We recently connected with Libby Bunten and have shared our conversation below.

Libby , appreciate you joining us today. Let’s start with the story of your mission. What should we know?

My mission for my coaching business is to create a global Sisterhood of women who can embody their truth and power in Self-Approval so they can heal themselves and change the world. What I’ve found is when women are not completely distracted by what they think is “wrong” with them and their bodies, they are more free in their relationships, businesses, finances, and every other area of life.

I’ve experienced a lot in my life, including losing my mother far before her time to alcoholism and suicide. Her pain stemmed from internalizing years of toxic messaging about her body, her worthiness as a woman, and her trauma and abuse – all contributing to a belief system that she would never be enough. My mission is rooted in serving women as a way to honor my mother who did not have the tools and support to access the depth of her own healing in a Sisterhood that she never knew was available to her. I have also grown through my own personal sexual and emotional traumas and have found a rainbow of somatic embodiment tools and practices to help myself and other women to alchemize even the dark parts of our journey.

It is my belief that a Self-Approved Woman is a free woman, and women who are free to be themselves and share their gifts is what the world is dying for right now!

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

I was raised by a manual labor family in a small coastal town in Maine. Having grown up quite poor in a very wealthy area, I absorbed some faulty belief systems about what was possible for me, my worthiness and lovability, and my capabilities for change. When I finished high school I decided I had to see what was out there in the great wide world, so I worked my tail off all summer so I could backpack around Europe for two months, albeit on a shoe-string budget. This experience revealed to me how tiny my worldview had become as a result of growing up in a town of only 500 people with extremely limited thinking and virtually no variety of culture. It also became a jumping off point for changing my own inherited beliefs and perceived limitations. I later got a degree in writing and then backpacked around Europe again after.

A brief stint in a toxic, patriarchal, corporate job propelled me to pursue an MS in Clinical Psychology, leading me to ultimately work in feminist leadership with like-minded, irreverent women. In my former work as a Clinical Therapist, I learned much about how the inner workings of our varying degrees of traumas not only change the function of our brain, but also how that impacts our self-worth and ability to show up as whole women in the world. It became clear to me that if we are limiting ourselves in any part of life, we are limiting ourselves in every part of our life. I loved my therapy clients and took pride in the space I provided for collaborative healing, but it became evident to me that the “system” was broken in ways that I could not fix from the inside – I couldn’t give my gifts fully if I was a cog in that disturbing machine! This realization, coupled with losing my mom very unexpectedly, prompted me to leave my job, start my own business, and ultimately become a Somatic Embodiment coach. I have since founded Self-Approval School – a group coaching program where women come together in Sisterhood to break the bullshit Patriarchal rules, and learn to give themselves the stamp of approval. I also do one on one coaching with women who are desiring to go from feeling shameful to being self-approved, so that they can begin to trust their intuition, stop dissociating from and hating on their bodies, and live more joyful and present lives.

Some of the things I’m most proud of are being a fun-loving auntie to my magical niece and nephews; being a good friend, sister, and partner; and creating collaborative, deep, safe, healing spaces for myself and other women. When I’m not lifting women up through coaching and Sisterhood, you can find me traveling the world with my husband, Paul, singing Karaoke, writing funny stories about my lived experience, or surrendering into the deep abyss of weirdness that is this life!

We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?

One lesson I had to unlearn is that you have to do it all yourself and be it all to everyone. I picked up a lot of negative thought processes and behaviors from growing up in a chaotic, alcoholic household and I cannot count the times I heard my mother say, “If you want something done right you have to do it yourself.” While I do believe there is great power in self-sufficiency and the willingness to try and fail and try again, my belief about having to do and be it all created a lot of problems for me. After years and years of people pleasing, workaholism, and over-achieving, I became burnt out, resentful, lonely, and my health was suffering. In my late 20s and early 30s I had developed an eating disorder and was afraid that if I told anyone that I would be abandoned. Eventually, I had a dark night of the soul where I was bargaining with the Universe for someone to help me out of the hell of my own creating. It was at this point that I found my first coach and everything began to shift for me. In a group program I slowly but surely started to realize that I had more in common with other women than I thought and that Sisterhood and connection was actually the antidote to my depression and isolation. I shudder to think had I not had that dark night that led me to the journey I am on today. As a result of walking this path of healing and remembering myself, I have co-created a beautifully imperfect life and a business that makes a difference in the world. I could not have done that if I kept trying to do and be everything on my own!

What do you think helped you build your reputation within your market?

Walking my talk, my sense of humor, and my willingness to share what I’ve lived through have all helped me to build my reputation within my market. For years I was prospected by coaches who wanted me to hire them, but I was not buying what they were selling. I have a good sense for when people are living by what they are saying and often I could see that they didn’t even believe what they were saying to me in their marketing. I remember one woman who connected with me over and over about her programs but all I could read in her energy was that she actually didn’t really like people. My ability to laugh at myself and the insanity that it is to be a human also seems to have built solid trust within my market. I personally have a hard time trusting anyone without a sense of humor! Lastly, my willingness to share what I’ve lived through, show my shadowy stuff, and not pretend like everything is perfect has been a powerful bond-builder. This illusion of perfection is such a turn-off and it just perpetuates people’s beliefs that they are not deserving or good enough for their own messy process. That approach will make you exhausted as an entrepreneur and will repel your audience.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.libbybunten.com/
• Instagram: @thelibbybunten
• Threads: @thelibbybunten

Image Credits
Jen Dean Photography