It's interesting you mentioned that, Chelsea. That's very much the impression that I get from your persona on LinkedIn, and it was reinforced when I got to chat with you in person for the first time a couple of weeks ago. And so when I when I meet people like that on LinkedIn that seem to have found a truly authentic passion of theirs and built a business around it, I'm like, damn. Like, that's the promised land. Like, how do people do that? So but my experience tells me that when I find people like that, their story is much more complex, and it's not as glossy and perfect as it seems. So what are what have been what's been the hardest part of that journey for you?

So my my my transition into entrepreneurship was not some sort of, like, a planned move over. Looking back on it, like, I have to give my gut some credit. I think I knew that I was not in alignment with a lot of things. You know, I reached marketing VP over six figure salary shortly after I turned thirty. That was supposed to be the dream. And then you get up there and go, wow. I was just like, really? This was the wrong ladder. Like, oh shit. Now what do I do? So I tried to pivot, but still within the corporate space and was really trying to override my gut intuition and be like, no. This is totally fine. I can go to this very vanilla job and work with pretty close minded people. And, like, I can do this is gonna be okay. And it wasn't okay. And, yeah. So that exit out of that was not on, like, the best of terms. I didn't feel super in control of the situation. And what's interesting is that this kind of story of origin is I'm writing a book, and it is the prologue of my book. So, I feel very prepared to answer your question because I spent a lot of time sitting here going like, okay. What actually happened? Because I talk to dozens of people every week who are like, man, you got it together. And I'm over here going, I fell ass backward into this, people. Like, now that's not entirely fair. I know my therapist, if she's gonna listen to this, is gonna be like, hey. No. Give yourself some credit. But it really was a process of self reflection. Everything comes back to the ability to really know yourself too. Right? You can't be in relationship with others unless you're in relationship with yourself. And so, it was kind of this interesting, what am I trying to say, time warped, parallel where this couch behind me, I'm like, totally brains just buzzing. I go sit crisscross applesauce on this couch and go, wow. I'm starting from the beginning. What do I even do? What do I wanna do? So our brains have kind of, they have, like, some sensory memory. Right? So, like, I'm sitting crisscross applesauce sauce on this couch, and I immediately go back ten, eleven years to my first therapy session where I walk in, and I'd never been in a therapist office, but I watch enough movies. I was like, oh, I'm gonna sit on a comfy couch or a chaise lounge. Right? And this very smart, well dressed person is gonna sit across from me and, like, poignantly take notes about all these profound things that come out of my mouth. And then I'm gonna leave and my life is going to be changed. And that was not the case. I learned that I had experienced enough trauma at an early age to not have memories. And so when you don't have memories, you can't talk about them. So it was decided that I would actually sit crisscross applesauce on the floor and do different forms of, like, play therapy and other modalities that are reserved for children who can't actually articulate a lot of the things they need to in, like, your typical talk therapy. And my takeaway there was, like, I wasn't ready for the couch. I eventually worked my way to the couch. Right? And so I'm sitting on the couch behind me, and I'm like, man. All those people, like, all those friction points, like, they weren't ready for the couch. So, like, maybe that's what I do. Maybe I go help people and guide people and teach people and share all of this knowledge and perspective so they can sit on the couch. And that's how I got to the point of being like, okay. Well, I'm gonna put marketing, and I'm gonna put psychologist in my headline. And I did, and it blew up.

Well, there's something so incredibly authentic and real about that. That's not something that somebody could just make up. Right. Like, it's a very personal, real story. Because the thing that the thing that immediately comes to mind for me is, have you found a way to almost find some gratitude for that trauma given that it led to the the therapy and this life that has worked out pretty well so far?

You know, you wanna talk about some synergy. It was probably only a couple of weeks ago that I do a lot of walking. I do a lot of miles and miles a day of walking, processing, thinking, sitting, letting that creativity kind of happen. And and I had this moment of, like, man, I have really released a lot of the the guilt and the shame and the why me and the, you know, woulda, coulda, shoulda. And I'm like, I wouldn't be who I am if I wouldn't have done all I've gone through all of those things, and I had the agency to make the choices I made to go down the paths that I did. So, like, yes, external factors, all these things happen, but it's actually quite empowering to look back and go, like, no. I never I mean, I'm I got knocked down plenty of times, but, like, I got back up. And would I have the courage, the bravery, the gumption, the ambition, the drive, the all the things to go through a process like entrepreneurship, which is very difficult and one of the most difficult things out of everything I've experienced. And so I think I have gotten to that point where there is a part of me that's grateful for the experiences that have happened and shaped me.

Yeah. Because I imagine if your therapist is listening to this and hear you say you fell ass backwards into it, you know that's not true. Right? Like, there are there are other people that would have gone through those experiences that wouldn't have had the tools or perspectives that you've had. Yeah. And, you know, the outcome would have been very different. So, god. That's so amazing. And, yeah, coming just coming back to one other thing you said, you know, you were on the wrong ladder. I think, man, I can when you were describing that experience, I was on that ladder. I made VP. I was making good money more than I ever had. Yeah. And it was gross. Like, it was it wasn't healthy. It was kinda toxic, and I don't love what it brought out in me. I did my best, and, I don't know. I think a lot of people can relate to that.

So I think we all sort of kind of understand that's happening. And one of the things you talk about a lot is kind of manipulative marketing, which I wanna dig into. Like, don't we all kind of accept that, yes, I know that I understand that marketing is trying to get me to buy something that maybe I don't need. And so and so we're sort of signing up for some of that manipulation. Like, how do you how do you draw the line between, I don't know, persuasion and manipulation?

Brilliant question. In a conversation that starts happening on a lot of my posts, which I absolutely love, as it's let's pull back in this example of relationships. There's some pretty clear toxic behaviors in relationships that I think the vast majority of people would would point to and say, yeah. That's not good. But then there's also nuances. Right? We all have that friend who's in that marriage where you're like, I absolutely don't understand. Like, I would never this would drive me mad. What's going on? But for that person, that's not the case. Right? And so I do think that there's a lot of nuance and there's a lot of gray space here. But for me, the big difference between persuasion and manipulation is when there is a lack of real value. When the when the consumer, the person on the other end doesn't actually seek that value. Right? If you're just trying to get them to buy it and there's no reciprocity in what is going on here, it's manipulation. I feel this way about I'm gonna I'm gonna say a very high percentage of, like, beauty beauty brands. Unless there is, like, okay. Is it preventing skin cancer? Is it, you know, helping regulate my hormones as I enter a different phase of, like is there a health benefit? Or is the only reason you're selling me this beauty brand is because you're trying to tell me that these little wrinkles showing up my face aren't very attractive, and I should really, you know, get rid of those. And here's this product. That to me is manipulation. It's not persuasion. You're you're preying on insecurities. Right? So there's always gonna be persuasion. I mean, go you can go look at any of the stuff that I put out as well. Like, I try to really make the case that, like, here's why I think we should all be building ethical brands. Here's why I think we should be in very healthy relationships with our consumers and our clients. But I also firmly believe that there's a group of people who aspire to achieve that value. Whereas in a lot of stuff that's happening and being sold, do those problems really exist? Do people really want that? Is that is that a value that they're seeking? And I think in a lot of cases, the answer is either no or or I don't know. So that, to me, would be kind of where that line starts to get crossed.

Yeah. Interesting. I can see that case in for for beauty products. You know, what do you say when people say, well, I I can spot manipulation when I see it, so nobody's fooling me.

In some ways, I do think there are people who are more conscious and aware of what's happening there. Right? And they're they're engaging in it more. However, like, even doing what I do, I would never say, oh, I can spot it. Now in hindsight or afterward, sometimes I can, and I get so irritated. I'm like, oh, I totally fell for that. Gosh. Like, but I I do think and this has also been a conversation in the comments of some of my posts. For the people who are like, I absolutely know this is happening all the time, they're the easiest target.

There's also the thing that I that occurs to me about this, and I always come back to, you know, the amazing documentary on Netflix, A Social Dilemma about social media and how it's, you know, dopamine and how it's basically, feeding on our, hardwired need for, you know, belonging and dopamine, etcetera. But the one of the thing one of the kind of the scariest things about that is they said that even if we even when we know it's happening, we are powerless to do anything about it. So I'm wondering if that applies to this as well. Knowing that it's happening, even you, when you spot it, it's almost like it we're powerless to do anything about it. So how do people protect against being manipulated with stuff like this?

I think it's self awareness and education. I could feel the resistance when you said the word powerless because I'm like, I struggle with that one. Like and I do think in a lot of ways, like, there's just certain things that, like, they're human nature. I'm also not a person though who subscribes to the fact that I'm powerless in many ways. Mhmm. And so I do think I I firmly believe in the what you're not changing, you're choosing. And I also don't think there's anything wrong with someone who chooses, okay. This is just how it's gonna how it's gonna be. I'm not gonna lie to you. I curate my Instagram feed on purpose. Like, I will go Google something random that I want, and then I'll get all these ads. Right? Like, because I want to get served the ads for certain products or things. I wanna know what's on the market. Like, there are, you know, ways to also go out and use it for your own good. But I think as far as being entirely powerless, the more educated you become, the more self aware you become because we're all susceptible to different things based off of who we are, how our brains were kind of programmed, what our own individual insecurities or strengths or visions of ourselves are. I just announced yesterday I'm gonna go ahead and start a messaging campaign that educates consumers. They can continue to understand more and more of like, okay. I'm seeing this. What's showing up in this? And then they can choose. You can still look at it. Like, my kids at the grocery store, like, grab for something. Oh, I want that. I'm like, oh, you know why you want that? Do you you wanna know why you think you want that? And, of course, my oldest is nine and a half, and she's like, I actually don't. Like, will you buy it for me? I'm like, no. But I'm like, look at the placement. Look at the colors. Like, what is what is happening in you when you go get this? And then, like, let's talk about what's in the dang thing. So we use the YOOKA app a lot because knowledge is power. And so we scan the stuff so you can see. And then I just show the kids, like, can you read any of these words? No. They're all chemicals. Do they have green next to them, or do they have red next to them? Alright. Let's just open up this little box and see, causes cancer, causes whatever. Like, do you still want this thing? And they're like, nope.

What's that app called?

Yuka, y u k a.

That sounds terrifying to be looking up at I don't wanna I'm not sure I wanna know the answer to what's in some of my favorite foods.

We completely overhauled our entire pantry. When you scan an item, it can be health and beauty products, food. If it comes up as bad, it gives you options underneath that are better. And so when we first downloaded this app, we walked up and down multiple grocery stores. And I would say maybe one out of ten things was healthy to consume.

Oh, man.

And so we ended up switching. We went to Costco. And granted, my kids are getting older, family of four, so, like, we can buy in bulk. It makes sense at this point.

Yeah.

But, I would say over half of the products, including frozen processed foods that we scan, are in the green.

Oh, wow. Shout out to Costco. Yeah. Don't take away my Costco mixed nuts and my, these little quinoa bites that they have that are just insane that I just can't yeah.

It's a whole I should do a case study on Costco because I was like a little anti Costco with like, is it sustainable? Who needs this much? Are you just like duping me into buying more? Like is the, the pricing psychology, all of this stuff. And then it's like, I go in experience it, scan it. All their foods are great. I mean, there's plenty of stuff that's still crap, but, like, you can find so many great options.

Okay. So that's awesome from the consumer side. Now as an entrepreneur, I work with a lot of founders. Mhmm. You know, people that are wearing lots of different hats, and marketing is one of the things. And so it's interesting when you talk about this stuff because I've never met a founder that is purposely trying to manipulate people, but they have targets to meet, and they're frantically trying to get their message out to try to, you know, trying lots of different to throw in all kinds of shit against the wall to see what will stick and trying to test different things. So how can they maybe be more mindful of not crossing this line? Because they're not they're not thinking about it in terms of manipulation. They're just like, shit. I gotta I gotta pay the bills, and I gotta bring in this many leads that will convert to this many paying customers.

Yeah. I think there's a a pause that I wanna have because I actually have worked for a few founders who did not have any qualms with manipulating people into what they wanted. Right? Those were the people where I learned what I didn't wanna do. But for all of the I call them, conscious companies. And, I've started to get a lot of outreach from several companies that are kind of in this similar space where it's like, look. We've we've got a little bit of a proof of concept here, and we wanna do this right. But I think the big thing for me is not what people say, it's what they don't say. So when you're working with founders who are only talking about money, they're only referring to human beings as cold leads, warm leads, hot leads, conversions. You are unknowingly entering into a manipulative space because you are no longer focused on the value that you are putting out into the world. You are focused on the return that you're gonna get. And the thing with business is that money is a lagging metric. So you you need to money is a very clear way to track success and failure. Absolutely. But a lot of those people end up spinning their wheels bringing in the wrong pea they think they're the wrong people because they didn't do their homework. They're not approaching them from what I call the value aspiration intersection. A lot of things in business are one-sided, but because I'm so focused on relationship, everything I do is interconnected. It's both sides of the relationship. So I do a I do a workshop with people that I call value aspiration identification, and that's what this is, is it's like, okay. Before you can even think about scaling, have you identified the point where what your value proposition as a company is and the value seeking of the consumer is where those things meet. And I don't just mean in your head you think you have the answer. Have you done some research? Have you asked the consumer? Right? Because if you haven't, you're in no place to scale. It won't be sustainable over time because you're gonna be constantly just trying to come up with new tactics to throw against the wall to get people to convert into something that they don't actually want or need. I say these things, I should add, there's a ton of research. There's a ton of research around this. It's like if you speak to the emotional trigger of someone, you easily two x your conversions easily. Lead generation, super easy. I I like to say, like, if you're doing this correctly, you're not selling, you're inviting. And at the same time, if you have an emotionally engaged audience, you can increase your profit margin up to thirty percent before that emotionally engaged audience will go, now I'm not sure. Because at that point, they trust you. And you know what's even better? They go tell their friends about you. They go post about you. People become embodied extensions of your brand when they feel like they belong with your brand as their authentic selves. Right? And so I think that's where where I was at, and I've had a question before that's like, you know, I mean, how do you how do you sell this to people? Because people want money right now. And I'm like, sure. But, like, would you rather have, like, three hundred leads in the next thirty days that don't convert, or would you rather build a relationship with thirty people who buy from you for the rest of their life and tell everyone about what you do?

Yeah. You're not selling. You're inviting. Oh, I love that.

Yeah. I've started using a lot of, like, invitation and cocreation language in what I'm doing. You wanna talk about maybe an area of being powerless. The effects of what money does to the psyche is a real thing. And so they're like, look. We have proof of concept. We've we've sold several million, you know, and we wanna scale it, but we know we have to stay true to these values because that's foundational to how we got started, and it's a core to the mission behind why we're doing what we're doing.

Well, coming back to that idea of ethical branding, so you talked about Costco. So I wanna con contrast that to Target. So you wrote about how your daughter came to you and said, I don't wanna shop at Target anymore, and it kinda went viral. Tell me a bit about Target's story and what led up to that quote.

You said the t word, and my brain went dun dun dun. Such a sad story. It really is. Like, I love Target too. Yeah. So my daughter is nine. And, at the beginning of this year, we were on our way to a birthday party, and she wanted to grab something. You know, they do chores, so they get some allowance, which I don't remember. It's probably a Lego or something. She wanted to stop. And, so I told her, I said, hey. There's there's one thing that I do wanna let you know about Target because these are the conversations we have in our family. And I had told her, like, that Target had rolled back their their DEI initiatives, and so she wanted to know what that meant. So I was trying to give her a pretty objective, just here's some facts about what that means. And she would just look at me, and she was like, I don't wanna shop at Target anymore. And so okay. And as we're walking into, like, the trampoline park or wherever we were going, I I don't know why I didn't I but I just kind of typed up a little post. I was, like, kinda proud of her. Like, here's this nine year old who loves Target, and to be honest, has a fantastic Lego selection. And she is like, no. This goes against my values. This is not the kind of store, like, the values I thought, and so I'm not going in. And so I made a post, and it went totally viral. And so I did a follow-up this week because it's now been, like, three or four months, and my daughter still refuses to step foot into a Target. And on occasion, she will ask me, mom, has Target done the right thing yet? And I have to be like, well, if you're asking if they've reestablished, like, some of these things, like, no. They're they're still in this spot. And she's like, okay. I'm not going. I mean, to the point where the girls know we were looking for swimsuits and we were running out of options, and I knew that Target would probably have a whole bunch. And it was down to, like, okay. The pools are opening, and either we can go into a Target and get you a swimsuit or we might have to order online. You won't have one this weekend. And my daughters are nine and five, and they looked at each other in the car and then looked at me and went, we're not going at a Target. They chose not to have swimsuits to maybe not go to the pool. Like, that's how firmly they were in that. And so it's like if children are in that space, of course, there's adults in that space. And, as I've been reading about all of this, it's like I I get a little bit sick to my stomach because I read all of these reports. Right? Everyone's trying to position themselves around being the expert and why Target is plummeting. And it's like, sure. There's all of these, like, other little pieces around it. Absolutely. But at the core of it, like, they broke trust. They broke the trust. We all felt duped. We realized you're just gonna say whatever you need to say to us to get us to come in your store and make money. And if you think that you can make more money by changing, you know, changing the direction, then you're gonna do it. I'm actually, working with a friend of mine. His name is Avante Daniels. If you are listening to this and you don't know who Avante Daniels is and you're enjoying this conversation, I highly encourage you to go check him out. So he has this thing called the CRI. It's the cultural resiliency index. And the reason I wrote about Target again is because he had sent me kind of a report. And when you look at everything that he'd put together, they've been on a path. They didn't just do it overnight. That was just the one big public thing that did it. They've been making decisions that have pulled them away from their core values over the last two years. There is a point at which though that the public finally goes, woah. Okay. Now we see it. And not only do people see it see it, more importantly, they feel it. Yeah. Like, the heart and the gut are going to town way before the brain gets on the train. Like

Yeah. Trust. So something you've mentioned a couple of times, and I wanted to come back to it, Chelsea, this idea of belonging. You've written about it a little bit. You've kind of alluded to it a little bit today. How does this sense of belonging tie into this? Because when I was reading about it, it really seemed to scratch an itch. Be like, that really seems there's something really compelling about that, and I don't know how to articulate it. I'm sure you can do a better job than I can.