Latest / Christian Business Growth Podcast / Faith to Start Again with Belinda Terro Mooney

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Faith to Start Again with Belinda Terro Mooney · Christian Business Growth Podcast

• 0:01
  Hello and welcome to the Business Growth Podcast.
• 0:03
  I'm here with Belinda.
• 0:05
  She's going to be sharing her story as an author, coach, and speaker.
• 0:09
  So Belinda, how did God get you started in business?
• 0:14
  Hi Lyle, it's great to be here.
• 0:16
  Well, I think basically that this time around, because I was in business before I started homeschooling my children, but this time around, I was teaching at a secular college in
• 0:28
  human services.
• 0:29
  And it felt to me like God was saying that if I could replace that income with coaching, then I could continue to write, because I'm primarily...
• 0:39
  I guess you could say I'm primarily an author, but I'm coming to the end of the books that God has said I have to write.
• 0:45
  Thank God.
• 0:46
  Because it's not an easy process.
• 0:49
  And at the ninth book now that I just finished, I'm looking to those last two books as an ending point.
• 0:57
  But having said that, I still need to earn a living and build my coaching business while I'm writing, because just the writing itself doesn't provide enough income for me and my
• 1:08
  family.
• 1:09
  So God kind of guided me into coaching to replace the income from teaching and still allow me to keep writing.
• 1:18
  So that's kind of how I got into business this second time.
• 1:22
  A long time ago, I was in business for myself as a uh social worker and an addiction counselor.
• 1:29
  I was in private practice and I own my own training institute where I would teach other people how to help people who had addictions.
• 1:39
  follow an ethical code and take care of themselves while they were doing all that.
• 1:44
  So I had like 24 trainings in my institute and they would come to me for CEUs.
• 1:49
  So that was a long time ago and then now this is more of a coaching and speaking business to go with the writing that I'm trying to do and finish doing.
• 1:58
  So yeah, that's kind of how I got into this business.
• 2:03
  to impact others through coaching.
• 2:06
  Right.
• 2:09
  So tell me what is one thing that you think God has really given you as that crust, that one thing that pulls you forward?
• 2:18
  Well, you mean like what he's doing with me right now in the business, like how he's showing up for me.
• 2:25
  of wisdom that God displayed in your life?
• 2:30
  Well, I think he's trying to overcome the fear, the freeze response that I have around, number one, building another business.
• 2:40
  It wasn't in my plan to do this.
• 2:42
  It just really wasn't.
• 2:44
  I thought I would be retired right now and just giving my skills and my gifts away.
• 2:50
  And because I'm a widow, I need to earn a living.
• 2:53
  he's trying to help me overcome all the fear of redoing this all over again.
• 2:58
  And sometimes I'm like a little toddler, you know, throwing a tantrum, Lyle.
• 3:02
  I'll just go, yeah, like I've already been there and done that.
• 3:05
  I've already done this, Lord, do I have to do it again?
• 3:08
  And then other days it's like, oh, what a privilege to serve all these people.
• 3:12
  So I go from my tantrum self to my mature self.
• 3:17
  It just depends on what day you're going to get me.
• 3:20
  But poor God, he has to put up with a lot from me.
• 3:23
  But he is showing me that he's going to provide no matter what.
• 3:29
  when I have extra expenses, you know, he'll send in a client, you know, uh, bails out on me.
• 3:35
  He'll send another client to replace that person.
• 3:38
  No, it's not the five more clients that I wish I would have to really replace the expense, but at least I'm, I'm holding steady on the income that I'm coming in because he's
• 3:48
  allowing other people, uh, to come to me.
• 3:51
  And as you know, when you have to do sales yourself for your business, uh, which most people do.
• 3:58
  that there's a fear of sales unless you work at it through the eyes of God.
• 4:05
  This is a service I'm providing.
• 4:06
  This is something that I'm going to help you with.
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  my gosh, I've got all this experience, this knowledge and this personal empathy from all the things I've experienced.
• 4:15
  I really am a great coach.
• 4:16
  Would you like to work with me?
• 4:19
  But you don't know all the time about how people will receive you.
• 4:24
  so sales is always a little bit tricky and there's always...
• 4:27
  I think in building a business, the part around sales for the business is something that a lot of people struggle with.
• 4:35
  So that's the part that God's working on me with and, trying to, you know, trust that over time it's going to build.
• 4:44
  Cause by the time I finished the first business that I closed down to start homeschooling my children, oh that business was making a lot of money.
• 4:54
  God, just really just outdone himself for me.
• 4:56
  He just dumped the grace on me.
• 4:58
  was, like I said, I had people coming for all their CEUs from me, some of them.
• 5:03
  I had private practice clients.
• 5:06
  I was speaking at conferences, writing a book, doing all kinds of journal articles.
• 5:11
  Like I was just wildly successful for a person who had a master of social work degree.
• 5:16
  You just wouldn't think it.
• 5:17
  And so he's just reminding me that it took 10 years for us to build that and we're...
• 5:24
  not there yet with this.
• 5:25
  We're just a few years into that process.
• 5:28
  So yeah, so he's working with me through the fear and he's working with me in the trusting.
• 5:35
  He'll always provide no matter what.
• 5:40
  That's great.
• 5:41
  And tell me, so you're developing your business.
• 5:43
  It's a whole new start over for you.
• 5:45
  What's God doing right now in your business?
• 5:48
  What's he doing that you're excited about?
• 5:51
  Oh, well, there are a couple of things with book sales that I'm very excited about.
• 5:56
  And then there are a couple of things with new opportunities for speaking, because every time I go out to speak, I can sell both my books and my coaching services.
• 6:05
  So that's really helpful.
• 6:07
  Going to a Writers Guild conference at the end of this month.
• 6:10
  And then I've got some women's conferences that I'm looking at that are very seriously considering having me come to speak.
• 6:18
  So that's real, real exciting.
• 6:20
  because then I'll be bringing books there and signing books and um helping people with the books.
• 6:26
  Because the only reason I wrote them is because I thought I could help them.
• 6:29
  God called me to help people through this writing.
• 6:32
  So I want to get the books to the people that need it, right?
• 6:36
  So ah that's exciting to know that these doors are opening up.
• 6:42
  And you and I have a coaching.
• 6:46
  Go ahead.
• 6:46
  Sorry.
• 6:46
  just seeing the growth in the coaching clients that I am working with, it's very, very gratifying.
• 6:53
  So I'm always grateful to God that he got those people to me.
• 6:57
  I'm able to show up or he's able to show up through me and coach with me and we're able to make a difference in their lives and we're seeing a lot of progress.
• 7:05
  So yeah, there's just so many things, so many good things.
• 7:09
  That's good.
• 7:10
  You're on the rebuild factor and you're talking about sales.
• 7:12
  You and I have a coach in common, Justin, and he says sales is service or sales is love is another phrase for that.
• 7:19
  And it's all about caring for those people enough to get past yourself and get into helping them.
• 7:26
  It's just a mindset thing.
• 7:27
  Tell us about that mindset because I know you deal with it personally.
• 7:31
  Yes.
• 7:32
  So when, when I was a therapist, I did a lot of work with cognitive behavioral therapy.
• 7:37
  It's called CBT for short.
• 7:39
  And there's a great book if people are interested, if they want to try to do their kind of coach themselves through it first before they get a coach.
• 7:47
  But, but I do, I do recommend this book.
• 7:51
  It's called feeling great.
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  The new mood therapy.
• 7:54
  Um, no, sorry.
• 7:55
  Feeling good.
• 7:56
  The new mood therapy is his first book.
• 7:58
  That's Dr.
• 7:59
  David Burns.
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  And then feeling great.
• 8:02
  the revolutionary new treatment for depression and anxiety.
• 8:05
  I'm looking at the book.
• 8:07
  This is his new book now.
• 8:09
  He kind of walks you through how to do this for yourself.
• 8:13
  But basically you look at a thought that's killing you, that's really taking all your energy, making you fearful or whatever.
• 8:21
  You look at the feelings that produces and the action or most of the time non-action, because most of time you're going to freeze when you're feeling fearful.
• 8:31
  overwhelmed, confused, all those things, you're gonna freeze and you're gonna put it off, or you're gonna do it just to get rid of it sort of thing, you're not gonna do it to the
• 8:43
  best of your ability, right, if you even act on it at all.
• 8:46
  So I'm gonna have the person look at what the thought is.
• 8:50
  So the thought is, you know, I can't do sales, I don't know what I'm doing, okay.
• 8:56
  So, and the enemy, usually, if you're a Christian, the enemy's gonna put just a little kernel of truth in there.
• 9:01
  Maybe I don't know all of what I'm doing, right?
• 9:04
  But so then we're gonna really think that that's the truth.
• 9:07
  Okay, no, I may not know all of what I'm doing, but I have enough skills to show up for somebody and tell them what I do and invite them to come and work with me because I know
• 9:18
  that God has given me this skill and he wants me to use it for their good and for his glory.
• 9:23
  Okay, now you see now that,
• 9:25
  thought leads to you feeling encouraged, hopeful, confident.
• 9:30
  And if you can't be confident in yourself, at least you're confident in the Lord.
• 9:33
  Like there's a way that that thought is now then leading you to the first step.
• 9:38
  What's an action that I actually can take?
• 9:41
  I can make a list of five people that I could invite and just do that over the next few days and schedule that into my oh calendar.
• 9:52
  So now you went from thinking you can't do it and you're frozen.
• 9:55
  to, well, there's a bit of truth and I don't know everything that I'm doing, but I know enough to get started.
• 10:01
  And so now I'm gonna be confident that I can at least start and I'm gonna call five people or text them or send them an email.
• 10:08
  And so that's the difference in working on finding the lies and replacing them with the truth.
• 10:17
  So anytime something gets you stuck or you feel like you're frozen in that continuum from the thought leading to the feeling,
• 10:24
  leading to the action or non-action.
• 10:26
  If you're over here freezing and being overwhelmed, you know that there's something over here in the thought that's a lie and that is not the real truth because God didn't set us
• 10:36
  up to fail.
• 10:37
  So you go back to the thought and see what is the grain of truth and take that out and put it in, reframe it.
• 10:45
  And then it'll lead you to that confidence in God and yourself and that hopefulness that will lead you to take at least a small action, a little micro step if that's all you can
• 10:54
  do.
• 10:54
  You know?
• 10:55
  So yeah, that's, um I'm telling you, the best thing I can tell you about this, about how effective it is, is I was in the classroom one day with one of my students who um was
• 11:10
  acting as the client.
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  So I'm teaching a basic counseling skills class to students who will become counselors.
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  Some of them will be in human services and some of them will be in addictions.
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  But.
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  wherever they're going in this whole big, huge field of working with people, they have to know all these listening and counseling skills.
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  So we get into small groups and I'm one of the extra observers.
• 11:32
  So there's an observer, a client and a counselor.
• 11:37
  And this woman is really dealing with a lot of stuff from her mom.
• 11:41
  And so I asked the counselor of the session, could I just take a moment and kind of jump in here?
• 11:48
  and work with Corman for just a second if you don't mind.
• 11:51
  Oh no, professor, please do.
• 11:53
  uh That was usually the response I would get when I would ask him.
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  And I just looked at Corman and I said, Corman, this thought is absolutely killing you.
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  Do you wanna get rid of this?
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  Do you wanna fix this today?
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  Do you wanna get out of the pain?
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  And she goes, yeah.
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  So we started looking at how the thought was leading to all these terrible, really painful feelings.
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  and she was totally shutting down on the other end.
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  She was even thinking about moving somewhere different so that her mom couldn't say these things to her.
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  Whereas whenever I worked with her and I asked the little group now, is she not an intelligent person?
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  And everybody was like, no, no, she's very intelligent.
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  So we refrained the first one that she's stupid to I'm an intelligent woman.
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  And as the professor, I'm telling her, you make one of the highest grades in this class.
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  You're always prepared.
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  Like, I'm just giving her all these
• 12:44
  truths, like these are facts that come against the law that she's been told and by a very authoritarian person in her life.
• 12:52
  And again, whether a person says something to you directly or what you get from the person is this image where you think you're stupid or whatever, it's still the same.
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  You're going to feel like you can't do anything.
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  So then we reframe that and we said, I am intelligent woman.
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  I can set boundaries with people, including my mom.
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  and I'm going to totally kill it in this class and all my other classes until I get my degree.
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  And how does that make you feel?
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  Well, uh wow, she just left me.
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  She's like, my gosh, I feel like I can take on the world.
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  I'm confident.
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  I'm hopeful.
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  And so we just started writing all these wonderful feelings.
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  Now what are you going to do?
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  I'm not moving.
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  I'm just going to tell my mom.
• 13:34
  Don't say that to me anymore, mom.
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  I'm like, oh, this is great.
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  And she looked at me afterward and she goes,
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  my gosh, professor, I have been through five years of therapy and in five minutes you have totally changed my life.
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  And I looked at her and it was like, I wanted to look up at God and say, thank you God.
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  Cause what you put in me was able to come out right here with this person.
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  And now her whole life is different.
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  She'll never believe that lie from the enemy again.
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  However it came, whoever it came through, doesn't matter.
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  She won't, she's not there anymore.
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  She's gonna have a better relationship with her mom.
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  She's not gonna be avoiding her.
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  She's gonna be standing up and she's gonna be saying whether you mean it this way or not, this is what I'm getting.
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  Like we just, it was literally five to 10 minutes.
• 14:22
  That's all we took.
• 14:23
  But because I understand how to walk people through the process, she was just there in a second.
• 14:29
  And she's the one who bought me this book, the Feeling Great book.
• 14:33
  Cause I was always mentioning the Feeling Good book in the class and she was so appreciative.
• 14:37
  of what God and I had done for her in that five minutes that she bought me the new book.
• 14:44
  That's great.
• 14:44
  Yeah, you're taking the lie or the feelings and you're impacting with truth.
• 14:48
  And in your case, you had better with truth and God's word.
• 14:52
  Right, right.
• 14:54
  How does God see you?
• 14:55
  How does God and us, like people outside of whoever was telling you that, well, we totally see a different thing and we're not like, she knows us, she knows us, because we had been
• 15:06
  in the class for a long time together.
• 15:08
  It was a 16 week class and this was toward the ending of the class.
• 15:12
  So she totally knows me and trusts me.
• 15:14
  She knows the other women that we're working with.
• 15:17
  So she knows we're not lying to her to make her feel better, like we're not gonna do that.
• 15:22
  And we're proving it with facts, you know?
• 15:26
  Yeah, so you show up prepared, you're very responsible, you do, you have such meaningful things to share, you're very intelligent.
• 15:35
  Like I'm an intelligent person and I know what intelligence looks like, so.
• 15:40
  Yeah, so it was just.
• 15:42
  ah I just invite everybody, if you're struggling with a lot of negative thoughts, do something about it.
• 15:48
  know, work through it, get a coach who can help you with it, but just don't let it sit there because your business is going to stall on the things that you have those kinds of
• 15:58
  thoughts about.
• 15:59
  So even if you just work through whatever it is you're thinking about sales and then work through whatever it is you're thinking about trying to promote yourself on social media.
• 16:07
  I know those are the things that I see a lot of authors and coaches.
• 16:11
  have just a tremendous struggle with.
• 16:13
  And if you're struggling with trying to write things, have an ability to have some kind of authoritative kind of a stance with the audience that you're trying to your business with,
• 16:26
  then you might need a writing coach.
• 16:28
  That's something that I do.
• 16:30
  you can do this.
• 16:32
  There's no skill that you can't build if you work at it.
• 16:36
  And you just need some help working at it.
• 16:38
  So you need to build a team, a support team.
• 16:41
  to assist you, you know?
• 16:42
  So that would be something that for your business, working on your own mindset, working on your own self-care, taking all the lies and all the overwhelm out and just staying steady
• 16:54
  with what you feel like God is calling you to do or provide for people in your business.
• 16:59
  Yeah.
• 17:00
  That reminds me of 2 Corinthians 10-5 and had to look it up over here.
• 17:04
  We demolish arguments and every pretense that sets itself up against the knowledge of God.
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  And we take captive every thought and make it obedient to Christ.
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  There's power in the word.
• 17:16
  I love that.
• 17:18
  So we're going to shift real quickly.
• 17:19
  Great story.
• 17:20
  Thank you for sharing that.
• 17:21
  That's going to impact somebody's life.
• 17:23
  I guarantee somebody's going to hear that story and go, I need to be reminded of those same things.
• 17:27
  But as we shift,
• 17:28
  We're going to talk about some business growth.
• 17:29
  are some things you're doing to help your business grow, especially since you're redeveloping?
• 17:36
  Well, I'm taking a Pinterest course right now.
• 17:39
  I've taken a sales school, like you had mentioned before, when we were in the CCA together, I have um tried to learn.
• 17:48
  I'm going to learn Canva.
• 17:50
  I don't care how I do it.
• 17:52
  I'm just going to do it.
• 17:53
  um But there are things that I'm doing right now to, to position myself to where all these things that I don't know how to do don't continue to cause me fear and stress.
• 18:04
  So.
• 18:05
  All I can do is like take it on, but I can only take on one at a time.
• 18:09
  So while I'm doing all the coaching, trying to sell books, uh sending out speaker packets to try to get speaking engagements right now, the writing is kind of suffering, but I'm
• 18:26
  just doing articles right now.
• 18:27
  So, but those articles will help people and those articles aren't heavy for me.
• 18:32
  So those are some things I'm doing right now.
• 18:35
  And I read a great book that I wanted to recommend to people.
• 18:38
  um It's a book by Andreas Wiedmer.
• 18:41
  It's called The Art of Principled Entrepreneurship.
• 18:44
  And he just did, again, oh what is our economic system and how is it supposed to work?
• 18:51
  And instead of everybody trashing it, let's look at what it's really supposed to be doing, how business people are really supposed to be serving and not being greedy.
• 18:59
  and how the reputation that business owners have gotten as greedy people is because of a few and not most of us.
• 19:07
  Most of us are trying to serve with the products or services that we have developed.
• 19:12
  We're trying to meet a need, but it just washed all that nasty negative stuff that I've had in my mind that really made me not want to start another business again, because it's
• 19:24
  a lot of work and why do I want to get out in business the way it is right now?
• 19:29
  Again, when you're listening to the world's version of things and not God's version of things, you're not seeing the wholesomeness that's out there.
• 19:37
  You're only seeing the bad stuff.
• 19:38
  And so your mind is flooded with all this trash and you're trying to, I'm just trying to let it all be washed away.
• 19:44
  I'm listening to uh Andreas Wiedmer.
• 19:50
  uh He is head of the principal entrepreneurship, the school of principal entrepreneurship at CUA.
• 19:58
  in Washington.
• 20:00
  And when he wrote this book, was so that he could give people again, uh like a fresh look at what we're supposed to be doing.
• 20:10
  And it just kind of reorients you to what business is and how, and there's a lot of good reflection questions at the end of the chapters that he puts in.
• 20:18
  So that's the book that I've been working with that I recommend to people um to try to continue to grow in.
• 20:26
  just your understanding overall of your business and how to then pinpoint certain things you want to do in your business.
• 20:31
  Because he does that too in the book.
• 20:36
  And as we end up here, what's a tidbit of wisdom you want to leave us with today?
• 20:41
  And how can we get in touch with you?
• 20:43
  yes.
• 20:45
  Well, I thought that, you know, um for those of you who believe in God, your relationship to God and your commitment to daily prayer is absolutely foundational because you cannot
• 20:59
  build a life or a business without it.
• 21:01
  Like, I don't know how I would be overcoming all these things.
• 21:05
  a second.
• 21:07
  You blipped a little bit.
• 21:08
  Could you start over that wisdom part so we can get a good clear version of that?
• 21:13
  Okay, so your relationship to God and your commitment to your daily prayer life so that you grow in unity with God is just very, very important and foundational.
• 21:25
  Like before you do anything else, make sure that you're doing what you feel called to do and you're living out your uh relationship to God by doing His will, trying to give Him
• 21:38
  all the glory and trying to serve
• 21:41
  all the people, because then you're living out the first great commandment to love God and love others uh as yourself.
• 21:47
  So that would be my first thing, because for me, I can't build a life and I can't build a business without that.
• 21:56
  oh reading the scriptures, talking to people, service, you know, just listening deeply and accompanying people and listening to God throughout the day, uh trying to bring
• 22:09
  All your thoughts captive to Christ like we were talking about before.
• 22:13
  These are a foundation to build a business and a good life around.
• 22:20
  And how can we get in touch with you?
• 22:23
  Well, I have a website.
• 22:24
  It's my full name, BelindaTerroMunie.com.
• 22:28
  I'll send you the links to put in the show note and everything, Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, Pinterest, everything is at my full name, BelindaTerroMunie.
• 22:38
  So if you wanna email me, you can email me Belinda at BelindaTerroMunie.com.
• 22:44
  So anything you do, if you use my full name, you can reach me.
• 22:49
  You can sign up for my newsletter.
• 22:50
  You can look at my books on my website.
• 22:53
  I have a wonderful book about self-care that I've used with all those hundreds of human services students to make sure that when they go out into counseling, they're not burning
• 23:04
  out.
• 23:04
  So I know it would work with business people and coaches.
• 23:07
  So that book looks at all the wellness areas, so spiritual, but then also all your physical, mental health, your creativity, your...
• 23:17
  uh
• 23:20
  your relationships, it's just a, and it's called My Therapeutic Lifestyle Changes Workbook, Creating a Comprehensive Plan for a Calm, Ordered Life.
• 23:29
  It helps you to build that good foundation of health and wellness.
• 23:35
  And so your prayer life will go under your spiritual wellness TLC.
• 23:42
  Thank you for sharing with us today.
• 23:45
  I'm so, so happy.
• 23:47
  I will be praying for everybody who listens to the podcast and hoping that you'll get the little nugget that God wanted you to get from this.
• 23:54
  God bless you all.