We were lucky to catch up with Stefanie Julia recently and have shared our conversation below.
Stefanie, sincerely appreciate your selflessness in agreeing to discuss your mental health journey and how you overcame and persisted despite the challenges. Please share with our readers how you overcame. For readers, please note this is not medical advice, we are not doctors, you should always consult professionals for advice and that this is merely one person sharing their story and experience.
About 7 months ago, I made the hard decision to end my romantic relationship and move out of my home. I knew it would be hard and take a toll on me mentally and financially but I knew it was time. I had location freedom as I was well into the world of full-time entrepreneurship as a business strategist and coach in the online space so I moved to Atlanta in the hopes of finding stability in a well known city for black women in entrepreneurship. Within a week of arriving, I learned I was pregnant. This news rocked my world which was already on a tilt after packing up my life and moving across country. My now ex was not too thrilled with this either. The next 3 months were hell for the both of us as I had to travel back and forth from Atlanta to Denver due to my insurance limitations and the many attempts to try to work things out.
In the end, the relationship was over and I decided to move close to family to help me with my transition into motherhood. Real talk…I was not doing well mentally and emotionally. I was grieving so many things at once, my relationship, my home in Denver, the community I created there, and the life that I built as the rich auntie. I had a prior late miscarriage so attachment to this pregnancy was slow coming and my relationship with the baby’s father was abysmal. I regularly woke up to angry texts that screamed abandonment issues and judgement from family and friends on how I was letting him affect my stress levels for the baby’s sake.
Now, mind you, I still ran my business full time and was barely taking time off but instead working extra hours to create a new marketing cycle that would fund my maternity leave. It was something I always wanted to do and would have been a lot easier if I did not decide to rebrand at the same time (not wise). New domains, new ad media, meetings with new team members, and more detailed conversations with prospects added to the frustration of this new marketing cycle. The cycle also was scheduled to end 2 months before my due date.
I navigated all of this without sharing publicly all of what I was going through so there was no empathy for rescheduled webinars when I couldn’t pull it together and show up for others or missing deadlines with my team because I had put too much on my plate at one time.
Pushing myself to the brink of exhaustion may not have been necessary but I am genuinely proud of myself for how I have navigated this time. I created boundaries for my ex that even called for him to only being able to communicate with my mother for baby updates so I wouldn’t be triggered by his name popping up on my phone. I increased my therapy appointments to weekly over monthly to provide that extra support. I leaned into my mediation and Reiki practices that did wonders on speeding up my healing journey (if that’s even a thing). I gave myself grace regularly and gave myself permission to take time off when needed. I also leaned into my automated systems that I already had created even with the old brand if I needed more time in creating the transition.
And most importantly, I allowed myself to pivot. By the end of my marketing cycle I had made a whole new maternity leave plan for my business. One that was way less work and didn’t put so much stress on my team or on me to grow my team in my 3rd trimester. One is honestly more profitable and in alignment with my post-maternity leave plan. I gave myself permission to even work when I wanted to during maternity leave. Judge ya mama but I LOVE coaching my clients and it feels my spirit.
So my lesson from all of this is PERMISSION TO PIVOT and know that you weren’t given this purpose unless it was meant to take care of you.
Great, so let’s take a few minutes and cover your story. What should folks know about you and what you do?
Nowadays I am known as the Client Attraction Coach but I have worn many hats over the past few years. I am also an online fitness coach and avid traveler which led to the growth of my other business and brand, Catch Flights & Fitness. I launched this business during the peak of my career as a Special Agent in Homeland Security Investigations. Yup, ya girl was a fed! And I loved it. Until the rise of police shootings in the black community led to trainings that made my stomach turn and made me overall angry and conflicted. When I left I went full time into my business but had already built a 6 figure online fitness coaching business while traveling monthly (for a streak of 7 years) and working a full time career that I described as a 24/7 job. My 13-year tenure in federal law enforcement afforded me so many skills that I use in both fitness coaching and business coaching. The tenacity to solve a problem and find a path to a solution stems from my top-awarded investigation skills.
Through my business, Profitable Passion & Purpose, I offer a refreshing perspective on launching, growing, and scaling a business while working full time in a very demanding federal law enforcement career. I help my clients build and automate client attraction systems so they attract their clients on autopilot. And when that funnel becomes too packed, I show them how to scale their sales with what I deemed a group sales call, a webinar. I teach this class regularly live. You can register for the next one here: thevipcoaches.com/automation
Automation is necessary not just for time freedom but when life starts lifing you can lean on it to continue to grow your business while you take care of your mental health.
If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?
1. An Automated Client Attraction System – this system allowed me to systematize my marketing through my team and ads so I wasn’t pouring out my limited energy to cold prospects that may or may not have been ready to invest in my services. This allowed me to only have to physically step in when prospects were hot and ready to invest.
2. An Automated Sales System – this system allowed me to bring money in the door without being on a bunch of sales calls throughout the day. I loved this one because my 1:1 time was only reserved for my 1:1 clients. I also used this system to pre-sell a course I was created anyway for my clients but bring extra money in from prospects who were not ready for whatever reason for my high-ticket offer.
3. Biz Besties – without these women I would not have been able to get to where I am now. I would have probably given up or quit 5011 times. But they remind me that the hard moments are temporary and I would be singing a different tune soon and even in the moment when I don’t believe them, it’s true. Also! My biz besties are highly skilled, trained and experiences coaches themselves so they have helped me push through roadblocks faster than I could have myself. One of my biz besties also gave me a strategy that led to me earning an additional $22k & counting from a new offer model alone that I would have never tried without her clarity and encouragement – Shout out to Ceria Woodrit of Soul Liberation. I can’t shout out everyone but these two deserve a reward for those early morning strategy AND healing calls and late night coworking sessions: Katherine Searcy, The Retreat Maven & Carmen Blyden from the Walk in Power Podcast,
Even though biz besties are listed last, you need to get these on your team ASAP. No business can grow in a silo. Then identify what automation needs to be put in place if you ever needed to step away. I thankfully had developed these skills early in business career because of my hectic 24/7 job which is why the only automation I needed to implement for maternity leave was in the realm of client delivery. You can do these by creating a time study. Go through your day and notate what you do every hour for 2 weeks. Seriously just do it. And don’t judge your time yet if you do things that are unique to the day or week, unless you are on vacation. Then pick what could be delegated to a team member, software, or automation. And then determine how much you need to make to fully automate each aspect of your business. THIS should be your first goal. Not to buy that shiny new benz but to implement automation when life starts lifing because IT WILL!!
What is the number one obstacle or challenge you are currently facing and what are you doing to try to resolve or overcome this challenge?
I am still concerned about the effects of new motherhood on my business growth. As the Automation Queen, most folks think I am or should be confident. But I am not. I am terrified. This is new and untested territory in my life and business. But not in general. Plenty of women in business that I hold in high esteem have figured it and so shall I. And I know this is my purpose and not just my passion so motherhood will help me grow into my purpose even more and not deter me from it.
Some things I am doing to overcome my fear and concerns are voicing them. There is a ton of stigma over unwarranted advice regarding pregnancy and the postpartum era. But in my opinion that’s only from folks who don’t walk in similar shoes. I may side-eye my moms advice to me on how long I decide to work and how I move during maternity leave but I highly value the advice, strategies, and suggestions from fellow business owners especially those who did it without a partner like I will. So I open up and ask whenever I get the chance. Someone should one day write a pregnancy and parenting book for US!
I also am determined to fill a need too. I have spoken to so many women in entrepreneurship that are holding off having a trouble because they don’t know how they will fund or navigate maternity leave. I have a solution for navigating with automation but funding is something I want to provide too so I plan to start a maternity leave grant for entrepreneurs who are full time in their business. Stay tuned!
Contact Info:
- Website: stefaniejulia.com
- Instagram: instagram.com/thestefaniejulia
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/StefanieJulia.IPF
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stefaniejulia
- Other: Facebook Group for Coaches: https://profitablepassionandpurpose.com/community Facebook Group for Travelers on their Fitness Journey: https://catchflightsandfitness.com/ Automate Your Client Attraction System Masterclass: https://thevipcoaches.com/automation
Image Credits
The picture in the purple blazer – Flor Blake Photography The picture of me at a desk with the laptop in front of me and lifting the barbell – Michelle Kuan Media The one where I am being interviewed – Strength on Stages
