Rebecca (00:00.374)
Hello and welcome back to the Champagne Lounge podcast. Each week on the podcast, I bring on one of our fabulous members to talk about who they are, what they're doing, and why they're on the crazy journey that is running a business. Today I've got the fabulous Natasha. She is a registered psychologist and is also making Hayway in the online space. And I am so excited to chat to her about her journey to date. Welcome to the show, Natasha.
Natasha (00:25.442)
Hi, thank you so much for having me. I'm super excited.
Rebecca (00:30.474)
Is this going to be a good one? Now, when the title of registered psychologist could be a little bit scary to some, right? Like, and can you let us know, like, why you went down that route and what that, what that actually means and looks like to someone that goes, actually, if I'm being honest with myself, don't actually know what that means.
Natasha (00:50.969)
Yeah, so I was very wildly naive at 17, read a book, decided to go to university and become a psychologist so I could help people. I remember thinking, I just wanna help one person and that will be enough for me. And I really still feel that true. Like each time you help somebody, it's great. So being a registered psychologist in Australia means that you have to be registered with APRA, which is the Australian Health Practitioner Organization or Association, one of those.
And what that means is that you have six years minimum of training. So it takes six years to become a psychologist. There's multiple paths. So I became a psychologist several years ago. The path that I took has now changed. But when I did it, I did a four year degree and then I did an additional two years internship across multiple settings. So primarily I was in private practice, but I went across into a pediatric clinic assessing for ADHD.
And then I also was within a school and I worked for a job provider as well as a psychologist. So my job was to help get people back into work or to get them into work for the first time. And really I learnt a lot within that role. I really think it was one of the roles in which I learnt the most. Sorry someone started leaf blowing right out my window.
Rebecca (02:13.518)
Yeah, you love that. We can't hear it. We're all good. Now, you and I were chatting offline. You know, that is such a big undertaking of a degree. And you still have the passion of helping others and having that drive, which is so important in no matter what career and profession and business that you're in. We were talking about though, in the healthcare space, the healthcare space, the medicine space, it's always trading time for money. And actually moving online was a little bit of a...
Natasha (02:15.924)
Yeah, fair.
Rebecca (02:42.546)
I'm going to say sort of a different journey and a different mindset shift for you. Can you walk us through what that looked like? Because a lot of healthcare professionals actually aren't prevalent in the online world.
Natasha (02:53.765)
So it was around, well prior to getting into kind of running my own business, I was really hesitant to work just for myself. It didn't feel safe and that's really my own history around, you know, stuff to do when I was growing up for example. So I was really reluctant and so then what happened, we were going into COVID so it was prior to lockdown and I had been contracting to other people as a psychologist for a few years and so what happened then
is that I just had this moment, there was this interaction and I remember exactly where I was. I was driving home from work, I called my mum and I had been doing some webinars getting kind of up-to-date on how to be a psychologist and how to do therapy online because we could kind of see that the world was moving towards lockdown especially in Australia and so it really just clicked for me. I had this moment and there was this conversation, I got in my car and I drove home and it was just the right combination.
of emotions, the wheels kind of lining up in my brain. And I was like, that's it. Like, this is how I can have my own business and I can have control. And I'm very passionate about, you know, trying to increase that revenue as well without having to trade my time for it. Because what I've learned is that as I was working more and more within the industry, I started to pull back from five days to four days to three days. And I said, I would never work more than three days. And that is seeing six clients a day.
that six hours face to face with clients. And so for me to open up a, yeah, it is a lot of people, but at one time I was contracting and I was having to see seven a day and I really didn't wanna do that. And they said, I'd do it for X amount of time, for example. But then once you have seven in there, it's really hard to pull back.
Rebecca (04:25.218)
lot of people. Yeah.
Natasha (04:40.777)
once you get a caseload of a certain size. So there was this conversation, this interaction, and then I got in the car, and like I said, I remember where I was, I called my mom, and I was like, this is how I can free myself from this. This is how I can have control back in my life. This is how I can do things my way, you know, in line with my ethics and my values. And I went home and I created the, I got the name, I got the concept, and I spent the rest of 2020.
building out my business. And then it's kind of just gone from there. We had a we had a pause when I was pregnant. I had to stop actually the business for a period of time and to say I just have to contract because I had HG in my pregnancy which is severe nausea and vomiting and so all I could really do was see my clients go home and lay on the couch. I didn't have any energy to build.
anything so I was actually turning away old clients and saying I can't, I can't take anybody else on, I can't, I can't do anymore. And then once I came back from maternity leave, we picked it back up. So yeah, it's been, it's been a real journey.
Natasha (05:52.058)
Yeah.
Rebecca (05:52.315)
Amazing. It's a massive journey. And I think one of those things there is it was very much, and I loved that you talked about going from five days a week to four days a week to three days a week and still being able to manage it both financially speaking, but also energetically speaking, because running a business, you went from being contracting to others to running your own show in a consulting fashion, for want of a better explanation, and then building a second
Natasha (06:07.299)
Yeah.
Natasha (06:15.246)
Yeah.
Yes.
Rebecca (06:17.966)
And I know the work you do now is very much around helping female founders support their nervous system, avoid burnout. Like why have you focused so much on that space? Like I know how important that is having gone through burnout myself, but what are you seeing the trends of, of women, whether they're business owners or not being, when it comes to taking care of themselves.
Natasha (06:23.805)
Mm.
Natasha (06:39.357)
Yeah, so I certainly really saw three years ago the opportunity to come into this space and to help more women in the online world through courses as a practitioner. And so I really didn't know that I could do that initially as a psychologist and it took finding a lady called Natasha Ace and her private practice allowance to find that out. And once I found that out, I was like, let's go. The reason why I target women in this kind of area is really because it's just so prevalent.
It's so prevalent in so many women at every stage of their life. So even if you're, I don't work with teenagers in the online world. It's over 18.
what we see is that even with teenagers going through the HSC, I'd be working with them and they'd be burning themselves out and pushing themselves too far. Then we have women in their 20s trying to figure out life, trying to figure out who they are and they're getting burnt out because we have these expectations that you need to have your shit sorted out and you're trying to have fun, you're trying to figure out who you are, you're trying to go through university and again we have so many women and girls in university
working so many jobs, trying to put themselves through their degree and having a degree is a full-time job within itself. So what I saw is at each stage women self-sacrificing themselves for their careers, for others, for whatever it may be for their future careers. And what we start to see is women really setting themselves up to have nervous systems that are not aligned anymore and that they're so overwhelmed, they're serving from an empty cup and they're not.
giving back into themselves, or they have the intentions to, but they don't follow through because we do have this kind of mindset in that I'll do it later, or that I need to help this person first, or we're just so used to not going slow anymore, that we're running from whatever it may be, whether it's a breakup, our depression, whether it's, you know, family stuff, whether it's intergenerational stuff, we're keeping ourselves so busy so that we can avoid that.
Natasha (08:44.041)
and you know I could keep going on there's so many reasons why but really it's about supporting women to come back into themselves, come back into their body and so that they can start creating the life that they want in this season but also so they can repair their relationships with themselves and be able to live life the way that they want to, feeling the way that they want to. Does that make sense?
Rebecca (09:09.838)
It definitely makes sense and I'm curious to know when you were saying that we've not learnt to slow down and we are trying to put things in places business owners or as women should say, I shouldn't just focus on business owners that you go, I am trying to put myself first but then I'm not and it's kind of on the back burner but then it kind of isn't and then I'm sure you'll see a lot of people that go through the world going well, I did have that one massage though, like I did take my time out for an hour and do that one thing. I know a lot of your work.
Natasha (09:33.073)
Hmm.
Rebecca (09:38.29)
in your online program, Revitalize is coming, you're very much around the rituals and supportive rituals actually make a difference. So like not just the normal, going for your nail appointment or going for a massage once a month. What do those rituals look like? When we talk about self-care, what I talk about and think about may be very different to actually what you're seeing from your professional side of doing things. So what does it look like?
Natasha (09:47.288)
Mm.
Natasha (09:53.831)
Yeah.
Natasha (10:01.327)
Mm.
Natasha (10:05.865)
Yeah, so I think in the last several years, we've definitely seen the marketing beast of self care. So particularly in people trying to sell you products like, you know, buy this moisturizer, you know, use this, you know, hair care product or, you know, all I can think about is baths, really, which is very stereotypical. But generally, what self care is, is trying to not, yeah, right, all I can think about is baths. Trying to not engage
in self-sacrificing, having boundaries, being able to, there's this term that we use, which is body up top down, which is that first we need to look after our bodies.
so that we can align them and then we can work at our capacity. So when I do work with women, say in business, we talk about your off season. We need to prepare you in your off season so you can perform on your on season. Now, that everybody hasn't often an on season. It may be that you are on university break. It may be that it's Christmas time, whatever it may be. But when we talk about self care, it's really about the small practices where you choose yourself. You choose to support yourself in the mornings before you go and serve others for the rest of the year.
of the day you choose during you know the middle of the day to check in and actually tune into your body and go okay how is my body feeling then you choose actively
to engage in a tool or a practice, whatever it may be, to align your nervous system or to, at least in this stage, I talk about supporting your nervous system first. So what that looks like is generally I start with the body. We are talking about things that are to move emotions through the body, release tension, to actually connect to your body is really the first step because if we don't have connection, if we're not aware, then what's gonna happen is we're not gonna be able to pick the thing or to know.
Natasha (11:57.173)
what our body needs or what we need to get us through the rest of the day. And so it may not just be, oh, I just need to survive. It may be that I have to go give a presentation. So I need to tune in and see where's my energy at? Where is my mindset at? Where is kind of like the emotions in my body and my nervous. So giving them tools to move through that. So
say in revitalize we break it down into many different areas. So we have internal somatic, we have external somatic, that's kind of like body based stuff. Then we have rhythmic movement, we've got creative things, we have things that target specifically your vagus nerve so that we can work on
aligning your parasympathetic and your sympathetic nervous system, which most people would know as your fight-and-flight and your rest and digest. We go through these different areas of self-care but really at the core it's about you finding what feels good for your body and what you need in that moment at that time in that day. So for one person how they start their day.
is gonna look quite different to how another person is gonna start their day. And it may differ for you, depending what you have on that day. So when I talk about self care, I really talk about, it's about coming back into your body to tune in and to ask yourself consciously, how can I support myself so that my day goes the way that I want it, or that I can perform the way I know I need to perform today? And you not only do it once, you do it three times a day.
Because once you go through your day and you're trying to calm and wind down for the night, you then again have to consciously go, okay, am I going to sit down in front of a TV and disconnect my brain from my body or do I want to regulate, connect so I can ease into kind of winding down and getting to that rest and digest stage, which is where recovery truly happens. So yeah, it's, it's a whole kind of thing, but it truly
Rebecca (13:53.235)
Yeah.
Natasha (13:54.413)
it's really personalized to the person and it's all about tuning in with your body and then also working with your mind as well and even your relationship with, I guess, going slow.
Rebecca (14:09.674)
Yeah, and going slow is not something that most people, I would say, have in their repertoire of things that they're doing and being aware of right now. So for people listening, I know everything's a little bit personalized, but what is one thing that someone could go and do now or go and think about or action that actually can help them start this process? What's one thing that possibly could start them on the journey?
Natasha (14:14.994)
and
Natasha (14:21.168)
Mm.
Natasha (14:34.125)
Yeah so, oh let me pick, there's a big kind of menu that I can choose from.
I would say one, one tool that I think everybody can benefit from is really actually pausing, stopping what you're doing and tuning into your body. We call it a body scan. And typically I will say you want to be doing at least three body scans a day when you become aware of the sensations in your body. Is there any heaviness? Is there any lightness? Do you feel any tension? And if so,
Natasha (15:10.499)
that are present as well. So when we there's a saying to name the emotion is to tame it and we want you to say that emotion out loud. So to really stop, pause, tune in, connect to the sensations, name the emotion that you're experiencing and then I would say the next step would be
to then choose how to support yourself with whatever is present. If you're feeling good, that's great. How are you going to then continue that energy on throughout the day? But if you are finding there's tension or a heaviness or a fatigue, then ask yourself, okay, what can I do to support myself?
with this and that's kind of where Revitalize comes in as you get that full menu of options to do that and I think that sometimes yeah we just get really overwhelmed with where to start and you go well how am I supposed to wake up my body I can't go for a run I don't run what do you mean?
Rebecca (16:06.858)
Yeah, no, I love that. I'm going to go practice that one because it's an interesting one. Even when you've got the rituals, I find that sometimes they can slip past. And so I know that if I haven't got my dog around, I don't go for that morning walk. And if I don't do the morning walk in the same pace, in the same vitality, then I know that doesn't start my day off in the way I need it to. And it's almost working out what...
Natasha (16:25.881)
Right? Hmm.
Rebecca (16:30.114)
How do I almost, I need to trick myself into doing it even if I haven't got the dog when I'm traveling for work. So it is different for everyone. And as circumstances change, it's nice to have a tool that you can tap into and go, oh, okay, that's what I need to be doing today.
Natasha (16:32.63)
Um...
Natasha (16:39.238)
Yeah.
Natasha (16:46.125)
Yeah, exactly. And yeah, super, super important, but how often do we not do things that are common knowledge?
Rebecca (16:48.339)
Yeah.
Rebecca (16:56.254)
Oh, all the time, all the time, because we're crazy busy, right? So we're constantly trying to do different things. So I'm gonna link the resources that Natasha's got to the bottom of the show notes in this, because I think it's incredibly important, having gone through burnout seriously myself, knowing friends that have done it, constantly pushing to the point of exhaustion is not the way forward. And I'm so glad that you and I connected in this way, and we can jump on in and share this information and share the work you're doing, because...
Natasha (16:57.617)
Mm.
Natasha (17:04.945)
call you.
Natasha (17:18.866)
Thank you.
Rebecca (17:25.078)
Not only is it inspirational as a business owner in the work that you're doing for others listening in a similar space, but it's also so beneficial to everyone that can jump in and have something a little bit more accessible rather than, as you say, jumping on a wait list to get one-on-one time and charging that time for money. So I think it's a benefit on both, on so many levels for people listening. Now you and I met via the Champagne Lounge. We'd never met before you jumped in.
Natasha (17:50.297)
Yeah. No.
Rebecca (17:53.402)
to the membership. And I remember being like, when you sign up, going, oh my gosh, someone I don't know has jumped in and this is amazing. And you were that first experience to me and going, this is working, it's amazing. And when we got chatting, it was around, you know, you're working from home and haven't been able to necessarily connect with like-minded businessmen. So what was it about the Champagne Lounge that you sparked attention for you, but also what are you loving about it? Because I know you're super active in the space.
Natasha (17:59.002)
Yeah.
Natasha (18:08.989)
Mm-hmm.
Natasha (18:20.545)
Yes. So I think I had only started following you just before that or around that time. Because I knew you through, of course, like Tina's membership. And so I just saw you post it and I didn't know it was brand new. I just saw it and I just intuitively knew like, oh yeah, that's what I was going to do. And I had seen it actually a little bit before I even joined. And there's a theme that you just got me with the messaging, which is really about connection. And for a lot of people...
connection is a huge contributing thing to self, if we're talking about self care and just even wellbeing and mental health in your nervous system, you need to have connection. And if you don't have connection, because now I work remotely, I'm not in an office. I'm not always talking to, you know, my peers, for example, and even my, you know, psychologist friends. Most of us, we all have like children under two.
So we're all wildly busy and to catch up takes so long. Right. And we try, we have peer supervision say once a month, but that's kind of, you know, once a month and you know, they really want to talk about specific clients. So for me, I was just like, for me, it was a no brainer. I was like $7. I'm like, that's a, that is like a rip off. Like that's like, wow. Like that's such good value. Um, rip off for you. Good for me. But sometimes we have to provide that value.
Rebecca (19:12.846)
Hehehe
Rebecca (19:17.548)
Yeah.
Natasha (19:42.222)
So yeah, I just was like, I'm going to do that. And I didn't really think about it too much. I didn't look into it too much. I think I went to your landing page, jumped out of it because it was probably the middle of the night, quite frankly. And then I think it was like a week or so later, I jumped back in and I was like, yeah, I'm just gonna do it. And I think that's kind of.
The way that I do things is that I know connection's really important. And I had identified for myself that I had lost this big connection and I thrive talking to others. You know, I love, um, getting to like debrief, but also getting to hear other people's internal monologues. Uh, I don't know if that's the psychologist in me, but getting to see how other people are running their businesses and hearing their self doubt and hearing how they work through it, or just seeing these people that are widely successful. Right. And you're like, damn, like, look at them go.
then you get to see behind the scenes and behind that veil, it just again really normalizes that people are people.
and that everybody struggles with the mindset blocks that you come across. Everybody struggles to look after themselves and prioritize their themselves and their nervous systems. And that's the connection that will validate and will carry you through your business. And it's not about, I think you can come into communities where there's a lot of comparison and a lot of competitiveness. And what I found within the champagne lounge, there isn't really, I haven't come across that competitiveness. I haven't come across that comparison.
of women in business and you know particularly the online world can be incredibly isolating. I don't know any other psychologist personally that's doing what I'm doing and understands the even the language that I use in terms of like Kajabi or like the online course world you know. So it's so nice to jump on and to hear other people's kind of you know they know they know it they get it it's so nice but again coming back to the value of connection because
Rebecca (21:29.424)
Yeah
Natasha (21:39.425)
I really just want to, you know, hone in on this point that it's so easy to say we need connection in our lives, but we feel it on a body level. It's not just about the cognitive. It's just not how it makes you feel in your head. It's about how it influences your body and how that can...
carry you through those periods where you're really struggling. Or it can allow you to kind of soften and release and go, I'm not the only one. And it can also help to energize you on the days or the weeks when you're feeling, you know, kind of like, oh, like, is this going to work or like, you know, everybody else is more successful, whatever it may be. When you hear other people that you view as widely successful or, you know, doing really well and they say something.
then what happens is then your body kind of goes, oh, okay, like it's okay, we've got this. Like we don't have to kind of carry this fear with us. Yeah, and I think that what you're doing is so beautiful and so important on so many levels. And yet for me, it was really just a no brainer in that I don't know who she is. I know a little bit about her, but I believe in community so much. And honestly, through getting to know, and I think it's even better because I...
Rebecca (22:28.266)
It's okay.
Rebecca (22:37.538)
Thank you.
Rebecca (22:43.013)
Yeah. Ha.
Rebecca (22:48.147)
Yes!
Natasha (22:50.885)
Yeah, I didn't know a lot of, I knew a few of the women within the Champagne Lounge, but even within that, kind of like I see them and then I go back into my own little world, but getting to hear the inner workings again, it's a real privilege. Like when you get to hear other people's stories and you get to support them through their businesses, I think that is, not to sound really like cliche, but it really is a gift. And it's a gift that's gonna keep giving for your business as well. And for me,
Rebecca (23:16.727)
Yeah.
Natasha (23:20.757)
if you join a networking group it's all about networking and I'm like I'm not naturally a networker I should probably develop this skill a bit better um but yeah it's all about kind of like building people up and supporting them yeah I just I could network well I think yeah I could keep going I could just sit here for an hour and just celebrate you
Rebecca (23:32.926)
It takes time. There's an art form. Yes. Yeah. Oh, you've articulated it so well. We really did. And that's made my heart sing because
Rebecca (23:49.87)
because it is around that connection piece and it doesn't have to be overthought. I think that's one of the things it's actually, one of the things that you've just articulated so well is that it doesn't have to be difficult, but it needs to be present. And you're languaging around a gift. I'm gonna take that. I think that's beautiful. So thank you, Natasha. You said you could celebrate it all day long. My last question all the time on the podcast is, what do you do to celebrate? Like, I know when we jumped into the business, we were just starting it, you know,
Natasha (23:51.279)
Hmm.
Natasha (23:54.503)
No.
Natasha (24:00.273)
Hmm.
Natasha (24:05.701)
Mm. You're more than welcome.
Natasha (24:15.601)
Mm-hmm.
Rebecca (24:18.902)
You were just finding your feet on things, but constantly having conversations around trying new things and, oh, that failed or, oh, has anyone done this? And one of the things we pride ourselves on is going, actually, now what did you do that we can celebrate with you this week or this month? So in doing that, how do you mark your milestones and how do you celebrate the successes in your business?
Natasha (24:30.511)
Yeah.
Natasha (24:38.393)
Man, do you know what? I'm gonna call myself out and say.
Rebecca (24:41.397)
Some people find this hard.
Natasha (24:43.101)
I don't actively do anything. I'm a classic. Okay, I told you it was nine years ago today that I finished my degree and I was like I'm gonna buy myself an SLR camera because I love photography. Did I do it? No, because I put that money towards something else, something practical, right? So when I was like oh when I get my first course out I'm gonna go get a massage. So really I just put back into myself. There's nothing huge that I do. I'll take something that
Rebecca (24:52.001)
Yeah.
Natasha (25:13.635)
the whatever it may be so say if I've got a goal or you know the last month has really just been about you know getting this done and filming and you know uploading creating all of this stuff and I had put off getting a massage so I'm like do you know what I'm gonna do I'm gonna give myself a massage and I'm going to say you know I'm gonna talk about it I'm here because I'm so proud because I've done this thing and I'm so excited to just disconnect from the world and connect back into myself so my things are small
Like I don't, I'm not a drinker, so I don't, even though I'm in the champagne lounge, I don't drink. So what I do is I go, I'm going to, no you don't, I can be the spokesperson for that one. So I'll go for like a bush walk. I'll go to like one of my favorite beaches or I'll go to like Waterfall. So I'll pick like an activity which puts back into myself when I've kind of depleted myself on that on season, when you get right to the end. And I'll just go and do something to fill my cup back up that maybe I've been booting off for a week or two or a month.
Rebecca (25:47.69)
Don't have to drink.
Rebecca (25:54.253)
Hehehe
Natasha (26:11.809)
um hopefully not longer um yeah so that's kind of what I do it's nothing big it's nothing flashy but it's just really about giving back to myself and also telling people I think it's really important like you said to tell people what you've done and what you've accomplished and for me like I'm a classic you know won't go and tell anyone and I've been working probably on the last year actually going and telling people telling my friends saying this is what I've done
Rebecca (26:23.959)
Yes.
Natasha (26:38.145)
telling my partner even, I'll be like I've done this big deal or I had this great moment, but I just like go back into mum mode and I just go and you know look after my kid. So instead I'm telling people. So I think that's important too.
Rebecca (26:51.314)
Yes, that's amazingly important. And it comes right back around to where we started, right? It's being human and it's going, you know what? The little things are just as important as the big things, right, but to have that connection and conversation with people that go, yay, you did that, that's amazing. And celebrating doesn't have to be an expense in terms of a cash expense. It's an energetical shift, I think, that just keeps you going completely. Natasha, I've had the best time.
Natasha (26:58.311)
Mm.
Natasha (27:10.945)
Exactly. Mm hmm. Yeah.
Rebecca (27:17.57)
talking to you today. I think there's some gems of stuff that people can take away. I love having you as part of the community. I love chatting with you on the networking nights that we do. It's been a blast. Thank you so much for coming on the show.
Natasha (27:31.109)
Thank you. Like I said, I'll celebrate you all day. And community. We love community.
Rebecca (27:37.174)
I love that. We love community. Okay, I'm gonna get you to stay on.
Natasha (27:41.269)
I do, yes.
