EP69 Interview Sue Bonanno

Mar 30, 2016

1425538_10152708866260698_8569255554649455552_n In today’s episode I interview Sue Bonanno. Sue is a self proclaimed reformed workaholic turned yoga instructor-meditation teacher. We talk about transitioning from a high profile marketing career into her holistic practice of teaching yoga.

Show Transcript

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Transcript

[INTRODUCTION]

EPISODE 69

[0:00:13] KC: Welcome to the Business of Life Podcast. My name is Keith Callahan and today, we have on Sue Bonanno. So I had an awesome conversation with Sue and really excited to share this with you guys. It takes us a few minutes to get warmed up but once we do, we really get into it and we get into really focusing in on Sue’s transition from a high profile marketing executive, someone who actually have a few of her own marketing businesses, into being a full time mother and yoga instructor, a meditation teacher.

And one of the things that I really want you to focus on in the middle is we really dive into when Sue identified what she wanted to do and the steps or the process of actually doing it because I feel like so many of us want to make this leap. We finally identified what it is that we want in life and then there is that chasm, right? Between where we are and where we want to go and bridge in that is the work that we talk about on the show and Sue really vocalizes that period in her life really well.

All right, I will stop rambling and let’s go ahead and get Sue on. [INTERVIEW]

[0:01:36] KC: Okay, so I am excited to introduce today’s guest, Sue Bonanno. Sue, welcome to the show.

[0:01:44] SB: Thanks for having me.

[0:01:47] KC: So as we were getting prepared for this, it was funny that we have originally connected and there was someone who was like, “You need to get Sue on the show,” and then as we had this scheduled, we’ve been scheduled for a month and then you were traveling, which I want to talk to you about but a few other people have messaged me saying the same thing.

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So here we are, excited to have you on and I guess if you’re willing, I’d love to dive right into what it is that you’re doing for work right now and just to sort of get everybody up to speed and then I have a bunch of questions that I want to ask.

[0:02:29] SB: Sure, so what it is I’m doing for work is I guess the most basic explanation is I’m a yoga teacher. I teach weekly classes, I teach workshops, I train new teachers but really, if you ask me on a bigger level, I’m in a job that serves human beings I think. I hold space for people to go through their journey.

[0:03:02] KC: Tell me a little bit more when you view it that way. I feel like we have two things that we can focus on in life. We can focus on being significant in the lives of others and then also, there’s part of life where we’re going after what we want and then we can also be significant in the lives of others and definitely with your work, you’re out there serving others.

How does that affect you on a day to day basis? How does it change what you’re doing and your focus and all of that?

[0:03:41] SB: Well, I’m completely happy, content and satisfied, thrilled and I just feel like this is what I’m supposed to be doing. So I think you can serve other people and do what you want but it takes some work to get there to figure it out for yourself.

[0:03:58] KC: Yeah, so it’s funny, we’re like leading right into all of my questions. So you have this practice and prior to us hitting the record button, I was explaining with you the number one goal, the thing that I am always focused on with this show is really looking at and helping people to identify, create and then ultimately be living that life they want to live.

So prior to what you’re doing, is this something that you’re always doing? Is this something that you’re led to? How did it evolve into where you’re at now?

[0:04:37] SB: So my interests, personal interest, I would say since I was a kid I’ve always been physical and then in my 20’s I was very interested in more spiritual endeavors but I didn’t know I would do this for work. I am a marketer by trade. So I graduated college and I was a liberal arts

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major and I was going to go off in the world and make money because that was the way to freedom and the way to flexibility and the way to being happy or so I thought.

So I got a job in advertising and I worked in Manhattan for a few years and then I moved up to Boston and so I was always in the communications trade and even when I was younger in college, I was a French major and a Spanish minor. So I was always in this field of communicating. So then I began yoga in my late 20’s really as a response to a very stressful career.

So I started to get into the physical practice of yoga and then what happened was it started to become this force in my life that it just grew and grew and grew, and it started to appeal more right to me than the work that I was doing. And over the course of that, I had two children, I got married, I did life, I progressed in my career, I launched a marketing firm. So I spent 20 years kind of very aggressively pursuing work that I thought would support my life.

[0:06:23] KC: Yeah, can I ask you a personal, deeper question? [0:06:28] SB: Yeah.

[0:06:29] KC: Was there a time, and I’m asking this because I went through this recently, was there a time where you made it financially and then realized, “Wow, there really isn’t — the things that I thought I needed once I got to that point, there would be a fulfillment.” And for me, I’m going to explain one piece and then hand it over to you.

For me, it wasn’t even like there was not a fulfillment, it was a huge, almost like a slingshot. I’d been working so hard to get to a certain point and then I got there and I was like, “Wow, it really doesn’t matter.”

[0:07:12] SB: Right. So I had a pre-moment to that and then I had a very, sort of very clear moment of that. The pre-moment to that was, I was at the peak of my career. I’d gone up the ranks, I’d worked for this great companies, I was making a lot of money and I was starting to feel like, “Oh I want something more,” and so I launched my own company. Then I thought, “Oh this is a way for me to take my job and to build a place that people really would work.”

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And so I thought that was going to be my future. Build this little marketing firm with two business partners, do this and create a really great place for people to work and have great maternity policies and all this stuff that I was dealing with personally. I was in sort of a little bit of conflict, I had my kids. They were babies. I wanted to be with them, I wanted more flexible work and all of these is happening at the same time.

[0:08:18] KC: It’s such a tear right? You’ve got this career but then that maternal part of you, it’s not natural to leave your kids.

[0:08:26] SB: Right, when I was a kid, I had a paper route. [0:08:28] KC: Oh me too.

[0:08:29] SB: I was a business person and then I never had changed a diaper until my first son and when I had my kids, my heart just burst wide open. So I think people that knew me before kids and after kids they’re probably like, “Oh you’re so much softer now,” you know? Because I was very driven before that.

So anyways, I had this moment. After the birth of my second son and I was rocking him to sleep and I was like, “Wow, I have my perfect life.” I have two beautiful healthy kids, I have a great husband, I own a business,” and I’m like, “I have everything. I have it all.” It was great. I was sleep deprived, I was probably in a little bit of fog.

I was thinking, “Great,” right? It seems perfect and then I return to work a couple of months later and within four weeks of returning to work, my partners executed sort of a hostile takeover over of my share of the business and I was completely, completely shocked and everything that I had identified with before was falling down around me.

At the same time, I actually lost my voice so I couldn’t speak and it meant things like I couldn’t present. So my body was breaking down and it took me a few months to rebound out of it with a lot of support from my husband. He was like, “You know you can’t just take this lying down,” kind

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of thing and I ended up moving through that and still kind of thinking, “Okay, well I’ll still be a consultant.” So I had a more flexible schedule.

[0:10:26] KC: Can I ask you a question while you’re going through that? So had you already had an established yoga and meditation practice while you were going through this?

[0:10:35] SB: Yeah, so I had an established practice probably a good seven years prior to that. So yoga was always in my life. It was something that I always went to and then after this, I’ve probably established more of a deeper meditation practice.

[0:10:50] KC: When was this, like around when?
[0:10:54] SB: It was probably about six years ago, six or seven years ago. [0:10:58] KC: And where were you practicing?
[0:11:00] SB: What studio? I was practicing at Open Doors Yoga Studios. [0:11:04] KC: Oh all right, I know Richard well.

[0:11:06] SB: Yes, so I ended up ultimately studying with him or training. Anyway, so yes, I said, “Well, I don’t need to have this business. I’ll have another business doing the same thing.” So I started doing that, a marketing consulting business, a little more flexibility. I saw my kids and I thought that was it.

So what am I telling is that there is this stepped evolution, there were these moments of sort of crisis, things that were knocking on the door actually quite loudly and I was kind of choosing not to listen. And so I was like, “I can still have it all. I can still do this,” whatever. In the midst of all that, I got my certification as a yoga teacher and just started teaching one class a week.

Then I started to dislike my work. I just wanted to be with my kids more. I wanted to do yoga more. I was starting to get frustrated with marketing work and so that to me was a real sign that

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this career that I loved that had served me very well, that I learned a lot of things in was not satisfying me and so I started to take a non-profit clients.

I thought that would fix it. I’m like, “I’ll work for charities. I’ll do marketing for charities,” and I did that for a little while too. So I shifted my whole client based and it’s good work, but it was the same content and so where I ended up hindsight 20-20 was, I’m a people person, I’m a communicator, I’m good at taking ideas and bringing them out to people.

But I wanted that to have much more meaning and so I found the most reward in working directly with people in the yoga mat. Yeah so from there, everything snowballed. I took more trainings, I studied with Ralph Gates. I came certified in yoga and meditation.

I’m currently studying with Deepak Chopra to advance the studies and Training new teachers and I’m working with people every single day, one on one. I’m touching them with my hands. It’s a physical practice. It’s a practice of health and wellbeing and I’ve never been happier so.

[0:13:31] KC: So when you went through the transition and I’m totally high jacking this podcast because I’m going through some of this myself right now and so when my wife and I moved out to the Berkshires, we really got to this point that the financial piece was like what I call taking care of and as I’m the primary earner in our family and there’s a responsibility.

There’s a reality that comes with that so I have to focus on that but once it was past what our family needs to live the lifestyle we want to live, there was a, it was a shift in motivation and motivation probably isn’t the right word, there is a shift in focus. Like focus in life and I personally believe that in order for us to move as human beings, we have to be desperate or really inspired.

Those are the two things that move us but I’m sort of going through an interesting piece internally where — so prior to kids I got to a point with my spiritual path that I was literally at the point that my spirituality was the corner stone. It was everything that my life centred around. Now four kids later, and my kids are younger than yours, I want that to be it but there’s the reality piece too.

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Before I was like, “If I lose all my money, I lose all my money.” I’m always going to have food and I can stay with a friend if I need to but now, it’s like, “I’ve got to pay for my kids for this, for that,” like all these different things. So I guess the question is once you get to the point like you let go of that but there’s also a lifestyle.

There’s also certain things that I want to provide for my family that isn’t all just the “universe is going to take care of me”, like I have to do the work too. So I was wondering have you gone through something like that as well?

[0:15:58] SB: I think sometimes I feel like it’s a luxury to be spiritual. This is like a luxury and I am lucky I have a husband, a life partner, that earns a living is the primary earner in our family now whereas it used to be a little more equal in terms of the financial part. But we also have needs too and certain things and kids going to schools and college to think of.

So a friend had asked me this, “Do you ever think it’s bad that people make money in spiritual endeavors?” And I said, “Well, absolutely not.” They were particularly asking me about Deepak Chopra who is very, very obviously successful, and, “How do you even feel about studying with someone like that?”

I said, “Well I like what he’s teaching. I like what he has to offer. He’s helping people. He is bringing it to large masses of people and I really don’t see anything wrong with that and I don’t see anything wrong with abundance.” Somehow, I think we’re taught to think, “Well if you’re going to be a good spiritual person, you have to be poor and that you have to live in this very modest way.”

And I think that abundance is okay. I think we have to stop apologizing for that and I think there’s a pathway to it if you’re truly in your dharma, if you’re in your purpose that I think things do come to you and so you set your intentions and you do the practices. So there is discipline, there is practice.

For me its yoga, meditation, walking the talk, waking up and making sure that I’m trying my best to be with my family the same way that I tell other people to be. So there is a discipline to that

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and there’s work. You know, I am a business person, so I’m so lucky that I have all those skills to bring to my yoga work but it’s possible for sure.

[0:18:16] KC: Yeah and I really appreciate you bringing that up. I work with a lot of people in the health and wellness industry and specifically yoga instructors and studio owners and one of the things that they have a really hard time with especially with Vinyasa Yoga or power yoga, it attracts a certain type of person and it’s the type A person that crashed and that’s how I came to it.

You crashed and you went to yoga because you needed to be fixed and then it’s almost that like the reverse of letting everything go, nothing matters, I’m going to be taken care of and then reality sets in real quick and I think that if there’s one recommendation that if I could go and work with everybody’s teacher trainings, it’s an important piece in the marketing because it is.

It’s a livelihood like you said and I also think just to add one more point to that, for me personally, if I’m going to go to a teacher and I’m going to do private lessons or I’m going to go to a class or I’m going to go to something like you do with the Chopra Center, I take it a lot more serious when I put money down, right?

[0:19:42] SB: Right.
[0:19:43] KC: You look at it a lot different.

[0:19:45] SB: Right and it’s also an energy, it’s an exchange. So to not charge money for services, you’re giving but the other person is receiving without giving. So there is an energetic exchange that goes along with the money as long as it’s reasonable and there are advantages to success which in my opinion is scale.

So when you’re successful with something that you really are passionate about that you believe is good, that you want everybody else to do that the only way to scale that is to put some business acumen behind it and to take the steps that you need to take to get the word out. So as a marketer, I’m unapologetic about communicating.

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I think we have a brand and a brand is just who you are and so I think it has to be authentic. You can’t lie, you can’t be fake and represent something that’s not true. That’s how a lot of famous yoga people get in trouble.

[0:20:58] KC: I’m going to stay quiet on that one.

[0:21:00] SB: Yes, you stay quiet on that, right? But if you’re authentic and true and you’re really offering something from your heart, people pick up on that right away and then it’s okay for you to say, “Yeah, you know this is a training and it actually isn’t for free.”

[0:21:19] KC: Most of the trainings within the yoga community are extremely cheap like if I went away to, this was probably 15 years ago, I went to a five day real estate investment course. I used to do a lot of work in real estate and that was $5,000 for five days and I got to spend just over New Year’s, I went to Cropalot with a mutual friend Ralph and that was $400 bucks for five days.

[0:21:50] SB: Right.

[0:21:51] KC: And the amount of impact in my life is just as rewarding.

[0:22:00] SB: Right well and there’s different scales. Cropalot is so accessible and it’s terrific but actually Ralph is my teacher, geez, I think you should be getting paid more and I pay a lot more than that when I go out to California but when I studied with Deepak Chopra, he brings in the top experts in yoga and Ayurveda which is ancient Indian health system and I’m studying that too.

So he brings in all these amazing resources and everybody that we interact with is a doctor or a physicist. The level there is amazing so I feel okay paying what I’m paying to have access to that.

[0:22:48] KC: For a simple definition, what is the Ayurvedic medicine?

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[0:22:55] SB: Ayurveda is the ancient Indian system of health. It is a sister science to yoga and it’s translated as the knowledge of life or knowledge of life and longevity. It sources come from Vedic wisdom, Vedic knowledge which predates a lot of the yoga that we practice. So most people are learning the Sutras and all of this and that’s great. But another couple of thousands years before that, there was a broader system of wisdom called Vedanta.

And so Ayurveda sources from that and it’s basically a set of practices to bring the body back into the homeostasis in which it was born. So the base assumption is that we’re born working. We’re born in balance and that through life and through the five senses, we take things in that create imbalance.

So whether it’s food or it’s experiences or things we hear or stories we tell ourselves or trauma, all of these things throw our balance and so Ayurveda presents this system of healing that is completely based on nature and the five elements and it gives you these practices, two of which are yoga and meditation.

So there’s herbs, there’s nutrition, there’s physical practice, there’s body work, there’s all kinds of stuff and so to me, it’s broader. It’s much broader than yoga and meditation and it’s a way to health because you can’t do any of this that we’re talking about here today much of a healthy mind and body.

[0:24:48] KC: Yeah.
[0:24:51] SB: So it’s kind of cryptful.
[0:24:52] KC: Is that most of the work when you’re going out there that you’re doing?

[0:24:57] SB: Yes, so most of that is studying. I’m studying a lot about Ayurvedic nutrition which is very different than what you would consider traditional nutrition, studying a lot about herbs and then I’m just reinforcing a lot of my knowledge about meditation and yoga and putting it all together with an understanding of neuroscience and what enlightenment is.

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What is Sammati? What is enlightenment? How does it feel, what is consciousness but how do we talk about that in a little more scientific terms which is accessible to people? So it’s about conscious living. Being awake and connected.

[0:25:41] KC: Awesome, I love it. [0:25:43] SB: Yeah.

[0:25:44] KC: When you were going through the transition, what was one of the hardest things that you had to overcome?

[0:25:53] SB: At the time, probably the perception of what other people would think. So all these other people, I was very accomplished in my career and all these people — I mean I used to work with all these Harvard MBA’s and all these people who owned businesses and who are major entrepreneurs and ventured capitalist and I felt like they wouldn’t respect it.

What was really, really interesting, I have a mentor who is a multi bazillionaire and I’ve worked for two of his companies and he’s a really wonderful mentor because I’ve always thought of him as a kind and good person which is why I worked for him, I chose to work for him and I always admired him. I thought he did business on a really ethical level and was still very, very successful.

I told him, I said, “I am going to be a yoga teacher and this is what I’m doing FYI,” and he’s like, “That’s amazing,” and I come to find out that he’s a trustee or he’s a major donor for Cropalot and him and his family spend Thanksgiving out there every year and I had no idea and the two of us almost probably didn’t tell each other ‘cause we were thinking, “Oh we’re business people,” and now, I think that has shifted in a pretty good way and now, I think I am so much better than what I used to do. So I’d scream it from the rooftops when I do.

[0:27:34] KC: Yeah, so it was sort of a loss of identity almost, right?

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[0:27:38] SB: Absolutely. I completely over identified with career accomplishments versus saying, “Well, really who are you? What are your skills that you want to give out to the world? What do you want your life experience to be like and how do you get there?”

[0:27:55] KC: Yeah, so you have this, this is the question I’ve been on lately because I think it’s such an important one. So again, the whole theme of this show is identifying, creating and then ultimately realizing the life you’re truly meant to live and I feel like we’re at a little bit of a shifting point within our culture and our society that people are coming. We’re having a home coming to this but there’s also a lot of people that miss it.

[0:28:30] SB: Right.

[0:28:31] KC: When you had that calling or that pulling and you’re in this space where you could have retreated and gone back, what do you think the difference is? There’s a lot of people who have been in that space you are at but they don’t make the leap that you made and start to create the life that you’re creating. What do you attribute it for you that pulled you through?

[0:29:01] SB: Probably two big things. First, the support of my family. Support of my husband, support of my parents like, “Wow, that’s really great what you do.” Every time I talk about what I do, they’re like, “You’re really helping people. You really know your stuff. You’re really into this, you’re passionate,” and then secondly is the practices. So yoga and meditation is critical, especially meditation.

Meditation is this active practice of getting to know yourself and this active practice of being able to step back a little bit and see the patterns that you’re reacting to and see what you’re actually doing and as you start to see it, then you can start to make conscious choices to move in a direction that aligns with what you really want from your heart. So the practice of meditation for me, absolutely hands down is a game changer.

[0:30:10] KC: So it was really seeing the — it was being committed to where your heart was calling you and having that support community and then for you, it was the practice of meditation that allowed you to continue to realign with where you’re heart wanted you to go?

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[0:30:31] SB: Right. Ralph Gates talks about the search for meaning as your quest to align your actions with your values. So you really need to understand what your values are. Are you working with a set of values that are defined by society or what your parents told you or are you working with the set of values that are really driven by something deep within you?

Anything that’s coming from within you is spot on and sometimes we really refuse to listen. It takes some cataclysmic thing to wake you up and then sometimes you still don’t listen. Sometimes it’s a health crisis, sometimes it’s a financial crisis, sometimes it’s a crisis of identity and it doesn’t feel great.

It’s not a happy time but a little bit of faith that you already know the answers, that’s what intuition is, that’s what your gut is and you actually already know. So I knew when I signed up for that first teacher training that I wanted to be a yoga teacher but I have to live into that over and over again to trust myself, to trust my instincts. So you have to keep making the choice that it seems maybe counter to what everybody else is saying but it feels really, really right for you.

[0:32:07] KC: Yeah and I think it’s so important the piece that you were just bringing up of, it sounds cliché but when we’re — like those tough experiences, the ones that move us to change are actually the biggest blessings in our life.

[0:32:25] SB: Absolutely.

[0:32:26] KC: Yeah, even people who go through something major like cancer and they come out the other side and even friends who haven’t come out the other side, they still see that as the biggest blessing in their life because we’re all going to die and if you have something like that happen that rocks your world so much that you actually start living.

[0:32:54] SB: Right, it’s a slap in the face from the universe and these are things you would not necessarily choose. You wouldn’t chose any of this.

[0:33:07] KC: We all want it to stay just like it is.

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[0:33:11] SB: But one of the greatest Buddhist teachings is that, we go through life thinking there should be no suffering and it’s one of the biggest ignorant points of view, of the human existence, the human condition is that we truly believe that there should be no suffering and there are so many things that are beyond our control that are not good.

They’re just not good. There is no way you can qualify them any other way but they’re there and so the mark of your life becomes how you deal with those things. How — there’s my pups. How you chose to work with it.

[0:34:00] KC: Yeah, your dog had to make his or her appearance on the show. [0:34:06] SB: Yes, the mailman drove by and it’s so classic.
[0:34:12] KC: If you’re willing, I’m going to fire some rapid fire questions over to you. [0:34:18] SB: Sure.

[0:34:20] KC: If you were to sit down and have a conversation with your 25 year old self and offer some advice, what would it be?

[0:34:28] SB: Stop trying so hard. Stop trying so hard, just do the work and don’t worry about money so much. Yeah.

[0:34:41] KC: What about your 30 year old self?
[0:34:43] SB: Have more fun. Have more fun, definitely for sure. Stop worrying about money so

much and have more fun and don’t worry about what everybody else thinks.

[0:34:57] KC: Yeah. That’s awesome. What about right now, anything, any websites, any newsletters, podcasts, anything that you’re diving into that you’re finding a lot of value in?

[0:35:09] SB: Well, I’m a big reader. So I’ve got different books on my nightstand. I’m reading about How to Practice by the Dalai Lama. I’m reading Synchrodestiny by Deepak Chopra,

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there’s an Ayurvedic Facebook page I follow called Cure Joy. They have a lot of practical Ayurvedic health applications and of course, anything Deepak Chopra I’m always on because I love what he’s talking about.

[0:35:44] KC: How did you get connected with him?

[0:35:46] SB: You know, his books were always on the teacher training lists to read, The Seven Spiritual Laws of Yoga and these types of things and I — initially when I had heard about his center and I’d always thought, “That would be a cool place to visit,” and I went out there actually to actually rest for the first time and do a program out there just for myself for my own wellbeing.

The second I walked on site there and met some of the teachers and heard some of the lectures, I was like, “Oh this is home for me.” They were talking about meditation, they were talking about the physical benefits of meditation, they were talking about consciousness, they were talking about overall health as it relates to the mind and the body.

I was extremely affirmed when I went out there so that’s how I decided to take on a course of study there, but I’ve always read a lot of his books and stuff because sometimes there is a little bit of an “ick” factor like “he’s too commercial, he’s too this” but the work he’s doing is really ground breaking.

[0:37:00] KC: Yeah, he was good friends with Wayne Dyer who was the — Manifest Your Destiny was my introduction into this whole new world and I came from a background where there was no belief in God or higher power and that was all foo-foo stuff to me and I had to hit rock bottom in order to really have that awakening. Yeah, I remember for a year, I read Manifest Your Destiny and I think there was more underlined and starred in the book than there was that wasn’t.

[0:37:41] SB: Right, exactly and you’re like, “Which page did I fled, oh the whole book”. [0:37:45] KC: Yeah but Wayne Dyer and Deepak are really good friends, yeah.

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[0:37:50] SB: Yeah and it seems sometimes, I think people look at some of this stuff from the outside with a little bit of skepticism and all I wanted to say is you really have to do it. This isn’t stuff that you can just read about. You have to sit down and be still every day and meditate even if it’s for 60 seconds. You have to listen to yourself and you can’t do that unless you stop doing things.

[0:38:22] KC: One of the things that I always recommend because I do think there is are some people who really are at the point that when they sit down, things become worse and my advice is “That’s okay,” first of all, but the second things is, “I think you can do certain things to slow your mind down.” And I think we’re going to see a huge emergence and it’s already happening right now in adult coloring books.

[0:38:51] SB: Yes.

[0:38:53] KC: Yeah, I always tell people go buy one of those because if you can’t meditate, that’s a form of meditation or at least it’s an opening the door an entry way in and yoga too right? We do yoga.

[0:39:06] SB: Yep. Yoga is the moving meditation and it’s an entry way. It for sure is an entry way because sometimes, the body is just holding too much.

[0:39:16] KC: Yeah and you sit down and it’s too much. It’s like, “That’s a big…”

[0:39:21] SB: Yes and it’s like you’re driving your car, you’ve hit the brakes and you’re not a girl but if you have a purse on the passenger side, it flies forward and everything in it, the contents of your purse fall on the floor and sometimes, when people stop to meditate that happens and it scares them or overwhelms them.

But it’s actually quite natural, it’s what happens, it’s the way the mind works. So if you get a good teacher that can explain to you that meditation is not just emptying your mind and being blissful, it’s actually a very active practice of watching the workings of your mind so that you understand it. So you are curious about why do I think what I think? Why do I do what I do? That

BOL 69 Transcript

you care about yourself enough, that you like yourself enough, that you actually want to get to know yourself.

[0:40:17] KC: Have you ever been over to the Barre Center?
[0:40:20] SB: No, but it’s on my list. I listen to their Dharma talks, they have great talks online. I

listen to them all the time.
[0:40:27] KC: Yeah, Joseph Goldstein is actually coming to Cropalot in the beginning of April.

[0:40:33] SB: Oh, yeah and Lila Kate Wheeler is another talk speaker there and she actually works down in Handover. She is a guest at the Insight Meditation Center, so I’ve been down there a few times too because I meditate there, I do follow Buddhist teachings a lot. I read a lot of Buddhist teachings and Pema Chodron and all that.

[0:40:55] KC: I was just introduced to her recently. I was listening to, what’s his name? The really smart marketing guy, he’s small with the bald head?

[0:41:08] SB: Oh, I know him, I have a mental block.

[0:41:10] KC: Seth Godin.

[0:41:11] SB: Yes.

[0:41:12] KC: Yeah, I was just listening to Seth Godin and he mentioned her and he was like, “Anything that she does on audio is a must get.” So yeah, I just started listening to her stuff.

[0:41:24] SB: Yeah, I’m reading her book now, Being Comfortable with Uncertainty.

[0:41:29] KC: Yeah, she’s amazing. So Sue, tell me about you’re launching your website you said within the next couple of weeks, tell us about that. What’s going to be on there, what the address is, how we can find you?

BOL 69 Transcript [0:41:42] SB: Sure, the address is Suebyoga.com.

[0:41:48] KC: Nice and easy.

[0:41:49] SB: Yeah and you know, I’m a marketer, I’ve got to keep it simple and so the biggest thing on it is how to find me; how to find my teacher training, how to find my classes and my workshops and then I have some top line information on Ayurveda and meditation, so it has that but it’s really how to find me and there’s some pictures so you’ll know what I look like.

That is coming out and really where I’m going to be expanding is really bringing more Ayurveda to the yoga studios because these practices worked really well for me. And I’ll have an official certification coming this year but there is so many daily things that you can do just by your body on track, just to get your mind on track that tie right back to these ancient practices.

So that’s going to be where I’m going. I have essential oils on there, I also have a link to where you can get essential oils because that’s a big part of Ayurveda as well.

[0:42:58] KC: Awesome and then what about upcoming teacher trainings, do you have anything starting or are you in the middle of everything right now?

[0:43:06] SB: We are in the middle, smack in the middle of training right now. So another one won’t come online until next late fall of 2016.

[0:43:17] KC: Awesome. Well Sue, thank you so much for taking the time out and sharing with me and sharing with all of us. It’s really been an honor and I’m looking forward, we haven’t met in person yet but I’m looking forward to meeting you soon and hopefully I can get out there for a yoga class of yours.

[0:43:36] SB: I hope so. It’s been a pleasure just getting to know you online here. I’ll hope I’ll see you soon.

[END OF INTERVIEW]

BOL 69 Transcript [FINAL MESSAGE]

[0:43:42] KC: Hey, Keith here, and today I have a free gift for you. Listen this free gift is a list of the 12 most influential books that I’ve ever read. These are the books that have helped me to create the mindset, learn the philosophies, learn the skills to really create this big, beautiful, life that we’re living now.

I read a crazy amount of books, I really do. I’ve probably read thousands of books and these are the top 12 books that – they’re the ones that I go to, they’re the ones that I work with over, and over, and over again. They are highlighted, outlined, dog-eared. And I put this list together for you because I want it to be a shortcut.

I don’t want you to have to – you don’t have to go out and read the thousands and thousands of books. These are the 12 that I highly recommend. I have a detailed review for each book, explaining why I recommend them, why I like them, when I worked with them in my life, what part of my life they helped me to improve.

So I put this together for you, and made it super each for you to get this list. All you have to do is send a text to the number 33444 and then in the body of that text, type in “12books” with no space. So that’s the number “12books”. Again, send the text message to the number, address it to 33444 and then type in “12books” as the message and just send that. And that’ll get you setup to receive those top 12 most influential books that have had the biggest impact on my life.

[SPONSOR MESSAGE]

[00:45:46] KC: Today’s episode is brought to you by our sister podcast, All About Beachbody Coaching. So All About Beachbody Coaching really allows us to do this podcast without having all those annoying commercials in the beginning for you. So All About Beachbody Coaching, the Beachbody business that Amy and I run, actually funds this podcast.

So yes, it does cost money to run this podcast, we do not charge you anything, we don’t throw in commercials or anything like that, it really is, it’s funded by our business and by our other

BOL 69 Transcript

podcast, All About Beachbody Coaching. And for me, I’m just eternally grateful for this opportunity because it’s allowed me to really create the life that I love to live.

It’s given me the opportunity to do what I want, when I want, with who I want, and even deeper than that, it’s allowed me to help others to create the same for themselves. It’s allowed me to help hundreds of other people become part time or full time Beachbody coaches, to leave that corporate 9 to 5 job and create passive income in their lives.

And really there’s nothing like that. It’s cool when you have success, it’s so much more rewarding when you help others. So I mention this or a few reasons, the first reason is, that’s actually the way that I work with people and mentor people. I don’t do anything outside of Beachbody coaching because I know that it’s such a powerful life changing tool.

So if you’re curious about working with me, interested in working one-on-one, interested in creating the type of life that you wanna live, I suggest swinging over there. The other reason is, even if somebody’s just curious, like you’ve heard about Beachbody, you know there’s a lot of Beachbody coaches out there. Maybe some of them you get a little annoyed with.

It really dives into what this business is really about, which is life transformation. So if you’re just curious, swing over there. And then the other piece is, if you’re really considering becoming a Beachbody coach, I highly, highly recommend you listen to that first.

Alright, much love guys. Again, that is the All About Beachbody Coaching Podcast, our sister podcast.

[0:48:13] ANNOUNCER: Thank you for listening to the Business of Life Podcast. Apply what you learned today and you’ll be one step closer to creating the life you love to live.

[END]

EP69 Interview Sue Bonanno

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