Struggles in a workplace. Immigrant edition.

• Do you feel like you must work really hard because as an immigrant you would lose your job first? 
• Do you feel like no matter how hard you work, you will never be successful as Americans?
• When interacting with other employees, do you feel like an outsider? 
• Are you starting to feel resentful because you feel like others are constantly taking advantage of your kindness? Stealing your great ideas?
• Do you work with someone you have a hard time standing up to, and that's really frustrating because if you were in your home country, this would have not been a problem?

If you said YES to any of these questions, please listen to this episode. 
I interviewed Anna Lakomy, Career Guardian Angel. She is a career coach for immigrant women. In this interview she shares her story and tells us:

• Why working with immigrant women is her mission?
• What are some of the biggest struggles her clients deal with?
• Her favorite success story.
• What in her opinion Americans think about us, immigrants?
• What are some of the biggest struggles immigrant mothers go through?
• How we can celebrate ourselves and start living the joyful American Dream?
• What she has recently celebrated in her own life?

More about Anna:
Anna Lakomy, known as the Career Guardian Angel, is on a mission to empower cycle-breaking women, often from immigrant families. With her expertise in neuroscience, behavioral science, and advertising, Anna helps her clients build powerful personal brands that lead to greater influence, impact, and success in the workplace. Say goodbye to workhorse days and hello to more money, freedom, health and happiness—without "selling your soul."

If you would like to get a hold of Anna you can find her here:
Website: https://annalakomy.com/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/annalakomy/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/annalakomy/ 

To join our Facebook Group "Pogaduchy na Emigracji" click here:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/1106767306991881/

SIGN UP FOR FREE COURSE ON HOW TO FEEL GOOD HANGING OUT WITH AMERICANS WHEN YOU ARE THE ONLY IMMIGRANT IN THE GROUP:
https://shorturl.at/chyM2

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SCHEDULE A QUICK CALL WITH ME:
https://app.simplymeet.me/lifecoachewelina

Transcript

Ewelina (00:00):
Hi friends, this is Ewelina Life Coach for Immigrants. So good to be back here. I hope you all are doing well. I am doing fantastic. I had to take a bit of a break from recording these podcasts and one day I will explain why, but I am back and so happy to share with you an interview I did with a very special lady.
[00:00:30] She is a career guardian angel, and she works with immigrant women. Her name is Anna Lakomy. She was born in the US but both of her parents are Polish. So she grew up in an immigrant household and in her journey she has experienced very similar challenges to what we see amongst us immigrants. I loved talking to Anna because she is kind of like this person in the middle. [00:01:00] She identifies with us and understands us immigrants really well, but also since she was born and growing up here, she understands Americans and their perspective. And I love that because when we move across the world and we establish this new life for us, we need
to build connections and to build them, we need to understand the people we're building connections with. So I feel like she has a great perspective that can help us do that. So let me tell you a little bit about her. Anna Lakomy known as the Career Guardian Angel is on a mission to empower cycle breaking women, often from immigrant families. With her expertise in neuroscience, behavioral science
and advertising, Anna helps her clients build powerful personal brands that lead to greater influence, impact and success in the workplace. Say goodbye to workhorse days and hello to more money, freedom, health and happiness without selling your Soul. Doesn't that sound amazing? I know it does to me. I'm so glad you get to hear this interview. So here we go. Let's get going.
Anna (02:30):  I'm so excited to be here because Ewelina, I know you work with people on getting back on track with that American dream, and I love that you cover all these different facets of life that obviously contribute to people's success, happiness, relationships, which is also important. And me, I play a smaller part in that. I focus on career and the careers impact, but it is absolutely about that American
dream. So I'm so excited to talk to you about that today.
Ewelina (02:58):
Absolutely. I don't know that it's such a [00:03:00] smaller thing, right? Because I'm sure as you're coaching, you're touching on lives overall, right? Because how much time do we spend at work? Most of our days, right? Most of our life we're either working or sleeping and hanging out with our families sometimes.
Anna (03:16):
Exactly. And as you know, mindset, nervous system, regulation, boundaries, all of that, it spills all over each other. Actually, one of the funnest thing is when I see my clients helping their parents [00:03:30] with their careers demanding what they're worth, preparing for interviews, getting better salaries, it blows my mind. So you're absolutely right. It does impact a lot.
Ewelina (03:42):
I love it. Alright, so why don't you tell us a little bit more about what you do. What does that look like exactly?
Anna (03:48): Yes. So the main thing that I do in working with predominantly immigrant women is helping them to succeed in the corporate world and do it in a way where they're not sacrificing that happiness or health because we didn't come here. The American dream is not all work. There needs to be some play, there has to be some joy, there has to be fulfillment. And so the way that I help women succeed in the corporate world is by helping them with personal branding, corporate politics, relationships,
networking, all these things that women like us are never taught. Most women are not taught, but especially not immigrant women. They don't teach this in college high school. They don't teach this basically anywhere. And why don't they teach this? Because a lot of companies and brands benefit from passionate, ambitious, intelligent women like us doing the most in return for the least. So I see myself as kind of a person that brings justice to the world, where I help my amazing immigrant ladies
get recognized and rewarded for the incredible value they bring to companies and they bring to the world. So that is what I basically do.
Ewelina (04:57): I love it. Okay. Tell me a little bit, how did you come across this whole issue, right? Obviously you were working in a corporate world. You've already said that, and I think I've read it too, but why is this your mission? What happened there?
Anna (05:14): I guess it does boil down to me. I was raised to be hardworking, ambitious, humble, beautiful qualities that my Polish parents gave me. And while that worked in school, it did not work in [00:05:30] the corporate world. What it gave me instead of  these rewards and success that I imagined in my head, if you work hard, you'll get everything you want. No, what it got me was I was overworked, underpaid,
invisible, stuck, and sick. I ended up getting sick from working so hard, and because I wasn't seeing the results, I did what most of us immigrant women do. I worked harder. I did pause to question, why is this not working [00:06:00] or is there a better strategy? I worked more and eventually I worked myself until I developed something called P C O S. For the listeners who don't know what P C O S is, consider yourself super blessed. For those ladies who do know what P C O S is, we know that it's hell on earth, hormonal imbalance, anxiety, depression, acne, hair falling out periods that are so painful that you're literally on the floor and wanting to die. So long [00:06:30] story short, I got myself in my own career, hell, and then when I looked around, the hardest thing that I had to realize was that I had put myself in that position. And that was so painful because I was so angry for so long, and I was like, this company, is this my boss? Is that the corporate world America? But then I realized no one forced me to do the things that I did. I did them, but that also showed me I had the power to do things differently. And [00:07:00] the reason why this is my mission now is because I created my own success story within one year, I got promoted several times, changed companies became the head of the office. So I call myself like a little Cinderella from intern to office head in nine years after all the struggle if finally the abundance gates opened for
me. And not only that, but can you imagine that my P C O Ss also vanished?
Ewelina (07:27):
Interesting.
Anna (07:28): As my career took [00:07:30] off, my health improved. And that's not a coincidence Evelina as as a life coach, right? Absolutely. So then I finally made it to the top. I was the queen. I was on my corporate throne. And of course, probably because I'm an immigrant woman, I couldn't just chill and relax. I looked around me and I saw, Hey, Anna, this was not a unique experience for you. I actually carried a lot of
shame. I thought I was the only one that struggled. I thought it was my fault and [00:08:00] everyone else has it figured out but me. But I realized when I looked around, a lot of my sisters were struggling, especially my immigrant sisters. So that's when I decided to try to share some of my knowledge, and that's how that evolved into being the career guardian angel. Now
Ewelina (08:15): I love it. Love it. So tell me where it comes to us, specifically us immigrant women. What are the biggest issues that you'll see with us specifically?
Anna (08:26): I'm going to give credit to my dad for this one, but [00:08:30] it is what I call workhorse syndrome. I remember one day I was crying to my dad about I'm not getting paid more. I'm doing the work of five people. They don't appreciate me. And he said, you know what, Anna in Polish, he said, you are the horse. Do you know why you keep getting more work into your wagon? Because you keep carrying that wagon up the hill, and instead of getting rewarded with a carrot, you're getting slapped in the butt. And this is the PG polite version that I'm sharing right here.
Ewelina (08:59): I [00:09:00] can imagine.
Anna (09:01): I was devastated. I was crying, and I could not believe that my dad said this to me because once again, it was that personal radical responsibility. And so he said, you're being a workhorse and they will never treat you differently as you continue to be a workhorse. And that was such a rude awakening. And that is something that I see in 99% of my immigrant women. We do the most. We go above and beyond all
the time. We perform miracles. [00:09:30] We're so dependable, but then we start to neglect ourselves. We start to burn out. It just, yes, it never works out for us because let me tell you, nobody respects the
workhorse, sadly.
Ewelina (09:42):
Yeah. If the workhorse doesn't respect herself, no one will respect Her.
Ewelina (09:48):
Yes. It starts with the self-respect. What's coming to my mind is what I was dealing with in my career, but also what I see with my clients. And it's the extremely low self-esteem, [00:10:00] the continuous comparison between us immigrant women and American women. And then while it comes to American men, it's like we are on the bottom, bottom, bottom in that Carey. And so there is, in our minds, we are
not as good as American women. Definitely not as powerful and confident as American men, but we bring so much to the table. [00:10:30] So the reality is it's like, come on, we have to see our own worth, just like you said, we have to be the ones that see what we're doing to ourselves. And so you're the
ones, you're the, that's showing your clients. Tell me, what are some of the things that you do with your clients to help them see that they need to change their own perspective?
Anna (10:53):
So I have to be honest, we immigrant women. We resist this very much [00:11:00] because hard work is something that we lean on for safety. It gives us a sense of control in this scary world, especially maybe being the first woman in your family to have a job like that, being the first woman in your family to move to a different country, to be living in America, et cetera, to have a profession speaking in English. So hard work is sort of that security blanket. So immigrant women tend to be very resistant to it. So what I do is I ask [00:11:30] questions as a coach, ask questions, and we dig deeper to shine that flashlight and show, well, who is benefiting from that?
(11:38): What did this extra two hours yield in terms of the impact of the report? Well, how much better was this report because of the extra two hours? What did you miss out on when you spent these two hours, what you think you could have done during those two hours? How would you feel if you spent those two hours going on a walk, [00:12:00] reading a book, meeting up with a friend, calling a friend? So it's those
kind of questions that kind of make this iceberg fall because there is that resistance to seeing that this pattern has not been serving us. And then the second part is there's fears of letting go. So even when women realize it and they're screaming at me, they're like, Anna, I see this. I see how this is not benefiting me, but we are so scared to let go of the hard work. [00:12:30] We're so scared that we're going to get fired. We're so scared that it's already not working. When I'm working hard, how is it going to work when I stop working hard? And that is actually where the magic lies, because when you stop
overworking yourself, your true talent gets to shine. You get to work on more impactful things, you get noticed, then you get the opportunities and the rewards, and that cycle goes the other way. But you have to take that scary leap. It's very scary, but very rewarding.
Ewelina (13:00):
[00:13:00] Yeah, this is, it's really incredible how many parallels as you're describing it are between what you're doing and what I'm doing too, the questions, and then basically just taking a little flashlight and shining on these dark areas that are dictating our behavior. And yet it's like we're choosing it, but not consciously really, because we don't understand fully the impact of what our choices give us. Do you have a [00:13:30] success story, like your favorite success story you can share with us?
Anna (13:36):
Yes. So I have a client who also an immigrant. She comes from Serbia. She's seen a lot of scary things in terms of war, losing everything. And she's actually the only one that left Serbia came to America and started fresh on her own. And through grit and determination and hard work and ambition, she had found some success. [00:14:00] She had found a company that she was working for a role that suited her skills and paid her appropriately. And so everything was going well, but she was constantly worried about job security, and this is one of the most brilliant people I've ever met. So it was so funny, not funny, but it's so crazy for me to look at her and say, what are you scared of? You add so much value every single day. Also, one of the things that she noticed is people were stealing [00:14:30] her ideas.
(14:31): People were not letting her speak up. Even her boss would sometimes actually in a covert way tell her to shut up. And therefore she was worried that her job stability was at stake because no one saw all the value she was bringing to the table. So working with me, that's how we discussed confident communication. We discussed how she can be more assertive in a way that feels comfortable for her, because we don't want, I'm not over here telling people to do crazy things that are totally outside
[00:15:00] of the realm of your comfort, but how can you speak up for yourself in a way that works for you? We don't have to be that confident American man. We can still be assertive immigrant women in our own flavor, our own power, our own energy. So she started doing that. She started putting together, she started doing simple, logical strategies like writing down her ideas, and then she started using relationships. So she started talking to people even above her boss about the work that she's doing. And
then the final thing was when she [00:15:30] finally let go and stopped doing as much, she was finally ready to let go of the workhorse, and that was the scariest week of her life. And then the best thing was when two weeks later, she said, Anna, I'm doing 50% of what I used to do and everyone is so happy with
me.
(15:49):
It was shocking. She thought she had to do 120% all day every day. She leaned back every day. Her focus was to lean back and to stop looking for more work and [00:16:00] to lean back and focus on connecting, focus on communicating some ideas that she has. When she did that, she was so much less stressed. People started noticing, and then funny enough, her boss in a meeting was like, actually, so-
and-so had a great idea. I would love for her to share it. He stopped stealing. He noticed he can't steal, and he allowed her to shine. So complete 360 already, a amazing powerful woman, but making her  time at work so much less stressful. And therefore, in her regular life, she can focus on other things instead of worrying about getting fired.
Ewelina (16:39): Amazing, amazing. That's the impact of working with a coach. When you think about the value of what you provide for this one person, just this one person, how her life literally has changed thanks to the, well, the work that you have provided her with, but also the work you have done together with her,
[00:17:00] because she had to actually go out there and do it on her own. But thanks to your guidance, she was able to do so. It's priceless. It's priceless work. But then I think to myself, how many of my listeners are like I used to be, and maybe you can relate to where when we think of working with coaches, we think to ourselves, yeah, no, that's probably not for me. Or even if they explore it and then comes [00:17:30] to the financial investment, they're like, yeah, no, that's too much. I could never spend that much on me. Can you speak to that a little bit?
Anna (17:38):
I think you're absolutely right. As immigrant women, we're not taught to invest in ourselves. We're not taught to ask for help. Asking for help oftentimes feels already like failure, doesn't it? But when I look back to when I was suffering in my career, and it was three years of hell that I described. So the short thing that I described, that was actually three years of that no [00:18:00] promotion, getting sicker and sicker, and my confidence going lower and lower. I think back like, oh my God, what could have
happened if I had a coach, if I had a career, guardian angel, if I had an Evelyn, what would have happened? How could I have dug myself out of that faster? How much more joy could I have experienced? How much less stress would I put my body under? So yes, unfortunately, I do agree that we're not taught to do this, but I think a lot of immigrant women are also cycle breakers. [00:18:30] We are here to do things differently.
Ewelina (18:32):
Absolutely.
Anna (18:33):
And so oftentimes just because we weren't raised to do something or we don't have an example, doesn't mean we don't do it. It might not feel safe, but we do a lot of scary things. So I think investing in yourself, having a coach for a lot of people could very well be that cycle breaking thing.
Ewelina (18:53): And it's like you said, right? That's what we do. We break cycles. The fact that we live in a different country, the fact that we [00:19:00] move away from the familiar culture, from the language and everything that comes with the safety zone, and we plant ourselves in this different world, and we're surrounded by people who think differently. We start different way of thinking as well as a result of being in this almost like a different mental field. There's so much that we already do. There's so much
courage that we show in our own path. [00:19:30] What I find myself doing with my clients is looking back and recognizing those elements. Look at what you have accomplished. Have you ever celebrated that? I'm curious about this. Do you have any thoughts on how Americans perceive us immigrants in the
workplace?
Anna (19:51):
Cheeky question.
Ewelina (19:53):
Let's go.
Anna (19:55):
I generally think that immigrants have a very [00:20:00] good reputation for being ambitious and hardworking.
Ewelina (20:07):
No, tell me. Let's have an honest conversation. Let's go. This is an honest podcast. Tell me all the things.
Anna (20:12):
I do think with anything that's different, I do think that there is maybe hesitation or not knowing how to connect with someone that's from a different culture. It's so funny because I was born here, but I still feel the difference [00:20:30] of being an immigrant daughter of immigrants. You don't feel that same immediate comradery that I would say you do feel with your immigrant friends where it's that immediate connection where you're just vibing on the same level and energy. I would say that in my experience, there still is some of that. There is a hesitation, and I would say it's harder for people who
are immigrants to develop, [00:21:00] I would say friendships in the corporate world. I think we're appreciated for our strengths and how we add value. As a colleague, I'm not so sure about genuine friendships. That's how I would put it. So we're useful, but do they want to invite us to a barbecue? I don't know. I don't know. Maybe it's case by case, but my experience is we're more seen as for what we can provide. But maybe that's also us coming in and [00:21:30] trying to prove ourselves by what we can
provide instead of leading with our personality and our hearts. It could be a combination of both.
Ewelina (21:38):
It could be a combination of both. I've been exploring that idea of connection, and I've realized that oftentimes when I was interpreting somebody's behavior as negative towards me, they were actually trying to connect to me. I remember going to a party and someone was saying, when they found out that I'm from Poland, [00:22:00] they said, oh my gosh, do you know any Polak jokes? And this was my, I think eighth or ninth month in America. I had no idea what he's talking about. I never heard of Polak
jokes. It would never even come to my mind, no, that he would ask me that question. I was completely oblivious. And yeah, I remember being confused about it and not making it a big deal. But everyone that was standing around us [00:22:30] at that moment grasped air terrified that I could get offended. Right now, looking back, I realized that what happened in his mind was like Poland, Pollack jokes there. I can
connect. I can say something that this was the familiar world to him and I was a stranger, but there is that point of familiarity. So let's talk about that piece. And I'm glad I didn't get offended. I'm glad that this is how it all turned out. But I [00:23:00] think how often has this happened in my life where I assumed that someone is judging me or making assumptions about me judging me, where I'm judging them? Actually, I'm the one judging, right? Assuming.
Anna (23:17):
And there's a fear there, right? Yeah.
Ewelina (23:21):
And how do I show up when I'm judging, when I'm expecting the worst? I know I've done it millions of times in my journey. [00:23:30] I remember for a very long time being in this very ego-based space where it's like, you don't know who I am, and my English is so bad I can't explain it, so I'm not even going to try. But in the same time, it's like, well, you don't know who I am. I'm not going to connect to you. It's like, how was that helpful? I felt like a stranger. I felt like I don't belong, [00:24:00] and I was coming off
from my ego space. So I wonder how often does that happen even in a work environment. Another thing that I know that also happens is that we get humbled by the difficulty in our journey. So it's almost like you step in, you're trying to prove yourself, and first of all, you don't know what you're doing
because everything is so brand new.
(24:27):
You feel like most of the time you're just [00:24:30] winging it because you just don't know what you're doing. You're just hoping that everything's going to be fine. But your most important mode is, I want to prove myself. I do not want to lose this job. And then we step in that mode, that's where we start, and
we just keep on going because this is what we learned. And unless we talk to you and we stop ourself, we will be constantly trying [00:25:00] to prove our worth and we'll be working harder and harder and harder, because the more you work, the better you'll get. So you don't have to work as hard, but if you keep on taking on more jobs to prove yourself, well, yeah, you'll continue on going at a hundred miles
per hour where you could be going at 25. I wonder how many of my listeners right now are like, this sounds interesting. This sounds like me. [00:25:30] I might need help from Anna. Tell us what do we
need to do to get ahold of you?
Anna (25:36):
So if you would like to get ahold of me, I am very present on Instagram as well as LinkedIn. And thankfully my immigrant name, there's not many of my names out there. So if you just search for Anna Lakomy, L A K O M Y, you probably will see a blonde Polish girl, and that's most likely me. You're probably in the right spot. And if you start seeing a lot of sassy things about corporate politics [00:26:00] and some emotional things, like today I just posted about what immigrant mothers go through and how they leave everything behind to give their children everything you can expect a lot of sas and a lot of emotionality on LinkedIn and Instagram from me.
Ewelina (26:16):
I love it. Love it. That's life, right? Yeah. So tell me a little bit more about the immigrant mothers. What is the thing that you see that they struggle with the most?
Anna (26:28):
So I'll tell you what inspired this, because [00:26:30] it's the popular Barbie movie right now. And funny enough, the creator of Barbie, Ruth, it has Polish heritage, and her daughter's name was Barbara, Barbara, and that's why she named the Barbie Barbie. But anyway, so towards the end of the movie, when Barbie meets to her creator, the creator says, this one line that kind of took me out emotionally, she said, we mothers stand still so that our daughters can look back and see how far they've come. I'm
[00:27:00] getting emotional again. Oh,
Ewelina (27:01):
Wow.
Anna (27:02):
Yeah. And I think especially for people who either left their country, left their mothers, or whose mothers came here to give them this life, there are sacrifices involved, there are hardships, there are struggles, big ones. And so being able to look back and see how you or the next generation, how far they have come, there's so much. People have [00:27:30] described it as guilt, sadness, gratitude, beauty. There's just so many mixed emotions. I think when it comes to mothers family and being an immigrant,
there's so much pressure to be successful. But on the other hand, there's so much gratitude and so much love. So I think, yeah, it's just our unique experience has these deep, deep complex emotions, I think.
Ewelina (27:59):
Yeah, and big [00:28:00] emotions. They're big emotions. To have the courage to show up every day, working as hard as you do, knowing that your family is across the world and you do not have the support other people do around you, knowing that you always feel like you're less than. And yet you have done some incredible things, and yet you're not even seeing that either, right? It's like your brain is deleting the incredible achievements you have made, and yet [00:28:30] you're like, yeah, whatever. Everybody
does this. That's what I was telling myself. Oh yeah, everybody has a master's degree. Everybody does. That's a lie. That's a lie. But then hanging out with immigrants, you're hanging out with incredible people who have done that. So then again, you're not comparing yourself to majority of the world that you are
actually interacting with. You're comparing yourself to other people who are incredibly [00:29:00] strong, have these incredible stories, feel these huge emotions, although don't really know how to process them consciously or
Anna (29:07):
How to talk about it,
Ewelina (29:08): How to talk. Oh my gosh, that's a big one too, right? We're just not being taught any of this. And those are the skills that allow us to build the dream life consciously on purpose. Yes, there's the first generation that comes and struggles so heavily so the second generation can rip the benefits, but I'm like, Hey, stop [00:29:30] the cycle. The first generation can also have fun, also appreciate, also enjoy the positive 50% of this reality. How about that? And let's show our children, right? The ones that we're doing this for, let's show them that life can be fun. And we do not have to be workhorses. I am sure that your story, your work ethic is because of your parents and what you have seen [00:30:00] them do on daily basis, right? You're just observing.
Anna (30:04):
And they didn't celebrate themselves. They didn't celebrate the amazing things that they've accomplished in a foreign country without the language, without any support or safety net or money. They never celebrated themselves. So how can we celebrate ourselves now? Why do we have to wait until we're perfect? And we've checked off every list, which let's be honest, it always grows with every achievement. Like you said, we delete the prior ones [00:30:30] and add three more. How can we start celebrating that now? How can we start living that joyful American dream life now and not just focus on the struggle? Because it doesn't have to be a struggle. Doesn't
Ewelina (30:44):
Do. No, it doesn't. So tell me, let's answer that question. How can we start celebrating? Tell me.
Anna (30:51):
I think it's twofold. I think one, it starts for yourself. So I'm very big on whenever one of my clients texts me [00:31:00] about anything big or small, I'm like, congratulations, proud of you. How are you going to celebrate yourself? I'm kind of a broken record at this point, but because of how we were raised and the lack of safety we've experienced as immigrants, our brains are wired towards achievement oriented
dopamine. So we only receive the dopamine once it's done. We don't receive the dopamine along the journey. So we have to reprogram that. And the one way to do that is by celebrating ourselves. It can be as simple [00:31:30] as saying, you know what? I have a client right now. She's going to take a voice lesson. You know what I mean? Nobody has to know about it, but she's celebrating herself taking a voice lesson. That's how you start to rewire your brain away from constantly chasing the next achievement,
but actually enjoying your life along the way. And then the second thing is, I think we need to bring this culture of celebration out. Ask your mom. How can she celebrate herself this week? Ask your partner, ask your colleagues, [00:32:00] ask your children. I think we have to create joy. And one of those ways is
acknowledging what's beautiful already and what's beautiful about you, what's beautiful about what
you've done. And so I think let's make celebration contagious.
Ewelina (32:16):
I love it. I love that idea.
Anna (32:18):
Let's celebrate ourselves. If you want to more publicly, I mean, that's very bold for immigrants, right? Patting yourself on the back, that's a big no-no. But how can we break that chain, that break that cycle, and then how can we inspire [00:32:30] someone else that's like, oh my God, if she can celebrate
herself, oh my gosh, maybe I can celebrate myself.
Ewelina (32:37):
Absolutely. And there's also that element of the competition between women and all of that stems from that comparison, not feeling worthy, this and that. But when we celebrate, we're forcing ourselves to see the good, right? So what are you celebrating this [00:33:00] week? Tell me
Anna (33:02):
Juicy, juicy question. Alright, it is just Tuesday. But let me think about the past week, actually. I'm going to go back 10 days. Last Saturday I did a workshop about conquering your inner critic, which is very important as you know. And I have to say, after several years of being a coach, having coaches, working on my own inner critic, working on my hyper achiever [00:33:30] tendencies, I have to say this was the
first time I created a workshop and I was not stressed.
Ewelina (33:39):
That's amazing.
Anna (33:40):
Old Anna would be worrying, sweating over planning, over preparing, literally having anxiety for weeks. This newer Anna, this Anna that's been working on herself came peacefully, joyfully. I was ready to serve. I wasn't going to prove anything. [00:34:00] And ironically, I was able to focus on them. I was able to detach from focusing on me and my mind drama. I just got goosebumps. So thank you for letting me
celebrate that because yes, and that was a big change to what we're taught to do, right? Absolutely. So yes, I'm celebrating that I am releasing a lot of my own workhorse tendencies, even as a businesswoman
and someone who's public facing, I'm releasing [00:34:30] the need to be perfect and I'm releasing the need to overcompensate and over prove myself and finally feel like I'm enough. And what I'm giving you is a gift, and it is enough.
Ewelina (34:43):
I love it. Well, the beautiful set of thoughts you just said, I love it. And yeah, congratulations. That's huge. I mean, it's just the proof of the work that is the value of the work. After you look at your own stuff and you keep on processing these heavy patterns that you have developed in the [00:35:00] past, that's the value of it, is that you can show up and be of service and really connect to your clients and do
that work that you're already doing from a different level of service. Beautiful.
Anna (35:14): And that's my American dream, right? My American dream was not to be stressed and overworked and anxious. My American dream is to use my gifts and talents and serve because that's what makes my heart happy. And
Ewelina (35:29):
This transcript was exported on Aug 27, 2023 - view latest version here.
That's what it comes [00:35:30] down to, doesn't it? For so many of us, yes, I can definitely relate to it, but it's like when we are in service, that's when we really feel aligned and happy and it's like, this is what I was meant to do on this planet. When we're not stressing, we're aligned. So at the end of the day, that is that higher value of the work that you're providing your clients with and the person who has finished
whatever program that you have taken them through, that is the value of it, [00:36:00] the impact that they have on the world, the next level impact. That's amazing. The ripples that you create with your work and then your clients create with their work. Beautiful thing. Well, very proud of you, and I'm so happy that we've connected. I know we've talked already about you being on this podcast more, so I'm
looking forward to having you again, just because of the time restriction.
(36:24):
We're going to end here. But I promised my listeners, you will be back because we already had some [00:36:30] amazing conversations and I cannot wait to continue this. Remember you guys, I am going to put Anna's information into the description of the show. All the links will be there to Instagram, to her, Facebook, LinkedIn, all of that will be there. So wherever, whichever platform you're using, you'll have
an easy way of connecting you to look up at the podcast description. And I thank you so much for being here. I am just thrilled that you are here for the immigrant [00:37:00] women, that you're helping them truly create these new, beautiful beliefs and embrace the next level life that they can create for themselves. We know this, this can happen, and I'm just so happy that you're here, that you're in this world doing this beautiful work.
Anna (37:24):
Thank you so much Ewelina, and thank you so much for giving me this opportunity to share my story, share my [00:37:30] work, and I look forward to talking more with you and on so many other beautiful topics that are related to our beautiful immigrant life. So thank you so much.
Ewelina (37:40):
Thank you. I hope you enjoyed this interview. If you would like to learn more about Anna and her work, look in the description of the show. Before we end, I want to tell you quickly what I've been doing. I have been preparing a free course for you. [00:38:00] It's going to be on how to hang out with Americans when you are the only immigrant in the group. This is going to be a game changer for those of you who feel really stressed when you go to a party or really any type of gathering where Americans
will be present and you want to build connections, but it's hard. You worry about saying a wrong thing,
you worry, you [00:38:30] will be judged. You think about all the awkward moments you've participated in before, how weird it was. You think about how everybody is fake and you can't really trust them.
(38:44):
You think about how it's going to be boring and not that fun. Listen, I am so familiar with this because it was me for a very long time. Not any longer though. And in [00:39:00] this course, I share with you my secret sauce because today I feel very comfortable hanging out with Americans. So if you are new here, please follow this show so you get notified about new episodes coming out because I will be telling you
more about this special course and you can also follow me on social media. I am on Instagram and on Facebook. Just look up live coach for immigrants and follow me there. [00:39:30] And as soon as that course is ready, I will be sharing it with you because I am that excited. Alright, my friends, this is it for today. I hope you are doing well. I hope you are proud of how far you have come sending. Love my
friends. I'll talk to you next time.