Read on as Curtis interviews Tonia Emanuel, single mom, entrepreneur, and owner of Coach You 360 LLC. Self improvement is an inside out job, and Tonia reminds us that it’s important that we build relationships, and we understand who we are as people, not as products, not as businesses, not as brands, but as people.
Listen to The Full Episode Here:
Welcome everybody to another episode of referral secrets! We have the one and only Tonia Emmanuel here with us from Coaching-360. She helps clients with resilience and mindset as well as relationships, supportive relationships in all different areas of your life. Welcome! Thank you so much for being here.
I’m super happy to be here. Thank you. I am honored to be in this space with you and your audience and for them welcoming me and joining us with an open heart and an open spirit and an open mind.
Thank you for being here and, you know, obviously, it’s always important to grow our businesses. It’s always important. And you say it’s an inside-out job and really taking care of you. So do you mind sharing your story; what led you up to this point to be able to help businesses and help individuals?
Oh my God. I’ll make it short and sweet. I do love to share my story because I think people get great insight out of stories, and we learn the most through the storytelling process. So it’s really cool to have this opportunity. I’m Tonia Emanuel. I am a 45 year old single mother of a three-year-old and a 24 year old. Go ahead. Count it. Yeah, I get it. Big stretch, big difference.
I’ve always been really passionate about businesses. I’ve worked in many sectors, including Corporate America for 25-plus years, higher education, radio advertisement. But one of the things that’s always been so important to me and close to my heart, is relationships.
Even when the relationships were unsuccessful, whether with my first daughter’s father who ended up in prison for 15 years, or with my second son; those relationships still mean something to me. Every relationship always means so much to me. I’ve been doing self-development and personal-development for 25-plus years, just working on myself, because I can’t take anybody where I haven’t already been. It’s an inside-out job. I’ve always known it was more about me than it was about the other person. It was about how I thought and created my reality and the experience that I was having with the person sitting across from me. It didn’t matter whether it was in business or in my personal life.
I was always very aware of that. So through my mental health issues and bad relationships, to come out of those and still support my children and myself; that’s where the passion was. It was surviving; but there was more than just surviving, there was thriving. When you’re going through things, people always come into your world who are similar to you or have similar issues or concerns or worries, or anxieties. So as I built myself up and came out of whatever ditch I was in at the time, I loved building other people up, because as I learned, I could share that information with them.
So for me, personal development and coaching and empowering people has always been a part of my life and a part of my journey since as long as I can remember. It’s always been my passion.
I think everything we do which enriches our life, is always from a story that we’ve had and the stories that we have heard. I’ve heard about your story, the loss of your brother, and how and why you started your business. I was intrigued by that, you know; it’s always the story and the relationships that help create who we are. That’s what led me to where I am, through challenging how I see people, how I see myself and who I am; my parents, my relationships with them, my grandparents, and siblings and pastors, all of these people help create who we are and what our journey is. It shaped my relationship with God and spirituality, all relationships. So that’s what led me to the business that I have today and where I’m at.
Awesome. Tell me about how you take people through a process, because not everybody thinks outside the box like you do. So how do you help people to think outside the box and do things maybe that they haven’t even thought of.
You know, for me, it always starts on the inside. It is an inside-out job that always starts with your thoughts. If you happen to stub your toe, immediately you get all these negative thoughts that it’s going to be a crappy day. Just one little random thought, and it creates a whole day of negativity. All that negativity that originates with that one initial thought. And we judge ourselves so cruelly.
We’re the meanest people in the world to ourselves, right? And, I mean, we all have challenges. Don’t tell us how crappy we are and that we’re not good enough and all this stuff, because thoughts are just that, they come, they go, they flow in and they flow out. We cannot control them. We shouldn’t be judging them. We should be kind and forgiving to ourselves. So my process starts with the thoughts that you think about yourself. When we begin to consistently and immediately challenge those thoughts; like just because I stubbed my toe, doesn’t mean the whole day is going to be ruined. It means I stubbed my toe. So, if someone was viewing our life story, what would they see? They would only see that we bumped our toe; clearly it was painful, but now we’ve moved on. The rest is creation. So if we can create thoughts of somebody else’s life on Instagram and how great their life is and have all these amazing thoughts about how wonderful they are and crappy we are, and how crazy our world is and how healthy theirs is, That’s the opposite of the thought. That’s where we want to go. And that’s the process that I’m talking about.
So you get your clients to start talking about spontaneous thoughts that come into their head and being very vulnerable and open with you about what their self-talk is. Then your process is making sure that they’re intentional and conscious when that happens so they can try to switch it somehow.
Right? The first process is to get people to understand, that I’m an educator naturally. I always educate first. So we talk about what the brain is, what the brain does. We talk about the difference between the brain and the mind. We talk about where our thoughts and beliefs come from and how they shape our experiences, and the reality we create. That’s always the first step in the process. I have a lot of business people, entrepreneurs and people in corporate America who come to me frustrated about their career. Their usual thoughts are “I’m not good enough”, “My boss hates me”. It’s all of these downloads of thoughts. No matter where you come in in my process, I immediately want to know your story.
I want to know what you’re telling yourself. I want to know about the tapes, or for the younger generation, the CDs, on repeat in your mind. When you go through these things, like the challenges at work with your boss who gave you a good review, but you wonder, “why wasn’t it excellent?” You have all these thoughts in your head and preconceived notions about your boss and who they are. We challenge those thoughts and where they come from and dig behind them. When people want to break through a glass ceiling in their business, even people with multimillion dollar companies, they sometimes just can’t seem to achieve that next level. It typically stems from a thought, an understanding that either they’re not good enough, smart enough, or just don’t have the intuitive ideas to birth. Usually it is based in fear and thoughts of not “being enough”. It doesn’t matter how much money you make. We all have these thought processes. So yes, every stage starts with a thought and challenging the stories that we’re telling ourselves
Do you have a course that you take people through? Is that “Rise to Your Alpha?” Is that what you have…
“Into Your Alpha” is a group program. It’s a small group podcast I do specifically with people that come in and apply. They apply for my program… (aside- My son is trying to break in. I’m so sorry.)
Don’t be sorry. I have a four year old, okay?
That’s one of the things that I’ve learned to do as a single mom, is fully incorporate my son into my life. That’s one of the beauties of having your own business. So I apologize.
You don’t have to apologize at all.
So “Into Your Alpha” is my new group program. I do only five or six people in this program because it’s intimate. It’s personal, it’s a sacred space where people can be totally honest. I believe we do better when we have the support of others. I am the leader of the group, but there is so much genius within the group. When people share stories about who they are and their struggles, they’re more able to be open and honest with each other. You know? My first group program was at the end of December. So “Rise to Your Alpha” is my new platform and my new way of doing business because I really do it differently.
Why did you name your program, “Into Your Alpha”?
Because I want people to remain resilient. It is finding your Alpha Dog and being dogged in the spirit that you are, and finding the balance in the Alpha. You are the Alpha and the Omega. You are the great I am. God comes to, and within you, and has given you a zone of genius that makes you Top Dog in what it is that you do. So I want people to feel empowered, to rise into their leadership positions, whether it’s being the leader in your family, being the leader at your business, in your business, or being the leader in someone else’s business. Because we lead in so many different areas of our life. We need to rise into the Alpha that we are because every single person within our businesses, or in our communities has something that they bring that makes them Top Dog. And that’s what “Rise into Your Alpha” is all about. I want people to be encouraged and empowered to be number one in what they do.
I like that. Bringing people together as like a little Mastermind to be able to share and realize that everybody has their own junk, right? Everybody has their own stuff they’re dealing with, and often, one thing affects the other, like personal relationships and business relationships.
It’s all reciprocal. The interesting thing that I’ve seen since I’ve been coaching, especially with the six- and seven-figure CEOs, is people run their businesses similar to the way they run their personal lives. If somebody is not happy in business, they’re usually not happy in their personal lives. That’s why it’s so important when we are creating our business, that we create a business that is aligned around our life, who we are, what we truly value, and what we care about.
I found even though people come to me about businesses, their mindset is around relationships and trust and breaking through fears so that they can move to the next level. It’s a vulnerable position, because we all have fears. My new project is actually more of a relationship- building structure that I’m doing on Facebook, because I believe that panel discussions and open discussions are more of the way to go. Even in Facebook groups, people have the ability to bring their geniuses to the table. I believe it’s all reciprocal. It’s not just about my business or your business. It’s about our businesses as a community, because that’s how we make the world rotate in a better way. There’s so much clientele and money and resources for every single one of us, and so it’s important that we build relationships, and we understand who we are as people, not as products, not as businesses, not as brands, but as people. That’s how we’re going to grow our businesses to six and seven figures. That’s how we begin to live wealthy lives involving meaning, well-being, and living the life we desire.
So it hits our experiences, the experiences and events that we’ve gone through in life. So in personal development and self-improvement, who are some of the people that you look up to and would love to be mentored by?
I have so many! Straight up out the gate. I’ve got to say Pastor Steven Furtick, at Elevation Church. I love his message. He’s honest, he’s raw. He’s authentic. I love Dr. Dimartini, author of The Values Factor. People might be familiar with his name, because he was in The Secret, which was a big thing several years ago. I love his work and how he aligns everything around what your authentic values are, because most people really don’t know what their values are. We think we do, but not all the time.
Our values are things that we spend our money on, our time on, our resources on, what we can lose ourselves in. We’re very organized around them. Those are usually our top values. Dr Dimartini has an amazing test online which you can do for free. It’s called The Values Test. Look him up. I love his work.
I am a coach with several coaches. If you have a coach that doesn’t have a coach, they shouldn’t be your coach. Coaches are always trying to improve. Rich Litvin is my coach and mentor. Many people may know him as Steve Chandler from The Prosperous Coach, the top coaching book of all times. If you’re looking to be a coach, check it out. He presents a very different view of how we position ourselves for our clients.
I like that, The Values Factor. Many people don’t understand what their values really are. So that sounds like that’s one of your first parts of a process that you take people through.
Yeah. The Values Factor. I always encourage my clients to take that free test, and read The Values Factor, because it’s so important that we align everything that we do around our values. A lot of people say, well, money is my top value. No, it’s not. Money is a tool. Money is a resource so that you can experience your top values, so you can get to your top values. Money is never a value. Money is neither good, nor bad.
I definitely want to buy that book, because I love when people make recommendations of something. I’ve seen him in The Secret back in 2000. It was the first version with Esther Hicks in it. Yes, yes. So powerful. It planted seeds in my head , and really kind of set everything in motion. You know, obviously it’s about taking action. You can’t just sit there and say, a Ferrari is going to show up in my driveway. However, the Law of Attraction without action is delusional.
It is work and it’s self-development. I’ve read a lot of Esther Hicks; I’m really into new thought leaders. So for me, The Secret was one of the first catalysts that helped me to really think differently. The Values Factor was a game changer for me; that book and Dr. Dimartini. A couple of my favorite books.
Very nice. What other processes do you take people through? Can you share any examples of clients you’ve worked with in the past who had some breakthroughs that you would like to share?
Sure. I have a couple examples on my website. I really am passionate about working with people who are trying to birth new ideas. I have one client who wrote her first book, which was published in 2021. I’m very proud of her. She also started a t-shirt company, in 2020. It’s amazing to see how many people benefit from coaching to help them see who they are. Coaching is not about how great I am. Coaching is about me helping you answer the right questions; so you can see how great you are, and discover your gifts and talents within you.
My client, Becky, created her line of “Christian Creations”.
Her self-talk initially was ‘I’m a single mom’, ‘I don’t have enough resources’, ‘my job doesn’t pay me enough’. She had all these stories. She was telling herself negative stories, was stressed out, and working two or three jobs. She was coming out of a bad relationship. But once she could see those stories and step outside of herself and see that the stories were the same junk over and over again, she could see her own self and she could focus more. She said, that’s a story; that’s not who I am. And then she became fearless! She just did it. She stopped making excuses for why she didn’t have enough money, and set her stuff up on Etsy. She stopped being fearful, and put herself out there!
She found the power in the story. She now uses her story to empower others, and say, this is why I started Christian Creations, because God saw me through this poverty and horrible relationship and got me out. She was able to buy her first car, and now wants to tell everybody her story. She wrote the book, Broken Warriors, which was published this year. She’s very proud of that. She attributes it to me, and says, “If it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t have been able to do it”. But I attributed it to her, for having the courage, having a coach, and doing the work.
Doing the work. Changing your story. Changing your life.
Oh, totally. It can be done in an instant!
Sometimes you just need to have that person call you out or have that self-discovery. I know the number one thing for an entrepreneur is resourcefulness, being resourceful.
Yes; and finding the right people to support you, to have your back, to challenge you, and to be fearless. One thing about me, as a coach, is I’m also an educator, a visionary and a community leader. First, I’m a networker. I like to bring people together and help people figure out how to creatively solve a problem. I’m about the solution, not problem coaching. It’s just a tool. It’s one of the many strategies that I use to help people get to the next level and create the strategies that they need to create, to hit a goal within the next goal.
One thing about me is I’m fearless. I’m so fearless. I don’t care if you fire me. I’m here to ask the tough questions and to challenge you through the questions that even your best friend or spouse wouldn’t ask you.
That’s the breakthrough–when somebody holds your feet to the fire. Now, if you want to turn the dial down, I let you, I give you the option. If you don’t want to go there, we don’t have to. But the point is, you always want people who are willing to challenge you. You always want to be in the room with people who are bigger than you, better than you. You want to find the people that are at the top of their game. That’s what I challenge myself to do. If I’m the smartest person in the room, I’m in the wrong row. I’m always looking to connect and network with people and create relationships because I’m looking for that next sharper piece of steel.
So what is a wealthy life to you?
A wealthy life is different for everyone, but a wealthy life for me is about well-being. It’s about feeling supported. It’s about being encouraged, feeling empowered. It’s about having healthy relationships with your family. Even the family members that you dislike; there is still a way to have healthy relationships and communication. It’s about creating an ending, ending relationships in a healthy way that is healthy for you. It’s about finding the tribe that supports you, your vision, your mission, your family, your business. It’s about creating a business that you love. It’s about not spending so much time in your business, that your family is neglected. It’s about finding a healthy way to manage the life you want. It’s about creating a business, whether you’re owning your own business or whether you’re in corporate America or you’re a blue-collar worker, cause any of those can make six and seven figures. It’s about doing what you love and finding what connects to your soul and supports your values, that allows you to make the money, create the resources and the life that you want to experience. It all starts with you having the mindset to know that it takes one thought to create your entire life in your entire experience.
Wow. That is awesome. I almost want to kind of wrap up on that thought, because that was super-powerful. I think in 95% of what you just shared, there was nothing financially related at all. Yet all of that stuff affects the bank account,
Everything. Every single person who is super rich and super successful, including yourself, has built a business off something that is passionate to them. Something that naturally comes easy to them. Does your business come easy to you?
I love what I do. It hasn’t been easy to get it to the point where I am. There’s been a lot of ups and downs, but I’m very blessed and grateful, for sure; and I love what I do.
You love what you do; that makes every other piece that’s hard, worth it. But the problem is some of us don’t believe it, because we have the limiting thoughts that tell us that nobody wants to hear you, that you’re not good enough. And here you are, with this amazing business that’s serving a vast amount of people. You look to serve a vast amount of people, and that’s how you get wealthy. Most people want to serve whatever that is, whether they’re a speaker, creator, designer, whatever.
Definitely some sacrifices early on, as you just said. We started, and one of my first things was my developer asked me, what are a few things that you want this to be? And he asked me questions, challenged me a little bit. He said, that really helps me build what you would like to see. One of the things I said, is “it’s got to be customer first”. I’ve been in businesses before, where it’s really about reporting to shareholders. That’s really about this, stakeholders. They’re making decisions at the top that don’t necessarily serve the person who’s sending them money every month or many times a year. That was the sole focus in the very beginning, and it served us really well, because a lot of decisions that we made in the first month or two of constructing what we have, I’m very proud of.
And it shows, it shows it, I don’t know if people are going to even get to see you, but it shows on camera, even in your skin, you have that happy glow.
But we are not doing it just for the money. It’s not about the money. It’s always about what you want to experience with the money. And so once you know what you want and how you want to live, be unapologetic and yes, build a business that is going to allow you to serve the greater good of people, who are then going to turn around and allow you to birth the money and the wealth that you want so that you can create the legacy that you want for your kids and your kids’ kids. And this is how we change. Like everything, it doesn’t start with the government. It starts here with us at home and in the community and in our families. That means it’s an inside out job all day.
Inside out job. That’s exactly what I keep coming back to, and I love that so much. So, in wrapping this up, is there anything that you would like to share with our audience? There’s so much gold and so many great little nuggets that you shared with us today. Definitely check out “www.coachyou360.com”.Go ahead and check it out. And if there’re any questions that you have, I’m sure that she’d be more than happy to answer them, or if you’re interested in her coaching program, by all means reach out. So is there anything you would like to share in wrapping this up?
Thank you. I felt honored that you blessed me with this opportunity and I love what you do. I love what AM cards stands for. I love the people you work with. I appreciate you. You know, it’s been such a hard year that we have all gone through, but the truth of the matter is there is so much gold in this moment. There’s gold in every moment that has challenged you. I encourage you to think about what you’ve learned through this experience, everything that triggers you. That’s a place that you need to understand that there’s some portion that may need to be healed, but in that experience, you learned a lot. It made you who you are. It made you amazing, and you are a gift from God.
There’s something that you need to do. That’s why you’re here. That’s why you breathe. That’s why you live. The thing that you think that is small and insignificant, but you feel it in your gut that the world needs to know about it, or maybe just your community, or maybe just your family, maybe just your kids. You are the Alpha, you are the Omega and you are the light that God projects through, and it’s time that you step and rise into the power that you are to birth. What- ever it is you want in this life. Everything started with the creation and the thoughts of God. And so it was, and that’s the exact same thing for you.
Oh my gosh. I’m going to definitely take that clip then highlight that. That was amazing. Thank you so much for hopping on here and sharing your wisdom with our audience. I’m looking forward to meeting you in person someday.
Thank you so much. Have a great day. Bye-bye.
Important Links:
About Tonia Emanuel:
“So who am I? Some people would call me an activist, or a speaker, some say I am a feminist, a thought leader, others would call me a coach or mentor, but my favorite label is NO label at all! I am what I am.
A woman on a mission to help you “think outside of the box” and live unapologetically.”