- Publisher |
- Stephen Warley | Solopreneur Business Coach
- Media Type |
- audio
- Podknife tags |
- Business,
- Careers,
- Entrepreneurship,
- Interview,
- Self-Help
- Categories Via RSS |
- Business,
- Careers,
- Education,
- Entrepreneurship,
- Self-Improvement
Each interview is like a case study on how to transition from employment into self-employment. Stephen also interviews loads of people questioning the status quo of conventional work like Jenny Blake, Seth Godin, Chris Brogan, Pamela Slim, David Neeleman, Greg McKeown, Todd Henery, Omar Zenhom, Kwame Christian, Sean McCabe, Mike Vardy, Emilie Wapnick, Erik Fisher, Nick Loper, Elaine Pofeldt, Taylor Pearson, Jordan Harbinger, Neil Pasricha, Tracy Litt, Chris Guillebeau and many more!
Learn how to gain your work freedom as a freelancer, consultant, coach or solopreneur. It is possible! Get started at LifeSkillsThatMatter.com/getstarted
- People |
- Country Of Origin |
- USA
- Produced In |
- Boston, MA
- Premiere Date |
- 2016-11-28
- Frequency |
- Weekly
- Explicit |
- No
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Submit Reviewbeever.png">
If you're not working toward it, Kate Beever wants to inspire you to focus on your dream career path right now!
She's worked as a therapist using music to help people regain speech and mobility for the past 20 years. She launched her own business, Maine Music and Health about a decade ago because conventional jobs limited her from doing the work she really wanted to do.
Lot of great lessons in our conversation including:
- Why she says she started a business out of necessity, not necessarily out of a desire to do so.
- What Kate believes it takes to be a good business owner .
- Why you can't fail if you don't quit.
- How cultivating curiosity makes you feel more positive.
- How she defines success day by day.
Life Skills That Matter In This Episode
- Self-awareness.
- Embrace discomfort.
- Curiosity.
How Kate Works and Thinks
- Wake up time: Around 5:45 am
- Core work activities + habits: 1) Looking at her task lists, separated by category, to see what should get done each month. 2) Making new connections and telling her story. 3) Doing self-care to maintain her energy and excitement for telling her story.
- Ideal work environment: Close to the ocean and in a clean space.
- Definition of success: Finding joy in little things, being able to celebrate big things when they happen, and being a good community member and trying to give back.
- Regains focus by: Dancing in the kitchen, oftentimes lately to Underdog by Alicia Keys
- 90-day goal: Building up new connections in her new town and feeling good about starting over.
Inspirational Quotes
“You can’t fail if you don’t quit.”
“Curiosity allows you to be more positive.”
“I feel successful everyday in small ways.”
“Part of the skillset that I had to develop was the confidence and passion to stick with the thing that I know is gonna work.”
“You don’t know how long you’re here, it could be a long time, it could be a short time, but what are you gonna do with it?”
“Instead of talking about my business and trying to sell my product or service, I just talk about the effect it has on people and then that makes it a little more of a natural conversation.”
Coaching Advice
After living in big cities for 20 years and now moving to rural Massachusetts, Kate had this advice for Stephen about running a business in a rural area:
1) Even when you’re running an online business, sometimes you have to think about completely getting off the computer.
2) Doing things like printing off paper fliers and hanging them in town halls or community centers can help get a sense for who the community leaders or connectors are.
Resources + Bonus Materials
Keane – Everybody’s Changing [30 minutes extended]
Special Offer
Related Episodes
Get Paid To Play With Jeff Harry (364)
Living Your One wild And Precious Life With Kimberly Jung (241)
Connect With Kate
The post Give Your Dream Career A Chance With Kate Beever (393) appeared first on Life Skills That Matter.
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Mary Ann Kristiansen wants to inspire you to start a business to make an impact, not just money.
She's the founder of the Hannah Grimes Marketplace, a main street store celebrating the local producers of Keene, NH, as well as running an incubator to help businesses start and grow.
She's also the co-founder of Radically Rural Summit, an annual conference to exchange success stories about what's working in rural America from land development to renewable energy to entrepreneurship.
Lot of great lessons in our conversation including:
- Why community is her core source of motivation.
- The concept of being idea friendly from SaveYour.Town.
- How she challenged her limiting beliefs about what it means to be a leader.
- How idea demons help her overcome big challenges.
- Why her business incubator has such a high success rate.
Life Skills That Matter In This Episode
- Build community.
- Curiosity.
- Tell your story.
How Mary Ann Works and Thinks
- Wake up time: 5:30 – 6:30 am
- Core work activities + habits: 1) Keeping the community tight, starting with supporting her team. 2) Listening to the community and keeping an eye on the news for a sense of what’s happening. 3) Staying attached to why it’s important and loving the place she lives.
- Ideal work environment: Having lots of open time before she gets into working. For some types of work, it’s in a busy environment, with lots of people, and ideas popping around. For other work, like writing or thinking, it means taking a few days off to approach it really fresh.
- Superpower: Seeing things as easy and attainable, even if they sometimes turn out not to be.
Inspirational Quotes
“For me, a lot of forward motion comes from working with lots of different things and then sort of seeing the connections between them and sometimes seeing a new path forward.”
“If business were consistently a force for good, so many of the, what we consider, complex, intractable problems would go away.”
“What we’ve found is really having a wide variety of things, help feed each other.”
“I really believe ideas are things, I’ve more and more come to believe it’s some dimension that we have yet to learn.”
“We give people what they need at the time that they need it.”
Coaching Advice
Got a big, burning idea that you’re having trouble starting on? Mary Ann recommends this as a first action to get going:
1) Get clear on your idea in order to be able to articulate it, and your excitement about it, to others.
2) Do that by sitting down and writing out what your idea is, how you would market it, what does it look like, and get really detailed.
Resources + Bonus Materials
Hannah Grimes Business Incubator Program
Deb and Becky – Save Your Town
Mary Ann’s TED Talk: Radically Rural Idea Demons
Vivid Vision by Cameron Herold
coach-assets.s3.amazonaws.com/Uberflip/ImpactFiterToolAndGuide_Booklet.pdf">The Impact Filter
Related Episodes
How To Do Your Best Work with Amber De La Garza (366)
Design Your Lifestyle Around Your Work With Craig Chavis (164)
Connect With Mary Ann
The post Make An Impact, Not Just Money With Mary Ann Kristiansen (392) appeared first on Life Skills That Matter.
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She's been working as a behavior specialist for the past 20 years. She explores the root causes of challenging behaviors in both children and corporate teams to help them feel less frustrated and overwhelmed.
Lot of great lessons in our conversation including:
- How she tried on different professional identities to discover the one that truly reflects who she is.
- The power of consistently taking small steps.
- Importance of tracking your behavior, so you know how to change it.
- How she learned how to sell as a coach.
- Why she felt the need to pause her business for over a year.
Life Skills That Matter In This Episode
- Tell your story.
- Self-awareness.
- Curiosity.
How Dr. Marcie Beigel Works and Thinks
- Wake up time: Ideally around 8:00 am
- Core work activities + habits: 1) Check email. 2) Show up for her sessions. 3) Commit to only doing things that she’s enjoying.
- Ideal work environment: Being in person, in a home or an organization, helping to guide through changes on the ground. For other business activities, it’s being at her standing desk, in her living room, looking out big windows at trees and sky.
- Superpower: Finding the silver lining in any situation.
- Regains focus by: Meditating, sleeping, or talking with her therapist.
Inspirational Quotes
“Behavior is one of those things that we don’t realize how deeply it impacts everything and how small steps in the right direction have such a big impact in all elements of our life.”
“What I do is I help people change behavior however they need and want help.”
“You don’t actually have to have a label, you can describe the feeling that you create in the world.”
“As entrepreneurs, we’re creating our own stories, we’re deciding our own labels.”
“The magical thing about behavior is I don’t need to know where it came from or why you’re doing it, I just need to know that you don’t like it and somewhat of where you wanna go.”
Coaching Advice
Feeling chronically drained these days? Dr. Marcie recommends this small step to start restoring your energy:
Sit and stare out the window at the sky, or a tree, or a building for five minutes per day, because part of restoring energy is giving ourselves permission and space to rest.
Resources + Bonus Materials
Related Episodes
Find Balance Between Doing Well And Doing Good With Andrew Kemendo (230)
How To Be More Intentional With Neil Pasricha (309)
Building Career Security With Pamela Slim (077)
Connect With Dr. Marcie Beigel
The post Create Lasting Change By Taking Small Steps With Dr. Marcie Beigel (391) appeared first on Life Skills That Matter.
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Taylor Buonocore-Guthrie wants to share how to have a great conversation with no agenda, but only to connect and learn from others.
She's a conversation facilitator and co-founder of ate.com/">Convers(ate), offering facilitation services to spark learning and connection.
Lot of great lessons in our conversation including:
- How Taylor defines what it means to be a facilitator .
- How technology has adversely impacted our conversations.
- Making conversations less transactional by practicing beginner's mind .
- Suggestions on how to start a conversation with a stranger.
Life Skills That Matter In This Episode
- Build community.
- Self-directed learning.
- Tell your story.
How Taylor Works and Thinks
- Wake up time: Around 6:00 am
- Core work activities + habits: 1) Doing prep calls with clients to understand their goals and tailor questions to them. 2) Designing the sessions to reflect the goals of the client. 3) Leaning into the follow-up with clients after their sessions to capture takeaways and share them back with the group.
- Ideal work environment: In the corner of her bedroom where she created her small home office, using the corner of a desktop, and ideally having a view outdoors or being outside.
- Superpower: Creating a warm and welcoming environment where people feel guided, but with so much warmth that they feel comfortable being themselves and speaking authentically.
- Definition of success: Leaning into the areas where she feels most excited when she’s done a good job, which is usually seeing folks, after completing a facilitation session, having made connections or learned something.
Inspirational Quotes
“My focus is on making conversations easier to have.”
“It’s like the original exchange of ideas, I mean, the original idea forum is conversation.”
“It’s not always about convincing people of your way, sometimes it’s really nice to just listen, absorb, observe, and understand what’s happening elsewhere.”
“I was craving the ability to build something from scratch.”
“It feels much more authentic, to me, to have conversations about business after I’ve been able to lean into my curiosity just about them as a person.”
Coaching Advice
Feeling uncomfortable about talking with people you don’t know? Taylor suggested these steps to start feeling more comfortable in starting those conversations both online and offline
1) Have a question that feels special and authentic for you to ask, that you’re genuinely interested in knowing about someone.
2) Have beginner’s mind conversations that have no obvious utility.
Resources + Bonus Materials
ate.com/order/conversate-box-set">The Convers(ate) Signature Box Set
Mollie Khine – Co-founder of Convers(ate)
Special Offer!
ate.com/">Use code “LIFESKILLS” for 15% off of Convers(ate) products
Related Episodes
Get Paid To Play With Jeff Harry (364)
Make Difficult Conversations Easier With Kwame Christian (246)
Connect With Taylor
ate.com/">Website
The post How to Have a Great Conversation With Taylor Buonocore-Guthrie (390) appeared first on Life Skills That Matter.
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She's the founder and creative director of Copperheart Creative, a graphic design agency on a mission to root your brand in your heart, so you stand out from the crowd and in alignment with your values.
Also be sure to check out her podcast Small Business Big Heart .
Lot of great lessons in our conversation including:
- How Amber defines what it means to be a heart-centered business .
- Why knowing yourself is the most important first step toward starting your business.
- Why the intangible aspects of your brand dictate the visual aspects.
- How to get better at saying, No, so you attract customers who energize you.
Life Skills That Matter In This Episode
- Self-awareness.
- Building community.
- Tell your story.
How Amber Works and Thinks
- Wake up time: 5:00 am
- Core work activities + habits: 1) Work out. 2) Turn her phone on airplane mode. 3) Journal.
- Ideal work environment: It varies, but is often right after she works out while the endorphins are going, her energy is high, she’s positive, and has a clear outlook.
- Superpower: Bringing people together.
- Regains focus by: Accountability from her community.
- 90-day goal: Launching new resources in the shop for Copperheart and starting to prepare for The Fill Your Cup Conference by doing things like selling tickets and finding sponsors.
Inspirational Quotes
“We design with heart for people with heart.”
“Having branding that actually reflects your heart and who you are and your business makes the selling process so much less painful and so much more exciting for your customers.”
“I like to think that we’re part designers, part coaches, part therapists.”
“Customers are gonna connect with your heart, your why, and how you’re showing up in the world.”
“Find your people and stick with them. Link arms, do life. We’re not meant to do this alone.”
“Let your yeses be a firm yes and your no be no.”
Coaching Advice
Starting to question the role of work in your life? Amber suggested the following actions to get to know yourself better in a deeper, more honest way.
1) Seek out therapy.
2) If you’re not ready for therapy, try journaling instead.
3) Ultimately, find opportunities for self-reflection by asking yourself hard questions and having a safe space to be able to answer them.
Resources + Bonus Materials
Related Episodes
Build Your Business Slowly With Noé Khalfa + Harmony Eichsteadt(307)
Find Your Cheerleaders And Champions With Vanessa Tharp (270)
Special Offer!
Use code “LSTM10” to get 10% off the heart-felt branding questionnaire!
Connect With Amber
The post How To Create A Heart-Centered Business With Amber Zaricor (389) appeared first on Life Skills That Matter.
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Kyle Ewing shares why your product won't sell itself and why you need to embrace sales if you want to work for yourself.
He's the founder of TerraSlate Paper, a waterproof and tear proof paper used by the military and as washable menus by restaurants.
Lot of great lessons in our conversation including:
- Why selling is the most important activity during the early days of your business.
- Why he works harder for less money compared to when he worked for someone else.
- How he felt when he has 100,000 sheets of his paper with no market to sell to.
- Toughest lesson he learned as a result of starting his business.
Life Skills That Matter In This Episode
- Tell your story.
- Self-awareness.
- Outreach.
How Kyle Works and Thinks
- Wake up time: 5:45 am
- Core work activities + habits: 1) Hire people. 2) Find a way to meet demand. 3) Get his hands off of as many things as possible.
- Ideal work environment: In the morning, being first in the office with no one around asking questions and the phone not ringing, having a couple hours to really concentrate and work in deep thought.
- Superpower: Working at a really high speed for 12 hours at a time.
- Regains focus by: Making a good sale.
- 90-day goal: Hiring really good leaders to increase capacity, but maintain the quality that customers expect.
Inspirational Quotes
“The key really is, when you want to sell a product, is to get on the phone and sell it.”
“The risk is there, but it’s probably lower than what you think it is.”
“As soon as I started my own company, I had never known what hard work was, I mean I work harder now than I’ve ever worked.”
“One of the most valuable things I learned from being a management consultant is how to give a pitch.”
“Part of my personality is I am motivated by the challenge.”
“Sell the benefits. The features are great, but the benefits are what people buy.”
Coaching Advice
Have a business idea you can’t get off your mind? Kyle suggested these steps to give your idea a chance:
1) Get on the phone and figure out how to make a minimum viable product (MVP) by calling the best people you know and following their recommendations.
2) Set a goal of spending 1 hour per day figuring out the next steps avoid getting complacent.
Resources + Bonus Materials
Related Episodes
Building A Minimal Viable Product (MVP) With Amy Kauffman (102)
Selling When You Have No Sales Experience With Meredith Bell (037)
Create Time Freedom With Laura Roeder (360)
Connect With Kyle
kyle.ewing@terraslate.com">Email
The post Why Your Product Won't Sell Itself With Kyle Ewing (388) appeared first on Life Skills That Matter.
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Lucy Scott is a very special guest who wants to inspire you to author your own story!
Lucy was a mentor of mine in the early days of my career. We were both laid off working for the same company during the Dot-Com Bust of 2000.
She's a storyteller who has shared her talents for over 40 years as a broadcast journalist working as a producer for CBS News, NBC News and ABC News. She has covered some of the most important stories of our time and has interviewed some of the biggest names in politics and business.
She's now on a mission to help you get noticed by telling your unique story!
Lot of great lessons in our conversation including:
- It's people that keep you engaged with your career.
- Why she believes self-awareness is the most important life skill.
- If it doesn't fit, don't force it.
- Understand the needs of others.
Life Skills That Matter In This Episode
- Build community.
- Self-directed learning.
- Tell your story.
How Lucy Works and Thinks
- Wake up time: About 6:00 am
- Ideal work environment: When she feels comfortable with the genesis of the work, she believes in what she’s doing, she feels that it will be helpful to someone, and she feels spiritually driven to do something.
- Superpower: Trying to be open-hearted.
Inspirational Quotes
“I’ll lay down in front of traffic for somebody that I believe in. I won’t leave the house for somebody that I feel doesn’t have my back.”
“What I seem to have a knack for is telling somebody something they don’t know, telling them before somebody else tells them, and having fun.”
“It’s not the mistake, it’s what you do next.”
“Yesterday is heavy. Set it down.”
“Generalization is poison to creativity and innovation.”
Coaching Advice
Feeling stuck? Lucy offered this guidance for telling the story you really want to tell:
1) Focus on specificity. Don’t generalize and paint your thoughts in broad strokes, be specific about your own skills and articulate what you’re offering that other people can’t
2) Think about, and maybe even write down, things you know that you’re damn good at, don’t make it about what you feel you’re supposed to do.
Resources + Bonus Materials
Related Episodes
How To Unlock Your Creative Mindset With Monica Kang (385)
Know Your Customers With Richard Fawal (218)
Connect With Lucy
The post Do Work That Matters To You With Lucy Scott (387) appeared first on Life Skills That Matter.
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Corbett Barr wants to inspire you to rethink your digital life.
In the fall of 2020, he shared a post on his blog titled, I'm Starting Over. He decided to delete his digital life by breaking up with social media.
He's been an online entrepreneur for 15 years and has helped thousands start online businesses, so as you can imagine this was a decision he didn't take lightly.
He co-founded Fizzle.co over a decade ago. It's one of the original online communities helping solo creators get paid to do something they love by being honest, determined and making something people actually want.
Lot of great lessons in our conversation including:
- Where he has redirected the time he once spent on social media.
- The importance of taking sabbaticals.
- The process he used for breaking up with social media.
- Why he believes he has become a better communicator by leaving social media.
Life Skills That Matter In This Episode
- Self-awareness.
- Build community.
- Curiosity.
How Corbett Works and Thinks
- Wake up time: Around 7:00 am
- Ideal work environment: A super quiet morning, with the best work often coming between 8:00 am and noon. Getting up, going for a walk, having a cup of coffee, and then having time to sit down without having to jump into a meeting or having conversations.
- Superpower: Being a jack-of-all-trades and being able to figure out most things to a level of competency pretty quickly.
- Changes to definition of success: Initially, wanting to build something big and of significant scale. Today, it’s more about the depth and the level of impact they have.
- Regains focus by: Reconnecting with the people he hopes to impact with the thing he’s working on.
Inspirational Quotes
“There’s nothing more exhausting than trying to be someone who you’re not.”
“It wasn’t until I took that sabbatical that I was able to really reconnect with myself and understand who I was, what I wanted from life, and what really mattered to me.”
“Not spending time on social media means that I have more time to actually have real conversations with individual humans.”
“Self-awareness allows you to actually accomplish your goals.”
Coaching Advice
Thinking about trying to spend less time on social media? Corbett recommended these first steps:
1) Observe how you feel as well as what decisions and thought patterns come up when you spend time on social media, specifically for each platform.
2) Jot down and idea of how much time you spend on these platforms every week to start getting a sense of the impact they’re having and how much time they require of you.
Resources + Bonus Materials
I’m Starting Over by Corbett Barr
Finding Your Voice – The Fizzle Show 001
Related Episodes
Own Your Digital Life With Angela Crocker (375)
Signal The Right Message To The Right People With Zak Slayback (255)
Connect With Corbett
The post Rethink Your Digital Life With Corbett Barr (386) appeared first on Life Skills That Matter.
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She's the founder of InnovatorsBox, offering workshops, tools and community to help reframe your mindset from feeling overwhelmed and anxious to creative and thriving.
She's also the author of Rethink Creativity, debunking everything ever taught to you about creativity!
Lot of great lessons in our conversation including:
- When you understand your Why, you attract people who are aligned with you.
- Why she felt stuck in her dream career.
- The very first steps she took to get herself unstuck to create work on her terms.
- Why creativity is all about leaning into your curiosity.
Life Skills That Matter In This Episode
- Self-awareness.
- Curiosity.
- Tell your story.
How Monica Works and Thinks
- Wake up time: Lately around 9:00 am
- Core work activities + habits: 1) Strategic, macro-lens planning to keep smaller activities tied into the bigger goal and do more with less. 2) Connect dots faster to make processes succinct and enjoyable. 3) Finding ways to communicate more thoughtfully and employing “yes, and” approaches to compromise.
- Ideal work environment: After a lot of good sleep and good food, feeling psychologically safe and encouraged to promote more safety for other people.
- Superpower: Making rooms feel safe, no matter who’s in the room, and making people feel they can be themselves.
Inspirational Quotes
“When you have a clear ‘why,’ you organically keep coming across the people who align with that ‘why.'”
“Some people will never get you and that’s ok as long as you believe and you know where you’re heading and why this is important.”
“I was more energized because I was now curious.”
“Just because somebody says, ‘this is the limit,’ does not mean you choose that to be the limit.”
“You can’t skip self-awareness.”
Coaching Advice
Feel like you aren’t creative? Monica recommends this action to test your assumption about lacking creativity:
1) Pick something you do at work that you know you always have to do and try to do the same thing with fewer steps.
2) Thinking about the same task, what can you do to make it more fun?
Resources + Bonus Materials
Rethink Creativity by Monica Kang
Podcast episode about being clear on your inner world and aligning with yourself
Special Offer
Free Resources from InnovatorsBox!
Related Episodes
Get Unstuck By Feeling Your Pain With Shawn Askinosie (240)
Unleash Your Creativity With Tania Katan (301)
Connect With Monica
The post How To Unlock Your Creative Mindset With Monica Kang (385) appeared first on Life Skills That Matter.
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He's living what he preaches and meets life's challenges head on!
He's a survivor of a rare kidney disease, he chose to leave his corporate job after 18 years instead of hanging on until he could retire and he admits it took him 5 years to figure out his business idea!
He discovered he loves developing the potential of others. He now helps consultants build an additional $1 million in annual revenue by teaching them his Accelerate Sales System.
Lot of great lessons in our conversation including:
- Being a consultant versus running a consulting business.
- The process Paul used to find a business idea that worked for him.
- The importance of creating space to make a big change in your life.
- How a health crisis triggered him to work for himself.
- The importance of hanging with like-minded people to help start your own business.
Life Skills That Matter In This Episode
- Build community.
- Self-directed learning.
- Self-awareness.
How Paul Works and Thinks
- Wake up time: 5:45 am
- Core work activities + habits: 1) Lead his team. 2) Sell. 3) Set the strategy of where they’re going.
- Ideal work environment: Getting an early start, doing a fitness activity in the middle of the day, followed by a meditation, a nap, and a cold shower, before getting back to the rest of the day.
- Superpower: Helping people to help others.
- 90-day goal: Get more clients to increase revenue and to help existing clients to achieve their goals.
Inspirational Quotes
“I looked back at, ‘well, what am I paid to do and what do I love doing?'”
“The more I help people, the less I think about my own circumstance.”
“Join a community where there’s people that have done exactly what you plan to do.”
“No matter how good you are, if no one knows about it, it’s very very difficult to help more people.”
Coaching Advice
Starting to plan how to start your business? Paul suggests these first steps for exploring the viability of your idea:
1) Take a look at the resources and content available from places like Life Skills That Matter that focuses on the early parts of starting a business.
2) Really look at your network and who is going to help you get to your first $10k-20k as well as how you can help them now.
3) Think about if you can help an existing or previous employer as your first client.
Resources + Bonus Materials
Build Live Give by Paul Higgins
Related Episodes
How To Start A Mastermind With Iggy Perillo (345)
Learn The 6 Stages Of The Winning Mindset From Charlene Norman (103)
Special Offer
Check out Paul’s masterclass here!
Connect With Paul
The post Never Stop Developing Your Potential With Paul Higgins (384) appeared first on Life Skills That Matter.
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