Episode Summary

Jenna invites Germaine Foley to share strategies for overcoming feelings of not being good enough in business and navigating the challenges of belonging in coaching spaces as a woman of color.

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Show Notes

In celebration of Black History Month, I’m inviting two successful black women entrepreneurs and coaches to the podcast. This week, Germaine Foley offers valuable insights and tips tailored specifically for women of color who own businesses, which will undoubtedly benefit all women business owners.

Germaine is a coach who helps women who make good money but struggle to keep it, build wealth without sacrificing their lifestyles. She came across my invitation post for Black coaches in our Facebook coaching group. In this episode, she shares why she initially ignored the post and discusses how the sneaking thought that got in her way reflects her most significant business challenge, a common struggle among many women of color.

Tune in this week to learn how to trust in yourself, your worth, and your right to have a business or be a coach. Germaine shares mindset, tactical, and energetic tips, as well as an exercise she gives to her clients when questioning if they are good enough. She even provides the exact prompts to start putting yourself out in a bigger way, charging what you want, and making offers to serve your intended audience.

What You’ll Learn From This Episode:

• Germaine's journey, from struggling to maintain wealth to becoming a successful coach.

• How Germaine was able to build wealth while still enjoying her lifestyle, without compromising it.

• Germaine’s biggest struggle as a Black woman in the coaching industry.

• Insightful mindset, tactical, and energetic tips from Germaine for women of color in the coaching space.

• Germaine’s experience as a woman of color in business and her journey towards self-alignment, despite external opinions.

Listen to the Full Episode:

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• Wealthy Women’s Podcast with Germaine Foley

Full Episode Transcript:

You're listening to The Uncommon Way Business and Life Coaching Podcast, the podcast that helps women entrepreneurs get clear on signature offers and strategies that sell themselves so you can lean back and stop the hustle.

You will learn to maximize your mindset, messaging and strategy, and step into the uncommonly successful business and life you are creating. Here's your host, top-ranked business coach and reformed over-analyzer turned queen of clarity, Jenna Harrison.

Hey, as a special treat for Black History Month, I'm bringing in some successful black women entrepreneurs to share tips that are specifically for women of color who own businesses. But this information is wildly useful for all women business owners. As we do around here, they'll be sharing real tactics, great mindset tips... Both of them are fantastic coaches… and an energetic tip.

I am beyond excited for what they have to share and how very useful I know it will be. In today's episode, you'll hear from Germaine Foley. She helps women that make good money, but struggle to keep it. She helps them build wealth without having to sacrifice their lifestyle. I know you'll love hearing her story about how she almost didn't host this episode, and how the logical sounding but very sneaky thought that got in her way is a reflection of what has been her very biggest struggle in business.

And it's something that affects many, many women of color. She'll also share how playing small insulates you from questioning your worth. But now that you are stepping out more, and you might be coming up against some of that, naturally, she is going to show you a very specific exercise that she gives her clients.

She even gives you the exact prompts in order to start putting yourself out in a bigger way, charge what you want, and make offers to help the people you're meant to serve. Plus, she's going to share an energetic perspective that really stopped me dead in my tracks.

I was walking Sky at the time, and it stopped me in my tracks and made me laugh at the whole ‘hell, yes,’ truth of it. It's the kind of thing where once you see it in this light, you can't ever unsee it. All right, my friends, enjoy this very valuable episode.

Germaine Foley: Well, hello, everyone. I am so excited to be here with you all today. Of course, I have to give a huge thank you to Jenna for having me. So, you may or may not know that Jenna and I were both certified through The Life Coach School, and we are in a Facebook group together filled with coaches who were certified through the school.

Jenna was so gracious to post in that group that she was looking for a black coach to be a guest host during Black History Month. I have to tell you, I saw that post very early on, almost as soon as she submitted it, and I literally scrolled right past it and kind of ignored it. A little while later, I logged on to Facebook and notice that someone had tagged me on the post, as if they were recommending that I put my name in a hat. And so, I did.

Now, I want to let you know that the reason why I ignored it initially, was because I thought someone else would be more worthy of the opportunity. And to be quite honest with you, this has been my biggest struggle as a black woman building a coaching business.

Before I get deeper into that, I want to tell you a little bit about me, my story, and who I help. Years ago, my husband and I, we struggled with our money. Our finances were literally a hot mess. We were really, really good at making money but we had trouble keeping it, and we were definitely not building wealth.

One of the things that really held me back was the fact that most of the personal finance experts at the time were preaching, “Stop buying so many lattes. Coupon. Put yourself on a strict budget. Eat rice and beans, Don't go to restaurants, and just pay off debt and struggle your way through.”

We had about $200,000 worth of debt at the time. And to me, that was going to take almost a decade to get out of. I couldn't fathom living my life like that for an entire 10-year period. Where we couldn't vacation. We couldn't do the things we love. So, I had this brilliant idea that maybe I could build wealth while enjoying my life at the same time.

My husband and I, we were able to pay off over $200,000 worth of debt. It did not take us 10 years, by the way. We have built a multiple six-figure net worth that grows literally every month. And we were able to build our dream home. I am so blessed to be able to live in the house I live in. I literally dreamed about this home, and we were able to build it from the ground up.

Now, we were able to do all of this while still enjoying life. We still traveled, we still made memories with our two boys, we still went on date nights, and we built our net worth. So, that is who I help.

I help women who are like me making lots of money; either in corporate America, or through building your own empire, maybe a professional, a doctor, a lawyer, a real estate agent. You're doing everything right. You're making all the money, but you're not keeping it. You're not building wealth. That is who I help.

Not only have I helped myself conquer this issue, but I've helped so many other women do it as well. And I do this without them having to sacrifice their lifestyle. So many women just avoid their money altogether because they think that they can't build wealth and enjoy life. That they can have fun and travel and buy nice things and do all the things that they really enjoy doing if they focus on their money.

They think that they have to choose between the two. I'm here to help them to realize, you actually don't, you can do both. You can build wealth and enjoy life at the same time. So, that is who I help.

I know that this mission is so important. I know this to my core. There are so many women suffering financially, even though they make amazing money, right? And so, I know that's who I'm here to help. I know that is my person. And yet, I struggled with putting myself out there and making offers to help women change their lives. You may be wondering why.

Well, it was because I didn't think I was good enough, or that I didn't belong in this coaching space simply because I was a woman of color. I know that so many of you amazing business women can relate to this, even if you're not a woman of color. Because let's be honest, women in general, we have been socialized to question our belonging, our worthiness, and our enoughness, especially when it comes to making money and having lots of it.

So, please hear me as I share this mindset shift about coming into alignment with who you really are, no matter what society or anyone else has to say about you. Here's what I want you to know. You are inherently worthy, adequate, amazing, enough, powerful, abundant, creative, and you belong anywhere you desire to be. You were born this way. This was something you were born with, and there's nothing you can do to change it.

Any thoughts that contradict these truths are simply lies. I often use this analogy with my clients whenever they're having negative thoughts, especially about themselves. I always remind them of “the battery.” All batteries have two sides, right? It has the positive charge and the negative charge.

I always remind them that their brain has evolved to always look for what's wrong. Or to focus on the negative side of the battery. The reason why your brain has evolved this way is because your ancestors had to survey the land and the environment all around them in order to survive. Literally, it was all about the survival of the fittest.

Their brain had to always be on the lookout for something that wasn't right. It needed to point out all the little negative things around them. And so, even today, your brain is doing that right now. But the other side of the story is this, that you have the ability to deliberately focus your brain on the positive side of the battery. Which is what I had to do when I was tagged in that Facebook post.

As I said earlier, this has been my struggle for a while, but I kind of thought I was over it. I thought I'd made my way through it. But now I know my brain is just a little bit more clever, and a little bit more subtle and sneaky, with how it likes to tell me ‘I'm not enough.’ So, the way it did it this time was, “Oh, someone else would be a better fit than you.”

I have to give my brain some credit because it has become a little nicer. It’s not just coming at me like, “You're not good enough. You don't know what you're doing. You don't belong.” Those were the three main sentences that my brain used to offer me. And now, it's coming in a little nicer, and I just need to be onto myself that it's still there.

And so, now I have the opportunity to question even the most subtle thoughts like, “Someone else may be a better fit than you.” And honestly, that's the beautiful thing about entrepreneurship and having your own business. It gives you the opportunity to come face to face with your worthiness.

When you're not putting yourself out there, when you're living within your comfort zone, you very rarely have to question your worthiness because you're in a comfort zone, you're not putting yourself in “harm's way.” Your brain is kind of quiet because you're living a status quo life.

But when you start to put yourself out there, when you start to step outside your comfort zone, when you start to share your message with the world, your brain perceives that as potential danger. And so, it offers all these thoughts like, “You're not good enough. You're not worthy. You don't know what you're doing, so go sit down.” And that is what I've noticed.

Because honestly, before I started my business, I never questioned my worthiness. But that doesn't mean that I didn't question it subconsciously. I truly believe I did. And putting myself in a position to be a business owner, to be giving value to the world, to be putting myself out there, I believe it brought up those questions to the surface.

Now I'm able to deal with it. And now I'm able to make sure that I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that I belong and that I am worthy. It has been a beautiful journey to really rediscover that about myself. That I am worthy. I am good enough. I am amazing. I am powerful. I am creative, and I belong anywhere that I want to be.

I want to offer that to you, as well. This entrepreneurial journey is way more than about the money, it is about who you become on the journey. I know that sounds so cliche, but it's so true. How you literally learn to love yourself, to have your own back, and to value yourself, is a great byproduct of being an entrepreneur.

So, now I want to give you a tactical exercise that you can engage in if you find yourself questioning if you are good enough, if you're worthy, or if you belong. This is a journaling exercise that I give to my clients when they are suffering from this line of thinking.

The first thing you want to do is think of a time when you held yourself back from doing something you wanted to do. That's the first thing, think about that time, and then write the circumstances of the situation. What was the opportunity that you passed up? What was the situation? What did you do, or what didn't you do?

Get all the details out. Once you have all of those details out, regarding the situation, simply ask yourself: Why? Why didn't I go after it? Why did I pass up that opportunity? Why? Then allow yourself to write, without editing, for three to five minutes. Just write, write, write. Let all those thoughts in your brain come out onto paper so that you can see what they are.

Once you've written them down, read what you wrote and find one, just one, negative thought about yourself. And then, once you identify that thought, and know that, “Oh my gosh, this is the reason why I didn't put myself out there. Because I was thinking I wasn't good enough. Because I was thinking someone else would be more well suited. I was thinking that I wasn't creative enough. I didn't have the credentials.”

Once you identify the thought, deliberately choose to focus on the positive side of “the battery.” That was the negative side, “You're not good enough, somebody else will be better.” Now you can deliberately and intentionally refocus and start to question that thought. I think all thoughts are questionable. Start to wiggle it around. Start to wonder if it's really true.

This exercise in itself will help you to start to identify what is holding you back. What are the thoughts you have about yourself that are holding you back from putting yourself out there in a bigger way? For charging what you want? For making offers? From helping the people that you are meant to serve?

So, this is the work that I have done. This is the work that I continue to do. As you can tell, I still have work to do. I've come a long way, and I'm so proud of myself for the progress that I've made. And I'm so happy for the experience of ignoring Jenna's post, because now I know, “Okay, brain, you're coming at this from a different angle now. You're coming at it from a ‘oh, well, let someone else do it because they may be more well suited.’”

It's just interesting, that again, this entrepreneurial journey is the best personal development class you can ever, ever take. And I'm so grateful and delighted to be on this journey.

So now, let's explore how we can look at this from a spiritual or energetic perspective. I think we can all get to a place where we can believe we are amazing and worthy and good enough. For some, you'll get there by just having the mindset shift that I offered earlier. By just deciding to believe you are worthy, adequate, and good enough.

For others, though, it may be more helpful to approach it from a more spiritual and energetic place, so here's what I'll offer you. Your worthiness has nothing to do with you. Your Creator embedded worthiness into your DNA when you were created. For me, that's God. For others, it’s the Universe.

With that knowledge, opening yourself up to just receiving your worthiness because it's already yours is inherent, it’s intrinsic, and it's a fact. It's an indisputable fact. So, if you believe it or not, you are worthy, so why not just believe it? You belong. You were meant to be here. The world is your oyster, so why not just open up and receive it on that energetic and spiritual level.

I hope this was helpful, and I would love to stay connected to you. There are two ways that we can connect. Number one is follow my podcast, it's called The Wealthy Woman's Podcast. And of course, it's by me, Germaine. My last name is Foley. You can also follow me on Instagram. My handle is @germainefoleycoaching. And if you go to the link in my bio there are further ways that we can connect.

So, I hope you all have a fabulous week. Bye-bye.

Hey, if you want true clarity about your secret sauce, your people, your best way of doing business, and how you talk about your offer, then I invite you to join us in the Clarity Accelerator. I'll teach you to connect all the dots, the dots that have always been there for you, so that you can show up like you were born for exactly this.

Come join us and supercharge every other tool or tactic you'll ever learn, from Facebook ads to manifestation. Just go to TheUncommonWay.com/schedule and set up a time to talk. I can't wait to be your coach.

Thanks for joining us here at The Uncommon Way. If you want more tips and resources for developing clarity in your business and life, including the Clarity First strategy for growing and scaling your business, visit TheUncommonWay.com. See you next time.

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