Is confidence something you are born with, or something you build?

women, it has to be rebuilt. Psychotherapist Denise Wogan, a graduate of the Non-Diet Coaching Certification, describes it this way: confidence is not something you are born with, it is something you create. That distinction matters because it removes the idea that some people are simply wired for confidence while others are not.

From a feminist perspective, the more accurate picture is that women are born innately confident, and that confidence gets squashed through childhood experiences, parenting, and social expectations tied to gender, appearance, and achievement. Confidence is not withheld because it was never there. It is withheld because women are taught, early and repeatedly, that they are not entitled to it until they meet certain conditions.

Rebuilding confidence is different from performing it. Fake confidence takes up space to prevent anyone from really seeing you. Real, quiet confidence is somatic. It lives in the body as the ability to sit with a feeling, a sensation, or an “ugh” in the stomach and act anyway. This is closely tied to self-trust, which is less about knowing what you are going to do and more about trusting the sensation driving you toward it.

In practice, confidence is built the same way self-trust is built: in small, repeated moments where you act despite fear and then witness yourself surviving it. That is what allowed Denise to go from describing herself as scared to start a business to completing a national TV interview and opening her own clinic four years later.

Transcript 

[00:00:00] Stephanie: Welcome to the podcast, Denise.

[00:00:04] Denise: Thank you for having me.

[00:00:05] Stephanie: I’m so excited to have this conversation with you, but I’m gonna introduce you to the crowd first, and then we’ll go right into this amazing conversation we’re about to have. So Denise Vaughan is a psychotherapist, nutritionist, and coach, and founder of Joslin Place in Ireland.

[00:00:23] Stephanie: Uh, and she’s a graduate from the Non-Diet Coaching Certification, and she is now a counselor and a psychotherapist. How long ago did you graduate from the certification? I can’t even remember. Is it three years, four years?

[00:00:37] Denise: I think it’s four years.

[00:00:39] Stephanie: Four years?

[00:00:41] Denise: Yeah. Um, mostly because I did my de- degree, so four years, yeah.

[00:00:46] Stephanie: Okay. Four years ago.

[00:00:48] Denise: Yeah.

[00:00:48] Stephanie: Um-

[00:00:50] Denise: Wow \…

[00:00:50] Stephanie: so we were having a conversation on Instagram, right?

[00:00:54] Denise: Mm-hmm.

[00:00:55] Stephanie: And I’m like, “Okay, we gotta stop conversing because I wanna record this because it’s so inspirational.”

[00:01:02] Denise: Excellent.

[00:01:02] Stephanie: So the conversation today is a catch-up between me and Denise. I think we haven’t talked in, like, three years.

[00:01:09] Stephanie: Wow. Um, and also the whole focus is gonna be about confidence, because that’s been the journey we’ve taken together, building up confidence. And I wanna share with people, um, kind of the topic of the conversation we were having on Instagram. So Denise sent me a voice note on Instagram beginning of March right after she did her first live national TV interview.

[00:01:38] Denise: Oh, yeah.

[00:01:39] Stephanie: Do you remember that?

[00:01:41] Denise: I don’t remember the full content, so I’ll get a little bit of a surprise.

[00:01:44] Stephanie: You were in your car after the interview, and somehow, somewhere, they w- the first person that came to your mind was me, and then you sent me this voice memo about your interview and confidence. Yeah. So what happened coming out of this interview on national TV in Ireland that made you think of me and confidence?

[00:02:11] Denise: Because I came to you to work to learn how to be a non-diet practitioner.

[00:02:18] Stephanie: Yeah.

[00:02:18] Denise: And we got into confidence. And I do, I remember saying to you some time back that I still hear so much of our work together- Yeah \… over time. And I guess this is something that I would share with my own clients now, is that you may not always hear me in the moment, but our work will pay off down the line.

[00:02:45] Denise: Um, like I was so nervous going to do that interview, but I just remember coming out going, “I just have to tell her,” because I was nervous, but I think one of the things that I had learned from you was the will or the permission to dream that lots of things are possible for you in your life, and that if you can trust yourself, you don’t know where they’re gonna come from, opportunities for your work or for, for even outside of your life, and it’s just having the confidence to just go and do it.

[00:03:24] Denise: And yeah, I just went and I did it, and I came out and I was so\… I think actually one of the things that reminded me of you is ’cause I was like, “I am so bloody proud of you, Denise.” Yeah. That was like, whoa. Yeah. And those are the things that I had learned from our work.

[00:03:40] Stephanie: Yeah. And I wanna contextualize this for people listening to this.

[00:03:43] Stephanie: So Denise told you about why she came to work with me, but we would\… did some work one on one on confidence. And, uh, before, to prep for this interview, I was looking through our notes, my, my client notes.

[00:03:56] Denise: Yeah.

[00:03:56] Stephanie: And you know what our first goal in our one on one time together was? Do, do you remember? I can’t remember.

[00:04:04] Stephanie: And this is just gonna show you how far you’ve come. Your number one goal was to feel confident in myself so that I can build a business, because right now I’m scared shit.

[00:04:16] Denise: No.

[00:04:17] Stephanie: Yeah. It- So that was you like four years ago.

[00:04:23] Denise: Wow. ‘Cause actually, I started this year, and I’m undertaking, like a big step in my business, and it’s the least scared I’ve ever felt I’m like, I

[00:04:35] Denise: It’s just, it’s happening, and I don’t feel scared, and I’m bloody well risking a lot to do it, but I don’t feel scared. And I went back through some of the work that we had done in our, like, the folders and the days that we had for goal planning, and I read back through some of them and I just thought, “This is kind of amazing that these things have been materializing,” but I haven’t read them, like, consistently and thought about them consistently.

[00:05:06] Denise: I put them out back then in that time of not feeling confident, and then my mind has been working on them.

[00:05:16] Stephanie: So let’s talk about your confidence journey. Like, we take- Yeah \… took back the, the lane to go back four years ago where you were completely scared shit to start a business.

[00:05:30] Denise: Mm.

[00:05:30] Stephanie: You hired me to help you 101 with confidence.

[00:05:35] Stephanie: When you look back who that woman was versus the woman that you are today-

[00:05:41] Denise: Mm \…

[00:05:42] Stephanie: what do you see different?

[00:05:44] Denise: Just feel a presence that’s different Yeah So it’s like I know I go and I do things now, and I’m doing it all in one sentence that just sits with me all the time, and I know this came from our work, is that you’ve got your back. And I remember one time you saying to me, “You’ll never feel alone when you know that you’re always there to support yourself.”

[00:06:13] Denise: And I think that’s why I can take scary decisions and actions now, because I know that the person who’s gonna meet me is one that’s going to be supportive and helpful and say, “Right, okay, we needed to do that. We needed to, we needed to sweat. We needed to go through all of that ickiness of growth in order to be where we are.”

[00:06:38] Denise: Rather than before that I would allow that make so many meanings about me that I wasn’t good, I was in the wrong job, I was, um \… Oh, G- god, like there was a litany of them. Whereas that language just doesn’t even enter my mind anymore, and it’s much more, “All right. Okay.” I, I will be heard saying the phrase of, “Oh, shit, there’s growth in this.

[00:06:59] Denise: There’s learning in this someplace.” I don’t, I don’t wanna know, because I know it’s sticky, but the growth is less uncomfortable than it was before. So yeah, I think, and I think I dream bigger now. I’m like there’s- Yeah There’s nothing \… That I think you and I talked about me going off in a camper van one time.

[00:07:20] Denise: Yes.

[00:07:21] Stephanie: Remember? Yeah.

[00:07:22] Denise: Like yeah, and doing like, uh, coaching or therapy on the side of the road, and I laughed at that recently. I was walking on the beach, I was like, “That’s what I loved about our work,” was that those, like, ideas, I don’t know if that will ever transpire, but if it didn’t, it just allowed me to be playful, and I think confidence and being playful as well has really worked out for me.

[00:07:49] Stephanie: Yeah. One thing you said in your voice note, a piece that stood out for me is you said, “Confidence is not something you’re born with, but something that we create.”

[00:08:04] Denise: Yeah.

[00:08:04] Stephanie: Can you break that down for the listener in me, how you think about this now?

[00:08:10] Denise: So now I think about that as- You have to want something. You have to have an intention.

[00:08:19] Denise: So there was always a yearning in me to\… I always knew I wanted to set up my own business. Yep. But the confidence, you c- you can’t learn without failing, and I, I can’t remember h- where I heard it, but it was like, “A business is not made overnight. It takes 10 years to be an overnight success.” And I don’t, I just, my brain does not allow me to believe that anyone can wake up confident.

[00:08:48] Denise: And what we talked about was, like, not, it’s true confidence. It’s not fake confidence. Like, I’m not the person who will go in and light up a room to make everyone feel at ease. I am just gonna be slow. I will feel at ease in myself, and people will come towards me. And that maybe is an innate belief in how I experience confidence that I’ve really learned to tap into.

[00:09:12] Denise: But I had to learn how to tap into that, that how I am confident in the world will be different to how you’re confident in the world. But it has to be authentic and true to you.

[00:09:23] Stephanie: Yeah.

[00:09:24] Denise: Does that make-

[00:09:26] Stephanie: And for me, that resonate because when I think about my feminist approach, right? Mm-hmm. Of confidence, and, and we’ll tie in your new education around psychology and psychotherapy, but the way I think about confidence for me is that we’re born innately confident, and then it gets squashed-

[00:09:47] Denise: Oh

[00:09:48] Stephanie: out of us through childhood experiences, parenting, and then because of our gender and society’s expectation of us of how we should look, how we should be, it gets even more, not even repressed, like literally pushed down that we’re not entitled to be confidence unless we look a certain way, we do certain thing, we earn so much money.

[00:10:15] Stephanie: So for me, that’s how I approach confidence is I have to create it because somehow it got robbed from me, it got squashed out of me, and I have to rebuild it.

[00:10:28] Denise: Mm-hmm. I think, yeah, and I think we’re mirroring there in ways is it’s the rebuilding or it’s the reconnecting

[00:10:37] Stephanie: Yeah,

[00:10:37] Denise: reconnecting \… or replacing, yeah, with who we were, that young dreamy, which is what I said a while ago, that young dreamy self who’s willing to take all those risks when you’re like naught to two, three, four, and you’re totally selfish, and then you suddenly begin to adapt to the world around you.

[00:10:56] Denise: And we are so very quick and clever at how we adapt. And I suppose that is y- barring trauma, and there’s a lot of period people who’ve experienced a lot of trauma, but there are lots of life situations that have made it particularly, I suppose, women, that we have had to adapt. But we can use our knowledge and our, um, information about how we’ve adapted now to come back even stronger.

[00:11:25] Denise: And I think there was a huge part of me when we were doing our work, there was so much anger and resentment and bitterness that this happened. But until I processed that, I couldn’t actually connect with my own confidence because it was blocking me. It was blocking-

[00:11:42] Stephanie: Ta- do you mind talking about this?

[00:11:44] Denise: Yeah. No, not at all.

[00:11:46] Stephanie: When you say when that happened, the that, right? Resentment and fear. What is that for you?

[00:11:56] Denise: Um, so go- bring me back again ’cause my mind is gone.

[00:12:01] Stephanie: That’s okay. So- So you’re saying like, “I had a lot of resentment, a lot of anger that were preventing me from reconnecting to my confidence.”

[00:12:11] Denise: Mm-hmm.

[00:12:13] Stephanie: What is that? Are you f- are you able to talk about what that trauma was for you, if you name the trauma, like that was preventing you from connecting from your innate confidence?

[00:12:23] Denise: Okay. So I don’t think it was\… I, I, I was referring to some people have experienced- Yes \… a lot of trauma in their life, right?

[00:12:31] Denise: But for me, the resentment and bitterness was I had a huge connection to social justice from a very young age, and things being right. And then when I began to view the world and how it was operating, and how I began to see patriarchy, and how I began to see that we have women’s rights and female liberation, albeit just in language, because the reality of what we’re experiencing was not the same.

[00:13:01] Denise: So there was all the anger and resentment that I had to work through in myself so that I could not let that hinder or impact how I was acting. So I guess that- Mm \… goes into the emotions piece. I had to let myself feel that anger, and that deep frustration, and the deep disappointment that we are women who are so powerful, but yet we are so constrained by how society and culture has developed.

[00:13:33] Denise: But the anger wasn’t helping anyone else. It was just creating more anger in the people around me. And I guess I disconnected from social media for a long time because I was like, “I’m not helping anyone by projecting my anger out into the world. I need to work on it internally, and then I can come back stronger and more confident in my voice because I’ve been with it, I’ve heard it, and I worked through it.”

[00:13:57] Denise: Does that-

[00:13:58] Stephanie: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And I mean, we could talk about this for hours. Sure. I’m curious, how did you work\… How did you became aware that you were angry, and that you were projecting that anger, and how did you work through it? What did you do, like very specifically?

[00:14:17] Denise: What did I do? Eh, I continued to work on myself Tell,

[00:14:23] Stephanie: tell the listener what is that?

[00:14:25] Stephanie: What- The listener is, well If you’re not a therapist, right? Or you’re not a professional coach like me, like work on yourself, what does that mean?

[00:14:31] Denise: Mm. I, I suppose I can follow that thread inside me that there was new, more that I wanted to discover about myself. So I wanted to understand why was I the mom standing at the kitchen sink flipping out over dishes not being washed when, you know, those things that I, I just wanted to be like, “Why, why do I respond, uh, in this way?”

[00:14:57] Denise: So I continued to go to therapy. My degree of psychotherapy hugely helped me as well, because you’re studying this stuff. It’s like anyone who \… You know, the way you sometimes see people on Instagram now, and they’ve got these picture perfect meals, and I try and remind my clients all the time, okay, this is their job.

[00:15:15] Denise: They do this all the time, so of course their meal looks bloody amazing because this is what they do. So even if you see my bookshelf there, I read and I read and I read, and I stay reading. And I found out along the way that one of my big drives is, uh, loving to learn. So I’ve always known I was hugely connected with human behavior, economics degree, relationship management, past career.

[00:15:40] Denise: I was always really fascinated by humans. And then having traveled when I was younger, I remember being like, “Well, that culture is completely different to my culture, and they still live and function.” So there’s, you know, that, that piece of me, the questions. I’m trying to get to my answer. The questions that I needed to answer, I just followed them, and I just kept following them, and working with them in ways\…

[00:16:07] Denise: And I do remember, Tim, I probably have a, I like, have about that many journals now, so

[00:16:13] Stephanie: Yeah. For people listening, she’s like putting out the 12 inch, like- Yeah \… stack of paper.

[00:16:19] Denise: There’s journals for everything. And then even when I can’t journal, I voice note myself. Uh, and those are things that I picked up in our work, ’cause I do remember you one day, and I felt like a little child being reprimanded, I think.

[00:16:32] Denise: And it’s like, “You know, you gotta do the self-coaching, Denise. You’ve gotta sit down and work through your thoughts because if you don’t, and if you don’t look and see there’s another outcome, you’ll never,” what I now describe it as, “create that neural pathway of possibility.” I love that term. Things could be different.

[00:16:51] Denise: Different.

[00:16:53] Stephanie: So is your journey towards confidence, confidence, feeling confidence is what drove you to go into psychotherapy? Because when I left you four years ago, the path was a name, I’m going back to school and I’m going to study psychology and become a professional psychotherapist, counselor. So walk me through how you left my certification and decided to go back to school.

[00:17:22] Denise: I went back, actually, I will say for the first year I was like, I just need the piece of paper for- Ah. Yeah. So the first year I told myself the story I needed the piece of paper, and then I started doing the work and I was like, oh no, this is about me wanting to step into the confidence to be the therapist and the coach that I want to be.

[00:17:47] Denise: So I knew the clients that I wanted to work with, but I think when we were working together, I thought I’d never be good enough. I’d never be able to work with \… Now I work with clients with all the spectrum of eating disorders, and I thought I would never be able to do that. I wouldn’t be good enough. So the confidence work was just perfect alongside that, and that was what drove me, because I needed the education to be able to be confident to know I have the right information.

[00:18:17] Denise: But now, even in my, my continued work and my supervision, it’s always the self-trust. So when I’m making clinical judgments, when I’m making clinical entry- Really? The self-trust piece is, had I not done that, our work, I don’t think my degree would’ve been as effective And now- It’s

[00:18:38] Stephanie: interesting \… we- Because that’s what we work on.

[00:18:40] Stephanie: We work on three main driver, right? Yeah. We work on inner safety, we work on self-trust, and we work on feeling worthy, and what I call enoughness. That’s my own terminology. And it still came back to you, it comes back to you now in your supervision as an advanced practitioner, trusting your diagnoses, trusting your treatment plan.

[00:19:02] Denise: Yeah. And, and like, so I do go back to our work so much because the simplicity of when you can get overwhelmed by maybe, you know, I need to read more research or- Yes. \… as you know, my mind loves the research and it wants the black and white. Um, I do come back to, hang on a minute, where am I gonna anchor myself in?

[00:19:26] Denise: Exactly what you said. I am safe in myself, and if I don’t feel safe in myself, that’s when I know I need to reach out and get support. Um, and then am I acting in a way that feels true for me? Um, and what was the other one you mentioned there? It’s getting me. Feeling good enough.

[00:19:42] Stephanie: Enoughness. Feeling good enough.

[00:19:44] Stephanie: Yeah. Yeah.

[00:19:45] Denise: Yeah. Like it was\… It, I didn’t, I think I realized after the TV experience, like I went and did a radio inter- uh, interview after that, and it was so much better than the TV one. And I reflected on what I didn’t say in the TV interview, and I went, “But it was so good enough.” It was.

[00:20:06] Stephanie: Yes.

[00:20:07] Denise: And I was able to take the feedback of the people around me who were like, “No,” ’cause my brain wants to criticize every single bit of it.

[00:20:15] Denise: But I was able to take the feedback, and I had said to my husband the day before, I was like, “If I mention anything like this again, I’m not doing it.” And he said to me, the second thing I said to him was, “I hope I get asked again next year, or I’ll do it again if I get asked next year.” So, yeah.

[00:20:35] Stephanie: So what in your training in psychotherapy four-year degree, so that you can then counsel and treat advanced cases like eating disorder, which is outside of scope in my world, right?

[00:20:48] Stephanie: That’s not our- Yeah \… purview to look at. What did you learn about confidence in psychotherapy?

[00:20:55] Denise: Jeez, you love hitting me with the hard questions, don’t you?

[00:20:58] Stephanie: That’s okay. I make you reflect, I guess, as you’re coaching.

[00:21:02] Denise: Reflect on the spot. What did I learn about confidence? I,

[00:21:06] Denise: I think what I’ve mostly learned is that if I want to be a confident therapist, I have to continue to do the work on myself, and I, I don’t think that’s dissimilar to how you approach things. No. Yeah. Y- you can read all the literature, and you can read all of the approaches, but it’s the confidence to go through your own, I, I would say like your cupboard in the back of your mind that you don’t wanna look at.

[00:21:39] Denise: The confidence to stay going through there, the confidence to stay witnessing your patterns that you repeat, and to watch those without judgment. The confidence to acknowledge when you’re maybe not able to do something, and you have to refer out the confidence to ask. It, it’s essential because the trust and the confidence are there that we are humans who have an enormous ability to educate and learn, but if we over-intellectualize, we miss the human connection.

[00:22:13] Denise: And it’s maybe the moment in a session where I feel that I’m intellectualizing, and I’m \… there’s transference going on between me and my clients. I’m intellectualizing, and that I have to pull myself back and go, “Okay, what’s in my felt sense here? What is my body telling me here? And do I trust myself enough to work with the immediacy of the situation and name the experience?”

[00:22:38] Denise: And this is often what helps us move forward or with our clients because if I don’t name what I experience, then a client is, because of transference, countertransference for anyone listening, that just means that we’re \… In simplest language, this is one of my skills that I’ve decided to stick with, is that my energy presence and your energy presence are looking at each other’s thing called mirror neurons, and we’re trying to understand what this communication is.

[00:23:07] Denise: And usually by naming something in a session, a client will relate in some way, and it will help them shift. So the more I could trust myself in that experience, the more it’s allowed my clients to be able to bring their experience and name what maybe previously was unnameable, or relate in some small way because they’ve been given some, some connection to hope to catch on to.

[00:23:32] Stephanie: So what I heard you say is that what you’ve learned is that confidence is not just intellectual or cognitive.

[00:23:40] Denise: Mm-hmm.

[00:23:40] Stephanie: It’s somatic. It’s a self experience.

[00:23:46] Denise: Yeah.

[00:23:48] Stephanie: And it’s the feeling, right, in your body being able to connect with those feeling and name them-

[00:23:55] Denise: Mm-hmm \…

[00:23:56] Stephanie: that creates the confidence in part.

[00:23:59] Denise: Yeah.

[00:24:02] Stephanie: That’s interesting because that’s, that’s my lived experience. Like, I don’t have a degree in psychology. I have training in coaching, right? But I don’t have a degree in that. But that’s been my life experience, right? Until I\… For years I stayed in my head, and it was a fake confidence, what you call a fake confidence, right?

[00:24:21] Denise: Mm-hmm. It

[00:24:22] Stephanie: took up a lot of space just to make sure nobody could, like, see me.

[00:24:27] Denise: Yeah.

[00:24:27] Stephanie: It wasn’t like an inner confidence that I was just moving through the world with, and it’s when I w- went in my body and being able to feel my emotion, name the sensation in my body, that I started to embody the confidence, and that looks different.

[00:24:47] Denise: Yeah.

[00:24:48] Stephanie: That’s interesting. So when now you work with people, and do you, what do you specialize on? Do you, and I heard you say eating disorder. Is that your specialty?

[00:24:58] Denise: Yeah, eating disorders, anxiety, and chronic illness.

[00:25:03] Stephanie: Okay.

[00:25:03] Denise: Mm-hmm.

[00:25:04] Stephanie: And, but so when you work with people, does your population you work with name their desire to f- to build their confidence?

[00:25:16] Denise: Um, no, but it is a central tenet of my work.

[00:25:21] Stephanie: Tell me more about that.

[00:25:23] Denise: Because when I work with my clients, they want to fix, and they want- Okay \… the disorder to be gone. So alongside us working on whether it’s the thinking patterns or usually for clients that ability to connect with their emotions for whatever experience they’ve had in their life, whatever trauma or whatever way that they have developed during their childhood and adolescence, the connection to emotions is, is gone.

[00:25:53] Denise: So what I’m\… How I work is by helping clients to feel confident enough in me first, in the- In you, the practitioner \… in the relationship. Okay. So to trust, we build a trust and safety that this relationship can handle anything that comes up. And then as I notice my client’s experiencing difficult emotions or as I notice that they can’t, um, they’re having difficulty expressing emotions, I am confidently intervening with as many different tools or techniques that I can alongside myself to stop the client from intellectualizing their feelings and helping them feel them.

[00:26:39] Denise: And it’s, that’s where the shift is. So the confidence for me is knowing that this is the right time to intervene.

[00:26:47] Stephanie: Okay. I

[00:26:47] Denise: am not rushing or I am pacing my client. I am not going to trigger them. I am not going to traumatize them. I know where the moment is, is that this is clinically sound for us to use this intervention now.

[00:27:03] Denise: Um, but do they look for confidence? No. But what I continually do on the side of all this work is highlight how, “Oh, you see the way you stuck with that really discomfortable, uncomfortable feeling? We, uh, you know, I am so proud of you,” or, “I’m so\… I’m, I’m acknowledging to you that you did this.” And slowly you’re building their ladder of confidence in themselves that they can recover.

[00:27:33] Denise: So it’s the- Right \… it’s using the confidence tool alongside.

[00:27:38] Stephanie: Yeah, because what you’re describing in doing the work with the client, what you’re moving your client through in feeling they’re feeling, you’re describing building up a relationship with themselves that they can have their back. This is my layman’s term, like my- Yeah.

[00:27:56] Stephanie: simplified, non-clinical, non-scholar term. But you’re teaching them to have their back, that no matter what sensation or feeling they’re gonna have, they’re gonna be able to handle it.

[00:28:10] Denise: Yeah. Yeah.

[00:28:12] Stephanie: Right? You’re teaching them to have their own back within their experience, within their world.

[00:28:18] Denise: And, and we don’t teach it in a, a

[00:28:21] Denise: Like, I love research and I love science and all of this, but you cannot teach this stuff by thinking about it. You’ve gotta feel it. So it’s the confidence to go, “Okay, this isn’t working.” I’ve recently trained in, um, IFS, internal family systems- Yep,

[00:28:39] Stephanie: yep \… to work.

[00:28:40] Denise: Um, and using different, different approaches work for different clients.

[00:28:45] Denise: But it’s sticking with the, you know, w- we can feel this feeling here together, and you will be okay. I implicitly trust that you will be okay. Um, and helping them in just small, small, small, small, tiny increments, uh, begin to feel that.

[00:29:06] Stephanie: Which is the work you’ve done on yourself. That’s what you were ta- talking to us about, right?

[00:29:10] Stephanie: And for people listening to this that are new to this world, they’re like, “What are you talking about? Confidence is, is the ability to just, like, put any piece of clothes on or walk into a room.” That’s not confidence. That’s more, like, audacity, arrogance. Mm-hmm. Right? That’s not confidence in the clinical term or in, in the world that I’m teaching it.

[00:29:34] Stephanie: Confidence is being able to be with yourself and have your back. No matter what you try, no matter what piece of clothes, no matter what event you go to, you know, no matter what happen, people scream at me, hate me, judge me, I am going to support myself.

[00:29:52] Denise: Yeah.

[00:29:53] Stephanie: Instead of expecting the world to support you, and then leaning into the world to be nice to you so you can do the thing.

[00:30:01] Denise: Mm-hmm.

[00:30:02] Stephanie: Which is where eating disorder comes in, right? Eating disorder is a coping mechanism, right? The, it’s a coping mechanism to an unbearable world in themselves. Is that a good way of, of-

[00:30:14] Denise: Yeah. And I, and I think we can, you know, because we have so many more people experiencing eating disorders and disordered eating, we have to make this language less intellectual and more relatable.

[00:30:27] Denise: And I think for a long time I didn’t have the confidence to say, “Actually, I don’t speak in big psychology terms, and I don’t speak like some of the intellectuals around me.” But I do remember another supervisor of mine saying to me, “But does that work for you in your sessions with your clients?” So what I need to be able to do is understand.

[00:30:48] Denise: Understand, understand, understand, and then help people understand what I’m beginning to understand, and together we tease it out. But-

[00:30:57] Stephanie: Could I ask you to define\… So we talked a lot about confidence, we talked a lot about having your own back, self-compassion, whatever. How would you define self-trust?

[00:31:07] Denise: I immediately went to when I feel the ugh at the bottom of my stomach. And I just go, “Okay, I’m gonna do it anyway. I’m gonna do it anyway.”

[00:31:22] Stephanie: Yeah.

[00:31:23] Denise: Yeah. It’s \… I, I, I think there’s a, if you wanna, to take it deeper, there’s, self-trust to me is that- It’s almost like I can imagine this part of me that’s sitting, smiling, going, “You were always gonna do this.

[00:31:41] Denise: You were always gonna do this, but you didn’t know you could, or you didn’t believe you could, or you put so many things in the way, or things got in the way.” But it’s almost like there is a part of me that just says, you know, “Just stay going. I’m so proud of you.” So it’s that internal voice, and I do remember, ’cause, yeah, I used to look for your validation so much.

[00:32:03] Denise: Yes. Yeah. A lot of people do at the beginning. Yeah. And I do remember one time when you were like, “I’m not gonna say what you want me to say.” And now I can hear my own voice validate me that, you know, y- self-trust is, to me, more so than knowing what you’re going to do, is knowing there’s a sensation or a feeling there driving you in a direction, and you’re trusting that whatever happens, it’s happening for a reason.

[00:32:35] Stephanie: That’s a beautiful definition.

[00:32:38] Denise: Yeah.

[00:32:39] Stephanie: I don’t know what the clinical definition of it\… Your definition, to me, sounds good, and it’s, and it’s almost borderline spiritual self-trust, right? There’s, it’s n- knowing, some people call it God, some people knowing call it the universe, your inner wisdom. Self-trust is being able to follow that, whatever that is for you.

[00:33:02] Denise: Yeah.

[00:33:03] Stephanie: Right? But not a god from a book. Like, for those of you who are, like, more an organized religion, not following the, the, whatever, the Ten Commandment, because that’s external, right? That’s like somebody else telling you what to do. It’s understanding that y- God is within you, or the, the universe is- Yeah

[00:33:21] Stephanie: within you, right?

[00:33:22] Denise: Yeah.

[00:33:23] Stephanie: And you’re, like, you’re good enough, quote, unquote, in my simple term, layman’s term, you’re good enough to know what is good for you, and trust that.

[00:33:34] Denise: Yeah, or brave enough, or you honor yourself enough to go, “Oh, God, I really do trust this in me.” I- And you trust

[00:33:44] Stephanie: that

[00:33:44] Denise: voice \… that voice.

[00:33:46] Denise: Yeah. That, like, before it would’ve been like, “Oh, God, that voice is just, it dreams too much,” or- Yeah \… it’s airy fairy. I call it as, like, that’s like, “Oh, I have an idea.” And he goes, “Oh, right, okay.” But now when I hear myself go, “I have an idea,” I’m like, I don’t know when that’s gonna materialize, but it’s written in a, in a journal somewhere, and it will pop up in my world, and it will happen.

[00:34:08] Denise: And- It’s trusting that those\… I always say to my clients, they’re like, “I don’t know why I’m telling you this,” and I’m like, “Trust everything that your mind wants to release. It’s coming for a reason.” And the more you can release what’s in your mind, the more the picture or the garden or whatever analogy you wanna use, the more you can begin to, what, what we would have worked on with you is creating the life that you want.

[00:34:35] Denise: Yeah. Where we need to connect with our thoughts, whether it’s in our writing or, um, or in talk therapy or in with a coach. The more you can listen to your thoughts, the more they suddenly just don’t get consumed in your mind in a spiral or in a little knotted, uh, ball of wool. We can release them and free them, and we get to choose then the bits that we want and the bits that we don’t want, so it actually frees up choice as well.

[00:35:05] Stephanie: Yeah. What do you see as\… So if we’re thinking about self-trust and the impact of diet culture, the impact of wellness culture, like people leaning outside of themselves to know what to eat, when to eat, how much to eat, and how that impacts their ability to trust themselves outside of food with other segments of their life

[00:35:34] Denise: It’s probably like the biggest connection. Mm, yeah. So- Tell me more \… if you don’t trust what to eat, to me it’s always a sign there’s so much more inside that you don’t trust. And if you can begin to understand your relationship with food, so I see lots of people saying, “We need to bring nutrition into mental health,” and it’s telling people what to eat.

[00:36:01] Denise: I’m like- No \… ‘No, we don’t do that.” We can absolutely bring nutrition education into our therapy world, but it’s not about telling people what to eat. It’s about guiding and connecting them back to if I’m mistrusting food, where else am I mistrusting? And can I have the confidence to look around and kinda see, well, am I mistrusting somebody in my marriage?

[00:36:27] Denise: Am I mistrusting, uh, my family? Am I mistrusting myself? So, and, and then that links even back into anxiety because- Yes \… there’s generally anxiety connected. And anxiety is really, really, uh, misrepresented as something negative. And then when I work with my clients who are working through emotions, I’m like, ‘It is a wonderful indicator that we need to hear a message.’

[00:36:52] Denise: And we absolutely need to hear messages on what is that anxiety. If it had a voice, what was it trying to say to you? Or how is it trying to get your attention?

[00:37:03] Stephanie: Oh, I love that. So, and, and again, food is your playground, what you’re describing. Nutrition is your playground to build self-trust. Like, instead of bringing nutrition and mental health to tell people what to eat, it’s like let’s take nutrition as a playground.

[00:37:22] Denise: Yeah.

[00:37:23] Stephanie: To build self-trust.

[00:37:25] Denise: Mm-hmm. And then usually what people say is, “Oh, I noticed I spoke out for myself at work the other day.” Or- Yes \… “I put up a boundary with my family and they’re like, ‘I don’t know if this is a coincidence. I got a job offer.’” And I’m like, “It’s absolutely not a coincidence. It’s what we’ve been doing.”

[00:37:44] Denise: You work on this area, and that translates back into every other area. Because, like as humans, we really, we have to eat every day, and we have control over our food and our, as one of my supervisors calls it, toileting. Yeah. So, you know, those are the two things that we have control over. So if we can learn to connect and see where there is a disconnect in our relationship with food, and to start trusting our inner signals, then we just begin to trust in so many other areas of our life.

[00:38:21] Denise: And that brings freedom and that brings growth.

[00:38:24] Stephanie: And confidence.

[00:38:25] Denise: And confidence. Yeah.

[00:38:28] Stephanie: Right? And I love the way you say it that like anxiety, which is like a very popular emotion that people talk a lot about right now these days, is like the radar of your world. Like instead of seeing it as the enemy that we need to shut down, we see it as like the flag that’s being raised to say- Yep

[00:38:50] Stephanie: ‘Hello. Hello.’

[00:38:53] Denise: Yeah. ‘

[00:38:53] Stephanie: There’s something \… I’m here for a reason.’

[00:38:57] Denise: That’s what I say to my clients. I’m like, you know, and they’re like, “Really? Do you talk like this?” And I’m like, ‘Well, we all a- we’re all aware of the negative inner critic.’ So my voice is now, ‘Oh, anxiety is here. I wonder what it’s here to tell me.’

[00:39:09] Stephanie: Yeah.

[00:39:09] Denise: And then they’re like, ‘But it’s not answering me.’ And I say, ‘Yeah, okay. You’re gonna have to be patient, because you’ve probably spent 20, 30, 40, 50 years not listening to it. And now suddenly you turn your eye and you say, ‘Hey, I’m gonna listen.’ It’s gonna be a little bit slow in what information it gives you.’

[00:39:28] Denise: So it’s you’re creating a m- again, probably a little bit of the IFS parts work. You’re creating that connection between yourself to build safety so that anxiety can tell you what it wants you to hear. And you just slow it down enough to be, ‘Look, I’m just really curious, what do you want me to know?’ And it could be two weeks, it could be 10 weeks before you really get to understand.

[00:39:51] Denise: It could be years, you know, before you really understand what that anxiety wants you to know, but you can exist with it. So I am not an believer of you can only have one mot- emotion at any one time. You can exist with multiple e- emotions-

[00:40:08] Denise: circling in your orbit or in your presence, you can be, uh, I love Deb Dana’s work and the glimmers. You can be in a low mood, but you can have a moment where you see a flare and you go, “God, that’s really pretty,” and that’s a glimmer of a connection to another emotion.

[00:40:23] Stephanie: Yeah, and it’s the world of grief, right?

[00:40:25] Stephanie: We can grieve and be happy at the same time, and we can stop grieving, and grieving s- grieving come back two years down the road. Like, it’s constant flow.

[00:40:35] Denise: Constant flow. But we’re not afraid of our feelings or emotions.

[00:40:39] Stephanie: But that’s true, like when we’re, if we come back to the topic of the conversation, like I hate to use the word true confidence, but an inner unshakable confidence.

[00:40:49] Stephanie: Like, not the arrogant confidence, but the, the calm confidence is somebody that knows no matter grief comes in, anger comes in, I’m just gonna w- ride the wave of it and I’m gonna be okay.

[00:41:04] Denise: I- it’s, it’s, ’cause even when you say what, like you said the qui- you said calm confidence, was it?

[00:41:09] Stephanie: Yeah.

[00:41:10] Denise: Brain went to quiet confidence.

[00:41:12] Denise: Quiet, yeah. It’s like quiet confidence that somebody has that you can just feel from their energy, and they don’t waver in what they’re thinking or how they’re behaving. They just know how to be what they want to be and who they wanna be, and that is so inspiring.

[00:41:31] Stephanie: It’s inspiring, and that’s when the, your power comes alive.

[00:41:37] Denise: Yeah.

[00:41:37] Stephanie: And that’s \… Right? That’s what, that \… I think if we look back at the whole interview from where we started to where is now, because that’s what the next question I have, like, now you’re building an entire, not only a business, but an entire place. Like, what is that project you’re working on? Because it sound like, like, you have reached that powerful place within you that you are, quote, unquote, “unstoppable.”

[00:42:02] Stephanie: Tell me more about- \… your project you’re working on. You’re building something three-dimension in this world.

[00:42:08] Denise: Yeah. I, and I do remember going to someone, um, uh, I, I am opening up my own bricks and mortar clinic. So-

[00:42:17] Stephanie: So

[00:42:17] Denise: that’s

[00:42:17] Stephanie: what Jocelyn Place is \…

[00:42:19] Denise: Jocelyn Place is going to be a clinic for me and other therapists, um, who are going to really work the central theme on it is that I did not want mental health, uh, to be sitting in the back down a dark laneway or in somebody’s house.

[00:42:37] Denise: I want us to be on the main street, just like the gym or just like the doctor. And the confidence came from I am not going to be shut up and put in the corner anymore. And also to really connect with what was important to me. I know if I was to go to some coach, they’d say, “But you’d make so much more money if you did it this way.”

[00:43:03] Denise: We worked on a piece together where I talked about \… I think you remember, uh, you introduced me to the concept of legacy. Yes. And what I want is to create something that will continue on long after me, and that is- I do wanna get paid. I wanna \… I, of course I do. Everyone wanna get, gets \… Everyone wants to get paid for their money or for their job.

[00:43:26] Denise: But this is more about creating a space that I will walk home from every night and know that I’ve helped make a ripple in the world of actually working with people in the way that I truly believe is going to support more and more people accessing proper mental health care, um, preventative mental health, a getting in touch with

[00:43:49] Denise: It’s a non-diet clinic, so all of the therapists that are coming through, they will go through, like, a program with me that will work them through how to talk about non-diet, how to ensure their clients know that this is a space for everything as well. ‘Cause a lot of people would have come to me, um, when I started therapy and said they’d never

[00:44:10] Denise: Nobody, no therapist had talked to them about their eating issues or their eating behaviors. So once I get into that, that’s like a whole other body of work, and they’re like, “This is what I’ve needed for all those years,” is alongside the other things. Um, so yeah, we’re going to have the great, great plans, um, lovely subtle tones, um, community of therapists who are gonna work together, because it’s one thing that can be really isolating in this, uh, work.

[00:44:38] Denise: And I know I’m a people person. I love being with people, and I want to sit in front of my clients again. I still work online, but it’s going to be having people walking through the door, and we’re gonna have a garden so that people can experience therapy in, in other ways. Um, so they could come in and just sit and be in a space that they can contemplate.

[00:45:01] Denise: Life’s so busy, so, you know, they can come in and read, and they can have access to some of the resources that I have the privilege of having. Um, so it’s really about sharing everything that I’ve learned and building a team of therapists who are gonna be able to share it too. Because I think I realized at one time along the way when I was that forever pressing play on what new course am I gonna do, I just went, “I can’t do them all.”

[00:45:28] Denise: And actually together we are so much stronger than on our own

[00:45:33] Stephanie: Yeah, and you don’t need another course right now. You need to take all that, those resources, time, energy, to now put your mark, your legacy into the world.

[00:45:45] Denise: Mm-hmm. Yeah. To

[00:45:47] Stephanie: leave a- And train \… Like, this is such phenomenal, like, there’s so many mental health practitioner that gets stuck talking about food, because it comes up in every conversation.

[00:45:58] Denise: Mm-hmm.

[00:45:58] Stephanie: And body image. Oh, yes. Like, oh my God, do we need training for body image for mental health professionals so they can \… Especially right now in the GLP-1 world.

[00:46:09] Denise: Yeah.

[00:46:10] Stephanie: We need people equipped to have those conversation beyond just me. That’s my specialty. We need people who are trained in that aspect so when the conversation comes in, they can have it.

[00:46:21] Denise: Yeah. And, and because it’s when that conversation comes up and the client is heard, that is where they can make their, make their progress, and they can actually begin to change their own thoughts and build their own quiet confidence in themselves. And I’m just \… You know, when, when you reflect back, I’m sure you’re the same, but I do reflect back on some of the work that I’ve done, and your clients leave you, and you never really know where they end up.

[00:46:47] Denise: But the odd time I just think, you know, they’re, the butterflies are out there now, and, and they’re continuing what I’ve started with them. They’re going to share what they’ve learned with their family and friends and, and hopefully all of us together, we make more of a ripple.

[00:47:04] Stephanie: That’s why I wanted to have this conversation with you.

[00:47:06] Stephanie: I think this is the perfect way to end the conversation. You’re my little butterfly.

[00:47:11] Denise: Aw.

[00:47:12] Stephanie: Right? Four years ago you came into my world. For a year or so we did some work together, and then you went on your way. I didn’t- Yeah \… like, I saw you here and there, like, from far away on social media. That’s the beauty of social media.

[00:47:25] Stephanie: Mm. And then also then I got this voicemail. I’m like, now I wanna know where my butterfly went and what she’s doing now.

[00:47:31] Denise: Yeah. Well, she’s flying her wings proudly.

[00:47:36] Stephanie: She is, and she’s impacting. To me, that’s the liberation, that’s the last place where when we think about, like, confidence or body image, when we’re at the liberation stage is when we pass on the work to other people.

[00:47:49] Denise: Yes. Yeah. I, and there’s something lovely about that, that, you know, it was passed on, and I, I, I have said to you over time, you’re still there. Yeah. Still always there. And that’s \… It just shows me the power of human connection.

[00:48:08] Stephanie: Yes. Mm-hmm. And if you need me to come and do some speaking for your people in your clinic when you do your training, whatever it is from a lived experience, I am

[00:48:19] Stephanie: I will be there for you to help- Or you do some- \… pass that on to your people \…

[00:48:23] Denise: of. You will come to Ireland, so when you, when you’re ready, we will have you with arms wide open.

[00:48:31] Stephanie: So if people wanna get in touch with you, I know you’re opening a physical space in Ireland, but you’re a- also back on social media now.

[00:48:39] Stephanie: Where can people find you?

[00:48:41] Denise: So at the moment I’m on Denise Wogan Wellbeing. Okay. And, uh, in a couple of weeks time we’ll be opening up a Instagram, just in place. There’ll be a Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn. You’ll just find me at Denise Wogan.

[00:48:55] Stephanie: Okay. And you work locally with people, is that correct?

[00:48:59] Denise: Yeah.

[00:49:00] Denise: So I work in nor- here in the northeast of Ireland. Um, but I do work internationally within Europe, uh, insurance reasons, uh, not with the US. Um, but, uh, I do work online as well with people.

[00:49:16] Stephanie: So the licensing in Ireland allows you to do most of European?

[00:49:21] Denise: Yeah.

[00:49:21] Stephanie: Wow. That’s much better than the US

[00:49:23] Denise: where they isolate.

[00:49:23] Denise: It’s either Europe and, um, Australia. I must check and see if we can\… I don’t know we can or not. US and Canada.

[00:49:33] Stephanie: Wow. This is like\… ‘Cause it, you have this big struggle in America whereby, um, psychotherapy/counseling-

[00:49:42] Denise: Yeah \…

[00:49:42] Stephanie: license are by state. Yeah. So even within Canada you can only work within the province of Canada.

[00:49:49] Stephanie: You can’t even work with somebody that lives on the other side. Yeah. So it’s much better in Europe that you’ve changed that piece, because it allows you to work with people wherever they are.

[00:49:59] Denise: Yeah. It, it is, it is really good. Um, and then for coaching, but I, because I, the typically the nature of the work that I do, I set more in therapy.

[00:50:08] Denise: Yeah. I bring my coaching into the work, but, um, yeah, if I think for coaching we can work with the US, uh- Yeah \… depending on what insurance body you have and what certification.

[00:50:20] Stephanie: But we need you as a therapist. Like, I, we have plenty of coach work graduating, but they’re limited in their scope, and that’s very important.

[00:50:29] Stephanie: We need people- Mm \… that can go the next step, and that’s you now.

[00:50:33] Denise: Yes. And I think I would say, too, like for me MDT is so important because having come from coaching, nutrition, and psychotherapy, I’m like each one of these disciplines have so much to offer. So as a team together having all of the approaches, and even medical, um, because I work with

[00:50:53] Stephanie: I’m so happy. Maybe we’ll catch up another four years, and God only knows where you’re gonna be at that point. You’ll have changed the whole medical system in Ireland.

[00:51:02] Denise: Well. Not gonna say it’s not possible, because it, it could be possible. And I always trust seeds that you plant in my mind.

[00:51:13] Stephanie: Thank you, Denise.

[00:51:14] Denise: Ah, it was lovely to chat to you.

[00:51:21] Denise: wanna coach behaviors, not bodies. Learn the mindset tool and the method that create real changes.

[00:51:28] Denise: Join the wait list for the next cohort of the non diet coaching certification at stephaniedodier.com/waitlist. That’s where the real training begins, and I’ll see you on the other side, my sisters.