.png)
Shine On Success
Shine on Success is a dynamic, story-driven podcast where extraordinary entrepreneurs, visionary leaders, and resilient change-makers share their journeys to success, revealing both the challenges and the strategies that led to their breakthroughs. Each episode offers a unique blend of inspiring personal stories, practical business insights, and actionable advice, allowing our guests to connect with an engaged, growth-oriented audience ready to be motivated and uplifted. By joining us, you’ll not only have the opportunity to showcase your expertise and inspire listeners but also to be part of a powerful platform that celebrates ambition, innovation, and the courage to turn dreams into reality.
Shine On Success
From Rock Bottom to Reinvention: Finding Light After Loss
In this unforgettable episode of Shine on Success, host Dionne Malush sits down for a raw, unfiltered conversation about grief, reinvention, and the courage it takes to lead with heart. What starts as a conversation about viral marketing and entrepreneurial success unfolds into a deeply human story of loss, healing, and rediscovering purpose.
Rachel built an empire reaching over 100 million people a year, but behind the numbers was a woman navigating unimaginable pain after losing her father. Together, Dionne and Rachel explore what it means to keep showing up when everything falls apart, how creativity can become a lifeline in grief, and why the most powerful thing we can do is tell the truth. If you’ve ever felt broken, this episode reminds you: you’re not alone, and you can rise again.
Connect with Rachel here:
Website: https://rachelpedersen.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/themrspedersen/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/the.mrs.pedersen
Grab Rachel’s Book Here: https://www.rachelunfiltered.com/bonus
Connect with Dionne Malush
- Instagram: @dionnerealtyonepgh
- LinkedIN: /in/dionnemalush
- Website: www.dionnemalush.com
- Facebook: /dmalush
- LinkTree: https://linktr.ee/dionnemalush
What happens when you mix viral strategy, a laptop, a dream and a wildly made-up fantasy language? You get Rachel Peterson From welfare to worldwide impact. Rachel scaled her businesses to eight figures, grew a community of three-plus million fans and reaches over 100 million people a year without ever dancing on TikTok.
Speaker 2:She's a.
Speaker 1:USA Today bestselling author, founder of four companies and the queen of going viral without selling your soul. Oh, and when she's not running empires, she's co-writing a fantasy novel with her husband and, yes, she's already developed a fictional language. Jr Tolkien would be proud. She's built her life and business on curiosity, creativity and proving you don't have to fit into a box to win big. Rachel, welcome to Sign on Success and let's have some fun today and talk about anything you want to talk about.
Speaker 2:I'm so excited to have you, Dionne. I'm so excited to be here. Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1:You're so welcome. So I always like to ask this one question what is one thing you want people to know about you before the titles, before going viral and before the success?
Speaker 2:Oh my gosh, ooh, probably that I'm a pretty big nerd, and I don't mean just like a little bit, I mean like a lot like. Leopardy was my best friend growing up and I took Toastmasters for fun.
Speaker 1:I love Toastmasters.
Speaker 2:I took it in middle school and high school. I do know some of four. So, like first, communication between ships across like the ocean and I'm like really nerdy. So whenever someone like assumes I don't know that I'm not, I'm like no, that's who I am first and foremost. Like I am a nerd and it took me a while to like, as an adult, be okay with that and it's my favorite place to be. I mean, you mentioned Tolkien and I love Tolkien so much and when I was like a teenager, yeah, I tried so hard to learn Elvish with our limited internet back then and I just remember I'd be like Nero Niamh Nastavath, you know like yeah, so I'm a nerd.
Speaker 1:I'm with you there. I feel like I'm definitely nerdy. I love sitting behind the computer, I love AI, I love doing things all the time and people are like, what do you like to do for fun? I'm like be on my computer, like that's funny to me. I love it. So thank you for sharing that. And I know you've built an empire, truly, and you haven't burned out yet. So what was a moment you realized there has to be another way?
Speaker 2:You know, I actually I quietly burned out in a time where most people didn't realize it. One thing I'm really proud of is we've built like a lot of systems that are good for providing margin in life and in everything. So my systems from just like almost a decade of business building propelled our business forward like enough the last three years. But I actually yeah, the last three years I feel like I was going through this deep, like a pit of despair, if that makes sense. Um dad died about three years ago and that was just coming off of like a big breakdown mentally as I was learning about my own diagnoses and life and all of that. And then when he died, at first I was like so mad and so sad and I didn't realize that it went super, super deep. Yeah, it kind of like you might have experienced this too when you lost your dad. There was this like what is the point of life? My dad couldn't figure it out, so how am I supposed to figure this out?
Speaker 1:Right, yes, oh goodness, it was so true. Because, like what is left? Like what can I do now? Like I mean I was doing so much for my parents. You know what I mean. Everything I was doing was to help them and you know, my mom was here living with us, which is a totally different life for her. It's not one she ever wanted.
Speaker 2:She lost every her best friend or, you know, her life partner her house, everything she owned, like she lost it all, and so I get what you're saying. Like it was. What was the point? Yeah, and that was what I experienced was just this like I remember my sisters wanted to like go through my dad's belongings. You know, there's like the the claiming of belongings, and it was surprisingly peaceful. I was really impressed with how we all handled it, but I didn't actually want any belongings I was searching for like a journal or a letter or some place where he thought to give us like further instruction or, and I was desperate and when I combed through everything in his rooms, like a deep, deep brokenness kind of set in, I'm actually totally going to cry talking about this.
Speaker 1:I haven't.
Speaker 2:I haven't talked about this yet. I just remember like, dad, please tell me that there's a place that you left me like a note, a quote, something that explains like what is the point of all this. And it wasn't there and I was so angry and this depth of anger was like it was hard to even show up and I was bitter at the world. And this is literally my first time ever talking about this. It was just wild where suddenly I was mad at everybody and it was hard to even like show up publicly at all and I stopped doing events and I stopped doing interviews and I stopped so much and thankfully, I had a lot online so it kind of pulled us through that season, not glamorously, but like enough, and it didn't lift until three months ago.
Speaker 2:So for three years I was yeah, I was quietly like struggling through this and being like I do. I just give this all up and become like a librarian and settle into the concept that I don't really want anything bigger and I don't want to change the world and I feel selfish now and I want my dad. Yeah, it's a wild experience. Loss is wild as it is. Oh, it's loss.
Speaker 1:Right, and it's going to happen to everyone, like no matter what, we all experience it someday and then loss is a leader.
Speaker 2:When you're leading teams and you're leading people and you're leading a company forward, it's you feel almost like a hypocrite, like you're betraying yourself by showing up and that is weird. You feel guilty because you're like I feel so broken and I feel like something that was robbed from me, almost like a cornerstone of who I am, and I still have to show up for clients and for students and for followers and for my team and my kids, and I was just like I don't know that I want to do this anymore. And so for three years I sat and just tried to coast and tried to figure out. And then it was 90 days ago that I was like, oh, I felt the spark again, I felt excited about life again. And then over these last 90 days it's finally come back. But I mean, that was three years.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so I'm about a year and nine months in and then, nine year in, I find out that my husband needs a liver transplant. So tough guys right, my toughest, the ones that will protect me no matter what. And you know my dad, I can remember when I was little and he's like my first boyfriend. He's like't have a boyfriend. I'm your boyfriend, you know. I was my first love. Like I opened my eyes and he was my first love and so, and what we had? We watched him die and it was horrible for like 12 days that he just laid there and didn't eat. So it was a horrible experience and I have to be honest with you. That's why I did this podcast.
Speaker 1:But one of my friends and I don't know if you've ever heard that me say this story but he called me the next day. It was a Navy SEAL and he left me this message and I'll never, never, forget it. I saved it forever. And he's, like you know, he said, in the military when we don't grieve, we honor. So you, if you can spend the rest of your life grieving and crying every day, but know that that's not what he wanted from you him then if you're yeah, you're in the military and you grieve. You can't get through the day, right, you have to protect our country.
Speaker 1:Yes, so that moment was literally the day after my dad passed, and I've barely spoken to him since. It was he. He was there for that moment that I needed so bad and it helped me because I kept thinking about this. Do I want to live my life in sadness and depression? I mean, we're nine months out and I have to tell you there's moments that just take my breath away. Still, and I too looked for those things, and it has to be those things right.
Speaker 1:I found a letter that he wrote. Wild wrote the letter. He had the most beautiful handwriting. He wrote this letter to my husband, which later became a text that he was trying to write out. So he wrote this letter and it's so beautiful because my brother died when he was three days old. So my husband, who I've been together almost 27 years, he really took to him, and the letter he wrote was so beautiful that I looked at it and I thought I have that and I have all of these memories and all of these little messages and I tell this to all my friends. I started two years before he passed. I started a dad said file in my phone and anytime he said something really cool, I would put it in there so that I would be able to go back and look at it. But I have to tell you, rich, even though you know it's coming, I don't know how was your dad sick.
Speaker 2:No, you can finish your thought and then I'll share a little bit about our experience.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it was like we knew he was sick but we never believed he was that sick and you know. So we're there for 12 days and the day finally, like we're holding him, picking him up, trying to help him. He was in so much pain. And he said, in the middle of those two in the morning I'm sitting there and I'm wide awake Cause I'm like I couldn't sleep. We're laying on the floors like we were the floors and they lived in a house that had concrete floors because they didn't have a basement in South Carolina. So we're all on the floors.
Speaker 1:He says I'm ready to go to the hospital and I like sat up and my sisters were falling asleep and I'm like, wake up, wake up, everybody get up. And like we had hope that moment he was that he probably had about two weeks and that he had a tumor and he was so sick, he had an aortic aneurysm that was so big that they'd never seen one like that, and so we brought him home thinking he had two weeks and he literally died the next day. So the most beautiful part of the story is we started playing a song that was for us Daughters it was called Daughters. And then my mom and his song From Boys to men. We started playing that and he died during that song, like he took his last breath during their song and it was so unbelievable how it was choreographed.
Speaker 2:Yeah, ours was a little messier. We actually were on a trip, paul and I in Arizona to go to like one of my students weddings, and we were so excited and I was getting my nails done. My sister was home watching all three of my kids and I got a call from her and she said Ray, I think dad's dead and I'm at a training for my work and he is in charge of the kids right now. And that was so like I was literally like in the nail salon and I like gasped and I so desperately didn't want to be in a room with a bunch of strangers in that moment, you know, because I just knew I was like no, I think I think he's dead, you know. So our two oldest kids, like they were actually, or sorry, our two youngest, our son was five and our daughter was nine and they thought he was sleeping on the floor while he was watching them and he was dead, like fully dead, and we called my oldest daughter. My sister rushed home from it was a training that she was doing for work. Our oldest daughter ran downstairs, got the kids out of the room, ran outside, flagged down the police, had to answer questions for the police until my sister got there.
Speaker 2:And I have never felt so helpless in my whole entire life. I felt sick because I've always been the one in my family that's the fixer. So people come to me when they don't know what to do or when a situation is too intense, and I'm, for the most part, I'm like pretty strong in those situations. And suddenly it is at that time my 12 year old in charge and my dad is dead in the living room and I know it. And we saw a picture and I was like he's dead, there's no way he's coming back. And I'm sitting there just bawling my eyes out in the salon waiting for the call back, that he's like confirmed dead and that they can't bring him back. And they were like do we stop doing your nails? And I said I'm either going to a wedding or a funeral. So no, continue with my nails, because either way there's one version of a life event.
Speaker 2:So he wasn't sick leading up to it. We haven't. I haven't talked to my sisters about how much we want to share. We chose not to get an autopsy. My dad just had some struggles. He had a lot of struggles and I'm pretty sure that some of like the medications he got in Mexico were like cut with something else, or fentanyl or something, because, yeah, he just dropped dead. It was like he had like a brain aneurysm or a heart something. He just stopped all of a sudden and it wasn't the world's most surprising thing, but the timing was yeah, we weren't at all. How old was he? 62.
Speaker 1:And are you the oldest? I am. How many sisters do?
Speaker 2:you have, I have two sisters and they're, yeah, five and eight years younger than me. I have two sisters, I'm the oldest as well.
Speaker 1:Oh my gosh, yeah, so it was. It was quite the experience and we were all there together but yeah, that's, that's alarming, like it's just like that. He was fine and then he wasn't yeah, I mean say anything. Like I got to say everything, I got to have. That time I said everything I could think of. I said are you good with Jesus? You know, are you, are you okay, dad? Like one time he said I said are you hungry? And he said I'm hungry, I can't eat.
Speaker 1:So how horrible that was for us to watch. He was so hungry but he couldn't eat anymore. And so, yeah, but I have to tell you something cool. That happened like three weeks before that my mom made him homemade ravioli, and happened like three weeks before that my mom made him homemade ravioli and, even though he couldn't eat, he ate like three days in a row of ravioli and he's like he said to me when I got there I don't think I'll be ever get these again and I'm like you will, dad, mom will make them for you. But yeah, so she made these homemade ravioli. He couldn't eat nothing else, but he ate them and for days, like 30 days later, and oh god, I miss him so much.
Speaker 2:I know I miss my dad too and one of the things I was like these last 90 days I was in literally it's been 90 days and the hardest part is when you're like keeping everything going is you feel like a hypocrite and you feel fake, right, because you're like I still have to show up like things are fine and they are not fine. I still have to try, or else everything falls apart. You know, my dad actually never was in love with life and that's kind of why he had moments like he had these little pockets of joy, but for the most part he like really struggled just across the board. He really struggled and he would always like when his birthday was two weeks before and I was like dad, you're going to be 62. He's like it's so old, I don't want to be 62. I never planned on living this long. So he had resigned himself to the fact that he was like going to die early and all of that like mentally. So I was yeah, it was like 90 days ago that I was like wait, am I repeating it just because my dad is dead, by like walking around like this, you know, like the zombie.
Speaker 2:So that was a big thing for me was realizing I got to go love life again or else I'm going to go do this now the same way as my dad for the next 30 years, and that can't happen. But the second thing I did and I really hope people listening take note of this I wanted a letter. So bad, you wanted a letter. Right, we want those letters. So I started keeping journals for my kids and they're for them. So I started just leaving notes for them in these journals, dated with like observations of them growing or a little tip or something that they said that was clever, so that they never have that same experience of mom is gone, no matter what age, mom is gone. And I don't have that letter. Nope, I've got it all ready to go and I just keep adding to those journals for them.
Speaker 1:That is amazing and it's important, and the memories, like I'm worried, like I don't want to forget. You know what I mean. So I don't know, you're three years, I'm a year and nine months, but I have so many pictures of him. I'm so thankful that I took them, since we had cameras on our phone.
Speaker 1:I really took a lot of pictures but I didn't take enough video and that's something I do regret. Like I could have gotten a lot of video and I didn't. I have a lot of pictures and you know definitely the hardest times of our lives and as we get older, it seems like stuff keeps coming at us. And what you said before meant a lot because I had to put on this. You said before meant a lot because I had to put on this, this thing. Right, I'd put on the show of Dionne, so positive she has, you know, all of this positive mindset. She's thinking we're rich, she's this, she's that, and if I couldn't do it, then who would ever believe in me again?
Speaker 2:Yeah, Isn't that that is one of the hardest things. And people kind of say like, well, why don't you just take time off? And it's like you don't have that luxury as a leader. You know it comes with privilege and that is not one of them. Like you have to just keep moving forward, even if it's messy and even if you mess up and just hope that one day it'll be good again. But it won't be good again if you don't at least try, which is so wild. Yeah, that messed with me.
Speaker 1:I get you and I didn't know the audience doesn't know this but you sent an email out to me after my dad passed. I'm not sure how you knew or how that even happened. I don't know how your system worked, but I was so blown away by that email and I probably read it 10 times over and over again, because most people weren't saying the words like you were, and it was so impactful because I knew you had just been through it. And so, yes, thank you for that. And you know all of the words. Words are so helpful and powerful. And songs like there are so many songs I cried my eyes out through like bawling, can't even breathe, you know, and I always look for, keep saying where's that sign, dad, is everything okay over there? You know how can? Can you give me something? You know?
Speaker 2:But there was a thing that saved me, because I think lowest point was actually about a year ago and I was like I don't even feel like I recognize myself anymore. This is so emotional, I'm sorry, like so. I remember just feeling like nothing matters and I kept saying that. And there's this scene in this movie called Everything Everywhere, all at Once. Have you seen that movie? It's intense and it's pretty inappropriate, but I love it.
Speaker 2:And one of the main people, like the villain, is like nothing matters. If we boil it all down, nothing matters and it's that pit of despair and I was like, yeah, I feel that and I was watching that movie a lot and it felt good to hear those words from someone other than me for once. And then I found this song. It's by an artist called Aurora and I'm pretty sure she's French, and it's called Everything Matters. And that song, if you just turn it up and go in a room where the acoustics are incredible and turn it up so loud you can't even the acoustics are incredible and turn it up so loud you can't even hear your thoughts and listen to that on repeat until you know the lyrics. It's you're a part of the dawn, like you're a star, you're everything, everything matters and I was like I need this.
Speaker 1:I don't believe it yet, but I'm gonna listen to it and hope that someday it's real yeah, I know, I feel like I remember right after that where I'm like I don't even care if I die, I don't care anymore. Like if I die, who cares? Like everybody dies, nobody pays attention after four days, like they barely remember you, you know. So it's wild that we have so many similarities of what we went through. I guess everyone goes through things, but I just thought it was so different than I imagined. Like, yeah, it's, my mom is like not the same person and she's just not. And you know, just last week her best friend dies after her husband, right, and so she's poor lady. I felt so bad for, like I'm like how much more can we take? And it feels like it just keeps coming right and then I keep punching through and getting to the other side. And that's why I did this, so I could prove I can push through adversity. But how many do I have to have?
Speaker 2:It's wild because it's like life will throw anything and everything it can at you, and it does. It kind of amazes me the amount of tragedy that isn't even someone's fault that can happen in one person's life, and the fact that we can even still keep going like it is pretty miraculous to me and I'm I'm really glad that I have young kids and have young kids through that season, because the pain and the grief were so, so foundational that I don't know at that time if Paul would have been enough, if that makes sense, and that is wildly selfish and I don't care because it's true, that's how I felt and I feel like other people might feel that way too at times. But I'm so glad I didn't give up during that. You know, I'm glad I'm still here because there is light on the other side and I promise that it just takes a lot longer than you think it'll take.
Speaker 1:You know, and some days you'll be, you'll feel different and then you'll be like, wow, we had a really good day, you know, and there are really good days in it all and there's so many great memories and no one can ever take that away from us. You know, the memories are are such an important part of our life. But I don't know, I feel like I told someone, I feel like sometimes, that the bible, the job, and he went through all that. Now he went through some pretty tragic things in the Bible. That was horrific. Sometimes it feels like life is like that, you know, and you've got to get back up because it really doesn't. It's not a good place to be. If you're down, you have to force yourself back up and it's not easy. But Rachel said, the light is definitely there. It's always light and darkness. You just have to find it right.
Speaker 2:Yes, my dad would always actually, he was a former pastor. He was a pastor when I was growing up, yeah, and he would always talk about like the Israelites in the wilderness, and he would talk about that all the time, and he would be like I'm just in a wilderness, I'm just in a wilderness, and it was one day. It was either Paul or I, but we were in sync with our thoughts. We challenged him on it, and we said at what point are you choosing to stay in the wilderness, though? And he was like it's not a choice, it's a season, and we were like you've been in that season for 30 years, so at what point are you going to move forward? And he didn't want to hear it, but I needed to hear that for this season.
Speaker 1:For your season. Yeah, so many seasons. This is not what I have planned for today's podcast. We were supposed to be having fun fun too. That's how complicated life is you know it's kind of ironic because it's it was. It's important that we go through this and share this, because we the one thing I know for sure is all of the things that I've been through is to help someone else go through it too, and you know, the impact of my husband having the best post I've ever had on social media.
Speaker 1:We'll talk about that was the day that I explained that my husband didn't have liver disease due to alcohol or drugs. He had it due to sugar, which is the biggest drug of them. All right, I told the story and I think probably 170,000 views on my Facebook one post in my whole career went because I told the story of our life and what we were going through. The people I have had people praying from all over the world and I know that literally because there's been podcast guests I've had from everywhere and they've all been praying for him and us. And you know his, his liver is a hundred percentgrown 10 weeks out. It's 100% regrown. His friend gave him his liver 60% of it and he kept 40 and his liver's completely regrown.
Speaker 1:And we're just going through battling like pain and medicine right now, but the liver is, the doctor said, is doing excellent. So see, there's some, there's that light. Right, the light came. It's been going on for 18, 25 weeks. It's been 18 weeks we went to the hospital every week and then 10 weeks, so 28 weeks. We've been going through this and it's been a lot and, but the light is always there and the story is always there that you can share and change someone else, because now people have hope because of us.
Speaker 2:They see that and have hope yeah, I, I love that and I will say, like I think it's separation. You know how they always say like separation is what creates shame. Sometimes I know that I think everyone has things figured out and like everyone's house is like cleaner than mine, and that they wake up brighter than I am, like happier, smiling, or they wake up and their face looks camera ready. I don't know why we assume these things, though I don't know we do, though we're all human. We all experience moods and seasons and loss and grief and zits and wrinkles and gray hairs, like we all experience this. Yeah, this built up separation makes us think like we're the only ones, and that couldn't be further from the truth. So I'm a huge fan of sharing stories, no matter how ugly they are, if it can help people, you know yeah, everybody's hurting.
Speaker 1:And I was talking to someone just today where she's like she said something about someone and I said I think they have a mental illness, I think there's something wrong. I said, but I think we all do, I think we all have something that we're going through. It is so difficult because times are different than it was 20 years ago. Right 20 years ago, 40 years ago, it was so different. Yeah, there's so much chaos and constant, everything you don't get a chance to breathe.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, I think about like back in the older olden days. So you know, I have bipolar type 1 and people who, yeah, people who have mental illness. They had to hide it. So either they would end up locked up in insane asylums and they wouldn't literally that's what they were called asylums or they would be put, you know, like the disgrace rooms, the shame rooms in an attic. They would hide mentally ill family members, like in a basement or in an attic, or people just had to pretend, or be all hopped up on opium or whatever was available.
Speaker 2:But the thing is it was all about survival back then, you know, in almost any time in history. And so the fact that we as a society can talk about things like grief and mental illness means that there is progress. Like we actually we're not afraid that, you know, like we're not afraid that a bunch of pioneers are going to storm through our backyard or whatever. You know, like we're not afraid that a bunch of pioneers are going to storm through our backyard or whatever. You know like there is progress, and that always encourages me, if you look at kind of the big picture.
Speaker 1:So we, we all have stuff. You know, hide their stuff right, because they're afraid to say it. But don't be, just share. There's so much honestly, there's so much joy in sharing. You know, I know, for me I've had anxiety so bad I can tell like I can feel my whole body being affected by anxiety. My dad had a heart attack when he was 48 years old. So you can tell, I can tell you for sure, in my 48 year I was freaking out all the time every pain, everything I have, like, oh my gosh, my dad had a heart attack at 48, you know. So we all go through all kinds of things. We just I love the idea of sharing and you know how we got here on this podcast today sharing. This is from an email that Rachel sent to me because I was going through something very difficult and you know we have to have other people to talk to. It's so helpful.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think so, and I think leaders can especially break down the barriers of people feeling like they have to be perfect, and I'm really glad we're kind of moving out of that era of entrepreneurs and marketers pretending that everything's always fine. I hope that did Fantastic, but I think I think it's it's not just like bottom up, it's top down to like. Both need to happen. Leaders need to start being OK with the fact they might get some criticism, but just like share real life, not just the chat JPT polished messy bun version you know.
Speaker 1:So, yeah, for sure. I remember whenever we were talking about this transplant and I was talking to my partner and they were like everyone was like worried about putting it out there, right, does it mean we're going to be weak as a company because Dion's going through something totally traumatic? I went through it and if nobody knew they would have never known. And I went through it and then I shared it and everyone was like rooting for us, like it was incredible. So you have this people that are in your life all the time and they feel it now with you. They feel with you. So I honestly I think that I think they look at me differently now, in a better way, because I was honest and I shared our truth. So I think there's nothing wrong with that, and people are always hiding behind the. You know the Kim Kardashians, right? The ones you got to put on the show all the time. You know you don't have to. You just have to be who you are, cause there's something special about every single one of us.
Speaker 1:And if we all have something wrong mentally, it's okay too because we can share.
Speaker 2:Find our people who can handle that, you know, and people who can't. Because it's Not everybody is comfortable sharing or talking about things that maybe they haven't experienced yet, so it feels, I don't know, taboo still a little bit.
Speaker 1:And I think honestly, I love social media. I think it's the greatest thing ever. We've learned so much about people good, bad. We see people that we would never see Like you spend time with your people that you went to high school with. You know things about them you would have never known if, without social media, you'd have been still wondering. But I love the idea of it. So it's so impressive. You've built this incredible business and I had all these really cool questions for you. But tell me this, because I think this is important you kind of had to reinvent yourself. Now you're in that reinvention, right, because you went through, you had this, everything going great, and then, all of a sudden, this great loss. Then, 90 days ago, you're like I'm ready to reinvent and be back. Who I you know, who everyone knows you to be, maybe or someone different. What does that look like?
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 2:So the one of the biggest differences this time with the rebuilding, rebuilding and then rebuilding better and possibly bigger we'll see where it goes, I think so is I don't want to shut myself off to showing other sides of me besides just expert professional.
Speaker 2:I've always tried to like show, like fun or sadness or a weird story or like the reality of any part of life or business, and I think sometimes before my dad died there was, it was really built up in my head Like you have to be professional, you're working with these big names that actually the majority of the world does know.
Speaker 2:Now it's getting high stakes here and those big names back in the day had hired me because I was goofy and fun and found cool ways to present things, and so I found myself almost like closing off more and more of who I was and trying to just be like straightforward. I'm trying to prove I was intelligent, because I was kind of feeling insecure. So now my big thing is I can have so much fun and I can tell you maybe a little bit of a cheeky joke or something, as I'm sharing cool things about how to grow on social. So that's been one of the big things is not shutting, not closing down in my mind what I want to share, and then also being open to the idea that maybe my hobbies have nothing to do with business, like writing a fantasy novel and, yeah, inventing a cookbook based on my fantasy novel. For when?
Speaker 1:that time happens. Oh, that sounds like a really interesting one, for sure for when that time happens.
Speaker 2:Oh, that sounds like a really interesting one, for sure. Yeah, so that's been a big thing. And then one other thing was really big Don't try not to make too many life decisions. This is for anyone listening and to past me Try not to make too many big like career life decisions when you're going through grief.
Speaker 2:And because I started believing that social media was vapid and I was having a really hard time with caring about it and being like so here's why you want to reach more people or here's why you want to go viral, and I knew technically it was all good and helpful and it grows businesses, but it felt really shallow to me because of the ways that some people were using it while I was grieving.
Speaker 2:And so, right, totally different lens versus this side of things, I started diving really deep into psychology. I want to understand why are we the way we are and why do we do things the way we do and why does our brain do this and how does our brain react to this? And I started tying psychology into everything and I kind of boiled it all down to one thing we all want to understand ourselves and then we want the world to understand us by being seen and being heard, whether that is in what we're seeing reflected to us across social or like going viral and taking off because we all have important messages to share. And that really helped to redefine it versus feeling like it was just a bunch of pretty pics. So that was pretty big.
Speaker 1:That makes a lot of sense. I did one thing you've definitely helped companies grow, and so tell me a transformation story from a client or a student that really stands out to you.
Speaker 2:Oh, there's a lot. Which one do I want to pick? You know one that was my absolute favorite, since we have been talking about grief. So I had a client who I worked with for I want to say a year or two years and while we were in the middle of gearing up for like all of the advertising and marketing for her challenge that was coming up, her husband, at like 42 years old, died completely unexpected. He was like deer hunting with his friends, and first we found out he had gone missing and hadn't come up or never showed up at the hunting thing, and so I told her. I said I'm not really good at knowing what to do, but I'm a natural fixer. So can you let me run this challenge on behalf of you, because you're still going to need money? That's how I can offer support to you in this season. So I just come in and I like to fix things and that's kind of my secret nature is fix, fix, fix, fix. So she said I would appreciate that so much. I have nothing to give. And then he turned up dead and she had three small kids, and so I ran the challenge on behalf of her.
Speaker 2:I wrote the copy as me slash the team and we ran this challenge once the new after the news broke about her husband and it was more like us, as the team, want to make this happen for you. So previously she had always done like six figure years. They had done great, they were on fire, they were happy, and suddenly her world was rocked and we did a six figure challenge the month her husband died and 84,000 of it was profit. So I was able to be like, okay, this buys you margin. And it was like one of my favorite campaigns I've ever done. My whole team and I we just we hunkered in, we edited videos, we wrote copy, got everything going, we scaled harder than we've ever scaled. We leaned on the community and did a really like life-changing campaign wow that's amazing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, how is she doing?
Speaker 2:today she's doing. She is just settling into single life and now sharing about the ways that she copes as a widow and how to handle grief and how to like regulate your nervous system. So she kind of moved a different direction a few years later, which I love.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's awesome. Yeah, so I have a good question to ask you. Your fantasy book turned into a Netflix series tomorrow. Who's playing the lead role?
Speaker 2:I will tell you because we wrote out all of our comps. Let me pull it up. Yes, of course we did Okay, so this was really tough. I don't know. This process made me laugh because I feel about 21.
Speaker 1:I'm older than 21, so there.
Speaker 2:So I'm like, okay, who's going to play the mother? And then we were looking at names and we're like Carla Gugino and Angelina Jolie. And then we're like these women are 50. And by the time this book comes out, they're going to be 60. This is wild. So we went through the process. The main character would be played. Her name is Nari. Nari would be played by Catherine Langford. She has a perfect look, and her mother pretending it were today is Carla Gugino.
Speaker 1:There you go. I can't believe you had that all figured out. I know I love that. You asked it. Oh my gosh, I don't even know some of the things that come up. This is, I have these, cool. I have so many questions, but I'm just going to narrow it down to a couple more so then I can let you go. But what would the 2016 Rachel say If she scrolled your current feed?
Speaker 2:today. Who is this chick and how do I be like her?
Speaker 2:Oh, good one, that's super cool and I still have my journals from 2016. So I go back and I write myself. Since I was 11, I've written myself notes for the future. So if I go back, every single year of my life is documented by journals with notes to my future self. My 11 year old one is my favorite. She said dear Rachel, you better be a hot mom, and if you're not, you need to get off the couch and go run a mile and like, go get some makeup and hair done and then go rent a Corvette and go travel the country with your daughter so y'all can pick up hot boys.
Speaker 1:And that's what her expectation would have been Amazing.
Speaker 1:How old are you right now? That's what her expectation would have been Amazing. How old are you right now? 36. Yeah, so I just turned 57, three or four weeks ago. Oh, you look incredible. Oh, thanks, but I, you know, I'm starting to feel it. It's hurting, but at the end of the day it's like I feel like I'm like in my last you know third right In my life. Yeah, best third.
Speaker 1:So one thing that grief brought out for me was extreme creativity. So before I started this real estate brokerage and before I got my real estate license, I had a graphic design business and I loved it so much. But my dad died and my creative juices went wild. So I know that this last phase of my life it's whatever I do next is going to be something super creative and I love that.
Speaker 1:So I think when you think of grief and you're looking for that light, try to look inside your own self, because there is something in there that's so big If you just let it out. That's the time to do it, because you're at that point where you don't care anymore. Do what you want, be who you want to be, and you know the end result is I can say that creativity helped me get through grief. Am I through it all the way? Heck? No, I'm never going to be. I'm never going to be the same person that I was the day that he took his last breath Never happening.
Speaker 1:But that doesn't mean I'm not a good person and I can't do amazing things. It's just going to be different and same with you, right, we're just going to be different, and you just said that your 2016. You would look at you today and be blown away. So that's amazing. So keep doing what you're doing, rachel. You're changing lives and it's awesome to watch from the sidelines. Hopefully, someday I can be one of those. You know one of your stories that you tell, but watching you is just it's awesome. You're amazing. So I know you've built a business that totally breaks the mold and now you're building a world from scratch. That's what it looks like. We've talked strategy, a little bit more story and a little bit of sci-fi in our, in our talk today.
Speaker 1:And I think everyone listening is ready to own their own weird and go big anyways, because that's how I feel I'm ready to go big, because I don't care At 57, you seriously don't care what other people think anymore.
Speaker 2:So for all of our listeners.
Speaker 1:How can they get ahold of you or how can they find out more?
Speaker 2:about you. Ooh, I'm going to share two things, because we didn't talk about Napoleon Hill. Some people might be waiting for it. You can find me at rachelpetersoncom. You'll see that there's like I blog about five times a week and I actually do that. So feel free to check out my blog and there's there are a lot of free resources on there as well. One tip I'm going to share for everyone.
Speaker 2:I'm pretty sure this is Napoleon Hill. I read it, or at least I read it right around the time. I read his book Think and Grow Rich. So the concept of the invisible council. You know the imaginary council. 10 out of 10 recommend this. So I created an imaginary council a la Napoleon Hill back in 2015, before this was even a business, and I created my table and I won't share who was at my table because it's private but think of the people that you admire and think of the people who encourage you and bring out the best versions of yourself. And put them literally at a table in your mind and imagine you have a problem, or think of a current problem you have. It's not hard to imagine problems. Share the problem with the council and imagine their reactions and what they would tell you to do and then follow that. I started doing that, yeah, 10 plus years ago.
Speaker 1:That's amazing. Now, with AI, you can really do that. So I did the same thing I used to have pictures of. Now you're making me rethink what I'm doing. I used to have pictures of all of my board of directors on a board in my house and I would walk past them like, what do you think? What do you think you know? So now I can just go in AI and say what did, what do you think about this? You know I can help you with that, and so, yeah, I love that. That's a, that's for sure. Sometimes it looks like eight figures and sometimes it looks like perfecting a fantasy language on a Tuesday. That's Rachel Peterson, all aspects of her, and thank you for sharing your heart, thank you for sharing your grief, because I know we're going to help a lot of people with this message. Thank you so much.
