We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Lindsay Elizabeth Preston a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Lindsay Elizabeth, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Can you recount a time when the advice you provided to a client was really spot on? (Please note this response is for education/entertainment purposes only and shouldn’t be construed as advice for the reader)

One of my favorite client stories is from a woman who I’ll call Kristy. Kristy hired me at age 39. She had had wonderful success in her career and friendships but still hadn’t found the right guy to start a family with. At the beginning of us coaching together she was dating a man who she liked and thought could be the right fit. In time, as we coached together to dig into what SHE really wanted in a partner, it was shown he wasn’t.

As she started to date again, now knowing now she wanted, and processing her upcoming 40th birthday, she realized as she coached deeper that she’d been waiting for years to find the right guy so she could have a baby when she could really just have a baby on her own. Within weeks she was pregnant! She’d been waiting over a decade to have a baby thinking it had to be the stereotypical way when in fact she just needed a coach (ie: me) to show her how society was impacting her decision, ask her what she wanted to do with that information and then ask her the right questions for HER to find HER truth to accomplish her goal.

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

Hiii! I’m Lindsay Elizabeth Preston. I’m a leadership coach to women who are ready to stop checking off society’s stereotypical boxes and live deeply fulfilling lives instead.

My zone of genius is helping women find what’s stopping them from having the calm, balanced and thriving life they desire. I help my clients develop action plans for making more but working less in careers that light them the f*ck up. I teach them how to overcome the feelings and traumas holding them back from showing up fully in their relationships. I empower them to create the courage and confidence needed to live a life that’s deeply fulfilling to THEM and I give them the support and mentorship needed to step into their power (which for some includes starting or growing a business).

I entered the coaching industry 8 years ago after overcoming a horrible divorce where I discovered my then partner was living a double life engaged to another woman. At the time I was a stay-at-home mom of our 2-year-old daughter. Scared and heartbroken, I walked into a high conflict divorce with no job and no money. I walked out within weeks getting exactly what I wanted and feeling more confident and free than ever before.

The work of healing and rebuilding my life had just begun though because as I started to date and look for jobs again, I fell into similar patterns – dating
liars and spending time in jobs that didn’t fulfill me.

It was suggested I hire a life/leadership coach. While I thought it was somewhat wacky, I trusted my intuition and invested the last money I had in savings. Within weeks I felt better than ever before and within months I knew that coaching was the profession I always wanted, I just didn’t know it had existed.

I took my background in Human Resources, being a previous business owner (I owned a dance studio), my BS in Psychology and Communications from TCU (go frogs!) and obtained multiple coach trainings from there.

Since then I’ve helped hundreds of women all over the world while living my ideal life in the process. I’ve since remarried, have two children and I’m exactly the woman I set out to be years ago.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

I’ve had to unlearn many of society’s typical lessons while on my journey to becoming an awakened woman and leadership coach for women in the world. Some of those include:

#1: Hard work = success. No SMART work = success. This work ourselves to death mentality is toxic and hurts women the most as our bodies are cyclical in nature and need times during our monthly cycles to REST. This is why 1 in 2 women have a hormone imbalance and 85% of women experience extreme period symptoms. Our bodies are not meant to work as much as we are. When women learn how to best utilize their cycles to work smarter, not harder, success blooms around them even MORE and their health and wellness doesn’t suffer in the process. They learn to tap into the times when they’re most potent vs. keeping up with the daily grind. (This is true for women beyond the menstruating years too!). I help my clients find their cycles so they can build a life around that vs. them forcing themselves into a patriarchal system that causes them to ignore what they need most.

#2: Education is everything. While education is important and valuable, it’s not the most important factor for a successful, healthy, and thriving life. Yet
our society loves to tell us otherwise. From a young age our grades start to define our worth as humans and we’re measured on things that aren’t built for everyone’s zone of genius. This leaves many feeling less than and it forces the most driven to put themselves in the box of intelligence the school system applauds vs. tapping into what THEY do best in the world. This is why I take my clients through a “puzzle of you” exercise where we put together all the pieces of who they are on a deep level (like their innate strengths, ways of thinking, motivation, etc.) so they can align themselves for a career that is fulfilling AND feels easy for them. No additional school required most times too but if school is needed to shift, it’s a SMART and strategic investment vs. a “I don’t know what I want to do with my life next but here’s an idea.”

#3: Put others before yourself. Giving is a beautiful thing no doubt, but the messaging we give women and girls from a young age is often “other’s needs,
comfort and desires come before yours.” This starts with strict dress codes placed on girls in schools to ensure their attire isn’t too “sexy” to make others uncomfortable. While we need boundaries for sure, the messaging we’re sending these girls is that it’s YOUR job to make others comfortable and what they feel/think about you is YOUR responsibility, not theirs. This messaging gets especially strong if a woman becomes a mother. The needs of your family, especially your children come first. This leads to women burning out at record levels and our collective mental health tanking. With my clients, their self-care and desires come to the forefront again and we release all the subtle (often unconscious) messaging they’ve heard so they can be the woman they are meant to be in the world.

Have you ever had to pivot?

After I started my coaching business in 2014, I was in heaven! I loved what I did, who I worked with and the work/life blend I was creating. I then got happily married and became pregnant with my 2nd child and felt so sick almost all of the time. I knew I needed to take some time off to rest and focus on my family.

For a year and a half, I put my business on the back burner as I incorporated the life of this new little human into our family. I’m so grateful I had the
opportunity to take this pause as I know others do not and I’m so glad I did it.

During this time it became clear on where I wanted to go next in my business, including focusing solely on one form of coaching (at that time 1-on-1 only) and launching my now highly-rated “Become an Unstoppable Woman” podcast.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.LindsayEPreston.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thelindsayelizabeth/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LindsayEPreston
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lindsayepreston/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/LindsayEPreston

Image Credits
https://lumoscreative.com