43 - Erica Shoop and the Power of Community 20/05/24

No individual, especially those who are neurodivergent, should feel isolated! Join Samantha as she engages in a conversation with Erica Shoop, exploring the profound impact of community. Negotiating the complexities of neurodivergence comes with its own set of obstacles, and Erica is here to guide you in forging connections with a supportive community that will walk alongside you on this journey! Stay tuned!

Here's what to expect on the podcast:

• The initial signs or symptoms that prompted Erica to consider the possibility of being neurodivergent.

• How can communities actively work to create spaces where neurodivergent individuals feel empowered to express their true identities without fear of judgment or stigma?

• Long-term masking impacts an individual's sense of self-awareness and identity.

• How can being self-employed help parents of neurodivergent children adjust their work schedules to fit their child's unique needs and routines?

• And much more!

About Erica:

Erica is a visionary in the realm of self-employment, rejecting hustle culture and taking a more holistic approach that leverages her rich background in business + life coaching and community building. Erica’s on a mission to guide individuals on a journey of self-discovery that encompasses all aspects of the human experience because being a successful business owner is less fulfilling when other aspects of your life are in ruins. With a unique perspective shaped by her adult ADHD and OCD diagnoses, Erica brings creative solutions to building a livelihood that supports a sustainable and harmonious life.

Connect with Erica Shoop!

Website: https://www.findyourkula.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/findyourkula/

Neurodivergent in Harmony: A Summit for Empowered Parenting: https://link.youcanautomate.com/widget/form/wv9qzX…

Connect with Samantha Foote!

Website: www.boisemusictherapycompany.com

Email: [email protected]

Consultation: https://letsmeet.io/boisemusictherapycompany/30-mi…

TRANSCRIPTION

Are you feeling overwhelmed by your child's unique needs? Wondering how to turn daily challenges into moments of growth? Discover answers at the Neurodiversity in Harmony, a Summit for Empowered Parenting, coming on September 13, 2024. Join us for a day filled with expert insights and real life stories from professionals and parents alike.

All dedicated to autism, ADHD, and other neurodivergent diagnoses. Learn about innovative positive parenting strategies, and gain a deeper understanding of how to support your child's unique journey. Connect with a community that understands and shares your experiences. Whether you're seeking new strategies or some reassurance, this summit is your gateway to an empowered parenting approach.

Seats are limited, so don't miss out. Join our waitlist now to receive exclusive updates and registration details, visit www. boisimusictherapycompany. com today to secure your spot. Embrace the journey of neurodiverse parenting with us. This podcast is for parents like you, navigating the world of neurodiversity with love and compassion.

I'm a neurodivergent mother of three amazing neurodivergent children and a board certified music therapist. Our mission is to create a supportive space where you feel understood, connected, and inspired. With practical tips, strategies, and resources, we'll help you and your child thrive in your unique way.

Join us as we dive deep into the diverse world of neurodivergent individuals exploring topics like ADHD, autism, dyslexia, sensory processing challenges, and more. We'll cover it all to empower, educate, and uplift both neurodivergent individuals. And those who walk alongside them together will create a world where every brain is valued and celebrated.

We're excited to embark on this enlightening journey with you. We are your hosts samantha foot and lauren ross, and this is the every brain is different podcast

Welcome to the every brain is different podcast. You're here with erica shoe And Erica is a visionary in the realm of self employment, rejecting hustle culture, and taking a more holistic approach that leverages her rich background in business and life coaching and community building. Erica's on a mission to guide individuals on a journey of self discovery that encompasses all aspects of the human experience because being a successful business owner is less fulfilling when other aspects of your life are in ruins.

Which I can definitely attest to with a unique perspective shaped by her adult ADHD and OCD diagnoses, Erica brings creative solutions to building a livelihood that supports a sustainable and harmonious life, Erica, we are so excited to have you on the show. No, I'll be too. I have been looking forward to this conversation, Sam for so long, and I'm so grateful for the opportunity to be here with you guys.

Yeah. And I love that you're also diagnosed as an adult with ADHD and OCD because that's what I am. And I just feel like you have a lot to bring to the podcast. So this is exciting. It's a spicy little cocktail to be working with, isn't it? Yeah. Yeah. It's interesting.

So can you tell us a little bit more about how you're involved in the neurodivergent community? Absolutely. So, um, this in this venture for me is relatively new. We started working on Kula about eight months ago, um, building a community for neurodivergent individuals where we can just sort of come together.

Connect with each other, explore, um, figure out how to navigate the unique challenges that our neurodivergence presents and just be a place where we can kind of lift each other up and support each other and grow together through it. Um, so I have been working with other neurodivergent friends on building this community for about eight months, and we are so excited for the doors to be officially open, to be welcoming people in, um, to experience it and just, uh, Just to feel safe to show up completely uncensored, unmasked, um, free to be 100 percent authentic in who you are.

Yeah, I love that you said uncensored and unmasked because I feel like that's where a lot of people Get bogged down. Is there like, Oh, I have to be this way. So I fit in with other people. So other people accept me. And when you take off the mask, it's so freeing, but it's also very anxiety inducing, at least for me.

Absolutely. I would a hundred percent agree with that. I would say like. The, the sort of like late in life realization of my own neuro divergence has had these beautiful moments of like validation where I can like look back in the rear view mirror of my life and be like, Oh, this makes sense. And this makes sense.

And this makes sense now, but then there's also this other very real aspect of it, where you're like, I've been masking so long and I don't. Even know who I am anymore. And I need to sort of untangle who I've been in this persona that I've created. And I need to just sort of get read and like back in touch with who I am and who I want to be and how I want to show up in the world.

Um, and so it's, it's like you're on a seesaw. Sometimes you just kind of tip back and forth and you have these very real highs and lows, which is, you know, if I were doing this alone. I would feel so much more like isolated and, and probably sit in those down moments a lot longer, but that's the beauty of having people around you who can kind of resonate with parts of your story and lift you back up or help you navigate something.

Just kind of walk beside you because, you know, we don't, we don't just need people in the moments when we're having those moments of validation and like high and celebration or recognizing where. Our neurodivergence is our strength. We really need people and community in those moments where things feel hard and tricky and it's okay for us to just kind of show up and be human with all of the messiness.

Yeah, for sure. I know that, um, I have struggled with intrusive thoughts. And so I was talking to someone about that and they're like, Oh yeah, I have those. Like, once a week, I think, like, Oh, I should just drive off the road and crash my car, and I'm like, Okay, that is an intrusive thought, but I have those every half hour.

Like they are constant in my life. And so I felt like I was like a terrible person. Like when I was 13, I just felt like the devil possessed me. And I was a terrible person because I was having these crazy thoughts. And so talking to people who actually. Get it to the extent that you're talking about is very freeing to know that you're not just crazy.

And I don't like using that word, but that's what I felt like. You know, I felt like I was going crazy. And then you, um, you can just talk to people who are like, Oh yeah, I have that too. And then it normalizes it more. And you're like, Oh, I'm not the only one that does this. Absolutely. Yeah. It's so important for us to just share our stories.

more frequently and more openly because when we do and you start to see parts of yourself reflected in someone else, it does, it takes some of the weight off of those feelings that you've had. Because the other thing that we do with our neurodivergent minds is we can get stuck in this like shame spiral.

And it could be a result of like, Rejection sensitivity dysphoria, or like even the perfectionistic tendencies that often come along with a lot of different types of neurodivergence. I feel like that there's little flavors of that all across the board, but when you're so sensitive to rejection, you feel like you can't tell people.

What's going on inside your head for fear that they're gonna like be dismissive or just not understand because all we really want as humans is to feel seen and understood. And so, even in the most like, even in sharing the most like difficult. Even sometimes like brutal aspects of our lives and ourselves, when, when you can just do that with someone else who understands, it just turns into this really beautiful experience, even in the midst of the, of the hard stuff.

And that's like, that has honestly changed the game for me, I think. My experience had I been diagnosed a lot younger would have been completely different because I think that I like younger and when I was younger in my life, like in those years, it wasn't necessarily as, as talked about or as prominent.

I feel like there's a big shift happening, which is really positive and amazing, but now there are so many more opportunities for us to find these connections and be more open and share our stories and actually. Just embrace the challenges and learn to work with them instead of against them. Yeah, for sure.

I know that. I feel like the generation before us, or maybe like our parents, um, they're more of the generation of you suffer in silence. You know, you, you have this problem, but you're just going to keep it to yourself because you're not going to be a burden on other people. You're not going to share with other people.

And it's not that when you share with other people, you're a burden. I think, like you said, it creates a beautiful experience where you can just share with other people. So people don't feel so isolated and think that they're just not. Not normal or they're bad or whatever, you know, um, so yes, I love that.

Can you tell us a little more about how you came to a diagnosis? Like what prompted that? Great question. Um, so I feel like I had, um, I definitely had moments all throughout my life where I noticed. The OCD and my subtype of OCD is like the just right OCD, the perfectionistic type of OCD where I have like very disproportionate, very, um, visceral reactions when things aren't the way that they're supposed to be.

And, and that is where my intrusive thoughts come in. Like I get mad when things aren't the way that they're supposed to be. And then I get more mad that everyone else isn't as mad as me. That they're not like, so it's, it's a real nice little spiral that we go on there. Um, So I think I had moments where I kind of noticed those things, but definitely like push them down or brush them off and just as like, Oh yeah, I'm just super OCD.

And then, um, fast forward to, I entered into this. New partnership that I'm in right now. Um, with my partner and he is neurodivergent. And so at the beginning of the relationship, I was like, I should probably start learning some stuff about neurodivergence because I really want to understand like how he's showing up in this relationship and how I can communicate better with him.

And the more I started reading stuff about ADHD, the more I was like, uh, um, all of those, all of this is hitting a little too close to home for me. And so, um, The, the most prominent thing with ADHD is the rejection sensitivity dysphoria. For me, like that is by far and away the most, um, like prominent trait that I notice in myself, but there are many other examples.

Um, so it was really just a discovery phase of me trying to show up better in this partnership and then in turn showing up, uh, seeing parts of myself in this story. And so I sought out a therapist who specializes in neurodivergence. Um, I don't know. I can't remember exactly how long I've been seeing her, but I literally went into my first session and I was like, hi, I'd like to talk about getting diagnosed with ADHD.

Here's all the reasons I think I will be ADHD. And I just proceeded to absolutely info dump on her for approximately 50 minutes. I don't think she said a single word and she just sat there like nodding her head. And she was like, yep. Yeah. Yeah. All of that checks out. Yeah. I was like, okay, cool. So what do we do now?

So there's, there's all of that. And I still see her on a weekly basis, just trying to sort of like untangle and continue the unmasking process. Because like we were saying before. And it is very much filled with a lot of highs and lows. And she kind of, she kind of warned me about that right in the beginning.

She's like, I mean, there is a lot of validation and sort of understanding this about yourself, but just so you know, it's going to get kind of hard now because you're going to have to go through this whole unmasking process. And I was like, okay, yeah, whatever. And I was like, you know, I've, I've definitely had moments where I was like, she told me, didn't she?

Yeah. Like, yeah. I was warned. Yeah, yeah, I, I get that because you like, you. Bill, you, what am I trying to say, you just noticed new things and you're like, oh, how can I deal with that? Or you notice things that like rejection, sexist, rejection, sensitivity, dysphoria. I just always thought like, oh, I don't like crowds.

People really don't like me like that. I honestly thought that like that people just don't like me. I did not know there was a word for it. And so working through that and changing that mindset of no people like you, it's literally all in your head, you know, so. Yeah. Yeah. I appreciate it. And I've, I've found, I don't know if everyone has this experience, but for me, the ability to find like the language or a label for something that has previously made me feel so alone is like, Oh, not only am I not the only one who feels this way, but there are so many people that they decided to name it.

Yeah. Wow. Okay. Like that's powerful. And it sort of like take some of the weight off of it for me to say like, okay, well now I can name the thing. So now I can show up differently in conflict or in these moments where these things are, are kind of bubbling to the surface. And I can say like, okay, I'm having a moment where I'm feeling really sensitive.

To whatever this like perceived or real rejection is. And here's what I need for support or like, I need to just take a quick five so that I can go reground myself or like re regulate my emotions or, you know, whatever. And, and, and having the names and the labels just gives me the language to be able to communicate more effectively with the people around me and educate them on like how we can show up better for each other in relationships.

Yeah, for sure. I. Love that. Um, what strategies do you have for parents maybe that are raising kids to have OCD and have ADHD? Like what would have helped you as a kid? Um, I, I think I want to preface this with like, I think there has also been a big shift in just parenting strategies in general since our generation.

But I do feel like a huge part. Of, um, of what I've been really navigating and kind of like unpacking in my past and in my childhood was, um, how my OCD was fed with other, with that sort of. Yeah. You mentioned it earlier. Like we don't talk about this. Let's just, you know, let's just push it down, brush it under the rug, keep up appearances.

As long as everything looks great on the outside, then everything's fine on the inside. And like that sort of narrative was very prevalent, um, when we were younger, but that actually feeds OCD. So I think that over time, having my, having my kind of like little compulsions. Fed intensified them. Um, whereas like a lot of what you can do to kind of.

combat some of those OCD symptoms is to like, not feed it to like, give yourself some space and some moments of pause and, and the opportunity to reframe or like write a new story inside your head. Um, but that. That sort of mindset that I feel like we had in our generation growing up was like, everything needs to be perfect.

If you're walking out of the house, you need to look a certain way or like inside the house, it needs to be a certain way and everything needs to be clean. You know, all of these things, I think, um, coming back to your question, like for For parents of kids, it's learn as much as you possibly can about neurodivergence in general, but then about your specific kids and how it shows up for them.

Because I love this phrase that I've seen repeated over and over and over again. And then I neurodivergent community, it's like, if you've met one neurodivergent person, you've met one neurodivergent person. Yeah. Yeah. It truly is. It truly is that way because everybody's got this like unique little cocktail of like, Maybe a whole bunch of different letters, um, beside your name and a whole bunch of different ways in which that stuff shows up in your life.

And so. Learn as much about it as you can in general, but then learn as much about your own children as you can and offer them as many options and encourage them to be curious, because the other thing that I think has been super challenging for me, looking back in the rear view mirror was that when you're told that there's one way to do things.

Like my OCD loves rules. Great. Thank you so much. Give me the exact framework and the exact set of directions and I will stick to it. But then that also goes to the extreme of like rigidity. And I'm like, I'm not, I'm no longer being curious because if it doesn't work the first time I try it, because it's just not vibing with how I'm wired.

Then I start the shame spiral of like, well, I must. I must not be smart enough to do this, or I must not be good enough to do this. And woof, like that can go to some pretty low places. And so, um, encouraging curiosity really to me, just like is teaching me now as an adult and, and can teach kids how to ask for accommodations, ask for what they need, or even just find creative solutions to problems.

Because in most cases, like as long as we're getting to the end result, it doesn't matter how we got there and often neurodivergent brains just think about problems differently or piece things together differently. And as long as we're getting to the end result. It truly doesn't matter. So encouraging the curiosity, I think is just so critical for all of us, not just parents or kids, just literally everyone.

Yeah. I love that so much. As long as you get to the end result, it does not matter how you get there. It. I love that. Thank you so much. Okay, we are going to shift a little bit. I know that you help people, um, who are self employed and I know a lot of parents of neurodivergent kids cannot have the, you know, nine to five job.

They, they just can't. Because there's therapies, their kid needs to be homeschooled. So they need, you know, alternative ways to make money. So can you just give us some strategies like how to be self employed, maybe some strategies or recommendations for success in that area? Because I know it is daunting to get started.

Yeah, it can be. It can be so daunting to get started. And so I think there's there's really. There's three things that I kind of always come back to. I think the thing that I leaned into the most when I was getting started is establishing my core values. And so that could be like for the individual person who wants to create a path to self employment or it could be you sit down as a family and you say like, what do we value as a family?

What things are we going to prioritize? Because my vision for how I want my life to look is that. My life is this sort of like kaleidoscope of all the things that I love the most, things that make me come alive, all of these like people and experiences and hobbies. And my work has to fit into it, not the other way around.

Not, not my life is my work. And then I fit in all these other things around my work. That's how I want to tackle life. But that starts from a place of, I need to know exactly what I value, what things are most important to me. And that could be that list of things that make you come alive or could actually be values.

It could be like, I value. Authenticity. So I want to do something that feels like that just deeply resonates with my soul. And unless I'm doing something that I'm passionate about where I'm chasing my special interest with this, with this thing that I'm taking on, um, it, it has to resonate in order for me to be motivated to do it and to want to like, really build a livelihood around it.

But then for other people, the priority might be. I value time above all else. So I need something that's going to be a little more lucrative with a little, with a lot less time invested so that I have the time and the flexibility to be able to show up for my family or, you know, whatever. So all that to say, it starts with your core values, establish what your values are and how you want to build this life.

Because if you don't have that vision in place and you just start like kind of picking at things or facing things, You're going to end up like a lot of entrepreneurs, especially neurodivergent entrepreneurs who are looking back at like a graveyard of unfinished projects. Cause we, we tend to chase shiny objects, you know, so, so figured out what it is you value the most and how you want your life to look that's step one.

And then step two is, um, going back to the idea of curiosity, like really just getting curious about how you can design your day. Like I, you said in the beginning, it's written in my bio and I just kind of love this idea of like rejecting the scripts. Like there's a lot of narrative out there around.

What it takes to become an entrepreneur and like how to build a business and everything like, again, there's a lot of like rules that you could potentially follow. There's a lot of paths you could go down. It's not going to be right for everybody though. So I would say, like, as you're building and as you're learning, look at everything through the lens of curiosity and say, like, what parts of this actually resonate with me or align with my values.

And what parts don't take the parts you like, leave the parts you don't, um, and really build something that feels like you are just, you're actually excited about it because that's, what's going to be the most motivating to keep you going. Um, and then there is like, there's a lot of strategic things that you need to learn that can feel really overwhelming when you're an entrepreneur that you have to like, kind of be responsible now for all aspects of the business.

So. The huge mistake and misstep I made when I first started my own business was that after 15 years of business coaching, I was like, I can totally do this. I've been telling people how to do it for a really long time. And I tried to do it a hundred percent by myself. I tried to follow that narrative of like, just put your nose down and get quiet and don't tell anybody what you're doing and just hustling around for like six months until you build the thing.

And it didn't work for me for so many reasons. Um, all of which probably trace back to my neurodivergence, but, but like the rejection sensitivity, the imposter syndrome, the perfectionism, it all came on real strong early on in my journey of becoming an entrepreneur. And I stalled out a bunch of times I wouldn't just go in waves where I would like work super hard for like a month or so.

And then I would just shut down. Um, And the thing that I was missing there was people. So you need to find community. You need to find people who can kind of lift you up. You need to find people with complimentary skill sets to your own because it is overwhelming and it is a little bit unrealistic even to expect that you're going to understand all of the different facets of owning your own business.

Um, to the level, which like you, do you understand all the legal aspects? Do you understand all the financial aspects of managing your business? Do you understand marketing strategy? Do you understand sales? Like all of these things are going to come into play when you start your own business, but it's, it's an unrealistic expectation to place on yourself to become an expert in all of them.

So find people who you can collaborate with, share ideas with bounce ideas around. And if you can come together and kind of, Support each other through it. Then it's, it's like that old saying, like the rising tide lifts all those, you all get better together, but entrepreneurship, even though you're doing it by yourself, and even if you're going to be a team of one forever, even if you have no dream to like grow and manage a team or, you know, build this empire of a business, you really just want something to be able to sustain and support your family.

Like, even if you're going to be by yourself forever. You don't have to do it alone and, and more importantly, like, we're really not meant to do anything alone. We are, we are meant to exist in community. And so you will get so much farther and do it so much faster if you find your people and you can support and collaborate with one another as you're all kind of coming out together and walking the same path.

Yes. Yes. So I just have a cool story really fast. Yeah. Yeah. Speaking about community. I made less than 10, 000 in my business in 2019. And then I joined in 2020, I joined polka dot powerhouse and I got community. And there were some other factors that went into this too. Like I got on a list for Medicaid for music therapy that they would refer music therapy clients to me.

And I also quit my nine to five job that I was only working part time at. So, but I joined the community. And I joined Polkadot Powerhouse, and I Did I six times my business that year just because I was working with other women there with my husband calls on my co workers and so I, I grew my business six times over that year and then the next year I did six figures.

Because I was in a community. I wasn't alone. I had motivation. I had accountability. Like they're like, Hey, what are you working on? They would ask me about the projects I was working on. So I was like, Oh, well I need to finish those projects because they're like asking me about them, you know? And so my business has just flourished since I got the community and I wasn't just trying to do it.

By myself. So yes, definitely find your community. Um, because that that's where it's at. Like you don't, I don't know. I, I don't come up with ideas as well, unless I'm talking out loud about them too. And so in polka dot powerhouse, um, they have like masterminds that I can go to, and I can just be like, Hey, this is my problem and all these women will help me.

And then there'll be like. But they won't say you should do this or you need to do this. They'll just be like, have you considered doing this? Like, and they ask clarifying questions. And so that also helps you like narrow in on what you actually want to do in your business. And you're not just, I don't know.

I had to talk out loud to, to do things. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I need to just like hit the stream of consciousness out of my head. So that I can start to make sense of it. 'cause it just comes out in like a jumbled mess. . Yeah, I totally do on that one. Lauren is a person that I usually verbally process to. So, um, yeah.

But it just helps to have other people also, and not just Lauren and my husband because they, I think they might get sick of me sometimes. Fair enough. But also like, I like as much as my partner is like my biggest cheerleader ever. Um, he doesn't own a business or really understand to walk that path. So having other people who are walking that path is so powerful because again, similar to just like.

The navigating your neurodivergence and navigating like the highs and lows of that journey, same thing goes for entrepreneurship. There are highs and lows. If there are good days and there are bad days and having people who are walking the path that can just kind of like sit beside you when you need to, when you need to take a rest on the hard days and then like get up and cheer you on while you, you know, keep walking on the good days, it's, it's everything, it's everything, but then also, yeah.

Again, just like filling those knowledge gaps or even just. You know, you mentioned like mastermind groups. Like I, I do, like, I'm going to offer group coaching. I have like the livelihood lab inside the cooler community where we talk about building a livelihood. We do body doubling sessions for, for the ADHD folks.

Um, you know, we do all of those things. And so it, it can just be. So powerful, because, you know, just like neurodivergence can feel a bit lonely sometimes, so can entrepreneurship. But, when you find your people, I mean, such beautiful things happen, that was a beautiful story you shared. That is the power of community, that's why I love this so much.

Yeah, for sure. Do you feel like you're failing as a parent of a neurodivergent child? You're tired of cookie cutter advice that doesn't work for you or your child's unique needs. Do you feel like you're navigating this journey alone? You aren't alone. Join us each month for the Parenting Power Sessions, Autism and ADHD, where you'll discover not just support but real, actionable strategies tailored to the unique needs of your family.

Every second Wednesday of the month at noon Mountain Time. We explore topics like positive discipline strategies, understanding neurodivergence, and enhancing self regulation skills for you and your child. Each session includes 20 minutes of expert led teaching, followed by a 10 minute Q& A where you get answers to your most pressing questions.

Best of all, it's completely free! Sign up today and join a community of parents just like you who are ready to transform their challenges into strengths. Visit www. BoiseMusicTherapyCompany. com to register. It's time to feel empowered as a parent. Yeah. So that's why I love it. I love community. I love, um, just talking with other people because you're right.

Entrepreneurship is lonely. Um, I have, I even have a team of people, but I'm the owner. I'm not on the same level. I'm not worrying about the same things that my team is worrying about. I'm worrying about my team and getting them paid. And if they're happy in their job and if they're with the right clients and all of that.

And their, their job is to worry about providing the best service for their clients. And so it's just, it's very different. The jobs that we have. Um, yeah. Do you have any resources other than the Kula community, which you can definitely talk about more? Um, but any other resources like downloads or anything that people can get?

Yeah, absolutely. My, um, my coaching page on our website has a free download for walking you through the process of establishing your core values, which. Helps you set that foundation. If you do decide that you want to try to take on entrepreneur entrepreneurship and, and build this life, build it around your core values, because it just gives you this very, um, grounding tool.

And you'll need that grounding in moments when like, inevitably, like people have feelings or opinions about whatever you're doing and the haters come along. If you can look back and say, is what I did in alignment with my core values. Yes. Okay. Then we're good. Don't, don't need to worry about that or waste any more energy thinking about that.

Or it's like, do I want to take on this new project? Is it in alignment with my core values? Yes. Let's do it like, or no, great. Then we're not going to chase that shiny object. Yeah. It just gives you such a, like a place to kind of ground yourself and anchor yourself as you build the thing. Um, and so it's the thing that I always work with first when I'm working with my coaching clients and helping them build their businesses, it really sets your foundation.

So I've put together a whole guide around it. Um, And yes, the community itself, we've got a private community platform, um, which we did with a lot of thoughtful intention because we have some really big and really heavy conversations sometimes inside that platform because being a human being is a little bit messy sometimes, but we wanted there to be this element of safety for people who showed up and were authentic and vulnerable inside that space.

We don't necessarily want it to just be like a free and open community. We want people to come in who are really invested in that, like, we know that that vulnerability can be such a great pathway to connection and depth with other human beings who are going through the same or similar things that we are.

And so we created this private community platform, but you can check it out with a one week free trial. Oh, I love that. Yeah. And I've checked it out. It's. It's. That's pretty awesome. So definitely go check that out. And I love the core values that you were talking about because it does give you permission not to do something.

So you might, you don't need to have FOMO. You don't need to worry that you're missing out on like this great opportunity. Who was, I was listening to a podcast about this. Oh, it was Amy Porterfield's latest podcast where she was like mapping out her year and you map out. Like when you're going to do your promotions, when you're going to do all this stuff to, to make the money that you want to make.

And she said, if you map it out and you have those things, you want to follow it by 90%. And so you have 10 percent wiggle room, but. If someone comes to you and they say, Oh, I want you to be an affiliate for this, but their promotion time is the same time as your promotion time. You can be like, I'm sorry, I can't do it this year.

I plan out my year in October for the next year. If you want to let me know, like in September or before that, then I can put your plan into my plan for the next year. But it gives you permission to just not do it and not worry about it because you've already established that value. Right. I love that.

For my little, first of all, Amy Porterfield's Dan, love her. Yeah. She's, she just drops wisdom left and right out there for other, um, online entrepreneurs, but you're exactly right. Like especially for, again, the neuro divergence, you have rejection sensitivity or people pleasing tendencies. Like it's so easy for us to overcommit, overestimate what we're capable of achieving in a certain amount of time.

Chase shiny objects or worry about what someone will think if we say no, but when you've established your core values and you are crystal clear on who you are and what you want your life to look like, it becomes a lot easier for you to say no. Yes. Reground yourself back into that, into that place. And then some of those other feelings start to fade away.

Yeah, exactly. Oh, I love that. You have given us so many good strategies and so much wisdom. I love it. Thank you so much for coming on the show. Our last question is, what do you do for fun? Oh, what do I do for fun? Well, if you can see behind me, there's a very, very large bookshelf. I'm a, I'm a little bit of a nerd.

I love to read. I love to just kind of absorb information. A lot of the books behind me though, like, I mean, building businesses and just entrepreneurship is my special interest. So a lot of what I read is personal and professional development or things that are going to help me or my clients. Um, so I do, I do love all of that.

Um, But beyond that, if I'm just like planning a super fun day, um, I, one of the things that I love the most is going into like small towns and going into the little like mom and pop or like locally owned shops and looking at all of the things that like local creators have made, like all of the pottery or like the art or the handmade jewelry or like handbags, I.

will never get tired of the limitless brilliance and creativity of humanity. Like I love absorbing it. Even if I don't like buy anything, it's just being in the presence of people who have like had the courage to put something that they're passionate about or excited about out into the world. There's something like so beautiful about the energy.

And I just love popping around little shops like that, that kind of showcase local artists and, and things like that. Oh, that's awesome. I love it. Yeah, I like going to small towns too, and Idaho has a wealth of them, so, yeah, um, well, thank you, what? Thank you so much. Yeah. Thank you so much for coming on the show.

We really appreciate it. Thank you so much for having me. Thank you for everything that you guys are doing to sort of educate and just normalize all of these things that can be hard and tricky about being neurodivergent and just, you know, the more we have these conversations, the more we're going to like kind of build bridges, you know, I don't love the idea of like the S versus them, like the neurodivergent versus the neurotypical, these types of conversations that you're having and giving people a platform for.

Build a bridge between the two and I think the work that you're doing is amazing. So thank you. Oh, well, thank you

She is amazing and I want to be her friend I I could have a whole Whole other episode just rehashing the things that she talked about Uh, one of the big things I want to put out there, um in the beginning. She's talking about uh being uncensored and unmasked and and having that safe space and and I recently Uh, heard a quote that really resonated with that for me.

Um, I don't remember word for word, but it was essentially like, Life isn't about trying to figure out who you are and who you want to be. Like life is, um, it's stripping away from like everything that you've not necessarily been taught, but like stripping away everything so that you can show who you've always been.

Um, and I feel like that was her vibes, like with business and everything. And, and I really love that because. Again, we get caught up in masking and trying to fit in and trying to do the things that we think we're supposed to be doing and, and sometimes we forget that maybe that's really not who we are.

Um, yeah. And so, and I think that also, you know, translating into establishing your own business and The first thing starting with is, who are you? What are your core values? Like, how do you want to live? And then don't, like, what she said, don't make work your life and then fit stuff around it. Like, figure it out how that's going to fit in your values and how you want to live and go off of that.

And so that was one of the things that really stuck out to me and I really, uh, liked that. Yeah, definitely. If you don't get your values, then when you get opportunities, you'll be like, Do I want to do this? I don't know if I want to do this. It, you know, does it feel good? Does it not feel good? But if you have your values in line first, then you just be like, Does this align with my values?

So if like, for example, right now, I have a waiting list for music therapy. And I want to take those clients on so bad, but summer is coming and I want to spend time with my kids and family is one of my core values. And so I'm not going to work 10 hours a day every day while my kids are at home for the summer.

Yeah, yeah, it goes back to giving you that permission to say no, like, yeah, it's okay that I'm not going to do that because I'm still fitting with my core values. I really love that. Um, another thing that she talked about that kind of stuck out to me. Um, and I think it's really important is, you know, I'm, uh, asking.

You know, what do you recommend for parents and stuff and just finding the information and learning and being able to learn not only for your children, but in her case for her spouse to like that's how this all started essentially for her and I think that's so important because especially to maintain like I think just happy relationships in general with either a spouse or your child because that's where you're going to Learn to compromise and to be curious and think outside of the box of how these things are going to work within our, you know, family.

And you can't do that if you're not willing to learn about what's going on with them. Um, and so I, I like that she talked about that as well. Yeah, she had so many good things to say. That was, I think I really liked what she said about. Learning about neurodivergence in general, but learning about your specific type, your child's specific type, your partner's specific type, learning about those specific things, and then Not just saying like, oh, my kid has autism, so he's like this.

But once you've met one neurodivergent person, you met one neurodivergent person. And so learning specifically about what helps your child in different situations and not just being like, well, this helps all people with autism because it doesn't. Yeah. Um, and then the, the I think I said last thing last time, but another thing too is going back to that community and finding your peop finding your people.

I think the American culture lately is very selfish and indivi individualistic and how can I myself succeed and Without thinking of other people and I think that we need to start going back to the community and how much that actually does benefit you and, and you, you know, a real life example of how I stopped trying to do it alone and I got help, people who had different expertise and, and different things and yes, I'm really great at giving you emotional support and boosting your morale and stuff, but you still need people who have the knowledge, you know, of what you're trying to accomplish and so again, it's okay, but to ask for help and you don't have to go it alone and there is community and if you just embrace it like You can flourish.

So I really, I really like that as well. Yeah, definitely. If you are thinking about becoming an entrepreneur, check out her community. I've been in it and it's phenomenal. She is so fantastic at creating the community and just helping entrepreneurs. Because I know for a lot of People who have neurodivergent kids or are neurodivergent themselves, like having a nine to five job.

Or just having a typical job is just so hard. It's not it. They need the flexibility. Yeah, yeah. It's not it. They need the flexibility. They need, they need what they can build their own schedule around their life. Yeah. I'm really excited to check out her stuff. Cause I know my boyfriend is trying to do his own little business and he has ADHD to the extreme.

And so I'm excited to, to share some of her stuff with him and, and see how that goes. So yeah, keep you all updated. We'll, we'll report back. Yeah. So, well, thank you for listening to this episode. Let us know what you thought. Give us a shout out on Instagram, um, or Erica or both of us and yeah, leave a comment or leave a review is what I was trying to say.

Leave a review. Rate us. That really helps. Um, the ratings so that we can share this show with other people. So thank you for listening. Thank you for listening to this episode. We hope the discussion on neurodiversity has provided you with support, understanding, and inspiration. If you found our podcast valuable, please share it with others who may benefit from our insights and leave us a rating and review on Apple Podcasts.

Hit the follow button and let's keep exploring the fascinating world of neurodiversity. Click the link in our show notes to visit our website for a free download of three tips for a stronger relationship with your child.