Intro: Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in Atlanta, Georgia. It’s time for High Velocity Radio.

Stone Payton: Welcome to the High Velocity Radio show, where we celebrate top performers producing better results in less time. Stone Payton here with you this afternoon. Please join me in welcoming to the broadcast with Transformational Edges Coaching, Sheila Bélanger. How are you?

Sheila Bélanger: I am great Stone. I’m so happy to be here with you and your people. And I love the high velocity. Let’s go baby.

Stone Payton: Well, I think a great place to start would be if you could share with us mission. Purpose. What are. What are you really out there trying to do for folks with your with your practice?

Sheila Bélanger: Yes, I specialize in working with my coaching clients and students with navigating the edges of change which hello, we’re in huge ones right now collectively. But personally I love to work with visionary change agents. I call them sacred disruptors that recognize the status quo in an organization in whatever area of life they’re in, says we’re going to change this. And so how to resource them? So they’re really effective and compassionate change agents for bigger changes that need to happen for the world.

Stone Payton: Now, how in the world did you get in this line of work? What’s the backstory?

Sheila Bélanger: Oh, Stone okay, I’ll try to be succinct. So in undergraduate college, I was a double major, comparative literature and mechanical engineering.

Stone Payton: That’s an interesting double major that’s there.

Sheila Bélanger: There’s my life. That’s my psyche. Okay. And when I got to college, I just couldn’t stomach going into being a professional engineer because at the time, The. It was so misogynist and it was so difficult to be in as a woman engineer is so personally, I had proven to myself I could do the math and the science, but I just didn’t want to go there. And out of the blue, I ended up having a consultation with an astrologer. I had my first astrology reading and I went in like an engineer saying, what is this? But you know, we’ll do it. The woman blew me away. It was so accurate and helpful as a navigational tool and a self-knowing tool that I said, I got to figure out how she did that. So I spent the next two years after work doing a self-study. I came out a professional astrologer as one of the hats and roles I wear. And the bottom line is, it led me to my passion for profound change and lasting change is an inside job, so that whatever tools or practices an individual could use to free themselves from limited concepts, ideas Enculturated mindset. That’s what I was in for. So I spent decades really more in the sort of spiritual growth arena doing lots of counseling, lots of trainings, guiding all kinds of things. And I always knew I wanted to go more towards the business world because I felt like that’s where a lot of leverage is. So I ended up getting trained as a coach and I’m ICF certified. I feel that’s really important to be certified, and I just love now working with leaders of any kind, really helping them, resourcing them at their edge so they can do really effective change agent work.

Stone Payton: So I have to ask what compelled you to to feel like and invest the time, the energy, the resources to become formally credentialed, get that ICF certification? Speak to that a little bit, if you will.

Sheila Bélanger: Yeah, well, as you probably know, Stone, in most professions, some people can just hang out their, you know, their little sign saying, here I am. And what I love about ICF is it’s rigorous and one it has a huge ethics component. And the way that you train as an ICF certified coach to prepare to take your testing is it’s a person and client centric. So you’re really in the role of supporting deeply the client to know their own wisdom and their own power. And I love that because you’re a support to their own agency and their own empowerment of their wisdom. And the more leaders who have that, the better off we are. And there’s a rigorousness to getting your ICF credential. And I really respect that because I came out of it feeling like I earned this. I worked hard and I can stand in my ethics in this profession having that ICF certification.

Stone Payton: I have to believe that I won’t say easier. That’s not a fair word, but but going through that process with that rigor, discipline, structure, it had to help the the transition from the corporate arena to now. You’re a coach and you’re running a business. It had to help to some degree. You had to make that transition.

Sheila Bélanger: It did, although I never I only worked in a corporate job for five years. Oh, okay. I worked as a technical writer, and I was on a management track, actually with Microsoft. And there was one point I said, nope, I can’t do it. I am an edge character, stone, and I just couldn’t do it. But I understand organizational culture, and I understand a lot of my leaders. They’ve trained me up like, what is what is it they really struggle with inside and out. And one of the things I loved about the ICF training was it gave me a pathway to understand how to be the most effectively helpful, because when you’re a coach, you’re not a consultant. They’re not they’re not there to have you give them advice or, you know, tell them things. They’re there to have a really profound experience of being witnessed, being supported, being tracked and being encouraged to really get in the power of their own knowing.

Stone Payton: So what are you finding the most rewarding? What’s the most fun about it for you these days?

Sheila Bélanger: The most fun is when the light bulbs go off. With my coaching clients, I’m holding space. I mean, you’re trained as an ICF coach to ask really poignant, powerful questions, and some of them are very disturbing. You know, they’re the kind of questions like, could you tell me, why are you doing that? Basically. You know, type of things. And to witness the client connect the dots inside and go, oh, that kind of rush of power that happens when a person has a deep insight that’s really transformative. That is like course correcting for them, either personally or professionally. I love that that’s my real happy place when that happens.

Stone Payton: So I want to hear more about this concept of the edges and the work in general. I’m particularly interested in the early phases of the engagement cycle or whatever you call it, but kind of you maybe even do a use case. Of course, you wouldn’t mention any names, but just kind of walk us through what what that might look like.

Sheila Bélanger: Oh, yes. Okay. Well, I’ll give you general first and then I’ll use a use case. Um, so edges are basically the edges of change. That’s that’s my place is, it’s when, you know, we’ve outgrown our old identities and our old patterns and our old attitudes, and we have a longing. We know something’s calling us. You know, whatever it is, whether it’s a different role as a leader or something in your personal family life. But we’re not there yet. It’s not embodied. We don’t know how to be that new identity. So the edge is this really mysterious place where the old life is over. The new life is not fully here yet. And how do you navigate that? It’s a really rich, powerful place, but it’s a terrifying place for our established ideas of ourselves. And what I love to do is resource people at the edge, because that means compassionately and fiercely addressing the two limited mindsets that the person is carrying. I call them the toxic smallness mindsets. And to really vigorously investigate the roots of that. Now recognize as a coach, I’m not a therapist so that if things are coming up from early childhood or family system, it’s not my place to do therapy. I can refer out, but most of my clients are very well resourced and they can really wrestle with, why do I keep limiting myself, you know, before I go forward at the edge to embody my greater potential, my bigger dream of professional or personal manifestation, I have to wrestle with those habitual attitudes and mindsets and wounded inner figures in me that want to hold me hostage, you know? So the edge work is really deep, compassionate inquiry, honesty about self, what’s really going on and resourcing so you can bear the tension of not yet knowing who you’re becoming.

Stone Payton: Now, do you find yourself helping people work through some version of fear or a set of fears? Does fear real or perceived factor into any of this?

Sheila Bélanger: Yeah. Fear. And the way I name it, stone is we all know about our inner critic, right? Um, and that one is is for me with my my perspective and perspective. It’s, um, an inner figure that’s quite young in us. It’s it’s one that’s wounded, but it sort of puffs itself up like this authority. And it shoulds on us. Right. Or it’s the classic one for leaders is imposter syndrome, right? It’s that little voice or that big voice says, who do you think you are? You know, you don’t know. And so what often happens is I use a lot of alternative coaching practices to help people really get the keys back from the inner critic and say this one is not should not be driving your car. You know, because this one is actually wounded and it’s going to drive your car into the ditch and you’re not going to get anywhere. So what I’m doing as a coach is listening. The inner critic is one example. There’s several characters that really get caught in fear, and then it freezes the person and they get caught in the habitual mindset, and then they can’t get anywhere. You know, they feel like they just caught in the cage of their own self-sabotage. And so I use some really powerful practices to help them really put the inner critic in his or her or their right place. Right? Because they’re still part of us. We can’t get rid of them, but not to be having the keys to the car.

Stone Payton: So I walked into this conversation feeling pretty sure in myself that that you certainly would have to endure a great deal of trust for people to open up to you, and you’d have to cultivate Relationship and not violate that relationship. And I’m sure you have disciplines and practices that support all that. What didn’t occur to me until right now is how much you have to get them to trust themselves to participate. Is that accurate?

Sheila Bélanger: Oh, Stone, you want to be a coach? That’s it. It’s really. You’re cultivating and holding space and supporting your client to learn to trust themselves again. Radically.

Stone Payton: That. Yeah. So there’s a there’s a learning that. Well, there’s that. And you’re going to hear me. If you listen to any of my future work, I’m going to use get the keys back. I love that.

Sheila Bélanger: You know, what I love about that is people get it like they I don’t have to blab on. They’re just like, oh, yeah, give me those keys back. You mean you don’t have a license to drive? Okay.

Stone Payton: So when you did get credentialed, you went out there. You did hang that shingle out, so to speak. Did like on the business side of coaching was the was going and getting new clients a challenge or did it fall together pretty well for you?

Sheila Bélanger: Um, it was both. I mean, one, I had a base of people who had been doing sort of classes and workshops, and I was a kind of spiritual teacher for them or guide for them. So and some of those folks were already in business, you know, they were leaders, they were managers. They were, you know, C-suite. So they were like, oh, you’re doing coaching. Okay, I’ll come on over. But, you know, that was like initially. But then any of us who are are business people, it’s like, unless you have the funds to have your own marketing team, which I didn’t and I still don’t. And actually, I like I’m a solo character, I’m a solopreneur, and I love it. So the biggest challenge the stone is I came into coaching. I forget how old I was, um, I think I was in my 50s, you know, late 50s. I don’t mind aging myself because I appreciate the great I’ve earned every one of these gray hairs. Thank you very much. And the biggest challenge was the technology, the learning curve to run all the platforms as a solopreneur, as a solo businesswoman, as a coach. That was, oh my gosh, that was its initiation in itself. And then, like most of us, you try to find the right kind of guides for your marketing process, you know, because there’s a lot out there for coaches. I’m sure you’ve had people on your show or you know about them to try to help coaches run their business, because most of us are really gifted, you know, in that person centric capacity to support and guide a lot of therapists, become coaches. A lot of people have that skill set, but most of us don’t have the business skill set. So we have to somehow find a way either to learn how to do it or to hire it out.

Stone Payton: Did I hear you right? Earlier in the conversation mentioned the term sacred disruptors. Did I?

Sheila Bélanger: Yes I did, Yes. I got to say more about that. Yes. Okay, so when a system isn’t working. And let’s be blunt, my friend, there’s a lot of systems not working right now, okay? Like big time, small and little systems when it’s not working. And you have somebody who has maturity and enough inner resources to say, whoa, this system has to radically change if it’s going to really survive or the people involved or nature or the animals involved are going to survive. And that’s what I think of as a sacred disrupter. It’s like a mature resource change agent. And I just want to contrast when I’m talking about the wounded inner figures that might sabotage us at, you know, as leaders. The inner critic is top of the list. The other one is the pissed off rebel, and it’s the inner figure that has a big chip on their shoulder. They’re hurting for whatever happened, you know, in their life where they were marginalized, including self marginalization. And so they’ve got a head of steam and they come in like a wrecking ball. You know, they’re like, I’m just going to blow everything up. So when I’m working with my change agent leaders, I’m really helping them to resource that pissed off inner rebel, because most most of us have one of those inner figures, because that one is not an effective leader. The fuel and the energy of that character is wonderful to support you, but you’re mature, sort of sacred disruptor. Okay, I’m going to mess with the system for the the main goal of making it better for everybody, right? That’s really different than a pissed off inner rebel who says, I’m just angry and I’m going to take everything out.

Stone Payton: Yeah. So as a leader who participates in emerges from their work with you when they are back at their ranch, can they borrow a few pages from the Sheila book and use it to do they.

Sheila Bélanger: So do I’m going to actually come. I’m going to bring up one of my most amazing clients. Hotel love story. Now stone. Yes, please. You said, you know, sort of a case study. Um, an amazing, uh, at the time I started working with this leader, uh, they were, uh, decades. They were almost at the C-suite and, um, lesbian woman, but but, well liked and really had support from the people under them. But the upper level, uh, you know, really held them at the upper level. Management and super supervisors held them at, um, arm’s length, which really activated for her all this angry rebel. Right, because she was already working as a lesbian, having had to come through her own process with that in the culture. Right. Like, how do I stand in my authenticity when this is here? And one of the things that happened was as we worked together and particularly resourced. Her inner rebel got that one calmed down. It allowed what I would call her more mature inner leader to come through, and as she grew into that, she really felt the power of taking her place at the table and not making any apologies for how different she was and then her team under her. She started utilizing some of the practices that she and I worked with, which is calling in the sort of inner saboteurs, again, not doing it as therapy because that wasn’t her place.

Sheila Bélanger: She’s leader, you know, she’s she’s leader of her team. But that kind of education about who’s at the conference table with us again, who has the keys to the car, you know, because that’s individual work. But it’s also in a team, in an organization, if every single one of your team, the one that has the keys is some wounded inner figure, well, we know how much gets done, right? Nothing. Because then it’s just a free for all right. And it’s like a food fight and and you know Oh, there’s all kinds of chaos. So my example of working with her was in supporting her to come into her own empowerment. She had more awareness with her team to build a what she called a coaching culture, like a way that they could help each other track when a wounded part was up again, not inappropriately doing therapy with each other, but it was something that she could translate to her workplace that was very effective. And because, you know, like attracts like, she’s a feisty, edgy change agent. So she had a whole team of them. And so she got to kind of, all right, we’re all going to grow up together. And it makes some really good changes in this organization.

Stone Payton: So do you find yourself from time to time having to educate or and or debunk some commonly held misconceptions or myths may be a little bit strong, but so are some incomplete information about people’s initial frame of reference perspective, preconceived notions about coaching, what it is, what it’s not, how to use it.

Sheila Bélanger: Yes, very much so. A couple of things. I’d say two examples for you stone that are frequent is it’s really important when I do because most of us do a discovery call or a chemistry call, you know, I call it basically a sniff test kick the tires, you know, like, okay, do I want to go drive with this coach? You know, like, let’s check it out. I mean, let’s cut to the chase. It’s a sniff test, baby. Okay, but I could call it a discovery call. Yeah, but essentially, there’s two things I see. One is they’ve never worked with a coach before, so there’s just no understanding yet of, like. Well, how could you be supportive to me? You know, like, why would I hire you? Or why would my organization hire you and contract with you to help me as a leader? So part of that is just educating our role as a coach is like, I think of it again, I’m going to use the word sacred. It is such a privilege, especially for leaders, especially those you know more in the C-suite. It can be a really lonely place tremendously, and a lot of pressure in a lot of decision making pressure. And so, so many things going on in the organizational culture. So the coach can be like this really personal ally to listen deeply and effectively, not try to change them, not try to tell them what to do, but like holding the space deeply so that they can listen to themselves.

Sheila Bélanger: And that goes to the trusting themselves. So many times leaders are so overwhelmed with time, they don’t even have time to think through, you know, some key decisions they’ve got to make. So one thing that a coach does, it’s like you have this time, this session committed to I’m holding space for you. You can listen to yourself. I’m going to ask you really poignant questions to help you get to a deeper level of understanding and truth. And that is a really rare gift, especially for executives and leaders. So one is educating, well, what exactly does a coach do? And the thing again, if you’re ICF certified, the focus is you really are trained up. The the client decides the goal. You don’t come in as a coach and say, okay, we’re going to work on this today. What do you want to work on? What do you think we need to address at the end of the coaching session? How what did you what are your takeaways? How are you going to be accountable to yourself? So throughout the whole way as a coach, when you’re ICF certified, your focus is the empowerment of the client. And some clients don’t understand that. They come in thinking, oh, coach is going to tell me what to do. So that’s that’s one piece of education that needs to happen. I’ll pause there in case you you want to.

Stone Payton: Know, keep going. This is fantastic. Get your sip of water and keep going.

Sheila Bélanger: Yeah, exactly. That’s what I have to do is like because you pushed my my talk button stone and I’m off to the races. Okay. Like some people say, okay, where’s the hook that takes her off the stage? Now you can just cut me off. That’ll work. Um, the second major piece when people are interested in coaching is to help them really understand what I understand, what I call our swim lane, which is we’re not consultants, we’re not therapists, we’re not advisors. And so sometimes, um, a leader will come in and they’ve worked with a consultant. Right. Which is great. It was beautiful. But I have to educate them and say, I am not going to tell you what to do. I’m not even going to assess with you and give you answers. I’m going to listen deeply. And if we hit a pocket of emotional material unmetabolised trauma, things that I realized, well, now I’m out of my swim lane because now what’s coming up for this leader is potential work with a therapist or healer. And so as a coach, we’re really trained to say, stay in your swim lane. This is what I’m doing. And some leaders come in and they kind of say, oh, it’s going to be like another consulting session. And I have to tell you, Stone, the biggest surprise for them when they get into is like, oh, I have to do some work. Yeah you do. Guess what? Yeah. It’s on you, baby. And I’m going to keep using my coaching skills and holding great space for you to do your own work.

Stone Payton: Well, with your permission, I’m going to switch gears on you for a minute, if I might. Uh, interests, hobbies, pursuits, passions outside the scope of your of your coaching work. Might my listeners know I like to hunt, fish and travel? Anything you’d like to nerd out about? That’s not within the scope of coaching.

Sheila Bélanger: Hiking, and backpacking. Stone. I’m an avid backpacker. I love, and I live in the Pacific Northwest of the US, so we have amazing we have amazing opportunities in this area. And I my preference is to go like on a seven day backpack, you know, but all my stuff in the backpack get on the trail, just go wild. It’s it’s I just love doing that. And I’m also a gardener. I love is particularly flowers. And I also love to grow vegetables. It’s so satisfying to get my hands in the dirt and, you know, just. And the satisfaction of, like, planting a seed. And then it comes up, you know, or planting garlic bulbs in the fall. And then in the summer you get these huge garlics when you pull them out of the earth. Those are two of the things I adore.

Stone Payton: Well, you’re clearly doing great work and very rewarding work and living your best life, it sounds like to me, but I’ll ask you anyway. Uh, what’s on the horizon? Any designs on a on a book or certifying people to to to do the Teach the Sheila way or anything like that to replicate your.

Sheila Bélanger: Oh, dear. Oh, Stone, thanks for dropping that one in front of me. It’s like most of us. Where would I put that? In my schedule, my darling, you know, um, mainly what’s on the horizon for me. I love doing group coaching programs because of the synergy. It’s like it’s just building community. Because I’m skilled as a coach, I’m born to do this. It’s really good. But to come together with a group to support them as a coach, but really for them to support each other and build these communities, that’s what I love doing, because it’s like I might do a short term six week, you know, six session group coaching and then I’m on. They are still together, many of them as cohorts, you know, helping each other professionally and personally. So, um, that is the most important thing to me, particularly now with all the incredible changes we’re all going through, through collectively and personally is how do we build community. And so for me, that’s one way I do it is, is group coaching programs I love it.

Stone Payton: Well, before we wrap, I’d love it if we could leave our listeners with a couple of, I call them pro tips, maybe, maybe on both sides of the table or for, you know, of being a good coach and getting the most out of coaching or something else that we’ve talked about, but let’s leave them with a little something to to noodle on and look, gang. The best pro tip I can give you is reach out and have a conversation with Sheila or somebody on her team and let her help you think this through. But to to to keep them in check and and making progress between now and then. Let’s leave them with a little something.

Sheila Bélanger: Great. Thank you so much. Well first of all, for coaches in your audience, if you’re in the ICF world, if you’re ICF accredited, you know, there is an amazing amount of resources because part of our requirement to keep our ICF credential is ongoing continuing education, professional education. And I have to say, Stone, another big shout out to the International Coaching Federation, in case you don’t know what Stone and I have been talking about is they have local groups that offer these amazing, like, you know, lunch and learn or trainings. And as a coach, it’s just an enormous resources. You can have to continue learning as a coach. Easy to get either with your local ICF chapter or the national ones, or the international ones. The website for the International Coaching Federation is phenomenal for resources. So coaches who are listening, you probably already know this, but if you’re not an ICF accredited coach and you maybe you’re getting a little interested. This is one of the big supports is you get really amazing ongoing training as a coach that broadens you and deepens your skills as a coach. And then for, you know, leaders who are listening, gosh, I want to say I have a couple of free resources that people will get to and on my website. But I want to say just a pro tip, when I’m working with my coaching clients, one of the first practices we do is I call them the wisdom ways of knowing, and I’ll just say it very easily. It’s basically to recognize that your inner wisdom has many components and it’s not your conscious mind. With all due respect, there’s heart, wisdom, your feelings and emotions. There’s body wisdom. What is your body know? Like we all know, you can walk into a conference room and your body starts twitching.

Sheila Bélanger: Your body is already telling you what’s going to go down in the meeting. Okay? Like listen to your body wisdom and then what we call your imagination or your imagery wisdom. And what I mean by that is sometimes your mind and your own business and suddenly a song will come or a memory will come. And there’s a way to consider that your, your intelligence is talking to you, that it’s not random, that just an image you can start cultivating images, that what might this be sharing with me? What might this be a bit of wisdom from my inner self. So my pro tip is you might start cultivating. Yes, your mind is brilliant and that’s wonderful, but also start cultivating simple ways to breathe. Even if you just touch your heart and say, what does my heart know right now? And just give some space for that? Or, you know, if I just sort of shake and maybe stretch a bit and just take a couple of breaths. What’s my body feeling like right now? What does my body know? You know. And then with the imagery, you might some I tell my clients, just gently close your eyes. And does any image come to you? Nothing has to happen, but you start cultivating your other ways of knowing your other inner wisdom. Places that we all have. But we’ve just we haven’t cultivated them because we’ve been trained up just to use our conscious mind. So and this is really simple stuff, but, you know, you’d be amazed if you just daily stop and touch your heart and say, what does my heart know right now? You might blow your mind, so to speak, what comes up to you?

Stone Payton: I am so glad I asked. That sounds like terrific counsel. And I’ll tell you, gang, if you want to just have bright, passionate people who are doing good work to share some really strong, powerful information with you. Get yourself a radio show. It’s a great way to do it right. Oh, this has been marvelous.

Sheila Bélanger: Well done. Stone.

Stone Payton: All right, let’s make sure we leave them with your website and any other contact information. So they have coordinates so they can tap into your into your work.

Sheila Bélanger: Yeah. Thank you so much for that stone. So my website is transformational edges Coaching.com. Transformational edges Coaching.com. And you go to the home page and you can link over. I’ve got a link to courses you can link if you’re interested in my next upcoming group coaching program starts in mid-March of 2025 to whenever this goes out. And plus there’s a couple of free resources in my coaching courses page, ones that will help you work with your four ways of knowing and a couple a short workshop series, free workshop series on guided practices. So you’re welcome to go and check those out. And thank you so much for the opportunity to be with you and your audience. I really, really appreciate it.

Stone Payton: What an absolute delight to have you on the broadcast. This has been inspiring, invigorating, informative. I have thoroughly enjoyed the conversation and I know our listeners have as well. You’re doing really good work for so many and we sure appreciate you, Sheila.

Sheila Bélanger: Thank you. Stone, I so appreciate you and your people and we’re in it together, darling.

Speaker4: Let’s do it. Okay.

Stone Payton: Oh my pleasure. Alright, until next time. This is Stone Payton for our guest today, Sheila Bélanger with Transformational Edges Coaching and everyone here at the Business RadioX family saying, we’ll see you in the fast lane.