Hello everyone and welcome. I’m Laura Greco, your host of SuperPower Mommas, and I’m so excited that you are here today. Our topic today is regarding a question, and this question is what is self-respect?
So, let’s just take a moment to think about that question, what is self-respect? Let’s pause, take a breath, in and out, and ask that question. What do you come up with when you ask that question of yourself? Well, I asked this question too and I decided to go to dictionary.com and see what they had to say. And the definition there is proper esteem or regard for the dignity of one’s character. And this is closely related to another word of self-worth. So, I got thinking about this, and maybe you’ve thought about this too in your lives, of what we think we want, do we one day wake up and question that? Am I honoring myself? Am I honoring what I believe is important in my life and do I treat myself with dignity?
In our work, or in our business, or even more importantly in our homes and families and community, do we know ourselves and live in alignment that demonstrates respect for ourselves? And it is there, in this place where we would want to create more fullness in our life. So, our soul is searching that question, and it affects our happiness and also the happiness of those around us.
Well, when we’re not in alignment, we start to see signals. And really, it’s a gift from the universe. These signals look something like symptoms of overwhelm or dysfunction or dissatisfaction, exhaustion, and really just not seeing good for our hard work. Well, this is exactly why I am so excited to introduce you to our guest today Milana Lodzinski. She is an energetic woman who has migrated from the Ukraine to America with her family, and she has two children. She arrived here with all kinds of dreams to fill, and she did. She worked hard and she reached a point where she reached the seven-figure business, but she hardly noticed it because she was working so hard, and this really brought her into questioning happiness. She was overwhelmed, exhausted, and dissatisfied so she decided to take a sabbatical and really soul search what is important in her life and in her family’s life.
And so, she came back to work with simple solutions that allows her to live the life she loves while assisting other business owners to achieve their dreams and simplicity and live the lives that they love too. So welcome, Milana.
Thank you so much Laura, for having me. I’m excited to talk to you.
I’m excited to talk with you too. I’ve watched you online, I’ve seen your work, you are really energetic and certainly have some gifts to share with those who are looking to build a business. And I’m intrigued by the fact that you’re a mom and you came from a foreign country with lots of adjustments in coming here. So, I have to ask you, because it’s our first question that we always ask, and that is what is your super power? So, what is the gift that you bring to yourself and to the world, to your family?
Yeah. It’s a simple question. It’s not so simple to answer. I actually had to search for the answer for years. And through my work with my own coaches and my clients and watching what my clients say to me, and what I feel I bring to the table, after 20 years of being in business, I learned that my gift is demystifying. I’m a demystifier, which means that I can take a complex concept and teach it in a simple way. So simple that people who didn’t understand it or couldn’t grasp it in the past suddenly see clarity around it. So maybe we can say demystifier or maybe my gift is clarity, although the word clarity is something that a lot of coaches say. I prefer the word demystifying.
I love that word though, because when you think about it a mystery, right? We’re trying to find the answer to a question. And by changing how it’s presented and drawing the bottom line, you are able actually to demystify that mystery. I love the word.
Yeah. Definitely.
Well I’m so glad that you are also pursuing something that can really let your gifts shine. And so I would like to explore with you, because I think it’s very fascinating for our listeners as well as myself, you’re raising two children, you came from a foreign country, would you like to share a little bit about that journey and how you came to where you are today?
Yeah, sure. I came as a musician. I had just graduated from a music university, I was a music teacher ready to teach, and then as soon as I started teaching, I came home and found papers in our mailbox, permission to enter the United States, so our whole family was absolutely thrilled. We waited for two years for that permission and it finally happened. And literally a summer after my graduation from music college, I ended up in America so I actually never formally taught as a music teacher. I gave piano lessons, I was an intern before I immigrated, I was 18 working with 14-year-old kids. It was an interesting teaching experience.
And I remember that when we were packing and getting ready to come to the States, my uncle, who had already moved here 15 years before us, he told my dad, “Nobody needs musicians here,” and so my parents were terrified, what is she going to do here with her music degree and music teaching degree? And 30 years later, I can tell you that you just need to trust that things will work out the way that they will work out.
And when I realized that music teaching is not going to be something I do here because the system is very different, I signed myself up for a college major, new college major, went back to college, first for business administration and then ended up in computer information systems and discovered web design. It was 1999, 2000, right at the roots of internet marketing where people started using the internet for emailing, for building email lists, for publishing email newsletters, creating eBooks, reports, things like that were really popular. And I fell into that and I liked it. And I created my first three eBooks, sold them, and I got bit by the internet marketing bug. So today, I’m an online business building coach. If you have any kind of expertise that you want to monetize, that’s what I help people with.
But the story of… I worked as a web developer for a few years after college and I had just had my second child and… I don’t know if you know, but ever notice that when you have your first child you may or may not be ready? You’re just learning. You’re just getting to that taste of being a mom. By the time my daughter was born, my second child, I was so ready to be a mom and I craved more time with her. And one time I went to pick her up at the daycare, she was almost two, and I saw her sitting in the heat of the day without shade, without any cover, her cheeks were burning red, she was breathing with her mouth open, and I just picked her up in the middle of the day and I went to my work and I gave my two-week notice.
Oh my.
So that’s how I became a work-at-home mom. But the journey to that decision wasn’t simple because in the former Soviet Union there was no such thing as business, let alone a work-at-home mom. All of my family members had a nine to five job. And so for my parents to hear that I was considering quitting my job and staying home with my kids… And I had a good job with benefits. I was a $33,000 a year web developer, like why would you want to leave that job? It was a great job at the time. And I hadn’t considered it either, except there was a show at that time, and I don’t know if you remember it, but Dr. Laura Schlessinger.
Okay.
She had a show for moms. And she on the radio, every day, every morning I would drive to my web design job and I would listen to her show, and she would really get hard on moms. She would say, “Why do you have kids and then leave them home with strangers or put them in daycare with strangers and want to have kids?” And that rubbed off on me a little. So at first I thought, well, it’s ridiculous, of course I want to work. I’m a professional, I’m going to work. Yeah, that’s how things are done.
But then I started working with people who were entrepreneurs. I had one client who hired me to create her website, I had another client who paid me to create his website. Slowly through communicating and interacting with these entrepreneurial minds, my mind started shifting into the possibility of becoming self-employed.
Wow. I have to stop you here, but I want you to continue this story. We have to take a break. And so before we go for that break, please tell everyone where they can find you because these moms who are at home, maybe trying to build a business, whatever, I think that they’re going to want to find you.
Yeah. You can find me on my website at www.simplicitycircle.com.
Great. Okay. Hold on everyone, we’ll be right back. We’re talking with Milana on the topic of what is self-respect.
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