#179 When Standing Out is Your Superpower with Dr. Manuela Powell

Hey, this is Melissa Parsons, and you are listening to the Your Favorite You Podcast. I'm a certified life coach with an advanced certification in deep dive coaching. The purpose of this podcast is to help brilliant women like you with beautiful brains create the life you've been dreaming of with intentions. My goal is to help you find your favorite version of you by teaching you how to treat yourself as your own best friend.

If this sounds incredible to you and you want practical tips on changing up how you treat yourself, then you're in the right place. Just so you know, I'm a huge fan of using all of the words available to me in the English language, so please proceed with caution if young ears are around.

Melissa Parsons

Hello everyone and welcome back to Your Favorite You. I am very excited today because we have one of my friends and colleagues and I'm just going to go ahead and call her a fellow badass because we all know that I think that I am a badass, but I want to welcome Manuela Powell to Your Favorite You.

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Manuela Powell

Thank you so much! Oh, it's lovely to chat with you.

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Melissa Parsons

Yeah, for sure. So every guest that I have on, I always ask to tell our listeners about your favorite version of you, Manuela, as a way of introduction.

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Manuela Powell

Um, my favorite version of me is, I guess the answer is like the current one always, because I feel like I'm never stuck in a chapter. I'm always changing and evolving. And I think I've lived several lifetimes from cancer surgeon to life coach to business builder passing by mom, sister, friend, lover, all of that. And, and every version of me is really about evolving into something more authentic, more expensive. So, so my favorite version of me is the one that knows that there's always another layer to uncover and always doing the work to get there.

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Melissa Parsons

Mmm. That's so juicy. I love it. I love it. Okay. So now I really want you to brag on yourself, like no need to be even the least bit humble. Tell us all about some of the badass things that you've done in your life. Oh my God.

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Manuela Powell

How long do you have because there's been a lot.

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Melissa Parsons

Listen, I'm here for it. And it's going to lead me to my next question too. Okay.

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Manuela Powell

Yeah, I think I mean honestly I do feel like a massive badass because there's so many stories that I can tell that is like people are like what you did what so first of all, I never thought about being a doctor until I was in business school and then I was like I dreamt about being a doctor for two weeks and I was like, yeah that's what I’m supposed to do. And I left and I did that and so that was one and then you know became a cancer surgeon which I don't know. There's a lot of uncover that it feels like I needed to prove something because I was like Let me find the hardest thing. Let me do that. So I did that, I was a firefighter for a while, which was awesome. I worked at the search and rescue. Yeah, I know I worked in the search and rescue battalion in Rio. So I used to like rappel down cliffs and it was I mean the number of stories just from that part of my life was amazing and then I decided to move. I'm Brazilian, I did most of my training and I started as an attending in Brazil and then five years into that I decided that I needed to move to the US and just like I'm just gonna go and in 40 days I got rid of everything I had got two suitcases and moved to do just step one and see what the hell was going on. When I did that and at the same time when that happened, I was 35. So then I moved and started doing all that, my dad got sick it turned out to be a class tumor because obviously a son of a cancer surgeon needed to have the most insane thing. And I brought him to Johns Hopkins I was living in DC at the time and he did his training there so I stopped working for a year to take care of him and you know and then did all the USM alleys and all that stuff decided to be a doctor here in the US went into training. So Sloan care again, right because I had already residency and fellowship and back to fellowship at Sloan caring, which, best place to work in the planet and and then was like, well, you know what? I think I'm gonna- I want to be board certified. So I'm gonna go into resident general surgery residency again and everybody said you're crazy and they were absolutely right. That was stupid but it was also I don't have any what-ifs I was like, I absolutely will not do four more years of this. So I was very sure that my decision to not do that was good and I still stand by that. So I decided to go back to Brazil, but I was like, well, it should take a sabbatical first. And then I moved to the jungles in Hawaii to be in an intentional community. I worked there for I lived there for almost a year. Yeah, I went for a month and the day I got there like oh, I'm not leaving and just lived there for a year. It was amazing. Met my now ex-husband, but you know, he was 12 years younger than me. So that was insane also and then we don't end up getting married having kids we we then did a massive road trip around the US like 9,000 miles and moved back to Brazil had the kids there and then decided to move back here and when I decided to move back here like, okay I'm not gonna do the residency stuff like not birds board certified. So probably cannot do surgery also I want to see my kids which I saw many of my surgeon friends not being able to do so so then I decided to quit at 45 to quit medicine and do something else and I then became a life coach and that is the thing that a lot of people are like, wow you let like, how dare you do that? Training and all this stuff. Like what'd you do with your training? I'm like, I did the thing I was a cancer surgeon for 20 years. I did more than 3,000 surgeries. I did the thing. It doesn't mean- just because it ended it doesn't mean that it didn't work out or whatever. I loved doing it. Yeah, but people get really- I remember this right when I left I was already here in Austin and I was doing improv at the time and one of my improv colleagues I said, you know that I had left in medicine, he was a lawyer, and he's like wait a second. What can you leave? And I was like, dude is not in a Hotel California. And I think I stirred something in his brain that is like, oh, wait a second. I'm not stuck to this thing I can actually do other things.

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Melissa Parsons

That's great. You know, there's a lot of us don'tget that message, especially after all the years of training, all the years of practice.

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Manuela Powell

I forgot one thing that was very badass and very brave and very crazy also that I don't know if I recommend or not, but I did have kids in my forties. I have kids of 42 and 44 and that's my second one had the audacity to be almost 10 pounds and I was like, dude, I'm 44 years old, what are you doing?

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Melissa Parsons

That's amazing. That's amazing. So, I mean, I didn't know half of that. I mean, I knew maybe a third of that. You know, I knew that you were a breast cancer surgeon and just being a surgeon alone, I knew that you had kids for the first time in your early to mid 40s. I also know you didn't mention this, but you're an amazing dancer and that you compete with all of your dancing skills. And what I think about you when I think of you is that you've done so many things in your life to stand out, to separate yourself from the ordinary.

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Manuela Powell

Oh, interesting way to look at it because, you know, I, I don't know. I think when I was young, all that I wanted was to be like everybody else. Right. I was like, and I was always different. I was never, you know, like in school, everybody, yay, sports and boys and blah, blah, blah. And I was like, books, you know, I was always like, Oh, everybody likes this. Okay. I'm not, I don't like, I always had that rebellious thing. And definitely that's some childhood trauma of some sports, but I was like, I don't want to do it with everybody that, but legitimately I did not like those. Like, I don't like action movies and blockbusters. I really don't like them. It's not because, you know, everybody likes them. It's just like, it's just not my thing. So I think it was always, I think I was always different. And the moment I said, okay, cool, that's who I am. So I might as well just keep doing it because I can't fit in. So might as well do whatever I want then, you know, so that took a while to get. And I think it was in Hawaii, I was 40 when I moved there, you know, and obviously at that age, kind of like already makes you think about your life and all, you know, all that and being completely separate from civilization in general. Cause I was really in the jungle in Puna, the south, southeast of the big Island. And there was no cell phone service. There was very minimal wifi. So it was like to talk to people in Brazil, like to my family was like an eight-hour difference, so it basically never happened. So I really had to figure out who am I besides, because in my mind it was like, if you take surgeon away, it was like, there's nothing left because that's all I am. And at that time was when I realized that, like, no, that's something I do, but I'm actually a person. I didn't mean to leave at that time. I didn't know it was going to leave. Um, but it was because of that, that I was able to really shift that identity and, and, and not, you know, well, I will absolutely die if I don't do this anymore, which I think a lot of doctors have that.

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Melissa Parsons

Yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah. It becomes such a huge part of our identity that if we don't have that, the question is like, okay, who am I without this? Am I allowed to have other dreams for my life? It sounds to me like you kind of already knew that because you were in business school and then you decided to literally have the dream of becoming a doctor for a couple of weeks and then decided to do that. So yeah, it's so, it's so interesting because I mean, I know that you've shared with me that, you know, you've struggled over life to feel like you belong, to feel like you fit in and that type of thing. So I'm curious if you can tell the difference or I guess in your experience, what's the difference between fitting in and having a sense of belonging?

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Manuela Powell

I think fitting in, and Brene Brown says that fitting in and belonging are the exact opposites. The opposite of belonging is actually trying to fit in, right? Because what you want to do is just like, I just want to do whatever to, for these people to like me or for me to be part of whatever this group. And I think the first time I felt like I'm where I'm supposed to be and I belong, I have that feeling was in Hawaii, I felt like I was accepted for who I was. Nobody gave a crap about me being a surgeon. I mean, obviously I was the jungle doctor. You know, they came with me with, with the things, but like it was whatever, right? It was not, I actually did the trash collection, garbage collector. And at the time I used to joke, it was like, I'm the only surgeon garbage collector in the entire country, I'm sure. Cause I used to actually get the trash and do the, you know, trash service. And people were like, why are they doing this? Right. And it was so fun. It was me and this other guy and we had so much fun. We'd put music on the van and we're just like, blah, like you're just grabbing all this and it was gross. There's maggots everywhere and like all that stuff, but like, and we have to separate the recycling and the compost and all that. And it was fun, you know, and people were like, Oh, that's the grossest job. I'm like, I'll take it. I'm good with gross.

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Melissa Parsons

Exactly. Any surgeon knows gross, yeah.

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Manuela Powell

So I think I felt like I started feeling like, oh, me being myself and just being like, I'm okay with those things and I'm just going to do whatever because really I didn't have any responsibility. I had money. I could, I didn't need money to live there, but I was like, I can do whatever I want. And because it's a place where people were in so much transition, you know, they went there to really find themselves and all that, you can really like explore that. And they had so many workshops and conversations and all that stuff, like just like really getting to the bottom, like, who are you really? And I think that was the moment that I was like, you know what? I think if it's just, it's so much easier to just be me and not try to be the thing that other people want me to be. So I think when I left there, I really had that sense of like, one of the things that I remember thinking is like, I had so much, you know, the way I was raised was a lot of like, oh, people's appearance is very important. I'm sure Brazilians care about that, but there was a lot of like judgment about people who didn't look like the standard of whatever, like even myself. I heard so much from my mom and my grandmothers. I know you can't eat. You're going to be fat and literally, oh, you're fat. You're too, because my mom is very skinny. And I look at the picture. I was never fat in my life. This is the heaviest I've been. And I'm not fat today. So obviously I haven't been fat. And I had this idea of like, oh, this is wrong. I shouldn't be fat. And I was like, I remember the day that I was talking about this yesterday. That's so funny. Cause I was, I tried so many diets and then one day it was like, you know what? Screw this. I'm just going to be fat. I hate this. I hate not eating what I want. And immediately I lost five pounds and I never like the rest. I eat whatever I want. I, and sure. I don't like eating a bunch of crap, but I never think the thought of, oh, I shouldn't eat this because calories has not crossed my mind in 30 years. So I, yeah, I know I am exactly. I am like, and I know this has some genetics. And I remember thinking that about my friend who could eat everything. And then I was like, Oh, apparently I can too. Is I don't know if calories without guilt do not count. But what I know is that's, that's what happened. And you know, so like there's all these things like, Oh, it's so much easier to just like, just do the thing that brings you pleasure because that's all right. There's already so many things that you have to do in life that don't.

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Melissa Parsons

Yeah. Oh yeah. So beautiful. That's awesome. That's awesome. I know you and I were at the Physician Coaching Summit in the fall. And, you know, I feel like for physicians who are coaches, you know, that is a place. And I mean, obviously we're putting ourselves in a room with other, mostly women, physicians who are coaches. So there's already kind of a sense of, oh, like these are my people. But can you describe there? Because I know there you had a huge sense.

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Manuela Powell

Yeah, for sure. And first of all, thanks to you, because you were the one who told me about it. Oh, you're so awesome. It's so true. I'll take all the kudos. And it was great, because I think, so I was a life coach for six years, and all my life coaching was geared towards, just be your freaking self, like stop, you know. Because I saw that in my office, because I was a breast surgeon, I saw these very young women who came like, there's no reason for you to have cancer now. And I always try to, you know, even before being a life coach, trying to connect the mental to the physical. And I saw these things, these women are people pleasing, and they have everything perfect on paper, but they hate their lives. They don't want to do these things that are perfect. And so I had that sense. And then so I became a life coach, all like about self-expression, and letting go of people pleasing, and being yourself, and boundaries, all that stuff. And then eventually I had this idea of this business for a doctor, because I did help a lot of people during my life coaching journey. People who are like, oh, actually, don't need to be this thing, and I can't actually do the other thing. So I was like, okay, now that we figured that out, let me help you actually start the entrepreneurship thing. Yeah, we can pivot. Yeah, and my mind was like, okay, doctors don't have time to create all the things, and all that, and so I'm gonna do that, and I'll just, you know, I'm gonna coach, and I'm gonna create all the tech, and all the things that they need to be entrepreneur. But at the back of my mind, I was like, ah, but I need, then I'm gonna be, need to be all serious, and all stuffy, and not say bad words, and not wear my sequins. And I was like, I hate all that, I don't wanna, so, you know, so I started kind of like showing up a little bit, but like, ah, I don't know. And then my first client, who signed up right away, she was like, oh no, I chose you because you're not those things. And I was like, oh, okay, that's cool to know. But then when I actually went to PCS, and I was like, oh my god, this is great, look at all those people who are so not stuffy, and serious, and boring, and want things to be like, oh, you know, you have to be serious. Because I worked with so many of those people, especially the women surgeons, honestly.Yeah, oh yeah. Not all for sure, but like, there were so many that were like, ah, you were a horrible person, why are you being so mean to everybody? And rude, and what I asked, I actually asked that to one of them, while I was an intern, she was, you know, I don't know, my PG-3, PG-53 or whatever. I was like, well, because that's how I was trained. I'm like, exactly, so you know how bad it is, why would you do that to other people? That's crazy. So when I saw that, you know, all these, I mean, we had that dance party, we were talking about all these amazing things, you know, that are not super stuffy, but you know, they are, quote, woo. But in my mind, the woo is just the stuff that the science hasn't caught up to yet, and we don't know what it is, because for a lot of those things, there is a lot of science. So I love to be in a place where, yes, we can talk about the science and the serious stuff, but not in a way that makes me want to go to sleep.

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Melissa Parsons

Right. Like every other medical conference that we've all been to.

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Manuela Powell

And I obviously had to present a lot when I was at songwriting and all that. And I was never serious. And I always, I would sit, you know, stand in front of literally the people who wrote all the books and all the papers about breast cancer, you know, and I would still make jokes and whatever. And I was like, you know what? Like, that's just how I roll and that was fine. So I don't know why I thought so much because, you know, I was like that, but the other people not necessarily. Literally. So I think I was like, no, I have to be, I have to be something. And that, that, you know, those days were really when I saw, oh no, there are, that is not true at all.

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Melissa Parsons

Yeah. Standing out is your superpower. Exactly.

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Manuela Powell

Right? Who knew? Yeah.

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Melissa Parsons

Me, I knew it about you.

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Manuela Powell

Right. And it's funny because I knew it about everything else, but I put doctors in this different compartment of like, no, I don't even, you know, when I became a coach, everybody, oh, you're going to coach doctors. Obviously. I'm like, absolutely not. I'm just not going to do that. But I think at the time was just like, I didn't want to be so involved in medicine when I wasn't part of it like I liked to be. So I think it was just like that defense of like, I just don't even want to hear about it. But then I started having doctor clients and helping them through things and, you know, but I really didn't connect to like, well, I have these people in my life that are good. But like, Oh no, these are the exceptions. Everybody else is very stuffy and I should be serious when I work with them.

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Melissa Parsons

That's amazing. That's amazing. So good. And man, do I wish that what you're offering now was available when I first started my coaching business back in 2020. I would have paid big buku bucks to have somebody like you in the corner.

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Manuela Powell

Cause like I just had a console yesterday and you know, I set my price and all that. And just it's, I set my price to the price that I would have thought at the time.I absolutely take my money immediately go away because I'm like, let's go. Right. Because my price now to do everything, to be your concierge, to have a high-touch support, to create all the tech, all the things, to coach you, to create custom video, this price is less than I almost paid someone to make a website for me. Before I did anything, which was dumb.

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Melissa Parsons

So I know that is not the smartest decision, but it seemed like it was necessary at the time.

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Manuela Powell

But, but it's funny cause then now, and obviously now when I talk to people, because I work with people who are not yet in the world, they are still in medicine. They're like, Oh, this is a lot of money. It is an investment. Obviously. Right. I'm like, Oh my God. Trust me when I tell you, you're going to spend so much more money, you know, doing things that you don't have to like paying $13,000 for a freaking website. You don't know right now. Right. So now it's like, you don't need a website right now. Let's do a one page thing and it's going to be super simple and it's going to be beautiful. And then you get clients and then you know exactly what you're doing and you refine your messaging and then you do a website, but we don't know. We want to start. No, I need an LLC and a business cards and what I was like new.

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Melissa Parsons

Yeah. Well, I mean, I think in their defense coming from their world, they think that they need that serious cachet to be able to, you know, so it makes sense and it's like so unnecessary.

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Manuela Powell

So I think the problem is that I feel myself now in my business is how to shake people like, no, let me help you, please. It's going to be so much better. And also it's going to be fun instead of you trying to do everything yourself and going to YouTube rabbit holes, like how do I do this thing instead of like, no, let me do it for you.

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Melissa Parsons

I think you do just that, Manuela.

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Manuela Powell

Oh, no, I do. I do. I tell them. I do tell them in the comments. I was like, trust me. This is going to cost you more. And it's also going to cost you time. I talked to this person yesterday. She's like, yeah, I've been trying to do this since 2019. And then when I set the price, which in her case was about $12,000 to create everything for six months, literally everything, website, brand, all that. And she was like, yeah, no, I think I'm going to try. And I was like, but didn't you just say you're doing it since 2019? I was like, yes, but I already invested in all these things. I'm like, aren't you doing the math in this thing? What's going on right now? Yeah, but you can only do so much, right? You can coach them a little bit and then they're like, yeah, I can't. I'm like, you know what? That's fair. And I had my share of bad program PTSD also. So I understand that you have. But what I say is like, you know, if you paid for a course or a program or coach that didn't deliver, well, in this case, I will deliver because they're actual deliverables. You know, if you're paid for a website and you don't have a website, well, then I need to do something, you know, you can't, I can't just walk away from you. You need an attorney in that situation. Yes, exactly. You can go to court and be like, hey, she didn't pay me the thing or do me the thing that I paid for. Right. So it's just like, you're going to have something very tangible to show for it. You know, so it's, it's, it's a very, I'm, I'm having fun with the, with this work, which I think is the important thing. You know, I love doing it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. So for the people who get over themselves, the whole like, no, I should be able to do this yourself. I'm like, you are because you're freaking badass. Of course you're able, but why? You can also churn your own butter and sew your own clothes. Are you doing that?

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Melissa Parsons

Oh my God, that's the best. You can also churn your own butter. You can wash your clothes by hand in the bucket with the washboard and the homemade line. Yeah, right.

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Manuela Powell

You're not doing that anyway.

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Melissa Parsons

You’re taking a shortcut of using the washing machine and the dryer and buying the carry gold butter. It's already been perfectly churned for you.

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Manuela Powell

Exactly. So, so that, I think that is a thing that in the mindset of us doctors and lawyers and people with letters after their names, right? It's just like, I should be able to do this. And what I say is like, you are, but you don't have to. You are. I promise you that you can do it. I did it. I'm not special. So like, obviously you did every, every one of us that didn't have that, like did them themselves, but like, it's just less time and less work and less energy. So you have time to hang out with your kids, to go to work, to sit in your couch, to whatever, right? So that's the thing that is for me, the actual thing that I'm selling is just your time and energy.

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Melissa Parsons

Right, right, right. Well, and I think a lot of people, you know, we heard our colleague, Christine Goins at the conference talk about if we treated time with the same value that we treat money, you know, it would be a total, totally different world that we all lived in. Right. And I do think that, you know, especially for those of us, like you said, with professional degrees, who've done all the, you know, dotted all the I's and perfectly crossed all the T's and gotten all the A's and, you know, taken all the tests. And, you know, I do think that there is this mindset of this rugged individualism that I should be able to do this on my own.And like you said, of course you can, but do you want to? And I really think that one of the things that has made me so successful in my business is knowing when I'm in my zone of genius and doing that and knowing when I am fucking out of my zone of genius and using the resources that are available to me. You know, I can remember when I first, you know, started doing my podcast, I read this book that our lovely friend, she didn't write it, but she recommended it to me, Maggie Reyes called the podcast journal. Yes. I love her. And, you know, I started reading it and I got through all the things that, you know, that were easy for me and that were like, of course, of course, this is what it's going to be called and this is what we're going to talk about and this is why I'm doing it and all of that. And then I got to the tech and I was like, like record scratch. I'm like, fuck no. Like I'm not learning this. Like I refuse and I'm not going to spend one moment of my time on this. So I hired my podcast producer and thank God I did because, you know, what we're doing right now, I will send her this video recording. I will send her the audio recording. She will make it pretty. She will make it sound beautiful. And like all I have to do is drop it into the Google drive. It's a beautiful thing. Like I could spend another probably three hours

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Manuela Powell

Oh, and you would. I had a podcast during the quarantine and I did everything just because, you know, yeah, I can't and whatever. And I want to learn it. And I did. And like for my 40-minute episodes, I would spend three and a half hours doing all the other stuff. Yeah. Can you do it? Sure. If you're a doctor who's doing clinic, your mom, and you want to have a life. Why? Yeah. Because it's not crazy expensive. It's just, you know, but the thing that I think we get into a lot is part of what I did use to coach, which is especially us women, especially us women of color or immigrants or whatever, we're like, well, no, we have to do it. We can't pay for something just to make my life easier or for me to be better, which is a lot of people also get into this problem with just coaching, right? It's like, wait, I'm going to pay all this money for this person to help me just feel better. That makes no sense. I will do that for my kids, for my husband, for my neighbor, for whomever, but I don't deserve it. You know, and obviously that's not exactly what we think, but we justify it by saying, oh, but the financials, the time isn't right. The thing, the other thing and the other thing, but truly what it is. No, you just don't think you deserve to invest this money to have your time back, your energy back, or just really just to feel better in the case of coaching.

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Melissa Parsons

Yeah. Yeah. I'm here to say that's bullshit.

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Manuela Powell

It is it is because oh my god, I mean, oh my god just like how my life changed with coaching. And yes, I did a lot of work before on my own, but then you get to coaching and you know, even when while we're coaches I don't I can't see my brain so well that I need another person to be like I guess I'm gonna rephrase that I don't need another person, but I do benefit from the person who say I want another person. Yeah, let me reflect that back to you and like is that really how you want to do things? Right, and some of us are like I'm lucky to have an amazing partner who does that really well for me but also he's my partner. He's not my coach. It's also different and I felt like when I was a coach and I was selling coaching especially in the beginning I had a hard time just again wanting to shake people. Yeah, so I think that's the that's the thing we get into with women is really, you know us having the thought no, I do. I do actually deserve to invest this in myself just for the sole Reason of me feeling better or being happier or having ease in my job or whatever.

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Melissa Parsons

Yeah. Ease in my life. My God. Yeah. Like if somebody would have told me when I was younger that I would be paying somebody to make my life easier, if it would have been like a cleaning person or somebody to take care of the kids or something, I would have been like, yes, of course, I'm going to do that. Right. And that was always going to be a line item on my budget. Right. Yeah. And now I can't imagine not having coaching as a line item. Totally. Yeah. And I think

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Manuela Powell

That's the thing. It has some things I'm like, all right, these are kind of okay. And even here, I see like here in the US, a lot of people who can totally pay for cleaners don't, I'm from Brazil where like we, everybody, my maid had a maid, so it's like, we do have that because people need those jobs and you know, so it's like, it was fine. I had a nanny, a maid of like, I never, that's insane to say, but I had never before I moved to the US, did anything. I didn't do a lot of grocery shopping. I didn't cook my own food. And I, you know, I didn't, when I live by myself, I obviously do those things because I didn't, once I had a family, any of that, because I was a freaking surgeon, I was going in and working. And then the rest of the time I want to spend on of my kids. I don't want to go to grocery shopping, clean my house or whatever. So obviously I'm going to do that. So, you know, and I see a lot of people here when they say, I was like, Oh, I have to clean them. Like you like, I have to clean it. Why do you do that? I mean, if you love it, and I do actually, actually is one of the things that I'm anxious. I will clean my house is going to be sparking clean just because that's the thing that I like.

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Melissa Parsons

Friend is going to be like, yes, break out the vacuum, make those lines.

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Manuela Powell

Perfect to the vacuum with the light in front please and thank you for that invention love that but you know it's like you can actually have someone to take care of your kids right if you if you need to work or whatever and that is fine so that there's those things that we got into the the whole like patriarchy things like those are okay and others I'm like well that's that's crossing a line yeah you know so funny.

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Melissa Parsons

So funny. All right. So I'm curious about what you are curious about going forward into your future.

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Manuela Powell

Oh, wow, man, everything. Okay. I'm curious what's the next version because I think every step that I get from my life, I think like that it can't get better, like that's crazy. That's insane. And I'm having one of these moments out now of like, sometimes like, yes, life is very challenging. There's all the things over here and at the same time. Oh my God. Like I noticed just last week and I know if you're familiar with the, the big leap, the, the upper limit problem. Yeah. The book. Yeah. I realized I was like, I think I'm getting into a upper limit problem with my relationship because my relationship is so good that I'm like, this can't be true. Something where the camera is, you know, like this cannot be happening.

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Melissa Parsons

Like what is somebody's going to jump out and tell me I'm living a lie.

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Manuela Powell

Yeah. So I feel like we have to notice these things. Like when you're up leveling or upgrading your life to notice that it's like sometimes you actually will sabotage everything because your thermostat is set to something. So luckily I noticed that and I was like, wait, I think I'm doing, I think I have that. And now I'm just like, I'm trying to find something to just be like, well, where's this can't be like, let's go. Where's the catch, right? What's going on? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And especially I'm, you know, I'm non-monogamous. So like in the non-monogamous relationship, it becomes a lot of like, okay, is this jealous? Like am I jealous? I was never jealous in my life. I'm jealous now. You know, it's like, Oh, maybe that's it. Maybe because it's like, this is too good to be true. You know? So sometimes that might happen, you know, in your, in your career and with the kids and your family and you have to notice that so that you can go above that. So I think the curiosity that I have is like, how can it possibly get better? Just keep getting.

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Melissa Parsons

Yeah. I'm wondering, I mean, I think probably for me, if I was in that situation, the ultimate flex, I think, would be being able to admit to my partner, like, hey, I think I'm doing this.

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Manuela Powell

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

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Melissa Parsons

Right? And like having that vulnerability. Yeah.

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Manuela Powell

We actually did exactly that. What I told him was like, you know what I'm going to do whenever you tell me something because we can also like not talk about other partners. That's an option. I was like, I don't like that. We talk about everything. We're together all the free. He's actually playing guitar in my living room right now so I can hear you. I'm sure you can't because my microphone is really good, but yeah, I cannot, but I wish I could. Exactly. Oh yeah. He's amazing. But I told him, I was like, okay, I don't want you to not tell me things. I want you to tell me whatever you want to tell me. And if I feel feelings, I'm going to say, Hey, you know what, I'm feeling a little jealous. Continue. Yeah. You know, and I'm going to deal with my feelings because I can, I said, okay, I want you to ask first if I'm ready for to talk about more anything like that at the moment. It might be that I actually, right now I'm not in a space, right? Like yesterday was the day that I had a really difficult morning with my kids. And I was like, that wouldn't have been the time when I want to add something to my emotional bandwidth. Right. But you know, once I'm like, okay, now I'm, you know, I'm, that crisis has resolved. So I was like, okay, cool. I'm ready to have a feeling like, Oh, this is a feeling. This is a sensation in my body. And here's all the evidence that I do not need to have this feeling because you're doing all that. And then you're here and then you come back and you're wonderful to me. And you're just freaking awesome all around. And I know you love me. So like, why would I, it's just a feeling because society, because blah, blah, blah, all those things. So being able to just say, Oh, I'm jealous. Okay, keep going. That has helped a lot.

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Melissa Parsons

Yeah. Emotional maturity 101 over there and probably more like a graduate level course probably for most people.

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Manuela Powell

For everybody. I'm telling you that because like namunagmi will put you in contact with all your shit. You're insecure. You're going to be like, Hey, remember me? Yeah. Oh yeah.

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Melissa Parsons

I'm gonna give you all the reasons why you should be jealous and ruin this forever.

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Manuela Powell

Yeah, it is a really good personal development tool if you're looking for something to really see if your personal growth is working and just get yourself in the loving polyamorous relationship.

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Melissa Parsons

I think for right now, my husband and I are good, but you never know what's coming in the future. Right. So funny. Okay. Tell us, Manuela, how can people find you if they want to reach out? If they're like, I need to be in contact with this woman, I want to know more. How do they find you?

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Manuela Powell

Um, my website for my business is the doctorspivot.com that has my business and my, I have that Instagram and all that stuff that all doctors pivot everywhere, but also I have my personal sort of Instagram, which is all my coaching stuff. So that's really fun. If you want to connect with me, actually that's the best place, which is Dr. Manuela Powell , um, that one is the, you know, the, the life coaching stuff from when, which I still do stuff because I love it and I'm a clown and I love post in my silly reels. I love your reels. They're so fun. Yeah. But for the business, if you're ready to, you know, all that we talked about and like have a business that you don't have to figure out everything and all that, then it's the doctor's pivot.com.

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Melissa Parsons

Yeah, I love it. I love it. Thank you so much for coming on.

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Manuela Powell

Of course, it was such my pleasure. Thank you for having me.

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Melissa Parsons

I love our conversations and this one did not disappoint for sure. Yay.

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Manuela Powell

Thanks for having me.

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Melissa Parsons

Yeah, you're so welcome. All right, everybody, come back next week and I'll be here with another amazing person or another amazing topic for sure.

Hey - It’s still me. Since you are listening to this podcast, you very likely have followed all the rules and ticked off all the boxes but you still feel like something's missing! If you're ready to learn the skills and gain the tools you need to tiptoe into putting yourself first and treating yourself as you would your own best friend, I'm here to support you. As a general life coach for women, I provide a safe space, compassionate guidance, and practical tools to help you navigate life's challenges as you start to get to know and embrace your authentic self.

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