CONNECT with Sheila Botelho Podcast

Your Slow Season Is Building Something Bigger | EP 485

• Sheila Botelho

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🔗 Mentioned on this Episode: Show Notes 👈



In this solo episode, I’m revisiting the bamboo metaphor I shared in one of my most listened-to episodes — and sharing how that quiet season of planting has grown into something far more powerful than I could’ve imagined. What started as a small seed of an idea has become a full movement: a new model for scaling a business with self-care at its core.


If you’re in a season where things feel slow or unseen, my hope is that this conversation gives you a new lens on the foundational work you’re doing — and why it deeply matters. This isn’t just about growing your business. It’s about building a legacy that protects your health, amplifies your creativity, and stays true to your values.


I also open up about the key shift that helped me stop over-functioning and start building something more sustainable — and more magnetic. If you’re a seasoned founder craving your next level without burning out, this episode is for you.


Listen to my previous episode here.

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Sheila:

In this solo chat, I'm sharing the continuation of my bamboo story about how the seeds of ideas we plant quietly beneath the surface can grow into something far bigger than we ever planned.

Sheila:

And when you stay open, the path often reveals itself in ways you could never design. If you're in a season of planting or wondering what's next, this is for you. Hi, welcome to the Connect with Sheila Botelho podcast. I'm committed to helping you reconnect to your purpose, elevate your wellbeing and build your version of a happy, successful life. And on today's solo chat, I'm sharing the continuation of the bamboo story. And last year around this same time, I shared a story with you about bamboo, how it spends years growing roots underground before anything ever appears above the surface, and how that was manifesting itself in my life in terms of connections with people and opportunities and things starting to grow and take shape in new ways in my life in business. And I want to share a little bit of the continuation of that story, because some of the seeds planted then have quietly been growing and now they're blossoming even more and into something I could never fully have predicted, and it's very interesting when we look at these things right. So when we look at bamboo. Bamboo can take up to five years of growing an invisible, intricate root system before ever breaking through the soil, and during that time, nothing seems to be happening Above ground. It looks like failure. Perhaps it looks like, oh, that seed didn't take root, oh well, what's going to happen now? I guess we need to plant something else. Yet below ground, a miracle is taking place, and if you haven't heard the full story about what I had shared, I linked it in the show notes, and it's one of my most listened to episodes, and for good reason. It's a reflection of the seasons that we all move through in life and business.

Sheila:

I remember when I first was moving into the world of online business and everything was so new to me, even the social media space. I had been on it a little bit just for fun, like most people were back in. I think it was 2008 when I first got on and I really didn't spend much time on it at all. And then, all of a sudden, in 2014, I started to be moving through this process of wanting to move into the online space and nurture my community with something called a blog, and I started to do that and realizing that in order to draw traffic towards the blog. I needed to be on social media and, of course, at first it was many moving parts and it really felt like I was planting a lot of seeds and not a whole lot was happening. Can you relate? Has this ever been something that you can point to in your past? Probably right, I mean, we experienced this.

Sheila:

Even if, for instance, you're working out at the gym for the first time and you know that you have a certain goal to reach and you feel like you're working so hard but you don't see the results yet, like you don't look any different. And then, what's very interesting and I've found personally, it seems to be like around the four month mark of consistency in that regard, in a physical regard, you start to say, oh, my clothes are fitting a little looser and everything seems to be tighter and I'm not as sore now when I'm working out. And, yes, we always want to keep progressive overload, as they say, keep moving forward. But it's neat when you see the results. And so seeds, when they're planted, we have the intentions and then life happens and the key to us staying the course is having a lot of hope, really, that the efforts we're taking every day are starting to pay off and that they're going somewhere and I like to allude to bamboo, because it is that kind of that intentional time that you've planted something and you're moving forward into it and you're trusting, you're working with a lot of trust. And so I had planted some seeds early in 2024, and I was starting to see little shoots of bamboo come up in the form of connections with people and events and just some beautiful things.

Sheila:

Again, you can listen to the show notes like some synchronicities, I guess you could say, in terms of the people that I was aligning with. Then what started to happen is a new offer came my way that I could be involved in, and then I actually was able to start meeting with people from many different industries as they started to grow the next phase of their business, and it was like there was this theme that kept coming through and it was very much aligned with my focus on self-care and it was like the seed of self-care for business had been planted early in 2024. And I was building that message and working on that and then, all of a sudden, sudden, the people I was serving, my coaching clients, were actually reflecting back to me what it looked like to practice it because it was something completely opposite to what they had been doing and what they had been taught to do. When it came to growing something, and certainly any kind of business, when you're shifting it, pivoting it, getting something off the ground or just growing into the next iteration, it takes a lot of time and intention and it takes focus. And you still need to have a life outside of business and you have to take care of you, because if you're not taking care of you, then the creativity dries up and then you're really not growing Like we need energy to be able to move things forward in our businesses.

Sheila:

And so it really started tiny, because I started working with a few people on it. It didn't look really flashy, it wasn't even branded or anything at that point, but the work was really transformational. It was exactly what I had intended in terms of the message itself, but I didn't know how it would show up. And there was someone who came my way and on the outside everything looked like it was so beautifully put together. They were put together, their work was put together, they had success and they were wanting to do something different and after a few calls with them, they started to really open up about how stretched they were in their life and how much they were putting into building this new portion of their business, and they just knew that the way they had things set up originally they could not do for much longer and they were actually approaching burnout.

Sheila:

And so through that time we were able to work on some tools that would help them be able to move through this new business that they wanted to create but also take care of themselves along the way, and it was exactly like they were the archetype of the person I was thinking about when I was thinking about self-care for business, and so what's interesting about that is that's one client, and then there were others that started to follow and it's like a forest of bamboo is growing and the thing about bamboo I actually had a friend message me the other day saying she thought of me because somebody had mentioned bamboo and just this whole idea that once it's growing, once it's sprouted, she reminded me, once you actually chop it down, it'll come right back up, and so it's like once you really have that small idea that you plant and you nurture and you water it and you wait for it to grow, and you trust and, yes, you look at metrics and you do all those things to make sure you're on the right track, right, but as you do the faithful actions, things start to grow and it just really comes, and then the root system is so strong it can keep growing and growing, and so this small idea started to develop into community, started to move into what is now my signature movement of the Seasons Growth Accelerator, and now clients of mine are building businesses with self-care as the foundation and not as a bandaid after burnout, because that is typically what happens. Typically, we like just go as hard as we can and then we say I'll rest later, right, and what I'm noticing now more than ever, though, is in 2025,. This is revolutionary. It's an act of rebellion against a system that profits off of your exhaustion, because let's look around us right now, we are in the midst of constant news cycles and fear-based messaging that conditions all of us to stay reactive and overworked, worked, and so, when you are choosing peace and taking care of yourself over that, it is a radical business move, because the person who you are inside outside of your business, like you, are the same person, and your business is impacted by the economics around us. However, this is a time that when you are rested, when you are taking good care of yourself, you can actually see opportunity, because in every troubled time in our world and in our economy, there has always been the opportunity.

Sheila:

Also, I think it's the Japanese culture that has this one symbol that stands for the word chaos and it also stands for the word opportunity. Correct me if I'm wrong. I remember hearing that years ago. I think that's what it is, but when I think about chaos like chaos, and there's always a flip side to it, it's like the polarity in life is just a given right. We have sunshine, we have darkness. Right, we have winter, we have summer. We have so many different things around us in nature showing us the polarity, and so, of course, chaos is going to have some kind of polarity as well, and we get to when we are thinking clearly, when we are rested, we get to see those opportunities.

Sheila:

I realized one of the days last week, I believe I was walking out of the yoga studio early in the morning and the sun was shining and it was beautiful. And I remember the day before hearing some news and you know I typically like to get my news midday through an email. So I'm not like scrolling down the rabbit hole, but I can get the headlines and if I need to look further into something, I can, and then I move on with my day. So I'm not getting it first thing, I'm not getting it last thing. And I remember, you know, there it was a chaotic day in news and I was walking out of the yoga studio the next day and the sun was shining and the birds were singing hello birds are back and the air was fresh and it was like a milder day. I didn't even need to do up my jacket and I realized, wow, I feel so clear, I feel so hopeful, I see opportunities all around me in a world that is in need of more connection to themselves, which is really what I'm always talking about on this podcast and in all of my work.

Sheila:

It's that when we do step away from those things that are trying to control us, and when we step into silence with ourself, to tap into our intuition, when we step into nature, we can see life and our future a little bit differently. Because when I look at the big, massive oak tree in my neighbor's yard, that is like literally gigantic. I think, well, that that tree has been here for a long time it's got to be over a hundred years old and it's still here and I think about people in our culture and certain movements in our culture and they're still here. And we all have the ability to move forward in our life, but we need to be clear headed to make decisions, and sometimes we're in a time of contraction where we need to be more mindful about things like that, and so we need to shift in that way. And then there's a time where, where we're in expansion and that there we go Polarity again.

Sheila:

Right, I invite you to consider how this stuff lands for you when we're going through these times, like where do you find your mind go? Do you find you're easily led into different ideas and hysteria? Perhaps Do you find yourself worrying? Do you find yourself staying awake at night and or waking up and not being able to fall back asleep, thinking about these things like this is this is true? These are things that are happening in our world, and there is always a way to be able to get support, and I think a big part of it is spending time with people who are thinking about opportunity and are thinking about the bigger picture of how do we take care of each other, right, with that kindhearted goodness that we have within us, and I believe that, again, right now, self-care for business matters more than ever, because without the structure of it, the founders that I know will either burn out and implode their business, they will stay too long working on projects or in business relationships or any kind of collaboration that really is not timely anymore. They take way too long to pivot and they may even mute their creativity and lose their connection to their true work, and so you need regular periods of disconnection from everything else to hear your own wisdom and building self-trust comes from doing the small daily things, not just thinking about them.

Sheila:

Right, we have these great ideas. You're in the shower, you're driving somewhere and you don't have the access to be able to write something down, perhaps, or even voice note it, and you have this amazing flash of inspiration, and then you move on with your day and you forget all about it. And then you see someone else has done something about it. You think, oh, that could have been me, and that doesn't mean that you can't do it, but that just shows you the important not only of being quiet with yourself, but having space on your calendar to actually think about things other than the day-to-day. And I remember a time where I was trusting myself, when it made absolutely no logical sense about a piece of business that I was going after, and I just thought, something inside of me just felt that I needed to do this thing and I needed to make this phone call. And so I got on the phone and I made the call and this actual opportunity that I was discussing it never actually came to fruition, but what did come from that is a beautiful connection with someone who then led me to another opportunity that actually did pan out and went on to be very successful. So you never, ever know what will happen when you take that first step, but it really does involve being in tune with yourself in terms of honoring those instincts that you have.

Sheila:

So, listen, I believe there is a call for a new legacy. Your personal brilliance is needed in the world, your creativity is needed, your leadership is needed, but it needs to come from overflow, not from survival mode and building. I'm really all about building a legacy businesses. It's not necessarily about having a business that stays the same all the time, but it's one that's really going to go on to impact many other people, and it's not about the loudest voice or the fastest sprint. It's about sustainability and impact and deep rooted success. So I just want to leave you with a thought for the day, and that is the seeds that you plant today, the seemingly invisible work you're doing now, will create the forest your future self gets to walk through, and so my bamboo story. It involves a whole new areas of business that you'll be hearing about and some collaborations that I never expected to have in my life and a level of community, really, that I've been wanting that has just opened up.

Sheila:

So, if you've been loving this podcast, I would love it if you would tap, follow and stay tuned for future episodes. Leave a quick review and I'd love also to hear how this episode landed for you and what is your bamboo story Like? What are you, what seeds are you planting and what are you wanting to bring to fruition? There is a way for you to message me inside of the show notes. You can just tap a little link in there and, if you are ready to step into this next season of growth yourself with full alignment, download the Embodied Success Method and Meditation. That's in the show notes. It's a free thing that I have for you in there that allows you to really tune into yourself, get quiet and then have an actual step-by-step process to start bringing it to life, this idea that you have. So thank you so much for listening. I hope you have a beautiful rest of your day and I'll see you on another episode. Big blessings.