Create Space for Growth with Christina Garrett

Roberto Candelaria 00:00: Alright, y’all. So, listen, we’re here with one of my favorite people. And I know you’re probably tired of hearing me say my favorite people. But here’s the thing, like, when you go out and you actually begin to talk to people and build relationships, you’re going to find that you have lots of favorite people. So, if you don’t have a lot of favorite people, you just need more people or more of the right people in your life. So y’all, you already heard about Christina. And we met a whole hot minute ago. And I really didn’t share the story in the intro. So, I’d be curious, Christina, like, I want your take, like, how do you say we met? And why are we still talking all these years later?

Christina Garrett 00:38: Oh, my goodness. That’s a good question. Because it has to be at least six years ago, I think, at least six years. So, I’m sure that found you through April’s community. And I think I just started following because you are the sponsorship guy? No. And I was really in the beginning stages of hosting my conferences and events and meet up and I was trying to figure out, how do I plug into something bigger than me doing all of the heavy lifting myself. And so, I latched on and started following because I knew that you were the person who had the answer. And you really did help me get my start with join some bigger things at the on a bit.

Roberto Candelaria 01:20: Yeah. And you know, what’s funny is like, I think one of the things that people forget about is that like, no matter where we’re at, in our journey, I know you say you like you were just starting out there and people like even now, like you purposely, like people have you like on this pedestal that you’re just like, Yo, I’m just a person. And it just said like, it’s always weird. People are like, you were this and you were that cuz I’m just like, you’re just me. And I think like over the years, like you’ve gotten to see I’m just me, I’m just a whole hot mess over here. But at the last start, listen, listen, listen. So, speaking about a hot mess, which really isn’t necessarily a hot mess. Like we share that a bit about you and your family. So, people get an idea of like, where you’re at in your business now. And what some of the unique things you got going on at home that make it where you had to figure out a few things. She got lots of kids, y’all.

Christina Garrett 02:10: A lot of them. A lot of them. Oh, my goodness. So, I am a homeschooling mom of five incredible, very loud children. But I think that we all discovered during the pandemic, how challenging it can be. Not everyone, but a lot of us, you know, is this you a specific, you know, someone who was struggling through playing the balancing game. And so, the Garrett family had to learn that a few years before everyone else was forced to learn it. But it really makes me do my job. Well, my kids are 5 to 15 year and they’re around all the time. So, I had to do all of my work, my consulting, speaking training, podcast moments just like this, with kids around and in tow, but they make me really good at the job I do.

Roberto Candelaria 02:59: And part of that job is as a productivity coach. And so, I know you got to deal with the family and all of that, but like, what really led you into being a productivity coach, and really helping women of women and women of color specifically, like get to their by profit goals, and like the productivity that they wanted in their life.

Christina Garrett 03:19: You know, I have found that our minds drama, honoring the season of life that we’re in, and knowing how to balance our time and energy are the keys to transforming everything else. A lot of us because we’re in a different season of life, we may feel as though we’re restricted in some ways, we feel like we had this invisible CLA or it’s very visible, this feeling over us that keeps us from moving from one level to the next level. And so, for women, especially those with families, I work with women who are in the corporate sphere, women who are educators, and attorneys and politicians that just women who want families and their say, I see who I want to be, but I feel like my current life is holding me back from doing that. And so, we tap into the more that they see. And we create a path that’s reasonable and not too scary, so that they can reach it. I had to rediscover who I was after mother Nina and you know, a lot of us were thrust into this new theme, and maybe you plan it, maybe you did. But you’re now in the place of really birthing something new and you have to figure out how do you do it with the family? How do you deal with a partner with a significant other if you’re co-parenting, if you’re homeschooling if your work at home mom or working outside of the home? Still the mind drama that we carry about our decision making and how we balance our time and our energy are the key to everything.

Roberto Candelaria 04:47: Yeah, absolutely. Now there’s so many moms and listen, y’all I clearly ain’t a mom but I know lots of y’all. I coach. Yeah. Yeah. And you know, one of the things I hear from a mom Um, specifically, but I would say all humans, right is to say I need to be more productive, I need to be more productive, like, Oh, I just needed to get this done. And so like, what does that actually mean? To be productive in your definition?

Christina Garrett 05:14: So, when we define productivity, I invite everyone to go into their personal family vision. For some of us, maybe we come out of scenarios where they were favorable, some of them weren’t so favorable, right. So now we’re here with our own families, and our own vision, and your family want to be more productive. But what does that actually mean? I find that us knowing the love, like wishes of the people in our lives, no matter, you know, for my husband, he, you know, we’re all grown, he could care less how clean the kitchen is, if he’s gonna get, he doesn’t get.

Roberto Candelaria 05:49: He likes physical.

Christina Garrett 05:51: If I had to choose one thing or another, you know, he’s gonna throw rotten, these spins your energy over here. And that would be more to the vision for our family, for my children, I want them to see a mom that has joy, that walks in her purpose and is fulfilled, I want them to see a mom that laughs and, you know, they obsess with them. And we still handle business. And I teach them life’s most important lesson, you know what my daughter see a mom that lives out her dreams, right? When every year when I come home from the conference, or if I’m gone for like four or five days, and it’s wonderful. And I get to come home and say I accomplished what I worked on all year, I do what I said I was gonna do all year, that’s the vision that I have for my family, I want my sons, I have four boys, I want them to see women that read, that’s part of my vision. And so, every single day, I get to chip away at that and become more productive in the areas that matter the most. And sometimes we have a really identified what matters most to us, and what matters most of the people that we love. So, we run around doing all these things that really don’t make that big of a difference. You know, if Warren says, I really want to go here for this particular event, or this whatever, and you’re doing everything, but that are we really communicating love to the person that we care about, you know, so if we incorporate that as part of our productivity plan, and we can see a host of other things that we can just let go or delegate to somebody else.

Roberto Candelaria 07:18: That last part, especially yo, the delegate to somebody else, I had issues with that for some so so so long. So, you know, let’s just say that, you know, I love the part about this family vision. And for the person that may not have that yet, right? Like they didn’t you know what, even if they do, right, so whether they do or whether they don’t like what really are outside of this family vision, like some of the keys to productivity that can help this entrepreneur, this woman, this coach, the CEO, whatever title and identity like you’ve given yourself, or they’ve given themselves, like, how do they actually move forward? In business? And in life? Because I think so many people see them as like, I can be 100% in business and 100% in life. Its like, no, y’all, there’s 100%, like just one of them. So how do people like balance productivity in this one, like pool of 100% that they have?

Christina Garrett 08:15: So, my thought is this, I, The distance between two points is always the straight line. Okay. So, I’ll give you an example. One of my goals in 2020 was to work with Essence magazine, okay, in my mind, part of my vision, which was always step one, was to not just, you know, be a one stop, you know, I didn’t, I wanted that whatever they thought of motherhood, they thought of me. This was my personal goal, and I had to start talking about it more often, I will go on Facebook Lives. And I will say, they don’t know who I am yet, but they should. I had that level of confidence and a bar near and where I was going, where my community was going, I could see it clearly. Okay. And so often if entrepreneurs destination is cloudy, we see people that we admire and other places we see the level of success that they’ve reached the money to pay name, but we have not yet mapped out a path in between those two destinations. And so, I made a beeline for my destination. I wanted to make sure that no one could debate me on who I was. If they weren’t sure if they wanted to work with me. Just go Google me and come back when you’re ready. That was my that was my focus, thought leadership affirming what our community was doing so that there was no doubt in anyone’s mind if you are productivity plus mom, like Christina is the goat always right. So, for those of us who are still finding their way or maybe they have a little bit of mind drama, that what’s happening next, you have to have a level of certainty that the vision you see is guarantee. Its guaranteed you’re going to make it no matter what. So now I have to map out the path that the fast In between those two places, so I started befriending editors, right journalists and things like that. That was the fastest way. If you’re the one just writing all the content, you should know who I am, right? And so, I began to map myself to that plate. A lot of us we are going back and forth. So often is this for me? Is it not for me? Am I ready? Am I the perfect person? You already are, but no one else is going to try to persuade you or drag you there. So, the longer it takes you to climb over that initial hurdle, the longer it’s gonna take you to get to the destination. Hey, I started talking to all the people cue, Roberto relationships, raise money and opportunities and speaking engagements, all of it. Like how else can we get there? Let me go talk to the people who are hiring. Let me go talk to the HR manager, let me go talk to the people who are working in diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility. Let me go straight there. Because they want the message as bad as I want to give it. How fast can I get there? But sometimes we’re just getting too much when I’m not making powerful decision. And now working straight to that place. We just don’t have time. If you haven’t reached your destination yet, you don’t have time to be scared. You don’t have time to not make decisions. Let’s go. You know, we have to make moves now. So, for those of us who are on the line, like you just have to make a decision to run after it, it’s you’re going to go to the fastest way possible and execute on it.

Roberto Candelaria 11:29: Yeah, I love that. And y’all Listen, this could be in anything. So, you heard her give a couple examples here. But it’s just like, you know, like, what is the fastest way to get to clients? Well, you got to figure out who your client is you got to figure out where they’re at. And you got to figure out what you’re going to sell them. Like some people don’t have a client because they don’t know what they sell it. So, nobody can buy if they don’t know what you sell. I mean, yeah, and let’s be real, like you can’t sell people if you don’t know what you sell. And so, I love. Like, what is the quickest way there and you know, you touched a little bit about the conference. So, like we tell us more about the conference, kind of how that came to be. And because this is life, the first one wasn’t probably sunshine and rainbows and puppy dogs and kitties. So, like, as you share about, like, where the conference is today, what were some of the things that, you know, maybe weren’t expected along the way that have helped you become who you are today and make the conference what it is?

Christina Garrett 12:29: Oh, deep breath. Okay. Yeah. Also, I’m gonna get some lessons from but I’m gonna share. So, we are now going into the eighth year of the conference. It is a gathering of our community every year a celebratory event, a workshop weekend, it is a weekend where we leave all children at home, some of us leave our husband too and we just come and gather and focus. We reworked the vision based off of our new season of life seasons change often, we just take a deep breath for what we want to see happen. In the next year, I started the conference just wanting to host a quiet space for mom, right? I told my husband, we had three small kids at the time. Okay. I told my husband, I just want to host a dinner for mom. I just want to start something. But I have so many reasons why this is not going to work. I had 100 reasons why it wouldn’t work and maybe two of why it would. So, you work long hours we had the kids we have all of these things going on in our life. Or, you know, he was at school all of these reasons why I could never host a three hour event okay, so he told me don’t you say that I love you if you want it to go out for an evening and host something for some local ladies then I will come home early from work. So, you could go and do that. And I had to pause and say know what you’re right. The only thing that’s really holding me back from executing on this on mine. And so, I went into a mall Hilton Garden Inn, okay, this Hilton Garden if that was the row had to be 10 by 10. Not really, but in my mind now It told me what the chicken was dry the cookies. I don’t even know what the catering department was doing. But after that first event, something magical happened, where everyone was still around hours after everything ended. And they were talking and connecting and you know, forming these friendships. The next day we woke up and everyone had a new network of people because they had come to that event. And I knew that something magical had happened naturally, that little bit of magic went in my head, Roberto and the next year I and the next year I’ll have like, oh my gosh, we’re blowing up. I had gone viral in 2016. So my virality naturally meant that everyone on the internet was going to come and pack out the Renaissance for my next product. Everyone, everyone, like all million people. Okay, so I went viral all of a sudden, I was on Fox News everywhere because of some things that God had done in my family. It was not so it did not happen. Like in my mind, mostly because I didn’t prepare for it. I think I, it could have just been ego it could have been overreaching. I don’t know. Anyway, our hotel attrition, which is you booked a certain amount of row, you do not fill those rooms with people see what Roberto is rubbing his head, y’all can see this when he is if you do not fill those rooms, you have to pay for it according to your contract. And so, my little family had a five figure, right, I suddenly five years ago, like five fingers of like, seven, oh, yeah, I was so debilitated. I was so distraught, I could have hung up the Mamathon and never took off again. That was like my quitting year, like everyone has a year where I’m just done. That was my quitting year. 2017 was my quitting year, and my husband, who loved me so much, we have to surround ourselves with people who just pushed us forward. He said, This is not your quitting time, we’re going to pay for it. And we’re going to keep moving on. And those are the lessons that thanked me hard and what might sail but made me stronger. You know, you have to be willing to go back to the thing that knocked you down and say how do we avoid this from happening again? And how do we execute at a higher level? So, queue the sponsorship lessons. Queue making better relationships and really establishing our community hosting in person meet up, you know, small micro events, before we go bid with the other one. All of these lessons helped me to be to get to year eight, but we have to go back to what knocked us out to learn the lesson. Reconsider the how and then do it better.

Roberto Candelaria 17:07: Listen, so y’all she Christina is right. I was rubbing my head. And you know, it’s one of the things that I think that not enough event producers or event hosts talk about, you know, I’ve been very open that my very first three-day event like we were negative, almost 40 grand. And it was see now I saw her face, y’all heard her son. And it was just like, okay, like, literally the first thoughts were like, maybe I shouldn’t do advanced. This isn’t for me, other people make it look so easy. And was just like, I just didn’t know what I didn’t know. And so like what I want to add on to what Christina is saying here is like, as you face these things, it’s like, how do you face them? And maybe you got a tip on this? Cuz I realized I was gonna ask a question. So, ask the question, what I’d love to hear your take, I know what my take is. I don’t wanna years, like when these things happen? Because they will. And hmm. And they can happen more than once. Well, hopefully not the same situation. But like when something happens in life, when something happens in business, that’s just whether it was in your control or not, it doesn’t go the way you want it. How do you not make it mean anything about you? Because I think that’s what people do is they just like, oh, that means I’m a failure. That means I shouldn’t do the event. That means I can’t be an entrepreneur. That means I won’t ever get a coaching client. That means I never host an event again, like, would you go through these things? How do you know, there’s that lovely phrase like water off a duck’s back, but it’s just like, how do you like not make it mean anything about you personally, you just didn’t know what you didn’t know.

Christina Garrett 18:44: I have found if you learn a lesson about what you didn’t know what, if you learned it? What, even if it’s just from the point of this podcast forward, you always leave more space for error. Okay, more space every time. You know, if you have a goal set, give yourself extra time. You know, for example, I run 5k, I’m working on it, maybe five, just sideline me, okay. But I’m working on getting back since 5k and 10K half marathon status again, okay. But if I give myself 10 weeks to run a race, I need 15 because there are some days when it’s too cold and I don’t want to go outside. And there are some days where my body hurts. And there are some days when I have a sniffle. And I don’t want to make it worse by going outdoors or Sundays when that schedule gets dirty. You need that extra time that extra state. So sometimes we can make it an indictment on who we are as a person or make you feel like we’re not enough or we’re not ready. Instead today. The Productivity coach is telling you give yourself more space. Give yourself more time. If you’re creating a budget, add 25% to it and only 25 like that on top of because I learned Oh, so the food and beverage minimums actually gave me doesn’t include fees.

Roberto Candelaria 20:08: It’ll cease will be like a whole nother 30 ya’ll.

Christina Garrett 20:12: Like literally stay on the budget. Yeah, do not prepare, you will get knocked down, I’ll just get the breath knocked out of you for a while. And it will take the gusto out of you, moving towards your goal and the most audacious and relentless way. And so, we have to make sure that we’re creating with more buffering space, give yourself more time and 25% to your budget right? Up start planning earlier. Like is literally the difference between you succeeding at the level that you want versus you just making it surviving? graving by like, you don’t want that experience without a plan for success. And sometimes we are not taking us up far enough in advance if we’re not adding enough on top of the goal to say, You know what, I might not do this in a month, it might take me three months. But I will make it I will do it. But you got a plan.

Roberto Candelaria 21:07: So, listen, you just you chatting over here helped me think of something. And I have I don’t know this may send you on a rant. It may not. But listen, I had to rant. And I was like God go do that on social media later. It’s so key what you were sharing about planning more, whether it be time or whether it be money, or team or resources or, or all of these things. I remember when I did my first marathon. I didn’t, y’all first of all, let’s be clear. I didn’t even know what a marathon was. I signed up for it. Because it was several years ago was the 20th anniversary of the Walt Disney World Marathon. And y’all know I love Disney and somebody was like, I finally found the one Disney thing you’ll ever be able to buy. And they showed me the metal. And I was like, okay, and garage and went and paid my little money. And, you know, for a marathon, I say little back then it was like $300 Now there it’s like so it was like, eight, nine weeks to the marathon. Now my essay never run out scene, right? This das people that was like if I hadn’t run into this chasing me. And so, I was like, okay, and I told a friend about, oh, I’m gonna do a marathon. It said, like nine-ish weeks, and they’re like, how long? Have you been training? I’m like, I just signed up. For real. But how long? Have you been training? Because I just signed up? Do you know what it is? But no, really? Yeah, I went to Google. And I found out that is 26.2 miles. I got my car and drove it. And I said, what if I did, but what I’ll tell you is I finished the marathon. It took me a lot longer than planned. It took me close to seven hours, I ended with shin splints, and a stress fracture in my foot. And like, by just all the things that could go wrong, like physically, and it was only because I didn’t plan and prepare. And I like since that I’ve done like three more marathons and probably like, seven or eight half marathons that maybe we do one day, but I think it made it a different shape other than pair, which is where I’m at right now, you really bust your brain. Anyway, all of this ties in to this question, which is, you know, why is it that as an y’all this, this, I’m gonna say people of color, this may, even as a not person of color, you may experience this too. And so, I’m going to speak kind of broadly here with this, but like, why is it as people of color, one of the things that we’ve seen it, as I heard you talking about this is just like, we just like, I need to take whatever I have, and make it stretch it as far as I can until this date, like pop versus plan for there to be enough. And can you maybe share a little bit about that? Because I said, I remember my grandma, she would like, listen, she would have three days of leftovers in the fridge, and she figured out how to feed 30 people. But why is it that like, sometimes our brains are like, let me do just enough, versus plant.

Christina Garrett 24:09: I believe that some of us and this could be anyone, right? Anyone who under the sound of my voice can come out of a place where you were just making and somewhere in life, we feel like that’s the way it always is. That’s the way it’s always it’s always been that way. And this is how I’ve been functioning all of this time. Okay, so I’ll give you some of my clients as an example where these are like powerhouse women, who most of them are black women. And you know, they are superstars in their field. I’m talking my like Head of Public Relations for network, and it’ll all be really killer job. And something inside of them still said, I should be cleaning my house, that it’s my job to clean my house every week. I’m only But says, you know, even if you don’t hire someone, your chances are as tall as you are legs down, do it. I am not paid to clean. It doesn’t mean that I don’t go in and you know, do some, you know, get some things that you wouldn’t need. Oh ensuite right. But I walked through my house, and I think it was picture day of it. Because as of May, I will have three teenagers that live here. So, this is not in my job description. Christina job description is love on the husband; I homeschool you guys. But I’m delegating a lot of that nowadays, I coach I think I’ve trained cleaning up after you guys is not in my job. So I have moved out of survival mode. Right. And I think that more of us need exposure, I think the difference between survival mode and thriving is exposure. Because if we don’t see people who aren’t doing it, if we don’t hear about it, or podcast, and no goal to that is that if we don’t show up and absorb that information, or see people who were in our shoes doing it, if we do not see this happening in real life, then sometimes we go into this inside goal of this is just how life is. So, one of the one of the corporate partnerships that we’ve established this year is working with the city of Montgomery is housing authority, right. And I’ve gone and done some training with the people who are over there residents services division. So, they’re working with people who are coming in on a fixed income, their mother’s mother’s mother lived in that project. And they now live in that same project with their kid. And they want to move from this apartment to home ownership. But no one else in their family has ever owned a home or ever made it over this hurdle. And so, it’s my job now to go in and talk to those who are working with these people and say, You are the only person perhaps in their entire life who’s holding belief that they can accomplish this goal. You might be the only person that tells them. You know we might be the only light that people see. So, I think that some of us had been in survival mode for so long, that we don’t know what it’s like to have space to breathe, add extra in the bank account to sleep in, you know, the home reason we homeschool is to sleep in the morning, we don’t get up to like 9:30 you know. That’s why we do this. And so, you know, especially as people of color for black women, especially, there’s a big movement going around about the soft life and self-care and wellness and all of this, because we felt like we’d had to carry the brunt of the low for so long. You know. So, I think that when we get to exit that mind frame that mindset, it really does make all of the difference.

Roberto Candelaria 27:50: Love it. Love it, love it, love it. See? Ya’ll, this is why I like to ask questions that some people be like, and I’m just like, now let’s go there. So, as we wrap up today, you know, I’ve I have three questions in my head that I’m gonna go with one. And, you know, I’ll say it’s this is we work with a lot of moms. And some of them are single moms, and whatever may be two tips that you have found help you be a mom while running a business because you’re I don’t know, personally because I’m not a mommy all but I hear about this thing called mom guilt, I see that it’s also real, and in the lives of my clients. And I also see moms that are, you know, single mom co-parenting and relationships. And one of the things about the women we work with I hear so often just like Roberto, how do I do this and be in the drive line? Main homeschool in my queue, they dedicated to the drive line, but then it’s like, how can I do it? Like how can I build a six-figure business and still be mom? What would you say?

Christina Garrett 29:00: Oh, my goodness, I would reignite the family vision for one. And here’s what I mean. 10 years from now, 15-20 years from now, when you look back at your journey of being a mom, right? When you look back to who you were to your kids as they were growing up, I can promise you that a lot of the tiny things that we harbor over now in this current season will not matter. Okay, the pile of laundry going to be falling asleep falling over with the dishes still on this day. All these other things are just not going to be significant. Okay, so you have to remember that just because you have a lot I have time with my kids every day does not mean all that kind of quality. So, they still ask for Hey, can we watch a movie together in the evening or something like that? That’s the quality family time. So, you have to remember just because you’re together doesn’t mean that quality time you and Warren could be working in the same house, right? He’s in whatever role you’re in a different quality time and date night. That’s quality time, right? So, we still can feel that ever echoing mom guilt. My suggestion would be if you can only take three things into your future you from your mom’s journey, what would those things be? I want more field trips with my kids. I want to sit down and laugh with them more and I want to make sure that I teach them that you know, my son is 15 and he’s handsome. I need him to go to college knowing the hoes are not loyal. Like I need him to go to college knowing that. Having wisdom, right and knowing who got it and most of these women who are allowed to pass you are no good for you. Go to campus Bible study, find a girl you know who will give it at least she knows who got it. Okay, like don’t Okay, so go back to your family visit.

Roberto Candelaria 30:53: I’ve just pictured this shirt. Just to see to have just picture with that shirt. The hoes ain’t loyal.

Christina Garrett 30:58: He’s still handsome and I’m like listen most of these girls they probably laid they’re eyes on you baby they’re not worth 3 cents. Go to college and find a wife. Like your dad did. Okay? Talk to him all the stories you’re gonna feel guilty about all kinds of stuff like you just, you know, you always aren’t something that we carry with us because we cannot do what all and be it all to everyone. So, number two, your vision. If you had to imagine your kids grown with their own kids, what would you wish that they repeated, do more of that. I bet you’re not gonna be able to be perfect, the more of that. And the number two of your busy mom, you’re growing a business. We talked about the fact that difference between two points of the straight line, go do what everyone else is scared to do. Go do it. Every everyone else is running away from the in-person conversation. They’re running away from the big ask. They’re running away from showing up in their name and life. Like I’m calling for all of it, like the mission of this year’s daytime TV. If the okay like we’re that slowing down, we’re just going to pick up the pace. But so many other people are walking slowly. And they’re very careful about making decisions be a powerhouse decision maker, the sky that that’s the future that just felt the hat. It was the fastest way for me to get there. Do that every day. And you’ll pass everyone by loosen down.

Roberto Candelaria 32:11: Listen. So, after that, especially people who don’t want to find you, where do they find you?

Christina Garrett 32:16: Oh, my goodness. Oh, I know. Right? So, I’m on Instagram and Facebook under the Momathon Diaries. Or you could just send me a friend request on Facebook. I’m totally a human. And I say voice note and video. I’m just a totally normal human being with a lot of kids. So, I would love to connect with any busy moms especially who are trying to get organized and want to do more without adding more to the to do list.

Roberto Candelaria 32:44: Awesome. Love it. Thank you all for joining another episode of the show and we’ll see ya’ll real soon.

Outro 32:50: Thanks for listening to another episode of the Relationships Make Money podcast, subscribe to the show and never miss another episode. Want to stay connected. Learn more about our Facebook community and other free resources at robertoteaches.com