The Truth About Confidence, Validation & Future Self Work

If you’re in need of an ego boost, this is the podcast episode for you! CJ chats with Kira, the manifestation coach, dishing up how we, as female business owners, can embody our own version of confidence so we can put ourselves out there and drive our success without external validation or negative self-talk holding us back.

Expect revelations that’ll leave you shook and takeaways you wish you’d learned sooner:

1. What IS confidence as a business owner?
2. How we, as business owners, can find self-belief and feel value in what we do and what we put out without external validation.
3. Hype talk tips and scripts for doing things you’ve never done before and pushing yourself out of your cosy comfort zone.
4. How future self-talk and manifestation actually works (no BS here).

Check out Kira’s website: https://www.kiramatthews.com.

Connect with Kira on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kirathebold/ and LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kira-matthews-679a89b5/

You can also connect with me! Instagram & Threads: onherplate_ or onherplate.com.

Transcript

Welcome to the Energized Entrepreneur podcast. I'm CJ, your host founder of On Her Plate Educating and Empowering female entrepreneurs to repave the foundation of their business with a nourishing diet so they can match their energy with their growth rate. I am genuinely honored to be inside of your ears right now. If you're listening to this, you must be a female entrepreneur looking for your permission to hustle in a way that puts your health first. Well, great news, you found it! Let's power up this episode. Welcome, Kyra, to the Energize Entrepreneur podcast. How are you? I'm good. Thanks. Thanks for having me. No, it's it's, um. It's certainly my pleasure. I'm really excited about this conversation. Um, before, though, before we get started into the process side of things, we're gonna get the listeners to loosen up a bit, uh, with a few hotseat questions so people can get to know you on a more personal level. Okay, so here we go into the deeper stuff. So I'll jump straight in because that's how we roll. What was the latest podcast or TV series that you binged? Oh. I hope it's something embarrassing. Is it something embarrassing? I laugh because this isn't something I would necessarily tell the world for me. But the latest, the most recent podcast I've been bingeing, was because I had a phase of scrolling on TikTok and then these podcast clips. There was so much drama in them. I kept on watching them, and then it got to the point where I was like, no, I need to go to the podcast. And it's this podcast called The Cancelled Podcast, and it's by these two American girls in LA. They are absolutely insane. But it's so, so funny. This sounds great. Um, it's very like there's like lots of drama, lots of scandal, like they name people. It is just like, wow. It's almost like an experience rather than a a podcast. Okay, I love that. Um, cool. If you could only eat one meal for the rest of your life, what would it be? Probably chicken fajitas. Oh. Like that? I eat them a lot, actually. I mean, that's a good thing if you're. So. You already used to eating a lot. What's in the chicken, Peter? So you've got peppers. You've got red onions, coriander, tomatoes, cheese a little like sauce. Like I love, like condiments, like fancy sauces and stuff. And I think I like it because it's kind of healthy, but it's like very, very tasty and it's very easy to eat. You do it in one pot, cook it in like 20 minutes and you're like, ready to go? Yeah, and it is super healthy. But like you say like super easy. And also kind of I'm going to say it feels like takeaway, but it feels like food that you would get out, you know, like if you cook it well. And sometimes I add like black beans if I want it to like go a little bit further and so more authentic, I love it. Okay. Great. Uh, beach or mountain? I'm living by the beach now. I'm going to say beach. Okay. Yeah. Same, same. Favorite workday beverage? Oh, coffee. Yeah. Everyone says that. I mean, I mean, it's mine too, so. If I'm outside and I'm, like, somewhere where this is accessible, like a kombucha or I love trip. Oh, nice. Yeah. Nice. Okay. Like that. Okay. Lastly, your go to hype song for when you need to give yourself a little confidence boost or something by Beyonce. Anything by Beyonce. Anything by Beyonce. Yeah. Okay. Lovely. Okay, great. So that was just for the listeners to get to know you a bit better, so I enjoyed that. I also like the other day I did a podcast and the first question was something like, so how do people change their identity? And I was like, no, you tell me. No easing in. Just sorry. Like, okay, okay, you're doing this. Yeah. Well, I mean, we've started with the kind of hotseat and now we're going to go into effectively your elevator pitch. So we're we're easing in. We are easing you in. So with that you obviously know what's coming out. So over to you. What do you do and why do you do it. Yeah I'm a mindset manifestation coach for creatives, freelancers and founders. And I essentially help founders set goals in their business and achieve them. And usually those goals are things to do with growth. So launching a new product, gaining new clients, launching a new sort of service within their business, maybe they want to become a speaker where they had just been working quite closely with clients before. And I think the reason why I do it is because. I think it's so interesting because I've had lots of different readings from tarot readers, astrologers. I had a Vedic 

astrology reading last year, and something that always comes up for me in my in the stars, in my energy, is that I was born to facilitate community and harmonious communities. And this idea that I grew up in spaces where I was really aware of what disharmony felt like. And so now my life's purpose, if you will, is about creating harmony. And when it comes to mindset and goals in your business, that can be disharmony on a very personal level. You can have these goals and have no idea how to achieve them. Also this sense of I can't achieve them. It's not possible for me. It creates this disharmony, um, within the founder and so within my one on work, one on one coaching work, it's all about helping that founder create that harmony with the goals that they want to achieve. But then also with my events, it's also about creating this space that. I felt was missing. It's about creating these spaces to talk about big goals, to feel included, to feel like you are valuable and worthy of taking up space. Even if you don't have the biggest audience or the biggest message it's about. It's about that. It's about like you being there, being as important as what you have to offer. Um. That's beautiful. I, I love that, I love the, like the word harmony as well. Where you used it, I thought was really great. Your events also look so, so fun. Like, oh, there's so far future nights looking at them. Yeah, they look amazing. So, um, I feel like I've edged you in, so I'm going to now dive into the deep end. What is confidence and what does it mean to be or feel confident in yourself as a business owner, but also in your personal life? Because as we know, if you run your own business, your personal life, it's kind of a little bit tangled up, isn't it? So what is confidence in that respect? Yeah, that's a really interesting question. I guess there's so many ways that you can frame it. Like on a very basic level, confidence is an emotion or a state of being. I like to describe confidence, whether it's in work or personal life, as it's this sort of trust that you can point at something on a map or in a direction and say, I can get that, or I want that, and I believe I can also have it. It's this self- assuredness, um, and sometimes that self-assuredness can come from prior experiences. You've developed a skill and you've seen yourself do something over and over again. So you build trust in that. And also sometimes confidence can come from a sense of resourcefulness. Sometimes we are reaching for things that maybe we haven't had before, but we still can approach that with a sense of shrewdness. Um, this sense that, okay, I may not have it now, but I trust myself to be able to figure it out when I get there. And I look at confidence as this sort of relationship with the self, instead of having a relationship of inner criticism and judgment and shame. It's also it's almost a relationship of support, love, trust and action. I love that it's almost like it. And I don't know why this kind of sparked this in my head when you were saying that, but I feel like confidence a lot of the time is thought of as something that is almost like tangible, that you, that you either don't have or you have or you can get or you can't get. But I think how you're describing it is almost like makes it feel much more accessible to everyone, like it's it's part of you, it's who you are. And as you say, it's something that you can point to on a map. It's a self-assuredness rather than, you know, saying, just point blank saying to yourself, well, I'm not a confident person. Yeah. Like and I think that that comes through like this idea that you either have confidence or you don't is like when people are talking about being introverted or extroverted, like extroverts are seen as the people who have confidence, who have loads of friends. They walk into rooms, they're really loud, they get stuff done. But whereas introverts are typically seen as people who aren't confident, aren't loud and more reserved, and actually through the work that I do have creatives, I've just found that that isn't the case. It isn't the case that you can be shy and not develop confidence, or not learn the skills to develop confidence if you want to. It isn't the case that if you are extroverted. That doesn't necessarily mean that you'll be confident in all situations, all circumstances, and at all times. I think our emotional states change and they flux in in different seasons of our lives. And that's okay. I think a lot of my work is about as much as it's about achieving goals and doing these really fun, ambitious things. It's also about this awareness that you are human. The human should experience a whole range of emotions happiness, 

sadness, joy, disappointment, rejection. We're supposed to go through all of those emotions. And so the most confident people that you'll be able to point to aren't the ones that never feel anxiety or never for a worried. It's just that they never allow those negative emotions to become the defining parts of their personality. It's almost like they're okay with the fact that they will pass through them, and that there's that self-assuredness of who they actually are and how they see them. That sort of stays quite close to them. It's almost like, I know I'm in a storm at the moment, but I can see the shore, and the shore is who I am, rather than the storm being who I am. Mhm. That's really not. Yeah. That's great. It reminds me of I don't know why this is stuck with me but I am not I wouldn't even say I'm like a huge Adele fan. I mean I like her but I don't know why this is stuck with me, but I guess because she does seem really confident and she's obviously this incredible singer, right? You know, we all know we all know Adele, right? Um, and she once said, I'm not going to quote it officially because I don't know what the exact quote was, but she was talking about the fact that she does get stage fright, and she does get to the point where, you know, she's even thrown up before she's gone on stage. But she said something like, just go. I just go out there and I do it. I think, I think other singers have said, like, I know that Rihanna has said something similar. She said to you make it kind of kind of vibe. Um, so it's not that they don't feel that emotion. It's like you say, like they see the shore and they know that that's who they are. They're not the storm, they're not the nervous wreck that they might be feeling. They're, you know, that's the that their confidence is who they are. And that that reminded me of. Yeah I resonate with that so much. I did a post the other day on my Instagram, actually, about how I have hosted many events, I've done many talks and yeah, the last time I did a Future Self Night event, my brain was like, you need to cancel it, no one is coming, nobody cares. This is terrible and I didn't cancel it. I went through with it and I had an amazing time. I say this to my clients often. The brain isn't a great reliable predictor of the weather. Just because you're having a thought in your mind doesn't mean it's true. Or you should believe it. And I often get my clients to write down the thoughts that they're having about something, especially the thoughts that feel negative. And they can be your thoughts that you have about yourself, your ability to do something or something that you want to achieve. And then I ask them to put a tick next to all of the thoughts that they've put down that are factual. Like if we presented this in front of a court of law, everyone would agree that it is not possible for you to do this thing because of this fact. And so rarely do people have actual factual evidence as to why they can't do something or why it's not possible. It may feel very permanent to you. It may feel really hard, but it doesn't mean that it's actually sort of not possible. And I think that's why I love mindset work so much because. Our brains create these illusions, and the illusions are informed by all sorts of things like representation or the lack of trauma, our environment, our friends, prior experiences. And it is all so malleable and we just have to really tap in to what we want to see, what experiences we want to have, and lean all our energy into that area. Yeah, I, I you it's so funny that you, uh, that you said that because I used to and still do sometimes a similar exercise with my clients when it comes to how they feel about themselves, how they feel about food. I think the crux of it is they just don't feel in control of their diet. But things like, I can't stop snacking or, um, yeah, sugar. And you know, if I get chocolate, I have to eat it all. You know, it's all of this kind of stuff. And and I say exactly that, you know, write all of them down. And if you can provide me with proof that would actually stand up in a court of law, then fine, we've got a truth. But if you can't give me any evidence, which, of course they can't. Um, then it's not that it's not true, is it? Like you can change it. And so it's really interesting that you said that because I was like, oh yeah, it's a really powerful exercise. And I would I would recommend anyone doing it. If you're just in that kind of mindset where you have well, I suppose you have several mindsets, um, about about certain sticky things that you're not and they're quite stagnant. I think that's a great I relate to that a lot. What you said about like eating the chocolate shake, it's like, oh my God, I have no idea how 

common that is. You can imagine. Um, yeah, but it is possible. It is possible. I would say the same thing to you, you know, um, it is, uh, it is definitely possible. Sometimes you need to do things like, um, like I did tell a client once, uh, it was around Easter time, so obviously. And she's got kids. So obviously Easter eggs were just. Everywhere. Um, and I said, we're going to put them away in a cupboard, like a really high up cupboard where you can't reach, and we're going to leave them there for about two weeks. And it's just a strategy to make you again, just reinforce that belief that you don't actually need them and that it's your brain saying they're right there. You can have them. And after two weeks I'll say, oh, so how are these toys going? She said, yeah, I haven't touched them. And to be honest, I don't really want them anymore because I could. And she got she got them down and I think she ended up eating one. But it was over the course of like two weeks rather than one one hour. Yeah. But it's it's just I'm not saying you need to hide your Easter eggs every single year, but it's just that kind of reinforcement of sometimes you need to just do that, put it away, and you tell yourself, oh, it's your mind telling you that this is right in front of you, and you know that. So I've got often talking about chocolate and Easter eggs. But just to give you an example of, you know, how powerful the mindset is. Um, yeah. And we really underestimate how often the brain is wrong. The brain is wrong all of the time. Like, this is why I say it can be really unreliable. Your brain can be telling you you are going to fail. You are going to die. It's going to be the worst thing you've ever done. And I when I work with my client, sometimes we work with this thing called the best case, worst case scenario. So if they have a goal and they're thinking, should I go after this goal? I make them write out the best and worst case. And typically when we're thinking about our goals, our brain will hyper focus on the worst case and expand it and make it feel really big. And usually people are really afraid to go for that worst case scenario. So the worst case could be like trying to launch a workshop and nobody signs up and you feel really embarrassed. But actually, as somebody who has lived through very many worst case scenarios, having your worst case could actually be some of the best experiences that you have. Because what it does is that when you go through that and you realize, oh, I'm kind of fine, and oh, actually other people have experienced this as well. And oh, it was nowhere near as bad as I thought it was. It teaches you that like, oh, like my fears aren't really as scary as my brain is making them feel. It's the exactly the same on the other side, if you have a goal and you write down your best case and worst case scenarios, and your best case happens, even though you had lots of fear and you had lots of doubt and you're like, oh, I did that. I proved myself wrong. And so I think I find that really interesting. How? Yeah, the brain is often wrong. It's not always right. Yeah, it's such an important point. And that, I mean, it's a good segue actually to my next question. So as business owners, we open ourselves up to, like you said, you know, rejection, criticism and crickets essentially, and sometimes not all the time, but sometimes all of which can bring on a lot of fear around, you know, being vulnerable and putting ourselves out there, especially if we don't get that initial external hype and that confirmation that what we're doing is working. And so our minds just run away with us, that worst case scenario keeps cropping up. How can we find that in a confidence that we spoke about that self-belief and feel value in what we do without the external validation? Oh, this is such a good question. So when I'm working with my clients, I get a piece of paper and I draw a line, and at the start of the line is the point A and point A is where you are now and your current circumstances. Is that you at the beginning beginning of a goal, and your point B is where you want to go. And I sometimes refer to the point B as your future self. It's you who has achieved this goal. They've got the skills that they need in order to achieve this goal, and they've also worked out the habits that they need. So they are in enabled enabled to do this goal once twice, three times over. And so when we are at the beginning of a goal. So when we're near our point, A if you imagine that shift almost as a percentage. So between 0 and 30% at the beginning of that line, we're not going to be doing things very good at all. We're probably not going to have all of the skills that we need. 

We're not going to have all of the mindset habits that we need. We're not probably not going to have all of the tools that we even need. Perhaps we don't even know what that even looks like. And that's okay. That's exactly how it's meant to go. But what happens is, because the brain likes to do everything perfectly, perfectly likes to know, and likes to be really certain. It will see all of that failure that happens in the first 30% of that shift. It will see that as a reason to go back into the comfort zone. And what it will look to in order to make sure that it it knows it's safe, is it will look to what other people think of you. It will look to what your friends are saying about you, what Instagram is saying about you. And it's interesting because at that part of the goal, it's also where you're probably not getting a lot of validation externally because things aren't working. And so what can happen here is people can try a couple of things and they just go back to their point A or back to their comfort zone. They sort of give up on that goal. But what I always say is you have to talk to your future self more than the voices that doubt you. If you think, okay, I have a plan to or I have a goal to sell out of my workshop. I want you to imagine yourself one year in the future where you always sell out your workshops. What advice would that version of you give? How did they do it? What challenges that they have to overcome? How did they get over the fact that the Instagram algorithm sometimes doesn't swing in your favor? What did they do about that? And if you ask yourself those questions and visualize that future self and you use that information to guide your next steps, what you're actually doing is you're using your conversations with yourself to validate yourself, and you'll be taking the actions, building the skills. And that line shifts. You grow more and more and more, and to eventually you reach a tipping point. And your tipping point is when everyone on Instagram can see that you're achieving your goals. It's when you're posting and you're getting a lot of traction. It's when people are signing up. It's when people are messaging you and complimenting you on whatever you're working on. And that's great because by that time you've already believed it. You've put in all the hard work. But if we're waiting for that validation at the beginning, it's going to leave us completely stuck, because that is not the purpose that we set out to, and it's going to come a lot later in our goal. Makes so much sense. I think I really used to struggle with that external validation and needing that to put more stuff out there, but it's so backwards because if you're not putting stuff out there and you're not kind of considering about the stuff you're putting out because you're worried about what they're going to think as well, and, oh, I haven't got external validation. So I need to I need to do something different again. You know, you're you're not I suppose you're experimenting, but not in a very beneficial way because you're experimenting based on that external validation. Right. But it so it was always backwards for me. Whereas when I start genuinely and I know that I used to hear this when I was stuck in that phase. Yeah, this is bullshit. But when genuinely when I stopped giving a fuck and I started just putting things out that I really believed in. Yeah. And that's when, you know, the external validation did come. Um, but and I'm not saying I don't care because of course I do. I think we all do to some degree, but I feel way more comfortable and confident in what I'm putting out and I believe in it. And so that external validation, they kind of go hand in hand. And it's nice, it's a really nice collaboration rather than, I'm going to do this and see if I get external validation, and if I don't, I'll do something different. Yeah, that's how you want it to end up. You know, I have totally been there. I have totally been there. And you just said something so interesting and I was like, oh my God, yes. Oh yeah. Because you were saying how the external validation comes and it's so interesting because people message me all the time saying like, oh, I love that podcast episode you did, and I love this and thank you so much and blah, blah, blah. And it's interesting because I always appreciate those messages, but they don't mean as much as you think they're going to mean when you're at the beginning. Like at the beginning, it almost feels like life or death. Like you're like, I need someone to tell me I'm doing a good job, please. But when you become a more established business owner, of course, I want people to 

resonate with my content. And of course, I want my clients to really have the best time ever. But it's almost got to the point where. What I do is it's so by design for people to have that experience that it's like it's no longer something I'm relying on. It's something that I'm sort of planning on through how I do my content, how I run my program. So I'm like, yeah, amazing. Like, this is what I plan for. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's it's kind of less of a surprise that and that's like, well I'm not I'm not being big headed. But I totally agree. I think this, you know, this podcast is new. Um, you know, I only relaunched it as part of my business relaunch that I recently did. And the the feedback that I've been getting from the podcast has been absolutely amazing. And people have messaged DM'd me being like, you know, oh my gosh, I love it so much. I resonate with it, you know, etc. etc. etc. and I'm still humbled by those messages. Like they just really make my day and they're so, um, it's so kind of somebody to reach out. Yeah, even if I don't know them. And to say that so I and share share it on their own stories like things like that. Like I still get get lit up by seeing those, but I completely agree. In the at the beginning, at the very beginning of like my entrepreneurial journey, like three years ago, whenever it was like, it's like life and death, like you say, like clung to those and being like, you know, it's like a way bigger deal. Whereas now I think, well, yes, I'm humbled and I really appreciate that message and it's so kind, but I'm it's almost like I'm not surprised that you're sending it because or that you're feeling it, I should say are because, well, that's literally what I designed this podcast for, is for you and for you to resonate with it. Yeah. Well, it's lovely to receive the message and for them to take the effort, the actual, um, context of their message, the fact that they resonate with it and they love it. I'm like, well, yeah, cool. Good. Because I really believe that in what I'm putting out. So that's, you know, I'm so with you. And on a personal note, like, it's really interesting because I've been looking at my personal life and my relationships and how I interact. And I read a book about codependency, and I don't know if I identify completely with being a codependent person, but there was definitely things in that book that I really resonated with. And I think that being able to do things without the need for validation gives you so much more freedom in your business, because you're allowed to make decisions of what is best for my clients and what is also best for me, rather than what I often see. A lot of creatives get into this space or is of. The community or the audience are almost dictating everything for that business owner in a way that is almost unhealthy. So the creative will be excessively burn out trying to create content or really under charging for fear of somebody not liking their prices or having a go at them because of their prices or whatever that is people pleasing all over the place, doing way more work than you said that you were going to do in your contract. And so that external validation and the desire that might be showing up for you on social media, but it can also show up in so many other places and really impact the money that you make at the end of the year. So it's really important to sort of knit that in the bud if that's something that you're noticing across the board. So true. And I think it's so easy to people please at the beginning especially. Yeah, you get to a point in your business where, you know, perhaps the growth is happening like, yes, there's more revenue, yes, there's more clients, but then there's also way more responsibility. And you're like you say that kind of people pleasing element is, is just takes over really. So you end up, you know, again not listening to yourself, your body, your limits, your boundaries, you know, any of that really because you're just focusing in on that. You know, you can't say no to the growth, but there's definitely a balance to be found, I think. And part of that is finding your. You're in a confidence, but also you're in a reassurance that, no, I don't actually have to do work like this, I guess in a way that benefits my health, and that's not sacrificing my health and still gets me the growth and the value that I, you know, essentially, we start growing businesses to have that freedom and that liberation. But I see so many business owners not being able to get that liberation because they're doing exactly what you described, which is a shame. Yeah, exactly. And it's hard because I feel like you almost have to sometimes you have to cross the limit to know what 

your limit is. And it often means that many of us, and I know you relate well, get burnt out. And then we're like, oh, there was the line. It was like, right back there, I see way, way two years ago. Yeah. I remember like, okay, now that this is serious now, I can't just be working on the weekends or working like way beyond my hours or whatever. I have to take this seriously. So I completely agree with you. Yeah. Okay. Great. Let's talk about because I really want to talk about this future self work and manifestation, because you did touch on it earlier. But I think we could definitely go deeper here. Um, so future self worker manifestation I feel like divide some people like some people absolutely love it but maybe aren't sure how to go about it beyond maybe like some journal prompts that they find or listening to a couple of podcasts. But some people might think it's nonsense, but they're also stuck where they are and aren't actually moving forwards. Um, and don't know how to move forward. So can you share, you know, any experiences, either of your own or a client story about how impactful this kind of work is to how entrepreneurs can feel in their businesses and growth? Yeah, absolutely. I have quite a few stories. I'll start with one of mine. Yeah. We could. Yeah, I kind of have to flick through the little booklet in my mind. Um, but one of the reasons why I think I was initially drawn to this work is because we get limits placed on us, and sometimes we put those limits on ourselves, and sometimes we're given those limits. So obviously, in the way that society is set up, depending on your identity a daughter, sister, mother, wife, black, white, Asian, tall, skinny, pretty, whatever, there are all these sort of limits of what society says you can do and what you can become. And within the creative industries, there's a strong sort of narrative that creative industries don't make a lot of money. It's a sort of hobby thing that you do. It's really undervalued industry, even though in the UK the creative industries contribute so much to, um, the economy. Um, and so for me, it was almost this awareness of, okay, I come from a very working class background. I don't have a lot of family that are going to connect me or get me into this internship or that internship, and I became really highly aware of the limits that society had placed on me. And yet I wanted to do go into fashion. I wanted to do something that I hadn't seen before, and I really had to look outside of myself for that belief. Often it can be really easy to believe in something if we've seen it done. For example, your dad is a dentist. It might not be a leap for you to believe. Oh yeah, I could also do that. I could be a dentist, blah blah blah. Really hard to believe in something that you haven't seen before. And that's when manifestation comes in. I like manifestation because of the way it sort of. Makes things even. Even though I know people feel like manifestation isn't even or whatever. But manifestation essentially says like attracts like that you can have anything that you want, as long as your energy and the actions that you're taking add up to the thing that you're wanting to create. And me hearing that when I was I discovered manifestation when I was about 15, 16, I was like, oh, that's something that I can do. Like I that gives me my power back. Like I can be in control of that. And I started experimenting and playing with it, and I would definitely say so since being 16 to my age now, I'm 29 now, I've tried a lot of things and I really questioned, okay, what makes something work and what makes it not work? And I like to think of it more like a maths equation. My thoughts plus my feelings, plus my actions are going to give me an A result and they're going to. Sometimes my thoughts are going to need to change. Sometimes my feelings are going to need to change, or sometimes my actions are going to need to change. Either way, I create my results through those three things. One story that I like to talk about often is my collaboration with Ganni. That happened at the beginning of the year. So in 2021 I put Ganni on my moodboard. I really wanted to work with them, but I had really no business trying to work with them. I had like in 2021, I think I had like 1500 followers, you know, I didn't really know anyone who worked there at the time. I didn't really have an in. I just put them on my vision board. Um, I had just started my coaching business the year before. It was on my vision board, and I've also put this on my link on my Instagram so you can scroll back and see it. Um, and then a really like a really interesting series of events happened 

where somebody reached out to me because they had bought my future self nicely journal, and they were trying to get a job at Ganni, and I remember coaching her in my DMs and supporting her, and then she got that job at Ganni and I thought, oh, okay, they're getting closer. And then a year later, I hosted the very first Future Self Nights event and the store where I hosted it. The owner of that store said, hey, by the way, like I'm going to be. Ghani's new stockist in Walthamstow. Like, Ganni hasn't launched a new stockist in ages, but they've decided to go with this store. And I was like, oh my God, that's amazing. And then somebody in the Ghani team had seen Future Soft Nights through the event that we did on that, on that person's Instagram. And then we connected and followed up and I was like, oh my God, it's going to happen. And then so since that point, there was about eight months of me continuously emailing, getting ignored, completely ignored. Like if you go to the emails, it's like me like double, triple emailing, like, hey, just like bumping this up to your emails again just to see that thread. Yeah. Like it's like hilarious. Like, but the whole time I was like, no, no, this is going to happen. I love that brand. Many, many ganni items in my wardrobe. So I was like, I am this Ghani girl. I'm like, I'm going to do this. And eventually they replied to me after being so persistent and I hosted a future night events in collaboration with them with Mark in March. And I was so, so happy about that. And I feel like manifestation allows us to believe in things that we can't see yet. Ghani doesn't collaborate with coaches necessarily. Ghani, even when you look at their Instagram, they collaborate with like beautiful influencers with huge followings. So it was really sort of audacious for me to be like, yeah, we're going to do that. We're going to work together. Like you're going to give me lots of clothes and give me lots of money, and it's going to be amazing. Yeah, and it really just proved to me. Ah, as long as you can see something in your mind and you're willing to take the actions and do the things to make it happen, then you can do that thing. Mhm. That's such a good story. I loved that story. That was great. My favorite thing. Yeah. No I'm not surprised because that's just proof of everything that you're saying that it actually does work. I think actually one question I have on it, because I think with I'm a big believer in it as well, obviously. Otherwise I wouldn't have got you on here. Um, but I do think that there's sometimes a bit of scarcity and hesitancy around setting a goal like as big as yours was and like being that audacious and saying, fuck it. I'm like, I'm going to do this, and I'm going to not just believe it, but I'm going to take action and make it happen. Because that action, the fact that, like all of those emails you were sending that takes guts to do that. Yeah. Like that was audacious. And so my question to you is, how can you try and get around that hesitancy to have that big goal? Because goals are scary. Those big goals are scary. So what would be your advice for. Yeah, how to kind of pivot around that and just go for it anyway. Yeah, that's such a good question. One of the things I would say is that this is what I love about the future sort of concept, because the whole time I was going through that process with me, it was about three years from the time I put Gary on my vision board to the time that that collaboration went live. Yeah, that whole time I was doing what I call showing up as my future self. So showing up with this energy that was slightly larger than life, like, who is the me that collabs with Ganni, how do I. Interact with my audience on Instagram. How do I show up on LinkedIn? Like what kind of collaborations am I doing? And it was almost like I saw everything I did leading up to this larger goal. Um, it was really helpful that, you know, I wasn't waiting for them to come to me. I have this thing where I say, you never leave the ball in their court. It's always in your court. You never want to leave the responsibility onto them. Um, so it's kind of interesting because if I sent all of those emails and they didn't reply, I wouldn't have lost that much. It honestly doesn't take that long to send an email. And that's the thing. I think that when we've got a big goal and we're scared to go out and attempt it, we imagine that we're going to lose so much. Like I'm going to feel really embarrassed. I'm going to feel really rejected. And what will people say? What will that person think if I reach out and ask them this question and they have to say no, that the Earth has like 9 billion 

people on it, I think it's okay. Yeah, yeah. Like it is okay. Like I've had many, many opportunities. I've put myself forward for that. Haven't worked out. But it's kind of like if I don't put myself forward for the opportunities, who else will? And that's what being a business owner is all about. I think when you are an employee, you often don't have to take that risk unless you're doing something like sales account management. Fair enough. But when you are your own business owner, you are in charge of the visibility of that business the marketing, the sales, the community engagement, all of that. It's really you who has to be going to the people and saying, hey, this is what I can do. This is how I can help you. And so that is really what I would say to anyone who's feeling that hesitancy, like, what have you got to lose? You've only got things to gain. Yeah. So true. I felt the same with this podcast, actually, because, um, I think I think that there's a couple of guests on here that I knew before that, like, one of them's my best mates. And so that that kind of eased me in. Definitely. But most of the guests on this show, I either, you know, I hadn't communicated with prior, like for us, for example, I just reached out to you because I knew that I wanted to interview you, uh, for the podcast. And, um, and that's the same with quite a few of the guests. And initially, yeah, of course, there's like a. Or I don't know. Like she might not reply. She might say no. But after you get over that initial, you know. But what if she does, like, just leave me on red like she's left me on red? Like it's not really an issue, is it? Like I just won't, you know, if I really wanted to get her, I could DM her again and I could spam her and say, you're just checking. You've seen this, even though I know she has, because she. It says that she's seen it. But, you know, like you were doing with your emails, like just bumping into, like, I'm sure you're so busy, you know, um, there's and to be, to be fair, that might genuinely be legit. Like, you might have just so many DMs that you meant to get back to me, but you didn't. And so if you didn't reply again, you just forget about it. And you might remember in a month and be like, oh, I never got back to her. Um, but then that's it. Whereas if I'd, I didn't have to in your case, obviously, but if I, if you had left me on red, you know, again, you've got nothing to lose. But as you say, everything to gain. So this conversation is happening because I reached out, because I want it. I knew I wanted to interview you. Um, so I guess it's just also I well, I'm just saying, I agree with you. I think it's important to remember that and just think, fuck it. Like, what's the worst that it's like the worst case scenario that you're talking about earlier, you know, left unread. Is that really such a bad thing. Yeah. Also, one thing I like to use. So I will say that I spent a year in sales, which really helped me hone these skills. One thing, one mindset that I like to have is that I never think negative about myself. Like, I'm never gonna assume that they don't want to hear from me, or they don't want what I have to offer, which really helps. So sometimes I'm afraid to like, send that DM or send that email. What are happens in our mind is, gosh, they're going to think I'm rubbish. I don't have enough followers, I'm not impressive enough or whatever. And that convinces yourself not to send the follow up. But what I would do is I would just be like, what I have to offer is so juicy. Like they are going to be thanking me that I literally reached out like that is such a different energy to, oh, I've got to have an amazing website before I reach out, and I've got to get like 10,000 more followers before I reach out, like, no, you can just reach out. Yeah. Okay, great. So we're I'm just aware of the time, so. But I could chat to you for ages. Maybe there's a bit more excited. So we're just going to finish with what are three things that listeners can do from tomorrow to. We'll go back to the start. That inner confidence we spoke about that's, you know, not something tangible that somebody that has or doesn't have, let's say that they have it, but they're not sure that they have it. What can they do to believe more in themselves and build that inner confidence? Yeah. So I'm a massive journalist. So I think the first place I would go is I would make a list of all the times when you had confidence and you surprised yourself. And what was the result of you having confidence? Because I think often business owners, there's something funny that happens that when you start a business, you can really, like deny all of the skills that you have in other areas. Like I work with clients 

who are parents, have have achieved PhDs and they're really like successful in their career, and then they start a business and they don't take any of those skills with them. So I would go through your memory and be like, okay, when were you really confident? Because you're going to start to create more evidence of that confidence. You'll be like, oh, actually, I guess I'm more confident than I thought. Maybe the not being confident was just a story I was telling myself. Yeah, yeah, I like that. Okay, good. Um, amazing. This has been such a good conversation. I have really, really enjoyed it. Uh, could you just finish off with where people can find you, how they can work with you? Yes, absolutely. So you can find me on Instagram. I'm at Kyra, the board. Um, and there if you are in the UK, you can come to one of my events future nights there. So so fun. It's networking for creatives and there's such like a really fun like manifestation vibe in there as well. And also for your Instagram, you can reach out to work with me one on one and that's really great as well. Can I just say when I'm less pregnant? I'm definitely eyeing up your one of your events feature events are so, so good. Um, I would just love to. I hear about all these events in like, you know, in the States, in Australia and stuff. And I'm like, when I saw yours and obviously I saw it was in the UK, I was like, oh my gosh. Yes. Like that's doable for me. Um, but now it's not because I'm eight months pregnant. Yeah, really. But in the future, yes, I would definitely I will definitely be going. Um, conversation. Thank you so much for joining. Thank you so much for having me. It's been so fun. Good.