... like a really bad sense of disassociation with my own body where I would not even want to look at myself in the mirror and you know like if I looked at myself in the mirror I was like... I  didn't think like I was looking at myself… I didn't identify myself... If I saw pictures of myself it was like I was looking at a stranger's picture… like I did not identify myself with my body… I  didn't want to identify myself with my body it was just too traumatizing because in my mind my body was the reason I was suffering and in trouble and vulnerable to more suffering and getting into more trouble so I was like I don't want to deal with my body at all and so I did my best to ignore it... and so you know when I started these kind of practices of saying I love myself and especially in the context of recognizing my body myself as my body... it was really tough but look at me now… Yay... I'm so glad I'm so glad I went through that process and yeah... 

SHOSHANA: And you get to appreciate everything about yourself right... 

SAMIA: Yeah...

SHOSHANA: …and that's really what it boils down to is that appreciation and that gratitude... And I'll tie it back to how it really helps us as entrepreneurs move forward in our business right… 

SAMIA: Yes... 

SHOSHANA: Because when we start believing in ourselves and our own ability that's the vibe we give off to others… so then your clients your customers other people start seeing you and believing in you and seeing a successful entrepreneur and they can suddenly put their trust and belief in you right... that’s right… and if you're gonna come as a shadow of a doubt and not stand up straight and not believe in your product not believe in your services then nobody else can do it right... So that's why self-confidence is the foundation to a successful business…

SAMIA: Yes... I still agree with you... and you know what you're just sharing oh my gosh our lack of self-confidence besides you know the energy that we give off that other people can totally read… it actually has so many other real impacts as well... so for example if I don't like or love or feel comfortable looking at myself in the mirror you know now we're living in a world because of the pandemic where we're having to constantly stare at ourselves sometimes when we're on video on zoom etc. and I this was like a few months ago you know there was a report coming out that one of the reasons a lot of people's mental health is suffering because of being so much on zoom is because they're experiencing drops in self-esteem and self-confidence because they don't love looking at themselves on video… when they look at themselves they thinking about... oh my gosh this aspect of me looks bad and I look fat here or you know like whatever it is about their body or appearance that they don't love and appreciate... And so then they don't even want to be present you know... they're women… another coach that I was working was recently who actually is a brilliant wonderful coach and she really is very passionate about helping women be comfortable with being on video because they don't like the way they look or they're not comfortable about the way they speak or you know whatever it is... and video… I'm not saying that you have to do video or you must do video in order to be successful in business but it should be a choice that you are making from a healthy happy place that you know I'm not just into video... I don't want to do video I'll do something else... it shouldn't be something that you think you can't do and you're not doing because you’re afraid to do or scared to do or because it makes you feel bad about yourself you know... 

SHOSHANA: That's right... that's right we should have that choice to say this is the way I want to grow my business or this is the way I choose not to grow my business right... So my program combines all of those into one right… you don't need a separate video coach to have that you don't need  a separate mindset coach... I give you everything together in one package deal… 

SAMIA: What's the name of your program… 

SHOSHANA: My program is called Millionaire and I help you to grow a CEO millionaire mindset right... because we're all the CEO's in our businesses... Listen... money is just energy right so the more money we have not necessarily gonna make us happier but the more life experiences we can actually experience with our loved ones... We can help our loved ones we can support our loved ones and we can give them more experiences in life when the money flows easier to us... 

SAMIA: Exactly… it's like the one last thing you'll stress about…

SHOSHANA: Yeah...

SAMIA: Okay awesome... Any last words or any last shares or tips on how to keep in touch with you…

SHOSHANA: You can follow me on Facebook @shoshanakolodny or my Instagram is @shoshana.kolodny or you can find me in my website shoshanakolodny.com... and I would love to be in touch with you in any way... I hope you find this helpful and successful and let me know the first step you'll gonna do to build your self confidence...

SAMIA: Indeed... yes please do that... Also make sure you check the show notes because we're going to drop all of Shoshana's links in the show notes... you can just click on it and connect with her real easy and not to worry about you know to get the spelling right and things like that... so yes please check the show notes …connect with Shoshana...I'm also going to drop my links if you like to get in touch with me... And with that I just want to say until we connect next time... I wish you lots and lots of peace and joy :).