Inspire People to Create the Unimaginable with Keri Ford
Do you have big audacious goals? Discover how to create the unimaginable with our special guests. Keri Ford is the founder and CEO at Elevate with Keri. This elite transformational coaching movement is dedicated to serving and elevating women’s emotional intelligence and whole-body wellness. Keri and I discuss how to create the unimaginable. We are both coaches who work with very successful people. Keri works with powerful women to create the unimaginable in every part of their lives.
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Keri Ford: The Transcript
About: Keri Ford is a High-Performance Holistic Life Coach. Keri is the CEO & Founder of Elevate with Keri – an elite transformational coaching movement and luxury brand dedicated to serving and elevating women’s emotional intelligence and whole-body high performance. Her unique online influence and programs have transformed the lives of thousands of women across the globe. She is an international motivational speaker, author, event host, and global authority on women’s wellness. She has spoken alongside 50 other top industry experts, neuroscientists, doctors, and authors in the personal development industry.
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Disclaimer: This transcript was created using YouTube’s translator tool and that may mean that some of the words, grammar, and typos come from a misinterpretation of the video.
Keri Ford: [00:00:00] Growth edge being that point where you know, that it feels unsafe, maybe risky is a better word that a lot of us can associate to making big decisions, taking risks that have no promise of working out on the other side, but doing it despite that. , and so we like to live on that growth edge. And so oftentimes we will see this upper-level limit that we’ll approach, but it’s really just where our nervous system and our body start to oh. You’re unsafe here. It may feel unsafe, but the experience is actually that we haven’t been there before. Right. And we’re challenging our current belief system, which requires us to move the baseline of fear on some level. And the only way to do that is through that, doing it anyway, despite the fear.
Intro: Welcome to Growth Think Tank. This is the one and only place where you will get insight from the founders and the CEOs, the fastest-growing privately held companies. I am the host. My name is Gene Hammett. I hope leaders and their teams navigate the defining moments of their growth. Are you ready to grow?
Gene Hammett: Hey, we look at a very interesting [00:01:00] subject. A lot of people I know have big goals, sometimes those goals, bill impossible. So today we’re going to look at creating the unimaginable. What does it take for you to rise above the fears that you have and all of the stories that keep you stuck, where you are right now? Allow you to expand into an identity that allows you to receive an unimaginable goal, something that you can’t even foresee or can’t even see as possible? Well, all it takes is the right coach in your corner. Today, we have a special coach that specializes in this. Her name is Keri Ford. She really works with a 1% woman. Really successful women that want to achieve more achieve legacy. Today, we unpack how to create the unimaginable. When you think about your own journey as a leader and in your life, are you playing life fully?
Are you leading powerfully? Well, today’s episode we look it. Exactly. What does it take for you to do that? Some of the key measures behind this, the key tools that Keri uses, we have a good discussion about coaching at this level, and it really is exciting if you [00:02:00] want to tune into creating the unimaginable. Now. Before you get there if you are questioning where you’re going with your life, what’s your legacy. What’s really getting in the way of you creating the life you want living powerfully leading powerfully. And I want you to get on the call of me. Inside that call. I’m not going to sell you anything. I don’t have anything to sell right now. My coaching practice is pretty full, but I want to get to know you and serve you. If you’re listening right now, you’re tuning into this. My job is to help you become the most powerful leader you can be because I know that leadership is the activator to more growth, more fulfillment. And if you want to do that, let’s have that conversation.
Just go to GeneHammett.com and schedule your call. Not a sales call. It truly is about serving you to be a more powerful leader. And here’s the interview with Keri.
Gene Hammett: Hi Keri How are you?.
Keri Ford: I’m well, how are you, Gene?
Gene Hammett: Fantastic. We’re going to have a great episode here. You’re a fellow coach. You got a different approach and angle to this, but I wanted them to tune into you a little bit. Tell us a little about your business and how you got to where you are.
Keri Ford: Loaded question. So do we begin 12 years ago? No, just kidding. [00:03:00] So I am the 1% woman coach and who that is is the woman that is in the 1% of success. Of abundance of really being the high performing achiever. , and I love working with women like this because they’re not afraid to go out and create a new path, but sometimes it comes at the expense of time feeling like they have to do more a feeling like they have to be more. And so using a lot of the modalities that I teach, you know, which started with intuitive, eating around, listening to their alignment is where. we Begin. Right. And we just let that flow into leadership and legacy and love and all areas of their life, because success is a feeling.
Gene Hammett: it is a feeling I’m really excited to have this conversation today because we’re going to talk about something. It may not be just for women. I think a lot of people want to create something that’s unimaginable, but you have some pieces of your work where you help people see and create something that they couldn’t even imagine. The possible [00:04:00] for them. Where did this come from for you?
Keri Ford: I remember many a time being told Keri that just is unrealistic. Keri can’t you just be normal and be happy with a nine to five, Keri, you always make it hard on yourself. You always have to choose the path that hasn’t been walked. And I’m like, I feel like I was created this way. And you know, after years. of Sort of oscillating back and forth and realizing I was really good at whatever I put my energy into. I thought there has to be a way that I can make this work for me rather than against me because I was really tired of being the black sheep in my family and being misunderstood
Gene Hammett: for me with this concept of working for you or against you. But I think a lot of people have a story that they, they bring with them and that they really focus on what works against them. But when you talk about it for against. Give us some ideas of how you help people see those things.
Keri Ford: I think the cleanest way to say this is I once had a therapist tell me, so you feel misunderstood? And I said, yeah, she goes, well, if you’re a leader, isn’t that the point [00:05:00] like you, you are, you’re creating a path that hasn’t yet existed. You’re going somewhere that you have not been before. So, yeah, it’s going to feel weird and hard and like maybe you’re alone. And oftentimes the women, I coach they feel alone a top. , but normalizing and calibrating our consciousness to. I mean, it sounds a little fluffy, but magic and miracles and the possibility of anything is what really excites me because I’ve walked that myself.
Commentary: No, I’ve heard a lot of people say what Keri just said. It feels alone at the top. The reason is it’s because they can’t talk about the things that they would normally talk about with their people around them, their executive team, their board, their investors, their even their significant other, because it just wouldn’t understand. And a lot of these fears that come in are well-founded because a lot of the stuff that you’re dealing with, people just aren’t prepared to be able to serve you. Let’s be honest, not everyone who can listen to you can give you. Some insight about what’s really going on. They’re not trained and not really helping you move to that next level. That’s what coaches do. This is [00:06:00] one of the best things I do in the benefits behind my work is we have conversations that people aren’t having with other people in their lives, their peers, their executive teams, their boards, anyone else in the business we talk about things. So that we can get to the heart of it and it can move forward with clarity. That’s what you need in your life. You need a coach back to Keri.
Gene Hammett: When you’re working with someone who gets stuck in their own stories. And I know the 1% of woman probably has playing in a different game than those, but they all have something that holds them back. What are you seeing as the patterns that hold people back at this area?
Keri Ford: Well, we like to call it living on the growth edge and the growth edge, being that point where you know, that it feels unsafe, maybe risky is a better word that a lot of us can associate to making big decisions, taking risks that have no promise of working out on the other side, but doing it despite that. , and so we like to live on that growth edge. And so often. We will see this upper-level limit that we’ll approach, but it’s really just where our nervous system and our body [00:07:00] start to say, oh, you’re unsafe here. It may feel unsafe. But the experience is actually that we haven’t been there before. Right. And we’re challenging our current belief system, which requires us to move the baseline of fear on some level. The only way to do that. Through that, doing it anyway, despite the fear. Right. And I, I think a great example of this is when I was in Taloon last year, around this time, and there was a four-story jump, and my partner, he jumped off. No problem. Woo. Right, right down into the snow day, I just thought, oh, that’s crazy. But I really, I want to do it even though I’m scared. And so I stood at the ed and I looked down into the water. I stood there for an hour. I stood there for an hour. We left, we went to look at the Mayan ruins and I was so upset with myself the entire time. And I thought I’m going to go back and there’s no way I am leaving Mexico without jumping off that damn it. I refuse to let fear take over here. And now I hadn’t even jumped off a high dive. I’m one of those that like dips my toe in the water. And so [00:08:00] I, I decided. Right. Two of the most powerful words you can ever say. I decided that I was going to go back and I was going to jump off that ledge. And 4, 3, 2, 1 48 feet jumped right down and thus shifted my baseline for fear because anything thereafter was compared to, okay, it’ll still be scary, but compared to 48 feet, what else do you got? You can only go up from there.
Gene Hammett: Love that I really appreciate the story. Cause I think it brings us right into the moment because we’ve all had moments of fear and we pushed past them. I’ve never jumped off 48 feet. So I can, I’m a little bit jealous cause I would’ve probably stressed with it, but I would have done it anyway because that’s just who I am. When you are helping people to feel unimaginable and create the unimaginable inside their day-to-day lives. There’s a lot of stuff that gets in the way, what are the most common things that get in the way of these unimaginable dreams of people?
Keri Ford: Two things? One is we haven’t created space to sit in the feeling as if it’s already existed. Our brain does not know the difference between something that has happened and something is going to [00:09:00] happen. So being in the frequency, in the energetic alignment of that, having been experienced, despite it not being experienced, which is where it feels like a lie is important. And so sitting in that, through meditation, those visualizations. It’s really crucial. , the other thing that gets in the way is, well, self-sabotage, you just haven’t been there for, right. And in those places, we’re letting fear take over. So getting curious one of the exercises I like to do is called the flip the script. , I have clients write down their goal or their dream that is yet to be realized and they’ll write it down. And then as you can imagine, a whole slew of self-proposed objective. Flurry up to the surface to be released. And I say released because oftentimes we shoved them down. We try to ignore them and do the thing despite the fear. But sometimes those things need to be reprogrammed or flipped, right. So we can start to rewrite our beliefs. And so let’s say the goal. I always want to have a coat. Well, the flurry of objections that might come up as part of my program talk track, and my limiting beliefs [00:10:00] could be well, always having a coach is too expensive or that feels like a luxury. Right. And then I just go one by one into those beliefs and then flip that. So if the objective, the objective is or the objection is that’s too expensive, then I might flip that to start to reprogram the belief. and say having a coach always makes me more money than the amount I actually invest, or I always have an abundance of money. Right. So just, this is really a relationship to self and my beliefs.
Gene Hammett: I’ve got to go back to the other one because I used some frequency work and my coaching, I think there’s some overlap, but maybe there are some new, new elements that you can bring to this conversation sitting with the fact that it’s already happened and being in that frequency, unpack that for us.
Keri Ford: Ooh, so, so good. So we’re desire. I’m going to take it to my blue God, right. Or universe or love whatever resonates with the audience member. , desire means of the father. And I strongly believe that where we are called to desire is where we are as Shannon. Our coach has said seeking to be expressed, right. This is in alignment [00:11:00] to us, but we think, oh, I misheard it. Or maybe I got it wrong. And let me just try and hold on to this thing a little longer. till it doesn’t. It feels so good anymore. To me, you’ve got to let go in order to step into expanding. You’ve got to let go. And I say that again in order to receive what you’re expanding into.
And so that’s uncomfortable for most people because it feels reckless. It feels like we’re free-falling out of a plane with no parachute, but that desire is crucial because it’s the breadcrumb trail into the path you’re meant to walk. But again, it’s a quiet whisper sometimes.
Gene Hammett: The whispers where I think a lot of people miss it. I, I can trace back one of the most difficult problems in my life where I missed the whispers and I was able to actually come out of that stronger and better, but it took years being honest is reason I became a coach is because I lost everything. I don’t know if you know my background, but when I was able to let go of that identity and expand, I was finally able to get, find forgiveness. Life changed for me when you’re working with, you [00:12:00] know, people, there’s a lot of stories that play in the underlying identity of who they are. Do you have three hands working with people, getting their shift, their identity to a next level?
Keri Ford: That’s all I do essentially.
Gene Hammett: So tell us some more about how you do that.
Keri Ford: Yeah. So visualization meditation, self-healing, work, self-guided tools. And all different, you know, there’s not, people are like, well, what’s the best way. There’s no best way. It’s just whatever moment in that moment, you’re feeling called to communicate with yourself and your beliefs around like it’s whatever feels good to you. I’m a really strong believer that our body is a compass. , intuition speaks second and quiet. So forego speaks first and loudest, and also the truth doesn’t need defending. So if there’s like some sort of story or something of defense, or you feel confused it’s of ego, right? It’s and it’s it’s okay. The ego’s not going away. It’s designed to keep us safe to protect us may be from places that we’ve been hurt or have experienced failure or rejection or abandoned prior. Thank you for being there. And then get curious as to [00:13:00] where it came from
Gene Hammett: Getting the curious part. It’s a critical fact because I think a lot of people just race from one thing to another, I work with a lot of busy executives. You work with a lot of busy people and they don’t take time to really get curious about what’s going on. You help them get more intentional about this. I mean, I know you’ve got a lot of experience with eating disorders that you have overcome and things that you’ve worked with. You’ve worked on some, some big opportunities around this. What would you share with us about that kind of tuning in to the body and really being curious to what’s going on there? So, so that we can move forward? ,
Keri Ford: well, at first I would like to say, you know, most of the high performers, I’m sure that we both work with the question is not whether or not they will succeed or make money. Like they’re good at that. We already know that motivation is not the issue being burnt out is the issue of not listening to themselves. First is the issue, putting everything, you know, maybe working too much or putting everything and everyone before themselves is the issue. The answers are always within you first, which sounds like some sort of Lulu spiritual nonsense, but I [00:14:00] promise you, this is the only way that I’ve ever been able to create massive success in a very short, a short amount of time. It’s why we paid a hundred thousand dollars for an island with zero people enrolled and only a vision. Because I believe what I see when I know there’s a reality available for me. And I go all-in on it, despite not having physical evidence with my eyesight. And that requires a level of faith and connection to self that’s super deep because that’s unshakeable.
Commentary: Keri just talked about burnout. I get a lot of people that are pushing so hard in their business. They’re adding more hours and they’re pushing so hard that it causes more stress. And they’re trying to burn the candle at both ends. At least that’s what my grandmother would say. But burnout is something that you have to be able to let go of. Your identity is not about how much you work. It’s about the value you’re creating. And if you’re really honest with yourself, nobody at your company is creating the kind of value you are because you’re working on the highest value work. You are doing the things that are most important for the business. The things that people don’t know how to measure the value of because it [00:15:00] really is hard to put a finger on you are doing the work that can’t be done by others. You are doing the visionary work. I just saying this over and over. Cause I want you to really let it sink in that burnout is a choice. You don’t have to continue down that path. You can choose to delegate to others. You can choose to trust people. You can choose to empower them. You can choose to do that, but if you choose to hold it and keep it all yourself, it will lead to burnout and you will have to take a different approach. I have had these conversations quite a bit. I’m being a little direct and honest with you today because I know that this burnout thing is a choice. You can be a better leader. You can empower people in a different way so that other people help you, you can ask for help. That is a choice. Realize burnout is not something that just happens. It is a choice that you have decided to fall into. Unfortunately, it’s something that has just continued to snowball and it will get worse before it gets better. Unless you hire a coach and they should hire someone that can really help you understand and unpack what burnout is what’s causing it. You won’t be able to create and really need. in your life back to Keri
Gene Hammett: what I’m hearing from you saying this [00:16:00] Keri is you’re talking about really trusting yourself. And I don’t believe that anyone’s going to create the unimaginable without trusting themselves, but they have to let go of those old identities and those old stories in order to move forward, you had to let go of something. As you jumped off that ledge, 48 feet, when you, the work that you’re doing right now, what has been the biggest transformational moment or thing that really changed you to be able to come to the leader that you are. Incredible women.
Keri Ford: I mean, I think you said it best when you said it is learning to trust yourself because we think, oh God, that’s crazy. That can’t be right. Can I hear that? Maybe that message got a little scrambling of water in my ear, you know, and we don’t believe it. So we just try to buy a little bit more time before we make the inevitable decision, which sounds like you sat in for a minute or a few years, right. Where it was like, I know this to be true, but let me just keep doing this thing over here. Grief is huge. Process, because we’re so attached to what we do and how we think it defines us and the labels that the quicker and the more willing we are able to let [00:17:00] go of what we think defines us. The more we’re able to be shaped by nothing but us. Right. I can give people strategies and ideas, but it really has to come from them. The strategies, the offers programs. I work with a lot of coaches, CEOs even. The way in which they even lead their teams, it has to be authentic. And so therefore it has to come from them. My job is to sort out the noise. Where are you in all of this? What feels good to you? Why is that your truth?
Gene Hammett: I want to give you just a few minutes here because we’ve been talking where generally you work specifically with women. I have a few women clients, but it’s mostly men on the Inc 5,000 that are, my clients have found founders. What is the one thing that’s getting in the way of women living the lives that they really want to. I know there’s a lot of things, but what is one thing you see coming up more often?
Keri Ford: They don’t think they can actually have what they want. They don’t think they can have what they want. And so they placate to everybody else. They do things they think they should do in the order. They want to do it. They people [00:18:00] please. I mean, the pattern runs deep. They, they abandon themselves and they micro betray over and over and over again until they’re so last. Just hard to find who they are in the midst of all that. I mean, and a lot of them actually are forward-facing successful, but they don’t feel fulfilled. So that’s, that’s the problem because you’re always going to exist in some sort of chasing energy thinking that someone else knows you better than, you know, yourself or this strategy or plan has the answers over you. I’m the coach that brings them back to themselves all the time. And they’re just like, this can’t be right. But nourishing that conduit to intuition, really listening to who they are. How’d they get back in touch with what they want and then letting them dream and process that it’s possible that they can literally create their reality,
Gene Hammett: this is exactly the reason why I wanted to have you on the show today. But so now you bring up a new perspective and the energy to the conversation around living life at a different level. This is exactly what I wanted to. So thank you Keri, for being here.
Keri Ford: You’re welcome.
Gene Hammett: What an incredible interview with Keri. I really. Having [00:19:00] these guests on the show, them taking their time out from the busy schedules, serving their clients to take a look behind the scenes of how they do what they do. Creating the unimaginable was a concept that we came up together about the work that she’s doing, and it really is related to the work I do to help leaders play life at the next. And when you took in today’s episode, my hope is that you took some notes about, are you truly looking at your fear and, and moving the edge of fear? Are you truly pushing beyond the boundaries? Are you willing to let go of your current self to create a new identity? All of these things are unpacking this episode. If you have questions about how to do this specifically, all you have to do is go to Genehammett.com. Schedule your call. You can talk about it, get really clear about what’s next him build relationships. It’s not about me selling you anything. It’s about building a relationship. Go ahead and go to Genehammett.com and schedule your call today. When you think of growth and you think of leadership, think of growth, think tank as always lead with courage. We’ll see you next time.
Disclaimer: This transcript was created using YouTube’s translator tool and that may mean that some of the words, grammar, and typos come from a misinterpretation of the video.
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