A Personal Note from Orion
Wherever you are in the world, whatever you celebrate, I hope this week brings you joy, love, and warmth. Thank you for listening, thank you for making time for this show; I put in so much care and love into each episode, and I have an amazing team who supports me as well, and I hope you have found inspiration, knowledge, awakening, breakthroughs, laughter and all you need to lead a Stellar Life from this year’s show. Hosting this show is one of my passions, but I wasn’t always sure that I could do it. As a pseudo introvert, I didn’t always feel 100% confident that I could find the right guests or the right topics and lead these inspiring conversations. But I really, really wanted to do it. So I followed my heart.
Today’s episode is about just that: finding your own way to success, whatever that may be. It’s not always going to fit into the ‘recipe for success’ that the biggest gurus or coaches out there say to follow. But there’s so many ways to be successful, and the meaning of success itself is personal on so many levels. So when you know what you want to accomplish, go after it in the way that speaks to you and motivates you.
My guest, Heather Dominick, is a graduate of NYU where she received her first coaching training, and is the winner of 2015 Best of Manhattan Coaching award. Today she is going to talk about the Highly Sensitive Entrepreneur Movement and how to use your strengths and weakness to go after your success.
About Today’s Show
So you look at Facebook and you check out people online or on YouTube and it seems like all the successful business people have this really powerful presence online and on social media. But what if you’re an introvert? What if you don’t love to do videos? What if you want to do things differently? Does that mean that you’re not going to be successful? Of course not. There are so many ways to be successful and there are so many ways to not follow everybody else’s way. Because sometimes what works for somebody else will not necessarily work for you. So in business, and in life, and in relationships, and in general, you want to follow your own advice. You want to follow your own intuition. If something that some guru does or says that you should do doesn’t work for you, then don’t waste the time, attention, and effort to do that. Basically, what I’m trying to tell you is to follow your heart. And when these get too crazy, and you feel a bit overwhelmed, take a step back and breathe, and focus, and find your way, your specific, magnificent, glorious way to show up powerfully in the world. My guest today is Heather Dominick. She is a woman who is impressively successful and highly spiritual. A former high school drama teacher who collaborated with none other than Bette Midler. A graduate of NYU where she received her first coach training, Heather is the winner of 2015 Best of Manhattan Coaching award. She created a virtual event, a course called Business Miracles that went globally and affected thousands and thousands of people in a great way. So you’re going to learn a lot about how to bring yourself into your business and your life and how to do it gracefully in with ease and flow. And now without further ado, on to the show.
Hello Heather and welcome to Stellar Life Podcast.
Thank you so much. I’m so happy to be here with you.
I’m so happy to have you. Before we start, why don’t you share a little bit about yourself?
Sure. I am the founder and leader of the Highly Sensitive Entrepreneur Movement since 2010. And the way that I started this movement is a bit of a longer story but the short of it is that I left my previous career as a high school drama teacher for over 15 years ago now and when I first started my business I knew nothing about the world of being self-employed but I really just had this pull, this call to be working and serving in a bigger way than the traditional classroom provided for me although I so loved my students dearly. And so I really went into this world of being self-employed full force and I built my business up to cross the seven-figure mark for the first time and I found myself absolutely overwhelmed, overworked, over exhausted and that really led me into what I can definitely say was a dark night of the soul where I was really questioning everything that I was doing and through that questioning I discovered that I was highly sensitive.
And this is a term that I hadn’t heard before at that time. It’s developed by the founding researcher, Dr. Elaine Aron and when I heard this term, it didn’t surprise me so much that I was highly sensitive. But what did surprise me was when I took one of her assessments and realized how highly sensitive I was, and it was off the charts highly sensitive. And because I’ve always been a firm believer and teacher of one of my foundational principles, which is that your ideal client is a version of you, I brought one of Dr. Aaron’s assessments into a group of 25 women entrepreneurs that I was working with to one of our in-person meetings. I had the entire group take the assessment and the entire group was highly sensitive.
Now, again, because of my foundational principle teaching, it didn’t surprise me so much that they were highly sensitive but what surprised me there was how much they did not want to be highly sensitive, and that they really saw it as a detrimental label and as a sign of weakness. And the two together, my own discovery, and then the discovery of this group really had me begin to see and understand that there was something very, very important happening here and that there needed to be a new way of approaching business for those of us who are highly sensitive and that was really the beginning of the movement and really the beginning of the building and developing of the body of great work that I have built and developed since then.
I am highly sensitive myself. My mom always tells me that I’m too sensitive. I want to be like those entrepreneurs that they don’t feel anything and they can just go go go and people stay stuff and don’t affect them. That’s how I perceive highly sensitive but what is your definition of a highly sensitive entrepreneur?
I love it that you were told that you are too sensitive because most of us who are highly sensitive do have some type of similar story where we were given this message that being sensitive in whatever way it was showing up in our early years was not okay. And that really leads to the definition of what it is to be highly sensitive. So again, the founding research really comes from Dr. Aron and in her research she really outlines how there are 20% of us who are born into the world highly sensitive. And what that means is that our nervous system is literally, physically, biologically wired differently than someone who is not highly sensitive.
And the way that it’s wired differently, in very simplistic terms is that we, as highly sensitives, process stimulation differently and at a much higher level than someone who’s not highly sensitive. And that stimulation can come in through any of the senses. So we are more attuned to say, sounds. We’re more tuned to smells, we’re more attuned to sight, we’re more attuned to information. And so something that will not really stimulate or maybe slightly stimulate someone who is not highly sensitive could absolutely bull over a highly sensitive. And how that relates to being self-employed- this is where my work and my research comes in- is that we must learn how to manage our sensitivities.
And when we learn how to manage our sensitivities, what occurs is there becomes a shift from your HSE shadows into your HSE strengths. I really identified 12 top shadows and 12 top strengths and I won’t go into to all of them right now but just to give an example, one of our HSE shadows is overwhelm because we really process emulation at such a higher level. Those of us who are highly sensitive can absolutely experience overwhelm so much more easily than someone who is not and that doesn’t need to work against you. However, for anyone who’s self-employed or anyone who’s ever gone into any type of creative endeavor that is absolutely a potential gateway for getting overwhelmed.
But when you really learn how to work with your sensitivities and really be able to manage your energy proactively, then you can shift that shadow of overwhelm into one of your HSE strengths. For example, one of our strengths is that we are very intuitive. So you can begin to learn how to really channel that intuition and really use it to support you and being able to serve in your business and grow your business.
It’s so beautiful. When I work with my clients I do a lot of Shadow Work and I just love the unique methodology, it’s so beautiful. It’s so true that for a highly sensitive entrepreneur, when he or she gets into overwhelm… everything in our lives is a gift in disguise and we can’t see it. We’re like, “I’m overwhelmed.” But hey, on the other side, there is intuition which is such a beautiful thing. And when you’re overwhelmed, it’s the space for you to tap into your gift and receive it. You either can be swallowed by your darkness and by your shadow or through your shadow you can find your light and rise and I love that concept.
Yes, exactly. And it very profoundly applies to those of us who are highly sensitive and self-employed because the majority of the training that’s available out there in terms of what you need to be able to market successfully and sell successfully as an entrepreneur really doesn’t apply to those of us who are highly sensitive. But that doesn’t mean that we can’t be successful at marketing or selling. It just means that we’re meant to go about it differently and about it in a way that won’t trigger our shadows but instead will allow us to really be able to access our strength.
So I noticed the video on your website were beautiful slides and photos and then some photos of you and your community and then there was a voiceover. It wasn’t you in the front page doing the video but it was almost like a metaphor for the highly sensitive entrepreneur I guess the are you talking about it in terms of extrovert and introvert?
Yeah, that’s a great point and first of all, thank you for that feedback on the video. I love that insight and that awareness that you’re able to see that it’s done a bit differently and I’ll speak about that just for a moment because before I understood that I was highly sensitive you know, I would be coached to like do these videos where you’re standing in front of the camera and doing video for hours on end and it would absolutely exhaust me. It would just take so much energy from me because I didn’t really understand at that time how to manage my sensitivities.
So the camera, the light, the energy required was a real mismatch. And the video that’s on my website now that is my voice and it was this beautiful, creative collaborative project experience between myself and the videographer and the team and absolutely a demonstration of how to be able to approach things differently. So with that in mind, a beautiful question in terms of introvert and extrovert and they don’t necessarily go hand in hand, meaning you can be highly sensitive and be extroverted. You can be highly sensitive and introverted and one doesn’t necessarily equal the other. There is some overlap in terms of qualities or characteristics in regards to people who are introverted and who are highly sensitive but again, they don’t necessarily go hand in hand.
That’s beautiful. You actually answered my next question. I was like “wait a minute, but I’m kind of an extrovert. I like being on stage. I like being on video. I like being seen.” I enjoy that. I keep taking chances. I keep getting outside of my comfort zone and doing things that might hurt me and I keep myself in a vulnerable position. And sometimes, when you are in a vulnerable position, you have to learn how to get out of your shadows and into your gifts as you said, and it’s been a journey and it is still a journey and it will be a journey. But for me as a personality, I keep myself open and vulnerable but as a sensitive person, sometimes I get hurt. So let’s talk about boundaries.
Yes, it really cannot be a conversation about being an HSE without boundaries coming into it in some way or another. First, I’ll say that as an HSE, it’s not so much about what you do, but about the way that you do it. And what I mean by that is what I’ve really come to refer to as HSE coping mechanisms. And so, just really briefly, in regards to what those coping mechanisms are, I’ve identified there’s the coping mechanism of what I refer to as pushing. There’s a coping mechanism of what I refer to as hiding and then there is a coping mechanism of what I refer to as combo flattering where you go back and forth between pushing and hiding.
So just really briefly, so a pusher is a highly sensitive entrepreneur who will get done anything and everything that an 80 percenter or non-highly sensitive will be able to get done in their business but it will come at a high cost for that HSE. Meaning that they will have a similar experience to what I described earlier as my dark night of the soul is they will find themselves you know, exhausted, overwhelmed, overworked and not fulfilled or filled up by the pushing or completion of those tasks that for an 80% percenter would totally fill them up and would totally fuel them to do even more.
20% of business people are considered as Highly Sensitive Entrepreneurs. Find out if you’re an HSE.
A hider will come up against the tasks that are needed to be successful as an entrepreneur and they will find anything and everything to do except those tasks. They will get all the laundry done. They will take care of their neighbor’s hamster. They will make sure that they have the most perfect beautiful website and marketing materials but aren’t actually having selling conversations. So it’s important to understand those coping mechanisms so that again, similar to what you were describing in terms of love being onstage, love being seen, that you’re approaching the tasks that are needed within your business in ways that do not trigger you into the coping mechanisms because those will obviously work against you.
That is really where boundaries come in. So you have to be able to really know yourself as a highly sensitive entrepreneur in order to be able to understand the coping mechanism that you tend toward, how to do it otherwise, and then how to be able to communicate to the people around you, whether that be family of origin, whether that be team, whether that be colleagues or clients, what you need in order for you to be able to work and serve in the highest way in your business. But if you don’t know what that is, then again, you will be operating from your coping mechanism and you’ll find yourself feeling very typically resentful, right? Very typically angry, very typically perhaps confused or frustrated. Either if you’re a pusher, again, why is this entrepreneurial thing taking so much energy from you or if you’re a hider why is it that you can’t seem to really get this business off the ground or to where you want it to be. So in order to be able to set those boundaries, you’ve got to be so super clear about how you and your nervous system work as a person who’s highly sensitive.
I just got back from heroic public speaking in Philadelphia and I was coached on stage by Michael Port. I was the VVIP. Very VIP. Like for three days, I was very very very special. And then at the end of the event I was like, “damn, I’m not a VVIP anymore. Oh, I’m gonna miss that.” That meant that I got coached. I was able to be on stage in front of 500 people and share my story and get coached on it. And Michael and Amy, their background is in theater and in movies and they were very successful during their careers as actors as well. And they bring everything from the stage to the public speaking. I made big choices, I went on stage. My first story was super strong. And then Michael talked about the term pushing from acting where the actor wants to bring so much that they push it a little too much and they try really hard to convey their message forward.
And then he took me back and he had me tell the story in two different ways and the transformation was immense. It was beautiful and I even got the best compliments a speaker can get where one of the audience members said, “I felt like you were talking to me.” That was great. That happens when we don’t push and that’s a metaphor for life and business. We need to find that delicate balance between pushing and allowing, allowing our greatness, allowing our power even our quiet power to come through and when you don’t push, you actually make better connections with your audience, with your business partners, you really connect on a different level. And another thing that I learned that reminded me of what you were talking about was giving and receiving feedback.
There was a whole class about giving and receiving feedback. Because when you need to ask for the feedback that you want from people… specific feedback, not how was it and then people who are not experts will give you an answer because we are used to giving answers to people even on topics we don’t know anything about. So you might get bad coaching, or you might get coaching that is very, very insensitive or wrong from people that don’t really know what they’re talking about. But also you need to put your own boundaries when it comes to feedback. You ask them “how was my movement on stage?” and they’re like “the movement was great, but when you did this and this and that, I really did not like it.” You kind of like stop them and you say thank you. I did not ask for this feedback. I’m in the middle of my creative process. Can you just answer my question in a very assertive, clear way?
Just because you’re on stage doesn’t mean that people own you. But people think that because they see you on stage and they connect with you, they already feel like they’re your friends because you’re open and vulnerable and they feel like they know you and because they feel like they know you, they feel like they can tell you whatever they want. And this is just one example of what happens on stage in life.
Absolutely right. Really makes me think of one of the teachings that I share with the HSEs in my community, which I refer to as learning to take personal responsibility versus taking things personally. And for those of us who are highly sensitive when we haven’t yet learned how to really own the power of our highly sensitive nature. And we’re really operating from that shadowed place. It’s very easy to take things personally. We might register, for example, a high level of energy or we might register a high level of energy from a comment, as you said, that’s shared and we immediately take that in through our shadow filter. And then we are taking it personally versus what I hear you describing in terms of how to respond to feedback. Feedback is an act of taking personal responsibility, you know, for your experience for the boundaries that you’re able to set and how to really do it and a gracious and grace-filled way.
In other words, stop in the name of love before you break my heart. Stop! It’s like you have to actually literally stop the thing with your hand. But also you don’t want to do it. You do it energetically where you’re like yeah I love you. Thank you. But no thank you.
Yeah for sure. And again, for those of us who are highly sensitive, most of us were not taught how to be our most empowered, highly sensitive self because there was a lack of awareness as most of us were growing up. So because of our sensitivity, we were often having the experience of being this “doormat” because others unconsciously, could tell that we are receptors of energy. And again, because we weren’t taught how to put those boundaries in place with love, we didn’t know how to do that.
So we became used to being this doormat or this empty vessel that we believed had to be filled up with other people’s thoughts, comments, energies, and none of that is true. It does not have to happen that way. Just because it can or has in the past doesn’t mean that that’s how it has to be. And actually, if you’re interested in being successfully self-employed, you must be willing to learn how to develop another way.
Can you share with me a few examples of how I or somebody who’s listening right now can create more boundaries around the business?
Absolutely. First and foremost, again, it does go back to that awareness of self. So that would begin with what I really refer to and teach as self-assessment. And self-assessment, very, very simple yet very powerful, consists of three questions. So the first question is what’s working really well? The second question is what’s not working so well? or what did not work so well? If you’re assessing a certain situation, say, maybe a marketing campaign or selling conversation, and then the third is what will I do differently based on what I now know? So when it comes to boundaries, that assessment can support you in having a greater sense of clarity and awareness about what’s really happening with your business boundaries.
The reason why those three questions are simple but powerful is that often for those of us who are highly sensitive, we don’t have a developed organization process yet within our minds. We experience the energy, a very big open big flood of things that are happening. So you might be having the experience in regards to business boundaries of like, this just isn’t working, or this is so hard, or this just takes so much energy, and it’s like, well, wait a minute, let’s take a moment to assess and really be able to dissect what’s happening energetically here. And then once you’ve gone through that assessment, and you can see what’s working well, then that shows you oh, these are areas where I actually, perhaps it’s been unconsciously, but I’m actually really working within my strengths when it comes to boundaries, and then what’s not working so well, these are areas that are in need of improvement.
And then the third question is, you can almost compare column one from question one and column two from question two and look at what can be transferred from column one to be adapted to, and apply to shifting the items in column two. And again, that’s where that third question will literally show you the answers. It will start to give you the map of what is meant to be shifted and changed in regards to boundaries for yourself in connection to your business.
That’s a great process. I just had a conversation with a friend of mine who went to this amazing sushi restaurant. And by the way, you talk about sensitive people, I took a bite of that dish and I almost had a When Harry Met Sally moment. I was like, “oh, it’s so good.” My friends looked at me and were like, “are you okay?” I’m sorry, I couldn’t hide it. It was too good. So I was sitting with my friends and if you are listening, I love you and you know who you are.
We had a conversation similar to this conversation. She was like, “what do you do at that time of the month where you’re not only sensitive, you’re hypersensitive and your brain is being hijacked by hormones. And it looks like there’s this little alien that sits in your brain controlling it and make you say and do things making you feel extremely reactive?” I had an answer for her and I want to know, what do you think about it?
I have a huge smile on my face with your description. What I would say is that habits create everything. And so what I mean by that is that when you enter into a retraining process, like I teach in my Business Miracles Mentoring program, where you are learning how to really begin to think differently, feel differently, see differently, all aspects of yourself as a highly sensitive person and how that applies to your day to day in business and life. And you really begin to go through that retraining process with a commitment to what I refer to as core practice and consistency.
Then the new habits that you begin to form on a day to day basis become available to serve you and support you in these heightened momentary situations. Whether that is hormonal hijack or an expected crisis or when something just doesn’t go as you planned, right? It really is the building of any other type of muscle, right? If we think about a physical muscle, you go to the gym day in day out or yoga, let’s say because you’ll never find me at a gym. And you come out of say, 30, 60, or 90 days of daily yoga and suddenly, you’re able to physically hold the weight of your body differently than you were when you first started because the muscle has strengthened. There’s literally an experience of a new normal being created.
And so the same thing happens energetically, mentally, spiritually, when you engage in a process of retraining your relationship to your highly sensitive nature. And then suddenly, all the years where you reacted to that time of the month in a certain way, suddenly, there’s a new array of skills available to you to call upon and “ oh my gosh, that time of the month? Wow, this isn’t having the same kind of level of impact that it used to have on me.” And that really is the most just exciting aspect of true transformation. One of the things that I say in my teachings all the time is that everyone wants transformation, but very few actually want to change.
What that means is, first and foremost, are you willing to really open to a different experience? Or are you kind of secretly committed to that time of the month and the way that it goes down? that’s number one. Number two is if you’re really committed to having a different experience, then you have to also be willing to step into the commitment to the process on the day to day, not just the end result. The work that I do is to serve highly sensitive entrepreneurs but my body of work is called a course in business miracles. And where that really comes from is my over 30 plus years of being a student of the psychological and spiritual curriculum of a course in miracles.
The definition of a miracle according to the course is a shift in perception. And that’s really what we’re talking about. It’s that you’re willing to engage in the day to day process of what it takes to strengthen that new muscle and create that shift in perception so that you’re not just intellectually thinking about things differently but you’re really embodying and being able to see and then, therefore, experience things differently. And so I would say all of that applies to the time of the month.
Be willing to engage in the day-to-day process on what it takes to understand and work around your common perception.
Very well said. I saw Louise Hay on her 90th birthday just for a brief moment. On one of their events, she just came on stage and she didn’t say anything, it was just her presence and God I was melting it was beautiful and I kept hearing references on the of course of miracle and then I followed Louise Hay, Wynne Dyer, and Marianne Williamson and I never really, really studied it. What is it like this study it and how does that apply to business?
First of all, what brought me to the course at such an early age was the sudden death of my mother when I was 14 and everything in my world, as I’m sure you and everyone who’s listening can imagine, just completely turned upside down. And it really was the introduction to Marianne and it was her book A Return to Love that I was… actually I don’t even think the book came out yet. I think I was first introduced by a cassette tape of Marianne speaking at a unity church and that really began my connection and then my studying of the actual course. And so the question of what’s the experience like, my first answer is, it’s very dense.
For sure.
And yet my experience and understanding are that the course is purposefully dense. And anyone who may or may not know about the development of A Course in Miracles’ really brief history is that basically it’s channeled information that came through the most unlikely subject who was a researcher at Columbia University on male and female partnership. But the course material is dense so that it must be taken slowly and methodically. And through the slow methodical experience, then there is a deeper opportunity for integration. And that’s really been my experience. And Marianne, who definitely obviously is an expert teacher on the course has said more than once that even after her own 30 years plus of studying, she is absolutely still a student, of the course. An advanced student, but a student nonetheless. And I definitely feel the same for myself.
I have gone through the course many, many times. And each time I’m taken to a deeper level. And yet there’s absolutely still the experience and the process of being a student. So how it applies to business is, again, specifically for those of us who are highly sensitive, when I really started tuning in to this understanding that there’s this large component of us who are highly sensitive, who are attracted to being self employed, which, by the way, as a little side note really make sense because of the way that we are wired as highly sensitives, we are literally designed to be what Dr. Aron refers to as the royal advisors of society. We are meant to be the therapists, the coaches, the healers, the creatives, so it only makes sense in this age of technology, when so much is available to us that we feel called to deliver those gifts and those services via the amazing aspects of connection, such as Internet that is available now.
And as I’ve been saying, throughout our conversation, we must be willing to do it differently back to the heart of A Course in Miracles and the definition of a miracle to have a shift in perception. So we must be willing as highly sensitives to see ourselves differently, to see ourselves coated with these strengths, almost really, truly a secret superpower rather than shadows and weaknesses and shame about who we are. So we must first be willing to see ourselves differently. We must be willing to see business differently. What it means to be self-employed and how to use the format or vehicle of business for healing rather than how it’s typically been seen as a vehicle for greed and or domination for example. And we must be willing to see the operational aspects of business differently to again, approach our marketing differently, our selling differently, all the ways that we organize differently. And when we’re really able to step into that willingness, and, of course, in miracles says, all that’s needed for a miracle is just a little, little bit of willingness.
And as long as we are willing to step into that perception, then your business will deliver to you miracle after miracle after miracle. Your entire life and experience as a person who’s highly sensitive will change. So that is that is really the experience of A Course in Miracles and how it really, truly does apply to business for those of us who are highly sensitive.
That makes sense. And what are some examples of doing it differently? I want to be more specific. Let’s go to sales because it looks like for sensitive people like me, that’s one of the hardest things to do. The fear of rejection is big. I have a huge fear of rejection that I keep conquering every day.
Exactly. That really is the first place to start and believe me you are far from the only HSE who has an experience and myself included. And I would say that that’s right where my journey began. And actually, my journey with approaching selling differently started before I even realized that I was highly sensitive and years ago, early on in my business, when I really first began to develop a different approach to selling. And the reason why is because how I was taught was not working. I was following all of the scripts that I had been given and it wasn’t happening.
I have a few different scripts from a few different mentors and I get the scripts, I try them a little bit and I’d be like “meh”. It goes to the drawer. I don’t like it.
Yeah, I totally get it. It really was my experience. And what I really remember is that it was at the end of the year, because it was in November, and it was like a six week time period and I talked to a prospect every week, and it came up to the end of the year holidays, and I look back and I was like, “oh my gosh, I’ve talked to prospect every week for the last six weeks and not one of them has enrolled to become a client. Something is not working.” And for some divine reason, I was really able to bypass through my first reactive response at that time which would be to beat up on myself and tell myself stories that I can’t do this. And I think it was more like my survival instinct kicking in and I was like, “I need to get this worked out because I’m not going back to the traditional classroom.” And through that process, I really started to assess those three questions that I shared earlier and really started to dissect what was working what wasn’t working so well.
Embrace the experience of serving more than the experience of selling. This is how HSEs mainly run a business.
That was really the beginning of developing the process that I’ve now really honed and really streamlined for those of us who are highly sensitive so that the experience of selling is really an experience of serving. And that’s really what I call it in my foundational principles that I teach in my six-month mentoring program, which is to shift from selling to serving and that you want to follow this format but to use it as a frame and a guideline, not a script. And in that frame and guideline that it is created to be an avenue for you to use your HSE strengths, such as intuition, as I mentioned earlier, such as empathy, which is also an HSE strength, and such as also the HSE strengths of deep listening, deep thinking, and deep feeling. And to really be able to then really make an intimate connection with your prospect to take away the element of traditional typical sales, time, pressure, fear, manipulation and instead be able to incorporate a full knowledge of the human psychology that a person goes through in making a decision and be able to guide them through that process which we as HSEs are really good at being guides. It is, again, part of that royal adviser nature.
And so those are just some the elements and examples of how I reconfigured and redesigned the selling process which has worked for so many of the HSEs that I’m privileged to mentor and I get great feedback all the time. Not only in the fact that HSEs come to my mentoring programs, not having been able to be successful previously and now are enrolling clients but more importantly, is that HSEs, when using my selling process, often get the feedback from their prospects that the prospect had a spiritual experience through the selling process. Isn’t that so beautiful? So rather than having to be like afraid of like being salesy or pushy, you’re really able to provide this like, beautiful, spiritual, transformational experience in prospect process. Use me for your prospect as they’re becoming a client, not after they become a client, but right from the beginning of connecting. And that is what warms my heart. Tells me I am answering my calling more than anything.
Yes. it makes sense. I feel like a lot of us has an imposter syndrome and it doesn’t matter how many clients we are going to have that are coming to us and say, “wow, you changed my life.” “Wow. This is the best me” and we get all these great feedback. But there is this little voice saying “you’re not good enough. Who are you kidding?” or “they’re not gonna buy from you.” And that’s syndrome and it drives us to think. And I think the world, in general, thinks that “oh, wow, we need to trick people into selling. We need to use all those like freaking awesome techniques because only then they are going to buy from us and only then we are going to be good.” Because if we’re not good enough, we need some tricks to sell. But then if we are a very intuitive, genuine, sensitive person, and it doesn’t align with our values, it creates a block and all of a sudden, I can’t sell and I don’t know why.
Really well said. Absolutely. And it’s so interesting because I do two in-person training retreats a year for the members in my mentoring programs and I’m getting ready to deliver a training retreat. The focus of the training retreat is on the energy of comparison which is another way of saying not enough. And we absolutely bump up against that exactly the way that you just described. For those of us who are highly sensitive entrepreneurs, it’s really important that we learn how to master that energy so that it no longer takes over the driver’s seat of our business.
The flip coin of what I see of what you were talking about, which is being of service is that I see for myself like, being in service, I end up giving too much and that too can really sabotage the sales process. Like, you gave them so much like, “whoa, I got so much. Now I’m good.” I have the illusion that I’m so good that I can just go on and do it all on my own.
It’s a great point because you are not the first person I’ve heard that from, of course. I used to experience it myself. That’s really important. We are giving away too much, we are actually not being of service. That is service to your prospects, to your clients, or to yourself. Which is why, again, the selling process that I designed and developed is a frame, is a container, a guideline to be able to support a person through the decision making process using your HSE strengths without giving away your strengths, your skills, and the talents that you are there to provide within the container of your business and your service. So it’s so important that you’re providing a prospect the experience of making a really grounded decision. That’s being of service. Over providing, which is what I refer to as HSE shadow of over responsibility, again, is not of service to anyone.
Brilliant. What are some of your personal core principles or habits that you had to develop for yourself?
First and foremost, the three core elements of all of my mentoring programs come from my own core values and that is community, core practice, and consistency. Community is about being in a light community and allowing ourselves the experience of really being able to be seen for who we are and know that we can be safe in that process. And then the element of core practice, which is to be able to transfer core practices that tend to come fairly easily for those of us who are highly sensitive in the areas of self-care and self-development but to be able to transfer those over into the areas of business and then consistency. What it really means to be held in community supported by core practices to really strengthen that muscle of consistency which is often a challenge for those of us who are highly sensitive.
If I can really have those three elements in place for myself, then everything else is easier. And I’m really then able to have the experience that I desire in my business and in my life. But I would say the umbrella over all of that is back to the willingness to do things differently. The willingness to do things differently in a way that I refer to as honoring my HSE essential self versus my socialized self. And every time that I can do that, then and I am really in my best place. It’s a constant re-returning. It’s constantly being challenged like, “no, no, no. Everyone else is doing it this way.” And to be able to be like, “nope, I’m not going to do that because I have to be willing to know who I am, to honor who I am, and to trust and believe that knowing and honoring will translate to the physical business results that I desire. So that’s the umbrella and then the community core practice and consistency are the on-the-ground day-to-day steps that helped me to be able to stay connected and committed to my HSE essential self.
Did you ever struggle with consistency? How did you develop more consistency in your business in your life?
I definitely struggled with consistency and what really had me struggling with consistency, and it’s different for all of us HSEs, although again, typically as HSEs we struggle with consistency. It’s just the reason why looks a little different for each of us. But for me, it was really because I would get caught in confusion. And that confusion would really have me doubting myself and I would look out there to that coach, to that mentor, to that program, to that system, looking for the solution, the answer. Anything that would take away the confusion. And that literally just had me so scattered in a fractured experience. And I really had to go through the process of calling my energy back and that led me to develop the energy management tools that I now teach and share with other HSEs. And those energy management tools, what’s different about them is that they are designed to be tangible and trackable.
So things like meditation, I greatly believe in yoga, I greatly believe in taking baths, walking I greatly believe in and yet when I was starting off being self-employed and was so immensely terrified, and again, really fractured and disorganized, I needed to be able to manage my energy in a way where I could look back, and I could see where I started. And now step by step by step by step by step, as I stayed consistent with this practice, I’m now in this new place. So it really is the art and the science of energy management in a way that I teach it that really helped me develop that active consistency.
And 15 years I’ve been self-employed and I always share with my mentoring program members every day. I manage my energy every day. I use one of the energy management tools that I teach and it’s never going to stop. I don’t want it to stop, I don’t need it to stop, I don’t look at energy management as temporary, I don’t look at it as something I have to use because there’s something wrong with me or that I’m less than. I simply recognize it as a tool that helps me to be proactive with my highly sensitive system rather than reactive. And so with that foundation of consistency and energy management, it helps me to show consistency in all other physical trackable aspects of my business.
That sounded very profound to me and I could totally relate because I studied with so many mentors. I usually will travel to a seminar at least once or twice a month and study about different things with different people. And I understand that the experience like you said, you get so much it’s almost like drinking from a fire hose every time you go to an event. And I put myself in those environments where I’m a learner, it’s one of my qualities but when I did the StrengthsFinder, empathy was my number one and the learner was number two or three. So I had those two, I love to learn, I love absorbing knowledge I feel like I’m a better human being because I experience the profound knowledge of what I learned from my mentors. And like you said, there is this experience of like, “wow there is so much you can do in marketing. There is so much I can do spiritually. There are so many practices, there are so many ways I can hack my biology, there are so many ways I can hack my brain. There are so many ways I can improve my business. There are so many ways I can improve my love life. There were so many ways I can improve my sex life. But I only have 24 hours a day.”
It can get overwhelming and I loved, loved, loved what you said about doing this one practice a day, you just have this one practice a day that will help you center. And I also loved what you said about… it looks like you are in a way analytic when it comes to your own growth and you look back and you journal and you really look in instead of looking out, which is typical I guess for what you call a highly sensitive person or entrepreneur, You’re so sensitive. You look out for affirmation. You look out for people to tell you that the way you think and your intuition is valid. You look out for people to think that your intuition is valid. And that’s an oxymoron.
Totally. Yes.
And that was beautifully said. I was like, whoa. I had a light bulb moment or an aha moment as Oprah said.
Awesome. Absolutely. I’m nodding my head at everything you’re saying.
Before we end this fantastic conversation, what are your three top tips to living a stellar life?
The first I would say is be willing to engage on a consistent basis with what’s needed to truly know yourself and how you work best. Number two is be willing to take the outer steps to honor that true genuine discovery of how you work best. And number three is have tools and teachings in place to turn to when the outer world suddenly and unexpectedly has you questioning who you are and how you work best. Because to me, if we are not our genuine true selves and embracing that fully and lovingly, then there is no possibility for a stellar life.
Mic drop. That was beautiful. Where can people find you, work with you, learn from you?
First of all, if you’re starting to think I wonder if I’m a highly sensitive entrepreneur then I would really recommend that you take the quiz which is really a self-assessment that I’ve created and developed working off of Dr. Aron’s work and you can find that at www.hsequiz.com. Through that assessment, you will find out if you’re somewhat highly sensitive, super highly sensitive, or like me, super uber. And then depending on where you fall, you will receive a free success guide once you’ve completed the assessment that will support you in learning how to begin to work with this new discovery about yourself and how that applies to your business. So that’s number one, www.hsequiz.com. if you’re interested in seeing the video that Orion was talking about earlier, you can see that at www.businessmiracles.com.
Thank you so much, Heather. This was very beautiful and enlightening.
Thank you so much, Orion. I so enjoyed this time of connecting with you in this conversation and appreciate the work that you’re doing to really inspire people to live a stellar life because otherwise, what are we all doing here?
Your Checklist of Actions to Take
✓ Allow yourself to trust in the strength of your intuition, so you can channel it in when you need to make important decisions that can move your or your business forward in life.
✓ Don’t let your introversion prevent you from selling. You just have to do it in a way that comes from the heart, because then it won’t be like selling at all.
✓ Learn to take personal responsibility for things rather than take things personally. You’ll handle situations with a clearer vision this way.
✓ Do not become a doormat – as highly sensitive people, others tend to dump their problems on you because you are receptive. Learn how to establish boundaries to keep your sanity.
✓ Always be a student, even if it means taking the same courses over and over, because each time you will see that you reach a deeper level.
✓ Flip the script on selling: when speaking with a prospect about your services or product, come from a place of serving, rather than selling.
✓ Know who you are and honor and trust yourself, and you will see how that manifests into success in your business.
✓ Learn to manage your energy – you’ll become proactive rather than reactive, and can better handle difficult situations.
✓ When you are feeling overwhelmed in life, try tapping into your intuition so you can see what gift the universe is trying to show you.
✓ If you are highly sensitive, be mindful with sudden stimulation such as loud noises, bright sights, etc as they can affect your ability to focus.
Links and Resources
About Heather Dominick
: 21-Day Discovery Series that attracted close to 6,000 official registrants from all around the world including: Iceland, Nigeria, Russia, Asia, South America, Australia, Europe and the U.S.
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