SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to Midlife Women Entrepreneurs. I'm your host, Lynette Turner, and I have a question for you today. I want to know have you ever had the moment where you're watching somebody online and you think, man, I could be doing that? It feels so obvious, it feels like you, and then you don't do it. You stay in that safer version of your business, you keep the same offer, you keep pushing through work that just doesn't light you up anymore. Today we're talking all about that. We're going to talk about alignment in your business, but in a practical way, not a fluffy kind of way. The kind that helps you simplify your message, clean up your offer, and stop building a business that slowly drains you. My guest today is Barb Scalia. She is an alignment coach who helps women 50 plus redefine success by rooting into self-worth, rising with purpose, and building a business that reflects their real value. Barb, welcome to the show. I'm going to hand the floor over to you. Tell everyone who you are and the work you do, and then we're going to jump right into it.

SPEAKER_01 1:03

Hi, Lynette, and thank you so much for having me today. My pleasure. I light up when I work with women, especially high-achieving women, midlife beyond, yes, that 50 plus point, where we're really starting to question am I failing? Am I in burnout? What's going on? I'm just, I'm not being fulfilled. I mean, so many signs and clues. And my work blends that intuitive insight with that grounded strategy to let go of all those shoulds, what we think we should be doing, and guide women back to their voice, their value, and the work they were actually meant to do. So I can't wait to dig in deep about this so we can know how to align into our next chapter.

SPEAKER_00 1:53

So, Barb, we on the pre-call, we talked a little bit about this. I could do that. And I I don't think I've ever met one single person in my life that hasn't said, oh, I could have done that, or I should have, like you said, I should have done that. But then what happens to us that we don't actually do it?

SPEAKER_01 2:14

But we are guided by the shoulds. That's it. Where it's misalignment is when the inner, our inner world and our outer world, our outer selves and inner selves are not aligned. They're not matching up so that we just feel disconnected. And we're not, as I said before, we're we're not failing. It isn't even burnout because there's a difference. We can rest when we're burned out, right? But we're more misaligned. We have to go into a deeper journey of what is it that is feels in alignment and more true about who we are now, because we have a growth cycle. And when we start out in our careers, we're on a track, but we grow and we evolve into different beings and and and and we gain experiences and different expertises. And many times we have a misidentity at midlife and beyond because we're still attached to those old stories, those old identities, old labels. And it's about making that paradigm shift into a new way of being that's closer to your truer self.

SPEAKER_00 3:27

So when you talk about alignment, I mean, we hear a lot of that word going around, right? Get in alignment, get in alignment. But what does it really mean? Sometimes I think to myself, am I aligned to what I'm doing, or am I just bored of what I'm doing? Or maybe am I burnt out? Or I just feel like I want something new. How do you differentiate when you're working with a client and she comes to you and, you know, what is she saying to you that helps you identify that she might not be in alignment or, you know, the underlying cause of that?

SPEAKER_01 4:04

Well, she may be dreading her work. She may feel invisible, she may be overworking to overcompensate a bunch of things. She may be really trying really, really hard and and and making things happen. And they're not. And it's not about that working, they're not working hard. These women are not working hard or they're not doing the right things. They're just misaligned. They're just not where what I like to call their highest level of service or work, that they're they're maybe stuck in in a should or a pattern or an old identity. And it's about growing into the person and the values and the truth that we now can help and share and radiate out in our service work to others.

SPEAKER_00 4:55

What happens when a woman comes to you, but she's never been truly aligned to anything that she's done in her life? She's maybe she went to school, maybe she didn't, i.e., university, I mean, but then she got the job. Like most women in their midlife, have led a very stereotypical life. And so they got into a lane of their work that probably met the current needs back then, which was go to school, get a degree, or not, but get a job and then start working, raising kids. And they've been in this lane for so long that they've realized I hate the last 20 years of what I was doing. Now I'm in my in midlife, in my 50s, and I'm thinking, oh, I'd like to start something new, but I haven't even got a clue what to do. How would you work with that person to try to get them aligned to something?

SPEAKER_01 5:55

Well, that's basically my story. I I'm a lawyer, went to law school, right? We tend to follow those. I'm gonna do what's expected of me. I'm gonna do, right, get a job, the societal norms, what what we're supposed to do to quote unquote be successful out there. Um, and and to provide and to contribute and and and you know, really show up for our responsibilities to others and our lives. But at some point, if we're totally off track, I mean, you just gonna know it. That that little voice will start talking and versus a whisper, and it will get louder and louder, and you'll just feel off center, off-ground, you're not grounded, off balance. And so I went through my own, I guess it's great here, midlife show, midlife crisis, on okay, practicing law isn't doing it for me. It is not that higher level service work. What is it? And so you have to go through a bit of a journey and an excavation to find out how to be more aligned. Now, the clue is that what we did, like you said, oh, I hate the last 20 years of what I did, it's never for naught. There's always some uh some reason or all the good stuff we learned that we can pull into an alignment going forward on what we want. So, um an example is someone I'm working with who's in the divorce coaching arena, has a teaching degree. And so she's gonna meld that into helping healthy families. And so what a great, what a great level of service because she left the teaching profession, probably felt burned out or whatever it was, and then started working in mediation and divorce coaching and all. And now it's it's going to blend the two main focuses of her life. It's not always that perfect, though. It's not always that easy. So, which is where with guidance we can we can discover what it is. And I I always say there's three things. You have to be conscious, you have to be present, and you have to be really curious to ask the questions that are going to make that journey smoother rather than bumpy, or shorter rather than really labored and long, which was mine. I mean, I went in this nonlinear direction for several years. I did everything from divorce coaching, which is why I help a lot of different types of coaches, to uh to creating a lifestyle brand and doing uh becoming like the local foodie chef on TV and several things in between because I didn't really know how to narrow it down. Well, I do now and I call it my framework, the Seeds for Success. So anybody else's journey doesn't have to be as long as mine was. I wanted to make it more streamlined. You don't have to bang your hands your head against the wall for years and years and try different things, especially if you don't have the time or wherewithal to do that.

SPEAKER_00 9:36

Right. So when you when you went through your, I let's call it a reinvention, so that you could kind of get more sort of, like you say, aligned to what's right for you? When you were going through that, you you sat down, you said, okay, uh being a lawyer was not what I want. How did you then start, what steps did you start to take to uncover that? Because you said you you had done a few things before you it landed on what you do today. What questions did you ask yourself? How did you do that, I guess, skills inventory, if you will?

SPEAKER_01 10:14

I started to be present, conscious, and curious and noticing what triggered me sometimes. What triggered me? What would I naturally help people with? I knew it was in the coaching arena. Um, I thought I'm an attorney, right? The natural linear way of thinking is, and the should is should be a divorce coach because I've got this legal background, right? And and mediation background. But that wasn't landing right. So I was really curious and just started digging deeper and realizing that I was always triggered when women would say, This is what I'm doing, and they're trying to justify it. And I'm I can somehow have, you know, how Superman has like x-ray vision or something. I can almost see through it and say, My gosh, that's not really what she's jazzed about, or why is she going in that direction or staying stuck in that when she can be so much more or on to a different evolution or growing in a different way? And so I don't know. We tend to overlook what our natural inclinations are or how we can what we naturally do. And this was kind of my very intuitive thing that I did with everyone. I would go, no, that person is not landing on it right. And then I started to work with that and say, oh my gosh, that's where I can help women. I can help women because they're stuck in those old stories and old identities and what's being expected of them and all those pressures and self-doubts that don't move them forward.

SPEAKER_00 12:10

So do you help a woman, do you help a woman get clear on her offer, or do you help the woman create the offer?

SPEAKER_01 12:20

Good question. I would tick all of the above. Yeah. Uh getting aligned more with her idea. What what is the problem she can ideally solve? And who can she ideally solve it for? And what is her natural inclination or what is her superpower to then help with these problems? Like some women out there can are really good with helping women align for being visible. And that's part of my work too, how to get visible and how to build up that confidence. But mine is fine-tuned. And so when they get aligned to exactly the problem they're solving, then they can create that offer, and then they can build out a really great offer or offers for their audience so that they are the person to help them with that, and they can attract the the people and clientele they want to work with.

SPEAKER_00 13:22

How did you present yourself to your network that you were now this different person, that you were no longer the lawyer, you were no longer this lifestyle influencer, if you will, and now you are doing what you're doing today? How does somebody change the perception of themselves to people who already know them as a certain way?

SPEAKER_01 13:44

Interesting question. You know, I got asked that a lot. Uh, I co-authored a book, Sanity Savers Tips for Women to Live a Balanced Life. And the number one question I got from audiences when we went to QA was how did you transition from being a lawyer and doing this? And I'll have to say that I practiced law, then I then I coached and I did events for women, and I, like I said, I had a nonlinear approach. I went back to practicing law because that need I needed to get grounded in what I had studied, in what I knew really well, to realize, oh my gosh, here I am again. I'm asking for that something more. So to present yourself in a different light, you're gonna show up to new audiences who don't even know you. Or if they did, this is you're evolving, you're growing. How many musicians out there go on to be movie, you know, in the movies, you know, and they don't have to explain it. I know I'm a musician, but now I'm in a movie. It's just like when you present it in that really confident and and clear, make it very clear, people are gonna go along with you for the ride because they're like, good for her. Actually, it's a ripple effect because uh people say, Wow, if she did that, I wonder if I could. And that's the reaction I often get. So it's rather inspirational, and people are gonna lean into the transitions rather than say, I want her in this box, stay in this box. Because that's not, I'm all about my metaphor is all about blooming, bloom with Barb, right? So it's all about growing and evolving and rising and more purposeful work that really makes the impact that we're all looking for and that self-fulfillment and everything else we want from our work, and we just don't want to go through the motions of things. So you'll be surprised how people will embrace that transition when you feel very confident about it and you feel like I'm aligning and they'll say good for her. My gosh, she's more aligned. This is more to her true self. This is more the values, this is what all of her experience has led to. And now she can offer it out in a new and unique way, which is going to help so many more people, especially women in the transactional type of business like I was in. And now I'm using it more in a transformational way. It just creates that impact that I'm looking for, and that can can help and guide more people. So it's it's beneficial.

SPEAKER_00 16:37

Um, okay. So, what is the shift that has to happen for a woman to stop selling the task or you should do this, you should do this, and start selling the transformation? Like, how do they pivot from that? I help women do blank, so that blank. How do they get to that selling of the transformation?

SPEAKER_01 16:56

You're talking about two different business models. You're talking about a transactional hour time report-based transactional business, which I did. The trend, the paradigm shift is into transformational work, which is not tied to hours. It's tied to value. It's a value-based business model. And that I help women align into their value because they're doubting themselves. They're doubting that they could ever get aligned because it feels scary. It feels like they're not quite valuing themselves there. How can others value them? And when they and it's an amazing thing when they shift from that transactional model to that value-based model. It's like the whole everything shifts. Everything shifts. And it's and it's wonderful to see. I can think of one of my clients who, um, a massage therapist who had a had a really thriving business with vendors of massage therapists bringing them to companies. And she didn't know it. Well, she did know it, but we discovered that aren't I going into this company and talking about mindfulness? Like I see people doing it while I'm there with my doing the massage experience. And I'm like, I don't know, why aren't you developing wellness programs? So it was shifting that business model from being having an arsenal of vendors and provided providing a massage experience to her shift that being almost like an add-on to her business or part of the experience of it, but she's providing now wellness programs to companies and being the thought leader in that arena. That was, I always say that's like my poster child for the transformation that can be made from being transactional to transformational, and which creates an expertise and a thought leadership. You take on a leadership role in how you're of service to people.

SPEAKER_00 19:12

Yeah. And I I think that corporate, that that wellness example you just gave there, for me, I feel like she could have stayed so caught up in the, you know, going out, be, you know, giving the massages and staying very transactional, as you say, in that realm. But then now that she's elevated herself into this more corporate wellness example, she gets to do that thing that she sees other people do as well. Like there's so many people out there that are talking about mindset and you know, just and I'm sure she probably thought to herself, I could be doing that, but then had no way of really incorporating into her business. Well, didn't know how to incorporate it into her business.

SPEAKER_01 19:56

Did not know where to start, what the steps in between were. And it's so funny because she just came on. So I run the Bloom Business Incubator, and she came on the call the other day, and I said, Tell us about when you first came here. And we toyed with the idea of you doing these programs. And she went, you know, it was always like the scariest thing you could ever say. It's almost like she lost her voice, you know, like the Little Mermaid. And um in the story. So now she comes on the call with a confidence, just beaming. I mean, she looks, she looks like a leader because she is a leader. She looks like an accomplished woman business owner because she is one, because she stepped into it, because she took those steps. She did not know where to start. But here's a clue. And and you said it, and we're talking about it here. What's one way to know that you're misaligned when you go, my God, why why can't I do what she does? I'd love to do what she does. Or and it could be somebody who's famous, or maybe not. It could be just like her that she was there and she saw somebody walk in and give a talk and say, Why are I'd love to do that one and and not even realizing that she could, she was in her business for over 30 years, 25, 30 years, something like that. So she was in a real plateau for a long time.

SPEAKER_00 21:33

Yeah. And but she was okay with the plateau, or did she always know there was something more there? Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 21:39

She was not okay with the plateau. That's why she came to me. I'm in a plateau. I don't know what to do with it.

unknown 21:45

Right.

SPEAKER_01 21:46

You didn't know. I mean, it was not like I want to make wellness programs for companies. That's what we that's what we unearthed. That's what we're doing. Yeah, you unearthed together. Yeah. And she's beaming because she worked in the corporate world and understood stress and and and being tied to that chair and everything. And then she went out and learned about different modalities and spirituality and mindfulness and so many things. And then she thought, you know, and massage. So that was great. It was a de-stressor, but that still wasn't her exact alignment. And when she took that how she felt stressed out in the corporate world to now helping them with mindfulness and being, you know, cared for and self-serving themselves. Oh my God. I mean she, you know, like I'm smiling, just talking about her, that's how she talks. She likes beams. You notice a shift when their work starts lighting them up, when there's a confidence, when their creativity returns or the creativity process starts where it was like log jammed when I don't know where to start or know what to do or don't know what my something more is to oh my gosh, I it's almost like I don't I I don't know where not to stop. I I have a I have someone who's like I can't put the pen down. It's 10 o'clock at night and I have to run my computer because I have to go to sleep. I she's so in content creation mode with what she's doing. So it's it really it really lights you up to the point of you might have tons and tons of energy all of a sudden all over again where you felt so de-energized and so out of breath almost before.

SPEAKER_00 23:42

Yeah. And I I think about like house I know a lot of women who have had businesses for that long as well 20 20 25 years. And it's going, but I don't know if it's really lighting them up to that level of an example. And I think that you know sometimes I think a lot of women in that state will just start to add on different types of services. They'll keep stacking services on to ultimately create this soupy mixed offer, if you will what do you think is happening there? What is what need is trying to come out of that woman?

SPEAKER_01 24:21

They're staying ground not grounded but almost like stuck in this identity and so they're not working create creatively. I work with a lot of attorneys who are have shifted like I did into the divorce coaching arena and they're trying to run their coaching business like their litigation practice and it doesn't work. So there is a a pivot and a shift and an evolvement and that with guidance we can get it. It's a skill we can acquire because the cost of misalignment is high. It it affects our emotional well-being our physical our spiritual our cultural identities and everything. So the the cost of high is high and when we do align and really do that work we're meant for or that something more or that fulfilling or creating that impact it's really really lifts us up in so many so many ways for our overall wellbeing yeah and there's things too that they they probably haven't even thought about like I think about often I'll help somebody just sort of brainstorm a bunch of their skills but then we look beyond the tactical skill and we we look beyond like what's the shadow skill that they've got because they have that particular skill.

SPEAKER_00 25:51

And I don't think you get that ability through chat, you know, a you know chat GPT or even even just on your own I think you're too close to it. I think the help of somebody like you to really draw that out is what's necessary, you know, to really get into the shadows of what they'd love to do and bring it out and get them to see it as you know an add-on to their offer maybe it's a complete pivot maybe it's a just a small directional change. Barb, if somebody was listening today and they felt pulled towards a new lane in some way, wants to do something, but they feel a little bit scared and unclear about what that is, what would be the smallest, bravest step that you'd want her to take this week that would tell her the truth about what she's really meant to do next?

SPEAKER_01 26:44

I would tell her to grab a piece of paper and a pen and write at the top of the paper what am I meant to do not supposed to what am I meant to do next and just let it go. And maybe do that every day because in the beginning when we start doing those kind of prompts we're going to default to to the usual we're not going to think outside of the box. We're going to stay in our lane but every day you kind of write the same question at the top of the page and you know when you write it you're not quite quite landing with it. Something else is going to flow and you're going to get closer and closer to something that you have to really explore deeper in so I always say everything it's just like Dorothy and the Wizard of Oz the answers are inside of us okay so she's written down for the next three days she's what am I meant to do at the top of the page and it's just a free flow.

SPEAKER_00 27:56

How do you tell somebody to do that without them putting guardrails around like limitations I guess around what they're going to write.

SPEAKER_01 28:07

Well you know when you're guiding people to get realigned the first thing that comes up a lot of the times is a very scary concept oh my God I have to abandon every I have to you know misalignment is about abandoning but now I have to abandon everything I know and I have to totally change and that's overwhelming right so I don't advise that this is a step-by-step process you know it's a progression and you can evolve with it. So it's starting somewhere it's noticing those those clues those patterns those triggers those tugs but starting out on that path with one step and foot in front of the other is a way to really evolve and grow and know you don't have to throw everything out and start all over again at midlife because that would be daunting. It's about building it's about growing so that's the good news.

SPEAKER_00 29:11

Yeah I like that I like that you know it's it's like you said you're not throwing the baby out with the water kind of thing. You're you're still doing what you're doing today but get started today on what does that next growth spurt if you will look like for you and how can you evolve? So I really like that. So if Barb, if if she's done this exercise for three or four days, has has a few kind of ideas, but you know maybe I am going to call on Barb to get a little clarification. What does it look like to come under your wing, if you will?

SPEAKER_01 29:44

Well they can go on my website bloomwithbar.com they can email me uh and I'm so happy to take a call and let's let's just chat let's just see what's going on I call it an alignment strategy assessment but it's a really nice friendly talk and I'll be asking questions which will lead me to okay here's what your next step would be or this is how we could work together. And and I do run a bloom business incubator which is for women in the sweet spot when they've started something and they're not gaining the momentum I can work one-on-one and we can go on a journey and get that assessment down. So that's the building blocks and the core to start from to then then keep taking it and keep tweaking it and keep working with it. Barb, what where do people are you on Instagram? I am and what is the handle? I'm Bloom with Barb at on Instagram and yeah and on LinkedIn I'm Barb Scala okay perfect.

SPEAKER_00 31:00

So bloom with barb.com and bloom with Barb on Instagram.

SPEAKER_01 31:05

One last question before I let you go uh inside of your incubator what's happening inside of there well we have a a marvelous uh group and community and of women who are just that they're incubating they've and they're professional they're high achieving women they might be on their next chapter their next act getting to their next level they may be trying you know go into a new direction with what they're doing and they're fine tuning and getting better aligned and each time they do they just go up a notch and it's just amazing to see the people they work with and what they're doing and it's just great to have that camaraderie because when women come together there's quite an energy that happens.

SPEAKER_00 32:02

Yeah no that's great. That's great. Well Barb, thank you for being on today and thank you for giving us such a nice way of looking at business I think that through the lens of alignment and loving what you do, lighting yourself up, letting go of what's not lighting you up. So thank you for that and I wish you all the best. Thank you so much, Lynette for having me on. I've enjoyed it so much. Thank you. Great.

SPEAKER_01 32:26

You're welcome