Episode 21

full
Published on:

23rd Feb 2026

A Re-introduction

In this episode of Unfolding, I’m reintroducing myself to all the new listeners and my subscribers on Substack. I share what it really means to be a Decision Mentor and Inner-Trust Guide. Why I'm passionate about working with women in midlife, and how discovering my Human Design during burnout changed everything for me.

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Connect with me: erica[at]ericavoell[dot]com

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Transcript
Speaker:

Welcome to the Unfolding Podcast,

a space where we explore what it

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looks like to really trust yourself.

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Say no without guilt and live your

life like it actually belongs to you.

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I am Erica Voell, a Decision Mentor

and Inner-Trust Guide, and I help

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women in midlife trust how they are

uniquely designed to make decisions,

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reclaim their authority, and

understand their unique strengths.

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Using Human Design as a lens, we clear the

noise of conditioning so their no feels

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powerful and their yes feels true, and

they can move forward without self-doubt,

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guilt, and the pressure to prove anything.

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On this show, we have honest conversations

about self-trust, boundaries, energy

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and identity, especially for women who

in midlife who are done living by the

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shoulds and second guessing themselves.

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You'll hear stories, insights,

and tools rooted in Human

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Design, coaching, and real life.

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Not to tell you what to do, like

another self-help book, but to help

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you really hear yourself so you

can stop overthinking and start

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making decisions that feel grounded.

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Clear and true.

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I have a lot of new listeners through this

podcast and on Substack, and I just wanna

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say welcome and thank you for listening.

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I felt like with all the new subscribers,

it was time for a reintroduction because

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I have changed so much, even since May

. One of the first questions I get asked

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when I tell people what I do is, what is

a Decision Mentor and Inner-Trust Guide?

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I work with women in midlife and one

of the things I've noticed when I was

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talking to my clients and where they

would get stuck is in making decisions.

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But that's not where they start,

and that's not why they come to me.

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Where we start is what are the

stories that are coming up for them?

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What are the patterns and the

stories that they've been telling

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themselves their entire lives?

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This is not to blame them.

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This is just like what were their

coping mechanisms and what were

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the stories that have shaped them?

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We also talk about how they have

shape-shifted to make other people happy.

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'cause so often they have felt like

the black sheep in their family or

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that they didn't belong, or that they

were too sensitive or too inconsistent,

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or too emotional or in too intense.

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And oh my gosh, I feel that

same way my entire life.

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They also tend to compare themselves to

others a lot, and they've taken all of

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the personality tests trying to help them

find something that explains who they are.

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But they feel like they can't be defined

by a series of letters or a number.

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They have felt like Myers-Briggs

and Enneagram and StrengthsFinder

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put them into a box and they don't

feel like they fit into that box.

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And what's also come forward

is a lot of these things have

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affected how they make decisions.

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For a lot of them, they've made

the safe decisions because it

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was what made others comfortable.

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What would make others happy?

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What would keep the peace, what they

should do, especially when it came

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to a job or what was the path that

was recommended or most acceptable

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in their family, in their groups.

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So that's where the Decision Mentor

and Inner-Trust Guide title came from.

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I ultimately hope to help people really

feel good about their decisions and

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to develop this inner trust and to

trust that inner guidance that they

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have, so that then they can make the

leaps that they want to make or just

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to feel like they have a gift , and

that they do belong in this world.

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One of the things I've been learning

lately is about the new era in

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Human Design, which starts in 2027.

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And we're moving into it.

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We've been feeling it since

about:

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And what is giving me so much

hope is that we all have a

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role to play in this new era.

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For those who have felt that they

didn't belong in this culture and

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society that we've been in for the

last 60 or 70 years of hustling and

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getting ahead and like having it all.

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And that they feel like they've been

too sensitive or feel things too much.

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What's been giving me hope is that

they have a role in this new era.

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Their gifts might have not been

recognized in the old era that we're

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moving out of, the Era of Planning, but

their gifts are going to be needed and

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essential and recognized in this new

era called the Era of the Individual.

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So the main tool I work with is Human

Design, and I came to Human Design through

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a really to tumultuous period in my life.

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I was in the beginning of healing

from clinical burnout in:

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I was preparing to go through a

series of medicine journeys and

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still things were coming up for

me that were roadblocks or walls.

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And my therapist one day said

to me, "Erica, I want you to go

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look up your Human Design type."

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And she left it at that

and I was like, oh, great.

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Is this like Eat Right

for Your Blood Type?

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Now I have to figure out something new?

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What I did not realize is this

was a simple suggestion that

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would absolutely change my life.

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So that night I went to work and I worked

on the public service desk at the library.

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It was a really quiet night.

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And I looked up my Human Design.

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I looked up my type, and the chart

I looked up looked so complicated.

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There were lines and shapes and numbers.

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I had no idea what it was, but

there was something telling me that

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I needed to look up what it meant.

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I was really intrigued and when I

learned I was a generator and it said

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that generators are the life force here

to help lift the energy of the world.

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I didn't feel like I could lift

up any energy to lift up anyone.

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I was exhausted and I had no energy.

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But then I read about the emotional

authority and that it's based

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on how something makes you feel.

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And so I started to Google everything

I could in those three hours that

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I was on the desk and I copied

everything into a Google document.

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But what I read through all

that research made me cry.

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Something that really resonated with me.

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I still have in a Google Doc.

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And that was you spread and amplify

energy and you are here to be lit

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up by what you do, and in turn your

energy lights up those around you.

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And like I said, I was in a

really dark place at that point.

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I was holding out hope that those

medicine journeys would help me heal.

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I didn't know how I could light up those

around me when I was feeling so dark.

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Another thing that resonated so deeply

was that you are lit up by what you

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do, and then when you turn your energy,

you can light those up around you.

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You spread and amplify energy.

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The energy sustains the fire.

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The real kicker was this.

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My emotional authority feels everything

and needs to ride out the emotional

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waves before making a decision, and

I found this quote by Erin Claire

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Jones in Allure Magazine about

people with an emotional authority.

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She said, quote, "if they're happy,

they will say yes, and if they're

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sad, they will say no, and they

may regret that decision later on.

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They need to wait to be in a calm

space as long as it takes, and get off

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that rollercoaster of feelings before

deciding what's best for themselves."

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End quote.

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It still gives me chills to

read that out loud because I

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had felt that my entire life.

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I felt like I was not

good at making decisions.

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I would make dec quick decisions like at

the rest of my family, and sometimes I

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would have this sick feeling and wanna

back out, but my brain would talk me

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into it because that's what I should

do, because it would get me closer to

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what I needed to do to get further in

my career, to feel like I was recognized

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or that I was making others happy.

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It was all about what I should

do, not realizing that I had been

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overriding this internal sensation.

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When I would feel sick about a decision,

I would tell myself that I was wrong,

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and then I started to reflect back

on the times I had made decisions

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and when I felt weird about them.

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Like a lot of times I would make

a decision, uh, or we would plan

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something and somewhere in my body or

in the back of my mind, I would think,

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I don't need to get ready for this.

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I don't need to plan for this

'cause I'm not going to do it.

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I'm not going to be there for some reason.

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And it would really freak me

out when it would come true.

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There would be a snow storm or I would get

sick and I would not be able to be there.

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A perfect example of this, like just

feeling like something wasn't right,

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was when we planned a family vacation

with my parents and my sister, and

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the closer we got to this vacation,

the less good I felt about it.

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I could not put my finger on it.

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I didn't know it was bubbling up for me.

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I couldn't explain it.

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I could just feel it.

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Something was off.

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And that family vacation did not go well.

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My dad could not go because he was sick.

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My mom was sick the entire

time and just pushing through.

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My sister and I were on each

other's last nerves the whole time.

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I felt like I couldn't do anything right.

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Little did I know that I was in

the middle of burning out and

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everything was setting me off.

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I cried more on that vacation

and I rarely cry on vacation.

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When we came back from that vacation, I

got really sick and I could not get well.

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And reading about how someone's an

emotional authority needs to sleep on

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their decisions shifted so much for me.

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I dug in deep to learn more about things.

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I want to know more about me.

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I've read so many self-help books and

hoped that they would help me figure

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out myself and to fix the things

that I thought were wrong with me.

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But the longer I studied my Human

Design, what I noticed was I didn't feel

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like there was anything wrong with me.

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It was giving me language for my lived

experience in a way that felt like

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it had read my personal journals.

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How could something where I put in my

time, my date, and my location of my

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birth know so much about my life story?

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Not the events in my life story, but

like the experiences of being in my body.

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So I just felt like I had

to learn as much as I could.

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I signed up for a couple of

classes, but neither of them

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really gave me what I was wanting.

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They seemed so esoteric

for my logical mind.

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The ones I wanted were so expensive,

but I didn't, couldn't spend hundreds of

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dollars just to learn about type and then

to spend more to learn about authority.

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I was not in a place where I could

shell out $6,000 right away for

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Human Design classes, and then.

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Somehow Erin Claire Jones came back up.

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I found her on Instagram and amazingly

enough, a few months later, she was

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sharing about her course and that she

was selling it in increments that were

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actually really affordable for me.

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And I started to study Human

Design and in turn study myself.

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When I was learning something, I

would not just look up my chart,

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but I would have my husband and

my daughters also on the screen.

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'cause I wanted to know everything and

I wanted to know how this particular

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aspect was being expressed in them.

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I learned that in my profile that

I am someone who loves to dig deep.

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There's sort of a joke I have with

myself that I never met a rabbit

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hole that I didn't want to fall

down once I started to dig in.

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I love to feel like I'm becoming an

expert in something that truly brings

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me joy, which explains why when I

started to learn how to knit, I took

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a lot of knitting classes and then

I wanted to teach people about it.

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Then I got into quilting and I

took several classes on quilting

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and I made a bunch of quilts.

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And then I got into sewing, and I really

wanted to learn how to sew my own clothes.

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So I really know that I can

focus and I can dig deep.

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And one of the things that started

to happen as I was studying my Human

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Design and studying my family is I

started to see things come to light.

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I started to see that

I was no longer broken.

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I started to see why I felt like I

always had to keep up with my husband who

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can move super fast through the house.

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I mean, if something needs to be cleaned,

he can make it happen so fast and I'm

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like step by step and we're gonna fix

this room and then we'll do this room

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and I have to do all the things in

that one room before I can move on.

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But he can just like move through

the house and do all of it.

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I thought there was something wrong

with me because I couldn't keep up, and

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maybe it was because I felt fatigued

and exhausted so much of the time.

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I learned that my natural state

of being is doing things in

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a very step-by-step fashion.

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I learned that even though my daughter

and I have the same type, the same

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profile and the same decision making

strategy that it gets expressed

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very differently in each of us.

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She has a very unique way

of being, as do all of us.

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And learning her decision making

strategy and how it expresses itself

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differently than mine, even though

we have that emotional authority.

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It saved us so much money.

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Now I tell her before she buys something

that she needs to sleep on that

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decision, and a couple of days later,

she's either forgotten about it or if

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it's still in the front of her mind.

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I'm like, okay, let's go for it.

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I mean, we're not talking about

hundreds or thousands of dollars.

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We're talking about $25 of her allowance.

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But I want her to learn how to

wait so that then she learns that

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she doesn't make good impulse

buys and want to return things.

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And I also want to help her learn what

it feels like to make a decision and

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then what it feels like to back out.

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Or to only have two options to choose

from, so that she learns what it feels

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like when something is right for her.

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With my husband, I've learned that

asking him yes or no questions is huge.

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He knows almost instantly what is

the right thing for him, just by

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me asking him yes or no questions.

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So how did I start working with

Human Design in my coaching practice?

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I really started digging into

Human Design around the same time.

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I didn't realize how much I was talking

about Human Design with other people in

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the coaching certification program until

one day I was on a practice call and the

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person on the other end said, "when are

you gonna share this with other people?"

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I honestly didn't know how much I knew.

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I didn't think I knew enough.

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I thought I needed to finish

the Human Design course

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before I started to share it.

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Then a friend in the coaching program

said, when you're ready, I would

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love to get a reading with you.

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And so I felt some pressure

and I was like, oh, I guess

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I do know enough to share it.

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So I decided to finish part of the

course, and then I would be ready.

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But then as I learned how to coach

with Human Design, I realized I didn't

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need to know everything to share it.

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It was just me taking that leap.

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So I did a reading for that friend.

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It was so amazing, and she

became my first paying client.

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And at practice I offered it to other

friends just to help me get my sea legs

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under me and for me to feel comfortable.

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I learned a lot about myself and

working with clients in those sessions.

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I learned that I can overwhelm people

with lots and lots of information

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because I want to over-give.

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'Cause I'm like, I know all this.

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You need to know all of that.

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But having a lot of

information doesn't help them.

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So I've refined my approach and

started working with people on a

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monthly basis instead of sharing

all of that information at once.

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And during that time of retooling, I was

trying so hard to be a general life coach.

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But it wasn't until that first

client, who's also a coach, said

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to me, "Erica, I would not send

people to you for life coaching.

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I would send them to

you for Human Design."

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I was a little taken aback.

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I was like feeling really pigeonholed.

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But then I sat with it and I talked to

my business coach at the time and she

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said, "why not go all in on Human Design?"

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So I did and I got my first

monthly clients after that.

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I also co-hosted a retreat where I taught

about Human Design and have since led

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multiple workshops in person and online.

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And I love sharing it.

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I love talking about it.

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When I meet people, I'm like, I wanna

know what your Human Design type is.

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I wanna know all about you

from your Human Design.

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I love sharing it with new people and

I'm just like, oh my gosh, I can't

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wait to see if this is who they are.

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And like I can really tend to

spot the projectors around me.

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It's really fascinating.

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And I love when I just pull

out a couple of things.

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I love the aha moments that happen

and there's this look on their face

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that they get and they're like, "oh my

gosh, how do you know that about me?"

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Because I know how much this can

transform people's lives and how it can

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transform relationships 'cause I've seen

it happen with my family and I've seen

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it happen with my client's families.

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It still blows my mind every time I

sit down with somebody and I'm sharing

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what I'm seeing in their chart.

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It happened to me yesterday.

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And when I ask how is

this resonating with them?

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And they're like.

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Yeah.

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Wow.

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You know that about me?

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You can tell me about

that from this chart?

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It's so fascinating and I've learned

that as I guide them in helping them

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learn more about themselves, they

start to embody it as opposed to me

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just giving them lots of information.

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And it may not surprise you to learn

that I was a librarian for 19 years.

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I mostly worked as a children's

librarian and I spent 10 of those

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19 years purchasing children's

and teen materials for libraries.

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So this natural curiosity in this

research part of me is just so innate.

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I loved the library, I loved the concept

of the library, but one of the things that

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happened as I was healing from burnout

and learning my Human Design is that I

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realized I had followed the "should" path.

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It was a theme my entire life.

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I have three college degrees.

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I have a social work degree because

my mom's friend loved being a social

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worker, so I thought I should try that.

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And I loved the classes and I

thought, oh, this could be fun.

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I could do that.

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But in practice, I did

not love social work.

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I tried different aspects of it through

working in the elderly population,

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and I interned at a public policy

department at Planned Parenthood.

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Even going to lobbying days in

the Kansas legislature, I thought

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that's what I wanted to do.

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I was gonna get my

master's in public policy.

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But thank goodness for my dad, he

noticed that my heart wasn't in it.

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So my parents, took me for

aptitude testing, and I tested

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high in computers and math.

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So I did some research back then.

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This was in 1997, and you had to go to

the Federal Department of Labor office and

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get this booklet about jobs in this field

and what jobs I could do in that area.

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And I have to tell you, there

was not a lot online about what

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careers were available in that area.

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I mean, I knew sort of what it

was, but the more I read about it,

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the more excited I got about it.

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So I enrolled in a computer

science degree program.

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I loved it.

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I loved learning the new things.

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I loved digging in.

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I loved how learning about

how coding worked and the

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problem solving aspect of it.

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And so after graduation, I got a job at a

large corporation, and within a few months

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I knew it was not the right place for me.

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That job was not right.

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It sounded great.

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But it was not what I wanted to do.

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I didn't want to be digging through

code to find bugs and to fix them in

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legacy code on mainframe computers.

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So I found another job within that

same company as a software tester

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and analyst working on software for

actuaries in the insurance industry.

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And all that time I didn't

really feel like I fit in.

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Part of it was that I didn't want to

socialize with people outside of the

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organization, and I actually got dinged

on that for my performance review.

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But even after a year, I

found my interest waning.

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It wasn't what I wanted to do

for the rest of my life, and I'll

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never forget realizing that once

again, I was in the wrong job.

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I dreaded it every single

day, and I was late most days.

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I now know that this is a sign for me,

that it's that I'm not in the right job.

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When I have the Sunday scaries and

I have to drag myself into work.

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I know it's not the right place for me.

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And then in 2002, I met my husband.

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He was a librarian.

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He loved his job.

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He was so good at it.

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We actually met.

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Because of his job.

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He did a Yahoo search and found

my website because I had listed

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an obscure band on my website.

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So about a year after we started

dating, I started to volunteer at

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the library 'cause it looked so fun.

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I had so much fun as a volunteer and I'll

never forget going to see the movie Garden

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State and crying in the car afterwards.

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I was so stuck in that job as

a software tester and I felt so

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hopeless about what else could I do?

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I was learning that the computer

industry and being in a large corporation

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:

were not where I wanted to be.

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:

So I thought, I love

volunteering at the library.

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:

I should go to library school.

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:

So we decided a year after we got

married to quit our jobs and for my

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husband to go to library school because

I did not get in on my first try.

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:

I did not get in on my second try.

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:

But I got in on my third try after

working at the public library for a year.

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:

And I loved school.

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:

Are you seeing a theme here?

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I loved school.

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:

I loved learning.

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:

I went the route of the youth

librarian track and I really

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:

felt like I found my people.

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:

I was thriving.

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:

I loved my literature classes for the

first time because I had not liked

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:

my English classes in undergrad.

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:

I dove deep, and maybe because I was in

my thirties when I was in graduate school.

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:

I made a conscious decision I was

not going to make the same mistakes

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:

I made in undergrad 10 years before.

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:

Then I got into the working world and

I loved being at the library, but there

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:

was something that just didn't feel quite

right, and about 18 months after I started

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:

that first library job, I knew that

that was not where I was going to stay.

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:

I was getting into trouble for stepping

on people's toes because I tend to step in

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:

when I see something is not getting done.

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:

I was having issues where I was

being told I was being too forward

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:

and rocking the boat too much.

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:

So I found another library job where I

was buying materials for the library,

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:

and I loved that job for about 18 months.

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:

And then the same pattern started to

show up from my previous library job.

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:

And after those first 18 months,

I also started to see that

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:

verbal abuse from my manager.

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:

I was made to feel like I was

the problem and not the manager.

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:

But I didn't know where else to go.

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:

The library world is small, especially

in Kansas City, where we have

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:

four library systems in the area.

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:

But I had already worked at two of

them, and one of them was where my

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:

husband worked and they had a nepotism

rule where I couldn't work there.

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:

And the other one was a 45

minute drive one way for me.

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:

I was a new mom and I didn't wanna drive

that far, so I felt really stuck and I

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:

ended up working that job for six years.

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:

And then the library where my husband

worked, changed their policy on nepotism,

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:

and I was able to apply for another job.

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:

About a year and a half

later into that job

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:

things didn't feel like they were right.

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:

A year after I'd started was

the beginning of the pandemic.

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:

So everything was really topsy-turvy,

and I thought that that was the

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:

problem, but I was also made to

feel like I was the problem again.

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:

I wasn't falling into line

with the organization.

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:

I was asking too many questions.

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:

I was not fitting in with my coworker.

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:

So I changed to another library

branch, and about a year after

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:

that, burnout started to settle in.

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:

I thought I just needed some time

off, so I went on a retreat by myself.

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:

I came back refreshed and things

just never felt right, and

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:

burnout really settled in hard.

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:

I was pushing through feeling exhausted

every single day, wondering what was

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:

wrong with me, why couldn't I feel better?

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:

And just before I was diagnosed

with clinical burnout, I had an

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:

experience where I heard a voice

telling me to "gather the women."

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:

It had me doing a lot of soul searching,

and it made me realize that I was

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:

being called to something different.

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:

Now, all of this happened before

I ever discovered Human Design.

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:

And what often happens when you have

that kind of experience is you can't

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:

live with the discomfort and becomes

even more uncomfortable the longer

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:

you try to keep yourself there.

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:

I worked with a career coach

shortly after some burnout healing.

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:

Because I was trying to help me find a

new job, and what she told me was that

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:

that I had a lot to unpack before we

could focus on what jobs I could do.

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:

I was so desperate and I wanted her

to see something in me that would

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:

help me find the right job, but I

didn't need to find the right job.

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:

I needed to figure out what

I really wanted to do instead

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:

of finding another job.

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:

Because that next job could

potentially be another one where I

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:

would be miserable 18 months later.

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:

I didn't realize I had this pattern until

after I healed from burnout and after I

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:

started to really learn my Human Design.

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:

As I studied my Human Design, I

started to notice other patterns

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:

that had come up in my life.

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:

Things that just kept presenting

themselves until I learned the lesson.

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:

And honestly, have I learned

the lesson all the time?

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:

No, not always, but I am so much

more aware of when it's coming up.

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:

And that's one of the things I

work with clients on, is noticing

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:

the patterns that are coming up in

their lives and when those patterns

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:

are around making decisions.

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:

In a recent podcast interview with

Heather Wick, I had a realization that

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:

if you had told me two years ago that I

would be working with women in midlife,

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:

and that's where I would be focusing.

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:

I would've been like, "oh

my gosh, middle-aged women.

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:

No way."

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:

'Cause I didn't consider

myself middle-aged, even

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:

though I was 49 years old.

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:

I had always assumed that people

in midlife were older than me.

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:

But then I was listening to a podcast

with someone, who is now my mentor,

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:

Julie Ciardi, and she said, what if

midlife is not a crisis, but a calling?

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:

That whole episode was about

seeing midlife, not as a crisis,

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:

but as a midlife awakening.

461

:

She talked about it as a woman near

50, and I was realized, oh, the

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:

people I'm working with are women

in midlife around their forties

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:

and their fifties, and I love them.

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:

So now that's why those are the

people I focus on working with

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:

and why I feel so excited every

day to work with women in midlife.

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:

To help them feel like they can stop

comparing themselves to other people.

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:

That they can stop feeling like they have

to live by other people's expectations.

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:

That they can stop making decisions based

on what will make other people happy or

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:

keep the peace and not rock the boat.

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:

And women who know that they can

take all the personality assessments

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:

and that they can't be defined by

a series of letters or a number.

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:

So that's the long story of who I

am and who I work with, and why I'm

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:

so passionate about Human Design

and working with women in midlife.

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:

I am also happy to report that I

left my library job in May of:

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:

and I have become a full-time coach,

Decision Mentor and Inner-Trust

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:

Guide, and I love it every single day.

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:

I love waking up on Monday

mornings, getting to do a job

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:

that brings me so much joy.

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:

If this episode resonated with

you, I would love to invite you

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:

into my Life Patterns Review.

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:

It's where we look at how you've been

moving through your life, the roles

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:

and responsibilities you've picked

up, the patterns you've repeated

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:

so often without even realizing

it because you're on autopilot.

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:

The overgiving, the fixing, the

saying yes when you mean no.

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:

The trying to be a version of you

that made everyone else comfortable

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:

and who you thought you should be.

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:

You can find the link in the show notes.

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:

If this episode resonated with

you, I would be so grateful if

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:

you would click the plus sign to

subscribe and share it with a friend.

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:

I'll see you next time.

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:

Be well.

Show artwork for Unfolding: Audio Letters from the Middle of Becoming

About the Podcast

Unfolding: Audio Letters from the Middle of Becoming
What if midlife wasn’t a crisis… but an invitation?

The Unfolding Podcast is a space for women, especially in midlife, who are learning how to trust themselves again.

Hosted by Erica Voell, a Decision Mentor and Inner Trust Guide, we explore decision-making, self-trust, identity shifts, boundaries, and the patterns we’ve inherited around responsibility, productivity, and “shoulds.”

Through honest conversations, lived stories, and insights informed by Human Design, Erica invites you to slow down and listen to what your body, energy, and inner voice have been trying to tell you.

There are no quick fixes or 10-step plans here.

About your host

Profile picture for Erica Voell

Erica Voell


I use tools like Human Design, coaching, and
Reiki to help women in midlife say no to what
drains them—because they trust their decisions
and understand their unique strengths.

Together, we clear old patterns, and they learn
how they’re designed to make confident decisions
and start putting themselves first.