Episode Transcript
Alara Sage (00:01.886)
Hello, hello, and welcome to another episode of Wealth Embodied, where we activate you and your wealth consciousness, your creative genius and your visionary impact. I'm your host, Alara Sage. And today we have another wonderful guest appearance. And this is the option of the Pleasure Channel. So we are going to journey down the path of aliveness. And I invite, as you listen to this, to
feel our wonderful guest to see if you can feel her passion, feel her words, and connect to her on a deeper level of your being and her magic. So our wonderful guest, Micah Walker, is a business strategist and microdose mentor. She helps new nurse coaches launch and grow their own coaching practices so they can go full time online. And she loves implementing strategies.
to help new coaches leverage their passion, skills, and knowledge into coaching experiences that change the world. Yes, yes, yes. Welcome, my love.
Micah Walker (01:10.958)
Thank
Thank you. I'm stoked to be here. This should be fun.
Alara Sage (01:17.446)
So the question that always kicks this off is what is currently in your life, in your business, in your creations lighting you up?
Micah Walker (01:31.822)
This is gonna sound really interesting, but schedule blocks. Schedule blocks are lighting me up right now because I used to not have set aside time where I focused on the stuff that I wanted to focus on, whether that be creativity, skateboarding. Skateboarding's really important to me. It's been a huge part of my life for many years, so it's my outlet. It's the way that I move my body most often. Also just blocks to spend time with my partner.
blocks to just be with myself, with my thoughts, let things surface. And like maybe many of us, if a lot of your listeners are entrepreneurs, there's kind of this, especially at the beginning when you're launching your business and you're excited about it you're growing it, there is this tendency to get into just go, go, go, grind, grind, grind all the time. And I found myself at the beginning stages
never like taking time away. I was just consistently working on what I was growing and what I was building, which is awesome because I was having a lot of fun doing it and I love what I do. you know, because I love what I do, I was doing it a lot. At the same time, I was losing connection to some of the other really important parts of me. And lately, the stuff that's lighting me up is those blocks of time that I'm scheduling out that nothing can get in the way of. It's been really beautiful and super fun.
Alara Sage (02:59.982)
Yes, I don't think it's weird at all. I do this as well. In fact, sometimes people are like, wow, you're so busy. There's no availability till. And I was like, well, that's because I block out a lot of my time. I really loved when you said it, when you said it, when you spoke about skateboarding and movement through skateboarding, your body really lit up. And so obviously that is very important to you.
Micah Walker (03:08.278)
you
Micah Walker (03:12.92)
Yeah.
Micah Walker (03:23.79)
Hmm.
Alara Sage (03:29.05)
What do you find when you're blocking out these times during your day and those moments that you go skateboarding? How does that help you? How does that help your business? It's like dive into the juiciness of what skateboarding means to you.
Micah Walker (03:29.069)
It is.
Micah Walker (03:45.39)
Yes, I have been skateboarding since about 11 years old. And while I have competed and had my fair share of doing little contests and things like that, it never was really about that for me. It was just always about pushing myself and trying new things and challenging what I thought was possible. When I was a kid, from 11 to maybe 14, I was not afraid.
of like anything really. was jumping off massive stair sets and grinding handrails. I mean, I really could have gotten hurt. And at some points I did. Luckily nothing that was permanent. These days, I'm a little more afraid to try new things. I have my frontal lobe that's like, have, you know, you have things to do. You don't want to end up in the hospital. But something that
I think really excited me about skateboarding from the time I ever set foot on a skateboard was just this excitement to push myself and try new things. And while I see myself strained from that a little bit, the older I get, it's still that for me. It's still an outlet and it's still a way that I can push myself and just enjoy being outside. And a lot of it is community based too. Like everything that I do in my life is
typically centered around community. It's one of my top values. It's the thing that I probably care most about right now and have for a very long time is my connections to those around me. And that surfaces in a variety of different ways and manifests itself in a variety of different ways. But to me, skateboarding was always a way that I could just hang out with my friends, build community. We're all doing this thing that we love. I don't know that it really
impacts my business. Like I'm sure I could find some kind of thread in those, but to be honest, it's actually a way that I can like tune out to tune in. Like separate myself from all this other stuff and just enjoy like my childlike spirit of playing and enjoying for the sake of enjoyment. There's no, like I'm not competing anymore. There's nothing else attached to this.
Micah Walker (06:07.392)
It's just enjoying for the sake of enjoyment.
Alara Sage (06:11.176)
This is why I love these conversations because they seem arbitrary and they're not. They're so deep. So when you were speaking about the very first thing you said is that it challenges you and your sacral chakra lit up. And so our sacral chakra is our space of our power, space of our wealth. It's a space of our intimacy and connection and it's a space of our creativity. And so
This is a perfect example of one of those things that it's so easy for us to say, skateboarding is just not important. I got to take care of my business. And yet what I feel in your body is one, aliveness, this activation of your creativity. And like you said, getting into the, I don't remember your words, I'm totally paraphrasing something about like stepping away from everything, right? And just being in play. Play is one of the most
powerful tools for us to access our creativity, right? It's that child essence. And it is deeply profound for our businesses because when you feel creative, when you feel playful, you have more spaciousness. You're accessing deeper levels of what is possible, right? Like what is possible? Just not for me.
but also for my clients and for humanity and for the world. So I want to point this out because I want the audience to recognize that it's so easy for us to displace the things that are very important to us, the things that light us up. And yet they are vital from my perspective to our wealth. And the more that we can say yes to what you're doing so wonderfully, blocking out that time, making it a priority, saying yes to that, this has to be a part of my life.
Is it always convenient? No, right? And sometimes maybe, and I'll speak for myself, but I'll ask you this as well, you you go to do it and your mind's like, yeah, but you have all these other things you got to be doing, right? And you have to like, and I let go of that right now. And yet these things are vital to work-life balance, right? These things are vital to really the deeper connections of who we truly are and what we want to create. The second thing you spoke to was community.
Micah Walker (08:06.542)
you
Micah Walker (08:19.938)
Yep. Totally.
Alara Sage (08:34.204)
And of course your heart lit open with that, right? And there's this weaving, like the mycelium in the forest, it has this network. There's this network, this weaving of energy that I see from you to all of these people. And not to say it's necessarily directly with your business, but we are all one. There's no true separation. So even when people don't seem like, that could be my client or that is,
part of my business, those connections and your beautiful value of valuing those relationships and your community absolutely adds tremendous energetic value to your business.
Micah Walker (09:19.214)
Yeah, it really does. And I actually built a community centric business. Like my entire business model is surrounded on community. I do this online community where I bring people together. do workshops, do a lot of free trainings, things like that. I I tell the same thing to my clients. I'm like, look, building a business is super rad because it's not just like, how can I make
this person, client of mine, you're just building connections. You're kind of just throwing seeds all over the place. And if something sprouts, awesome. If it doesn't, that's cool too, because you made a really cool connection with another human being and you probably get to learn something from that. I've made some of my closest friends just from being an entrepreneurship, making connections, reaching out, networking. And so to me, it's way beyond like...
How can this benefit my business? And it's more about building a life for me. I'm building a life through community and building a life through those connections. So everything that I do is truly surrounded on that concept and getting to do more in-person events and things like that. I we do a lot of stuff in our backyard too. Summer's rolling back around and we'll be starting to do more stuff in our backyard again this summer. And it's just the stuff that really lights me up whenever I'm around a bunch of people.
and we're on a shared mission or we have similar values. There's just nothing like that energy where you're just coexisting in that, just celebrating each other, existing with each other, sharing a meal together, doing an activity together. It's just so fun and super life-giving.
Alara Sage (11:06.696)
Yes, and truly something that's going to be even more important as we move forward and AI comes to be more more a part of humanity. I want to go back to the blocking of time because this is incredibly invaluable for entrepreneurs. What else do you experience as you block off time outside of skateboarding? What else are you making time for and or what are your experiences as you started to make this part of your reality?
Micah Walker (11:35.63)
That's a great question. I started setting aside time just for creation, things like podcast episodes, YouTube videos, any content creation, like that side of things, which has to do with the business. What I found is I didn't really give myself a lot of time to just kind of sit in my creative juices. It was just like whenever something came up, it would come up and maybe I'd write it down as I'm on the go or put it in a note in my phone.
and then circle back around to it when I had time to actually create that thing. Now I'm setting aside more intentional time to say, this is where I get to let that stuff surface and those ideas flow and I get to kind of be more in the creative juice of it all. So that's one way that I've been blocking out. Another is I just recently started doing this. So this is brand new and I've been traveling so much this summer that I haven't actually really gotten to experience this yet, but.
I started blocking off CEO days on Fridays. So this Friday, like my entire day is blocked off. And what's cool about that is I actually don't know what that day is going to look like, but it's just for me. It's just for whatever I feel in the moment, whatever feels good, whatever feels aligning, whatever feels like it's pulling me towards it that day, that's what I'm going to do. If that's another skateboarding session.
That's what I'll do. it's spending time with a friend I haven't seen in a month, that's what I'll do. If it's maybe literally doing absolutely nothing, just existing me in a journal because I haven't had time to sit with my thoughts for a while, that's what I'll do. Like whatever I feel is coming up for me in that moment, I want to have the ability to actually be in that.
came to this realization of how important this is because I wasn't doing that for such a long time and I felt really disconnected from myself. Really, really disconnected from myself. I was just focused on my business and the other people I was serving and especially in coaching, you're holding a lot of space for people. Sometimes the space that you're holding is a little bit intense and I found that I didn't have very good energetic boundaries for myself.
Micah Walker (13:54.158)
to be able to hold spaces like that so that from the overflow I am able to serve, from the overflow I'm able to show up and hold space, not because I'm obligated and have to, but I actually have the capacity because I've done a good job with my energetic boundaries, protecting my space in such a way that I have enough to give.
Alara Sage (14:18.64)
Yes, I want to speak to two things. The first thing you're mentioning around being in the juices. This is a lot of what I call our wealth kink and it's individual to each person. One of the ways that I really love to be with the creation energy is out in Mother Gaia. And I just go out in her and there's no expectation. I'm not like going out. used to, I used to go out with her like, okay, give me the juice, right? Like give it to me. And then I realized that I was like,
going out to get something like that wasn't the relationship that I wanted with the mother. And so now I show up every day and it's like you, me, whatever happens occurs. But it's one of the most profound spaces for me where my creative energies really flow. And I created this whole thing where people can really tap into that. And that's what it reminds me of. The second thing you're mentioning about the CEO day. This was interesting because this really triggered your throat chakra.
And so I'm curious as it comes through the question as was there something that made you realize that you needed this for yourself? You kind of alluded to it, but I want to see.
Micah Walker (15:31.406)
I think burnout, I was a nurse for seven to eight years before deciding to go on an entrepreneurial path. And the reason I left nursing and the reason I left healthcare, there were many reasons, so I don't wanna simplify it, but one of the big reasons is I was so burnt out. I was so burnt out and showing up.
for 12, 13 hours a day, sometimes not having a moment to pee or eat lunch or whatever. You just are there holding space for people. It's often really intense. There's a lot going on. It's a lot of over-stimulation. And the days that I was off, because oftentimes nurses are on for three days and off for four, not always consecutively, but we usually work three days a week.
I was doing some contracts where I was working for and I was like, no way, I need those extra days. But what I found is even on the days off, I was so exhausted that it felt like I was in recovery mode from the shift. And I did that for long enough that that whisper, it started out as a whisper, it was like, you're getting a little burnt out here, you know? I started seeing it and the way I showing up at work with patients, things like that.
And then it got to be more of like a stern voice and I kept ignoring it and I kept ignoring it. And eventually it turned into just this scream. Like there was no ignoring it. was exactly in my throat. It was just an overarching yelling at me. Like you've got to figure something else out. There's no way you can continue to show up like this. And so I got to a place I was like, okay.
I can't keep showing up like this, so what else am I gonna do? And I started looking into other ways of still being able to help people help the world transform in the ways that I felt aligned with. And I found something online about coaching and I was like, I think I'd be really good at that and I wanna try it. I went head first into that. And what I found was,
Micah Walker (17:46.58)
It's not burnout proof. Online business is not burnout proof. It's not like, now I just work on my laptop, so there's no way I can experience the kind of burnout that I did in healthcare. And it's different. The kind of burnout that I was experiencing is not the same as the one I was experiencing in healthcare, but I still found that I was on my way to burning out. If I did not start to set myself up,
for success and choosing to spend time with me, choosing to block out my schedule for the things that I really love and bring me to life, choosing to fill my cup so that from the overflow I can serve other people. And so for me, that was kind of the point was like witnessing the parallels of like, wait, this exact feeling is why I left healthcare in the first place. Let's not recreate that.
Alara Sage (18:43.826)
I love that. First off, you nailed that. You went straight to it. Your throat lit up. You know, the expression of what happened with you as a nurse, your throat was really triggered there with that exhaustion and then that turning point for you. Because yeah, isn't it interesting, right? We think, entrepreneurship. Okay, I'm not going to get burned out. But then we find ourselves to a slave, literally to our businesses.
Micah Walker (19:12.13)
Mm-hmm.
Alara Sage (19:12.488)
And that turning point for you, I could really feel that in your throat and also in your heart, this place that was, you know what, I'm not going to do this to myself again. Like I'm hearing the scream, the roar, the, can't quite ignore that anymore. And you you didn't just hear it. You actually listened to it. And I could feel that transition into this. Yeah, I matter.
Micah Walker (19:27.278)
Yeah. Yes, it was.
Alara Sage (19:41.192)
my boundaries matter, my space matters, and this deeper opening of your heart through that process. So I want to honor your vulnerability there and thank you for that. And really honor your journey because I know nurses, it's a known thing that you guys are worked to the freaking core. And to break that cycle, just because you shift into entrepreneurship doesn't mean...
That's an easy cycle to break. work with a lot of clients. I'm sure you have the same thing and I wanted to bring this up with you. That they just, they just want to keep doing what they've been doing. They know that's what they've been doing a lot of times, especially for women are worth is tied up in this. If I just give everything that I have, I am then valuable rather than no, I value me first. And as you said, from that overflow I can give.
Micah Walker (20:30.424)
Yeah.
Alara Sage (20:34.398)
So I want to take this to your clients. Is that the experience you often find with these beautiful givers, right? These profound givers that are nurses and then they're transitioning. And second question is how this blocking of time that you're learning for yourself is helping your clients.
Micah Walker (20:55.854)
Yeah, it's so interesting. Nurses really are wired to put themselves aside to show up for other people. And I think part of that is innate and part of it is trained in us. When we do step into the four walls of the hospital, it's like, you got to leave your stuff at the door and you got to show up for these people. And often we will, because we have
a heart to serve, a heart to help people heal, even more like an empathetic tendency to really feel for others and that sort of thing. I think a lot of that can be taken advantage of by the system that we operate within. So a lot of times nurses will just, sure, I'll do overtime. Sure, I'll come in on my day off. Sure, I'll stay late to help with this patient. Like there's just a lot of, sure, I'll do it. I'll show up.
and not a lot of, no, I matter too. And this is a boundary that I'm gonna set. And what I see happen when nurses are transitioning into entrepreneurship, this is really interesting. They struggle a lot with charging for their services. And what's interesting about that is as a nurse, you're not allowed to accept money, you're not allowed to even accept a gift card or even like...
cookies unless they can be shared amongst the unit. You can't accept anything from a patient because of that conflict of interest. What I find is when they're stepping into entrepreneurship, they're very wired to like, just have to show up and serve other people, but I can't receive anything else and I can't receive an exchange for the energy that I'm putting forth.
Alara Sage (22:20.125)
I'm
Micah Walker (22:43.798)
What they can build is actually a very unbalanced energetic exchange between the people they're trying to serve. And that is recipe for burnout again, you know, that is recipe for recreating this thing that oftentimes they're trying to leave behind and they haven't learned how to step into. I actually have worth outside of how I show up outside of how I serve outside of what I give and
If I choose to show up and give and serve, it is worthy of an energetic exchange and I do get to charge for those services. So it's really interesting to walk nurses through that process and show them like you can't create a sustainable business if you don't accept the energetic exchange that has to come as a result of how you show up. So that's something that I've noticed working with nurses. And of course I'm a nurse myself. So I've had to go through
my own struggles with this and really navigating these waters. And it's really, really hard. I struggled a lot with co-dependency when I was younger and can still, if I don't keep that in check, this way of showing up for other people and trying to get what you don't feel yourself. Like for me, it was trying to get...
love because I didn't feel self-love. So I'm trying to show up for other people in a way to say, give me love, give me love, give me love. Trying to get worth because I didn't feel self-worth. So trying to show up in a way where I'm like, can't you see that I'm worthy? Can't you see that I'm valuable? Don't leave me. Can't you see how much I'm showing up for you and giving for you and pouring out for you and willing to drop everything for you? And a lot, I see this a lot with nurses. There's a lot of the same
kinds of tendencies. So it's really interesting to witness how that kind of translates over to entrepreneurship. And then you asked about how my schedule blocking can impact my clients as well. And I really just think it's an energy thing. It's just how I'm showing up. And if I'm showing up more drained, more exhausted, I think in any relationship, you will feel that from another person. Whereas when someone's showing up,
Micah Walker (25:05.854)
And you can tell they're just stoked to be there. They're energized. They've been filling their cup. That also is evident. so I don't, I think personally, gives me time to be with my thoughts, which oftentimes will come with like an idea that I have for a client because I give myself that space to actually have those thoughts and more creative ideas arise. And sometimes it's just an energy thing. It's just how I'm actually showing up and how I'm holding space in that setting.
Alara Sage (25:36.604)
Again, I find this such an important conversation because in our society, we've been really in this hustle. If you want more money, you want more wealth, you want more joy, you've got to grind harder. You've got to do more. And it feels very contrary in our bodies to say, okay, I want more, so I'm going to actually do less. Or it's not that we're not doing because you're out skateboarding or you're sinking into your creative juices, you're doing things, but you're just not doing
what would be the task list for your business or the things that would, you know, quote unquote, push the needle for your business. You're doing, as you said, the things that fill you up. And so I'm just putting this out to the audience because it's so contradictory. And yet for me, I always say where paradox lives, God is revealed when we find these two things that seem opposing and seem like, wait, those things can't be together simultaneously.
Micah Walker (26:26.349)
Mm.
Alara Sage (26:32.958)
That's actually where truth resides. So I really celebrate you for having just so organically come to that place in yourself. Again, I can really feel it in your body. I can feel how this is truth for you. This isn't something that you said, okay, I heard this really good idea and I'm gonna like, you are implementing it. You are experiencing it through your life.
and you are experiencing that sense of self-worth and self-love because of these boundaries and these blocking this time off for yourself. I also wanted to celebrate what you're doing for nurses, right? Because I just have so much love and compassion for them and what our society has really done in the context of taking advantage of that empathy and their willingness to give.
and you are providing the space for women or I don't know, maybe it's just nurses in general, where they can choose a different life for themselves and you're helping that transition. And I really support that. So thank you for your medicine and for the work that you've done both with yourself and that you've done with the nurses. Where can people find you? Is there anything specifically you wanna call out?
Micah Walker (27:42.68)
Hmm.
Micah Walker (27:48.488)
Yeah, I run, like I mentioned before, community is everything to me. Everything that I'm doing usually has community at the center of it. I run a couple of online communities. One of them is called NursepreneurLab. And it's a free space where people can just come in and if they're interested in maybe exploring what it looks like to go from bedside nursing to entrepreneurship through coaching.
They can come in and experience the lab and a lot of it is just hanging out and enjoying each other's company. And some of it is free trainings and workshops and things that can actually help them get the insights that might help be helpful and understanding what that could look like in their life and in their career path. So nursepreneurlab is on a platform called school and happy to share that link with you. It's school.com slash nursepreneur. And then yeah, my Instagram I'm there.
quite often, nurse perineural lab, and I have my personal, which is Micah Walker.
Alara Sage (28:49.386)
Wonderful. My love, thank you so much for coming on here, for being open, vulnerable, for letting us really feel you and understand a deeper side of you. I'm very grateful for who you are.
Micah Walker (29:01.57)
Yeah, thank you so much for having me. This was really special and fun to just hang out and get to chat.
Alara Sage (29:09.224)
And to the audience, again, this type of seeing your reality, creating your business in this way, it is very new. And yet it is really what we've been seeking for so long. If you are a nurse or you know of a nurse, and maybe that nurse isn't even necessarily implying that they're ready to quit, start something new, you might send them to Micah and help
plant that seed if you feel called, if it feels resonant to you. Or honestly, if you just feel like reaching out to Micah in general, please do so. As always, I love and appreciate you as the audience so much, your courage, your availability to be in these conversations with us. And until next time.
Micah Walker (30:00.022)
Awesome. Bye y'all.
