41: Water, Chatter, Sting, & Comfort (w/ Nicole Waters)

All right. Welcome back to the name and creative show. I’m your host, Josh Naman.

And if you’ve been here, you know I love meeting people who are building something good, exploring ideas and uncovering the stories behind them. So today is no exception to that. My guest is someone who’s helping people achieve breakthrough success with strength and serious intention.

Nicole Waters is a certified coach, business leader, and the powerhouse behind 525 coaching and Amplify Women Tampa Bay, an event that has quickly become a must attend for women entrepreneurs and change makers in our region. With over a decade of experience coaching top tier professionals and organizations, Nicole knows what it takes to lead, grow and succeed. So I invited her here to share some of that wisdom with us today.

Nicole, I really appreciate your time and your energy. Welcome to the show. Here you are.

Thank you. This is amazing to be here. Thank you very much for that kind introduction.

I do what I can. I get some help with your about pages and things like that. So I can’t really take credit, but I just put it together and so I want to start with kind of your origin story.

You know, I like to just get right into why people do what they do. And so for the coaching side of things, because you’ve been coaching for longer than Amplify has been around, I, I’d like you to walk us through what gave you the bug of coaching. How far back does that go? So where it actually began is kind of hard to specify because it’s always been innately part of how I show up in the world.

In high school, of course, I was one of those people that joined student council and cheerleading. I always wanted to be part of bigger teams. I wanted to contribute and support others and didn’t really make the connection of being a servant leader or mentoring until I was into my professional career.

So fast forward many years when I was working with a large luxury automotive organization and I was at lunch with a girlfriend. And at that time I was also the president of a non for profit and we were talking about the work that we were doing in the community. And she says, have you ever considered being a certified coach, like really formalizing the work that you do and supporting others? And I really had not considered it.

But from that point forward, I really gave some structured thought around the impact that I have and what I have to offer and how I could give structure to my craft so that I could serve and in a more meaningful way. And from that point forward, gave birth to 525 coaching. And I’ve Been doing it successfully ever since.

And how long have you been doing that? About 12 years. 12 years, that’s great. Absolutely.

And what’s interesting is it started kind of off as kind of a plan B. I was in corporate America for a really long time at that point. I had been very successful in my role and I was looking for something else and I just wanted to have my own identity rather, or my own way of giving back outside of the umbrella of working for someone else.

Sure. And so it was kind of always humming there until last year when I formally left corporate America in order to serve completely in that capacity. Oh wow.

So you’ve been juggling both for 10 plus years then? Absolutely. Oh, wow. How, how did you manage that? You know, any, any tricks to having time to serve in corporate side of things and then also be doing your own thing? Because that’s a lot of, that’s a lot of time and energy.

It is. I did it on the weekends and in the evenings and it worked out fabulous. It worked out really, really well.

And it’s working out even better now that I’m able to expand my hours into the work day where people also like to be met on their lunch breaks or at the beginning of their days. But it was a lot of weekends and late nights. Oh yeah.

As we were just talking before we started recording about late nights, it’s just like part of our like genetic code of an entrepreneur. I swear I don’t know. And for me it’s like the world kind of everything stops in the evening.

So nothing new is coming in, no calls are coming in, no one needs me at that moment. So I can just stay in the flow and I’m not getting pushed and pulled and that’s okay during the day, but you need time to focus on certain sprints. So as an entrepreneur, we are always on.

But to your point, it is nice to know there’s that standardized workday and that it’s seven o’, clock, eight o’ clock at night. You know, the expectations of you are a lot less. And depending on how you’ve conditioned your clients, they will respect that and contact you in the morning.

Or they might contact you at 7 but not expect a response until the next day. 100%. Sundays are my like, do not disturb day.

I had to create some boundaries around that. But yeah, as an entrepreneur, it just seems like our brains are always going, we’re always contributing, we’re always creating. But the expectation of our clients changes outside of those normal business hours, which is nice.

Absolutely. Are the expectations are something that I’ve been juggling. And now that I’ve set them over the past year year, my phone stays in the office after 5pm and on weekends.

And when I go back to that phone, it’s very rarely now I have like a missed call or a text because I’ve set those boundaries and it’s wonderful. And even if they did, like you said, they don’t expect that I’m going to get back to them in those after hours parts, 9 to 5, Monday through Friday, that’s when we are on. But they know that I’m working in the background, you know, other hours.

But as far as communication. So that expectation set, that’s huge because everything’s fine. But if you don’t set that expectation, then people, certain clients might think, oh, they’re ignoring me because you’ve set a precedent, that you’ve gotten back to them at 8pm at night and now why aren’t they? I’ve had to explain that to one client who I spoiled and I was like, oh, I’ve recalibrated my life.

Now my weekends are like fully family, you know, because I have to have that. Yeah, leave me with a phone in the other room. Boundaries are really important for a couple different reasons.

So Dawn Hunter has an awesome podcast called Work Comes Third or Work is Third. And it’s really all about those boundaries that are so important for us to all have. But thinking about the work that you do in a creative space, right.

It’s also equally important that you take time to quiet your brain and eliminate distractions that would impose any type of disruption to the creative process. 100%. So I have found, even for myself as an entrepreneur, it’s very easy to get caught up in all the things you need to do and all the things you want to do.

And you just can go and go and go. But at some point, you actually stop being productive. You stop being creative because you’re in this vortex that just sweeps you up and now you’re just busy instead of productive.

100%. When I used to teach and I was learning a lot about the production pipeline in film, I did a deep dive into color grading of film. And one big thing is that once you are editing a particular scene and the colors for too long, the colors don’t become the same.

And you literally have to walk away and look away from the screen and come back at a later time to actually understand where the colors are in the context of those colors because you’ve been working on them so closely that they become different because you’re so involved. And so you know that. I feel like that’s an example, but of, like, mindset when we’re talking about business or productivity, it’s like you.

Sometimes you just reach a point where you need to walk away, go take a shower, go take a walk, go for a run, exercise, and then come back. I guess as a designer, this huge. Like, I’ve been looking at this.

I’m not figuring it out. I. Now I’m just gonna start wasting time by not making any real progress. I need to step away and come back with fresh eyes and a fresh brain.

Yeah. I work with my clients a lot on identifying where that point is. When you decide I have to step away, you know, if it’s a shower or go grab some water, just actually go for a walk.

Like, distance yourself from it. Because there is a break point where it. You’re just now again in that vortex where you’re not productive, you’re just being busy, and it becomes very frustrating.

It becomes defeating. And that doesn’t feel good either. And so there are so many examples.

When you were describing, you know, the designing aspect of. And how the colors actually look different and you’re interacting with it differently, I thought a lot about all the different ways that shows up in our lives and how it’s not just when you’re in a creative space, but when you’re trying to find solutions or when you’re. When you’re trying to create something new.

Right. Whatever it is where you really need your brain to perform for you and you feel like you’ve hit a wall, it’s really just the best time to say, all right, that’s my body telling me it’s time. It needs a break.

Absolutely. Are you. Are there indicators that you found that are common between the people that you work with, where they are reaching that point? Any.

Any, like, particular threads that are common for anybody listening or myself. Adhd. Okay.

So once that starts to really kick in. Yeah. I think, you know, we.

We use that phrase a lot lately. And I think because we are understanding that more. Yeah.

And so it’s easier to identify. But quite honestly, you know, to answer your question more accurately, it are. It is people who are high performers, and they’re.

They are holding so many different elements at any given time that they are. Their brain is just constantly on, and they’re being pulled in a lot of different directions. So it’s not even just isolated to.

I’m focused on this, and I’m hitting a brick wall or I’m not getting where I want on this. It’s also. I’m holding too many things.

I’m trying to answer, what are we going to have for dinner? I’m trying to answer my team on this particular solution for a client. I’m trying to figure out when I’m going to go to the gym. You cannot logically think of all of those things in any given space.

You have to hold space for any one of those thoughts I’m sure you’ve heard before, too. We don’t technically multitask. You cannot.

No. You can only do one task at a time. You can be thinking about something and physically doing something else, but you’re not actually doing either of them in a productive way.

Yeah. Unless you’re playing guitar and singing. Oh, okay.

You got me there. All right. You got me there.

But it’s really hard. Yeah. That took me so long to get.

And Jordan, our producer here, is sitting there looking at us like, yeah, but, like, that’s an exception because that’s still, like, the same task. It’s just, like, harmonizing it. Exactly right.

I like the way that you put that. You had mentioned, when you were giving us a little breakdown of how you came to be in the coaching world, you had mentioned the term servant leader. And I have that book, Servant Leadership, and, you know, have really, like, gravitated towards that ever since.

One of my best friends, he was my instructor in undergrad, Zeb Wood. Shout out to you, Zeb. He had told us about servant leadership, and he is a servant leader.

And like, I’ve started, I. I adopted that. And maybe I’m not perfect, but for those who don’t know it, maybe from your perspective, can you explain what you meant by that when you talked referred to yourself as a servant leader? For me, it means finding people where they are and identifying with them where might be a gap or a barrier and walking alongside them to find a way around it, over it, under it, really serving in a capacity that serves others where they are, not where I want them to be, o
where I think I can bring the most value. Right.

So servant leadership is not imposing your gifts on others, but finding how your gifts can serve them. I swear I didn’t tell you that question ahead of time. You just served that on a platter.

And now you don’t have to read Servant Leadership. Although I recommend it. That’s huge because, you know, I feel like there’s multiple areas that, like, you could think about it in business or you could think about it in sports or Education.

And if someone’s like talking down to you or like you need to be here and they’re not meeting you where you’re at, it’s a totally different experience of growth rather than the coach or your instructor coming down, understanding where you’re at and being there with you, holding your hand through it to grow up together. And I think that’s a huge difference. It’s maybe sometimes nuanced, but you know, for me, like as a new parent, I’m trying to think about these kind of things in the context o
that, like, how do I. How do I meet my child who knows nothing about the world and not become frustrated or put my will on them to bring them up into this world and let them discover there’s so much to unpack.

So it’s interesting and I don’t want to deviate too far away from the leadership perspective of this, but this just came up in a conversation last night with a friend of mine and we were talking about conflict resolution. And they were talking to me about their perspective and how they were telling this person that they have conflict with about how valuable they are to that other person. And I said, you’re probably not going to make much headway with that perspective because you’re putting y
priorities ahead of what motivates them.

And they’re behaving this way because they’re wanting something and you are constantly giving it to them. And so when I coach in regards to servant leadership, a lot of the times it’s reverse engineering our mindset and our thinking to the other person perfectly described by you. How do I align myself with my child who’s new to this world and doesn’t have the experience or the knowledge that I do? They certainly don’t have the perspective that you do.

And how do I inspire them to do what I want them to do? Same thing as adults. And it doesn’t matter if we’re talking about a marriage or a work relationship or a creative partner. It is our responsibility to understand what inspires and motivates that other person so that we can speak their language to deliver our point.

Right? 100%. Yeah. And sometimes we lose that focus because we’re so prioritized on our thoughts, our feelings, our motivations, what we want.

And then we get frustrated when we don’t get it. And it’s like, this is a two way. This is a two way transaction, conversation, experience.

We have to consider both when we are communicating. Sure. I mean, that’s the ultimate goal of understanding and communication.

I feel like is explaining it in a way like, for instance, in debate. To move forward in a debate or a conversation, you should always check in and be like, okay, so from what I’m understanding you, I’m going to explain what I understand you just said. And so we can both agree in our heads collectively that this is the point or this is the fact, and then we can move forward productively, collectively, to our next stage of the debate.

And because I feel like debate is about meeting in the middle, meeting each other to understand reality better, whatever that may be. And the only way to gain a greater understanding is to use communication that aligns with each other. Otherwise, you’re just talking past each other.

We see that all the time, like politics and news and everything that’s going on is wild everywhere. Everywhere, everywhere. I actually have talked about this on several other podcasts.

I firmly kind of follow this philosophy of keeping in alignment physiology, focus, and language. And when I am keeping these elements in my life in alignment, language is such a big one. And you often do need to check in with even the most basic term.

So I was at a recent board meeting, and we were having a conversation about community, and I took a pause. I asked for a pause at the table because I really was curious. When someone was using this word community, who were they talking about? Because I’m receiving their message, but I’m applying my definition of community, and they’re using their definition of community.

And to your point, we were missing each other. So was that the whole rest of the meeting is understanding the word community? You know, you opened a can of worms. There was definitely time spent on defining that so that we collectively, as a board, could be more responsible in our communication.

The point is, is that no word, it’s not about the complexity of the word. It’s really about the complexity of how we’re using it. Yeah, right.

And when we communicate, we’re. We’re thinking about moving things forward, or we’re thinking about being a leader or a business owner. We have to be so responsible with the language that we use, because it’s not how we want to put it out into the world as much as it is how is it being received? Yeah.

Yeah. It’s so interesting that we got onto language ultimately, like, have this sharing of understanding and words. It’s everything.

It’s threaded through, literally our lives, whether it be our discussions with our colleagues in business, our clients, our children, our friends. Like, if you’re writing music together and. And you’re, you know, like, coming from a band, Jordan and I Played lots of music together and still do.

And there’s particular times where there’s, like, this unwritten language where words don’t even matter. It’s like you. You describe something to each other and you’re using analogies or metaphor.

And. And then Jordan’s like, oh, okay, I get that. Okay, we need to, like, tone this down or slow down or increase the intensity, but that’s not how I phrased it.

But we just. There’s like a collective understanding that that’s. That’s how we need to move forward.

And I feel like teams, family, units, boards, you. It’s important to get on the same page about the shared, you know, terminology that you’re using, because then you can be way more productive in that meeting that you probably have. Maybe it takes you.

Okay, took a pause, and now you took a little extra time from that meeting to define community. But okay, so that took time, but you’re probably way more productive after that once you were on the. Maybe calibrated, if you will.

And I feel like just society in general, we’re just going so fast. So, like, just to hear you take the reins and say, like, hey, can we pause for a second? Like, for me, that’s so refreshing. These kind of conversations, like, it’s just you and me and Jordan and, you know, right now in this moment that these mics and we are kind of pausing it because nothing else is coming in and we can just focus on this.

I feel like it’s so important. That’s why meditation is huge or, I don’t know, exercising or running. And maybe I’m going on a tangent here and need to pause, but you got, you know, you’re like, you pulled the cord of my lawnmower engine here.

I love it. I absolutely love it. Strategic pause is really important, especially as a leader.

When you find yourself talking to your team, you’re talking to your clients, you’re having a conversation with anyone, and I’m going to give a sidebar suggestion here. I’ll allow it. For anyone who’s listening, who doesn’t understand what the strategic pause is or how to use it, I’m going to lay it down for you right now.

Sweet. First, it requires you that you’re self aware, that you are aware that you were communicating. And then it is about being aware of your audience and realizing, okay, I’m doing a lot of talking here, and now I’m watching the body language of my audience, and maybe they’re getting agitated or maybe I’m losing them.

They’re Getting glossy eyed. But I don’t know what to do. I’ll just keep talking until something happens.

Right. This happens a lot, especially if you are a leader, because you feel a lot of pressure to have all the answers or to form. And one of the most responsible things you can do, it doesn’t matter if this is at home or at work or with a client or with friends, is you can say, you know what, I’m going to take a moment just to give you an opportunity.

Are there any questions or is there anything on your mind that you want to share with me before I go on and be intentional about taking a pause? Say, you know, I just want to take a moment here. You have any questions or comments, not to say that you’re not going to continue, but you want to make sure that that person who is listening to you doesn’t have a question or a comment, that mentally they’re distracted now they’ve checked out exactly right. And now we’re not effective in o
communication.

So, yeah, communication, this is something I could talk about for hours on end because it is something that is at the crux of a lot of the coaching that I do. It boils down to being an effective communicator, getting out of your own way. But it also is a solution to many challenges that clients have.

Yeah, I think it’s a solution to many or all of the problems that we have in society is conversation. That’s why I love the medium of podcasting so much, is because this isn’t a five minute clip and five talking heads here trying to answer one of the deepest questions about a conflict or something like that, and what the resolution should be in five minutes or something. It’s like the no one tells us when to stop this or where to go, and people can engage in it.

And these long form conversations, and conversation in general is the ticket to at least figuring out each other. And then we can work towards a goal of, you know, solutions. But like, how else are you going to get that ball rolling of solving something the other way? Is that, okay, well, I’m mad at you and you’re mad at me.

Now we’re at war. And that’s like the opposite of conversation. And it’s interesting because it’s such a simple thing and it’s the most complex thing.

Like you just mentioned, most of the coaching that you do is around communication. And so it’s interesting because it’s so ingrained in us. It’s pretty much all we do all day, whether it be in our bodies or with our mouths and in our voices or in our heads and, or text.

Now, other than that, like what are we doing? Even playing music is communicating something. So it’s just, it’s unbelievably powerful. And you know, the focus of communication, it makes a lot of sense in the context of coaching.

So it doesn’t surprise me. And, and, and then when you think about, okay, because I imagine this is probably influenced by it, but okay, then where did amplify come from? Amplify is all about communication because it’s a sharing of knowledge and empowerment. And, and I’ll let you fill in the gaps on that, but am I getting close to correct on that? Yeah, no, A.B.

absolutely. And I want to specify too that we all have our own authentic voice and we have our experiences and we have our worldview and perspectives and that’s where we communicate from. And that’s the most beautiful part because no two people are the same.

But this can also be a barrier. Sure, right. Because we have this singular perspective that we are communicating from.

And a coach really helps you talk through how you communicate and what your perspective is so that you know where to make some adjustments, to learn how to ask more questions, to become more aware of other people so that you can be effective in achieving what you want through communication. And so, so when people are considering like, well, why a coach? Or do I need a coach or what do coaches even do? Exactly, this is where we really provide the most value is because we’re able to sit with you i
a non judgmental safe space and talk through like, what’s keeping you up at night and why is that keeping you up at night? And dive deeper and then help reflect back and ask you key questions so that you can decide where do you want to make adjustments in your life that will help you get beyond some of these barriers? Yeah, totally. It’s also communicating with yourself.

We’ve been talking a lot about communicating with others, but like for me with my coach, you know, Eric Medi, he’s great. And a lot of our conversations actually about me communicating with myself on what are my priorities, getting organized in my head, what’s. How am I going about my flows of work and, and charting that all out and then I can move to okay.

And then that informs my communication and organization with my team. But it kind of all starts internally too. I, I feel like it’s very therapeutic going through our meetings and improving because I. You had mentioned, like, I believe everybody needs a coach, even if you’re not the business Owner Like, I have my team being coached because.

And it’s. And now empowering my whole team. And that’s like hugely beneficial for me and for them and for the collective business.

Everyone, I agree, should have a coach. Coaches have coaches. I have a coach.

I have several coaches. And I was at breakfast this morning with someone else who’s a professional, who has several coaches, a health coach and a business coach and a speaking coach. So, yeah, I think coaching is a very instrumental tool for success.

And I think it’s great that you’re working with Eric. And to go back to my methodology or my tool of physiology, focus and language and keeping those in alignment. When I talk about language with my clients, it is absolutely first that we talk about how they talk to themselves every day.

That voice in your head you have a relationship with. And I never talk about quieting the voice. Right.

It’s about having a relationship with it that serves you like listen to it. What is it saying? Why is it saying those things? And an excellent book to check out if you really want to learn how to have this healthy relationship with a voice in your head is called Chatter. And it is by Ethan.

Oh, my goodness. His name is Escape Cross. Ethan Cross, professor at University of Michigan.

How could I forget? He’s got a couple books out right now, but that is the best place to start, if you ask me, in introducing yourself to his work. Sweet. And to connecting with how to have a relationship with your inside boys.

That’s. That informs all that we do. You know, you’re the voice in your head.

How you’re going to go about your day. Speak to others, speak. Speaking to yourself is.

It’s all in our head. And yeah. And then you.

You talk about like traumas or how people were raised or things they’ve been through on top of just normal chatter. Then the levels of intensity of that chatter and how to combat it or cope with it or utilize it and then be productive. There’s so much dynamic there.

It’s wild. Okay, call me back for another show. We’ll totally dive into that.

Okay. Part two or two. I absolutely love that topic of understanding how and why people show up as adults the way that they do.

And there’s a lot of professionals who can speak more eloquently and with a lot more credibility on the topic. But a lot of when we talk about communication, those gaps in communications or where people miss each other again is because of those lived experiences that are so vastly different. And so assuming where people’s perspectives are coming from is huge.

So, yes, let’s. Let’s talk more about that another time because I’d love to dive in. Deal.

Okay, cool. Yeah. As otherwise we’re going to go on two hours.

Um, it. So it’s clear, just based on what you literally just said, that your passion, you’re doing what you’re passionate about, this is obviously you care very deeply about it. So can you walk me through your coaching? Your coaching, having these experiences, working with people, you’re in the corporate world.

Where does Amplify come in? Absolutely. How was that born? So, ironically, In February of 2020, I gathered a very small group of women who I had met shortly after I moved to St. Pete about eight years ago. They were all entrepreneurs from different sectors.

One was from non for profit, one was from education, one was my hairstylist. But these were all women who worked for themselves. And at that time, I was still at corporate, but what I was looking for was a tribe, like minded women, women who were experiencing life and the transitions of life.

Similarly, how could we get to know each other well enough to want to genuinely support each other with our different gifts, talents and treasures? Then Covid hit. And unfortunately, that cohort and that concept kind of went to the wayside, and I focused deeply in my role as the director of service center operations at the financial institution that I was at. And then the day came where it was right for me to leave corporate America.

And I ran into a friend, Duvet Weaver, from Closer to Our Dreams. Oh, yeah, I know him. And we were having a conversation and he’s like, nicole, I had a women’s empowerment summit in Tampa a couple years ago, and I think we should do something like that again.

He’s like, you’re the perfect person for this and now you have the time. And I did not connect the dots between February of 2020 and this sparking of let’s create space for women. At that moment, you had already started.

I had already started that, yeah. Right. And so I had a lot of conversation with Duvet, but I thought to myself, all right, if I’m going to create Amplify Women Tampa Bay, what is the real purpose? And so in year one, based on my awareness of women business owners, or really just business owners collectively and their lack of awareness of all of these entrepreneurial resource organizations that existed to serve them, I thought, there’s the bridge I need to create.

So I was working in a non for profit financial organization, opening up business accounts, speaking directly with business owners, and they were not aware of score. They were not aware of The Greenhouse Embark Collective, their local chambers, all of these resources that were available to provide them mentors, funding websites, or sorry, workshops. Right.

And so thus, when curating the first Amplify Women in Tampa Bay, I went to all of these Score Greenhouse SBA and invited them into a space so that I could invite the business owners into that same space to become aware of how we can leverage each other to be more impactful, healthier, well utilized. While growing these businesses. And despite the fact that we had two hurricanes which kicked my summit down the road two extra months, it was successful.

And we have a lot of wonderful success stories that we’re going to be sharing at this year’s second annual Amplify Women Tampa Bay Summit on August 8th and 9th. But that’s how it came. It really came from a spark between a conversation with Davay and I and the knowledge that there was a clear gap that needed to be bridged between these resources and the people who need it them most.

Wow. Powerful. All right, don’t go anywhere.

We’ll be right back after this quick break. You don’t need a studio. You don’t need a script.

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We’re back. Thanks for sticking with us. Now back to the conversation.

Shout out to you, Coach D. Yeah, it’ll be inevitable when I have him on the podcast, but we go back to Rising Tide days early. Rising Tide.

So I. I either knew or forgot that we have share similar connections, but it’s awesome that, you know, someone can spark something that changes your trajectory so greatly. You know, if you think back to, like the moments of creation of. Of a particular thing or an idea, it’s pretty wild that, you know, someone communicates something to you, like, what about this? And you’re like, boom, done.

Now it’s its own. It’s got this own world and momentum of its own. So year two, what was your feedback that you got from year one already? Obviously you said you had mentioned success stories.

Are they still pouring in? Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah.

Success. Success through what’s at the core of Amplify Women Tampa Bay, which is connection, relationship, and shared experiences. So these individuals that experienced the summit in year one, through those connections over the year, they’ve deepened those relationships and have found that through those relationships they have found mentors, connections to resources, support and friendships that have helped them elevate personally and professionally.

And it’s been amazing. I bet. And so there’s a young lady who’s on my advisory board as we’re launching this into a bigger community, who shares with me that every week while she’s out in the world networking or representing her business, she runs into somebody that was at Amplify in year one, and they have this instant camaraderie, a comfort level with each other.

She feels less alone, less isolated. And that is our goal, is that we want to create a space where people can find resources, but resources mean nothing if you don’t have community. And so those connections and relationships behind those resources is critical.

I love that I’ve been volunteering at the world’s largest computer graphics conference since 2008. It’s allowed me to travel the world and meet people from all over the world who help run the conference and learn at this conference. And that community has been everything.

Yeah, we see the new animation techniques or how they do hair dynamics and a particular film, and Pixar talks about that or whatever it is, the get togethers, the parties, the time, waiting in line to go to an event, though, people there are everything. And that support over the years has been the main thing. Obviously, the information in those resources are there, but that community is like the glue for so many people in that industry.

It sounds like ultimately, I believe there’s so much power to getting people together around a particular cause or shared vision or need, and you’re. It’s like a recipe for success. Like, when I first learned about Amplify, I was like, oh, yeah, I’m sure that’s like crushing it.

I’m sure that that’s wildly popular and effective. My question for you is, how has that affected you over this last year? So I’m really excited to answer this question, and I feel that my answer about the last year really is just an amplification of my entire life. I am a reflection, and I am a product of all of the relationships that I have ever had in my life.

Like, I’d love to say I’m this uniquely designed person that I curated, but I have a little bit of everybody who’s ever poured into me inside of me, and everything I do is a reflection of them. The decision making that my mom, you know, helped me curate, like how I process decisions, how I serve other people, how things, how chances were taken on me, and now I know how to take a chance on other people. And this past year is so profic.

Prof. Oh, my God. You’re going to have to fix that. It is so prolifically reflected in what is happening.

Amplify women. Tampa Bay is nothing without everyone who has contributed to it. Right? Every one of my speakers, every one of my workshop hosts, every one of my guests from last year, everyone who is serving and curating it, my photographer, my videographer, my event planner.

It is a collection of people. And these are people who a year and a half ago I did not know were not in my life at all. And it’s crazy to see how, when there is a movement, how quickly people are drawn to it and want to find their own identity in it and they want to contribute to it.

And so this past year has been awe inspiring because the relationships and the impact that we’ve been able to make collectively is immeasurable. That’s awesome. You had mentioned, you know, like people being out about and then, you know, that person that you work with consistently hearing about people’s positive impact of a shared experience that goes in a positive way or a negative way.

Like for instance, the hurricanes, which you mentioned. We all shared that and that’s really intense. And there’s something about our community in St. Pete and beyond in this area where it’s like, yeah, we, we went through like back to back hurricanes and we’re at the, at the other side of it or a conference or something like that.

Like people that I haven’t seen at the conference since my first one in 2008. We still have like inside jokes and, and very specific memories of the times that we are together that will never fade. It just will never fade.

And there’s such power in that. Like, for me, that’s, that’s where I spent all my money is traveling is into the experiences. It wasn’t like stuff and we’ll continue to do that, but it’s, it’s awesome to see that that’s happening with Amplify and it’s again, no surprise.

What about some resistant or resistance or hurdles that you ran into starting amplified besides hurricanes, which I’m not undermining. That’s a big deal. But what else did you run into? Where was there pushback to someone say, no, you can’t do that, and obviously if they did, I’m pretty sure you dumped them.

So what’s interesting is that I didn’t get a lot of, no, you can’t do that. It was more, we’re gonna sit and wait. You know, a lot of people who maybe didn’t want to sponsor the first year.

Maybe they didn’t know me personally. They didn’t know my reputation. They didn’t know my brand.

They certainly weren’t clear on what we were trying to achieve. And I respect that. You know, I respect that not everybody’s an early adapter, but I think that was a bit of a challenge for me because I had to really.

I was curating something that was built from my own network and from my own resources on my own reputation. Right. And year two, we’re continuing to build that, but now we’re building it on the reputation of my speakers and the workshop hosts and people who are willing to advocate because they joined last year, and that will continue to grow and be perpetuated in years to come.

So I think the barrier in the first year was just getting the wheels under it and showing people that when you have a collective shared experience, that that is the most powerful thing, and that’s where the motivation and the momentum for more comes from. Oh, sure. To your point earlier about the shared experience of the hurricane.

So originally, year one was scheduled for September. We have a hurricane. I rescheduled it for October, thinking there’s no way another one is coming like that.

You jinxed us. Apparently. I had to reschedule, and I was like, third time’s a charm.

We’ll see what happens here. And I went back and forth, do I do it? Do I do it? And ultimately, I had it, obviously. And one of the blaring comments that came from a lot of my guests were, thank you for creating a normal space.

Thank you for creating a space of community. Thank you for allowing there to be space to acknowledge the trauma that we all went through. And I realized then that shared experiences and creating space for people is my calling.

That is what I will be doing for the foreseeable future is I’m creating a community that knows that there will always be space for them with their peers and where they can feel less alone and well resourced. Yeah, it’s clear that’s your calling. Or a calling.

Yeah, that’s awesome. It’s definitely something that when after the hurricanes went through and the dust settled, I feel like everybody was craving the bits of life that were normal or that getting back on track or getting back into the groove. Even if people were living in a displaced location or working on their home or fixing stuff or repairing their fence, you know, as little or as big as it was, you know, there’s some who, like, felt bad because they didn’t get their house lost, but t
still are dealing with, with things and there’s, there’s all sorts of experiences.

But you gave people like a, a normal thing. Right. Right after that.

Which is, which is good. You didn’t just say, oh no, next year. I think that’s huge.

And that’s also shows like your determination and the power of what this brand is. Hurdles that you’re running into now with it coming up in like a month. Oh, great question.

So maybe we can sort through it right now and just take care of it. You know, it’s been interesting because I. This is like a baby. I’ve literally what feels like every single day have been working on this for at least nine months.

Sure. And I am ready to give birth. Right.

Natural hurdles though is the expectation of what now people expect. Like in year one, there was zero expectations and people were just happy to come somewhere normal. Year two, there is the hurdle of.

And I don’t even know that it’s a hurdle, but it is something that I grapple with mentally. Like the programming. I did shift up a little bit from last year.

So, you know, people who did experience last year, are they expecting the same type of platform? And also there we do have men involved in this as well. I was going to ask at some point, are boys allowed? Yeah, boys, men. Absolutely.

You know, we hold space for women at Amplify Women Tampa Bay, but we also understand that we need collective community. Yeah. And so we do have a male presenter of a workshop from out front media.

We have men owned companies who are sponsoring. We have men volunteering. So.

And we have men participating. So from sponsors to speakers to volunteers. Yes.

You know, this is a collective space and you know, are there going to be some women who are like, wait a second, what’s he doing here? And you know, I may or may not be confronted with having to answer that. I’m completely prepared to. But you know, there’s all these little things where I start all of my events, I start all of my shared experiences from the perspective of the person who will experience it.

And then I build around that. Right. And then I look at it from that perspective.

So that’s, I think the best perspective I can give you in regards to barriers. For me right now, of course, ticket sales, people’s behavior around ticket sales, let me tell you, and I’m guilty of this as well. But they wait till the very last minute because they want to make sure, especially I think now with finance, you know, people’s finances, they’re holding them much closer.

Oh, sure. And so when they make a financial investment to participate in something. They want to be sure they’re going to be there.

And so what they do is they wait till the last minute to make sure they’re not going to have any schedule conflicts before they invest in that ticket. But I will tell you, and this is not a marketing plate. This is for real.

I have two VIP tickets left. Once those are gone, they are gone. But we do still have plenty of general admission tickets left, and we hope that people will grab them while they can.

But I also respect that people will wait until the last week. Of course. That’s why they do, like early bird specials and things like that to just like, get people committed.

But yeah, like ticket sales for shows and things like that or whatever it is. It’s. It’s such a thing there.

You’re like, come on, just. You’re saying you’re going. Prove it.

Yeah. And it’s just hard for planning, too. You know, it’s just.

It’s really hard to plan different experiences and curate things when you’re just not sure if it’s going to be 10 people or 70 people. Yeah. But that aside, I completely respect, you know, the environment that we’re in right now and that people do want to make sure.

Like, if I’m going to make this investment, I want to make sure that I can also be there. Sure. Yeah.

I’m sure you’ll have a great showing. There’s no doubt about that. And I didn’t realize that you took on volunteers or needed volunteers to sign me up for.

For next year. You got it. Got my commitment on that.

Well, it’s recorded, so. Yeah. As on the record, like, quite literally.

Absolutely. Sweet. I love.

Big fan of all that you’re doing. Real quick, going back to 525. What does 525 mean? It is actually.

It’s an origin of a date. May 25th. Okay.

That’s a pretty important date in my life. I made a decision at that point to move forward with my relationship with my now wife. And it was a very intentional.

It was just so intentional. That morning I woke up and I kind of envisioned how the day was going to go, and I was like, if this, this, and this happens, then I’m going to do this. And everything lined up perfectly.

And I made a very intentional decision. And so when I was looking to name my coaching company, what I really want to bring for my clients is a lot of intentionality, a lot of clarity, and a lot of mindset about what we want. And for Me, that particular day reflects all of that.

And so five to five actually is May 25th. That’s perfect. It also, you know, it’s a good name.

So it worked out well. Like five to five kind of like flows off the tongue. Well, okay.

And there’s also this like, really cheesy thing that I envision. So I also envision that I give the opportunity for my clients to have a lot of high fives. So five to five is like high fives.

Oh my gosh. My wife’s like, do not ever do that. I’m like.

But it is a lot of like, self high fives. Like five to five is like those that, you know, you’re, you’re constantly high fiving your decisions and you’re, you’re feeling good about yourself. But no, we’re sticking to the original story, which is May 25th.

Sure thing. Oh, you can do all sorts of stuff with that. Like five to five in the morning.

the afternoon. Really? Absolutely.

And that’s not just a marketing ploy. Like, I do coach. I coach internationally.

I have clients in Africa and I have to, you know, change my schedule for that as well. So. Yeah, no, we, we definitely play off of that.

Five to five. Although it is an area code in New York, it’s not really well populated, so most people don’t assume it’s the area code in New York. Sure.

Okay. But that’s a new market that you could go after and, and say, hey, I’m here. Oh, I’m going to own that for sure.

No, I appreciate that. That’s, that’s really special, that name. I mean, it’s like close to your heart and means so much.

And then it’s in alignment with like what you’re actually doing to bring it to your clients. So. Really cool.

100%. I’m going to use your phrase 100%. 100%

Yeah. Well, we’ve, we’ve done a lot here. We’ve reached a point in the episode called the Rapid Fire.

I love it. And ultimately I ask many, and if not all the guests that I have on same question, see the similarities and the differences with the idea that if you could keep it condensed, but if you need to expand, that’s all good. You just lose points.

Excellent. Sound good? I’m perfect for this because I am not one of many words, I promise. Oh, you’re doing great.

All right, so here we go. Number one, what’s your biggest source of inspiration? Water. Oh, that’s a first here on the name and creative show.

Do you hear that, folks? You’ve got to expand a little. It’s obviously in your life. All right, now that you’re giving me, now that you’re giving me, I’ll allow it.

I’ll allow it. So I am also an avid runner. I run a marathon, several half marathons and lots of 5Ks.

And when I run, it is when I feel the most clear minded. I get my best ideas, but they hit pinnacle. Thinking and creativity.

When I am near water, when I am looking at water, when I am just embracing every element of water, how it sounds, how it looks. Water is extremely powerful and should be well respected. So for me, I get a lot of inspiration when I’m looking at water, I’m near water.

I love it. And your last name happens to be Waters, so that’s pretty cool. How fitting there is that as well.

Yeah, but it sounds like it would be that even if your last name was Smith. 100%. Nice.

Yeah, that’s awesome. I grew up by the Great Lakes and I’ve lived in Florida, always by water. For a very short time I lived in Atlanta, Georgia and I identified very quickly.

The lack of water was not where I was meant to be and got right back to Miami. Awesome. I feel you very much.

I, I run too. And like Jordan can attest, like I send him random texts of an idea and I, I’m just like, send him real quick idea and then. And because it’s in the middle of a run, I barely can get the text out because my fingers are so sweaty.

Like my phone isn’t quite getting everything. But I get, that’s where I get like clarity. And I go through Walsingham park and so there’s like that big, big water in the middle.

So I just go around a big thing of water. Yeah. Couldn’t agree with you more.

I love that answer. We have to introduce you to Siri and just say, hey, Siri, text. You don’t have to be typing.

Be typing while your sweaty films are on. You’re right. I just always default to turning off Siri because it always turns on when I don’t want it to and then when I want it to, it doesn’t.

But maybe for your next run. Operator error. Yeah, next run.

Okay, good deal. Because you’re right. Thanks for that.

Doing great. What’s the most impactful book you’ve Ever read. And since you’ve already mentioned chatter, something else.

7 Habits of Highly Effective People. Classic. It is a classic and I hate to admit this one as well.

The Success Principles. I would not recommend that book now. The Success Principles.

So should I write it down? Should I put it in the notes for people? I’ll give you this disclaimer. I think the principles themselves are amazing. I think the book’s curation of the message around each principle is not a reflection of how I would do it.

You know, somebody actually gave me the idea of rewriting the book, you know, utilizing those principles from my perspective. Do it. Make it water themed.

Right? Absolutely. So. But I would be remiss not to admit that that has been one of those books where I do reflect on those principles and they continue to serve me.

7 Habits of Highly Effective People. Also really ingrained in what I do and how I practice. Sweet.

Okay, I’m going to put them all in there in the show notes. So. Excellent.

Yeah, they all made it. Cool. And I’ll let you answered with two books and a third earlier, but I’ll let it slide.

So we’ll keep going. Just a couple points off, but since they seem to be good books, you get the points back. Wonderful.

So you’re on track. Love this net neutral. I like it.

Yeah. You can only listen to one music album or artist on repeat for the rest of your life. What is it artist would be Sting.

I’m trying to think of which one of his albums, but I would honestly say any one of Sting’s albums on repeat. Cool. Good deal.

Good deal. Sometimes that really trips people up. But you were.

That’s good. Congratulations. Sting’s great.

Also the Police. I mean, I’m a huge fan of that band. Yes.

Oh man. I know. Such good stuff.

So unique like that. There’s this really great blend of like rock and groove and almost like there’s some reggae in it or. I don’t know how to describe it, but it’s so such a cool sound.

It is. And the drummer’s awesome. Well, everything about that band is awesome.

And what Sting does such a great job of doing is if you continue to follow his career over the decades. Right. He’s a very eclectic artist who loves to collaborate and some of the best outputs of his music is when he introduces other artists.

He did this kind of a cappella, not acapella, acoustic, rather acoustic concert in Tuscany. And I just. It changed me forever.

You were there or listening to the album? No, I was able to see it was a YouTube or like, something on social media that came up, and I just, like, forever changed that. That. That experience and how who he brought together and how they performed was just, like, beautiful.

There you go again. Like collaboration. You cannot go wrong.

Yes. Yeah. Especially, I mean, that’s what music is, and it’s so universal.

So, like, it’s so powerful when different people from all over with different experiences or tastes come and fuse together. I mean, that’s where magic happens. Love it.

Cool. I’m going to pop some sting on on the way home. Last one.

Okay. How do you define success? Comfort. That’s how I define success.

You have to be comfortable in yourself and where you are in the world and the impact that you’re having. It’s not a title, and it’s not. I don’t think it’s any one thing.

It is. Can you look at yourself in the mirror and say, I like the way I’m doing my life, and if my life ended tomorrow, I would be proud of where I am and what I’ve done, and I have no regrets. That’s success to me.

Oh, man, I love that. That’s perfect. Comfort.

I don’t think I’ve gotten that answer. Contentment, happiness, you know, sustaining those things. But comfort’s great.

One word, boom, you nailed it. So if we have to put this together. So it was water, chatter, sting, Comfort.

Water, chatter, sting, Comfort. That’s the title of the episode. There we go.

I like it. I don’t like saying, oh, happiness. Success is happiness, because happiness is an emotional state.

We don’t live there. We ebb and flow out of it. Sure.

And so success, if you truly want to achieve success. And I hate this. My favorite topic is success is a journey, not a destination.

It’s not a place where you’re like, oh, I’m successful, so now I can die. No, you’ve reached a mile marker, and now you just continue to go. Right? Absolutely.

So that is such an interesting and loaded question. It is, yeah. Yeah.

Well, you. You did well with it. I think it’s also, you know, like, with the.

Happiness is a great, like, goal and an indicator of success. I think comfort maybe is more accurate to what it is because, you know, happiness, there’s ups and downs. So, like, there’s contrast to the journey, and that’s how you know you’re happy is because you’ve been sad and things have been hard.

And so, you know, ah, those. These are the ups versus the downs. But comfort is being comfortable with all, in my opinion, the downs and ups in life and being able to sit on it all and be content about that.

Yeah. So love it. Thank you.

You win. Yay. Yeah.

Go five, two, five. Go five, two, five. Well, to close, I would love to know what your vision you had maybe alluded to it a little here earlier, but where Is amplify in five, 10 years? So it is a thriving community of really impactful, influential voices here in Tampa Bay that are so highly sought after and respected as a collective that larger companies, organizations, look to us to guide them in the work that they’re doing and to collaborate to make Tampa Bay like the place for innovation, health entrepreneurs, and business owners.

Boom. Okay, so you have that vision pretty well locked in. Yeah.

And I think deeply it starts small. And one of the five pillars of Amplify Women Tampa Bay as a community is that we do have a collective voice. And that voice might be kind of quiet right now because it’s just a few of us, but my goal is if we are creating a community that that community serves in an impactful way and is heard and influences the world around us.

Love it. Thank you. That’s awesome.

I look forward to seeing it all flourish. And I think, if I may, your voice is probably at least double what you think it is out there in the community as far as, like, the amplified collective voice. You know, I feel like even just one.

One year in, going on year two, there. There’s a lot more than you even know because some people aren’t even saying it, you know, or. Yeah, so.

Or the. The domino effect is hard to trace, but it’s there, you know, So I. I encourage you to not stop, please, because that’s what we need more of. More Nicole Waters, More water.

Thank you. I appreciate that. Yeah.

So where do they connect with you? Where’s someone listening is like, oh, I want more. Yeah. If they want to know more about Amplify.

So the Summit’s website is amplifywomentampabay.com and you would go there. And I highly encourage you to register your email because the community that will be launching in the next few months, you don’t want to miss the opportunity to be part of that, and that’s the fastest way to do that. And if you’re looking for some coaching and some connecting and all of that other good stuff from that perspective, 525coaching.com perfect.

Awesome. And that’ll obviously be in the show notes to make it easy for everybody. Last thing, leave the listeners with a message, something that has resonated hard with you or that you Want to leave someone, whether they’re a man, woman, entrepreneur, sports, figure something that you want to leave everybody listening.

What an unique, awesome opportunity. I would say find your breath and keep breathing. Yeah.

Whatever you’re doing, you are enough. And just keep breathing. Keep showing up, doing what you’re doing.

It matters. Can’t say much more about that. That’s awesome.

And if you are breathing or figuring out your breath, then. And you’re underwater, make sure you have an apparatus, some scuba cure or something like that. I couldn’t.

I couldn’t help. I couldn’t help myself. No, absolutely.

But I think you know what we find. I’m going to challenge you now. Okay.

I want you to kind of check in with yourself throughout the day on any given day and see if you’re actually holding your breath. So often we’re like, in these creative spaces or we’re working on a project and we’re so intensely focused on it that we’ve actually stopped breathing or softened our breath so much and that enough oxygen is getting to our brain and this is where we start to get, like, in that vortex I was talking about earlier. So check in with yourself because, yeah, breath i
important and it’s kind of what helps us with all the other things that we want to do.

Absolutely. Breath air and water. Here we are with water again.

What can I tell you? I mean, you got to have both. For me, yoga has helped incredibly with me focusing on my breath and, like, breathing through things when, you know, that’s like. What I’ve learned is that yoga is all about the breath.

The poses are the distraction, but it’s really a breath work exercise, which I love. I’m like, I’m a huge fan of yoga and I constantly trying to focus on my breath, and my wife reminds me too. So I appreciate that reminder so much.

The reminder. Have your water take some good breaths. Absolutely.

All right, so that’s it for this episode of the Name and Creative Show. You know, asking you, the listener, to think about subscribing or liking or sharing this. You know, if this made you laugh or think or breathe a little deeper, please pass it on, send it to a friend, share it with your team, drop it in a some sort of group chat, whatever it is.

And if you haven’t already, please hit follow so you never miss an episode. But in until next time, stay curious, be kind, and keep building something good.