We were lucky to catch up with Melissa Coulier and Melanie Samuels recently and have shared our conversation below.
Melissa and Melanie, so great to have you with us and we want to jump right into a really important question. In recent years, it’s become so clear that we’re living through a time where so many folks are lacking self-confidence and self-esteem. So, we’d love to hear about your journey and how you developed your self-confidence and self-esteem.
Melissa: My self-esteem and confidence come from celebrating others’ wins. I have come to love rooting for people instead of allowing others’ wins to become my losses. Another way I’ve developed and continue to build upon my confidence is through education. I gain confidence when I learn more. Knowledge is truly power and the real key to feeling your best in my opinion. I didn’t always feel this way. I had a lot of challenges throughout my early education, and this made me feel really insecure. However, once I flipped the script and proved to myself that I was capable of gaining more and more knowledge, my self-esteem grew significantly. A couple of things that have also really helped me in this department are dancing when no one is watching (it’s a great boost of endorphins where I can really laugh and enjoy myself!) and practicing Mel Robbin’s high-five habit. This has been a game changer for me to be able to not take myself so seriously and give myself a high-five in the mirror every morning!
Melanie: I consistently work at my self-esteem and confidence. It’s become a daily practice for me. As someone who has struggled with body image, the comparison game, and striving for “perfection,” confidence didn’t come naturally to me. However, once I accepted and truly knew who I was, I felt more confident than ever. I’ve always been someone who has tried to be a social chameleon – someone who can adapt to many types of people, situations, and lifestyles. However, I realized that was taking a toll on me. Once I narrowed in on those who really accepted me for who I was and what made me happy, I felt more comfortable in my skin. I make an effort to prioritize the things that make me feel good – family time, talking on the phone with my closest friends, cooking a good meal, and moving my body. These things enhance my confidence every day because I’m not overextending myself anymore. Instead, I’m distributing my energy in a healthy way for me. Most importantly, I’ve come to a place in my life where I’m proud of the life I’ve built, and to me, that’s self-esteem at its best.
Appreciate the insights and wisdom. Before we dig deeper and ask you about the skills that matter and more, maybe you can tell our readers about yourself?
Living Well with Mel and Mel’s mission is to provide an inclusive community that celebrates bio-individuality and uses all aspects of your life to manage inflammation.
Our philosophy is if we can touch one life and inspire them to make the changes needed to feel better, we’ve done our job! We are so passionate about bringing realistic, sustainable, and well-rounded solutions to gaining back confidence in your body, whatever that looks like for you.
Our website features articles, recipes, wellness trends, and more. We are also active on Instagram and love doing Lives to connect with you and answer your questions about wellness and living an anti-inflammatory life. We are also in the process of creating goods that will help bring your personal wellness journey to life.
We are most proud of our focus on inflammation that looks through a wide lens. Often times, certain protocols or advice about health focuses on only one aspect of your life, such as food. While nutrition is certainly important in this journey, we factor in all aspects of your life including mindfulness, movement, relationships, connection, environment, sleep, and even what you put on your body. Each of these important elements of your life make a big difference in how you are able to thrive.
If this resonates with you, we’d love to invite you to join our community by following us on Instagram and joining our mailing list on our website, www.livingwellwithmelandmel.com.
Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?
Looking back at our journey, we feel that the three qualities that have had the most impact on where we are today are empathy for others, risk-taking, and celebrating others’ wins instead of playing the comparison game.
Empathy is essential when it comes to being in the wellness space. Health can be such a vulnerable topic, so it’s important for us to approach our mission of helping others with a flexible lens, one that can be looked through from many different eyes. Health is extremely individual, so we make an effort to acknowledge that everyone is bio-individually different and that requires empathy.
Risk-taking is really what brought us here. We still continue to manage risks, taking some and not taking others. However, we both have a very strong intuition and know how to listen to our gut feelings. Those feelings are what guide us to taking certain steps in our business.
When it comes to celebrating others’ wins, this is a practice and really goes back to the confidence piece of this interview. Being strong in your own path means not allowing someone else’s structure to affect your own. We work hard at being in alignment with what feels right for us specifically.
Our advice for those early in their journey who might be reading this is to embrace communication, the “old school” way. Modern communication (social media, texting, quick/convenient, etc.) has detached us from the idea of having conversations in person or even on the phone. Especially when working in a partnership, real communication is key. When someone talks about someone else behind their back, it often times is a reflection of poor communication – not being able to confront that person in a kind and constructive way. True partnership and relationships should never be talked about behind someone’s back but only in same the room. Being able to communicate in this way will help you in so many situations in business. The strongest connections, we believe, are those made without a screen.
Tell us what your ideal client would be like?
Our mission is to help women who are struggling with inflammation or perhaps don’t even realize they’re struggling with inflammation. Inflammation can show itself in so many different ways – some that might be thought of as subtle, like fatigue, anxiety, or acne. However, inflammation is commonly at the root of so many symptoms people may be experiencing. Because of that, our ideal client is someone who is looking for enjoyable and realistic tools to manage their symptoms amidst career, family life, and travel.
Our ideal client is also someone who is overwhelmed with the rhetoric around diet culture. There is so much information out there about nutrition and health, some of which is outdated and perpetuates a restrictive mentality around food. We want to help make wellness enjoyable and approachable, taking the intimidating and restrictive messaging out of it and adding the positive and encouraging messaging into it.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.livingwellwithmelandmel.com/
- Instagram: @livingwellwithmelandmel
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/people/Livingwellwithmelandmel/100087787701539/
- Other: Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/livingwellwithmelandmel/
Image Credits:
Photography by Melissa Coulier
