S06|11 - Leading Your Life Through Intuition with Amber Smith
Apr 24, 2023Amber Smith is a life and business coach for soulful entrepreneurs and a mom of 3 girls. She loves helping ambitious women grow successful online businesses that create high impact by helping them do the inner work.
In this episode:
- What intuition is and how it can guide your life
- How to know the difference between intuition and your own thoughts
- Carving out space for answers and creative solutions to come in
- Getting quiet in your own body and finding the time/space for answers
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Episode Transcript
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Hi, I'm Crystal The Parenting Coach. Parenting is the thing that some of us just expected to know how to do. It's not like other areas of your life where you go to school and get taught, get on the job training, or have mentors to help you, but now you can get that help here.
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What Amber Smith does and how she got started
Leading Your Life Through Intuition with Amber Smith
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Amber Smith is a life and business coach for soulful entrepreneurs and a mom of 3 girls. She loves helping ambitious women grow successful online businesses that create high impact by helping them do the inner work.
All right, welcome to the podcast today, everybody. I have a guest today that I'm excited about. Amber and I connected a long time ago, over a year ago, I think, on Instagram. And I just feel like we're really aligned in what we talk about and how we live our lives, and businesses and family and all the things. And so, I thought it would be a great conversation to have her come on and talk to us today.
So, before we dig into our topic, which is going to be around intuition, which is one of my favorite things-- if you know me on Instagram, you probably know that. That is what I would love to have our conversation around.
But first of all, Amber, do you want to just tell us a little bit about what you do and then also I would love to hear kind of your origin story, how you even got here. Like, what landed you into what you're doing?
Amber Smith: Yeah. So, I consider myself like a Life & Business coach because I do a lot of life coaching; but generally, I work with entrepreneurs and coaches growing their business, making more money.
But it's all related, right? Like when they're trying to grow their business, a lot of them have kids and a lot of them are married and a lot of them are trying to be successful in lots of different ways. And so, I consider what I do life coaching a lot of times.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Well, I think your business is personal when you're an entrepreneur, right?
Amber Smith: Yeah.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: All of your business issues you bring into personal life, all the personal you bring into business; and trying to manage and balance all of that, it's like all interconnected.
Amber Smith: Totally. Definitely. Yeah. The word that I like to think about is like integrated, right? Like the way that you show up, you know, in your marriage, often affects the way that you show up in your business; whether you see it right away or not, it definitely presents itself in growth.
And so, that's what I've found. But my origin story, so I studied Psychology for my bachelor's degree thinking I was going to become a therapist.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Me too. Me too.
Amber Smith: Okay. So, I started my-- I actually like got into a Master's program and was like halfway through, but then had my first baby. And when I got-- It was by choice, like we wanted to start our family, but I had no idea what I was in for; thinking I could have a baby, and just continue on doing my practicum and all this stuff.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Yes. The things you think before you have kids, you're like, 'Oh, it'll be easy.'
Amber Smith: It's going to be easy; I can do that.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: I was in the school when I had a baby too; and I'm like, it's fine.
Amber Smith: It's fine
Crystal The Parenting Coach: And then I'm like sick all day trying to like listen to the lectures, but like, not even being able to like stay in the classroom.
Amber Smith: Yes. And so, and then even while I was pregnant, I was like, 'I got this, I can do this.' It's online. Like a lot of it is online. Some of it is in person. Like, it'd be fine. And then like I had her and I was like--
And at that time, I was about to start a 25-hour week practicum out of that house to like finish my Master's degree. And it was really this, like, the question that haunted me was like, who's going to raise my baby?
And I was like, I do not like that question. And so, through a lot of pondering and praying and talking and like really thinking through what I wanted out of my life, I decided to drop out, which was hard because that means student loans we could come do. It means I don't get a Master's degree.
Anyway, before I had started my Master's degree, like to backtrack a little bit, I had worked at a residential treatment center and they treated me as what they called like a Values Coach. So, they would go to therapy, but they would also work with me where they lived.
We talked about like their internal locus of control and, you know, their thoughts and more like applied – more like coaching instead of therapy.
And so, that's where I first heard the word 'coach', but I kind of like put that on the shelf and forgot about it because I was going to become a therapist. So, I didn't really think about that. Anyway, fast forward; I have a baby and now I'm pregnant with my second baby, and I start a blog called Growing in Grace!. And I just shared my thoughts about growth.
Because I was really interested in personal development and combining it with principles more of grace and surrender, and like that combination, right? So, yes, do all you can do to improve your life, but also take it easy on yourself and, you know, believe that you're going to be okay…and rest, and all this stuff.
And that's when I started getting people reading my blog, and I would get like this-- I remember this one time I got a message that was like, "Do you take coaching clients?" And I didn't know what that meant.
And so, I was like, "No, I don't."
And then, it just like wouldn't go-- that thought wouldn't go away. And then I found like Tony Robbins and Brendon Burchard; and then, eventually, I found Brooke Castillo from The Life Coach School. And I was like, 'I think like I could do this, like this coaching thing.'
And I found this random YouTube video that was like, 'Here's how I would start a coaching business from scratch'. And it was like, 'Coach a hundred people for free'.
And I had-- I had tools and stuff, so I was like, 'Okay, I'm going to do it.'
So, I started coaching people for free. And those people were like, 'Okay, I want to keep doing this, how do I pay you?'
And those like became my first paying clients. And then it was just like this snowball effect. So, I, life coached for a couple years; and then over time, other coaches were like, 'Hey, how are you doing? How did you build your business from like, nothing – nothing?'
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Yeah, because then you didn't have an expectation either. You were just like, 'I'm taking all this previous knowledge that I already have.'
Because this is an interesting thing that comes up with people that ask me about it; I get a lot of DMs about, "How did you become a Parenting Coach, and what do you suggest?"
And like, I'm actually not technically a Parenting Coach. Like I've never been certified in Parenting Coaching; I've been certified as a life coach, but I take those tools and combine them with my previous knowledge of parenting and all the books that I've read and whatever.
Amber Smith: So good.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: And so, I think so much of what makes us be able to do what we do, even though we may have certifications or trainings or programs or whatever, is actually our own experience taking us through it and then our experience with other clients also.
Amber Smith: Yeah. Yeah. And I learned this from Russell Brunson, who's like a business person. He's like, "My results are my certification." And so, I've thought about that a lot because now it's like, I have undeniable proof that what I do works.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Yeah.
Amber Smith: You know, I have like lots of happy clients, lots of testimonials, like lots of people doing great. And so, it's not that I don't learn too. I've always been obsessed with learning--
Crystal The Parenting Coach: With learning.
Amber Smith: -and learning tools and combining principles, which I think what you just said was really valuable because it's like you combine life coaching principles with what you had with parenting.
That's what I feel like I've done with a lot. It's like I'm taking this idea from psychology and this idea from business; and we're combining it right?
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Yeah.
Amber Smith: And I think that that's where intellectual property comes from. And like, I resonate with people in different ways than other coaches, just like you do, because you're combining lots of different ideas in useful ways. So, that's why I think about it.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Yeah. Even though I did my certification, afterwards, I like definitely did it in the way that I was taught a lot; but then I was just kind of like, 'Okay, no, I want more or I want something different or whatever.'
And so, now, my coaching has evolved into something completely different than what I was trained. So, I'll have people ask me like, 'How did you learn this, or what--'
And I'm like, 'It's not, it's not something--'
I can't be like, go to this school and you'll learn it, because it is so different and it's evolved so much. And so, I think like you, for people that love just like self-help and love psychology and love figuring out people's brains, we're always learning and we're always developing – we're always growing.
What intuition is and how it can guide your life
Crystal The Parenting Coach: So, it's always a hard question to answer when people are like, what should I do? And I'm like, 'I don't know; here's all the things, look into it'…and which will lead us into our topic – but of leading your life through intuition, but that's really what has happened in my business and my life too.
So, now you're in a space where you're working with clients, mostly business. You also coach them on life. But everybody pretty much runs a business.
Amber Smith: But they come to me for business. Yeah.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Right. So, where did intuition come in for you? When did this kind of come into your life? How did you hear about it?
Amber Smith: Yeah, I'm trying to think of a time where I didn't like use it because I'm sure we'll like dissect what I'm about to say. But I remember when that YouTube video, I randomly found it, and he's like, 'Here's how I would life coach.'
I remember the feeling I had, which was like, 'This matters; like this is--' Maybe the word is resonance, right? Like, this somehow feels like home to me in a micro. Like, this is it.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Oh, my goodness, we have to pause there because I think that is literally the system of intuition. Like, it feels like home. It's like those little moments, like you just said, because, for me, that happened when I watched the video of The Life Coach School training and I decided to sign up. And it was like so pucky and crazy and scary and whatever. But that feeling of like--
Amber Smith: But it was right.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: This feels like home. Like, this is right.
Amber Smith: Yeah.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: I love that. I love that that has already been guiding you, and probably you felt that way even when you were trying to determine whether or not to leave your Master's program because that's a huge thing too.
Amber Smith: Yeah, and I battled it for a long time. And then it was like-- And this is something that I think it's like you have to go to the future a little bit to know if it's intuitively right. I think that it's hard when you look only at right now, right?
Like The Life Coach School example you gave, it's not just like, is it right to pay all this money to get a certification? It's like you're also zooming into the future and that also feels like the right move, whatever it's going to lead you to.
So, it's like, it's right now and it's right for the future. And I feel like that's the combination that I know, like my intuition is guiding me. Like, it's not just good for right now because sometimes your intuition's going to guide you to do something really uncomfortable, but it's leading you where you want to go.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Oh, I would say 75% of the time, my intuition doesn't feel like that peace, grounded, calm feeling. Sometimes it does. But so many of the times, it's like pushing me to an edge that's really uncomfortable.
Amber Smith: Yeah.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Okay. I love that. That whole thing. So, when did you kind of start noticing that as intuition and learning how to kind of harness it more in your life and your business?
Amber Smith: Yeah, so I remember, so the first course I bought it was like KBB, I don't know if you followed Dean Graziosi.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Oh yeah. Yeah.
Amber Smith: Yeah, so like-- Well, I guess maybe that's in business. In general-- Like do you want in general, about intuition?
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Yeah.
Amber Smith: Yeah. So, like, the first time I can remember using it in business-- I'll use that example first and then I have other ideas as well. There's like this course that I wanted to buy, and it did not make financial sense for me at the time – kind of like we were talking about.
Like, but I knew-- I just knew it was like going to help me create what I wanted. And my husband was like, 'Are you sure this is a good idea? Like this is crazy. Like, you've never spent this much money before, what if it doesn't work?' Like all this doubt.
But what's interesting, if I got quiet in my own body, it was like, this is right. And you have to believe, right? Like, other people might not believe it, but it's coming to you. This idea came to you.
And so, like that feeling of home in the micro; and the vision in the future, I knew what I could create. It was like a leap of faith. And sometimes, that's what's required to honor your intuition. Right? Like, it feels like almost like a free fall or like uncertain.
And so, and then that course made me tons of money because I plugged what I learned and everything. And it was for sure a good idea; I didn't know it was going to be okay.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: But if you don't know in the beginning if it's going to turn out.
Amber Smith: You didn't know when you take the leap.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: And it also doesn't mean that you're going to get the kind of results you think you are either. Right?
Amber Smith: No.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Like, lots of times you're like, 'Wait a second, I thought this is going to lead to like more clients or more money or more growth or more impact.' And you're like, 'Wait a second, what happened here?' Yeah.
Amber Smith: Yeah. Because sometimes I think we get results that seem like something's gone wrong, but actually; it's like either developing you into the person you'd be, or you learn, this isn't for me. And that is valuable information too, right?
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Yes.
Amber Smith: Like, I'm so glad that I almost became a therapist and then I didn't, because now I'm like, I love what I do so much. I wouldn't-- Even if I had all the time and all the money in the world, I still wouldn't go to get trained as a therapist because I love what I do.
So, it's like sometimes you have to go down a path that is wrong. I don't know if you're watching this on a video, but probably not. I'm making quotes, air quotes.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: I do air quotes all the time on my podcast. I'm like, 'Oh wait, I should probably say--'
Amber Smith: But it's like, it seems it's just wasn't the right path, but it was still the right move because you learned something that got you to the right path with the skills and the perspective and experience that'll solve the long run.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Yeah. I think 100% of the time, your intuition either leads you to the path of growth and learning or to the path where you're going to get the results and the outcome.
Amber Smith: The result you want, yeah.
Getting quiet in your own body and finding the time/space for answers
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Yeah, either one. But I love also what you pointed out; you just kind of said it quickly, but getting quiet in your own body--
Amber Smith: Yeah.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: -because intuition never comes from a space of like busyness. And it also never comes from a space of-- Someone commented on my post a while ago and was like, "I don't know if intuition's true all the time because it can get confused with the trauma response."
And I was like, "Yeah, but that's not intuition."
And so, if you're not taking time to get really quiet and safe and chill in your own body first, you can really get it mixed up with either other people's thoughts or ideas – or it really can be like a dysregulated response from fear, shame, discomfort, whatever.
So, the discomfort we're talking about is not that kind of discomfort. It's not from like a dysregulated state of like really, really strong emotion there. It's from--
I describe it as like being at the top of a rollercoaster because at one time in high school, I got convinced to go on a rollercoaster. I'd never been on one before, ever. And it was like the biggest one I think in Canada; it's at West Edmonton Mall.
Amber Smith: Wow.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: And it's giant. And the only reason I went on it is because there was a really cute boy that asked me to go on it and he'd never talked to me before. Fast forward, the cute boy is now my husband.
Amber Smith: Oh my gosh.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: This was pretty much our first interaction.
Amber Smith: That's a great story. Yeah.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: And he was like, 'You should go on it.'
My friends have been begging me to go on it all day and I'm like, 'No, no way.' We're there for a high school physics trip.
And he's like, 'You should go on it.' And I'm like, 'Okay.' So, I'm like standing behind him in line and I'm like, 'This is so dumb, I cannot believe I'm doing this.' But anyways.
Amber Smith: Like, why did I say yes?
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Right? Then I get strapped in, I'm already screaming before we even like start moving. But we get to the very top and we're like at the apex of like this crazy drop.
And I'm just like, this is crazy. And like right before we go down, and then, of course, it's like thrilling. And it ended up being awesome. And I went a couple times again; and years later, we ended up getting married. So, it worked out.
Amber Smith: Of course.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: But the crux of the story there is like at the very top of that rollercoaster, everything inside me was like, ugh. Like it felt so pukey. 'Pukey' is the only word I can use to describe it. And now when my intuition is pushing me to an edge of like discomfort, that's what it feels like. It's like pukey, but not pukey-wrong – pukey-right, and I don't know how to explain that feeling in my body.
Amber Smith: Pukey-right. Yeah. Well, this is how I think about it; usually, your intuition's going to lead you into a possibility or potentiality, not something that's predictable. And that's what's--
Like to me, a trauma response is predictable over time. You can start to see your trauma response is going to-- your body's going to react and respond the way it always does. And that, oftentimes, is like a trauma response.
What's interesting to me is when you learn to trust yourself and to slow down and get quiet-- I like to go on walks, that's how I kind of like tap in. But without like podcasts or music or anything, just like kind of listening to my own thoughts and--
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Me too.
Amber Smith: -what comes by. But usually, it's like something possible. Like I think that your rollercoaster is like a really interesting example, like that was not predictable for you.
There's things that, for sure, like decisions that I've made that have had huge payoffs. Both like internal satisfaction, family, business, all of it came from like the pukeyness, which I love that you describe that, but it was not predictable.
It was something that felt so out of my comfort zone, but still had that feeling of, 'This is right, I don't know why-- I don't know how it's going to turn out, but this is a pukey yes for me.'
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Yes.
Amber Smith: It's not predictable. It can't be.
How to know the difference between intuition and your own thoughts
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Yeah. And it's so interesting to start living your life by that.
Amber Smith: Yeah.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: So, intuition came into my life a couple of years ago. I've always believed in what I call like the spirit. So, I've always been like--
Amber Smith: The spirit, me too.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: -kind of tapped into my body, I guess, and my own responses. But I did definitely felt like I was pretty indecisive. One of the things I first started learning when I started life coaching was; how I explain myself matters, how I identify matters. Right?
Amber Smith: Yeah.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: And so, I used to explain myself as this really indecisive person and then your thoughts create your reality. And I was always this indecisive person.
And so, I started changing these little things like, 'Wait a second, maybe I'm really good at making decisions.' And so, I started noticing, I actually am. Like, when I heard about The Life Coach School; I just heard about it, I was looking for Master's programs at the time. And so, I had some money like carved away.
Amber Smith: Saved it up. Yeah.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: We were living in my parents in my in-law's basement and my husband didn't have a job, just finished his Master's. So, we had all this debt and like zero money; homeschooling four kids in my in-law's basement. It like, was a pinnacle worst time ever. Then I find out about it, and I signed up within just a couple days.
I watched it and I was like, 'I know this is a thing, I have no idea why, and this is so bonkers.' And also, it's like 30% more because it was American, for me. So, I'm like, this is a lot of money. But it felt right.
And I think my husband felt that also, which was helpful for me because I think it would've been tricky for me to decide that. But over time, I started like noticing, "Wait, the way that I identify myself really matters."
And so, I started changing those things; and I started realizing that the way that I thought about myself, which I now call my self-concept, was what was blocking my access to intuition.
Amber Smith: So good.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: And so, I really thought that I didn't have the answers. I thought that some outside source had the answers.
And I think this is really common as women; and I think this is really common, especially for people that are religious because you're so used to kind of listening to other people maybe tell you things or whatever.
And so, and even just as women, and not even as women, but just like as humans with all of these experts around us, like there's so much information. And we have access to like, books and research and podcasts; and we're like, 'Well, somebody else probably has the answer.'
And we kind of tap out of our own personal authority. And I think of intuition as kind of like alignment. Like yeah, somebody might say something outside of me, but I also feel the yesness of it inside of me.
Amber Smith: Yeah. Context matters, right? Just because someone said something in a book or on a show that you watched, doesn't mean that that's the right context for you.
The other thing that I think of is like seasons that we're in, the person that's saying it-- I remember like early in my entrepreneur journey, like I really liked listening to certain people and I was like, "Wait, they're not a mom, they don't work part-time, they have a team…they're trying to build a billion-dollar business and I'm no, is their advice for me?" I don't know.
And so, what I've learned is I look for true principles that people teach; and then I ask, how can I apply that? Like, where does that fit in my belief system? Where does that fit in what I'm trying to create? Which I think is really important. We could talk about that, for sure.
Like, intuition really, I think, takes power in our life when we know where we want to go because then that's like the guiding force, right? If we don't know where we want to go. Like, what is intuition going to guide you to do? I don't know, because you don't know where you're trying to go. It doesn't matter.
So, I think having the clarity of what you want, which is a decision, intuition guides you to what you want. So, I think all of that combines into like this really personalized, customized plan. It's not one cookie-cutter.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Yeah. And I love that idea of like alignment too, because I felt the same way with business gurus that I was following and listening to, realizing that they were such a different energy and vibe than I was doing and so different than what I was trying to create in my own business and my own life.
Amber Smith: That you wanted.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: That I was like, why? Why am I still-- Like, this just isn't aligned. And I also think, in the end, like for me, personally, with my own spiritual and religious beliefs, it helped strengthen that instead of always being like, 'Well, what other people tell me is true.'
It was more like, 'Wait, is this true for me, inside of me? Does this align with the truth that's outside of me?'
And like, it helped me-- I like expand. I don't know. I don't know how to explain it more than like, it was almost like a spiritual expansion because I'm like, 'All these, kind of, pieces fit together.'
And I find that with my clients also, no matter what their religious belief is, that it helps them as well. Like spiritually; they feel more of that alignment inside of themselves connected to the source outside of themselves. Fema, who's my favorite author, she calls it God's spark or the divine spark. It's like the spark inside of you that's connected to what's outside of you.
Amber Smith: So good.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: So, let's dig into-- That's kind of how, I guess how intuition got into my life was just like little bit by little bit. But then I started going to more intuitive business coaches because like you, I was like, 'Wait a second, these things don't super align, why am I continuously following this advice?'
And so, I dug more into learning about divine feminine and intuition, and feminine and masculine energetics, and stuff like that. And was like, 'Oh, I love this.'
Using intuition as a guide: How intuition guides Amber Smith
Crystal The Parenting Coach: And so, then I just got like full into it and was like, 'Wait, this intuition thing is amazing.' I'd love to hear from you now, how it looks for you in not just your business, but how does it guide your life, your marriage, and other aspects of your life?
Amber Smith: Yeah. I mean this is just like how I live. So, it's easy for me. Like I don't see, like, 'This is how I show up in business and this is how I show up in my life,' it's like all the same. Right?
Crystal The Parenting Coach: It's all the same, yeah.
Amber Smith: And so, one of the things that I've learned is like intuition, you can only feel it now. And so, like, part of my work has really been to learn how to be present in my body. That's like a buzzword.
Like I think there's like a lot of buzzwords that are using 'alignment' and 'presence' and 'intuition'. But for me, what it means is like, there's truth. It's always like a veil. Like I think about it almost like a pool of truth or something. Like, it's always around.
It's like, am I tuned in or not? I can feel that about like, what needs to be done with my kids or my home, or our family goals – my relationship with my mom or my sister, the nanny that I hire, like all of it.
And so, I feel like that is literally like just how I make decisions about everything and how it feels. Like I try it on, you know what I mean? Like, it's weird. Like a really good example is like actually how I hired the nanny that I have right now. It's like I just knew when I talked to her, I'm like, 'You're the person.'
My brain could be like, you can't know that.
What I've learned is like, almost like that gut feeling that I have…it's like, that's the true, yes. You know what I mean?
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Yes.
Amber Smith: My brain is like blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. It has all this like commentary. But I've learned to trust that first little nudge, that inkling, that feeling in my gut, that-- the things that-- It's a knowing, that's another way. I think it's like hard to describe, but it's like, I don't know how I know this, but I just know this. I pay attention to those kinds of things.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Oh, that is so good. And I like that what you said, like that first little nudge because our brain wants to make sense of that nudge. And for me, intuition is never cerebral.
Like my brain wants to be like, let me figure out all the reasons why this is supposed to work. And like, whenever I notice my brain ruminating and trying to solve something from like a mind space, I know that I'm not tapped into my intuition. Because like you, intuition, for me, feels like presence and peace and calm, like getting into my body.
And even if there's discomfort or like kind of fear coming up there, there's still presence and calm at the same time. Like, it's almost like both.
Amber Smith: Yeah.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: I think for people that are listening, they're like, 'Okay, this sounds amazing and magic and sparkly and whatever, but how do you actually do it?' So, as somebody who hasn't been tuned into your own intuition in the past, what would that look like for them?
Amber Smith: Yeah. I think there's like a good line that I use, "If you're going to pray for it then you have to dig the ditch." Right? So, if you're expecting intuition to come in, you have to give it a space. Hmm. And for lots of--
Like, for me, like that's going on walks, where it's like I literally go on the walk expecting to get some download, some insight. Sometimes that's journaling, like maybe you like open a blank page and you just start writing, and you trust that something's going to come.
Maybe you're like contemplating like something with your kid. Like I know for me it's like when I have a challenging situation with one of my kids, it's like; I know something's going to come, I know a solution…I believe in creative solutions coming to me. So, I move forward in faith. Like I go about my daily life, but I know it's coming. Like, I expect some answer.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: And you're open to receiving it. You're just like, it's going to come.
Amber Smith: Yes. I'm looking for where it's going to come from. It's almost like, okay, is it going to come from this book I'm going to read, is it going to come from this person I'm going to talk to? Like, I'm looking for the thread that's going to come through with the clarity.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Yeah.
Amber Smith: Just go by your life expecting it.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: I just finished reading The Alchemist and they talk about omens.
Amber Smith: So good. Yeah.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: And so, I think that's what I kind of think of it as like all these little things that might happen or things that people might say, but it'll like come to you.
And I love the example of giving it space, that you have to give it space. I think one of the reasons we're so tuned out of our intuition as a society is busyness. I'll talk to clients who are like, can't even make it to a call because they're so busy or cancel last minute…or they're just like, 'But I have this and this.'
And like, they list all the things and I'm like, 'Yeah, that's actually the problem.' The problem is the too muchness, doing all of the things and saying yes to all of the things because there isn't space for that calm and that peace and that presence for those answers to come.
I love that you used a parenting example too, because that has always happened for me, and I've noticed that it's happened for every single one of my clients.
Amber Smith: Yeah.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: It does not matter. I'll coach couples, I'll coach dads, I'll coach moms, new moms, moms that have been moms forever whose kids are all gone out of the house; does not matter anything about it, everybody is able to tap into that. I also call it creative solutions. I'm like, there's always a creative solution there. And it doesn't ever come from that space of our brain trying to like, solve it for us. It's like--
Amber Smith: Yeah. And the feeling of forcing it, to me, that's a signal that I'm not believing that I will have this download come to me. When I'm trying to force something versus like, I trust; because I think trust means I don't have to solve it right this second.
And I think that that takes a little bit of practice because we want to solve it right this second, but that's not where our best ideas come from. Like most people, it's like they have it like in the shower when they're not expecting it or like when they're on a walk.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Oh, totally, shower aspirations, I call them.
Amber Smith: This is why I like setting the brain because you can recreate that. There's a really great book I think you'd like; it's called The Art of Impossible. And he talks about flow state, basically.
And flow is, to me, where my mind is joined with whatever you want to call it – universal mind, the spirit, intuition, God…however you define that, right? To me, that's the connection where it's coming through me. I'm not trying to force it from my brain; it's like literally moving through me.
And everyone has had this experience, but I think what's cool is you can recreate that with certain things. For me, it's going on a walk. Like I know if I go on a walk long enough and I don't listen to anything, I will have solutions come to me, or ideas.
Maybe it's like sitting and meditating. Maybe it's like when you're talking to someone that feels as passionate about something as you or when you're praying or whatever, like you can recreate it. And when you learn to expect it, like it does come.
So, it's not like intuition is random because I'm sure you get that too. Like, I can't depend on it. I'm like, 'Yes, you can.' It might not be exactly when you want it to, but when you stop forcing it and letting it flow through you, like it will come and you can trust that.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Yeah. And I think if you're really, really new to this and listening, I think it's also helpful to start working on your own self-concept. Because, for me, I was indecisive; and indecisive really was doubting myself and my ability to make decisions in my own life, and not trusting that I was the one that had the answers and that the answers were inside of me.
I always felt like I had to ask somebody else, read another book, phone a friend, listen to somebody else's inspiration from my life.
Amber Smith: Somebody else, yeah.
Carving out space for answers and creative solutions to come in
Crystal The Parenting Coach: And I've noticed that self-trust is the key ingredient to intuition.
Amber Smith: Totally.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Because if I don't totally trust myself that that answer is going to come and that I have the ability to receive it, then I'm not going to receive it.
And so, I think for years I was stuck in this indecisive mode because of how I identified. And so, I think simultaneously, carving this openness and space, and then also really intentionally working on like, how do I identify, how do I describe myself? How much do I trust myself? And allowing yourself to trust yourself even if you feel like you've made mistakes in the past that haven't turned out, but allowing yourself to trust yourself anyways.
Amber Smith: Yeah. So, I'm curious just like from like a 'you perspective', how would you define yourself now if you used to describe yourself as like indecisive, what are the words that you would describe yourself as far as your self-concept?
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Oh, I think I'm amazing at making decisions. I think I'm like really efficient, and I make them really quickly.
Amber Smith: Efficient. Yeah.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: And yeah, I would say I am decisive. And when I tell people that I used to be, they're like, 'What? Really?'
And I'm like, 'No, really.'
Like, I'd be like, 'What should I wear today? What should I eat today?' Like, I'd ask other people just like basic little things. And now, I'm just--
Amber Smith: It's a muscle.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Yeah. And I feel like I don't-- I spent so much mental energy in this space of like, how I described myself. It wasn't just indecisive; I was like, I was also overwhelmed. I also always had too much to do. Like, there was a lot of thoughts in my brain that felt very true about my life.
And so, those were the first little-- Those were the first little practice steps for me to get into coaching. I honestly didn't know anything about coaching. I didn't even know what a life coach was up until I signed up for this program.
Amber Smith: Yeah, that's awesome.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: I kind of thought like…oh, it'll be kind of like therapy, but like maybe a little bit more applicable or something, like more application-based.
But then as I got into it, I'm like, 'Oh my goodness, this is actually going to change my entire life.'
Amber Smith: Yeah. Yeah.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: And that was three years ago. I certified three years ago this March – like this month, like four days ago, actually, I think, or five days ago. I got my certification three years ago, and five days ago. And everything in my life has changed.
My husband now works from home; he runs his own business online helping coaches do Kajabi tech stuff. We homeschool our kids. We travel. Everything I wanted in my life that I always believed was possible, but had no idea, because people would be like, 'But you have a job and you do this and you do that.'
And it always seemed like there was no way to create the life that I wanted. And I think that's what intuition guides you to. It creates this life that's like even more amazing than you probably could have thought of for yourself, but there's not necessarily, like, you don't really know what the end is going to be like.
I honestly only signed up because I thought, "Oh, well, they hire coaches after, so I'll just work for the school." I've never worked for the school. Now I run my own business and all these things, everything has changed. And it's just like, and every year now I'm excited to be like; "I wonder how much is going to change this year, I wonder where my intuition's going to take me."
Amber Smith: Yeah. Well, and I love thinking about it this way because I think spirit wants to expand, right? It's like the more that we live that way, expansion's going to lead us into places that we can't predict, into places that we don't know.
Like, you would've never known this was going to be where that decision took you, but then that's how intuition works. It's not going to give you the whole picture; it gives you a possibility and then you have to act, and then it gives you more, and then it gives you more, and then it gives you more.
But I think the mistake would be to never act on it; to always do what's predictable, to do what you've always done to like shut down that little voice – that little nudge, which a lot of people do because it is scary.
It's intimidating, but it's like a muscle that you flex; and it's a muscle that you learn how to grow with you and you get more familiar and you trust it more. But it's like you have to take that first act of faith.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Well, I think it's so interesting too, that looking back on it, even before this experience, that my intuition guided me to do so many things before then too.
Amber Smith: Yeah.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Like, I didn't know anything about homeschooling. I had no friends that homeschooled, like literally that was never in my line of sight. And I read a parenting book and I just decided, "I want to spend a little bit more time with my kid, so I'm just going to pull them out for a year or two and I'll like put him back in Grade 3."
This is when my son was in kindergarten. He's just finishing up Grade 11 right now, which is crazy. And if I had-- I would've never signed up if I knew that I was going to be doing it for 11 years it would've been a hard no. But I was like, 'Oh, I'm going to do this for a couple of years,' and it kind of led me to that.
Amber Smith: Yes.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: And then having homeschooling be so difficult and hard and really not work out for several years, helped me expand in my ideas around learning and education and what that looked like – and really pushed the box of belief that I had been given and had had for so many years.
Amber Smith: Yeah.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: And there was so much expansion there. And in that expansion also came this idea of like-- The leadership education that I love to follow is like us before them. So, it's like, whatever I want to see in them, I need to do myself first.
And I was like, "Well, I don't have any passions, I don't like do anything for fun." So, then I started looking for things like, what do I enjoy doing and what do I want to learn about? And like, what do I want to spend my time doing? And I took all these random classes and did all this stuff--
Amber Smith: So cool.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: -that led me to the space of being able to be open to going back to school again, to look for Master's programs, to find The Life Coach School.
Amber Smith: So good.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: And so, looking back on it, and I'm like, "Oh, my whole life has been guided by this."
Amber Smith: Yeah. Yeah.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: I just-- I think that I just kept saying that it wasn't-- Like it would've turned out and I'd be like, "Oh, that's lucky," or whatever. Or like, I don't know, that's--
Amber Smith: Good thing it worked out.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Good thing it worked out. And I do think that I knew that some of it was divine intervention or whatever, but I think a lot of times, I was just like, 'Oh, good thing that worked out.'
But looking back on it now, I can see that it was like intuition guiding all of my decisions up to where I am now. And how exciting that is to be like, 'I wonder-- I wonder where it's going to guide me next.'
Amber Smith: Yeah. And now, you start looking for it. I think that that's like the progression, right? In the beginning you're like, is this my intuition? Is this-- Is this actually how I feel? Or am I crazy? You know, that battle.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Yeah.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: And then once you learn to trust it, then it's like, I'm waiting for it, I'm looking for it. Like, I know what it feels like. I'm waiting for it to come in about this decision, you know?
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Yeah. So, I'm going to-- I'm going to say quickly in summation; if you are listening to this episode and you're like, I want to start practicing intuition, if you want like a concrete step by step, which is not very intuitive to give you concrete answers, but I would say it's like building self-trust, figuring out how to build that for you.
And like you said, like tuning into or carving out that space and that time, whether or not it's like the shower or meditation or going on walks. For me, nature is like always where-- Like nature is just, I think it's potent with answers.
Amber Smith: Yeah.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: And then also--
Amber Smith: And not trying to force it, right?
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Yeah.
Amber Smith: You're just enjoying nature. It just flows. Yeah.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: It just flows so good. And like what you said too, trusting that first little nudge. And so, I think if you follow those steps; if you're like building that self-trust, carving out that space, and taking that little nudge, like what's the little nudge not coming from my brain, but I think if it is like my soul space, like my center space.
Amber Smith: My soul space.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Coming from that space, and then just believing it – believing that even if it didn't turn out the way you thought it was going to, that it was still your intuition. And then I always ask myself, what came from this? Like, what was my intuition trying to teach me then?
Amber Smith: Yeah. So good, that reflection. Yeah. So, good.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: I love everything that you've said. I like taking down so many little note quotes. I'm like, 'Yes, yes, so good.'
Amber Smith: Love it.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Thank you for being here. Is there any last little tidbits you want to leave us about intuition before we sign off?
Amber Smith: Well, thank you for having me. It was so fun. I think if I had to like, leave anything, it's like; you can trust yourself and you have good ideas. Like, I think a lot of people, maybe they don't say, "Well, I'm just not intuitive."
It's more like, "I always don't have good ideas." It's like sneakier than that. And so, I think like, I like to think and believe all the time, I have really good ideas. And it sounds like conceited until you really like develop like, 'No, I do have good ideas, and it helps and blesses other people because I have good ideas.' And so, I think that that's--
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Yes, it's not-- I think that we often think things are like selfish or conceited or whatever, but it's really not. It's really like having a belief in you, which also helps you have beliefs in others and you're all like lifting each other up. It's not like a hierarchy of like, I have really cool beliefs, but you don't – and like, I have cool ideas and you don't, and I'm better than you. There's no like better than.
Amber Smith: Yeah. No, there's no competition. There's only creation. Yeah.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Yeah. Okay. Thank you--
Amber Smith: Love it
Crystal The Parenting Coach: -for all of your little nuggets of wisdom.
Amber Smith: Yeah, tell me.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: I feel like we could make so many cool Instagram posts about all these little cute little quotes that you've given today.
How to connect with Amber Smith
Crystal The Parenting Coach: So, if people want to connect with you or learn more from you or listen to you, how would they find you?
Amber Smith: Yeah. I have a podcast called The Conscious Coach Podcast. That's probably like my best content. And then on Instagram, I'm @itsambersmith.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Yeah.
Amber Smith: Those are two good places.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Yeah. So, if you've loved hearing Amber's voice- I think even just your voice is like soothing and grounding – so listen to one of her podcasts and go check it out.
Amber Smith: Thanks.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: I think even if you're not a coach, there's just like nuggets in there that will help you.
Amber Smith: I have a lot of non-coaches following me, which is-- and listening. I think there's good little nuggets if you're interested.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Oh, go join. All right. Thank you so much for being here.
Amber Smith: Yeah. Thanks for having me.
Crystal The Parenting Coach: Bye.
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