Permission to Kick Ass

Do what you want & break all the rules with Jana Bartlett Alonso

• Angie Colee • Episode 184

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We started with a "podcast telenovela" and it only got more philosophical (and eye opening) from there. Today's guest is Jana Bartlett Alonso, and our convo will make you rethink everything you know about success, happiness, and personal growth. Fair warning: this convo might just flip your world upside down in the best way possible.

Quick content warning - we cover death/dying and abusive relationships in this one. Our approach includes positivity and hope, but I want you to make sure you're OK first and foremost.

Can't-miss moments:

  • My favorite quotes: “My family cracked open and the secrets started pouring out,” and “She had to learn how to die, and I had to learn how to live.” 

  • How is it that we can simultaneously feel like there's all the time in the world, and we're so far behind our peers? Jana reveals why this kind of duality thinking is actually an entrepreneurial superpower...

  • Are you operating your business (and life) like a vending machine? If "insert coin, receive happiness" isn't working for you, maybe give Jana's idea a try...

  • Trolls be trolling: Jana and I share our experiences with being in the spotlight and having the haters come for you with a vengeance (plus our tips for letting it all roll off you)... 

  • Spoiler alert: not only does nobody care about your illusion of perfection... who actually starts a story with "So I woke up and it was a really great day!"? Jana explains why embracing the suck will make you a better person and entrepreneur...

Jana's bio:

Jana (HAH-nah) Alonso is a renowned integrative healer and business growth strategist with a deep commitment to helping individuals achieve high levels of wealth, joy, love, impact, and growth. As the founder of The School of Integrative Healing, Jana has developed a powerful system of healing that combines multiple modalities and dimensions to provide transformative experiences for her clients. Jana went from making €400 a month, to making her first million using a combination of the practical strategies she teaches, but more than anything the inner work. 

Jana takes a unique approach to business growth, recognizing that success demands a holistic understanding of our multidimensional nature. She believes that thriving in business involves not only addressing the physical and practical aspects but also our emotional and mental patterns, our soul connection, and energetic mastery. In her role as a trauma healing expert, Jana is dedicated to assisting individuals in healing from past traumas, as she considers trauma healing an essential component of the integrative healing process. Her ultimate goal is to support clients in attaining emotional and physical well-being helping them reach their full potential. 

Resources and links:

  • Jana on Insta (PM with "podcast" to get a freebie)

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Angie Colee:

Welcome to Permission to Kick Ass, the show that gives you a virtual seat at the bar for the real conversations that happen between entrepreneurs. I'm interviewing all kinds of business owners, from those just a few years into freelancing to CEOs helming nine-figure companies. If you've ever worried that everyone else just seems to get it and you're missing something or messing things up, this show is for you. I'm your host, Angie Coley, and let's get to it. Hey, and welcome back to Permission to Kick Ass. With me today is my new friend, Hannah Bartlett Alonzo. Say hi, Hi Now. We almost got into a fight before we started recording because we discovered that Hannah is a Mac girl, an Apple girl and I am a PC and an Android girl, and she was like oh, I can't do this interview now, I'm just bringing a little bit of Spanish drama.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

So you know what, you know what's coming. Right, you know what's coming, I've preempted it.

Angie Colee:

Oh gosh, is this the telenovela issue or episode of permission to kick ass?

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

No, it will be. And it's so funny that you just use that as a reference, because my clients say this. They say you know, doom programs with Hannah is like watching spiritual or spiritual Netflix, because I bring. But in my defense, okay, I've got defense. And in my defense, right, are you going to remember a teaching If I tell you it all vanilla, all chill? Are you going to remember it If I embellish it, if I add a plot line, if I make you it all vanilla, all chill? Or you're going to remember it If I embellish it, if I add a plot line, if I make it larger than life, if I really sink that in, you're going to go. Now, I remembered that, right, and so it works.

Angie Colee:

Yes, it does. Well, I mean, that's really the whole point of this show to getting better and learning through each other's stories. So, speaking of stories, tell us a little bit about what you do, what your business is. I want to hear it all.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

Okay, amazing. It's a big question when people ask that. I'm like how much of the story do I give? I do a lot of things. I'm going to give you a synopsis.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

I got into personal development 12 years ago, so I'm 31. You know, when you get to that age, you're like how old am I? Old am I? And I had to pause for a second nearly 32. And I began kind of this personal development journey when I was 19. And, as you can probably predict, it's because things in life weren't going as swimmingly as they could.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

I'd been diagnosed with an array of mental health conditions depression, an eating disorder, social anxiety and in the same three weeks my mother was diagnosed with cancer and I had let's call it an existential crisis, right, really, this existential crisis and realization of wait a minute, I've done everything that I was told to do. But I'm a good girl. Do you know what I mean? I got a boyfriend, had sex for the first time. I've got a group of friends. I, you know, get good grades. I couldn't do better in my. I mean, I'm English, as you can tell as well from the British accent. So in my final exams I had these phenomenal and I felt like I jumped through all of these hoops of what I should do to have like this beautiful life, right, and I wasn't happy. Right, I wasn't happy and I wasn't happy. Right, I wasn't happy, I was very depressed. Hence the diagnoses. They also kindly diagnosed me with severe depression, not just depression. Thank you very much.

Angie Colee:

Overachiever.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

Yeah, overachiever, thank you, you saw me Can't just be depressed, I've got to be severely depressed. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Angie Colee:

Dark Angie humor, sorry.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

No, it's brilliant. I loved it and you've nailed the personality type right. Very short frame time. You nailed it. And in that same three weeks, when my mom was diagnosed with cancer and I had all of these diagnoses, it was kind of like the family cracked open and I started being told the secrets that I'd never been told. Mom's been depressed since she was 19,. Right, we come from this family. I come from a family of refugees, you know, from the civil war in Spain and you know all of these things that I hadn't been told because they were protecting me came out and I was hit with all of this information and I had this really big realization.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

I was studying psychology as an undergrad and I was looking at my mom and I was like, okay, she's done everything that you're meant to do, but for 50 years, right, and it hasn't worked. She's still not happy, she's still on medication, and now she's sick, now she's got cancer. And there was something in my mind at 19. And now I tell the story and it blows my mind. That goes this doesn't work, this doesn't work, this is not what I choose. And you know, I finished my psych degree, my psychology degree, with three awards of excellence. I was the top performing undergrad in my psychology degree of that year. You know I couldn't have done better. There was no space to do better and I was like, well, if this is the best that they've got and I'm the best in this year and I still think that this is rubbish, right, then I'm not going to go down this line. And so I would have been offered, you know, master's scholarships, doctorate. I could have gone that route, it was available to me, but I made a very sideways choice and I was like, okay, I'm going to find out what it means to heal.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

This is over a decade ago, so no one was talking about healing. Everyone thought I was insane. No one was talking about it. And I was like I'm going to find out what it means. And I remember calling my dad and saying, dad, when I find out, you know, I'm going to bring this to the world. And I didn't realize the weight of those words. I didn't realize where it would take me. Now, right, I just knew that I was picking another path and I'm going to kind of sum up the last 10 years as succinctly as I can, but I did all of the modalities that everyone does nutrition yoga.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

And then my mom was diagnosed with terminal cancer and I went okay. So even the surface level alternative ain't a big enough bandaid for what's going on in my family. I became a full-time carer when I was 23. My mother died when I was 26. And it was the greatest and most beautiful awakening of my life, because sometimes we awaken through shock and pain. Let's hang on with that, and sometimes we don't. It doesn't matter, okay, no judgment, no good, no bad, no wrong.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

And I really was faced with this situation of Hannah. If you really want to learn how to heal, you need to go further, deeper, wider than most people do, because they're not put in the desperate position that you've been put in. You know, most people in their early twenties are out drinking. I was in hospices, you know do my drinking. I grew up in England, but you know, I quit alcohol by the time I was 22, you know, and I was.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

I did my traveling years and all of these things, but I was very, very focused on the healing work and I discovered, oh, we're multidimensional beings right. We're physical, emotional, mental. We have got a soul right. And this isn't just me saying this, I'm working with people that are proving it, that are doing the research behind it, put a pin in their belly about that, because that's really epic and we're energetic. And I realized, oh, just because the trauma happened to my grandparents doesn't mean that that's in my DNA, right. Just because I haven't directly experienced this doesn't mean that the stress and the anxiety and the fear has down the genetic line. And so when I started doing this work, not only did I get happier, healthier, have more wellbeing, I realized the same stuff that had unlocked that for me unlocked relationships. I'm going to put trigger warning here. You can decide where you keep this. I've experienced sexual abuse as a child and as a teen. Romantic relationships for me were very challenging. They are not anymore Same work.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

You know, when I was doing the trauma healing and then I applied it to business after my mom died and it was this thing of okay, this has worked in every other area of my life. I'm committed to bringing the healing work to the world. What happens if I apply this to business? You know I was hitting quarter of a million launches in my first year in three months. That's not normal. That is not normal. We hit seven figures at two and a half years, you know, and you know having, you know, a hundred K weeks, all of these things.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

And it's not about the financial milestones, even though it is cause I love the money and I love the fact that I get to have this level of freedom as well, but it was the way that we did it. We didn't do it in the way it was being taught, we did it in this really integral, embodied, healing journey way, and I continue to do that. And so I really preach the inner work as a standard for all of us, you know, so that we can have the lives that we want to live, whether it's in our relationships, our bank accounts, our purpose, our, you know, impact it, for me it's really the same. It's all part of the spiritual journey and when it's what I've come here to do. That was a long way of telling you who I am and my story, but I think you've got the highlights.

Angie Colee:

I love that too, and we talked a little bit about about it before we hit record. But like the prevalence of neurodivergence and like mental health crises and entrepreneurship and how many of us are drawn to entrepreneurship because we just don't function like a neurotypical person, I feel like there has been a theme among all of my episodes recently that deals with that, and I think that's also why self-development, self-improvement, becomes such a big part of building a successful business. I've made that joke so many times, but it's the reason it's so funny, is it's true? Almost 80% of what you do in business is just working on yourself, because every challenge you come into like it's a direct confrontation with some story, some trauma, some experience that left a scar on you that you haven't dealt with yet, and like you have the big launch and then suddenly there's a meltdown and you're like why am I not happy? Like this happens all the time in business and that ties back so perfectly to what you said.

Angie Colee:

Like I was, I wrote it down, my family cracked open and the secrets started pouring out. Like oh, oh, my gosh, that's exactly what I hoped to do with this show to just kind of like crack that shell and have the secrets start sharing. Um, and you wrote something beautiful before the show that I actually wrote down because I wanted to quote. Like when your mom got that diagnosis and you got your diagnosis, she had to learn how to die and you had to learn how to live. And I was just like, oh, we're saying that out loud because that's something that people need to hear.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

You know it's, it's oh God. You just said so much. Firstly about the neurodivergence, and then we'll speak about the mum piece. I, I'm officially unemployable and I think there's great freedom in that. You know, more people are designing a life on their terms than where they get to express who they are, and we realize that neurodivergence isn't really neurodivergence. It's just your gifts, right? I'm severely overachiever, again dyslexic, right, I'm also bilingual and I do a lot of things that I was not meant to be able to do, but I can do that I was not meant to be able to do, but I can do. And it was very interesting.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

My father, when I was diagnosed with dyslexia you know this was back in it's. It doesn't sound that long ago, but it was you know, when I was diagnosed with dyslexia, some of my abilities on the normal distribution, I was put as a mild mental retardation. You're not allowed to say that to people. Now, you did then, but my father and my mother were amazing. They were like Hannah. Now, you did then, but my father and my mother were amazing. They were like Hannah. Don't listen, they're like that just means you're a genius. And so then what they would do is they'd send me all of these articles of these celebrities and business owners that had severe dyslexia, right, and how it was actually their genius. And so I've always believed everything that makes me different is my gift, and we just are in a society that don't know how to see that yet, right? So my hyper fixation you probably understand hyper fixation, why I have a business. Do you know what I mean? Like you know all of these things. You know we really get to choose how we experience it.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

But let's go back to that sentence about you know, I wrote a chapter in a book many years ago about this, but my mother had to learn how to die and I had to learn how to live. So poignant, because our society sees death as a failure and that's not true, right, right. So my mother died peacefully and beautifully, albeit in hospital, and is the single most transformational moment in my life to witness my mother die with grace. And there was something imprinted in me, right, people are very afraid to talk about their mortality, but that opened possibility. Oh, my God, I get to die in peace. I get to die in grace, right and simultaneously, the living peace was at 23.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

Went, oh, wow, like I, I'm not going to live forever. So get intentional, hannah. You know, and that's what I mean about hospices versus being out, you know, getting drunk. You know I was sat at home and I had been for an existential crisis, let's be honest. But it served its, served its function and purpose because it got me thinking really and this is the business thing, you know, when I'm let's put the energetics for this when I'm at least 97, closing my eyes to peacefully depart to other realms, you know I realized I want to look back on my life and go oh my, I did that, like I did that, and sure I was scared at times and sure there were challenges, but like I, you know, I've got a friend, sarah Blacker, and she says this. She says I feel that you know, when I pass, I want me and my friends to be holding hands and we just take this bow, we like we've just done this amazing show you know what an incredible way to live.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

I love that. Not just surviving we, we, we. It's almost like this great performance that we get to put on planet earth, and so that's what I mean about learning how to live. It really shifted how I perceived all of life, and it was massive, massive gift.

Angie Colee:

That brought up a couple of things for me, like, first of all, you talked about death as a failure. My brain immediately populated, I think in movies, and I think in movie lines. That's part of my particular neurodivergence. So my brain went to ever after when the king and his son are arguing about what the son needs to do to be king and he's like I will deny you the crown and live forever.

Angie Colee:

That's what popped up for me, because I was just thinking, oh, death is a failure. So somehow we think if we can just conquer it and live forever, then that's going to. But I think, like, death is simply the end result of life, and what I would hope for is that it's a life well-lived, exactly like you said, that the end result is we go to whatever comes next, knowing we did everything that we could. And then that brings up the other point that I wrote down, which is, like this seems interesting to me the dichotomy of I've got all the time in the world and I'm running out of time, because I see that happening a lot in entrepreneurship too. I'm so behind, I'm so behind. Look at what this person is doing, look at what that person is doing. And also, I've got so much time left to achieve this, I'm going to move slowly, as if the clock isn't running out. I don't know where I really wanted to go with that, but it came up so this is so good.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

Okay, I love this, I love this, I love this. I have so much to say on this. So it is holding the duality and being an entrepreneur or being just a human being alive on planet earth, basically means learning to be able to hold duality. So when I mean about, you know, focus on, I am mortal. For me, that doesn't create stress and it doesn't create pressure. It creates intentionality. So this is very different, because we can feel that we have so much time, and this is something that I teach to my clients and I practice myself. Right, because I do a lot of things. I'm on TV, I've got investments in Dubai, in real estate, I write curriculums, I've got so many businesses, and so I don't want to live a stressed life. I want to do a lot of things, but I want to live a relaxed life, and you can't have both right, and so it's all about our state of being, as we live, and so intentionality. This is a really good example of it and I'm going to bring this together.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

When my mom passed away, I'd had this really crappy pattern with my men, right, just choosing, like very inappropriate choices in partners. You know, choosing partners that were abusive or just choosing partners that never made sense for me or I didn't even like that much just bizarre choices, really, and obviously it was stemming from my belief systems and my trauma and things from my family lineage, and so when my mom passed away, I got intentional right. The time is now, hannah. You don't want to have another crappy relationship, do you? You want to have another nourishing relationship. But I accidentally did have another crappy relationship because sometimes the process is messy. Okay, and that's fine because the process is messy, because it is nothing wrong with you. So I but I made a choice and it was, you know, I want to have kids. This was the choice, and I'm still in process of the creation. I want to have kids. I want to have a job that gives me freedom to be able to mother in the way that I want to mother my mother's.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

My memory of my mom was just being asleep on the couch after work every day because she was so exhausted. So I was choosing, not that right. I wanted to have kids. I wanted to have a partner that's like me, a bit off the wall, a bit weird, a bit of an adventurer, right? Someone that you're like we're a team and like you know, me and my partner have moved house five times in the four years that we've been together. And because we think it's fun, we don't find it stressful, right, and so I wanted that and I was very clear on that, and so the intentionality is okay. Then it would not make sense for me to go out tonight, get drunk and just sleep with someone, right? That's not in alignment with what I want. So the intentionality is acting in the present moment, right, in congruence to what you want. That's what intentionality is okay. So it's congruence, it's choice, it's decision, it's not pressure and stress.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

Because I didn't then go well, I've got to meet him tomorrow. I didn't care when I didn't care, when I just knew that that's what I wanted, I knew that I had faith and trust that it would come, and certainty, no matter the evidence, and I knew that I was willing to do the work around my own patterns. So that's what I did. I just got to work and I met a man prior to my partner that was willing to be committed, but he was, you know, perpetuating some of my trauma patterns and, um, I ended things and then I sat down and instead of having a pity party, I had a pity party for as long as I needed to, a couple of days. Right Cried boohoo, poor me, that was mean, you're mean, um. And then I got pulled, pulled my knickers up, pulled my socks up, whatever you want to say, right. And you know he said okay. Well, how am I matched to this? Oh, han, you're very submissive. Most people wouldn't tolerate this. That was helpful for me.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

So sometimes you know, the process to what we want means having a situation that makes you see all the ways that you're perpetuating the old pattern. Nothing wrong with that. That's the mess, okay. But we sit down, we take responsibility and eventually we're going to get to where we want. It doesn't matter how long. The fun, the fun of existence, is the process to what we want. The reason that business owners are stressed is that they think that when we achieve the result, they're going to feel differently. That's not true. A lot of people get to big money and they they're going to feel differently. That's not true. People get to big money and they realize they're the same person. It's because they didn't do the inner work at the same time. So for me it's so much time to create what I want, but I'm intentional with that time. I'm not going to spend it on things that are the opposite of what I want.

Angie Colee:

Do you see? Oh, I love that, I think that makes perfect sense and I love I wrote down and I underlined a couple of times. The process is messy and I wanted to highlight that for everybody listening because, especially in entrepreneurship, we have this expectation of perfection. In the age of social media, when everybody is sharing their highlight reel and you don't get to see the messy stuff Like look, I can't tell you how many times, with my obsession with sharing the messy middle right and the mistakes and the missteps and the mental health challenges and things like that, I've been told by mentors in the past don't do that. It shakes people's faith in you. Don't do that. Here are all these reasons why you shouldn't be talking about this stuff and, to a certain extent, right. There are things like if I haven't processed something, if I'm still in the middle of something, now is not the time to talk about it and invite the outside world into that. I've still got to sit with it, let it pass, learn what I can before I'm ready to share with it, and so, in that sense, I don't share from the open wounds when I'm still bleeding. Right, let's stop the bleeding and then I can talk about this and share that scar with people and be like okay, here's what I learned. But I also learned that so much suffering happens, like you talked about at the beginning with your family, when we protect other people from what we're going through. Whether it's altruistic, like I don't want to set you up to think that this is super hard, and like you have to struggle, I get that. And also like my struggle is mine, it may not be yours, but we're all struggling to a certain extent and it doesn't make you wrong, it doesn't make you bad, it doesn't make you a failure and I also loved. This ties to what you said about the pity party. Like, so that relationship didn't go the way I wanted to. I had a pity party for as long as I needed to and I rail about this all the time.

Angie Colee:

Feel the feelings. Stop pretending like you can shove it down like a beach ball and just hold it beneath the service. That thing is going to pop up and smack you in the face when you don't need it to right If you don't just deal with it and allow it to pass. Feelings aren't facts. They don't have to control your life. You don't have to act from that place of feelings, but you do have to allow these things to pass and to teach you, whatever they're trying to surface, to show you about your life that you need to pay attention to, so that you're not just following the motions and when I say following the motions, I've been there, hannah's been there. We talked about this. We have, all, I think, fallen into that trap where these are the steps, I follow the steps. Where is my happiness? I put the coins in the machine Give me my happiness, and it doesn't work that way. I wish it did, though.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

Yes, it would be so much easier.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

I'm like why don't we get a five steps to whatever we want? But I think I think you're really speaking to something really important and I'm going to say this in a way that hopefully is is received. But I think the way that the online industry has gone is that it's been a breeding ground for entitlement, because a lot of people post just wins and they don't post what it's taken to get to those wins, and by that I mean the grit, the strength, the dealing with the haters, the dealing with the dips, the dealing with things that work well, the dealing with my family. I'm suddenly making all this money and my family don't feel cool about it, like all of the things that happen behind the scenes. And so people buy these courses, right, and and you know, and then they, they, they feel that they're entitled to these big cash results, right, and it doesn't work that way and it's not helpful. And so you know, it's the distinction between Prince and King and Princess and Queen, and so entrepreneurialism gets to become a process of our adult maturation, right, and I've gone through it. You know.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

I'm like I bought the program and I did the launch and I didn't make $7,500 million. What do you mean, yeah, I thought that's what I, yeah, exactly. And and then I realized, wait, a minute, you know the responsibility is in me and and you know every single path. Do you know what makes a really good entrepreneur? An entrepreneur that is really really good is someone that doesn't copy, is someone that's innovative right and innovative moves take bravery and gumption and grit and time right, and so I think that it's not about you know, like you said, it's not always appropriate to share from an open wound, because if you're wobbly and then someone says something, you're going to wobble even more and that doesn't serve them and it doesn't serve you, right? So we don't need to go around and not protect ourselves. I used to share a lot more about my personal life than I do now, because then I learned that I'm manipulatable and you know I had hate page.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

I've had all sorts of the online world and it was used against not good ways, so that was a toughening up lesson. So it's all duality, right. It's like, how can I be honest and authentic, but how can I protect myself? Because you're allowed, right, you're allowed, absolutely, you're allowed. Because that's a trauma response, so I've got to give everything to everyone. No, you don't have a boundary.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

Not everyone's allowed in, not everyone deserves a seat at your table. Right, you know, and so and, and and also you know, sharing the truth of, and I think I fell into this at the beginning of my journey because, you know, I teach manifestation and it was very easy for me my first six figures really easy. My first six figures and savings were really easy. First quarter my first six figures really easy. My first six figures in savings really easy. First quarter of a million launch really easy.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

Right, I didn't really start to get hard until we got till about seven figures-ish total cash collected not in a year and so it meant that I had a bit of a wonky perception of what business building could look for people. Right, it's my genuine experience. But here's the thing the context of my life was sitting next to the bedside of a dying parent for three to seven years, and so I realized my grit. My ability to just go right and stop and cry and process wasn't the normal. My resilience wasn't normal.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

When we got to seven figures, we were hit with way more challenges than I'd experienced in business before. That did throw me, and it was good because I started speaking about business in a different way, you know, and I started sharing more of that, and I think that a lot of people similar to me that had easy start journeys are now sharing the other bits. And the truth is, the online business is that we're all learning and doing this together and we're all humans, and this has never been built before. There's so much finger pointing in this space. But it's like you made a mistake. Cool, so have I right? Let's tell the truth about it and let's learn and grow together and improve this for everyone. It's a bit of a random spiel, but that's what I'm going to say.

Angie Colee:

I freaking love it Well, and I think everybody that listens to the show is used to the meandering. We follow all of the shiny threads on Permission to Kick Ass because I mean, I tell people it evolved into this. I tell folks it's like my conversation at a bar, like I heard you speak on stage. Please tell me all about your business. Whatever comes up is going to come up. That's how I run this show and I like that.

Angie Colee:

One thing that came up when you were talking about all this is this illusion of crossing the finish line into happy, as I call it. If I just grind away, eventually I'm going to hit that goal, whether that's my first million dollars or I've bought a company and now I've got people that can make that run for me while I make a living and I've got more ease, right. And we think once we hit that goal, I will have everything figured out. That's the coin into the machine that's going to give us happiness, right, and I just go. That's the next step, because you're going to cross that finish line and you're going to go where's my happiness? And you're going to go oh shit, well, I've done everything I thought I was supposed to do.

Angie Colee:

Here we are repeating this cycle yet again. Everything I was supposed to do, that was supposed to give me happiness, did not give me happiness, and to that I say forgive yourself, have yourself a little bit of a celebration, have yourself a little bit of a pity party. Whatever you need to do to process and then get to work on the next goal and maybe add in like a little bit of layering, a little bit of practice. Right, how can I be happy while I'm doing this? What can I do to bring myself some joy, some satisfaction during the process of this?

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

I love that and it's so true. You know, I went to an invite only event retreat last year and it was very big people. Everyone was either famous or a Silicon Valley billionaire Do you know what I mean? Or you know maybe millionaire and um, or big influence, or something like this and um, there was this, this man who had built I'm not going to give a name but $3 billion companies in his career. Okay, and he gets on stage and he's asked about this. You know, on paper, extraordinary career, on paper, it's an extraordinary career, right, and it was really shocking to me. This man had just come out of a breathwork class and it's like, you know, when people just find spirituality. He was barefoot and wanted to cross his legs.

Angie Colee:

And I'm like, okay, we're on the correct.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

But like we're love, yet We've all done the overcorrect. You know I've lived in India barefoot teaching yoga, so I am no one to judge. I have overcorrect. I also like myself a bit of an extreme, you know, as You're trying on identities. Exactly so I'm like you're wiggling around seeing what works, anyway, so barefoot cross legs, and he was, you know, asked about these $3 billion companies.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

And he was sat next to this guy who became, you know, he built his first billion dollar company, I think by the age of 20, something insane, right. And so they were talking about hitting some of the biggest you know success highs that you know really heard of in our world, and someone said what do you want people to know?

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

And the older man gets up and he says don't do it, I promise you I'm going somewhere with this question. He goes don't I know? Wow, right, I was amazed. He said don't do it, it's not worth it. My marriage is a. This is an invite only retreat.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

Okay, so it's a very selective group of people and there's obviously a level of honesty that you wouldn't have in other places and and both of them agreed with that. And you know and it was very interesting to me and I teach this what's the distinction between creation through force and creation through alignment. And when you create through force which is, I will be happy when and I will do whatever I need to do and I will push myself to any extreme that I need to go Well, then, when you get to the end of the goal, you're empty, right, and this is what these, these men, were experiencing, and now they were going on their spiritual path and it was really beautiful to see. But this layering goal with happiness. For me, what that looks like is when business becomes your spiritual journey. So, for me, I'm fulfilled when I'm connected to my soul, right, I'm fulfilled when I have time for myself. I'm fulfilled when I'm in a relationship. We've been together for just under four years and the relationship is better. Now we're more in a honeymoon than we were at the beginning, but it's because we prioritize it.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

7.30,. We walk the dogs right. We have Hannah and Craigie weekends. He does not call them that, he's ex-military. I call them that. He does not call them that he's ex-military.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

I call them that he does not call himself freaky to be very clear, and so it's the thing that I think people are realizing. It's not about the goal, it's about what does the journey to the goal look like? And it's not about not pushing yourself. And it's not about not having grit and determination, because you need that too. But it's again that duality. Can you hold the grit, can you hold the determination, can you push through your limits and can you soften, can you have fun, can you go to a nudist beach for lols once? Can you run around your garden naked? Can you give your dog seven kisses in the morning before you make your coffee and go straight to your meetings? Because, in the end, those tiny things are what make up your life. Final thing on this my father is a Norwegian crime fiction translator. I always tell this story because it's funny. Yeah, it doesn't make sense. He didn't give up. Okay, to be clear, it doesn't exist. He decided what he wanted to do at 45, no, 50 years old.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

I was five years old, he had me late, he had my sister. My sister was three, I'm the eldest, and so the context of my life for my slightly hippie parents was that it's never too late. Do what you want, break all the rules, right. That was really my upbringing. So the fact that I was such a goody two shoes was very surprising to everyone. You know what I mean. That's like straight from me. And I saw him build his career in Norwegian crime fiction translation. He's now 76 and he's still working because he loves it translation he's now 76 and he's still working because he loves it. And he hit success very different to the digital age.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

Back then people would say it's five years in business to make a living. That's kind of the standard. Right Now we expect ourselves to be millionaires in a week, right, but like, so it's five years. And then so by the time he was 60, mid sixties, he was peak of his career. And by the time I started building my business he was early seventies.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

And I'd call him up dad, and I'd say dad, I'm so stressed. My first year in business I flunked. Do you know what I mean? I'd made less than 10 grand, not enough to live, had to borrow money. You know, like really normal, so cool. Yeah, it doesn't mean anything about you. Your first year in business Doesn't mean anything about you, how long it takes to make it. I remember calling him up and saying, dad, like I'm stressed, maybe I've you know, I never said maybe I've made a mistake, because I've never thought that but you know, just really like this is harder than I thought it would be, and he said to me he said, Hattie, one day you're going to have made it like he did, and he says you're going to miss the journey.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

And that really stayed with me figuring out how can I meet the right person to create this book, the right author, the thinking about the words. And so I think it's really important to remember that when you speak to those that are in a different age bracket and they have made it right, they're reminiscing about the very moment that you're living right now. These are the good days You're living in, your good old days, so can we remember that whilst we're living them?

Angie Colee:

Oh my gosh, the thought that came up while you were saying that was like living in suspense or maybe suspension, where it's like I can't really live, I can't really enjoy myself until I've crossed that finish line, until I've hit that goal, and it's not like you can actually press pause on your life that way, like a video game character. I could just pause this until I go buy like re-up at the store, get my coins so that I can buy an extra life and skip ahead to the next level. That's not the way it works. And you know, I started working on mindset a while back too, and I would say that I grew up kind of a negative person and if you're a fan of Mindset by Carol Dweck, definitely grew up in a fixed mindset kind of thing and have been working on opening myself up.

Angie Colee:

But the thing I've come to understand, especially as a storyteller, is that all of the shit that happens is so the shift can happen and the shitty days make the best stories. Y'all like nobody's going to pay attention to me if I'm holding court at a conference and I'm like so. So I woke up and it was just a glorious day outside and I got coffee and it was like the perfect temperature and then, like the outfit just made me feel like a goddess. Nobody fucking cares, nobody cares, they care about. Like, oh my God. I woke up and I had a planes, trains and automobiles experience and I didn't have to learn anything or teach anything from that story. It was just entertaining for the folks around me and I got to relive that through a lens of humor instead of a lens of trauma. So I don't know where I was going with that, but that's what came up.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

Yeah, but I'm going to follow up. Have you heard of Kabbalah?

Angie Colee:

I have not Okay.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

So Kabbalah is? It's a set of teachings. So I consider myself a polymath. What that means is that I do many things, I master all of them and I bring them together. It's a really old school word that pretty much only 70 to 80 year olds know. And me, okay, which tells you Old soul. Inner consciousness is like yeah, old soul. And also I'm like sign me up for the 70 year old lifestyle cups of teas in bed. Do you know what I mean? Like yes, anyway. So Kabbalah is a set of teachings which I'm really appreciating at the moment. And Kabbalah talks about, you know, the laws of the universe. Basically because the laws exist. We just weren't taught them at school. We were taught algebra, which I loved. Most people didn't, but I loved algebra. Nothing against it.

Angie Colee:

You didn't love algebra, or you didn't. No, I'm so. Not a mathy person, I'm a true creative.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

Oh yeah, okay, I make creativity into maths because I'm that cool, I'm very mathy, but anyway. So Kabbalah shares this piece of wisdom and I think it's really helpful to what you've said. He says you know, if you wake up one day and it's just this great, glorious day, it's been a good day, right. But if you wake up one day and everything goes wrong, you've got an opportunity to turn your negativity into light. The whole process of enlightenment is turning our negativity into light. If you can't see it, you can't change it. And so it says if you will wake up and you know, um, you've not signed any clients and you're getting anxious, right, the creator, that's the, the, the linguistics that they use, replace it with a different word. If you don resonate, is giving you an opportunity to transform that anxiety into certainty. Right, and so the mantra in the Kabbalah that they use, which I love, is I trust and I am certain that everything in my life is for good, or showing me what I need to change, and I love that, because we talked about entitlement. Entitlement is I want this to be a different way and it's not, and I'm sad about it, right.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

What Kabbalah teaches is all is good, because either it's a pleasant experience, right, or it's showing you you so you can do something about it, and then that will take you to more pleasant experiences. The Kabbalah says that you can have it all all right, but that's a by-product of earning your spiritual miles. You earn your spiritual miles by turning your negativity into light. So go back to that relationship I mentioned. I'm going to have a great relationship, fall straight into an abusive one, but I got to see all of my trauma and I turned it into light, right. And then I was blessed with this awesome oh I'm bumping myself on my microphone because I got excited this awesome partner, who's just incredible. We have this beautiful life together. But it's because I cleaned my stuff up, you know.

Angie Colee:

Oh, I love that. I had a similar experience and I'm glad that you're saying that, because I feel like that that was something that was hidden in business for a long time to abusive relationships and the prevalence of them, especially around you. Know, you're a smart woman, I'm a smart woman. A lot of smart folks tend to have this unconscious belief in there of, like I'm too smart. This can't happen to me. Like I, I recognize the traps, but guys. Then chemicals come in and emotions come in and you start rationalizing stuff and and abusers and manipulators are really good at holding back the full on crazy until you're super invested. So, like it's, it's easier to get into these things than you think they are. And and like you, I had a similar experience where I was in an abusive relationship for a while. It was, ironically, my business buddies that helped me realize this is not normal and this is not okay.

Angie Colee:

And when I was doing all of the work after the fact to ask myself, how did I get here? What signs did I ignore? What was I telling myself? Why did I make the decisions I made, I came to the conclusion that, like I had done, I had done part of the work right. I'd made myself a checklist of what my ideal partner would have, but I didn't think about who he was as a person. I didn't think about what I needed from the relationship to feel like whole and loved and appreciated. I was just like. I was looking at him and I was like but he checks everything off on the checklist. I don't understand why I'm unhappy, and now I can see it for what it is. Put the coin in the machine. Give me my happiness, please. I found the guy, the checklist guy. Here he is. Why am I not happy?

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

Completely this. And it's like when you look at patterns of abuse, since we're going here, abusers abuse people that have weaknesses, right, and so it's very helpful in business and in love to identify this, because it's happened to be in business and it's happened to be in love In the romantic relationship the reason that I let someone in and it's very normal when someone has a type of personality that manipulates they love bomb at the beginning, don't they? So you think, oh, this is amazing, right, but someone that's got a secure relational attachment is suspicious of love bombing and they don't need love bombing. But I was very insecure. I didn't believe that anyone could love me, right. So because I didn't believe that anyone could love me, so because I didn't believe that anyone could love me and I didn't believe that I was worthy of love, when someone came and they wanted to have a relationship with me, I overlooked things and I tolerated things that other people would not do, and so then I suddenly ended up in this relationship and the healing work for me was actually learning to love myself. And I don't mean, you know, bubble baths and baths, it's by that, I mean being cool with who I am, who you know all of who I am not, you know, having to be a certain version to be lovable, but liking me for the messy, for the nice, the good, the bad, the pretty, the ugly, the glamorous, the ferret look. You know all of it. And so my partner says this he's like everyone thinks you look a certain way on Instagram, but he's like I know that really you're a ferret. And he literally got me a t-shirt printed saying I am ferret. Do you know what I mean? And that's the kind of love that I want. I don't want to have to be glamorous in my house. I want to wear like knickers and have no makeup on and a little bun here and to be singing to a song without knowing the words terribly, with tone deaf, like that's. That's how I want to live, you know.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

And in business, right, it's the same when I got a hate page and there was a lady that wanted a, a refund, and she wanted a refund for you know she was eight months into a contract and anyone may feel different refund policies, but it was the first time I'd had to hold someone and say no. And as a primary caregiver, I've never had to say no. I've always said what do you need. Let me love you, let me give you all of myself, and so it was very uncomfortable for me to say no to someone asking for a refund eight months into a product, right, um, and this person reacted in the worst way possible, to know the worst way, as in this person obviously had a pattern of if I attack, I get what I want. But I took the attack very personally and if I hadn't been doing the work, I would have given that person a refund and that would have been manipulation and that would have been abuse in many ways, because she had discovered, you know, if I attack Hannah, then I get what I want, and so that would have been a weakness, and so a lot of business building and scaling that people don't realize is finding weaknesses in our system and cleaning up, finding places that people can hook into to manipulate our behavior. Right, and I say this to my clients what's the thing that I'd have to say to you? What would I have to call you and that would let me in and you'd be able to manipulate me If I called you unethical? Would that create so much emotional intensity that you'd let me do whatever I want If I called you? Do you know what I mean, and so this is a part of business that people don't talk about.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

And so last year I lived my worst case scenario in business. All sorts of things that are said about me that weren't true, right. But let me tell you what. This year I feel like I'm a unicorn. I'm like there is like do you know what I mean? I'm like I went through how can you say that to me? You know, my income plummeted. I stopped selling. It was really after this big high, this big kind of rollercoaster which I'd never been on in my business, because I was so shaken. But this year I'm like I am solid, and if you want to create a big impact and you're going to have lots of eyes on you, people are going to talk baby, you need to know you, you need to be solid in you right, and so it's kind of a process of initiation a lot of business owners go into. I mean, I love this, because how much of this work is so cool would we never do if we weren't put into this context?

Angie Colee:

Right and stepping up when there is no path right. There is no happiness machine and having to figure that out when so many will settle for the prescription and just repeat that pattern over and over and over again Well, I didn't get happiness this time, but maybe this one over here, but maybe that one over here and they don't learn to enjoy the process and address the issues that are causing some of the struggles that they run into. Right, and I loved that you pointed out the manipulation, because I don't think we've ever even talked about that on this show. But like, yeah, there are people out there. There are I don't want to call them bad actors, because I don't think a lot of the people who do bad in the world are necessarily bad people. A lot of folks are. They're suffering under their trauma and they see enemies everywhere, including us sometimes, and we have the best of intentions. But somebody said something I can't remember where it comes from True freedom is allowing people to misunderstand you Like they don't have to get it. They don't have to see me for who I am, for who I know myself to be. I am completely solid in it.

Angie Colee:

I didn't have an experience like yours, where people went after me, but I did have a story that went viral a while back and it was interesting because I knew the haters would come in the comments and let me know what they thought about my life, and I shared a messy breakup story and what I learned from the travel in the aftermath. I was so scared to put that story out there because I knew that the haters would come, but I felt a strange sense of calm when they did, because I just went oh well, that assumption is totally wrong. Oh well, that is not accurate at all. And I started to realize all of these people are projecting all of this shit onto me. I even had one argue. I was active in the comments because I'm a marketer. I was like let's up the engagement. So the algorithm puts this out to even more people, right.

Angie Colee:

But I had somebody arguing over the situation that we were in and I was like you're fine to think whatever you want. I was there and I know what happens. You don't get to rewrite the story for me. I'm sorry, that's not the way this works, and it was such a sense of peace to be like. You can misinterpret me all you want. I don't care If you're willfully misinterpreting me at this point, when I'm giving my side of the story and I'm trying to explain it to you. That's a choice and then I go. I really don't care what you think right now.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

I adore this. I absolutely adore this and you know, it's been a big liberator for me as well to realize I can't control other people. I can be as good, I can perform as well, you know and this is the good girl in me but I can't control other people's opinions. I can't control their reactions to me, I can't control their experience of me. So I'm just going to create a really good life for me and know that I'm an integrity with me and that's enough.

Angie Colee:

That is absolutely enough. And the funny thing is like we operate under these delusions of control all the time. I see it happen all the time in relationships, business relationships, personal relationships and otherwise. I need this person to start doing this and then I will do that. And that is how we're going to fix this thing. If I can tell this other person what to do, do and then I can work on myself. Do you know? The opposite is true Like almost 100% of the time. If I know that something is broken in this relationship and I start working on myself, it's either going to make the clash between us so glaringly obvious that something has to give and we have to have that hard conversation, or the other person is going to notice something has changed and been like that.

Angie Colee:

Magnetism kicks in right. People are drawn to you. What are you doing? That's different. Oh, I, you know I could do that too. I could go to the gym with you too. You look like you're having fun. Maybe we should do that together. So instead of me like trying to pressure this person into doing what I think they should do, I just focus on me and work on me and trust that they're going to come along if they see this as part of their journey right. Work on ourselves first.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

A hundred percent and trust other people. Trust that people are adults and they can make choices for themselves, and that's a thing. And then also cause I completely agree with what you say. Something that I've realized in my romantic relationship is that I used to think my partner should be more like me. Do you know what I mean? We do this. Oh, they should be like me. And our relationship really started to bloom and it's always been a beautiful relationship. We've had challenges and moments, but it's been a beautiful relationship. But when I went oh my God, I get to love and appreciate him for who he is, in all of his distinct and separateness to me and difference that he became even bigger and more beautiful. In that, you know, and it's a really interesting thing to watch it's like the rice experiment. You know, two jars of rice Once one jar. You're saying loving words to one jars. You're saying horrible words to the jar of the rice. The horrible words moldy, gross. Seven days later, the other jar. Have you seen this experiment?

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

They do plants as well. So get two plants Like. Everyone can do this at home. I feel like it's blue to Peter-esque. You might not get the blue Peter reference in America. Does that make sense? No, Okay, Just going to pass over that Clearly British. And to one plant every morning you say loving words and to the plant you don't Watch how the plant that you don't say loving words to that you say, oh, you're a horrible plant, You're so ugly you don't know how to grow shrivels, Whereas the plant that you're like, oh, you're so beautiful, You're growing slowly, but I adore the precision in your like that plant blooms and it's. We are the same as that. And so the people around us, especially our romantic relationships and our intimate relationships, it's like can we love them for who they are instead of who we think they should be?

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

That was a revelation for me, yep, for who they are, instead of their we think they should be.

Angie Colee:

That was a revelation for me. Yep, For who they are instead of their potential is another way to say that. Who we think they should be, who we think they can be, yes, oh my gosh, I want to keep talking for like two more hours, but I glanced down and realized that we had. So I'm going to say we're going to have to have a part two and wrap on this somehow somewhere. In the meantime, tell us a little bit more where we can learn about you and your fabulous multiple businesses.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

Yeah, so my name is Hannah, but it is spelt with a J, so I'm just saying this so you don't get confused on your way to finding me. I'm Spanish, english. My name doesn't exist in England and Spain. My parents thought, oh, let's make her life interesting. So my name is spelt, you know, is Hannah J-A-N-A? Yes, I am sure. No, I haven't got that wrong. That's what I always get asked, so it's J-A-N-A. Bartlett Alonso.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

Really great place to find me is Instagram. I do lives there teaching, and I just love it when people come into my messages and just say Hannah, I listened to the podcast and this is what I took away. And if you message me on Instagram just one word podcast I will send you a free business course Okay, which is really, really fun, and I will give you the business course link. It's called multidimensional business. It's my approach to apply the healing work to business, so you guys can sample a bit.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

And if you're one of those people and I'm one of people and you're like I don't need to do a free course, you don't need to take me through this process. I just know that I want to work with you and I want to know how to work with you. I always say this to people ask for what you want direct communication. Get in my DMs. This is my goal. This is who I am. This is what I want. I what I want. I will either send you to the correct product that would be a match to that, or I will send you to someone else. I will always sell you something that is a match to you. So just be clear in what you want and your need and I will respond to that in my Instagram, best place to find me.

Angie Colee:

Fantastic. I will make sure there are clickable links in the show notes. Thank you so much for being such an amazing guest and for sharing so much of you yourself, your personal journey.

Jana Bartlett Alonso:

Like it matters. It matters and I appreciate you. Thank you for having me. This has been a fun podcast.

Angie Colee:

I really hope everyone enjoys. I'm sure they will. That's all for now. If you want to keep that kick-ass energy high, please take a minute to share this episode with someone that might need a high octane dose of you can do it. Don't forget to rate, review and subscribe to the Permission to Kick-Ass podcast on Apple Podcasts, spotify and wherever you stream your podcasts. I'm your host, angie Coley, and I'm here rooting for you. Thanks for listening and let's go kick some ass.