Amy: (Laughter) Thank you and what a great introduction. Well, if you'd been honest, I do simple skating -

Katie: Awesome, I'm coaching you, you know, like - (Laughter)

Amy: Oh, that's good you're an au naturel.

Katie: So tell me, I mean, I hear about life coaches, I hear lots of talk about trying to, you know, get back into balance of personal and professional life. What is it that you do as a life-balance coach?

Amy: It's a really good question and so I'm gonna kind of back into it and I'm gonna tell you what balance is not.

Katie: Ah, okay. Let's do it.

Amy: Alright, are you ready?

Katie: I'm totally ready.

Amy: Alright, let me take notes, here we go. Balance is not a 50/50 split. So, instead of trying to like juggle everything that's on your plate or everything coming at you, instead it's about determining what your priorities are in the moment and then putting your focus on the priorities.

Katie: Very interesting. So, would somebody come to you and say, you know, "These are the five most important things in my life, help me to balance them," or are you actually walking someone through to identify the passions and what really needs to be prioritized?

Amy: Exactly. So what happens is - this is a real life scenario. People will come to me, the majority of folks and say, "Ah, I just am a little stuck right now. I feel like I'm at a crossroads. You know, I can't even really articulate it Amy. I'm gonna sound stupid, but I can't put my finger on it, but there's just something out of whack, off balance. Again, it's showing up that I'm feeling stuck or frustrated or overwhelmed or confused. I just can't make this decision to save my life right now.

Katie: Hmm.

Amy: So yeah. So they usually come, you know, with this really great inquiry as far as, "Okay, something's going on here." And what we do at stage one is to identify what that is. So there's a lot of time up front spent in life coaching just kind of determining where you are today. And again, a lot folks can't really put their finger on it because they come to me in a state of like wanting to go to the next level of their life, but not really sure what that looks like.

Katie: Oh, very interesting. And so I know that we were talking earlier about the importance of goal-setting and really knowing what direction you're headed. So I assume that in addition to helping people figure out these priorities and get balanced, I mean, are you helping them to find these actionable next steps and goals?

Amy: Yeah, yeah. Acts of goal-setting process is a huge part of life coaching. It's actually one of the number one success mechanisms. They're more than number one in life coaching because there's just so many great tools that we offer our clients. But acts of goal-setting process is designed to move the client forward and here's the really cool thing about it Katie. The first stage of it is just identifying what it is that you want, right? Your goal, your objective.

Katie: Oh man, and that is so hard to know sometimes, I mean.

Amy: And do you know why it's hard to know?

Katie: Why? Tell me. (Laughter)

Amy: It's because your beautiful mind, the human mind, is structured to go to, "How am I gonna do it?"

Katie: Ah. How do you get over that?

Amy: This is how you do it. You identify what it is that you want and you go immediately to your obstacles or what's blocking or stopping you from getting it.

Katie: Okay.

Amy: And that's the second stage of it. So that's kind of like, "Okay, wooo, paradigm shift, mindset. You mean, I identify what I want, my dreams, and I don't jump immediately to how am I gonna do it or the action?" No, you don't. Like I said before, that will actually stop the dream dead in its tracks -

Katie: Okay.

Amy: - but what you do is you go and identify what's been blocking you up to this point. And that's like such an authentic conversation.

Katie: I can't even imagine. I mean it's kind of like you'd have to play like therapist for somebody, you know, once you hit these certain points. I mean, I cannot even imagine the conversations you've had like that. (Laughter)

Amy: Well yeah, I mean, and it's a real privilege to get invited into my clients' lives. I think it's actually, probably one of the most fun aspects of goal-setting is come up. I mean, I let my clients just wave their magic wand. Any obstacle, "I'm too fat. I'm too old. I'm too poor. My husband isn't cleaning the kitchen." I mean, any obstacle you want to list, let's begin. And we start giggling and joking about it, and then eventually we get to the real heart of the matter or the real core of it. And a lot of that is, you know, fear or, "I just don't know, I've never done this before. How am I gonna do it?"

Katie: Excellent. Now, I know that I've read a little bit of your story online and how part of your path to getting where you are today as a life-balance coach. And I mean really, what it seems to me is that you have this amazing career, you really had this - you know, everything that society sort of defined as your success, you had it. You had the stuff, you had the position, and then at one point you were just like, "Oh, no more." Like, was there some sort of like moment of revelation? Like how did you identify that, "Ahhhh," that thing that your clients come to you now? Like what was it that brought you here?

Amy: This is how I can best describe it, okay. So actually, you know, just like in the movies, it showed up. I didn't plan for it, you know, I didn't take 15 minutes out of my schedule and jot it down and write it down. But what happened was, I was at work one morning, and even before I got out of the car, I was just sitting there and I was watching some of my colleagues go into work; and even if I wanted to move Katie, I've really felt like from the neck down I was immobilized. But here's the thing, my head was racing and I kept like, you know, like in the movies, you know, are these thoughts and phrases would just like shoot across my mind like, "No purpose. Inauthentic."

Katie: Oh gees.

Amy: Making a lot of - let's see, "What am I gonna do today? Hide from my boss. How am I gonna look like I'm busy?" I mean all these things were coming up. I know, and my hands are gripping the steering wheel, you know, harder and harder as it's going on. And then, all of a sudden, great flash. It was like everything came together and I realized that, you know, this isn't what I wanted. And I didn't know what it was exactly that I wanted, but I just landed that this truly wasn't what I wanted, and I was no longer gonna try to fake it, and I was no longer gonna pour my great energy into it because it was just a drainer at this point anyway. And so, the commitment was at that point, "I'm gonna do something about this. I don't know what that looks like, I don't know how I'm gonna begin, I don't know if I'm gonna be able to do it even, but here's the commitment to self. I'm gonna do it."

Katie: Whatever it takes that you're gonna be there.

Amy: Yeah, and as soon as I did that Katie, I mean I just got free, I really liberated. I went in and I told my boss that I was leaving. I mean it was just a really -

Katie: You didn't waste any time, that's awesome. (Laughter)

Amy: And here's the thing. You know, when it's real, when it's authentic, when it's your time, when you're open, when you're willing, it flows! It's like there's been pressure in the faucet all this time and then, you know, you turn it on and it just flows so easy. It was like breathing and walking.

Katie: (Laughter) That's beautiful. Excellent. So, I have one last question for you. The majority of our listeners are either entrepreneurs now or they're aspiring entrepreneurs wanting to jump head-first into the business world. And I think everybody knows that being an entrepreneur, it's not exactly a nine-to-five job at all. Like maybe 9:00 a.m. to, you know, 5:00 a.m. (Laughter) the next day. Any tips that you could give to somebody that, you know, is in this position where they really, perhaps, may have to lead "unbalanced" life by normal standards - you know, spending so many hours in the office - how do you work with people like that that are in that kind of position and helping them really find themselves and just keep level?

Amy: This is what you do, you structurize, you structurize, and you structurize some more. And, you know, when an entrepreneur hears that - you know, entrepreneurs are very much visionaries and so the infrastructure or the structure of their day-to-day life, I mean, that's why they're leaving corporate America to get away from that so that they can have freedom in their work lives and their personal lives. But you've got to have an infrastructure in place. I mean you really have got to schedule your time most effectively and the way that we do that is we identify what your strengths are. I mean, write down to Katie like what's the best time for Katie to work. Is it in the morning from 9:00 to 11:00 or is it in the afternoon from 2:00 to 4:00. And then what we do is after we identify again those strengths, we go ahead and we put your biggest projects in there. There are things that require, you know, your most time, your most energy, your most focus, and all of that. So infrastructure has a lot to do with just knowing what your strengths are. It also has a lot to do with prioritizing of course.

One of the biggest things my entrepreneurial clients wrestle with is prioritizing, especially because we're all so plugged in 24/7 now to email and iPhones and BlackBerry and all that stuff. We're just constantly bombarded and that's kind of like, you know, it's great to distraction -

Katie: Absolutely.

Amy: - a distraction, right? And so I get real specific with my clients as far as listen. Every afternoon, or every Wednesday from 1:00 to 5:00 p.m. you're not to open up your emails, you're not to look at them.

Katie: Ahahaha! (Laughter)

Amy: Yeah, yeah. And that's exactly the reaction I get -

Katie: Of course you do.

Amy: - we take our hands and we walk through it, and they absolutely love it. They love having a coach who's gonna hold them accountable -

Katie: Excellent.

Amy: - but then to co-collaborate and create the structure with them. See entrepreneurs, you don't have to have it all. You just have to know what your strengths are and then go hire the people who can really help you get to the next level.

Katie: That is awesome. And tell us, if we have an entrepreneur out there that you're just completely singing their tune right now, although they may totally be appalled and passed out at the idea of not looking at their email; and that's okay everyone. Amy's here to help. (Laughter) Where can our listeners find you online?

Amy: They're gonna check me out on my website and it's AmyLRobinson.com.

Katie: Wonderful. And I know for a fact that you also have a Twitter account, and what is that Twitter account?

Amy: I wanna say it's Amy coaches. It's that simple, yeah.

Katie: (Laughter) Easy enough, I love. (Laughter) Well Amy, it's been such a pleasure talking to you. I think that I see some pathways towards my own balance as well. I really appreciate this discussion.

Amy: You are so welcome. May I throw just one other thing in there.

Katie: Please.

Amy: This is, well, because it's you Katie. I want to let your clients know that balance again, not a 50/50 split, but balance - look it up in the dictionary, it's the third definition down - it's the power to decide. You choose and you always have that in your control.

Katie: Ooooo, powerful parting words. (Laughter) That was good. (Laughter)

Amy: Thanks.

Katie: Amy, thank you so much.

Amy: It's been my pleasure.

Katie: And that was our great interview with Amy Robinson, a quite inspiring woman with lots of tips for us to really kind of achieve that balance, and to help highlight the importance of setting goals, and not just in your business life, but in your personal life as well. And now it's time for another business survival tip with Carl Kleimann of Odyssey One Source.

[Business Survival Tip]

Katie: Stick around for a great Chapter 3 as Esther and I dive into the world of cause-marketing. We're gonna look at the good, the bad, and definitely some great tips for you to take home to your company. You're listening to the BusinessMakers Overtime Show heard here and online at theBusinessMakers.com/overtime. See ya in Chapter 3.