We were lucky to catch up with Lois Barth recently and have shared our conversation below.
Lois, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Risk taking is something we’re really interested in and we’d love to hear the story of a risk you’ve taken.
At my core, I’m a passionate pragmatist. In many ways, I’m exceedingly bold audacious, self-expressed, and in other ways, cautious, and an overthinker. Like most people, I’m a study of contradictions. We all have so many aspects of ourselves. In terms of my transition from acting and being a health practitioner, I knew there was something else I wanted to be doing. I call it Career Translation. I knew I wanted to take my gifts, passions, skills, and talents and repurpose them in a different direction. I started hearing about coaching and thought I’d be a good fit. So my first “risk” if you will was to ask my clients if they thought I’d be a great life and business coach. This was way before coaching was so mainstream, so they asked me what coaching is. I told them it’s more of a guide than a therapist, to help people identify where they are in their lives, personally and professionally, where they want to be, and help them navigate the ups and downs, to talk them off the cliff, and to give them wings to fly, so they could indeed reach their goals. They each smiled and said the same thing, “You’ve been doing that for me for the last (fill in the blank) years! That was the sign from the universe that I was aligned. So the risk was to get a reality check that I was on the right path. From there, I pursued multiple trainings and networking and create strategic referral partners. It was a similar path for speaking and writing my book. Creative Crankies (a need for change and growth) + asking the universe for affirmation + following that wisdom = next steps.
I’ve never looked back. We know inside when something is right, off, or needs to shift. If we’re willing, to be honest with ourselves, look both inside and outside for guidance and signs, and honor those messages, we’ll be guided to the next chapter of our life. I truly believe that!
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 background and context?
Well, I mentioned how I got into coaching and speaking, so I’ll share my approach, what problems I solve and the services I provide. I believe that what sets me apart is that I can take seemingly disparate topics and somehow bring them together to make sense for my client(s) and the groups I speak to. As a coach, people come to me for all sorts of things. On a professional level, it can be anything from clarifying how to advocate for themselves in the workplace, stepping into new levels of leadership, strengthening their interview skills, building their business, or clarifying what’s next in their career. On a personal level, it often comes down to building their confidence, and courage, taking better care of themselves, as well as creating healthy loving relationships in their lives. I take an individual approach with my clients. I’m always looking for ways of moving them from criticism to curiosity, to learn and grow, as well as giving them language and a context to understand what they’re going through and really practical and powerful strategies to move forward. My brand and the title of my book is Courage to SPARKLE. I have seen that when you support heart-centered go-getters who crave greater impact, meaning, and fulfillment in their lives to shine bright, to share their gifts, to make a difference, then something really special happens. Not only do they step into a whole other level of alignment and aliveness in their lives, but they are also of greater service to those around them they impact. I work on the body/mind/spirit level. As a speaker, I create an experience when I speak for people to laugh and learn and actually embody their most courageous selves, so they can take inspired risks, which creates more fulfillment and engagement in the workplace as well as personally.
Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?
As a coach and a speaker, my business took a huge hit during the pandemic. Clients were on furlough and in-person speaking gigs got canceled across the board. I’ll admit it, I was rather lost. I was fine financially since I’m very conscious of where my money goes and dealing with rainy days. But I was in a new relationship with my Pandemic Prince (who I met four months before the pandemic) he was working around the clock and I was spinning my wheels. It was exceedingly frustrating. But the more I allowed myself to be in uncertainty, to “not know” to question, and to really get clear about what mattered to me, the more freedom I started to experience. I realized that I was way more resilient than I previously believed or had to be. I started studying what resiliency really was during these challenging times. I started reaching out to clients and people sharing what I’m seeing in the trends but more importantly a way to not focus on “bouncing back” but rather “bounding forward.” People got excited. I created many virtual programs on resiliency, on my Teams 2.0 YOU!, and moved my Courage to SPARKLE keynote to virtual and things really started to shift. I also saw the preciousness of both time and life and vowed to do more things that I enjoyed. To work less alone and more in partnership. I started doing more contract and consultancy work, and less solo work and really enjoyed it. My business is doing great, and I’m looking to grow it even more and create online courses. My first one (coming out in early 2023) is called The Perils of People Pleasing and How to Overcome It: A Mind/Body Approach. None of that would’ve been possible if I hadn’t allowed myself to embrace uncertainty and question.
What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?
I think the most important lesson I continue to learn and relearn is to constantly question my own beliefs and if they are true and most importantly do they serve me. I really believe that our greatest strengths are often our biggest challenges, but with a few important and substantive shifts, can once again become our strength. I’m very self-reflective. I ponder, I love to understand, to have a deeper context or a different lens to look through life. That’s great in the insight department, but often if taken too far analytical types can fall so in love with the understanding that we’re not taking action. The term “analysis/paralysis” sums it up well. So when I look back on my life most of my greatest gifts from being appointed life coach for three different national makeover campaigns that to date over 4 million folks have registered for, was to just show up and be my most authentic in my case, audacious, enthusiastic self. To be real, and to be unapologetic for who I am, to trust at the moment, and do what feels right. Yes, I’ve had blunders and have made mistakes, we all have! Yet some of the most wonderful miracles happened in my life because I just showed up as my full self, not overthinking it and trusting the moment! I highly recommend it!
Contact Info:
- Website: www.loisbarth.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/loisbarth/?hl=en
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lois.barth.9
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/loisbarth/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/user/LoisBarth
- Other: Lois Barth Motivational Speaker Reviews https://www.google.com/maps/place/Motivational+Speaker+Lois+Barth/@40.7813047,-73.9771425,11z/data=!4m7!3m6!1s0x8d1deb08b80f1381:0xd8bd39c8bcd3ae87!8m2!3d40.7813047!4d-73.9771425!9m1!1b1