We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Trish Boes a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Alright, Trish thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Risk taking is something we’re really interested in and we’d love to hear the story of a risk you’ve taken.
I think that a lot of my life has had an element of risk taking. It started when I took a risk to leave my home in Melbourne, Australia to move to LA for a job, even though I had never been to the US before. It also extended to quitting my full-time corporate job to go back to grad school to get a Masters Degree in Spiritual Psychology; to taking a risk to become a solo entrepreneur with my own leadership coaching and L&D (learning and development) consulting business; and moving across the US several times. The thread amongst all of those early risks is that even though it was uncomfortable to dramatically change things in my life and there might have been some initial growing pains, bigger and better things always happened as a result of taking those risks.
One of the biggest risks I am taking is right now, in recently starting a company with my husband as my co-founder, while also raising a young daughter together. For a lot of people working with your spouse is no-go territory, and the idea of putting all of our eggs in one basket (especially the financial ones!) can feel like a lot. While on the one hand it might seem like a risk, on the other hand it feels so aligned with the work we are meant to do on the planet. Through our company UnlimitMe, we are charting our own course in educating college and high school students and learning a lot about the higher education industry in the US (especially with our work with college athletes) and it sometimes feels risky because there is so much unknown. However, as they say “with great risk comes great reward” – even though things are a work in progress, we both already feel an incredible level of satisfaction, inspiration, and joy. We love the work that we do, we love all of the people that we get to work with (especially the students), and appreciate being able to cheer people on to continue to do phenomenal things each and every day.
Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.
At UnlimitMe, we want to support young people, especially college and high school students to unlock their infinite potential by supporting them with tools to embrace their inherent worth and elevate their mental wellbeing. We believe that all humans are special, but we also recognize that it feels hard to actually be human. There’s a lot of pressure on young people to get into college in an educational landscape that is super competitive, plus with the rising costs of education it adds a whole other layer of stress to not only young people but their families. Then after college there’s pressure to find a well paying job and become successful. All of this pressure is leading to high levels of depression and anxiety amongst highschool and college students, and we want to help shift the narrative around this where people can feel empowered by their future, not just overwhelmed by it.
What sets us apart is that both my co-founder and I come from diverse backgrounds – and we believe in serving our youth as whole humans. My co-founder Pranay is from India, went to University in the UK and has lived in the US for the past 20 years, while I am a first generation Australian (my mum is from Indonesia and my dad is from The Netherlands) and moved to the US almost 15 years ago. Our interactive group sessions are really focused on creating a safe and judgment free space where every single person’s voice matters. We also create all of our workshops specifically to meet the unique cohort of students that we work with, as there’s no such thing as one-size fits all. Our job is not to push information to students, but to give them the tools to find the answers within themselves as they grow in their self awareness. Our learning methodology and curriculum is built on our proprietary “3C’s” 3 levels of connection model which utilizes a research backed psychological and ontological framework. It aims to support students to increase their:
1. Connection to themselves – becoming more self-aware, confident and emotionally intelligent
2. Connection to others – the ability to enhance their social bonds and build genuine, long lasting relationships
3. Connection to the world – the ability to understand their greater purpose in order to set clear goals and take empowered action
We founded UnlimitMe because we noticed that a lot of people in their mid careers were suffering from burnout and a range of mental health issues. Through my work at my prior leadership coaching company I recognized that there was a basic lack of understanding on how to be whole, balanced, functioning human beings. These skills are not things we are actively taught in our education system, so that by the time people get to middle age there is a lot of suffering. That’s why we wanted to bring some of these skills that we were teaching middle aged adults to a younger audience – especially since there is a lot more pressure to succeed on younger people than in previous generations.
What we are most proud of is getting to work with so many incredible students and hearing how our programs have had a positive impact in their lives, where students have reported still using the skills in their life after college to feel calm, confident and happy. We are also proud of using our program to support a College Athletic Team where the coach reported that our work supported their team bond so much that none of their students went into the transfer portal. Finally we are also proud of never turning people or schools away based on financial abilities, and appreciate looking at the data from our anonymous student surveys where: 90% of students surveyed reporting feeling more self-aware, confident and connected to themselves; 100% of students felt more connected to others and created more authentic relationships; and 100% felt more empowered about their future.
Have you ever had to pivot?
One of the biggest pivots I did in my career was when I left my corporate full-time job to go back to grad school, while also starting my own coaching and consulting business. The reason that I left the corporate world is that I was suffering from severe burnout, and a lot of that stemmed from the fact that I didn’t have the crucial life skills to understand who I really was, and how to best take care of myself (which is something we now teach about in UnlimitMe). I had a great job and worked with incredible people, but it wasn’t enough. It was also a major pivot for me to stop full-time work to go back into full-time study, especially to get my Masters degree in something that seemed very woo-woo and out there like Spiritual Psychology (even more so because I was very left brain dominant prior to that). But that pivot was the best thing that ever happened to me – through getting my degree I learned so much about what it means to be a whole human, and to truly understand the concepts of working towards a higher purpose. I also learned psychological tools that provided me with crucial coping skills that have supported me in feeling healthy, confident, happy and in love with my life. This pivot has not only improved many relationships in my life, but it makes me a better founder, leader, wife, mother and friend. This and many other life experiences, learnings and tools have been incorporated into our UnlimitMe programming.
Any stories or insights that might help us understand how you’ve built such a strong reputation?
I think one of the biggest things that has helped to build our reputation in our market is our willingness to learn. Both my co-founder Pranay and I truly believe in the phrase and our company name “UnlimitMe”. We chose that name because we want to lead with a growth mindset – we recognize that there’s always things to be learned in life and there’s always a way we can show up and have a positive impact. Even though I had a background in corporate education, I didn’t have higher education experience, so it’s the willingness to get out of our comfort zone to start fresh and to learn about a new industry with enthusiasm and positivity which I think has made a difference.
The second big thing that has helped build our reputation is that we are very clear on our values, especially when it comes to building each relationship intentionally – whether it’s with a school or college administrator or with a student – and being willing to show up authentically and with integrity to serve and support others. Our values also support us in creating long term relationships and working with people who really want and need our program, (and are willing to work collaboratively with us) – we believe in it so much that we don’t ever want to turn a student or school away just because of a lack of financial means. Being so focused on life long relationships is also a core value in how we show up to support students, we want to be part of the student’s life throughout the school year or years and build long term relationships and trust with them, rather than offering “one and done” solutions.
And finally, I believe our optimism and ability to provide a different perspective and different offerings to what a lot of our students/schools currently experience also supports our reputation, and having people that continue to want to work with us. Our vision and mission is to change the status quo of education to focus on the inside-out, and we want each person to feel uplifted, inspired and capable of making their dreams and goals a reality, which is something that really resonates with our clients and makes them want to help us to continue to grow our impact.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.unlimitme.co
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/unlimitme.co
- Linkedin: https://linkedin.com/in/patriciaboes
Image Credits
UnlimitMe Technologies, LLC