We were lucky to catch up with Charlene Ridley recently and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Charlene, thanks for joining us today. Alright, so you had your idea and then what happened? Can you walk us through the story of how you went from just an idea to executing on the idea

Honestly, I have always been the idea person, the problem solver and a cheerleader for my friends to help them hit their life goals. For a long time, I wanted to start a business but was stuck because I didn’t believe my gifts were tangible like other businesses I knew. You couldn’t come to me and leave with a painting, clothing, cupcakes, your taxes done or any of the things that I thought made a legit business. I’d never heard of coaches or consultants so even though I dreamt of being an entrepreneur I didn’t see how it could happen.

Then in 2015. I enrolled in a six-month self-development & leadership workshop with the purpose of seeing what was available to me and getting unstuck, The work that was done there helped me completely change my thoughts, ideas and perspectives on what was possible for me in the world. I had my first experience with coaches and saw first-hand the tangible changes that their guidance brought to my life. And I knew that I wanted to do the same.

I began by reading every book I could on emotional intelligence, goal setting, business, communication, mindset, etc. & I applied to start coaching training.

In 2016, I became a coach through that same program and spent over 5,000 hours over the next few years learning, serving and helping hundreds of people reach their highest goals.

In 2019, I decided to start my own business, Unpause Your Dreams and to dedicate myself to helping people & businesses grow into their wildest dreams.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I am a Christian, mom of 3 & dog mom of 2 frenchie poos.

To find what you love you have to try different things on (kind of like a jacket), see if it fits and if it doesn’t, put it back on the rack. You gather information, learn, get really clear about what you like and don’t like so that you can make the decisions that are best for you. I’ve applied this to my life and professional experience to get where I am today.

I got my MBA honestly, because the U.S. promotes education as a way to achieve success and wealth. I didn’t really know what I wanted outside of that so I tried a lot of things & have worked in many different industries/roles to figure it out. I was a licensed trader, top performing realtor, college career services leader, college campus director, manager at a top 5 bank and manager at a Big Four consulting firm. It really feels like I have done it all because I have done a lot! None of it was wasted because I get to pass on all of my lived experience to my clients. I save them time–they learn, grow & achieve their dreams much faster.

This diverse background sets me apart from so many coaches and business strategists. It positions me to help just about anyone, makes me relatable and helps my clients connect with me.

I coach people 1×1 or in groups to achieve goals like: buying a home, writing a book, starting a business, scaling an existing business, scale six figure businesses, getting license agreements to sell in major retailers, starting coaching, change careers, negotiate higher salaries, getting clear on what’s next, growing their confidence and getting new jobs.

I have a dream brainstorming notebook to write and keep track of all of your dreams.

And one of my favorite things is to teach 9-11 year old children how to Dream B.I.G.

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

In the past few years there is a huge push to have a strong social media presence. So much so, it feels like something you have to do as a business in order to grow, thrive and survive.

I’d started pouring more energy, time and strategy into building social media in late 2021.

I took mini-workshops, got coaching around it, developed goal & strategies and set out to grow my following and business through social media.

I ignored my initial concerns that it didn’t feel authentic for me. I committed to challenges and showing up daily. My following grew a bit and so did my business but it wasn’t substantial and I swore I was doing it wrong.

The reality is I was in resistance to the ways that I was being told I had to use social media. It turned the joy of my work into something I had to do—a place I had to show up and I really didn’t like it.

I did some work with all of the thoughts I had about social media.

I realized social media is one tool to connect, promote and grow your business. People do business with people they like and if I was doing it grudgingly that wouldn’t be attractive to my ideal clients.

I decided to pull back from social media in late 2022. It’s a tool that I can use but for now my strategy of being active in the community and meeting new people in real life is the tool I’m most comfortable using—and its been my most successful tool to date.

How’d you build such a strong reputation within your market?

3 things have helped build my reputation in my market: knowledge, delivery and results.

A jack of all trades is master of none but often times better than a master of one. This perfectly describes me. My clients count on me having a wide range of knowledge about many things. They know that I coach on what I know and if I do not know something I am upfront about that & commit to finding out or connecting them to others in my extensive network who do know. My client’s confidence in my knowledge based directly impacts business and is evident in not only the number of return clients I have but also in the referral rates for new business.

I want everyone to win and tend to “over” deliver. I give my coaching clients everything that I have and not just the bare minimal to create small changes which is the approach of many coaching programs. My client surveys says that I consistently exceed expectations and that the time spent with me is “way more valuable than expected.”

Every aspect of coaching with me starts with mindset work. This is important because often we set goals without realizing that we have beliefs in our subconscious mind that conflict with what we say we want to create. When the subconscious isn’t in alignment the goal doesn’t happen and people become frustrated and sometimes afraid to try again. Identifying these beliefs and our natural approach to adversity up front—is a game changer in achieving the results we want.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.unpauseyourdreams.com
• Instagram: unpause_your_dreams