The Identity Series [PART 1] - The #1 Problem New Coaches Face & What To Do About It

If You’ve Been Thinking About Becoming a Coach…or don't know where to start,

This episode is for you.

In this new Identity Series, we're going BTS of what "HER" actually means. We’re unpacking the real reason early and aspiring coaches stay stuck - and it’s not lack of information or wrong strategy.

It’s identity.

Inside this episode, we talk about:

• Why you still identify as a beginner
• The truth about confidence and coaching
• How to start coaching before you “feel qualified”
• The simple four steps to building a coaching business

If you feel pulled toward coaching but terrified to claim it, press play.

Because you don’t need permission.
You need to decide.

Episode Referenced: The Experience That Changed My Life

Transcript

0:00

Hello and welcome to this week's episode of the Building Her podcast. I'm your host, Kati Lillian. If you've been loving this podcast, go ahead and rate the podcast five stars and DM me on Instagram when you do that, because I want to connect and personally thank you. If you are new here, hit that subscribe button. It really helps the podcast grow, and that way you will never miss an episode. So let's dive in. Hey, my name is Kati Lillian, and I am obsessed with all things mindset, personal development, and helping you build the best version of yourself. I'm a women's life and mindset coach and an entrepreneur who started a fun hobby of posting hashtag sweaty selfies, grew a successful side hustle, and now I run a six figure coaching business. I teach you the secret of building a life that aligns with your deepest values and one that you wake up excited for. This podcast is designed to expand your mind and. Challenge the status quo. So get ready to uplevel your life and let's start building her. I have to be honest with you all, I had just scheduled a guest episode and that guest episode lasted maybe six minutes because we both showed up late, and then my guest was like, oh, my husband. Sick. And my youngest always likes to hang out with me and, oh, we'll see how this goes. And I was like, wow, that's crazy because I'm in the same boat. My husband was supposed to have a, a work call and my daughter was being fussy and she didn't wanna go down for a nap. And so he was kind of scrambling around and I heard her outside my door and so she's like, you know what? Why don't we reschedule mom life? And I was like, oh my God, yes, she gets it. So that's what just happened. And now my daughter is down for a nap and here we are. I have about 25 minutes before my next private coaching call, and we're going to drop some knowledge, wisdom, and everything in between. On this episode, so. I wanna share that because building a business and maintaining a business is messy. So here we are. Anyways building her is the name of my podcast, and one of my clients had asked me, you know, what is her what, what is? Why did you even name it, building her? And so I answered, you know, from like it's personal development and it's growing into this higher version of yourself that you know, you have on your mind in terms of, ah, I wanna be, um, healthier, I wanna be stronger, I wanna be more confident. I wanna go do the thing that I wanna go do. And, and it's just really. Embodying this version of your higher self that you know is possible for you. And as I was describing, I was like, I don't think I've ever brought this to the podcast, and I don't think I've ever given it, you know, the episodes that it deserves to really deep dive into what I even talk about when I say her or your higher self. So. A, a way to put it clearly, and I'm speaking directly from my experience now, five years of owning my coaching business. It's not even about the business I've built, it's more so about the woman I've built and the woman I've built. Is the one that gives less fucks, the one that is exuding confidence, the one that is living a life of alignment and purpose and fulfillment. The one that has designed a life on her terms, rooted in the values of. Freedom of time, money, and location. Do you see what I mean? The business is there simply to support the life that I want, and in order to grow that business and maintain that business, I have had to become and build a version of myself. That one is even. Allowed to do this one that feels worthy to have all of this and the abundance that she desires. One that feels like she has the energetic capacity to even go about her day-to-day and support her clients and offer transformations. So the business, of course, it was no small feat. However, I had to become the woman. In order to even have the business, and so the focus for this episode. Is talking about identity and I actually wanna devote an entire series to identity. So this is the introduction to that series of identity. And when I keep saying identity, which I will a lot, this episode and future episodes. What I mean is that version of her that you know, you want to grow into. You know, you have the capacity to do so, but you are not doing it. And so in this world of coaching, I want to break it down for you and see what's going on, perhaps. With your identity and uncover some of the truths, some of the realities, and leave you with tangible tips on what to do next, as I hope I do in every episode. So with this identity series, if you've been thinking about becoming a coach, or if you have decided I'm a coach and you. Are looking to build. So perhaps you have a client or maybe two clients, but you know you want the five to 10 clients or even future. You want the group programs, you want the digital courses. You want to. Launch your own podcast, right? But, but we're starting in that private one-on-one client world. Um, this episode and this next series is going to be for you now to describe your current reality and DM me on Instagram. If I, if you're like, wow, this is so me, like you hit the, the nail on the head. Is that right? Is that the right expression? Anyways, so to identify with where you're at, I really had to go into the archive and think, where did I start? I remember I would Google. And now I guess you can chat GBT, but I would Google how to become a life coach. And I did this, you know, on the side of my main job and I didn't know where to start. I didn't know what a coach meant to I, my only reference point was Tony Robbins because of my. Incredible experience when I was 24 years old, and so I didn't know the first step of even considering becoming. A coach and let alone a life coach, because I was like a life coach. That sounds kinda weird and it sounds daunting and overwhelming because I'm not perfect. I don't know everything, right? So, so that was my thought process around that. And so I would Google how to become a life coach, or what does a life coach mean? Or you know, what do you need to know in order to become a life coach? I've also saved. Lots of different posts and reels and you know, on all the platforms, TikTok, YouTube, and I would just try to be a sponge and listen and learn, you know, what is coaching and what do I have to know? And I would save all the posts and I would watch all the YouTube videos, but I realized I wouldn't take any action. Right. I, it's like I was busy learning. I was in that learning loop, but I wouldn't actually do anything myself to move the needle forward. And I felt pulled. I, I felt called towards this line of work in this industry, but it also felt very stupid. It felt very ridiculous to even. Sit this as an option. That's why it took me so long. It took me years to finally say and announce I'm a coach and that was just in my life. But let alone, you know, social media on a platform. So if any of those resonate with you and you're nodding your head right now and you're like, wow, this is so me. This is exactly where I'm at. This is exactly my thought process. Well, you're exactly who I want to talk to these. These next identity series are going to be for you, so make sure you subscribe so that you don't miss any of these episodes. The number one problem that you are facing right now and you are experiencing is that you still identify yourself as a beginner. Now, again, I'm speaking to life coaches and perhaps even business coaches. I just had this conversation actually with a new one-on-one client with of mine, because she's starting out as a life coach, and some of the thoughts that came up for her were, well, who am I to do this? Am I even qualified enough? I don't have like a life coaching certification. And then do I need a certification and how many certifications? And then it's also the that critic, right? Well, what if I even go through with this and try and I fail? Or what will people think of me to even say that I'm a life coach and. You know what, if I never become confident enough to truly own this and actually make this into a career and make some decent money from it. What I've realized with all of those thoughts, because I've had all of those myself, is that it's not that you don't know where to start. It's more so the identity of even calling yourself. A coach, right? You don't trust yourself and this identity to start to put yourself out there online. You think you need to get not one certification, but several certifications. You think you need to hire someone or learn how to build a website. You feel like you need to create an LLC before you do anything. You need to design a logo and you need to come up with your niche statement and your tagline and all this stuff. And while some of that absolutely needs to happen, it's not the first thing that needs to happen. I created an LLC after I moved to Florida, after I already had 10. Clients under my belt. I built a website, but I don't even use it right now. I just use social media platforms and I designed a logo and no one knows what the fuck my logo is. None of it matters. What you actually need to learn is sales. It's sales, sales, and some more sales. That's it. It is simple, but it's not easy because when you sell, you have to talk like you are the expert, and that takes conviction and that takes confidence, which first is rooted in courage. You have to show up online. And show your face. As coaches, you are the personal brand, whether you like it or not. You are the face of your company. You are the walking billboard of your company, and so people have to like, know and trust you because they're investing into you as the coach. So you have to show up online, you have to speak, you have to use your words, and. You have to know how to talk to people and what questions to ask in order to allow them to feel safe, secure, and trust you and therefore themselves to even make a decision to invest thousands of dollars into you and your program. That is what you need to learn. It's sales. And what I have discovered over the years, the women who have built successful coaching businesses, and I've been on in multiple masterminds now, where I've met six figure coaches all the way up to eight figure coaches. I always thought they needed to be, you know, the loudest and the most confident and the most certified. But when you meet these women, it's actually more so identity work. They've simply decided. I'm a coach now. They took imperfect action and they were willing to look silly. At first. They were okay, you know, being embarrassed and making a fool of themselves because that is actually the requirement for you to learn. That's it. Those are the three things. That those successful coaches did and continue to do. And when I reflected on that, I realized, holy shit, that's what I've done. So if you're not familiar with my story, just to give you a brief overview, when I was 24, I went to my Tony Robbins experience and that changed my life. I have an entire episode devoted to that. I'll link it in the show notes below so you can get more of the details. But it changed my life and from there it catapulted me, or it was the catalyst, I should say, that turned into this personal development journey and. I would journal more and I became the observer of my thoughts, and I would meditate using the app Headspace, and I became more familiar with visualizations like I just poured. Tony Robbins was a very fixed mindset. My mindset after Tony Robbins was a very growth mindset, meaning whoever Katya was in the past is. Who Katya was. It doesn't mean I need to carry that version of Katya in the future because she can grow, because she can change because she can learn. And that gave me so much excitement and freedom and childlike curiosity to look at what could I actually build and what could I actually grow into. Right there. It's that version of her again that I was so excited by. And by the way, that growth never stops because that version of her always changes. It's never like, okay, once I become her, that's it. It's like, no, no, no. That's the first stepping stone. Right, because then once you hit your dream, which you will, your dream expands and now you can see more. And now you can have more, right? There's always a new level to this, but new level, new devil. So. That sent me down my journey of personal development, that Tony Robbins experience. Then I was having such a tough time with my career because I was very successful at my tech company and I loved all the people. I still love all the people, and everything was great on paper and all the benefits and the 401k match, I mean, you name it, but inside. I was feeling pulled. I was feeling called towards a different career. Now in the back of my mind. I did consider coaching, but I always put it in this box of no, can't do it, because my only reference point at the time was Tony Robbins and Tony Robbins is this superhuman? And I was like, I'm not superhuman. Like there's no way I could coach people. Right. I, I allowed my past story, my past weaknesses and insecurities to truly limit my vision. And that limitation really sent me down this path of brand deals and, health and wellness through tone it up. And that all served a purpose though. I realize now when I reflect, it was a stepping stone to still get me back though, to coaching. But I had to learn what I didn't want, what I didn't like, but it at the same time, it still had to, had to expose me to a different stream of income, right? Making my first dollar online opened up that world for me outside of my tech bubble. Let's call it. And so when I was starting to make money from brand deals, that unlocked the floodgates in my mind. I was like, wow, making money online is so possible. And this was, mind you, like 2018, somewhere around there. And so once I made money from brand deals, my question was, well, how do I add a second stream of income because this is cute money over here. I think I had made like six grand at the time. But I knew that wouldn't really turn into something unless I loved brand deals and content creation. And at the time, influencer work. That. Okay, let's double down on this. But I knew I didn't the like coaching came up again, right? There was still that curiosity there. And when I thought of coaching for money, I had such a block because. I didn't have the identity for it. And so I remember I had Googled, you know, how to become a life coach, or what life coaches are out there, or how to find a life coach. You know, whatever I wrote and I came upon this. Article written by a life coach. Her name was Jenny Mustafa, and every single word that she had written resonated with me. I was like, oh my God, this is it. This is me. Like, I felt so seen. I felt so heard. I was like, this woman gets it. She's in my head. I didn't follow her on Instagram. I never even saw a photo of her. I just read this article and in that article it said, book a call here. And I was like, what can that hurt? It's a free call. Like fuck it, just do it. But that already took so much courage for me to even just book that call. I booked the call. We met on the consultation call. Loved her immediately. She was so funny. She made me feel so comfortable and I was just an open book. I was like, yo, this is what I am doing now. This is what I wish to do. I don't know where the fuck to start. I don't even know if I'm capable of doing this. And just kinda word vomited to her and she. She caught it, right? She, she held it. She was like, I totally get it. I've been there and I work with others that have been there and I can help you, and just totally reassured me. And so I invested$900 into her for her nine week program. When I did that, I was so scared. I thought I would shit my pants and all the thoughts of is she is. Scam. Is this real? Did I just lose$900? What will Bert think? What will my parents think? Blah, blah, blah, blah. So despite the fear and those thoughts that I had deep down in my heart, I did feel it was still right. So it was scary, but it was still right. So I went through with it, had my. Program with her. Loved every moment of it, and she helped me so much with my identity. She helped me switch from this tech girl that I had been for, you know, north of five years at that point, and helped me realize it's just a job. It's just financial oxygen. You're collecting a paycheck. You do not owe this company anything. You don't need to be like a loyalist to them, even though they've helped. Change your life and the CEO is one of your biggest mentors. Like I get all that. You can still have love for them, but at the same time, you can still branch off and do your own thing. Like this is your life. You're allowed to do what you want, basically. So she helped me with that identity switch from Tech Girl to. Coach. And, um, what also really helped me, and I didn't know it at the time, but just seeing her structure, right? Like how often did we meet? What were the calls like? She had a group component to it, there was a handout with it. Like just everything that I received on the client side helped me then tailor my coaching for. Um, my future program, and that is where my six week program was born. The$600 for six weeks. I used her structure as the guide and then everything else was a domino effect from there, right? Then I had enough money to invest into a business mentor who helped me scale to six figures. I replaced my income. I therefore quit and went all in, and the rest is history. So. I share all that with you because I had decided to invest. I had decided to become a coach. I took imperfect action. I always say I threw spaghetti at the wall just to see what stuck, right. It was very messy. There was no blueprint or roadmap that someone laid out for me until I hired my business mentor, which was years into my journey. And then I was willing to look silly and embarrassed. I showed up online. I didn't know what the fuck I was doing. I didn't know what I was saying, but I was like, fuck it. Like we gotta do something here. And so that is the recipe for success. That is why I'm sitting here today. I was never fully confident. I was never fully certain, I was never fully prepared for what I was getting myself into. But I did see myself capable to grow. I did see myself capable to unlearn and relearn. I did see myself changing from this tech girl and tech history to this new world of coaching. I was willing to be new at something. Again, I was willing to quote unquote, start over when I was 30. 30. That's usually when you're well into your career and people frown upon you starting over and quitting your job, especially when that job looks good on paper, because it absolutely was. And I stopped waiting for external validation, right? I had to internally validate my decisions. No one, not one single person was clapping for me or cheering for me, like awesome. Quit your tech job. Awesome. You, um, stopped your 401k match. Awesome. You lost your health insurance. Awesome. Like no one was doing that. Bert was the only one in my corner, my husband, who supported me, and the only reason he did is because he is the only one that witnessed my growth. He witnessed my pain, he witnessed my highs. My lows, my right. He saw everything in between. So he saw firsthand how hard I worked. He saw firsthand how badly I wanted this. Nobody else has seen that, nor will they ever. So only he supported me during this time, and so with his support, I had to learn. How to internally validate myself. Basically, you clap for your damn self. That's what that means, regardless of what other people think or say, or their beliefs or opinions or their fears, you know, whatever. The list goes on and on and on. So that's what you need to do as an earlier aspiring coach. You need to see yourself as capable of growth. You are not stuck in a career. A career is a job. It's financial oxygen. You can change your mind whenever you want to, especially in this digital landscape and in this era of ai. Like all our jobs are about to be obsolete. Hate to bring it to you. And I'm not the AI expert by any means, but I just regurgitate what I hear from Diary of a CEO or uh, Gary Vaynerchuk or any of the people that are really on the front end of this conversation, right? I do listen to them and I regurgitate it here. Being willing to be something. Sorry. Be willing to be new at something is so, so, so important because that is the only way we learn. I don't know why we always, why we all agreed to pick a career outside of college. And then now is it? That's what you're stuck with. Even if you don't like it, like that's your career and you're gonna climb up to the top of the ladder until you retire and then you die. Like that's not growth. That is being stuck in something. And we, as humans evolve and change and grow. And so our jobs usually reflect that growth. And if it doesn't, well then. There's something seriously wrong. That's why a lot of people say, if you're not growing, you're dying. Right? That's why a lot of people can become so miserable in their job because the growth stops. They become stagnant and complacent. So, as you guys know, I want to leave you with some tangible tips and some information so you actually know where to start. So I would recommend these next four steps, and hopefully you take it and run with it. So number one, start coaching before you call yourself a coach. So this will absolutely help you with the identity of becoming a coach, because even if you do it for free. You're still gaining the knowledge and the know-how on how to coach. So I would offer free consultation calls, or if you call it clarity calls, whatever you go by, but basically free calls, like, here's a 60 minute call, here's a 90 minute call. Come to this call with your problem and let's see if I can solve it right? So like it puts you in this energy of being a coach and it's for free, so there's no money exchange. It's just free value for the person on the other side. Then you can practice those conversations, practice coaching, practice, asking the questions, practice being in this identity and energy of a coach, and then. After you have these free calls, I would ask them to fill out like a survey or even just text or voice note or whatever method of communication you have, but give honest feedback. So have them tell you like you really helped hear. You didn't really help. Here. I offer this constructive criticism, this feedback, whatever it is. But that is how you learn. And once you have enough of those, then you can kind of look on average, like, oh, okay, there's a lot of people saying this, or, you know, they're saying I'm good at this and I'm not so good at this. And so then you can lean in a little bit more. Into the weaknesses and perfect your craft. Step two, please stop consuming and over quote unquote, researching. If you've been consuming endlessly without acting, you need to stop. You need to catch yourself. You need to hold yourself accountable to the bad habits that you have. Information is not momentum. Information is not going to move the needle. You. Putting yourself in this uncomfortable situation by getting onto a call with a complete stranger, that is uncomfortable. And so what will help you learn and grow is by having more conversations and conversations lead to conversions.'cause remember, these are free calls, but what if you do a really fucking good job? Someone might actually ask you like, do you have anything where I can pay you? Do you have a program where I can become your client? Or maybe down the line when you do offer paid options, then someone will have a good memory of you and and the help and the value you gave them. Well, now they might become a actual paying client. Step three, say it out loud. And you don't have to go on social media right away and say you're a coach, but why not in your community, in your network, in your circle, maybe one person that you trust the most. Like tell them. I think I want to explore coaching. I think I want to become a coach. One. Notice how it feels, just to say it out loud and claim it. Number two, see how it lands. Right. Not that we need the external validation, but sometimes, especially if it's a trusted person in your circle, they might say, oh my God, it's about damn time. You've been coaching for free for years. Right. But the more you say it out loud now the more it becomes real. And then step and final. Uh, sorry. Last step and final step. Step four. Let it be small. Sometimes when we think about building a business or starting a coaching business, it's like this mountain we have to climb and that can be really fucking scary and overwhelming. You don't need the public announcement. You don't need to show up on social media, just. Yet, you don't need to quit your job. You don't need to do all these crazy things. What you need is one call. You need one conversation. You need one offer, and then you need one client. Think in terms of one, I just need one call. Even when you're like looking at your upcoming week and offering free calls, you're like, I need one. Yes. Right, and then I need that one person to show up, and then I need to have that one conversation, and then I need to have that one feedback survey and bit by bit, step by step, brick by brick. That is how you grow and learn, and one feels a lot more approachable and doable and possible than, oh God, I need to build this six figure coaching business. Okay. Okay. I love you so much. That's what I got for you this week. If anything about this episode resonated with you, please do me a favor, take a screenshot and post it onto your stories and tag me at Katya Lillian so I can see it, and so that I can connect with you. Thank you in advance. Thank you for being here every week. I appreciate you all and until next week,