Bennett Maxwell (00:00.112) Yeah, we just hit we're about 18 months in and we just hit half a million downloads last 12 months. So we're freaking. I'm excited about that.

Marni Battista (00:05.023) Nice. That's great. Very cool. Congrats.

Bennett Maxwell (00:09.552) Okay, so we are recording. All right, welcome to another episode of the Deeper Than Dough podcast. Actually, before I say that, I need to make sure I'm at Marnie Batista, but Batista, what, what? Okay, Marnie Batista. Okay, let me go back. Welcome to another episode of the Deeper Than Dough podcast. I'm super excited to have our guest Marnie Batista on the show. Marnie, thank you for joining, welcome.

Marni Battista (00:22.637) Batista. Yeah, perfect.

Marni Battista (00:35.905) I'm happy to be here, so fun.

Bennett Maxwell (00:38.244) Marnie, I'm super excited to jump into this because, I mean, we started talking a little bit, this should life. That's what I'm most excited about. I'm sure it will impact a lot. Do you mind giving us just a minute or two of whatever you choose to give us as far as your background, who you are.

Marni Battista (00:53.379) Yeah, so I've been a coach for about 15 years, which is like a grandma in this business, it feels like. And I started my business in about 2009 -ish as a dating coach. I always sort of think of coaches as like, you know, have this thing that you fix and then you want to help other people get out of their pain. And I had been divorced and I met my husband, my second husband, and I was like, I got this dialed in.

And I built this really big business. We had almost $2 million of revenue for lots of years in a row. But the thing is that while I was helping women date, really what I was helping them do was actually design life on their terms. It was almost like the problem they think they had in life was that they couldn't find a guy. But once they started to unpack who they really are, they looked around their life and they're like, wait, I need to redo this whole thing.

So I was having clients stay with me for like three years, five years, seven years, 10 years, right? Really creating this life that they love. And around 2020, just before lockdown, I got in a serious ski accident in Canada. Double black diamond didn't like me. And I went down on a toboggan and...

barely made it back to America and was in bed for three months. And while I was supposed to be recovered and the doctor said like, shouldn't have pain, I still did. I had cracked seven fractures in my sacrum. It was healed, but I wasn't able to basically resume any sort of normal activity. And I had an opportunity to have a conversation with a mentor.

who said something really profound and said, you've cracked the foundation, that's the sacrum, and you need to rebuild. So, interestingly, my father had just died and I had gone to a religious service and I had heard about these seven questions that you are asked in this story in the Old Testament at the pearly gates. And in this moment,

Marni Battista (03:11.615) you're asked these questions to decide if you've lived a meaningful life. And like the sky opened up and I was like, my gosh, I have these seven fractures. I have these seven questions. I have totally been living my life based on a set of success metrics that were not mine. They were decided for me years and years ago.

And in that moment, sort of everything unfolded and ultimately I ended up selling my house after 20 some years. My kids left the nest. My husband and I set out on a road trip adventure for a year in an RV to figure out what really made me happy. And I ended up writing a book about it and shifted my whole business, my whole brand, and that's what I'm helping women do.

officially now, because I've been actually helping women do it for 15 years.

Bennett Maxwell (04:11.962) but now it's official, a little bit more of a clear path. I love that. First question is, where were you skiing?

Marni Battista (04:13.132) It's a fish.

Marni Battista (04:18.854) Whistler.

Bennett Maxwell (04:20.44) Okay, where's, I'm not familiar with, okay, we're in Utah.

Marni Battista (04:21.943) Canada, just like about three hours away from Seattle.

Bennett Maxwell (04:26.776) Okay. I'm in Utah and there's tons of people that come here. There's a franchise conference that's held every year, which is really just let's ski during the day and drink at night. But Hey, another side question before I dump a dive into the, the deep stuff dating coach, me and my wife are in season six of sex in the city. Have you seen that show? She's like, she's not a dating coach at all, but

Marni Battista (04:41.258) Yes.

Marni Battista (04:46.977) Nice, nice. That's so funny. The OG one, yes.

Bennett Maxwell (04:53.742) You know, she's, she's writing on dating and anyways, do you like the show? That's my other question.

Marni Battista (04:57.953) I I love the show. I actually, when I first had my business, I had these dating archetypes and I designed them after the girls in Sex and the City. And I was like, I was Samantha after my divorce. I totally admit it. And it did not serve me well long term until I got my head out of my, you know.

Bennett Maxwell (05:18.124) I freaking love that so much. mean, they do such a good job in portraying that in the show and the writing in it is the best that I've seen. And maybe it's the first time I'm actually paying attention to it, but I'm like, everything just ties together in their play on words. Anyways, there's a plug for Sex and the City.

Marni Battista (05:25.345) The best.

Marni Battista (05:32.547) Yay! The old one, not the new one so much.

Bennett Maxwell (05:35.696) Although not the new one. Okay. And then I want to jump into the something that you said that I've been focusing on maybe for the last three years or so, identifying the real problem. I'm to give you a little background and then ask the question. It was about three years ago I sold my solar company and I was working a lot and I got up to 300 something pounds, wife, three kids. And I was just like, everything is a side, right? Because as long as I can just have a good exit,

That wasn't the goal, but I didn't take it to the end. It's like, well, superficially it was money, know, selling business means money and money means more vacation time, which means more time with my family. And then turns out I like when I'm with my family. So, you know, foolproof plan. And then you get to it and yet, you know, you hit the net worth that you're shooting for it ever. And then you're like, my gosh, that was the wrong goal. If the goal was really just to be with my family.

Marni Battista (06:07.105) Right.

Marni Battista (06:12.578) Yeah.

Bennett Maxwell (06:34.98) I could do that every freaking day. like identifying the right goal, my view on that is if your goal isn't an emotion, it's not all the way. I mean, it's not the end goal and this is why. No matter what goal we set, it's all, in my opinion, you want to feel a certain way. So figure out the feeling that you want to achieve. That's the goal. Then you set your sub goals, but like your main goal if it's I wanna be a millionaire or whatever, it's like.

Marni Battista (06:38.253) Yeah. Yeah.

Bennett Maxwell (07:04.282) but how do you wanna feel? And if it's not attached to your feeling, I think it's again, where like at times you spend your whole life or weeks or months, whatever, but you're working so hard and you're going in the wrong direction. You're going to something that you think is gonna achieve this goal that you haven't even really defined on the emotional status and then you hit it then it doesn't. anyways, I would love to know, like give me some examples of you or people that you've worked with, like what are the superficial or the fake or the smoke screen goals? That's a sales term.

Marni Battista (07:24.717) That's it.

Bennett Maxwell (07:33.764) versus like when you're uncovering what they really want, what that translates to to the real goal after they've had some work with you.

Marni Battista (07:41.667) Well, I think it's really an interesting thing. So whether it's money or title, right, there's some illusion of sort of like a freedom that you're going to have. And when you get that freedom, then you're going to start living your life, right? Then you're going to be happy. I think it's ironic that in our culture, at least in America, that there's like either a number or like a financial number in the bank or like a retirement age number, right?

And so like the whole like, like mythology of that is like, you know, I life my life and I do these things. And then when this thing happens, then I'll finally do the life that I want. And then, you know, I'll be happy. Well, my mom died at 64. I was 55 when I had this whole thing. And I was like, if I had nine more years to life, literally if I knew, do I want to spend it like looking at pictures of my kids who are now grown up waiting for them to come back and visit me?

working a million hours fighting with my husband all the time. Not so much, right? And so I think that most people have an idea that freedom is attached to a number and it's an age or it's an income goal. And that when you start to understand that life is precious and that you can have what you want, you can have joy in that emotional state,

without having to blow up your life, because nobody wants to do that, that there's an actual way to figure out what would bring you more joy, more fun, more freedom, without blowing up your life, then you're like, why wouldn't I take that path? And that's really what I'm helping my clients do. And they're like, crap, this is amazing. Like, I have freedom, and I didn't have to wait.

Bennett Maxwell (09:29.424) People are always, you know, how do I scale my business? How do you do franchising, this and that? And I'm just like, why do you want to do it? Well, you know, I could, the people that have thought about it a little bit more, this is usually the conversation. like, well, if I build a big business, that means more money. And with more money, I could impact more people. And I'm like, but why do you feel like you need to impact more people? Like what's lacking in you that makes you feel like impacting more people is going to fulfill that. And then it's like, I don't know. And I'm like, yeah, I've seen a lot of therapists.

Marni Battista (09:57.507) Right, well, no, but it's really true. In fact, I was just talking to a publicist about my book that's coming out in February, 2025, and she was like, why do you care? And I was like, well, I have a mission to help people, and I want people to have this freedom, and I don't want them to have to wait. And because helping...

Bennett Maxwell (09:58.232) I'm using their techniques on you.

Marni Battista (10:22.061) Helping people understand that they're living a backup life and they don't even realize it half the time is, it's just like my gift. So not only is there an emotional state, I think, with getting out of the should life, but you're getting to express your unique soul, your gift. There's only one Bennett, one Marnie, right? And we're here to do something.

And if we can organize our life so that in all the areas of our life, we're just expressing the crap out of ourselves and everything we do, that's gonna feel resonant. We're gonna have joy, we're gonna have peace, we're gonna have fun. We're gonna have all of those things that people wait till they're old or they have a crisis, you know, to like start living their life like it matters.

Bennett Maxwell (11:09.264) I love that. I want to get into the should life first and to find that. And then you mentioned a little bit about religion. In my view, maybe I'm a little too cynical on religion, but I view a lot of the should life is, I mean it's just a siding culture. And part of that, at least for me growing up in Utah, very religious growing up, I served like a two year Mormon mission in Mexico. You know, they just ship you off and they say, learn Spanish, come home in two years.

Anyways, love to dive into that, after, can we just define a little bit more, what is the should life? And talk to me about that.

Marni Battista (11:39.32) Yeah.

Marni Battista (11:43.521) Yeah, so the should life is the life that was designed by the rules of the world that you have created. So let me elaborate. Now, I have talked to a lot of podcast hosts that are men and women. So this is also a quiz, a gender quiz. So what is your favorite fantasy, like movie or series, like Marvel movies? Like what's your, like maybe that's fiction. What's your thing?

Bennett Maxwell (12:08.42) I love Marvel. I haven't seen Lord of the Rings forever, but I love those ones as well. I also don't watch a ton of TV, but those are two really good ones. Yeah.

Marni Battista (12:17.485) Those are your friends. Okay. The reason why I ask, when I ask women, for all the females that are listening, most everyone says Bridgerton right now, by the way. So if that's your thing.

Bennett Maxwell (12:27.6) I know the gossip, I haven't seen it, but my wife's always watching it, and if I just get a clip, like, what, who's she talking about? Who's the, Mrs. Whistletail, whatever.

Marni Battista (12:35.273) Yeah, exactly. Okay. So, but the thing is we watch these shows where we read these novels and pretty quickly, if it's well done, we believe there are rules in this world, right? There are rules. I mean, there's the blip. I mean, we just believe it, right? Because everything depends on the blip in Marvel movies. And so what happens is that as humans, we have the rules of our own world.

and they were given to us and they were reinforced and then they were created by all the experiences that we have. And so the should life is the world that you life in, your world of one, where there is a set of rules, there's a set of characters, there's what you can do, what you can't do. And you wake up and you're like, wait, like this is an illusion that has been created by a set of beliefs. And we come to a point in our life and we're like, what would it look like if I start to

question every single thing and ask ourselves why is this true? Like we were talking about before, like who's they? Said that you should do that, right? And that's the should life.

Bennett Maxwell (13:45.25) So it's one you have to recognize that that's the should life. And to break free, it's questioning the heck out of everything. And I like the word that you use, I listen to a guy a lot right now. He's passed away for many years. His name's Alan Watts. He was popular in like the 60s and 70s. Sounds like you've heard of him. And he, like right now I'm in a book of his and talk again, the illusion of the self. And you're like, what does that even mean? What do you mean the self doesn't exist? How do you even gonna claim that?

Marni Battista (14:02.423) Yeah, yeah.

Bennett Maxwell (14:13.71) And then the way he explains it, and I'm like, my gosh, you are really good at it. There's another neuroscientist and he has a meditation app named Sam Harris. And I follow him as well. And I've heard it from him too, the illusion, but it never clicked. And then I listened to that Alan Watts and him explain like, your consciousness or your ego is just what you're aware of because that's all it can be, right? And how much of you that you think is you, are you aware of? Do you know how your hand moves?

Marni Battista (14:21.441) Yes.

Bennett Maxwell (14:40.346) Do know how your heart beats? You know nothing about yourself. You have a very limited amount of experiences based on a very limited amount of sensories that you have in your body. And then you're building up like, what is you? But when in fact, you know nothing about yourself. Anyways, and on that first time I'm like, okay, maybe I'm starting to understand why the self is always in there.

Marni Battista (15:00.395) Yeah, I love that. So my metaphor is a shopping cart. We've all been to Costco. You know how you go to Costco, you got the thing, and you just start pulling stuff off the shelves. Exactly. So through life, we have this giant shopping cart, and we start pulling things in that are our identity, right? That are like ego, like a nice car.

Bennett Maxwell (15:11.152) was there two days ago, $760 later, I was out. I didn't even have anything to go there for. I'm like.

Marni Battista (15:26.945) the number in your investment portfolio, a handsome partner or beautiful partner, right? And so then we're like, well, this is me. And we think we are the shopping cart, but we are not the shopping cart. We are just pushing it.

Bennett Maxwell (15:42.416) I love that. That's a really good analogy. And I'm still trying to figure out the difference between

I don't get into that. Maybe I will later and get your advice on it. your thoughts are a stream and the river and you aren't your thoughts because you're just watching them. But it's like, well, there's nothing else actually watching them. There's not a river of thoughts and somebody standing by and perceiving them. There's just the river and you're floating in it. Anyways, I don't even know. Back to...

Marni Battista (15:52.993) We'll about it later, yeah.

Marni Battista (16:11.299) That's so deep and I love it. It's all part of the should life.

Bennett Maxwell (16:15.76) It's all this should life, I'm just questioning everything. I'm maybe I'm questioning a little too much. Okay, so I wanted to bring in a little bit on the, for my experience, and I know in Utah it's a very religious culture, the Mormon or LDS culture, and it is, there's exactly what you should do and what you shouldn't do. Like, you should not drink coffee. I never had to question if I was supposed to drink coffee growing up for myself or tea. Like, it was just no, you know, because God said no. But there's a lot of that should life.

And then it gets you in the habit of just like, I'm part of the religion that is the one and only true church. They do have all the right answers. So as long as I just trust, then I don't have to figure out any of my own shit. So my question packed in all of that is how does religion play in the should life, either for or against it?

Marni Battista (17:00.246) Yeah.

Marni Battista (17:05.773) Wow, that's such an interesting question. I I think that religion is an interesting topic and highly, what's right word, binary, right? Because it's like, this is good or this is bad. I think that what is the most important piece is to find a spiritual connection to something that is divine, whether it's outside of you, inside of you.

talk in my book about creating a stillness practice. And I think that stillness practice is really important. For some people, they're gonna say, I wanna talk to God as they define the universe, source, whatever. For some people, it is connecting to nature, right? But the bottom line is that my belief is that there is something bigger that is created us, but is that our uniqueness inside of us and that

Bennett Maxwell (18:01.498) Dad, let me, let.

Marni Battista (18:02.027) We get to express it.

Bennett Maxwell (18:04.91) And I didn't ask my question as effectively as I could have. Although I love all of that. How does it play a role in like in the should life? Like is religion good or bad for the should life? Not in general or your religious beliefs or whatever, but just like in general, is that something that we should be doing as a society? like, here's a religion because religion is a, you know, a set of shoulds and shouldn'ts, but same with society, same with government, same with everything, right?

Marni Battista (18:08.418) Alright.

Marni Battista (18:14.733) Yeah, well -

Marni Battista (18:31.715) Well, that's what I was going to say. So here's the thing. I think there is no good or bad. I think that what we need to do is for ourselves as individuals is to literally question every assumption and really figure out what is the essence that resonates. I have a client who grew up in Russia, and I'll never forget the conversation we had where she said, I remember the moment I was 10 years old. Up until 10, I believed I was lucky to life in Russia because I didn't have to make any decisions. Right?

And then something came in and it shifted everything for her. And she was like, wait a minute, why is that the truth? And so I think that the most important thing is to understand that you have all these beliefs that were given to you by society, culture, parents, legacy, ancestors, whatever it is, social media.

And you just go, is this really right for me or is it not? For some people, yeah, religion is gonna be like awesome. For other people, it's not gonna fit or they're gonna wanna adjust it or find a way to express that in their own way.

Bennett Maxwell (19:36.144) Love it, love it. You mentioned the no good and bad, which is, I feel like I'm crazy, because I always say that. When my kids are always like good and bad, and I label things good as bad as well, but when I think about it, what I'm meaning when I label something good and bad is generally better for you slash society, or generally worse, but not in the, when I say I don't believe in good or bad, I don't believe in good and evil. I don't believe like,

Anyways, I don't need to jump into it. Is that more, talk to me more about that, like there is no good and bad. I just view people like, Hitler was a sick person with bad, with terrible genetics that got dopamine from having power and killing people. Thank God I don't get that. Thank God. He was unlucky in that sense and I think I'm a little bit luckier, but I don't know if he had a terrible soul. I don't know. Anyways, love to hear your input on that.

Marni Battista (20:32.237) So I think that we grew up in our culture being evaluated and judged in certain categories, or all categories is good or bad. And that when we're good, we get a cookie, a metaphorical cookie, right? And that means we're good. So we get a good grade, you get a home run, you get a great at bat, whatever it is, right? And so you start to...

Organize our our minds are meaning making machines, right? And so they want to organize things in a way that feels good So that category right which is very performance oriented Becomes a metric right because we learn that if I do something good I get a reward Dopamine a promotion my parents pat me on the head. Whatever it is if I do something bad Most people start to learn then

I am bad, right? Or I've done something bad. And so what we want to do is we want to like disconnect those things, right? We want to, in my opinion, create a value on the journey and the effort and the experience itself so that we stop measuring and judging because judgment of self and others is what takes us out of joy and dumps us right back in the should life because

Our shoulds are like, okay, our brain is going, well, that's a cookie, that's not.

Bennett Maxwell (22:08.016) think the every most, I don't know, issues, like mentally speaking, if you're not feeling the emotions that you're wanting to feel, come down to security, kind of like the Maslow's hierarchy, like right at the bottom. And your brain for security, it seeks familiarity. So even if that familiarity is a shitty, for me, I feel like my brain has been addicted to just chaos. I grew up in, you know, one of

Marni Battista (22:19.501) Yeah. Yep.

Bennett Maxwell (22:37.016) Nine kids with a single mom, it's chaos. then I'm like, everything that I'm doing, I just feel like there's always chaos. And then somebody explained that, like, maybe that's what's comfortable for you. Even though you don't like it, at least it's familiar and that means safety. So I think it all comes back to that. I don't know. You mentioned focusing on effort. You mentioned a few other things, but effort stood out to me. I have three young kids, seven, five, and three. I follow all the Instagram parent stuff.

Marni Battista (23:05.708) Okay?

Bennett Maxwell (23:06.882) And one of them was saying there's a study that they had a bunch of kids, they did a test, and half the group, they praised them for being smart, and half the group, praised them for trying hard. And then they had another test, and then the second test was way harder. The group that was praised for being smart realized that they couldn't solve this problem, so that means they're not smart. And then they got worse scores versus the people that were...

motivated or can't even think of the word right there. They were, I'm gonna have edit all that out. I'm just awarded, what do you say? No, no, no, I'm gonna tell you what I'm trying to explain, because this is embarrassing. Recognition, if they're recognized, okay, back up. Now I can start over. So the second group, if they were recognized for effort, then they focused on effort when they addressed those

Marni Battista (23:43.447) They were rewarded? Were they rewarded for something?

Marni Battista (23:51.531) Okay, no, it's fine.

Marni Battista (23:56.289) Yes, okay.

Bennett Maxwell (24:04.154) harder problems and they didn't get down on themselves and overall their scores went up quite a bit. Talk to me about why you said effort and if it has anything to do with what I just mentioned.

Marni Battista (24:13.539) Well, I think, so I have three kids who are 29, 26 and 22. So I see how this all pans out. And so what I, and what I noticed is that.

Because our society doesn't reward effort, which showed in your study that it creates intrinsic motivation, which is something that creates empowerment, right? And that is the one thing that we can control. Then we constantly feel like we're not good enough, right? And so what happens, and there's an interesting book that was written for young girls, and it was called Brave Not.

perfect. And in her book, she posits that, especially for women, because they want to be perfect and get the cookie, right, and get the good grade or get the promotion, and I think this is true for men and women, but in her case it was women specifically, they didn't try things that were hard, right? Because if I'm not going to be great at it,

then I'm not gonna do it, right? Because it's hard, it doesn't feel good, what will people think? And so can you see how that creates the should life, right? Because if someone told you, you you're good at math when you're seven and you're like, cool, I'm just gonna keep doing math. And then you struggle in PE, you're gonna be like, I'm bad at PE, I'm not athletic, I'm not capable, I'm good at math, I'm just gonna stick to doing math.

and I'm gonna stop doing a whole set of things. And people don't learn how to be courageous, they don't learn how to be imperfect, and they don't reward themselves for that effort. And that's the journey of life. So ultimately the universe is gonna make you learn the lesson, you know, at some point.

Bennett Maxwell (26:14.98) that a ton. Universe is going to make you. Yes, you will learn them one way or another. It's just how stubborn you want to be probably. In the should life, we talked a little bit about like steps on how to break through. just briefly mentioned questions. I would love to dive into that. Like what are the types of questions that we should be asking ourselves to recognize that we're in the should life and then any other tips or steps in order to either recognize it and or get out of it.

Marni Battista (26:19.881) Exactly. Exactly.

Marni Battista (26:42.699) Yeah. So, so when you think about the old way, I'll just call it the old way, where you and I were talking about having reached the success financially or externally, and then not feeling joy, fulfilled freedom, not spending time with people you want. You, most people ask these questions, the how questions, like they're coming to you, right? Like, how do you, how do I scale my business? How do I sell in an online store? How, how, how?

So one of the most important things in debunking the should life is one of these questions and it says, were you you? Like, are you being your core of who you are in your life? And this is important because I would like people to start focusing less on the how while it's important, but more on who do I have to become?

Right? Who am I to get the relationship, to be a CEO, to be a better leader, to be abundant, to be, have a great marriage, right? Because the skills and the tactics and the strategies are super important. But if who you're being as a person isn't an expression of you at your highest self and you're operating out of jealousy, judgment, fear, lack, right? The strategies kind of don't work long -term.

So one of the greatest questions you can start asking, I call it like a wisdom seeking question, is like, know, who do I need to be? How do I need to show up more as myself so that I can actually do these things that I want? Because most of us have a shit ton of like, you know, limitations and limiting beliefs and things that are in our way that are keeping us from really living a life of authenticity.

Bennett Maxwell (28:28.74) Yes, I love that. You mentioned something, operating a fear, that's what resonates with me. I'm like, I'm doing everything to make sure I don't lose something that I've already had or, you know, like anyways. And again, before it was like, if I just have enough money, that'll go away, which I didn't even recognize that was. So I'm kind of back to one of the first things that you brought up, which is actually knowing what your problems are. I forgot how you phrased it, but making sure that you're on the right target.

Marni Battista (28:39.68) Attachment, yeah.

Marni Battista (28:57.323) Yeah, yeah, So this is a great thing. So when I talk to people, and this happened in my own life, right? So in my journey, it's funny, I had an article that was in the LA Times. I wrote like an essay, bless my husband, he lets me write about him. And basically in this essay, I was like, I want my husband to change. I think my problem is that my husband's not working, right? Like we had an agreement, he helped me raise my kids and now my kids are grown and like, if he would only change, then we'd be happy, right?

I have clients who are like, if only my boss would stop filling my calendar with a bunch of crappy meetings. If only my parents, my elderly parents would blah, blah, blah. If only my kids would, right? And so what happens is that we get completely derailed by these things rather than stepping into what is it that I can do.

that will allow me to start to do what I need to do to do now, right, by that being part. And so it's really, really important that you discover what I call what is the essential problem, right? For me, the problem was I was just terrified of change. So I just was blaming my husband. It was so much easier, right? Or blaming anything, any other situation. It's not your boss's fault.

per se, it's not your spouses or your kids. And so what we need to do is there's usually a deeper problem that's internal. The good news is when you figure out the accessional problem, it's typically a you problem, which means that you can actually solve it rather than trying to put all your energy in to get other people to change.

Bennett Maxwell (30:42.96) love the, okay, so that was the verbiage you used that what is the essential problem? That's what I was trying to get at earlier. I do think that, man, what 99, at least 99 % of people, we haven't figured that out yet. It's again, it's still, well, I need money. Money's going to solve it. But it's like, no, what's the essential problem? What are some typical examples of like, again, diving into maybe some of your clients, obviously not with sharing any names, but.

most common in women, what are the typical essential problems that they weren't aware about?

Marni Battista (31:17.421) Yeah, so I have a client who is a PhD, like super high level executive. She came to me and she was like, know, Thelma, this is typical, Thelma and Louise, like I wanna get in my car and like drive off a cliff and like never go back to work again. Like my work is the problem, you know? What we realized was that the essential problem was that she didn't believe that she mattered.

So she didn't set boundaries. She didn't ask for what she wanted at work. She thought that she was constantly on the chopping block. In fact, we just had a conversation and she was like, I can still be the number one employee and also have a life and put my needs first. right. And so, nothing changed. Like.

Bennett Maxwell (32:05.989) yet.

Marni Battista (32:11.437) Her boss didn't change, her company didn't change, nothing changed. She realized that she mattered and she started showing up differently in her work and everything shifted, right? I had another client, same thing. She thought that her calendar was the problem and that people that worked for her kind of sucked. They were kind of lame, so she had to do it all, right? A lot of my clients are very excited to show me their calendar.

to show me how it's all blocked out and there's no time to do anything else. So for her, the essential problem was that she felt like she had to do everything herself. She couldn't delegate. So the essential problem, she was kind of a control freak. Once she started, yeah.

Bennett Maxwell (32:53.85) self worth attaching to that because I feel like that for entrepreneurship, that's a lot. It's like, if I'm not busting my ass, then I'm not valuable. And you're like, how do you get rid of that?

Marni Battista (33:05.011) Yeah, well, so what's interesting is when she started to do this work with me, she went to her boss and she had a conversation and her boss was like, yeah, honestly, like you have a leadership problem, you know, like you need to delegate your team, you know, like, yeah. So in the end, which was crazy was when she started doing this, guess what happened? There was no budget, but suddenly she started getting more team. Suddenly everyone on her team started having better output and better productivity.

Bennett Maxwell (33:20.547) Trust.

Marni Battista (33:34.687) everything in her life changed. And then she ended up figuring out a way to retire early with a great package and it's gonna move to Portugal, right? But it all started from taking responsibility and asking like, you know what, this is a me thing. If you ask that question, this is a really powerful one, write it down. What is this challenge here to teach me?

It's a universe lesson, right? And when we get out of blame, I call it like rage, blame, too tired and too exhausted to deal with it pattern, because that's the pattern that people get in and start saying, what is this constant repeating challenge here to show me or teach me? Then you are now empowered to take responsibility and start asking better questions and change the one thing that you can, which is yourself.

Bennett Maxwell (34:02.746) Yeah.

Bennett Maxwell (34:27.938) It's completely perspective. Pain is only pain if you think it should be hurting. Like if it's pain at the gym, you're fine with it. If it's pain in an ice bath, you're fine with it. And I love that because it just helps you, okay, well, what am I going to learn? Who am I becoming is another thing that you've mentioned. And it all, and you said it all starts with, you know, it all started with her taking ownership and maybe it did, or maybe it started by with her hiring and seeking help and then you walking her through how to take ownership.

Marni Battista (34:54.347) Well, but here's the thing, here's the thing. I'm glad you said that because for every person who realizes something, they don't ask for help or get support. And there's a great coach, she's an OG Mary Morrissey, and she says, awareness without action is entertainment. And so you can like, aha, the hell out of yourself and underline your books and listen to all your podcasts.

But if you don't actually say like, what am I gonna do about it? Then you're just like helping me and Bennett get downloads. And we love that. But what we really want is for you to like take action and get some help to see what you can't see.

Bennett Maxwell (35:35.066) favorite quote so far is underlining the book. I look what I'm doing. It's going to make a difference. You're like, but what are you doing? and, a lot of it, at least for me, tell me if you relate to this, I'm, I'm always way better at giving advice, right? Because I like, I know what to do in a lot of senses, but then when it comes to actually doing it, there's a million distractions and recognizing that in myself is then easier for me to go ask for help with a business coach or advisors or a mental health therapist.

Marni Battista (35:37.868) Yeah

Marni Battista (35:49.026) Yeah.

Bennett Maxwell (36:04.912) It's like, me manage this because I know that even if I think I know it, one, and then there's the whole accountability thing. So I was very hesitant to hire the first business coach that I did because I was like, well, I've already started a business. I've sold it. This one's doing well. Why would I pay? If my business started bigger than his, why would I spend that money? But it's not about that. It's not about that. It's just about, I can only see what's, I'm limited.

Marni Battista (36:05.153) Yeah.

Bennett Maxwell (36:29.968) to focus on whatever thoughts are in my head at that time. And there's only so many things you could think about. So getting help, I'm just a very big proponent of go get help and go get help where it matters. And where it matters is achieving how you want to feel and getting a coach or a therapist or somebody more focusing on that. Like the business side's great. You need to get a big business. But as we've already talked about and you've probably, know, everybody's already heard, it's not gonna get you where you wanna go.

Marni Battista (36:58.177) Well, no, I mean, I think that it's really interesting. I think about like asking for help and vulnerability in the same category, you know, like why do you think Ted talks or, know, or if you watch someone really share something vulnerable, like it goes viral, right? Because someone's being real and we admire that, right? We admire people's courage and strength. I mean, we just got done, you know, with the time we're recording this watching the Olympics for two weeks, right?

We were like, my God, look at all these people are overcoming. That's amazing. Right. and we admire it. And then we get into a space ourselves and we think, well, I'm different. You know, and I want everyone who's listening to understand, like you have that capability and capacity inside of you. All those people had a great coach, right? All of those people took a risk and allowed themselves to be seen. And so.

Why, you know, there's that why not you, why not now, right? And I believe that. And so for those things that you admire, you dream of, like you have an opportunity to do that risky thing, to be vulnerable, to take the list, to ask for help. And magic happens when you do that.

Bennett Maxwell (38:17.872) And how much easier would it be if you weren't focused on am I winning or am I losing and rather than am I putting in as much effort and am I focused on what is this challenge going to teach me even if the challenge is I don't even make it or I lose or I make a fool of myself and it's prepping yourself I think you know all way before leading up to that that makes the difference and that's everything that you're talking about and sharing with your clients and I freaking love that you're doing that.

Marni Battista (38:47.927) Yeah, well, you know, I think the thing is like, I had this business that had a trajectory and then everything started to get stuck, right? And so there was like a big waste of energy and time where I was like, what's wrong with me? What's the right answer? What's the right answer? What's the right answer? You know? And I was just thinking about this yesterday because yesterday, like I had a really light schedule and this morning I was thinking,

I woke up and I was reading my book and I, you know, excited about doing this podcast. And I was thinking like the universe was acting for me, right? Like I didn't fail, so to speak. What happened was that I got realigned to the life that I really want to have. And now in retrospect, like four years later, I can look back and I go, dang, I don't want to be 60 with a team of like 25 people.

That's like not the life that I want to life. So when things are challenging and if they're not going the way you want, there's a tendency to force and push. And I would say like, if you could surrender to the goal and ask, is this a goal I should have? And you start going, is this really for me? Is this something that I really want? Just like ease the pressure and then start asking those better questions. That challenge or that failure or that thing didn't work right actually might be like.

directing you on the right path.

Bennett Maxwell (40:17.232) Sex in the City, I just watched the episode that Charlotte, she's like, no, it's not, everything's good. You know, same thing, just there's perspective. Because if I had to get married and then divorce, then I wouldn't have now been engaged to Harry, you know? And it's just like, it's just, it's just perspective, right? And I love that you're sharing that. So I appreciate all your time. I told you you going 30 minutes. I went over because you're freaking awesome. And we will include all of your links on to connect with you, but can you, any,

Marni Battista (40:18.593) Yes.

Marni Battista (40:30.091) Love, Harry.

Marni Battista (40:39.87) thanks.

Bennett Maxwell (40:46.618) That's not even the right question. I don't know why I'm saying that. There was something that I read on the, there's, have a book coming out. Okay. That's what I'm asking about. Okay. So I'll rewind. I will include all of the links to your social media website and all of that. But before we hop off, last thing, can you tell me right before you have to go about your book?

Marni Battista (40:49.271) I love that you could just edit, it's so good.

Marni Battista (40:54.625) I do have a book coming out.

Marni Battista (41:07.715) Yeah, so I have a book coming out in February 2025 published by Hay House called Your Radical Living Challenge, Seven Questions for a Meaningful Life. And what I have ready right now is actually a quiz to decode your destiny. What is your personality type to actually achieve the kind of success that actually will fill your heart with joy, peace, and fun?

So how far are you away from it? So definitely take the quiz. I've had fun having people take it and being like, this is me. Decodeyourdestiny .org.

Bennett Maxwell (41:41.712) Where do we find the quiz?

Okay, okay, awesome. Marina, I appreciate it. Thank you. my God.

Marni Battista (41:50.273) Marnie, wait, it's Marnie. That's okay.