For years, I’ve admired Melissa Ambrosini from afar.
I first saw her speak at a wellness event here in Adelaide and was instantly drawn to her grounded, empowering approach to life and business. Fast forward to a recent event in Brisbane, and I finally introduced myself and invited her onto the podcast.
In this conversation, Melissa shares her incredible journey from professional dancer at the Moulin Rouge in Paris to building a global business, writing four bestselling books and creating a life that feels deeply aligned with her values.
We talk about success, motherhood, nervous system regulation, business growth, comparisonitis, systems, flexibility and what it really means to build a life you genuinely love.
If you’ve ever felt pressure to do more, be more or keep up with everyone around you, this episode is your reminder that success gets to look different in every season.
This conversation feels like a deep exhale and a powerful reminder that the most sustainable success is the kind that supports your wellbeing, relationships and life
SUMMARY
0:00:00 Intro to the Episode & Guest Context
0:04:51 Starting the Conversation: Who is Melissa & What She Does Now
0:06:44 – 0:14:42 Melissa’s Origin Story: From Moulin Rouge to Rock Bottom to Inner Work
0:14:42 – 0:16:00 Hayley’s Reflection & Setup for Success Conversation
0:16:00 – 0:19:21 Redefining Success Across Seasons (Especially Motherhood)
0:19:21 – 0:22:44 Staying Grounded and “In Your Lane of Truth”
0:22:44 – 0:27:00 Nervous System Regulation: From Buzzword to Daily Practice
0:27:00 – 0:32:42 Motherhood’s Impact on Business, Time & Priorities
0:32:42 – 0:39:13 Flexibility, Pivoting & Systems Around Motherhood
0:39:13 – 0:44:51 Structuring Work Time, Boundaries & Focus (Business Systems)
0:44:51 – 0:49:00 Showing Up Online Consistently Without Showing Children’s Faces
0:49:00 – 0:50:33 One Core Reminder for Ambitious Women
0:50:33 – 0:52:32 Where to Find Melissa & Mastermind Invitation
0:52:32 – 0:52:51 Closing
Hayley Osborne
Hello, and welcome back to the Hayley Osborne Show, my podcast. I am Hayley, and I’m so glad that you are here today. We have, I have a very special episode for you in the name of a guest expert, and if you read her name in the title, it is the one and only Melissa Ambrosini, and I just cannot even believe that I’m sitting here about to interview her on my podcast. Before we get started, though, I want to tell you a little bit about Melissa, so you can get to know her before we go straight into the episode. So, Melissa Ambrosini is a best-selling author.
She has four books. She is a sought-after speaker, entrepreneur, and mentor devoted to helping women create deeply fulfilling lives, businesses, and relationships without sacrificing themselves in the process, through her globally ranked podcast, The Melissa Ambrosini Show, which, mind you, has over 30 million downloads globally, as well as through her best-selling books, programs, retreats, and private mastermind Iconic, Melissa supports ambitious women to elevate their income, impact, self-worth, and wellbeing, while staying true to themselves and the life they genuinely want to create.
When Melissa is not recording podcasts, mentoring women, or creating transformational experiences for her community, you’ll find her spending time with her husband, Nick, and their two children, enjoying nature, tending to her veggie garden, dancing in the kitchen, or soaking up the sunshine by the ocean, but before we dive into today’s episode, I just want to say that this conversation felt really special for me. I have followed Melissa Ambrosini for years, and I still remember her seeing her speak at a health and wellness event where I live, here in Adelaide, South Australia, many years ago, and feeling really inspired by the way she showed up, and the way that she spoke, and the way that she made women feel empowered to create a life that actually felt aligned, and then recently at an event in Brisbane, I saw Melissa on a panel, and thought, you know what, I’m going to ask her to come on the podcast, so I quite literally followed her on the way to the bathroom and introduced myself, and here we are, which, honestly, is such a reminder that sometimes the opportunities, the conversations, and moments that we want most are sitting on the other side of simply being brave enough to ask and feeling a little uncomfortable, and you know, if you don’t ask, you don’t get.
So, in this episode, we go far beyond business strategy. We talk about what success really looks like as women, especially in seasons of motherhood, seasons of growth, seasons of ambition and seasons of change, and Melissa shares her incredible journey, from which I’m so inspired by, from a professional dancer at the Moulin Rouge in Paris, to then hitting rock bottom when she returned back into Australia, living on a friend’s couch, struggling with her health, questioning everything, and eventually, like, rebuilding her life from the inside out, and what I love most about this conversation is how honest and grounding it is, and we speak about all things, from nervous system regulation and burnout to building a successful business without sacrificing yourself along the way, as well as motherhood and your identity, and I, you know, asked her about her system structure and flexibility, as well as, you know, comparisonitis, especially like in the social media and digital age that we live in today, and staying true to yourself, which I think is really important.
She’s very visible, so I really wanted to understand how she did that, so she shares that with us, as well as you know, creating success on your own terms with what success means to you now, and how to build a business that supports your life. There are so many moments in this conversation where I found myself thinking, yes, this is what more women need to hear, especially as ambitious women and mothers. I think it can feel like the world is constantly telling us to do more, to be more, to achieve more. But I think that Melissa brings this beautiful reminder that alignment, clarity, simplicity, and a bit of self-awareness are actually some of the most powerful tools that we have, so this episode feels like a deep exhale. I think that it’s really inspiring, calming, motivating, and incredibly real.
And you can tell, like Melissa, when she pauses, she’s really thinking about how to answer the questions that I gave her, which is so lovely. So I think about whether you’re building. A business, whether you are navigating motherhood, rebuilding your confidence, you are redefining what success looks like for you, or you are simply craving something that’s a little bit more grounded and a bit more of an intentional way of living and working. I know that you’ll get heaps out of this episode and this conversation, so let’s dive in.
Melissa Ambrosini, welcome to the Hayley Osborne Show. I am so excited that you are here. Thank you so much for having me. I am so excited to spend this time with you. So we hit a record, because I feel like we could have spoken for ages, and it was just a hit record, so I have given a description of how amazing you are. However, in your own words, are you able to share with my beautiful audience who you are and what you do?
Melissa Ambrosini
I thought you’re going to say how amazing you are. Can you please tell everyone how amazing you
Hayley Osborne
are? Please, because I already have, so now it’s you. You have to tell everyone how amazing you are.
Melissa Ambrosini
Um, so do you. what?
Hayley Osborne
Okay, what do you do today? What do you do, and then tell us a little bit about where you’ve come from. What, what that summary looks like, because your story is beautiful. It’s huge that I don’t know anyone that has done what you’ve done, literally. So you know the dancing, the books, the like your story from a long time ago is huge from the very beginning, so it’s okay. Where is yours?
Melissa Ambrosini
Buckle up, baby, buckle up. How long have you got? Okay, so today I help women unlock the blocks that are holding them back, so that they can have the life, the business, the relationships, everything, the health of their dreams. Everything I do is with the intention to help women elevate, to help women become the best version of themselves. So I do that through my podcast, The Melissa Ambrosini show. I do that through my books. I have four best-selling books.
I do that through my mastermind, which is called Iconic. My programs, my meditations, my social media, my events, my retreats. Everything that I do is to help women become the best version of themselves, the woman that they want to be, the woman that they desire. So, that is what I do today. Let’s rewind, because I haven’t always done this, although I kind of have, if you know what I mean. So, I was a professional dancer.
I danced at the Moulin Rouge in Paris. When I was 20, I went over there. I went over to Paris by myself, and danced to the Moulin Rouge in Paris. I did acting, a little bit of singing and modeling, and TV presenting, and I absolutely loved performing. I started performing when I was three years old, and loved being on the stage, like that was my happy place, and I just adored that feeling of, yeah, just being a performer. I loved it so much.
And then, in 2010 I moved back to Australia after living in Paris for a year, and then London for two years, working very successfully over there as a performer, making a lot of money, getting to travel, like living the dream, 2122 23-year-old life. I had to come back to Australia. I didn’t want to come back, but I had to, because my visa expired. So I left my very successful career back there. The boy that I was dating, who was semi famous, my friends, my thriving career. I left it all, and I moved back to Australia, where the industry in Australia, as a performer, is very non-existent. Let’s just say, and I was heartbroken.
So, I was. I had no friends here. The two girls that I was friends with back in Australia. They dumped me when I got home. The guy that I was seeing dumped me back in London. I had no career. I was literally living on my friend’s sister’s couch. I had no money, no job, and no car. I was so lost, so depressed. I went to the doctor because a friend from back home said to me, “You need to sort yourself out. I went to the doctor and I said, “I think I have depression, ” and she said, “Yep, you have depression, which I now know was not depression, it was just called sad. Us for love, so she gave me antidepressants.
I took them for a couple of weeks, I think, and, and thought to myself, this is not the road I want to go down, and at that time I was partying to numb the pain, I was not looking, not taking care of myself, or looking after myself. I lived for the weekend to get drunk and was burning myself out. And then I ended up in hospital at the end of 2010 and that was when everything shifted for me. I, and this is what I speak about in my first book, Mastering Your Mingo. I will talk about this hospital experience. I was in hospital with a whole host of health issues, but my entire immune system was shutting down. I was in hospital for a week, and this is when I had all of these revelations come to me, all these downloads. One of them was, if you live, if you get yourself healthy and happy again, you’ll live a life beyond your wildest dreams. And that was a message that kept on coming to me. And I was like, okay, I’ve just got to get happy and healthy again. I was like, how the hell do I do that? So that was like a message that kept on coming to me.
Melissa Ambrosini
Another one that kept coming to me was like, surely God or the universe, whatever you believe in, didn’t put you here to suffer, like surely there is another reason you are here, Melissa, and that was what I pondered for that week in hospital, and another one was like all of the beliefs that I had about money, about relationships, about working hard, you know, all of these things I realized in that hospital, and this was like I was, I think I was 23 or 24 I realized that all of those beliefs were not actually mine, they were borrowed or inherited from, you know, my parents or my grandparents or school teachers, and they weren’t actually my beliefs, and all of this information, all of these downloads were so exciting for me, because I felt like I had a path out of suffering, and so from that moment I made it my absolute mission to sort myself out, to get healthy, to get happy, to find work that I loved to sort out my relationships, and I just made it my mission.
And I started this thing called a blog, and I started sharing everything that I was learning and studying and discovering on this journey. And I went into studying holistic nutrition and started sharing everything that I was learning, started meditating again, shared everything I was learning. I did my health coaching certification, and my life coaching certification, and my yoga teacher training, and my meditation teacher training, and my Acu energetics healing training, and I was continuously showing up on my blog, sharing, sharing, sharing, five days a week, every day. I did not miss a day, and began running events.
Got asked by Lululemon Australia to be a motivational speaker, and I was like, what you get paid to speak, what is this? I was like, this is amazing. And started my podcast. Now it’s at 30 million downloads. I’ve written four books, began creating programs and products and meditations, and it’s just snowballed from there. And honestly, it’s been 16 years since that moment in hospital in 2010 and I’ve just continuously showed up. I’ve just continuously put one foot in front of the other and continued to do the work on myself and put my work out there, because you know there’s no other option. The other option is suffering, the other option is hiding, and we’re not here to do that, so it’s been a journey, and a beautiful journey, and definitely not all rainbows and butterflies.
Nothing is, and if anyone tells you that their journey is all rainbows and butterflies, run in the other direction, and yeah, it’s just been a journey of continuously putting one foot in front of the other, showing up for what feels true for me, showing up for my audience, serving them as best as I can. And here we are today. And I met my soulmate on that journey in 2013. We got married in 2014. We’ve got two beautiful children who I just love and adore, and here I am.
Hayley Osborne
Nice, it’s a beautiful story. Now, where I’m sitting, I remember seeing you for the very first time. I went to a health and wellness event; I think it was a bit of a festival. It was in Adelaide, and you were there, and I remember you being there, but I can’t remember what you were doing. I can’t remember. You were speaking, or if you were teaching yoga, or I don’t know what I don’t know, but I remember seeing you, I would have been
Hayley Osborne
I think you were speaking, and I remember seeing, you know, a couple of other people that are idolized, and then I have kind of followed along your journey this whole time, kind of stalking in the background, like over the years, and then, so, for context, for those that are listening, I ran into, well, Melissa was on a panel at an event that we went to in Brisbane, and I was, when I knew she was going to be sitting on the panel, I was so excited, because I knew that I was going, and I was like, this is my moment, I get to see her again in the flesh, and then me being me, I hunted you down on the way to the bathroom, and asked you if you would love to come on my podcast, and that’s just a, you know, a sign that if you want something, you go after it. If you truly believe in something, you go after it, and if you know that you are meant for bigger and better things,
Melissa Ambrosini
Like you teach, nobody is stopping you, apart from maybe the stories that you’re telling yourself in your head. So I want to talk to you more, I think, from selfishness for me, but like, how has and what does success look like for you now, and how has that changed over the years, knowing that you have small humans the same as me? Like, what does that look like for you? I love this question, because it does evolve as you evolve, and I think it’s really important that we continuously, like, whether it’s yearly check-in with what success looks like for us in this year, in this season of our life, it’s not a one and done thing.
And so, for me, in this season of my life, like, if I can put my head on my pillow at night, and I can say I have done work that I love, and I’ve made great money doing it, helping women. If I’ve spent time with my kids present and got time with them, if I’ve spent time with my husband and been present with him, if I’ve been out in nature, and if I’ve had time for myself that day, you know, all of these things, like if I can go to bed at night and say I’ve done all of those, like that is success to me, that is success.
And I think it’s really important, like I said, that you get clear on what it is for you in the season of life that you’re in, like there was a time where success for me, like, let me take you back a year and a half, where, when my son was born, success for me was like showering, you know what I mean, like, I 100% know what you mean, that was success, like, and then I remember in those newborn phase, in that newborn season, I had a post it note, and I wrote on that post it note five things that fill me up, like I call it the self-love menu, and I’ve spoken about the self-love menu since, like, I started my business, and I wrote down five things on that self-love menu, and I stuck it on the bathroom mirror, and it had on there like dry body brush, sun on my body, red light, oil my body, and drink water, and if I had, if I got to do those five things in a day, like I am freaking winning, my friend.
So I’m just sharing that, because that’s an example of like success for that season of my life, and now it looks different again, and it will look different again as my children get older, and it will continue to evolve. So, don’t compare your success, what success is to you, for you to me, to like yours to mine. Just make sure you tune in, and you figure out what it looks like for you in the season that you’re in, and that you live in alignment with that,
Hayley Osborne
yeah. I think it’s really easy for, well, it’s available for lots of people to see online through social media, and if you’re just starting out, or if you have just had a baby, and then you’re feeling a bit down on yourself, that, oh, I really want to be in this moment. Time goes so fast, and that will come, and then you know, in terms of comparisonitis, it happens so much that you can’t compare your one to somebody else’s 20. Everybody’s journey is so different, and, like you said, success depends on the season, which I think is really important, and. It is hard to get swept up and caught up in everything, so how do you stay grounded in all of that? Because you have obviously, you’ve got, you’ve still got big goals, you’ve continued to like kill it in your business, and you know, in motherhood, and the way that you show up, how do you stay in your lane of truth?
Melissa Ambrosini
It comes back to it comes back to like I don’t, I can’t do it any other way, I can’t do it any other way, because I have in the past, and it doesn’t feel good living out of alignment with your truth does not feel good, and I just can’t do it anymore. So, how do you get to that place? It is like you have to know yourself so intimately, and how you know yourself intimately starts with, like, daily practice, whether that is sitting in silence, going inward, seeing what arises, breath work, meditation, journaling, all of these tools that are free that we have access to.
It’s in those moments where we hear our inner voice, that we can connect with that inner voice, and I, the more we can stay true to that voice and live in alignment, the better for everyone, the better for you, your partner, your children, everyone around you, it ripples out, and I think it is very easy to look at everyone online, and you know, I wrote the book on it, comparisonitis: how to stop comparing yourself to others and be genuinely happy, because it’s, it’s like getting bigger and bigger, this comparisonitis, and especially like everyone thinks that that’s people’s actual real life, like every day looks like that, or and it’s just very unhealthy, and I think the more you can stay true to what is for you in alignment for you, like that is going to get you to where you want to get to way faster than looking left and right at what everyone else is doing and comparing yourself and trying to keep up with that one, because that’s what that person says. It’s like, well, what do you say? Like, what again? It comes back to, like, what is success for you in this season of your life? And I guess, yeah, it comes back to, I don’t know any other way. I have to live in alignment, because it feels so uncomfortable when I’m not.
Hayley Osborne
I love that there’s a lot of talk at the moment to just, I think it’s a becoming a bit of a throwaway line, which is nervous system and nervous system regulation, and I think it’s a bit of a popular word at the moment, but in terms of, like, I know that you know you’re really big on health and wellness and regulating nervous system, like, can you tell us what does that mean practically? What does that mean, because I feel that in my bones when I’ve got my three small humans that are all boys running around like crazy, and then I, when I move away, and I just have to take three deep breaths, but for you, what does that mean, like practically?
Melissa Ambrosini
Yeah, I feel like it is definitely a hot term at the moment, and I think mainly because people are feeling it so much, they are feeling more fried than ever. The cortisol levels are through the roof, the nervous systems are completely fried, like I visualize it, like you know, if the car is in park, but the wheels are like turning, and it’s like, you know, you put the foot on the pedal, and it’s like, like that’s what everyone’s nervous systems are like at the moment, they’re just getting absolutely burned and fried from so many different things, like from Wi-Fi, from constant screens, from blue light, from the food, the lack of nature, the sitting, and the not moving, and the not, you know, it’s there’s the list goes on of the things that are affecting our nervous system, and for me it, the more you can tune in with yourself, the more you can literally feel I can feel when I am like about to tip into that like Bernie feeling, you know, that like fried feeling, I can feel it, and then it is my responsibility as a leader, a leader.
Leader in my business and a leader in my home to sort that out. It is my responsibility to do that. No one else can do that for you. And so, for me, how I do that is by breathing. One, like breath work, is one of the quickest, cheapest free, you know, like it’s one of the quickest ways to instantly calm your nervous system. So, a simple box breathing, you know, like breath in for five, hold for five, breathe out for five, hold for five, like a simple box breathing technique can instantly calm your nervous system. Meditation, you know, movement, nature, diving in the ocean, water, cold, cold on your wrists, cold on your face, you know, ice facials, legs up the wall, red, like all of these things.
There are so many things, so many tools that we have access to that are majority of them are free, and we’ve got to do them if we’re feeling fried, so it’s our responsibility, and you know, teaching it to our children as well, like I teach my daughter breathing, and sometimes she’ll do something, and I can see she needs to get energy out, so teaching her how to get that energy out safely, without, you know, taking it out on her brother or something like that, so you know it’s, it is a very, it’s an epidemic at the moment, like it’s crazy, but there are tools, there are things that we can do to regulate our nervous system that are free, and it’s our responsibility to do them. So, yeah, those are some of the things that I do, and it is a daily practice, like running a business and having tiny humans. Like nervous system regulation needs to be part of your business strategy.
Hayley Osborne
I love this. That’s like, that’s like a mic drop moment. Wow. Okay. And I guess, like, yeah, I, for me, I teach my kids this as well. So my eldest was crying in the car the other day. He was, his brothers were going off somewhere, and he was coming to school with me, and I didn’t realize that he was upset because he didn’t get to say, “See you later, and I was like, “Oh, quick, okay, get out the car, and then he just couldn’t shake it, and I was like, “Stand up, let’s do some star jumps and wiggle around and shake your hands in the air, and he started laughing, and then all of a sudden, like, it was over, and I think that we need to practice some of those things as adults as well, where we realize we’re in a bit of a funk, and that can sometimes happen in the afternoon, you know, when you get that little bit of an afternoon slump, it’s like, okay, I’m going to get regulate my nervous system to regulate my body, I’m going to jump up and down, and I feel like my kids have taught me
Melissa Ambrosini
so much about running my business, and they never have worked in a silo. They’ve always, I think, I’m a better business owner because of my small humans in so many different ways, and you know, the nervous system definitely comes into it. So, I think, in terms of motherhood, for you, how has that changed the way that you lead your business, and show up. It’s completely changed, like you said. You have to be so efficient with your time. There is no time for scrolling. There is no time for procrastination. Like, I am so efficient. I often think I’m like four kids. I’m like, what did I do all day long? What did I do? Seriously,
Hayley Osborne
I could have achieved so much more.
Melissa Ambrosini
Well, I did write four books. Yeah, so you know, and people, people often say to me, actually, no, the last one I had written, I wrote half of it when, once I’d had my daughter, my first, but people often say to me, “Are you going to write more books? And I’m like, “Maybe when my kids are 10, like I’m like, “I’ve got a one-and-a-half-year-old, like there is, there isn’t no spare time,
Hayley Osborne
let’s just, you’ve, you’ve done so well, yeah. So, in terms of having them now, and knowing, like, what are
Melissa Ambrosini
What would be like the key pullout, or a few key messages on how it’s changed how you lead, like for those more specifically going into motherhood and running their business, and thinking, how the hell am I going to do this? Or, you know, at the very beginning, it’s like, before you have kids, make the most of your time, because you will have no time. Yeah, I think, well, firstly, it gets you so clear on your core values and your priorities, you it.
Becomes so crystal clear what your values are and what your order of priorities are in your life, and when that becomes clear, almost everything else becomes easier, because you know your north star, you know where you’re headed, and everything else, all the people pleasing, all the that baggage, like I, you literally don’t have time for it, and I think that’s a beautiful thing, and so that’s another benefit of like having children, and like getting you get to get so clear on your core values and your priorities, and you know where you’re heading, and my time is so valuable.
Every second of my day is valuable, and I have to love my work so much to take me away from my children, and I’m lucky, like I am. I love what I do so much, and it makes me a better mother. Like, I go downstairs once I finish work, and I’m literally like, my husband says, “You ice skate around in the house, you’re so freaking happy. He’s like, “You come down those stairs after your calls and you’re freaking ice skating, and I’m like, “That’s how I feel after getting to do the work that I do, whether that is a writing session or whether that is working with clients inside my mastermind, or recording a podcast, or whatever it is, I just literally walk downstairs and I’m ice skating because I’m so happy and lit up, so yeah, you’ve got, you know, becoming a mother helps you get really clear on what is important and what are your core values, what are your priorities, and what else has it changed for me?
Everything, it’s changed everything, it’s brought so much joy, like being a mother is like brought so much more purpose to my work, like I already felt like it was, like it was purposeful and meaningful, but it’s brought so much more because I do it for them, you know, as well, I do it for them as well, they’ve become part of my why, so yeah, that’s another one, but it’s, you know, children change everything, everything. I don’t think people talk about it enough, they do, it changes everything, it changes your relationship, it changes the way that you look at yourself, the way that you work, the way that you lead, it changes everything for the better,
Hayley Osborne
so in terms of like, because there has to be a certain level of flexibility in your world and my world, we operate similarly, and we have to be able to be really intentional about being flexible, so in terms of, you know, we have more freedom, but I think the question I want to ask is, and for everyone else thinking, yeah, but it’s okay for you, but so for me, I do, I’m very.. I wouldn’t say I’m lucky, I’m grateful, I have a tribe, we have a big family, you know, my husband’s Italian, we have that support, and I know that some people don’t.
However, I’ve still had to create systems in my world to be able to have that freedom and that flexibility with my children. So my youngest, who’s not too dissimilar to yours, he’s 20 months, he doesn’t go to childcare, like he is with me all the time, or he’s with my mum, or he’s with my mother-in-law, and that’s it. And I’ve had to build that around my world, because that’s my choice, and I love that. And so, what systems have you, what are the key things that you have built around your world, so that you can have your business, because you know we need to be whole as adults as well, and then have the freedom and flexibility to be a present
Melissa Ambrosini
mum. Absolutely, I am the queen of systems, and like this is how my life, my business is run on systems, my home is run on systems, and that has allowed me to really thrive at home and in my business. So, I 100% relate and agree with you, and something that I did, you know, before I even had kids was to get very intentional about the type of mother that I wanted to be, and what did that look like? I always knew that I wanted to have a business that gave me the financial and location freedom that allowed me to be with my children. I knew that long before I wanted to have kids, or I was, you know. I had kids, and so I set out to create that.
I created the business that gave me the location and the financial freedom to do that. Now, for us, we have had the same nanny. My daughter is five, just over five. She came into our lives when she was four months old, so she has been with us for almost five years. She has known her, she has known her almost her whole life. And she is such a big part of our life, and we love and adore her. So we have had her, and then we have my mum, who helps out as well, and my mother-in-law, who helps out as well, so between the three of them we’ve, we’ve got care.
However, right now, my mother in law is in Europe, and my mother is interstate, so we’re like a little bit short on care at the moment, but that’s okay, we just pivot, and we’re flexible, you know, like you said, we pivot, we’re flexible, and again, that is definitely something that having children has really taught me, is you know, I like things in order, I like to know what I’m doing, where I’m going, and I like to control, I think most women do, however, you really do have to surrender and let go of control a lot when you have kids.
You cannot control how they are going to show up. For example, yesterday I had back-to-back calls with my iconic mastermind girls, back-to-back calls, and it just so happened that they, that the last one finished as my son was going down for his nap, and my husband was putting him down. He didn’t want to go down. I don’t know what’s going on. I think he’s got teeth coming through, whatever. So I was just like, cool, whatever. I had probably two more hours of work. I didn’t have any calls, but I had two more hours of work to do, and I just picked him up. I put him in the car, and I went for it.
He took a nap in the car, because he wasn’t going to go down in his cot that day, and I just pivoted, and I did it with so much grace and so much calmness, and I was just like, this is what’s happening. And I got in the car, he fell asleep in five minutes, and I pull over, and then I just work from my phone, like that is motherhood and business, like you have to be able to pivot, you have to pivot fast, you have to be flexible, and that, like, not always am I like easy breezy about it, sometimes I’m like, I really needed to do that, or you know, sometimes I do have a call, and I’m like, oh, now I have to tell, but you know, most women understand.
Yes, and if you say, I’m so sorry, I have to reschedule because my baby is crying, I don’t think anyone’s going to be like, oh, that’s so, you know, like everyone’s going to be like, go, go, go, babe. Like, one time I was on a call. I’ll just give you another example. One time I was on a call with a client, and I could hear him screaming downstairs, and I knew that this scream was not one that was going to stop without Mama, and I said, ‘I’m so sorry, I can hear my son crying. I’m going to. Can I come back in a moment? She was like, ‘My God, of course. I went downstairs; he had fallen and really hurt himself. He was bleeding.
Melissa Ambrosini
Anyway, I was downstairs and I said to my husband, “Can you please go up and tell me?” I won’t say her name. Tell her that I will be, you know, five or 10 minutes. And so he just came up, he was chatting to her, and gave her some business advice. It was wonderful, and life advice. And I just sat with him and regulated him until he was fully calm. I think it was about 15 minutes, and then he went to my husband, and he was happy. And then I was able to finish my call, and she was like, “Don’t worry about it. She had three kids; she has three kids. She was like, “It’s all good, and I think the more flexible you can be, the more you can pivot and pivot fast and pivot with grace, the easier the better that it’s going to be on everybody, including yourself and your nervous system.
Hayley Osborne
It’s funny, isn’t it? Because I feel like we put that pressure on ourselves to, oh no, I’ve got to be this person, I’m here for this amount of time on this call, and it has to be like this, otherwise everyone’s going to get upset. It’s not actually like that, and that was such a beautiful example of people understand, and when you are honest and open, and this is what is happening, and you knew the cry, because you know the cry, and you know when it’s different, and you know when it’s they’ve just had a toy taken from them, totally exactly. It’s a
Melissa Ambrosini
very. I, and like I am upstairs and down the other end of the house, for me to even be able to hear that, you know? Like, I knew it was. it was a. I need my mum to cry.
Hayley Osborne
Yeah,
Melissa Ambrosini
and as soon as I hugged him, he stopped,
Hayley Osborne
so on. Terms of like maybe a couple of tips in business, like business tips that you’ve actually systemized or like processed. I don’t really know the right word, but what about in business for somebody who’s a little bit, they don’t have like the clearer systems and processes. What is the one thing that you’ve done that’s changed the game in that regard as well? So, like, for me, you know, being very clear about my calendar has made my life so much easier and really intentional, and I know that when we spoke, we both said, “Oh, yes, Tuesdays is my work day, that’s my work day, perfect, that will work, because if your work days were Thursday, Friday, we, I think, that would have been very hard to be able to come together, so like that’s an example of me like being able to create some kind of system in my world, but what about for you, you’ve been doing this a really long time.
Melissa Ambrosini
Yes, I think again it comes back to the type of mother I want to be. Like, I don’t want to work all day, I want to be with my children, and I don’t have them in full-time daycare. I don’t want that. I want them to be here downstairs whilst I’m working upstairs, down the other end of the house, I want them close. That is my choice. I’m not saying that every mother needs to do that. You need to do what feels right for you.
Like, I have other women entrepreneur friends that have put their children in care very, very early on, like, you know, six months, and that’s what they wanted to do, and you got to do what you want to do, and what’s best for you and your family. But for me, I didn’t want that. I only want to work half a day, like four hours a day. I don’t want to work more than that. I want to spend the rest of the time with my children. I want that. That’s very, very important for me, you know. There, they’re only little for so long, and it goes fast.
And already, like my daughter, for the first time ever, she’s five. She went to what they call Kindy here, and it’s five days, five days every two weeks, so two days one week, and then three days the next week I cried and cried and cried. I didn’t sleep. I lost many hours of sleep over leading up to that event that day, and then you know, cried for the whole first term, at every drop off, I would get in the car and cry, you know, like it’s, it’s just the season, and you just have to do what is right for you and your family, and systems are very important.
So, coming back to your question, I know when I’m working and when I’m not working, and so when I’m working, I am going for it. I am here in my office, my door is closed. Do not interrupt me. I am going for it. I’ve got my four hours, or however long it is, and I just laser focus. My phone is silent. I’m not taking phone calls from my best friends. I’m not scrolling social media. I have four hours to do what I need to do and go for it.
And then when I am off, I try to be off as much as I can. I feel like I was very good with this when I just had one child. I would never look at my phone, I would put it in a drawer on silent and close the drawer, and because my time, you know, as you know, you have two and then you have three, like it gets even your time gets shrunk even more. I have noticed, like, I will check my phone a little bit more, but I’m trying not to do that as much again. I put it on silent and I put it in a drawer when I’m with the kids, and then it’s out of sight for me, is like out of mind.
So, you, I think that’s a good thing that mothers can do is work out when you’re working, when you’re not working, laser focus when you are, know when you’re having your meetings or your podcast, like I don’t podcast every day, because that means I would have to do a full face of makeup and hair every day, like I’m not podcasting every day, I’m not, you know, so when are you taking your meetings, when are you creating content, when are you, you know, doing your calls, all of those things, like get clear on that, like map out your week, if you work for yourself, map out your week, so that you hold yourself accountable. Yeah, you can show up as the best version of you in all areas of your life,
Hayley Osborne
and showing up in all areas of your life, and especially social media, you’re very, you know, consistent, and you have been showing up online authorities. Tech Lee for lots of years. What helps you to do that? And if you’re much like me, your camera roll is full of your children, and you look through and you’re looking for something like what helps you to show up and not show their faces, because I don’t do that either.
Melissa Ambrosini
Oh, it is like I have battled with this for five years, babe, but I always knew before I had children that I would never show their faces online. I just knew it, and there is absolutely no judgment for people who do. Some of my best friends do, and I love it, because I get to see how freaking cute they are, but it’s not for me, it’s just not for me.
And you’ve got to again do what feels right for you, but it just does not feel true for me to do that. And so I knew that before I would have kids, my husband was a little bit more like, whoa, like he wasn’t fussed, he was not fussed, and he was like, whatever you want, and I was like, well, that’s a very strong preference of mine, and he was like, okay, well, we’ll, we won’t do it, but he is not face if I turned around tomorrow and said we can post them, he’d be like, okay, cool, who
Hayley Osborne
would mine, yeah,
Melissa Ambrosini
he’s not fussed as much as I am, and so there’s that piece, and I think when this is what I teach inside my mastermind, the iconic mastermind, as a mother, like, yeah, your camera roll is full of your children, and you have to like come back to what is your core offer, like, what are you actually, how are you serving, who are you serving, and what I do is, and I teach this to my clients, like in my notes section, we have different categories of, like, carousel ideas, of talking head reels, of B roll ideas, and so whenever we do get that inspiration, we jot it down there, so that the when it does come to creating content for your ideal customer avatar. We’ve got a bank of ideas ready to go.
You’ve got a bank there. Oh yeah, like, and so often I’ll get them on walks, you know. I’ll go for a walk. Nature is one of the best inspirations there is. So I’ll go for a walk, and I will, you know, have an idea. Oh, I want to do a reel on that, or I want to do a carousel on that, and I’ll just jot it down in my phone, and then put my phone away. And then, when it comes to, like, creating content, I will just look in those ideas, and I’ll go, oh, yes, yes, yes, yes, I wanted to do that, and I make sure that the energy is still there, like if I’m like, oh no, like that’s kind of done.
I don’t record it because people feel energy, so I make sure the energy is still there, and then I will flesh that out. I’ll flesh out the idea, and then I’ll record that, but it comes back to two things. Who are you speaking to, and how can you help them? And then the second thing is, like, I always bring it back to helping one person every day.
I heard this acronym, HOPE, help one person every day, that’s it. Help one person every day. A girl called Jen, Jen Gottlieb. She shared that, I think, on her Instagram. I’m not sure. And I just think of that, you know, we can get so caught up in the numbers and things like that, but if we just speak to one person and we help one person with our message, like, isn’t that enough? Yeah, isn’t that enough? Helping one person, and yeah, sure, I have lots of followers on my Instagram, but like, I just help one person and I change one person’s life, like, that’s wonderful,
Hayley Osborne
That’s beautiful. I have one last question for you to close, and it is, what is the one thing every ambitious woman needs to remember when they’re building a life and a business that they love.
Melissa Ambrosini
Stay true to you. don’t get shiny object syndrome, don’t get comparisonitis, don’t look at what everyone else is doing. Everyone’s moving to Bali, everyone’s moving to Greece, everyone’s doing this, everyone’s doing that. Stay true to you. If you want to create a life and a business that you love, you have to stay true to yourself. Get off social media, close the app, and stay true. No, you don’t have to get off it, but stay true to yourself.
Get clear on what it is that you want to create. Sit down with your partner, if you have a partner, look at you. Goals together, your five year, your 10 year goals together, and create that, not what someone else on social media is doing, or what they say you should create, like what do you actually want to create, forget about everything else, like, do you really want, like, you know, this type of business, or you just think you want it because everyone else has got that, like, get clear on what it is that you actually want, and then put your blinders on and go and create that.
Hayley Osborne
I love that. So, for those listening that love you so much, where can they find you?
Melissa Ambrosini
Well, thank you for having me. It’s been such a fun conversation. So, come to Instagram at Melissa Ambrosini and tell me what you got from this conversation. I’d love to connect with you. Come and say hi. I will personally respond back to you. I am in my DMs. There is no one else in there. Occasionally, my assistant will check things for me, but I am the one in there responding. And my podcast, The Melissa Ambrosini Show, and then my website, Melissa Ambrose, seen me.com And if anyone here is interested in my mastermind, the iconic mastermind.
Just go to Melissa Ambrose, see me.com forward slash iconic. I take on two women a month, two new women a month, and right now there’s the wait list, so you can jump on the wait list if you’re interested. This is for women who want to create the business of their dreams, have the income and the impact of their, that of their dreams, and do the inner work that makes it all sustainable. So we’re not just doing the outer strategy, it’s not just a business, it’s like the inner work that really makes it all sustainable.
I share the seven patterns that I have created, which are the seven nervous system patterns that are installed in so many of us, usually very, very young, that are the reason we have these fears, these blocks, these beliefs, and I help women unprogrammed those, rewire those seven patterns, so we do the outer work, we create the business, the income, the impact that you want, and we do the inner work to make it all sustainable. So, if you’re interested in that, just head to Melissa Ambrose, see me.com forward slash iconic.
Hayley Osborne
Melissa, thank you so much. Thank you so much for taking the time out of your day to come on my podcast. I appreciate you. Sure, the listeners will love this episode. And thank you, thank you, thank you,
Melissa Ambrosini
Thank you for having me.
You can find out more about Melissa over on her website HERE.
You can connect with Melissa over on her Instagram HERE.
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