146. How Feminine Power Grows Entrepreneurs and the Businesses They Touch

Welcome to Mind Power Meets Mystic. The show where practical mind power and mystical wisdom collide with humor and wild curiosity.

Yeah, we're not here to play it safe. I'm Cinthia Varkevisser, your resident spiritual shit disturber. I stir things up with mystic power and bold action.

And I'm Michelle Walters, coach and Hypnotherapist. I bring strategy and transformative hypnosis to help you turn subconscious blocks into unstoppable momentum.

Let's shake up your thinking, dive into your soul and make bold moves in your life.

We'll take you on a journey of breakthrough and aha moments, exploring spirit, business, love relationships and self expansion.

We're connecting you with your highest self and flipping fear into strength. So

buckle up. We're doing this one wild, transformative conversation at a time.

Let's go.

Hello friends, welcome to another episode of Mind Power Meets Mystic. This is me Michelle Walters. I am the mind power our show, hypnotherapist and now marketer, joined by my pal, Cinthia Varkevisser, our show, mystic. We are excited to be continuing on with our chakras, in business series, and we are very excited today to have our friend Caterina Rando. Caterina Rando is a woman on a mission to uplift the lives of women everywhere through thriving entrepreneurship. She is an author, sought after, speaker, podcaster and business transformation coach who passionately serves women leaders and entrepreneurs on missions. She specializes in authentic, selling, embracing, speaking to build influence, how to build bliss in your business. Katerina is also the founder of the thriving Women in Business Center in San Francisco, a place for women to gather and host workshops. Plus she also started thriving women in business giving, which raises money for women and girls education and entrepreneurship training. Welcome back to mind. Power meets mystic. Catarina,

Thank you, Michelle. I am blessing to be with

both of you. Oh, I'm always excited when we have time with you. I want the listeners to know that although we're talking about the second chakra today, which is the itty chakra, I call it because the itty chakra because it's about femininity, receptivity, creativity, all the it is, and you actually encompass all of that, you also encompass other parts, which is about generosity, being loud and proud. So you work with other chakras, right? The fourth chakra, which is the heart, loud and proud, the fifth chakra, which is communication, but you have this special identification of Women Helping Women, right? And I'd love to hear more about this, or to share with our audience, because you're probably the most loud and proud about Women Helping Women. So can you tell us more about that?

Yeah, well, the first thing Cinthia is, I'm born on March 8, which is International Women's Day. I do feel that I am divinely appointed for my work, which is to uplift women. I like to uplift women in many ways, including economically, because when women are thriving financially. What are they? They're doing, they're investing in their children, they're investing in their communities. They're investing in themselves. And by the way, women are extremely generous with their surplus wealth, and I want more women to be in charge of wealth in the world, because women do well with wealth. They don't spend money as much on tobacco and gambling and other things, and they use their money for good. So that's one of the reasons why I'm all about women, uplifting women.

And love that. I love that so much I have to tell you a quick story. Right before the pandemic, I met you for the first time, and you were lovely, because you were actually at one of my speaking engagements, and you stayed in that right? And you You were very, very much a part, a participant, yeah. And it wasn't until, I think the second time we met that you came up to me and said, You know what, you're a great speaker, and there are things that we could even up level. Why don't you come to one of my events? So I went to one of your events, and you were so feminine that I was uncomfortable, and I grew up a tomboy, and you. Always look beautiful. Your hair is always done very well. You're in a dress, and you do not swear you and and everything that you did came from a very feminine perspective. It took me a while to to decide whether or not I wanted to have you as my coach, because I was so uncomfortable. But here's what happened for me. You present very feminine. Your information, although presented femininely, is very business driven, which is much is masculine, but because it's presented so well and in such a soft way, it was easier for me to listen and accept than it did with other coaches. So thank you very much, my

friend. Thank you. I know Michelle told me that you described me to her as a girly girl, which made me laugh, because I didn't really think of myself that way. And you know, all women, all are, we are definitely a combination of the masculine and the feminine, right? Some of us amplify one more than the other, and when we're our authentic self, we find that place of authenticity that might be more one or the other, but as long as we feel like we're being ourself, then that's really all that matters, I think. And, and I do love all the girly stuff. I love the fashion. I love the, you know, afternoon tea with fascinators. You guys know me. You know I love the swag. I mean, I love all that stuff.

I'm actually sad that Michelle, you and I did not come on with our tiaras. But what were we thinking? What

were we thinking? I called Caterina the Queen recently. Oh, I'm thrilled you think of me that way. But why? And I said, because you give us all crowns right. I love that you've been listening to Mind Power Meets Mystic with me. Michelle Walters and my co host, Cinthia Varkevisser, we want to tell you about a special gig the two of us have going on. It's called mind power meets mystic, the project, and it starts off on a zoom call with Cinthia. Cinthia tell everybody what they can

expect. So for the first half of our session, you will be with me, and Michelle will be very quietly in the background preparing to do her work. What we will do is that we will talk about the one thing that you either want to amp up or that you want to release. And through the intuitive work, I help you get boil it down to its essence, and then give you an RX of three practical things to do to set you on your way. And then Michelle magically appears. What is it that you do that Michelle, I

have been listening in but not participating in the first half of the call. I have an excellent idea of what Cinthia means when she says something, and I have an excellent idea of quickly getting to what my client is all about and his or her individual strengths, I turn all of this into a 20 to 30 minute hypnosis session on the second half of the call, which, when we're done, I strip off and send you as an mp three that you can listen to over and over again. You also will have Cinthia's three point recommendations and the recording of the Zoom call. It is a fantastic one hour offering a great gift for yourself or for someone you don't know what to get such insights, and we've gotten such great reviews. So if you're interested, send me or Cinthia an email. You'll find our contact information in the show notes, and we'll tell you how to get started.

The thing that I like so much is when we think about business, well, I won't say we, but being a child of the 80s, when we would dress up as in our power suits, as women, it was. They were masculine suits with really severe shoulders, super short skirts, and so we were masculine, sexy. And, yeah, that's pretty much how it was. And although I liked it from a certain perspective, because there is a kind of power with sexiness, it's not a true power, it's authenticity that's powerful. And and I was wondering, when there are people like me who are having a hard time being authentic, which is feminine? What do you what's your coaching style for people like us? I know the answer, but so no.

Well, one of the things I'll say, and I know you both have heard me say it many times, is I call people's attention to the fact that we have been acculturated to be a certain way based on usually for women. I talk about our our institutional places or corporate places or academic places where we started our careers would. Tell us how to behave and tell us how to dress, and tell us what's acceptable and what's not acceptable. That's why you hear me say you're the queen of your fempire. You get to design your own corporate culture. You get to do it any way you want, and be loud and proud about the amazing woman you are, and that will attract your people. Also, you know, there's all those messages that we get about how to be and how not to be, from our family of origin, from our ethnic community, from our religious communities. And that, in many ways, is telling women from a very girls from a very an age, young age, who you are in your essence, is not okay. You gotta be more this, or you gotta be more that. And that's one of the things I so love about entrepreneurship. Nobody gets to tell me nothing. I get to wear what I want. I get to do what I want. If I want to give people crowns and throw hearts all over the place. I get to do it, because it's my business, and if somebody doesn't like it, sorry for them. They can go somewhere else, because I get to be having a creative expression of who I am through my business. And hopefully. Cinthia, back to our earlier discussion and Michelle, that's inspiring to the gals that are present.

Yeah. So it is true when I because Cinthia has been a friend for a long time, and when I started my hypnotherapy business, I was like, Look, I know marketing. I can handle that, but I have never well, and I didn't sales before, but it was always like, sell, upselling a client. So when they're already your client, and you're like, Oh, I've got another little strategic project. Is a very different sell than Hey, I'm new in this game, and I can help you, and let's work together. And she she said, Well, I think the best in the business is Katerina Rando, but you need to know she is a girly girl, and it either works for you or it doesn't. And fortunately, it did. And I started off, as I know many of your ladies do in your thrive at sales class, which was so good and so helpful. I even though conceptually, a lot of it is not different from the work that we do in marketing, it was the way you laid it out, and the way you encouraged everyone in the group, and you encourage the women to support one another, which is not always done. You know, coming from a lot of years in corporate, I don't want to say it was all a man's world, because it wasn't entirely, I mean, I was in creative ad agencies, they they're not all a man's world, but it is very fun and freeing to be an entrepreneur and to be able to do things the way I see fit, right and and that includes with my dose of femininity, and I just love The way you have interpreted business, which, in so many ways, over the history of time, has really been dominated by a more masculine energy. You have found a way to achieve amazing results, but with a softer feminine energy that is just lovely. So you would love to appreciate it.

Thank you, my friend. Thank you.

So your communities, I think: 5000

Um, well, our, our group, I think it's somewhere around there. Yeah. Republic group, I lost my I did have 5000 friends, but I lost my account, so now back to about 3400 building back up. Um, yeah, I, I like to connect with people, absolutely.

Well, not only that, you're, I know that you like to connect with people, but you have created in a community where you're also teaching them how to connect with people. So I'd like to talk about your bliss cruise. I got to go on the one post pandemic, and it was like the most special cruise in the whole wide world, not because it was on a ship, but the the women that I now consistors Consider sisters and what I'd like to talk about is you made sure to highlight everyone on that cruise. And so can you walk me through that process so that everybody is seen, felt, heard, acknowledged, loved. Well, it's very

depending on how many ladies you have. It can be challenging to showcase everybody, but I like to do that Cinthia, because really, and Michelle, we are a leader like I get to be a leader of leaders.

And the women that come are amazing. US, and I want everybody else to know how amazing they are. And as women, we have a lot of superpowers that we don't think are superpowers. And one of the things that I think is a big superpower is the ability to get the ladies together and facilitate them having a great time. And what happens when they get together? They make friends, they make connections, they start to collaborate, they gain clients, they share resources. And that's where the whole mastermind cruise came out of because I did a cruise retreat, and I said, Let's mastermind for 90 minutes, and then we'll go to dinner, and they're still there seven and a half hours later, that told me, women love to connect, and that's why we have a whole cruise on it now. And you know, the thing is too that it's also strategic Cinthia from the perspective of business, because they want to keep coming back, and that's what we want. We don't want clients. We want long term and lifelong clients, and that's what we get with retreats and cruises. Excuse me,

that's okay. I was very fortunate. I didn't I didn't know you in time to be a part of the bliss cruise that Cinthia was on, but I did know you in time to be on the following bliss cruise, which was just a magnificent trip. I was blessed to be able to go. I made so many good friends. Well, I made good friends, and I started some friendships, and I evolved some friendships, and it was really quite a mix. And then I also went on amp up. Well, Cinthia and I were both on amp up, your mastermind cruise last fall, which was a blast, very different feel because of the size and number and yeah, kind of cruise but, but also so much fun. And there's something really magical about being with your people. You've spoken before about how you cultivate your community, and it shows because the women in the room are there to listen, to be supportive, to share ideas, to realize that you know the world's going to be a better place if we work together to make it happen, right? And and your your

events and opportunities really support that.

Thank you. And really, Michelle, I believe that women want women are natural helpers, okay, and this BS myth about women want to pull each other down and blah, blah, blah, that is so old that is from, you know, decades back when there was like no women, and if you were there, then you had to do everything you could to keep your place. But now there are so many opportunities and and guess what? We get to create our own opportunities. You know, nobody taught me how to do retreats. Nobody said, Caterina, it's okay for you to open a center. I get to create in my mind whatever brilliant idea I want, and I get to pursue it. Of course, as you all know, we get so many brilliant ideas. The challenge is managing our brilliant ideas and not pursuing them all at once. But the thing is, it's your party, it's your fempire. You get to do it any way you want, and the sooner you figure out that it doesn't matter what other people think and it doesn't matter what the naysayers say. It's not, it's not. They're not you and determination and connection and resilience. These are things that we learn as we do our thing, and those are superpowers that we can continue to use on our journey.

What I also like when you are in your creative space and doing your programs, I'm going to talk about your speaker, mastermind, yeah, because I have the privilege of being a one of your value ads, right? Yes. And what a lot of people don't know. You know, even in all this time on mind, power meets mystic, I don't talk very much about my martial arts, or, you know that, that I do that that work, and here you are very quickly picking up this valuable piece and turning it into board breaking and and it's a great transformation during speaker mastermind, which I absolutely love. Yeah, yeah,

let me say it's awesome. So when people come. To the speaker mastermind retreat. We work on their speeches, their offers, their how to tell their client, examples and their overall speaking. I want them to be more confident. I want them to leave more empowered than when they showed up as a business woman and, of course, as a speaker. So the last day we have Cinthia come in. She does her magic. She shows the ladies how to break a board, and we break boards. Now, for some gals, they've done it before, but most of the gals have never broken a board before, and within an hour, usually every gal has broken a board, and she feels more empowered. Sometimes we have some board breaking challenges, which, of course, is an opportunity for breakthrough and learning that Cinthia masterfully facilitates. And then everybody takes their board home. And this is the thing is that you always want to be looking for, yes, we're learning some stuff, but what's an activity we could do that could really solidify the breakthrough that we want to provide? And so Cinthia, I'm always blessing when you come and the ladies love you, of course.

Oh, thanks. Well, to to go on that you have this lovely way, and I think this is a feminine way of doing things too, is that you invite us to do something different. So on the amp up cruise, Michelle and I were not slated to do comedy. We were going to do the crafting. Part of come of was it comedy and crafting?

Supposed to be comedy and crafting, but the crafting went away very quickly,

right? And then what happened was, and of course, with the help of Elaine Williams, who's also brilliant, with a little bit of encouragement from her, all of a sudden a lot of people were going up and doing some comedic storytelling, understanding how to craft a story, and we felt empowered in a different way. And I love that curve ball effect where we're doing that. So can you talk to me about how you come up with these ideas, or the shifts that you see in people after they do because I've seen the night shift. So that's the

thing, is you have to be able to dance in the moment and on cruises. You know, it's not like you can run out to Walgreens and pick something up. I mean, it is, it is challenging to have everything self contained, and if I come up with a brilliant idea, I better have the stuff to pursue it or make it happen or or be able to talk to the people. Fortunately, we had already blocked out that space to do our crafting, and it turned into our comedy night. And I loved it that so many of the women got up to tell a joke or tell a story or, you know, do something outrageous that they hadn't planned on doing. I absolutely loved it. I haven't, I haven't watched my video yet, but I made me feel like, Hey, I'm ready for the big comedy stage. I mean, it was so fun. And that's the thing is getting and that's what retreats are great for, is getting women out of their usual activities, their usual environment, and not only having opportunities for them to do something new, but opportunities for them to do something new in a room of people that are there to support them and love them through it, and it's not about being great, it's Just about participating and and the personal growth and transformation that comes from that we'd let you know we've done with the karaoke we did the group karaoke, which was so fun. And then this has nothing to do with empowerment. But you know me, I love to do the accelerated Jewelry Exchange with women empowerment sing along. I mean, yeah, I just come up with this stuff, because it's my it's my party, and I get to do what I want, because it's my business. And that's what I want to say also, is that having your own business, you know, it's not just about revenue. When you have your business and you're blissing in your business, you're already winning, you've already you're already living, you're living an authentic life. And that's why I love entrepreneurship, because we get to bring our personal values to our business. There are. There is no distinction between your personal values and your business values when you're doing it in a way that feels authentic. And then some years are better than others. Financially. Of course, the market is up and down, but you know what? That's okay, because you get to Bliss. You get to build these great relationships and be your authentic self every day in your life. Bing, bing, bing, what could be better than that? I'll tell you. What's better than that. I have an answer to that. What is better than that? What is better is. Watching the impact of your work. I was talking earlier about an in another thing I did this morning. I was talking about Sandy Okamoto, who you all know, who I love so much, and watching her go from not stri not being, you know, struggling in her business as a image professional to now blessing in her business with all of her speaking, she's speaking every month. She's getting clients every time she speaks. I went to her event the other day. There was 100 people registered for her event, and she's collaborating with other speakers, and she's so blessing in her business at a time in life when a lot of gals are, you know, looking for the porch chair. That makes me super bliss. So that is the best part. Cinthia, of business, Michelle, you know this when you see the transformation like Michelle in your business, our mutual friend Heather, who never drove, now she's got her own car because Michelle helped her get over her fear of driving. I mean, seeing the impact of your work is the best part the positive impact.

Yeah, it's very, very rewarding, and it's in many ways. So I spent 20 something years in corporate America making marketing stuff happen. And you know, it was fun to see your ads out there. It was fun to see this kind of stuff, but the level of transformation, or I don't know how far the needle moved, kind of thing, is a very different observation in that world than in this world, and that's a big part of the reason why I do the work that I do now, because I love getting to work with individuals and seeing how they make things change. I want to circle back real quick to the comedy night on the ship, because the comedy night on the ship, yes, my intention was just to watch other people. I had no intention of speaking. I didn't really have a tale to tell. And yet, the room was filled with so much love and support that halfway through the the speeches, I was like, oh my god, I could tell that story. That's a really good story. I've never told that story on a stage. I mean a little stage, but a stage and and yet, here I was around all these people, some of whom I knew pretty well, some of whom I'd met days before. And I was like, You know what? Whatever happens with my story, it's gonna be okay. Yeah. Here is a chance for me to try it out, see what happens speaking at a comedy thing, which is like, so not my thing for the most part, like I avoid going to comedy show, but it was really fun, and it really pushed me to go in a new direction. And I think that is a large part of one of the of, one of the big reasons, not the only, but one of the big reasons of why I love being a member of your community. Katerina,

thank you, my friend. Thank you. And watching all the ladies bliss at the Comedy Night and on the ship and at the retreats, and when we get together for tea with fascinators, makes me so happy. You know, that's that's my bliss, and that's the thing. Your business is supposed to be your bliss. And I want everybody to have their attention on that. If you're not blissing in your business, you're not doing it right. And the first place to look is to the authenticity. I'm

going to go ahead and circle back as well, because it's not just on the cruises that you do the accelerated Jewelry Exchange. And here's what I here's what I have found. I found that I am attracted to things. I it. There's a disorienting piece to it, because there are some guidelines that I won't talk about, because, you know, you want people, when they come into to experience it for themselves. Here's what I have found. I found that there are pieces that I would normally pick up, that I pick up and wear, and then the people who that did the exchange, they said, Oh, that's my piece. And now we have something else in common to talk about, right, which deepens that experience and and then, what do you say

about wear it? Time to share it. There you go. Time to share. And Cinthia, I want to say to you, my friend, when you came recently to break boards with the ladies at our speaker mastermind. I gave you a pair of yellow flower drop earrings that looked so phenomenal on you. And so let's just say that your girly girl is coming out a little bit more these days, bing, bing, bing, Oh,

yeah. Well, let's just say I make sure to dress up as feminine as possible when I go to board breaking because I want to replicate what you do, which is present very feminine, to do the things that are considered masculine, and they're not. They're just things, you know, and. And how, how fun is that? I think the next time we'll do it, and we'll do them in fascinators or tiaras.

Oh, hey, why not? Right? I think it's fantastic. Okay, well, that's good. Make a notation. We'll do that.

our bliss cruise, which is in: 2026

It's for women, and it's for yes, we're going to we're going to highlight some podcasting. We're going to highlight some speaking, absolutely, but it's for any woman in business that wants to be connected to more amazing women and grow and thrive and connect and bliss more in her business.

And if they're afraid to speak in front of all these people at the ship that you have speaker mastermind series, which is an intensive. I've done it twice. I love it. It's helped me also with the comedy. Now I feel like, the next time I go, I'm just gonna like, like, really nail it. What else do you have coming up?

Well, you know, one of the things I do is, every month, I do a free workshop, and that's always a great way for people to come and check out our work. We're talking I'm talking about speaking. I'm talking about selling. Sometimes I talk about how to do retreats, because, you know, I love that. And then the super excitement coming up is our Shero speaker summit towards the end of August, and that is our two half day event where I am mostly speaking and other people are connecting. It's speaking and connecting speaking and connecting speaking and connecting and some learning. And there will be a great opportunity to meet amazing women who are also speaking to grow their business. You will absolutely leave more uplifted than when you showed up. I priced it super inexpensive this year because we actually send you a Shiro fun pack in the mail, because I like to send fun stuff. And you'll get a cape, a satin cape, you'll get some other accouterments to enhance the experience. Because you know what, your business is supposed to be fun and and connecting with other people is part of the reward of business, but also learning is supposed to be fun. And so we will have a really fun time. And that's the Shiro speaker summit towards the end of August.

Thank you so much for being on Mind Power Meets Mystic again, Caterina as always, a wonderful time with you. Thank you for doing the great work you do and sharing it with our listeners today.

Thank you. I'm always blessing to be with the two of you. Thank you, my friends.

You've been listening to Mind Power Meets Mystic. Thank You.