Cheaper Than Divorce: The Gym And The Guilt | Dr. East Phillips

Your confidence doesn’t disappear at pricing time because you’re “bad at sales.” More often, it vanishes because you’re still asking for permission to be fully seen. I’m joined by Dr. East, an integrative and alternative medicine physician, frequency coach, and best-selling author, for a candid talk about what it takes to unshackle yourself as a woman, a mother, and an entrepreneur.

We dig into the mindset blocks that quietly run the show: self-limiting beliefs, people pleasing, and the belief that a “good mom” should sacrifice everything. Dr. East breaks down why that story creates guilt, resentment, and pressure kids never asked for, then shows how writing your own permission slip can change your marriage, your energy, and your calendar. If you’ve been waiting for someone else to make space for you, this is your reminder that the rescuer is you.

From there, we go deep on identity-based transformation and purpose. We talk intuition as a real business asset, how to follow what lights you up, and how to spot the moment you’ve overstayed your purpose. Dr. East shares practical ways to uncover desire, plus the daily habit structure behind Elevate, a 50-day consistency container that supports higher energy, better boundaries, and healthier growth without grind culture.

If this hit home, subscribe, share the episode with a woman who needs her permission slip, and leave a review so more wellness entrepreneurs can find these conversations.

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Transcript

Welcome To She’s The Boss

SPEAKER_01 0:01

Welcome to She's the Boss, the podcast where female wellness entrepreneurs talk ambition, money, and ownership out loud. I'm your host, Lee McSwan, a certified holistic nutritionist turned wellness business coach. This is where conversations are unfiltered, the rules of entrepreneurship get rewritten, and nothing is off limits. Money, motherhood, friendships, legacy, wealth, power, and what it really takes to build a life and business on your terms. Let's get after it. Today I'm joined by Dr. East. Dr. East is a physician of alternative and integrative medicine, a frequency coach, speaker, best-selling author with over 25 years of experience helping people create lasting transformation from the inside out. And she also holds a doctorate in acupuncture and oriental medicine, is a licensed acupuncturist, former professor, and clinical supervisor. And she's worked in integrative medicine settings, including the Chopra's Center Mind Body Medical Group. Her background also includes decades as a fitness professional. But what makes Dr. East's work so powerful is that she doesn't teach theory from the sidelines. She teaches from her own lived experience, her clinical practice, and years of guiding real people through real life. Her approach is compassionate, grounded, and deeply honest. Today we are talking about stepping into our full power, unshackling ourselves as women, as mothers, and as entrepreneurs, creating identity-based transformations. And we're talking about what it really takes to be aligned and living in your passion. This is a rich conversation. I know you guys are gonna love it. Let's dive in.

Sales Confidence And Pricing Nerves

SPEAKER_01 1:46

Before we kick it off with Dr. East, I have a question to ask you. Why does your confidence seem to disappear the second someone asks you about your prices? Whether it's your offers, your services, your digital course, why does it feel like you choke? Maybe it even feels like you absolutely suck at sales or pitching yourself. Well, if selling your services feels awkward, rest assured you are not alone. Most wellness professionals were never taught how to sell. Inside sales confidence, you'll learn how to talk about your work, your pricing, and handle objections with ease. You can click the link down below this episode and make sure that you grab it within the next couple of days because early bird pricing is in effect. Sales confidence, it's in you.

Meet Dr. East And The Theme

SPEAKER_01 2:33

Dr. East, welcome to She's the Boss Podcast. How are you today? I'm outstanding, fabulous. How about you? Oh, I'm also outstanding and fabulous. Thank you for asking.

Books And Business Mindset

SPEAKER_01 2:46

We are going to kick off this conversation with an icebreaker question, as we do at the start of every episode. So, my question for you today is other than your own books, what is the best book that you've read in the last 10 years?

SPEAKER_02 3:01

Oh my goodness. The best. That's hard. That's hard. Since this topic is about women in business, I would say I'm gonna pick two that were powerful with my business. And they're kind of masculine and feminine. They're beautiful. Dot com secrets was fabulous, and it still is. It's just everything. There's so much business um wisdom in dot com secrets. And I went on to actually buy the whole ClickFunnels training. And honestly, it's all in dot com secrets. It's right there. Uh, and then second is think and grow rich. It it continues to be one of my favorite books to go back to. The principles there are so solid and in creating, and that's what we're doing. And how beautiful women in business, we are natural creators. So those are the two. Um, a fun book. If for anybody that's into yoga, there's a great book. It's called How Yoga Works. And it has nothing to do with how yoga works. It's actually a story, it's super sweet. It is a fictional novel. And if you're into yoga, I learned how to teach yoga years ago. And somebody recommended that book. I almost didn't buy it. And it's one of those books I'm so grateful I did. The story, it's one of those stories you put down the book and you're bawling at the end. Not for it in a good way, because your soul is touch. Um in autobiography of a yogi. I mean, another one that I pull out that just has that very soul in the Bible. So I know you said one and I'm offering more.

SPEAKER_01 4:39

I could never pick one book either. I'm such a book nerd that I'm the same way. If you if you ask me for my favorite book, I'm giving you one from each category.

SPEAKER_02 4:50

Absolutely. Absolutely. I mean, I have so many books. I'm staring at books. I got books, books, books like Mindset by Carol Rec is so important about do you have a fixed mindset or a growth mindset? And women, if you're listening and you're about to, you know, stop, just what kind of mindset do you have? Your success in business in life as a mom is 99.999% your mindset, if not 100%. So that's your desire. I always go there.

Self-Limiting Beliefs And Conditioning

SPEAKER_01 5:19

Yeah. And what are some of the common mindset blocks that you see in your many decades of working with women specifically?

SPEAKER_02 5:28

Self-limiting beliefs and arguing for them. Richard Bach, an author, he says, has he's quoted to say, argue for your limitations and they're yours, right? Whatever you say and believe, you're right. I could never run a marathon. You're right. I could totally run a marathon. You're right. So it's being very mindful. I use the example with a lot of my clients. You know, Oprah Winfrey ran a marathon. Like, East, why are you telling me this? Because she has every reason to say she couldn't. She doesn't have time, she was a little bigger, she didn't train, and she said, No, I'm gonna run a marathon and I'm gonna do what I need to do. I'm gonna show up, I'm gonna train, I'm gonna clear my schedule, I'm gonna prioritize it, and she did it. So the that's where I see a lot of people uh that I work with and and women, women societally, culturally have been taught to put themselves last. And so they do, and then they tell themselves I shouldn't want that, I couldn't do that. What are you talking about?

SPEAKER_01 6:34

Yeah, it seems like unlived potential, right? And so many women. And one of the things that we had spoken about before we hit record was sacrificing everything for your kids and how this is this is a statement that really kind of irks

Motherhood Without Self-Sacrifice

SPEAKER_01 6:50

me. And I know you feel the same. Can you just elaborate on why we should not even say that, let alone believe that or live by that? Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 6:59

I mean, I like in my priorities list, it is God, my marriage, and my children. So my children come before my business. However, I'm not sacrificing everything for them. I am it rather, I'm acting as a model of kind of a healthy relationship, right? Like I am a sovereign being in and of myself. I know how to generate my own happiness. I know how to go out there and be in the world without being needy. And what I see is sometimes women go over the top, sacrificing everything. I've sacrificed everything for my children. Those children now feel indebted because you're constantly telling them of all the sacrifices. Some of these children also feel like your happiness hangs on them and their behavior. And that is too much weight to put on a child. You know, your your children didn't come into this earth and at one year old look at you and say, I want you to sacrifice everything for me. Like, so a lot of these women, and I'm I've been guilty to this as well until I kind of like, oh, whoa, wait. Um, that guilt, right? I shouldn't want to do that stuff. I'm not being a good mom. It's it's recognizing, hey, wait a second, they're not even asking for this stuff. And I want to be a good example for my kids. And I, and again, like you and I talked about before we hit record, I would never want my children to feel uh that my happiness hangs on them. I'm responsible for myself and I'm teaching them that for themselves as well.

SPEAKER_01 8:39

Yeah. And so for the people that do feel like that, I feel like that might be some inner resentment for not living the life that they truly desire or that they even want, like going to the gym or carving out time in their schedule for their girlfriends. Like so many times women run adrift from the things that bring them true, true happiness. And as we talked about before, it's it's the little things. And what I think women need to get very strong and convicted in is saying, I'm doing this, and not asking for permission from themselves, society, their husbands, their partners, their children. So what is what is that permission slip kind of situation? What is that looking like for people that maybe aren't even aware that they're doing it in their lives? And how do they break from

Non-Negotiables And Writing Permission Slips

SPEAKER_01 9:34

that?

SPEAKER_02 9:34

Well, they got to write their own permission slip. So this was something that I caught myself in as well. I had my first child in 2016. And before that, I was a health and fitness enthusiast, uh, taught fitness all over the place, and had my child, and I had these preconceived beliefs that I had to be home. And I have two things to say about this because one is in regards to writing my own permission slip. So, number one, I put everything in being the best mom I could possibly be and wife and all these things. But I caught myself being kind of like snappy, irritable because I wasn't doing the things that kind of fill my own gas tank up. And in my mind, I was I was thinking, well, if my husband really loves me, he'll know this about me. And he will come to me and say, honey, I've got the kids, I've got our son, you go to the gym. So I was waiting for him to give me permission, and that never came. And so then I started to speak it and say, I think I need to start going to the gym. There was a little bit of resistance. Well, like, what am I gonna do? I said, you know what, you're gonna figure it out because I can't be the best version of myself doing this. And so not only am I writing myself the permission slip that I give myself permission to go to the gym. And I'm not saying it was easy. There was a lot of guilt there at first, right? Like, oh, you know, what's gonna happen? Who's gonna take care of my son? They're not gonna do it as good as me. All those things have to be released. And I didn't ask for permission. I said, not only am I gonna start going to the gym, let's decide how that works in our schedules. It's a non-negotiable, hon. And he's like, what? I've said, yeah. I that's the kind of language we start to use is this needs to become a non-negotiable. What brought me to the non-negotiable is in my own mind, I started to think of things like, man, if we got divorced, then he would have our child half the time and I could go to the gym. So I started to use that as my inner leverage. I would say to myself, cheaper than divorce, you know, and that really helped me with perspective of how I guess just like over the top I was being on myself in terms of what I thought the ideal perfect mom was. And it relates to fitness, the permission for the gym, but also like, yeah, going away for girls. Like I thought, oh my gosh, going to a girls' night, that is horrible. What a horrible mom. But I wasn't showing up as the best version of myself because I really craved that female connection that we should never expect from our husbands. Our husbands are not hairy women, they are men. And so I caught myself wanting my husband to be like a hairy woman, you know, hold space for me, empathize. And that's just not how men are wired. I would come to my husband with a problem, and all I wanted him to say is like, who do you want me to beat up? You know, like, yeah, that sucks. Instead, he would start going to solution mode. I'm like, oh, you're no help. I need my girlfriends. And so uh all this comes with awareness and taking full responsibility for ourselves. I think a lot of women still are waiting for somebody to come and save them and rescue them. But that person is you. And we are women, we are badasses. I love your podcast because we are creators, literally, we are creators, and so we get to be multifaceted and multidimensional so we can be all of the things and to recognize that and give ourselves permission to go all out in all of those. We don't have to just be a mom. We can. I so that's the second story. I'm bringing it back. The second thing is before having my first child, I worked a lot. I love working. So I told my husband, I've been working my whole life and I want to be a stay-at-home mom. I want to know what that feels like. And we had some disagreements about this. This was a challenge for us. He was used to me working, bringing an income. And after a long conversation, I convinced him to allow me to be a stay-at-home mom. That lasted about three weeks. So, three weeks as a stay-at-home mom, I realized, oh my gosh, I don't really like this. So then I had to go back to my husband and I had to say, Hey, um, you know about that stay-at-home mom thing? You know, I fought. He's like, Yeah. I go, I'm not really liking it so much. He goes, okay. Luckily, my husband uh didn't stay in a space of I told you so or what have you. He allowed me to explore that. And that leads me to my kind of approach to life is you don't know unless you go and try it. You don't know. So I'm very grateful that I said, I want to experience what it's like to be a stay-at-home mom. I want to know what that's like. And so I did, and I was like, ooh, okay, don't like it as much. Can we um alter this to where I like? So I started working part-time and being somewhat of a stay-at-home mom. And I got to try on both of those, you know, kind of see the contrast and um see which one I like. And so that's what I want to encourage any woman listening is to go out and try it. You got to experience something, you've got to embody it before you really know if it's for you or it's not for you. One of my favorite quotes comes from Jim Rohn, and it says, an ounce of discipline weigh or sorry, discipline weighs ounces. Regret weighs tons. And how this applies to what I'm talking about is when you're 90, you're not going to regret the things you regret are the things you don't go after.

SPEAKER_01 15:32

Absolutely, right? We we get stuck in the what we should do, what's safe, what's familiar, and we don't allow ourselves to evolve. And that's really, I think, uh a lot of people's um like prominence around depression and anxiety. And I'm very much like you. I have tried on very like so many different hats. I even went to university, committed to becoming a psychologist. And halfway through my second year, I'm like, this ain't it. And like felt like I was disappointing my parents. They had told family and friends and kind of put what I was going for on a bit of a pedestal. And then, much to their great disappointment, I decided to become a nutritionist, which is not at the same caliber education-wise, as a psychologist, and it's not nearly as um notable,

Identity Shifts And Following What Lights You Up

SPEAKER_01 16:27

I guess. But in your work, you really emphasize becoming the person who naturally sustains the change rather than chasing the next fix. So, what does that identity shift actually demand of somebody?

SPEAKER_02 16:42

That's uh I love the way you you said that. Following what lights you up. It's that simple. You follow the success leaves clues, you follow the clues. Well, what are the clues? You you follow what excites you, what lights you up, what gets you motivated, what you're interested in, uh what when you're doing it, time stands still. Um, you enjoy it so much. Enjoy. When are you in joy? And so that's that's really it. It's it is very simple. Uh Rick Rubin talks about it. If you're in the spiritual realms, Bashar talks about this. Like our our purpose in life is to live and experience life. I and I also don't believe we have one purpose. Like I came down for one purpose. We have so many purposes. The purpose of life is to experience as many things as possible, to be the full expression of who you are at at in this incarnation. Yes, you may incarnate and reincarnate, but you're only you only get one shot as who you are in this lifetime. I have one shot at at East Phillips, one shot. This is it. So I'm gonna go and like find the edges and see what's possible and look at what gifts were given to me and express them to the fullest because this is my one shot at this incarnation. I might come back in another life as a male or another female or who knows. But I know this you have one shot at this lifetime. Bringing it back real quick. I think it's very important, especially for our moms. We don't think about this. This is a plot twist. People tell you all the time, oh, savor it. They grow up so fast. Wouldn't you agree? Don't your kids grow up fast? Yours are 12, 14. Super fast. Yeah, right? My kids are seven and nine. So guess who else is growing up so fast? Mama Bear. That's right. We don't think about that. All we think about is like, oh, the kids, the kids. You are also, I can't tell you how many times I look back and I'm like, oh my gosh, time is flying. So the longer you stay in stories of victimhood and I can't and I shouldn't. And um, I've even caught myself most recently, like two or three years ago, I was telling my husband, I'd be so much farther along if I wasn't taking care of the kids as much as I am. You've put your business before mine. So my husband's like, all right. Touche. He said, so he's like, all right, I will take a sabbatical. I will take full, I will take the children on. I'll be like, you know, Mr. Mom, and I will give you all this space to be like this badass entrepreneur. You go after it. And I was like, good, finally, my chance. So now I have all this time, right? I used to argue that the reason why my company wasn't hitting the goals and I wasn't where I thought I should be, is because I was taking care of the kids. Well, then my husband got rid of that. He started taking care of the kids, and I was like, wait, I'm still not hitting those goals. So it wasn't that at all. It was my beliefs.

SPEAKER_01 19:58

Yes. And what belief were you tied up with? What were you holding on to?

SPEAKER_02 20:03

Uh I think it's been a long process of unraveling people pleasing, unworthiness, um, and structuring my business, it's receiving. Yeah, that's learning how to receive for women. I am so good at giving. Yeah, I'm really good at giving. And I'm now learning how to receive.

SPEAKER_01 20:30

And how does that feel for you on a daily basis?

SPEAKER_02 20:35

And like anything, you know, you start working out at the gym, you're like, oh, I'm sore. You know, it when you're learning anything or strengthening anything in your life, there are those somewhat growing pains, if you want to call that. Sometimes it feels uncomfortable. Sometimes I have to sit on my hands, sometimes I have to stop myself from giving more and more away for free. Uh, and and trusting that I'm being taught these lessons for a reason and being open, open for the messages. I love, I think you said this to me either on recording or not, when you said, oh, this just came like dropped into my awareness. You know, that's what another thing that is so beautiful about women is we do have that con that direct connection to the divine. And it comes through this like mother's instinct and this gut. I mean, we are so prepared to be business owners and and run businesses. I think it's this limiting belief. We tell ourselves we're not, because society tells us we're not or we shouldn't be, or or business is a man's world. Like what? No.

SPEAKER_01 21:41

No. And I think it's Glenn and Doyle that um coined it, the inner knowing. And I don't think I've had one conversation with women on this podcast where we haven't brought up that in intuition piece. And that is our superpower. It's it's something that we don't have to explain. I think we don't have to justify with logic. We just lean into it when we're when we're kind of like tapped into our own desires and wishes and stuff like that, and we're in that alignment. It is something that no man has. And I think that not only just in motherhood, but that in business is an absolute essential asset that we need to harness more. And I wanted to just bring back going into that process of what lights you up. What is your process for helping people uncover that fire, that desire, the thing that they want to do that they haven't stepped into yet?

Finding Desire Through Play And Pain

SPEAKER_02 22:36

Oh, I love it. I love it. I love it. Thank you. That's great. I wrote about that in my book that just came out called Living Life in Your PJs. And it's simple. How did you play as a kid? Just start to think about it. Like, oh, did you play in groups? Like, get curious. How did you play as a as a kid? What if people come to you for advice? Or like, you know, um, they're coming to you for advice, they're picking your brain for free. Right. Uh what if people tell you that you're really good at and you're poo-pooing? So I'll give you an example. Years ago, years like the late 90s, I used to take fitness aerobics classes. And some of the students, my friends, would say, East, you'd be such a good teacher. I'm like, what are you talking about? Like, have you seen me? I don't have a beat. I don't have, can't, I don't have a sense of the beat, you know? And they I kept hearing this. Like after two or three people independently said you'd be a great teacher, I got curious. I was like, what do they see in me that I don't even see in myself? And that's something I want every woman to hear. And so that's where you're getting divine messages as well from other people saying you'd be so good at that. And you're like, no, I wouldn't. Like, get curious. Okay. And then um, never let any pain go to waste. So, what big major challenge have you overcome in your life or are still overcoming? One of the women that I've followed for many, many years is Gabby Bernstein. Love her, love her work. And she tells the story of how she overcame and is still overcoming anxiety and addiction. She didn't wait until she was perfect and, you know, a Buddha before she started teaching. You only need to be one step ahead of the people you're leading. And so she had the bravery to say, I'm still getting over my own anxiety, I'm still getting over my own addiction, and I'm going to show you what's been working for me so far. I'm not going to wait for me to be perfect or what I think, and I'm putting air quotes for anybody that can't see me, fixed. There's nothing to fix in you. There is nothing wrong with us. There's nothing to fix. There are there's a possibility and an opportunity for you to experience different things. You already know what it feels like, uh, or all these other experiences. Now you get to experience something else. Like, so um I think that's I hope that answers the question. It it's um getting curious that way. But those are the three things that we kind of start at. And if you start looking there, and then what are you really just super excited about right now? Right

Overstaying Your Purpose And The Pivot

SPEAKER_02 25:05

now, what we do, and it's in this is somewhat I'm now coining this, we overstay our passion. We overstay our purpose, right? So um you you went to school for Chinese medicine, and that's all you know. You have a practice, you have patience, you love them, um, but it just doesn't excite you. You wake up on a Monday and you hear yourself saying things like, Oh, I have to go to work, red flag. Then as you're driving into your office, beautiful ocean view, bougie office, patients that are paying you lots of money, you're thinking to yourself, man, I sure wish my patients would cancel today so I could go work on something else. That right there is the time when you pull over on the side of the road, you look at yourself in the mirror, and you say, Not today. Like, who wants to be my patient, if that's how I'm thinking? And that doesn't serve anybody to live like that. That's an example of overstaying your purpose. That's not burnout. You know it's not burnout if you take time off of work and you're not excited to come back. That's when you know you've overstayed your purpose, but people hold on because that's their persona. That's why my PJs book, Living Life in Your PJs, the P is like nine Ps, persona. Like, well, if I'm not an acupuncturist, what am I? You're anything you want to be.

SPEAKER_01 26:30

Yeah, and permission to change that no matter what. I have a one-on-one client right now who I'm coaching through this as well, where she's been in her current niche within, she's a psychologist, and she has a passion for something that looks a lot different than what she's currently doing. And she's got decades under her belt, and this is a really scary thing to step out of and to step into because of a lot of fear of judgment, a lot of fear of the finances not being there, um, colleagues being like, this is woo, and we are of the science population.

SPEAKER_02 27:09

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 27:10

It's really just such a shame. But when you look at it from what I'm gathering from what you're saying, it's like find what your passion is, but find out what also has been extinguished and evaluate that where you've done your complete.

SPEAKER_02 27:24

Yeah. And you know, it's like I say this a lot, it's like you loved it until you didn't. And it's okay to get curious what the next thing is and have and have the bravery to step into it and follow it. Because if you don't, I promise you, I promise you, I have a saying, nobody gets off a comfortable couch. And in God, source, the universe, your higher self, your future self that is doing something else, tapping on your shoulder, saying, It's so great over here, come over here. And you're like, no, no, I have to stay here, you will be taken off that comfortable couch. God, source, universe, your future self will make your life uncomfortable and force you to move because we're all here with somewhat of a destiny, with this assignment. And so if you don't answer the call, it's okay. Don't worry. It will eventually come and get you, but it'll look like a crisis. It'll be a health crisis, something tragic will happen. And what I like, I like things the easy way. Do you want it the easy way or the hard way? Because both are available. And so when you start to get the nudge, like, oh, I don't really like this anymore, but what do I do? Get curious now and have a beautiful transition versus like it have to come to some crisis point. Both ways are gonna get you there. I have a quick story. I had a client as well, 18 years as a uh functional medicine practitioner. And she called me and said, I want to make, I want more patients. And I said, Well, you already have 40, 50 patients a week. She's like, Well, okay, I want more money. Okay, so we came up with strategies about more money. And she's like, honestly, none of that sounds fun. I don't want to do any of that. If I have to do another, if I have to read another set of labs, I'm gonna poke my eyes out. I said, Well, okay, so that's not it. Like, that's not lighting you up anymore. What would you rather do? I don't know. I don't know, I don't know anything else. I don't know. This is all I know. I have so many patients. They would never let me leave this practice. I said, Well, right there, it's your permission slip. So we just started brainstorming and I said, What when was the last time you had fun? She goes, My girlfriend, I'll tell you, East, it's so silly. My girlfriend runs Airbnbs. And I love when she buys a new Airbnb, I go with her and we decorate it and I put little Zen touches touches on it, you know, Chinese medicine background and Eastern philosophy. And I just love that. I I just think it would be so cool to own and operate bed and breakfast or be Airbnbs. And I said, Well, why don't you do that? She goes, I could never do that. Why not? And I said, Do you have any extra money laying around? She goes, I actually do. My uncle just gave me um an in a little bit of an inheritance. I said, Is it enough for a down payment? She goes, it is. And then she falls back. She's like, I could never, what am I? My patients aren't gonna leave. I said, honey, you're being greedy. You are being greedy. Give those patients away to somebody who wakes up every morning and says, I can't wait to read their labs. I can't wait to get into that office. Like you're released those patients. I could never find somebody to buy your pre my practice. Oh, really? Yes, you can. So long story, somewhat long still, but I'll shorten it. She did end up selling the practice, releasing her patients to somebody who was newer in the industry, loved it, super excited. She opened up her first Zen Den and then went on to open up three more. And that is her thing. You already know what it's like to be successful in a certain aspect and area or field or industry. And if you're being called into another one, answer the call before it becomes a two by four over your head or painful.

SPEAKER_01 31:00

Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And I think a lot of the times, too, speaking with so many women, they're they're caught up in this idea that they have to be like for your friend, for example, maybe she believed that she needed to be an interior designer or maybe she needed to have a real estate license.

Dropping Credential Myths And Charging Fairly

SPEAKER_01 31:16

How do we squash that bullshit?

SPEAKER_02 31:19

Because that's what it is. It's like I have done probably 15 marathons. Okay. So if you came to me and you're like, I want to do a marathon, I'll say I could totally not only have I done 15 marathons, I have taken so many people through the training process of marathons. Do you want to sign up with me for $1,000? I will train you and you'll run a marathon. Like, hell yeah, let's do it. Okay. I don't have a degree in physiology. I have a track record of being in the vicinity of that transformation or that desired outcome. And so that's just us getting in our own way, arguing for limiting beliefs that are not true. And so you can use Byron Cady here. At any time you catch yourself, I could never stop and say, is that true? Is that true? Is that true? And um am I limiting myself here? And if people are already coming to you for this advice, picking your brain for free, you might want to look and say, like, because what I'm doing right now, I used to do for free. In fact, a lot of the things that I offer in the world, I would do for free because I absolutely love it. I was giving it away for free. I didn't even know coaching was a thing. Uh, I was in practice, I was a professor. And because I'd been in practice for about 10 years and a professor, students would call me all the time, text me, ask me advice. And after this very, very long exchange with one very stubborn student of mine, at the end of this, he said, Gosh, East, you are so good at this. You should charge for this. And I thought, you know what, dude? After you, I am totally charging for this. You got one for I was getting so angry and resentful. People calling me saying, Can I pick your brain? And I'd spend hours with them. I'd be lucky to get a $5 coffee sometimes. And that's when I said, wait, and this goes back to what you you brought up earlier. Like my biggest toe stubbing is overgiving. I don't want to say overgiving because I love my generous nature. I never want that to stop. It's putting um being a better steward of my overgiving nature or my, it's not overgiving, being a good steward of my giving nature, which is my gift, and saying, God doesn't want me to waste that. So knowing that I'm such a giver, let's put a little bit of protection around that so I'm not wasting that beautiful gift. And so I did. So after that, that student said that to me, I went on my website and I just put a little button on there. It was a free Weebly website, and I said, uh, business coaching, $150. And so two days later, somebody calls me and said, Hey East, can I pick your brain? I'm like, Yeah, go to my website, click the button, and then we get on the phone call.

SPEAKER_01 34:05

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, like that's kind of similar for me as well. Too my girlfriends and I were we were on vacation and we were staying in an Airbnb, and they were kind of humming and hawing, like, what should I do? Blah, blah, blah. And I it immediately was like rapid fire. I'm like, you should do this, you should do that, blah, blah, blah. And they're like, you should be doing this. And I was like, no, what? There you go. And it took a year and a half of that sitting in my brain. And it it was just perfect timing, right? Like, I wasn't loving my nutrition business. I had people asking me, can you build out this program? Can you build out that? I could have charged so much and I could have easily made a killing off of it. And I had to say no. I had to say no. I had to step, step into that new thing. And switching your niche and switching what you do can come with a lot of apprehension. But I think this is probably where your book, um, Elevate comes in. So, how can we, how can we utilize this as female entrepreneurs to like step into the thing that we just want to do without anyone's permission, without the credentials, just our lived experience. How do we, how do we utilize elevate?

SPEAKER_02 35:18

Yeah. Oh, I thank you for bringing that in. The the real, the first start for something like that, like a pivot, would be living life in your PJs.

The Elevate 50-Day Habit Framework

SPEAKER_02 35:27

Because if you're gonna go into a corner, a very sharp corner, what do you do? You slow down, right? And so when we do a pivot, like I do feel there is a book out there called The Year of the Pivot for a reason. A healthy, stable, sustainable pivot or transition from something, you know, like a major career change. If you give yourself the grace of a year, it's gonna not look like a tragedy or be so chaos and throw your life into an upheaval. So take your time slow. Where elevate comes into is it's building the small, consistent habits, the consistency. Like I said, discipline weighs ounces. And so a lot of us don't have the discipline, right? And I also think the elevate program originally was a frequency raising program. It still is. I just don't call it that. Why? Why do we want our frequency raised? Well, have you ever been around anybody that just has really good energy and it feels good? Yeah. And have you ever been around somebody who has just like bad energy and you're like, ugh, I'm getting infected by it? Okay. So the thing is we have full control over what we're putting out. We have full control. But East, you don't know these things have happened to me. I agree. You have no control over what might happen to you. You have control over how you respond. Notice I didn't say react because we are reacting. When we react, we're usually reacting subconsciously from lower states, from lower energy levels, from lower frequencies. So if you can first ground yourself, so important for women because we're so powerful. You don't want to be wielding all that power all out of there without being conscious of your power. And so the 50-day transformation process of elevate takes you through seven weeks and seven areas of your life to um explore. And it gives you the discipline, right? Part of it is moving in nature. Oh, East, I do that every day. Do you do it every day? Sitting for 10 minutes in either meditation or silence. Um, oh, I do that. I meditate once in a while, right? But you don't do it consistently. That's the thing. So uh meditate for 10 minutes, moving in nature, moving outside, gardening, just getting outside. How often? And I can ask you this like, how often have you caught yourself? We talked about this, we both have our business development days where we just stay in our pajamas, our hairs up, and we probably don't even leave our offices, right? And then it's dark outside. You feel good, you feel productive, but we're totally detached from the universe. So getting outside, eating healthy, it's not as much in this program, which is very similar to 75 hard. You don't have any alcohol. It's not as much what you eat. You do commit to a healthy diet. You could do paleo, you could do Mediterranean. It's about what you don't eat. So alcohol, alcohol, alcohol. Oh my goodness. Just give yourself a break. A lot of people are doing like dry January, just take it another 20 days and see what 50 days of no alcohol feels like. You know what it feels like to wake up with that wine headache and all the things. So just giving yourself this beautiful container of a healthy ingestion of food. And then what else are you ingesting? Are you online listening to comparative type of narratives out there of what you don't have and watching everybody else's fake roles of their lives and not really knowing? Like, what if you took and you read 20 pages of personal growth every day or listened to 30 minutes of a positive podcast like this, and that's what you're consuming. Oh, I already do that. Do you do that every day? Are you learning? You know, leaders are readers. So that's part of the seven daily habits that you do for 50 days straight. So eat a healthy diet, move outside, um, meditate. Gratitude is a great one. You sit down, you write down in this workbook, you have like five things that you're grateful for every day. And there's a secret element to this program that no other program has. And I'll give it to you because you start incorporating this into your life. And this is an invitation, a challenge, it's a challenge. See if you can do it. Think of somebody that has done that has done something nice for you and send them a text, send them an old-fashioned letter, send them an email and say, hey, I just want to let you know you helped me move last summer. And I was thinking about that this morning, and I want to thank you again. I never told you at the time, but that was a really tough time in my life, and you really made a difference by taking the time out of your schedule and helping me to move. Try this out. Reconnections with people. And so it's an act of appreciation. You do one a day. Issa, I already do that. Do you do it consistently? Do you do it every day? I tell people thanks all the time. Do you look at them in the eyes? Do you take it a deep further? When you're at the grocery store, do you look at the happy, go lucky, positive energy box person and say, your smile is beautiful. Thank you for being just positive and happy. Every time I come in here, you're just so full of light. I really appreciate that. Do you do that? What if everybody did something like that? So there's that area of uh that appreciation and then reflection time. So those are the seven pillars. Part of the exercise, like 75 hard, when you do that program, it's 45 minutes of strength training, 45 minutes of cardio. In this program, which is a little more on the spiritual mindset and emotional side of things, it's 30 minutes moving outside, walking is powerful. Uh, just being outside, some people call them God walks, walk with God, and 30 minutes of strengthening your physical body. When your physical body is stronger, it can hold higher energies and frequencies. When you are vibrating at a higher energy, you attract more high energy things into your life. Have you ever been in a bad mood and everything goes wrong that day? You see, your jacket gets stuck on the doorknob, then you get a flat tire. It's just like you're just like this magnet for crap. Same thing positively, right? You wake up in a good mood, you're like, well, everybody's such a good mood, and you're just attracting more of that. So I feel as we become more conscious creators of our own life, especially women, because we're the real leaders. Even men look at us, right? Like they always say, uh, great men leaders, their success is the woman that's in their life, right? And it starts with us being the best version of ourselves, which will require us to get into those recesses of our minds and find where we're limiting our own beliefs, our own thoughts, where we're bringing our energy down because we're doing it. And stepping out of any victimhood whatsoever is so important. And saying, I'm taking responsibility, uh, this is how I am going to move forward in my life and how I'm going to alchemize. We are beautiful alchemists. This happened to me, and I'm going to use this to help other people, right? I've been cheated on, I've been lied to, I've been abandoned, whatever those things are. And so, how can I use that pain to help other people? Very powerful.

SPEAKER_01 42:55

Very powerful. And what are some of the business shifts that you've seen for yourself or your businesses since you've implemented this process?

Business Results Without Grind Culture

SPEAKER_02 43:05

Oh, uh, I enjoy it a lot more. The belief that I have to grind and I have to put in long, long hours to generate income is another one of those limiting beliefs. It does not have to be that way. Uh, I don't have to sacrifice time with my kids. I still am home when my kids are home. I go to all their events. I don't work weekends. When I was in private practice, I always told myself things like, well, I have to work weekends because that's the only time my patients will come and see me. It's like, what? All these things, these these kind of lies that we tell ourselves uh in my current business. It's uh it it continues to be that beautiful mindset, strengthening opportunity when I um get to a new thermometer setting. If you're if you're I know that you're um up on the The psychology speak, but you know, we all kind of like maybe you're used to making so much money, the six figures, um, high six figures, and you think, okay, how do I get to the seven figures? That next step is gonna take a mindset shift. And um, and so that's that's still the biggest lesson. I don't know that it's ever, like I said, I don't think we ever um, this could be a mixed misconception with a lot of business owners and women too, that it's like a ones, one-time fix, right? I'm gonna go to this workshop, I'm gonna hire this coach, and then that's it forever. It's like, no, no, no, no. It's a lifelong learning and evolution.

SPEAKER_01 44:43

Yeah. How how important do you think it is for coaches to have coaches and for anybody in business to have some sort of mentor?

Coaching Mentors And Getting In Rooms

SPEAKER_02 44:51

Uh so important. So, so, so important. We don't know what we don't know. And I, I also, you know, one of the traps is that we ask all these people all kinds of advice, even our loved ones, on things they've never done. Like, hey, give me advice on writing a book to somebody who's never written a book. And then we're listening to them, and they're like, oh, well, you know, um, I the books I read, this is what I think you need to do. And it's like, but you've never written a book. Well, I'm not gonna ask somebody who hasn't done what I want to do advice. That's a true.

SPEAKER_01 45:27

You gotta get in the room. You gotta get in the room with the people doing the things, right? Yeah, yeah. Like into those containers. Yeah. I agree.

SPEAKER_02 45:34

A coach is a fast track. A coach is willing to say, listen, I stubbed my toe for 10 years on that exact thing. And so instead of you having to spend 10 years to learn it, I'm gonna teach it to you in six months. And that is worth some money. So I think coaching is is fabulous. I mean, I always am getting new coaches um to grow, continue to grow myself. Absolutely. Yeah, super important.

SPEAKER_01 46:02

It's such a it's such a powerful resource and a tool. And same with like entering into a mastermind again, going into community with women. It's one of the most powerful things.

Where To Find Dr. East

SPEAKER_01 46:12

Um, so East, where can everybody find you? Where can we get elevate? Where can we get living life in your PJs? And drop your social handles. Where can we find you?

SPEAKER_02 46:22

Yes, thank you. Thank you. Uh, dress.com, all written out, D-O-C-T-O-R-E-A-S-T. That is my given name, by the way. A lot of people say, Did you change your name to go to Chinese medical school? No, I was born in the 70s. My name is East. I have a brother named West. Like that's that's my given name, East, I know. Um, and so drese.com, uh, my Instagram is drEast, my Facebook is dressed I've really built my personal Facebook up more. So East Phillips is my on my Facebook. Uh, and then YouTube is I'm expanding into YouTube this year. You can experience the elevate process for free. I have, if you go to my YouTube channel, Dr. East, the seven-day challenge, you can download a workbook and um go through the process yourself and just see what how you feel after seven days. If your energy is feeling higher, if you're feeling um, it's all about how you feel because women are feelers. So I invite you to go check that out. And then live in life in your PJs and Elevate, they're both sold on Amazon as well. Living Life in Your PJs is also um in on Balboa Press, which is the um publishing arm of Hay House. And we just came out with Live in Life and Your PJs. My mother's intuition tells me it uh will go bigger because of how powerful the work can be. So while it's with Balboa Press right now and on Amazon, who knows where it's going? It's got legs, it's growing like my children.

SPEAKER_01 47:53

It's taken off. I can't wait to get my hands on it. And I can't wait to do the elevate um 50 days. I think it's gonna be absolutely incredible. Thank you so much for helping us understand how we can unshackle ourselves from ourselves. It was such a beautiful conversation. I have one last question for you.

Being The Boss Your Way

SPEAKER_01 48:12

And what is what does being a boss mean to you?

SPEAKER_02 48:19

Oh, that's a that's a a good question. Being a boss, it ties into all of the things that we talked about. Possibility, infinite possibility. I think this is a beautiful question because everybody will answer it differently. Being you get to be the boss that you want to be. So don't tell yourself I should be this way, I should be that way. There's your way. I told this story this morning when I was teaching indoor cycling. I said, think about a zoo. We love the zoo because of the variety, don't we? You know, if it was all monkeys at the zoo, it could get kind of boring, but there's so many different animals. Well, the same applies for us. Why are we trying to be like each other, be all you, be the full expression of your unique uh blueprint. And that goes with being a boss. So I think we should on ourselves as well. Like, I should be hard, I should be that. Like people used to tell me I was too nice. And so I tried to be mean. This is a true story. And same thing with being a boss, you know, oh, you're too nicely, you're too generous with your employees. So then I would try to be hard and I was going against my grain. I wasn't being my authentic self. So now I get to say, I am super generous. I love being a nice boss. All that means is to put some protection around that beautiful gift that God gave me is I have to be better at my vetting process. That's all. That's me being a steward of my gift. So um, my way of being a boss is what feels right to me. And I go inside and say, where can I be better always as a boss? Um, it's it's kind of like the golden rule. Like, I'm the kind of boss I would like to be bossed by, you know. Um that's that's how I choose to be a boss. I'm very um generous, like I said. And I also don't own anybody. I'm grateful for anybody that works with me on my team. I don't feel better than anybody, I don't feel less than anybody. Somebody that comes on, for as long as we work together, we have a common goal. We either are a match or we're not. I don't put any judgment, I don't put anybody down. If somebody comes into my organization and it's just not working, that's it. It's a simple, it just isn't a fit. I am leading to recognize because your business is like another baby. I thought about this this morning. So important. We can end on this. When my children were going to daycare, my husband and I like vetted the daycares. Would you keep taking your child to a daycare where your kids getting bitten and beaten? And like, no, you'd you'd like, I'm taking my kid out of this daycare, and your business is the same way when it comes to the team members you bring on. So if you're bringing on team members that are beating up your baby, that's all you, my friend. Like you get to say, without judgment, all right, we're not a match. You might be a match for somebody else. I'm gonna take leadership here, we're gonna part ways, and I'm gonna find the match for my baby, my business, and be the steward of that business, that gift that you're giving out into the world. It's up to us. And we're not waiting for permission for somebody else to do it. We lead and we decide this fits, this doesn't fit, and then we take action.

SPEAKER_01 51:56

Oh, so good. So much radical accountability and responsibility. I love it so much. It was an absolute pleasure chatting with you. Thank you so much for being on this episode. I'll see you again soon. Today I'm joined by Dr. East. Dr. East is a physician of alternative and integrative medicine, a frequency coach, speaker, best-selling author with over 25 years of experience helping people create lasting transformation from the inside out. And she also holds a doctorate in acupuncture and oriental medicine, is a licensed acupuncturist, former professor, and clinical supervisor. And she's worked in integrative medicine settings, including the Chopra's Center Mind Body Medical Group. Her background also includes decades as a fitness professional. But what makes Dr. East's work so powerful is that she doesn't teach theory from the sidelines. She teaches from her own lived experience, her clinical practice, and years of guiding real people through real life. Her approach is compassionate, grounded, and deeply honest. Today we are talking about stepping into our full power, unshackling ourselves as women, as mothers, and as entrepreneurs, creating identity based transformations. And we're talking about what it really takes to be aligned and living in your passion. This is a rich conversation. I know you guys are gonna love it. Let's dive in.