- It's once again time to
get gutsy with Liz Hall
and her expert guests on
the Gutsy Babe Podcast.
- Welcome to the Gutsy Babe Podcast.
I'm your host, Liz Hall.
On today's show, we'll be
talking to our guest, Beth Valli.
Beth calls herself a
motherhood story coach
because she believes that
discovering, exploring
and clearing the stories
and interpretations we carry
about motherhood shifts us
into greater freedom.
At 42, her unexpected journey
of missing motherhood plunged
her into profound grief,
steeped in the childless,
not by choice community.
She assumed she would
coach women like herself,
but digging into the
issue led her to realize
that childless, not by
choice, women are a symptom
of a cultural root cause.
This realization paved the way for her,
blow up the clock program,
blow up the clock,
empowers women still on
their way to motherhood,
to unravel societal
notions holding them back.
These women, often career driven,
have usually silenced this aspect of life
and are awaiting a distant someday.
Beth's program helps them
discover their vision,
bring action to their journey,
and redefine someday on their own terms.
Beth, it's great to have you
on the Gutsy Babe podcast.
- Thanks, Liz. It's so awesome
to be here. I'm so glad that we met.
- Yeah, I'm very interested in this topic
and excited for our conversation.
I too have direct experience
with this, so I can so relate.
So can you share a little more
about how you got involved
with this type of coaching?
- So, as you said in
the intro, I am someone
who missed motherhood.
Um, at 42, my body dece
decided to shut down.
Um, I actually went
into perimenopause at 37
and then at 42 into full menopause,
which was not expected at all,
very, very early for a woman.
So that left me in a space where I was
dealing with years of grief.
Um, and I was actually
just coming out of my grief
of my divorce that I went through at 36.
And then on top of all
of it, just when twinges
of joy started to come back, Yeah.
I was plunged into this.
Um, and there's just a wall that you hit
that you don't even
understand or don't expect.
You can never fully anticipate
what that feels like
to suddenly hit that wall of this thing
that you thought about
happening in your life.
Just not ever happening.
Not in the way you imagined
it, not biologically.
- Right.
- And so, you know,
after many years of working
through that grief, um,
I really thought at once I became a coach,
I would coach other women like myself.
I'm part of a child that's
not by choice community
for women all around the world.
And I thought those would be my people.
And as I was doing writing,
so this is the great
thing about social media
'cause it forced me to tap
into writing about everything
that I was about.
And as I did it, it occurred
to me one day, which
by the way, happened in Aruba
where I was living at the time.
So like it was a great setting
for all this to happen, but just
- There was, yeah,
- It was, but I realized, I was like, huh,
I'm a symptom in our culture.
I am not a root cause.
What is the root cause?
Why is it that one in five
women in the western world on
average are childless?
Not by choice? I'm gonna say, actually,
I'm gonna say are childless the majority
of those not by choice.
'cause some people intentionally
choose it. Right? Right.
They want to be what? That's
what we refer to as child free.
- Correct.
- And so why was this happening?
And as I was writing, I feel
I got a divine download.
Like this is just, there's
stuff going on in our culture
that we're not paying attention to.
And it got me super curious.
So I started looking at that,
which led me to a whole lot
of findings, which I'm
sure we're gonna get into.
Mm-Hmm. . But that really
is my story of how I got
to be a motherhood story coach.
I actually, the term itself,
which I ne I don't know if
I ever would've come up with
that myself, came from a friend
of mine who is a marketing person.
I was in her marketing group
and she said, you're a
motherhood story coach.
And I was like, what does that mean?
It even took me a while
to like feel comfortable
holding that title.
Like, and adopting it.
Digesting it, because
I just didn't get it.
'cause it's so different. Right.
And the way I like to
describe it now is like this,
you may know coaches who are
consider themselves money
coaches or abundance coaches.
Right. And what you do is you
work with them to look at all
of your stories and all
the things that you have
that are holding you back
from the financial abundance
that you want in your life.
Well, I'm doing the same
thing with motherhood.
What are all the stories and
the things that you're holding
that are keeping you stuck?
And often women are very
stuck in this spinning
that they don't even realize
A lot of times they're in
that are holding them back
from getting that thing they want.
Or from even being able to
decide if they want it. Right.
Mm-Hmm. , there's just so
much cultural, uh, clutter
as I like to call it,
that we're living in.
And so this is, this is what
I help women do. I help them.
And on the other side of
all of that is an ownership
that they didn't even
know that they could take.
There's an agency that they take on.
It's like, oh, I didn't
know I could do this. Wow.
And I didn't realize how much
I wasn't paying attention
that I've heard that so many times.
So it's, it's just super
cool to watch them come out
of the darkness
and their blindness until like,
own this in a, a completely new way.
- That's beautiful. Um,
I'm realizing that we have
so much more in common than I common, but
even
- . Yeah.
- So, um, I too went into, um,
menopause at a very early age.
Um, in my early thirties,
I had to have a full,
full on hysterectomy.
Um, and it all started with, uh, trying
to have children see the, it's the story
that you've heard a million times
and I suffered from
endometriosis most of my life.
And with endometriosis,
like the hundreds of stories
that you've heard, it's hard to diagnose.
I went to, I can't even tell you
how many countless doctors up
until the time I was trying
to have, you know, a family
with, with my husband.
And that's when I finally get
diagnosed, come to find out
that it was too late for
me to even have children.
So I had to make the harsh decision
of having a full on hysterectomy.
Right. And then going
into full on menopause.
And they don't share any
of like, you don't know any
of the feelings or any of the grief
or even knowing that you're
gonna go into menopause right
after that surgery within
like a day after the surgery.
Wow. But yeah, it was a hard decision.
And we did try for many years.
We even fostered a little two
little girls for a while. Mm.
Wow. But I think that
what you're doing is,
like you said, is from a pain point.
Right. And when it's from a pain point,
you are being truly authentic
and you're sharing your story
and you are helping other
women like myself to empower us
and know that you're right.
It is a cultural issue
and we need to be okay
and bring it up to the public
and have women say, this is okay,
and it's okay to blow up the
clock and empower yourself.
And for me, I'm religious.
So what helped me, I had
to say, well, this is
what my path is.
God gave me a path that I have
to move forward and accept.
And I had to heal myself
knowing that it was okay for us
and we didn't have to
have a child in our life
to have a beautiful family.
Still. Can you share a couple
of success stories about a
client that you've helped?
Like right now, you're
helping me, so thank you .
- Thanks. Thank you. Um, for sure.
I love sharing these stories.
So I will not use their real names. .
Um, there of course was
was a woman who, I mean,
I call these my early adopters, right?
So I just started my program
for the first time in 2021.
And the people that were in
my course originally were both
powerful coaches, people who went
through the same coaching program I did.
People who believe in transformation
and live their lives on purpose.
People who design their lives
and how they wanna them.
And when I went to them, to
this one particular woman,
and I told her about it, she said, huh,
she's very, a very intentional person.
She's like, wow, I
never even thought about
this part of my life before.
Like, how did I miss that? Right?
She speaks to what's going
on in our culture, right?
But there's just this even
an awareness that we need
to think about it or talk about it.
And she's like, huh, because I realize
that I haven't talked about it,
or I'm not doing anything about
it, giving it no attention.
I think I need to join
this program. So she did.
She was in my first cohort cohort
and she was the person who
came in saying what many,
many women say Mm-Hmm. ,
why do I have to be
intentional about something
that should just be natural?
I if I had a, you know,
a hundred dollars for
every time I heard that .
And also this idea of
I'm, so, it's like this fear about this
concept of being a mom.
Because as she would say,
I feel bombarded with
the image of the tired,
exhausted, sad mom.
And I don't wanna be that.
Like, why should I, this is
what I feel I'm up against.
And throughout the course of the program,
I'll just tell you where she ended up.
At the end of it all,
she was like, I realize
that I can own this.
I realize that I can make
this what I want it to be.
I realize that no matter
what happens in my
life, I'm gonna be okay.
And I'm gonna tell you she does have a
child , which is awesome.
She, she and her husband now have a child.
Um, but that was just so cool to be part
of that journey with her.
And I mean, I feel honestly like I did
so little other than create a container
because she's just such a
powerful person herself.
And this is what's so cool.
I get to work with all
these amazing people.
'cause the women who, the
women who come in are going
to be women who have some kind
of self-awareness already.
They're already people who have
been doing the work. Mm-Hmm.
people who realize they
need a little more support
to move them forward in
this dream in their life.
And so that's, those are
the people that enter.
It's not somebody who's not
thinking it about it at all.
And, you know, doesn't,
don't ever look at themselves like that.
I've had some women like that come to me,
but it freaks them out and they run away.
So it's pretty much what happens. .
But yeah. So that's one of the stories.
Um, I'll actually talk about, uh, a woman
who just finished doing
the program with me.
She, again, another coach
. Yeah. Powerful person.
And within the first month
of doing the program,
and this is not the first
time this has happened,
she met her person, like
who she thinks she's going,
who she's planning to marry it,
that they're already talking about it.
Like this happens because
when we open up, as you know,
we are integrated beings.
And if you think of the world
or our lives as like a room with doors,
the motherhood door gets
completely neglected.
And often we just have cobwebs
that are over it. Right.
We don't open it until
we absolutely have to.
And so what I ask them to do, oh,
lemme go back to this though.
When behind that door isn't
just a contained room.
It is a room that connects
to all the other rooms in our lives.
Right? We are integrated beings
and what's going on in one room
affects all the other rooms.
And so when we're not paying
attention to that, it has
ramifications for other
parts of our lives.
So it's not a surprise when
women start to open the door
and look at what's inside
that room, that other parts
of their lives start to fall into place.
It's just, it's not unusual.
I hear things like, wow, this has changed
how I am in my business.
This has changed how I am in my career.
This has changed my romantic relationship
by just taking the time to pay attention
to do the work that's
undergo, uh, with the things
that are going on underneath.
- Right? Yeah.
When you're listening to
your inner voice, right.
It does really help. And
that resonates with me.
So I I definitely know what
you're talking about. Yeah.
Um, what's the procedure
for accessing your services
and what should your clients
expect from working with you?
- There are lots of ways
to access my services.
I have different, you know,
entry points for people.
Um, they can easily, I have an assessment
that people can do online.
Mm-Hmm. , it's called
your, uh, conscious path
to motherhood com.
You just go there and it,
it just covers all areas
of your life, from health
to mindset to community
and support to get an assessment of
where you stand in relationship
to your motherhood journey just
gives you a view into that.
And I also have a text community.
So this is for people who aren't
yet ready to talk about it.
- Yeah.
- They can just sign up for it.
And I send out a text once a week
that asks a question they may not
have considered to ask themselves.
It's just that simple. They don't
even have to interact with me. .
They don't want , . It costs
nothing to do. You just
- Sign up.
Yeah. I mean, women are at
different stages, right? Yes.
Of how open they are to it.
They're still struggling. Right.
Like for me personally, it
did take me many years, um,
to accept that, you know,
I wasn't, uh, meant to,
I wasn't meant to be a mom.
Right? Mm-Hmm. . Um,
but I also do believe
that you could be motherly
in many ways, right?
Um, I feel like I'm a
mom to my, to my dog,
Charlie . Mm-Hmm. .
- Mm-Hmm. - . And also to
my friends and girlfriends.
Right. Um, there's a lot of things
that you could be motherly at.
And I think that's just for
me, that brings me peace.
- Yes, totally.
- But you're right. I do want to mention
that it is a cultural thing
that they put a taboo.
Like, oh, you're not a mom.
I mean, I've had till
this day I get, you know,
questions like, oh, how
many children do you have?
Or Do you have children? And
I, I don't get offended at all.
Um, I I just say, no,
I think we don't have children Mm-Hmm.
end of story and move on. And it's okay.
And when I was younger, I
was self-conscious about it.
Uh, but I think it comes
with age and acceptance
and not letting someone else
their feelings reflect Right.
And project onto how I feel in my life,
because I don't feel like
we're missing out on anything.
Um, Yeah.
And I think it's important
for, for women to, um,
be they have to go through that process
whenever they're ready for it though.
Right. 'cause everyone
has their own stages.
- Yeah. Really. Well said.
And I, you know, I think
every woman who's gone through
what we've gone through
would say the same thing.
It's difficult.
And you come up against a
lot of cultural barriers.
So I'm gonna actually on that,
I'm gonna share the story of
what it's been to be a motherhood
story coach without children.
- Yes, please.
- And what I've had people say
to me, Yeah.
It's the same thing. Like,
as soon as I say what I do,
and I use that term that
they'll go, well, are you a mom?
Like, they automatically assume that
that's who I need to be.
- Right. I could see
that. I could see that.
And, and that sucks. But you know what?
I think that is actually
very empowering for you, .
- Well, it, it isn't at some points.
I mean, I've had to learn how to,
because I was struggling to own
it myself, struggling to own
moniker of motherhood story coach.
Like what does that mean? And
how can I call myself that?
I mean, talk about
imposter syndrome, right?
I even had two coaches
who I respect male coaches
say to me, well, people
don't go to a coach.
They go to a coach because
that coach has what they want.
Like, you're not a mom.
Why would they come to you?
And man, that, I remember just
as soon as I heard that, I,
I just went into like,
I got hugely triggered . Right?
- Yeah.
- You know, and then I was like
trying to process through that.
And it took me a long time.
And it even took me, I mean,
I would say it took me like a year
or more to really have perspective on it.
It still, I still get
twinge of it sometimes.
But the thing that
really helped to shift it
for me was this, was
realizing that in a culture,
in any culture, the people
that are in the minority,
which I consider us in
the minority Mm-Hmm. ,
see the intentional
and unintentional acts of discrimination.
People in the majority only
register the intentional
acts of discrimination.
Things that are blatant.
When you're in the
minority, you see it all.
And so it gives me a,
a sight into this world
and into this whole concept
of motherhood in general.
That somebody who has become a mom
and just gotten the, had the path
and got what they wanted
that they don't have.
And that's not anything against them,
it's just what their life is.
And I have a completely
different perspective.
And so I could see more clearly
what are the things
going on in our culture.
And I was listening for the
things that women are saying of
what they experience
in our culture in a way
through the child is not by
choice community, through women
who struggle with infertility,
and then through women
who are on their way
still to motherhood.
And what's interesting
about is it's all the same ,
it's all the same things
that we're all stuck in.
It's just we're all at different points.
Kinda like you were
talking about with grief.
We're all at different points.
Mm-Hmm. in that journey.
And so the women who are still
on their way there have this,
there's still this hope that they're,
and this idea that life's just gonna
work out the way that they want.
Right. It's part of that comes
with youth , part of it comes
with like not having the experience.
And it's hard for them to grasp
this concept that I'm putting out there
because they're just like, well, I'm fine.
You know, I'll, I'll
have a child. You know?
And that's why it takes people
who are paying attention
and like aware, do the
work and are aware of that.
They need to do the work.
Mm-Hmm. to really embrace it.
At least at this point. I'll,
I'll tell you, I have, like,
I've looked for other ways to communicate
with women who aren't in that space.
And I finally had to resign, not resign,
but settle on the fact
that these are my people.
Like my people are the deep
people, the intense people,
the people who do the work,
the people who want more.
Um, not someone who who doesn't, it just,
they, it doesn't connect.
Right. Just doesn't connect.
- Right. Well, that makes sense.
I mean, everyone has
someone, there's, there's
so many different types of coaches, right?
Yes. And there could also be
another motherhood story coach,
but it's gonna give a
different perspective
or different Yes.
Energy. And you're going to attract the,
the customers and clients that
are attracted to your energy.
- Exactly.
- Mm-Hmm.
- . Exactly.
- Well, I'm attracted to your energy
because it, it resonates with me. .
- Awesome. Thank you. Thank
you. I appreciate it. Of course.
- Um, can you name three things
you love about what you do?
- Sure. Oh goodness. Um, there's so much.
Well, I think one is I get to
be fully expressed in who I am
and bring all my creativity to
bear on everything that I do.
You know? And, and apart
from being a motherhood story
coach, I'm gonna take it up a level.
Being an entrepreneur,
being my own boss. Yeah.
You know, I get to create my day.
I get to create my life the
way that I want it to be. Be.
Um, I have always been
somebody like who's done
that since I got outta college.
Mm-Hmm. . I've never
followed like the mainstream
path for a while.
I did. Which I'm grateful for. Yeah.
And I like, I don't know, at
22, I was like, all right,
well, you know, I was in
film, I as a film major,
so right there that was like, you know,
hanging out in the
basement at the film school
with all the people who were black.
You know, we were all like,
a little bit different .
And then, you know, I,
I ended up getting into,
um, I did that for a few years.
I went through a lot during that time.
So a lot of career shifting.
'cause my mother passed
away when I was 23.
So I was dealing with a lot.
And that led me into nonprofits
and then, which led me to
working with homeless youth,
which led me to working, you know, in, um,
somehow then getting into web
design and, and everything.
So I like being my own boss.
And I like the freedom
to answer your question.
Like, I love that. I've
always had this sense of,
I'm gonna do what I'm gonna do.
I'm not gonna follow
everybody else's path.
And, and I continue to do that . So Yeah.
Um, but I need, I need
to give you one more
because you asked for
three , I think.
Um, I had, what's the
third one? Oh, I know.
Just the amazing people
that I get to meet in life.
I love the amazing, like these
amazing people who come to me
who, who want to change their lives.
You know, like it's just
who are brave enough
to step into the unknown
and do that. Yeah.
- It's beautiful. And I could see,
and yet you get to see
the progress, right?
Mm-Hmm. you to witness
that, that is very special.
I think for me, I think
maybe for you as well, is
that you are tapping
into speaking your truth.
And that when you're
speaking your truth, that
just makes you shine.
I feel that, um, I, I like you,
I've had many careers
and experiences that brought
me to where I am today, even
with the gutsy babe and with my travel.
Right. That now
sharing you menopause issues,
my hysterectomy being childless,
and where it's brought
me to where I am now.
And in the past I never
brought those topics up, right.
It was all personal and private.
But by speaking our truth
now, I just think that it
makes life so much sweeter. .
- It does. . It really does.
I mean, and that's like,
it's doing that I can speak
for myself and I'm
guessing for most people
or maybe all people that
when you're in that vein,
like your words are
aligning with your energy.
Right. And it just, it
amps up your energy.
It's like that's what you're
putting out into the world.
Um, it, it aligns. I think
that alignment is so important.
- Exactly. Yes.
- Yeah.
- Well, Beth, how can people
contact you further, um,
with information and get, uh,
set up an appointment with you
- Appoint?
Okay. Well, they can go to
Bath Valley coaching.com. Okay.
Um, uh, they can contact me through that.
Um, and they can also, I have,
they can do my assessment
online at your conscious
path to motherhood com.
They can, um, find me on Instagram,
they can find me on Facebook, LinkedIn,
and d DM me through those.
And I'm just Beth Rave coaching
in all of those places.
Or just Beth Rave on LinkedIn. Okay.
And yeah, it's easy to
get in touch with me.
You, my calendar link is out there.
People can set up appointments.
Um, I do this, I have this
entry level call that I do
with women called the
Motherhood Clarity call, where
I give them an opportunity.
I ask them a lot of questions
and it's basically presencing them to
where they're in their journey right now.
Mm-Hmm.
- .
- And then looking at where they wanna go,
but more about all the things
they're holding inside that.
And then looking at what
might be in the way of getting
what is they that they think
they want at this point.
So it's really, it comes out,
they walk away with an action.
One thing that they can do
to start moving in the
direction they want.
- Can you share one action with me? Sure.
- Yeah. Yeah. There's a,
I mean, there's so many
that people take on.
I would say one that's really
important, I love to call,
I call curiously collecting stories.
And so in my book that I've been writing,
that's a whole chapter.
It's actually a whole
session in my program
where I have the women collect
stories from other moms.
So, because we have all these
ideas about what motherhood is
and usually not good
ideas, maybe they're good.
But even so, our scope is limited.
And when we can really
listen to other moms,
especially moms, we consider
empowered, it shifts.
It's one of the biggest shifts
women have in my program
because it opens them up to
going, oh, wait a second.
It doesn't have to be this
way. It could be that way.
That person does it. I could do it too.
You know, like my friend
Sarah, she lived in Mexico.
I, I mentioned her earlier before,
but she lived there as a
single mom with her child,
- Uhhuh,
- You know,
and that was a choice that she
wanted to make for various reasons.
And people are like, oh, she
did that. Like, I can do that.
You know? Um, there's a really cool, uh,
YouTube channel called Fly
the Nest, uh, that is a couple
who travel all over the, the world.
They stay in different places
and they have a toddler and a
newborn
- . I love that.
- Uhhuh. And it's just more, I think
because in our culture we can
tend to be, the child runs
the roost, whereas like maybe
in Europe it's more like the
child joins our family.
- Yes.
- That mindset is different.
And so here, people
getting to see that more,
just they don't get stuck
in that space than of,
oh, I'm gonna lose my life.
Because that's what a lot of women say.
I'm gonna lose my life.
I'm gonna lose my career.
I'm gonna lose all these
things if I become a mom.
Well, what if you gain all
these other amazing things?
Right. It becomes an addition rather than
a subtraction in their life.
And they, once they shift their mindset.
- Yeah. No, that is beautiful.
You know, it's funny is that
when I thought I was gonna be a
mom Mm-Hmm.
early on, I always had that vision
that I would have my baby on
a backpack trekking around .
- That's awesome.
- So I think that I,
like my mom has said in the past
that I've always been
a natural rebellion .
Mm-Hmm. I've always done,
you know, beat to my own path.
And I feel that you are the same Beth
- Pretty much.
But yeah, it's funny
'cause I've also been
like such a rule follower
and such a, a follower
for so much of my life.
But at the same time, with
this underlying rebellion going
on, that not everyone always saw .
- Yeah, no, I'm just saying
because I'm a rule follower as well.
So there's certain little things
that were rebellious Uhhuh. Exactly.
- Exactly.
- Thank you again.
So people can contact you@bethelli.com
- Or beth veli coaching.com.
- Beth veli coaching.com.
And that's R-I-V-E-L-L-I.
Correct. Alright.
Well thank you for joining us
and sharing your wisdom, Beth.
Oh my gosh, this was beautiful.
- Thank you, Liz, for the
space you're creating.
- Well, until next time,
this is the Gutsy Babe
with Liz Hall.
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