Balancing Business and Wellness

There really was a turning point for me. Having had my business that was not heart centered. That really made me feel this was my mission. This is what really got me going. Right. Like I would always say we're not changing lives in this other kind of business that I do in corporate marketing, but over here we actually are. Right? With life coaching, it was more around the mental health and whatever people were going through and then the last seven years with fertility. And it really does make a difference for you if you're showing up in a way that you feel this really is making a difference to me, somebody. And of course you can do that in marketing as well. That's just not. That wasn't my path per se. And that's where for me it really is such a shift in the way that you show up in every aspect when you know that this is kind of your baseline, right. This is what helps drive you every day. Of course money matters, but also it doesn't really matter when you're able to walk your walk and talk your talk and know that you're exactly where you're meant to be.

Hey there. I am so looking forward to diving into this unique conversation with you today. We're going to talk about some things that may be happening in your body that may impact your energy levels, how you show up, the tasks that you are doing in your life and in your business at any given time. We are so lucky to have a conversation today with Elizabeth King six figure, CEO and founder of Elizabeth King King Coaching. She brings successful heart center business strategies she's implemented when coaching over 35,000 women in 20 countries around the world. She's the founder of the nationally accredited Fertility Coach Academy that guides and mentors women on how to become certified coaches so they can create and build heart centered businesses of their own. She frequently shares her message to her Instagram community on her podcast Creation Innovation and as co author of best selling books Naturally Conceived and the Creative Lifebook. This conversation is a beautiful unfolding of how to build a heart centered business, how to balance and grow multiple businesses at the same time as Elizabeth has and does. And it's how to listen to what your body is saying and potentially even ask your body what is it that you need from me this week? And listening to that and engaging with that and showing up really aligned with how you are feeling and what your body needs in any given moment. We are going to go into detail on all of this in the episode and we've got resources and strategies for you to implement and put this in action in your life and in your business. So. So the everything can make a little bit more sense. I cannot wait to hear what you think of this. Definitely let me know in the reviews or find me on instagram @amber McHugh to connect on this deeper and share your thoughts about this journey and the strategies shared in this episode. Let's do this. Here comes Elizabeth. Elizabeth, welcome to the show. How are you?

I'm amazing. Thanks for having me.

Oh, thank you for being here. I'm so looking forward to our conversation and I love what you do and how you show up. Before we dive in, though, can you tell us a little bit about yourself?

Yes. I am a mom of three little boys, which I never thought I would be saying that out loud ever in my life. I had them all naturally over the age of 40, so I feel like I always need to put that little plug in to give people hope that maybe they're not quite there yet. There's still hope. I specialize in fertility, so I really focus my life's work in helping people through the journey of fertility, whether they're trying to conceive naturally or perhaps they're down the road of IVF or any other alternative ways. And yeah, just love to be in the space of helping, serving, and supporting men and women actually on this path.

So that's a little bit so beautiful. Your heart absolutely shines through in everything you do, everywhere that you show up and you really focus on creating a heart centered business. Can you tell us more about that?

I do. You know, I have another business that is not heart centered that I've had for 25 years. And I think when I first went into certifying as a Life coach in 2008, there. There wasn't a lot of life coaches out there. People would joke like, oh, you're from California, you eat sushi and you're a life coach. I was like, kind of, you know, and now, you know, life coaches are everywhere and people have this awareness of what that is, which is great. But there really was a turning point for me, having had my business prior that was not heart centered. That really made me feel this was my mission. This is what really got me going. Right. Like I would always say we're not changing lives in this other kind of business that I do in corporate marketing. But over here, we actually are, right? We in. In. Before it was with life coaching, it was more around the mental health and whatever people were going through. And then the last seven years with fertility, and it really does make a difference. For you, if you're showing up in a way that you feel this really is making a difference to somebody, and of course you can do that in marketing as well. That's just not. That wasn't my path per se. And that's where for me, it really is such a. A shift in the way that you show up in every aspect when you know that this is kind of your baseline. Right. This is what helps drive you every day. And it doesn't really. I. Of course money matters, but also it doesn't really matter when you're able to walk your walk and talk your talk and know that you're exactly where you're meant to be.

So dang good. You do corporate marketing as well, or still do?

I still do, Yep.

Okay. How did you know and how was it like this other path that's more heart centered, how was that revealed to you initially?

Through my first divorce. I say my first divorce as though I've had many, but I've had one. I should just make that clear.

No judgment either way.

Yeah. And we had gone at that time, we had gone through marriage counseling. And my prior previous husband had said that didn't feel like they were helping us to get to a goal of staying together. It felt like they were kind of just listening to our stories to help us separate, essentially. And I remember thinking there wasn't really defined tools of helping people move forward through something. And I had known several people, my mom included, who had been at that time in therapy for 25 years talking about the same things. And I remember thinking, there's got to be a better way. And in that path of thinking this, as I was in it, I came across somebody who was a life coach at that time. And again, remember, it wasn't really a thing too much. And she told me about it and really that it's focused on the future rather than the past. And how. How do we help people navigate to the goal that they want to reach? And that was a light bulb moment. I was like, oh, my gosh. I feel like people who are coaches are always kind of know that they're meant to be on that path. Whether you're the person in your friend group that people always come to or your family or whatever it may be in some form, even if it's through, you know, as a business coach, that people always come to you for business advice or whatever that path is. You kind of know, like, this is where I'm meant to be. And that's where the light bulb came for me of, oh, My gosh. I can help people and have a business this way and fill them up and fill me up at the same time. This is amazing. Right. So I went on that path for many years before I got on my own fertility journey and then recognized, wow, this is an area that is very unsupported and really needs to be lifted up and a fact of knowing that people are not alone on this journey. So here we are.

I love your heart, I love your mission, I love this path that you are on. And you know, we multiple business owner here as well. And I'm so curious, how do you find yourself balancing multiple things, two different businesses, very different streams of marketing and like very different. How do you, how do you balance.

That, you know, the word balance. I don't know, is there ever really such a thing? I've kind of come to the, the acknowledgement and exception that's probably not anything as balanced. And I think there's certain days that are harder than others. Right. Sometimes I'm back to back from. Actually today was 6am I was on a newscast talking about egg freezing. And then here we are, 8:30 and I'm all the way down. It could be back to back for fertility, but it also could be back to back changing up whether or not my team can be on another call and. And you quickly have to shift. Some days it's easier than others depending on, you know, the energy of what you're meeting about or who you're meeting with, et cetera. And some days it's just really easy and in a flow and after you do it for a while I think it starts to become easier. It just depends on, you know, each thing that is in front of you. Right. Sometimes there's stuff that's pretty heavy to switch over and you know, I find myself, oh my God, One minute I'm talking about miscarriage loss and how to conceive again. And then my next hour call is about launching a product that is software related. You know, like it's very different. I spend most of my days now though in the fertility sector rather than in the marketing, which I'm happy to say, but there are times where I have alternating days of meetings and things like that.

Yeah, you have also, as you think about spending more time in the, the coaching space. You have coached over 35,000 women in 20 plus countries. That is not a small number. Which leads me to, in my head, your business model design and how do you support a container for. And over time, of course. But 35,000 women. How, how did you build that space in that container to support and serve at that level.

Well, in the coaching sector, it really is a matter of scaling through group coaching and figuring out how to collaborate with other groups, software companies, apps, whatever, that hold their own container of curated people that you're serving within there. Right. And that's really how we've been able to reach such a broad scope is because we've been lucky enough to, to have those opportunities to reach out through other avenues that we tap into their markets as well, and therefore in turn get to touch lives of many, many people throughout the years.

That's pretty incredible. So partnering with people who already have a platform built up for what you also deliver and serving them in a different way than what the partner does.

Correct, Right. Because it's, it's a little bit of a, a tiptoe because you don't want to overstep on these partners. Right. Once they've asked you to, to come on board, you don't want to kind of start to do your own thing. So it seems like you're in competition with the people that just have asked you to serve as their fertility expert and serve their own community, which is such an honor to be able to, to come in and serve somebody else's community that's already intact, essentially. Right. But really also figuring out how do you then market to them from your own business as well so that you can take that on, to continue to grow that on a different level. Right. So that's where a little bit of that, you know, tweaking the funnel, so to speak, as to how do we transition that and where does that come in to say, you know, we're, we're selling them one on one coaching or something else. You know, maybe perhaps they came in as a conception client, trying to conceive and now unfortunately, they're on this side of IVF now. Maybe they went from natural to art, which is artificial reproductive technology, to perhaps they've suffered a loss. So then we help support them through that. So it just kind of depends on how we kind of take them from where we initially came in contact with them to where they come into our world essentially into a different type, different level of coaching.

Wow. How, as you were building these relationships, how did you find these partners?

You know, honestly, a lot of them have found us and I think part of that is just being out there and showing up in effect of, you know, this is what we do. And whether you are, you know, a, it doesn't really matter where you're at on this, you know, in life, but this collective of women, there are now one in six worldwide that are going through this. Right. So there's a lot of different avenues from our kind of niche of fertility that it touches. And so we can talk to corporations that have women that are, you know, lacking in their productivity because they're so concerned about their fertility. You know, so how do we help the corporations in order for them to have their, their women workforce to be more productive when they're through that time of that era of their life? Right. So there's a lot of different avenues that people have reached out to us to, to ask to partner. And then also if there's something that we really feel in alignment with. So if there's a supplement company or something that we know that they're building their brand and they have their own community, sometimes we'll reach out to them too, to say, hey, would you be open to having a fertility expert? Because we know that, you know, we're kind of in alignment with the same customer that you guys have as well. And this would be a great resource for you guys to offer to your existing clients.

Pretty incredible. I'm loving this. And you know, as you think about the journey and the path you are on, corporate marketing layered in coaching in a very niche way. What guidance would you give to someone who's saying, like, okay, I may need to add coaching on, right? Or I may need to make this official or I need to expand into this space. What led you there? What process? How did you become and learn the coaching models?

I mean, I went through a certification. So in the United States anyway, there is only one really regulation, that international coaching federation that regulates coaches. So you would see quite a few coaches out there that may not be ICF coaches just fine. It doesn't mean that they're not a good coach. But there's also a lot of other kind of privately owned certifications that are out there. I wouldn't say that they're bad. I just think that there's really no regulation. So maybe are in the corporate world and you think, you know what? I think I could actually help people who are in a 9 to 5 to figure out how to do a side hustle when they're in their nine to five still or whatever. Like a lot of people, there's a lot of avenues to coach others in different ways. And I think there's always this aspect of maybe there's something more than my 9 to 5. Maybe there's something more than maybe it's not even your 9 to 5 and it is an entrepreneur company like you and I have that still makes you feel like there's got to be something more out there that's more heart centered again. That was for me would really fill me up and make me feel like I didn't just fall into the job that I was doing. I was good at it, all the things. But I just knew that wasn't my life path, that wasn't what I was meant to do on this world, how I was meant to show up. And I think there's a lot of avenues that people can get into coaching. That is a really easy lift. It doesn't have to be some big thing. So find a coaching program out there. It doesn't have to be a big certification but learn the tools to hold the space to. There are certain tools in coaching, no matter what niche you fall into that can help you help somebody else. And I think that's a really good place to start is just kind of getting that baseline of how do you even start start to coach and what does that look like.

So this also leads me to wonder if you think about the tools and the resources available, you know, to learn to coach and to learn to juggle all of the things that you do and have you share and talk a bit about using cycle syncing strategy with our cycles. I am absolutely dying to know more.

Yeah. So I think that this is kind of something I wouldn't. It's not new by any means, but it's definitely trending which I think is really cool because it's one of those things that right now people are starting to talk about it more and eventually again back to corporations and whatnot will understand. It's important for us to recognize that women work differently than men. And different times of our cycles, women have four different phases of the cycle. And for most of us we're taught you have your menstrual cycle and you have your period and that's it kind of thing. And then there's much more to it than that. And there's so many ways now and apps and amazing education out there that can help you to figure out for your particular cycle how you work during that phase. So that could be, you know, everybody's cycle is different. So traditionally we're told people are on a 28 day cycle. Not very many people are actually on a 28 day cycle. That doesn't mean there's anything wrong with you. For me example, I'm on a 24 day cycle so my times are going to Be a little bit different than somebody who's on a 28. So if I track that cycle, I will be able to know the times through that that I want to be more creative, that I want to be more social and do my networking, that I want to do more podcasts, that I want to put myself out there versus other times in my cycle that it's time for me to slow down a little bit. Like right before I'm going to start my period. And then definitely during that bleed of the period that you want to say, okay, I'm going to just go inward. As they say, your napping will actually be your sport and exercise during that time. It's really important to figure out what is perfect for you and your body during that time. Even the type of foods that you eat will change during your cycle and you'll have that awareness. A lot of people will say, oh, I'm craving sweets because I'm about to start my period. Right. So if we are feeding our bodies the certain types of food that it requires to balance those hormones going into the accurate cycles, then you won't be craving those things as more and you will feel more. You know, you're showing up in a way that's honoring what's happening in your body. Right. And that our cycle is known as our sixth vital sign because it really does tell us about the health of our body. Not only our body, but our mind and how all of those things are connected. Because a lot of times people will say, oh, you're just hormonal. Well, okay, if that's true and, or you're having painful periods, we want to know why that means something is off. And we can try to balance that even seed cycling. Having certain seeds during the time of your cycle, day one through 14, helps to increase the estrogen. Day 14 to 28, if you're on a 20 day cycle, would help increase the progesterone. And even that will help to regulate how your body is physically feeling and mentally because you're, you're naturally giving your system what it needs and kind of tweaking that to, to give it that extra estrogen or progesterone at the right times of the month by giving it.

Extra at the right times of the month. Is that a food? Is that a supplement? Is that a prescription?

So it depends. I would say definitely not a prescription unless you have something specifically going wrong and you need to be having extra estrogen or progesterone at the right times. I would say as a side note, low progesterone is pretty common for people who are having miscarriages and things like that. So if you are having losses, I would say you might want to check on your progesterone and see if your doctor can give you progesterone prior to conceiving so that you're. Your body can hold that embryo once you do conceive. But seed cycling is natural. It's just ground up seeds. It's sesame and sour sunflower seeds at the 1 through 14 and pumpkin and flax seeds, 14 to 28. And both of those, or I shouldn't say both of those, all four of those really give your body that natural, you know, boost of the hormones that it needs during that time. So you can put that in smoothies and yogurt and granola. I put it on like enchiladas and regular food, you know, so it just depends on what it is that your body requires.

So. Incredible. You meant literal seeds. I was thinking like dropping, like planting some sort of seed.

Literally consuming seeds. Yes.

Oh, my goodness, that's so easy. You know, I tracked my cycle for a long time and I was pretty good about it, pretty consistent. And then something happened in the world and I felt a little bit less comfortable putting my data into an app. What do you recommend? And I've been way off in tracking, but things are happening and I'm like, oh, boy, I should probably be tracking this. Where do you recommend? Like, where is it safe for us to track this so that the data is not used in ways that we would not want it to be used?

Yeah. So definitely check out any app that you're using. Most of them are very hypersensitive to the information that women are sharing there. So they are, they are keeping that data private. But you certainly want to make sure of that. If you choose not to do any sort of app to help you cycle in that way, you can always do your basal body temperature. That is going to help you to identify what's happening there. Now, that's not as easy as, you know, most people of other technology that's out there. But if that's something that you kind of have a fear around with the privacy data and everything like that, certainly that's kind of the, the tried and true way to, to do that. And you can download a chart, a basal body temperature chart online really easily and just mark it every day. You'll see what's happening there. And it'll also help you to indicate if it's too low or, you know, your cycles are too long or Too short. You're gonna want to try to bring those in into the right amount of time, because that kind of, again, signals that something with your hormones is off. And you'll want to get that in alignment as much as possible so that you can be creating healthy eggs and therefore a healthy baby.

My God, no more babies. On my end, I've got three girls as well. And as much as they beg for, like. No, I hear you with the three boys.

I was.

I was wondering. I still observe and check out my heart. Like, I feel it. You're talking about. Yeah. And energy levels up, down, consistently down for a while. Oh, there's something to watch here.

Yes. And I think that's the misconception as well, Amber, is that I'm not having children anymore. So I'm not. Like, that's not my world. But actually it is, because, again, that sixth vital sign is telling us the health of our body. Right. So most people are like, oh, I'm just going to get a hysterectomy or I just going to do whatever. And actually, that monthly bleed really tells us so much about our body and what's happening. And so as much as it's not fun and it's kind of a pain, it really does help us to identify what's going on. And I would argue in a different way, even more so as we get older, tracking those hormones and making sure that we're still in balance and what we can do to keep them as balanced as possible keeps us healthy. Right. So you see people that look. You're like, gosh, they look so good for 60 or whatever age they are. Right. And I would guarantee that if you do their hormonal panel that, you know, everything is really in line and they're taking care of their. Their body in that way as well. So it's not to be let go once you're past that area of having kids. I'm certainly not having any more kids either, but I am still taking all the seeds and still doing all the things because I want to make sure that my body is as healthy as possible. And then once it changes to the next phase, then I'm aware of what's happening. And, you know, I don't buy into, you know, the menopause situation of, like, it's going to be awful and all these things. Like, I just don't subscribe to that. And I think part of that is because I know that I'm going to take the power back from that and do what I need to do in order to give my body what it needs to transition through that gracefully.

So good. Elizabeth, you mentioned the estrogen and progesterone, but do you look at testosterone as well?

Yeah, testosterone definitely plays a role for sure. So people who have pcos generally have a higher rate of testosterone, and that's not necessarily a bad thing. As far as, you know, pcos, if somebody's like, oh, I just got diagnosed with this and I'm not going to be able to have children, absolutely. That is not true. Don't think that for a second. Where the testosterone plays a role, though, post children is that tends to change and fluctuate as we get older. Same with men. The men lose their testosterone as they get older. That's why you often see them get a little more weepy as they get older. And whatever, their estrogen goes up and their progesterone goes down, ours sometimes will be the opposite. So you want to make sure that that goes in line. So the kind of wild card in that is if you have had children and you're kind of not so far post that the testosterone can get a little bit out of whack for lots of other reasons. And so you do want to check that because it matters with your libido and all the other things that are important in life. And it can easily get off track. But the good news is that can easily get back on track as well. So not to fret, but certainly something to track. It's not, I wouldn't say it's like as much as the heavy player as the progesterone and the estrogen when we're talking about those things, but, you know, it certainly cannot be left behind. That's for sure.

Incredible. One other technical question that I just can't get out of my head. So there must be someone that also needs to hear this.

The.

You said the basal body temperature.

Yes. So there's certain thermometers that measure like point, you know, by the 0.1 type of measurement versus a regular thermometer that you might get while you still get this at the pharmacy. But you will want it to be a basal body temperature. And because the slightest increase, if it's a 0.5 increase, can tell you that, you know, whether you're ovulating or not ovulating or what's happening in your body. And that's why when you're trying to track your hormones, you want to make sure again that it's by the percent degree that it's tracking for you. And that's why you want to make sure if you buy a thermometer at the pharmacy, it's a BBT basal body temperature rather than a regular thermometer.

So good, Elizabeth. I have taken so many notes. I am going to start seed cycling. I got to start tracking some things again. This has been so incredible. And do you find as you track things? You know, overall, I go through seasons where I just feel like I'm in a slump. But when you're tracking this, you can better. And the supplements that you have to align with it supplement the seeds and other things, I'm sure to align with all of it. Does it bring your entire well being to a better place?

It makes sense of the world sometimes, right? Like we were talking about the new moon before we started recording and it's the same type of thing, right? You're like, oh, okay, that's why I'm feeling this way, right? Oh, okay. You know, it just puts the puzzle pieces together, I would say, as far as the bigger picture of what's happening, you know, like, that's why I don't feel like meeting my friends for dinner tonight because of how my hormones are. Right. And you'd never really understand that those things equate to one another. But once you're in that regular period of cycling, then you're like, okay, I know I'm going to do my big brain dump with my team this week because this is when all my ideas are coming. This is when I'm going to be best suited for that. And this is when I'm going to need to retreat and everybody's going to go off and do their tasks of what we talked about because all my creative juices have kind of left the building right now because my body is doing something else. And so it just makes sense of things when sometimes life doesn't make sense. And I think we're always kind of looking for those missing puzzle pieces and everything in our life to be like, oh, okay, that's, that's why I'm feeling this way. Or that's why whatever's happening. So I do think that it makes a big difference in just understanding ourselves.

You know, you said something there as you were thinking about, okay, here's where my energy is now. It's creative. And then let's, all right, we've got it all out. Team will go to work on the tasks or we'll shift gears. I thought, oh, but what if we're not in sync as a team? Or what about my team, like my colleague cycle? And then I remembered we so Often think up cycles and how incredible the whole design of all of this is that, oh, this makes the cycle thinking kind of makes sense.

Yeah. And it shouldn't be something that we're not talking about. I think most times people would say, oh, I can't work today, or not going to school today because I just started my period. But that's really all they talk about as far as their cycle. Right. Is like, I don't feel good or I have cramps or whatnot, rather than, okay, I'm in the luteal phase. What phase are you in? Are we tracking in alignment really? Or are we super off? And even if you're super off, that's okay again, it's just a matter of kind of meeting somewhere else where they're at to be like, okay, maybe she's not feeling it this week because she's, you know, getting ready and. Or having the understanding that maybe somebody does have something like endometriosis or something else that really, you know, is extremely painful. And to that point, please be open to talk about that because we want to be empathetic to those things that you are out of your control. And it's not just like, oh, she's having bad cramps. You know, there. There could be something serious going on with somebody. And that's why. Another reason that I think it's so important for people to talk about that, because we can all help support each other to be like, hey, that's not normal. You need to go check that out, you know, because people who generally have that think that it is normal, and so they just suffer, you know, because they think, oh, it's always been that way. Just because it's always been that way for you or generational, that doesn't mean that that's normal and the way that it should be. So, you know, there was a Division 1 soccer coach recently that I was talking to, and he was like, I want to have the girls put bows in their hair for different times of their cycle. So I know who's doing what and who can work out different ways. And I'm like, that is a great idea. Because again, having this awareness that people aren't going to be able to work out as hard during their cycle and whatever else. Right. And it's the same thing with our businesses of like, okay, who's at the point of really putting out ideas this week versus who's going to be up next week? Right. Or whatever it may be. And you're right. Most times people, the women that we are around Tend to cycle very much in sync. There's sometimes again, because there's different things that may be going on or maybe someone's on the birth control pill or whatever that things can be a little bit off.

So good. Okay, Elizabeth, we have talked about so much from building and following and building your heart centered business all the way through to cycle thinking, which pulls through that empathy and your heart for people. If we were thinking about this and people wanted to, okay, I've got things going on. I want to start using this cycle tracking to as I am building my heart centered business. Also, what are the first steps that people start to take?

I think really getting in tune with your cycle of that. So are you on a 28 day cycle? Are you not? When are you ovulating? What are those signs for ovulation? Again, we're not taught that in school. So are you. Do you have cervical mucus? Do you not? Those are all signs of again, your health, of what's happening. And you should be having all of those things at the right time. Again. There are so many apps out there that help you to navigate that process, to kind of give you that signal of this is what you're checking for right now. This is what you need to be doing. One that is super popular, that I love as well is my flow. Again, I will just always say the caveat. Make sure that you look at all the data privacy things, make sure that you are in alignment with those. Most of them are because of the fact that you're putting in health information. So they're very aware that they're serving a community that has. They're putting in medical data. So I would say for the most part they're all good, but certainly check that out for yourself and then start to do that. What is my food this week? What am I shopping at the grocery store for? What is my work schedule going to be like? Who am I meeting with? Who am I clearing my schedule for this week? Because I'm not going to be feeling up to that. You know, just really honoring your body and where it's at and kind of taking that as its own entity of what is it that you need from me this week? And you will be in amazement of how your body starts to show up for you in all kinds of ways again in that creative brain way, all the way down to how you're working out and what you're doing in that regard. And really in the same time figuring out is there any red flags that I need to be aware of? Do I need to be advocating for my myself with the doctor to say something's not right. I thought I was ovulating but maybe I'm not or you know whatever else may be going on.

Incredible. I know that you have so many resources on so many of these topics out there so point us in the right direction. Where do people find you? Where do you recommend people go to continue this journey?

So you can find us@elizabethking.com we also are on Instagram and TikTok at the official Elizabeth King. We have a podcast as well the Creation Innovation where we talk to other business owners as well as some people that are still on their fertility journey and or in that fertility industry to get information around that. So lots of different resources. You can always ping us directly. Happy to answer any specific questions that people may have and we'd love to help support anyone on the journey.

You are incredible. Thank you so much for being here.

Thanks for having me.