18. Changing Relationship to Social and Coach with Michelle Mouhtis
Limitless Podcast —Episode 18— Michelle Mouhtis
Have you ever felt an overwhelming sense of dread when it comes to posting on Social Media? Well, you are not alone. Today, on the Limitless Podcast, Michelle Mouhtins, (That Millennial Therapist), chats about how she went from completing hating having to create content online for her business to finally finding joy in it and having fun while doing it. She also shares how she eventually gave in and tried TikTok and how it led to a new client.
Episode’s Highlights:
How Michelle went from dreading social media to embracing it.
Michelle’s transition from a “regular” therapist to becoming a relationship coach.
Why she thought she was being over-coached and how she got her voice back.
Finding joy in social media.
How a TikTok video landed her a client.
The power of relationships and navigating love in 2022.
Listen to last week’s episode: Is it Time for a Social Media Break? 4 Tips to Come Back Stronger
About Michelle Mouhtis
Michelle Mouhtis is a relationship expert, speaker, and licensed therapist who helps high-achieving single millennials find lasting love and those in relationships deepen the connection with their partner. Her work has been featured in Brides, The Washington Post, and The Knot. Michelle is a trauma informed accredited expert serving millennials who crave a healthy relationship with love in their adulthood and moving through past romantic or intense family experiences.
Resources:
Connect with Michelle: Instagram │ Website │TikTok │ LinkedIn
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Connect with Jamie and share your story: on Instagram │ Website │Twitter │ LinkedIn
Read transcript below
Jamie Ratermann 0:00
What I love the most about multi-channel creators is that the pressure is off, you can find a new sense of creativity when you use another place. It's not just repurposing, of course, there's an element of that. But like the idea of like, let's play on this new playground, and then it rejuvenates everywhere else. You're listening to the limitless podcast, where we dig into all of the possibilities that exist when you lean into the big vision for your life and your business. Hi, my name is Jamie Ratterman. And I am a Holistic business coach, meaning I am just as invested in growing your health as I am in growing your wealth. With 11 plus years and Brandon social media marketing, I help rebellious entrepreneurs master marketing and body leadership and say fuck it to the hustle. This show is here to encourage you to become radically aware of your self imposed limits, to break free of your shoulds and to expand your brand into a movement led by you. The way I see it, marketing is a way of spreading your mission. Social media is a gift for connection. And sales are where you build your strongest relationships. Let's dig in. Hello lovelies, welcome to episode 18 of the limitless podcast, I couldn't be more excited to introduce you to a very special green today. But before I get into it, we have been talking about our relationship to social media for the last couple of episodes. And I want to continue to keep you accountable for you to use this amazing platforms as a place of growth for you as a place of empowerment. So if you haven't yet, this episode is going to be fire full of things that you can consider. Take a screenshot, tell me what you love about these episodes, tag me. And I will also encourage you to tag our guest today as well. But this is where I get to hear from you. What do you want to hear from me. So go ahead share what's most insightful to you a takeaway onto your Instagram stories. And or I don't know, oh, subscribe, check, stick around with me for a while see see how much you love to be an all the things that fascinate me that I know can help you. So let's get into it though. So today I have a queen like I said, but Michelle muitas. And she is here to tell us a little bit about what it is to be an entrepreneur for her. So she is a relationship coach and therapist who is all about creating really dynamic, caring, loving relationships. And it starts with creating that relationship with yourself. And then from there, we get to, you know, radiate this love to somebody else in our lives, being able to know that relationships aren't always so easy, but they are always worth it. And she's all about giving those, you know, real real about what it is to be in a relationship. But also it gets to be really frickin fun. So I love having her on today because she is currently working with me as a client. And we've been seeing such amazing growth and how much she loves her content. So we're going to talk a little bit about that today. But I'm gonna let Michelle, tell us a little bit about her. Michelle, welcome to the limitless podcast. Go ahead and share a little bit about yourself.
Michelle Mouhtis 3:07
Jamie, thank you so much for that beautiful intro, I just adore you. So my name is Michelle, I am a relationship coach and a licensed therapist. And I help high achieving Millennials throughout the entire love experience spectrum from breakup to dating to relationship and I help Millennials find lasting love as well as deepen the relationship that they have with their partner, especially through life transitions, think moving in together, having a baby getting married, getting engaged, etc. And I do this through master classes, group programming, and one on one coaching. And it has been quite the journey to get to this spot. And I have been so so thankful for the entire process, especially transitioning from being a private practice therapist to the coaching space.
Jamie Ratermann 4:06
Oh my gosh, yes. So she's like the she calls herself that millennial therapist follow her everywhere for sure. But what I what I've really loved about about what you're talking about is and I think as I've seen it more after I met you was that the absolute transition from therapist to coach? Like what what do you feel is the benefits of making that switch? Like what what made you decide, you know, what, coaching is the thing that I think I can make even more impact for?
Michelle Mouhtis 4:34
For sure. I'm obsessed with this question. So I was a full time private practice therapist, and one of my first and earliest inspirations was actually the angry therapist John Kim. He's a licensed therapist as well and I found him on my Explore page. Shout out to social media. And I was so inspired by the way Is he got to be creative helping people. So he had online courses and different kinds of programs. And I had always felt some sort of misalignment coming into the industry. I love helping people. I mean, that is like, to my essence and my core, right. But I personally love to color outside of the lines, I love helping people in creative and different ways. And to be totally frank, I get a little bored doing just one thing. So with private practice, in my therapy practice, it was getting kind of monotonous. And a sense of, it seemed to me at the time, like my my only option was to do one on one sessions with clients. But I had this, this deep sense that I wanted to create more impact. And I wanted to do more than just one on one. So I started to dip my toe into the coaching space. And something else that influenced this decision as well was I noticed, and not to say there isn't a place for this because there is. And that's a whole nother podcast episode. But the therapy space can be very pathological and a sense of like, okay, yeah, you have generalized anxiety disorder, let's just say, we're treating the symptoms up here, but what's going on in the room, and so often the root is trauma. And this led me to be much more trauma informed in both my therapy practice and my coaching practice, because beliefs shape our experiences and experiences shape our lives. So the coaching space also was much more receptive at the time, to trauma being stored in the body. I mean, now it's all like, you know, bumper sticker shit. But it was a lot more receptive to somatic healing and things like this, when the therapy space this was seen as super woowoo. And out there, it's changed and evolved now. But I do a lot of somatic practices with my clients, like EFT Cafe as well. And the coaching space again, just allowed me to color outside the lines. And I was really inspired to create content, I love, love, love teaching. And I really love public speaking and getting on video and getting on camera and social media was my way of getting messages across, especially since we are so woefully under educated on how to date, or how how to heal from breakup, how to find a partner how to find someone who's compatible with you are teachers are romcoms. And that scares the shit out of me. So to be able to share this message and teach on a platform, a totally free platform that will allow me to reach the masses, with these teachings has been life changing. So that's a bit how I got into this transition to be a coach. And again, not to say therapy doesn't have a place it does. I'm all for therapy, most of my clients are in therapy. But for me, personally, I felt this calling to be more creative in the coaching space allowed me to do just that.
Jamie Ratermann 8:38
I love that. So I think I think a couple of things like when you were when you were sharing is like, there. I hope like I always I this is like a subconscious mission that I end up and having a lot is that I think entrepreneurship now can start to influence like corporate, it can start to influence like the hard lines of these other things like knowing that, like you get to be a better coach and better therapist, when you're motivated by how multi passionate, multifaceted, you are creative you are like allowing it to be something that you get to do in each of those realms. Like I hope that therapists get to do that, I hope that you can see that and to and knowing that like for every person who has the privilege has the monetary wealth to be able to go to a therapist to help them with their mental troubles or whatever it might be. There's a Instagram post, there's a book, there's something out there creatively that can help them in the meantime. So I what I love about, you know, maybe therapists right now don't feel that empowerment to do that. And I know that I've worked a couple of other therapy to therapy therapists, two coaches, who were like, I'm not allowed to post this stuff. And I'm like, what, what like it just it unnerves me and a lot of ways let's just let's just throw that out there but like I think there's for me like when it comes to To the mental health, like, and and how we move to the world, how we understand what our patterns are, because when you're talking about trauma, and you were talking about involving the body and and all of these things like, people still don't understand it like you were talking, you're joking about the trauma bumper sticker. That's great. Like, guys, we've all had trauma in our life. How like when someone told me that, like, I was like, No, I mean, traumas for this very specific group who've had some horrendous things happen. And it's like, no, we've all had some type of trauma in our life that informs our people pleasing, that informs how we feel about talking like boldly and proudly about ourselves that informs, you know, in general, like our relationship to others, so like, I think that what I what I love about this decision, it was one, it was led by the fact that it was purpose, you wanted more, and you knew that you could help more people by going and doing this scary thing and using social media. But then that but then you had the backing of EFT and somatic healing and all these other things that came into into play. And I think for anyone who isn't, doesn't understand what we're talking about a great book is body, the Body Keeps the Score just to get an idea of how our nervous system like stores emotions for us. But tell me a little bit more about like your EFT training. Tell me a little bit more about like, hearing this, even just hearing trauma informed as a part of like your business lately, like what like how, what is this something that's exciting for you, like, let's get into how you involve the body?
Michelle Mouhtis 11:40
Totally. So I'll start by kind of defining what trauma informed actually means. For those of you who might not know, it means, in essence, to look at the experiences that someone has been through. And like you said, Jay, we like Perinton it over here. Everyone's been through trauma, trauma is on a spectrum, right? It's not just reserved for people who have been to war or experienced genocide, etc. Trauma is on a spectrum. And to me, trauma is anything that is a disturbance to your regular functioning, and you are carrying with you. And it's affecting you at present and an adverse way. So that could be anything from Yes, having maybe being in a car accident, something like this. Or it could also be having a parent say certain things to you over and over and over again, and getting conditioned to believe something about yourself receiving that message from your parent. And now in adulthood, maybe you're struggling in your relationship, because you believe that everyone leaves, you can't trust anyone. Because no matter who you end up with, they always leave. Right? So that could be a form of a trauma response. So I was noticing in especially the therapy world, and again, it's changing now, which I'm working for y'all going. But we were very focused on treating the symptoms of what's going on on top. Without really saying I'm putting a diagnosis on things as well, before we say, wait a minute, why is this person what happened to this person, that they are so anxious all the time, nine times out of 10, it is rooted in some sort of experience, some sort of trauma. So getting to that experience, and getting to how that experience shaped their beliefs and how it's affecting them to day. That is what it means to be trauma informed, versus just saying like, Oh, this is a character thing.
Jamie Ratermann 14:06
Totally, totally. And I will say for me when I was someone, I was working with someone and they're like, Hey, you got trauma in your life? I was. It was a was like no. I was like, No, I have it. And they're like, No, I like from what you've shared. Like you've had some trauma in your life. And I like I remember getting off of that, that call and I was just kind of like, oh, wow, this is freeing. It's actually a freeing experience. Like, I think the idea of accepting that we've had trauma is like something that people like, oh, wow, it's such doom and gloom. When really the perspective that I guess it did for me it was it was being able to go like, Oh, there's not a damn thing wrong with me. There's nothing wrong I don't need to fix it. It's literally like just these like little gears in the past from like, silly experience that I now just side is like negative, like sitting in the back of my mind that that are still like puppeteering little things throughout my day and if I ignore them they stay if I don't ignore them, I can start to, like free them up. And I think I think for me the the more we can make trauma feel like a normal word like stress, the better I guess like the better that people can be forgiving and and move through it because I when you were talking about it, one thing that came to mind was I read this book called Getting past your past by Francine Chu. She does she does EMDR that's her hers piece. And she was just talking about how you can create trauma from like your parents not getting like picking you up in the crib. Right away. Like it was like there. It's not that it was like they forgot you. It was like the you wanted them to pick you up at three minutes when it was like they came in at five minutes like like this. Like, it's, it's quite easy for our brain to create these things, which is exactly why involving the body can be such an important piece. So I just wanted to jump in there because me going on this journey for myself can be I think can be helpful here. But you use EFT to start to release these older patterns. So tell us a little bit about that.
Michelle Mouhtis 16:11
Yeah, absolutely. So I actually discovered EFT in my own therapy almost 10 years ago. And I remember when my therapist introduced it to me, I'm like this is quack literal garbage. What is this? I was so resistant to it. And she's like, Look, you don't have to try it. But give me a session. And if you don't like it, you never have to do it ever again. And I'm like, okay, so we use the somatic technique, which I'll get into the SparkNotes of the mechanism, how it works. And I felt profoundly different in a single session, one session, so much so that I said to her, where did you get this training, I need to go do this now. And I literally did. So in essence, my EFT, or energy psychology and Emotional Freedom Technique is under the overarching branch of energy psychology is that we have meridian points all over our body. And when we tap on these points on our body, what it's doing is sending a message to the part of the brain called the amygdala. The amygdala is where your fight or flight receptors and sense is stored. So going back to this idea of trauma, anxiety as a trauma, depression is a trauma, right? So this is where all these sorts of emotions are stored. So when you activate these meridian points on the body, you are soothing the amygdala. So what happens is, you can think about the distress and what was bothering you, whether it's everything, anything and everything from a memory to a feeling. And it feels like you're recalling what you ate for breakfast yesterday. It's so incredibly powerful. We're still understanding its mechanism and how it works. But that is a bit of SparkNotes of how EFT works. And I got my training through a CEP, the Association for comprehensive energy psychology. They're a fantastic organization.
Jamie Ratermann 18:36
I love it. I love it. And I it's like sometimes when I have, I think people will call EFT or any of these like new sciences, or they're not really do they've been around for a while, but like the, like the ones that are coming, more becoming more popular, though, you're calling it quack. Or other people might say, Oh, that's too woo for me. And it's like, Alright, sure. But there's, there's a side of it, that once you start to do it, you realizing that like you're creating a better mechanism to handle things so like, I if I without involving the body, without involving the body, you're using just your brain to like push yourself through like that's, that's the thought I have. I gotta I gotta fix this I gotta push myself through this and it's like, it's like riding a bike but only using one pedal, right? It's like Like, like, oh, let's hope that I can get move in. I'm gonna just use one pedal here. EFT is like let's involve your arms, your limbs, your body, like allowing like all of it to kind of, like you feel you vibrate after like, it's like it's a full like when we're talking about energy, like when you feel released, it's like a vibration. And you can feel that difference. And that's like really being able to like speed up your timeline a little bit because you're involving your nervous system. You're involving like your entire body. And so like sometimes now because I've talked about this for so long, and I'll talk about mu is meant and meditation. And if you want to go a step further EFT and all these other pieces in there, like, Oh no, I just like want to work through, like work through it without having to do all that I just like my my mind always goes like, Wait people do people don't realize this. So yeah, like people don't understand that, like, if you want to be your most creative you want to like take quantum leaps, you want to make big changes in your life, don't just involve the Burien do like involve the body and how that could gets to be really exciting. So I think if there's anything that kind of talk at the top of this conversation is involved with your fucking body like get get get into like your whole humaneness when it comes to wanting to be the best version of yourself or to or to really want to create a bigger, better life for yourself. And I think, definitely check out EFT for with Michelle, for sure.
Michelle Mouhtis 20:52
It's definitely the equivalent of working smarter, not harder, right? When you involve both the brain and the body. And the truth of the matter is 100% of the brain is connected to 100% of the body 100% of the time. And it's being shown more and more in the research as well.
Jamie Ratermann 21:10
Put that on a bumper sticker use 100% of your body like it's a difference, the difference between like half assing something and whole assing it like whole body at man whole whole body it like it like get into it. I love it. What's so funny about us talking What's so funny about talking about this here at the top is that when I met Michelle, or when I started working with her as as when my client, you know, I knew she knew so much about relationships, I knew that she like I knew a little bit about her mission and like we were thinking about a month in and you're like I'm EFT trained, you didn't know that. Oh, like what snow I didn't know this like, and this is a kind of rolling in here is that. Like, this is one of the secret sauce that makes Michelle amazing and we like like is that she can showcase that she involves herself with her with her coaching. And whenever I was talking about we were talking about growing your audience and what you wanted to do you're like, but I can't show that. I don't want to show that side of my business. And I think I actually said Why the fuck not like why are we like, give me reasons why this thing you've invested in this thing you use within your coaching, or like we don't want to use it. So I guess I want to I want to dive in a little bit of like, your own metamorphosis of how you've just started to show up online, especially in the last five months. What what created this block you want, like let's just give if it's okay with you a little bit a little bit laundry list. Michelle, also, is loves a good knitting. Like I didn't know this. Michelle as a DFT TABBERT. Like it's like she's she's definitely shares pieces of her relationship. But she also gets a little spicy. And she was just doing something a little different before but like what, what prevented you from wanting to show like your full self, when it comes when it came to social media and talking about your business.
Michelle Mouhtis 22:57
I think in part, I was over coached. And I think this can definitely be a thing, where I was listening to so many different opinions in so many different voices, and I lost my own. And on the other side of that, looking kind of like Monday night quarterback to hindsight 2020 I can see there's a million ways to make a million dollars, there's a million ways to market. And you know, something that you taught me so much, Jamie is that it's not about doing what someone else did to make their million dollars. It's about doing what you enjoy doing and marketing in a way and showing up on social in a way that you enjoy. So I think I was I was over coached. And I was so focused on how other people did it. And you know, it was very like results oriented, talk about your clients, no one wants to hear about you. Everyone wants to hear about your clients and your process and the results they got. And so anytime I went to go post on social media, first of all, I was dreading it, I was absolutely dreading it. Like I hated it. It took me like an hour and a half to make one post and it didn't even feel aligned. And I wasn't talking about the ways I helped clients in that in some of the ways that I do with with EFT and you know, even I love research and so much of my methodology is research back right, it was more just like, Okay, I need to showcase results. And that really took away from the fun that I now so much so have sharing value and sharing what I know and it's not to say that client stories aren't important aspect of marketing. It just gets to be one piece of it versus the whole pie. So that was kind of especially with our work together. Jamie I went from like literally hating social media not wanting to post and taking an hour and a half to make a single post and dreading all of it to like dread not only cutting back the time, because I'm not overthinking it, because I'm enjoying it. I'm so in my flow in my energy and my element. But it just feels so much more aligned and impactful for me. So that was kind of the absolute I
Jamie Ratermann 25:24
loved it. I love that. And I and I think this like, kind of like boiling it down to this idea that like, if you're not selling on social, you're not going to get clients like I think that was like a overarching theme. Like, if you're not selling on every post, like you're, like, this is what it is. And it's that concept because I did it's all over the internet, like this idea, like sell on every post, it has to be this way.
Jamie Ratermann 25:49
It doesn't make sense. Like, like, who and who wants to be sold to on every post? How do you trust somebody if they're selling you something on every post, and then at the end of the day, none of us none of us naturally are always selling. So like so for me when I kind of wondered when Michelle came in it was like really getting a breakdown of like, re re getting to know who you are. I mean, I knew because we had a lot of like other conversations I knew like when we ever we would just get into a role it just chatting with each other going like I love Michelle and then like going but is this the way that is this Michelle I love like is she she's showing herself online and it was all of this like rules rules that are there and don't as we're talking about this Don't get me wrong I tell Michelle about strategies and simple ways to grow but it's that's that's the backbone what's the what's the essence what's the energy it's it's Michelle. So we were able to I just it makes me so it makes me laugh so much because if you remember you're like I don't think I could do I don't think I should do the EFT and that was one of your first reels that did fantastic. That was one of the first ones that you're like oh, okay like I was it was lovely that the first time we were kind of pushing those old rules and like like you know let's Why am I saying pushing taking a sledgehammer to I'm gonna go and I let's let's showcase what your value passions all of all the things you were you showcase to me and behind closed doors let's showcase that you had an immediate showing like this is what people want which is which was a nice little like shrug that shoulders like like this little brush off as soon as I'm like yes perfect. But we brought that to a whole new place. So Michelle has already said that she loves video clearly listening to her on this audio you can tell that she's she's very good vocalist as well. And we I was asking you to try out tick tock. What and what how did that feel for you? Because beforehand you were it was it was the gram and it was email that was that was your two places. But what I was like why don't we I think you're gonna kill it over on Tik Tok. So what so like, let's kind of talk about your transition to deciding to expand.
Michelle Mouhtis 28:09
Totally. So and yeah, I was barely on an email. I had all my eggs in the Instagram basket and back in when was it November when Instagram went down for the day. I had this moment of like, I am fucked with a capital S Instagram goes away tomorrow. Because I really didn't even have a you know, built up email list. But I was so resistant to Tik Tok because I thought, like poor Gen Zers or audits and would never get any clients from Tik Tok. That was kind of my mindset like people consume Tik Tok but tick tock is not a place for people to plug in to an offering Tik Tok is not a place for people to want to have a desire to work with someone. It's just a place to consume tock tick tock, consume content and do viral dances and I'm not about any of that shit. So but I love JB I kept an open mind. I'm like, okay, and especially Jamie when you gave me examples of people on Tik Tok, who just shared with they know that the camera in 30 seconds to a minute. So I started there because that felt really good for me. And I'm like, how this is fun. I love this and I started doing it just because it was fun and enjoyable and didn't take an hour and a half because I wasn't overthinking it because I was just having fun. And then my tick tock blew up Am I ticked tock started going viral. And I had a third of my Instagram following in one month on tick tock and a And Tubu I've got a client from Tech Talk, who reached out to me, didn't even know I had programs. And even though I had offerings, I was only posting value driven content. And this person found me reached out to me via email and became a client.
Jamie Ratermann 30:17
I mean, I, I loved it for the like this is, for me, what I love the most about multi channel creators is that the pressure is off. Like, like, you can find a new sense of creativity when you use another place. It's not just repurposing, of course, there's an element of that. But like the idea of like, let's, let's play on this new playground, and then it rejuvenates everywhere else. Like, when we it's like, it's like, if we eat an apple every day, and that's our only meal. We're gonna be like, frickin apples not reckon doing it for me anymore. I don't want it anymore. And then, and then as soon as we start to, like, create a bit of variety, and how we share ourselves, then that Apple starts to taste a little better. Like it sounds like that. So this this metaphor is saying, like, you came back to Instagram and loved it even more, you ended up having more value over on Instagram, dropping a little more value and redefining your rules over on Instagram, and it just started they work together. So what I love and I even to, for anyone who's who's listening, if you are like, Have you been considering going into a new platform, it could be that ticket but like releases this Instagram burnout, you might be feeling doesn't mean I'm telling you to forget Instagram, it's more of as more like, Michelle was like, Alright, I'm just gonna for 30 seconds a day, drop some knowledge, a download from a client a download of what I want people to know. And then it started to get even more fun. You're like, oh, I want to do a knitting one. Oh, I want to share my mission more it was, it was like she would come in exploding with these valuable content pieces that she wanted to create. And I was I was just sitting there going like, here's some small tweaks keep going here enjoy it, go go go like it was absolutely refreshing to see like, you broke one rule of yours where like, I Instagram was the only place I got to be and then it's almost like you, you just like created this whole new space like this, the we're in a bit of a Instagram cage. And then you became like, Oh, look at all the things that I can do. So like that. So part of what I love about it is that you flourished. It's like a blooming like a blooming of what it was. So now that you have been using tick tock, you've been what I would call a video visionary, you're coming into loving every aspect of it, like how does it How does social media feel now? Versus before?
Michelle Mouhtis 32:39
Oh my gosh, it's a playground now. And I never thought I'd be sitting here saying how much fun I'm having with social media. I would like told you this, I want to be like a full time content creator now. Whereas before, like, I suppose today, what do we say when they want to hear I don't even know. And now I just have taken my foot off the gas brought it back to me to my vision to my purpose to what I want to share what my clients are going through taking these stories and turning them into lessons, original reasons why I got into coaching in the first place so I could have this beautiful playground. So I could take my creativity and plug it into different places and use it in different ways to engage with a community right. Everything from Yeah, I posted my pen collection of over 1000 pens. I'm a pen junkie. I'm getting DMS about my pen recommendations to Hey, I just went through a breakup and I don't know what to do right. So it's definitely been such a such a night and day change. But I think my biggest takeaway for myself but I think that would be relevant to anyone listening to this is it has to be done your way. You have to do it your way in a way that feels good for you if you're a writer right? If you love video, do video, whatever that is taking it and harnessing it don't try and fit yourself into the way other people are doing it. Instead know how you do it and what feels good for you and create and call in client sales whatever it is your marketing through that I think that's just the biggest takeaway you helped me prove myself wrong and the ways in many ways that you can market and calling
Jamie Ratermann 34:37
in all the right ways proving yourself wrong and all the right ways. So I what I love about the share is that you know this is what social media is going to continue to be it's like we curated feeds, the overselling these other like this old version of what we what it was, is no longer what people are here for. They want to they want to be in the Enter Do you have others and I think that's what she's sharing here. But like, I get to be me, like, I get to be who I am. And then, like, people were like, I like your vibe. I like your energy. I like your pens. I also like your advice, like, like, all of that can be a part of I always like to share, I am a SpongeBob fanatic, I can quote the first three seasons. So like, know that that's a part. And I would never like put it into a program like talk about Spongebob and get a client, I've gotten a client from talking about SpongeBob because they're like, oh, this, this business coach is a little bit quirky, like, well, let's let's let her in. And that's like, it's, it's the closer you can be who you are, like who you are in real life on social, the better it is just like you're going to want to show up. It's like, it's like saying hi to your friends and family and, and like knowing that like, you don't have to put on a filter. You don't have to put on makeup. It's just about like, how am I blocking my more of myself more of my purpose, and releasing that and coming into it in a different way. So like I that the encouragement there is like, this is empowering. This is more fun. This is this helps you to be consistent. It doesn't mean that there's not some mindset things that come up along the way going like what will they think if I show my whole selves like what will they think if I say this triggering thing or what it might be and one of the topics for you which I love to just quote is that so one Michelle is engaged with amazing like like that. If you get a chance go look at her grand because a stranger did a beautiful pan of the moment and Central Park. I can't even get over it. But the insane before that. You talked about how because you're live with your fiance that you guys slept in separate beds, like going back to like I Love Lucy days, like what do you set it? I was like, Wait, are we are we doing 1950s television, I don't understand this. But the idea that like Michelle is clearly in a happy relationship doesn't mean that there's not some difficulties, but she's in a happy relationship that she intends to stay in. And she was saying like, I don't want to sleep next to my partner because I don't get a good amount of sleep. So tell me about like this, you know, what others might be considered like a weird and triggering kind of content to be talking about as a relationship coach, like, Tell? Tell us a little bit about that. Totally.
Michelle Mouhtis 37:24
I love that you use this example too, because it was super edgy, because there is so much stigma on sleeping separately, like, Oh, you guys must not be doing well. And for me it was like, No, my partner wakes up at 5am every morning and snores and I'm homicidal, like I want to kill them. Right? Um, and even on Tik Tok, it was so funny. There was this lawyer, a divorce lawyer who said that most of his clients, if not all, one of the first signs of the demise of their relationship and inevitable divorce was that they started sleeping apart. So it was so fun, yet challenging. At first, it was super edgy, to do a stitch with that tick tock with that lawyer who said that and say, Hey, no, actually, you have a lot of bias. Because, of course, you're going to notice this, because you work with divorcing couples. And there's this whole other flip side that you don't get to witness right, because you're a divorce lawyer, you don't get to see the entire spectrum of all relationships. But it was definitely edgy at first. But it's so interesting because I feel like these sort of edgier pieces of content and ideas are what people want to hear and what people want to see. And you know, even disagreement in my comments section we Jamie and I were just talking about this could be it was at first pretty triggering for me. And I think two years ago, Michelle would have really really shied away from it. But now I welcome it. And I love to see all the different opinions and ideas coming together in the comment section as well. Totally,
Jamie Ratermann 39:11
totally. So I'm Michelle gave me an idea to talk a little bit about the haters in a future episode. And we can like we could definitely get into it. But there's a sign of like, like disagreement creates conversation, but as long as it's, you know, constructive if it's someone just being a complete press right, like, break well, that's not that's not going to generate conversation and we're not shouting at each other. We're gonna actually I don't see it the same way. Like that's the kind of quote unquote haters or disagreement that we want to invite for the fact that like, we can change minds and like, we can also like people can like shift like kind of shut like we can like shift them to go, well, maybe there's a different way to think about these things like so, for the divorce. I remember kicking that to I remember like, Oh, here's one you can stitch and you're like, wait, what do I I say and I'm like, disagree because you know you do and, and like, you know, I was really like, like a guy that's puffing on his chest like number one thing we've known you're gonna get a divorce is separate but like he was so like so sure of himself in that and it was so fun about Michelle was like she was like, I don't know if I can do this and then she does the set she goes, I go bullshit. Like she was like, like we as soon as you got into the set, you're ready to be like, guess what. And I think there's a part of that as long as we can take this like with a grain of salt and have fun with it. Like we were not angry at these people we disagree with we're going like, here's a different point of view. And for me, one of I would never call this person a hater. Like I talk a lot about, like telling your inner critic to like, take a day off or tell her to shut up, leave her alone. And she's like, I'm actually friends with my inner critic like that was the comment. And she was in my DMs going I'm really sorry, I shouldn't have commented that and I go note, disagree with me, as long as we can have that continue to have a conversation of like, why you feel that way? There's definitely a side of all of this, like triggering to be triggering is one thing. Like literally going like if I piss people off, I know it's going to cause a splash versus being like, I disagree. And here's my reasoning. Let's let's I'm open for discussion. Like I think that was like a big part of it. So like watching you, in general come out of your shell a little bit because the you know, she made the joke about I'm like, I'm ready to murder him when he snores all night. It's clearly a joke, but like the idea the idea is like, happy relationship is not a relationship without frustration sometimes a fight sometimes these things because usually it's like you're agreeing to spend your life with somebody. Of course, there's going to be friction that you get, like the happiest couples know how to walk through versus the ones that never have it. So like I what I love about that. This kind of content is like I'm like I feel seen in Michelle's content. Like I might be her coach, but I absolutely feel seen and going like, This is amazing. This is exactly what it is. So encouragement, go there's one thing that you want to take a bit of a risk on because you just disagree. Put it out there, put it out there. I love that. So I have two questions because I know you did hop off in a second but I want one before we can't get off this call without going like why are rom coms bullshit? Like why are they the worst freaking thing like let's just talk about the fact that ROG dolls are bullshit. And for the record, I would out myself here my recent Netflix binges have been like the high school rom coms lately I don't know why, like the boys like kiss before for some reason I recently was like, oh, we'll try this one out. And I'm like, Oh, that's so nice. Like there's always really like things that I've done I'm like, but this is rom coms. Let's clean this alone. It's kind of been funny, but tell me tell me like for all of us, all of us millennials who have grown up on the Jennifer garnered like Jennifer Lopez. All of the wrong comes from our past. Like why? Why are these kind of a little bit toxic when it comes to creating these relationships?
Michelle Mouhtis 43:09
Totally. And I just want to normalize I am an absolute like love this line, junkie Bachelorette. Nicholas Sparks I hear for the rom coms. The problem is and becomes when you base your relationship off of The Bachelorette, misapplied the rom coms, right and you're taking relationship advice from there, it versus just only seeing it as pure entertainment right. And in that might seem like an obvious, but it's not. I've literally had clients, quote The Bachelorette to me about what happened in the Bachelorette. So they tried to repeat the same thing in the dating world and I'm like, mortified, right but at the same time, I think this is where we become so woefully under educated on how to be in a relationship because what the rom com does for example, we're going to hit on rom coms for a moment. They they show you number one toxic sort of relationship dynamics like Mr. Big and Carrie from Sex in the City, getting together breaking up constantly in that cycle, for example, right and seeing that as like, oh, but they love each other. And even though they were always fighting and couldn't agree on anything, they always love each other right the notebook. And that's not love that's toxic and dysfunctional, but it's been framed as love and persistence, and unwavering devotion. And something else the romcom doesn't show is what happens after the credits. They don't show what happens when the going gets tough or something that Andrew and I I went through in 2020, when one of you has a sick parent, and you're navigating hardship together, though, something that is so important to me about millennial therapist, and my brand is showing all sides to a relationship, not just the happy, but I'm here to celebrate the happy and I don't think that you have to pull from the pain to celebrate the joy. Don't misunderstand. But I'm so so big on showing all the sides of the relationship, what relationships really mean, what makes a healthy relationship, how to navigate through conflict, that conflict is normal, because you're two different humans with two different opinions. So of course, you're going to disagree. Right? Exactly this, what matters is how you work for it. What matters is being able to have a safe space to share your feelings. And of course, Nicholas Sparks doesn't talk about that. And that's okay. She's entertainments he's not relationship research.
Jamie Ratermann 46:02
Totally, I feel like there needs to be a rom com that drops us in the middle of the three, the three year, three year mark in a relationship like, like, how do they keep the spark moving? Like how to like, like, how did they find themselves in the relationship because I think, and even to it with what what Michelle does, she has two programs for singles and for people in a relationship. And it's both incorporate the fact that like, our best way to create really aligned and happy relationships is focusing on like, how we feel. And I like I've been in a relationship for nine years, and how many arguments come up when I'm tired? Like, how many arguments come up when I'm having a tough day, instead of going like, this is what's happening? For me, this is not the time for these things. Like there's so much to be said about? Yeah, wait, let's, let's get some Hollywood execs and let's, let's let go like, Alright, let's get the real deal about rom com where we're a happy couple, but three years and and what goes on, really in a relationship because most of the examples were given or that honeymoon early, you know, salt, like want each other phase and like and there's, there's, I want more examples of like continuing to be this like loving couple. So yes, don't take romcoms with a grain of salt. It's just stage one. And we don't get to see like all of the elements. I want to talk about that for an hour.
Unknown Speaker 47:29
But that's a whole nother episode. That's
Jamie Ratermann 47:31
a whole i We've really listed off like three episodes that we're gonna need to do in the future. And Michelle will work on that. But really what I love about and what I wanted to have you on here is that like being limitless is really about like relationships, not only with others, but with yourself.And then also what how that transforms into being an entrepreneur, business owner, like showing up for yourself. So like, for me, I just was like, Michelle gotta be here but for you. Like I know, that's why I feel you're limitless. That's how I feel it. But I always like to ask this question, what does limitless mean to you?
Michelle Mouhtis 48:10
Limitless means to me. untapped potential. uncapped, everything, really. And I think limitless is also feeling empowered to yourself in the process.
Jamie Ratermann 48:28
Oh my god. Beautiful. Absolutely beautiful. Michelle, thank you so much for joining me today. Go ahead and let us know where we can find you. We'll drop you in the show notes of course. But how can people continue to connect with you? Oh, totally.
Michelle Mouhtis 48:38
You can find me on Instagram. I'm that millennial therapist who else too ends. You can find me on Tik Tok. I believe I am that millennial therapy on Tik Tok. Or you can always send me an email at that millennial therapist@gmail.com.
Jamie Ratermann 48:55
Amazing. Amazing. Oh, and by the way, she's also running a retreat that coming up. Yes, Thomas, tell us about the retreat because it's pretty. It's pretty badass. So let's give us a little bit of a glimpse of what the retreat is.
Unknown Speaker 49:07
Massively. It's a women's wellness retreat and talk about the relationship with yourself. That is what we will be focusing on it is for the burnt out, overworked, overtired woman who has been giving giving giving to everyone else but herself. So it will be a weekend August 4 through seventh in Hunter, New York, where you where you will spend time pouring back into you. All you have to do is show up and every minute will be played for you. And it's called Summer of surrender. The theme is surrender and leaning into your feminine. Oh
Jamie Ratermann 49:41
my gosh. I love it. I love it. So amazing. Michelle, thank you so much for being here. lovelies. I hope you got the most out of this episode. Make sure to tag Michelle at that millennial therapist and me whenever you hear things that were so insightful for you or how you want to use what we share today. Would love to know what you thought. But thank you again. Have a wonderful rest of your day