Jackie Johnstone - Applying Human Design to Your Business

Welcome to the Real people, Real Business show. My name is Stephanie Hayes and I am a business strategist and coach who loves to speak with like-minded entrepreneurs to share their real stories and the gritty details of building their businesses. On this show, you won't hear about the glamorized entrepreneurship journeys that you see online. You won't be told how to make six figures in six weeks. Instead, you can expect to hear real vulnerable and inspiring stories you can relate to that have helped create the foundation for each of our. Businesses goodbye, boss babes. Hello, real life entrepreneurs today. I'm so excited to welcome my old friend, Jackie Johnstone. Jackie is an expert in human design for business, a breathwork facilitator, subconscious transformation coach retreat leader, copywriter and marketing consultant. She helps business owners create their own true capabilities so they can transform into the versions of themselves that serve the best. Welcome to the show. Jackie, thanks so much for taking the time to share your story. Hey, I'm so excited to be here. Me too. And I can't believe we haven't talked before. I mean, we've talked before, but I can't believe we haven't been on the show yet when we well, everything, everything in the right time, always. That's right. And I mean, I think if we had done this a couple of years ago, we would've had a really different interview, right? Yeah. That's true. Yeah. okay. So fill us in, tell us, how did you get to where you are? Right. Oh, my gosh. Okay. The short answer yeah. Give us the story. Uh, I have been running my business online since 2013 and a friend of mine the other day called me an online business elder and I was like, Guess it's kinda true. It's been almost 10 years and this is an industry where people kind of come and go all the time. So, um, it, it, it made me chuckle, cuz I don't feel like an elder in any way, but I have been doing this online business thing for a while and it's looks different and you're absolutely right that like if wed talk five years ago, what I was doing. Is different than what I'm doing today. And probably five years from now, it'll be the same cause, um, that is part of who I am, right. Is, um, I know where we're gonna talk a little bit about human design today, but for those who already know, I'm a manifesting generator. So I like to do lots of different things and I like to pivot it's my favorite thing. And I have been doing it my entire life, even before I knew that I was a manifesting generator. Um, and, and it's definitely shown up in my business. So I first started an online business. um, kind of out of like, not desperation, but like we had moved my husband's a physicist and we'd moved from Canada, Toronto, Ontario to Bordeaux, France, um, for his postdoc. And I was really excited to move to France. I speak French. I love the French culture. I love French food and, um, I kind of got there and was like, okay, well, what am I gonna do? Like at, we thought we were moving for two years originally. Um, that was the plan to begin with. And I didn't really, I wasn't drawn to like being a, you know, tour guide or a waitress or teaching English or a lot of the other things that people in that expat community that I met were doing. And after being unemployed for a couple of months, which was really hard for me, because I was like, I'm not contributing in any way and I'm not doing things. I like to do things I like to work, but I wanna do work that's meaningful. And that is kind of how I ended up in online business. It never occurred to me that I would run my own business. I have, I had no kind of role models in entrepreneurial or business space, a business for me at that time where like meant somebody that had like an office and like employees and like a brick and mortar type of situation because the online business world. That we exist in today was just new, quite a bit newer back then. And so the fact that I could just have a laptop and help people in some way, cuz that's what I wanted to do originally was I went in to, to do social media consulting. Like that's the first iteration of my business because that's what I was doing in my have a master's in journalism. And I was in a communications position in Toronto and I knew quite a bit about social media and there were a lot of people who didn. No, how to use Twitter or, you know, like how to, how to set up a Facebook page. And so that's where I started and slowly started to make money doing that. You know, it's, it's, wasn't like an overnight, oh my gosh, I've replaced my corporate income, like success story in any, cuz those, these things take time, right? To like establish yourself and figure out what you wanna do, how you wanna help people like how to meet enough people to. Um, you know, make it happen, but I really enjoyed it. And I kind of, I, I think it was pretty clear to me after a couple of months that like, I wasn't really gonna ever be satisfied to go back to a job because I loved being in charge of how much money I brought in and the fact that I got to choose my clients and choose my projects and like challenge myself in that way. And then in 2015, my business was really starting to take off. Um, and I was working a ton. I got pregnant with my first son. Um, and I had all these plans for like how I was gonna set up my maturity leave. And I had done a, a ton of affiliate selling that year that helped me to set up like some income for when I was gonna be off. And then he showed up two months early and we were in the NICU for a month. And all of these, like things I had planned to do with that last trimester. And I went out the window and I ended up taking a full year off. And by the time I stepped back in. Just something had changed. I didn't wanna work the way that I'd been working. I mm. The type of work that I'd been doing, like things had started to shift and I didn't really wanna just do social media consulting work anymore. And it was a period where I was sort of trying to figure out what it was gonna look like to be a mom and be an online business owner. And what did I really wanna do? Um, and so things kind of pivoted behind the scenes a bunch, um, in 20. 18. I had my second son and I was like in between those two periods, working a lot behind the scenes in other people's businesses, basically acting like a freelancer at that point. Um, running Facebook ads, doing copywriting, um, doing some coaching work for, um, a coach that we were both worked for. That's where I met you. And, and then when I got pregnant with my second son, um, I started seeing this thing called human design. Chasing me around the internet. Now, again, it was one of those things where now, if you're listening to this, you may have heard of it because it's quite a bit bigger now than it was in 2018, but it was just crossing my path over and over again. And I kept saying, what is this? And it sounds really kind of insane. Like, it's a, it's pretty like, woo woo. Like I'm a pretty scientific, logical analytical person. And I was very skeptic. Um, and it just kept crossing my path and I followed my gut, although I didn't realize at the time that that's my decision making strategy as a stake role manifesting generator and decided I was gonna explore it and experiment with it. Just one of the things that I love about human design is that really the underpinning of it is that you're here to have your own experiment and to try it for yourself and see how it. And it started making things easier. I was like a super overthinker before human design, trying to like, you know, intellectualize everything and plan out a path and force things to happen and make things happen. And there was a lot of frustration that can be involved in that. And having it gave me the permission to lean back and to respond to things and to let my intuition guide me, which is something that. People had always said to me, but I didn't really understand like what, okay. Like, okay, trust your intuition. But like, what does that actually look like? how do I actually do that? And human design gave me the man like kind of a manual for it. Like, this is what, how it's gonna show up. This is what it's gonna look like. Here's how you can play with it for yourself. Um, and that started the next pivot of my business because once I got into human design and saw a, how it helped me, but B how different we all are and our energies are, it was so clear to me that like, All of the marketing and consulting type of work that I've been doing. Like that's the reason why sometimes one strategy works really well for one person and then totally flops for another, another person because we are all so different. And so having that lens of human design to put on top of all of the marketing, um, work that I had been doing. It really kind of caught my eye and I sort of started to go down that rabbit hole and then my business pivoted into like human design for business. And slowly I've been adding other tools that have been really helpful to me. Like you mentioned, I'm a, breathwork facilitator, I'm a subconscious transformation coach and it's all kind of, for the aim of getting the person in front of me to realize how capable and trust themselves to run their business in their. because we are all perfectly designed for our purpose, but like how I do it is not how you do it. And um, how can we like take, take back our inner wisdom and put that at the top? And that's the goal. And I love this. I mean, there's like 800 things I wanna see to you right now. But first of all, I love this so much because it's so perfectly aligned with the way I approach business design. Right. I very, very early on in this work, realize that if we don't design a business for the person who's running it, we have a business that doesn't get any energy, right? Yeah. Yeah. And so while I'm not rooted in. Um, any other concept, but that was just sort of common sense. Mm-hmm in my mind, when I, the more people I worked with, the more I could see that if we're not coming from a very deep place of aligning with who you are as a person, even if that means you've got some weird Frankenstein business that yeah. Nobody would think to build. Yeah. If it's, if it's totally aligned with all the pieces of you. You're gonna be successful. Exactly. And so I love that you've taken this kind. Cause I remember I, when I first met you, you were still the social media expert, right? Yeah. And when you started moving into human design, I was like, what? And I can't say that I actually still really understand it cuz the biggest education I got in it was when we were together down in uh, in Corvallis. Yeah. And we started working through it, but I, you know, I certainly. There's a lot to explore in it. Yes, sure. But I love how, how aligned it is. And I love that you've put this really sort of practical spin on it. Right. Mm-hmm because like, what does it mean for you to understand? Like, I still don't understand how you get from. Where you start in human design to sort of the pragmatic pieces. So how do you, you know, my human design. So how would you understand that my best tactics for marketing would be whatever they are? Yeah. So there's a lot of layers. Human design is, um, I often describe it like an onion because it's like there's layer under layer, under layer, and it's like, you can just peel one layer at a time and then you see the next one. And I think. With the trap that we can get into with it. And when you look at a human design chart, if you've ever pulled yours, or if you want to go and look at yours, you can go to my body graph.com and look, pull it up for free with your birth information. It's really like kind of mind blowing, cuz you're like, what are all these, there's these colors? And there're all these different shapes on this chart. And there's these numbers down the side and some are red and some are black. And what do they all mean? And it it's, there's a treasure trope of information there. And if you try and. Understand, all the information all at once. It's like, it can be a very interesting kind of thought experiment, but like, what are you gonna do with it? And I am like, you are quite a practical person. I want to do something with it. And some of that comes from, but both of us are, are one, three profiles. And the profile in human design is your public role. It's kind of like the costume that you're wearing to play the role that you're here to play. And one threes are. Consciously the, the first line is the authority. We want it to be built on some like solid information and expertise, and we're constantly looking for that, right? Like I want the training, I want the certifications, or I wanna go down the Google rabbit hole enough and watch a zillion videos and listen to 12 podcasts about it. Right. Um, and like really get a solid foundation. And then the third line. Wants to be. The third line is the pioneer. It's like very trial and error. Okay. It's time to start experimenting with it. And so it helps us to take, get out of learning mode and into action mode. It's kind of how I see the one three working together. And so I love learning and I'm like, I don't even know how many hundreds of hours I've put into human design learning at this point. And. Um, how do we start to actually use this and how can I with my clients start to use this in their businesses? And the profile is a great layer of the onion to look at. It's a natural one to look at for marketing. Um, and I think I've done, um, I know I've taught classes on profile for marketing, and I might have even done another podcast interview where I break down all the profiles, but it's like, we can look and see, okay. As a one three, for example, the types of marketing that work best for us are going to be anything where we can demonstrate our authority and expertise and share our journeys. So if you think about this content that resonates with people, it's like when you let your authority come through your life experience, that's what people really grab onto. And that. Yeah, go ahead. Well, I was just gonna say that's super interesting because I really found like the content that resonates with people when I create it. And I just actually had this conversation with Laura Berry yesterday. And I was like, when I try to write about something. um, from like a conversion perspective, like I just, and there's a purpose behind it. It's just like sawdust. Yeah. Right. But when I Tru create content that, that comes from a story from experience, from something that happened, it's so authentic and it's so it's so resonant. Mm-hmm and that's where the, all the creativity lives. Yeah. And that makes it different for other people. But it's like really interesting to hear you say. Absolutely. And I notice personally in my own experiment, when I show up and share, um, I often start posts with what I'm learning. Mm. And I'm like sharing some stuff I'm learning and how it's showing up in my real life. And my entire, I have a not podcast cause it's like 15, 20 minute episode. So I don't consider it a podcast it's called Lumos. And that's what I do. I just let myself show up and talk about an experience that I've had and how I see it through the lens of human design or subconscious transformation or whatever. And. That is what lands with people. Like the amount of notes that I get back when I write those types of posts or I put up a podcast with a personal story, um, because it, it that's the role that we're here to play. Like the one three is the only profile in human design. That's fully. Personally focused, both of our lines conscious and unconscious are personally focused lines, which means that we are here to really focus on ourselves and that's how we have impact on other people. So when we put ourselves and our own growth journeys and transformation and experience all of that first, that's how we. Affect others, not the other way around. So when you say, oh, well, I'm thinking about other people and like how to convert them. I mean, I think there's some other energy there. I'm not sure that will work for anyone. Cuz as soon as we're trying to get something from someone there's like, the energetics are kind of sticky, but there are other profiles who are very, what we call transpersonal focus who like six twos or five ones where. It is about the other kind of before yourself. And so they can share from that place. And it does resonate with, with people in a different way than it would if we try to do it. So, um, the profile is a great place to start when you think about marketing stuff, but I think the kind of gold from human design to start getting into practice. I know we've talked about this before, is your decision making strategy mm-hmm so each. Human design chart will let you know your strategy and authority and together that's the decision making strategy. And that's like I said, how your intuition shows up, how do you tap into your body's wisdom and stop letting your mind try and run the show? Because our minds are super great at researching and thinking of different like arguments and opinions and like gathering information. And they're really, really not good at making decisions. Like that's where we start. Spin. We get mind drama.

00 AM, like rehashing the decision we made three years ago, wondering whether or not we should have made a different decision. And our body kind of allows us to tap into the subconscious wisdom that we have the, the kind of wisdom out there in the world. Like all of these variables that are minds computer, literally can't physically consciously hold. And so when we tap into our intuition, um, we might not always know why. Were being led to say yes or no, or to do this thing or not do this thing, but that's what is correct for us. Right? And so we can just start playing with decision making strategy and human design already. You're gonna see things start to get more satisfying, more successful, have more peace, have more delight in your life. And, and that doesn't require understanding all the numbers or planets or lines or colors that are going on in your human design chart. So that's where I. Let's start. Yeah. So let's go, let's like take just a, a micro step back. Yeah. For, for people who are listening. Are not at all familiar with human design yet. Mm-hmm but maybe familiar with like there's personality tests. And there are, you know, quizzes, you can take that, give you some answer, which I actually think are like, there's quite a few that I like for me. Helpful. Yeah. Yeah. Strengths finder, Clifton strength. Like I find that one to be extremely helpful because it's, it's a little bit different than like, who are you as a person? It's more like, what, what, what strengths do you start with? But how, like, where do you start with human? What is it based. What is it based on? Yeah. Um, so let's, let's just like work through the experience for someone who's totally new to human design. Yeah. So , as I said, I was ex extremely skeptical coming in because the base of human design, I mean, it's, it's based on a lot of kind of ancient, um, I don't, you know, what you call them technologies or wisdom systems, awareness systems, right? Um, the chakras Cabala, astrology, eing, like a lot of these kind of Eastern wisdom traditions. Underlay human design, but human design itself, um, was downloaded by the father of human design, Raha on Ibiza in the eighties in a like multi-day experience with what he calls the voice. So I know that sounds like he was high and he had some kind of experience. And then he came up with human design and that for me was like, Are you joking? when I first heard it, like really, I mean, it actually sounds kind of great. Like, I would've liked to be there too. right. But like, okay. Like I'm not exactly like the scientific side of me was like, really, like, this is, sounds like jump, like just like complete baloney. Right. And. I think the reason, I mean, that's why I dismissed it a couple of times, the first few times it, it crossed my path, but the reason, like what kind of got me to come back around to, it was like, okay, but when you're looking at this thing and it's combined all of these different traditions and they have this new way of looking at things and you start to see, you know, how the chart is put together and you know, what is based on, like it's quite, um, complex and I'm. I just can't see someone coming up with it in their, just out of their head, like in, in the span of two days. Um, so it's possible that he had some kind of other worldly experience, you know, there's, there are things that happen. There's things we can't understand. And, um, The, the tipping point for me was that human design, as I said, is really framed as your own experiment. And you're invited into your experiment and no one's saying, at least he wasn't and I don't, um, say this is religion or law, or like the only way to look at it or think about it. It's like here's an awareness system. Here's some things that might be helpful. Here's how your intuition shows up, how you're made to operate in the world and make decisions. Try it experiment with it. See what works for you. And if it doesn't resonate, if it doesn't work for you, great, like throw it out. Like I'm not gonna be offended. he's, he's passed now. So he's not gonna be offended, but he wouldn't have been, I mean, he's just, he was doing his own thing and there are so many people that have had human design be, become so helpful for them personally that I've worked with. But also just out there in the world, you can hear people talking about it now that I think there's something there just. Strengths finder Myers, Briggs, or any Agram or any of these other systems where it does help people to be more aware of who they are and, and like step in and give them permission to show up in the way that they wanna show up and live the way that they wanna live. And so for me, it's useful. Um, even if I can't say I a hundred percent know the science behind it or that this thing isn't completely made up, maybe it. I still think it's useful, but here's, here's how I look at these things kinds of things, right? Like I, I think every one of these tools. It's called them. Mm-hmm has some piece of information that's useful to you, right? Yeah. And I sort of look at it the same way I went on this journey around spirituality. Right. I'm not a religious person. Um, but I, I also am, am like aware enough to recognize that there's something else going on that we're not, we don't know yet. Right? Like we're, there's something else that is more than us. And so I went on a journey of learning about all of the different. Spirituality modes that I thought might be interesting. And I think what, you know, what really resonated for me was. You know, the yoga Sutra. And so I pulled a bunch of stuff from there, but what I did is I hired somebody to just be like, educate me, educate me on all the different pieces. So I think like, whether it's, we don't need to prescribe to one, no, say this is my thing. Yeah. I think that you can pull so much good information from all of these different modes to piece together, a better understanding and awareness of yourself. And from there, it's a very powerful position to be. Exactly. Yeah, because it's really about, for me, like the human design is here to empower you. And there are definitely times where I hear some people speaking about human design and I feel like it's limiting, or it's putting people into some sort of box. And for me, that's not the point of the system at all. Like it's here to tell you that there is no box. Like everybody's energy is different and. Whether or not you ever learn all the details of your chart or not is irrelevant. As you said, you get to choose what works for you. And some people might feel pulled to go deeper and go really down the rabbit hole like I did. And other people might be like, great. I've learned that I'm here to respond rather than initiate. And that's really changed how I show up in my business. And now I'm good. You know, like I'm happy for either. Yeah. And I think there are like bits and pieces that really like, I, when I did strengths finder, I learned that my number one, like no strengths in the top 10 within like the executing and the relationships when I think I won in relationships, but everything for me is in strategic and influencing. Yeah. And my number one, strength is an activator and I was. Oh, oh, this is why I'm the one who will put up my hand. You know, you go into those rooms of like people and you do an exercise. And then someone says, okay, who wants to share? And everyone it's like a rule. Everyone just sits there and looks around the room. Like I, yeah. And I'm like, I'll go . Yeah. And I used to have this story that I was just a narcissist or I was like, I wanted the attention, but what I really wanted to do was just like, get things started. Like I hated sitting around watching everybody just kind of go, oh, oh, oh, you know, and I'm like, can we just go? Right. Yeah. So that was really good information for me. And I think that like pulling all the other pieces, I know that there's been a lot of interesting stuff from human design around how. How we move forward with things. And I think that was one of the things that, that really struck me, but I really haven't gone deep enough into it, to know where all the other gems are, but the place you start is your birth chart. Right? Uh, yeah, I mean, you can pull, like you said, like I said, you can pull your human design chart for free on my body graph.com and it will, you know, there's a, it looking at the chart. It can be a little overwhelming, but in the information pain, it will tell you your type and your one of five types. Okay. Um, manifesting generator and generators are the most common type. So 70% of the world are either a generator or manifesting generator. And those are you and I are both manifesting generators. We're here to build and create, and especially manifesting generators are here to do it efficiently. We like to skip steps. we like to pivot and change it up. We have like a lot generators and manifesting generators have this SAC defined SAC role in human design, which. The centers and it's a motor to do and build that regenerates every night. When we sleep restfully, the next day we wake up and we have more energy to build and create and do so most of the world is here doing that. The other 30% of the world are non-SEC types. Um, 21% of that are refl or. Projectors, which are the advisors of the world. And projectors are really, really good at seeing deeply through problems. How systems can be put together the right questions to ask how to guide energy, especially how to guide SAC energy while we're busy building and doing what we might be, not be seeing the big picture that they do. Um, and they're like the architect kind of in the project. If we're the builders, they're the architects and, and then 9%. Uh, of the world are manifestors, which are the innovators. They're really here to have impact and kind of really be here to do their own thing and just make it happen. They're the only type that are not waiting for something. They are doing it. If they're not doing it, it's not happening for them. Um, they have to make it happen. Um, and they have the energy for that. And then, um, the last 1% are reflectors and reflectors are completely undefined. So your charts completely, all the centers are white and that gives you. Mm, a very special place in that. You can really sense all the energy of other people and you act as a mirror. So you're here to evaluate how things are going and like how healthy is the, the business, the community, the group that you're in the family, like you are the mirror, um, for the rest of us. And so each of the types is here to play our role in our way. And just understanding your type can give you a lot of permission. I can't tell you the amount of projectors I've sat. Across from and explained that they're a projector and that they're not here to be stake and do all the doing and like work, work, work like generator types. And they're like, what? I just felt lazy my whole life. Like, you just changed my life by telling me that it's not my fault and I'm not broken, you know? And that's incredible to like, you know, realize that for 30, 40, 50 years they might have been feeling like something was missing for them. When in fact nothing was wrong, like they have a different role. They have a different way that their energy works and that it's okay for them to care for it in that way. Um, so there are five types and then under type is strategy. And that will tell you for your type, what is your strategy, which is the first piece of your decision making strategy. And so for generators and manifesting generators, it's always to respond. And that means. We aren't here to make it happen, despite what we've been conditioned, despite what society's told us about, just do it. like we're not manifests. And so in order to know what, what we want to build, what we want to create, we need our gut to respond and to know, oh, aha. I'm really excited. I wanna do that thing. I wanna help. I wanna make this business or, uh, like I do not want to be part of. I don't have the energy for it, or it doesn't interest me. It doesn't light me up. And our gut only works when we're responding to something outside of ourselves. Like we can respond to anything, like I can smell coffee and feel that like, mm Uhha. Like, I want that or see a billboard and have a gut response to it. But I can't respond to just like random ideas that fall into my head while I'm having a shower. I, I, you can't feel my gut at that point. So when I initiate on those random ideas that fall in my head, one pound a shower, that's when I get into frustration because I didn't wait to see if it was correct. And since 70% of the world have this strategy, if you're listening and this is you, and you're like, how do I know the difference between responding or, or initiating the very first episode on my podcast, not podcast. Lumos is called my shelf and I go into like a whole description of like this. That I use that can be really helpful for that. And then, so you understand your type and strategy before you even have to go any deeper in your chart, and that will help you already to those, the, those two things will help already. And then you go down a couple of lines in the description and it will tell you your authority. And that's the second piece of your decision making strategy. And this is really how your inner wisdom. Shows up. Okay. And for generators and manifesting generators, it's one of two authorities. It's either SAC authority. So it's your. In the moment, Uhhuh Uhuh, or it's emotional authority, which is what you have Stephanie and 50% of the world have emotional authority. And it just means that you have a defined emotional solar plexus, which is the, if you're looking at your home design chart on the right side, there's a brown triangle. That's the emotional solar plexus. If it's colored in, you have emotional authority. And the reason that you have, um, that the emotional authority kind of supersedes your gut response, or like, kind of is working together is. You have this defined emotional wave it's chemical. Some days you probably wake up in a really good mood. You have energy. It's like you're wearing rose colored glasses. Everything is up. You're happy. Some days you might feel blue, you have less energy. You wanna be left alone. you're in your melancholy a little bit. And riding that emotional wave in order to know when something is correct for you is important for you to kind of sleep on it and not make a spontaneous decision because. What can happen is when you're super excited, you say yes to going out this weekend and then the weekend comes and you're like, I am not excited about going out this weekend. Why did I say yes to that? And I regret it, or the flip, like if you're in kind of a blue mood, which can happen, you say, no, I don't wanna be part of that summit. I don't have the energy for that right now. And then two or three days later, you're like, oh, actually, I really think I did wanna do that. Like now I'm feeling like I regret saying no. And it's literally like allowing yourself to just feel the emotional up and down for a little while on a decision and come to something that resembles 70 to 80% clear. Like there's no huge emotional charge around a decision. And then you can trust, you know, your gut in that moment to, to guide you. So understanding those three things type strategy and authority. Is where I would start. If somebody wants to get, get going into their human design. Just so interesting because when, like I have known myself to be like a quick decision maker and I'm like, I collect all the information and, and very quickly, and then I'm like, I know what this needs to be. And I usually just kind of stay stick with it. But I do know that there have been times where I'm like, Ooh, I did that too quickly, or what have you. So it's really interesting for you to say that and to hear that, because I think it's like very contrary to what I sort of consider. Right. So I think to speak, you know, we, we often say to emotional authorities, uh, you need to sleep on it and it's a good hack in the beginning because it helps you to push pause and to not make decisions in the moment because spontaneous decisions can be incorrect for you. And it's more nuanced than that. Like, as you get to know yourself better, if it's a decision that doesn't have emotional involvement, you're not super excited. You're not super like, uh, like there's no charge. Like Stephanie, do you wanna have pizza for dinner tonight? Like you don't need to sleep on it. Like you're like, no, I don't. I don't like pizza okay, great. But like, you don't need to sleep on that because there's not there's no, there's no emotional urgency. Okay. So like making a decision like that in the moment and trusting your gut is correct, but if it's a bigger thing, That has more emotional baggage around it. Then that's a great time, especially if you're negotiating something. If there's, uh, like money involved, that's a, the great time to be like, actually I just really need to sleep on this. And I just need to go through my process. And one of my emotional authority, friends, Jess, she often describes this for me. Uh, you know, I'm in the high of the decision and I'm super excited and I'm really excited. And then I go down into the low and I'm thinking about all the reasons why I might not want to do it and why, you know, it's not a great idea. And then I kind of come out and like eventually get to this sort of place where the ocean has calmed down. There's no giant swells anymore. And you're. you get to clarity. So that's what, that's what waiting for clarity can look like. Yeah. So, so here's the big million dollar question, right? Yeah. And this is the first thing, and I, I know that there will be people who ask the same question. The first thing that came to my mind, when I, when you first introduced me to human design, I was like, how is. My birth time, place chart, relevant. Like how can you know any of this stuff? Because there could be somebody born at the same time, in the same place as me. Who's a very different person. Yes. So because it's underpinned on astrology, that's why your birth time is relevant. Just like you get an astrological natal chart. Okay. If somebody's had their like looked at their as astrological chart with the houses and the planets and all of that, like all of that is underneath the human underneath human design. So that's why it's relevant as for somebody with the same exact birth time and place might be a completely different person while we are all. You know, a combination of nature versus nurture, right. And the human design chart is, um, it doesn't change. Like the one you had when you were born is the same one that you have when you die. Right. So it's just like your, your natal chart. But that, and it doesn't say, oh, you're gonna be a lawyer. And you're gonna do like, just like astrology doesn't right. It gives us the like broad strokes of your strength. The places you might have shadows the, the way that your energy is meant to like work and the way you're meant to show up. And there's always room for the, what we call conditioning in human design. So like the influences of your family, of origin, of society, of all of the culture of all of that stuff, that shapes who you are and how this energy shows up and expresses itself. And, and also there's a, a level of. How much in alignment are you with this energy? Because we all know that we can get pulled away from what feels true and what, what lights us up, what satisfies us. And we can look like completely, you know, there are projectors out there who are working like manifesting generators or generators, but the problem is, is after five or 10 years and they get completely burnt out. And so what looks like. Might be correct for somebody with sacral energy might not be correct for, with somebody who, who doesn't have that energy. And so. Figuring out, like all of those external influences play a role on how we show up and you know, what we do with the energy we've been given. So interesting because like, like I just said, you always take something out of everything in what you just said. I don't think we ever got to this level of the conversation before, but. Um, I've always beat myself up for not being the ideas person mm-hmm and the one who comes up with the new innovations and that sort of thing, because I really value innovation and I did all my post-grad work and innovation management. And so it's like a, it's like a, a thing I love to study. And I wish I was that person who was always innovating, but I'm like Microsoft. in terms of like the software world mm-hmm they are, they do a really good job of being fast followers and they take an innovation and they, they turn it into something bigger and, and profitable and that sort of thing. Cuz they have the resources to do that. And I've found that I've always been the person who can take like the raw idea and then run with it. And so that response, as opposed to like, can I give myself a break for not being. The a manifestor yeah. The, the manifestor the ideas person. Yeah. And know that there's a lot of value and it's really aligned for me to be able to listen to someone's idea and say, this is how we execute on that. This is how we build that. This is the, I can still be strategic. Yeah. Which I love to do. Yeah. But I also wanna show them how to make that happen, right? Yes. So that's really interesting to hear you say so we know we know all the information about ourselves. We've done the, the chart. We understand all of this. Now what's curious to me is that you went. Further, and I know you and you're like, okay, let me go straight into this. Yeah. Obviously you've been doing a bunch of research. You've been doing a bunch of education. You've really kind of gotten into this and now you've developed out these other practices around breathwork around transformation. Like what, where did that come from? Yeah, so, because I'm a one, three, and I'm really here about like my experiences, how I impact others. Um, those were. Just things that those were tools that were really helpful to me. Like I got into human design for myself in the beginning, cuz I was like, this is interesting something here's pulling me in. I'm gonna start experimenting with it. It's giving me a framework for how to hear my intuition for the first time in my life. Um, and, and then people started asking me questions about it and that's how I got deeper in that rabbit hole. Um, I was with breathwork specifically, I was in. um, in Bali, on a retreat, literally the week before the pandemic started, it was my first, um, vacation without kids, like since before I becoming a mom. So it was like five years then my husband and I had knock gone away. We went away for a week together and then I stayed for a retreat, um, with my coach, Laura Hassan, and she, um, brought in a breathwork a local breathwork practitioner, um, to the retreat in Bali and the. It was like a full outed body experience. I'd never, I had never even heard of breathwork again, it's another one of those things where. I think people are talking about it more and more now, but two, two years ago, I had never even heard of it. Um, I'd never done anything like it before and lying down and just following the breathing pattern, there was music and I was having an outof body experience and I was like crying at one point and laughing at another point. And like, all the people around me were also having the same experience, but private, like we were all, you know, in our own, like our eyes covered and all that. So you're just, it was a really strange. Powerful experience. And I was like, okay, I don't know what this is, but I'm really interested in it. And I think I wanna do more of it. And then I landed back in France, in lockdown, literally like it, me hall, the president of France announced the lockdown as I was flying home from Bali. And suddenly we, my husband and I were home in our thousand square foot apartment, downtown Bordeaux with a five year old and two year old. For three months, like 24 7. And you weren't even the lockdown, there was like, you couldn't even leave your house except for like an hour a day. And you had to be within a one kilometer radius. And like we had small children and it was just like, the whole thing was like, It one of the hardest moment periods of my life. And I do not think that I would have come out of it with my mental health intact. Had I not been doing breathwork almost daily. I, it was such a powerful tool for my own like emotional processing and my own mental health. Um, That I was, I was doing it almost daily during lockdown. It became like part of my, like necessity of my energy routine in order to like dis you know, in order to just be present with this intense experience of being locked in my house with my children for so long and not being able to work and build and create. And my husband was also struggling with the same thing and he loves his work too, and he wasn't able to go to his lab and, you know, do science either. And so we were, you know, it was a, it was a pressure cooker and breathwork really helped. And so after I got out of that experience, I started to get pulled towards becoming a facilitator. And again, like in my manifesting generator process, I had no idea like how this was gonna fit in with my work. But I was like, I don't know. I'm like somebody like he's offering a training and he was recommended by somebody at Jay Bradley from breathe on. It is who I trained with. And I signed up for the training to do it. And as I was going through my training in one of my own breathwork sessions, during the training, the idea to use a human design chart, In a breathwork session kind of dropped in at the end of the session. Like the meditation portion, always I'm getting downloads. It's like the best feeling ever at the end of breathwork. And I was like, okay, I wanna experiment with this cuz like yeah, human design chart, when you know how to read it, like you can read. People's energy from it. And like, what are the types of things they might be struggling with? What are the things that they're really good at doing? And how can, like, we weave that into a breathwork session for them. And I, I did like 10 practice sessions with, um, like friends and colleagues and the, the experiences people were having was, were really powerful and I really enjoyed doing them. And so it started to. Part of the work that I do was like, okay, breathwork by design. Like, I'm gonna look at your chart. We're gonna do a breathwork session. I'm gonna do like, you know, affirmations or meditation using your energy at the end of the, at the end of the session. And that was amazing. And subconscious transformation was a similar story. Um, Laura, the coach that I went to Bali with, uh, she started bringing it into her work and it was really powerful for me to let go. Like our subconscious has. You know, in charge, in charge of so much in our brains that we just don't even realize how much, because 96% of our brain is subconscious. And so when we've got old, a patterns or identities that consciously coaching ourselves, isn't working, like I love thought work. I love the model, but like there's limits to how much it can change for us. And subconscious transformation helped me to release, um, things that I had been struggling with for a long time. And. I was like, okay, I don't know. I wanna learn more about this. I wanna know how to share it with people. And again, it's like human design. We we've been talking about conditioning and we can see that in the chart. Like how, how much is your not self pulling you away from who you really are? What types of conditioning are not being or not helpful to you embodying the full alignment or the full energy of who you are. And can we use subconscious transformation to let go of some of. So that we can really be in our energy so that we can trust ourselves. Right. And so all of these pieces are just like parts of my journey that I was drawn to like bring into the work that I do. And up until now, they've been kind of siloed. I mean, I've been using human design as kind of the, the weave through all of it, but the three pieces of it now, like human design and well, four pieces, cuz there's all the marketing and copywriting work that I still love to do. And, um, And subconscious transformation and breathwork, um, they're all coming together for me in a kind of, I guess, coaching umbrella. So like all, when I, when I, when a client works with me, I get to show up and choose from this toolbox of like, what's going to support them most on my goal in the, in our goal altogether of working, uh, towards how can you trust yourself more? How can you be in more in tune with your own. Wisdom. Um, and these are just tools to help you get there. I think that this year, for whatever reason has been an absolute, like transformation for me in terms of understanding how much that underlay. That is is important. And I know that, you know, I'm a very practical tactical person and, and, you know, strategic, but also five years ago, I would've like this. Wouldn't have, it might have been a curiosity or an sort of interesting, but I would never have connected how important this piece is, because what I'm realizing now, and this whole journey has been really interesting is that this, this soft underbelly, right? Like this. Piece of us. Mm-hmm is so critical to the success of our businesses. Oh my God. Yes. Like just layering on all of the, the frameworks. The, the tactics is not enough. No, it's just not. And it, it like, you can get. You can have everything strategically in place and still not be able to move forward, because this is me, right. Because I have not uncovered and unpacked what's underneath. Right. Mm-hmm and I don't, you know, without knowing truly knowing yourself from that perspective. Yeah. So I think this is like, what you've created is so fascinating to me and, and like really, really needed. And I. People on their evolution are gonna eventually come to this place where they know that this work has to be done alongside yeah. Strategic work, the tactical work, the like architecture work, so to speak. And those two, that combination of those two is really where we're going. Right. I think that, I mean, this has always been true, I think, but I also think that it's even more true today and it will be more true. Tomorrow and into the future because we are all becoming much more discerning than ever before. Mm-hmm, our own internal bullshit meters. And also just like energy feeling like, what is your energy really underneath this? Like, are you actually really lit up and satisfied or are you putting on an act? Are you posturing in or are you coming from somewhere authentic? Like we, even if people are doing this unconsciously or subconsciously without even realizing. People are getting really good at that. And, and your energy makes like 80% of the difference. Like the amount of people who I've seen, you can tell, like, I know them, they're in alignment, they're in their energy and they don't have. Professional sales page or they don't have, you know, they don't like their business structure is like com could be scaffolded and they could make more money, but they're already making lots of money because people feel it and they feel their energy. And the flip side is also true. The per you know, there can be people out there that have all exactly, as you said, all the tactics and strategies and the like beautiful website and all that. And they're just struggling because something hasn't clicked yet and people feel it and they're like, Mmm. I don't know what it is, but I just, yeah. And so that discernment, I think we're all getting like, that's turning up, um, around the world right now. And so getting our own energy into a place where we feel like we're a hundred percent behind. Um, what we're doing is really important. I absolutely agree. And I think that the missing piece there is that we can, we can collect all the information, but without someone like yourself to sort of facilitate that and interpret and give us that like download, I mean, it, it, it can be a little bit like a, I mean, I think there's 1,000,001 ways to do. And there are people out there doing it in so many different ways, right? Like the people who need my medicine, right. What I do are gonna be attracted to my energy and they're gonna be my clients and people who need it in a different way are gonna get it from somebody else. And there is so many different ways to come at it. And I think that's what's, um, it what's important is that you. Deeply at yourself and your own, like if you had to really be honest with yourself, like how satisfying, if you're a generator manifesting generator, like how satisfied are you in your business? How frustrated are you? Cause those are our red light green light feelings. Like if you're spending a shit ton of your time, frustrated. You are leaking energy and something is out of alignment. Mm-hmm so like, we need to, you know, we need to go in there and figure out what that is before you layer on the, a new photo shoot or a new website. Yeah. Or a new sales funnel or some Facebook ads, because all of that is not gonna work when it's being built on frustration. Yeah. Oh, a hundred percent. A hundred percent. And so who, who are those ideal clients that you wanna work with? Like who are the, who are the ones who are gonna be attracted to. Um, , this is really fun as a manifesting generator because things are always transforming. And I really feel like people just it's usually people are like, I just resonated with some piece of your story, or I could see myself in you in you, which I think is a one, three is normal. Um, but generally it tends to be, um, really. Driven passionate women business owners, for the most part. Um, especially if they've also been in a place where they felt like they were overthinking all of the things like you're so smart and you've been rewarded for being so smart your whole life. You've been rewarded for being the good student because when we're the good student and when we've been rewarded for the smart. Way that we show up. We kind of start to put teachers and mentors and authority figures on this like pedestal. And we get away from trusting ourselves and our inner knowing and, uh, and knowing what, what our intuition is and how we wanna show up. So generally those are the clients that seem to end up in my world and, um, I, I think it's the manifesting generator ness and my love of pivots, but people send, people seem to end up in my world when they know they're ready for some big change. Yeah. Or they might even not realize that they're ready, but then they end up there and then some big change comes through. So, um, that's what they have in common most of most often. And, and like last question, but how are you finding them? Like, are they finding you, how are you becoming known to them? That's a great question. I. Generally I'm showing up and sharing my story. I mostly show up on Instagram. That's my favorite place to be. I've met. I would say probably almost all of my clients through social media or through connections through social media. Um, I have a lot of fourth lines in my chart. Um, so those of you who are fourth lines out there, your networker type people. And so, you know, somebody who knows somebody, that sort of thing. Um, and so I have connections with people and they have connections with people and I end up on podcasts like this, or, um, speaking to other people's groups. So I get invited quite a bit by. Friends and colleagues to, oh, can you come to my mastermind and do everybody's human design chart in a, in a group or that sort of a thing. So that's right. Um, been another kind of source of clients, um, for me. So generally yeah. I'm showing up and sharing and the people who, who are attracted to my message, end up in my, on my calendar. I love it. Okay. I have one question that I ask everyone yes. In the whole flavor of this show. And I know you're gonna have some really good things to say about this. Um, what's the difference between what we hear out in the business world, online business, world, business world, and what's real in business. What's like the biggest thing that comes to mind for you. I mean, it sounds like a cliche at this point, but like there, isn't only one way to do it. Mm-hmm , you know, we, I, I think, especially in the online business space in the early days when I first was like, oh my God, I could have an online business. Like I went through B school, Marie Forio brought like a whole generation of women into the online business space and that's. Amazing. And at that time, people were like, well, that's the only way to be successful. Like I want my website to look like her. I wanna be like her. I wanna have a YouTube show. Like all, you know, all of it, because that was the way to be successful. And I think the more we can pull away from that it's happening more and more every day. But the more that we can pull away from that, like that was the way for her to be successful. That's right in her. Right. So like, how can we figure out what works for us and what is gonna feel the most satisfying? What's gonna feel the most successful for us, um, in our businesses. And how do we get back to that? Yeah, I think, yeah, I, I, I mean, you know, I agree with this. So the foundation of everything that I do, I'm a business model designer and we. We have to build business models that are very specific and personalized to us. Mm-hmm where it just doesn't work. Right. Yeah. And I think in the early days that sort of prescriptive guidance was really helpful, right. It like, if you don't know where, what, where to start at all. Exactly. Here's, here's like, here's something to do and then going. Yeah, and then we, we need to evolve from there. So I love that you're, you know, everything that you're doing is very much part of that evolution. Okay. So we are running out time. I really appreciate the time you've spent with me. You know, we could talk for like two more hours, but I'm sure we could, we have in the past. So , can you tell people what the best places to find you and we'll put all your links in the show notes as. Amazing. Um, you can go to Jackie johnstone.ca/more, and there's a whole like set of links there. My website is Jackie johnstone.ca I'm on Instagram at Jackie Johnstone. Awesome. We'll put all those links in there, but I'm sure that people will be going out to find you pretty quickly, cuz this feels like the time that we need what you're offering. For sure. Um, I can't wait. yeah. I love introducing people to human design. okay. So we're gonna wrap up. Um, thank you so much for your time and for the chat today. I'm so happy. We had the opportunity to talk to Jackie today to hear more about how her business came to be her experiences along the way. What the future of her business entails. And I think that is going to be very creative and I would watch this space to see what evolves. Thank you for tuning into this episode of the real people, real business show, where we get real entrepreneurial stories and journeys that you can relate to the show notes, resources and special offers from this episode are available. On my website and social media platforms. If you've enjoyed today's content, I would love for you to give us a review on whatever platform you're on to help us share these genuine stories with an even bigger audience until next time, keep building, keep dreaming and keep being real.