Coach Sze Wing Podcast

Kristy is an ex-nurse turned author, her first book "Confessions of a Professional Overthinker” is coming out in October 2019.  Her journey of writing this book is nothing short of personal experience on acceptance, courage, and healing. Her background in nursing has helped her to identify certain connections between physical or emotional problems and the life stories people tend to hold. More often than not, the thoughts of “I am not good enough”, “I am unworthy” or “I am not lovable”, were the stories many patients have in their minds, especially those who have addiction issues. She talked about how we unknowingly play the “old stories” in our mind based on our childhood experience and even though they are not valid or true, we are still affected by them. We may not be able to change the past, but now we have a choice to stop repeating those stories that no longer serve us and we can decide not to let them define us any further.  Kristy said powerfully, "At the end of the day, it's a cho

This week’s blog is sparked by a recent conversation I had with my client about asking for a pay rise.  Lindsay (for her privacy, this is not her real name) has been running a multi-million dollar start-up as a managing director for several years. The company has been doing extremely well in the last 12 months and for all her hard work, long hours and personal scarifies, she feels it is time to ask for more and she wanted some coaching to prepare her for the conversation with her boss.  What makes this really interesting is that the conversation we had was actually not about HOW to get a pay rise. You’ll see what I mean next. After listing a number of very reasonable, rational and critical factors, she told me how much she was planning to ask for. But then I asked her, how much you actually think you are worth for this company in the current market?  Without a pause, she named a figure that is 20K more than what she just told me.  I asked her why she didn’t say that higher figure first

In this week’s interview, I talked to the founder of Highly Sensitive Healing, author and professional dancer/teacher Jennifer Arnspiger. Clearly, she is a multi-passionate and talented being. Jennifer's healing journey is an empowering lesson for many of us who are in the midst of the dark night of our soul or in recovery from trauma.  Jennifer shared with us how she discovered that she is a highly sensitive person, what are the common characteristics, potentials and some really good self-care tips too. We also talked a lot about why creativity and movement are so important for highly sensitive people. This is a delightful interview, and I’d love for you to listen to this podcast. So, instead of including a summary here like I normally do, I am only going to include the show notes/highlights below but I'd add a full-length transcript at the end of this blog. (Just in case you prefer reading!) You can also watch the video version if prefer that! Shownotes/Highlights: Falling in love with bal

One of the typical reasons why we are exhausted is because we are trying to do too much, trying to tackle everything at once. Why? It’s because we are so eager to get ahead, we want to make sure we are making progress. I love progress and totally believe in taking actions, but sometimes we may need to slow down in order to go fast LATER. We must adjust to our circumstances and avoid unrealistic exception so that we don’t need to get burnout or disappointed about ourselves.  Reminder # 1:  It is always the small changes that we make consistently over a period of time that bring us the biggest change or massive result.  So stop trying to make a giant leap all the time. Sometimes it is the incremental improvements that would path the way for your long term success.  Another reason why we tend to put way too much on our plate is that we want to make sure others are happy. Ranging from pleasing others to impressing others. We need to know if we doing what we do for the right reasons. 

Today I have a special interview featuring two wonderful healers, Kate Gyngell and Judi Bastinwagner to share with you. Together, they run the Soul Healing Studio and Circles of Wisdom in Sydney. Kate is an author and speaker, and she does Ashati Healing during the healings sessions. Judi does energy/Reiki work combine with aromatherapy and sound. Another really interesting fact about Judi is that she is also a Druid in training. So you see why I was so fascinated and excited to interview them about their journey and their work.  Kate and Judi host a monthly Soul Business Circle in which I was very honoured to be invited and spoke about my work there back in August. I love the concept of a circle, it is not just a networking event for conscious businesses, but a real opportunity for people to share their experience, wisdom and knowledge. I felt there is a lot of respect for one another, with no judgement and simply a very nurturing space to be invited in.  In the interview, I asked them about

I heard myself saying to myself the other day, "You can’t go over it, you can’t go under it, you have to go through it.”  That’s right, I kinda got the idea from the book Today We’re Going on a Bear Hunt. I wonder if the author Michael Rosen of this children’s picture book meant to impress this profound life lesson into our little one’s mind.  If you are not familiar with this awards winning book, the story is about several children who decided to go on a bear hunt.  In the first half of the book, it focuses on “going after the bear”. Each page begins with:  We're going on a bear hunt We're going to catch a big one,  What a beautiful day! We're not scared.  Then, when they face each obstacle, it reads: We can’t go over it. We can’t go under it.  Oh no! We’ve got to go through it! The children encounter all kinds of tricky situations, from dark forest, cold river, oozy mud to snowstorms, and finally they get to a bear cave.  It is all courageous and optimistic u

Are you thriving in your life, or just surviving? In my interview with Jennifer Jerries, we spoke about how we are all emotional beings, and we need to look at health as an integrated unit of our body, mind and soul. You can listen to this podcast with the player above or on iTunes podcasts. You can also watch the video below. All the wealth and success mean nothing if we have no health to enjoy it all. Good health is not just about the absence of illness but it is about being well and feeling good.  Jennifer Jefferies is The Present Day Wise Woman, one of Australia’s most respected authors and speakers in the area of health and wellbeing, working closely with some of the world’s most well-known brands to restore work-life balance. She is an international speaker and author of many books, including her Aromatherapy Insight Cards. After leaving her pharmaceutical management career and experienced a car accident, Jennifer took a complete turn and looked at her life and health in a completely new l

Two weeks before our epic annual trip to France and Hong Kong/China, my little one got rather sick. She had flu, chest infection and high fever, followed by an allergic reaction to her antibiotics. I didn’t have much sleep during those two weeks because of all the pre-trip work I’ve planned and her illness unplanned. Despite all the physical and emotional exhaustion (48+ hours road trip from our home in Sydney to our home in France), I felt there is tremendous strength in a mother’s heart. We rise as superwoman, pulling through all the hurdles in order to help our loved ones to get better and get through the challenges together as a family.   The whole experience reminded me of an article I’ve written some time ago but didn’t release. It is about the “Mothers of the World”. As I’ve become a mother myself, I understand what “unconditional love” really means. When you watch your child suffer, there is no remedy for the mother’s worry or fear, but we find the strength we need to care for them. Unconditio

In my interview with Dr Orlena, we talked about how to create or maintain healthy eating habits and lifestyle for the whole family including kids. Dr Orlena is a pediatric doctor turned “Healthy Life Coach” now helping busy mums to create a healthy and balanced life.  A few years ago, together with her husband and 2 children, Dr Orlena and her family moved from England to Spain. Since then, her family has expanded to 4 children.  Our conversation began with life transitions, how one thing lead to another and how her career has changed. It was really one adventure after another. Many of us experienced the same thing, it may be about a career change or relocation or simply expanding our family.  As a health life coach, many of her clients come to her because they want to lose weight, there are lots of diets and helpful activities out there that work, but at the end of the day, what Dr Orlena finds to be most useful is to have a good foundation, here are the top 3 elements: 3 Tips on Healthy Habits 

I've always love to learn about how leaders of different generations are formed and their background stories. What I have found in common in all of them is that none of these timeless leaders is remembered because of their title or social status.  Look at anyone who is widely considered an inspirational figure, for example, Dr Martin Luthur King Jr, Mohammad Gandhi or Mother Theresa. Do we even remember their official title? We get inspired by them for what they believe and what they did about it.  Think about the Woman Suffrage Movement, pioneers such as Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton who essentially started the women’s movement in 1848, they did not live long enough to see the legal right for women to vote in 1920. Yet, they paved the way of what is to come as one of the most significant milestone in achieving women equality. They did what they did because they felt the call to do the right thing. They believed women have the right to vote and should be treated more equally. They

In my delightful interview with Jan Marie, she shared with us so many great tips on how to HAVE IT ALL without feeling overwhelmed, exhausted and downright resentful. Think of the image of a super-mum, wife, daughter, friend, who has a good career or a thriving business, plus someone who is health-conscious and earth-friendly, well the list goes on.  Jan has been a licensed therapist for 18 years before become a Transformational Life Coach. She knows how it is like to be in transition first hand. We talked about how she felt she needed a change with her work, although she loved working with her patients, she wanted more freedom to share her work and to support more people.  Like me, Jan is also a mum and she has 2 little ones. We talked about how common new mums don’t talk about their struggles or past wounds, as we spend all our time trying to do everything right for our babies but often overlook the importance to take better care of our body, mind and soul. When we are low on our priority list, our

As I was preparing for a talk about my book "Goddess with Many Faces" and lessons learned from my self-publishing journey, I thought it may be fun and useful to share with my audience some of the myths or false assumptions that I encountered when I started to dive into the world of self-publishing.  I love learning and when I decided to self-publish my 1st book, I spent months learning about self-publishing and did a ton of research on the latest market trends and technologies.  In this week's podcast, I can't go into every detail or much of the technical aspects in self-publishing, however, I want to talk about some of the most common false assumptions so that it may clarify a few things for you and hopefully encourage you to publish your first book!  Here is a short summary of the podcast content: Is it TRUE or FALSE? Myth# 1: You need a big budget to self-publish your book  The reality is, you don't.  Just like everything else, you can pick and choose where you want to spend most of yo

In this fun and informative interview, I talked with Doreen (aka Dorz) Brown, an Search Engine Optimization (SEO) specialist on how to be seen and get found online.  Doreen has become a specialist through her own experience of starting out and not getting the visibility she wanted for her baby product business. She then decided to take a deep dive into the world of Digital Marketing space and worked in the industry for a number of years before running her own business again, but this time it is on SEO consulting. Since then she has consulted businesses of all sizes, locally and globally.  I know many people may find SEO and the whole digital marketing space overwhelming or intimidating, it is like facing a big beast and you don’t know how to tackle it first. This is why I love Dorz’s approach, it is all about breaking it down into manageable small parts and work on them over time, not all at once.  You can listen or watch our full interview here, the following is an outline of the key elements we've

I came out from meditation the other day and this thought kept lingering in my mind. “Allow the darkness to be dissolved by the light”. I thought to myself, what “darkness” my subconscious mind was trying to tell me? Later that day it daunted on me that I have been thinking about my past, more specifically, my past mistakes. Things that I did, that I’m not proud of. Or things that I should have done, or done better. I notice from time to time I would like to give myself a hard time, dig up the memories of the good, bad and ugly. Then, I would judge my younger self and criticize my character default. I made myself marinate in guilt, shame, doubt, anger and fear.  It feels like I am going through my annual mental muddy obstacle course, running through dirt and aches, eventually, I would make it to the finish line. Deep down I know better, I know it is my negative self-talk. I see it clearly when people come to me and doing that to themselves. But there are days I need to coach myself out of this dar

In my interview with Claudia, we talked about how she led a recent spiritual retreat and adventure in South America. She took a group of people from Australia to Bueno Sires in Argentina and Panache in Brazil. She called that a ReTrip, it is partly a “Retreat” and party a travel adventure “Trip" to see the extraordinary beauty of South America.  Claudia is an energy healer, spiritual teacher, coffee cup reader, Reiki Master, Shamanic practitioner and so much more. You can imagine the Retreat element has a lot to do with healing and spiritual practices. I know they did a cacao ceremony and I went on asking what that is, guessing it is more than drinking a chocolate type of beverage? She explained to me about cacao, how it is used as a sacred ceremonial plant, as it helps us to "open our heart" What I love about her work is that it is all about love. Spiritual Healing Retreat and Adventure in South America   She said: “What you open your heart, healing will occur.” What she learned from the ReTri

This is the Productivity Magic Part 2! A couple of weeks ago I wrote about how to get MORE done in LESS time, this week I am going to share with you my top tips on how to do LESS but achieve MORE.  Mind twisting? Not really. if you keep reading! :-) In Productivity Magic part 1, I focused on the logistics, the "how-to"s and good habits for increasing productivity. This week I want to focus on how to keep your body & mind as one unit to stay fresh and sharp as well as get the priorities right to maximise your results.  FIGURE OUT WHAT REALLY MATTERS I don't like this analogy because it talks about war, which I am totally against. However, it really speaks to the point.  "Pick the battles to win the war."  I know, you probably think it is a bit strange to say this here, but it's just so true to many situations for me.  My 2-year-old can be an angel SOME DAYS but she can be very challenging other times. To keep my sanity and effectively handle an unreasonable toddler, I've learned to accept

Our self-worth is reflected in how we treat ourselves. Do we practice self-love and self-care? Or are we often shadowed by our negative self-talk, something along the lines of “You are not _____ enough”? We may fill in the blank with “smart”, “successful”, “slim”, “strong”, or simply "Just Not Good Enough”.  The pursuit of perfection is epidemic. It is not surprising though, as we browse on our social media, we see tons of images of perfect body, wealth, beauty and success. No wonder why so many people suffer different degrees of negative self-image and overlook our body and mind connection.  For women to feel good and truly well, glowing from inside and out, with a happy smile and soaring spirit, we need a holistic approach. We need to know what really matters to our heart and soul and we need to nourish our body and mind.  This week I got to speak with Niomi Lindfors, founder of Stella Wellness, who totally walk her talk in a holistic approach on well-being. She has two degrees in psychology an

My friends often ask me this question, "How do you get everything done? How do you do it? Do you sleep?"  My answer is: "Yes, I get about 7 hours a day if my little one doesn't wake me up in the middle of the night." If you have a lot to manage, say a business, two jobs, several children, or other responsibilities you absolutely cannot delegate, then you really need to be aware of your habits, because some of them are better than others.  The formula of just putting more hours in simply doesn't work. It is not about working harder, it is about working smarter that will lift your game.  I love to learn about different tips & tools on productivity and I have been "collecting" and "testing" them over the years. What I've learned is that you may actually need to modify those tools or habits to make them work for you, instead of the other way round.  For example, if you are a night owl and hate the mornings, or you work late at night, you may find planning the night before you go to bed works better

Are you a creative (e.g. musician, artist, writer, poet, designer, dancer, etc.) who feels uncomfortable to talk about your work as a business? If you want to make your creative work a full-time job or a business, then this is an interview you really need to listen/watch. In this week’s podcast, apart from my personal updates/lessons learned, I also included my interview with Monica O’Brien, a coach who has been working with creatives for years. However, Monica's story didn’t start in a way you may expect.  The following is a recap of the main points we discussed in the interview: Monica was trained and worked as a nurse in her early years. She then worked with a lot of youth before "accidentally” became a music producer and founded a publishing company. Since then she has been working with creatives like composers and artists, and eventually, she became a coach and work with them in that capacity. I love her story because it just shows us how we don’t know what may be the next surprise on

You may have heard of this quote before, "If you do what you love, you'll never work a day in your life" by Marc Anthony. It carries a powerful message that if we do what we love as a job or career, then we will have a very different outlook towards work and what it means to us.  However, I think this is just part of the puzzle. Even if we are lucky enough to get that job, there are still things that we don't like to do within that job. For example, as a coach, I love the aspects of coaching, writing and speaking. But I am not that keen to work on technical tasks such as tracking analytics on my website or social media. Certainly, there are things I can delegate, but there are things I still need to do myself that I may not necessarily enjoy. It is just part of the experience, just look at the people you love, I bet there are things that you don't like so much day in day out too.  Then, there is also the distinction between landing a job vs. a career you love. There are many definitions out there, but f