The Humane Marketing Show. A podcast for a generation of marketers who care.

I'm joined once again by Kerry Dobson as we explore the resources and workbook that comes with the 5-week 'How to Sell in 2026 & Beyond' program. 

If you're curious about the 'How to Sell in 2026 & Beyond' program the 'sales page' is now unofficially open and you can view all the details at https://www.humane.marketing/howtosell

Book a human conversation with me to decide together whether this is the right next step for you!

I'm joined once again by Kerry Dobson as we explore the Doing, Knowing and Feeling aspects of each module the 5-week 'How to Sell in 2026 & Beyond' program. 

If you're curious about the 'How to Sell in 2026 & Beyond' program send me an email to [email protected] with the words 'Inside Scoop' and I'll send you the first draft of the outline of the program. 

In this episode I sit down with Kim De Coster to explore how purposeful partnerships can help you turn passion into profit—without losing sight of meaning.

We talk about Kim's compass of passion, purpose, and profit, and how to navigate its four quadrants: from the Profit Trap that keeps us stuck, to the Power quadrant where passion meets impact. Together, we dive into finding your right crowd, knowing your values and non-negotiables, and the difference between a simple collaboration and a true partnership.

You'll also hear how to test partnerships safely, have the money and vulnerability conversations that matter, and why profit is about more than money—it's about joy, energy, and freedom.

This conversation will inspire you to create aligned, impactful partnerships that strengthen both your business and the change you want to see in the world.

• The balance of passion, purpose, and profit – the trifecta for meaningful work
• Kim's compass with four quadrants: Pitfall, Profit Trap, Progress, and Power
• Why the Profit Trap feels safe but keeps you stuck, and how to move out of it
• The importance of being in the right crowd and finding your people
• The difference between collaborations and partnerships
• Knowing your values, principles, and non-negotiables before stepping into partnership
• How to test partnerships with small experiments (like co-hosting an event)
• The role of vulnerable conversations around money, concerns, and expectations
• Why profit isn't just money—it's also joy, energy, time, and freedom
• The reminder that good people making good money creates more positive impact
• Practical first steps: start with your existing network, ask for introductions, or join/create the right "room"

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Speaker 0: hey, kim. it's good to hang out with you and talk about 

Speaker 1: passion, profit, and partnership. 

Speaker 2: hello. it's great to be here. thank you for the invite. it's always a pleasure. 

Speaker 1: yeah. um, we're here because you're part of the humane marketing circle community. and during our last expo, you proposed a great workshop, which i missed, but luckily there was a replay. so i got to see that, um, around this topic of passion, purpose, and profit. right? it's kinda like this trifecta, those three things that, uh, go together. and, um, i yeah. i just thought it was such a great topic and it fits my seventh p of the human in marketing mandala, which is partnership. and so i thought it'd be really great to talk about it here on the, on the podcast. to people will be listening. and so you just have to kind of explain the four different components of this compass. 

Speaker 2: um, so for me, first of all, the compass is kind of before you start going into partnerships and so on and so on. i think the first very step is where am i currently at? and that's what the compass is for, to kind of see where do i start from. so you have, um, two things we'd be measuring somehow, which is on the one hand, you have passion on the lower end, and then you have purpose. and, obviously, you can work low on passion, or you can work high on passion. and then the same thing for purpose. low on purpose or high on purpose. before i explain, like, the four quadrants we've made, i do wanna make it clear what i mean with purpose and passion. so purpose for me because you hear the word a lot and also passion, they're a bit overused probably. but, um, purpose for me is not just what is my purpose, it's a positive impacts purpose on planet and society, so on planet and people. right. and because i'm all about sustainability. so that for me is, are you working alone? does it have not really an impact, a positive impact on planet or society, on humanity, or does it really have a high impact? so that's where the purpose lies. and then passion, we can all be passionate about stuff and let's be honest, everybody that has a business or has a job, there's always things even if you're passionate about what you do, there's always things you like more and you like less in every single job. but let's say that, like, 85% of your time, you're working on something that you really, really like almost to that effect that it doesn't feel like you're working because you enjoy it so much. 

Speaker 1: that's yeah. 

Speaker 2: the feeling that's passion for me. 

Speaker 1: yeah. so 

Speaker 2: there's four quadrants. one is low on passion, low on purpose, which is i'm not really doing what i'm enjoying, and it does not even create a positive impact. um, that one is called, um, the pitfall. and then you have the right next to it, which is you're still low on purpose, but you're really high on passion. you love what you do, but it doesn't have that positive impact on the rest of the world, let's say, like that. 

Speaker 1: so it's kind of missing also that meaning for you. right? like, it doesn't give you meaning. mhmm. 

Speaker 2: so you do like doing a lot of people say how is that possible, but i can give an example later on of how that is exactly possible because i've been through that. and that for me, and i've seen it in more people, is an absolute profit trap because it makes you money. it pays the bills, and you actually like doing it. and then what i hear about some, uh, from some entrepreneurs are kind of like, how do i move from here to working with impact? because i seem to be stuck. well, yes. and if you go there, you'll get stuck for quite some time. 

Speaker 1: mhmm. 

Speaker 2: and when there's the top two quadrants to say it like that, there's the progress one, which is actually the one you wanna be in to get to the power one, which is the one i love what i do, and i'm creating a really good impact on planets and people. the progress one for me is not exactly entirely excited by the actual job or tasks that i'm doing, but it does pay my bills, and it does create an impact at the same time. now there's a reason why i'm saying that the progress quadrant is the one you wanna be in to move on to the the power one. um, on power as well, i know it's a word with a really negative connotation. and in general, this is a a side mark. i use a lot of words, even prophets. like, in our realm, they're not used a lot. and for me, i decided to use them specifically because i want people to give them another meaning. like, they are what they mean to you, and i decided to give them a positive meaning for me. so being in it's all about empowering. if you're in your power, creating a lot of impact, making money, uh, working on your passion, then that is a perfect quadrant to be in. 

Speaker 1: it's also why why we're talking about this and we know each other because as you might remember, passion is my first p, and then personal power is my second p. but, yes, i hear you. you know, people think, oh, personal power, is that, like, too strong? is that over no. you have to stand in your in your personal power, and that's what makes you unique. and and for you, uh, it is that powerful position where you know who you are that you can go into trustworthy relationships and partnerships as well. 

Speaker 2: exactly. yeah. exactly. 

Speaker 1: love that. yeah. yeah. okay. so those are the four quadrants. um, what came up during the, uh, the workshop? where did you see that most people were at when you asked them? 

Speaker 2: to be fair, a lot of people were in the power quadrant already, but that is because of the audience, obviously. um, as i said, this was during the the humane, um, export that we did together. so, obviously, there's people in there that are already more aligned, um, that already are really clear on their purpose. they've worked through this and so on. so for me, i think they were mainly there to kind of figure out, oh, wait. the partnership thing in whole of this, what where does that take me? now there was a couple of people, i think, that were, um, leaning more towards the progress one, and then maybe one person that was a little bit in doubt as in, am i stuck in a profit trap? kind of. so but i said, it depends on the audience you have, and it was really nice to hear that a lot of them were already in that power quadrant, actually. 

Speaker 1: yeah. it's really good to analyze that for yourself to think about, uh, whether you're in the wrong crowd, because that's something that comes up quite often in the marketing. like, we're human program where people are like, yeah. but whenever i look around, i'm not seeing that kind of way of showing up in the world. and and often it's because, yeah, they are in the wrong crowd. and so it feels very it feels lonely to be in the wrong crowd. right? if you're the only one who cares and everybody else is talking about how to make a million dollars in three days, then then you feel very lonely when you think, yeah, but is that really what i want? um, and so i think i think it's this journey of a creating this awareness and knowing, okay, i might be in the wrong crowd. how do i work my way towards a different different audience? and and i'm actually doing that right now a little bit as well, um, with the inner development goals. i, i, i really saw that these were my people. uh, and so i started and this has been three years in the making. i started, you know, being there, connecting. and now last year, i created a new community with someone else. but it's like this slow, steady, this is where i want to be and these are my people and then working towards that, i think. yes. yeah. that's why it resonated so much with me to to see, oh, yeah. this is this is the journey, right, through these quadrants. yeah. 

Speaker 2: it is. that's why i say the profit trap is where you get stuck because you love what you do, but you're not in the right room. yeah. um, so you won't it's really hard to move from that one to the progress one. it's actually easier to go from the pitfall one, which is low passion and and low in purpose, um, to progress. 

Speaker 1: because you hate it. you're like, uh, let me get out of here. right? yeah. 

Speaker 2: one. and secondly, if you accept things that you might not be overly excited about work wise or project wise, it will at least get you in the room with the right people. because if it's a higher on purpose, then you know, like, okay. this is just a step. i've been through that. it's kind of like i need to get here to then move on to power. yeah. because you're more motivated as well. like, okay. this is not what i wanna be doing, but at least i'm surrounded, and i get to know more and more people that are my crowd. 

Speaker 1: yeah. in the in that workshop, you also shared an example that sometimes you just need to accept a a job for the money. yes. but then you made some distinction, like, how do you do that so that you don't get stuck in that trap there? 

Speaker 2: the i i can give actually because, obviously, everything this was created from my very own experience that i noticed, like, okay. i've been through this, so this is, um, my advice. the profit trap, for instance, i got i love software. i love everything that has to do with tech. um, i i love implementing it. i love figuring it out. so i had an offer when i just started my business, and this was someone who knew that i really liked that and was really good at that. and they said, don't you wanna come and do a consultancy for us for, like, a year more or less, and we'll give us a quote and so on. and it's to implement a crm, but it was a business that value wise and purpose wise was not aligned with my values nor but still, i found myself thinking, well, this is twelve months of this much money coming in every month. i think it was because this has been five to six years ago. in between 1,500 and 2,000, but that a month, it's kind of like, oh, yeah. and i think a lot of people will reason then. i'll take that and on the side, and i'm like, no. that's not what i started my business. i ended up sending them the quote, and then a week later, contacting them again saying, i'm sorry. i thought about this. it's not the right time currently for me to collaborate. yeah. because i know you need to think long term. you need to think long term. don't do this. you'll get stuck, and then other references will come up and recommendations and so on, and and you'll go where you don't wanna be. 

Speaker 1: yeah. yeah. 

Speaker 2: that is an example of low purpose, high passion. so it is possible. 

Speaker 1: yeah. i'll just i just have to share another example of of my son. uh, just recently, he needed to look for an internship, and he's a a graphic designer in, you know, in school. and and so he didn't have a a spot until, like, the very last minute, like, two weeks before it's he was supposed to start. got a lot of no's. and then, uh, a coach that he's working with pushed him to accept this offer where it was more like according to him, it was more more like a coffee shop. and he's like, i'm gonna hate it. it's the worst. he was like, i don't wanna be there. and and then us parents, we had to kind of, like, you know, make this decision. well, do we take that risk, um, that he says no to this one, the only thing he has? or do we also think long term and think, well, he can keep looking and who knows? maybe he'll find something that he's really passionate about and it's gonna be great. it's gonna give him great references. and so, yeah, in the end, he did find, like, his dream position. it's actually on the on the website. i had to laugh at it said, like, we only work with humane projects. i'm like, there you go. and so yeah. but just having holding that uncertainty, right, in this case, as parents, there's no money involved. but holding that uncertainty and and say no to something is is really, really difficult and even more so if it brings in, you know, a certain amount of money. so, yeah. 

Speaker 2: add on to the equation in my case that i am a sole widowed parent with a mortgage and a son, and i still sit on. yeah. i think for me, there's two things to keep into account, and this is an exercise that i always do when i feel that fear comes up and takes over because we start making fear based decisions. 

Speaker 1: yeah. 

Speaker 2: at that point, one, a lot of it has to do with trust the process, trust yourself, you will be fine, which already is a really hard one. but then if i notice, oh, there's a fear coming up, like, will i be able to pay my bills? will i this? i go back every single time to wait. what is the worst thing that can happen? mhmm. and in the end, if you start breaking it down, like, really breaking it down, kinda like, well, that no other project comes up, and then i'm gonna have to look for a job again and leave my business behind. that's not such a bad thing. so it kind of tones the risk down, and it gives me at least that's the trick i keep on doing. that's what i use when i moved countries every single time. it's like, what? wait. what's the worst that can happen? 

Speaker 1: yeah. yeah. and then you realize that's the worst thing. it's like there's much worse things than that. 

Speaker 2: exactly. yeah. and then you go ahead and you do it anyway. and, um, i have to say five years later, um, i'm very, very happy. i took that decision that day of saying no and and paving my way further on into the purpose 

Speaker 1: one. yeah. because we're we're creating with every yes, we're creating an ecosystem for ourselves. right? and the minute you say yes to the wrong thing, well, that's the beginning of your ecosystem. and then more and more and more of these offerings will come your way, and soon enough, you're trapped in that thing. so yeah. so important. okay. so we have the the four quadrants. we have the compass, uh, and then you said, well, that's really the beginning of thinking about partnerships. so it's kind of like an analysis that you do before you step into partnership, um, mode. so once you have this awareness, what do we do next? 

Speaker 2: well, there's a a couple of things because for me, um, it's not, oh, yeah. now i'm gonna find the partner and that was that. um, it's a bit slower than that. right. you've got certain phases as well, like, um, values that you need and need to figure out. now what i also say is i know people going into partnerships works best if you're already clear on your very own purpose, call it ikigai, whatever it is. if it's not, what i did learn very fast is kind of, well, it's actually by doing that you'll figure it out. you can go into, i don't know, how many online videos, um, and so on to figure it out, but it's also by doing an actual project that you figure things out. um, so the next one from there is kind of like, what are my principles? um, so there's actually five. there's trust. there's shared values. there's shared impact goals because if you go into a partnership, obviously, you need to make sure and i'm not talking money. i'm not talking just like, oh, profit is in is a goal. no. i'm talking beyond the money. like, what is it that the two of us want to gain out of this? yeah. profustrating, like, the balance of return. and then you mentioned it before the, um, the people that kind of go make a million dollars in three days. yeah. even though i talk about profit, this is not gonna happen in three days. right. so slow growth is is another one. 

Speaker 1: yeah. i love that. so, uh, again, trust, shared values, shared impact goals, and shared impact goals, again, are bigger than just the project that we're creating. right? it's like, you know, what is this impacting in the world, the work that we're doing together? 

Speaker 2: i think it's really important to know that because i've seen that partnership is yet another word that sometimes for me what it means. and when i speak about partnerships, it's actually all co creation mode. it's not you have your business. i have mine. let's collaborate. that's a collaboration. so all partnerships are collapse, but all collaborations are definitely not partnerships. a partnership for me goes deeper than that. it's kind of like, let's create a business or a project together. doesn't have to be a business, but it can be a project or something. but we co create this. like, we do this together. so hence, well, what are our shared impact goals then? and impact goals, again, for us, but also remembering purpose. what do we wanna reach? what's the impact we wanna create together on everybody else? 

Speaker 1: yeah. i love the distinction you make between collabs and partnerships. i think there could probably be also collaborations with shared impact goals, but they're time restricted, where a partnership to me feels like more open 

Speaker 2: long term. 

Speaker 1: long term. right? yeah. 

Speaker 2: yeah. yeah. definitely. yeah. no. definitely. i think in each and every collaboration, even, um, for me, for and then it comes on on the shared values. i very much know what my nonnegotiables are. and my nonnegotiables are so strong that i even do that when i accept a client. mhmm. um, so it's not just towards it's clients, collaborations, and partners. so it's actually everything. um, but, yes, for collaborations, that is also really important. yeah. 

Speaker 1: i'm i'm actually collaborating right now with, uh, for my new program, uh, sell how to sell in 2026 and beyond with with this group expert, small group expert, uh, carrie dobson, and we're recording our collaboration prep. and in the last call, we, um, she took me through these questions on the collaboration. and one of them that i think is is good to add here is she asked me what are your concerns about this collaboration? right? what are you worried about for us working together? um, and i think it's so important to talk about that and, you know yeah. with vulnerability, speak about our fears. do they have to do with the ego? do they have to do with being worried about who knows what? but address that. and and and then it feels like, oh, we talk it's kinda like what's the worst thing that could happen. right? it's like, oh, here are the concerns. we talked about them, and now we can build, uh, on that. 

Speaker 2: i think as well, um, what i've noticed as well is at times and i think the same thing happens with concerns. you think you know. you think before going into a partnership or a collab, you think you know what your nonnegotiable is and what your main concerns are until you go into partnerships. the only way to learn or collabs is do that. 

Speaker 1: right. 

Speaker 2: because you'll notice, like, oh, i thought this was actually my nonnegotiable, but this bugs me more or this upsets me more or this so you get to know a lot about yourself as well as a business owner or an entrepreneur or even a professional in general when you start collaborating. 

Speaker 1: yeah. if anything, you grow yourself. maybe you won't grow your business with this one, but you grow yourself. and then you can apply next time. yeah. 

Speaker 2: it's a really important one as well to allow yourself to make mistakes. it's fine from every single partnership. i've i've had partnerships that went totally wrong. i learned a lot from them. it was brilliant. 

Speaker 1: yeah. 

Speaker 2: very grateful for that thing going wrong. yeah. but that is 

Speaker 1: i mean, we started out with a partnership and and or collab and and that specific small project, well, it didn't go so well. but where he's still here. you know, 

Speaker 2: we're still collaborating. so yeah. exactly. 

Speaker 1: so so what are some ways that people can test, um, partnerships? so maybe it is those collabs. is that the step the first step? 

Speaker 2: yes. yeah. um, there's one recommendation i always do, um, and i get that it depends a little bit on on the type of business you have or, uh, the project you're working on. but if there's one recommend that's my way of testing it out a lot is co create a small event, however small it is. a webinar, uh, an online talk, a get together, it doesn't matter. just yeah. because when you set up an event, however small it is, actually, a lot of things are needed. like, what are the goals of this event? how are we going to promote this? um, who are we talking to? what's our audience? what what are we gonna get out of this, how are we gonna set up, what are the tools we're gonna use. um, all of that teaches you so much about one another. because when you set up an event, it's kind of like, oh, yeah. you're the techie one. i'm not. oh, you wanna have that audience? no. i was actually thinking of another audience, and that's where the difference has come up most definitely. like, for me, that's my go to to see, is this gonna work? let's test. and i think in a lot of businesses or or even for solopreneurs, it's actually very feasible to do that. everybody can do a webinar or something. and collaborating on that is an interesting exercise yeah. as a small test. 

Speaker 1: and i i think you're right when you said, you know, when you asked people where they're at in the when you hosted that workshop in the community, they already knew who they are. yes. so that is very helpful to go into partnership. because if you are still at the stage where well, first of all, you haven't done any inner work, but you're also very new in your business. there's a lot of doubt. right? and so that's why i see most people go, oh, don't wanna do any collaborations. i'm not even sure what i can bring to this collaboration. so in a way, it's like, well, that's that's the challenge, though. it's like work on that because you will grow as as you are having these collaborations. 

Speaker 2: when it comes to because we crossed over right into the alignment phase with the test, um, because, actually, there's stages to creating a partnership. um, so one, there's the principles you kind of need to think about in advance, but then for me, a lot of networking nowadays has a negative connotation. once again, i'm like, let's make it a positive one then. um, i'm not changing the words. i'll give it another connotation. in my case, yes, we put slow networking in front of it. um, the first step is you're solo. it's just you. start thinking about you, what do you want, those principles. and then you go into networking. now networking for me is very different than connecting. the word connection and connecting nowadays as well. hey. wanna connect with me? hey. wanna connect with me? mhmm. 

Speaker 1: and then nothing happens. i made 

Speaker 2: yeah. exactly. it's like, yeah. sure. let's be in touch because networking is just a first contact. it's, hi. this is me, and this is you. and then you can decide, do i go into creating a connection with that person where you start to get to know each other a bit more? you start nurturing the contact. that's when you start connecting. and then once you've connected enough, that's when i think you can well, that's when you can go into maybe we should cocreate something small. let's see. and that's the alignment phase. you need that before going into a full blown old partnership to check, like, is this right for us yeah. for the both. and then you step into a partnership, actually. 

Speaker 1: yeah. yeah. yeah. that's good. you know, we we we're calling this episode, how can purposeful partnerships turn your passion into profit. so so far, we've talked a lot about purpose and partnership. let's talk about profit. so how where does the money come in? and, yes, we agree. okay. it's slow. um, but we do have to have this money conversation eventually. so when do we when do we have the do we start with the money conversation? and then, yeah, how can we turn our passion into profit? 

Speaker 2: so for me, um, the partnerships is a vehicle to get to the profit for different reasons. lots of us are indeed solopreneurs or small businesses. um, so even more, in the purpose realm, lots of us feel alone. that's why there's so many communities. that's why your community exists. that's why mine exists. so there are so through a partnership, it has several advantages. it's not one plus one is two. it's one plus one is three. and that comes to the impact you're creating. that comes to the profit you're creating because you put your experience together. you put your audience together. you put so many things together that that then automatically makes you stronger. you strengthen one another. um, the money conversation obviously needs to be had because this is another thing people misunderstand lots of times. not every partnership is a fifty fifty when it comes to money. you can go into partnerships saying, this is a thirty seventy. whatever. it needs to feel right for you. that's the most important thing. and what i've seen, funnily enough, is also that i recommend very much partnering with people that might be passionate about totally different things work wise, like task wise than i am that you're complementary. so i love stuff marketing related. i hate the writing up reports type of things. and i co created a brand with somebody that doesn't really like the marketing side of things. but, yeah, more excited about the paperwork. that was a brilliant partnership because that was the one thing that i maybe couldn't always give to my clients, and he had that the other way around. so it's kind of like, let's combine this because we have shared impact, all shared values, and so on, and we complement one another. and that automatically led to a lot more profit because we were capable of doing certain projects together and have more reach, um, which automatically translates into. and i very much realized if i should have done this by myself, then either i need to pay somebody to kind of do this work for me, but i can't yet. so it's kind of like this it's just me. how do i tackle all this? so it strengthens you a lot, and and that's where the profit lies. i feel a lot of solopreneurs are just trying to do it all by themselves even though they're part of a community and so on. and it's kind of like, well, why don't you, like, create a partnership somehow? yeah. besides what you keep doing, which is perfectly fine. i mean, you can keep doing your own project, but it'll it'll really get you into into more profit. 

Speaker 1: more profit. and and and maybe we can also say that profit is not always money. profit is also more time to be human, more joy because you're working with someone who is very aligned. um, what else? more fun. so, yeah, profit can take many, many different versions. 

Speaker 2: more energy as well. i said, for me, it it's it's brilliant that there is somebody that absolutely loves reading these really, to me, boring reports and outlines that our clients sometimes ask, and and they're like, this is fun. and i'm like, yay. 

Speaker 1: yeah. and and vice versa, they're like, oh, i can't understand how she thinks this other thing is fun. but exactly. exactly. that's why we're 

Speaker 2: all different. so for me, that's priceless 

Speaker 1: yeah. yeah. 

Speaker 2: to be fair. because it's so and i think it's an important thing that people have to see in partnerships as well. it's it's yeah. what do you like doing that i might not like as much and the other way around? and is that compliment can we use that together? yeah. and it's amazing. goes beyond money, obviously. but for me, profit is also something i think this came about as well because i noticed so many solopreneurs in the purpose realm struggling with money or struggling with profit. one, i still feel due to limiting beliefs and the negative connotation money has in society as in the billionaires of this world are all bad people, and they're creating the wrong impact and so on. and i even myself heard myself saying lots of times in the beginning, like, just need to pay my bills and i'm fine and it's all good and, like, kind of down i don't know how to say that in english. 

Speaker 1: yeah. play small. right? exactly. exactly. yeah. 

Speaker 2: and then i came to the realization that that is not what i want. that, um, i feel the more money and more profit, and i'm just talking money wise. it's good to have all those add ons, obviously. the more impact i'll be able to create because that'll make it possible for me to hire people aligned with my values as well to maybe even invest in companies that are doing a really good job or help out solopreneurs. so there's so many things added to that. but for me, it's kind of like, let's talk about profit because it is important. we need to make profit. it's fine to make profit. it's fine even to make good money. it's fine. 

Speaker 1: yeah. we need more good people make good money. right? exactly. the good people will always bring back the money to where we need it. 

Speaker 2: i'm gonna use that, sarah. yeah. we need more money. good people making good money. yeah. i love that. yeah. 

Speaker 1: i think that's a a nice quote to to wrap up here, but, um, i'm glad we we yeah. we need to talk about the money. so that that is just and i think i think it's part of that vulnerable conversation also at the beginning of a partnership, you know? 

Speaker 2: yes. 

Speaker 1: it's like, let's have this money conversation. 

Speaker 2: so exactly. 

Speaker 1: yeah. maybe as a as a final question, if someone, you know, has never worked either on a collab or a partnership, like, what's a what's an easy first step for them to to do? 

Speaker 2: i think the the first one is if you're still remembering the phases. right? so low networking connection and so on. a lot of people are like, oh, so i need to get myself into the right room as a first step. yes and no because there's one before. take up your phone or your linkedin or whatever it is and see who's already there within your everybody has a network. don't tell me you don't have a network. everybody has a network, but you might feel that it's not the right network. but maybe there's someone in there that you can actually go to and talk and not as much as in to get in the networking or connection stage. if it's somebody that you feel might be aligned with you, then, yes, start connecting with them. start nurturing that connection. but if it's not, they might be connected. and i think a lot of people are scared to ask for introductions. 

Speaker 1: yeah. 

Speaker 2: and for me, a really important step is ask for an introduction. if somebody is already there that you know or you look up to and isn't that purpose realm and ask for an intro. if you see i do that all the time. if i see somebody's connected and i'm like, well, i i would love to connect with that person or get to know that person. and i ask. i'm like, could you possibly introduce me? yeah. and what's the worst can happen? they say no. yeah. that's fine. if that's not possible, then get yourself into the right room. and in my case, i didn't find the right room, so i basically created the right room yeah. which is also a possibility. yeah. you're like, well, the right room does not exist, and i'll just create it. and i started with the slow networking of it because for me, that was kind of like, let's start like this. 

Speaker 1: yeah. nobody else is talking about that. so let me let me do it myself. yeah. yeah. i think it's it's it's so it's so key to, um, also, like you mentioned, connect with someone, but we can also just see, for example, what events are they attending. and and then, you know, kinda get into those events. and and then you're like, all of a sudden you notice, oh, there's many more of my people, and i'm not alone. yeah. 

Speaker 2: it is exactly because, um, if you go on linkedin in the beginning, obviously, i came from the corporate world. so my linkedin was filled with maybe not my crowd or not exactly. and, funnily enough, the events that came up 

Speaker 1: yeah. not the corporate team. right. 

Speaker 2: then i started looking for them, and now it's a constant show up of things i could now it's kind of like, no. stop. 

Speaker 1: there's too many. i can't attend them all. yeah. 

Speaker 2: and, um, but that's that's how you do it. 

Speaker 1: that's where 

Speaker 2: where you start. and then even if it is because i i understand that there's a lot of introvert people as well for anybody listening. like, oh, i don't wanna then just join a webinar. mhmm. but going through the people that are there, and then afterwards connect with them on linkedin via message like, hey. i saw you in this webinar. would love to kind of stay in touch on here and start the conversation in writing. 

Speaker 1: yeah. it's 

Speaker 2: not always about showing up in person and having to speak face to face. there are other ways as well. 

Speaker 1: yep. great. great ways to start collaborating more. i think it's really yeah. it's it's where we're heading. i can see that it's, you know, when you started, it was kinda like this new thing, but now you hear a lot more people talking about it, which is great, which is great. and and i think it goes together with knowing who you are because then you show up in partnership with your boundaries, with your, you know, with your clear expectations. and and that makes a really good partnership. 

Speaker 2: exactly. 

Speaker 1: yeah. great. uh, that was awesome. kim, please do share where people can find you. tell us about your community as well. 

Speaker 2: um, i just launched and haven't really sent it to anybody, but i finally created a little small website, um, just with my name, kimdekoster.com. because everything about me is on there. like, all of my brands, the projects i'm involved in, i'm like, i need this little thing where everybody so that's one. great. and i think all the info is is 

Speaker 1: is on 

Speaker 2: that site. yeah. okay. is on that website, basically. 

Speaker 1: well, maybe what you can do is send me, you know, the compass, if you can send me that, and i'll include that in the show notes. so in case people are like, i don't know what she's talking about, they can go and look 

Speaker 2: it up. i will. yeah. i'll i'll take out that page because, um, by now, there's a playbook, obviously, as well. um, and so it comes with a little like, you can do the exercise by yourself. um, i'll take out that page and and send it over to her so people have that compass. 

Speaker 1: yeah. that's great. and if they if they can download it on your website, well, that, you know, if you make that available, then let me know and i'll link to that as well. 

Speaker 2: i will. perfect. 

Speaker 1: thanks so much for being a guest, kim. 

Speaker 2: thank you for having me, ovelyn. it was fun. thank you. 

Speaker 1: thank you. 

I'm joined once again by Kerry Dobson as we explore the Doing, Knowing and Saying aspects of the new 'How to Sell in 2026 & Beyond' program. 

If you're curious about the 'How to Sell in 2026 & Beyond' program send me an email to [email protected] with the words 'Inside Scoop' and I'll send you the first draft of the outline of the program. 

In this heartfelt and honest conversation, I'm joined once again by Kerry Dobson as we explore the VIP process of the new 'How to Sell in 2026 & Beyond' program. 

We explore the vibe, ideal client and program promise of the upcoming program. 

If you're curious about the 'How to Sell in 2026 & Beyond' program send me an email to [email protected] with the words 'Inside Scoop' and I'll send you the first draft of the outline of the program. 

In the next convo we'll talk about the Doing part of the program

In this soulful episode, I'm joined by healing guide Betty Cottam Bertels to explore how the blocks we face in business often stem from unhealed childhood wounds.

We talk about why part of us might resist the success we say we want, how patterns like perfectionism and procrastination are actually protective, and how tools like hypnosis and parts work can help us shift deeply and quickly.

This conversation is an invitation for quietly rebellious entrepreneurs to bring more compassion, clarity, and ease into their business — by starting with the healing within.

• How Betty's journey into inner healing began with an unexpected emotional release and how it now shapes her work with entrepreneurs
• Why feelings of "stuckness" in business are often rooted in unprocessed childhood experiences or early beliefs
• The subtle ways our unhealed inner child shows up in business through patterns like procrastination, perfectionism, and people-pleasing
• How to "update the software" of old protective patterns by dialoguing with the parts of us still running outdated beliefs
• Why deep healing doesn't have to take years, and how working at the subconscious level can lead to fast, lasting shifts
• How hypnosis helps quiet the conscious mind so we can access and release the real root of our blocks
• What it feels like to start running your business from a healed, grounded adult self, with stronger boundaries and more ease
• How aligned, empowered decision-making becomes possible when we're no longer operating from wounded places
• One gentle first step you can take this week if you recognize yourself in this conversation
• A sneak peek of what Betty will guide us through in the live workshop on September 3rd, 5pm CET, 11am EST.

Watch this episode on Youtube

--

Speaker 2: hello, humane marketers. welcome back to the humane marketing podcast. the place to be for the generation that cares. this is a show where we talk about running your business in a way that feels good to you, is aligned with your values, and also resonates with today's conscious customers because it's humane, ethical, and non pushy. i'm sarah senecroce, your hippie turned conscious business coach for quietly rebellious entrepreneurs and change makers, mama bear of the humane marketing circle, and renegade author of marketing like we're human, selling like we're human, and soon also my third book, business like we're human. if after listening to the show for a while, you're ready to move on to the next level and start implementing and would welcome a community of like minded, quietly rebellious entrepreneurs who discuss with transparency what works and what doesn't work in business, then we'd love to welcome you in our humane marketing circle. if you're picturing your typical facebook group, let me paint a new picture for you. this is a closed community of like minded entrepreneurs from all over the world who come together in two meetups per month to hold each other accountable and build their business in a conscious and sustainable way. we all share with transparency and vulnerability what works and what doesn't work in our business so that you can figure out what works for you, instead of keep throwing spaghetti on the wall and seeing what sticks. find out more at humane dot marketing forward slash circle. twice per year, i host my signature program, the marketing like we're human, aka the client resonator program live. in a deep dive into the seven p's of the humane marketing mandala, you will learn to market from within. this program is for you if you want and need to get more clients, but want to share your message in an ethical and humane way. if you want to make a difference with your work. if you are just starting out, or if you have been in business for a while, but haven't really found the marketing activities that work for you. or also, if you are pivoting your business from business as usual to your life's work and want to radically change the way you get clients. find out more at humane dot marketing forward slash program. and finally, if you prefer one on one support from me, my humane business coaching could be just what you need, whether it's for your marketing, sales, general business building, or help with your big idea like writing a book. i'd love to share my brain and my heart with you together with my almost twenty years business experience and help you grow a sustainable business that is joyful and sustainable. if you love this podcast, wait until i show you my mama bear qualities as my one on one client. find out more at humane dot marketing forward slash coaching.

Speaker 0: hi, betty. how are you today?

Speaker 1: hello, sarah. thanks so much for having me. i'm very excited and simultaneously in a slight bit of discomfort in my lower back because i've been not looking after myself and sitting too much. so, my body's reminding me today. so, yeah. but very happy to be with you.

Speaker 0: yeah. it's good to have you. and yes, after our conversation, you need to go for a walk yeah. barefoot, ideally. yeah. that sounds good. wonderful. we're we're gonna go deep, again. i love going deep. so i i suggest yeah. we just go straight into it. and and maybe you can tell people, listeners a little bit about how you got into this inner healing and making that your focus for your business and yeah, kind of the work you do.

Speaker 1: yeah. thank you. so when i where to start? you never know how far back to go. i think i'll do a very quick zoom over, a bird's eye view of my earlier life, just to give a context. i think this is maybe similar to you, sarah. i'm not entirely sure, but i was very much, yeah, i think people would, the easiest way of describing it is a hippie. yeah. you know? so like this kind of travelling mentality. i never wanted money, success, business. you know, these were words that were very foreign to me and actually words i would run from in the other direction. and what i spent most of my life doing, well, early life doing, was travelling and getting jobs that i could easily quit. that was my priority. raising enough money so i could go to india, or so i could go travelling, have amazing experiences, and never really once did i think about growing anything of any meaning. and then i met my partner, rob, and fast forward, and we're expecting a baby. and we were living in barcelona on a very shoestring budget at this point. you know, we both we were both teaching english as a foreign language. and, and suddenly we're expecting a baby. and he was the same as me, you know, very kind of shoestring traveller, musician. we'd both been in bands and festival lifestyle, this kind of thing. and so suddenly we're starting a family. and this is like a new feeling, right, of like, oh, now i want stability. like, i'm aware of wanting to create something stable and grow something secure because it's not just about me anymore. so, i'd always been interested in therapy. but you know, it was very difficult to know there's so many types of therapy out there that whenever i thought about, oh, i could train to be a therapist, it just was overwhelming. i could never make a decision. it felt like there's just all these different things. and then one day i heard a podcast with marissa pia, if you know her. she's the- no. so she styles herself as a kind of celebrity therapist. and really, the reason that she's made it so big is that the method she's created is incredibly powerful and it really works. anyway, i heard her talking on a podcast and she did this hypnosis kind of guided meditation thing about upgrading the child. the idea of this being that you're kind of going back in time and you're taking the earlier version of yourself and you're bringing them to live with you, you know, in your own home as an adult. and you're gonna look after them now and they're safe now and i'm upgrading you, showing you everything that's available to you now that wasn't available to you then. and you show them all the technology and all the amazing things that they couldn't have possibly dreamt of. anyway, so suddenly i'm listening to this podcast. i was in the garden potting, i remember. one baby, i had two babies by this point. one was upstairs napping. and, suddenly i'm in floods of tears, sarah. and i didn't know that, like, i didn't know that i needed healing. i thought that my childhood had been great. you know, it was pretty i thought, you know, it it was avarice. you know, there was nothing no capital t trauma i was aware of. and so i didn't have this desperate need to heal. anyway, i heard about marissa and i had this experience and i'm crying. and suddenly i know this is what i have to do. yeah. and so but it's so funny because i had so little well, now i can see i had so little self worth that i wouldn't even invest and so little money, right, having come from having nothing, really. you know, we were just scraping by and making ends meet and we somehow managed to get enough for a deposit to buy a little house. and, anyway, we didn't have a lot. but i didn't even want to invest the money to have a session on myself before doing this. i was always somebody who put everyone else's needs first and i imagine many of your listeners can relate to that. and so i signed my partner up for a session where i said, you know, you should try

Speaker 0: this.' that's so funny. they're like, 'okay, you should go. yeah, you should go. i can

Speaker 1: track that. that was a pattern in my life where i take care of everybody else. but i hadn't noticed that when realised it was a problem, if that makes sense. anyway, so i signed up. i did the course. we dug deep to invest. it's not a cheap training program. and i, have lost track of the question that you asked me. but

Speaker 0: yeah. just kind of how how you got into it and and yeah. and your own healing journey. so you touched on that. okay. good.

Speaker 1: it's, like, on track still.

Speaker 0: yeah. yeah. this this this notion of not really knowing that we need healing right. is probably something that you encounter a lot with with clients. right? that you're somehow stuck, but we don't know why we're stuck.

Speaker 1: yes, exactly, sarah. you're bang on, really. and so many, well, so many people feel this kind of energetic barrier somehow. you know, that it's just not possible. but we'll we'll come back to that, in a moment. but what yeah. so i signed up and i did the training course, and i went to london. and i'm in this room with about 70 different mainly women who'd all signed up for this training course. and of course and and i was thinking, i've got here on the skin of my teeth. i don't deserve my place in the room. i'm not like them. i'm different. i've i've never had any kind of success in my life. i'm, you know, i'm a complete outsider, and i just couldn't believe i was even there. i couldn't believe they'd even accepted me onto the course, which now looking back is is bonkers. it's crazy. but that's that is how my core beliefs were. you know, a lot one of the when i finally did do a lot of the healing that i had to do because i was training in it, i had to do the healing on myself. otherwise, i never would have done. i was the one when marissa was leading the sessions, and we were all in hypnosis, like 70 of us, everyone's sitting there, you know, drooped, head drooped, and she's walking around and she's guiding this. the session, i was always the one crying the loudest, like sobbing and wailing, so much so that i was distracting everyone else. but i never had a sense that anything needed healing. it's so funny. and then when once i started to understand the power of this method, and honestly it's so powerful, you know, i was seeing in the training, i was seeing some live sessions and some recorded sessions of marissa, you know, working with a woman, for example, who'd shattered so many bones in her body after a car accident, she couldn't stand. and then by the end of the session, she's standing. you know, this is like miraculous stuff i was witnessing. and my entire world view had to reorganise itself whilst i was doing this training programme. like, everything just reorganised itself in my head. i and yeah. maybe i'll pause

Speaker 0: for a minute. yeah. in case

Speaker 1: you have

Speaker 0: a question. so so i'm happy that you shared how you got into this. and and i think what we now want to shift into is, like, yeah, the actual inner work. right? because that's what this, podcast episode we decided is going to be about. and so before i mentioned that a lot of us entrepreneurs yeah. you said there's this energetic block, but we don't know what it is. and so what you're saying, i think you're going to explain to me how it's different from inner child work, but you did mention to bring the inner child to the present and kind of like nurture it. so, yeah, tell us a little bit, i guess, tell us a little bit first how and why so often these blockages are going back to childhood.

Speaker 1: yeah. so it's not necessarily childhood that we go back to. it could be anything. okay. it could be a moment in your twenties. it could be a past life thing. it could be an ancestral thing. and now this is where some people have different beliefs around this. so i just tend to go with what the client presents and what they understand is happening. and you know, when we get into this relaxed state of hypnosis, we it's like we just tune out the noise. and we can really get very focused on what's real. and everything that's ever happened to us is is still there. we can access it when we get into this very relaxed, very focused state of hypnosis. and, you know, what i've come to understand is the body the human beings, we want to heal. you know? we know how to do it. we just need to decide, i think, is the first thing. so, i've i've forgotten the question you asked me again, sarah.

Speaker 0: yeah. like, if it always happens in the childhood or how do we know

Speaker 1: yeah. right.

Speaker 0: where yeah.

Speaker 1: yeah. so the reason that so much of this does go back to childhood is that between the ages of naught to seven, when we come into the world, we are a blank canvas. we and we have to come in like that because we have to learn the ways of our family, of our people, of our community. we have to be able but but because we need to fit in, you know, our subconscious mind, its job is to keep us alive effectively. you know, this is like a very it goes back to serious survival mechanisms. so it needs to learn what's dangerous. it needs to learn what to be afraid of. and you could that could be about certain animals or plants if you go back. but now it's like we we learn different threats from our parents. you know, what what do they find threatening? what do they find scary? we just we just have a sixth sense about that, really. we just download that automatically. for good reason. because we're trying to stay alive. part of us, the subconscious, is just trying to keep us alive. yeah. that's the question.

Speaker 0: and so i guess so what i know from inner child work is that a lot of the the coping mechanisms we create are there to protect us. right? and so i think what what your work is also or or what we decided we wanted to focus on is is this idea of how can we will open these blockages so that we can really reach our full potential without having, yeah, our inner child keeping us small and saying, oh, but you can't do that. it's too scary. yeah. so talk yeah. take us into that. so how

Speaker 1: we do it? how how we stop the child from having control? yeah. okay. so the first step is we have to decide that's what we're going to do. first, we have to know that there's a problem because, funnily enough, i've worked with people who didn't acknowledge the problem. and, of course, we can't we can't get anywhere without that. they have to be have a very real sense of what's not working and what they want it to look like when it's removed, when the block is removed. and then yeah. so the rtt, i mean, this is the method i learned from marisa peer, rapid transformational therapy. this method is incredible. so it's a type of hypnotherapy, but it blends a lot of different modalities together. you know, inner child yeah, this kind of inner child work and parts therapy, like internal family systems, if people are familiar with that. and, a bit of tapping. there's all sorts of yeah. she's just kind of taken a load of modalities and put them together to make this super therapy. okay. so how does it work? so we need to know what's stopping us. and then what we do is we ask the subconscious mind to take us back to the root cause of that block or that issue. and what happens is, say somebody's, you know, so if we're talking about business people, often the most common challenges are fears, if you like. can be visibility. you know, a lot of people come to me just so scared to be seen. so scared to be themselves. and they're presenting this artificial personality or they're presenting just like everyone else. but we know that we have to bring our full selves to the equation so that our people can find us. but that's so scary for so many because we've got this need to be liked and to fit in. and that, as we can see, goes back to childhood when it was this is such a deeply human thing. if you go back to tribal times, we needed to fit in because that was safety. safety in numbers. if you don't fit in with the tribe, you're exiled. you're not safe. you might get eaten by a tiger. this is a serious thing as far as the subconscious mind goes. the subconscious mind has zero sense of humor. so it takes everything so literally. so if i see somebody for visibility, let's say, and i would we'd always start by installing the core belief. so things like, i'm worthy, i deserve good things, i belong. you know, these are the things that are so central and affect so many of us. most people have this underlying belief, like, i'm not good enough. and so we need to attend to that. and once we've attended to that, we can we can look at this visibility wound. and what happens is so so often that we go back to school. when when we ask the client's mind to take us back to the root cause, they go back there. and i count them, you know, so that what actually is happening is they've they've got their eyes closed, they're lying down, and i'm saying, you know, on the count of five, four, three, two, one, you're going back. and what can you see? what can you hear? what can you feel? what are you experiencing in this moment? and then they're bringing to mind, a moment from their earlier life. and so often with a visibility wound, it might be that they're at school, they might be on stage. i had one recently, one lady, she was on stage, and it was just so uncomfortable and so unnatural. she just had these very bright lights shining in her face. and it wasn't, like, major trauma in this instance. it was just, like, we're looking for what we tell ourselves as a result of what happened. so it's not even about what happened. it might have been a very traumatic experience, but it might not have been. and each person will respond differently. so we're really looking for the meaning. we're looking for what i told myself after this event. and in this lady's she's a very successful woman. she's a doctor. and she's come to me to start her own business, and she felt so terrified of speaking about natural health, which is what she she wanted to talk about, the mind body connection. but she felt like this complete blockage in her throat around speaking up, around being, you know, just such fear that people would shut her down. and what we went back to, one of the scenes was, yeah, this being on stage and it just being so uncomfortable. and what happened as a result of that was we say to ourselves things like, 'i'd rather die than do that again', or, you know, i'm just what do we say? well, there's all sorts of phrases like that that become common. self

Speaker 0: shaming and basically negative self talk.

Speaker 1: yeah. yeah. and just that that was painful somehow.

Speaker 0: that's a mini trauma basically. yeah. you know, that that we then some times blow up in our own minds. right. yes. i remember so clearly i was in a in a kind of like a mastermind group and we were talking about all these kind of things and inner work and and people were sharing, like, real trauma, like losing their dance or, or, or. yeah. all kinds of usually related to some kind of grief. right. so i was like, well, i didn't experience any of that. like you, you're like, you know, i'm like, i don't have any trauma in my life. and then i started to make the difference between trauma with the big t and the mini traumas that we almost, like, blow up ourselves in our

Speaker 1: yeah.

Speaker 0: our emotions as well. right? it's it's not always something that happens. like yeah. you said, it's just, like, how we lived it. and that then does in our heads and and tells us that was not safe.

Speaker 1: you don't

Speaker 0: wanna go there again. and so what you're saying is through the hypnosis, that's what you can, yeah, heal.

Speaker 1: yeah. well, when you uncover it, when you understand it, it suddenly makes sense. then you go, oh, i see why i don't wanna do that. i see why i don't wanna go live on facebook right. because of this experience of when i was on stage or or what people said to me when i was a child when i was on stage. and then you can go, 'that is completely irrelevant. that's not going to happen now.' so then we do this thing called it's not me'. we just draw a line in the sand. we say, 'okay. well then i was five.' and that made perfect sense to respond in that way. and now i'm an adult and i don't need now i'm trying to grow my business and blah blah blah blah. and you give all the reasons why you do want to do it. and then we get into this kind of juicy and yeah, this is my favorite bit at the moment. i'm really enjoying doing this parts work where we can scan around the body because these traumas, these things, live in the body. and so in the hypnosis, we can find them. we can locate where the block is. and when it's i'm gesturing to my throat here when it's a thing around speaking out, when people have, you know, and sometimes we go back to witch, persecutions, all sorts of things. like sometimes people experience a hand around their throat. and you might wonder where that comes from, but that's not the point. it might be that something like that happened or not, but the point is it's there. and then we dialogue with it. it's so easy. we just ask it, why are you there? what happened?' and then we explain. and almost always, this part is trying to help. it's trying to keep you alive. it says, oh, i need to protect betty from speaking up because she did that once and she died, or she almost died, or if we're talking about past life stuff. or it was just really uncomfortable, or i just promised i'd never do it again, or i got beaten. there's all these things that it can be big t trauma as well. that does happen too.

Speaker 0: especially in past lives, right, don't we?

Speaker 1: oh, yeah. all sorts of things. but the thing to note is 99.9% of the time, these parts are trying to help us. they're trying to protect us. and they're they've just got this you know, if it's been there since you were two or even in the womb, some so often people go back to being in the womb. and so they they they haven't got many options available to them about how to survive or be good or be liked. but, you know, what they can do is create this kind of protective mechanism. but, to stop them from saying the wrong thing or, because it wasn't safe. and so what we do is it's so simple. we just give it a voice, sarah. we just say and then we say, ah, thank you. i see why you are there now. and your only intention was to protect me. hey, i don't need that anymore. i'm not two. i'm an adult. and then we say, you can go now. and you know, this is the most exciting part because so often i can see when the part leaves. i can see it in them. there's just this relaxation, this relief. and sometimes it doesn't leave, but we reintegrate it. it wants to stay, so we find it a better job to do. you know, i just go with

Speaker 0: i'm just laughing because, yeah, i just need to share this little story because i just literally yesterday until yesterday, i didn't know what ifs stood for. so internal family systems therapy or something like that.

Speaker 1: exactly. yeah.

Speaker 0: and so, so, we have a community and emily, in the community, during our expo, she hosted a workshop around, meet, meet all your parts or something like that. and so i, was privileged to have a mini session with her around these parts. and i, and i, what i brought up is that i always have the struggle between ambition and enthusiasm. so naturally, i'm a very ambitious person. but over the last five or so years, i wanna come to more transform it into enthusiasm and just, you know, be more in the flow and not be so hard, soft and, etcetera. and so, yeah, she was guiding me through this mini session. and then the the visual i saw, and i'm not usually a visual person, but the visual i saw was that ambition was like this friend who moved to another country. we're still friends, and i can still reach her and we can still talk over the phone or zoom. but she there's a distance between us now. and i felt such a huge relief that i can tap into the ambition if i need to talk to her. right. but it's no longer so close. and so that yeah. that that's that was my discovery with parts work yesterday, and it was just great.

Speaker 1: i love that. what a what a coincidence. synchronicity. synchronicity. right. that you had that yesterday. it's amazing. yeah. really. and, you know, just yesterday i saw a 73 year old man who was struggling. he was a healer as well, and he was just really struggling to he had an audience and he was struggling to show up for them. and we just we discovered there was a part that had been there since he was two that was, like his parents had left him too long on his own. and he had this abandonment thing. and and that was that had come in when he was two, and it was still there. and and it took literally less than ten minutes, and it was gone. wow. and he felt completely different. it was in his solar plexus. and it was gone. and he said, i feel so much lighter. and he was grinning from ear to ear. he was just so happy. and so really, the parts work is very exciting.

Speaker 0: so for people who are listening to this, well, first of all, we want to invite them to join us in your in our collab workshop on september 3. right? so if if you're listening and you're like, yeah. i need to i need to see betty in action, and you're you'll take us through a hypnosis. right? so yes. we'll actually do that, in the workshop. the same one.

Speaker 1: yeah. the same one that i heard. when, you know, my version of the one that i

Speaker 0: so we'll all be crying, but it will be a safe container.

Speaker 1: yeah.

Speaker 0: so, yeah, if you wanna join us for that, that's at humane.marketing/workshop. so on september 3. but if people, you know, can't join us, what would you tell them? where can they start this connection with their inner child or or their different parts? well,

Speaker 1: you could go to truewealthwithbetty.com. and if you go well, i'd love to invite people i'd love to invite people in your audience if they're intrigued by my work. i offer a gift session. so would it be okay to

Speaker 0: yeah. sure.

Speaker 1: give the yeah. so, i mean, we can presumably, we can give the links

Speaker 0: separately. i'll put the link in the show notes. yeah.

Speaker 1: yeah. if you go to truewealthwithbetty.com/ work with betty, you can find a link to book a forty five minute gift session. and, yeah, i love doing those. it's so much fun. see what we can uncover in just forty five minutes. and people have incredible experiences. yeah. and just i wanted to say one final thing, sarah, if it's okay, just why i've called my website true wealth with betty. because, you know, the name just came to me, and i didn't understand it at the time. i just said, this is what i need to call it. and i didn't really know. and it's the name of my podcast too, true wealth with betty. and then i realized that, you know, for my early life, as i said, i had this, i'd never had much money. i never wanted it. but what i got was this, like, understanding that wealth is not about money. you know, wealth is about an ability to enjoy our lives. and so that is what i help people with. they come to me for business. so, you know, this niche that i'm working in is helping entrepreneurs with a big vision, who feel stuck or scared about the size of their vision. but what happens, the side effects, is where they, we always score the different things we're keeping track of, and where they've come to me with like a one or two for overall happiness, they're leaving with a nine or a 10. everything in your life, i mean, everything's holistic, isn't it? we all know that. so when you do this kind of healing work, you might come to it for your business, but your relationship will improve. you know, your your just sense of happiness and your presence and your mothering or your fathering, you know, all of it improves. it's amazing.

Speaker 0: yeah. i think that's that's so close to my heart. i think i shared with you that i'm releasing the latest book business, like we're human and. and just on the last conversation for change, lisa, who was there, she was just sharing, we did a kind of a visualization around, the ubuntu tree realizing that we're all one, you know, humans, family members, ancestors, but also nature. and then she was sharing as a kind of reflection how small the business part really is in our life. if you compare it to the rest and how small of an importance we can also give it. right? yes. it has importance because we make our living with the business. but out of the big scheme of things, if you think about ubuntu and the moon and the stars and and nature and all of that, it's just a tiny thing. and, yeah, to really truly be happy, the business is just one thing, and there's all these other things involved.

Speaker 1: yeah. but, yes. and i think that that, you know, when we do sort out the business so that it can be profitable, so that we can relax, you know, because so many of us are in the early stages of business. it's it's stressful, isn't it? the rollercoaster, the up and down, and will we be able to meet the bills, and will i have to give it all up, and all of that. but yeah. so when we and the other the other main focus that i do in the sessions is about our strange relationship with money, because that was my my thing. you know? this thing about money won't buy you happiness was, like, this deep rooted understanding. so those are the kinds of things that can also be unpicked with this work. and, just welcoming in ease and more fun in the business and more flow. you know, i think when we do this work and when we're operating from the adult who, let's face it, is it okay to swear? who doesn't give, you know, a damn about other people, really. you know? that you're just operating how you wanna operate. you get to do things how you you get to do it your way. you know? and so often we're stuck in these shoulds, and then business isn't fun, is it? it's fun. and when we make it our own thing, then it can be it can be fun. yeah.

Speaker 0: tell people again where they can find you in the yeah. so the name of your podcast.

Speaker 1: thank you. so it's truewealthwithbetty.com. and you can navigate there to the tab at the top, work with betty, and you can find the link to book a gift session if you would like to. and also, wherever you listen to your podcasts, you can find the true wealth with betty podcast.

Speaker 0: wonderful. thank you so much for being here.

Speaker 1: thanks for having me, sarah. i'm so excited about september. me too.

In this heartfelt and honest conversation, I'm joined once again by Kerry Dobson as we explore what it really looks like to co-create a meaningful group program.

In this episode, Kerry takes me through a visualization on how it will feel like in my body, on the last day of the 'How to Sell in 2026 & Beyond' program. 

If you'd like to go through the visualization yourself, here's the link for the Great Group Revolution private podcast episode of the full process. 

If you're curious about the 'How to Sell in 2026 & Beyond' program send me an email to [email protected] with the words 'Inside Scoop' and I'll send you the first draft of the outline of the program. 

In the next convo we'll start working through Kerry's VIP Process (Vibe Promise, Ideal Participant, and Program Promise.

In this inspiring episode, I'm joined by Jessica Lohmann to explore how nature can guide us back to more meaningful, ethical ways of doing business.

We talk about Jessica's journey from corporate marketing to founding Marketing by Nature and Ethical Brand Marketing, and how reconnecting with nature — and ourselves — can shift not just our business practices, but our entire mindset.

From animal wisdom to simple daily rituals, Jessica shows how observing and honoring the natural world can bring more flow, purpose, and integrity into the way we work.

• How Jessica's frustration with harmful, manipulative marketing led her to create Marketing by Nature and Ethical Brand Marketing
• The connection between our disconnection from nature and many societal problems
• How nature — especially animals — can inspire our business and marketing practices
• The role of spirit animals and how Jessica uses animal wisdom (like the misunderstood hyena) to guide her marketing and business decisions
• Daily practices to reconnect with nature, from simply walking outside to using oracle cards and observing animals
• The shift in mindset needed to make time for nature, embodiment, and rest — even as entrepreneurs

Watch this episode on YouTube

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Speaker 0:  hey, jessica. how are you? hello? i'm fine. how are you? yes, i'm good. hot, but good. yeah. same there. yeah, really looking forward to this, to this commerce conversation around marketing and nature. it's funny, it's like probably a year and a half or so that it comes up all the time, this topic of nature. and so when i started to see your linkedin posts, i'm like, yeah, she's someone i want to talk to on the podcast. so here we are. yeah. welcome. you have a program called marketing by nature. right. you have a business. remind me of the name of the business. ethical brand marketing. right. okay. so we have the ethical in common as well. but what really got my attention was the marketing by nature. so, yeah, tell us more about how this became your focus.

Speaker 1:  yeah. well, i do have a marketing degree. so i got that in 1991, and i worked in corporate, you know, for a long time and and moved to germany in 1995, so pretty early in my career. and i just watched because i graduated in 1991. we didn't have computers back then. right? like, only a few people did. so i watched how the internet basically increased the harmful manipulation in marketing over the years. and because before, it was just a little, like, false advertising. you know, it was still damaging, to some extent, but not to the, yeah, to what we have today. so it basically grew out of my frustration, of how marketing has been abused over the years. and also, like, with the nature part, because i'm very connected with nature, i've always, you know, we we went camping when i was young. i worked for veterinarians during high school and college. so i've always had this connection with animals. and, and i truly believe that the root cause of all our societal problems is our complete disconnect from nature. and there are people who will tell you, like, when that happened. it started when we start started, wearing shoes with rubber soles and, you know, those are kind of, yeah, i'm not really sure, but the industrial revolution definitely, helped with that disconnect. and so what i feel is that if we connect with nature, we are completely different people. like we actually find ourselves again and we respect ourselves. we don't criticize ourselves. we find love and also with other people and it just, yeah. so i just also feel, which i'm sure we'll talk about, throughout this conversation, how nature can really inspire us, how other species can inspire us, and also how we how we're all connected and how we can work together, to, yeah, to solve these super wicked problems that we've caused as one species.

Speaker 0:  so yeah. do you feel like like you said, you you've been, you know, super interested in this since 1991, which probably a lot of listeners, including i mean, including myself in 1991. yeah. nature was just this thing that we, you know, spent some leisure time in, but it wasn't yet we, there was no talk yet about reconnecting with nature. that is to me at least fairly recent. so did you all these years, because i, i know for humane marketing, the, the, this idea of, you know, doing marketing in a different way. for me, it started in 02/2006. right. which is like later much later than 1991. and even so, from 2006 till actually, no. not not even 02/2006. that's when i started my first business. it's more like 02/2018, i started talking about gentle marketing. and so for all this time, i felt like very alone talking about doing marketing differently. so i cannot imagine how you must have felt all these years. yeah. talking about connecting with nature and and how this relates to marketing. is this a story that i'm just telling myself or is this the

Speaker 1:  story that you lived? well, it's i it's kinda hard to really go back because back then in 1991, i was i was super young. right? like, i just got out of college. so i didn't really make that connection back then. mhmm. and we didn't have the internet, so i didn't see all the harmful manipulation that we have now. i just noticed it throughout the years. and then when i i guess when i started working for an it software development company here in germany in february, there were times where i was like, no. i don't wanna email these people because they did not consent. and this was way before the gdpr in 02/2018. right? so it just like, that even felt weird to me. and i also tried i tried so many times with this with my one, with this one company who i worked for for, i wanna say, eleven years. yeah. i tried so hard to bring nature into our branding, and i wasn't able to. and and that kind of upset me, but it's okay. it wasn't my it wasn't my company. so as soon as i got out, i was like, okay. now i could do what i want. and now i can say what i want. and now i can actually, yeah, bring something forward that really makes sense. and it was the first time well, actually, that's not true. i was gonna say it was the first time that i felt good about my job because, you know, as a marketer, you'd like we have a bad rep. right? with totally understandable. but i never worked for a company who did things unethically. i won't say that. like, that's not you know, i i didn't work for big companies and and do all this harm for manipulation. i just saw it externally. but, like, the first job i i had after college was with a, independent record label. so that was fun. that was what i was gonna say. like like, me, my my job is the first time i actually felt like it was purposeful. mhmm. but my first job after college working with vets veterinarians was also very, very, purposeful and fulfilling. it was best job ever. but then working at the record label, that was also that was fun. and, so but in between, there's just a lot of, misalignment, i guess, because i couldn't really do what i felt was necessary or was was was purposeful for me,

Speaker 0:  i guess. so so you referenced, you know, the the these, i guess, lessons or inspiration that we can get from from nature. and yeah. and i noticed for from your posts and and what you're sharing now, for you, it's may mainly animals. i guess for other people, it can be, you know, it can be plants, trees. people talk a lot about trees. i love trees. also, i just came off a call, in our community called, doing business with the moon. so planets and stars are also part of nature and, you know, the universe. so so yeah. tell us how you kind of, like, draw these parallels between nature and, and business and marketing.

Speaker 1:  yeah. i, i do spend a lot of time in nature and i observe, and i communicate. i communicate with trees. i communicate with wild animals, my pets as well, but you know, that's something different. like everybody communicates with their pets, but, this real connection piece. and, so like, okay, let's say this week we have a new moon in cancer. and so i was i i work with oracle cards. i work with, spirit animals, and my totem animal, which is elk. but this week i was, you know, asking asking animals, okay, who wants to guide us this week of this new moon? new moon, new beginnings, it's always exciting. and hyena came up. and like, i'm getting chills right now because when you think of hyena, you think, okay, they're schemy, there's something weird about them. they have a weird posture. they kind of laugh at you. you know, they're bottomless.

Speaker 0:  they're like the mean guys in the they're the mean guys.

Speaker 1:  yeah. exactly. exactly. but when you really learn about them, you're like, wow. so so what happens is that, like, they are a resourceful strategist, and they're deeply misunderstood, like we just said. like and that kind of, like, makes me think of people of my network. we're all working in the climate and the ecospace. we're trying to inspire people to respect nature and we are nature. we are all connected. we are animals and, we are not here on earth to destroy. and so, and i'm also vegan. so like, there's a lot of misunderstanding with veganism and basically why? because the narrative that we have been giving as a collective is doom and gloom, is blame and shame, and that doesn't inspire anybody to act. so it's it's like so coming back to the hyena, like, she's very matriarchal. she has an energy that we need in today's corporate, corrupt world, actually. like, she's also a team player. they hunt more efficiently than lions. i mean, male lions don't hunt at all. they just sleep, eat, and fornicate. but, but like hyenas, they they actually work together and they don't waste anything. you know, they are scavengers, but 70% i just read this yesterday. 70% of their of what they eat are from hunting, which i didn't know, which is more efficient than than than lions. so i thought they scavenged more than than hunted, but that's actually not true. so, basically like her energy and i say her because it is a feminine energy. so she does not waste time. she does not waste money. she does not waste energy, like, and on on things that don't matter. so, she also tells us to, like, know our worth and to lead quietly, but move strategically. and so these these learnings, really, really help me and i'm hoping that they're helping people who read what i've been writing because i write this, like, every monday now. i've just started this month of doing that, and, and it seems like people are really enjoying it. i'm trying not to get too woo at this point in time, but i will at some point. i will move more into the woo. and where are you sharing this? on linkedin.

Speaker 0:  okay. i only do people need to follow you on linkedin to

Speaker 1:  see this part? yes. please do. i would love to connect. so yeah, so it's like, it could also be something as simple as, you know, hey. it's because people have asked me, should i should i go on tiktok? and i'm like, well, are your clients there? no. okay. that kind of answers your question. right? so so when people, like, get in that sort of desperation mode, like, i want it it's not working. i gotta try this. i gotta try this, this, this, and this, and they move from one tactic to the to another looking at people who look, successful online, it's only gonna take them away from their real path. and so hyena and so many other animals, like, have this strategic, energy to them. like, follow the path, and you will make mistakes. you will fail a million times. but if you keep on doing that refining and refining and not jumping from one thing to the next, you'll get there.

Speaker 0:  mhmm. yeah. i love that. so so you you chose or the the hyena sounds like almost chose you because of the new moon in cancer. and so, but you said you're doing this now every monday, so it's not always at the new moon. it's just like every monday you you pick a new or the new animal picks you.

Speaker 1:  right. and i used to do this, like, daily for myself, and i used to also offer animal spirit guide readings. and i used to do, like, videos and stuff like that and and also go along with the moon. so every two

Speaker 0:  weeks, i was,

Speaker 1:  yeah, talking about, like, also, like, conservation of the animal that chose me because i i never i never pull cards. like, i just, like, yeah, ask my questions and then one flips out. it's like me. sometimes it happens right away. sometimes it takes, like, a minute or so. but mhmm.

Speaker 0:  yeah. i think it's just so good for us to even, yeah, know more about this wide animal world and, yeah, beyond animals. right? plants. i mean yeah. in this, book that i love by, not a book, but it's a collection, from rob hopkins called the ministry of imagination.

Speaker 1:  mhmm.

Speaker 0:  and and he asked, all his podcast guests to be the minister of imagination. and so there's the the this book is basically a collection of ideas for the future. and one of these ideas, the reason i bring it up here was this guy, i think it was a guy who is like, we should invent glasses that tell us and, like, when we put them on, it will show us, you know, like, high in, like, holiographically, what the the information is on the plant, the animal, give it its name. so not just our the botanical name, but it's like, hey, this is jessica. you know, it's like, give it a name so that we can relate to to, yeah, nature in that way and really feel like we're one. and i i just love that idea. i like

Speaker 1:  yeah.

Speaker 0:  put a big heart around it. yeah. so, yeah, i i love that you're sharing those on on linkedin. i need to make sure i i hit the bell so that i, oh, i keep seeing them. yeah. so so you mentioned, yeah, you're not going to go too much into the who just yet. but linkedin is still kind of the network where people are like, oh, this is, you know, can we put this there? you were working with companies, organizations on this idea of marketing by nature. so and especially in tourism. right? so how do you feel the readiness there? like, are are though yeah. has and have things changed? is it more in the zeitgeist now?

Speaker 1:  yeah. i mean, i still have a lot to do in that realm. like, i also feel the energy of the person that i'm working with, the company that i'm working with. and i can usually tell how much i can, how far i can go. so i kinda i kind of adapt. i i call myself a chameleon sometimes because i i do adapt to the other person's energy. and i've noticed, like, i also work with freelance creatives. so the designers, the, the copywriters, the filmmakers, those people who are actually able to shift perspectives with their words, with their designs, with their films. and, i find that they are very open to lulu, to, the spiritual aspect, to connecting with nature and, and really learning more about that aspect. and because i also say, like like, running a business, especially if it's just you, if you're like a solopreneur or even if you just have a few employees or independent contractors. like, it's like 95% personal development. i don't know if that's really true. that's just the way it feels and the way, you know, i've experienced it with my my clients and and my network. because your stuff will come up, every with every launch, with every campaign, with every, sales call, whatever it is, your stuff comes up. you procrastinate, you perfect, you get fomo. everybody goes through imposter syndrome. everybody. so we have so many multi layers of ego to sort through that animals and plants that the other natural world, like, don't deal with. and i, you know, i use this as a reminder as well. i'm like, just go out there and observe. like, they don't get in their heads. they just do. you know? they just they just go and do it. just do it. and, you know, especially when it comes to perfectionism. so, you know, like, my clients are, like, about ready to to launch or whatever, and then they they start feeling that fomo coming on and or not the fomo, the, imposter syndrome and and just the the fear of, you know, rejection and stuff like that, from those sales calls and also putting something out there that's not a 100% perfect. because, like, if you if you build a course or if you put out any kind of an offer and it's a new one, you you kinda have to you know, you can't put it out when it's completely done because you need that client feedback. you need to cocreate it with your clients. otherwise, you risk putting something out there and nobody wants it. so this is how software develop software is developed. right? they co create it with their clients. and, so it was it takes a lot to take that step and put something out there that's half baked, that's not finished. and so that is a true sign that, you know, if you can do that, then that's like, wow. okay. you have handled perfectionism. you may not have overcome it yet, but that's, you know, that's a true sign. and and the way to get there is to just do it and, and not think about it. so that's how i also bring in nature. i'm just like, you know, just just observe. they don't they don't do all this stuff that we do. keeps them stuck. they just go and do it.

Speaker 0:  that's so true. yeah. and and there's also cycles, right, in nature. exactly. that are, yeah, not always about being out there and and, you know, launching every day or or closing every day. but there's, yeah, there's wintering and and, you know, there's the dark moon and, like, yeah, in nature, it's just so normal that there's rest included. we feel like, no, rest is not part of not part of business for sure.

Speaker 1:  exactly. yeah. what am i doing?

Speaker 0:  so what kind of daily practices do you have? obviously, you go outside, i assume, and then you have the the the card. any anything i see you have plants in your office. i think that's the the no brainer. right? it's like yeah. of course, you have to have plants.

Speaker 1:  yeah. yeah. i don't have as many plants in my house as i used to just because, yeah. i don't know. i guess i moved, and and they had to stay where they were. but i also have a garden. so, so, yeah, as far as, like, routines, i used to do yoga and meditation every single morning, and this year, i haven't. just because this year has been very busy. and, you know, when you're not the first person who has asked me this this year, and and i keep on coming back to it. i need to implement that back into my routine, but not in the mornings because i i'm now spending a lot of time outside with my dog and and and just, like, connecting with nature before i start my day that when i come back, i'm like, okay. now i can start working. now i can be creative. and, whereas before i was doing i was doing both, but it was it was kinda draining because i would start my day really late. so i do wanna implement that back, but maybe, like, midday or something like that. so that thank you for asking that because it's just i i yeah. it's something that i i wanna be very intentional about, and and it's something that i really wanna bring back. yeah.

Speaker 0:  it is it is a shift when we do really want to, you know, be more embodied. so that means doing something physical. yeah, i do yoga every day. i i am the person who does yoga every day. right? i just decided that that's part of my day. and so when i don't do it, then, yeah, i'm missing it. it's much easier to just decide i am the person who does yoga every day than think every day. should i do it today or should i not? so it's just like, no, this part of my day. but then, yes, you all i also wanna be the person who goes outside every day. right? and then what i notice and the reason i'm talking about, you know, doing business like we're human, well, an eight hour workday is just not human to me anymore because we want to make sure that we do all these other things that are much more important than what we think is important, which is sitting on our computers and, you know, being effective or efficient. so so, yeah, in a way, it's it's this concept of time that we also need to shift and say, well, being in nature takes time. doing yoga takes time, but it's time that i value more than, you know, the work. and that's a big shift for a lot of people also because, of course, the money that's attached to the work. right? and we we are living in a society that still yeah. there's no universal income. and so we have to work to make a living. and oftentimes, like, if you're in a corporate job, you can't just say, oh, i'm i only wanna work six hours per day. right? it's like, no. that's standard forty two hours per week, which is so sad. like, it makes me so angry. so yeah. it it really and the thing is that even if we are entrepreneurs and and we feel like, okay, we want wanted to leave the corporate life behind. like you said, 95% is personal development. and so if we don't change that perspective and mindset that we are just here to work eight hours or probably as entrepreneurs ten hours per day, then we think we went for the freedom, but we just lock ourselves into another box that we create, which then we talk about, oh, i wanna connect with nature, but we don't make it a priority. right? yeah. so, yeah, it it really there's a lot attached to it. it's not just a nice thing to say that we now everybody wants to talk about reconnecting with nature. we actually have to make it a priority and make time for it.

Speaker 1:  yeah. yeah. and it's so interesting because some like, sometimes when it happens to me, like, just spontaneously, like, i don't look for it. it just happens. like, the other week, it was a really bad week. it was the end of, like, the june, the may. it was just really, really bad for several reasons. and so i was walking my dog. her name is nala, chocolate lab. and we were just walking, you know, in one of the normal routes that we go, 06:30 in the morning really early. and, all of a sudden, like, there were three families of geese, on the other side of the river, and then one family was in the in the water. so the babies are starting to get really big right right now, but they're still kind of fluffy. and these are canadian geese, by the way, in germany. but, yeah, we have them. and and then all of a sudden, you know, they they see me and one the papa, one of the one of the males goes into the water, and then his family starts coming. and then the other ones and then the other ones. so all three on the other side came into the water. they all came to us. my dog was like, just eating the grass along the side, but they just swam to us and started like bobbing their head and honking. not loudly, not aggressively, just like occasional honking and bobbing their heads. and i was like, wow, are you here just to say hi, thank you? like, i was just, you know, like communicating with them and it felt so good. and then afterwards i looked it up and i was like, wow, they were, they were excited to see me and nala, but primore me because, you know, nala's a threat. but, but nala was so calm and and they were just, like, saying, we see you. we you're one of us. they like, it is a bonding act of them to bob their heads like that and to to honk and all four families. like, it was it was amazing. and i've seen them a couple of times since. like, i used to see them, like, like, twice a week, but now they're kind of staying out of the water. they're moving onto the grass, onto the fields. and, yeah, and we don't feed them there, so this was not about food. but it was just such a such a, like, such a moment that the next time that i went, when i saw them, i just sat down and they were all just in the water, but also, like, bobbing their heads. they weren't honking. they weren't as excited as before, but they were just kind of staying there and i just, like stayed there and sat with them. but this kind of stuff like happens every now and then. but when i seek it, it's not there. if that makes sense. like you just have to have like an open mind and just say, okay, whatever comes comes, you know, even if nothing comes, then it's also okay. yeah. anyway.

Speaker 0:  yeah. but but but, again, it wouldn't have happened had you just been depressed and just stayed in bed. right? exactly. you had to make the time to make it happen. exactly. yeah.

Speaker 1:  that just, like, made my month. i was like, okay, i'm good. i'm good now.

Speaker 0:  yeah. it's it's like this, this confirmation that nature is perfect and we're all one. right? that's what this message was for. yeah. so definitely. yeah. so so as we're wrapping up here, what would you tell listeners who, you know, maybe they live in new york. i always think about new york city or or just like any city. i was just, in padova, which is the city next to venice. and it's, you know, it's a city. it's a beautiful city, obviously, very old, but it's a city. and there's, you know, there's there's concrete and there's, you know, there's rocks. yes. but, you know, it's still hot and there's not much nature. so what would you tell people who live in a city or listening? how do you connect with nature?

Speaker 1:  yeah. i i come from long island, by the way, in new york. so, and i now found my utopia. it took a long time, but i lived in atlanta too, so i totally get that. i can't live in a city right now, anymore. i don't think, there's nature is everywhere. like i said, we are nature too. so, you know, even a pigeon, like, i've connected with pigeons before. they're, you know, plants, trees. they're there. there are, you know, city parks and stuff like that. and it's not like, you know, you have to go and hunt a tree or whatever. like, there there is kind of a ritual with trees because they're very wise and they're very, you do have to respect their their presence. so i do ask for permission before i connect, especially with trees. animals just seem to do it anyway. so it's not a problem. but, so i guess, like, my advice would be just just go outside and observe. breathe in the air. hopefully, it'll be clean. go anywhere where you can go where there is a little green, or even if you just have some plants on your balcony or in your home or whatever. also like the spiders in your house. my goodness. people just vacuum those up as if they were garbage. like, spiders are welcome in my house until they get to a certain size. and then and then i'm like, okay. sorry, but i have to transport you outside. and then i do. i carefully, you know, pick them up in a jar and stuff and then, you know, walk away, walk outside with them. but, you know, just be respectful, of of all creatures except maybe mosquitoes, like or ticks or anything like that on your dogs. like, i totally get that. but there's just so much that you can do. and, like, if you're at your desk hustling at work, which is what we all do, that's not good for our brains. that's not good for our bodies. so if we just get up and just take a walk, like during lunch breaks, i used to eat lunch at my desk. like, how sick is that? and i know a lot of people still do. get outside. go outside. take a walk around the block. you will see there often there's, like, one sprout of of of life coming up from, you know, the concrete walls or something. and you're like, wow. yeah. there's always something like sit in silence, look around you, feel the wind on your on your face, breathe in the air, be thankful that that you're alive and, that you're okay and that you are part of nature. like, there's so many solutions in nature too that that we don't need all of our machinery and all this stuff that we're trying to trying to do.

Speaker 0:  i was just thinking as you're as you're talking, it's like it's so true. right? i probably live very similarly as as you. like, i have access to a forest and a and a river and, you know, a lake. so, yes, i'm very privileged like that. at the same time, i think if you're in a city, you're paying probably even closer attention to the small flower that, you know, grows through a crack like you just said. and it just kind of almost gives you this bigger moment of awe because you're like, how could this be that, you know, right here, you're yeah. there's so much power in that where where for us, it's like, oh, sometimes it's just like, oh, it's right there. so you have to be more aware, and and pay attention to it. yeah. yeah. yeah. wonderful. well, thank you so much for inspiring us. and and, yeah, i highly recommend people follow you on on linkedin. where else can they find you to get to know you a bit more?

Speaker 1:  i guess my website. so that's ethicalbrandmarketing.com. but, yeah, i'm only i am visible. i'm present on every every other channel. like, i do have a presence, but i just like, a couple of years ago, i was like, nope. gonna concentrate on where everybody where my audience is, and that's that's linkedin. so yeah. just jessica lohmann. easy to find. easy to find. yeah. thank you. a couple

Speaker 0:  of questions for you. yeah. we'll record those separately. so we'll close here, and then we'll see each other again. but thanks so much for being on the show. thank you. and, yeah. well, who knows? maybe we'll cross paths one in in real life. yeah. i'm sure we we're neighbors. that's true. thanks, jessica. thank you, sarah.

In this heartfelt and honest conversation, I'm joined once again by Kerry Dobson as we explore what it really looks like to co-create a meaningful group program.

We talk about the power of true collaboration, the importance of aligned values, and the beauty of building something new together—with transparency, curiosity, and care.

If you've ever wondered how to design group experiences in partnership (and with integrity), this episode will both ground and inspire you.

--

Speaker 0:  hello, humane marketers. welcome back to the humane marketing podcast. the place to be for the generation that cares. this is a show where we talk about running your business in a way that feels good to you, is aligned with your values, and also resonates with today's conscious customers because it's humane, ethical, and non pushy. i'm sarah senecroce, your hippie turned conscious business coach for quietly rebellious entrepreneurs and change makers, mama bear of the humane marketing circle, and renegade author of marketing like we're human, selling like we're human, and soon also my third book, business like we're human. if after listening to the show for a while, you're ready to move on to the next level and start implementing and would welcome a community of like minded, quietly rebellious entrepreneurs who discuss with transparency what works and what doesn't work in business, then we'd love to welcome you in our humane marketing circle. if you're picturing your typical facebook group, let me paint a new picture for you. this is a closed community of like minded entrepreneurs from all over the world who come together in two meetups per month to hold each other accountable and build their business in a conscious and sustainable way. we all share with transparency and vulnerability what works and what doesn't work in our business so that you can figure out what works for you, instead of keep throwing spaghetti on the wall and seeing what sticks. find out more at humane dot marketing forward slash circle. twice per year, i host my signature program, the marketing like we're human, aka the client resonator program live. in a deep dive into the seven p's of the humane marketing mandala, you will learn to market from within. this program is for you if you want and need to get more clients, but want to share your message in an ethical and humane way. if you want to make a difference with your work. if you are just starting out, or if you have been in business for a while, but haven't really found the marketing activities that work for you. or also, if you are pivoting your business from business as usual to your life's work and want to radically change the way you get clients. find out more at humane dot marketing forward slash program. and finally, if you prefer one on one support from me, my humane business coaching could be just what you need, whether it's for your marketing, sales, general business building, or help with your big idea like writing a book. i'd love to share my brain and my heart with you together with my almost twenty years business experience and help you grow a sustainable business that is joyful and sustainable. if you love this podcast, wait until i show you my mama bear qualities as my one on one client. find out more at humane dot marketing forward slash coaching.

Speaker 1:  hi, friends. welcome back. today, i'm kicking off a little bonus series of short episodes that fit the p of partnership. as always, if you're familiar of the show, you already know that i'm organizing the conversations here around the seven p's of the humane marketing mandala. and if you're new here and don't know what kind of mandala i'm talking about, well, you can download your one page marketing plan with the seven p's of humane marketing that come in the form of a mandala. and you can do that at humane.marketing forward slash one page, the number one, and the word page. and this comes with seven email prompts to really help you reflect around these seven p's for your business. so, again, this conversation really fits the p of partnership. so you've heard carrie dobson before in episode 213. and if you haven't listened to that one yet, i highly recommend it. we talk about meaningful groups and whether having a group program is a good next step for you. you can go to humane.marketing/hm213 if you haven't heard that episode yet. so carrie and i hosted a collab workshop together and really felt a strong synergy forming, so we thought we'd follow that thread, especially when i told carrie i was ready to create a new program based on the selling like we're human book called how to sell in 2026 and beyond. because just as a refresher, carrie is a small group specialist who focuses on creating meaningful group programs. so we decided to partner on this new bro program that i will kick off with a beta group in november. and carrie will actually join the program as a co facilitator and infuse her long experience with making groups impactful and transformational. and so we thought it would be fun to share how we prepare this collaboration and build this program together live here on the podcast for you to take part of the behind the scenes. and, of course, if you're intrigued about selling in 2026 and beyond, it would be amazing to have you in this beta group. i'll be posting these conversations as bonus episodes, so make sure you're subscribed to the show to get notified about the following convos. not all of them will make it to social media. so, uh, it's best to be subscribed so you get notified. and of course, if you have any questions that you would like us to address, you can reach out to either me or carrie directly. so here's the recording of our first conversation.

Kerry:  and our goal for this session is just to actually talk about the collaboration as a whole and kind of go through the guiding questions, um, and just kind of explore the collaborative part of it. um, and then we can kind of talk about next steps a little bit more about where we go from here. does that sound good?

Sarah:  yeah. sounds great. and i think why not share this as well? i mean

Kerry:  totally. right? yeah. no. i it's it's more of, like, how to contextualize it or put it in. so, yeah, it's not a yeah. so we what i did was i shared with you kind of my what i call the five guiding questions for collaboration, which are just starting questions yeah. for people who are looking to collaborate. i created it specifically for people looking to collaborate around groups, but it works for any collaboration.

Sarah:  mhmm.

Kerry:  so i guess what my first kind of question to you is, as you're coming into this, kind of having considered those questions, how are you feeling? what's going on? where are you at?

Sarah:  yeah. i think it's just a nice idea to, you know, to have a conversation about, uh, the collaboration. and and and like we discussed when we talked last time, it's like, how do we make this a win win? that is, like, really important, um, for me so that we're both clear and that this can be very harmonious. you know, like the last thing i think we both want is some kind of injustice that we feel like, oh, this is not so just, you know, making it all clear at the beginning, i think is so key.

Kerry:  yeah. yeah. i that that's for me, too, is that idea of when we do anything, we're having thoughts, we're having feelings, and yet we're not always super conscious and super clear at the beginning of a collaboration. because i know for me, i'm i'm a very positive, like, oh, i can see i can see the potential in everything. and going through this helps me to really slow it down a little bit and capture that excitement and capture what's really important to me, but also allow space and time to kind of say, like, what what am i worried about? like, what what is it that's happening that maybe i'm not fully conscious of, but it gives me that opportunity to do it?

Sarah:  yes. yeah. very good.

Kerry:  um, i have to

Sarah:  say mature, you know, it's like, oh, we're like super mature human beings

Kerry:  here. totally. and and we're acknowledging that we're human in this. right? and that that as we do this, you know, like, i the the story i make up is, you know, this is your body of work. this is a really important offer that you want to bring to your community, and there's a preciousness around that. and so, you know, inviting someone in both from the creation standpoint, but also a potential opportunity to co lead, you know, there's there's risks with that or there's perceived risks. right? and so, um, just acknowledging that that's part of what happens, i think, is yeah. super important. exactly. mhmm. very cool. so do you wanna go through each of the questions and we can just kind of share our answers?

Sarah:  yeah. let's do that.

Kerry:  very cool. okay. so the first one is, what is the goal of this collaboration and the experience as a whole?

Sarah:  yeah. so what we why this came up is because, uh, i'm, uh, working on a new program called how to sell in 2026 and beyond. and just wanting to take this group experience to an even deeper level. and, you know, yes, enjoying each other's company already through the collab workshop and the the podcast and just realizing we have shared values. there's things that i can learn from you. and, um, so, yeah, that's how we entered this conversation about the the collaboration. and i see what i can win. so, yes, hopefully, an even deeper experience for the the participants, uh, also for myself and just, you know, having someone else co lead. i mean, that's the that's that's fun. i mean, at this stage in life, all i want is to do good work and also have some fun.

Kerry:  so, um, yeah. yeah. do good work. have some fun. i like that. i can sign up for that.

Sarah:  yeah. and then we also said, well, we want to use that as a case study for you, you know, so there that's the win for you. and and just have you experience that with a group and see how that can lead to an offering for for your own business. what can you learn? what went well? what didn't go well? and then the third thing i think is really that i feel like people come and look to me for new innovative ways of doing business. right? that's kind of the brand that i created, uh, because i keep telling them question all the assumptions, uh, and i tell them we're lacking role models of the new. and so they're looking to me, uh, for being that role model, and so this collaboration feels like walking my talk about the p of partnership and and just say telling them, look. this is what we're doing. we're experimenting because it's never been done before. and so now here here's how it went.

Kerry:  yeah. and i love that part. that part of it too is that, you know, we are we are walking into something that we think is a possibility. we see it as, you know, this moment in time is really calling forth that partnership piece and saying we don't have to do all of this alone, and there is a way that we can support each other and, you know, kind of do good things together. and so i, you know, i love the fact there's a part of me that's like, oh, crap. what's this gonna be like? but i love that experimentation part. and to experiment with someone else is also it's just a little safer. right? it's like, okay. you know, two heads are better than one and, you know, the ability to have the conversation as we're going through it. and i'm really looking forward to, you know, the openness that we've created around being able to share what's going on. so i'm really excited to kind of get the feedback from you as well as you're going through things because i know you're super aware of what's going on in your body and your mind and what's calling you forward. and so to get that insight, i'm really excited to kind of see what that is, and i know that there will be learning in that for me as well. great.

Sarah:  yeah.

Kerry:  um, i also just, um, i love the approach that you have in the book for selling like you're human. so i've i'm i don't know if i'm halfway, but i'm close to halfway through it. and as i was reading it, i was like, oh, this is this is needed right now. right? like this idea of, hey, hold on a second. it was so funny because i've been listening to a podcast on the way home my cameraman rory was. and he was talking about this, like you need to decrease the demand the supply in order to increase the price, like, all this. and then i read your book, and i'm like, no. that's not what we need to do. so it was so confirming for me to be like, yes. this is the you know, sarah's approach to selling like we're human is absolutely something that i believe in. and so to be able to have that be the center of this group is really exciting for me too.

Sarah:  i think, yeah, that's a big part of your offering as well to only engage in groups where you can stand behind because otherwise, honestly, i don't think it would work that part of the right?

Kerry:  yeah. it it especially the coleading, but even the other part. right? it's there is such a need for alignment because of the preciousness of people's groups and their expertise. so it's like it's a lot harder to to to hold that space with them if i wasn't believing in what they're saying or if it's, like, in direct contrast to, like, my values and that type of stuff. so a big part of my process is really having it clear what what my values are and how i like to work and then making sure that there's a good connection before we really dive into the work.

Sarah:  for sure.

Kerry:  yeah. very cool. okay. so then the next question is, what are you worried about?

Sarah:  yeah. i sat with this question a while. i looked like really thinking, well, what is it that i'm worried about? and, like, i have, you know, i've experienced a lot of partnerships, and, yes, there's a few of them that didn't work out, but that's not what worries me. um, i think the only thing i came up with is is, like, not having enough participants to get a group together. but then i was thinking, well, then we just postpone it. then we do it another time. so, yeah, there's not, like, specific worries that i i feel like, um, you know, this is not gonna she's gonna walk all over me or, like, any any kind of, like, oh, i should be worried about my content. none of that. so right. yeah. awesome. really good.

Kerry:  well, that feels good to hear. so that's that's great. the worry about the participants, i think, is always a worry, especially with groups because especially how we design them, you know, you need at least six people to really kind of have that engagement and have that connection. and so i think that's such an important worry. and part of what we'll do, i call it the plan to pivot. and what we do is before we even do prelaunch, we talk about what happens if we don't get the whatever that minimum number is and what is our plan for that so we can be working on that plan as we go. but we also create the plan of what if we get too many people because sometimes that happens too. and so having that plan in place ahead of time makes it so that some of the tension, there's still tension in launch, there always is, but some of that tension, it's like, well, we have a plan for that. we know what we're going to do. and there's some, you know, postponement is part of that, finding other people, you know, all sorts of stuff. so that'll be part of what we do too. um, i so for me, my worry is, you know, because this is still new and untested, then, you know, trying to put it together, i you know, i'm worried i'll they'll be it just won't make sense. like, at some point, we'll look up and be like, what were we you know, what was carrie thinking? and so that's part of it. right? when it's really new and fresh, i have this vision in my head. i have this imagined ideal of what this could be. but, you know, when you start putting it all together, like, maybe maybe it doesn't work.

Sarah:  right. yeah. yeah. yeah. but at the same time, i think it depends if we're attached to a certain outcome, then yes, maybe the worry is justified. but if we're looking at it both as a growth experience, then then, yeah, there there is no it didn't work. no. we both learned something, and yes.

Kerry:  that is the

Sarah:  the outcome. yeah. yeah.

Kerry:  yeah. and then the other worry i have is just, you know, you have so much experience leading a group. there's there's this voice in my, you know, the back of my mind being like, am i gonna even be helpful? she has so much experience doing this. and so that's just my own my own stuff coming up, but i just wanna acknowledge that that that that it's there because, you know, part of the work that i do is often with people who have done groups before. i find that people who have done them before kinda have a better understanding and appreciation for my perspective and what i talk about. um, but it's always a little bit there of, like, well, what if this person turns out they knew everything and didn't need me? so just putting that on the table.

Sarah:  yeah. it's good to put it on the table. but, um, again, for for me, it's it's a big part of this is is walking my talk around partnership. and just because of that, uh, you know, it's worth doing. and then and then, yes, i think the at at this stage of experience, it's all about the small little adjustments. it's not gonna shift the way i do groups completely, but it's those small little things that are gonna make a huge impact. and that's that's really what i'm excited real about.

Kerry:  yeah. and i i just love that you are aware of that. right? like, that that the the enhancements at this point or the up leveling or whatever the language is is they are those small tweaks. and there's these small things that make a huge difference. and so many times, those small differences aren't really recognized by the participants at like, they're not aware of it, and yet it changes their experience. yeah.

Sarah:  it's kinda like subconscious. yes.

Kerry:  yeah. exactly. yeah. um, so what would you say your strengths in this collaboration are?

Sarah:  well, as we just said, i have certain experience with, uh, with groups. i, um, have experience, uh, with the art of hosting. uh, so i really come from a place of holding space more than just teaching. and i think that's a big strength that i have developed over the last, uh, years. so i'm comfortable with uncertainty. i'm comfortable with people's uncertainty. and and that is a big part of being able to hold space for others because i've learned to hold space for myself and then now applied us to to hold space for others. so that's, um, yeah, i think that's one of the strengths that i bring. and then the content, you know, the this idea of selling like we're human. um, i i wrote a book about it. so it's interesting because up till now, i didn't feel like, oh, there's a program in me for this. so so this is a bit new for me, but i i feel very grounded and solid because of the timing. i just feel like now the time is right. and so, yeah, that's another strength that i bring. and then this openness to collaborate. like, i have an undefined ego in in human design, and there's nothing that i feel like i you know, it's like, oh, this is mine and, like, nothing like that. and so it just feels really good to to collaborate.

Kerry:  yeah. i love that. i love that so much. um, so for me, what i what i see is the the strength in this collaboration is just the level of expertise that we both bring to it. you know? there's there's so much here that we get to work with, and i'm i'm really excited about it that. and so this my strength in kind of acknowledging and, like, appreciating the expertise that we both have. um, i also think we have a really similar view of business. that's part of what our conversations, whether it was, you know, prerecording or recording or during the live session or before and after it. and so, um, i i love that we have that, you know, similar vision and similar values, and we also are really noticing that this is the time for it, as you said. like, there's something about the timing both of, like, this collaboration, but also this work and kind of doing it. and so being aware of that, um, and then obviously kind of that, the expertise that i bring around the small intimate groups, i think, is is something that's a little different that, you know, not tons of people are talking about, and yet that's where i really think the power of connection and the power of results really blossoms. and so that's that's part of what i'm bringing to the collaboration too.

Sarah:  yeah. exciting. yeah.

Kerry:  um, and then the next question is just, what are the obstacles you can foresee?

Sarah:  i don't see any obstacles. i if there's obstacles, we'll find ways. uh, yeah. so i don't not yeah.

Kerry:  yeah. the obstacles. the only obstacle that i kind of am just aware of is, like, a timing standpoint. like, are do we have enough time? which i i think we do, but that's always kind of a a piece of it. and then making sure that it doesn't take me too long to catch up on your area of expertise and how you like to run groups. i've been part of a couple of your things and reading the book, and so i'm just aware of, like, okay. i'm not worried about it. it's just that's i i'm coming into this not having spent, like, a year in your programs and knowing kinda how you do things.

Sarah:  right. yeah. yeah. i can i can understand that?

Kerry:  yeah. thank you. and then what was it that was appealing about this particular collaboration? we've kind of, you know, said some of that stuff too, but is there anything else that you wanna

Sarah:  i think what we're doing right now is is, like, actually building it live. and so then sharing the process of this collaboration, uh, you know, on our podcasts and with vulnerability and also sharing if, you know, if then things didn't work out and we didn't, we have to postpone or whatever whatever it was. so so not just leading up to it, but then also maybe after, do a recap of what went well and and and what you're now going to do, uh, you know, with that. is it gonna lead to an offer? so so, yeah, that that is exciting. and then again, uh, we said this before, but this idea of creating different ways of of being in business and and and seeing. yeah. how, of course, right now we have this agreement that there's, you know, we are just experimenting. so maybe we can also just share with transparency that there's no money involved in this collaboration. yeah. but in the end, that is the goal. right? still to somehow get paid. and so whether that develops into a paid partnership between the two of us, uh, or if it's just something that you will then use in in your business, um, yeah, we we can continue to share how how that evolves as well.

Kerry:  yeah. i love that part of it. it's like not just like the the the build up towards it, but kind of continually sharing as the process goes and as, you know, the launch happens and all that type of stuff about it. um, i i'm really excited too or the most appealing part is, um, you know, i really value your expertise and your perspective on business and selling and humane marketing, and i think it's so needed in this world right now. i know even just as a, like, a customer, like, i i'm so much more sensitive to, you know, what people are saying and how they're saying it and, you know, all that kind of stuff. so the more people in the world that have this more humane approach to it, i i find really appealing. and so to be able to play, you know, one part one tiny part of kind of having more people out there operating that way is really appealing to me. and then i also you know, we've we've talked about this too. like, there's something longer term that i feel like with you and i where there is this potential for other opportunities, other ways of supporting each other, whether that's, you know, in collaborations like this or or also just, like, being fans for each other and, like, you know, telling others about there's something about the longer term part of this that that i find really appealing to.

Sarah:  yeah. exactly. to to to develop on on that. and and i think it's this human element that we so often still you know, yes, we're all busy, but that's to me, it's always an excuse. so when i do say, you know, let's partner and let's do a collab workshop, i really mean the collaboration part. right? and i think you're one of the yeah. there's about a handful of people who who really understand that part. and for others, it's still kind of like, can i get some visibility out of this yeah?

Kerry:  piece? so

Sarah:  yeah.

Kerry:  yeah. right? and and the the invitation to collaboration doesn't always get met with collaboration. and that that's sometimes like, that's what we learn too. right? and so when you find people who are truly interested in collaboration, it's so nice because it really can be the win win win of, like, real longer term partnerships and collaborations. so, yeah, i love that part too. yay. so with all that said, um, i'm curious about kind of what what's outstanding for you? is there anything that you're kinda like, okay. i still this i still don't know or i'm holding space for the fact that we're trying to figure it out. but is there anything left unanswered or untalked about at this point for you?

Sarah:  i guess i can't picture it yet. um, i mean, you when you mentioned the the co hosting, you were kind of like, well, if there's breakout rooms, you know, there's gonna be a chance for me to be in another breakout room. yeah. i'm i'm just kinda, like, wondering, well, what happens during the time that i'm actually delivering content? what's not kind of what what what i know a little bit is during, for example, our colab workshop that we did. right? um, you were on that end. you were the expert, uh, uh, you know, teaching in quotation marks. and the way i have these collab workshops is, like, yes, you are the expert, but i can then come in with questions or lived experience. and so maybe the way i kinda see it is that you're gonna play that role. and because sometimes we have groups where the people are, i don't know, too shy or or not confident enough, and they're not actually asking the questions that kind of flowed around in the room, but nobody just dares to speak up. so i would love for you to play that role. right? um, so that's one way i could see it.

Kerry:  totally. so i think i think you've hit it completely like the nail on the head there. in terms of, um, i i read it once as an article where it's like the yoda role. so it's like that permission to kind of say the things that you're you you sense that are out there and happening and people are thinking, but they haven't quite either because, you know, it's new or it's like, oh, uncomfortable. so there's that part about it. where where i see it is kind of like um, as as you demonstrated, but it's like, oh, i'm there kind of representing the group essence sometimes where it's like, oh, that that didn't land or, like, that instruction didn't you know, there was questions about that or could you say that another way or that kind of thing. so it it's it's almost like i'm there as the representation of the essence of the group while you're sharing. and then, you know, there'll be other times where, you know, it might be that, hey, i'm leading them through because it's more of a reflection opportunity or celebration. and then you take on that role of you get to kind of represent the essence of the group. so there's a flow to it, and there's like a back and forth. and it it's really it's a different idea. so part of it is about really how do we, you know, share this at the beginning so people understand, well, who's this other person in the room and and why do we care? right? and so, you know, people because sometimes they're familiar with more of what i would call a producer role where it's the person who's checking in on the chat and making sure the technical stuff is there, which don't want that. no. right? like, it's like so people people are kind of you not even used to. they've seen that sometimes. and so it would just be about us kind of setting the stage in that first session in particular of, hey. this is, you know, this is carrie. this is why she's here. this is what we've done. you know? i think this helps us because people will hear it ahead of time and will be part of what people might have, you know, seen before they said yes to being part of the group. sure. but it really is just setting that context and just recognizing, like, okay. that's that's the role that i have in the room for most of it.

Sarah:  yeah. it's great.

Kerry:  very cool. okay. so in terms of kind of the process from here, the idea is is we're just gonna work through kind of the the typical steps that i take clients through when we're putting a group together, um, especially when it comes to a book. i i love doing groups that they're not the they're not the group they're not the book in group form. right? it's not that you take everything from the book and put it into a group. it's that you the group is like the the book is the foundation of the group, and it's you know, i've had everywhere from an author who we took one one slice of a book and made a whole group and certification from it. and then for others, it's it's a bit more of the group. right? and so what we'll be doing is going through the process of kind of saying, okay. what is this group about? and we start with, it's the vip process, but it's, you know, the vibe promise. what is the environment that we're promising we're gonna create? who's that ideal participant? who is this really for? and then what is the program promise? so what are they what are we promising they will accomplish and or experience in our time together? and so that's really where we start because once you have that vip, all your other decisions are super easy or they're at least impacted by the vip. so how long should the program be? what kind of activities should we include? you know, all that. the vip really helps us to inform the decisions we make around that. so the first session we do, that's where we'll start is is the vip process, and i always love to start that with a visualization. so, um, what i will do normally, i would give you that visualization, and i'll give it to you so you have it. but i think we do it live. i think we record it and just kinda see what happens. sounds very cool. yeah.

Sarah:  yeah. for sure.

Kerry:  awesome. well, i think that's it for this collaboration piece where we're we're figuring it out in the next steps, and we'll catch you next time as we jump into the vip part of the group design.

Sarah:  very good. see you next time.

Speaker 2:  thanks for listening. i hope you found this interesting. and, uh, yeah. i gave you a little sneak peek behind the scenes of how we're setting up this completely radically new different, uh, way of collaborating. and, um, we'll post again when we have another conversation. speak soon. be the change. don't forget.

In this short solo episode, I'm reflecting on our recent Conversations for Change series — the fundraiser for my upcoming book Business Like We're Human.

Together, we explored what it truly means to bring more humanity into the way we work. From letting go of outdated success myths to reimagining business through the lens of Indigenous wisdom, natural cycles, and compassion — this episode is an invitation for heart-centered entrepreneurs to do business differently… more spacious, more honest, more human.

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Speaker 0:  hello, friends. sarah here. today, i'm coming to you with a short solo episode about this beautiful journey that we've been walking together these past few weeks through the conversations for change series, the fundraiser event for my upcoming business like we're human book. it's really been one of these seasons where i'm reminded why i do this work, why i believe so deeply that business is a space for healing, for reflection, and for creating change that actually feels good in our bodies. over the past few weeks, i've been gathering with a group of change makers, people like you, to explore some of the themes from my new book, business like we're human. but more than that, we've been exploring how to live and work in a way that feels honest, kind, human. because let's be real. so much of what we've been taught about work, about success, about business, feels really outdated. it feels disconnected from who we are and from the world we want to build. these conversations for change were an invitation to imagine something different, not through hustle, not through forcing, but through slowing down, listening, and reconnecting to what matters. and it just really felt really good to put this book out there in that way, to do a completely different book launch than anything that i've ever seen out there before. so i just wanna give you a kind of a feedback or a tell the story of what happened in these conversations if you couldn't be there. so we started on june 10, and in our first conversation, we really opened the door gently. it was all about waking up because that's the first part of the business like we're human book. and we started with the big question. what does it even mean to be human today? it sounds so simple, but the more we explored the deeper it got. we talked about compassion, not as a fluffy add on, but as a way of being. and we also explored the idea of an infinite circle of care. how our humanness doesn't end at the borders of our business cards. it extends to each other, to our communities, and the planet. i also remember pamela sharing about the hidden world of trees, how they communicate through their roots and how they're all interconnected, a quiet interconnected network of care. and chris reminded us how rare compassion still is in business, how it's often overlooked, but deeply needed. and then we began to name the myths that we've inherited. the old stories that tell us our worth comes from how productive we are. that success is measured in constant growth. that busyness is a batch of honor. and then together we asked, what if that's not the only way? what if success looked softer, more connected, more meaningful. in our second session, the week after, we let ourselves dream bigger. we stepped fully into reimagining. that's the second part of the business like we're human book reimagine. we borrowed from indigenous wisdom, from the cycles of nature, from the quiet knowing that life and business don't have to be linear. we explored the fish tank analogy, how even when we try to innovate, we often stay trapped inside the same old system, just decorating the glass walls. but what if we stepped outside the tank altogether? like what i'm wanting to do with this business like we're human book, and i think what we're wanting to do as a collective right now in this paradigm shift is not just adjust and kind of fix all these broken systems, but really reimagine a completely different way of being as humans, but also of doing business. so we talked about seasonal work rhythms, governments guided by indigenous women, workplaces designed for rest, for creativity, for joy. chris shared his shift from logic to intuition, and jean spoke about exponential living and how life expands when we allow it. were you reminded each other that like trees in a forest, our businesses grow at their own pace with strong roots, with gentle stretches toward delight, and that maybe that's enough. by our third gathering, we then moved from dreaming to grounding. we explored how to recalibrate. so that's the third part of the book, recalibrate. how to actually live and work in alignment with our values. we talked about the ubuntu mindset. i am because we are. and what that means when it comes to business, to clients, to collaboration, to really sense that we are all one. we drew our ubuntu trees, weaving together family, ancestors, and the natural world, because all of it shapes how we show up. and then we explored this topic that i talk about in the business like we're human book, new business intimacy, which is this beautiful space between surface level superficial networking and deep personal friendship. so to find a new way of being in this new business intimacy. so it's not personal friendship, but it's way deeper than just superficial niceties and networking masks. and it's really where trust, alignment, and real connection can grow. that led us to reflect on authenticity, not the buzzword, but the real thing, the kind that asks us to look honestly at our own alignment, at where our business feels spacious and true. and through it all, there was this quiet, steady thread that small businesses, our businesses, really have the power to show what's possible. we don't have to wait for corporations or politicians to lead the way. we can model a more humane, more spacious, more honest way of doing business right here, right now. and that's really where i find hope. so where are we now? well, i'll be making the final edits to the business like we're human book over the summer months, and then publish it to the public in september, probably around the full moon, because, you know, natural cycles. because if there is anything this journey has reminded me, it's that business like life isn't about constant upward growth. it's about cycles, pauses, reflection, and allowing ourselves to show up again and again as fully human. and speaking of showing up, there's one more thing i've been quietly, but excitingly working on over the last few weeks. and it's not called business like we're human, but it's deeply connected. i'm creating a new program. and honestly, i never thought i'd be the person hosting a program about selling. if you've read selling like we're human, you probably remember me saying that. but here's the thing, i think sales have changed, and i have changed. i've grown into the person who now has the courage to share my point of view about selling. and as you can imagine, it's not the mainstream approach. so this new program is likely going to be called how to sell in 2026 and beyond. and it's going to be a mix of tangible, pragmatic business and sales advice, helping you clarify your offers so that people actually want to buy it, but also tapping into this new paradigm of selling. expanding on what i shared in selling like we're human. and yes, i'm really giving myself full permission to integrate the woo. we'll be weaving in human design, looking at your unique sales power through your hanging gates, and exploring who you're truly meant to sell to through the lens of your north nodes of the moon. so yes, it's gonna be different. it's gonna be soulful. it's practical. it's just very human. and if you're curious and you want a very unofficial sneak preview, you can message me either on linkedin or via email to [email protected]. and i'll happily send you the inside scoop, which for now is just the first draft of the outline, but i'll make sure to keep you in the loop and conversation so that we really can cocreate this new paradigm of selling in 2026 and beyond. and then i have one last little celebration because together through the book fundraiser, we also raised 10% for the pond foundation. and i've purchased a carbon credit we're together, we're taking out one ton of co two out of the atmosphere, and it's a carbon credit for a bio carb project in ghana, a small but meaningful way to give back to the planet that holds us all. so truly from the heart, thank you for your contributions, for your trust and walking this path with me, for believing that business can be different. if you feel called, i would love for you to leave a book review when the time comes, or why not join us in the humane marketing circle? that's the kind of conversations we have there as well. or just simply keep holding these questions in your heart. because this work, my life's work, this remembering, this reimagining, it's not just mine, it's ours. until next time, keep being human and keep being brave. see you soon.