Author: Salima Jadavji

As a first-time entrepreneur, Ethan struggled to recognize his own self-worth and would tie it to the success of his company’s revenue. He speaks about how self-doubt played a role, where in the past he would think that others can persevere and take the leap of faith, but not him, leaving him to stick to predefined ideas of what he thought other people wanted him to be. At the time, the internal dialogue he entertained is that whatever he struggled with is what he just had to endure. Any mistake that he encountered tampered with his self-worth. Ethan held an inaccurate definition of failure and dealt with a great deal of anxiety around needing to execute each task perfectly. He shared his experience of growing up in an Asian household as the eldest sibling, showing up as an obedient child – wanting to please his parents, show them respect, which only led him to developing a level of codependency. This perpetuated themes of pleasing other people, finding satisfaction in how others saw him, and this partly defined his version of what success meant for him. Ethan shares a mindset he operated from keeping him in survival mode, which in time led him to experience bitterness and resentment when he started to tap into his gut instinct and then brush it aside as he continued to please those around him. Ethan was not okay with making a mistake, feared messing up and worrying he would not be lovable. His key message to the listeners is that: don’t hold yourself back, you have so much potential, ability, skill and experience; don’t put yourself in a box and predefine yourself based on other people’s expectations; there’s more joy when you embrace your authentic self; take time to get to know yourself with all your flaws, blemishes and beauty.

Guest Bio: Ethan is the CEO and Co-founder of Expresume, an Artificial Intelligence (AI) resume builder that creates custom tailored resumes. Based on a job description’s keywords and a user’s database of skills and experience, Expresume synthesizes a resume custom tailored to that job description. It doesn’t falsify information, but helps the user articulate themselves to have the best shot at landing an interview.

Ethan has over three years of experience in communications in guest relations at Disney World, setting up business operations, and creating technical solutions for startups and government. He is a bonafide storyteller at heart. He loves to share his authentic self through video editing and storytelling about his entrepreneurial journey through quick posts on LinkedIn. Ethan helps the next generation through mentorship and teaching and loves to get to know new people.  He volunteers at his local church to support the Saturday youth nights and Sunday School.

Passionate about:  League of Innovators, #Real Talk
https://www.theleagueofinnovators.org/

Jagdeep dives right in to share some integral parts of her life that gave her a wakeup call to pivot and take charge of her life in a different way. She delves into the perfectionism within her and how this impacted her ability to parent as she started to see how controlling it was on external parts of her life. She examines the damage that perfectionism had on her marriage, and expressed feeling she was destroying her life unknowingly and putting herself to feel unnecessary grief. Jagdeep converses about her process in uncovering unconscious choices she was making and looking at what habits were passed down to her. It wasn’t until Jagdeep had a mini stoke that she encountered her lightbulb moment of recognizing a change was needed. While she was in the thick of her journey, she faced her marriage falling apart, she learned to let go of the ‘picture perfect life’ she worked hard to carry on the outside view of how other’s saw her life, and reflected on what she was modelling for her children and what she wanted to model for them instead. Jagdeep dealt with competing thoughts of feeling like a failure, feeling that she had put her family to shame, self-blame and self- critical, and getting to a point where she had to chunk her day into small parts so that she could focus, function, and survive with demands of her life. Her key message to the listeners is that: it’s not all on you, you are not in control over everything, and you’re not supposed to be; the world doesn’t have to be on your shoulders, free yourself; take responsibility for what you are accountable to; when you recognize you are not in control of everything – start to accept it.

Guest Bio: Jagdeep is a Holistic Health and Life Coach, and a Reiki Master who is a highly intuitive person working with energy in both her personal and professional life. She works with individuals at all stages of life to connect to their inner child to explore the parent – child relationship. Jagdeep is a true believer that one’s childhood is where a lot of one’s beliefs and conditioning stem from, and therefore the work she is commits to allow connection with one’s inner child and become an effective parent and heal childhood wounds while understanding individual behaviour.

Jagdeep also works with youth and with parents and caregivers in several organizations working different roles. She supports women in their journey to reconnect with their intuition to find their answers from within, rather than seeking validation outside of themselves.

Passionate about:  

Parent Peer Support – for parents and caregivers who struggle with children with mental health challenges and behaviours.

https://familysmart.ca/

Held back by fear and core beliefs, Faizan was brought to his vulnerability to face his own truth, despite his deep knowledge and understanding of human behaviour. After reflecting on his own belief systems, he expressed that approximately 5 years ago things started to change for him when he dealt with his own financial failure and experiencing the intense feeling of almost losing his wife to the darkness of depression. Faizan talks about fear he experienced keeping him from being able to help his wife during the fragility of her ailments. He admits that while he had the knowledge and tools on how to help himself, he didn’t know how to embody the concepts for himself. He tapped into a crucial pattern he would come up against of this need to have control in his life and he took a deeper glance of where it came from. Faizan worked through narratives of feeling unlovable, unworthy, and not feeling good enough, and intense worries about his wife leaving him. He realized he struggled to let love in, and then started to work on his process to continue to build awareness and gain new insights about his core. Learning to trust, asking for help, and finding support led him to see how important it is to be able to lean on someone that can hold that light of hope. His key message to the listeners is that: don’t take anything personally, whatever is happening out there is not about you; always do your best no matter what and acknowledge that you have given it your best, then embody it; give others the benefit of the doubt, they too are doing their best; do your emotional work, introspect and take responsibility of your emotions.

Guest Bio: Faizan works with self-aware, high achievers who are ready for the next step in their personal and professional lives. His transformational coaching helps his clients identify blind spots, address their patterns, and confidently move forward. He has worked as a technology consultant for over 25 years and found that change of any kind was more difficult to influence than any of the technology challenges. His work with his clients, his deep interest in people and what makes them tick, and reflecting on life’s existential questions helped him see different perspectives that were mostly in conflict with a traditional upbringing.

Faizan provides life and relationship coaching while still maintaining a career in the technology field while living in the Okanagan region of British Columbia, with his wife and two kids. Faizan is the husband of one of our earlier guests from Episode 13 – Dr. Saira – who so fearlessly dived deep to take us through her mental health journey. With Dr. Saira’s permission, her husband – Faizan is here to give us his personal take on this mental health journey and the impacts and insights it has had on his own mental well-being.

Passionate about:  

Mankind Project: https://mankindproject.org/
Mankind Project – Dark Horse Group I-Group: https://bc.canada.mkp.org/communities/dark-horse-i-group/

Psychology of Vision: https://psychologyofvision.com/

Paige’s untold story is predominantly about finding her mother dead at their familial home at the young age of 17, and the impact her mother’s death had on her during such a developmental age and fundamental time. Paige takes us through her journey highlighting changes she experienced personally and professionally resulting from this devastating life event. Paige willingly uncovers the impact it had on her mental health as well as all other aspects of her life. Following this incident, she was diagnosed with anxiety, depression, and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). She explains that being diagnosed with PTSD was quite a peculiar thing to come to terms with since she experienced a great deal of false information circulating alongside the diagnosis, particularly in her young age demographic at the time. When Paige uncovers some of the darkest moments she experienced, she describes it as feeling completely shattered, not knowing what to feel or even do. She experienced a great deal of emotion such as guilt, shame, and at times disallowing herself to come to terms with what she was experiencing by minimizing her circumstances and telling herself that “someone could have it worse”. Paige took time to explain how she experienced survivor’s guilt, numbing feelings when it was too painful and living in denial that she even experienced a trauma. Her key message to the listeners is that: listen to your body, mind, and heart; if you start to notice a different experience or feeling, there is no shame in seeking help and searching for answers; recognize that you can only heal by reaching out and connecting; through healing and progression, you can take the tragedy and use it to your advantage.

Guest Bio: Paige is an accomplished academic, completing both the Honours Fast-Track Social Service Worker program and the Addictions and Mental Health program at Fanshawe College, in addition to holding an Honours Bachelor of Arts degree double majoring in Kinesiology and Psychology from University of Western Ontario. Paige’s educational background combined with her own personal wellness journey led her to a singular focus, to help people. With this focus Paige has had the opportunity to connect with many different marginalized people and populations within the community. Paige coordinates between many different community organizations to establish care and services to best meet the needs of marginalized populations, while also supporting and educating staff.

In her spare time, Paige volunteers to deliver basic need items to people experiencing homelessness, as well as coaching youth skating. Throughout her journey of personal wellness Paige has developed a wealth of empathy that has allowed her to connect with people in an impactful way. Paige assists people to realize their goals, dreams, and passions – while reminding herself of her own.

Passionate about:

Project Hope London:

Project Hope London Instagram

Project Hope London Facebook Group

Claire’s parents were told by their family physician when she was just around 4-years- that what Claire had been presenting with was obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD), but it was something she would grow out of. This informal diagnosis was not shared with Claire until she was in her mid-20’s nor did she grow out of it. Once she learned about OCD and how it shows up in her life, it took a great deal of healing to even come to terms with it, learn how to cope and manage it, and choose a path that led her to who she’s become today. Claire shared openly that while she was unaware of the OCD, she did have her own rituals and compulsions, and this resulted in limitations to her social skills and was a victim of school bullying. She suffered through anxiety, grew up with people pleasing tendencies, she felt that her true self and voice were silenced and suppressed, experienced intense sadness, became fearful to express herself and her inner critic was loud. Claire explained that her parents were extremely supportive of her, though they were aware of apparent struggles that she faced, it was attributed to emotional growing pains, like being shy, low self-confidence, and masking parts of herself. She spoke about how much of what she experienced had been internalized, she was so afraid to be judged and not accepted, afraid to let people witness her talents, and worried she wasn’t good at anything or competent. Her experiences have taught her determination, drive, what she is passionate about, and has found a way to conquer her fears by not giving into the voice of fear and learning how to work through the complexities of circumstances that come her way. Her key message to the listeners is that: it’s worth giving yourself some time to reflect; allow yourself to be big and bold; invite your true authentic self wherever you go; belong in your space, so express yourself — therefore, it’s vital to get to know yourself and love yourself fully.

Guest Bio:

Claire is an honour’s graduate from the Social Service Worker program at Fanshawe College, located in London, Ontario, she holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of Guelph and is a Certified Life Coach. Claire’s passion for people stems from her love for community. This passion has led her to become the Director of Community Engagement with All Women L.E.A.D., a Co-Coach for ‘Slay Your Inner Critic’, an intensive 8-week life coaching program, and provide communications support with Shifting Perspectives, a London, Ontario based Anti-Racism programming organization.

Through years of volunteering with Rotary and Youth for Social Justice clubs, Claire developed her love for community through coordinating fundraisers, international mission trips and more. In 2013, she received an honorable mention through the Keg Steakhouse Spirit Foundation for her fundraising initiatives and time spent building a school in the Dominican Republic. Claire is known for her grounding, light energy, and contagious laughter. Her intuitive gifts allow her to connect and celebrate the joys within life, while also recognizing the importance of healing and adversity within each person’s journey.

Passionate about:  

All Women L.E.A.D. – https://allwomenlead.ca/

Johnny takes us through his journey where he describes the difficulties in growing up without a father and the impact it caused to hunger for acceptance in all other facets of his life. Johnny elaborates on his journey, speaking about the lessons he learned from the absence of a father figure and how he drew from his own difficult experience and committed to giving his children fully what he was deprived of growing up. Johnny talks about feeling emotional emptiness, which led him down a path of drugs and alcohol, feeling abandoned and not evening knowing it at times, and battling through narratives stemming from questioning his own worth and questioning his abilities and capabilities. Johnny relied heavily on external validation, struggled with his own identity, and even contemplated suicide at some point. He shared that no one knew about the inner turmoil he experienced, expressing that he had a yearning for missing and wanting a ‘dad’ in his life. Johnny shared his new identity naturally developed when he finally was able to meet his self, he was stable, found a way to be his own self and claim who he was with the support of who is his wife today. When he truly felt accepted and safe, he was able to choose himself and understood the importance of caring for himself. His big moment was when his first son was born, that moment in the hospital, connected for Johnny missing ingredients in his life and what was most important for him. His key message to the listeners is that: learn your value, otherwise others will get you at a discount – they will devalue you and you will too; learn who you are and surround yourself with mentors that can guide you to do things better; learn healthy boundaries; get counsel and therapy; you are more than what you’ve become.

Guest Bio: Johnny is a husband of 43 years, father of 3 and grandfather of 4. He loves life, family and is devoted to serving in leadership ministry and community as a caring Pastor and mentor to men. Johnny serves as an associate Pastor at Sanctuary Church, in Costa Mesa, CA. He serves as the Men’s Ministry Pastor and Care Pastor. Born and raised in Los Angeles, CA. where at the age of 13, he began to experience a lifestyle of drugs and alcohol, filled with shame, rejection, abandonment, and thoughts of suicide. He turned his life completely around when he decided as a teenaged father to become the father that he never had and made a commitment to pursue the journey of finding effective purpose through family and faith.

Johnny also serves in support, alongside his 15-year-old granddaughter whose non-profit organization extends aid and support to the homeless community throughout local communities and as far as Ghana, South Africa, and cities around the world. This has been an 8-year journey that has been a hope for thousands of people. 2023 marks his 40th year in leadership service and he remains committed to a life of serving to encourage and empower the lives of others.

Passionate about:  

Supporting his teenage granddaughter who from the age of 8 has established her own charity for homeless people on the street, some with mental health challenges.

Khloe Thompson URL: https://www.instagram.com/khloekares/?hl=en

Website: www.Khloekares.com

Garcia shares her untold story and extracts the two extreme themes of growing up in what was seen as a perfect life on the outside, while feeling broken on the inside. Garcia battled with imposter syndrome, constantly held back due to fear, and openly spoke about the state of her marriage and how fearful she would be to take steps forward in her life as she experienced emotional consequences for actions she took. She expressed how she felt like she was leading a single life while being married and a mother to four children. Garcia longed for attention from her husband and didn’t feel she got the attention or affection she was worthy of and didn’t feel like she had anyone to turn to when she fell ill. She lists all the different ways fear showed up in her life and all the many things she was afraid to do. She didn’t feel like she had her own identity, she was so busy being afraid and worrying how her husband would react to any situation whether it be an everyday purchase for herself or the family or whether it was about pursuing career goals of her own. Garcia describes the mental toll from all the stress and anxiety experienced and found her way back to herself through her faith. Her key message to the listeners is that: you don’t have to live in silence; you are not alone; there’s healing to be done; if you are going through something as a couple, talk about it with each other, get support; things do get resolved; listening helps a great deal; experience fear and take action inspite of it; the light won’t come unless you work through the storm.

Guest Bio:

Garcia Hanson-Francis, is a Certified Payroll Manager with over 20 years’ experience in payroll, QuickBooks Pro Advisor, and Certification in Business Writing. A founding member of Immigrant Women in Business, CEO of CADJPro Payroll Solutions, and winner of the People’s Choice Awards Accountant category two years in a row!

Garcia’s strong attention to detail and passion for customer satisfaction and success has enabled the team, and her to form a strong connection within the industry. She also runs CADJPro Virtual Tax clinic through which she prepares tax return for underprivileged populations such as seniors, immigrants, students, incarcerated individuals, and single families to name a few.

Garcia ensures the support of female entrepreneurs, mentors new business owners, and recruits female volunteers looking to gain expertise in the field. She has great work ethic, good gut instincts, and a polite nature of how she engages. She is an assertive, result oriented and excels in planning and implementation.

Passionate about:  

Organization that helped me on the journey: https://m.facebook.com/RefugeCityAjax/

Rafiat details her untold story is all about how she followed her own intuition to leave an emotionally abusive relationship and toxic work environment. She explains that by doing so, she is able to live her life on her own terms and has made peace and joy her standard. Rafiat uncovers her mental health is tied to her financial health, when she was about 14 years old, her family lost their home, having to sell to avoid foreclosure, her parents were getting a divorce because of financial constraints and mother learned that father wasn’t paying the mortgage. They were able to get another home a couple years later, mother fell ill, and they cycle repeated itself, soon not being able to afford the home and again needing to sell to avoid foreclosure. Rafiat speaks about the burdens and pressure that she took on wondering how she needs to save her family, and how can she fix it. Rafiat shares emotionally she was left feeling she was running out of time and losing hope in the process. She identified several faulty narratives around money, success and taking responsibility, which were damaging to her mental well-being. She was unable to maintain confidence, lost her self-identity, suffered depression, relied heavily on external validation, and grieved the loss of her brother in 2018. Rafiat openly shares that her mental health was impacted by intense anxiety, ruminating thoughts, found it difficult to converse with people as she found self-doubt and the inner critic to interfere greatly. She would self-hate and self-shame and tell herself she was supposed to have her life together. Her key message to the listeners is that: be curious about yourself and question your thoughts with love; it’s okay if you are not okay; trust yourself to shift gears; pay attention to your internal process and allow yourself to feel; inner wisdom is all you need, just be curious and tap in; be with all your thoughts, feelings, and sensations.

Guest Bio: Rafiat is intuitive, fearless, and wise, stretching individuals to take inspired action to create the life they never knew they could have through understanding their identity, intuition, impact, and influence. Rafiat leverages her unique filled lessons to serve individuals who are on their pathways to self-discovery and healing from burnout and suffering from poor mental health experiences that hinder their life’s fullest expression.

After many challenges of her own, Rafiat lost her self-identity which ultimately led her to discover her purpose and who she is today. She hosts a podcast called “Follow Your First Mind” and has established her very own coaching program, which is named “Rafiat Ahmed Coaching,” where she teaches clients how to trust their first minds. Rafiat’s passions consists of faith, leadership, and especially teaching young people how to become powerful leaders.

Passionate about:  

Organization that helped me on the journey: https://moneymindsetshift.ca/

Alexandra taps into being raised with a strict parenting style, where she experienced emotional and psychological abuse, sharing her mother’s parenting style mirrored her grandfather’s style of parenting that Alexandra’s mother experienced. She left her life in France to come to Canada to live a new life and pursue her dreams and goals. Soon after she met the father of her child, she participated in a toxic relationship for several years and experienced emotional, physical, and financial abuse. Alexandra expresses the abuse she endured in adulthood was parallel to her childhood experience. She thought this is what she deserved and admits at the same time she was blinded in what she believed to be love. Police and child services were involved, and she did seek solace at women’s shelters. Alexandra shares she returned to the relationship even when she didn’t want to due to severe financial constraints. Alexandra’s mental health was impacted to the extent she had no love to give herself, she lacked confidence, she would end up putting herself down, and didn’t take care of herself emotionally or physically. The more toxicity she experienced in her relationship, the more distant she became from her friendships and decreased her interactions with family, resulting in bottling up all her emotions. Eventually she put up her own boundaries and started to make clearer choices that were good for both her and her son. She explained that when she found her inner strength and started to use her voice, it got loud, and she would no longer hold back. Her key message to the listeners is that: believe in yourself and know that you can do great things; you can have success; believe that you deserve better and more; believe that you are worthy of love, life and success – it can all be yours; search for resources, they are out there.

Guest Bio: Alexandra identifies as an immigrant who moved from France to Canada in 2014. While enduring many struggles of her own, she always challenged herself regardless of the odds she faced. Alexandra studied English upon arriving to Canada, and then pursued further education and obtained a business digital marketing diploma at CDI College. During the pandemic she furthered her career development and got her license as a mortgage agent and most recently, now licensed to manage life insurance. Alexandra had great pursuits to be an entrepreneur, which she has now achieved. One main aspect of her driving force to do so was to be there for her son and have the flexibility to manage various life curveballs while not being tied to a 9am-5pm job.

Alexandra continues to challenge herself to grow, face her fears and continue to see the brighter side to any situation. She’s a firm believer in affirmations and the law of attraction and attempts to apply these principles in her daily life which has evidenced the positive outlook on life which she has been able to create and manifest for herself.

Passionate about:  

Shelters for women and children:

North York women shelter : https://nyws.ca/

La Maison : https://www.lamaison-toronto.org/

Rachael dives deep into sharing that part of her untold story where she ignored her inner voice, got married, later divorced, and through the process she gained clarity, courage, and confidence, which permitted her to recommit to herself. She identifies as a supernatural human from a young age, she found it difficult to tame her gifts, given she couldn’t make sense of her experiences. This later led her to feel vulnerable and exposed. Rachael frequently questioned her identity, wondered who she was expected to be, while she had a great deal of awareness as a baby and toddler, it was difficult to communicate what she was experiencing before she could verbalize and could articulate her needs. As she grew up, she was conditioned to believe she’s not safe to express and reveal, and who she was had no place to be. She developed a pattern which informed how Rachael would show up in the world, she didn’t feel she could trust or integrate with others. She experienced a great deal of loneliness which she normalized, but continued to feel like an outsider, never felt included even when others included her. Rachael shared she really didn’t know how to let people into her life, as she felt she would be harmed in some way. Rachael described how her mental health was impacted over time. She describes feeling she disappeared inside of herself, in a prison with no freedom; feeling arrested, stuck, full of self-doubt, churning in confusion. Rachel felt disconnected from herself, felt she had to numb all feelings at times wondered she could survive this life and stay afloat. Her key message to the listeners is that: the world is waiting for you; you are worthy of prioritizing your life; your wants and needs matter; people are waiting for you to share your story and hear your voice; unapologetically be you, you are who you are; we are all valuable to each other.

Guest Bio: Rachael Abah is a supreme guide and courage mentor to highly intuitive and creative people. She’s in the business of supporting other highly intuitive people embrace their high sensing gifts as healing medicine. She’s a spiritual thought leader, whose training includes: transpersonal experiential psychotherapy, medicine-wheel facilitation, English literature & mythology, world religions, spiritual sciences, heart core leadership, and wealth-consciousness mindset. 

Rachael’s profound wisdom and guidance can inspire positive transformation, and wealth generation in people’s lives. She encourages individuals that she works with in becoming bold, feeling seen, and accepting themselves as whole-complete beings, without judgement. Her unique healing modality supports clients in conscious practices of clarity, courage, compassion, and committed action, to feel worthy, confident, productive, and powerful. She welcomes collaborations with other healers, creatives, and leaders committed to excellence, and dynamic growth. 

Passionate about:  

Dr. Roz’s Healing Place. Supporting women and their children fleeing domestic violence, heal and feel empowered.

https://drrozshealingplace.com