One of the major concerns when raising a special needs child is expenses. There are different ways to cover your expenses and entrepreneurship is one of them. In this episode, Christine Job joins the Parenting Cipher to share how you can launch a money-making business that can help you increase your income. By using your current skills and experiences.
About Christine
Christine is originally from Atlanta and currently resides in Barcelona. She is the creator, producer, host, and editor of "Flourish In The Foreign" a podcast she launched in May 2020 and that has already received rave reviews and an ever-increasing listening audience.
Christine Job is a Business Strategist that works primarily with Women of Color led ventures shepherding their products, services, or businesses from ideation to launch. She most recently began offering strategy services to help WOC who want to leverage their talent & expertise into viable & sustainable online businesses while pursuing their dreams of living abroad.
3 steps you need to know to be a successful entrepreneur
How to take your skills abroad and have a profitable business
How moving abroad is an act of mental health
Flourish In the Foreign Podcast
Aligned and Abundant 12 Weel Sprint Program
If you’d like to hear Christine’s favorite song “ All I do Is Win” By DJ Khaled click on the playlist below
Christine Job
Website: Flourish In The Foreign
Instagram: Flourishforeign
Facebook: Floursihforeign
Twitter: Flourishforeign
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Genie 00:08
Welcome to the Parenting Cipher where each episode will give you the tools and resources to help your child thrive in school and in life. Please rate and review this podcast. I love to hear your feedback and also hit the subscribe button so you don't miss any upcoming episodes. So today we have Ms. Christine Job, who is originally from Atlanta, and she currently resides in Barcelona. She is the creative producer, host and editor of "Flourish In The Foreign," a podcast she launched in May 2020 that has already received rave reviews and an ever-increasing listening audience.
Genie 00:42
She is a business strategist that works primarily with Women of Color which says it leads ventures shepherding their products, services or businesses from ideas to launch. She most recently began offering strategy services to help WOC or Women of Color who want to leverage their talent and expertise into viable and sustainable online businesses while pursuing their dreams of living abroad. Thank you very much for coming, Christine!
Christine 01:08
Thank you so much for having me! I'm really excited.
Genie 01:11
So I've been loving the conversation because it's like right on time since we're talking about moving abroad, right? And in my audience, one of the things that we don't want to talk about, but it's always on our mind is making more money. And that's actually one of the reasons I became an entrepreneur, was because I need more money to pay for additional therapies - maybe what I can do is take my skills and my experiences and translate that into coaching. So for women who have ideas and they want to make it in turn to a product, what's the first steps that they do?
Christine 01:46
Definitely! I think that the first thing that women need to do when they're considering transitioning from a career, profession, working for somebody else to working for themselves is I think, number one, you got to know your numbers, you got to know how much money you're trying to make a month, because that really changes everything because all of us women, we're multifaceted, multi-talented and depending on which talents we have or skills that we have, some of them are more lucrative than the others.
Christine 02:18
And that's just facts. So I always tell women, first and foremost, let's get serious about the number. What is your ideal number that you need to make a month after taxes and expenses, all those things. And I think it's also something I like to talk to my clients up front, because a lot of women have a lot of like blockages around money and as women, especially women of color, we have been conditioned to do a lot of free labor, physical, mental and emotional.
Christine 02:53
And I think it's important if you're going to start going into an entrepreneurial role to get really comfortable with numbers in general, the numbers you need to make, to make your life work. The numbers you want to make to have the ideal lifestyle you want to have, and of course, run the numbers for a business, so that's the first thing I always tell everyone for sure.
Genie 03:16
Those are facts. I think when I have an idea and I was like, I want to be an author. I didn't have a number, I thought more of titles versus the cash part, so I just want to be a best selling author but best selling author does not equate to dollars. Not all the time.
Christine 03:35
My thing is that everybody wants different things. Everybody has a different bucket list item, right? And you might say, I want to be a best selling author and I'm going to be like, that's cool. We can make that happen. But if your number is $10,000 a month, well, we know that selling books isn't probably going to get you there. You have to devise a plan to get you there, which would probably go around speaking engagements, other kinds of digital products.
Christine 04:07
And it really depends on who you are. Some people are like, I don't really want to do speaking engagements, okay, develop a course, develop digital products and maybe you don't like to be in front of lots of people, but you can do some. It's all day. You don't have to be around a lot of people at all. You be at your house. So I mean, that is the biggest thing. I hate for people to think like there's only one way to the dollar, to the euro, whatever. There isn't, you can be yourself. You can do the things that you want to do, the things that are in alignment with yourself, but you just have to be savvy and strategic.
Genie 04:41
Right. You can't be afraid of the number. You talk about money mindset. You put limitations on how far your dream, where your idea can go if one, if you don't know your number, but two, you're scared of the number that you say. One of the things when you're an entrepreneur and you go through a bunch of coaching, they always say's what's the number? How much do you want to earn? How much do you want to earn this year? How much do you want to earn in five years from now? And you say a number is just a number. If you are not attached to it, you can't see it, you can't visualize it, you can't see what comes with it, then it's just sitting there like, oh, I didn't make that number it's okay because I didn't think I was going to make it anyway.
Christine 05:18
Yeah and I really detest this kind of marketing strategy that's going around and everybody's like, I'm going to make you a six figure coach and da-da-da. And I'm like, look, when I say pick a number, I want to say, like just out of the air. I mean, let's actually run the numbers. So six figure coach, what does that mean? Is that revenue? Is that profit? Is that take home? Those are three different numbers. And to get there, if you have a six figure revenue business, excellent. I'm happy for you, but how much are you taking home? Are you spending an incredible amount of money on ad spend to make that happen? There's a lot of questions and I think once women get comfortable with picking a number and doing the research because deciding what that number is and the why, why is it this number? What is this going to help me do?
Christine 06:15
Okay, you have like your personal things that you say, this is why I got to hit this number. I got people to fee. I'm really trying to make us get here. Also, it lets you know what kind of business you want to run. Okay, yeah. Maybe I want six figures, but I don't want to invest all this money in ad spend, so if I can't do ad spend, maybe I have to do a lot more face to face. I don't need to cultivate relationships longer. Maybe it's going to take a little bit longer to convert. Possibly, but that's not always true depending on your business. That's why the numbers are so important, because it really starts to outline the kind of lifestyle but also business you want to have. It's kind of start telling you what services that you should offer, depending on the kind of life that you want. If you're trying to be before our work week guide.
Genie 07:05
Yeah.
Christine 07:08
You know, and everybody's like, yeah, that's what I want. Okay, you can do that. That's obviously possible. It's like when people thought running a four minute mile was impossible, then one person did it and everybody can do it. Of course, it's possible. We can all figure out how to get there, but there's many different ways to train to get there. There's many different ways to get to four hour work week. Depending on where you are in your business. It might take you two years to get to that point.
Christine 07:33
It might take a lot of investment in systems and then contract employees or employees to be able to run that business so that you can have a four hour work week and have your lifestyle. That's my thing. It's like that's why numbers are so important, because it takes the mystery out of it. You know what I'm saying? All of a sudden, this nebulous idea, Okay, I don't wanna work for somebody. I work for myself. Once you have that number, there's an outline to the business because now it's like, okay, it becomes algebra. It's like, X plus whatever is all for Y, that's what it becomes.
Genie 08:12
This is a good conversation because usually when people want to be an entrepreneur, it's just an idea. I want to be an entrepreneur. They see someone, like you said, I see someone earning if you do A. I can do A but there's so many different pieces and there's so many different ways that you can get to the seven figures, and when you start and if you're not really talking to a coach, you're not in a coaching group, people who've already done it, then it's a lot. So this is the first time I've spoken to a coach and we're talking about business and they say lead with a number. Usually, it's lead with the vision and the mission and then the number and from my experience, things can get really, really unclear when you're leading, especially if you're creative. You're leading with your creativity without a number in mind and I'm like appreciating this conversation.
Christine 09:06
Yeah, it's so important and the thing is, is that, my background, I have a business degree. I have a law degree, but I also worked primarily when I started working for myself. I worked primarily within the holistic wellness space. That was I did strategy for a lot of holistic wellness, micro and small business owners and creatives, so I completely understand people who are saying I'm here on this earth to give, provide this service of healing or art and beauty. And I fully believe that, like, I think, of course, if we say to an artist, no, you really get a real job, like you need to get a real job, then we don't have any art. You know, like we don't we don't get art.
Genie 09:51
Right.
Christine 09:51
And so what I was always about was like, I don't believe in starving artists. I don't believe that things that can really heal and help community should be seen as luxuries or, as you know, dead and just altruistic passion projects only done by the people who like, well, you know, my spouse is wealthy, so I don't worry about this like I run this yoga studio. I believe that. I just don't I think that you should be able to do well by doing good. I believe that you should be able to sustain yourself and to live abundantly while being in alignment. That's the fundamentals to my strategy style. I believe in being professionally fulfilled and financially abundant. I think a lot of times people talk about entrepreneurship.
Christine 10:44
They think and especially kind of in my niche of going abroad, people think it's like a hammock in Thailand with a laptop on your lap and I'm like, I would never bring a laptop onto a beach. Like, this is nonsense and I like Thailand, but I never bought it on the beach. It doesn't make any sense. They think like that is the ideal and that's not everybody's ideal. Some people say, I really like working, I like doing what I'm doing. I like having going to the office or working with my clients and having that delineation because it's professionally fulfilling for myself. I get to serve people, okay, but I also need to make my life run and so, that number is so important. Now, when we think about visioning, I think it's so important and I utilize visioning and meditation into my practice as well because I think it's important to have those balances of analytical and then also emotional because emotions drive a lot more powerful.
Christine 11:50
But the thing is, is that I think when we have these visions especially or I guess depending on where this entrepreneur, aspiring entrepreneurs coming from, if they're coming from a place of burnout, if they're coming from a place of desperation, then the vision is just like anything but this. Like anything and that doesn't serve anyone.
Genie 12:11
Right.
Christine 12:11
It's just like anything. It's a Hail Mary. It's a very strange energy and I'm like, look, I'm going to honor your feelings and I understand that you're feeling like this is not it. Your body's telling you this is not it. So good. We have acknowledged that, that dissonance. We're going to take that information, though, to say what is it about this that if that's not it, right? I went to law school. I have plenty of friends who make ridiculous amount of money being very successful lawyers, right? But some of them are in positions where it's golden handcuffs, so it's not money. That's the bad thing.
Christine 12:51
It is perhaps lifestyle or cultural fit. So I think that's why it's important to start with the money aspect, because it kind of helps you to focus on what you need when you just think of visioning of like, I just want to...And it can be whatever. I just want everyone to be nice to me at work. Well, people could be nice to you anywhere. You might this work somewhere that's horrible. I think it's important and I think, from personal experience, I've been caught up in vision and I have launched...I produced a music festival live in Atlanta. It was complete passion project, not make any money. I loved it. Didn't make the money and I think that's important. You have to know that are you in a position to have a passion project or not?
Genie 13:42
Oh! That's good one.
Christine 13:42
You know?
Genie 13:43
That's a good one. You have to ask yourself when you're doing something, is this a passion project or is this something that you are utilizing to make money? I personally get caught up in passion projects, and I'm making the shift into making sure that anything I do that I'm passionate about actually makes money and it is. It is a different conversation. So we have the money. We have the idea. Then what is the next steps? Because I want to know how do I get abroad with my entrepreneurship taking my skills and creating a business and thinking abroad, like how does that manifest?
Christine 14:17
So once you have the revenue, idea or you have an idea of your revenue and then you also have a basic sense, because the revenue like we said, creates an outline, this is the part that freaks everyone out and it is like I think we all know if you watch YouTube videos, there's a part we have to niche down. You have to actually pick a lane and how you pick a lane is combination of all of your skills. You lay them out, look at them very nice because everybody has so many different skills but you have to be honest with yourself.
Christine 14:53
What are the things that I excel at? I excel? What are the things that are valuable and profitable, because if you're in a specific industry, perhaps you're in some kind of finance or accounting, you know what skills are extremely profitable. You know what things are like, the skills that are highly sought after. You know that or at least you have in a sense, out of all your daily duties, you know the things that people are like, can you please do this? Can you please do this? Can you please do this? That's a hint that people pay you to do that, because they keep on asking to do it and that is profitable because people are valuing it. That is the step.
Christine 15:40
I think it's also important when you're niching down, of course, niching down into an industry. So like we take the example, you're an accountant and I'm not, I don't know about the licensing for accountants so sorry if accountants are like, that's not true. Okay, but we can also put that because I've also talked to people who are therapists and they flip their business model because there's licensing about being a therapist in the room. They put into being life coaches, to be a financial coach. Okay, it works.
Genie 16:11
Yup.
Christine 16:12
But it's important to understand the industry and a lot of times, especially if you're competent and especially maybe if you've been in a role in which you had to be everything to everybody because maybe everybody else in the workplace is not competent, so you know how to do everything you're like, but I can do it all. So I'm going to do it all and I'm like, no, you're not going to do it all. You're not going to do it all or you're not going to do it all for everyone.
Christine 16:40
Right? Maybe you have a 360 service, but you're only going to work with a very specific industry, with a very specific client. Yes, you are competent. You are brilliant and you could probably solve everybody's problem because you guys like that. But that's not how we're going to launch a successful business, because if you are speaking to everyone, you are speaking to no one. Other people supposed to vet you because you have all the credentials. But I mean, are you talking to me? Are you talking to her? Are you talking to him? I don't know and that's why niching down is so, so important. I have had clients resist me. Oh, they resist me so hard.
Christine 17:26
And it's hysterical because I'm not a drill sergeant kind of strategist. I do not berate my clients, I don't. I pose these questions to them. I say, okay, will you tell me where are you going to market your services? Tell me. Where does your person hang out? And of course, they'll be like, the internet. Well, everyone is on the internet. Where? What blogs? What podcast? What Facebook groups? Where are you going to put your marketing dollars or marketing equity to get the visibility for people to even know you, to even seek you out, to even try your service and I let them sit with that.
Christine 18:16
Sometimes it takes a session. I say, okay, I'll talk to you next week. You let me know and once you let me know, we'll rock and roll. And what happens is I think, yeah, I'm not for everyone and I say, that's okay, but it's powerful. It's powerful to not be for everyone for a couple of reasons. One, for marketing purposes, but most importantly, for filtering. You want people to self-filter. You want to be so specific with the type of client you want to work with, your ideal client or whatever you want to call it, that people filter themselves out like people say, oh, wait, no, you're not talking to me and good, so they don't waste your time, and people don't want to do that because they're so afraid of missing a sale.
Christine 19:09
And I promise you that you are not going to miss a sale, because the thing is, is that you want to convert the ideal client. You don't want to have a relationship with people that is painful and it's just you or your team and you're just like and you're really thinking like, dang, do I need money? Do I need to eat this month? I don't know. Maybe I could just starve. I don't know. You don't want that. You don't want that position. And also, you never going to give your best effort in that kind of energy and then you may not have a client who's thrilled, satisfied and a raving fan, which is what you want to convert these people into. Raving fans do the marketing for you and it is just a waste of time.
Christine 19:58
That's why it's so important to niche down. Marketing aspect, not a lot of people have the billions of Amazon and whoever who can follow you around the internet, you just like follow you into your living room. You're like, this is weird. How do you know? We don't have marketing. We don't have that marketing spend, right? So it's important to be strategic. I'm sudden, so I'll give this example. It's the difference between a buckshot approach and a sniper's approach and I'm not like a huge with gun toting girl, so there's that.
Christine 20:36
And, you know, it's true, though. Do you want to send all your marketing dollars just out into the air and hope it hits something like, no, that's money, that's time, that's effort. You want to be super specific. You want to be so specific that you hit that target. That's what niching down does. It also does something really cool, because when you're really, really specific and you're speaking to a specific audience, you get to develop that relationship with them. You get to hear them. You get to hear what their problems are. You get to hear what they think their solutions are.
Christine 21:18
They never know what the real solution is. I know that as a consumer, I'd be like, oh, I think I really need this specific notebook or something. They're like, no, you need to just turn off the Internet and read a book like, productivity, you'll be like, I think need more of it and it's like, no. What you need, stop being on the internet and do this.
Genie 21:41
Yup.
Christine 21:41
That's where we get to step in as business owners to hear what people are saying. Hear what they are saying is their problems and offering them solutions because oftentimes, the consumer doesn't know what their solution is or they would have sought it out and they're still not satisfied that it also helps you to mirror back, which is probably the best kind of marketing because as a competent professional, we use words of, you know, trade words like these kinds of very specific technical words in our trade.
Christine 22:18
I'm not looking that up. If I'm looking for something in finance, I'm not going to be like some very specific CPA accountant word. That's what I need. I don't know that I need that, so that helps you to do when you niche down and you're in those spaces where your client is. You get to hear that language and mirror it back to them. So maybe I'm not like, oh, I need a CPA da-da-da. I am saying, oh gosh, mind the business. I got this money over here, I got taxes. What I do about that? That's the language I'm using and you're like, actually we're going to do some bookkeeping, we’re going to get you do your provisional taxes. We pay those quarterly and I'll be like, oh, I didn't know any of these things because that's the language I'm working with.
Christine 23:09
That's why niching down so important, right? You get to really get to know someone, cultivate that relationship, utilize their language to mirror back to them and build a relationship because they feel heard, they feel seen.
Genie 23:22
And that's important. That's so important. I was one of those people. I raised my hand like I was once of those people niche down, no, but it changes your entire world in business when you're able to say, this is who I'm talking to and this is their concern, instead of like you just out here to sub everybody. It's like, but they say, you know, you're trying to catch flies, you can't catch anything.
Christine 23:49
For sure.
Genie 23:50
Okay then so we have finding your number, niching down, then what's the next step?
Christine 23:55
So this is where I like to actually go back into visioning. This is a step where visioning comes a fact, right? We done the number. We have some ideas. Now, we niche down. This is strategy. This is how do we get to our goals and there are infinite ways to get to our goals. This is how we start developing the business and the vibe of the business. That's where this visioning comes into place, right?
Christine 24:23
This is where I want my clients to really say, one, you are a servant leader. At least that's who I work with. I work with servant leaders, people who feel compelled to serve others and doesn't mean you have an altruistic or nonprofit business. It just means you believe so highly in your abilities and your services that you know, that as you give to these people, you are going to be transforming their life and you can do that as a CPA. You could transform people's lives for sure, especially business owners by being an excellent CPA, right?
Genie 24:58
Right.
Christine 24:59
So this is where this comes into play. It's about visioning and saying what is this interaction look like? How do I serve? How does this transformation happen? So we have all this information about our number, some ideas that are going to sustain this number, parts of our capabilities and talents that will actually get us there and now, we know our niche so we can take it to a $10,000 a month. That says that we'll probably do some maybe bookkeeping and business taxes for our clients and now we said my clients are women of color who are mommy bloggers in the United States. Let me be more specific, in the southern United States.
Genie 25:52
Right.
Christine 25:52
That's where going for. So now you're saying, how do I want to approach this? How do I run my business? There's a lot of people will hold on to ideas and like, I can't tell anyone. If someone has it, they're going to do it and I'm like, there is literally nothing original under the sun. Everything is a derivative of everything else and five million people have the exact same idea. It is all about execution. It is all about execution. That's what they can literally be. Five million CPAs and people be like, no, this is my girl. This is who I rock with. That's what this situation comes. You have to say, how do I do what I do? This is also good point for you to really envision your day so if you have other responsibilities, you say, Okay my day looks like this.
Christine 26:42
I talk to my clients from 8:00, 9:00 to 3:00, and that's the only time I work from Monday to Friday or from Tuesday to Thursday. I might take some other special client calls on Monday, but that's it because of my lifestyle. That's where you start developing that. This is the point where you start developing the strategy and the ethos of the business and that also is really important because you're starting to really take a stand and that's my biggest thing. I make a lot of people see, people who are successful and they want to emulate. They like, that worked for you, so I'm gonna do exactly it. And yes, success does leave crumbs and clues, but you standing in somebody else's shoes and projecting your voice and then wondering why you're getting only cricket is because it's not authentic to you, it's not in alignment, right?
Christine 27:43
So we can obviously use, lean business models and different kind of business strategies to attract business, put people through a sales funnel but this is a part where you have to be the most authentically you possible. If you're an introvert, don't be going up there and be like, I'm going to be a rah rah cheerleader accountant if that's not who you are.
Genie 28:08
That's not who you are. It doesn't work.
Christine 28:11
It's like, I am a rapping accountant and I'm going to rap and I'd be an accountant and I want to merge. Fine. That's who you are. There's going to be a segment, I'm sure we're going to be like, wow, she can really spell, she can really flow, okay and she's an amazing accountant. Yes, I love these things. but you got to be true to yourself. You got to be true to yourself.
Genie 28:36
You have to be in alignment.
Christine 28:37
Yeah. So as we take those three steps which are straight up analysis, this is the heart, this is the passion. This is what makes you you for sure. So after we kind of decide, this is my brand, this is what I'm offering to this service, this is how you can then start developing a brand in a market and start putting it out there for people to see and test and say, we're going to your market and saying, hey, I'm this person doing these things. It is how I do it.
Genie 29:11
Right.
Christine 29:12
Let's work together or let me show you what I can do.
Genie 29:15
Yeah, she's teaching you guys Entrepreneurship 101. I'm just learning those things. I've been entrepreneurship, apparently, according to my book, like five years, right? But it's only been the last two, they haven't had these type of conversations. It's not just about what you want to create. You do have to niched down and you do have to have a strategy and everybody strategies not work for you.
Genie 29:41
If you're an introvert, because I'm like both. Introvert, you don't want to be on camera, do not think that you're going to follow someone's model in their own. They're doing lives all the time. It's going to be hurtful for you because you're going to try to make yourself do it. It is going to be a struggle every time you have to get on the screen and the most important thing in business and being an entrepreneur is sustainability & consistency. That's how you build your true follower, your true fan and people get to know you is being consistent and if you are trying to do something that is not in alignment of who you are, you're going to struggle.
Christine 30:21
Yes. I tell all my clients when we're doing onboarding, I say, look, this is going to be uncomfortable, but it's not going to be painful, just like any good movement practice or exercise, no matter what it is. For growth to happen, it should be uncomfortable. Maybe you walk an extra mile. You're like, this was uncomfortable, but it should never be painful.
Genie 30:47
Right.
Christine 30:47
Yoga, lifting weights, ping pong. It shouldn't be painful. It shouldn't because pain, we all stop. It's natural response like, no, I don't want to feel pain. Uncomfortable, yes, that's growth but going against who you are -
Genie 31:05
It's painful.
Christine 31:05
- and bashing yourself over the head being like, no, I have to be on IG Live.
Genie 31:11
It is. It will happen as you create this cycle of disappointment in yourself because it's something that you want that end goal. You follow someone else's model that's not in alignment with you and then you don't show up and you're beat up like, oh my God, I suck, this is bad and then you either keep trying or you stop moving forward because you get stuck and you're beat up and you don't make progress.
Christine 31:38
Definitely. I think business, although it's uncomfortable and you have to stretch and you got to learn some different things, I'm a firm believer in infusing the business process, the entrepreneurial process in your business with joy, with pleasure, with rest. I don't believe in this crush it, grind it kind of thing. I think it's real certain kind of deeds, and I'm like, you don't have to do that, you can just be yourself. If you're saying I need to take a nap, from 12:00-2:00, you can take a nap and still be successful. I live in Spain. There's a whole country that's still rocking and rolling takes yes every single day, so there's different ways to do things and being honest with who you are and how you show up is only going to have the right person be attracted to your business.
Christine 32:43
If you're like, hey, I'm a CPA, but I also believe in rest and wellness, so you're not going to attract people and be like, what are you doing? You're not going to attract that because that's the thing I was talking about earlier, about filtering. You got that on your website or in your messaging. People like, I don't know, you seem a little bit too laid back to be a CPA. Maybe I'll find someone else which is perfect for you. If someone else is like, oh, yeah, I like this, it seems very gentle. This is my vibe.
Christine 33:18
You're only going to bring those clients to you. Being someone that you are not is never going to work and like you said, it has to be sustainable, this has to be pleasurable in some kind of way. This is not supposed to be painful. You go from working for somebody else, being miserable, working for yourself and be miserable.
Genie 33:39
It's work. I always tell my kids. I'm like, there's a difference between a job and a career, right? And I always tell them a job is something that you have to do to earn money. A career is something that when you wake up in the morning, it's a joy to do. It's a passion, it's something that you like to do, even if in the whole construct of whatever you do, there are pieces that you may not like but at the heart of it, it excites you. Your ideas, which you're passionate about and it's the same thing. Why would you go and become an entrepreneur from working in a job? And then you bring those pieces with you, you're still going to be unhappy.
Christine 34:18
That, I think is just is human nature. I mean, it's something that people who move abroad do all the time. They're like, I'm going to move abroad and my life's going to get better and they take, maybe the American mentality to move here to Spain and they'll be mad that everything is closed. Here in August, everybody goes on vacation. Maybe they're like, what? You mean? Everybody, the dry cleaners? Yeah, everybody goes on vacation and maybe they'll put up a sign, maybe they won't because they just going to live their life or during the rest of the year, they may leave for siesta. Maybe they'll come back that day, maybe they won't and they'll be mad. You don't want, you will make money and da-da-da. I'm like, look, this is a different mentality.
Genie 35:11
Different mentality.
Christine 35:13
They're not raising after every single euro. They really like life. They really have like this work-life balance kind of concept because they just live life and enjoy life.
Genie 35:25
It's not about the dollar and it's so funny when people go to different countries and you're taking your mindset over there and you're upset but one, when you went decided to go somewhere and you did not really look up their culture, so you don't know what's going on. You're bringing your predisposition ideas and you're like, oh, why are you not open? Oh, how dare you? I see reviews of Dubai during Ramadan and people are irate, Americans are irate. How dare? Why are you closed during Ramadan? During the day they're fasting, so they're closed. Don't they want to make money, no, it's that...
Christine 36:04
And that's so important for people to understand. In moving abroad, are you trying to have the American experience minus everything you don't like and plop it somewhere else because that's not going to happen. I mean, that's not going to happen. Unless you're independently wealthy. You can have your own island, sure. But for everybody else, no, it's not going to happen. It's important to understand what is it in your life or in your career that you currently do not like and and take that time to really understand what it is.
Christine 36:40
Is it, I don't like working with my coworkers? I only want to work with competent people. If I work with competent people, I'm happy in my work. I don't like the kind of clients I work with, I only want to work with people who are trying to do some good in the world, whatever, whatever, then state that. The same thing about moving abroad, What is it that I don't like in my current situation? In my home country or my town? Who am I really trying to go after? Am I really trying to have work-life balance? Like I'm trying to claim, well, then you're going to go somewhere where they're like, well, this is how we live life, so be ready and embrace that.
Christine 37:17
But it takes so much self-awareness and so much self-accountability. We have to be accountable to say wherever we go, there we are. We go from a career to entrepreneurship. We come from our home country abroad and we're having same problems. We're having some angst. There is some lack of introspection happening and there's lack of surrender because, look, these are two very different situations you're in. You're working for yourself. Oh my gosh. I was going to be great. I was going to be four-hour work week immediately. Not immediately.
Genie 37:58
Not immediately.
Christine 38:00
There's some heavy lifting to get an idea rolled out, depending on how much capital you have to really push it out there depending what it is. It might take a while. Moving abroad, you think all my problems are going to be solved and I don't know. You're going to be woken up with some bird singing every single day and even if you are, you may be like, I hate these birds because you brought whatever you're going through to this country.
Genie 38:29
-with you.
Christine 38:30
And then people blame entrepreneurship like, oh, it's horrible and it doesn't work and oh, I moved to Mexico. Mexico is the worst. It's like, no, it's you.
Genie 38:42
It's you. Me and my kids, we went to Dubai and we went to several countries in the Middle East and we went to London and Paris and when we went, I took my parents and I told my mom, what I need you to do is I need you to put your black experience, your Americanized black experience, I need you to put aside for a minute, because my mom is old school, so she'd be quick like, "Racist, you're racist. You doing it because I'm black." And I'm like, they have other things going on and it's not about you being black. They have other cultural and other things that situations that they're dealing with.
Genie 39:18
And unless you understand them, then that's what you're going to assume because that's what you're looking for. You're looking for the experience, depth experience that you're going to receive and she was like, "Okay" and I was like, "I just need you to chill." She had a beautiful time versus you can have stories where people says, oh, French people are rude, French people are this. I don't meet a rude French person, but we also try. Me and my family tried like it's so funny. My brother, he's in the cafe. He's like, "Do espresso."
Genie 39:53
He was like saying all wrong, but she was just smiling at him and she told him how to say it correctly. It was just like I experienced it because we came in and we came in open and vulnerable and saying that one, we talk about taking your experiences and then going abroad. And what do you have to have in place? What does that look like? How do you get to Spain?
Christine 40:19
Oh, my goodness. How does it look like and how do I get to Spain? Well, okay, so let me answer the Spain one first. So I got to Spain... I don't know how to start this. Well, I've always want to go abroad. I always want to go abroad. I started traveling as an accompanying minor since I was four or five domestically and then internationally, when I was 10, my dad had gotten transferred to Germany when I was about 10, so I started spending summers with him. And so that really opened up my world. I never learned fear of flying. I never learned fear of being by myself and traveling. I never learned fear of being a place, not speak the language. I was just like someone probably speak English.
Christine 41:06
And I was 10, I was just like...Actually, I felt like someone's going to take care of me and I think that's also a very interesting feeling to have. The universe is going to take care of me. I'm going to figure it out, so I always had that feeling and then by the time I was 17, I knew I wanted to live abroad for sure. So I went to university and I was like, I'm going to study abroad. I'll make it happen and I did. I came here to Spain, to Valencia, and I studied abroad for a semester and I had an interesting experience. It wasn't a romanticized experience like I had in my mind, but it was interesting. I was like, okay, cool.
Christine 41:44
And then, you know, between graduating from university, going to law school, I traveled my first job outside of law school. I joined a startup in Miami and I actually went on trade mission. When I just graduated from law school, everybody else was studying for the bar exam and I was in Namibia and South Africa on trade mission with the startup that helped me to be like, oh, I want to be abroad. I want to live abroad. I want this jetset lifestyle. This is what I want. I actually ended up leaving that startup and coming home to Atlanta and I started my own consultancy and that's when I started working with holistic wellness, micro small business owners and really learning that space and that was really interesting. I play some music festival.
Christine 42:38
I did a lot of cool things and I got burned out because it is a hustle and it could be a grind and I was definitely in a space where I was into my wellness practice, but I was still very committed to I would say like American grind culture plus coming out of law school, which is a whole different...We don't sleep. Sleep is for the week.
Genie 43:01
Right.
Christine 43:03
Okay, not for me. I was like, oh, I need sleep because I'm going to go crazy, so I decided to go on sabbatical and I moved here to Spain, to La Rioja, the wine region, and teach English for nine months, like totally outside my field. At the time, none of my friends, I think one of my friends had her first child and he was like a little baby baby, so I hadn't been around kids. I decided to teach English because I'm like, I need to get out and I need to do something. The first day, I walk into primary school and the kids are like two feet tall and I'm like, oh my God, I'm in a school. This is crazy. It was an amazing experience for me because it really taught me how sometimes you do things, you say it's for yourself, but you're always being moved and put in place to serve others.
Christine 43:58
I had a school that I taught at. It was deemed the immigrant school in town, and I didn't really understand what that meant. I kind of being like, what does that mean? What are you guys talking about? My Spanish wasn't that great because I was like, I had been practicing as much, so when I got home, I was like, I don't understand what they're talking about. What they were talking about, it was the black and brown school. So in La Rioja Spain, very white country. People you know, it's very white and also in this region is very white and it's the black and brown school.
Christine 44:30
You have kids who are first generation, second generation from Bangladesh, Pakistan, Morocco, Mali, all over even Romania and these kids were like, "Wait, who are you?" Like, they're black Americans and it's like, you speak perfect English and you went to law school? Their minds were blown. They hadn't had a teacher that looked like me, which looked more like them and they probably won't ever have a teacher and I was there, and I feel very deeply that I was placed there to be that representation for them and to help them grow and help them have that affirmation for themselves, right? A lot of these kids spoke French and Arabic and Spanish and I was like English learning English like y'all good.
Genie 45:26
Right.
Christine 45:26
The only [inaudible 45:27] anything.
Genie 45:28
Exactly.
Christine 45:30
So that's how I got to Spain. I did that for a year, loved it, decided to move here to Barcelona because I want a big city experience and I started working remotely for a boutique web development company in D.C. and then I came back and started working for myself, so that's how I got to Spain. Now, how I develop my business because I had it in Atlanta and how did I have it here in Spain was going through the process of niching down. I knew that one. My target market was not Spaniards. The average salary here a month is nine hundred euros. That doesn't cover my rate.
Christine 46:19
You may think that my services are superfluous where there's other people who are like, no, she's unnecessary. So I don't target my business to the general Spanish market, although I do have clients in Spain, they're expats, so it's very important to understand who you are speaking to. I have seen a lot of people move abroad, maybe to Portugal, maybe to Spain and then be like, hey, Portuguese people, buy my things.
Genie 46:47
Right.
Christine 46:48
No. How much money you talking, you crazy? No. So it's important if you are going abroad to really understand who your market is, your market, maybe the local economy. Probably not if you're trying to make the euros or the dollars that you're trying to make. That's why it's so important to niche down and understand who your market is so that you can be in Thailand, and you're not making Thai Baht.
Genie 47:18
Right.
Christine 47:18
No, I don't want to do that. I want to make USD. I want to make Euros, especially in the northern European countries. I want to make British pound as long as that. That's what's important. I think that is a balance. I had to understand. Okay, I want this business to work for me. I'm six hours ahead of East Coast Standard time, so how am I going to lay out my business to work for me? Who am I going to go after? What are my services going to be? And for me, I knew I like working one on one for now and I actually will probably end up having a course, something like that.
Christine 47:56
But I had to understand those things. I had to understand who my market was and I had to put myself in that position. I did that mostly with word of mouth because that's how I built my business forever is just people knowing me in being able to do that, but being in a different country and trying to be like, hey, I live in Barcelona, but I could be a really good help. You know, sometimes you play into it, sometimes you don't. For me, I just play into it because a lot of people ask me questions about living abroad and so I said, look, I can answer those questions and I can actually tell you how I did it, how I'm doing it.
Genie 48:37
Right.
Christine 48:38
I'm doing it not by depending on the local economy, because, again, like I said, it's weak and it's hard, especially in Barcelona. It's like an international city, so the prices aren't Spanish, they're European.
Genie 48:53
Okay.
Christine 48:55
You have to understand again your numbers so that you understand who you're marketing to, right? Did I answer the question?
Genie 49:04
You answered the question and then as you were talking, I was like, okay, so now, I get it. That's when we start talking about when you're an entrepreneur and you decide to go abroad. First of all, why are you going abroad and then converting those numbers and who's your audience is? Lot of things you have to take into consideration, but we're back to the why. For instance, I have a client. She's relocating to Paris actually in December for a couple of months because her son has muscular dystrophy and the specialist in Paris are better than what we have here and she's an entrepreneur. So she's at the part where she is thinking about, the correlation, the hours.
Genie 49:44
But it always goes back to your why and what you're passionate about. Like yourself, I've always wanted to travel and once you travel, you get the bug like especially the younger you are, the more you get the bug and you don't have any limits, like it's almost 18 hours you're like, it's not long to be on a plane. That's not long. You could do it? What's the problem? Why we can't just go on this plane? What's holding you back? And when I talk to her, she just turned two. I believe he's like five, so it's like, oh, she's like, yeah and I'm enrolling in a school. She's already spoken to someone who lives in France who's going to help her find a house to rent, so it's doable but the most important part for her is she is an entrepreneur and that gives her that freedom to do it, so then the other thing, I was like, okay, so now it makes sense.
Genie 50:37
So Christine has a podcast that's called "Flourish In The Foreign". And as you were talking, I was like, I get it. I get it now, so tell us a little bit about "Flourish In The Foreign"
Christine 50:50
Yeah. So "Flourish In The Foreign" is a weekly personal narrative podcast that elevates and affirms the voices and the stories of black women living and thriving abroad. I create the podcast because I just felt like there was a need for black women who are living abroad narrative to be heard and told by us. I just got tired of traveling and also living abroad. And there must be people, I would say probably mostly white people who are expats or travelers being very confused as to like why I was in the same space. They were like, what are you doing here? I live my life. What are you doing here? You're from Australia, what are you doing here?
Christine 51:40
And I got tired of that and also because I always wanted to live abroad, I actually pursued it immediately after I graduated from university. I graduated in 2009, which was not a great time to graduate from university and I hit up all of my mom's friends, strangers, a lot of these things that we have that are [inaudible 52:03] in 2009. I don't know if people realize that, like some of these intricate LinkedIn, like LinkedIn wasn't as popping and all these things were popping right now.
Christine 52:13
And so I was sending a lot of emails and being like, hey, y'all know how to get abroad. Like you got a job, you got something, you got something and so I was that person. If anyone knows about going abroad and it's part of like these expat forms, I was a person who was like, I want to go abroad and I'll do anything. Help me and of course, you know -
Genie 52:35
I got to get out of here.
Christine 52:36
I got to get out of here. That's my email to these people and they're like, I don't know you and I can't help you and I wish I had known these women, the women that I now know, I wish I had heard their stories. I wish that even these women who are not doing anything that I want to do, just hearing that the fact they can do it. Live in Hong Kong, live in Argentina, live in Australia and do what they want to do and create a thriving life for themselves, would have changed the game for me because I was never like... I was always an ambitious person and a proactive person.
Christine 53:17
And I felt like I spent a lot of years spinning my wheels because I wasn't sure which direction I wanted to go in and I just wanted to go abroad and it wasn't until I went on trade mission after law school to Namibia, where I met the then US ambassador to Namibia was a black woman. Now, intellectually, I knew that black women could be ambassadors. I've never met an ambassador and so when the door is open to her compound, she's having us in for tea and I'm the only black woman on the trade mission with my company. So I'm just like, oh, my. I was like, she's really an ambassador. I don't know.
Christine 53:58
I was just like seeing that representation was just so key. It was a game changer. It was a game changer because I was like, oh, this is real. Not just intellectual exercise, this is real. So that's what the podcast is about. I want it to be an anecdotal resource bank for people, women and girls who are thinking about going abroad, but I also want it to be inspirational. I want it to be us telling our stories, not waiting for somebody else to tell our story and get it wrong.
Christine 54:33
And I want it to be some practical tips, because you can Google and as black people, we do Google and then we say, let's find a black person. So this is where the black person to find out what is the real deal, or at least this person's perspective, what they dealt with living in the country and it has been such a blessing. It has been incredible, one, just to meet these fantastic, fantastic women. I mean, I shouldn't be surprised. Black women making something out of nothing and then just doing it and looking fabulous while doing it. It is the norm. That's what we do. This is amazing. I mean, professionally, it's also been fantastic because I get to widen my network and the podcast. I didn't know anything about podcasting at all. Nothing. All I knew is I like to listen to this American life and that's it. I didn't know anything else and I really started from the ground up in March and I did what I usually do. I have a 12 week sprint that I actually work with my strategy clients and I just put myself on a 12 week sprint. I launched the podcast in May.
Christine 55:49
The podcast is just surpassed 2000+ downloads and has over 40 somethings reviews and opportunities opening up for the business, for everything but also the feedback has been fantastic for people being like, wow, I feel seen, I feel inspired. People loving the podcast. It's been wonderful, really. Lots of warm fuzzy. That's been fantastic.
Genie 56:17
Thank you for saying it, because I'm in a space where I talk to black women who are abroad all the time and when I speak to other people, they're like, wait a minute, I thought you said that she was in Thailand. I was like, No, she was there for a little bit, but now she's somewhere else and they're like, oh, so did she just move around? Yes. And then they like, what did she do? And you know, I spoke to people who live in Paris and my mom's like, "Oh, so she's white." I'm like, "No, she's black." because I said that she was a head of the European Council as a consultant and my mom was like... and her name, so her name is like it's a Russian last name because she married a Russian man.
Genie 56:56
And my mom was like, "She's black?" I am like, "Yes." She's like, oh my God. I never would have thought that and my daughter always talks about traveling abroad, so when she hears these stories, it makes her know what she can possibly do but also, when you get there, it's an experience and that's important, especially when you come from America. Our experiences, they're not so good, they're not so bad either, but it does make us very I'm going to say anxious, but I'm also going to say it makes us anxious of people, which makes us put our guards up and when your guard is up, you're not vulnerable and you can't let people in and you can't let the two experience come in either.
Christine 57:37
Yeah, I agree, because, I mean, I think for me and something that I explore on the podcast, I think specifically for black American women, moving abroad, living abroad is truly an exercise in wellness because it opens up a world of choices that have not been available to us in considerations. One either from just systemic racism being like, you can't do that, or just societal programming being like, we don't do this. When you are abroad especially as Americans, because we have passport privilege that has to be acknowledged.
Christine 58:18
There is this openness, almost this overwhelming amount of choices from the minor just being like, oh, I didn't know that in Germany, maybe I could have a beer for breakfast and do I want to do breakfast? I mean, it's an option now, do I want to do that? I don't know. To major lifestyle changes where you're like, no, like I take all of August off and off. I don't check emails and like the French, like the Spanish people are offended like we do and email me. It's August, leave me alone. These are things that I think for black women really exercising this ability to choose and in this choosing, this intentional choosing to cultivate a life well-lived and to understand and to be able to exercise the fact that we are not monolithic.
Christine 59:17
Right? No matter what society has conditioned to think, black women, we're not monolithic. We don't want all the same things. We have different values. We have different lifestyles. That's why you can live in Albania and live your best life or live in Thailand or in Rwanda and live your best life. It's such a practice of wellness. I deeply, deeply believe that. I think that for black American women, wellness is a concept that's not talked about enough and people think because of the experience and the experiences that you can have in America as a black woman, they are like, I don't got time for some wellness, some crystals and some bubble baths.
Christine 59:59
I don't know is that what it is because I don't feel like that solves anything and although I have crystals and I love a good bubble bath. For us and I can only speak because I'm a black American woman, wellness is obviously so much deeper.
Genie 01:00:13
It's so much deeper.
Christine 01:00:14
It's so much. It's so encompassing. Wellness for us has to encompass professional wellness, financial wellness, mental, emotional, spiritual and physical wellness that's truly and not in a shallow way, in a very deep, deep way, because we're trying to heal ancestral and generational traumas. That's what we are being able to go into and I think that's something that, like you said, sometimes we have our guard up because we have to always have our guard. We all have to be like, so what's this B.S? You going to try to spit at me today? And other people be like, I'm just curious because we're in Albania and I don't ever see black people in Albania and I don't mean any harm to you.
Christine 01:00:59
It's just that we all see black people here, so I'm going to stare at you, but I'm not going to do anything to you. I'm going to stare and be like, Wow, you really look like a chocolate bar, but you're a person. This is amazing.
Genie 01:01:10
Like you're a unicorn, look at the unicorn, why are you here?
Christine 01:01:16
And we can't get of it. I've gotten the sense of being like, look, y'all, yeah, I got some Google like y'all see the black people but having to understand the traumas that we've been through and the baggage we bring to places and really being a space that is safe, obviously physically and emotionally, we can unpack those things and you are allowed to be soft, you are allowed to be vulnerable, and you're allowed to explore the places within yourself that you can't explore because you're in a survival mode and that's regardless of socioeconomic status in the United States.
Genie 01:01:56
It is.
Christine 01:01:57
So for me, living abroad, I think some people might think that's ridiculous, but it really is a practice of wellness. I'm not a person that says bump your home country, live in [inaudible 01:02:08] at. I think that the cost of living abroad could open you up in a space, in a mentally that you could go back to your home country and really be a catalyst or come and live and do things completely different or decide to not ever go back depending on what you want to do.
Genie 01:02:28
Yeah, this conversation is in alignment with me. We talk about wellness. So one of the things I always talk about is wellness is not this huge endeavor that you have to schedule in your life. That's not what wellness is, it's those small things and for black women, it can be so small as what's the one thing that you like to do today? Do you like to read? How many of us get so bogged down in life that the thing that you love to do when you were a kid, you stop doing and that is your thing. For some people, it could be something as simple as drinking a water. I mean, it could be so small, but it can be so big. But the small things that we ignore that become problematic when it comes to wellness.
Christine 01:03:12
Yes, we ignore the small things because we feel like we need to push through, so we ignore things for our health. We ignore the small things because they're just for our pleasure and joy and like, how dare us?
Genie 01:03:27
How dare we?
Christine 01:03:29
And it's something that is programmed. Moving abroad is not going to stop it. It is a conscious, intentional effort. I find myself working all the time and I'm like, why am I in Spain? And nobody working like this. People be like, you want to do this? I feel like I'm working on this thing. People like, really? To point where I have to say tomorrow, Monday, I'm like, I am taking the entire day. That's it. I'm going out of the city. I'm going to a nice beach, not answering any emails and I'm just going to do things I like to do and even that, having to watch my thoughts and notice the anxiety I have about taking time for myself.
Genie 01:03:45
Right.
Christine 01:04:15
This programming is deep.
Genie 01:04:16
And the guilt. It is deep and again, this is a whole another conversation because we're not going talk about, when you had to talk to other people, we're not talking about we've got to talk to your parents. We talk to your grandparents because they're looking at you like you're crazy, you're lazy like, how dare you, tell me you're taking off? Why are you taking off? Are you sick because must be real because if you're taking off, if you're a parent and only if you're a parent, you're taking off because you're sick or your child is sick. If you're single, you're taking off because you're sick. Wait a minute. But look, Christine, you can't be like sick, sick, like a cold, like you get sick, but you got to be sick where your parents like, Did you go see a doctor? It's like, how dare you take off? If you take a vacation, well, where are you going? If you tell someone you're not going anywhere, you just want to take off for yourself. They're thoroughly confused, like -
Christine 01:05:10
Yes. And see, that's the thing. For me, I know my program runs deep and it's going to take some years to get where I'm trying to go, it's going to take some years to really condition or reprogram my mind but I live in a society where the peer pressure is to relax. Everybody's like, chill out. It's not that serious, but it is. It's like you deliver this washing machine yesterday and now you're here like, you know but I live in a society where everybody is like, no, we're going to enjoy life. I got other things outside of work. I want to go to the beach. I deserve to go to the beach. It was an interesting society where it's like people are not judging me. If I'm going to the beach on Monday, it's only me.
Genie 01:06:07
Right.
Christine 01:06:07
No one else. Everybody's like, oh, really? Only Monday? Then I guess August. You're not going anywhere? I am like, we're still in the middle of a pandemic but okay, y'all. You're not going to stay? I mean, you could bring your laptop, but like you should go.
Genie 01:06:26
Right.
Christine 01:06:26
And that's what I needed. I guess I need a societal peer pressure in a different way to start helping me.
Genie 01:06:31
Actually slow down and breathe. That's one of the things I noticed when I went to Dubai and we were on a ship and I started looking at the water and then it was so calming and I was actually able to center my thoughts more because I didn't have the pressure of what do I have to do today? What do I have to do with it? The list of things that we say we have to get done to feel accomplished, which is so funny, because the way that American thought patterns work is we focus on what's not done, what we do but instead of what we have accomplished.
Christine 01:07:08
Oh, yeah.
Genie 01:07:09
And that creates that foundation of anxiety, but also that ties into our self-worth and our value and that's why we work so hard, because we never take the time to appreciate what we actually have accomplished.
Christine 01:07:24
For sure. I mean, that's who I've always been used speaking to because I have always been an overachiever but a person who's achieved never celebrated it because I was like, if I got it, everybody else could get it. Onto the next thing and that is I mean, obviously detrimental because as an entrepreneur, you have to pace yourself because nobody else is going to face you, so how do you not burn out? How do you and not just burn out, but how do you show up fully for the people you're serving? Because they deserve that.
Christine 01:08:03
But you have to create boundaries so that you can show up for people, so you can give that great service and working yourself to the bone, not creating boundaries, being like, yeah, of course, okay, sure. They call it that 3:00AM my time, okay, yeah. No.
Genie 01:08:19
No. But creating boundaries, it protect yourself but it also make yourself sacred by creating these boundaries. You have to have boundaries around yourself because outside of that, you're just going to be like this cup that just keeps pouring and when you're empty, who's going to fill you up because you just kept pouring and then on top of that, because you can't pour in you never had a period where you actually turn that cup upright for people to pour into you and that's where the boundaries come in because the boundaries say, okay, I've given enough, let me sit back up and let me refill.
Genie 01:08:53
When we talk about wellness, that's what wellness is. That's what emotional wellness is taking that time to breathe. I like to say breathe. I feel like it's something that we do because it's what you do, but we don't really sit and take a deep breath. We don't really sit there and think about that inhale, that exhale. We don't sit around and look around but what we're doing, how it makes us feel. So you're not actually in touch with who you are, how you're showing up, how other people make you feel and it's a detriment. You get lost in this I like to call it the American cop, like forever ever working and you take that whole mindset and you become entrepreneur. That doesn't serve you.
Christine 01:09:37
It doesn't. I think that's why I'm so passionate about people, one, working in alignment with themselves and also really being clear about how they want to show up and how they want to develop a business, because you have to build into your business rest. You have to build into the business joy and in pleasure like you have to, because it doesn't come. That's just like sprinkles about you while you're on your laptop. It doesn't happen.
Genie 01:10:12
It's just sitting here, it's not going to happen.
Christine 01:10:16
It just doesn't you know, maybe for some people, joy and pleasure is having a foosball whatever in their office and for other people, that's not it and you have to be true to what yours is because like -
Genie 01:10:34
I am laughing because at my job, they have what they call fun and I'm like, that's not fun.
Christine 01:10:41
That's the thing.
Genie 01:10:44
And what I think is fun is not necessarily fun to everyone else and I accept that. But I don't want to take a lot of the time. So two more questions. So what is consistent with Christine is that she continuously talks about alignment and I love that and you have an Alignment in Abundant 12 weeks program. What is that like? She has given us a little bit tea because we know what her step 1, 2 and 3 is, but what is the program about? So I know first one was good.
Christine 01:11:15
So the 12-week program, Aligned and Abundant is for one, competent women entrepreneurs. I only work with people who know what they're talking about. There are other strategists and people for people who are like, oh, I know what I'm doing and that's no shade to y'all. But I only work with people who are competent because for me, the program is not for like researching and building up your competencies. You have to be competent in your field for us to really launch a product in 12 weeks. So it's for competent individuals who work in integrity too because I'm not about make oil sales, I am not about that.
Christine 01:12:04
I'm not a person that's just like, repackage, repackage, repackage. No, I really believe in transformation and I really believe in real products. The program is for, like I said before, servant leaders, people who really see their business as a way to serve their community, the collective, in some kind of capacity, no matter what that business is but you have a heart of servant leadership that has to be there.
Christine 01:12:35
And also my program is for people who are truly committed and I make this a point because there are five million courses and there's five million business coaches and things like that. I'm a business coach, I'm a strategist, and I make the distinction because I not only have a business degree, I have a law degree. I worked in startups. I work in incubators. That's how I started being a consultant, was working in an incubator at my law school at the main campuses startup incubator, so I know what I'm doing. I'm about it and I'm not about thinking and or philosophizing forever and stringing along people.
Christine 01:13:24
No, I want my clients to transform. I want them to propel. I want them to launch. I want them to at a certain point, outgrow me. That's fun. But I can only do that for people who are committed to the work. It's 12 weeks sprint; it's a sprint. It is intense and it is uncomfortable. It is not painful. It is not exhausting but what it does is it focuses your mind, your efforts, and it requires action.
Christine 01:14:00
We don't talk about it. We be about it. I always tell everybody, I'm a mad scientist in the lab. We're going to test it out. We're not going to be like, oh, yeah, we think it's going to work. No, we're going to go out, like, push you little baby bird alpinist. We're going to get that market research. You're going to talk to people. You're going to get people in your sales funnel. We're going to see what works and what doesn't work. That's how we pivot. So we got to do that immediately so that by the end of 12 weeks, you have a tried and true and proven product service business because this isn't you know, I don't believe in you build your business in secret, in a dungeon and then you unveil it and it's all the clients come.
Genie 01:14:44
Oh, no.
Christine 01:14:46
If somebody says that, if that's their coaching or strategy style, I'm going to tell you right now, no, I don't believe that. I just don't. That's never worked for me. I only do things that I've worked for me and for clients over the past eight years. That's not how it works. I firmly believe in testing and iterating and that's probably because I started off in an incubator and working at tech startups.
Christine 01:15:14
So that is what the 12-week sprint is really about. The first month is really about ideation. The second month is strategy, strategy, strategy, which also has to do with experimentation and pivoting. The third month really is about launching and having a hard push, but obviously there's iteration in there as well. But that's a 12-week sprint. It's tested, tried and true. It's what I use to launch my podcast and that's been working out amazing.
Genie 01:15:44
Yeah.
Christine 01:15:45
So for me, be aligned in abundance. I call it that because I wanted people to know that you can be an integrity. You can do whatever your heart's desire is and you can be abundant. These things are not mutually exclusive. Abundance isn't dirty, like you need to be sustainable, this needs to work so that you can keep on doing what you're meant to do and you deserve to be paid whatever you want to be paid.
Christine 01:16:19
I mean, I always tell people the pet rock was a thing and people made a lot of money with the pet rock so, why do you think you can't make the money or don't deserve to make the money? And you're doing a service that's way better or a product way better than a pet rock. So these things are so crucial to work together and that's what I do. The 12 week sprint is going to launch a new product. It's going to launch a new service.
Christine 01:16:51
It's going to launch a new you because you do have to evolve and it's going to require you to show up and show out but my clients love it. I'm blessed for that because I only check if [1:17:05] because some people will hear this and they'll be like, oh, this seems intense and I'm like, look, it's not for the faint of heart. I'm not a drill sergeant. I'm not going to yell at you, but I will hold you accountable and we're going to move because I can't have a client who isn't moving. How do you look for me? I can't have you being like Christine's my business strategist and you being in the same spot for weeks. I can't have it. I can't do it.
Genie 01:17:35
It is a difference and it is a push when you have to launch a product and have someone to help you strategize instead of you, I like to come home, so when I want everyone, I want to strategize. I'm like looking at what everyone else is doing and figuring out what pieces I can do and then I have to put them together but to have a program like yours where you're helping people create this strategy, that's a big thing. That's huge. Wanted and need it.
Christine 01:18:03
Yeah because what I find and this is something that I saw when I first started working in the incubator in Miami with students and then with alumni is that I have men roll out of bed, come into my center, into the incubator and like Christine, I had a dream last night. I like this business. I'll be like, all right, we could talk about it and it's like, yeah, it's a new full noodle. It is a new concept on a full noodle and I'm like, okay. I mean, we live in Miami, so it could go, sure. I would have women come into the incubator with a huge binder, all of this research and be like, yeah, I've been thinking about this for three years.
Christine 01:18:52
I'm still not really sure if it's a thing. I'm like, girl, yes. I don't even open the binder. I was like, yes, it's a thing that you should try. I don't know about viability until we get in there. We start moving some things around we start seeing what's happening but clearly, if for three years you can think about it, you got three years of research, it gotta be something there.
Genie 01:19:13
Right.
Christine 01:19:14
And I think it's why I purposely work with women and women of color is because we don't pull the trigger fast enough, we don't and I am the person that pushes you to pull that trigger because we got to move. We got to iterate.
Genie 01:19:31
We don't pull the trigger and there's no one else. I like to say, whenever you have an idea for something, it's sent to you by the universe.
Christine 01:19:40
Yeah.
Genie 01:19:40
It has to be birthed.
Christine 01:19:43
Yeah.
Genie 01:19:43
So if you do not birth it, you will be sitting there and someone else will. The universe has to give it to someone else because you're moving slow and then you're like, oh I had an idea. You did and you sat on it so yeah that's not going to work. Look, everybody get on aligned and abundant if you're ready to do the work. I just have an idea. You have the idea. You really put in the work and you're ready for the coaching. When I say ready for the coaching, you want a thing, but you don't want to do the pieces that are needed for it to come to fruition and like what Christine is saying, it's not about necessarily what Christine is doing, Christine Job is doing, Rachel Rogers is doing. They're doing what's in alignment with who they are as a person. Trust and believe, every person you see out here make the same thing, they have a coach.
Christine 01:20:36
Yes.
Genie 01:20:37
So on that note, to my sisters out there and you have a business and you're entrepreneur, I need you to also embrace not just Christine as a coach, but the idea of a coach and a strategist because it will help up-level your business quicker than you just in people's mastermind and you're in these Facebook groups and you're like, well, this person did this, let me try that. This person did that. Let me try that. You're spinning your wheels and it's going to be frustrating for you, but you're not going to be able to up-level as quick. So I want to make sure everyone knows, if you're ready, because it's not for everybody. If you're ready-
Christine 01:21:14
If you're ready.
Genie 01:21:16
I am lining up by the 12 week course and then I always ask everyone what's their favorite hip hop song because it's the Cipher. Yeah, you say All I Do Is Win.
Christine 01:21:24
All I Do Is Win and Never Scared by Bone Crusher. Yeah. Because Never Scared was my hyped up music in law school because I don't come from a family of lawyers or people who have even gone to college right after high school. I do have other people in my family that went to college was later so I was the first and I was going to school and I didn't have like a cushy law firm job waiting for me and I felt very much out of my element. I was in a different state and Miami is like a different country and I felt like people are trying to intimidate you and I was like, I'm from Atlanta so no, I'm not and I really, I used to hype myself up. I'm like, I'm not scared, like I can do all things. If y'all want to take you there, let's go but you know, that that is a hype-up music.
Christine 01:22:19
And also for me now, it reminds me not to move out of a place of fear. I can speak things into existence and I can move things around. I don't like the results when I'm moving out fear. I like the results when I'm coming out of confidence and I'm coming out of divine alignment and I'm just like, this is mine because it is. It's been placed with my heart before I claim it. That's why. Also, the same reason for All I Do Is Win. That's an affirmation. Like all I do is win, win, win, no matter what, even if it looks like I'm losing. It's actually my greatest good. It's for my highest and my best so all I do is win. For those other reasons, yeah.
Genie 01:23:03
Yeah. I always ask that question which is a good question because some people like I don't really listen to hip-hop. I haven't listened to it since I was a teenager, but they have a song and when we start talking about why you chose this song, I'm like music speaks to parts of our journey in life and a lot of times one of the parts of the epiphanies or when we're going through strife or when we're growing, you've got a track. You have a track, you may not even know you have a track until someone asks you and it's all about growing.
Christine 01:23:31
Yes.
Genie 01:23:32
Overcoming that thing or just I have a song and my song literally was I was in a point of shift. Growing from who my parents wanted me to be into who I wanted to be and that's why music speaks to you. Thank you so much for sharing all of your tea with us today.
Christine 01:23:52
Thank you so much for having me. This has been so much fun!
Genie 01:23:55
I always remember you doing the best with what you have. Remember to be patient with yourself and your child. Did you know you can support the show from patreon so the Parenting Cipher can keep bringing you great content and guest, just click on the patreon link in the show notes. 'Till next time!
