Ella Magers:

Katie. Oh my gosh, this is so exciting. I’ve been waiting for this moment. How are you,

Katie Krimitsos:

Ella? I’m good girl. How are you? I’m very, very excited too.

Ella Magers:

Well, we were just chatting before we jumped on here, and I have to just congratulate you. This is insane. A hundred million, right? Is that correct? Download for the Women’s Meditation Network? Yeah. How does that feel? Does surreal to you?

Katie Krimitsos:

It feels very surreal to me, actually. I would imagine you and I have similar personalities in that I’m like a go, a go-getter, and I’m just moving forward. It’s about progress and change and moving in an evolution. And so I don’t do a good job actually of standing still and recognizing what I’ve done. I mean, I definitely try, I do that to the best of my ability, but to really stand in a big milestone like this and actually recognize it, we put on a big party here in Tampa not so long ago, and that was a really beautiful moment of like, oh, oh, oh my God, I created this. This is so cool. So it is very surreal and also incredibly humbling.

Ella Magers:

I can only imagine, and I’m really bombed that we were talking about this too, that I did not, was unable to make it because I was up at our farm sanctuary. But tell me, and let’s give a shout out to Allison. First of all, for Megan, this interview happen.

Katie Krimitsos:

Oh my gosh, love her. Yes,

Ella Magers:

Yes, yes. But tell us about that party and what came up for you as you were celebrating and taking this pause to actually acknowledge Yeah, what you’ve accomplished and how many lives you’ve touched.

Katie Krimitsos:

It was really full transparency. It was a very strategic marketing move for us to have a party, to make sure we were inviting people, to make sure that we could have a really good excuse for general media to come and see and take notice of what we’ve done. And so it was a really wise thing for us to do to see if we could get even more visibility and therefore spread the message even more. That’s really what the purpose was. So really up until the 11th hour is just about, okay, get everything done to get this party going, to get everything we need to get all the cool people there and make sure the media’s coming and get the stories out. And it was at the 11th hour when I was actually sitting down to write the talk that I would give, that I was reflecting on, oh my gosh, this is how many people, I have 18 people who are part of my team now.

Oh my gosh, this many women have been listening for this long. And I always have in spurts, I get feedback from listeners quite a and pretty regularly, but it comes in spurts too. So I’ll have this season where I just get emailed a lot, and it just happened to be that season where I was just getting these emails about like, oh my God, I’ve been listening to you since you began, and I’ve been listening to your sleep meditations every night for three years. So it was this really beautiful mix of standing very humbly in that, wow, this is what was created from one idea in one moment. And my willingness to take action on that and my willingness to do it very imperfectly and mess up along the way, but my willingness to really stay in line with the vision and with this dharma, I feel like I’m here for a reason.

I’m doing this for a reason, and the willingness to stick that out even in the tough times, and then incredibly emotional. I took my team out for dinner afterwards, and it was just this, wow. One of my producers flew in from London and I had Ally fly in, and she has been part of my PR teams during certain seasons. And so it was just really beautiful going, wow, all of these people who it’s so important that they know what they touch in the company and what they do impacts everyone else. So it was just this beautiful moment of interweaving all of these things. At the event itself, we are really lucky that we have a really strong local Tampa Bay, Florida, really podcasting community. And so a lot of people drove in from all over the area to really celebrate, and these are people who knew me in my past when I started my first podcast in 2014.

So that was a full circle moment of, wow. I even to joke, there was one of ’em who, who has a horse radio network who I had been very successful in my old podcast. And when I was starting this new podcast, when I was starting the Women’s Meditation Network, he took me out to lunch and told me what a horrible idea it was and that it would never stick really. And he was so sweet. He showed up to the event. I mean, we’ve remained friends all these years. He showed up to the event with a gift card to Cheesecake Factory where we had gone for lunch, and he is like, I’m so glad I proved you. Wow. So it was just this, it was a beautiful moment with all of the feels in it really.

Ella Magers:

Well, can we dig into that a little bit? So he told you he did not think this would work, and can you take us back to that moment and what was going through your head? And this is, that’s hard to hear. I know you’re a go-getter and you’re an entrepreneur. Yeah. But that’s tough to hear,

Katie Krimitsos:

Especially from somebody who I really respect in the industry. So a little bit of the backstory is that I had jumped, I jumped into podcasting in 2014. I had a podcast called Biz Women Rock. Back then it was a business entrepreneur show, which was rare back then. Now it’s incredibly filled with great podcasts. But then I was one of three who actually interviewed women entrepreneurs, and it was a phenomenal business. It fed a coaching business for me. I was a strategic coach for a lot of women entrepreneurs who were building their companies. I had masterminds, I did events, I mean, you name it. I had it in that business model and it was going really, really well. And in 2018, I found out we were pregnant with my second daughter. And it just in a flash of a moment was like, I don’t want this anymore.

And in that time was like, well, what do I do if I don’t want to do this? What am I going to do? And that’s this, just to clarify, this meaning that particular business business. So if I’m not doing biz women rock, if I’m not being a coach, if I’m not my business anymore, if that’s not what I want, which is kind of this intuitive hit that I got, which is very scary. And it was like, well, what is it? And of course, I went through, we could go on for days about what happened in that time period of me really trying to unwrap, well, am I sure? Am I just trying to sabotage myself? Is this just hormones? What is it? But really at the end of that, I really discovered, no, I don’t want to do this anymore. That didn’t mean I stopped it right away, but in that knowing, I was like, well, what do I want to do?

And that’s when the idea of the Women’s Meditation Network was born, and I’m lucky to have a phenomenal husband who I can bounce ideas off with. And I was just like, what about this and what could this be? And pretty quickly, it kind of took shape to be something really magnificent. And I saw this vision of it being this big magnificent network that could really touch the lives of millions of women. So I got really aligned with that vision. So fast forward a couple of months when I had just launched my very first podcast for that, the Meditation for Women, and I’m now sitting down with Glen, who has a horse radio network. It’s a very successful podcast in business. He’s been around the podcasting arena forever. And so we’re sitting and he’s like, you have a thing going here. What are you doing? No one knows you for meditation.

No one even knows you meditate. What are you doing? I think you should just stick with what? And I’m like, okay. Yeah. And so what I was feeling in that moment was for any of us who start something brand new, and yet we know it’s, there’s this strange nubile space of weird confidence, but also very shaky ground, meaning I knew right away I was like, no, I know I’m right, but I know I need to sequester myself so that I’m not letting myself hear this too much because I’m really sensitive right now. And I could give up if too many people told me this. And luckily, I absolutely had believers behind me, and I absolutely had people who were like, you’re nuts. What are you? So I was smart enough to take myself away and to limit my exposure to that because I knew that I wasn’t yet as strong as I knew I was going to be in it. Right.

Ella Magers:

Yeah, that makes perfect sense. And for our audience, what is your relationship with meditation? Can you tell just how you got introduced to that and how that relationship has shifted over the years?

Katie Krimitsos:

Yeah, lot. I started meditating when I was 19 years old in college. It was introduced to me at the end of a yoga class at Arizona State, and it was a five minute meditation guided, a meditation in the Shavasana opposition. And I was like, what was that? It was this warm, calm that I had never quite felt, and I can’t tell you, oh, it blew my mind and fireworks were there, but it impacted me enough to want more. And so I, all my life after that, I spent, let me just try, what is this meditation thing and how can I do more guided meditations? And I would go check out CDs from the library back then and try and do them on my own CD player. And I would try and just meditate on my own. And after three seconds, I would get so frustrated and walk away.

And eventually I moved out to Florida and I was like, I’m going to go find a meditation center. And I would go to the local Buddhist center for different classes and series that they had, and eventually randomly came, was introduced to a woman who held weekly meditation sessions in her house with whoever wanted to come. Sometimes it was just the two of us, sometimes it was 10 of us. And then eventually discovered podcasts and was like, oh, okay, cool. I like being able to access it anytime I can. So my relationship with meditation has always been very imperfect, always has been very practiced. I’m a practitioner of meditation. And so when I had the idea, it was in a season of my life when I had been meditating pretty regularly, which I don’t always do. I definitely go through seasons where I’m like, sometimes it’s just mindfulness moments.

And sometimes I’m like, okay, I’m, I’m sitting down and meditating for a certain amount of time. And so when I, I had come out of a season where I was like, I’ve been kind of formally more meditating and I have seen over the course of time how much it’s impacted me, how aware, self-aware I am at how willing I am to follow my inner intuition to build a life that I love and all the benefits of meditation. So I was just like, I know that this tool is really powerful. And coupled with that, I’m a writer. And so I was like, I’m just going to write these. My approach to it back then, and it still really is like, I’m just going to write these little love notes to women. You have everything inside of you that you need. Let those thoughts pass. Beautiful. One, come inside, own yourself. I’m just going to start writing these little love poems to these women and package it in a meditation. And then let me see how that goes. And here we are five years later, and obviously it’s made an impact.

Ella Magers:

A little one, just a little, just a little. No, I think, and this is really interesting because you are really with you, what you’re doing helping bring, and I always say I help, my vision is helping bring veganism into the mainstream. You’re helping bring meditation into the mainstream. That’s just from an outsider’s perspective, that’s what I’m looking at. And I’m wondering how many people I represent and if I can share my kind of relationship with meditation. So my dad is a Buddhist, so I grew up, he was into zen meditation, and so I knew all about it. He now teaches as a volunteer job, meditation to death row inmates. Oh, wow. Yeah. I like to brag about that because it just, that’s amazing.

Katie Krimitsos:

Is

Ella Magers:

So cool. But y it’s something that I’m like you, I do not sit still. Well, yoga, for me, moai and boxing, that was my thing. So when my body was breaking down in my mid twenties and I was like, I have to do yoga, it was the most painful thing. It hurt. It hurt to go so slow, and it hurt to sit there and do nothing at the end. And it’s still, to this day, I’m turning 43 and in a few weeks, and it’s still really tough. And I have gotten to a place now where I love yoga, and I can use that hour and I can disconnect from my stress. I can disconnect from everything. And I really do feel like I’m good at the moving meditation now, but the sitting still is still a real challenge. And I know it’s good for me, and I put it in my programs and I help other people do it. And still, I don’t really have a formal seated meditation practice that’s consistent.

Katie Krimitsos:

And I think that that’s ok. I think that that’s really what part of what I really want to communicate is that that’s why we call it a practice. Just as long as you’re willing to show up in any way, whether that’s moving today or whether that’s in yoga, I have the same relationship with yoga. I have a love-hate relationship with yoga. Or whether it’s just a day where you’re going to take five breaths before you get out of the car. It doesn’t really matter. What matter is is that you just show up. You’re conscious of the fact that it’s helpful. It’s helpful as a tool to bring you into presence. It’s helpful for stuff way beyond that. And then you just try, in some seasons, at least for myself, some seasons, I’m super disciplined about it. And some seasons I’m absolutely not disciplined about it.

And I think that that’s what gets me so fired up about creating this is because I feel these poems, these meditations are incredibly approachable so that anyone who has those thoughts of, I can’t sit still, I don’t do well with this meditation, whatever, I just can’t do it. I mean, I hear that so much even now. And I feel like meditation is such a prevalent term, and I feel like we, it’s very kind of in the mainstream, but even with that, I’m just, I just want to make these very approachable and these little bites that you could take and it so much, and I’m sure you approach veganism the same way, which is let, you don’t have to go out and want to change the world and save all the animals, but if you just try maybe meatless Mondays and just see how that feels like, let’s see how your body feels.

And you start taking little nibbles of it, and the more nibbles you take of it that you’re like, wow, I can really see the impact. And meditation’s tricky in the sense that much exercise, you don’t see the immediate, incredible benefit. Go and exercise for an hour. You’re not immediately 12 times more ripped, and you don’t see that. You really only see the benefits of ex. I mean, you feel good, don’t get me wrong. Same with the meditation. You feel good after you do that, but you really don’t see the benefits until time after again. And suddenly you realize, wow, I’ve created a pretty intentional life. I realize that my life is pretty outside of the box and I’m really stinking happy and I really don’t care about what everyone else tells me to do. And I only, I’ve experienced this little by little over the years in that, especially in this transition, this business transition I just discussed, I had an enormous amount of people come out of the woodwork and say, that was so brave.

How did you make that do that? You basically gave up a whole revenue business and started something new that you had no right doing. And I’m like that. It didn’t seem brave to me because of meditation, because of this intense self-awareness that I have gained through the tool of meditation throughout all these years and many other tools, journaling, exercise, I mean so many other tools, but meditation is a huge one of those tools. And it’s because I have this deep sense of self-awareness that I’m able to shift and change and adjust and completely pivot. And it doesn’t feel like the world is completely spinning upside down. I just keep trusting one step at a time until all of a sudden I look back and I’m like, oh, shit. I just did that kind of this a hundred million thing. Oh, okay. I just did that. I don’t know how I did that. I just kept moving forward and doing what felt right. And because I have that sense of self-awareness, I can hear the guidance, I can trust that I’m supposed to take that next step that I hear, and we’re getting pretty ethereal, but it’s all of that. I think that’s the power of meditation, and that’s why I’m so with anyone who will try it in any way. And I think why I want to deliver it in such an approachable way,

Ella Magers:

And you do, I love, okay, let’s go the self-awareness route for a moment and connect that with consciousness. I mean, I’ve gone the down the quantum rabbit hole the last few years and all of this, and getting to that place where we’re able to connect with or disconnect from who we think we are and give ourselves lots of curiosity, be able to approach ourselves with curiosity, approach the world with curiosity. I’m curious what your kind of take is on meditation versus or, and spirituality. And yoga’s now pretty much mainstream. All these things are getting mainstream. And then I’m going to take it to the vegan thing in a few, but first, I want to hear your thoughts on the relationship between meditation and spirituality, and if you try to separate those in a sense to be more inclusive or how do you go about

Katie Krimitsos:

That? Yeah, that’s a good question. So just to give you a little bit of a backdrop, I grew up very Catholic, very lovingly Catholic. I didn’t grow up the fear, God’s going to hate you if you don’t do X, Y, Z. I didn’t grow up that way. I grew up very loving Catholic, but very Catholic. Definitely got away from the Catholic church in my college years because I was a questioner. I was like, well, how come about this and how come about this and why don’t we do that? And that is what made me go and explore other religions and found all of, my mom used to call it my buffet style religion. And she’s like, you can’t just have your own buffet style religion. I’m like, why not? Can’t I just take the best of what really resonates with me with all of these religions?

Anyway, I say that because my belief about the relationship between spirituality, and I’m mentioning religion, not because I believe it’s spirituality. I’m mentioning that because it sort of paints a backdrop to why I believe this. Sure. My belief is that meditation becomes a powerful practice. Just prayer becomes a powerful practice to come inside to let go of this worldly experience that we’re having. And I think when the more and more opportunities we give ourselves to do that, to pause, to breathe, to come into presence, to detach, to really dissolve that attachment that we have to everything, the more opportunities we have to do that, the more we actually see the vibrancy of this spiritual self. And that becomes really fun and exciting. It’s really fun and exciting. You start getting into the idea of manifest manifesting and the idea of actually creating your own universe and the idea of your thoughts create things, and the idea that what you think now will, what you’re seeing now is what you were thinking before.

So if you want to change what you’re thinking now, what you see later, at least start thinking this way now. And so much more than that. You start seeing that really we’re all connected. And I think that this is actually the beating heart of why I love this is because, and this’ll wrap right into veganism. You start seeing really quickly when you get that you are a spiritual being. You see that we are all spiritual beings. We are all interconnected humans, animals, plants, everything, universe, everything. And so that gives you, for me, what it has flooded me with an enormous amount of empathy so that I’m really conscious about how I’m walking through this world. And I don’t do it perfectly, but I’m really conscious about how I’m walking through this world. I’m conscious with the food that I’m eating and how that food is coming to my table conscious about how even the people who are really just trigger the hell out of me, who they are and what has brought them to this space.

And I’m trying my best to see them as these beautiful spiritual beings in their own journeys, on their own paths. And same with being a mom and raising my girls, and how am I doing that in a way that honors their spiritual being and their spiritual path here? I don’t want little mini mes. I’m not here to tell them how to live their life. I’m here to help them guide them along their own journey. So it, it’s everything to me. That relationship between meditation as one powerful tool to discover and really unveil the depths of our spiritual selves,

Ella Magers:

That is so beautifully put. And one way I often like to say is you get to a place where you kind of feel like you’re playing life like a game. It’s kind of a game. You’re in it, but it’s not really you. So I love how you say that, and I think you’re right. It does flow right into this ability to connect with, I think it’s a connection thing, like you said, when talk, yeah, we’re talking about veganism and we don’t even have to use that word, but just respect for all living beings and removing ourselves from the hardwired programming meditation. There’s no better way to be able to remove yourself from that and create, create. Yeah. Right.

Katie Krimitsos:

Yeah. Wow. And I, I’ve had a lot of discussion lately with a friend of this idea of mindfulness, clearing the mind using the action of mindfulness, becoming aware of your thoughts in order to then clear the space and using the action in the practice of meditation to actually do that. Let me clear the space so that I can create from nothingness. What do I want to create now? And it all sounds very airy fairy, but in real life, the way that it shows up is it, if there’s something you’re not happy with, is if there’s a pain point for me, it has given me an enormous amount of hope and a feeling of contribution. I can do this differently and I can do my life differently. That can help other people. And that’s that connection piece who I show up to be actually makes a difference for other people.

And how can I show up in a way that sort of optimizes my life? I think that’s a big driver for me. How am I optimizing my life? How can I make sure that I’m getting to the end of this particular life? And I’m like, dude, I left it all on the table. I left it all. There’s nothing else that I could have done. I feel like I gave my best. And then some. And that’s really always my ultimate goal. And in that is how have I helped other people? How have I made sure that my life has brought life to others? And I feel like that’s a question that I’m constantly asking myself.

Ella Magers:

This podcast is really founded on holistic health, holistic health and wellness. And one of the foundational pieces of that to me is really feeling like you’re here for a purpose, and that your actions and what you’re doing every day is aligned with that purpose. What if you had to say, at this point, I think this is my purpose. What would you say that is?

Katie Krimitsos:

Oh man. I feel like I have a couple sound bites that I’ve been like, oh, okay, here’s what it is. But I don’t know if that’s always true. In some senses, I feel like it is to mother in this very spiritual sense, and this was reflected back to me by my cousin, who’s a dear friend of mine. We’re both moms and we’re constantly talking about motherhood and we’re talking about business. And she’s said to me one day, she’s like, Y, your capability to mother, everyone around you blows my mind. She goes, even in business, how you show up to business, how you show up to your team, how you show up, for every single one of those women listening, every word that you’re pouring into these meditations is a mothering thing. You and I have heard this feedback from my listeners, which makes me tear up. They’re like, you were the mother’s of voice that I needed to hear, and I’ve never heard. I never heard before. And

Ella Magers:

Yeah, I got to chill us when you said that.

Katie Krimitsos:

Yeah. And I feel like I, that is some of my purpose, and that to be this, to be as motherly as I can and in the most beautiful sense of a mother to create life, to love into everything, and to be intuitive, and from a business standpoint, I love that I’m leading that way, and it’s not a very masculine leading of business. I absolutely have masculine parts of who I am as we all do, but to be the sacred feminine in some way feels very purposeful to me. To be able to show that mothering is good and mothering can be profitable, and mothering can be helpful, and mothering can be massive and mothering on the micro senses with my little girls, and then mothering on this global sense with every single woman listening, it just feels really special.

Ella Magers:

That is incredible what you just said. I have to say, and I, I know you don’t like the word balance, but so much when we’re talking about, oh, balancing work in business, it’s like you’ve packaged it all together and created this way of being, and then the doing is in line with the being.

Katie Krimitsos:

Yes, yes. Exactly.

Ella Magers:

Is what I’m hearing.

Katie Krimitsos:

Yeah.

Ella Magers:

And that’s just incredible. I

Katie Krimitsos:

Don’t think I’ve said those words out loud until right now. I don’t think that that’s come to fruition until right now. Yeah. Yeah. It’s really, I think that speaks a lot to the intentionality. Again, meditation is a motive as a tool of intense, so you can be intentional about life and therefore create it from the inside out, and then let the actions line up in that

Ella Magers:

And your voice. It really is true. I was just listening yesterday to, oh, I forgot which meditation it was, but your voice is so soothing, and I completely can relate to that person saying that about it, feeling like the voice they needed, being cared for, and just the sense of unconditional love, it comes through.

Katie Krimitsos:

No, thank you. Thank you. I’m glad. That’s my hope.

Ella Magers:

Yeah, it’s insane. So how do you structure, can we talk for a little bit, because I’m in the middle of relaunching some things, and I don’t even have children. I have my chihuahua, but how the overwhelm thing, I think a lot of women that I work with in my coaching programs, like this sense of overwhelm in the world today. In part, I think just the fast pace and the social media, and there’s just so much going on all the time. Yeah.

Katie Krimitsos:

Can

Ella Magers:

You talk a little bit about how you manage on these boundaries that you put up and the clarity that you seem to have about your priorities and how you manage that?

Katie Krimitsos:

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. I want to give voice to the, it does feel like that. It feels very loud, very overwhelming. What’s kind of what’s out here, and I don’t know why or how I have this clarity, but as soon as I had this idea of the Women’s Meditation Network, I was clear on a couple things I was, and one of them was, I want a life that gives me, I want a business that gives me time freedom, because my value is my kids, my family, and the love that I want to pour in. They were young. I mean, I was pregnant with one, and I had a two and a half year old when this business started. So I was like, and still they, they’re four and seven. I’m still in the thick of young little’s mothering. So I knew I wanted time freedom that would allow me to do whatever I wanted, and I didn’t have that with the other business.

I had to have my button seat doing coaching calls in order to bring money in. And so I say that because I think knowing that from the get-go, I knew that if my family was my top priority and my sense of self, my own health, my own wellness, mental, physical, spiritual is my own priority, my relationship with my husband is a priority. Everything. If all those things that are all of our priorities, we all really have all these priorities. If those are my priorities, they have to show up on my calendar as my priorities. I can’t say my kids are my priorities, but I’m working 12 hour days and I can never go drop ’em off or pick ’em up. That doesn’t, that’s not in line. So I think I just, little by little, and this is throughout really my business life, but I’m become very good at prioritization.

And that’s kind of on one side of the coin is that I’m constantly aware what’s a priority. Every single week I write down, okay, this week’s priorities, and it’s just like, here’s the thing, the big things that I need to get done for the week, and then every day I’m sort of doing my tasks, but I, I’m always having my eyeballs on those priorities so that the days can go sideways, and that’s okay, but I know here’s what I kind of need to get done by the week. So that’s one thing. The other side of that coin though, is that I have become a really good student of energy management, not time management, energy management, meaning I am very aware, I do a lot of batch work. So I’m very aware that when I’m sitting down to write a meditation, I’m in the energy of writing meditation.

So I should probably, instead of just writing one, I should probably write 20. How many can I get done right now? Right. Oh my gosh. Can you write 20 meditations in one day? So depending on which one it is, yes, girl, I was at it. Whoa. I, I’ll speak very openly about burnout. Yes, please. And overwhelm, because I, I’m going to tell you all the pretty stuff, and then I’m going to tell you what it looks like in real life. Yes, please. But for energy management, yes. I batch stuff. When I sit down to record, I will record, yes, 10 to 20 meditations at a time, and I will make it on my calendar. So I know that my energy is going to be ideal for those things, so I don’t have to think about the other 20 things that I should be doing or on my task list because they have another part on another day.

So that’s the pretty part about the structure that I have. So I do say no. I say no to a lot of things. I have very big boundaries with social media that I’ve sort of just started creeping back into. I really, for a long time, I did not start this business with social media. I was like, I know I don’t have the energy for it. I’m not going to do it. I’m pregnant. Very shortly after I started the business, I had my second baby. So I was like, yeah, no, I have no desire to be on every day. That’s not going to be me. So it’s only been recently that I have started to build up a social media presence again, and that’s because I’m ready for it. So that’s one thing, but to be real about it, not easy. And last year, I was getting, as the company was growing, and as I was launching new shows, we now have 14 podcasts. Okay.

Yeah. So last year was a big growth year, and it was a big growth year with me doing most of it. So there was a point at which I was writing a hundred meditation scripts a month, a month, and voicing them. So that was a lot. So I was simultaneously drowning and also knowing that I needed to hire and trying to hire, but that’s a hiring process, and I’m trying to find the right people. So I was in regular burnout. Every single month I burnt out, and every single month I was in tears. And every single month, I would be like, oh my God. I would stress, I’d be a stress ball the week before everything was due, and then the week it was due, I would just get into fricking action and just get it done. I’m not sleeping. Let’s get it done. And I’m only so many times of that where I’m like, this is not sustainable.

I’m going to literally stop. If I do this one more month, I’m going to stop. So I had to really, to face the music of you really need to take it seriously to hire people and really do it fast and do it well, and get ’em onboarded and all that sort of stuff. So that was a big shift that happened at the beginning of this year where I was like, oh my God. I finally found creative writers, and it was a process of let me just go and find meditation writers. And what I found was that meditation writers actually all sound alike. And I don’t need meditation writers. I need creative writers who I could train to write in my meditative way. And so I have found a handful of those, and they’re amazing and wonderful. But that was all by trial and error. So to answer your question in a very long-winded way, I don’t do it perfectly, but I do have boundaries there.

There’s a start time of my day, there’s an end time of my day. Maybe 50% of the time I’m working after the kids go to bed. And that’s okay with me because I love doing it. And sometimes I don’t get enough sleep, and other times I catch up on sleep. So it’s just this constant dance. Sometimes I will let a task go, and it’s two weeks before I get to it. And so I am notorious for being horrible with email, and I’m like, oh, that’s just going to be what it is right now. But when it comes, that’s why having priorities saves me, because I will always do the top priorities. Those things will always get done.

Ella Magers:

Okay. So when you get to that point at the end of the month or whatever, when you had your little meltdown in that moment, can we just go to that moment for a moment? Yeah. You have the tools, and yet this still is, it happens. And what tools in that moment are you using to get through it?

Katie Krimitsos:

This is not the sexy stuff. Are you ready? Yes. Fucking do it. Show the fuck up, get your head, turn your brain off, and show up and do it. That’s it. And to me, that’s an athletic mentality I’ve had. I’ve been an athlete my whole life. I know you have to. That’s an athletic mentality. You don’t want to do it, show up and do it. And this is where it gets a little hard ass. I am very clear that there are moments where I’m like, I’m feeling so emotional today and I don’t want to do it, and I have the freedom to just not do it. And then this other voice comes in, not all the time, but enough. The voice comes in as shut up your butt in the seat and go do it. And there, there’s no prettiness to it. You just sit down and you get it done.

That’s it. And if you have to be, I think that’s what makes the difference in great and extraordinary, is the person who is willing to just sit and do it when everything in them is screaming, I don’t want to freaking do this, but it’s the right thing to do, and you have to do it. And so that’s my answer. I mean, the other alternative is you don’t do it. And if that keeps happening over and over and you just keep crumbling under that, I would actually start to question whether you’re on the right path and whether you’re doing the right thing. But I think when you’re on the right path and you really know, and you do believe in what you’re doing, that split second of a moment of just fucking do it, clear your mind, get down to business, take action. That’s all it comes down to, taking action.

Ella Magers:

I love it. I love it. And I think that sometimes self-compassion can be just fucking do it. Yeah.

Katie Krimitsos:

Because

Ella Magers:

The feeling of having it done when it’s done, there’s nothing better.

Katie Krimitsos:

Better. Oh my God. Every time my husband would joke with me, he’s like, dude, this is every single month. You’re sitting here just bitching. You’re complaining about all of this. And every single month you come out the other end, you’re like, oh my God, I just wrote this beau beautiful thing. I’m so proud of what I do. I’m in tears. He’s like, that’s how you’re still on it, right? Yeah,

Ella Magers:

Right. Oh, amazing. How does it feel now to have this team and having their challenges to having a team as well as doing it all yourself?

Katie Krimitsos:

Yeah.

Ella Magers:

Do you feel like you’ve got the right, I’ll say balance now between what you’re doing yourself and the team and how much energy you’re spending in managing a team? And does that feel all aligned at this point?

Katie Krimitsos:

It feels like it’s the right, I’m in the right direction. Yeah. Let’s just say that I’m still learning. I feel like I’m a really good leader. I’m a really good manager of people, but I’m still learning kind of the cadence of, I’m still very in the production, even the overseeing of the production. I’m still writing, I’m still recording. I’m still doing a lot of the things, but I’m now overseeing writers, other voices, producers obviously. So I feel like as it’s gotten bigger, it has been like, oh, it can be overwhelming managing all these 14 moving things. And I have an operations manager who takes over a lot of that, but it’s training her right to really be the leader of that. And so we’ve actually just come to this where I’m like, okay, your job is to report to me now on where we are, instead of you showing up to our meeting and me saying, okay, this is this.

So it’s me being mindful enough to really give over the duties, but also train well so that they’re doing it with excellence, and there’s nothing else less expected. So yeah, it’s been an interesting journey. And there’s a lot of love ups, man. There’s a lot of checks of the gut of, oh, I thought that one was going to go really big and it didn’t, so I don’t have this budget anymore. And so now we got to pivot and shift, and I don’t need that anymore. And now where are we from here? So it’s been a lot of learning, but I feel like it’s incredibly satisfying. And back to your point that you made at the very beginning, it does feel like a game feels like one giant game, and that’s simultaneously very serious. I mean, people, I’m responsible for people at this point, but also, how fun is this? There’s so many challenging moments, but it feels very fun. It feels like there’s always this catharsis at the end, oh God, that was so good. How much better can we do? Right.

Ella Magers:

Well, how much better can you do? What’s next? What do you have on your horizon? What are you thinking about? Yeah, what are your dreams? What, what’s going on now in your head?

Katie Krimitsos:

Yeah, in the short term, just launching more shows. We have a couple different concepts that are coming out here between now and the end of the year, so that’s really exciting. And just you kind of really cleaning up the production as far as making that hum le with less and less of me in it on a grand scale, just I, I’m in the dreaming phase right now. I don’t know where this stuff stands in actual execution, but it would be really great to have, I consider myself a publishing house. We just happen to publish content in the podcasting realm. We do have a YouTube channel too, but in mass, it’s really in the podcasting realm. I would love to have a production company that also does written works and has products and all sorts of stuff. So to me, I feel like there’s different languages. There’s different niches even. So I feel like there’s really only at the beginning, I feel like what I’m doing now is I am creating kind of the first structure of how it all works. And now it’s just like, oh, okay, the machine works. Where else do we want to apply it? Where else do we want to apply it? So that gets really fun, but it feels fun, and I know that I’m on this journey for a very real reason, and it just is fun to play it.

Ella Magers:

Beautiful. I can wait for those of you who, those of you listening that have not gone and listened to, how can people find your podcast, first of all?

Katie Krimitsos:

So you’re listening to this podcast now, so you’re a podcast listener, so just go on this podcast player, whichever one you’re listening to, and type in either women’s meditation network that should give you all the different shows or meditation for women. Both of those terms will be on most all of our shows. So you could find us. We have sleep meditations, morning meditations, affirmations, anxiety, meditations. I mean, you name it. We got it. Yeah.

Ella Magers:

Yes, you do. Are you up for a little lightning round before we wrap up?

Katie Krimitsos:

Ooh, let’s go. Okay. Yes.

Ella Magers:

All right. What animal do you think your personality most aligns with or that you feel especially connected to?

Katie Krimitsos:

Oh, that’s a good question. My gut reaction says parrots, and that’s because we have parrots. So I don’t know, gorgeous and beautiful and majestic, but also feisty. Yeah,

Ella Magers:

You see that. All right. Three daily habits besides meditation that keep you on the path of holistic health and wellness.

Katie Krimitsos:

Move every day some way, somehow move. Oftentimes it’s a workout, but sometimes it’s just walk in, whatever it is, just move, get outside every single day in the sun every day. And then the third is just eat Well, eat and drink well as well as I can. I tend to live by the 80 20 rule when it comes to food. So if I can eat 80% of the time, really good whole foods, all natural, vegan, great. And then if I’m having sweets and whatever with my girls, whatever. So yeah, just eat, well, eat that makes me feel good.

Ella Magers:

You get, speaking of food, you get one meal a day to eat every day for the next year. What is that meal?

Katie Krimitsos:

Oh, man. I mean, I don’t think I can ever get enough of good Mexican food from the south. I’m from, or southwest. I’m from Arizona, so good. I’m talking refried beans, I mean all vegan. I’ve, of course, veganized all this. So the refried beans, the guacamole, the salsas, all, I mean, the peppers, all of it.

Ella Magers:

And a margarita.

Katie Krimitsos:

Yeah. Yeah, definitely. That’s included.

Ella Magers:

Okay. And do you spi, how do you like your margarita? And do you like it on the rocks with salt? Do you like it spicy? What’s your

Katie Krimitsos:

I tend, 90% of the time, I’m straight up on the rocks with salt, straight margarita. But 10% of the time I’ll experiment with all the spicy or fufu or strawberry one or cucumber or whatever. But I love that sweet sour combination of your straight up margarita. So it is my favorite drink. I really don’t know what else to order. I’m like, I, I’m at a sushi restaurant. Do you happen to have a margarita?

Ella Magers:

I usually do. I know. I love it. Me too. Skinny, spicy, my,

Katie Krimitsos:

Yes. I’m going to have to try. I don’t know if I’ve tried spicy. Spicy. I’m going to have to try that.

Ella Magers:

Yeah, a little jalapeno goes a long way. Okay. A quirk or fun fact that many people might not know about you?

Katie Krimitsos:

Let’s see. I feel like, I mean, we already know that I’m super animal person, so yeah, I really don’t like killing anything. Even bugs. We have termites, and I have, I’m like, oh, go take them and go put ’em outside. It’s so bad. Yeah.

Ella Magers:

Oh, I’m the same way.

Katie Krimitsos:

It’s so bad. So yeah, I would imagine that’s my little quirk.

Ella Magers:

Yes. The cup with the paper underneath it for even cockroaches, and

Katie Krimitsos:

I know. Yeah, I know. I’m with you. I’m like, okay. In another lifetime you can come here, but not now.

Ella Magers:

Yes. All right. Last one. What message would you put on a billboard for thousands of people to see every day.

Katie Krimitsos:

Ooh, you are enough. Period. End of sentence. That’s it.

Ella Magers:

If everyone really embodied that, what kind of world would this be?

Katie Krimitsos:

Right. Really embody that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Ella Magers:

Beautiful. Katie? Yeah. You’re awesome. Thank you so much for coming on and sharing and being real, being yourself. Thank you,

Katie Krimitsos:

Ella. It’s such a pleasure. I feel like we could go on forever and I can’t wait till we actually get to hug in person. I know.

Ella Magers:

Oh, one last thing. We started a namaste in the hay at the sanctuary at Hogs and Kisses. So once a month we do a little meditation with the animals. I love it. We don’t have any goats. That would be fun to, I know they do like goat yoga. Goat yoga. No, we do pig pig meditation.

Katie Krimitsos:

That’ll be fine. They just stay there and hang out. Right.

Ella Magers:

We’ll have to meet up for that one day.

Katie Krimitsos:

Yes. I would love that. Thank you so much for having me here. I really appreciate it.

Ella Magers:

Pleasures al my.