Corporate Burnout and the Inner Critic: What’s Really Blocking Your Career Growth

What if burnout isn’t about workload—but about what you’re carrying?

In this episode of UnCeiling You, Natalie sits down with Nicolette Nierras, a former corporate high achiever turned transformational coach, to explore the real connection between the inner critic, burnout, and career growth.

If you’re navigating a demanding corporate environment, this conversation will challenge how you think about performance, self-worth, and responsibility.

Nicolette shares her journey through divorce, identity loss, and rebuilding her confidence from the inside out—revealing how overworking and perfectionism can actually be signs of deeper emotional patterns.

And Natalie connects the dots to what she sees inside corporate teams every day:

•  high-performers carrying too much 
•  blurred responsibility leading to burnout 
•  and professionals stuck in cycles that limit career growth 

If you’ve ever felt like you’re doing everything right—but still feel exhausted, stuck, or unable to switch off—this episode will show you why. 

Resources Mentioned:

🧠 Responsibility Reset Notebook (for career clarity & burnout reduction)
A practical tool to help you define what’s yours, what’s not, and regain control of your time and energy.
👉 https://unceilingzone.com/rrnotebook

About Nicolette Nierras:

Nicolette Nierras is a transformational coach and former corporate professional who helps individuals navigate burnout, self-doubt, and career transitions.

Through her work, she supports professionals in breaking limiting beliefs, improving mental well-being, and aligning their career path with their true values.

 https://thenicnierraswholisticlifestyle.com/

This is a link to download free mindfulness hypnosis audio for top 4 issues that we face today - it's a sneak peek into an element of Nicolette's coaching.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:04

What if that voice in your head, the one that tells you you're not doing enough, isn't the problem? What if trying to silence it is actually what's keeping you stuck? Because most of us have been taught that the inner critic is something to fight, something to shut down, something to ignore. But what if the real work is learning how to transform it? Welcome to Uncealing You, where we redefine ambition and help you grow your career without burning out. Today's episode is a powerful one. I'm joined by Nicolette Maris, former high achiever transformational coach, who shares her journey through divorce, identity loss, and rebuilding her sense of worth from the inside out. And what we get is a deeper mindset. We talk about why the inner critic gets louder when we're really already struggling, how overworking can actually be a way of avoiding a deeper healing, and what it really looks like to sit with yourself and rebuild from there. And as I listen to her story, something clicked for me because what she's describing internally is the same thing I see happening externally in high performers all the time. We carry more than we should. We take up more than is ours, and our brain never fully shuts off. So today we're gonna explore both the internal work and the reset that comes from finally understanding what's yours to carry and what isn't. Let's get into it. Nicola, thank you so much for being on the Unsealing You podcast. Let's start with our favorite subject: turning the inner critic into growth for fuel. So, as many of us are told, we have to silence our inner critic in order to succeed. But what if the key isn't silence, but it's transformation? So, Nicola, you talked about how alchemizing the inner critic into growth fuel. What is the process like for you?

SPEAKER_01 2:17

Thank you, um, Dr. Natalie, for inviting me on and for saying yes to have me on the show. I'm truly, truly honored. That's that's a very hard, it's a hard-hitting question right from the beginning, but I love it. Okay, the process for me was very cathartic, I would say. So growing up, I've always had this feeling or this innate fire within me that if I wanna do something, I'm gonna go and do it. And I don't mind having gone through difficulties such as I have this thought of okay, if I if I could basically if I want to get a laptop, I would pour my heart and soul. That means working my back off just to get that laptop, even at the expense of my own, I would say my own sleep, because that was that was the only thing that's keeping me busy. So it was studies and and sleeping, growing up and also doing house chores. And I kind of used that. I thought that it was good on one side because the universe I believed will always give it everything that you want to as long as you work for it. But then I kind of brought that kind of thinking or working, workings of the mind until I grew up.

SPEAKER_00 3:31

Pause here for a second because what Nicolette just described is something a lot of high performers don't even question. That belief that if I work hard enough, I'll be enough. At first, it feels like motivation, but over time it shifts. You don't just do your job anymore, you start holding everything together, and that's the moment it stops being drive and starts becoming weight until I finish high school, into the university, and then entering um the working force.

SPEAKER_01 4:03

But life is not linear like that, um, Dr. Natalie, as we all know it. By 17, at least I had my life plan out by 30. That I want to get that job, I want to get married, I want to have kids, and I want to settle down. And by 30, my life would be so great. Everything's gonna, you know, everything is gonna be a walk in the park because I I never knew that there was actually life after 30. And um, yeah, I was humbled very quickly. I met my um then partner, my ex-husband now, um, when I was only 26, and within three months he proposed, and so it was very, very rattling to my parents, but still because they supported me, so thankful for that. And then within two years we we got into a divorce, and so that's when I knew that okay, I've had this fire within me that I can always turn sorrow or sorrow or sadness into into into purpose, but it was nothing that I've ever done. It was unlike the difficulty I've done before because the marriage really broke me down, it tore me apart. Um there were some I was the kid that was that was that was always packed as oh she is she's go Nicolette's happy go lucky, she's never gonna get married like this early. But I proved them, I proved them wrong. But they were red there were red flags. I still went ahead anyway. So the process for me was hit, I I have to basically knock myself on the wall a couple of times until I learned my lesson. Because as you can tell from my story, even that surface level, I'm a very stubborn person. I knew what I wanted, but then I also had that pride and ego, and that became that became the mice of my Nicolette 1.0. I had to unlearn all those things, and I had to learn relearn a lot of those things right now to be able to uh stand up and be humble and just look back at the people around me and say, Hey, I think you're right. This is my mistake, I'm gonna own up to it. Not that I say that the marriage was a mistake, but had I taken a different route, the circumstance uh the consequence would have been different, I think. But still, in hindsight, it would have been, it would not have made me the person that I am today. So, long story short, that is the process so far.

SPEAKER_00 6:35

So it sounds like in that process is recognizing the ego for sure. And where does the inner critic fall within or relate to that ego? Do you think?

SPEAKER_01 6:48

Because there are two things that the biggest errors in my life at the time, or still is, I thought to myself were maybe maybe three family, love life, and and work, i.e., work and study. So when I was in my 20s, it was now work. When I had a big fallout in the relationship department, I said to myself, okay, I still have people who love me, and I have my work, and so my work means now it's become the percentage has become much bigger in my life. And I said I didn't want to process the feeling, the grief that came with the with the divorce. Because I can I can tell you, um, I went against a lot of people's opinion and advice when I got married. And so that um when that happened to me and the divorce happened, because it was there's no blaming here, nothing. We just we simply didn't have enough time to learn about each other, and we just it was it was in the heat of the you know the moment, and there's no blaming. I don't blame him, and and I had I wasn't wiser than had I stayed, probably would have worked things out, but the inner critic that was saying to me at the time is Nicolette, you are actually worthless because why can't you get anybody to love you? Now, growing up, I like I said, I mentioned I needed to prove myself my worth to get something right. So at the time, I thought that that was the MO of the universe, and I felt like I wasn't anything, I was an amount, I don't amount to anything if I don't work hard and therefore for love as well and at work. So that was the first time I felt not enough to be love as a person, to have somebody, you know, there was a third party, and so you feel a lot of things, and when you're used to getting things the getting things when you want them, as long as you work for it, I did put my heart and soul into this um relationship 200%. It didn't that was the first time the universe showed me that okay, it doesn't work like that. That there's two individuals, they're two individuals now, and I felt worthless, and so I focus all my time and effort into work.

SPEAKER_00 9:05

This is where things start to turn. Because when something is unresolved internally, we don't slow down, we speed up. Not because we're disciplined, but because slowing down would mean feeling it. So we stay busy, and that's when the brain doesn't switch off. It's not because there's too much to do, it's because something hasn't been processed yet.

SPEAKER_01 9:28

At the time it was pre-COVID. Uh, I was at the height of my career, pre-COVID hit, and I got my divorce as well at the time, and that was the first time in nine years I had to s I I I was single. Never before, never was I single before in my life. That was always a partner, and so I had to sit with those feelings and and those decisions, and you know, those I told you so, those inner critics say see. If you had if you just had to show to you know get rid of your ego, because my dad actually told me then Nick, you you should have you just wait for two more years, get to know this guy. No, no, because because practically on this I told him yes, but I wasn't there, I would I did not have boundaries, so to speak. Just just I'm just putting out because I didn't love myself enough to say no because when he begged he said, I I really want to get married now, even though the circumstances were were telling us, like, okay, you know, you're not ready yet, your financials are not on, you know, you're not that stable yet, and but still I went ahead and and tried to prove it, and so I got humbled by that. Uh fast forward after that, after the divorce, I focused on work. I was at the height of my career, good paying job. COVID happened, and again, the bosses and the projects that that I that I were on that I was on, they were like I don't know why. It's like the universe is trying to tell me you're not meant to be here anymore. You have yet to process your grief about your relation, your the loss of your relationship, and now you're focusing, you're throwing yourself um uh at work, you're not this is not the way you do it, and so I had to sit with that. That means going in, going inwards, and I tried everything that was the 2020 to 2021, 2022, those those years were the years that I cried the most. Of every song that I listened to, I cried. Like, no, I wanted to know, I wanted to feel because I was trying to numb it, and I was so used to numbing it and putting on this mask, uh and everything a show comes up. I was trying to just dive into the character and then try to feel everything because I know the only way through this is you know, the only way to get to the other side is through it. So I I felt everything like grief, sorrow, and it was it was a difficult difficult journey for me. And five years in and 2023, started my own podcast, and because I didn't want to go insane, I said, Okay, there might be better people who's experiencing this or something worse. Let me just reach out.

SPEAKER_00 12:22

So that kind of you know, so it's interesting the COVID and how when I I talked to people, uh, COVID ended up being so pivotal because it did cause people to sit back and think, reassess, go inward, as you say, and explore what am I meant to do? What am I, what should I do? As you were going through this, even though your dad said, hey, wait two years, get to know this guy, and then the worst happened. How did he or any of your friends, how did these people support you through this whole internal journey that you had to go on?

SPEAKER_01 13:08

I knew that I had to put on this brave face. So I'm the eldest in the family, and so I never wanted my dad to worry about me. And that at the time I moved away. At 17, I I moved out of the house, pursued my tertiary education, and then continued working where I was the last 15 years. I just moved back, it's like a full circle moment for me. I moved back into my parents because I started my own business. Um, but at the time when I got married, it was already five years outside of the the house, and I was independent, but I didn't want them to see how miserable I I was because I had again, I had to pretend, like oh my god, saying this out loud. Um, I had to pretend that everything was okay and Nicolette is the oh, she's got a good job, and she got married despite of what people say, but then now she's gonna she she decided that she wanted to get a divorce, and because that was my own choosing to get married in the first place, I thought that, or at least I knew that I had to solve it myself. At the time, my dad, I told my dad, my parents, that hey mom, things are not working out with him, and I think we're gonna go our separate ways. It was about one year into that, and then my dad just told me, Okay, you're you're still you're still there's so much more for you to do, it's okay. But there's just one thing that he said to me that really struck like a chord in my soul, or rather, like uh the knife was already here, and he pulled it out by saying, I told you so, right? And that was that was the only thing he said to me. My mom was the one, like as I was I was coming to her and then just you know, rambling or complaining about this. And my dad works, um um, he he doesn't he's not in the house that often, so it's just me and my mom. But when I my mom he knows like something is off, but when I finally had the courage to come up to him and tell him that okay, I'm making and taking this decision, since I already made the first one to get married, right? Against his uh wish, and and he said, Yes, you got so much more ahead of you, but I told you so. So uh sit with that. So I had to sit with that, and that really broke me, but then it broke me open. It broke like my ego. I said, Oh my god. Uh-huh. Why? I it broke my ego and say, Yeah, okay, this that there's something, this is why they called your parents. This is why you gotta listen to them and respect them. And they they supported me by not putting um by not blaming me. They accepted me as the true um, I love them very much. Um, they there were a lot of family friends who came up to them and say, Oh, I tended so is there like is there a bun in the oven yet? And I was in the city and it's like what three hours of a flight away, and they're here whenever they had to encounter people like that, and they're like, No, it didn't work out. And I'm as a parent, that is uh I'm sure they had to you know toughen up as well and say, no, she actually decided to get a divorce. And for and for that, I actually feel sorry for them. But at the time, because I was also going through my own thing, and they were my strongest pillar of support, I would say. They didn't they didn't say much. That's all I needed to know, and I know that whenever I need to be to be with them, I'll just fly back. And they did just that.

SPEAKER_00 16:47

So now you've started the podcast, yes, you're surrounding yourself with all these fabulous people. I'm sure they all of your guests feel like family after they've been on your at least. That's how it feels with me. I feel like my family's growing yes, exactly. Yeah, and so there's so many ambitious people that you're surrounding yourself. How is that impacting you personally and professionally?

SPEAKER_01 17:18

I used to measure my self-worth with the achievements that I have with the accolades that I manage to obtain or collect. And so right now I don't do that because it's actually the wrong way to do it, to move through life. I think of my self-worth at this point is just being connected and being able to resonate with people that are on the same frequency that I am, and it's different for everybody. Uh and the journey that uh you have had to go through yourself um alternately would have been different. On some levels, we understand each other that oh, we've done some work internally and we've done some unlearning in our mind and in the beliefs that we had before about certain things. And these guests that I have on, they are like my they're like therapy to me. It's a constant reminder, I've become more aligned than I've ever before in my life. Aligned means my mind, body, and soul. Whatever gut feeling that I have, I trust it, of course, with discernment. And the way I do that is I sit with myself and I wait. A person of faith, I wait for the sign, and universe never fails to give me that sign. And I believe to my core, uh, to every fiber of my being that you are attracting only the people that you are meant to attract in your life and be it good or bad. And so the podcast has become my how do I say this? It's the process to get the guests on, it's like a distillation process for me to get the very best of people. Now, during the first years, the first few months of having it on, you know, you want to build, right? You just you just interview so many people, but then you know, you kind of know the fifth month or the one you're in, you kind of know what type of people you want to be on the show, just like what we talked about before. Uh-huh. This people have become my my hope, my community. And I know within you know, few emails with a few, you know, typing on my laptop, or some of them I've become close to we've exchanged numbers. And as I'm in Malaysia, for those listeners tuning in, I've actually made the leap to go to the States and actually met about a few, about five of them face to face. And um, because I know that if you lead with your heart and with the right intention, with authenticity, those the wrong people will fall off your radar very quickly, and you can sort of sense their negative aura. And I'm tuning in to to the intuition that I have, the empathy that I have, because one more thing about me, um, Dr. Natalie, whenever universe tries to tell me something and I go against it, bad will happen. Just look at my right, and so this is something for you to learn, Nicola. I mean, if you don't want to you want to keep on making the same mistake, I mean you want to get somewhere. Like I have goals, but you want to get somewhere with you know not having to cost you know your mental health, especially the burnout that I had with my job. Just you have your internal compass and just listen. So I am now becoming the um the humble, I would say, I'd tune in for sure. And if and if it says they say wait, I just have to wait. I'm a very impatient person before, but I just I just have to wait.

SPEAKER_00 20:52

Yeah, and it I guess that that sign from the universe, it's almost like this knowing, like, wait, this doesn't feel right.

SPEAKER_01 21:01

It doesn't feel right, but you want to go ahead and show that you're gung-ho. Yes, yes, and that um this is my reality. I I create it, right? Because so don't get me wrong, like people get very whooped up between this is my reality and then just going against what is for your highest good. And this is where that subtle whisper, subtle voice is where you need to tune in and really sit with yourself.

SPEAKER_00 21:27

Oh, that's nice. So, as you sit with yourself, how do you uh, and maybe we just we well, we sort of covered it, but maybe we can go deeper. How do you know what's that feeling that comes to you when you know that you're sitting in yourself, you're set, you're centered, you're you know you're going in the right direction. How do you know the people that are going with you are not the right people versus those that are going with you are? Oh my god.

SPEAKER_01 21:58

Yeah. I just I I have the perfect um example uh because that's what happened to me the last couple of um I would say a year. So I got laid off in 2024, March. I got the news, and then my boss said, Okay, anything you want, we will support you. So we're gonna give you two months of paid leave. So I did, I took it, and I took it as a sign, which I think it was because I signed up for so I was I was a consultant, chartered accountant by uh by qualification, and I started my I I started looking into hypnotherapy, and again, it was not because I wanted to, it's because the universe like brought it to me on my IG feed and said, Hey, look at this, look at this. So I did, and the first time I brushed it off, and then two years after that, again I found the same feed, and this time again, because I was so careful already, and I needed, I asked the universe, and so I deep down in my heart. I said, Is this if this is what you want from me, then you you show me, you show me the same thing again, and it did not exactly, but I said that to the to the same effect, and it showed the same exact feat, and I said, Okay, I'm gonna heed to your advice and I'm gonna sign up. And I signed up. Then this is a new thing, they're talking about psychology, and from a numbers person to psychology, it's a it's a 180 change, but I said there must be something for me to learn, and at the time still is, but we're becoming more open in Asia. Therapy is not really that huge because for us it's a taboo. Because if you can't handle what's going on in your mind, how are wh why do you call yourself again useful? You should be worthless, right? You see, that's that's the parent thing that I I grew up in and I grew up with, and in the society, the societal norms around me said that you you should you should not ask for help when it comes to mental health. And ironically enough, no, it's not no, I don't I go against that belief now, and I'm I'm also helping people to do just that in Malaysia, helping break that stigma. And and so we I I went up and said to myself, okay, because I was so battered with my self-confidence then, had nothing else left, let me talk to people. That's why I started my podcast. And um, fast forward in I had two 20 people when I signed up on pod match resonating, and I said, Okay, people want to hear what I have to say. Let's let's go do it. And it was like the universe aligning things for me, but it gave me like a buffer time one year 2023, 2024. Yeah, and I was like, Okay, had I not had I not been laid off, I would not have left and I wouldn't have gone into this full force. Yeah, so that's so that's one way of me listening to the universe, but then the centering part, the centering part, knowing which one to keep and which one not to keep. I am a person with this mantra, you are you are innocent until you're proven guilty. So accept anybody uh in my in my field, and I I I open welcome them with open arms, and these are friends that I used to be very close with, but then through the years, I mean through the months we were we were together, I kind of feel like there was this animosity or jealousy that's happening between me and them. And they were making remarks like Nick, you could you could actually afford to drive a luxury car, you know, before because see that's that's the thing, because I I wanted to take off all the boxes, you know, dri get that car, and that's why I knew that's not gonna exactly the universe is not gonna deny me as long as I work hard. But when it comes to those friends that are inauthentic, I think they will portray first things first that okay, they want to get they want to be in the know, but then after that, they don't really care what happens to you in terms of what you're feeling, they just want to know what's going on. And so I had this inkling within me that says, Show me again. I prayed if they're really good friends, show me their true intention. If they're not, please just take them off my path. And um, true enough, I think uh two, I think three months in to me being laid off, that's when you know when you're in a bad position, you know who your real friends are. I made this joke with this one friend and said, Hey, I think I'm gonna go to the States. Like, are you crazy? You know, I because at the time I was already talking to so many people and I thought it was gonna open doors. And are you crazy? And then I shh and then he said that okay, well, as long as you know you're not you're not starving. And I ended the call, and a few weeks after that, another friend came to me and started asking, Hey, how are you doing? So are you still going to the States? And then she fed me some responses from the other person that confirmed that he was actually kind of bad-mouthing from the back. Which yes, which I really, really some friends have already told me that Nick, I don't think that friend is a good friend. Um, but I said, it's okay, it's he's he's he's good. He's just he just have a lot of things to process within him, his own trauma. So I wanted to be there as a good friend. Um, but then that's that those were the that was the sign. Then I said, Okay, this is not good. And eventually I filtered out that same person who was um giving the relaying the information, and I kept them out right now. It's again, it's the distilling process of who gets to be in my auric field.

SPEAKER_00 27:56

That's so important. So there you're setting boundaries, saying, okay, this is what's good for me, and this is what's not. As you work with clients that you know are new to paying attention to their mental health, how do you help them work through their deep emotional barriers or limiting beliefs? And what do you see happening? When someone's going through a healing pre process and it clashes with their current circle. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 28:28

Um, okay, well, that's a again, that's a whole lot of question. Okay, but I wanted to go back a few steps. I think the people that are attracted to my message, I believe, because I I do promotions, but I believe that the right my message will receive or will reach to the right person. And I've had I've had some pretty it's it's like the message is hitting right the nail in the head as they say it. And when they come to me, it's normally I kind of use my intuition and dig deeper into their issue. They may say one issue, let's say they they have trouble sleeping, but actually the issue is much deeper than that. Why is it that you have trouble sleeping? Oh, because I think about I don't have enough. What what is it that you don't have? Oh, I don't have enough money. Okay, why do why do you think you don't have enough money? And I I get into this okay this session because I do um rapid transformational therapy with my clients, pairing it with my coaching framework, worthy, authentic, and abundant. Now, rapid transformational therapy is a splendid way.

SPEAKER_00 29:47

What she's describing here, that internal signal is something most people learn to ignore, especially high performers, because we've been taught to push through. So instead of listening to that signal, we override it. We say yes to something that feels off. We take on more when we're already stretched, and over time, that disconnect builds between what we feel and what we actually carry to unroot your beliefs because 95% of our actions are driven by a subconscious.

SPEAKER_01 30:21

Right now we're talking, it's very conscious, but then when we're driving to work, one thing you're talking, you're thinking about the meeting that you're gonna have in like an hour's time. By the time you get there, you're already there. What is that? That is your subconscious working. And imagine if you have been implanted with those beliefs since you're growing up about money, you're gonna have the same beliefs up until now, unless there's something to disrupt that, that and reframe that beliefs, right? And so, how I help clients is through that, and it's true, um hypnosis, it's a combination of CBT, hypnosis, mindfulness, and um just thought regression. And I'm not gonna go into the technicals of it, but the key thing of it is I just want those listening to just imagine this. If you could understand the issue that you have today, the interpretation that you have today of an issue is actually directly related, or the cost was the things that you believe when you grow up, because we absorb everything between zero to eight. And a lot of things happened within those times, and we believe those things that were told to us by our family and the society, there are correct. I mean, I could even bring so many examples to this. This like what we talked about just before this about your guests. And if you right, if you believe that you are not, you know, you're not a privy of certain things in life, you're gonna grow up thinking that okay, people are out to get me. And I'm I just have to find my way through this. But then if you understood why, okay, I'm not gonna go into politics here, but uh just take take things very simply. Speaking, public speaking, growing up, you love to speak, you're an you're an extroverted kid, and every room that you go in, you light, you light up, you light it up, and but at one pivotal like at the time, especially the things that you waited for your entire, you know, your entire life as a kid, but you wanted to speak up, and you have somebody that you look up to, for example, uh, and say to you, actually, you're not really that good, but I think you should just stop. Can you imagine the damage done to that kid? Yeah, you'll see the light just dim just like that, and no, he or she is probably gonna grow up trying to fight that feeling, but he's they're gonna have this dual belief about themselves. Oh, I actually want to go out, but I've been told that I'm not good enough, and so okay, they they uh it would probably be so difficult for them to get the opportunity, but still the universe is trying to show okay, you're actually worth it, so you need somebody, you need something to help you get through that, and that's why people go to therapy. But if you're brave enough at one point, I'm sure to me, and I think to a lot of people, something would happen to you, at least maybe in terms of disease or in terms of loss, I don't know, financial loss, you know, family member, we don't know things would happen to you, and then that is your tower moment. And when that happened, I mean you go in, people come to me usually during that tower moment and say, Okay, Nick, um, I have I have I have these things, and we uncover all of that. The way I do it is just I'm I'm a guide and you're the one taking the lead um in that.

SPEAKER_00 33:49

I'd like to pause here for a second because if you're listening and thinking, this is me, I keep pushing. There's something important underneath that. A lot of high performers just don't work hard because they're driven. They work hard because somewhere along the way, their worth got tied to what they produce. And that's where the inner critic gets its power. It tells you do more, be more, don't drop anything. And over time, that turns into what I call the trust tax, where you're carrying responsibility that was never clearly yours, and your brain never shuts off. That's exactly why I created the responsibility reset notebook. Not to fix your mindset, but to give your brain structure. Because when you define what's yours, what isn't, and what can wait, your system finally gets permission to rest.

SPEAKER_01 34:44

It's a two-way thing. And when I ask you, why do you feel that you're not good enough? Why can't you talk to your friend? You have this, you've been working for this. Becoming a TEDx speaker, for example, and you know, but you just can't seem to shake off that that imposter syndrome or that feeling of you're not good enough. Why? And then during hypnosis, because that's when you're in a deep trance state, this is where your your conscious mind is off. It's subconscious. Oh, because the teacher that I love most said to me that I wasn't good enough. And do you think you're not good enough now? Is he still there? Is he still serving you? No. Are you able to make your own decisions right now and go up? Do you think that you have all the capabilities as a great speaker as a great speaker? Yes, you have the knowledge, right? You studied for this, yes, so once people understand the connection that they made before and now, that is the pivotal moment. And um, I also include things where you talk to the person who's actually hurt you, but then I don't do this with if it's a if it's a sexual abuse, that's we don't give voice to the person, but uh to the person that's hurting you, but we give voice to why did to the person who's actually said, like in this case, the the teacher, why did you say that to me? Oh, and then I ask ask my client to say I did that because I was told that before, and I think I was like I'm reminded of you and okay, you're not me, and I'm you, and I'm I have all the decisions right now, and I'm free no longer prisoner of the past.

SPEAKER_00 36:29

So you're basically helping people take that internal journey into themselves just like you did to be free.

SPEAKER_01 36:38

I am the I help people, okay. But the perfect avatar of a client is myself, the Nicolette before. Yeah, yes.

SPEAKER_00 36:49

There you go. What's one belief you had to let go of in order to grow?

SPEAKER_01 36:56

That I don't need to work as hard to get what I want, and therefore, my new belief now nature is never in a hurry, yet everything is accomplished. I love that.

SPEAKER_00 37:07

I love that vision. What's one small action that helped you rebuild your confidence?

SPEAKER_01 37:13

Progress over perfection. Putting one foot in front of the other.

SPEAKER_00 37:20

Okay. What's one sign that you're in the right room or community?

SPEAKER_01 37:24

That you and I, for example, right now, we are connecting on a soul level, heart to heart. Like it's there's no what do you call a fakery? There's nothing like I feel safe telling my story, and that you're not the person that I'm telling my story, whoever, they're not gonna use that against me.

SPEAKER_00 37:45

That is how I know. That's good. Okay, what's one habit stopped that you stopped doing that made a huge difference in your life?

SPEAKER_01 37:55

Thinking that I'm right all the time.

SPEAKER_00 37:56

Or that you have to be right. Yes, or that I have to be right. Yes, that's second part. I love that. That's a good one. My gosh, that's a that's a powerful one, I have to say. And what's one phrase or mantra that keeps you grounded in the tough moments?

SPEAKER_01 38:16

I would want to repeat that the first one that I mentioned. Nature is never in a hurry, yet everything is accomplished. But before that is fail often and fail forward.

SPEAKER_00 38:29

I really appreciate you being on. I really love your voice. I love your journey. I love the fact that you're helping others take that internal journey. I think that is so powerful. And in doing so, you're helping people connect to the higher power.

SPEAKER_01 38:46

Thank you so much, Natalie, for this beautiful, beautiful opportunity to share the stage with you and with your audience.

SPEAKER_00 38:53

Thank you. If you zoom out for a second, here's what's really happening in this conversation. Nicola is describing what it feels like on the inside. And it's the same pattern I see on the outside in high performers and teams. Caring more than you should, taking on things that were never clearly yours, and slowly losing the ability to turn it off. Different language, same experience. And once you see that connection, you'll start to understand why it's so hard to feel at ease. If there's one thing I hope you can take from this conversation, it's this. You don't have to silence your inner credit, but you do have to understand it. Because for a lot of us, that voice isn't random. It was built over time through expectations and pressure and the belief that you have to carry more to be enough. And Nickelette showed us today is that real world doesn't come from pushing harder, it comes from going inward, from sitting with yourself, from rebuilding your sense of worth from the inside out. And here's where I'll connect this back to you. Because once you do that internal work, you start to see something clearly. Everything you've been carrying is actually yours. And that's where the reset begins. Not by doing less, but by finally getting clear. Clear on what you're responsible for. Clear on what you're not, clear on where your energy actually belongs. That's how you grow without burning out. If this episode resonated with you, share it with someone who hates it. I'm Natalie Luke, and this is concealing you.