Developing Professional Confidence with Misty Megia

Welcome to Accountants Law Pod, where accounting professionals and law firms converge. Hosted by Lynda Artesani, Sarah Prevost, and Stephen Libhardt.

Welcome back everybody to the podcast. And this week we have a special guest, Misty Mejia, and we are going to talk about developing your professional confidence. And Sarah and I actually know Misty because we went through her program. And sorry, what do you want to talk about? What do you want to tell us? We adore her, but what do you want to tell us is your experience when you were with Misty?

Well, the first thing that was fascinating to me, I will tell you, as soon as I saw the Theater of Speaking, the whole— what you put out there, I think it was your second cohort, maybe, maybe your second or third, I can't remember. And I seriously privately was contemplating. I'm like, Lynda and I should do this. I'm like, Lynda's going to tell me no. And then Lynda came to me and was like, we're doing this. Like, okay, all right, pushing the buttons, going off we go. But the, the part that was enticing to me was I had been doing kind of like Steve, some local— Steve's a little bit above my grade, like he's doing some bar stuff, but I was doing some local speaking engagements and I knew I wanted to— Yeah. Perfect how I spoke. And I knew I needed some validation that maybe— and I love this about you, Misty— my tone, as I articulated in one of our sessions, I can come across really sounding very direct, very harsh. It's an ethnic thing for me, but it's not that I'm upset. It's just the way that I've fundamentally learned how to speak. And so— Mm-hmm. Not apologizing for that, just moving through it, picking the right words. I like the idea of owning our words. It sounds really fun, simple, but you— the way that you put your words together, how you present them, how you breathe, and all of those things. So this— I mean, there was so much in your court, like, I can't wait to go back and redo. There's parts that I'm thinking about now that I'm like, I really want to just reduce elements of it. But yeah, I, I, I love it. I don't know. You guys should just all sign up.

That's it. And I remember that conversation, Sarah, and I think it's a good one for anyone who is listening, right? That has nerves about how they're communicating things, especially if they're introverts. Then sometimes when they're coming up against something, they might just blurt it out and feel like, oh my gosh, I shouldn't have said that. That way. And to me, part of the conversation with you about it coming from your roots of your native language, and that sometimes you— I remember so specifically you saying, when we're talking, it sounds like we're arguing, but we're actually like having a loving conversation. And the more variety we hear in tonality and approach, the more acceptance we're going to build out in the world of all of the different tones and voices and pacing. that are out there that make us all unique. And so I love that you were able to just embrace that piece of you and go, yeah, you know, of course I'm going to curate the right language and I'm not meaning to be offensive in any way. It is all with love. But I absolutely remember that moment.

Thank you so much. Well, you know, I— learning through it at Scaling New Heights presentation I did say I just come across really passionate because it's true. I just, I just, I can see it, I feel it, I hear it. I know what I want to say to you, not critiquing you. And I felt like that really came across. Had I not learned that skill in, in the course that I took with you, I don't think I would have conveyed it anywhere close to— I know I wouldn't have. So it just is lovely that Lynda Artesani, even us, even our own communication that we've got to even between each other, with our team, just take that pause and just kind of take it in for a minute and help convey what we're trying to say without muting ourselves in a way.

I think that's one of the things I learned because I tend to speed up. I'm from New England. We go fast. And I remember you're telling me about the power of the pause, which I learned in teacher training with yoga, but you kind of forget about it because or we get passionate. We're very passionate. All three of us are real passionate about what we do. And I think that slowing down is hard, but it's more impactful for the audience. Steve, have you ever had that happen?

I'm so excited that you said that because I was thinking the exact same thing. It's okay to just be quiet and listen and take it in and not feel like you have to say something at that moment. You know, sometimes the power of the pause is, hugely powerful. You know, somebody will ask a question, like the presentations I do at the Colorado Bar, love those people, but their format is very dry. They just want a PowerPoint and they want you to stand there and talk for an hour. Yeah. And I get really passionate about what I do and how I want to convey it. And so I'm always trying to break out of that mold. And it's okay when somebody asks a question to just stop and say, you know, let me think about that for a minute, or I'll get back to you, or, you know, whatever. And then, you know, the gestures. But go ahead. I mean, that's my thought on it.

Stephen, I love it. It's absolutely true. And when you are passionate about something, it is palpable to the audience. And so that pause isn't just like for the question, which is a phenomenal strategy for a question, because I've never had a moment where I pause when somebody asks me a question and they think, oh, she doesn't know anything about what I asked. It's more, Oh, she's being really thoughtful about responding. And so feeling okay with yourself in that pause, but also when you're presenting, especially in lecture style, it is always a two-way conversation, whether the audience is speaking to you or not, because they're having to process what you say. And sometimes when you go over something and you're really passionate and you're speeding through it, it causes overwhelm because they don't have enough time to register everything along with that passion. So making sure that you have moments built in to really go, oh, this is a very difficult concept, or I, I feel myself being very excited about this, so I'm going to pause for a moment and just let you all soak that in, is one of the things that we do in theater a lot, but also in public speaking. It's just like, just take that pause in that moment to go.

I remember you did a speech, I think it was Scaling New Heights, about the rock in the rocks and taking the rocks for, what's her name, sister who passed. And it was that whole like main stage that you did made us cry, made us laugh. It had so many emotions went through it. And it was, for me, you standing there and I wasn't that many rows back, it was such a powerful presentation that you did. And I'll never forget it. It was, that just shows you, I don't know how many years ago that was. Was quite a while ago, but it was like, it just pulled at the heartstrings and it was so beautifully done. And I think you had some pauses in there and you had that interaction with the audience too was great. I don't know, I just, to me it was, that was one that I'll never forget 'cause it was so good.

Thank you. I definitely had pauses in there. To me, I think one of the aspects of crafting a good speech or presentation is really understanding the emotional shifts and making sure that you're helping the audience through those emotional shifts. And whether you're arguing in front of a court or you're working with a client, you know, when you're talking them through their numbers as an accountant, there are some things that you have to just, hey, we have to tackle this and I know it's going to be very difficult. And hopefully there's also some great news. And so Imagine if you blended that all together and you didn't allow for that emotional shift of like, hey, now we're gonna talk about some good stuff. Let's all mentally shift together. But it is just part of you recognizing for yourself where those shifts are so that you can help whoever the listener is through those as well. So they follow along with you a little bit easier.

And, and definitely is part of developing your professional confidence. I think It's— I don't think I ever thought years ago, I actually head down desktop, didn't really talk to my clients much, even though I went to their offices. I really didn't talk to them except like, what's this receipt for? Or whatever, you could do it right there. And then our whole job has shifted. So you are on Zoom. I think Sarah and I sometimes feel like we're on Zoom the whole entire day.

Right.

We have to put thought into what does our room look like? Where are we? You know, what's our audience? What's our room look like? What— and then sometimes if we have to have a difficult conversation, we wanna make sure that we're prepared for it because it is, even though it's not acting, we wanna stand in our confidence because you might get questioned, especially with attorneys, you might get questioned back and it's okay. Sarah and I have always said it, it's okay to say, you know what, I don't know about that, but I'll get back to you. It's okay to do that. I totally think that's okay to do that. Yeah. Sometimes we wanna feed an answer just to kind of like push the conversation along. And there's probably a great place for a pause in that too.

When, you know, part of the pause that really works, like yesterday I was in a 3-hour meeting with a couple of attorneys going through months and months of suspense transactions and clean up and all kinds of things.

Yeah.

The attorney was just on hyper warp speed. And I had to keep saying to her, it's okay, one thing at a time, one thing at a time. We'll come back to this. And then, you know, I would weave that back into the conversation later, but I was able to keep control of the meeting and get the information done and processed and all of that.

And you did that thing, Steve, that I was telling— talking about last time.

It's the framing.

You kept it circular, you kept it in frame to consciously move it forward.

And you're so good at that.

Which is the part that drives me inside because I, I don't, I don't wanna waste anyone's time. And that's the thing that we serve in our industry, specifically our niche. We have to value that time. They value the time differently than us. We have to make sure, especially if you're starting out or if you're kind of in the middle, you sort of forget that. But yeah, I didn't mean to cut you off, but this—

That's okay.

So perfect.

Cause it's just exactly what we were talking about last time.

Well, that builds trust with the client.

Yeah.

You know, if you're, if you're taking control of the meeting and, and you're, you're making it logical and methodical and, you know, give them permission to slow down because attorneys are used to being in charge of everything and just getting that information out and moving on. And I like to teach each of them, slow down, we're going to get through this, you know, and they— I think they appreciate it. And I wanted to mention, too, how many of you have seen this? This was like 3 or 4 years ago, maybe, or 5 years ago. Amanda Aguilar's presentation at Clio, that, that video. Do you know what I'm talking about?

I heard about it.

She She really keeps control on the stage.

Yeah.

I think I might have seen part of it and I thought she did a— she had like a blue suit on that day. Yeah.

I love that you remember what she's wearing.

Of course. I can tell you what she was doing.

The one in the blue suit? Yes, I remember that.

Yes, it was great.

I could see that.

And I was really— I started mimicking some of her gestures and things like that in my presentations after that because I just loved how she did that. She had control of that entire giant room.

Okay, gotta look at that. If that's somewhere, I'm gonna go look it up because—

Yeah, we'll have Tiara put it in the show notes for sure because it was— she did a great job.

She kind of—

She did.

I mean, she—

She commanded the stage from left to right is the best way.

Yeah, she just— she was all over that stage and she was talking with her hands and she was pausing at appropriate time. I mean, she had control that day and I loved it.

Loved it.

Beautiful. Beautiful. I love people that can intentionally use the entire space. You know, when they're pacing back and forth, then they're— it's like their nerves are showing because they're not stopping at any moment. But those— we always talk about when the right moment is to move on stage, and it typically is in that shift and that emotional shift to go into a different direction. So you're more purposeful about your movement. But that's what helps people trigger and go, oh, we're moving to a different topic, or we're moving to a different point. But if you're doing those really intentionally, like, as an audience member, you're just like, I don't know why I like this, but I love the movement that's going on. I love the pacing here. And I want to bring something back for that. What Lynda said too, you know, not just the wardrobe goodness that, that she was wearing, but for all of us in Zoom now, before we even open our mouth, the visual is our story of who we are and how we like to show up in life and to our customers. And so really paying attention to what your space looks like. And what story is it telling? And Lynda, I probably have video clips of throughout our time together.

I know, different, right?

Different of your background. Yes.

Right?

I used to look at your Venetian blinds behind you to see if they were straight.

Oh my God.

I love that about you.

I mean, I'd be like, okay, what's that look like behind you? What are they doing out in the yard there?

Well, I started facing, I was against the windows here and I had my back to the window. So I had that silhouette look from Lynda Artesani. Oh, it's the same room. It's the same room. I just turned the desk because I learned from Misty, like, you don't want the light behind you. And then I had my room, of course, was set up one way before the hurricane. And then the hurricane came and helped me really redo the whole room. And I had my yoga mat in the picture because it was in my office. I actually unroll it. It's actually over here now, but I unroll it and I changed the furniture because everything got ruined and I had the opportunity to redo it. And I love the way the room is now. I love my room.

Yeah. But the colors for all, all of you, the colors are calming. And so if you know that you work in a profession that is like a high intensity profession, but your job is to add calmness to your client, then going with those calming colors so they feel like they are in a very safe space before you even open your mouth, it can have a psychological effect on them. You know, for me, my background is very energizing and I do that because majority of my meetings not my one-on-ones, but our group meetings are at night. And so we wanna bring that energy and make sure that people know, hey, we're about to have some fun here. And so I love really bringing intention into what your entire visual story is because it can have a huge psychological impact on whoever is logging in, in this virtual environment where we get to see everything. And that is from the wardrobe. Mm-hmm. To your background. So I love really doing that with intention.

I've had people meet with me or reach out to me— sorry, Sarah— I've had people reach out to me and they'll, well, they'll say, can I meet with you? And then they'll meet with me and they're like, oh my God, you're in that exact room and it's really you, because they've seen me on YouTube.

You know, it's kind of funny. I'm like, that's me.

Kind of like the other day— It's really you.

It's really me.

I do find I, I tend to— regionally you dress a certain way, like obviously California, their styles to like what you're doing. But I do find that there are certain clients that I know, I'm like, okay, it's dress down day. I'm just going to kind of mirror it, not to, you know, not to show up or just to, to be in that comfort zone because there might be that subconscious thing that happens with them. And I think that it's interesting that you say that, because the more I think about it, the more purposeful I've been. I don't know for how long now. Just— I just didn't even realize it. Just, oh, oh, it's gonna be this client today. Okay, this is what I'm gonna have today. It's gonna be this, or weather dependent, mind you. I gave up my personal little AC in here. So I'm like, oh, but Anyways, yeah, it's interesting. I know, Steve, you want help with it, as you mentioned, because where you are situationally, like right now you're in the Airstream. I'm not going to mess that up now. In your home office, you wanted to change it because you right now have to do—

Totally want to change it up.

I don't have— Background. Okay. Yeah, because you do that. I forgot what you do on the background, but you have a background.

Right. You have a green screen at all, Steve? Do you have a green screen? Do you have a green screen?

I do.

I do.

Okay. Okay.

Okay. It's a beautiful background, but I don't know if it's your house.

It doesn't—

The only thing I don't like about it is it's a Zoom background that I'm using right now. And so, like you said the other day, I kind of fade in and out. My head will—

The hands.

And immediately there's so much research about green screen backgrounds that breed distrust. People feel like you're hiding something.

Oh.

And so as much of a physical background that you can have is recommended, unless it's specific for like a specific video. But in meetings and interactions, they have done a lot of research about how they're like, ooh, what are they hiding? And they spend more time of like, oh, is it messy behind there? Is that why they're doing this? And it just kind of takes them out of the moment. I have a whole article and maybe we can link it that is just some questions to help find your background vibe. And so if you guys want to link— Yeah, that would be great. But now Steve has some really easy, like, links to kind of get you started.

I switch back and forth because in the summertime, I literally this summer have been out for about 9 weeks working out of the Airstream. And so I try to make it nice and neutral because it's pretty anyway. But, you know, the home office thing is just— I just, I haven't been able to land on something that really speaks to me yet.

Yeah.

Yeah. I spent like almost $1,000 on this beautiful hand-carved screen to go behind me. It's so big, it takes like 3 monsters to pick it up and move it. And I, you know, I'll get it in there, but I don't like the way it looks behind me, you know? So I'm still struggling with what I'm— so I'll be a science experiment if you want.

Happy, happy to have it.

I know I'm, I'm actually wanting to wallpaper this here.

Sarah, I think that is so you with your punky Brewster, like fun-loving human that you are. I think that is brilliant. Yeah, I need some fun texture behind you. Yeah.

Didn't your mama not like what you picked? Oh yeah, has to be mama approved.

Why do you think I've been waiting for 2 years now?

I know. Well, that's right. You showed it to me and it was beautiful.

She did the, you're gonna put that where? And I said, on the wall. Oh, why? And I said, okay, moving on. So.

You could always, like, if it's just afraid of it being a permanent structure, you could always put it on Luan, which is a really thin wood material that you can buy at any like Home Depot, and you could wallpaper that. And just like tack it to the wall with a couple like really light screws. So then it's not permanent, and you can take it off when you get tired of it without having to wallpaper the entire wall. You can even frame it out so it just looks like a couple like little sections. But there's a lot of different ways you can tackle that.

Another project for Sebastian.

How far behind you do you recommend putting your backdrop. I mean, I love how Lynda's room has depth to it. I like how Sarah's room has the sofa closer to her.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

That's cuz if you only built it so far.

Yeah.

There honestly is no like, hey, this many feet backwards. Some people have— what I do recommend is that you have at least a corner in your background. And sometimes people, that's all they have is the corner space of a home. And that's okay because to create that dimension, you just need one angle in your backdrop to be able to have that visual like depth. And so you can sit in a corner and just kind of put a plant on one side and maybe a couple pictures on the other, and you'll have immediate depth. It's super easy to do. If you have a big office space, then yeah, we have, you know, face an area and see if you can get at least one angle in your space to help you create that dimension.

Oh my gosh.

Yeah, that's pretty neat.

Okay.

So when you're speaking and you're nervous because might, might be a new or a trepidatious conversation, like something. What are pieces like? We've covered this before. What are pieces that you can do? I mean, this could be for anyone, like it's not just a question. What are good like maybe some tiny little snippets of things that we should think about doing to help control our, the way that, so we come across as still that confident or knowledgeable person.

Yeah, I'm a big believer that a little bit of nerves actually helps you. And there's the fight, flight, or freeze mode. And if you are not nervous at all, sometimes you're not on your A-game. The fight, flight, or freeze mode actually helps you hyper focus in that moment because you might be in danger. And so it really gives you this tunnel vision of energy, which is really good to leverage. However, if you find yourself that you are over nervous and you're like maybe a little shaky, your voice is quivering or something like that, and your nerves are physically showing, then what you wanna do before a big moment is make sure— I call it NPH. Mm-hmm. And for miles per hour, and you're kind of dealing with the miles per hour of your heart or your anxiety. And the first piece is mindset. You have to do something to calm your mind, whether that is meditation, whether that is a mantra, that music, whatever it is that helps you just calm yourself for at least 5 to 10 minutes.

Mm-hmm.

Find that thing that will help you just go, there is a big connection between music and the pace of music actually influencing the rate of your heart.

Oh.

And so if you find music that is really slow, it can bring your, the pace down a little bit. And then it's, it's a mirroring neuron in your brain, which I think is freaking fascinating. And then when we think about P for physicality, your nervous energy is stirring inside of you. If you do not do something physical to give it an exit,, it will continue to stir inside of you. It could be as easy— I'm a person, before I go on stage, you'll see me in the hallways doing jumping jacks. And that's because I'm just giving my nervous energy a place to exit. It needs to go somewhere. And so whether that's jumping jacks, I had a client go, I found out what my physical thing is going to be. And I said, oh, good, what is it? She goes, I'm going to swim. And I go, uh, so everywhere you travel, you're going to go find a And then you're gonna be wet before you go on stage. I'm like, let's find another alternative as well. And so find something that is really easy that you could do anywhere, that you could absolutely do anywhere. It doesn't take any equipment. It doesn't find— add more stress of you having to find a physical location to do it in. So something super simple. And then the H in MPH is just creating the habit. Once you find something that works for you, You have to do that same thing over and over again to keep your mind and body from not going into the fight, flight, or freeze mode to say, oh, this is normal.

Mm-hmm.

This is normal. I'm gonna be okay. Because it's anytime that you change something in your behavior, your body goes, oh my gosh, this is new. Am I gonna be okay? Am I gonna be safe? But if you create the habits that you just repeat, then you don't go into that really high anxiety moment. Your body just goes, ah, I got it, I'm fine.

Remember that guy, Sarah, when you were speaking at Scaling? And of course anybody near Sarah is taller, but this guy was huge. I took a picture of him. He was a huge guy and he was miking her up. And she, that whole day, Sarah was like a top that somebody had twisted, twisted, twisted, twisted. They kept trying to, calm her down. Sarah, calm down. She was up everywhere and didn't teach till 5:30. So it was a long day. And I can— you're gonna run out of energy. You gotta calm down. There was no calming her down. So we get up there and he's miking her up and she— and he said, okay, let's do this together. And he was so good. I mean, he actually took her through some breathing to slow her down and it worked. It worked. And I thought, what a great guy, right? To have that wherewithal to take that time.

He would I'm 6'4", so that's—

That is tall!

Like this, you know? And I was like, "Huh, okay." Yeah. Really, you know? And it was funny because my— I knew mentally where I was not comfortable with what I was going to, like where, like the tools that I had to use.

Yeah.

So that was, I think, the part that—

That was a fear.

Scared me. Kept replaying, and I was trying to mute, mute, mute, and I was like, oh, okay, no, no, no. I know my— I know my—

I always had the clicker, see? And she had to go up by herself, and she didn't have me there to do the clicker.

Oh, that was interesting.

What is the clicker?

I don't look at it.

It changed the slides.

Changed the slides.

Oh, okay.

But you know, the other thing too is I'll be doing this where I won't— I'm, as you can, you notice, like, I feed off of interaction, just physically what I'm seeing. So I'll be doing one with no, no faces, just me. And I'm like, oh, that, that's gonna be interesting for me. Like, I really am gonna have to figure out how to practice asking the right questions to get the Q&A, because that— I'm just so interactive. Like, I just— Yeah, yeah.

And I'm in the front, Misty, and I already had said to her, I said, look, I'm gonna give you cues if I see that you're like going on too much, like, move it along. Or, um, time to wrap up. You got 5 minutes. And I'm literally sitting there and she was doing so great. And she had all these people in the audience and they're all giving her stories and she's telling them what she would do. And I'm going like this. She doesn't see me. I'm like this. She doesn't see me. I'm like this. She doesn't see me. All the way down to 1. And I finally said, Sarah, you got 1 minute. She was so in a zone by that point and she was doing such a great job. And I was so proud of her. And it was just so— it was fun to sit there and watch. But when she ever went up to that podium and all you could see was her eyeballs, I'm like, I got to take this picture.

I thought that was so funny. I was like, oh my gosh.

I was on my tippy toes on that part that you saw, Misty.

So is that part of the story?

That was not. When I stood on that footed, which I think even I put— I don't even know what shoes I was in.

We—

that whole thing.

Something that I like to do to break the ice with the audience too, and you've seen it before, but I like to either at the very beginning or if I see that I might be, they might be tired. Sometimes they put me on right after lunch. I don't know why they put the accountant on after lunch. And so I'll just make them all stand up and rub each other's shoulders.

Oh, wow.

Let's breathe, rub each other's shoulders. Let you know. Mix it up, or I'll pick out somebody in the audience who I see is really taking a lot of notes and I'll be like, I'll just say to them, what are you writing down? What's really inspiring you here? What are you getting from this? I like to kind of mix it up a little bit. And that seems to work. It kind of gets the ice broken and they're not just sitting there like, oh God, I'm going to listen to numbers for pay.

I got to get my CLEs.

That's what I'm here for.

Yeah. Well, that's why when we went in that room and we went there, I said, let's go see your room. So I'm trying to keep her calm. Let's go see what your room looks like. And she looked and she goes, Look at this. And I won't say it exactly like Sarah does because this is a G-rated show, but she gets on the podium and I said, oh my God, I gotta take this picture.

She did not know I was gonna put it on Facebook. And then we both said—

I thought it was going to my mom.

We both said it.

She's like, this is gonna be my opener. I said, oh, that will get everybody. Because at that point you'd already been at the conference so many days and it was the end of the day and it was a great icebreaker. Icebreaker because she just— you didn't even see her there. If you're sitting in the few rows, you couldn't even see the top of her head.

It's so funny.

And that just got it going. And then from there, once she got the laugh and you could see the interaction, she was fine. It was good. But it was so— it was fun to watch.

But even on individual, it's hard to do stuff.

Yeah. I love that, Lynda Artesani. And this is, I think, a good point for people is that you kept, you know, going, calm down, calm down, calm down. It is so crazy to me that, like, we know that that doesn't work for ourselves.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Like, if your nerves are inside of you and you're just going, you got this, you got this, you got this, the biggest pep talk is not gonna work. It just—

So when I said we practiced this 1,000 times, that didn't do any good.

No. And, but it, your, the intention is really good, right? The intention is to help, but it's, we are in such a mode internally that we have to create, like, a pathway out of that. And sometimes even for mantras, for me, like, mantras don't work for me, but I know other people that mantras work really, really well for them. So that's why it's important to find what works for you. And I love that breathing, Sarah, worked for you.

Oh, yeah.

There's so many breathing strategies. We had the square strategy, right? Which is breathing in for 4, holding for 4, breathing out for 4, and holding for 4, and just doing that in 5 cycles will calm yourself.

Yes.

You have to know what is gonna work. So you go, okay, I notice me just repeating to myself over and over, it's gonna be fine. I got this. It's gonna be fine, is not getting me out of it. So what can I do that is gonna get me out? And so I hope you made a note of like, hey, that breathing worked. That is gonna be part of my practice now is every time before I go into a high-stakes meeting or a presentation—

Just hijack the mic, the tech guy, and say, breathe with me, is what I'm going to start doing.

For sure.

Yeah, that's the process. Or Lynda or Stephen, go, hey, we have this important meeting. Let's all breathe together. It's going to help me. Yeah.

I know on Zoom, there's the element that people write in, and they write to you, and they're hiding behind the facade of the written communication in that, and that can feel very tense. And then on Zoom, the, the conveying, it just breaks that, that channel of friction, or it might enhance it. So I feel like if you're in a position, especially— It's high stakes, you may want to find— and I talk about this— is we've had this happen where I've literally had to just sit there quietly at the pause. And go, okay, hold on. And I know, um, Lynda and Steve, we've talked about this, but Steve, I think for you, sometimes when you're presenting and you get these questions in a live session, because you're kind of in— you're live speaking to a whole bunch of new attorneys that are game to start their own businesses.

I always get the newbies.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And, and you got, you got questions where some really are just they're ingrained to challenge. That's just their nature. Oh yeah, yeah. That and learning how to reverse and diffuse is a little bit easier, but it does feel overwhelming when you're— it just caught up in the moment and you— how do you break it? How do you unlock that? And feel like breathing is the best, but there might be other things out there, Misty. I don't know if that's the only—

Yeah.

And it really is so different for every single person of what's what is going to work. And that's why I say, you know, as you're testing things out, when you finally find something that works, document that so that can become part of your process of helping your nerves be in that spot. And I agree, sometimes, you know, questions, Q&A, depending on your expertise level in that room. So if you have people that are higher level of expertise than you, then those Q&As can feel like a firing squad. Yeah. Versus if you are the expert in the room, then you're like, I got this, go on the expert. And so I, I love that you were bringing that up of the anxiety that that can cause in a moment. Cause I think it is a, I hear a lot of like, oh, I got this, it's fine. And I said, well, not every situation are you going to be the expert. So figure out those moments too where you can show up and still sound like the expert. And sometimes that is— Yeah. Grounding yourself, taking up space. Right. That's another thing in fight or flight, that the closer your body is to your core, your body thinks it is not safe.

Mm.

As you are bringing in your limbs for protection. So if you want to trigger your mind that you are safe and have the confidence vocally, then you just have to kind of take up more space. Plant your feet on the ground and trigger your body of like, oh, well, all of our limbs are out, so I must be in a safe space. And your body starts—

yeah. Sarah.

Sarah, she did her thing.

This is Sarah.

She does this really large arm gesture to take up your space. Now your body is like, I am really safe. Do you see this arm gesture going on? I am not afraid of an animal eating me.

Here's something for you. In the Law Lab that Lynda and Sarah own, and I attend as much as possible. We have people quite often mention that they're afraid to even do a consultation with a potential client.

Yeah.

And, you know, sometimes you just have to fake it till you make it and you have to, you have to do a lot of the things that you're talking about, Misty, in slowing down and breathing and not having to say something at that moment. And having the courage to tell the client, you know, I don't have that answer, but I will get back to you and then follow up with them. That, that's so valuable to them. But what do you feel about telling people like that that are just terrified to even do a consultation to get business for themselves? You know, how— what sort of advice would you have for them?

Can I ask a follow-up question?

Sure.

For the people that are being so wonderfully vulnerable and saying this scares me, are— do they already have clients or are they trying to get their first one?

Sometimes they do. They might have a client, they might have like a beauty salon or something like that that they already are doing, but they wanna break into the legal field.

Mm-hmm.

You know, and, and so they, I think they're letting the attorneys intimidate them just because of who they are.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah. So right away they're scared and they're admitting to it and they're like, I, I can't go, I can't talk to 'em. I don't know what to say.

Yeah.

So it's a fake it till you make it thing sometimes.

I think too, we, you know, I think the imposter syndrome is thrown around a lot and I personally don't believe in imposter syndrome. I think it's something that we just created and it sounds way more dramatic than it needs to be because really it's, I'm learning something new and this makes me nervous.

There you go.

And so to me what it is is you, actually should look at what you have done that you are already successful at.

Yeah, what brought you here?

Really, I'm really good at this type of conversation. I'm really good at this. And you write down those proof points because you know you've had some success before. This is just a new market. So what can you—

I like this.

—over to the new market that shows, oh yeah, I can do this. Here's the few things that I need to learn. Let me go learn that from these wonderful ladies as experts. And then I can continue to grow. But I don't think any of us, you know, if we're not stretching ourselves and growing, then it's like, yeah. Yeah.

Okay. And it turns out people—

Yeah. And we always have people points. And it's like, okay, so what are the things? I'm really good at understanding my numbers. I'm really good about looking at things and seeing where the opportunities are for a client to shift. So you can always leverage what you know really well in this moment. You're going to be okay. But if you just look at, this is a new audience, I don't know how to do this, I'm starting from square one, you're not telling yourself a true story.

I like that.

It's true. And, you know, you think about it, I'm just thinking as you're saying this, something about when I first started to shift all to the attorneys, and I had one, and I got really close with him. He's still my client today. He's local. And we kind of rode the journey together. He had come from a big firm, started on his own, and we were really open about, like, you know, I told him, this is my first rodeo basically in working with law firms. You let me know. And I did a lot of research. But after that, when I started to really delve into it myself, I'll tell you what, sometimes it is a little bit of faking it till you make it. And I can tell you, I have Googled behind the Zoom screen to find an answer to a question on the fly. I mean, don't— I'm not embarrassed to say it because that's how I started to learn. And I just learned more and more. And if I didn't know an answer and I didn't have the opportunity to do that, I would just say, look, that's new to me, I need to get back to you. But always being confident in that answer and not hesitating, looking like a deer in headlights, like, oh God, I don't know that. You don't want to present it that way. But attorneys are, they can be, some of them are nice as pie and some of them can be scary, but most of them, they're just regular people and you can kind of pull that veil down. Sarah's really good at that with getting them to kind of, and we've had contentious meetings We're fortunate because the two of us are in it. So we tell the Law Lab folks to partner up a little bit if you need to, and that helps. And Sarah and I have done it where we'll go in and have a meeting with somebody that's a little bit of a contentious meeting, and we'll sometimes just let them blow off the steam because we don't know what caused the steam. It might not have anything to do with us, but they're deflecting.

Yeah.

You don't want to take it.

And I think I love this, Lynda, because I, I think you're absolutely right. Usually when we have that anxiety about taking on a new path, really it boils down to we don't wanna be embarrassed. We don't wanna be like ashamed of how we're showing up. We wanna have all of the answers, especially as accounting professionals and in the legal profession, we feel they're coming to us because we're an expert. And then if we do something that undermines that, that can be scary. It is our own vision of perfectionism that is keeping us from actually achieving. And once you go, hey, I don't need to be perfect, none of us are. And you just go, this is a learning process. I'm going to be okay. I'm going to learn every single day. So what I made a mistake on yesterday won't happen tomorrow.

I'll tell you, one of the things that I learned working with attorneys over the years is if, when, not if, but when you make a mistake, owning it, they totally respect that and love it. Just by the nature of their work, it's like, okay, you made a mistake, what are we gonna do to fix it? It's okay to admit that to them.

And we did that in the Law Lab. We did one whole session on the psychology of working with an attorney and their traits. They're actually very good with their words and verbal, but the numbers actually scare them. Some of them, not all, but a lot of them, a good amount of them are, they don't understand what we do.

Or they just don't want to do it at all.

Right. They want nothing to do with it, but they want to understand it. For the most part, they want to understand it, but they're a little embarrassed to tell us that they don't learn this in law school. So it's our opportunity to educate them and get them to understand it because we want them to understand where they're going so we can help them go forward and be profitable or whatever.

And that's a big part of it. Even if they learned it though.

Even if they learned it, yep.

It's not—

It's not what they do.

Intuitive. That's not what you went to school for. I'm sorry, did you sign up to do the accounting for your law firm for all these? I mean, I know you did not. You'd rather be in court. You know?

Yeah.

So let's get back to the reality of what needs to happen. But I appreciated what you all are saying because you have to remind yourself of the skill set that you bring forth regardless of what profession you're coming in now. Yes. Is it, is it a different skill set? It is. And if you feel like you can't own it, but by all means, respect that boundary. If you're in e-commerce and you're dipping your toe over here, okay, this may not be that. That's a little bit too harsh of a curve. And a lot of people, I think, Steve, that you are referring to, sometimes they, they're starting out and they're starting with a friend and then a friend, and then they start to grow. You have to decide too as an owner. Like, I'm fine being where I sit. I know it's the liability. I know it rests on my shoulders. I know it's my final decision. It's Lynda's final decision. I'm okay with that. If you start asking yourself if you're not okay with that and you just want to subcontract in this like backdoor thing, that's okay too.

Yeah.

But just be prepared to answer questions, communication, which is why I appreciated Misty's course is regardless of where you sit, you might be one cog in a big company, but you still have to present. I mean, you cannot get away from that. And think about what you lead for your family life, you know, what you're presenting to your family. You're a business owner, but you're kind of a hermit. I don't think those go together, but okay, that could be a possibility. Maybe.

I don't know.

Yeah. One of my favorite lines from a song in Dear Evan Hansen is, "I'm stepping, I'm slamming on the brake before I even turn the key." Ooh.

Oh my man, I love that.

I got goosebumps on that one.

And I think that that is what fear is for a lot of us.

Yeah.

Right? And so you have to like be able to turn the key and slowly move forward before you just step on the brake and go, "Ah!" Yeah, I love that.

Man, that's a really good—

And then in your group, Misty, I mean, I think you probably have the most amazing opportunity to watch us go from point A when we arrive to the end where there's such a shift in every single one of us that joined your group. You wanna tell us a little bit more about the group and kind of tell us, I mean, your cohort is, we found it amazing. We're glad we're still part of it.

Yeah.

Yeah, why don't you tell us? 'Cause you have another cohort coming up.

I do. I, I feel incredibly blessed because I don't know how, but all of these wonderful women, including you two, come into these cohorts. And every cohort I feel like, oh my God, these humans are amazing. And it's so true. And to me, majority of my work is just giving you all the framework because a lot of the women that join it already know like in their soul that they are born to create impact. And so it's just me going, hey, here's the framework so you can and you show up at your best level. And as we go through, it is true. Like Lynda, me and Krista typically stay on for about a half hour after the group sessions and we just like love on you all between the two of us and go, oh my God, did you see her do that? And did you see her do that? And then we're just like, okay, we need to get off the phone. But to us, watching you all just shed any misconceptions that you've had, lean into the journey, be playful to stretch yourselves and your skills is such a joy and a pleasure. Like, I can't believe it's my job sometimes. Like, this is what I get to do for a living. And so two things I do corporate groups as well. So it's a mix of male, female, and everything else. And then I do an all-women's cohort 2 times a year. And so the 2 times a year are March because it's Women's Month and August because it's Girlfriend's Month.

I don't—

Yeah, I do those 2 things. But I really, to me, I hope, and a lot of my corporations have been really kind to, of they have been putting through people through the program that aren't usually recognized within the corporation as a spokesperson or have been given the opportunities to rise. And some of my women are taking keynote stages for the first time and just knocking it out of the park. And I almost get— I actually do get more joy about seeing you all out there speaking and just owning your light than I do about getting on stage. I still love being on stage, but I am jumping up and down for y'all. I get text messages every day going, I just conquered this, I just did this. And I'm like, ah. So I love it. I'm blessed. I'm absolutely blessed.

And there's still space, right? There's still some space if somebody wanted to join August.

Yeah, we still have 3 more spots.

I'll tell you, it's amazing. It's amazing. And I feel like we, we sit in the— some of us sit in the world of introverts and extroverts in the combo. And I have to say what that your course did for me was remind me and provide me the ability— like, it's, it's okay where I sit. It's okay if I want to, you know, do a live or not do a live or do some social media or define things differently. It's nice to be in certain circuits if that's what you want. And the commitment of that was interesting. And seeing like people ask questions, well, how do you do it? Well, you'd have— it's like this weird journey of you have to want to be ready for it too, if that's what you want. But also just what you've provided is such a ginormous gift. It was my birthday gift to myself, I'll tell you that. That's what I did. And then it just gave me— Uh, it just gave me a solid foundation. And I didn't know that I needed it. I didn't know that I wasn't where I was in it, but I was so open. And I think that's the thing that I love about you. You just have to remain open. And the people that you bring to us to also learn from, some of these speakers—

Oh, yeah.

Give me goosebumps of their stories and their journey and their humanity, like what they've given to the world. Oh my God, I would have never otherwise met. So just, you, you provide so much value in just those few weeks. Like, it's life-changing. It really has.

It's a sisterhood. I mean, it continues on if you choose that path. It's, it's really fun. I, I enjoy looking in the channel and seeing all the things people are doing, and I'm like, yeah, oh, that's awesome, keep going. It's a lot of celebrating, and I love that it's a bunch of women. Sometimes we don't always get that rap of all getting along. You always know meow. But that doesn't happen there. This is like a major sisterhood where everybody loves everybody and everybody's lifting everybody up. And I think that's what I love the most about it, is that it continued on and there's still growth and we can still grow. And we always know we can reach out to you and you're always there for us. So, I mean, so it's got a lot of benefits to it and we just— I want to do it again now.

Oh, that's what I was—

If you learn again. But we were— we, we accelerated ourselves. So we're in the alum, so we have to do the alum piece. We are in the alum. Yeah, we have to do that part, whatever that part is. I have to go back and look.

But I better go get myself a wig and get ready for August.

You're fine, Steve. They'll let you in.

Steve, could I just tell you how much my husband complains about this? This is a consistent thing because he was obviously the first person to take any of my content just so he can like— Oh yeah. He quotes me back to me all the time, and it's really kind of bizarre.

He's like, well, what I learned is—

I'm like, okay. But he's constantly going like, don't leave out the guys. Like, I learned so much from this, and the guys learned so much from this. So we do the on-demand piece. Like, anybody can do at any time if they want to do that. And then I do one-on-ones for gentlemen as well. I don't want to leave anybody out. There is just absolutely— I'm like, to my core, for my husband's sake, like my women cohort, like creating that space that is just a safe space for them to take risks and cheer each other on. I'm just like, I'm not ready to allow anybody else in yet, but maybe one day. But right now it's like— If you came in a wig, I might be like—

Well, and you have a very special assistant who I've just— I love her so much, Krista, and she's got a whole music thing she just put out. I'm just gonna yell this for her. Yalla yalla! Which is a very Arabic word, and she just put out this piece, and I mean, we've gotta link her to you. Just FYI, I've gotta link her too, because it— I mean, Misty is such a force. And you've got this amazing person supporting you, which we celebrate you, Tierra. We're gonna have you on.

Yes, we have you too, Tierra.

So you— We're gonna have you on. But it is like the cohort thing. It's, it's the community, I think, is— and it just feels so nice to be welcomed without judgment, and be okay with showcasing yourself, with hearing feedback without feeling judged. That's hard to do.

It is. It is. And I love you're giving out a shout out to Krista. She is my executive director, and she— I just don't even know. She actually came to me from one of my students when I left corporate for a while and became a teacher, and he became a lawyer. Now he's a speech and debate teacher. And I wrote him and I said, hey, do you know any phenomenal humans. I need somebody else on my team. And without hesitation, he's like, yes, Krista, let me do a connection for you. Our first meeting, I was like, I love this human. And to me, I can teach— I feel like I can teach anybody a skill set that they need, but I can't teach the personality.

Yeah.

And she comes with so much equal love and care for humans that I am just in awe of her. On top of her skill set of speech and debate, which she is a gold medalist 7 times over, on top of her being an artist, so she has that creative vibe too. I just am— I love her. I like— we kind of have a love fest every time we talk. Yeah. I love you. She's like, I love you.

I'm like, no, I love you more.

I think we tied everything back up really well. She even brought the lawyers right back into the conversation for us. Well, thank you. Thank you so much for coming.

Yeah.

Misty Mejia, Theater of Public Speaking. We're gonna put all the links in if you wanna try it out, you wanna know more about it, you can reach out to me and Sarah.

Oh, yeah.

Get Steve in the program. We're gonna get him a wig, so we'll all be all set.

I'll shave for you, Misty.

Perfect. Perfect. I love it.

So if you want to follow us for more, you can subscribe to this, our podcast and our YouTube channel. We really want you to follow our YouTube channel. You get to see our beautiful faces at the same time. We would love it. So it's www.accountantslawpod.com. We'd also love to have you follow us on the Accountants Law Lab if you want to learn more about what we've talked a little bit about. We're learning how to work with legal accounting and working with the attorneys. We, we have a massive array of topics. If you join, you get to see all the past meetings, so it's great. And that's the— it's www.accountantslawlab.com. And, um, really, if you want to follow us, we're on TikTok. We're all over the place because of our beautiful assistant Tierra.

You didn't ask—

Oh, I didn't. Oh, Steve, where are you? I'm sorry, I forgot to ask you where you are.

Yeah. Well, today I'm in my driveway.

Oh, okay. Okay.

And it was fine. He's in his Airstream, but he's in his driveway.

You didn't see the bus.

We just got home from the Vintage Airstream Rally this last weekend, which was a blast. We saw— we had Airstreams clear back to 1942 there. It was awesome. So cool.

That's so amazing. And we have pictures right on our Instagram if you want to see the pictures. I think Tiara put some Did she?

Okay, and subscribing does help us. It helps tear— it helps—

And reviewing.

Good work. And yes, so thank you so much for joining us today. Bye-bye.

Thank you. Bye.