5.12 | The Psychology of Your Business with Amanda Abella
It’s story time and in this podcast episode, Amanda Abella is going to share about how she inadvertently triggered ancestral money trauma after becoming highly successful in her business and then had to take the steps to resolve it. Amanda is a former financial writer and expert turned business strategist, helping her clients achieve up to 90% close rates in high ticket sales and secure multiple five figure deals. She authored the best Make Money Your Honey in 2013. She’s now a YouTube expert and relocation specialist where she helps people relocate to Mexico through her business entrepreneur expat, which she runs with her husband. Buckle up and get ready to learn about money trauma, ancestral healing automation and SEO optimization. Hey Amanda, thank you so much for being here today. I’m really excited about what we’re going to be talking about today and it’snna make a big impact on people.
>> Amanda Abella: Thank you for having me. This is actually my first, podcast interview and I, and I think about two years because. Yeah, because I had to take a hiatus for a while. So I’m honored to be here and sharing my again.
>> Isha Vela: Ye. So you sort of took a break from podcasting?
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah, I took a break from business period. And making money because, well, I met my husband. He’s been an expat for about 10 years. So he’s been living in and out of the US for about 10 years. That was a dream. I always had end up meeting him. We’traveling around all over the place and moved to Mexico and had to plan a wedding. So you. It was just a couple years there where, podcasting was not at the top of the priority list.
>> Isha Vela: Right, right. Yeah. So what was it like for you taking a break from your business?
>> Amanda Abella: Well, I took a forced break from my business and what I mean by a forced break was for people who don’t know my background, I spe I started an online business in 2010, so I’m pretty much a dinosaur in this space. I’ve seen all the things. That’s why when people get stressed out about new regulations and things, I’m just like, meh, whatever. Because I’ve seen so many of them like, come and go and trends and all kinds of stuff. So I started in 2010 and I spent eight years as a financial writer and expert. So I did marketing for banks and I would get hired as a spokesperson for like TransUnion or Capital One when they had a new product coming out. And I would go do media tours and stuff like that on their behalf. So I did that for about eight years. 2017, I start transitioning, I start teaching people business because I realized, number one, freelance writing is not scalable. And number two, I had this weird intuition which has turned out to be correct because now I see a lot of people who remained in that space having this problem which is one good market correction and we’re all screwed. They’re just going to cut the marketing teams.
>> Isha Vela: Wow.
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah. So I basically started teaching people how to build an online business because that’s what I had done and that’s what I was being asked. And then my specialization became in sales, because I’d been in sales since I was 20 years old. So I would teach people, hey, here’s how to have conversations without being an asshole. Here’s how to get the deal done without pressuring people and actually understanding the skill sets and the psychologies. That’s what I became known for. so that started growing very quickly. I was on my way to a seven figure business. I started having six figure months, that was back at the end of 2021. And I ended up triggering an ancestral trauma. not only an ancestral trauma, but also childhood trauma. M, from starting to have these six figure months add. Yeah, tell me about that.
>> Isha Vela: Stop right there.
>> Amanda Abella: Oh wait, there’s more. Okay, there’s one more thing to add to the pressure of this, which is that my father was in and out of the hospital for eight months at the same time and I almost lost him twice. So it was one of those things where like life was lifeing really hard and I started to realize like, oh, wait a second, I can’t just force myself to do stuff like I used to. Like, I have no motivation to work out. I love to work out. I can’t meditate. I’ve been meditating for 10 years. I can’t sit still for more than 30 seconds and my panic attacks are coming back. I knew a part of it was obviously the stress of what was going on with my father, but there was something else happening because normally I’m able to just push through and I was not able to push through. So I Spent about like three months wondering what the hell was wrong with me. Yeah, I tried traditional therapy. That wasn’t really working. Cause it was a lot. And now I’ve done therapy in two different countries, so in the United States at the time, it felt like a lot of mothering energy to me. And that was just not what I needed. Yeah, it wasn’t working. Anyway, long story short, I’m doing what I call, dramatic dming, where I’m just like, freaking out and I’m like, dming a bunch of people and making connections and working. and I end up meeting this expert in neuroscience. And I was going to interview her from my podcast to make money your honey. And I found out what she did and I said, how much does it cost to hire you? Because I think there’s something wrong with my brain. I would end up working with her for six months and she would end up, uncovering basically the fact that I had gone into a state of ptsd. She didn’t tell me that at the time. She told me that a year later. but basically I had gone into a state of ptsd. I had, ah, triggered a lot of ancestral trauma. that was pretty serious. And I didn’t realize how serious it was. Cause I thought it was just normal for the environment that I grew up in. and then also some childhood trauma that came along with it. It was really the ancestral trauma more than anything. So I’m working with her for like six months. My whole world is flipped upside down once I realize what’s going on. And I realize I have to do life completely differently because I basically built all my businesses and my whole life based on survival programming. Trauma from my family, trauma from my childhood. I laugh about it now, but it was really intense back then. and I was like, I got toa do life completely differently because I have not hasn’t been my life. And what I want to do, I thought it was, but the subconscious was really the one running the show.
>> Isha Vela: Yeah. So what part of your subconscious was running the show? What was the story? What was the motor that was driving?
>> Amanda Abella: Oh, there were a lot of them. it all came out at the same time. It’s like I went through an ego death. so one of the really intense ones, that when this expert in neuroscience figured it out, I said, oh, my God, my entire childhood now makes sense was, sur survivor’s, guilt. And I was playing out a pattern of survivors guil. I was very confused at first when she told me that my Childhood was, like, relatively chill in comparison. Like most people, she goes, it’s not yours. It’s your parents and grandparents. Survival’guilt from having fled the Cuban Revolution and having to have left family and countrymen behind. There’s guilt there. They can’t let life get too good. You’re playing out the exact same pattern in your business and your life.
>> Isha Vela: Right. Wow.
>> Amanda Abella: That was one of them. And that was the one that opened the entire Pandora’s box of all of them. And I was like, oh, so that’s why things would be kind of cool when I was a kid. And then there’d be some sort of crazy emergency that we would have to go deal with, which, by the way, my parents still do that. Old habits die hard.
>> Isha Vela: Yes.
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah. Old habits die hard. and also that was a generation where therapy wasn’t a thing and these conversations that we’re having now were not a thing. so I don’t blame them at all. They’re just doing what they knew and they’re not even aware that they do this. so the other thing that came up was money equals anxiety. I grew up in a household because I have immigrant parents who had to start over in different countries, and not out of choice, but because they were forced into it, where basically, money equaled anxiety. Right? We could have no money and there’s anxiety. We could have money and there’s anxiety. So the more money I made, the worse my anxiety got. Makes total sense right now in retrospective. Very simple, right?
>> Isha Vela: Like, the body is very, like, stupid simple. Like money, equ’anxiety. More of it, more anxiety.
>> Amanda Abella: Mind blowing. I was like, o. That was one of them. then there was another one, which I really. This one I tend to. I dropped the quickest, which was I realized that I came from a lineage of very controlling women. And I was like, oh, that’s where all the survival programming comes from. And I’m talking back to my great grandmother, on my mother’s side at least, and then at least to my great grandmother on my father’s sidee. Right. So on both sides. On one side, I came from a lineage of very controlling women because it was survival. They had to. There was no choice. And then on the other side, it wasn’t controlling, but there was still a lot of survival. So as you can imagine, I’m putting all these things together and I’m like, there’s no way I’m going to attract the husband that I want. If I’m going through this, there’s no way I’m going to be able to make money easily and scale a business. I’m, not going to be able to live life the way that I want to live if I don’t start redoing this. so that was another one that came up that was huge, at the time that I didn’t realize how far back it went in the lineage.
>> Isha Vela: Wow. And so when, you know, this is, like, a little detail, but, like, when you were working with this healer, this neurologist or neuroscientist, rather, like, what were you noticing? What was the process for you?
>> Amanda Abella: I think at first it was just shock.
>> Isha Vela: Yeah.
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah. Just complete shock at first. Because when I tell you my life felt like it was flipped upside down. It literally felt like it was flipped upside down. Wow. and I was like, I can’t go back to doing life the way I was doing it because I can’t, unknow what I know now.
>> Isha Vela: Yes, yes. And so you had to, like, reconfigure everything.
>> Amanda Abella: Literally everything, starting from the ground up. And the last thing that I reconfigured was the money.
>> Isha Vela: Wow.
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah. Because I had been chasing money my whole life out of survival, and I neglected everything else. And I was like, well, what if I flip this on his head? And that was extremely uncomfortable, let me tell you. but eventually it started to sort itself out and figure itself out. but anyway, within four months, I worked with this person for six months, one on one. I did everything. The hypnosis, the energy healing, working with a neuroscientist. I did all the things. So I was like, I can’t go back. So we’re just going to start resolving these things once and for all. Because, honestly, what’s the alternative? I didn’t think there was one. So I just kept going. so anyway, once I start making sense of these things, then I’m like, you know what? I’ve been chasing money this whole time, but I’m actually ready to get married. How about I focus on that? Four months later, I met my husband. So.
>> Isha Vela: So what was the, Okay, so you’re having these epiphanies. Well, you start by having these panic attacks. You’re like, something’s wrong. I don’t know what it is. I need to change something. And then you decide everything needs to change. You realize what the stories are, where they’re coming from. Everything needs to change. What’s the first thing you do?
>> Amanda Abella: Well, the first thing I did was I stopped focusing so much on doing business the way I had Been doing it. I kind of became very anti hustle for a while. ###eah I think that was the first thing. I also really started focusing more on my femininity and my feminine energy. I understood the concepts. It’s not like I was new to this.
>> Isha Vela: Yeah. What does that mean to you? Because that means different things to different people.
>> Amanda Abella: Being surrendered and trustingay and letting the masculine leaday. Now at first it was surrendering and trusting to some sort of higher power. Right. And being like, all right, well, my whole life is about to fall apart. Or at least my life as I knew it is about to fall apart. So I have to really trust and surrender that I am taken care of. And it did totally fall apart.
>> Isha Vela: Wow.
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah. Because, my old life wasn’t going to continue into my new life. So trust and surrender is probably the first thing. And then also a lot of trust and surrender around being taken care of and provided for and money and that money doesn’t have to be a stressor. men don’t have to be a stressor. I think that probably trust and surrender is probably what I would say.
>> Isha Vela: Yeah. And I mean, when you think about trust and surrender in the context of a family or a lineage where there is like control, that’s like the hardest part. That is like the life task of the person that loves to control her, that needs it or has been doing it habitually. That is the whole freaking spiritual exercise.
>> Amanda Abella: Yep. Y and boy, was it a spiritual exercise. and really around money was the hardest one. For some reason, once I understood it in the context of dating and men, for some reason, once I had cleared all that stuff or became aware of that stuff, that one actually became a lot easier, than it had been before. I don’t know why. It just did. And then money was actually the really hard one because it was like, wait a minute, I’ve been making money this way for this long. How on earth am I supposed to change this and actually get what it is that I desire? And then I ended up getting a two for one that my husband ends up being like a whiz at systems and ops and automations and systems. That was not a part of my manifestation process. But I got a two for one. I got a little surprise there. Yeah. And then I got a three for one because he traveled all the time and lived in other countries, which was one of my dreams for years. So I was just like, oh, okay. And then I started g more evidence that I was the creator of my reality. And all I really needed to do was clear all the shit that is in the way of you getting what it is that you desire. I’d heard that for 15 years now. I understood it.
>> Isha Vela: Yes, yes, yes, yes. And so you went from having, like you said, six figure months.
>> Isha Vela: And so when you stopped, like, what happened to the money?
>> Amanda Abella: Like, oh, it went away, it disappeared. Yeah.
>> Isha Vela: The money stopped coming in. It was like, bye, bye.
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah, bye bye. Or I would find ways to get rid of it. That was one of the reasons I knew something was off with brain. I was finding ways to get rid of it.
>> Isha Vela: Say more about that.
>> Amanda Abella: It was the money equals anxiety. So I didn’t feel safe.
>> Isha Vela: Okay, okay. Oh my God. Yes, yes. How would you get rid of it?
>> Amanda Abella: Oh God. I’d hire people I didn’t need to hire. that’s mostly it, I think I would hire people I didn’t need to hire. I think that was the biggest one for me actually, now that I think about it. I don’t regret any of it. What was that?
>> Isha Vela: Did your brain used to justify it? Like, oh, but of course I need to hire this person. And there were very good reasons for doing it.
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think that was the biggest one. Because I was a personal finance writer for eight years. I wouldn’t go on spending sprees or binges. Right. But it was like, oh, I need to hire this person, I need to do this, I need to do that in the business. That’s how I would do it. Yeah.
>> Isha Vela: And Amanda, I find it so fascinating that even though money equaled anxiety, you found your way in the financial field.
>> Amanda Abella: I know, but why do you think I ended up there? Because I’m like, I got to figure out money or I’m fucked in life. So that’s how I ended up there.
>> Isha Vela: It was a sense of urgency, a sense of like, the anxiety. Was the driver there?
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah, of course.
>> Isha Vela: Hey. Wow. Wow. And did you have like, did you have like money saved? When the money disappeared, did you have money saved? Did you have like y money?
>> Amanda Abella: And all the money that I had saved went into my own healing.
>> Isha Vela: Wow.
>> Amanda Abella: Because I said once I realized what was going on, I was like, I am going to spare no expense. M. At putting myself back together.
>> Isha Vela: Yes. Wowow. And how long was that period? You mentioned it previously, but like, how long was that period between you saying, I’m done, I’m putting all of my energy into my healing until you started coming back into your business in a whole different way?
>> Amanda Abella: Well, my Husband helped a lot with this. So, it was kind of a joint effort because we were friends for six months first. and actually part of the money that I lost was investing in a networking group where I met him.
>> Isha Vela: Okay.
>> Amanda Abella: It all worked out.
>> Isha Vela: the. What do you call it? Like, you know, you lose this, but you win this. Right.
>> Amanda Abella: There’s no. I’ve learned, there’s no wasting money because even though I was like, in debt up to my. I didn’t just lose the money. I got into debt over my. Up to my eyeballs, like, really trying to figure out what was going on. and also, like, mistakes I’d made in my business and stuff like that. But I’m like, wow, there’s literally no such thing as wasting money because I maxed out a credit card trying to get into this networking group. And that networking group is where I am at my husband.
>> Isha Vela: Wow. Yes, exactly.
>> Amanda Abella: I love that. No such thing. anyway, that took a while to come around to, but, anyway, he helped a lot with that because we were like, colleagues and friends for like six months first. And he noticed that I thought the answer was, oh, okay. In order for me to get ready for my husband, then I need to have a totally automated business. Duh. Because I need space to be a wife and I need space to go travel. Like, I can’t be working. Like, I’ve been working before. End up meeting him, where he needed some other assistance in his business. So we were just helping each other out. He noticed a weird thing where he’s like, why are you so obsessed with systems? Because normally people are not that excited about systems. It’s not something that gets people going. And I was like, because I’m ready to get married and I need space. That’s what I said.
>> Isha Vela: Oh, wow.
>> Amanda Abella: He basically leaned back and had a look on his face and said, challenge accepted. And now we’re married.
>> Isha Vela: That’s awesome.
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah.
>> Isha Vela: Speaking each other’s languages.
>> Amanda Abella: We were speaking each other’s languages, right. And right up until meeting him, I’d been getting clear on, like, what kind of a husband I wanted. It turns out he was doing the exact same thing on what kind of a wife he wanted at the exact same time right before we met.
>> Isha Vela: Wow.
>> Amanda Abella: I know wild stuff that you can’t even make up. Right. And I’m like, m H. Vibration’s real. Universe is real. We create our reality. So I was just gathering all this evidence as I was saying, and then that would give me more faith. So my husband and Greanted he does this for like, seven and eight bigger companies. But he took me from basically bleeding out money to a 60% profit margin and automated most of my business.
>> Isha Vela: Wow.
>> Amanda Abella: And now we teach that to people. Yeah.
>> Isha Vela: Yes. Walk us through that.
>> Amanda Abella: That took a while. Okay. That was a process. This was. This was not. Like I had a mess going on because of my own psychology, which, is the case with most people. And we see it with a lot of his clients too, who coming in at the seven and eight figure range. And they’re a disaster too. They’re also bleeding out money. They also got people on staff that they should have fired six months ago. They’re also making things more complicated, than they need to be. The only difference between me is I didn’t have ego about it. And when you’re at like seven or eight figures, you think you did something and you have some ego. So that’s the only difference. that’s literally the only difference. but we’ll see it there too, which is how we approach. The conversation needs to be a little bit different because there’s more ego involved, if that makes sense. that’s hilarious. I mean, it’s what we’ve noticed, right? So I. It is what it is. so, yeah, so it was a process. Right. Because it’s like I’m working through my own psychology and everything’s a mess. At first, my life got. Well, the business career side of my life got really messy first before we got to the space where, it is now, where we just took a month off to get married and be with friends and family and go on our honeymoon. And my business not just sustained, it made more money even though neither of us were working or checking in or anything.
>> Isha Vela: Amazing.
>> Amanda Abella: Aming.
>> Isha Vela: That’s the dream right there.
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah. So now it’s like, oh, it works. Now let’s start teaching it to people. And then, of course, he still does his consulting for the more complicated ones.
>> Isha Vela: Yeah. So there’s multiple businesses, right, between the both of you, right?
>> Amanda Abella: yeah. I mean, because we basically work with a lot of the same people. And now we’re married. We merged a lot of the stuff because that would save us a ton of money on taxes, accounting, software, you name it. Right. So, we joke that I’m his first merger and acquisition.
>> Isha Vela: That’s great.
>> Amanda Abella: It didn’t make sense from a financial. And even to keep them separate. So we’re. We’re paying double of everything and we work with a lot of the same people. So just on different aspects of the businesses.
>> Isha Vela: So before you were doing, you were having everything automated. What did your business look like on the back end?
>> Amanda Abella: A mess.
>> Isha Vela: Describe the mess.
>> Amanda Abella: Bring it. I had a lot of things all going on at the same time. So I had like a lot of systems, but they were very disjointed. I make a joke that they were put together with duct tape and bubblegum because what I was accustomed to was just work harder and you will make more money. Just be more visible. Granted, I love visibility, I love doing podcasts. I’m more naturally creative. so to me, until it got to be unsustainable, it wasn’t an issue. But, basically that’s what it looked like, which is just a lot of disjointed, different things going on. And the way that I like to describe it is. And the expert in neuroscience actually is the one who helped me with an analogy. I needed to start seeing my business like it was a car. The car is just an engine. It’s got parts. Right. It runs with or without you. I mean, you got to be driving the thing, but like, you know what I mean? Ye, you know, but it’s just a car. It exists outside of you and it’s just a machine. If the brake light goes out, you’re not automatically making it about you and your worthiness and all kinds of stuff, which is what most business owners do. You’re just like, oh, the brake lights out. So, before, from a psychological perspective, I had way too much of my own self worth wrapped up in the performance of my business, which is most business owners, let’s be real. And from the psychological perspective, I had to dislodge myself from that. And then from the actual tactical perspective, I mean, it was just a mess. We had to turn it into one machine that we could optimize. Not. You have software over here, software over there. 15 different strategies going on all at the same time, and not the proper support.
>> Isha Vela: Okay, so it’s really about streamlining, simplifying, and then automating it.
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah, yeah. And what’s interesting is we see this. We had an intensive with a client the other day, and I’ve noticed with a lot of my clients at least, is that it’s a lot of people not really chasing their actual desires. A lot of people are using their businesses as, number one, their own like, worthiness kind of thing, measure, yard measure. So then their emotions are all over the place and you’re all dysregulated.
>> Isha Vela: Yes.
>> Amanda Abella: So that’s number one. And then number two, A lot of people are using their businesses to avoid other things that they really actually want desire. I’ll give you an example. We were doing an intensive the other day with a client and one of the questions I’ve started asking all our clients, right, is take money off the table. What do you actually want? Because everybody says, I want more money.
>> Amanda Abella: I want more money, I want more profit, I want more than st’m like take money off the table, what do you want? Money’s a non issue. We’re not talking about money. What do you want? And that’s when I’ll hear what people’s true desires are. And then I’ll start realizing, oh, you’ve been over compllicating your business, right? You’ve been, sabotaging your business. You’ve been doing all this stuff so that you would have some sort of a problem to fix that would keep you busy to avoid this thing over here that you actually truly desire.
>> Isha Vela: M and what is the thing or what are some of those things? Just as examples, in the case of.
>> Amanda Abella: This person, she was also ready for her spouse, in the case of this person. But it could be, here’s another one, right? We have a client now, in our effortless revenue mastermind. She goes, I just wanna be able to take time off. I’m like, you could literally do that now if you wanted to. But she didn’t see it that way. they don’t trust it.
>> Isha Vela: Okay, so we go back to the spiritual thing of trusting and surrendering.
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah, right. so sometimes I just want to be able to take like a week off. And I’m looking at her business. I’m like, you could literally do that now, right? You just think that you need all these bells and whistles and extra fancy things. You don’t. You just need to make a decision and do it. And I’m like. And she goes, no, no, no, I can’t do that. And I’m like, well, why not? She goes, what if the money runs out? I’m like, you’ve set up in your business in a way where it’s not going to. And even if it does, do you think money’s just going to stop? Like you just can’t make money again.
>> Isha Vela: Yeah. Wow. Okay, just taking a deep breath here. I’m just like letting it land because I feel like in what the half an hour or less, 25 minutes that we’ve been sitting together, you’ve already shared so much that like huge nuggets of like spiritual Wisdom. Business wisdom. and how all of those come together and especially, like, the things that we avoid. Like, that is something that I haven’t talked about very much on here. So. Yeah. And I’m kind of taking it in for myself, too. Kind of like, I’m always like, is that me? Am I doing that? And. Yeah, interesting. Interesting question. And you, like you said earlier, you said something about, like, the money piece was the hardest part.
>> Amanda Abella: Ye.
>> Isha Vela: You should be a little bit more about that and even maybe describing some of the, like, some of the embodied aspects of it. Right. There’s mental, there’s emotional, there’s physical, sometimes even sensations. Right. Like nervous system stuff.
>> Amanda Abella: Oh, God. yeah. So remember, I grew up with the story, money equals anxiety.
>> Isha Vela: Yeah.
>> Amanda Abella: So anything having to do with money was just setting me off. So if I didn’t have enough money, it would set me off. If I had too much money, it would set me off. So that’s why it was the hardest, because it was the one that was most, intrinsically tied to the feeling of anxiety.
>> Isha Vela: Yes.
>> Amanda Abella: So it almost didn’t matter what I did. I had to learn how to regulate my nervous system, not make more money.
>> Isha Vela: Right. In either direction. It would have dysregulated completely. Yeah. And it sounds like there was like, a zone of tolerance that was like.
>> Amanda Abella: Okay, around 20, 30,000amonth was my zone of tolerance.
>> Isha Vela: Okay. Okay. Ye.
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah. I started going above that very quickly. And that’s when shit went off the rails.
>> Isha Vela: Right. When you, like, leave the zone of tolerance and you’re like, okay, now we’re dysregulated. It’s too much or now it’s too little. My bank account is lower than I want it to be. Right. Oay. And yah. So what. The sensations of anxiety. And so what skills did you use to support you through that? The heightening of anxiety.
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah. Well, journaling is huge. so even this morning. Right. Because we’re all human, I was getting all flustered about something, and I was like, wait a minute. This is not about the outside circumstance. This is me. This is me. Let me go journal this out. Why am I’so pissed? And all this stuff? And that helps because I just get it out of my body. I get it on of my system. other tools were tapping. other tool or emotional freedom technique. A, hypnosis. When I tell you I did it all, I literally did it all.
>> Isha Vela: But I would say the hypgnosis on yourself now.
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah, yeah. Ye. and the eft once, it was like, really Taught to me how to do it and how to do it properly. And I was like. And it’s funny, cause in the beginning I was really skeptical. I was like, this is all bullshit. Whatever. I’m going to surrender to it. I’m going to surrender to it and I’m going to give it a shot because I got nothing to lose. So let’s go. Literally, had nothing to lose at that point. So I was like, I’m going right. And then I started seeing results really fast. So I would do like a hypnosis around receiving and the next day I’d get free stuff at a bakery and I’d be like, So again, just like building the evidence, like you create reality and you just have to remove all the stuff that’s in the way of you getting what it is that you desire. I just started little by little building the evidence that it was true. And then I started manifesting big stuff like my husband and moving to another country, stuff I’d been talking about for years. And suddenly it started happening like this really fast. Yeah.
>> Isha Vela: Wow.
>> Amanda Abella: Those were more clean and less messy. So I could see why those manifested a lot faster than for example, money, where there was a lot more emotional mess and dysregulation going on.
>> Isha Vela: Yeah. And it was closer. It was more closely tied to your identity because it was ancestral. It was so familial.
>> Isha Vela: Yeah, yeah. And it was tied to your, like, to your Cubanss.
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah, of course. Yeah, yeah. And then, you know, I’m scratching the tip of the iceberg of everything my family went through fleeing the. I mean, we had family members put in prison work camps, people who had to flee the country overnight. my dad’s dad had to flee overnight, basically. my dad was sent to the United States at the age of 11 by himself. Right.
>> Isha Vela: To get him out of Peter Pen.
>> Amanda Abella: Peter. Yeah, yeahe. Well, right. It was like the same thing, but right before they named it, basically.
>> Isha Vela: Got it. Got it.
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah. and that’s again, he didn’t see my grandmother for 15 years because they wouldn’t let her off the island. I mean that’s literally scratching the surface. Political prisoners as family members. and the thing is, I grew up in Miami. We where growing up, most of my friends were Cuban. Right. Because Miami was overrun by Cubans. It still kind of is, but depending on the neighborhood now we got like all of Latin America there. But you know, or even if they weren’t Cuban, they were like Colombian and they were at the time they were like trying to get out of Colombia because of the issue with the cartels in Colombia growing up or there was just something. So I was like, oh, this is just normal. This is a part of being like Latin, you know, like, this is just like it was just around me all the time. So I never thought of questioning it.
>> Isha Vela: Yeah, exactly, exactly. And you just sort of jumping around for a moment. You also wrote a book.
>> Amanda Abella: Oh yeah, when I was 25. Yeah. So that’s when I was still the financial writer and I was still trying to figure out, I think, that’s when I was in this stage. So I have these stages that I’ve created. Let me see if I can remember them by heart. the first one is basic biach or basic Betty. And that’s like the completely dramatic female. although I have shown this to men and they say it’s similar but slightly different because their journey’a little bit different. there are. But they relate to it enough where they’re like, oh, okay, I know how to plug in how this would work for a man, but here’s what it is for a woman. you have basic biach, basic Betty, completely dramatic, not self aware at all. Just drama, drama, drama all the time. Wounded feminine, basically. Then you go into this stage of awareness where you’re like, oh, wait, maybe the problem’s me. so when I wrote that book, I was in that stage of awareness from. I think maybe the problem’s me. Right? And I thought a book was like the thing to do. And I mean, it kind of was. I mean I got a bunch of speaking gigs at financial companies over and stuff like that. But I was in, I was just in that self awareness spacease and I was like, oh, okay, so here’s how money works. I wrote it for me. And because I was getting a bunch of questions from my blog, at the time. Then the next stage is what I call the huntress, right? And that’s what I started going into when I started making money. It’s like, okay, I’m taking responsibility now. Then I went into what I call wounded man. Right. Sorry dudes, I just can’t think of another name right now for the archetype. And that’s when I went way overboard. So that’s like when the hunress goes.
>> Isha Vela: Overboard, it’s kind of like it’s like hunting and then chasing money. And it just has an energy of desperation around it.
>> Amanda Abella: No, it’s just like you’ve gone way too far into hustle, got it and you’re totally dysregulated.
>> Amanda Abella: So for example, I’ve had clients in the past that, for example, they ran a salon and they did that for a number of years and at some point they were working seven days a week and they remember telling me stories of like, I remember sitting home and I was so exhausted that I sat in front of the TV and I didn’t even turn it on. And then I just sat there for like hours with a turned off TV because I was just so fried.
>> Isha Vela: Wow.
>> Amanda Abella: It s stuff like that. Righte. it’s when we go overboard in what I guess in our spaces they would call the masculine. For women, we’ve gone too far on that side of the spectrum and now we’re alling dysregulated again. and everything’s about hustle and it’s a mess and we’re overworking and here come the hormone problems and here comes the adrenal fatigue and all that stuff. And that’s actually quite difficult to get out of because most people end up having some really intense realizations about themselves.
>> Isha Vela: Yeah.
>> Amanda Abella: Because the next stage of that is queen and training. And that’s when you start rebuilding your business from a place where there isn’t as much hustle. So you start focusing on scalability systems, things like that. The thing that I didn’t realize when I created this three years ago, that I understand now, is that has to come in conjunction with a lot of mindset work and a lot of inner healing.
>> Isha Vela: Yeah.
>> Amanda Abella: Because that’s when everybody’s stuff really starts to come up. They’re like, no, no, no, I can’t possibly make money like that because I’ve made it this way the whole time. And if I’m not the one doing it, who’s gonna do it? And what do you mean machines are going toa do all the work. And at this point they had to work to get to a certain level. And now the goal is now you have to actually work less. I mean, that throws people for a loop.
>> Isha Vela: I mean, when you think about it, Amanda, like what you’re talking about, working in that way is completely new in the sense like yes, we had things like, I don’t know, auto, automotive companies with automation, but people were running all of that. So you had those sort of bigger scale type of businesses like that. But in terms of the, I don’t know, I think for women especially who 1973, we can finally get our own credit card. We have less of that timeline to practice. Some of these Things of not being the person in the trenches doing all the things of the business.
>> Amanda Abella: You’d be surprised because I see a lot of men struggle with it too. Yeah, Right. It’s just that their journey of getting over it is a little bit different because they got different conditioning, but that, ended up in the same place.
>> Isha Vela: Got it.
>> Amanda Abella: Right. And their conditioning is I’m the warrior.
>> Isha Vela: Okay. And for women, it’s. I’m the martyr.
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah. That’s a good way of putting it.
>> Isha Vela: Wow. So it’s o.
>> Amanda Abella: so that’s what I’m saying. It’s like, I’ve shown this to men and they’re like, we actually go through something very similar, but it’s different because a, they’re different from us. Right. The energy is different. like, for example. I’ll give you an example. My husband can work way more hours than me. He just can because he has the testosterone to do it. I do not.
>> Isha Vela: Y.
>> Amanda Abella: And that’s okay. We just accept that. And he doesn’t want me working as much as him, for example. He would never want that for me. but I’m just giving that an example of how. So we’re, like, physically different. Right. We’re psychologically different. and we’ve gotten different conditioning, but it’s been damaging just the same.
>> Isha Vela: Okay. Okay. Yeah. And I mean, you know, like, as a gender fluid person, like, I’m not super into, like, binary and stuff, but there is also, like, I know for myself in terms of, like, my age, aspects of my biology combined with age that have made, like, how I show up in my business, it’s just had to change.
>> Amanda Abella: It’s also seasons of life. You know, I’m running business differently as a married woman than a non married woman. I have other things I have to do now. Or we’ve had clients come to us that they’re ready to start a family. Okay. Your business has to change.
>> Isha Vela: Exactly. Exactly. Like, maybe going from one to one, one on one to one, to many, and even just scaling on that simplest level.
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah. So, yeah, men, actually, what we’ve noticed, and it’s interesting because a lot of my husband’s clients are men. I’m like, wait a minute. They’re like, dealing with a lot of the same stuff. I’m over here thinking, like, women are in a silo or something, and I’m like, no, it’s all of us.
>> Isha Vela: Yeah.
>> Amanda Abella: yeah, it’s totally all of us. It’s just that their version of development and the journey that they. It’s like the difference between the hero’s journey and the heroine’s journey.
>> Isha Vela: Yes, yes.
>> Amanda Abella: And it’s slightly different.
>> Isha Vela: Yeah, yeah. So tell me, Amanda, what does your business look like now, both from the systems side of things and like, just like, financially like. And what does your day to day look like?
>> Amanda Abella: Oh, this is so good.
>> Isha Vela: You’re like, I was waiting for this.
>> Amanda Abella: Moment because it’s like juicy now, right? Yeah. So six figure business. So, we’re there, but now most of it’s automated. That’s the difference. And because most of it’s automated, our profits went through the roof.
>> Isha Vela: Wow.
>> Amanda Abella: So step point number one was really like, we have to automate this and slash expenses. Right. And then now we can start moving into making money. And in my case, we have two. Well, at least I have two main offers right now. And then I’ll talk about what my husband does. but basically it’s all based on what is actually scalable. so for example, in my case, we have the YouTube mastery workshop. I’ll get into why I’m such a big fan of YouTube in a second.
>> Isha Vela: Tell me about it.
>> Amanda Abella: And why that workshop exists. Because that’s a part of the question. And then we have our effortless revenue mastermind, which is, an annual commitment. And basically you get access to every program I’ve ever taught. Every program my husband and I have ever taught together. There’s an order in which to go through the things. We meet twice a week on group calls, and you get access to us on Slack. Everything’s great. So we build up the recurring revenue, we build up the repeat business. people get what they need. and then on the videos, it’s like the more tactical stuff. And on the calls, that’s where we’re picking up all the mindset stuff.
>> Isha Vela: Okay.
>> Amanda Abella: And that’s where we’re handling those things.
>> Isha Vela: Oay.
>> Amanda Abella: So there’s that. Right. And then on my husband’s side, he does, consulting for equity. So he works with more seven and eight figure businesses. Same thing. He’s like a systems genius. Right. They have more complicated problems. My husband loves to deal with complicated problems. He loves to go solve them. Which is part of the masculine. They love to go solve problems. Right. The feminine is different. We don’t want to solve looking problems. Right. But the masculine loves to do it. It’s one of the ways in which they give. so he’s fixing more complicated messes, let’s put it that way. and he does consulting for equity. So it’s either on hey, here’s the VIP day. And basically the VIP day is the diagnostic where we really get under there and find out how bad this all is. And usually it’s oh, it’s bad. He had a client recently that was bleeding out 50,000 doars a month. Yeah.
>> Isha Vela: Like just ine expenses.
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah.
>> Isha Vela: O wow.
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah. And that’s what I’m saying. It’s like, wait a minute, what I was dealing with coming up on seven figures. All these people are dealing with it too. They’re just dealing with it at another level.
>> Isha Vela: Scale.
>> Amanda Abella: Just on a bigger scale. But it’s the exact same thing.
>> Isha Vela: Yes, yes.
>> Amanda Abella: And then, from there, depending on the business, then he’s building up a portfolio of companies where he has equity. So that’s like. And that’s scale. That’s thinking a lot bigger. Like, hey, I’m not trying to run five businesses, I’ve got equity in five or six businesses. Ah. So that’s kind of where we’re at with it. And then in terms of my business, most of that’s automated so I mostly just do video now. now I’m getting back into podcast interviews and things like that. But basically, because he got so much space back for me, Oh, I forgot to mention one thing. So when you join us in our mastermind, we’ve already pre built all the automations. So it’s not like we have to do that for people. We just get them on the right software, pop it into their accounts, they edit, they’re good to go. Amazing ###ing m and we were the guinea pigs for all those automations.
>> Isha Vela: So I have such a curiosity question, what are your favorite platforms that you use M as part of YouTube?
>> Amanda Abella: YouTube is my favorite. Yeah. So YouTube. And to give you an idea, I’ve tested YouTube on three different channels. Right. Because I had so much space that now I could just be the creative again. And I’m like, yes, my favorite part. and I was like, okay, well I’m not gonna go around posting on Facebook 10 times a day because ain’t nobody got time for that. and who knows what’s going on with all the stuff happening. Like now I’m back to it. But I was like, I really just got to focus on the most leveraged thing. The most leveraged thing when I started comparing all of them was obviously YouTube. And the thing about YouTube is you have over 80% of households that make over six figures a year. US households that make six figures a year, they’re hanging out on YouTube the next closest one is Facebook, around 60%.
>> Isha Vela: Oay.
>> Amanda Abella: Like no other platform even comes close.
>> Isha Vela: Woway.
>> Amanda Abella: In terms of high quality leads, LinkedIn’s like around 50 and TikTok’s bottom of the barrel, but we already knew that, so. Wow.
>> Isha Vela: Okay.
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah. In terms of percentages, it’s also like leads from YouTube convert at three to four times higher rates.
>> Isha Vela: Really?
>> Amanda Abella: Oh, yeah.
>> Isha Vela: Okay.
>> Amanda Abella: Right. And we tested this stuff out with a new channel, which I’ll get to just to like test the theories. And we found that this is true, right? This is actually true. so that’s one of the reasons why. And the other reason is because of the longevity. I can make one video, it’s getting me views and leads for years. So long as it’s optimized correctly.
>> Isha Vela: Right, right. Which is the key is SEO optimization.
>> Amanda Abella: 100% my favorite thing. now fortunately for me, because I’d done all the marketing for banks, I already knew about SEO optimization. We were just doing blogs back then, not videos. so that’s my favorite. Right? To the point where we started three channels, right? And I was like, you know what, let me. Because, the other thing that happened, we have three channels. So we have like my channel that I’ve had for 10 years, that I’ve been slowly fixing little by little with what I know. Now, we have, ah, a channel just on mindset, which I only really just started taking seriously. And even yesterday I post new video, number one ranking on the channel, got leads, boom. And it’s a brand new channel.
>> Isha Vela: Okay.
>> Amanda Abella: And then we started one, because we live in other countries now for expats, because we were getting so many questions about our lifestyle.
>> Isha Vela: I follow that one.
>> Amanda Abella: You follow that one, right? Well, we turned that one into six figures in sales in 90 days.
>> Isha Vela: Wow, that’s crazy.
>> Amanda Abella: YouTube’s my favorite, right. We weren’t doing anything for a month on social media and all three of those channels were growing on their own. Okay, okay, so YouTube’s my favorite, right? And now that we’ve like, really? And, we teach that in our YouTube mastery workshop. And to give you an idea, we took one person who took that workshop, and they’re a Canadian bookkeeper. And they’re like, I’m not attracting any Canadians to my channel. And I’m like, okay, well, let’s start optimizing this. And within six weeks, here come the Canadian. She had a smaller channel, so it was easier to do that. Right? Not like one I’ve had for 15 years that I gotta go fix CA. Because I didn’t know what I was doing.
>> Isha Vela: And you have to go through each video.
>> Amanda Abella: I mean I’m little by little. Right. I’m experimenting and actually reading the data. Right. Then we have another client who took that one and he’s a relationship coach. he coaches single women on how to get their husbands basically or how to have more harmonious relationships. I probably is probably a better way of saying that. because he works with a lot of married women too. And he was posting on Facebook like 10 times a day. And he’s like, it’s just getting harder and harder and harder on Facebook where I gotta write like 10 long form posts a day to make almost seven figures. Like that’s ridiculous. I’m looking for something more leveraged. Within six weeks we had them at like 40,000 views a month.
>> Isha Vela: That’s incredible.
>> Amanda Abella: That’s incredible. Yeah, yeah. So that’s YouTube’s my favorite. Right. and that’s where we spend most of our time focusing. and again now it’s easier, right? Because now like we’ve gotten into a flow about it and now I’m starting to layer in more short form stuff and really learning that. But all time favorite YouTube.
>> Isha Vela: Yeah. So tell the listener how they can find you on YouTube. Like what’s the name of the channel?
>> Amanda Abella: So the business one is make money your honey. So that’s where we talk about like yesterday I posted a video on like this one social media post, got us 60 free leads. Right. So I’ll do that on that channel. Right therePR. And the reason why I have three different channels is because of the SEO.
>> Isha Vela: Okay.
>> Amanda Abella: Right. Otherwise YouTube doesn’t understand what is going on and doesn’t know who to push the content to.
>> Isha Vela: Okay.
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah. So clarification. Right. Y the second channel is Entrepreneur Expat, which is the one you know about, which is like, hey, we’re living this expat life. we interview people living and expats living in all kinds of different countries. and then in addition to that, we’re in Mexico right now. So there’s a lot of content about Mexico, but we’re answering questions like how do you get a bank account in another country? Or what’s the visa process like? And that’s what cities to check out in the countries, things like that. so that one’s more like lifestyle, but also. Yeah, mostly more lifestyle. And then the next last one is the one that’s just about mindset manifesting and spirituality and things like that, which is like, brand new. Right? but it’s already generating weeds. Maybe we got, like, 101 subscribers and it’s generating leads.
>> Isha Vela: What’s the name of that one?
>> Amanda Abella: Mindful Success Path.
>> Isha Vela: Mindful Success.
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah. And people are like, three YouTube channels. I’m like, once you figure out how this thing works, that’s actually pretty easy to maintain. The hard part is the beginning. But the way that we’ve broken it down is we have a workshop. If you can dedicate like, three hours to the workshop and four hours to executing, you’re already seeing results.
>> Isha Vela: Wow.
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah.
>> Isha Vela: Okay. You sold it to me just now.
>> Amanda Abella: Okay. You signed up. We’re teaching it next week. We’ll get you signed upay live. Yeah. and a part of that, right, going back to what you were saying before about what’s changed in the business is I didn’t pay attention to any of that stuff before. I was like, yeah, my clients are making money. But I didn’t know, like, oh, all you need to do is dedicate three hours here and four hours over here based on what the most successful clients have done and you’re going to get. I had no idea. I wasn’t tracking any of that stuff. Probably should, because it makes things easier to sell, which.
>> Isha Vela: Incredible. I feel like this whole. This whole talk, this whole episode is, like, just so full. I feel like I just had a meal because I just feel, like, deeply satisfied.
>> Amanda Abella: Oh, I’m glad.
>> Isha Vela: No, it was. It was like you just dropped so many gold nuggets in here and. Yeah. thank you. Thank you so much for sharing your story and your process and your, like, what you do now and what your life looks and feels like now and showing other people what’s possible for them as well.
>> Amanda Abella: Yeah, I mean, thank you so much for having me and inviting me on, because like I said, I haven’t done this in about 2 years while I was going through all that stuff. And I’m very excited to start talking about this stuff more. And this is actually the first time I’ve ever been able to do it very succinctly. So thank you for giving me the space to do that.
>> Isha Vela: That’s beautiful. I love that. Amanda. thank you again.
>> Amanda Abella: Thank you.
>> Isha Vela: Thank you for listening to today’s episode. Remember to hit the subscribe button to get notified of new episodes dropping on the new and full moons of each month. And if you haven’t already, leave us a five star review on itunes to make sure that everyone who needs this transmission receives it until the next episode. I’m sending you fierce fier love.