Episode 17 c: Overcoming Adversity: The Inspirational Story of Vivace Max Victor

A discussion on overcoming trauma by embracing self-love, taking small steps, seeking effective coaching, and relying on inner guidance.

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I wanted to say being a coach and this is something that, you know, popped up while you were speaking on when the men come to you. It's interesting because it's only my imagination. They must come to you because they're seeing a life coach. So I need more money, I need more business, I need to be more aggressive. But at the same time, it seems like you sort of have to break them down to get all the other issues out of the way so they can open up to be more successful. Do a lot of guys just want to jump right into, hey, make me more money?

100% I've helped so many people do this. And so majority of my you know, I've been on a couple of shows. People come from the shows, but that was a while back, or they'll see me on network television or whatever.  But a majority of my people come through referrals, so they'll say, Hey, you helped so-and-so do blah, blah, blah, help me do it, blah, blah, blah.

So of course they come in from that angle. And again, I have to meet them where they're at. They'll start with that and then we can look at the underlying issues. If you have a lot of you know, if you have a solid track record and they trust you, they sort of submit. But also I have a lot naturally, I just have a lot of male energy. So you can tell I'm not passive. So I do really well with these alpha males because I can match their their tone and their intensity. And then I could just like slowly bring in some feminine energy and then it gets rid of their resistance and they kind of melt. They melt. And by the way, all my coaching, because people are always shocked by this is done by Fox.

It's not like they're seeing I they don't see me. And I've worked with one of many clients that I've never seen them. I don't know what they look like. So you don't do this .  For me I think I would prefer like what we're doing is or a phone call. No none it is and it's actually much more productive. First of all, I'm taking copious notes.

The entire time. Imagine if I were taking notes this entire time we were talking. It would be maddening for you. So, yeah, I'm taking tons of notes, and also, like, we don't want there to be any sort of like sex. I mean, I don't want there to be sexual energy with man. I don't want there to be any transference.

I don't want any of that shit. I want you. I've got a fucking problem. Come to me. I'll help you fix it. But no, there's no visual representation of me. It's literally old school by phone. Old school, this is it. Actually the landline, I need to go online. Yeah that’s great. I would thought that the only other thing I want to mention is, you know your girlfriend said? And I think she's 100% right. If you're dating someone, Either they have to or have been or are currently seeing someone because it's the only way they work on their issues. And I don't care who you are, you have issues.

So every videos has issues and when I was a coaching client just for clarification. I wasn't a friend. But yeah, everybody has issues. You need someone and not everyone needs a therapist or a coach. Like you could have a brother, you could have a sister, you could have a like a really aware, conscious parent who can give you feedback. The problem is a lot of times people have so much family drama with their family members that even when the family members are giving them great feedback, they won't listen to them. So I've coached when I'm not coming down on men, but like I've coached men where they're like, My wife does this to me all the time.

I'm like, Well, did you listen? Like, No, it's fine. I'll do it now. And in a lot of them, they're like my wife likes you so much because half the time I'm batting for the wife and not because I'm a feminist, because I'm like, She's fucking right. And sometimes I be like, Yo, I'm not with her on this one.

Like, this is why, you know, she needs to straighten out. So but I think, yeah, I think it's really, really important again to meet someone where they are. And then to your point, yes, please get some help, even if it's from your priest or your old teacher or a mentor or somebody. It is very challenging living in today's world in 2024 with constantly being bombarded with messages, social media, emails, campaigns everywhere, it's like your brain feels like Times Square. It's like so overwhelming. You need someone to come and like, put it into cute little categories for you so you can manage one piece at a time and you could feel sane and that you can get much faster results by actually talking about your problems in real-time.

Yeah, I do agree with that. And I just got to say, the the world right now is in such a bad state of affairs that. I can I do believe most of us, not most of us, forgive me, but a lot of people are angry, frustrated. Look at who our leaders are. Look at who we have to choose feminist. And it's so frightening and scary to have to deal with that. And I had another thought and there was something having to do with something I learned in program. And it said it talks about If you going through hell, keep going.

That's a fact right there.

Yeah. If you're going through hell, keep going. And you know, I have a faith that's enough to say whatever happens out there, I'll be fine. And I'm grateful for that. A lot of people don't have that. But as you said, it takes years and a lot of work to get there.

Even on day one,like don't focus on like, Oh my God, it's going to take me. I have a client of mine, She's from overseas. She's like, favorite, but it's going to take nine months. And it was a business thing she was referencing and this was like the time frame for that business thing to occur. And I said, Well, you can either do it in nine months from now, you'll have the result, or nine months from now you'll be right where you are and you won't have the result like the nine months are going to happen anyway. So do you want the results or not? So I think people get over on like, it's going to take so long, but do you want to suffer for that long?

And literally if you go to the right person, it's like talking to like your ladies, like your girlfriend when you talk to her for 30 seconds and she's like, I only have 30 seconds and you're upset about something and you tell her in 30 seconds she says one thing and you're like, ding, ding, ding. right. The world opens up and you have peace of mind in your calm again. There are so many coaching clients. Jay, Literally, I'll send them a one-sentence answer because I can't be on text all day, right? So like, text is not included in the coaching, but with my client I want to support them and nobody abuses the text. But if they have a problem and they're like, Hey, I'm going to this meeting. It's in 20 minutes and blah, blah happened.

What do I do? I can just quickly write them like one sentence, two sentences, five sentence, leave them quick little voice note That little piece can be everything. So if you're getting help, like allow that little piece to happen and don't just wait for like the perfect time when you'll have time and then you'll do it because that day is never going to come.

So get immediate help now. And literally, if they make you feel a little bit better, where you have access to your power and your grace and your might, it is priceless. So I don't care. It could be your cousin, but please go talk to them. Excellent. Excellent. And I finally remembered what I wanted to say. So like for myself.

And this is truth. When there's a lot of mayhem going on and true serenity is peace amongst the storm, not, you know, So the storm can be going around me and I that's where I have to find my peace. And I also know this another program saying.  I think I bought that Serenity pen from you.

You know, when you click on the top. Yeah and it says the whole prayer. Yes Yeah, that's great. And another good one is this too shall pass no matter where you are in life, this too shall pass. Just continue moving forward and this too shall pass. You know, it's I went to a group therapy and in the group this was not the original types of people who couldn't help me.

This was in the recent years I went to this group therapy place. This is a couple of years ago, and they, they had this plaque on. And I had never done group therapy before, so I didn't know how it worked. So but they had this plaque on the wall, and when they did orientation, they showed us this plaque. And I was like, What the fuck is this? So they're like, Do you see that? I'm like, Yeah, I see the sign and the sign said, Trust the process.

Yes.

Okay,I saw your sign. Now what? And then they're like, Okay, well, we just want to remind you that over the next few days, emotions are going to come up and you're going to feel that it may. And when those things happen, that we just want you to trust the process. And it was really interesting because it was perfect that they pre-framed us with this trust, trust the process, because during those days we all went nuts. Like at different times people were hysterically crying about whatever the hell our traumas were. And then it was like the refrain was trust the process.

And when you want to blow your, you know, like your head's going to, like, blow up, you want to pull your hair out, it is so hard to trust the process, but I think it's really empowering to have the slogan, because I'm telling us that the slogan actually helped us when we were feeling insane. And when we graduated from that program, they had us line up. It was really cute and. they gave us each a little keychain It was like a $2 keychain, that's a trusted process on it. So people trust the process.

I agree. Trust the process. I remember when I when I was going through my stuff, my brother said, Listen, I don't want you to make any decisions on your own. Nothing, because I was just sober and I was a mess. And he says, I want you to ask somebody about everything that you're going to do and get some feedback. And now he mentioned, you know, the people with time and program and things like that. And he says, you don't worry about anything because no decision is your own. And in that first year, that's what I needed. I was not capable of making my own decisions. So trusting the process is wonderful.

And in a program, right, you guys have the language, right where someone comes to qualify, which means they come to share their story and the lingo is they're going to share their experience, strength and hope. I think it's so powerful to if you're feeling like you can't help yourself or you're overwhelmed or you just can't process it, go to someone who's sharing their experience, strength and hope, and those stories when I was in the agonizing pain, were extremely, extremely healing. Just hearing people share their story in the format of experience, strength and hope like that was the format.

So hearing someone's story can be really helpful. I just I appreciate what you're saying, Jay, that you weren't in the space to do it yourself. So listen to other people's experience, strength and hope and them giving you guidance where maybe you weren't clearheaded enough to see the alternatives.

Yes, absolutely. I was not. All right. I have some more questions for you.

I have some more answers for you. I'm so happy You mentioned Grace entered your life. Yes. Does that mean to you were you raised believing in God?

No, I was raised being beaten every day. But God, I believe in God today. Like I always believed in God when I was being beaten. I remember like, hiding my head and trying to protect myself from the oncoming blows. Blows? Exactly. Different types of blows I was receiving constantly. And I remember just as a little girl being this in a ball shaking and thinking, this is not what God wants.

Yeah, I just always had it. My father’s dad was like a rabbi-ish but he died when I was very young. My father was psychotic. He was like, I'm pretty sure if he had ever gone to therapy, he would have been at least sociopathic. So definitely mentally very, very, very, very ill, severely. So it was just like this inherent thing of like this is not what God wants. So for me, Grace is just the the force that the thing, the light, the force that protects you and that takes a stand for you and that helps you when you can't help yourself. So when I say grace saved my life, it's the moment that I was a few days away, like literally a few days

Was it  for specific moment. What you remember when it came into your life?

No. Well, I think no, not like that. I just I think it's always there. It's omnipresent, but it's hard to believe it's omnipresent when you're being tortured and traumatized all the time. But I felt like I knew our household was bizarre. But I also knew that that wasn't normal people I don't know. I just had this understanding. And when I was a little girl, you know, I would go into the yard in Iran and I would there were these random stray cats that would come to your to your guard.

Like we had a it was a big property, but somehow there would be these random stray cats that were just like, I don't know how they'd get there, but they'd somehow get there. And then so I actually had a relationship with these cats. They, they saved my life. I would go and I would talk to the cats.

And even my dad, who was like a total whack job, he would say, you call them. I mean, they would come from the end and end of the property. I would say their names and they would like bullet towards me, like I had a relationship with these with these cats. So which is why I'm like now the cat lady.

And so I have three cats now and I would have 50, but I'm not allowed in my building. I had to actually gets permission to get the third one because our lease only allows two. So that one is the emotional support animal legitimately so. But these like there was so much grace in these cats showing up for me.

There was like these cats were everything. They were loving, they were kind, they nurtured me, they saw me, which was shocking because nobody was seeing me. The cats saw me, they heard me, they understood me, and we had a relationship. So there was so much grace in these cats just being there for me because I knew for a lot of it I had the cats.

Yeah, I now own a tiny little Yorkie, a £6 Yorkie, and it is, with no exaggeration in my daughter. I love it. It follows me everywhere. I take so much of my day up. I have to, this dog has made me, trained me to play with her twice a day and to walk her twice a day. And sometimes I want to go out in the morning and go play pickle ball. But I think of the love that I have for her, and I choose to walk her and play with her first. And I'll play less pickle ball. But it's what an animal can do for us in our lives is there are no words to explain it.

Yes. And, you know, this is actually a real fact. Real fact, as many people do not leave our household of domestic violence, because I speak a lot of them, domestic violence, because they don't want to leave the pets.

wow. That's very interesting. That's amazing.

Yeah. I saw on TV once and I was like, wait, what? And it was a real thing. It was it's a real thing that the pet is a huge consideration because that's the person is that pet. It's  like your child. It is. It's you love it so much.

All right. So I'm not sure if you want to get into this, but I know you said I’m get into it. All right. So I know you for a lot of years and I know what you have overcome, which is absolutely fascinating to me. But I remember maybe four or five years ago, you came into me and you were suffering from I may be wrong, but something like Lyme disease. I didn't have Lyme disease, but I had like a whole bunch of I had everything wrong with me.

So I to this day, we haven't quite sorted. Physical stuff physical Problem. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So one day, suddenly I had a problem with my stomach and I was like, That's weird. go away. Because I never had mental issues, emotional issues. I didn't have physiological issues. So I was just like, This is weird. Why do I have the stomach ache?

And then, like, it got progressively worse and worse and worse and worse where I was like, feeling terrible and I wouldn't even working in medicine, I hated doctors, I hated nurses, I hated hospitals. I didn't just wanna have it do with, right? So but I was like, I think I should go to a doctor. Shocker. So I went with my mom.

My mom, because I couldn't understand my constellation of symptoms. And again, I had a medical license and I didn't understand what it was like. I couldn't figure it out. And so my mom said there was this there was this guy and this woman had some weird thing going on with her and he fixed her. So we went to Long Island.

We go to this guy and he has he gets all my labs and it was tons of labs. If you have people if your audience has had autoimmune issues and chronic fatigue, whatever, you probably had every lab done anyway.  I'm with her and he's looking at the labs and he said he's like, you're sick. And I'm like, I'm not sick. I'm just not feeling well, right? Because I've never had him push it. And he's like, No, you're sick. And I'm like, I'm not sick. And then he said, Did you know, you could be in bed for the rest of your life.

And I was like, Wait, no, no, I got other issues now. So my Mom was there and she heard this conversation, and then I just got started in 2012, and I got progressively worse and worse and worse and worse.

I had chronic fatigue for two years where I would just do coaching calls, my doctor sleep. I slept for two years. I'd be so tired I couldn't get up to brush my teeth. I was so tired I couldn't go until the literally we had a deli in the corner of our street. I couldn't go to the deli to buy anything. My neighbor would be nice to someone who was going to watch my kids. She was nice, like she'd be, Do you need something? I look like shit. so I've had incredible. I've spent over $100,000 of my own money in addition to health insurance. There is like tons of issues. And I believe that when you have so much disregulation from trauma that somehow, like the body reaches the threshold, then it gives up.

And so I'm. Is that how you got from the issues that caused this.They don't know it was a constellation of things and I still have some issues and they don't know. So I went to so many different doctors. I paid ridiculous consultation fees like $1,200 for an appointment, $800, like insane amounts of money, thousands. And no one could get to the root of it. And there is a, I will plug a book that I love. There is a book by this man. I don't know him. I have nothing to do with him, but I just love his book. His name is jeffery Rediger.

You guys should sell this book. It's Rediger. And the book is called Cured as in you were cured.

So I found Jefffrey because I kept putting in my symptoms and I would put my symptoms in spontaneous remission, whatever was spontaneous remission. And the years because it's been so many years, it's been 12 years. I keep Googling spontaneous remission because I'm like, I know there are people who've had cancerous tumors and they've had spontaneous remission. So why can't they make whatever this has to go away?

And that was part of the reason why I started to share my story too, of like, maybe it's all this stuff that I never shared before, right? Like, I was like, Share it. Maybe I'll heal. I shared. I didn't heal. I mean, I healed a lot, like 90%. But there's still that 10% that is very upsetting on a daily level still.

So I got this guy, Jeffrey, right in his book. And in his book he has he's a Harvard M.D. so he didn't wasn't some random who just wrote a book. So in this book, he has case study after study after study of all these people who had, like inoperable tumors or whatever their malfunction was, and then they spontaneously healed and they went through the steps.

Now, I haven't been able to use it, but in fairness, I didn't fully dedicate myself to it. But there is this one chapter. It's chapter nine. It's my favorite part of the whole book. It's about your identity and how your identity has to change. Apparently, I haven't changed my identity enough for the thing to go away. So 90% better. I'm actually now reminded I should go back to the book and do Chapter nine again, but I've actually done Chapter nine with my clients because if they come up with something, I'm like this Chapter nine, let's go to Chapter nine or just jeffery rediger’s book. I'll use any resources to help them. So that is one thing that is really helpful. But unfortunately, I still have daily symptoms that are very unfortunate and drive me nuts. But I still say 90% is good. 

when you never well, one day something bothers you and it's a physiological thing and you spend so much time, money, resources energy trying to fix it. And I took I mean, I took all these prescriptions that God knows I would never want to take, like bushels of prescriptions because of supplements.

Yeah, I had everything done. I had like a breath test done. I had an endoscopy, I had a colonoscopy, I had a sigmoidoscopy, I had this thing, You don't want it here that I had. Like I had everything. I had a radioisotope test. I ate a radioactive egg so they could follow the, like, crazy shit. Like I went to a psychic medium. Like, I literally tried everything I could. He was supposed to, like, heal people did were like, none of this. It's every day when you have a medical issue every day and it's been 12 years, It will wear on you even if you're 80% better, because it's like, Wait, what am I doing wrong? Why isn't the other 10% better? And sometimes, like, it's like 90%, but some days are bad days and those days are like for anyone who's had chronic issues, the bad days you're fucked. Like it's not, Hey, I'm 90% better. You go backwards. So it's pretty maddening.

I have a strong feeling that first of all, it's very, very tough when something is gnawing at you and it stays with you for a long time. But I'm confident in the knowledge of knowing you and how you live your life. There will be a point where this is in the past. Amen to that. Yes. All right. Are you ready to continue. Yes, Yes. I’m Alright. Oh, you're on board. So let me ask you this. Can you share more about your journey from leaving your career in the medical to becoming a coach? I mean, the medical interesting is financially wonderful. It's a fantastic business that will never end. People need it. What made you make the change?

So,I hated my job. So I did. I hated my job from the get-go. I hated medicine to begin with. But again, I did it so no man could control me. But the one thing that I did, like I worked in, I was a surgical P.A. in cosmetic surgery, because cosmetic plastic surgery. So plastic surgery has basically like two broad categories. One is cosmetic and the other is reconstructive. Reconstructive plastic surgery is heartbreaking, totally heartbreaking. So as part of my training, I had many rotations and plastic surgery, but not a lot in reconstruction because I'm too sensitive and it's so heartbreaking. So I was like, okay, I hate medicine. And the other rotations that I had, like surgical ICU people would die and they would die in front of me.

And it was horrible. And I didn't I didn't want to get immune to it and I just didn't like it. So I'm like, okay, what can I pick that would is conducive to me staying sane, even though I hate the actual core curriculum here. And so I decided to do plastic surgery as and I did four of my elective rotations in plastic surgery, and I ended up working as a surgical in plastic surgery.

So our interop, I like operating, cutting, sewing, giving prescriptions, taking care of people post-op like I did all of that. But I was very, very bored because I'd be in the operating for hours and it would be like literally like the same four people because it's the surgeon, you, the anesthesiologist, and maybe another person like a circulating. Typically you would have the circulating nurse, but the circulating nurse can like, well, they shouldn't, but they can come in and out of the room. Maybe, maybe so It was the same people. And I'm like, and you're standing in there for hours and hours and hours with these same fucking people that you've been talking to day after day after day. It's maddening. I didn't like the work, so it's not like they enjoy in the work. I didn't have any joy in the work.

I have joy in like talking to people. And it's interesting, like I found because I worked with 15 different surgeons at some point I was an independent contractor. So it's just like working with these people independently and you know, they would sometimes they would share judgments about the patients. Like if we're doing liposuction, like a patients fat or abdominal class, you guys are like judging the patient.

And I would it would drive me nuts. And I would say, you know, that there's awareness under anesthesia and they would say there's no awareness under anesthesia, Like, obviously it's unconscious. How could they have awareness? And I'm like, imagine me trying to be like, but their soul knows their unconscious mind is wide open. They're looking like this. And they would tell me they're like, You're amazing at what you do.

It's just like, Zip it, but they don't want to hear all that stuff. So the one thing I loved about the cosmetic surgery, which was the only thing I loved about it, was that there would be this transformation and that I found really just like, intoxicating because a patient will come and this has everything to do with the coaching. So a patient would come and this is how it works in cosmetic surgery at. Least when I was working in it, a patient would come and you have their pre-op photo on the wall, right? This is what they look like right now. And many times since it's elective surgery, they can elect what they want to look like on the end.

It's not like someone's having their gallbladder out and there's no options, right? You just take out the gallbladder. Or if it's like transplant surgery, you just get the heart. You have no choice in asking bells and whistles and cosmetic surgery. You can ask for whatever bells and whistles you want. So typically in the offices that I worked in, patients would bring their preferred after pictures. So they would go to magazines and they'd say, I want to look like this person. And so we would have their pre-op picture on the wall, and then we'd have their preferred post-op picture. And then the whole goal of the surgical team is to match their end goal ideal right to and create that transformation for them.

Watching that part like that to me was like the end of it like when they transplant. Like I loved the transformation, especially if it made them so happy. Now some people have the transformation and they weren't happy at all because their problem was never their appearance. They thought their appearance was the issue, but it was their psychology was the issue. Like their mind was the issue. So their body looked better, but they were just miserable because they were miserable people who didn't have a good relationship with themselves. It didn't matter how much surgery that. So that was interesting. Anyway, so the goal was I like this idea of the before picture and then the after picture. So when I got up and I left medicine, this was after I had like done all my whole, like being suicidal time. And I got to the other side. I went to a two day seminar and this is why I'm saying help yourself.

Like, I tried so many things for myself. So this two day seminar was called literally the change was the I Can Do It seminar. That's what it was called. It was a two day event and every hour they had a new speaker come in. And so I went with my mom. And at that point we had been speaking. And then at the end of day one, I wrote my letter of Elite, my leave of absence. Meanwhile, I never went back. Yes, because I was like, I can do it. So and I suffered for 12 years because I felt so impotent. I felt powerless. I felt afraid. I felt like I had a real career, as you mentioned, something that would always be long-lasting. I always had work. I in the 12 years. Do you know how much I hated medicine? In the 12 years I worked, I never had a business card Because I was in denial. I wanted to have nothing to do with it. I have one photo of me wearing scrubs, and that was in a magazine that was published.

I only have like a couple other random photos here and there. Maybe somebody took me in scrubs. I don't even know where they might be. I just didn't to have anything to do with it. I didn't want to chronicle it. I don't have anything but I'm just curious what made you get into it then? Why did you choose menopause?

Because I know I wanted no man to control me. I'm not saying it's logical. I just knew that in order to have a consistent career in my brain washed brain, I had thought my only two brainwashed options were to either go the legal route because that's in our community that everyone was a doctor or a lawyer. So I was brainwashed.

I was like, okay, these are two choices. I'm not crooked enough to be an attorney, right? And so like, let me do this other thing. Now, the choices were not what I wanted to do, but I didn't know I could do what I wanted to do. Plus, I didn't have money to do what I wanted to do. So I took student.

I was like, okay, this is a path where I just have to pay back the student loans. So that became a thing. So anyway, I went to that I Can do it seminar and then I started. I had done it piecemeal in the past where I had done presentations and I had spoken. I I'd done like there was a man named Bob Proctor or some people know him from The Secret.

So a million years ago I was one of his facilitators while I was working in medicine of it was called The Science of Getting Rich, and I would do SDR for short I would facilitate by myself in New York SDR the seminar for the whole weekend. So it's speak 8 hours Saturday or Sunday. So I had done it, but I had never done it as a business and I didn't know how to do it as a business because I had medical skill sets. I didn't have marketing or sales skillsets, but I just decided to. I said, if I give a seminar, I trademarked the word power seminar. So I'm like, if I give a power seminar Once a month for ten consecutive months, then I'm sure like I'll get coaching clients. And back then which like the numbers are nowhere near each other now.

But I started it with I was like, okay, what is the least amount of money that I can charge that I could just pay my student loans? So back then I was like, If I do coaching for $97 an hour, I'll get a bunch of people to be like less resistance, right? And so, like, all these people came. And then so within one calendar year I had gone from and this is 12 years ago, I had gone from $97 an hour to 350 an hour. And so and then obviously I went way above that afterwards. But I just I kept doing it. And the thing is like my type of coaching. I tell people we're going to do two things on every call.

We're going to process and you have to take action. You can't just be like, Unless someone has like severe, severe trauma, which one? Of course you need a lot of processing time. But by the time the people that I have, you know, high-functioning people who have, you know, successful careers, but they just want more of everything, it's very important to process the feelings while you're taking action.

So I was doing what I was saying. I'm like, just get up and do it. So I just got up and I did it. And then it's interesting, the next last Power seminar, the ninth Power seminar, this girl came and she loved it. So the next time she brought this other girl and then I started coaching these two girls who were from Douglas Elliman Real estate, and then they brought this other guy.

So three random people I didn't know. So I got these random people from the same company and then they told their manager, because I remember the girl, Lisa introduced me to her manager and she's like, You know, maybe you could come speak at our company. And I'm like, I'm a medical person. I don't know nothing about real estate.

Why would I talk to these people about? So I was just like, whatever. So I wrote some pleasantry packed like, Hi, it was nice to meet you. Thank you for the introduction. I let it go. Anyway, these three people in a very short period of time started to make a lot of money and their manager went to them.

The same manager and the manager said, How are you making so much money? They're like, That girl is coaching us. And he's like, Get that girl in here. So then they call me. It's not like I had a line of people wanting coaching. Like I was grateful to get anybody to anyone to come. So his name was and I love Jeff, and I have to always share the story that Jeff was gay because as soon as I walked in, Jeff was like, I want to marry you.

And because, like, he was gay, I wasn't threatened by him. And I was like, okay, cute. So I did my presentation and then all these people signed up for coaching and I was like, Wait, what? And then became my brand ambassador. He became my number one ally. He connected me with. He's like, We're going to go to Brooklyn. This is 12 years ago. Brooklyn wasn't as cool and hip as it is now. He's like, Let's go to Brooklyn. You're going to present there and I don't want to go to Brooklyn. So I was like, No. Jeff Plus, I just got all these clients right. So I was like, I had a full roster. I was like, No, Jeff don't need to go to like, you're busy.

You have 300 agents that you're managing. You don't have time to go to Brooklyn. He's like, I'm coming to your apartment. I'm picking you up. We're going to Brooklyn. And again, because he wasn't straight, like, I'd be terrified if a straight man told me that she's coming to my apartment. So, like, Jeff came, we went to Brooklyn. I presented their they became the number two agents. And then, like, it blew like, every real estate, all the major. Many, many I can say all but many of the major real estate companies were like, We don't know what you're doing, but come do it for us. And then by now, I had my shtick, like I knew how to do it because I done it. And then all these people signed up for coaching.

So but it was extremely hard. I had no proof of concept. I didn't know how to do a business. I didn't know how to process their cards. I didn't know why they would come. I didn't know why they would stay. I didn't know why they would refer anyone. So I know a lot of people who are probably listening to this podcast or in a job that they don't want to be in and they're feeling frustrated.

And the best advice for me is you have to bet on yourself. And it was terrifying to bet on myself, but once I left, I needed the money because I started to pay for my rent and my student loans. So I just I was literally handing out jay like postcards, cheap postcards because I had no money. I had four postcards with me for 25 cents I would go to the coffee store down the block and it would be one eight and a half by 11 piece of paper that he would cut into four. He had one of those cutter things He had one of those cutter things and  I'd have these little flyers that said the name, the date, whatever the topic was, I would hand this to strangers in the street and tell them to come.

I gave the invite to all the tellers at Capital One. A bunch of them came. I was very excited. If I went to a restaurant and I ate, I would included in the check. I would just comp everyone because I mean, who was paying me? I was like taking their money, but I would comp everyone. I had a sharpie in my pocket. I said complex to this way. I was like, a lot of people would come, so like the room would be packed with all these people who came for free. So like, I paid the price I did. You have to. One thing I learned from I had a spiritual teacher. He said, The Vivace, you have to crush your ego.

And I was like, What does that mean? Because I was terrified. I'm like, What if I give the seminar and nobody comes? Because I didn't know anybody who would come because all the people I knew were from medicine. So there were off-limits. You can't go to a patient, be like, Hey, you had surgery with us. You want to come to my seminar?

Like, you can't do that. So I mean, people do that, but I wasn't going to do that, so I had nobody all the people I knew were gone. So I need to get random people. And this is why I ask random strangers literally off the street to come. And I started my business that way. And then Jeff, who was another piece of magical grace in the world, Jeff, his husband would not want to go to events so too, like awards ceremonies and stuff. So I was always his plus one and I obviously felt safe with him to be his plus one again. I would never do this with a straight guy, but like, it was amazing and everyone knew, so it didn't look bad for me to show up with Jeff at events. And then I had access to this brand new world.

So Basically, Jeff plucked me out of obscurity, put me in the middle of this world, and then I was on multiple television shows, blah, blah, blah. But it all goes back to Jeff, and that is grace, that is kindness. But Someone can only show you kindness after you step up for yourself and you bat for yourself really hard and you crush your ego because you have to crush your ego in order to win.