Creating A Deliberate, Conscious, Authentic Life With Katie Krimitsos

 

Do you have the desire to be more comfortable with yourself? Are you willing to start deliberately living your authentic life? In this episode, join go behind the scenes of Katie Krimitsos’ journey as a podcaster and find out what gives her a leg up in the industry. Katie is the Creator of the Women’s Meditation Network. Katie chats with Whitney Lauritsen about how she got into the healing space and the ups and downs. She talks about the importance of introspection and the benefits of meditation to becoming incredibly honest with yourself and knowing who you are. Katie joins together her business and finance knowledge and healing wisdom to discuss her money mindset and what it means to achieve true financial freedom. Be a part of this beautiful conversation around listening to your intuition, knowing yourself, and being true to your identity by tuning in.

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Listen to the podcast here

 

Creating A Deliberate, Conscious, Authentic Life With Katie Krimitsos

I was saying to my guest, Katie, that there are many directions we can start with. As often happens with guests, we were talking for quite some time before I clicked record. Katie, you said some juicy things, some beautifully said statements around authenticity. It was the topic. One of them that resonated with me was that I am mind-numbingly honest with myself. That is cool.

I am mind numbingly honest with myself. Share on X

You also said, “I flex this muscle so much that I refuse not to be authentic.” I feel like that must tie into your work with the numerous shows you have that are focused on meditation. Even the phrase mind-numbing is interesting because I suppose we can look at being numb as a negative thing, but maybe we can also reframe it to think of it as perhaps self-protection.

 

It is going inwards and tuning out the world so that we can be focused. That in itself is flexing a muscle. Learn how to focus on our breath, let things go and focus on what is important to us at that moment, even when the outside world is encouraging us to be something different. That’s my interpretation, but I’m curious about what these statements mean to you.

I have always been somebody who is introspected. I can recall hearing that inner voice fairly early on in my life. I can recall paying attention to her and listening to her, even though I would not have had the words to describe it at that time. It is something that I have always wanted to know. I wanted to know myself better. The desire to do that has always been born of a desire to see how I fit in the world, what is meant for me, and how I can get the best experience I can get out of this world.

I've always wanted to know myself better. Share on X

As I went into my teenage years in my early twenties, it was a desire to understand the pain I was experiencing, the pain of love unrequited over and over again, my body changing, and wanting to understand this growing into adulthood and my purpose in life, which at that age feels big. You are supposed to choose what you are supposed to do for the rest of your life.

I feel like this is a habit of self-introspection, mostly through journaling, going on walks, and meditation. Though I didn’t understand, it was relatively new to me in those late teen years and early twenties. It has all been for a deeper desire to be more comfortable with myself. I couldn’t describe this back then, but being more aligned with myself, authentic, and capable of knowing that my inner voice is what my external self is.

I developed a nasty eating disorder in my mid to late twenties. In my late twenties, I ended up going into recovery for it and going to Overeaters Anonymous. I joined the Twelve Steps program. I can go into that a little bit more but in relation to authenticity, that forced me to get incredibly honest with myself in a way that was not debilitating but was empowering even in the nastiness of it.

One of the steps of the Twelve Steps is taking an inventory. At that time, I still remember I wrote this massive paper for myself. It was this taking inventory of who I am in my life and my relationship with food, body, guys, and all of these things. I’m like, “What has it been up to this point, and what is it now?” There was a lot of ugliness there. That process wasn’t the first time, but it was a momentous process of being able to truthfully shine a light on everything that I am or was at the time, even the ugly parts and being able to move through it, accept, love, and give hugs to that woman.

When I alluded to flexing that muscle, that was a significant moment for me because I continued to practice that and still do to this day continue to practice that taking inventory. What do I feel about this? What is going on in my life? A lot of people get scared of that mind-numbing honesty with themselves because they think they are going to feel bad about those dark parts and feel shame in a lot of negativity about those dark parts.

My experience back then taught me that those are all part of me, and there is nothing to feel ashamed about. It has become this process almost with no emotion attached. Let’s take inventory. Let’s get connected to the truth of what I need and what is here. Let’s move beyond that. What have I learned from that that was crappy? What is that painful moment or the thing I did that I’m not proud of? What have I learned from that, and how can I move forward?

There is shame here. Let’s deal with that too. Shame is not bad. Let’s process, move through that, and learn from that so that I can better myself. That is a long explanation, but at the end of the day, when you have that practice, and it is a regular part of your life, there is no such thing called living inauthentically. You cannot do that level of self-introspection and inventory-taking and live in a way that is misaligned.

 

That was articulate and helpful because when I’m thinking about meditation or any of the self-work that you are discussing, this goes beyond meditation. You are sharing a lot of your journey to get where you are now and become in touch with yourself. I see meditation as one of the many tools around this. I love the word inventory, too.

That inspires me because I have always struggled with meditation personally. I feel the benefits, but I am not someone who feels compelled to have a regular sitting meditation practice. I don’t know if it is the way my brain works. I’m on this journey of figuring out if I have ADHD. A lot of signs are pointing that I do. Typically, with ADHD brains, it is hard to continue any habit. It is hard to sit still and slow down. Yet, it is important. A lot of the things we need can feel hard for us. When you are talking about building habits, flexing muscles, and all of that, they feel appealing.

Part of my own shame, since you were touching upon that, is not sticking with things long-term that are good for me. A lot of people struggle with that, even if they are not neurodivergent and don’t have ADHD. There is this idea around, especially this time of year, in January 2023, it is common for people to set all these big resolutions, have all of these ideas for self-care and struggle to stay consistent with that. When you are talking about flexing a muscle, we need to continue to flex, practice and keep these habits. What happens to someone who struggles with keeping a habit that is good for them?

First of all, I want to make sure you hear that you are not the only person who has that relationship with meditation. I have that relationship with meditation. I am not a regular every day at 5:00 AM meditator. I have never been that meditator. The meditation person I have always been had always led with a sense of knowing myself. I’m like, “I feel stressed out. I need to stop and sit down. I had three back-to-back calls, and this introvert needs to decompress a little bit before I go pick up my kids. I need to take five deep breaths. I need to lie on my bed, not look at a phone or listen to a guided meditation, or I need to be out in nature now. I feel boxed in. I need to walk around. I need to not have a phone with me. I need to be one with nature.”

 

In any habit that any of us are trying to form, in my humble opinion, it is important to deconstruct perfection of it because it can look like a lot of different things. It is about personal progress and not perfection. That is such a cliché, but it is true. I’m an athlete. In my whole life, I have been active and athletic. I’m a person who needs to move, work out, and sweat. There are these seasons of my life where that hasn’t felt good, and that hasn’t felt like what I have needed. Sometimes it has been right after I have a baby. I need to relax and not move as much or not be back up on my feet doing whatever workout program when I’m five weeks later.

In any habit it's important to deconstruct the perfection of it.. Share on X

Sometimes it is like I’m going through heavy mental and emotional stuff. There are some people out there who exercise to deal with that. I’m the exact opposite. I can’t go on a run when I’m sad, depressed, or feeling low. It is in those moments where I need to allow imperfect forward movement to be okay. That is what I would advise or shine a light upon for anyone because we all do it. It is exciting at the beginning of the year to think of all these things that you want to create for your life. There is nothing wrong with that. It is beautiful and healthy. The more you know yourself, the more you are able to create your own version of how it shows up in your life.

I need to allow imperfect, forward movement to be OK. Share on X

I have a girlfriend still to this day. We were college friends. I will be 44 by 2023. That was several years ago. She made a New Year’s resolution when we were nineteen years old that she was going to run every day, and she has run every freaking day. Maybe there might be, at this point, after all these years, a dozen or so days that she might not have run but like this woman has run every day.

That is not me. I am committed. I have discipline, but that’s not me. It all falls back to knowing thyself so that you know who you are in relation to commitments and when to push yourself. You know when to trail off and release a little bit when you’re giving yourself BS excuses and to push through those excuses and to keep going. You also know when to back off and to give yourself a break because you’re about to have a mental breakdown. That is the leader for me. It is more important than here is the structure of how to approach habits that you want to create in your life.

There is no one size fits all. It is about who you are. What is important to you? What are your values? Perhaps what is important to you at this time of year is one thing in particular that you want to master with a little bit of hesitation because we never truly master something. It is valuable and meaningful for us to put time and energy into that one thing.

This is me. I know myself well enough to know that I can’t change twelve things at once. I need to have a deep relationship with a shifting thing in my life one at a time if I’m going to hope for sustainability. At the end of the day, that is how I would approach it in the sense of desiring sustainability for a habit. At least for me, it doesn’t mean every single day looks like this. For some people, it does, and that is okay. That is not my level of sustainability. I live my life by the 80/20 rule. If 80% of the time I’m doing great, then 20% of the time that I’m not, it is okay. That is all good.

It is comforting to hear your perspectives on this. My brain tends to see something in your whole meditation network where you have all these wonderful podcasts. I immediately think, “She must have meditation all figured out.” It is a bit intimidating to me. It is interesting to project that onto someone without knowing them.

When I was going through your website, looking at all these beautiful podcasts and the layout, I had a tendency to think that somebody is doing better or has it all figured out. It is ironic because that is the opposite of meditation. Meditation is about self-acceptance and getting away from external comparisons. That is the beauty of it. I have also learned over time that meditation can be anything.

I have done many different forms of traditional meditation aside from the long sits. When I read Eat Pray Love, there is a section in the book where Elizabeth Gilbert is trying not to fall asleep during meditation. She was surrounded by a bunch of monks. It is a serious meditation, and you have to have your back straight. When I read that book, I thought, “That sounds awful yet cool because you could see how pushing through the physical can give you all these benefits.”

However, I know myself well enough that I love meditation when you are lying down, and it is okay if you fall asleep. You are not getting maybe as many benefits if you fall asleep, but if it feels good and that helps you get in that relaxed state, that is what you need. First, you have to find out what you need physically in order to peel back the layers. It goes against meditation if it is super strict in formulaic to your point of trying to do it because it is working for someone else or trying to do it in a rigid way if you are not somebody that thrives with that rigid way.

I was listening to your Ambient Sounds Podcast. When I sit down to work, I love having ambient sounds or music in the background. It is comforting. It triggers my brain in helpful ways. I’m able to get into my flow state more and stay in there longer. I feel more at ease and able to do my best. You also have the Sleep Sounds Podcast. For me, that is helpful with sleeping, which we could see as a form of meditation too. Whether we are meditating right before we go to bed or when we wake up, and all the self-subconscious stuff, maybe that qualifies as meditation when we are asleep.

To describe the nine shows that I have, I have three different podcasts that are just sounds. There is no guidance on there at all. There is no voice, and those are powerful. Those are all born out of listeners asking for more of those. The other six are all guided in some way. The question becomes, “How can I use this tool? What do I need it for?” I am someone who, for many years, has listened to guided meditations to help me fall asleep. I’m not necessarily there because I want a subconscious awakening experience, a self-aware experience. I’m not looking for more stillness at the moment or to try and slow down. I’m looking because I’m tired and I need to go to sleep. My brain is racing like crazy.

Those podcasts like Sleep Sounds, Sleep Meditation for Women and Sleep Meditation for Women Three Hours are all designed for that purpose. I write the scripts for the first two. Even though I will write some with poetic and meaningful messages, there are many of the sleep meditations that I do that for. There are powerful messages of self in there.

The other half of those scripts is to calm your body and relax your mind. I’m talking so that your brain can attach to me enough. Your body can fall asleep, and your brain can zone out. I’m aware that the ones that are meaningful and have this powerful message of whatever it is, most people aren’t going to hear that message, and that is okay. I want to be able to give you a tool that you can use in any season of your life at any time of the day and any particular emotion that you are feeling. The power of the network is that you got this massive library to be able to pick and choose how you want to use this tool, and each “meditation tool” works differently.

Many listeners will take me in their ears as they are doing a walking meditation around their neighborhood or on a nature trail. They are moving because they don’t want to sit down. That is not something that they want to do right then. They are designed for that. They are designed to meet you where you are and give you what you need at any given moment.

Putting the power in the listener of deciding what they need versus, as I was talking about, the rigid side of it that might be like, “You have to do it this way. I know what you need.” It connects to that authenticity of asking yourself, “What do you need at this moment? Here are all your options.” For someone like me, that can get a little overwhelming. The example, when I was listening to Ambient Sounds, I picked one to start with, and I felt it out.

I thought, “What are these sounds doing for me?” I let it play in the background. I would notice and think, “That is a nice sound. That feels good. I don’t like that one as much. Maybe I will switch.” That plethora of options feels so much abundance. I’m curious to go a bit behind the scenes because I have always loved to hear how people make things. I’m curious what the journey has been like from the first podcast you started, why you started to do another one and now up to nine of them. What has that been like for you to build this meditation? You call it a network, but it is a bit of an empire.

It has been an interesting but also a conscious journey. I started the Women’s Meditation Network when I found out I was pregnant with my second daughter. The podcast I had at the time had nothing to do with meditation. It was a women’s business podcast, and I was loving it. It was wonderfully profitable and exciting. I loved the work. The moment I got pregnant, I didn’t want it anymore. Within a heartbeat, I don’t want it.

I went on this little self-introspective journey for the next couple of weeks. “What do I want to do? If that is not what I want to do, what do I want to do?” The Women’s Meditation Network was born at that time. One of the things that I understood immediately was that this could be my next evolution of work with women in the world. Not only that, but I could do more than businesswomen, which is who I was working with before. I could get into the ears of women all over the world who are not in business, but they are there. They are having the desire to meditate and listen to something that is going to help them calm down.

I could be in their deep consciousness. That felt incredibly empowering. I’m a writer. I could write these beautiful love poems to women about how special they are, how they are extraordinary, and that there is no one else in the world like you. I could filter all of this love that, as a woman, I need to hear a lot. I want to affirm in myself and believe that other women out there love hearing that stuff too.

These are deep messages of love. The writing process for me has been fascinating and growing in the sense that the stuff I write now, I’m deeply proud of as poetry, and I would not have said that about myself when I first started this. I say that because I got clear that what I write and say can make a difference in a woman’s sense of self. It is not just that she is putting on meditation. She is going to get calm and help fall asleep. Those are the carrots I hold in front of you. Get more relaxed, fall asleep, and feel more Zen. What I want to give you is this message that is going to hit you right between the eyes and infuse your heart with a sense of self.

If I give myself this time, if you allow me to walk you through this experience that will open up a space of stillness in here, you are going to be able to hear this voice. I know you have, and it is not my voice. It is yours. If you allow me to guide you through this process, you are going to hear that voice louder. What happens when you listen to that voice? What happens when you take action on what that voice tells you? You start living a deliberate conscious life rather than a scripted life for you. I digress. I was passionate about that from the get-go.

 

I saw that it was a network because there were many different facets that I could speak to and many seasons of womanhood or experiences of emotion. There was so much here, and no one owned the space of women in meditation back then. I was like, “I’m going to own it. It is going to be a network and big.” I started with Meditation for Women, which is the first original podcast. For several years, that was the only podcast I had because, at that time, I then had my baby. I was tailoring back my other business. I didn’t close it right away. I was building up the one meditation podcast and raising two kids at this point.

When my baby was a year old, I finally shut down the other podcast. I was ready to go full force. The numbers were rising. I was getting significantly more listeners than my other show had ever received, and then COVID happened, and the country shut down. At a time when everyone was shutting down and pulling back, I knew I needed to create more because I saw my numbers skyrocket. I was like, “People are searching for this. People are feeling the same fear, uncertainty, and anxiety that I’m feeling. If I write these little calming pieces, that can help them through this because I need to hear this, and I need to give them more of this. I need to put more light out in a world that feels dark right now.”

In response, more people were listening. The experience of growing into more than one show then was that I started looking at my analytics. We were talking before about whether we are metrics people or not. I’m very much a metrics person. I love data analysis. I love to look at my numbers. I quickly saw right around that time period that 8 out of my top 10 episodes were sleep-related. I launched a sleep podcast.

The truth of that process was that it felt overwhelming because here I was with a 1-year-old and a 4-year-old at the time. I’m thinking twice the podcast means twice the work. I had to do a lot of headwork to sidestep that limiting belief. I was like, “I have 30 episodes that are all sleep-related. Let me start that podcast with those 30, and I will add one a month.”

It took three weeks for me to see that podcast was going to be the biggest podcast I had because my number shot up right away and quickly bypassed the original podcast I had. I was like, I’m going to have to produce more for this. It was leveling up content creation. I was doing one episode a week for the other one as many as I could at that point. I’m like, “How can I do two episodes a week for Sleep Meditation for Women and, eventually, three episodes per week?”

Several months later, I launched Morning Meditation with the same process and analytics showing me that people were listening to morning shows. It came up with that structure. A few months after that, I launched Sleep Sounds. That was looking at the analytics of what people were listening to on the Sleep Meditation Podcast. I would experiment with let me do one for content purposes. I was like, “I can’t do anymore. Let me put one that’s all sounds. I don’t have to write or record. Let me see how that goes because it’s valuable.” Those episodes would shoot up the charts, and I’m like, “I need to have a whole separate podcast for this.”

That is how every single podcast has come to fruition, looking at the metrics and statistics, seeing what people are listening to, using my shows to experiment with different types of content and being able to pull those analytics out and say, “People love these daily affirmations that I have been experimenting with. Let me do a Daily Affirmations Podcast.” People on the Sleep Sounds have been loving the water parts of this. Let me do Water and Nature Sounds.”

The more recent one that I have is Healing Meditation for Women. I have somebody else who does that show. She is a Reiki master and a beautiful friend of mine. People were downloading so much healing content. I was like, “Let’s go forward with that.” That has been the whole journey and will continue to be the journey. The primary thing for me is upgrading my mindset, which allows me to see all of those things as possible. Instead of saying, “Nine podcasts mean nine times the work.” It is, “How can I do this?” My girls now in 2022 are four and seven. That is still flipping young. It is a lot of mothering. How can I do this? That continues to be my question.

The primary thing for me is upgrading my mindset to see things as possible. Share on X

I’m sure I’m not the only one thinking about how you do it, but that is what you are asking yourself each time. That leads me to wonder what it is like to run something focused on healing and meditation as a business. You have your business background. That sounds like it would have come in handy. You weren’t starting from scratch.

A lot of people in the healing space start off as healing, and they don’t have any business background. They have to figure out how to integrate it. Some people struggle when it comes to monetizing or making something a business that is centered around health, wellness, and healing. Has that ever come up for you? How have you worked through those two things that feel a bit separate?

I don’t see them as separate at all. I celebrate the fact that I have both of those things in me fairly strongly. I understand that it is a huge benefit that I have that gives me a leg up in this industry. I’m proud of that. Part of this might be that I don’t consider myself a meditation expert or a healer. I don’t think I consider myself a healer from the vantage point of someone who has studied and has gone to the Buddhist school of meditation or the transcendental.

I don’t have expertise in any particular school of meditation. That is not so much a part of my identity. I identify as a writer, creator, and businesswoman. I happen to stumble upon or create from scratch this beautiful way that I can write. I happen to package it in meditation. The meditation itself is the delivery method. It is because I have been a meditator. I have been a consumer of meditation for a long time. That was the carrying vehicle. I know how meditation works. I know the experience I want someone else to have. The differentiation is that I don’t identify as a healer. I identify as a creator, writer, and somebody who wants her words to hit the heart of the person reading/listening.

 

In that, I cannot take all the credit. My husband is very much a part of my business. He is the head of marketing and growth. This dance that we have done all of these years together has been the best of his gifts and my gifts for this business. If I were doing this and he was not a part of it, it would not be the size that it is now. If he were doing this and I were not a part of it, it would not exist. The dance that we do together is not perfect and not pretty, but ultimately is incredibly special, beautiful, and unique. The dance that we do together to create this feels fun. This has been a long journey for me to learn this. Business is a giant game.

This product is my writing wrapped in a meditation delivered through an MP3 file into your ears. That is my product. I am a woman who wants to put love and light out in the world. That is a big desire of mine. That is a force that infuses this product. My job as this businesswoman is to see how many of these products I can get out in there into the world.

That is a fun game because I have the right product, I have this creative expression that helps create this right product, and I have this business mind in between my husband and me, this business team who gets to play. Let’s see how else we could do this. I feel incredibly fortunate that we have been conscious of the deliberate business growth from the get-go. There was no such thing called, “Should this thing make money there?” No, we are a business. Our job, as a business, is to make a profit so that we can continue to offer what we offer.

My past life before this went through the pain of learning those lessons. A lot of my prior business experiences led me to show up to this business in a holistic business-minded way. I see it as this incredibly beautiful dance of managing my time, so I get that creative writing time, but that is a small portion these days, and that is okay. I have writers for most of the other shows. I have people who are content creators over there. I have had a lot of fun coming into this part of the business where I am the CEO of this empire.

It is fun to talk about what shows are relaunching, what is the marketing schedule, and what is the growth schedule. What is the internal marketing that we are going to be doing here? What do we need to do to be able to bring on new partnerships and possibly even acquire other shows? My team is growing. I have a full-time operations manager or executive producer. I have another team member coming on here in the next couple of months full-time. I have a lot of contractors.

That, to me, is a fun game. It would have scared me several years ago when I first started, but it has been small little steps of practicing that and finding out, “I love this organizational part of it. I love the operations and making things efficient. I love these little tools. I’m good with working with these contractors.” It has been a lot of this tippy-toeing into what it takes to run this system. The best part is that I am ridiculously proud of this product that we create.

I still write for Meditation for Women and Sleep Meditation for Women. I still voice over for Morning Meditation for Women. My voice is still out there. I still get a sense of creation, but I am in a space of there are other people’s prints on these. There is a lot of intention into who those people are and what love they are pouring through in their voices. I’m proactive about training the writers that I have to write in a certain way that conveys a certain message that is important. It feels like this beautiful dance of the right product, the right time, the right need that is out there, and the right sense of business that all come together to do this beautiful dance that is a giant game for me.

Thank you for going so into detail about all of that. It is fascinating. I can feel your passion and enthusiasm coming through. It is helpful as you started speaking because in this world that we are in right now with so much content and need for specific types of content, people want to be able to find things quickly and get what they want. As we talked about earlier, having different options to figure out what works well for them and get more of what they want.

The fact is that you are committed to the metrics, analytics, and understanding what people are paying attention to. What might they want more of? Experimenting with all of that brings on abundance. That is what it feels like. You are giving people an abundance. You are getting an abundance back from them to keep it sustainable and accessible.

One of the greatest gifts of your work is you can go on and find quickly. That is a big part of access. The last thing somebody wants to do is struggle to find something they need, especially if they are trying to go to sleep. The fact that you offer so much to help with people’s sleep is such a gift. Forget what the metrics are. I could be wrong, but metrics-wise, 80% of people struggle with sleep. It is some high number like that.

To be able to do a quick search and find a show like yours is wonderful, but in order to get yourself in those search results and create all this, you need to have these systems in place that you’re outlining. It all makes sense. In much of the health and wellness world, people get caught up in their concerns about capitalism, which I understand. We have a lot of issues with that, but we can’t jump to think that because somebody is making money from something, that makes something that they are doing bad. I’m glad that you brought that up because you can’t continue to offer things over and over again if you are not taking care of your basic needs. Finances are tied to all of that.

I’m not going to pretend that I don’t want to make a profit, and I’m not going to diminish that by saying, “I have to make enough to get by.” No, I built this intentionally because I saw that it was a model for true financial freedom, which to me means I am building a model to generate revenue in my life that works when I am not working and/or is able to pay my bills and then some and then beyond.

I don’t know if you want to call it capitalistic, but I am focused on the profitability of this company. I am not ashamed of that, and I’m doing it. Have you ever heard of sales equal service? The more money this company makes, the more I can create. The more of these beautiful products and little pieces of light I can put out into the world, the more people I can employ and provide revenue for them. It is abundant. The more money the company makes, the more money it can put out there and the more light it can create.

I'm very focused on the profitability of this company and I'm not ashamed of that. Share on X

I don’t find anything wrong with that. Money doesn’t make a person. Money accentuates who a person is. I am someone who is incredibly generous. I am incredibly giving. I love having experiences. I love sharing with people. I have been in seasons of my life that I call the peanut butter and jelly years because that is what I had a budget to eat all the time. Those were the early years of my husband and me being together. We had a startup back then.

Money accentuates who a person is. Share on X

I have been in those shoes of, like, “How many more days or months of cash do I have to be able to pay the mortgage?” I have been there. Can we pay this person next week? I don’t know. What loan do we need to take out to keep the doors open next week? I can speak to the humility of that. The lesson I had to learn in money was that I’m not a bad person if I make money. I’m a good person. Without money, I’m a good person. With money, I’m a good person.

The only way you can create a profit is if you are providing something that is valuable to the person who is paying for it. I have been able to create this beautiful little system that is valuable for a lot of people, to the end user, the woman listening, and the sponsors who have awesome products that want to get in front of those ears.

 

If you don’t want to listen to those ads, it is okay. Fast forward and past it. It is all good, or purchase a premium membership, where you don’t have to listen to ads. We are all mature consumers at this point. In that conversation, I will not shy away from the fact that I built this with the intention of financial freedom and with the intention that my goal will always be more profitability because profitability means more for everyone, and that feels good.

I saw this thing on Instagram. I don’t know who it was, but it was this little reel share. The guy was talking about like, “I used to want to be rich, and I became rich. I discovered that I make other people rich and holy cow, that felt good.” The first full-time hire that I made in 2022 was my sister. I would have hired her whether she was my sister or not, but the depth of fulfillment that I feel in what I have created and now what she is a part of contributing to my sister, her family, and her livelihood feels amazing. I have a handful of producers and contractors. I’m a significant client for them. That feels good. I am on board with this dance of profitability for the sake of abundance because more is good for everyone.

In the beginning, we are talking about being clear about being who you are and what you want. That is what I’m feeling as you are speaking because, as a woman, your show is targeting women and people who identify as women, who historically have struggled so much with worth. We still live in a time where women generally make less money. We live in a time when women have a lot of shame.

Every human being, in general, gets a lot of mixed messaging about money and when you should make it, how much you should make, and all of this. It is tough to navigate because there are a lot of people struggling. There are a lot of disparities and issues with money. Money has to become part of our well-being.

I’m curious if you have any data on this, but I imagine a lot of people are meditating as a result of all these stressors in their life. Finances are one of the top stresses that people face. I know from my background of the tension, the shame, the concern like the peanut butter and jelly years, as you mentioned, most people have been through that. A lot of people are still in it. There are readers of my blog who, at this moment, are in a peanut butter and jelly stage, and there is nothing wrong with it but the stress, shame, and tough emotions that come from writing that out. They may turn to meditation to soothe themselves through that.

You are providing comfort, and you are also speaking confidently as someone that says, “There is nothing wrong with making money.” That can help you in many amazing ways. The ripple effect you mentioned of helping other people is beautiful. It is all connected, as you said. I wish that more people could reduce the shame around not having money as well as reducing the shame of having it and making it, especially if it’s connected to something of value like you mentioned, which is important.

I learned early on in business that you have to be providing value in order to make money. It is this energy exchange. I can’t make money if I’m not giving you something that is valuable to you. You learn quickly as an entrepreneur, “What can I create that is valuable?” You have to deliver on that because if you don’t, you don’t continue to make money.

I don’t want to sit here and pretend that I have this perfect relationship with a money mindset. It is a constant dance with me. I have come a long way but believe me. I still feel the stressors of not having enough and the stressors of, “Where is the cashflow?” Although the zeros might look different now than they did back in my peanut butter and jelly years, I’m also aware that, at any given moment, this could be gone. I could be in this situation where I’m looking at what credit cards I need to open so that I can save my cash for next month’s mortgage payment.

Money mindset is a constant dance. Share on X

It is a practice to dance with the attachment and desire to be unattached to money and this desire to play with it. It is an intricate and complicated dance. I’m constantly learning it. I don’t want to give the impression of like, “I got mountains of money. I don’t have to worry about anything.” That is not where I am, either. I am still with my hands and my fingertips in the grains of sand of the finances and the business. I’m making sure that things are moving because growth takes money to invest in the company.

I don’t have it all figured out, but I know who I am in relation to money. I know when negative money stuff is coming up and when I need to shift thinking about things. I know when there is a limiting belief. I know that my ability to make X amount of dollars and to have X amount of reach is 100% in my head. It is all about what I think is possible. You want to talk about us, as women, feeling our worth. It is like, “Am I worthy of this? Who am I to have to run this empire of nine podcasts and the financial impact and listening impact that that has, the X amount of downloads that that means? Who am I to be doing this?”

 

It takes an interesting coming into myself to constantly deconstruct that and say, “Am I hitting a plateau because there is something inside of me that says I’m not worth it or I will be bad? I’m not okay. There is something wrong with me if I make too much money. What does that mean if I have too much money?” The family that I grew up in is not entrepreneurial and has a lower middle-class income. There are some interesting things there that I’m aware of. It is a constant knowing of self or coming back to this theme of knowing yourself. It is a constant search inside for who I am at any given moment in relation to money, growth, and impact. Knowing that’s all internal.

It is a constant search inside for who i am. Share on X

That speaks so much to this theme of meditation being that internal process, and the full circle of all of this is there in everything that you are saying and the limiting beliefs that people struggle with. There is a lot for us. We were talking about inventory in the beginning. Taking inventory of all these feelings and trying your best not to feel judgment towards them is the big practice of meditation. You are figuring out what you need. What does that look like? Developing that for yourself, not based on how other people are doing it.

I’m curious as we have been touching upon many elements of the business side of it and obstacles. We are talking a lot about internal and external obstacles. I’m curious about what you have faced. You have developed so much and had a lot of success. Have there been naysayers? Is there a competition in the meditation podcast world? Are there people that are discouraging you?

I feel that a lot. In the health and wellness world, all these years I have been creating content, you find your people and people that are so excited in alignment, but there is also a lot of competition. There are a lot of people wanting to stand out. There are people who sometimes might feel like they are using you to get ahead or people that don’t want you to succeed. They are discouraging you. Have you faced that? Are there a lot of meditation podcasts? I’m not even aware.

Yes and no. In the old podcast that I had in the business entrepreneurship space, that was incredibly abundant. When I first started that podcast, it was one of three podcasts that existed that was hosted by a woman and was interviewing women entrepreneurs. It is a small niche, but it exploded that niche. I constantly felt that sense of comparison, that sense of I’m not as good as this one, and what do I need to do to stand out? At moments in my worst moments, unappreciative of the small niche community I did have because I was focused on what I could have and what I should have. That existed.

When I transitioned into Women’s Meditation Network, first of all, I had people I love, trust, and highly respect who tell me, “What are you doing going from a business podcast to a meditation podcast? Who are you? You don’t meditate. You are not a meditation person.” In the kindest of ways, many of them were like, “This is the stupidest business decision you can make. You already have this thing that’s working. Go deeper with that.” I’m like, “That sounds like the smart idea, but that is not what I need to do.”

You talk about listening to intuition and knowing yourself. That was a powerful transition for me of having to get clear on what I knew I wanted so that I was powerful enough to hear the naysayers because there were many, and deflect that. I don’t care how successful and knowledgeable you are. I don’t care how much I love you. I know what I’m doing. I’m terrified, and there’s a lot of impostor syndrome because who am I to do a meditation for people?

While that existed, there was a deep knowing and a complete lack of fear. I had the normal fears of like, “Is this going to fall flat on its butt? People are going to hate my voice.” There was no real fear. I knew it was completely void of that real fear of going. It was like the universe cleared out the way, like, “Go, Katie.” I had those naysayers from the podcasting or business perspective of who you are to transition here. “That is stupid.”

Along the way, a very interesting piece of feedback or pushback that I get is from men who hate. I get a lot of hate emails and messages about being for women. At first, I started arguing back and forth. I was like, “It is called a niche.” It didn’t exist before in the podcast space. I’m going to fill it. It is a black-and-white business decision.

I realized early on it does me no good to make that argument to try and sway people into my camp. If you are angry that I’m for women and therefore exclusive, I don’t love men, and I’m going to exclude men and anyone who doesn’t identify as a woman, that is your prerogative. It is okay. That is not why I’m here. That is not the energy that is leading me and the energy I’m putting out into the world. If you want to think that, it is all good. I’m not going to change your mind.

External pushback has been the extent of it. I have the unwillingness to swim in the other competitors in the arena because it is an interesting relationship. Number one, I do a lot of cross promotions with some of the other sleep shows specifically, but some other meditation shows. We are of the same size. I’m an abundant thinker. I believe someone who listens to my sleep podcast would probably listen to another sleep podcast because I’m a person who listens to sleep meditations, and I like a variety.

I have about a dozen or so fellow meditation people that were constantly doing cross-promo swaps, or episode drops to help build our listenership, which is amazing. I will swim in those waters. The waters I refuse to swim in are this space is saturated. People are coming into my space. She is bigger than I am, or that one is bigger than I am. Only because I have learned through doing that before doesn’t get me anywhere.

I will put a kibosh on anything that nurtures a sense of doubt in myself and what I’m doing and a sense of not being good enough. I won’t even step into those conversations because not being good enough is this foundational issue that I have constantly worked through my entire life. I feel it less now than I ever have in my life, and it still comes up. I am unwilling to voluntarily swim in that water because it doesn’t do me any good. It only keeps me from doing what I’m supposed to be doing here.

I don’t care what is going on in the meditation space. I leave that up to my husband to know what is going on in the market and talk about delegating. I don’t want to see and deal with it. I don’t feel any sense of negativity toward any of those folks who are doing well. It is mostly about the more amounts of light that can get out to this world, the better. We are brothers in arms, and we are soldiers in bringing all of this light and love out into the world, helping people sleep or bringing more opportunities for stillness and consciousness. That is a beautiful thing. I feel privileged to be a part of that. I’m going to have a lot of flips and fun trying to be the brightest one out there.

Katie, there are many directions I could go with you, but that last statement feels like a wonderful note to end on because who would be in a bright light, whatever that means for you? That feels like the theme here, this exploration of knowing yourself, knowing what to nurture and acknowledging the things you may always struggle with.

That is one of the biggest things I learned about meditation. It is not about fixing yourself. You also mentioned personal progress over perfection. That is such a great lesson because many of us will struggle with the same things throughout our whole life, and they will never be fully resolved. You touched upon the eating disorder history, which is something I’ve struggled with. I would use phrases like I used to have.

Over time, I realized, “That stuff is still there.” I always struggle with eating and with some level of shame. Not enoughness comes up for me too. Many of us struggle with that. It is not about getting rid of it. You can switch your relationship with something like meditation to not trying to solve and fix something. Addressing it and taking that inventory sticks out as one of your pieces of wisdom here. Take inventory without judgment in an effort to get to know yourself better to get that clarity so you can proceed in the world with that authenticity as much as possible and not strive for that perfection but that personal progress. I love those lessons so much, Katie.

Your wisdom from a business standpoint is valuable too. It is not something that I cover a ton on this show. I love dipping into it because it is such a big passion for me. It’s the way that business and work are tied to our well-being and the finances we discussed. You covered so much ground, Katie. It has been a privilege to speak with you and to hear about your journey.

Whitney, you are awesome. This has been an amazing conversation. I am sure most of your guests say this. These are not stories I often get to tell or areas that I get to discuss often. It is incredibly refreshing because these are real. I don’t want to call it behind the scenes, but this is what it means to be the human called Katie. We all have those stories, and I appreciate the ability to share that stuff because we are all intricate, complicated and full of every single color you can imagine. The beauty of the show you have here is that you get to share all of those colors with the readers and every one of your guests. I feel very honored to be here.

I appreciate that feedback so much and also recognize that. This is the first episode with a guest that I released in 2023. It feels like such a great note to start on in this new year because people are thinking about all these different elements of their well-being, including their finances. That might be top of mind for people. To come into something like that that I didn’t even expect was great, Katie.

You have a special giveaway going on. I try to keep things evergreen on the show. A reader may be reading many months or even years beyond when this episode comes out. Perhaps a quick non-evergreen shout-out, Katie, to what is going on in January 2023 for you because it is a great way to get introduced to all the work that you are doing and get something back, speaking of value.

This is my way to shower you with gifts. In 2023, in January and in part of February, we are doing a more love in 2023 giveaway, more love in the new year. All throughout the month of January and half of the month of February 2023, you can enter to win 1 of 10 different gift baskets that we have that are filled with over $300 of the best health and wellness products. Those are some of my favorites, and at no cost to you.

All you have to do to enter to win is to go to whatever podcast player you are listening to right now, go type in Meditation for Women in this search. See all of the different shows that we have, subscribe, and listen to any one or more of them. Head on over to Apple Podcasts, write an honest rating and review. Go screenshot that review, share it on social media, tag Women’s Meditation Network, and you are officially entered. On February 14th, 2023, because of more love in 2023, we are announcing the winners and giving ten baskets away.

I love giveaways. Who doesn’t enjoy the opportunity to get something like that? We were talking about how we were connected through our friend Allison Melody, who has been a big part of my life personally and professionally through her podcast, The Food Heals and the support and the brainstorming around things like that.

Even if it is beyond the giveaway date, knowing that you will likely have another opportunity and doing something like this later on also, the business strategy of it all is cool to offer people something of value and get them more engaged. It is a great example that Allison has spearheaded. I’m excited to see the results and who wins. It is maybe somebody reading this blog. I’m rooting for you.

Thank you for that abundance, Katie, and that beautiful offering for the readers. Thank you, readers, for being part of this beautiful conversation. Thank you, Katie, for sharing many perspectives and wisdom and doing that from a place of effortlessness. I know there is so much effort that you put into your work, but you are in a place where you can speak on this smoothly. It has been a beautiful conversation to share with you, and I’m grateful to have had you here.

 

Important Links

• Katie Krimitsos – LinkedIn
• Overeaters Anonymous
• Twelve Steps
• Eat Pray Love
• Ambient Sounds Podcast
• Sleep Sounds Podcast
• Sleep Meditation for Women
• Sleep Meditation for Women Three Hours – Apple Podcast
• Women’s Meditation Network
• Meditation for Women
• Morning Meditation
• Daily Affirmations Podcast
• Water And Nature Sounds
• Apple Podcasts – Meditation for Women
• The Food Heals
• https://Linktr.ee/WomensMeditationNetwork
• https://www.Instagram.com/WomensMeditationNetwork/
• https://www.Facebook.com/WomensMeditationNetwork

 

About Katie Krimitsos

Katie Krimitsos is a mom, wife, adventurer, podcaster, seeker and change maker. She’s committed to brightening the light of women around the world through her work under the Women’s Meditation Network – guided meditation podcasts and resources created for those who identify as women so they can use the tool of meditation to know themselves and consciously create lives they love. She has 8 podcasts in her network: Meditation for Women, Sleep Meditation for Women, Morning Meditation for Women, Sleep Sounds, Water & Nature Sounds, Ambient Sounds, Daily Affirmations Meditation for Women and Sleep Meditation for Women 3 Hours. She’s a writer at heart, has a soft spot for animals and Mother Nature, loves a good margarita, and treasures the job of raising her two girls.

 

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