The Counselor Helping Women Get Unstuck

  Shelli Varela: Melissa Bezotte, welcome to the It’s a TRIBE Thing Podcast. How are you?   Melissa Bezotte: I’m good. Thank you for having me.   Shelli Varela: I love the trajectory of your journey and how it plays out step by step by step. Your membership site is called The Inspire Collective and you help women get unstuck. But before you were a membership site owner, the big question is, what is your origin story? Who were you at the very beginning of your journey? And how did you end up here?   Melissa Bezotte: Wow. Should I start at like age two?   Shelli Varela: “I was born at a very young age.” Sure.   Melissa Bezotte: Not the whole beginning but when I was young, I was always one of those people. I had a deep faith and a deep connection with God. And I was one of those people that people could talk to, my friends could talk to, adults would talk to me, and I was kind of this vault as a young child and as a teenager. And so, I always knew that I would be a counselor and so I went to school for Psychology at the University of Minnesota, and then moved to Colorado and ended up getting my master’s degree in counseling and I started off as a school counselor for almost 10 years. Let’s see what was next. So, I was living in Minnesota at the time and I was about to give birth to my third child and I went through a Christian counseling program, and it totally blew me away. And it was at that point that I realized that I wanted to be a Christian counselor and it was really hard for me to go back to the secular field.   And so, I became underneath my church, a licensed and ordained pastor and then also licensed through the pastoral medical association, specializing in Christian counseling. So, it’s been 10 years that I’ve owned this practice and I’ve never marketed. It’s all been just organic reach and I now have two therapists that work for me and I am consistently on a waiting list. You want me to keep talking because I could talk forever?   Shelli Varela: Absolutely. I just want to jump in real quick, though. When you started counseling like what was it about that that filled your bucket? What was about that that lit you up? Because oftentimes what we’ll hear is, is people will be doing the thing that they typically do. It’ll be their job or their label or their identity and then they’ll realize, “Oh, my gosh,” like, aha, there’s this other thing that comes so naturally to me. But for you, you’ve been in the same groove and the same rut the whole time. What is it about that, that lights you up?   Melissa Bezotte: I’ve just always known that this is what I was supposed to do. Like I remember being in high school and thinking there’s no way I’m going to be a counselor because I have to get a master’s degree. And out of high school, you’re thinking how in the world am I going to have to go to school for 8 to 10 years? Like, there was no way. But then I got my bachelor’s degree, and no offense to anyone who has a psych degree, but there was not a whole lot I could do and I knew I wanted to be a counselor. So, it was something that I just did. I was actually a single mom at the time and I went back to grad school and finished and accomplished it, and I got my master’s degree and became a counselor. So, it was something that honestly has always been a part of my DNA and something that chose me and I had to fight to get it. So, it’s my purpose. It’s my passion and it’s what I do.   Shelli Varela: Because you use the word secular, I just wanted to make sure you explain to everybody what that means.   Melissa Bezotte: So, to me a secular means that it is an environment where I can’t really talk about God and I can’t pray with people and it’s something where like if clients were to come to me and say that they were a Christian, I could certainly move in that arena, but not okay for me to talk about faith or certainly not okay for me to pray for people. And so, I was learning just like this whole new toolkit where I was able to take everything that I have learned in college and in grad school and bring a Christ-based perspective to it. So, now I had this entirely new toolkit. The old toolkit was still there but I had this toolkit in front of me, this biblical toolkit and I’m like, “Now what?” So, I try to go back to doing counseling like I did before and I just knew there was something missing. I am a firm believer that healing comes in five different ways. It’s spiritual, mental, emotional, physical, and energetic. And so, the spiritual piece was so important to me. So, I literally moved out onto my own, working in my church for the first like couple months and then now I’m in my third space and just continue to grow.   Shelli Varela: That’s brilliant. I love that you are self-aware enough to take the pieces that you like, acknowledge what isn’t working about that, and then try and find a way to bridge the two. So, when was the first time you ever heard about a membership site and what was your initial reaction? Because oftentimes what we experience is people will say, “Oh, I’ve heard about this membership site idea and that might be possible for Melissa but that’s not really possible or practical for me. I don’t know anything about tech or I don’t know how to do any of that.” What was that like for you?   Melissa Bezotte: Well, first of all, that’s all my story. So, those are all things that I said and I can expound on. So, my third child was born nine years ago and so I work two days a week because my husband travels. My husband retires next year and so that just opens up time and space for me to do more of what I do, working more than two days a week and just really at a position where I was like, what’s next? So, I’m a licensed natural health practitioner, I’m a counselor, and then a pastor. So, how in the world do I put all three of those together? I’ve been on a waiting list for a very long time. So, I started retreats about eight years ago and it’s amazing what happens in these healing retreats. And so, I’m impacting more people, but still, like how do I put all this stuff together? So, I actually went through so I’m 47. I was 46 and kind of I wouldn’t say a midlife crisis because it definitely was a crisis. It was more like, “Who am I now? Like, what is my new identity? What does that look like?”   I’ve been a stay-at-home mom for so long and I’ve stayed home because I work for two days running a very successful practice in two days so that’s awesome. But what’s next? And so, I hired a coach. I hired a business coach and she told me she had a membership so I joined her membership and I was like, “Hm, what is this?” And I literally had no idea like I never in a billion years thought I could run a membership site because how could a counselor do something virtual or online? Like I just didn’t get how that would work. But the more that I worked with her and the more that I continued to see what this look like, I, of course, got curious. And so, she encouraged me to do TRIBE, to sign up for TRIBE and it just clicked. It just made sense for me.   So, these are the things I’m thinking, okay, I always am on a waiting list. I want to impact more people. I do retreats and everyone always says after these retreats like I wish this could just go on forever. And so, this is me doing all three of these things. I’m a natural health practitioner. I’m a counselor and I’m a pastor. And it’s kind of like I’m providing like a never-ending retreat because people are counseled and healed and equipped and inspired constantly. So, I’m a business owner. So, I’ve been a business owner for a long time, 10 years. We also started a business with my husband so I know how to run a business but moving from an actual one-on-one practice to being online, holy cow, like I get anxiety just saying that right now. Like, it’s such a learning curve, but I have everything that I need like within TRIBE and this isn’t even a TRIBE commercial like I really just do.   Shelli Varela: But it sounds like from what you’re saying, you’ve got like the trifecta of awesomeness. You’re a counselor, you’re a pastor, like, it sounds like having a membership site is the thing that allows you to be authentic and congruent to the whole you.   Melissa Bezotte: Yes, I’ve never felt more that. Yes.   Shelli Varela: One of the things that you said is you did it your way.   Melissa Bezotte: Yes.   Shelli Varela: Just wanted to dive into that a little bit because there’s so many people out there that think it’s got to be this or that. You actually are somebody who’s successfully acknowledged what you love, wasn’t working for you, thought for you in your life where you had something else that you love and found a way to combine the two that hadn’t been done before. Can you speak to the benefits of the transformations that you have seen when you’re incorporating faith into your practice as opposed to before you knew how to kind of fly between the radar, fly between the lines? What are the [inaudible – 9:05] different now that because you’ve said yes to that and acknowledged it, and innovate a completely new way of doing it?   Melissa Bezotte: So, you’re talking about moving from like secular counseling into integrating my faith or one-on-one.   Shelli Varela: Yeah.   Melissa Bezotte: Okay. So, honestly, like before, I feel like I was working so hard like to working so hard to get people to understand the tools and to grow and to change and to move forward. There are so many great tools out there and I’ve continued to learn those things but when you actually put the healing in God’s hands, like I’m not a part of the equation. I’m a part of the equation but I’m just a conduit. So, it’s like I can do less and God can do more through this. And I know that I’m telling them the truth like this is my truth, right? I’m a Christian. I’m a pastor like my truth is that they’re the only way to heal or one of the main components is Christianity or faith. And so, to me, I couldn’t go back. I felt like I was a fake because of who I was and I wasn’t able to bring that into the environment I was working.   And it was just really hard for me. I felt like I was a liar because I knew that if you incorporate faith, and again, for me it’s Christianity, it’s the only way. It’s one of the five ways that I believe people heal. So, talk about transformation. I’ve never advertised and if you google Christian counselors in our area, Living Water Christian Counseling is the first thing that pops up. I’ve never advertised. I’ve always had a full practice and I have practitioners that work for me. Yeah, I don’t have to because I know that when the person comes, they’re going to actually get healed.   Shelli Varela: What is the difference in the outcomes you’re seeing when you had to sort of censor yourself before versus like right now, you’re all of your whole self and you’re bringing all of your gifts and all of your knowledge and all of your worlds experience?   Melissa Bezotte: Yeah. It worked. I mean, there are things that work, right? I mean, psychology was created for a reason like it’s a beautiful science, right? But I think about back then too and I was just different like you go through grad school and you don’t learn a whole lot. I did like 2,000 hours of internship and I worked for free for two years just to get my toolkit, and then you work and it’s like you’re making stuff up as a counselor. No one really teaches you how to counsel. So, I feel like from back then to now is so completely different anyways, so I bring a neuroscientific approach to my therapy as well. And so, I pair God with neuroscience because God created neuroscience. So, it’s Christianity, natural health, and then obviously, the therapy that I provide. So, it’s like cutting edge light-years crazy different from what I did before. I feel like back then I was when I was a lot younger too but this is me like this is what this is supposed to be like this is how people are supposed to heal. It’s just so integrated.   Shelli Varela: What is having a membership site and doing it your way made possible in your life and your business?   Melissa Bezotte: Well, my business is still thriving. So, I have a business, right? Like I said, I’ve been a business owner for a long time. So, for me, I kind of see myself as moving from business owner to entrepreneur or like online entrepreneur. I’m still a business owner but I’m also an online entrepreneur and the learning curve again has been crazy. But what I’m noticing is I feel like I have like, personally, I have the ability now to I don’t have to be at the office five days a week. Like as a therapist or as a counselor, you can imagine doing one-on-one counseling. It’s beautiful and amazing but I realized I can’t do more than two days a week. I can’t see more than like 15 to 20 clients per week because it’s hard. I was seeing a lot more. Like when I said, I want to go back to work more full time, it’s just not my best. Like, I can’t give people my best. I can’t see more clients. So, I had to figure out a way to like impact more people and that was the retreats. And now I’m doing this and I feel like, I don’t know, my capacity is just increased so much and I feel way less busy, way less bogged down by stuff, by other people’s stuff, by the stuff that I would normally deal with if I was counseling 25 to 30 hours a week. So, I have more time, I have way more capacity, and I have far more reach to bring healing to people’s lives.   Shelli Varela: When you roll out the content for your membership site, what does that look like? Do you have a monthly model? Or do you do weekly? Or is it Q&As? Or what does that look like inside the back end of your site?   Melissa Bezotte: Well, here’s the deal. Like, I made most of this up like I walked through TRIBE and I remember going through TRIBE and thinking that I had to do everything just so like just this perfect way. And I’m a rule follower so I did like I followed all the steps. I did all that and that’s why I think I’ve been so successful so early. I’ve only been doing this for seven months, five months, five to seven months and everything I’ve done has been really successful. I think because I had the framework through TRIBE, but I decided to kind of do it my own way. And so, finally, I feel like I’m in a spot where it’s actually I’m doing it the right way. So, my membership site like an actual website is actually just going up this month and I have this beautiful success path to help people move from stuck to free. Well, when women come into the membership, remember, it’s an integrated natural health membership for women of faith so how can one success path or one course help people find freedom?   So, here’s the deal. So, there’s the success path. So, people go through the success path and then they use. We have two coaching calls per month that people can get individualized help, group individualized help during those times. And then we also so the content that I’m providing, as I said, the website is brand new. So, that’s just kind of the success path kind of this course but what I’ve done the whole time is I have a team of leaders and we are all experts in our fields of natural health. So, I have another therapist that works or that’s on my leadership team. I have, of course, myself. I have a person who really focuses on the body and corrective exercise and nutrition and wellness and fitness. I have a chiropractor, a Doctor of Chiropractic, who’s also a doctor of natural health, and then I have a senior wealth advisor and then I have a branding expert. So, I’ve got all the bases covered.   And so, once per month we have this topic. And so, this month, for example, it’s maximizing your physical health. And so, my deliverables per month so the website sits there, right? I just started that right now so I’m not sure what that’s going to look like. So, this month, it’s maximizing your physical health and so my expert on that topic is doing a – we do an event. It is a virtual event and it’s also in-person. So, I have people from all over the United States. And so, people can come either live or they can watch it virtually and she’s just providing content on how to maximize your physical health. And then I also have someone who is coming on for a bonus and she’s going to be talking about intermittent fasting for hormones and for, well, there’s so many benefits to intermittent fasting so two masterclasses per month, and then the two coaching calls per month. Long story short, those are my deliverables and it’s changed and ebbed and flowed. And that’s what I’m doing right now and I think it’s really working.   Shelli Varela: I love what you said and I want to echo it back to everybody else because whenever you have an area of interest or knowledge or expertise or education, you naturally gravitate to people who are in alignment with that, but maybe not exactly like that.   Melissa Bezotte: Yes.   Shelli Varela: So, for example, you talked about chiropractors and all different kinds of healers and practitioners. So, I just wanted to circle back on that because for anybody listening out there, who can be the expert in your membership site, and you can also bring in your cohorts, your peers, your friends, the people that you naturally have relationships to and use those resources as a benefit to not only to your members but also as a benefit to you because you get to expand the knowledge base of what your members are actually receiving by participating and being part of the community.   Melissa Bezotte: Yes. And I took it to another level that I’m going to share. So, before I started my membership site, I sent out an invitation to 10 practitioners that I had been working with or that I’ve known for a long time and I was like, “Hey, I’m doing this thing for $69 a month. Will you follow me? Will you be a part of my team? We provide content and you will be the only ones that I will refer people to.” And seven of those people said yes and so this is my team. So, I am a connector and I know that, yes, I’m a therapist and a natural health practitioner, and a counselor, but I can’t do everything. And if we’re going to provide an integrated approach, it can’t just be me. So, these women said yes, and now we do provide an integrated approach. So, not only do I have this tiny little membership but also, we’re the team that provides content for my membership.   Shelli Varela: So, that takes some of the heat off your plate in terms of content creation?   Melissa Bezotte: Yes.   Shelli Varela: Absolutely brilliant.   Melissa Bezotte: Right. Because I have a practice, a counseling practice, yes, so I can’t do everything. I don’t know everything and I don’t need to.   Shelli Varela: Absolutely. And so, everybody listening, please hear that. You don’t have to know everything. All you need to do is be the connector, the curator, and bring those people to your tribe and they will love on you hard.   Melissa Bezotte: My bonus people, they’re people that I’ve met through TRIBE and through Connect, and we speak on each other’s. So, that’s a totally other way to do that and it’s awesome because we provide content for each other for free.   Shelli Varela: Win-win. What advice would you give to somebody who’s thinking of starting a membership site?   Melissa Bezotte: Just do it. Like just do it like you have to set a vision. You have to really understand why you’re doing this. So, my why was really well defined. I know that I want to do something different. I know that I want to have a greater reach. I know that I want to use the use, like, for my passion and my purpose. Like I knew there was something else for me. And so, every time it gets difficult or every time I get overwhelmed or every time I do not know, I mean, honestly, I think I’m a very smart woman but technology is difficult. I have to remember my why. And my why is because my husband’s going to be retiring so I do want to be able to travel more. I do want to create a pipeline of income for myself. I want to move away from one-on-one counseling and affect more people’s lives. So, understanding your why is really important, so just do it but when you do it, make sure that you really identify it and understand and knowing your why. And the other one is how, like, I could not do this without the support and help that I’ve had through TRIBE. And again, this is not a commercial.   Shelli Varela: It’s all a commercial for TRIBE. It’s the best thing out there.   Melissa Bezotte: Yeah, I could not. There is no way. I hope no one’s going to laugh but I have three accountability partners, three, within TRIBE. So, three hours a week, we share back and forth stuff and it’s amazing because I need that. I’ve never done that. I’ve never been an online entrepreneur. I’ve been a successful business owner but I don’t know anything about this. So, I have some great people that I’m connecting with, I would say accountability partners, but we connect and we share and we support each other. I couldn’t do it otherwise.   Shelli Varela: But here you are and I just want to echo this back to you as a mirror for how awesome you are. You didn’t have it all figured out but you knew what you knew but you also knew what you didn’t know, and just found the resources to shore up the bits you didn’t know, in effect, allowing you to do the thing that you thought you couldn’t do.   Melissa Bezotte: Yes, and I’m still learning. It’s definitely not perfect but I’m still learning and I’m figuring it out. Like I did a founders launch at the beginning. I launched for the first time in January and I’m launching again and launching means that I’m going to be opening the doors to new members. And I’m just going to get better every time and I give myself a ton of grace.   Shelli Varela: Well, that’s how we keep moving forward, right?   Melissa Bezotte: Yeah.   Shelli Varela: Melissa, I wanted to thank you so much for taking the time. This has been a great conversation, very inspirational and I’m just super grateful for you.   Melissa Bezotte: Sure. Absolutely. I’m grateful to have the opportunity and grateful for you and for what you represent too and just giving people the opportunity of brand new newbie membership owner and opportunity to speak on your podcast.   Shelli Varela: Oh, well, it’s our pleasure. If people are looking for you online, where’s the best place they can find you?   Melissa Bezotte: The best place so on Facebook, my business is called Living Water Christian Counseling, LLC and The Inspire Collective is the Inspire Collective at Melissa Bezotte.   Shelli Varela: And spell your last name for us.   Melissa Bezotte: B-E-Z-O-T-T-E.   Shelli Varela: Perfect. Thank you so much, my friend. I appreciate you.   Melissa Bezotte: Absolutely. Take care. [END]