Weaving Your Reality

Melissa Hall (@melissahallny) is brand strategist, speaker and educator. I met Melissa through our mutual love for ceremonial cacao and in this very timely conversation we talk about Melissa's work and her experience being a black entrepreneur working in fashion, lifestyle, and wellness.

We also explore the questions of privilege, non-performative allyship and creating long-term change.

See all show notes on wokeandwired.com

We cover:

• The future of branding
• Why wellness has to be the foundation of every future business
• How to elevate your brand in today's digital world
• How the future of fashion includes mindfulness, sustainability and diversity
• Melissa's journey from fashion into wellness
• Navigating wellness and fashion as a black woman
• Why she feels more liberated than ever to promote her services
• The energetics of investing into your business
• How do we make fashion and wellness more inclusive?
• Non-performative allyship

Mentioned:

• 7 Important Questions Every Entrepreneur Should Ask Themselves
• 'This Is A Very Strange Time To Be A Black-Owned Business' by Trinity Mouzon on HuffPost
• The Heart Bowl

Connect with Melissa:

• melissahallconsulting.com
• @melissahallny
• @eatwithmelissa
• Theemergingdesigner.com

Connect with Woke & Wired:

1. If you enjoyed the podcast, share it with a friend and on your Instagram stories (tag @wokeandwired so I can see it).
2. Subscribe, rate and review the show on iTunes.
3. Join the Woke & Wired Facebook group.

Other episodes you might like:

• 65: Tanyka Renee – How To Create Iconic Content & Use Visualization To Grow On Instagram
• 19: Jasmine Takanikos: Making Brand Strategy Personal And Being The Energy Source Of Your Business
• 10: Blair Badenhop: How To Brand Yourself In The Wellness World, Create Magnetism and Success By Tapping Into Who You Truly Are

Quotes:

"Privilege can be a beautiful thing… when you act."

McKel Kooienga (@nutritionstripped) is a leading voice in nutrition and mindful health, awarded "Top 20 Role Models" named by Arianna Huffington. As a Dietitian and author of the Nutrition Stripped Cookbook, her mission is to guide others on how to create habits with ease. Her 5x5 Framework has helped thousands design a mindful way of eating and living unique to their body and lifestyle — by teaching how to apply the science of nutrition and practice the art of healthy living.

McKel is one of the very first people I followed on Instagram in 2012, and I've loved getting to know the kind, thoughtful human behind the powerful brand that she's created!

Key takeaway: trust what feels right uniquely for you.

We discuss:

• Top lessons McKel has learned from scaling one-on-one nutrition coaching practice to a digital business
• Nutrition as a catalyst to wellbeing
• How Nutrition Stripped went from being a creative outlet to business
• Free content vs paid offerings
• What is the Nutrition Stripped meal planning program?
• How to connect to your intuition and use it in business
• Nature healing
• How to separate work from home life when you run a business with your partner
• How to live in your zone of genius and delegate the rest
• How to batch tasks for productivity
• Where McKel goes for business advice
• How to make content with ease
• How to choose an aligned offering for your business
• How saying "no" more often helped McKel grow her business
• Who is the Nutrition Stripped mentorship for?

Connect with Ksenia:

kseniabrief.com

Instagram @ksenia.brief

YouTube Ksenia Brief

TikTok @ksenia.brief

Subscribe, rate and review the podcast on Apple Podcasts

Follow the podcast on Spotify

Caro Arevalo is a Peruvian visionary artist based in Brooklyn, NY.

From her Amazonian heritage she embraced the importance of rituals and ancestral wisdom. This is reflected on her intricate artwork that talks about how by observing nature we can notice that there is no real separateness in between beings; this leads her to identify the whole universe connected as a one.

I met Caro in a cacao ceremony (cacao ritual has brought so much magic into my life!), and it was one of those moments when I knew I was meant to connect with Caro further – before I even saw her beautiful art.

We discuss:

• Art as a love letter to planet Earth
• Spirituality and plant world
• The role cacao ritual has played in her life
• What does @cafeinacoli mean?
• Carolina's fashion blog story
• The relationship between art and inner world
• Why she changed her major from finance to art in college
• Carolina's first temezcal ceremony
• Carolina's first experience with plant medicine
• How plant medicine led her to become an artist
• How Carl Jung influenced Carolina's work
• Drawing "downloads"
• How living in a dark apartment served as an invitation to dive into the inner realm
• How bartending supported Carolina in the physical realm while she was doing deep spiritual work
• Healing your female lineage
• Growing up introverted and shy
• Cultivating self-love
• How to work with herbs and plant medicines
• Mandala art
• Her decision to quit all side jobs and give all of her energy to art
• How to be in flow with the Universe
• Selling art online
• How she created a viral YouTube video using only her phone
• Her approach to brand partnerships and sponsored posts on YouTube
• The power of saying no to opportunities that aren't aligned
• What is "greenwashing"
• How she manifested being a guest on Woke & Wired
• How to not care about what others say about your work online and stay committed to your art
• Boundaries with social media

Mentioned:

• What is cacao ceremony
• The Cacao Portal

Related episodes:

• 14: What is cacao ceremony with Florencia Fridman
• 101: Frequency healing and cacao ceremony
• 95: 5 Ways To Tap Into Infinite Possibility
• 53: Aileen Xu Of Lavendaire

Connect with Caro Arevalo:

• carolina-arevalo.com
• @caro.arevalo
• youtube.com/cafeinacoli

Connect with Ksenia:

• Courses and Programs: Conscious Social Media Method
• Join my email list to know about upcoming workshops and more.
• Podcast Instagram: @fundedbysource
• Ksenia's Instagram: @athomewithksenia @ksenia.brief
• Ksenia's TikTok: @athomewithksenia
• Ksenia's YouTube Channel

Share Funded by Source:

1. If you enjoyed the podcast, share it with a friend or on Instagram stories and tag @fundedbysource.

2. Subscribe, rate and review the show on Apple Podcasts.

3. Join my email list to know about upcoming workshops and more.

4. Visit fundedbysource.com.

In this podcast and video series, I'm sharing my journey on TikTok.

This is week three: 3,000 followers to 6,000 followers and multiple posts with 100K+ views.

Watch this episode on YouTube.

See all show notes on wokeandwired.com

In this update, I cover:

• The mindset and the energetics behind my explosive growth on TikTok
• How I created videos that got hundreds of thousands of views
• What I've done to gain 500 new followers per day
• How to get started on TikTok
• The mistakes I've made along the way
• Using music on TikTok
• How captions work on TikTok
• How to choose your niche on TikTok
• How to know what to post on TikTok
• How hashtags work on TikTok
• Taking advantage of the evergreen content aspect on TikTok
• Top hashtags I'm dominating and why it's similar to SEO
• A call to be unapologetically you!

Connect with Woke & Wired:

1. If you enjoyed the podcast, share it with a friend and on your Instagram stories (tag @wokeandwired so I can see it).
2. Subscribe, rate and review the show on iTunes.
3. Join the Woke & Wired Facebook group.

Carolyn Elliott is the author of Existential Kink: unmask your shadow and embrace your power, and of the cult-favorite creativity book, Awaken Your Genius, which is based on the dissertation she wrote while getting her PhD in Critical and Cultural Studies at the University of Pittsburgh.

We discuss:

What is shadow work and how does it apply to business?

How Carolyn went from being broke to building a business with revenue of $950,000

The principles Carolyn's business that have doubled her income every year

Reconciling the opposites within yourself

The "philosopher's stone" and crystallization of all parts of you

Creating organic virality around your offering before using Facebook ads

How to rewire your response to scarcity

How to shift your money mentality

Working with money as a medicine spirit

The revenue streams of Carolyn's business

What is existential kink?

Why Carolyn has chosen live launching over evergreen funnels so far

How social media and business works from an alchemical and planetary perspective

Connect with Ksenia:

kseniabrief.com

Ksenia's email list

Instagram @ksenia.brief

YouTube Ksenia Brief

TikTok @ksenia.brief

Subscribe, rate and review the podcast on Apple Podcasts

Follow the podcast on Spotify

Tara Stiles (@tarastiles) has had a huge impact on my life and career ever since the day I walked into Strala, her yoga studio in Soho, in 2012. Tara is who I got my yoga teacher training certification with, and I was lucky to make her a heart bowl breakfast and even share a recipe in "Make your own rules cookbook."

Tara Stiles is one of the first people to start sharing yoga videos on YouTube, a bestselling author, and founder of a global yoga training business that's radically different.

There is presence, ease and quiet wisdom about Tara, and I'm excited to share this business-focused conversation to you.

In this episode, we cover:

• Why it's important to carve your own path in business instead of a cookie cutter approach
• How working at a Pizza Hut and doing ballet led Tara to yoga
• Tara's business trajectory and current business model of Strala Yoga
• How she became one of the first yoga teachers on YouTube in 2007
• How to overcome criticism and stand for what you believe in
• How to make burnout impossible
• Path of you over path of yoga
• Trusting the unknown
• Why to "find your thing" as a conscious entrepreneur, it's important to release the need to "have a thing"
• Why Tara said no to venture capital
• The trap of social media and how to stay true to yourself
• Social media as an open channel to being of service

See all show notes on wokeandwired.com

Connect with Tara Stiles:

• @tarastiles
• @stralayoga
• Stralayoga.com

Mentioned in intro:

• The Cacao Portal Experience
• #101: Cacao Ceremony and Frequency Healing with Erin Eber
• #14: Cacao Ceremony and Maya Cosmovision with Florencia Fridman

Resources:

• The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success: A Pocketbook Guide to Fulfilling Your Dreams by Deepak Chopra
• Autobiography of a Yogi by Paramahansa Yogananda
• The Business Of Fashion

Connect with Woke & Wired:

1. If you enjoyed the podcast, share it with a friend and on your Instagram stories (tag @wokeandwired so I can see it).
2. Subscribe, rate and review the show on iTunes.
3. Join the Woke & Wired Facebook group

Frequency healer Erin Eber (@erineber) and I are coming together to bring you The Cacao Portal: A 5-Week Expansion Experience – a combination of rituals, working with the plant spirit of cacao, and the alchemy of working with a group. To celebrate the launch, we sat down to share our vision for this experience, and what brought us here.

See all show notes on https://kseniabrief.com

We discuss:

• How Erin and I connected over our love for ceremonial cacao
• What is ceremonial cacao?
• How music led Erin on a mystical healing path
• How she discovered her gift for toning, or Frequency Healing
• Our experiences with plant spirit consciousness
• How Erin discovered cacao in Peru and ended up studying it deeply in Guatemala
• What is a ceremony?
• How is ceremonial cacao different from hot chocolate?
• Why we created the Cacao Portal Experience
• Who is the Cacao Portal for?
• The role that human design played in this collaboration between Erin and I
• What is the 5D realm?
• What is Unity Consciousness?
• Working with plant consciousness
• How Erin left corporate America and never looked back
• Her top lesson from 8 years as a digital nomad
• Divine timing
• Transformation over information
• What role SEO played in Erin finding me
• Erin's experience taking the Conscious Social Media Program

Connect with Erin:

• @erineber
• Erineber.com

Mentioned:

• The Cacao Portal Experience
• Ksenia's "What is cacao ceremony" blog post
• Keith's Cacao
• Legacy Cacao
• Florencia Fridman of Cacao Lab
• Shawn Askinosie shares about direct trade chocolate
• Ksenia's TikTok about ceremonial cacao

Connect with Ksenia:

• kseniabrief.com
• Instagram @ksenia.brief
• YouTube Ksenia Brief
• TikTok @ksenia.brief
• Subscribe, rate and review the podcast on Apple Podcasts
• Follow the podcast on Spotify

In this episode, I interview the founder and CEO of Holisticism (@holisticism) Michelle Pellizzon about growing your email list and the Akashic Records. Welcome to the new paradigm, where the mystic and the realistic co-exist.

See all show notes on wokeandwired.com

We discuss:

• Merging your pragmatic side with spiritual side
• SEO and spirit
• The revenue streams of Michelle's digital platform, Holisticism
• How to build a digital platform and make impact if you have no desire to be an "influencer"
• Making wellness accessible, diverse and inclusive
• Michelle's experience with misogyny while raising capital for her business
• Fundraising vs self-funded digital business
• Consulting as a way to fund your business
• How Holisticism uses email marketing to monetize digital offerings
• How to define boundaries between free and paid offerings
• Michelle's take on brand partnerships
• What to do if you're afraid of sales
• Facing limiting beliefs around money
• What are the Akashic Records?

Mentioned:

• Holisticism Virtual Workshops
• Social Media Energy Hygiene Workshop with Ksenia Avdulova
• My TikTok Experiment

Connect with Woke & Wired:

1. If you enjoyed the podcast, share it with a friend and on your Instagram stories (tag @wokeandwired so I can see it).
2. Subscribe, rate and review the show on iTunes.
3. Join the Woke & Wired Facebook group.

Join the Woke & Wired Portal member community.

New podcast series is here! "My TikTok Experiment" is not about tricks and hacks to get famous on TikTok fast. It's about a mindset shift that will lead to ALIGNED growth on TikTok. I'm not surprised how many people think it's the end of Instagram, and are shifting to TikTok. I don't think it's THAT dramatic, but I do sense a tremendous amount of possibility for freedom of self expression on TikTok. No, you don't have to be 15. No, you don't have to dance. No, you don't have to know how to sing. No, you don't have to be funny (but that's always a bonus in my eyes). In this podcast and video series, I'm sharing my journey on TikTok. This is week one: 30 followers to 3000 followers. Next week I'll share my experience of going 3k-6k. Who's on TikTok? What's your handle?

Watch The time to get on TikTok is now. How to grow on TikTok in 2020 on YouTube.

See all show notes on wokeandwired.com

Connect with Woke & Wired:

1. If you enjoyed the podcast, share it with a friend and on your Instagram stories (tag @wokeandwired so I can see it).
2. Subscribe, rate and review the show on iTunes.
3. Join the Woke & Wired Facebook group.
4. Join the Woke & Wired Portal member community.

Talia Pollock brings humor into the world of wellness. She's an author, storyteller and a plant-based chef. In this conversation recording during the COVID-19 pandemic, she shares her story of building a wellness platform,, how she used her podcast to get a book deal with a top publishing house, and her journey of pivoting her identity as food blogger.

Talia's beautiful, funny and recipe-packed book, Party in Your Plants: 100+ Plant-Based Recipes and Problem-Solving Strategies to Help You Eat Healthier (Without Hating Your Life) is out on April 21, 2020.

We discuss:

• What's been helping her during the quarantine
• Putting human connections first on social media
• Coming out of a social media burnout
• The magic of the "mute" button on Instagram
• How she makes money with her wellness platform, Party In My Plants
• How Party In My Plants allowed her to bring together comedy and plants
• How she got a top publishing deal
• How she got on Dr. Oz
• Why podcasting can be a huge turning point for your business
• How not having IRL social life brought her to social media
• Loneliness as a side effect of becoming plant-based
• Work and identity
• Pivoting your identity is as a food blogger
• What is success?
• Pivoting as a food blogger
• Why now it's more important to show up fully in your light
• How Ksenia got her Instagram account verified

See all show notes on wokeandwired.com

Connect with Woke & Wired:

1. If you enjoyed the podcast, share it with a friend and on your Instagram stories (tag @wokeandwired so I can see it).
2. Subscribe, rate and review the show on iTunes.
3. Join the Woke & Wired Facebook group.