Trust and Trustworthiness with Melissa Camilleri

 In this episode of UNComplicating Business, join me and my friend Melissa Camilleri to explore how trust - particularly self-trust - can transform our businesses and lives. We talk about trusting yourself first, being trustworthy, adaptation, and understanding that personal and professional growth is a continuous process. We both share stories about trusting our timelines, making choices, and learning from them - whether in business, parenting, or personal development. This conversation is all about how success (and trust!) is not about being perfect, but about believing in our ability to figure things out, adjust, and keep moving forward. Melissa's perspective is both inspiring and practical, and she has exactly the kind of real-world wisdom I love sharing with you all! Listen on to hear it ALL! 

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 Melissa Camilleri is a lifelong educator and adult learning expert. When she was still a high school English teacher, she founded her first company, an e-commerce gift brand called Compliment as a scholarship fundraiser in 2011. She grew it into a thriving social impact enterprise, speaking on stages across the country, spreading the mission of the organization and helped send 13 girls from her community to University. She sold the company in late 2019.She now is the Co-Founder of Stand for the AND Education Co where she guides aspiring thought leaders develop their life first businesses through IP frameworks, offer suites, and educational programming to help them serve more people at scale without losing their humanness or burning out.She is also the Co-Founder of the Prosper Network— an international women’s business network founded on the values of generosity, reciprocity, and expansion-- with Sheri Salata, the former executive producer of the Oprah Winfrey Show and her business partner, Angela Greaser. She is a mom to 3 kids under 8 and lives with her beloved in Sacramento, CA.

Transcript

welcome, welcome, welcome. We are in trust series right now. I'm so glad you're here with us. I am Sara Torpey. I am the creator of selling for weirdos, which, you know, I am a business coach, I parent and do all the things in all season. On the podcast right now we are talking about trust, which I have told you again and again, and you're sad that you can't get away from maybe, but it is the thing, I think I have discovered that it is the difference maker. 

I think it is the internal thing that we can work on and build and control that changes all the things today we are talking to another one of my favorite people. I say that every time I have somebody on, but really, truly like I only invite my favorite people and all the best people for you to talk to you. So today we have my friend Melissa Camilleri from stand for the end, who is a teacher and in a business leader and has done a million things. So she's going to tell you the bio from the because she's going to do it better than I would, because I just going to pick and choose, but she wears all the hats also. So 

Hi, Melissa, thank you so much for coming to play with us today. I'm so happy to be here, Sara, thank you so much for inviting me. So you want me tell people you Oh, I'm Melissa, and I am a lifelong educator. I was a high school English teacher. That's how I started my career, and through a series of twists and turns, started business 14 years ago and burnt it all down at its peaks of quote, success, um, after I had my two boys back to back, 13 months apart, and I had realized that I had built my business in a way that wasn't sustainable for my life, because when I started it, I was newly divorced, so just it was just me, no kids, and, you know, I didn't build it with balance, but now after that, I co founded an organization with one of my business besties, Angela greaser, and it's called Stanford Anna.

 We're a business development and growth agency that helps people who are thought leaders, aspiring thought leaders, people with a really important message to share, and we help them develop a business around whatever that message or their their vision is for their life. I also am a co founder of something you know very well, also called the PROSPER network, which is a a business network for women who are who center and value generosity, reciprocity and expansion, which is there is such a deficit of that in the world of business, and we're trying to turn the page on that and do something different. I'm a mom of three, wife to one, and yeah, life is good. And a fellow baseball parent, because Welcome to the game. I am a fellow baseball parent, and it is intense on these streets.

Uh, it sure is. We just, yeah, first, first, first, first tournament, first trophy this weekend. So always nothing. Oh, my God, um, and actually, we're, I'm gonna talk to Angela in a couple of weeks. So that's gonna be fun, too. You're gonna get to hear both sides of the stand for the ancoin friends and all things prosper network, which, and I am someone who works with both of you. So like, I'm happy to tell people that, like my people, that I went to Angela and Melissa a couple of years, a year and a half, or, I don't even know anymore, and said to them, you know, your program sounds a little different for me, but what I need you to do is help me use marketing tools that are regular people, marketing tools in a way that feels like me. 

And so that is what they're really good at. For me, they're good at all kinds of things, but for me, they're like, Okay, take this tool, and here's how you turn it into a tool that gives right, and also is business and so for me, that's been amazing, but we had Melissa today to talk about trust, so friend in this really important thing that I think we don't talk enough about, which is what I'm gonna spend basically the rest of my life talking about it. Tell me just at the start, like, how you define trust for yourself and how what it means to you, first as a like, human being, but then as a business owner, because I, at least for me, they feel sort of separate. Like, yeah. And even trust as a parent is slightly different. I feel like those are different versions of me and different versions of trust, or maybe I just have more in one bucket or another, but tell me your thoughts about that.

So I think when I look at my life and my my personal and spiritual. Development and how I've kind of navigated through adulthood, there's the time before divorce and there's the time after divorce. So I got divorced at 32 after being with my partner for 32 years, 32 years. I was 32 years old when it happened. I was with him for 10 years. And I think you learn a lot about trust when your trust has been broken, and figuring out, like, Oh, I just gave this trust freely, and now maybe it's not safe to trust. 

And so I think the I remember when Brene Brown first came out, she was talking about, like, we asked all these people about vulnerability, and what they knew about vulnerability was actually, you know, the opposite it was about they were telling me about shame. And so when we talk about trust, the way that I think about it at first is, when have I had my trust broken? And how did that actually? What does that make me feel about trusting others and then trusting myself? And what I've learned since you know, getting through that like monumental personal life shift is that too often, I think we we put our trust in others before we trust ourselves, and then it sets us up for broken trust, as opposed to learning to trust ourselves first, to make decisions where our to mitigate other people breaking our trust, because you're not putting all your eggs in somebody else's basket, you're learning to turn inward first listen to what is, what it is that you value, what it is that you want from your life, and making choices aligned with that.

 That's how you build confidence, as you build self trust. And it's not that my trust hasn't been broken since then, it's more that it's not some external thing that's happening unto me. I have some control over it, because I've learned to trust myself first. When I didn't develop that at an early age, I developed that well into adulthood, well, and it's sort of the like I always think of that as the, does it work for me? Pause, right? It's the like, pause, does this actually work for me? Like, do I want this? Do I like this? Do I need this? Is this? It's that. And I think we it's not only like, what you're talking about is inward first, which is not only that pause, but it's then listening to it. It's a two step thing. Like you ask the question and you actually listen to the answer. Because I think sometimes we ask the question and they're like, moving on, yeah? Like any who that doesn't work for me and I'm still going to do it, and you're like, wait, whoa, roll it back. Yeah. Yeah. 

So it's like thinking about trust and turning it towards yourself, but then also acting on it differently, yeah, which I think is the only way that you actually build self trust. Is it that you act on it and you recognize, like, Okay, that was the right choice for me in this moment, and I'm not put giving my power to entities outside of me in this moment where I think that when we look to see we crowdsource like, what? What is everybody else doing? What does everybody else think? How you know? How does everybody else move? And we move in that way against what we know to be right for ourselves, we break our own self trust, yeah, and we rely on somebody else to have a better answer than we do. 

And that's not to say nobody else is to be trusted. It's really hard, though. I think it's just like a stroke of luck if everybody that you trust outside of yourself deserves and maintains that trust. To me, that's a stroke of luck. I don't, I don't know anyone. I don't really, I don't think it's their job, right? It's not their job to be perfectly trustworthy, because that's not the nature of people, right? Yeah, is going to run into that, but it is my job to to make my choices and to choose to listen to me right. Like, I think it is that external thing that so often we're like, well, we have to pick right based on what everybody said. Like, well, that's not their job. 

That's not the role their input. The role of their input is like, literally input, and then I get to sift through it and reflect, yes, and I think from the flip side, being somebody who's in a mentorship role, like you and I, both are I, I recognize when people put their trust in me, and I'm conscious of doing what I say I'm going to do, yes, following through on what my promises are, sending you my bio and headshot, not withstanding, because I didn't do that, but for the big things you know, like recognize and I think that actually came from teaching, because really early on in teaching, you realize that. But what you say matters to kids, and even if it's like a some sort of flipping comment that you don't even remember making, can it can really make a mark on a child for their life and their self perception. And so I feel so grateful for that experience, because it made me very conscious of how I was communicating and what I was saying to kids who don't yet have that self trust develop necessarily. 

I mean, it's a very it's very like unique child who has that sense of confidence and self worth and self understanding early on in their life. I don't think that that's a skill you build until, probably until adulthood, until you've had more life under your belt, yeah, until you had the experience. But I think you're actually trust. You're talking about two separate things to a degree, yeah, you're talking about building self trust, but then also being choosing to be trustworthy. Yes, in like, living both sides of that coin. Right there is allowing yourself to trust yourself, your thoughts, your ideas, your decisions about your business. And then there is you're in a role where you're in service. You're in a role where you're in giving and knowing that part of the way your business grows and that you grow as a person is by being trustable. 

Yes, right? And that really matters to you and to me, yes, and I think you, at least on my business journey, I have learned that I would approach every new relationship, every mentorship, everything that I invested in assuming that people were trustworthy, until, you know, proven otherwise. And pretty early on, I was like, wait, what? Like, this doesn't work for me. But no, I and, and then also so like realizing people don't hold themselves to the same standard, maybe that I hold myself when it comes to trustworthiness, or have a different definition of it, that, like, maybe my bar is extremely high and somebody else defines it in some other way, and they're doing their best, but It doesn't work for me. And then realizing that there are still lots of people out there who are trustworthy, but it takes that, the discernment, which I think comes from self trust and recognizing, like, what is actually, for me, like what we were talking about. 

The top of this is like, just navigating. It's not always, you know, in the business world, at least, it's not always the loudest voice in the room or the person with the flashiest, you know, they're everywhere. It's like, that seems like it's trustworthy, because all of these people seem to like this person. So maybe it's a you know, and then I I realized, like, my best business relationships are so like, just forms, like how I would form any other regular relationship, which is just through friendship and and over time, recognizing this person and I are aligned, values wise, this person and I share a lot in common, and we've developed a friendship, and therefore they deserve my trust, not just because they have X amount of followers or, you know, social proof, Oh, yeah. Well, and I think everybody's had that experience where you you're like, oh, this person feels trustworthy at like, the, it's like, the immature trustworthiness, right? Like, it's like an like, it's like an oh, I Okay, I'm gonna follow this. But I think, I think what's interesting is one of the things I realized in having made some of those decisions too and follow and like, opted into programs where I was like, Oh, this was that I get to trust myself, yeah, to show up and get what I need from it. And if I do that loudly or in a different way than the people expect me to, like, I am willing to be the one that comes in three weeks into the program is like, I see your thing goes in this order. 

And also I'm not going to do it like that. So tell me what to do if I want this, yes, right? And I have to be able to trust myself to advocate for myself when it doesn't work for me. Because sometimes you can do that quietly, and sometimes you can't, but you also have to be like, I bought into this. That's right. I'm going to, I am going to get what I need. 

Can we talk about that for a second? Because that is a that's, I think, business maturity, or what I see from a more mature business owners. I don't mean like, emotionally mature, but yeah, I guess emotionally mature. But people who have just, like, been at it for a second, you start to recognize that no matter what investment you make, whether or not the facilitator you. Deserving of your trust, that you trust yourself enough to get what you came for. And so I've invested in programs where I thought everything that was being I'm like, I know all of this, but mark my words. I came out with X amount of you know, new friends, new contacts, yes, in order to, like, create strategic partnerships. 

So I'm never going to invest in anything and not get maximum ROI, because that's my own self trust, like I won't let myself down. Mm, hmm. And that comes with confidence. That comes with being, you know, resilient, building resilience, staying power. And you recognize, okay, I, I It's okay to meet you. Both things can be true. You can need help. You can need mentorship. You can need support, and you can know how you work, how you operate, what's best for your business. And so you know, when Angela and I are coaching or mentoring or, you know, providing strategic advisement, we always have an asterisk that says you have full agency to choose whether or not what we're saying feels right for you. Yeah, and if it doesn't, let's talk it out, because then we'll find another solution, because we never want to be like this is what you have to do. So we're platform agnostic or marketing tool agnostic. 

We're like, what works for you, and let's listen and find a solution together, instead of like, you have to do this because, yes, who's to say? Like, well, because all
the ways work, right? Yes. And that's I think, yeah, the other mature thing in business, in some ways, that you sort of grow into seeing is it's like, early on, you're like, Oh, I think that way works. Let me try that way. I'm following this person, and this is the way they do it, so I have to do it that way. 

And then eventually you're like, Okay, I've seen this 50 different ways, and everybody seems to do well with their 50 different ways. I guess I can be 51 Yeah, right. Because if 50 ways work, then why doesn't 51 like and it's, you know, we're I can do what I do, what I do, but I do. I think actually, in that self advocacy, self trust, I think the teacher people have a little advantage, because we know a lot more about ourselves as learners?

Yes, oh my gosh, I could go on forever about this. I think teachers make the best business owner. Yeah, that's all of our transferable schools. But we don't see that, and that's not what we're taught in education. It requires us figuring out how we can take everything we've learned in this industry of education, and then flop it into the business world, and you realize, oh my god, I actually know a lot about humans, about how we learn about how I learn about how I need to access things. 

And I've been like early on in in my business journey. When I first started, I had 00, entrepreneurial experience. I had literally no idea what I was doing, same. And people were telling me, like, God, you like, how are you doing this? And I'm like, I literally don't know. Like, I have no idea how I'm doing this. And they're like, but you're you like, you're making relationships with people, and you're talking about your thing, and it was like, Yeah, because that's like, what I do, yeah. But it's the same as a classroom, because, like, yeah. Thing in entrepreneurship, I think what happens is you show up day one and you're like, Okay, I don't want to know what to do. And some people stop right there. But in a classroom, there was a point when I was 21 years old, when they were like, here is a classroom of eighth graders. 

They are yours. And so the first day I walked in, and then the next day I had to do it again. Yes, even when I was like, geez, I don't know what to do with these kids there I ran like, day five, I ran out of coroners, right? And I remember thinking, Oh, crap, I ran out of Coronavirus and, like, standing there and thinking, like, shit now what? Like, totally, they were all taller than me and, and I'm not short and, and like, you know, but you show up and you're like, well, guess I'm gonna figure out what to do next, because they're staring at you. And I treat entrepreneurship the same way. We're like, well, today I have to figure it out, because this is what we're doing now, totally. And you come from middle school, a middle school background. I'm in a high school background. 

So there's also this sense of like, okay, first period bond, well, better, do it better? Oh, my God, same, you know. And so you just keep on going, and you keep getting better little by little. And there's this, like, stick with it, ness that teachers cultivate, because 7am tomorrow morning, there's another 37 kids looking right at you, going, what's next? Well, there's no other thing, right? I better find, like, a trust master class, because it's like, okay, I got. Figure this out again tomorrow. 

Tell me what to say. No. It's like, sink or swim. And when you have a heart for humans, you're like, I'm not going to let them down. I will figure this out. I am smart enough and and willing enough to figure this out for the betterment of the people in front of me, and I think that that has totally driven entrepreneurship for me too. So I think what's really interesting about that is there's a trust in your ability to figure it out there. And I think a lot of teachers come over with that. I think the place where it falls down, and I was just actually talking to someone else about this this morning, is trusting in the idea that you have something valuable to other people. Yeah, something to give that people will pay for, that turns into a business. 

So talk to me about trusting that you have something saleable, right? Because I think that that's where a lot of people get stuck. They're like, Okay, I know I can figure it out, but I don't know if anyone will give me money. Yeah. So you know, my first business, I was selling physical products, so that made sense in my mind, it wasn't a service. It wasn't showing up because I did not actually know what my skills were. So I started selling jewelry for a scholarship program. It was a fundraiser for my high school girls who were coming up financially short for their next step for post secondary. And so people liked the idea of jewelry that had, I mean, called compliment, had a compliment inside the box and giving gifts with compliments. 

And at the time in 2011 it wasn't every where, like Etsy was still very new, yeah, he didn't see it everywhere. Like there was nothing like that at Target, nothing like that in the department stores. And so I knew I was onto something, because I sold a lot right when we launched, you know, to friends and family and other and other, like educators, because of the scholarship component. But when I shut that down, it was really hard for me at first to pit, like I didn't pivot out very quickly. It took me a year of just being quiet. And part of that is also because, you know, I was, I was a new mom, so I'm like, in the post human, alive phase, yeah, yeah. 

And it was like, What do I actually know? And during the time that I had compliment another business owner that I had met in a, you know, some sort of Facebook group or whatever, she said, How are you growing so fast on Instagram? And I was like, I don't, I honestly don't know, but like, here's what I'm doing. And I wrote out 10 tips. And she goes, seriously, you need to package this up and put it in a course. And I was like, why this is so dumb. Who would want Instagram, right? He's like, right, 2013, right. I'm like, Who gives a crap about this stuff? And she's like, No, seriously, this is really valuable. So I think what it was the seedling of it in sharing like a skill that was valuable and that people wanted it came from listening to somebody else's feedback, and that I think I honed during my years teaching, because there's like, kids are brutal and there is a constant feedback loop, right? They're the worst audience.

 They're so mean. They're so hormonal to you, like, you know, we try to foster a good thing, because they love you and you, you have trust with them, and then they gotta be mean, because that's way too your kids get to be 13, oh, yeah, same thing. And you're like, Oh, this is how they know they trust me, my six
year old, my six year old last week, he goes, or, yeah, he goes, Mom, just so you know, you are not cool. I go, okay, okay, it's starting already. I am fidgeting cool, um, but yeah, like, so kids are going to tell you what's working and what's not. And so you learn to listen to that and adjust your sales, you know, between first and second period, or between second whatever, day to day. 

And so when this woman emailing back, and she goes, I would have seriously paid you to show me these things, and you just so generously, like, sent them, you know, zipped them off in an email. Why don't you charge for this? And I was like, Could I really do that? Okay, let's try it. And in the first time i i said, here, I'm going to give you a tip a day for 21 days, I charged $47 out the gate and made like, I think, 17 grand.

Well, and but here's the thing I think that was, I think what's interesting there is, she said, this is valuable, and you believed her. Mm.
Yeah, I maybe not at first, but then I asked, but you should find your way out to that. Yeah, right, you found a way to trust that she wasn't lying to you. Yeah? Because I think what happens to people I see this all the time, all the time, is I'll say to somebody that's saleable, and they'll be like, yeah, yeah, yeah. But they don't actually believe it, like they, even though they hear it, they like, can't get past into the like, Okay, I believe you. Let me figure this out, right? Or people have said to me that I think they would, that they would pay for this, but I don't, you know, I haven't done anything with it, and it's an interesting it's that, yeah, step that makes such a difference to going to experiment.

 So I think this actually, if I think back, I had some things that made me extra willing to try. Okay, number one, I had just, you know, left my husband and I broke up, ex husband and I broke up at the time. And so I went from a dual income household to a single income household, and I had just left the classroom, so it was freaking sink or swim like I was on my own. I took a massive financial hit leaving that marriage, and I figure it out. And so when you're kind of like, nothing left to lose. Mm, hmm. 

Husband calls it the effort point. It's like, if it, let's try it. You know, there was a willingness to try something, and it not working. I was not precious about stuff. It was like, I need to figure this out, and therefore let's see what happens. Yeah. And then got feedback that, yes, people do want this. And therefore let's try it again, and let's try it again, and let's try it again. And always listening to the feedback was helpful in in building up that trust, that, okay, maybe I do have something that is is unique. And because we, you know, we say this in the impact incubator, which is our stand for the end program, it's like, you can't read the label from inside the jar. And so one thing that I know I am good at over the years is asking, not being, like, squeaky about feedback. I don't take it personally, because I want to be able to serve well. So it's like, what? What is your reaction to this? How do you How does this land for you, and not being like, Oh, I didn't like my stuff. 

Like, I can separate myself from what I'm trying to offer. Yes, and you know, I didn't start off that way. I don't think it was like of pitching yourself and getting a no, like, Rejection hurts. But then you then you realize, like they're not rejecting me, or they're not giving me as a human terrible feedback. They're just saying this offer isn't hitting and so I can look at that and objectively and say, Okay, what is it going to take for it to hit? And I can approach it more as a objective scientist, as instead of like this, you know, my bearing, my soul in this, like, you know, like this is such a precious thing, and you're accusing me of a human of not being worthy. Like, I don't subscribe to that. I know I am worthy period, separate from my business so
well. And I think that's a huge I think one of the earlier episodes in this year series I was talking about, like, I had to learn to literally think about my offers as, like a thing I hold in my hand, yeah, that I offer to people, yeah. Because that for me, like literally holding something in my hot little hand to being like, here I have this thing for you. Yep. 

And thinking about this service I offer as like a physical thing I hand to somebody means that if they say no, they're saying no to this thing in my hand, yes, and they're not saying no, Sara, you're a terrible person. And making that separation means I can trust myself and the offer, but the that are not exactly the same,
exactly. And that, what I think helped me along the journey, is I started with physical products, yes. And I can imagine like, Okay, if these are all on a shelf, I as a consumer, will go through a shampoo aisle and say, not that one, not that one. Okay, that's a good fit. And I can think of my product on a shelf in this exact same way. 

Somebody else is going to say, I want this one, somebody else is going to say I want hers. Yes. And this is why, and and I can be available, ready and available for the person who wants to pick my thing. Yeah. And it's not picking me for the sports team or picking me as a human, it's just the thing that's on the shelf
well, and services are the same. They go in a box on the shelf, right? And it doesn't like, we don't have to be like, I am not for everybody. I'm good with that. Like, if I was for everybody, we'd have a pro a different problem. You can't serve everybody. No, it's humanly impossible.

And so we don't. It to like, I say to people all the time, how many people do you actually need? And the number's so small, so small, it's like, and you're like, yes, you know, if somebody says to me, 300 it's still like, Okay, well, there's 300 million people in this country, yeah. And there's billions of people on the planet. So you're saying you need 300 of them, and it's like, oh my god, yeah, right. Like, it's scale. We have to, we forget that we know 300 like, I have 300 people in my freaking address book, exactly like I have 1000 people in my phone contacts. Like, are you kidding me?

I go 160 at wedding number one. Oh, my good. I know didn't do that one again. Holy people. So where you are now in your business, yeah, what are you working on? And trust? Oh, okay, so, and maybe it's less business and more parenting. Maybe it's where are what are you? Melissa, let me change the question. Working on and trust right now, I think there's two things that are really prevalent and constantly on my mind. The first one is I have a couple of really big, long term projects that I'm working on, one being me book. And I started writing the book 

The week before I gave birth at 43 years old to my youngest child, and got most of the writing done with her in a sling on me. Well, now she's two in some change, and that book is still not done. She moves more. She moves a lot more. She is, you know, our our family, is doing all of the things. There's a million things every day, and trusting myself and my and my timeline that is exactly the right time this will all get wrapped up. I mean, I'm very far in the process, and it won't take that long for me to wrap up that project. 

And yet, every single day, there has been something after my work is complete that is taking me away from finishing that, even when I plan, like I've planned overnights at a hotel, like a staycation to finish it, and something else is more pressing. And so like, I have to plan the birthday party, or I have to, you know, do it, whatever. And so really, trusting that whatever the timeline is is going to be perfect, because I am a I have deep, a deep, deep faith that dividing timing is always the right time, yep, but that I'm not saying like, I'm perfect at it either, like,
Well, no, you can believe it. And also have, like, many moments a day where you're like, really, yeah, gonna work?

 And, like, work, am I ever gonna get this done? Yeah? And there's definitely moments of, like, self loathing, or self, you know, like inflicted misery, where I'm like, God, that I should be done already. I should be at this other place. I should be doing, you know, whatever. And so that's one thing that I'm trusting and and then I'm also trusting, and this is like, I'm not overtly churchy or overtly spiritual in any of my business stuff, but I have a very deep faith that God doesn't bring me this far to only bring me this far, and so I lean on my faith a lot. And I'm a I'm not like a quiet prayer. I'm very I'm very internal about it. I'm not very showy about it, but I do a lot of as much as possible, quiet, prayerful moments where I'm like, Okay, God, world is on fire right now. Mm, hmm, there's so much chaos. Am I doing the right thing? 

Like, am I How? How does my work push forward and better the world? I have to trust that you wouldn't bring me this far only for peril. Mm hmm, but I don't know what that looks like, and so I'm leaning in. It's like a I'm leaning in full faith it that, like, you know, in secular terms, the universe has my back. Mm hmm, and and I'm going to be okay. No matter what happens, my family's going to be okay. We'll figure it out together. And if we're not okay, we're in it together, like otherwise I get in my head and figuring, trying to figure out how I can personally control all these external, uncontrollables that none of us.  Can do on our own. So I have to, I I'm really working on trusting who's in my community, how I can participate in in my own activism and my own community. 

Like moving my community toward where I want to go, what I do each and every day within my business, within you know, for my clients to help them as well, I'm really trusting that that is enough in this moment well, and that's a piece you're that you like. I always think about how it's not my job to know where my piece of the puzzle ends up, right, right? Students in schools like you did eighth grade or 10th grade or 11th grade, and you didn't, they didn't necessarily come back and be like, here I am as a grown up, and here's how you impacted me. Yeah, get to do your piece. And the thing I think all the time is like, I have to trust that me doing my piece is me doing my piece. Yeah, right, like that.

And for people with such a heart, for people like we talked about, it's like I want to, and this comes from teaching like, I want to save everybody. I want to make sure everybody's okay, everybody's taken care of. And I learned, you know, through teaching, was my, my first like, big, oh my god, I, I can't save everybody myself. Like, this is a real, this is a really big lesson here. And then parenting and realizing, like, Oh my God, these, these humors are outside of me and I have to trust that they're going to be okay. Like, that's a whole different level. And then in business, knowing, like, I'm giving my best every day, because that's that's my like, soul contract to my to my clients, it's like, I will show up and I will fight for you every single day. And at some point I have to be like, okay, and then you're going to take the torch and and go, because we're all, you know, and, oh, that part is so hard, because I like teachers band, we are like, let us in there. 

We're going to fix this. Well, it's like, I want to hold your hand, and I will take your hand and I will drag your ass with me, right? And that is no and you can't there, and you can't hear and you can't anywhere else, like, I can't want it more than they do.

Yes. So that's a the difference between empowering somebody to go off and and prosper and do their thing, or enabling them by doing it for them and dragging them along and being and and Angela and I have have had that happen in our business with some clients, where we're like, why is this interrupting our life when they're not even busy caring about the business? Yeah, the way that we're caring about their business, this is going to, you know, I think this relationship has run its course, right? Um, when we first joined forces, you know? And so there's, yeah, like that is a constant tug of war. Is trusting that what we do when we're doing our best is enough, so our best is enough. And, and that's, that's gotta be it well,
and it's, I always think, so there's, like, for me, there's three things in there. I think the first is trusting that I am doing my part right. All I can do are the things I can do right? I can show I'm going to show up. I'm always going to show up, but I have to trust that, and I trust that I'm going to do that. The second is, I have to trust the people on the other side of the relationship to be grown ups, yeah, to do their part, to know their part, and to show up for their part. Like I can't make them but I they are right. And then I have to, this is the one. 

This is the one I work on all the time. I have to, I've had to sort of make the internal shift from making things work out to letting them Yeah, and so my next job is to allow time to be time and process to be processed. If things to work as they're going to work, like last week was a really good example. We were supposed to, like, my calendar always works itself out, damn it, yeah, just let it on. Tuesday, I had a bunch of stuff going on, and I was like, I don't know if this is all going to fit. And there were people coming to do work at the house, and it's usually a house cleaning day every other week. And Monday night, the people coming to do work changed to Wednesday. The house cleaners change to Thursday. All the things work out. The dog walker was like, I can't do this way. Can I come Tuesday? And I was like, well, that cleaned itself up. Yeah. Like, it just, I have to allow it to do its thing. And that allowance is a, it's like 400 level trust instead of 100 level in. Course, trust, correct?

It's sweet, surrender and and that is, yeah, like that is the ultimate. The ultimate is just figuring out, how do you surrender when you do when you've done everything you can do, and then you surrender to the outcome? Yeah,
things work. Things work because you just let them do their thing. And that is like you got, I tell people all the time, stop touching it. Yeah, stop touching it. Let it work. And they're like, why? So if you knowing all the people you know, and knowing the things people are working on and knowing the teacher people, if you could say to them, okay, here's this thing about trust, for you to think about, for you to put in your journal, for you to practice, right? What is the thing that you want people to be like this one thing, no pressure, no pressure, no pressure. Which should be perfect, also kidding. I'm gonna, like, don't, don't worry. Like, what would you love for them to think about or do or try, right? Like, what is the experiment?

All I can say is, what's worked for me in the past. So from my own experience, if ever I am struggling with trusting an outcome, trusting what's in store for me, trusting myself. The thing that helps me the most is going back and remembering times when I had a choice and I chose well, and reminding myself I can trust a situation, I also remember times that I chose poorly and it still worked out. Mm, hmm, and if I can write those down and and call them up to mind. I mean, there's times like you, I have notebooks everywhere where there's just like jots of like scribbles of of like reminders to myself. It, it always works out in the end that is a belief that you must cultivate. But ultimately, anytime that I've made a wrong choice, a bad investment, choosing the wrong partner, it's always worked out better than I could have imagined in the end. It doesn't mean that I didn't suffer some, you know, from that, but it always works out better in the end, and if I can remind myself that I can, I can get into that trusting place faster. 

And so that's what I would recommend, is that every single one of us has made a choice where, like, yeah, I was at a crossroads, and, like, I did that good meeting. Yeah, yeah. Great, great job. And then every one of us has been at a crossroads and chosen the thing that wasn't great, and yet you're still here.
Yes, well, and to sort of have examples, you can go back to big ones, small ones. 

Like, I have little ones, I have big ones where I'm like, no, no. The thing I think all the time is like, you know, every now and then you like, you worry about money, you worry about something like but we, we are still here. Yeah, we always figured it out. Like it's always fine, it's just how stressed out do I want to be about it? That's right, because the only person stressed out is me, like nobody else is as worried as I am. And you know, my mom always said, Things always work out in the end, and if they haven't worked out yet, you're not at the end. Yes,
you're going through hell. Keep going,

Yes, like, it's just not the end yet. And that made me want to murder people. Honestly, it was like, well, but I would like to be at the end, and I would like to control this. And I would like because, you know, my little type, a child self, was very like, but I need this. I need to know how it's going to work. And that is a very different place than like, Okay, we're going to see where it goes and it's going to go where it needs to go. And if we're not where we think we're going to end up, then we're just not there yet. Because, honestly, if you had asked five years ago or 10 years ago, years ago, Sara, if she was a business owner with a podcast, she would have thought you were adorable. And this was so funny, right? Like I who knew you're right, I know, isn't it? It makes life actually quite interesting and fun, if you let it Oh, Oh, what fun things I get to do now, but oh, so fabulous. So Melissa, tell people where to find you and what to come get from you right now. Yes,
okay, you can find me two places. One is stand for the and. Dot com, and on the site, you will see a place where it's a start here, and you could just go and grab all of our freebies and resources. 

And then if you're interested in networking resources, check us out at the PROSPER network. I'm sure you'll you can put the link in the notes for that. Yep, I can put the links to all the things, and I will you'll get all the links in the in the places they always are. If you want to come find me, I'm in my Facebook group, which is the same name of this podcast. It's uncomplicating business for teachers, helpers and givers.  You can go to my website. It's Torpey coaching.com or you can, like, come find and connect with us, because it's like, we like people, we like you.

Yeah? Wait, can I say this? Yeah, please find me on LinkedIn. I am, like, just amping up on LinkedIn recently, and I would love to have a conversation. So if you heard this, say I heard you on Sara's podcast, and we will, like, I will legit write you back. And I like being friends so well. And here's the thing, I am the same, and people will be like, Well, I don't want to bother you. Like, girl, it is not up to you to decide if you're bothering me or not. It is up to me, and I like human beings. 

This is me telling you that you should believe us. You should trust that we really mean this, because we really do both, yes, they're like, people, people, yes, and we actually mean it. So believe it just like, yeah, believe Yeah. We mean it because we really do. We're both, like, people, yeah, it would be a joy to have a conversation with you.

Yes, Melissa, thank you so much for this. Thank you such a treat to get to talk to you. I know, I agree we need to do it more often. We're, we're we're not recording you each I know. We just talk about thank you the breeze I know, oh, my God, they love you so much. Thank you. Thank you. See you. Bye.