From Therapist to Coach with Caryn Gillen Part 2

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Welcome to beautifully bloomed, the podcast where we explore how to break you out of the box of rules and beliefs that are holding you back from the life you are meant to live. I'm your host, Rebecca Tervo. Join me as I share mindset tools, coaching conversations and Human Design to help you uncover your unique gifts and create the life relationships in business you desire.

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I'm so excited that you're here on the very first episode of my podcast beautifully bloomed. I've purposely chosen my guest today, Caryn Gillen, because she was my first life and business coach who helped me to really break free of some of the rules that were really holding me back in my life in my business. Caryn Gillen is a life and business coach for entrepreneurs and coaches who are stepping up into the leadership of their own business and creating a business they love. She helps them hone in on the gifts they bring to the table, break free from any rules in the way and do it all with more ease and fun.

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Now enjoy my interview with Caryn Gillen. So welcome, Caryn I'm so happy to have you here on the launch of my new podcast. Thank you so much for joining me, I would not miss it. I'm excited to be here.

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Awesome. I just want to point out that you and I met because I hired you as my first sexual life coach. I mean, after I became a life coach, you were the first life coach I hired. And I found you through another program I was in where you were a coach there. And I was really drawn to your energy. So I don't know where that was in your coaching career. But I was like a one on one client for a while. Right. That was right at one of the shifts in my career right at that time. Really? Oh, yeah. You were switching from weight coaching? Because I didn't hire you for weight coaching. And I remember telling you, I'm not working on my way. Right. Yeah.

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Sounds like that's great.

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So yes, now I remember that it was right at that shifting fight. So. So yeah, and I wanted to have you as one of my first guests, because you made such an impact in allowing me to be me in my business, which is something I didn't think was possible. I was trying to follow a bunch of rules. Yeah, and all those things. It's like the best thing anyone could ever say to a life coach, you got to be more mean.

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And like, this is amazing. And now it's funny, because because of your example, this is kind of what I help people do in my own way, right through tools I have that are different than yours. But it's so amazing. And I'm so happy like this kind of led me down the path and you just allow me to be me. And I'm so grateful for that. So that's why I thought it was perfect that you come on, as my actually, I think your first your first guest, but you're going to be the first one because it's so important. And so I just wanted to talk about first, like, how did you make this decision to switch from I know you were a therapist, that was something else that I was drawn to about you as you had this very, calming presence. And I had been to therapy before grief therapy and stuff, but I just thought Oh, life coach, was that therapist background. So what made you switch between therapy and life coaching? And how did that decision go? For you?

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Yeah, so for starters, I became a therapist, because when I was 22, or 23, and I decided to be a life coach. I was like, Well, maybe not like maybe that's not real, the more research I did, because that was really 15 years ago.

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And then I was like, Okay, I'll become a therapist. And I went through school and got my mind around the fact like, Okay, I'm going to be really good there. And then I went and did it for a year and a half. And then my husband and I took our honeymoon, which was like, six months long, we kind of went all over the world. So I was out there getting a lot of perspective. And the first country we went to was Australia. And I went to the US bookstores and I bought all these books about therapy. It's like I'm missing something. Everybody knows more than I do. I don't have the basics because my undergrad was in business and recreation. I was like, I must be missing something like there's something other people know that I don't like I never felt right. Yeah, I've got like nine used books about all sorts of therapy modalities in my bag, and I'm reading and reading and reading spending my honeymoon reading these books. And then we went to a couple more countries. And then one night I was sitting on a bed in our hotel room on an island in Thailand, Koh Lanta was Island. And it was like, it just washed over me. And I was like, oh, and like landed in my body. Oh, it's not fair for them. And it's not fair for me. Like it's not fair for me to expect clients who want a therapist to be trying to do life coaching.

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And it's not fair for me to show up and try to do therapy when I want to be coaching. Oh, interesting, then it just was like, okay, what's next? Where do I go? How do I train? What do I do here? And I've never done therapy again.

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So you did it for a year and a half before your honeymoon? And then you just decided no, no, I couldn't do it. I couldn't go back. Fascinating. So that's so exciting that you made the decision in Thailand. Yes.

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And six months Wow, what a honeymoon that was that was a good planning who here's the six months honeymoons

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love that. It was fine to just start a business like it? Did it feel scary to you? I remember you saying you came from an entrepreneurial background though. So it? Yeah, there wasn't a marine shop that now my brother and his wife, friend, my grandpa had a department store with my grandma. My other grandma had commercial Realty and a store and a tour business like, wow, everybody's got businesses. Yeah. And so it was normal for me to think in terms of business. As a therapist, I also had a private practice on the side of my nonprofit job. So I have, you know, a little bit figured out from that. And yeah, it was just, we're gonna do this thing. I'm gonna figure it out. We just landed back in California, I went into training. And when I got back to Oregon, where we live, I basically was a life coach, and I was full time. Wow, that's amazing. So yes, um, because some people have a real fear of doing that. But if you didn't grow up with a lot of entrepreneurs around you, you don't necessarily have the support to start it, you know? Like, yeah, yeah, sure what, what to do? Yeah, it's like crazy. And people around you think you're kind of crazy. Sometimes, right? when you don't have that entrepreneurial background support. So that is really cool. I don't know if that's true because I never questioned having a business. The other people never questioned me having a business. So they still questioned, you know, oh, nobody questioned you

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about being in business. It was like, of course, you're doing that. Oh, right. That's what I'm saying. Like, I had grown up in a different kind of background. So

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I don't feel like I had that kind of support available. Do you know what I mean? Like, of course, you should go have your own business. The certainty wasn't there. Okay. Exactly. Yeah. It feels different to me when you have that support. So I love that. And even the fact that I was a CPA, and I had done that for years, and that still didn't mean anybody trusted me. And having my business, which I think is fascinating, right?

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So then I remember this part that we kind of touched on where you were awake coach at first. And it sounds like you were Wait, coach for quite a few years before you switched? And what happened in that process? or Why did you switch? Yeah, I've been a coach for 10 and a half years. But there were a number of years where I ended up in restaurants. I was General managing, and then I was doing project management. I always had clients on the side, I was always blogging, I was still sending newsletters.

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It was when I had my daughter, she's five and a half now that it was like, Oh, this is like, this doesn't really get to be a hobby anymore. I don't have the same kind of free time I used to.

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babies do that.

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So not really serious when she showed up. And in my human design. This is kind of interesting. In our family, penta between my husband, my daughter and I when she came into our family, that's when either the ability to make more money or like money or wealth or revenue came in. I don't know how to say it right? Because I don't know enough about you to say like she definitely brought something into my, into my chart for strength. She brought a strength probably Yeah, that's very fascinating. How our energies work together. Yeah, yeah. So at this point, I don't even remember your original question. But oh, I was just talking. We were talking about how you switch from weight coaching. And you said that you had been a coach for 10 and a half years. And then I think your daughter was born? Was that it? Yeah, she was born, I got really serious about weight coaching. And I got to the point where I was at

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multiple, six figures in that business, I'd already left my corporate job. And I looked at my client roster, and everybody had come to me for business coaching or like life and business coaching. coaching. Yeah, the entrepreneur. And it was then that it kind of hit me in this really clear way. Like, Oh, of course, like this is the thing that

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I've always talked about, like all I want to talk about is business, family dinners. We get to talk about business, like my parents table kind of felt like the HR department like it's all business all the time and that's really my happy place. So I hadn't really identified

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But that's actually something not everybody thinks about or thinks about all the time. Yeah, so weight coaching came into effect when you thought, well, this would be a good niche. Is that kind of the thought process when you're like, Hey, everybody needs to lose weight, or, you know, was that the thought process? Yeah. And it was a thing for me too. It was just that struggle to be free from things like food and body stuff. I really wanted that for me. And then once I created that, I wanted other people to have it. And it seems like, Oh, that's a good business idea.

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But, what I really wanted to do was be in business and love business and talk business. And I didn't put it together that that was actually what I could be doing. Yeah, I think that's it's interesting how we come through to finally getting who we truly are, right? It's like, yeah,

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That's the same as grief coaching with me. It's like, well, I went through this, I can help other people. It's like, almost you get stuck in the thing you, like, had the transformation in? Yeah. And after a while, it's not the fulfilling thing anymore. But it's hard to kind of move past it sometimes.

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So yes, it's okay to switch

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the whole message, right? It's okay. We're allowed to change your mind. As long as you're moving closer to who you are, as further away. Yes.

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Like some off the wall thing you've never done before. And all of a sudden, it's like, well, I'll try that. I mean, yeah, I know what you mean. Yeah. So funny. Right? Um, so what do you do now? Then? I know, we talked about how you're in business coaching and stuff, but like, what is your kind of secret sauce? Now in your business? How do you help people? It's a good question. And one I've actually been working on a lot for myself, I talk about this thing that I do. And I will tell us what you're working on.

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I'm really starting to look at. And this is something I've always said this business is a healing modality. Of course, here comes the entrepreneur therapists part of me. Yeah. But if we can do our businesses in a way that is self healing for us, increases our alignment, like exactly what you're talking about, then what are our capacity for holding space for our clients to do that same sort of thing? And this is true for restaurants too. Like, you can do this in any business? Yeah, I can hold space to have healing opportunities, healing relationships, healing, transactions for the people that we serve. And so like, in the work that we do, it's like, beyond aligned business. It's not just like, oh, we're gonna say it's Win, win win, but like, no, we're gonna mean it this time.

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We're really gonna do it. Yeah, we're not going to show up with our childhood baggage and put that on our clients, we're going to be we're going to take care of ourselves, we're going to be emotional adults, we're going to do this in a way that actually works for us, not just the way that somebody said, you should do it. And then we're going to hold space for our clients to do that same thing, which I think is exactly what I do. Yes. So it's like you, like, as a coach, I need support. And you as a coach, you need support in order so we can be better for our clients, right? I mean, in whatever way it is that we do that in our businesses. I do. And you know, when you said, it's a healing modality, I felt this, like, in my body, I felt when you said that, like, Uh huh. Like healing, what it's like, show up in a business and you'll find every single issue that you ever had in your life comes up when you're trying to run your own business, I've noticed.

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And then it's up to us to answer the invitation. Like, I think, yeah, we could choose to become Yogi's, we could choose to become great meditation practitioners, but like, we've chosen business, here, we are doing our thing. And all of our stuff will come up, because we chose this. Thank you.

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Yeah, it's and it's awesome, in some ways, when you can get used to the fact that we're just always going to be uncovering more stuff is what I've learned. I'm like, Okay, I'm in the business of uncovering more stuff. It's all gonna be fine.

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It's not like it ever ends really truthfully.

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So how did you know then when you settled into this current like, or maybe you're still in the process, but like, where does it settle for you that this is my bit, you know, this is what I want to do. Now I like it. It's settled, you're not indecisive anymore. You're not like, well, maybe I should go back to weight coaching or maybe, you know, it's kind of

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like, it's solid. I don't think about like, is this the right niche? It's more like, what's the next layer here?

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You know, you get to plan further out into the future. I think the creative ideas are more aligned with who I am. Yeah, yeah. grounded and talking about alignment. So I'm curious when you found out I don't know when you found out what your human does.

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Line was, but this is a tool I use in my business to help my clients now. And I love talking about it with the people who already know what their design is and has had some work on it, or how to read or whatever. So how does it really help you? And when I don't know, when did you find out what your design was even? I don't even know that answer. probably been a year and a half or so. Okay, let's maybe put a Ben Hey, okay. So, yes and then you're a projector. And not everybody will know what that means. who's listening. But just so what did that open up for you? As far as Oh, this is how that works? or What did it change in your life to know what your human design was?

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In some ways, it changed everything. Mm hmm. Because really, yeah.

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Because it made sense of like, everything that didn't work out in the past, if I looked at it through that lens was like, Well, that makes sense now, and like things that don't work in my current situation or whatever. Like that makes sense now, and the ways that certain things feel that makes sense now. And so it's like, there's this really clear explanation, and I've done all the personality test and all that stuff. I've never had an experience with anything like this that was like, I'm, like, grounded in my bones like, yes, this makes sense. Everybody needs to know it, because it creates freedom for us. Yeah, so rather than

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rather than making myself wrong for showing up in a certain way, it's like, well, that just like, based on my design, that makes total sense. And I'm not saying that from like, now I'm off the hook. I don't have to do anything. I'll just let my life play out. I design like, yeah, still actively showing up in life. But how can I stay more in an energetic flow that fits me and doing that? I mean, everything's just gotten better. Exactly. Also, I know, in Human Design, there's this thing about how you make decisions. So I'm curious if you really sink into that way that you make decisions, like how did that help to change anything for you? so much? So I feel like I'm lucky because of my decision making strategy. Because it's that instant, yes or no, I just get this gut hit. And I'm like, Yes, or no. And it's like, so nice. And it's always been that way. I've always known that that's how I make decisions. But what I don't have to do anymore is negotiate with myself after I get a really clear No, about like, well, maybe I should go. Maybe I should do whatever it would be nice. was like I'm a no, yeah, and I don't negotiate with my nose, because my decision is clear. Yeah. And when I can just hold with my decisions and stick to them, like, my energy is better. And I just feel better all the time. So even though

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Yeah, sometimes I would want to do the things if I'm a clear No, I'm, like I said no to going on a retreat to France. And I thought it was a great idea. I was like, really? No.

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But I wasn't, though, I know what you mean. And so you have this. So just for the people listening, there's seven different seven to nine, depending on who you follow, but ways of making decisions. And we're not all the same. So it's amazing that some of us are instant decision makers, and when you can trust that like I am mine is not an instance making process. And sometimes I'm like, Oh, I wish I wasn't instant. You know what I mean? Like, isn't the grass always greener over there? But it's like, just when you really sink into what it is for you, it just feels so right. And oh, and the thing you said earlier about? making yourself wrong. Like that is the thing. There's so many parts of me that were like, I used to think that was a bad thing. Like, you know, we get conditioned or hard. Yeah, we get taught a certain way. And what you do when you're in your design might be different than what you're taught. And a lot of times it is for many of us. And it just gives you permission, and it just feels good. It's like, yeah, oh, I just got to be the way I really am. Isn't that amazing? I don't have to, like fight it or think I'm wrong. Like so many parts of that happened for me. And when you said about the personality thing that reminded me about personality tests where you have to answer a bunch of questions, you know, lists and lists the questions. And I love this tool, because it has nothing to do with questions. Yeah, just get to rely on your thinking brain that might be tired or no exact. It's just like such an amazing tool. And it's just so scientific. So yeah, I love talking about this with you. So thank you for sharing your perspective on your design because it's super helpful. So can Karen, can you tell us where can you be reached if listeners want to know more about your program or what you're offering? Where can they reach you? I'm Caryngillen.com and I'm at Caryn Gillen pretty much everywhere because

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I have a unique enough name, but it's car y n gi l l e n. Yes, yes. And so if listeners go there, there's gonna be something they can check out. Some kind of freebie. Yeah. Instagrams been fun lately. Yeah. I'm learning about Instagram. Let's see about that. I don't know. But so Thank you, Caryn, for joining me today. I'm super happy that you're here and that you can celebrate my lunch with me. Thank you so much. That was a clear yes to this. It was very easy. Yes. Awesome. If you enjoy listening to this podcast, please go subscribe so that you get notified of all the future goodies that are coming along. While you're there. Please leave me a review and let me know what you think. So excited to share this with you and can't wait to talk to you next time.