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In this episode, Diahana Barnes joins me to talk about your Divine Swagger and having total confidence in not just the physical you, but the spiritual you.
Confidence in your spiritual self means, it’s just like this unwavering trust, really, right? It’s knowing, okay, here’s a good way: I believe you have a dream inside. Everybody has this little dream, this desire, this something. It’s what drives you. It’s why you do what you do. That’s your spiritual self-talking to you. You have to trust it so wholeheartedly that nothing else matters. It’s like this tunnel vision.
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Hello and welcome to today’s episode of Retreat and Grow Rich the podcast. This is Darla LeDoux. I am the author of the book, Retreat and Grow Rich, and obviously your host of this podcast. I’m so excited to be here today with the fabulous and beautiful Diahana Barnes. Hi, Diahana, welcome.
Diahana Barnes: Hi, yay!
Darla LeDoux: Diahana is amazing and I’ve had the pleasure of getting to know her over the last couple of years. I’m going to start with her bio and then we’ll reconnect a little bit, because it’s been a little while since I’ve spoken to you.
Diahana is an award-winning training, speaker, author, and spiritual business coach who has owned her own six-figure coaching and online business since 2006. Her mission is to help 10,000 coaches, healers, and heart-centered entrepreneurs easily attract clients and become the harmonious CEO of their business.
After juggling a demanding corporate job, leading to multi-million dollar sales teams, she left because she saw precious time with her kids slipping by while she worked too much, and too hard, and finally said, “enough.”
In just one and a half years of leaving, and fully embracing her own spiritual gifts and purpose as a coach and healer, she has a rock solid business where clients “drop” in her lap and achieve their own success quickly and easily. Her unique gift is healing what’s going wrong in your business. She gives CEO minded entrepreneurial women a step by step harmony process so that they can have total business Zen around manifesting money and attracting clients.
Welcome, Diahana. Thanks so much for being here. I just want to start with, what’s exciting in your world right now?
Diahana Barnes: Yay. Thank you so much for having me, super excited. I’ve been looking forward to being with you in this way for a long time. So what’s exciting? Everything is exciting, honestly. I know that sounds so goofy. Everything is exciting. I have a lot that I’m working on. I have a mastermind that’s launching in May, and just really loving being in this world and sharing myself with others in the highest way I possibly can. I find that thrilling every day.
Darla LeDoux: Amazing. Well I’m excited to hear more and have you share your secrets. I happened to be there as you were developing a lot of your initial work, and content in this area, I know how juicy it is, and how good it is. I just really encourage folks to get your pen and paper out because I know you’re going to want to take notes here.
Diahana, let’s go back a little bit and tell people how you become, you know, I talked a little bit about it in your bio, but how you became so passionate about this work of harmony for entrepreneurs.
Diahana Barnes: Sure. So, I’m going to tell a little story, actually, because I think it’s interesting and fun, and may resonate with people.
Darla LeDoux: Yes.
Diahana Barnes: This is why I do what I do. Yes, you told part of my story, but I’m going to actually go back to the very beginning, because I believe- and this is all over everything I talk about, right- I believe you’re a CEO. I believe all of us, we are the harmonious CEOs of our business- and you talk about this too a little bit in your work- and that, everything we do can be Zen, right? Everything can be perfectly aligned.
It started way back when, right? When I was about, we’ll call it eight years old, I don’t remember exactly. It doesn’t matter. My parents- so my dad had a corporate job- my mom, my parents decided, my mom would open up a furniture store.
She was what I think of, like, she was an entrepreneur before we even knew what the word was, right? She had this amazing store. She grew it. She connected with people. She was a boss, right? She was a female boss. And I loved that dynamic. I loved it and she was the spiritual one in the family and my dad was the practical one. And I’m both.
It’s so funny because I look back and she was so amazing in that store, and the way she connected with people, and how she grew that business. What I watched happen was my dad would come in, love him to death, right? Love him, but this is all he knew. He’d come in. I call it like a tornado. He’d bring in his business sense, and he’d bring in his practicalness, and he’d, you know, tell her what she needed to do on a Saturday, and then he’d twirl out and go back to his corporate job.
I watched my mom, the spiritual woman who was growing this amazing business, like kind of acquiesce to that. She would kind of give into it, and listen to the practical. So I grew up, I was very spiritual and I talk about this a lot, you know, manifesting money at a very young age, and then I became this practical woman. I went into the corporate world, ran million dollar sales teams. Blah, blah, blah.
And then, finally came to that point in my life where I’m like, oh my gosh, I can’t do this anymore, right? I have to honor the spiritual side of me. And so that’s why I’m so passionate about it, because what happened for me was once I married the two, and really, I’m going to say, more importantly, followed the spiritual style- which is what you helped me really step into more than anything- that’s when clients literally fell into my lap. That’s when I would get, you know, people would call me, and want to work with me.
Before then, I was the business person always trying to manipulate. I call it manipulate my business and manipulate my results. It wasn’t until I let that go that … I just do, I call it a business miracle, or that’s when magic happens. Now, I’m like, that’s my calling. That’s who I am. That’s what I teach. Everyone has that. You all have that.
Darla LeDoux: I want to go back to that visual, and I love the way you did this tornado with your hands, you know, your mom having this Zen store and dad coming in with this kind of swirly energy. It made me immediately have a visceral reaction, right, because we feel people’s’ energy more than anything.
I’m in an experience about this right now actually in my own life, around being able to observe the energy, even though logically, all of the things are great. It’s kind of like, I’ve worked with a lot of clients who have been in this place where they’re like, you know, my partner is so nice, and everybody loves this person, and they’re amazing, but yet, they’re not necessarily energetically harmonious for the person.
They might be the nicest person in the world, or the most amazing person, but the energy doesn’t feel harmonious. I kind of got a visual of that when you were talking.
So what did you notice as a kid when you watched this? What decisions did you make for yourself? What did you observe and in what way does that serve you, and maybe in what ways did it limit you in the past?
Diahana Barnes: Great question. The first thing I want to say was, or say, is what I noticed is it was the highest good that my father knew. He didn’t intend to be the tornado, the disruptiveness, right?
Darla LeDoux: For sure.
Diahana Barnes: I think that’s important. I don’t know why, but I think that’s important. And in the relationship that you’re talking about too, you know, other people’s energy, you can actually affect other people’s energy too. His intention wasn’t to turn things topsy turvy. He was honoring that he knew best.
Darla LeDoux: Well you said he was coming from his corporate job, right, where there was probably a different energy and a different currency of exchange.
Diahana Barnes: Yeah. He was coming from the practical world. “Practically, this is what you do.” What I learned is, it took me years to figure this out, but what I took away from that was you follow the practical first. You’re logical, you’re practical. That’s why I went into corporate. I think a lot of us do that, right?
Darla LeDoux: Yeah.
Diahana Barnes: You want to be successful. You do that. You do this, you know, and that reaches success. What I learned, or relearned because I knew this as a child, and I think, and I let it go, was the spiritual.
Darla LeDoux: Yes.
Diahana Barnes: The spiritual is stronger and more powerful than the practical. That’s the hard-the human side of us, we have to let that go, the practical.
Darla LeDoux: I just want you to say that again. The spiritual is stronger and more, can you say that again, if you remember what you said?
Diahana Barnes: The spiritual, I don’t know what I said.
Darla LeDoux: I know you said it’s stronger than the practical.
Diahana Barnes: It’s stronger and more powerful than the practical.
Darla LeDoux: More powerful.
Diahana Barnes: Our human mind thinks, and you know, that we have to follow the practical, human steps to be successful.
Darla LeDoux: Yes.
Diahana Barnes: The spiritual mind, which is greater than our bodies, knows and when you trust that, anything is possible, right? Like, anything. That’s what I talk about. When I made the mental switch, and it took some healing work, as it does for all of us, the minute that happened, that’s when my business skyrocketed, right? That’s when my dream vision board came true in a very short…
Darla LeDoux: And when you say the minute that happened, what happened? What shifted?
Diahana Barnes: What I call it, that’s what I call divine swagger. It’s total and utter confidence. Not in your human self, again, in the spiritual. It’s an esoteric thing to talk about, but it’s very real and it’s very tangible.
Darla LeDoux: Oh, yes. I’m excited to get into that. And this is part of our series on the RICH Revolution, which is really all about making that intangible valuable, right? The soft skills that I was told in corporate, you know, tone it down. Use your techie skills if you want to get a promotion. If you want to just kind of squander yourself, then by all means, like, love our customers and be into that, but if you really want to get promoted, use your techie brain.
Diahana Barnes: I was told the same thing in corporate too.
Darla LeDoux: Really?
Diahana Barnes: My first executive, he’s like, “Diahana, don’t use your intuition.” Even though it was always right, I swear to you, it was always right. She’s like, “you’ve got to back it up with facts and figures. Facts and figures. If you want to get promoted, facts and figures.”
Darla LeDoux: Yes.
Diahana Barnes: I was like, but okay, but we’re going to hit this number, and they’re going to be like prove it.
Darla LeDoux: Yeah, and then you’ve got to go make shit up to follow it, which is fine. Someone recently in one of my retreats said that they actually had gotten the book in corporate about how to lie with statistics. That’s what it was called. You can make the numbers say whatever you want them to say anyway.
Diahana Barnes: Absolutely.
Darla LeDoux: But, it’s a lot of extra work, and time, and energy to do that. It’s interesting that you were told don’t use your intuition.
Diahana Barnes: Yeah, or use it, but don’t tell anybody and back it up with facts and figures.
Darla LeDoux: Right, right, which at least is a more reasonable piece of coaching, right? But, it does, it takes more time, whereas, we have access to what I call the RICH skills. Our right brain, which is nonlinear, which is what you’re talking about. The moment you shifted, clients drop in your lap. That’s nonlinear. It’s not like, do this, then do this, then do this, and then that will happen. Intuitive, obviously, you’re talking about connected to spirit, to source, to our inner knowing, and then heart-centered, letting that knowing lead, rather than be the logical.
I love that story that you had that experience of seeing that with your mom and dad, and then also your own journey out of corporate and into embracing your spiritual side.
Let’s introduce this idea of divine swagger, which is something you’ve coined. You have a retreat that helps people embody their divine swagger. You said it’s total and utter confidence in your spiritual self. Tell me more.
Diahana Barnes: Yeah, so I believe the number one thing, so when I work with clients or talk to anybody, it’s like the number one thing that holds people back in their business, the first one, the very first one is divine swagger. It is. It’s that confidence. It’s just really- and you talk about too- just really trusting your intuition. When you do that, you can have a lazy bee life, right, because everything falls into place.
Darla LeDoux: You said specifically, total and utter confidence in your spiritual self. I find that to be really intriguing and distinct from like “I’m confident in what I know,” or “I’m confident in my human,” you know, the way I show up as a human. What does it mean to have confidence in your spiritual self?
Diahana Barnes: Confidence in your spiritual self means, it’s just like this unwavering trust, really, right? It’s knowing, okay, here’s a good way: I believe you have a dream inside. Everybody has this little dream, this desire, this something. It’s what drives you. It’s why you do what you do. That’s your spiritual self-talking to you. You have to trust it so wholeheartedly that nothing else matters. It’s like this tunnel vision.
The way I identify it, and here’s a little, this will make it easier. If you think about little Darla, or I think about little Diahana, like when you’re small, like three, four years old, and how would you, or maybe someone you know because a lot of times we can’t do this for ourselves, we have to do it for, you know, other people have to do it for us. What one or two words would describe you? And they can only be positive and only be good.
Darla LeDoux: Are you asking me that?
Diahana Barnes: Yeah, I can ask you that, or I can share you mine, right?
Darla LeDoux: Yeah.
Diahana Barnes: I’ll give you an example. For me, when I was little, my mom would push me in the stroller. Here’s little Diahana in the stroller. People used to stop her on the street and they’d look at me and they’d be like, “Oh my gosh, your child is amazing. She’s beautiful.” They didn’t say she emanates an energy, right? They didn’t talk like that back then. They just stopped her. So my description would be charisma and love. I emanate a loving light all the time. I did it particularly as a child. Yeah, so you, you go.
Darla LeDoux: Yeah. Well, it’s interesting. I was thinking about a story that I share sometimes, the swing set story, you’ve probably heard. Whereas a kid I created this community event and we sold tickets, because there’s got to be energy exchanged. I was young. $.25 tickets to our swing set performance. What was really behind it was connection, and really seeing people, and seeing the needs that they had, that they weren’t aware of, and creating connection?
Diahana Barnes: Amazing. Love it.
Darla LeDoux: That’s the first one I think of.
Diahana Barnes: Love it.
Darla LeDoux: And then, the other is, I’ve never really thought about this, so I love this. My parents divorced when I was young. My mom was in a lot of different relationships and then eventually remarried my stepdad. And even though that experience for me left me feeling very unwanted, you know, and like I’m just being shoved everywhere, right? I was going here and going there. There wasn’t a solid place for me. I believe, in looking back, that everyone really just wanted to support me. There was something, even my stepdad, told me, “you are the reason that I’m here. You were my first born.” Like all of this. There was something there. Something there where I sold people on wanting to support me, somehow.
Diahana Barnes: So, your divine swagger, what I would call your core divine swagger or your spiritual confidence, just came out. You are connection, is what I heard. You are the reason, right? You are the reason for other people. You are support or receiving of support, but also probably giving support. That’s what I kind of mean by having unwavering confidence in who you spiritually are.
Darla LeDoux: What I hear in that Diahana, is it goes beyond, like when you first said it, that confidence in your spiritual self, I’m thinking like I will often just know, well God doesn’t make mistakes, right?
Diahana Barnes: Right.
Darla LeDoux: So, whatever is unfolding, is unfolding perfectly. I am the person to do what I’m called to do because there are no mistakes. You’re taking it, this even steps further of like a really specific energy that each person comes in with. That’s what I’m hearing.
Diahana Barnes: Yep. You’re totally right.
Darla LeDoux: Yeah.
Diahana Barnes: It’s beyond just trusting God, it’s also trusting who God created you to be, and how you be that person to execute your dream.
Darla LeDoux: That’s amazing. Okay, talk a little bit about how you do this with your clients.
Diahana Barnes: That was one way, right? I always like to go, because people struggle with this a lot. People struggle with it. It’s really hard. We’ll start with who you are as a child. A lot of times I’ll have you or ask- another great way to do it is- ask someone who loves you more than life itself to describe you, or describe you in five positive words. I did this and I asked my mom when she was still alive because she was my biggest fan on the planet. Plus, it’s confidence boosting to read amazing things about yourself from someone.
Darla LeDoux: What did your mom say? Do you remember the five words?
Diahana Barnes: I don’t remember. I have an email. I’ll have to pull it up. She wrote a lot. She wrote like a whole, as moms will.
Darla LeDoux: It was way more than five words.
Diahana Barnes: She didn’t do five words. She wrote a couple of paragraphs and I can’t remember what the paragraphs were. I do remember one of the themes was my spirituality, my unwavering spiritual ability to manifest.
Darla LeDoux: I want to ask something else. I’m going to come back to the question about clients. You’ve had this, and your mother was a very spiritual person, and you were raised in religion, and have embraced, and really owned this spiritual side of business in a way that is really steeped in the religion you were raised in, but is distinct from that. I know a lot our listeners have whatever their baggage is about religion, about spirituality, about you can’t be spiritual and make money, or like, when I go to work, I leave that out. You know, I would say if I really look back at all the clients I’ve worked with over the years, probably 70% of them had a journey to actually coming out of the closet spiritually.
Diahana Barnes: Yeah.
Darla LeDoux: You know, how did you choose to weave that in and actually put that forward in your business and in your branding? What advice would you have for someone who’s in that spot?
Diahana Barnes: The advice I have is, it goes back to what we’ve been talking about, you have honor who you spiritually are and if you don’t, or if you’re not seeing the results, that’s probably why. It’s funny you talked about coming out spiritually, I say, I “came out” on LinkedIn, because I was the corporate world, and I was terrified. I mean terrified of what my corporate colleagues would think of me and my business, the spiritual side of my business. When I finally just let it go, you know, there’s a lot of healing that goes on, there’s a lot of blocks you have to remove and just get over yourself. Get over the practical crap.
Just let it go. I wrote a post and I put it on LinkedIn and it was all about my spiritual side. It was all about, that’s when I created the Spiritual Sales Styles and how you weave it in your business. I have a big corporate client right now and I talk spiritual stuff. Not all the time, but once in a while to them. I have a couple of the ladies I was doing executive coaching with, I gave them crystals, just trusting. I’m like, they’re going to think I’m woo-woo. They’re going to think I’m out there, but do you know what? I’m going to do it because it just felt right. That’s what God told me to do. And they loved it. They friggin loved it. You just gotta do it. If God’s telling you, or Spirit, or intuition, whatever word you use, it doesn’t matter.
Darla LeDoux: It’s funny that you bring up LinkedIn because I had a whole trauma around LinkedIn when I was first starting my business that that was the place that I wanted to pretend I still had a corporate resume. And when I updated my profile, I immediately got clients, and not from LinkedIn, but just in the universe, right, because I was no longer afraid.
Diahana Barnes: Totally.
Darla LeDoux: Yeah and you help people get clients from LinkedIn. That’s part of your jam, right?
Diahana Barnes: Yeah. That the Heart-Centered Selling, if it’s aligned with your spiritual personality, yeah.
Darla LeDoux: Beautiful.
Diahana Barnes: But, yeah, it’s funny.
Darla LeDoux: Awesome.
Diahana Barnes: You just gotta do it.
Darla LeDoux: Give us a little bit about how this work has helped your clients. You know, I’m thinking how does being, owning your divine swagger and being harmonious, open up possibilities for them? Or manifest results? Maybe there’s a specific client that comes to mind.
Diahana Barnes: Yeah, well, there’s a few, actually. All the clients I work with, so some see results really quickly. I have one client, she sent a goal and manifested that goal within a week. She hit her year-end goals in a week. Like, months before the end of the year. Others, it takes longer. It just depends on where they’re at, and how much they really want it, if they’re really willing to be their spiritual selves. But, once they step into it, like I had a client, she increased her prices 50%. You know, she signed three clients in a month. I mean, it can happen as quickly or as slowly as you’re ready, really.
Darla LeDoux: Yeah. How does really understanding these gifts, the spiritual gifts, how does that help someone bring in clients? You said, you know, if something is not working, you’re probably not honoring who you spiritually are.
Diahana Barnes: I’m going to go back the confidence thing because one particular client is jumping out at me. Once she got her divine swagger right, once she really stepped into who she really was spiritually, so on the practical side, right? She was able to more than double her rates. And people were signing up. It translates into the practical confidence. She owned it. She knew how amazing what she did was, but she was insecure, and she got that security, and that confidence on the practical side. She’s like, oh, yeah, I’m amazing. Oh, yeah.
Darla LeDoux: How did she get that? How did she get the confidence and security?
Diahana Barnes: It’s a process. You start with where you spiritually are. You remove blocks or hidden fears. You do some deep healing work, which I know you do too. And then, you come out the other side a different person. And you choose. You have to choose to be that new person, and practice being that new person. Wake up in the morning and be like, okay, am I going to freak out, or am I going to live abundantly?
Darla LeDoux: Yes. I think it’s interesting. You know, I went to school for engineering, and so we learned how to design processes, and you would draw like a box, and what goes in the box, and what comes out the box. And then what happens in the box is a whole different thing. There’s a whole process, or a piece of equipment, or whatever, that this chemical’s transforming in the box. That’s what it made me think of. It’s like you go in one way, you come out another way. What happens in the box is a process, but like it’s challenging to describe, right?
Diahana Barnes: Well, it’s funny because I have that. I have a formula when I talk to people about it. It’s like okay, you have divine swagger, it’s like a mathematical formula, you have divine swagger, which is total spiritual confidence, plus, removing fear, healing blocks, right? That gets all your crap, your human crap out of the way, plus your heart-centered sales and marketing strategy. The one that is perfect for you. Like yours is a podcast, and a book, and different. Mine is LinkedIn and a few other things. That equals that harmonious CEO. That’s when clients literally fall in your lap.
That’s when, like, I can drop everything and go to my daughter’s volleyball game and not worry about how I’m going to pay the bills, or look at, you know, we can take them to Seattle for spring break, and not look at the price tag, right? It’s irrelevant because I know.
Darla LeDoux: You just know.
Diahana Barnes: You just know.
Darla LeDoux: That’s awesome.
Diahana Barnes: You just know. I know you know.
Darla LeDoux: I love it. Yes. So tell me- the word that keeps coming up, and I think this is a great conversation for you and I to have, is healing- and that’s a piece of what you said in your formula. This is something that’s come through for me a lot. When you talked about my formula being the podcast, I’m sitting here going, yeah, my formula is the podcast, because I’ve not been doing it that long. I actually, I don’t know if you noticed, but I discontinued my newsletter. I stopped writing and I’m focusing all my energy into the podcast. The reason I’m doing that is intuition. I was sitting with my soul, my soul showed up, and she showed up in the form of Katy Perry.
Katy Perry, wearing all white with her blonde hair, and she handed me a microphone. I was like, what is this for? I really got that I was meant to start a podcast. So I started the podcast without really a plan, per se, right? Like a linear plan like I would normally have.
But one of the messages that I’ve been getting since, so often, is about my voice and the healing properties of speaking. The reason I’m bringing that up is I know you have various magic ways of healing to where you even did a video sequence about sales, and people watched the videos and healed physical ailments from watching videos about sales.
I just want people to get that. People watched Diahana’s sales videos and their back pain when away. Okay, like long-standing chronic back pain. I don’t necessarily have a specific place I’m going with the question, but I’m just curious, how does healing play a role in the way that you work?
Diahana Barnes: Healing plays, it’s a big role. So, like with my clients, we might have a coaching call, but we also will have a healing session. They go and in hand because there’s human, mortal healing stuff that we have to work through to get the results. Myself included too. It’s not always things you can see for yourself. Sometimes you need someone else’s intuitive perspective to help. Yeah, I learned that, not the hard way, but it was just learning to realize that I can’t do it always all by myself, sometimes you have to turn to someone else to help you.
Darla LeDoux: Yeah, yeah. So, even if you are a healer …
Diahana Barnes: And I was a healer.
Darla LeDoux: Yes.
Diahana Barnes: Yeah.
Darla LeDoux: Reaching outside of yourself for healing. Yeah, and when you do a healing session with someone, how is that different from the coaching session, or what do you notice?
Diahana Barnes: The healing session is totally different because when I do them, I actually don’t do them in person. We don’t talk. I do the healing work separate. We’ll talk first and then I’ll do the healing work, and then I’ll send a recording, or a written, it just really depends. And then, I’ll teach people how to do healing work for themselves too. Us, the two combined, can be really powerful.
Darla LeDoux: Beautiful.
Diahana Barnes: It’s all, yeah. It’s all about healing the human. You know, like gremlins, the mortal mind. There’s different words that I used to describe. There’s different types too.
Darla LeDoux: Yeah. Say more about that. I feel like I’m asking you a lot of questions of things that you just do like so naturally that you don’t even talk about them, you just do them.
Diahana Barnes: I talk about there’s three kinds of, I’ll call them blocks, or areas of healing. The first one is what I call an “emotional error.” If you’re not seeing success in your business, or life, or whatever, the first thing, one of the things you can look at is, is there an emotional error in your life?
Emotional error is hate, fear, I want to say insecurity, but that’s not the right word, but you know. Trepidation, that would be an emotional error. If you have something in your life that’s causing you a physical, usually, it’s physical, emotional reaction that’s negative, that’s an emotional error. It can be blocking you from clients.
I believe, right, just picture all these clients, all this money swirling around you just dying to come to you because you’re so amazing, because you are connection- I’ll use you as an example. But you have this fear, or this block, or this right? You don’t want to come out on LinkedIn, whatever it is, keeping them from coming to you. You’ve got to heal that or remove it. That’s the first one.
The second one is what I call “gremlins,” right? A gremlin, and this is the common one I work with with clients, that’s that thing that sits on your shoulder, whispers in your ear, whatever the negative crap is that you tell yourself.
You can’t do it. Who do you think you are? Mine was, people are going to think you’re crazy if you talk about being spiritual in your business, right? That kind of thing.
And then, the third one is what I can “mortal mind.” Mortal mind is a tricky one because mortal mind will try to keep you from being your spiritual self in all kinds of ways. As an example, I’ll use you as an example, when you’re doing what you’re spiritually aligned to do and let’s say you’re going to have an amazing guest on your podcast and something goes wrong, technology collapses.
Darla LeDoux: Oh, that happened recently. Did you see my post?
Diahana Barnes: I did. I did actually. Like, I’m about to do a Zoom and all of a sudden the internet goes out.
Darla LeDoux: Right.
Diahana Barnes: It could even be family emergencies. I’m not saying that family emergencies aren’t legitimate. That’s not my point. I’m just saying be aware of how mortal minds tries to usurp you from your goal by whatever you’re weakest at, right? Just notice that.
My spiritual teacher back in the day, this is years ago, we were going to class- it was a physical class- I actually ask this of my clients too, when you’re about to come into a session, or about to go do something major, like we were about to go to our spiritual class, she said, “notice what comes up. Notice what tries to keep you from doing that thing.” Whatever it is. That’s mortal mind. Mortal mind is super sneaky. Childhood stuff, right? Some people believe in past life stuff. That’s mortal mind.
Darla LeDoux: Yes. Right. I love that. I love that. It’s so true. You know, for me this relates to sales, which your gift that you have for people is around spiritual selling, which we’ll tell them about in a bit. But when someone is making a decision whether to hire you, their mortal mind stuff will come up, right, to use your language.
I want to talk about your retreats and the way you do retreats and when someone is considering coming to a retreat where there will be healing and transformation that will happen, that will take them to the next level, whatever those things are, are going to come up. Like you said, family emergencies are really common, or a flight delay- I have, one of my favorite clients from a past group, her flight was delayed coming to our first retreat and she ended up sleeping in an airport and showed up very disheveled, and angry, and it was like the perfect storm of things to happen for her to be able to see the ways that she gets in her own way.
Diahana Barnes: Yep, exactly.
Darla LeDoux: Yeah, so technology, like external things, is really what you’re saying.
Diahana Barnes: External things.
Darla LeDoux: You said it will hit you where you are weakest. Say more about that.
Diahana Barnes: It will hit where you’re weakest because that’s where you’re most likely to acquiesce, right? We could go back to my mom’s example. She was in her spiritual power rocking her store business, her furniture store, but of course my husband, that was a faux pas. Her husband, right, was the love of her life and so tornado dad would come in and the reason why gave away her power, so to speak, was because she loved him so much. She trusted him so much. No intention on either side, it just is, right?
Darla LeDoux: Yes. It’s beautiful. Often, it’s relationships that are the place we’re the weakest because we’re most attached.
Diahana Barnes: Yeah, yeah.
Darla LeDoux: Yeah. I’ve seen it happen before in my own relationship where I know I’m at a waffly point, you know, where it’s like okay, I feel really clear and I’ve mustered my clarity, and then Kimmi will say something and I can watch it, like “wah, wah, wah” and then I’m like wait. Okay, this is not real. This is not real.
Diahana Barnes: It’s not real. Yeah, I love that you can see that.
Darla LeDoux: Yeah. I mean, I hope I can see it. I’m sure there are times where I can’t. Do you what I mean?
Diahana Barnes: Yeah.
Darla LeDoux: Yeah. Awesome. Tell us about your retreats and, you know, our listeners are I’m imagining right-brain, intuitive, connected, and heart-centered, spiritual entrepreneurs, leaders in their own right who lead retreats or want to lead retreats. Tell me, what’s been your journey, because I know you just launched your divine swagger retreat and you’ve got another one coming up, yes?
Diahana Barnes: In September, yeah.
Darla LeDoux: Okay, great. Yeah, so talk about that and how has that work influenced the way that you work.
Diahana Barnes: So my divine swagger retreat is all about marrying the spiritual with the practical. Day one is totally focused on the spiritual, because I believe that’s where it all starts, and then it gets practical.
Darla LeDoux: Yes.
Diahana Barnes: It’s my work embodied into two and a half days, right? You walk away completely different.
Darla LeDoux: I know you work with clients individually in person, as do I, right?
Diahana Barnes: Mm-hmm.
Darla LeDoux: How do you balance, or how do you know when someone should work with you privately or in group, and what’s been the journey of adding the group component? Cause it’s a big deal. Even though it can seem like oh, I’m just doing this little thing. It’s a big thing energetically to hold space for a group. Yeah.
Diahana Barnes: Yeah.
Darla LeDoux: That reaction says it all. Tell us more.
Diahana Barnes: Oh, yeah. It is a big deal. The best part about it is you come out the other side so much stronger than you were before. Like I thought I was pretty strong, but it is. It’s a lot of energy. It’s a lot to hold space for. I would tell any potential retreat leader, no matter how big or small your retreat is, always have back of room support.
Darla LeDoux: Yes.
Diahana Barnes: I brought someone in. God sent me the right person, totally. And that was huge. The dynamic of a group is, it’s just so powerful, right? Kind of like we talked about, you can’t always see it for yourself. I work one on one with clients all the time, VIP days are really popular because we do the same things, spiritual, practical. What I love about the retreat and I actually wrote a post about this- remember in the corporate world, executives used to do this all the time. They go on an offsite. As an executive, they go on an offsite. They go together. It’s not one on one, because the power of the group, people can see things, even you as a leader may or may not see, because you’re holding space for the whole group.
You get your highest results in the shortest amount of time, I believe, from a retreat. A one on one, yes, true, and a six month, or nine month, or 12-month coaching program, yes, but the energy, and the power that happens in the room is something you can’t recreate any other way, I believe.
Darla LeDoux: Yes.
Diahana Barnes: I believe it so passionately actually, that even corporate people do it, they just don’t talk about it the same way. They go and they an executive offsite, usually once a year, some do it quarterly, and they call it a quarterly business review, or whatever they want to call it, but they leave the office- because you know you can’t be creative when you’re stuck in your same environment. They do some kind of personal development. They might talk practical numbers and stuff, but they do do something woo-woo-ish. As woo-woo-ish as you can, do you know what I mean? The formula is there and us as entrepreneurs owe it to ourselves to be the CEOs of our business and going offsite is an important part of that. That’s me getting on my soapbox, but yeah.
Darla LeDoux: That’s awesome. I love the way you describe that. For me, there’s, you know, when I was in corporate we would do the offsites, and we would do the personal development, but there was no accountability to actually doing the work. People would go back and go back to their old ways. I know the work that you do and the work that I do is a deeper level of work, which I envision happening more and more in corporate. I know it is in places, but I envision it being more mainstream.
Diahana Barnes: Yeah, totally.
Darla LeDoux: Spiritually, I believe there’s a huge spiritual component. You know I talk about unlocking the soul of your retreat. There’s the moment where the soul of the retreat is born, and then the people start coming. Sometimes, the person that you thought for sure was going to come, they don’t come, and then this other person who you’re like, really? They decide to come. It’s always the right people. What was your experience with that, with just trusting that spiritual flow? A lot of times people get very stressed. You know, I’ve had a retreat with two people where it’s like I could’ve been really embarrassed and stressed, or like, oh, interesting, I wonder why these people? What was your experience with how Spirit guided your retreat?
Diahana Barnes: It was a journey for me because here I am talking about trusting and I wasn’t trusting, right? You know, I tried to have a retreat a couple of times before I actually had one.
Darla LeDoux: You’re not alone.
Diahana Barnes: I know. I know. And it was exactly perfect. You know, I wasn’t ready. It’s an exercise in really living who you spiritually are. If your dream is to hold a retreat, hold a retreat and just, if it’s with just yourself, then that’s exactly what it’s meant to be, and owning that.
I will say, like for me, right, the money never mattered. I got this message this morning too, actually, so it’s interesting that it’s coming up here. It’s like when you invest, and you’re stressed out about the money, it causes, again, you know, one of those errors that’s blocking clients from coming to you. Don’t let the money matter. Let it go, because there’s bigger, better things coming. It’s there. The money is there. The worrying about it actually makes it worse.
Darla LeDoux: Totally. It’s interesting what happens for people because you have to have a place to have your retreat, right? In our course, I talk about the five site vibes. There’s five different types of venues you can choose from. Each one has a different type of contract, and pricing, and a different level of risk, and all of that. When people get their contract, and they’re signing on the line, it’s like, and the energy shifts, as opposed to it being, like, this beautiful thing, Spirit’s helping me create, all of a sudden it’s like, oh, shit, if I mess this up I’m screwed.
You know, I had a retreat once that, you know, my retreats are usually 4-6, or $7,000 for me to put on, which by the way, is so minimal compared to if you’re doing big events and all of that. So I had a contract, honestly, I don’t even remember the details, probably like blocked them out, but I had one person register. We had all this food to spend, all this money to spend on food. She got all the meals. We had like fancy Champaign, and lobster, and all the things.
Diahana Barnes: I want to go to that retreat. No, I’m just kidding.
Darla LeDoux: Right? Right? Yeah, and people get worried that people are going to be upset about it. You know, and it’s like she got amazing treatment.
Diahana Barnes: That’s awesome.
Darla LeDoux: It’s not the same as having a group, for sure, but she got myself and Kimmi totally focused on her for two days, including a photo shoot.
Diahana Barnes: I love it.
Darla LeDoux: You know, we just made the best of it.
Diahana Barnes: Yeah.
Darla LeDoux: But, what happened was there was healing for Kimmi, my wife, in the experience. Like, this woman’s expertise was profoundly healing for Kimmi, just being in the room.
Diahana Barnes: Love it.
Darla LeDoux: The value of that was like way more than the cost of hosting that retreat.
Diahana Barnes: Yeah, yeah.
Darla LeDoux: To your point of how it always works out.
Diahana Barnes: It always works out, yeah.
Darla LeDoux: Yeah, amazing.
Diahana Barnes: Yay, okay.
Darla LeDoux: I know people probably want to get a sense of their spiritual gifts and their divine swagger, and so there’s a first step that you have for them. Tell us about the spiritual sales style, and how it connects to what we’ve been talking about.
Diahana Barnes: The spiritual sales style, yeah, it’s the first step to uncovering who you spiritually are. And then, I relate it to sales because you know, I’m always about the spiritual with the practical, right? We dive into who you spiritually are. It’s a quiz. It’s very easy. Light and easy and fun. Kind of like a personality quiz. And then, I take that, and I tell you in the report what that means for your sales and marketing strategy. Like, what might resonate for you.
You asked me earlier about how do you know like, you know, how do you get divine swagger, or get that confidence, and I said, “start with as a child.” Another way is to take the quiz, right? It will give you a little bit of an inkling on what your spiritual style is. It’s like a personality, kind of like arch type, I can’t even say the word.
Darla LeDoux: Yes, and I’ve taken the quiz before and even after this conversation I’m like, I’m going to go take it again. I would love …
Diahana Barnes: Cool. I’d be curious to see what your results are.
Darla LeDoux: Yes and I would love for our listeners to share with us, so over on the Aligned Entrepreneurs Facebook page, tag Diahana Barnes, also. Let’s have a conversation over there about what yours is.
Diahana Barnes: Yeah. Tag me, I’ll tell you all about yourself.
Darla LeDoux: You know, get visible. Claim it. It’s a small step, but it’s an important step to start to claim this truth of who you are by getting visible, even on social media, right?
Diahana Barnes: Right.
Darla LeDoux: Like for both of us, LinkedIn, like sharing who we are on LinkedIn made profound change.
Diahana Barnes: Yeah, yeah, do it.
Darla LeDoux: Awesome. Awesome. Okay, well thank you so much. Do you have any parting wisdom for people? You can take a minute to see what comes through because I know it will be magical.
Diahana Barnes: My parting words would be similarly with what I started with. I truly believe that you are the harmonious CEO of your business. God, Spirit, the universe would not have given you this dream, this desire, this calling without all the clients, and all the money, and all the resources for you to fulfill it. Let the human stuff go.
Darla LeDoux: That’s amazing. Thank you. I love that message. I feel it.
Diahana Barnes: Good.
Darla LeDoux: Awesome. You can go connect with Diahana, get her gift, get on her list over at www.DiahanaBarnes.com/spiritual_quiz. That’s where you can find that, that link will also be in our show notes, on our website, if you’re watching this on video on YouTube, it will be in the description so you can just go click the link.
I highly recommend you follow and stay tuned into what Diahana’s up to. It will be a healing journey, no doubt. Thank you so much, friend. I love what you’re up to in the world. We’ll see you soon.
Diahana Barnes: Love you. Love you.
Darla LeDoux: Love you.
Diahana Barnes: Bye.
Darla LeDoux: Bye.
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