The Chill Space

Most people think showing up visibly in their business means looking polished, put together, and just like everyone else in their industry. Emily Anderson has spent fifteen years proving that wrong.

In this conversation we talk about what actually happens when you keep waiting for perfect, what it looks like to build a business and a creative life on your own terms, and why the most important thing you can do for the people watching you might just be showing up before you feel ready.

We also get into what it is like to uproot your whole life and land somewhere completely unexpected, what a decade and a half behind a camera teaches you about people, and the project Emily swore she would never do and then did anyway.

If you have ever held back because something was not quite ready yet, this conversation is going to feel very familiar.

CONNECT WITH EMILY:

🌐 Website: https://emandersonphotography.com
📸 Instagram: @e_m_anderson
💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/emandersonphoto

The biggest breakthrough in your business probably isn't creating something new. It's seeing what you already have differently.

We're told the path to more freedom is simple: create another offer, launch another course, build another income stream.

But what if that's the very thing keeping us stuck?

In this conversation, Ellie McMakin challenges some of the biggest assumptions in entrepreneurship. We unpack why so many business owners stay trapped in survival mode, why passive income isn't about adding more to your plate, and how one shift in your offers can completely change the way your business supports your life.

We also dive into the future of coaching, building businesses that prioritize people over hustle, and why the best ideas often come from stepping away long enough to bake a batch of cookies.

In this episode, we talk about:

• Why most entrepreneurs are solving the wrong problem
• The biggest misconception about passive income
• How to rethink your offers before creating something new
• Why your business should fit your life—not the other way around
• The future of coaching, implementation, and client support
• How creativity—not productivity—might be your greatest business advantage
  

If you've been feeling like success is asking too much of you lately, this conversation might just give you permission to build differently.

CONNECT WITH ELLIE:

🌐 Website: https://www.elliemcmakin.com/

📞 Book a Discovery Call: https://www.elliemcmakin.com/discovery-call

📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/elliemcmakin/

🎵 TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@elliemcmakin

In this episode, Netty shares about the free online community she started, aptly called The Chill Space, built for people who are tired of adapting, masking, and performing just to belong in a group.

She walks through the four spaces inside: Open Hours (a no-agenda, body-doubling-friendly drop-in coworking room), The Work (a monthly live guest-led experience), The Clubhouse (the social feed), and The Soft Spot (a space for harder conversations, on the poster's own terms).

She also breaks down the community's house rules: optional cameras, no forced participation, no diagnosis required, and lurking counts as belonging.

It's free, open now, and built for introverts, creatives, the neurodivergent, empaths, the highly ambitious and the highly sensitive. You don't need to fit a label to join, you just need to want to find more chill in your life.

JOIN THE COMMUNITY HERE

If you have been avoiding the business side of your creative work because some part of you believes that getting good at it will make you less of an artist, you are not alone and this episode is going to hit close to home.

Netty spent years in that exact place, talented at her craft and completely avoiding everything else, and she talks honestly about the belief that was underneath all of it and what finally made her question it.

What she found on the other side surprised her.

For the creative entrepreneurs, artists, and makers who have ever told themselves that struggling with the business side is just the price of doing what you love.

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Join us in the Dominican Republic at the next High Vibe Women Retreat

Check out The Chill Space for Events

Topics: creative entrepreneur, creative business, artist in business, monetizing your passion, pricing for creatives, photographer business, financial confidence, creative identity, burnout, women in business, solopreneur, small business mindset, personal development, self development, mindset for creatives, authentic creativity

If you have ever felt like the entrepreneurship world was not built for you, this episode is going to feel like a relief. Netty gets into why building a business as a sensitive creative, an HSP, a projector, or just someone who feels things deeply and needs space to do their best work is genuinely hard, and why that difficulty says nothing about your capacity and everything about a system that was never designed with you in mind.

If you are a creative entrepreneur, artist, HSP, or neurodivergent person trying to build something real on your own terms, this one is for you.

Topics: sensitive creative entrepreneur, HSP entrepreneur, neurodivergent business owner, creative business, hustle culture, burnout, human design projector, solopreneur mindset, women in business, personal development, self development, creative identity, mindset for entrepreneurs, Rick Rubin creativity

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Check Out The Chill Space for Events

She's back — and everything has changed.

If you've been here before, you know this show has had a few names. And if you're brand new... perfect timing, because this is the beginning of something that finally feels right.

In this episode, Netty tells the full story of rebranding her podcast - twice - and the moment that made everything click. It's an episode about reinvention, about identity, and about what happens when you stop defining yourself by your hardest chapter and finally give yourself permission to start over.

For the entrepreneurs, creatives, and wildly capable who are ready to build something that actually feels good this one's for you.

Topics: podcast rebrand, reinvention, starting over, women in entrepreneurship, burnout, identity, neurodivergent entrepreneurs, building a business, mindset

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In this episode of Anxiously Ambitious, I’m joined by Ellie Steinbrink — Expert Stylist, Personal Brand Coach & Speaker, and the founder of Style Decoded.

Ellie spent over 20 years in marketing and branding before realizing she was on the wrong path. In the messy middle of burnout, part-time work, and even insomnia, she followed a nudge she couldn’t ignore: start posting one outfit a day on Instagram. That daily ritual awakened a new career, a new sense of confidence, and eventually became the foundation of her business helping women entrepreneurs align their inside with their outside.

We get into what it means to stop hiding behind your clothes, why self-trust is at the core of style, and how the way you get dressed in the morning changes more than your outfit — it changes your day.

In this episode, we explore:

• The moment Ellie heard the “voice” that told her to follow her passion for style
• Why giving yourself grace in the messy middle leads to breakthroughs
• The vulnerable truth about standing out vs. blending in as a personal brand
• The “closet effect”: how what you wear literally shifts your brain chemistry and daily outcomes
• Practical ways to clear the overwhelm and reconnect with clothes that make you feel like you
• Why style is less about shopping and more about asking: Who is the woman I’m becoming?

Guest Bio

Ellie Steinbrink is an Expert Stylist, Personal Brand Coach & Speaker. After two decades in marketing, she founded Style Decoded to help women entrepreneurs define and embody their authentic style. Blending psychology, branding, and fashion, she empowers women to stand out, simplify their closets, and feel magnetic in both business and life.

Connect with Ellie

Website: elliesteinbrink.com

Instagram: @style.decoded

LinkedIn: Ellie Steinbrink

Podcast: The Visibility Shift

✨ Freebie: The Style Mindset Reset

What’s holding you back from your next-level self? This free resource helps you uncover the hidden rules you’ve been following about style — and guides you to let go of what no longer serves you, so you can make an incredible and lasting style transformation.

Keywords

personal branding, women entrepreneurs, self-expression, authentic style, enclothed cognition, confidence, midlife empowerment, brand alignment, personal growth, less is more

If you loved this episode:

Share it with the friend who always says “I have nothing to wear” — and remind her it’s not about the clothes. It’s about becoming who she already is.

Links For You:
• Follow me on IG
• Follow me on TikTok
• Subscribe to my newsletter!
• Anxiously Ambitious Website

Send us a text

What if the bravest business move isn’t a new offer, but finally listening to yourself?

In this episode of Anxiously Ambitious, I’m joined by Jana Boyko: entrepreneur, business coach, and creator of the guided journals Bedside Business Plan and Employee to Entrepreneur. Jana shares how she walked away from a shiny advertising career, navigated a painful early partnership breakdown, and rebuilt a business by choosing boundaries, integrity, and self-trust.

We get into what it means to design a business that doesn’t abandon you, how to include yourself in your plan, and why the first step is often to simply start.

In this episode, we explore:

• The moment Jana realized she “couldn’t hear herself” and what she did next
• Redefining success so it fits your life, not someone else’s timeline
• Boundaries 101: saying no, having your own back, and avoiding self-abandonment
• How Bedside Business Plan was born from the question: “What if you could journal a business plan?”
• Action over perfection and how there’s nothing to “get right”
• A 20-reasons exercise to quiet self-doubt and build evidence for your next move

Guest Bio:
Jana Boyko is an entrepreneur and business coach, and the creator of the guided journals Bedside Business Plan and Employee to Entrepreneur. Her work helps people start and grow businesses in a way that honors both the plan and the person.

Connect with Jana:
Website: bedsidebusinessplan.com
Instagram: @bedsidebusinessplan and @janaboyko
LinkedIn: Jana Boyko • Bedside Business Plan

Mentioned products:

• Employee to Entrepreneur (guided journal): Amazon Canada — https://www.amazon.ca/Employee-Entrepreneur-Personal-Entrepreneurship-Hardcover/dp/1777602912
  
  
• Bedside Business Plan (guided journal): Amazon Canada — https://www.amazon.ca/Bedside-Business-Plan-Inspirational-Encouraging/dp/1777602904
  
  

Keywords: entrepreneurship, self care, business planning, personal growth, women in business, holistic entrepreneurship, overcoming self doubt, guided journals, success, leadership

If you loved this episode:
Share it with the friend who keeps saying “one day.” Then write your first next step. No perfect plan required.

Links For You:
• Follow me on IG
• Follow me on TikTok
• Subscribe to my newsletter!
• Anxiously Ambitious Website

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What happens when success starts to feel like a performance instead of a life you actually want to live?

In this solo episode, I reflect on a recent headline about Lil Nas X and what it reveals about the impossible standards we place on celebrities, on each other, and on ourselves.

When he faltered publicly, the world turned his humanity into entertainment. But beneath the scandal was a simple truth: he was overwhelmed, fragile, and apologizing for being seen in his lowest moment. And haven’t we all done that?

This episode is about the quiet ways we exile parts of ourselves in the name of ambition. It’s about the performance of success versus the presence of being human. And it’s about what changes when we stop apologizing for our fragility and start honoring it as part of the whole.

In this episode, I explore:

•  Why we turn breakdowns into gossip and what that says about us
•  How we other ourselves by hiding the parts of us we don’t think “belong” in success
•  The silent deal we’ve all absorbed
•  Why grace isn’t optional in business or life 
•  The radical power of letting success and humanity coexist

If you’ve ever felt like your ambition demanded you hide the most fragile parts of yourself, this one is going to land deep.

Links For You:
• Follow me on IG
• Follow me on TikTok
• Subscribe to my newsletter!
• Anxiously Ambitious Website

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What does it really mean to “own your story” and how do you decide what’s worth sharing online?

In this special live episode of Anxiously Ambitious, recorded at the stunning Greenhouse on Strawberry Lane in Nova Scotia, I sit down with my friend and mentor, Caley Dimmock. Caley is a digital ads expert, educator, and mentor who has built a thriving personal brand rooted in radical transparency, intuition, and storytelling.

Together, we dive into what it actually looks like to build a personal brand in 2025. Not just the glossy version, but the vulnerable, messy, deeply human side. Caley opens up about her own process of self-acceptance, how she decides what to share (and what to keep private), and why authenticity isn’t about telling everything but about telling the right things.

In this episode, we explore:
 – Why “owning your story” is less about arrival and more about process
 – The difference between authenticity and full transparency
 – How to share online without re-traumatizing yourself
 – The role of intuition in business decisions (and how to trust it again)
 – Why every founder benefits from a personal brand and how it creates freedom to pivot
 – The power of future-self visualization for pushing past fear

Guest Bio:
Caley Dimmock is a digital ads strategist, educator, and mentor who helps brands and service providers thrive online. Known for her honesty, transparency, and big-picture thinking, Caley works across Meta, Google, TikTok, and more while also teaching others how to take control of their own marketing. She’s passionate about helping entrepreneurs own their stories and create businesses that feel aligned.

Connect with Caley:
Website: https://caleydimmock.com/
Instagram: @cjdimmock

Venue:
The Greenhouse on Strawberry Lane
Website | Instagram

Sponsors:
– Made With Local
– Benjamin Bridge
– Kali Cakes

Links For You:
• Follow me on IG
• Follow me on TikTok
• Subscribe to my newsletter!
• Anxiously Ambitious Website