January 10, 2025 • 36 mins
On this episode of the Leap for Success Podcast, host Mary Gaul welcomes the inspiring Dawn Stebbing, a sales and leadership expert who has helped countless women entrepreneurs and professionals elevate their careers and businesses.
Dawn shares her powerful story of taking courageous leaps, from leaving the comfort of a corporate paycheck to embarking on a path as a hairstylist, building a direct sales team, and eventually becoming a sought-after expert in personal branding, sales, and leadership.
You’ll hear Dawn’s insights on how to stand out in a crowded marketplace, create a confident personal brand, build authentic sales strategies, and lead with integrity. Whether you’re an entrepreneur looking to grow your business or a professional aiming to make a greater impact, Dawn’s expertise and advice are sure to inspire you to step into your full potential.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Hello
and welcome to the Leap for Ladies Leap toSuccess podcast.
I am Mary Gahl, the host and now owner of Leapfor Ladies Community, and so excited to be able
to interview Dawn Stebing today with us as ourguest.
(00:21):
And just a little bit about the Leap forSuccess podcast.
So it is the conduit by which we share women'sstories of courage, bravery, success, and
diversity.
Each week, we interview women entrepreneurs andleaders that have taken the leap in their lives
to inspire our global listeners to be more,have more, show up more, and live a life filled
(00:43):
with joy and happiness through believing inyou.
So with that being said, welcome Dawn to theLeap for Success podcast.
And I would like to, just get started by havingyou tell us a little bit about yourself and
your business.
How little do you want it, Mary?
Yeah, I know.
(01:03):
Tell us your life story in thirty seconds,right?
Thirty seconds or more.
Right now.
Just in a short synopsis is right now I presentmyself as a sales and image expert and I work
with professional women and professional womenentrepreneurs to help them empower them to
(01:27):
build confidence, create credibility, and standout in their marketplace.
And I've been doing this work for, it's goingon fifteen years this year in April, I'll be
15.
Nice.
Congratulations.
Yes, thank you.
It's wonderful.
Yeah.
And how did you kind of, you know, you've beendoing this for fifteen years, but how did you
(01:52):
kind of get to this as a career option?
Right.
Kind of
talk to the long story.
I love that because, you know, it didn't happenovernight.
It wasn't something I dreamt that I would bedoing ever.
It was something that I think throughout mycareer, in my early twenties, thirties on up,
(02:19):
you change every ten years.
Every ten years, something different willhappen in your life.
But I always listened to this little thing inthe back of my head that there's more out there
for you.
There's always more out there for you.
Or what should I be doing now?
If you're not, if something is gnawing at yousaying, hey, there's more for you, or this
(02:42):
isn't it, or I'm not sure if I'm passionateabout what I'm doing anymore, then you aren't
fulfilling your purpose yet.
You need to keep looking and searching for yourpurpose.
So as I've done this through my life, and I dothis with some of my clients sometimes is it's
a piece of paper.
I take a eight and a half sheet of paper.
I split down the middle and I go, okay, whatare everything I've ever done since I started
(03:06):
working in my life from the earliest ages onuntil up till today?
And then all of that, and then take bits andpieces of that and put it into the second
column and say, now, what did I love about eachone of And then you'll find the common
denominator.
Now, what that does is it sparks you to look atit in a way like, okay, I'm not doing what I'm
(03:33):
supposed to be doing.
I'm like, I love this.
I love customers.
Let's say I love being with people.
I love customers.
I've always loved customer service.
I've always loved to make women feel good aboutthemselves, which led me one into a form being
a former hairstylist.
(03:54):
I'm a hairstylist, which also led into almostopening up my own salon at one time but didn't
happen because I didn't have the passion forit.
Yeah.
And that word alone, if you don't have passion,it doesn't fulfill your heart.
Don't push it.
Don't go for it because you're not gonna behappy.
(04:14):
And that led into, well, when if I didn't havethe passion, but in that process of research,
was looking for products to put in my salon.
And I came across a direct sales company, whichhad skincare, cosmetics, and nutrition, which
was all natural.
Got into that, ran with that, built my way tothe top of that company.
(04:36):
And then all of a sudden I'm going, somethingis still not feeling right.
And that's how I ended up in as building mybusiness as an image consultant fifteen years
ago.
And I'm still evolving.
I'm still evolving because I still have so muchto teach women.
It's not just about how you look on theoutside, it's about how you feel on the inside
(05:00):
and resonates with how you show up for otherpeople.
Great.
I love that.
I love your work sheet and dividing the twocolumns, everything I've done, and then the
pieces that I loved of that.
That is such a great tip, for our listeners andfor everyone.
So whether you have a corporate job or a W-twojob and you've been there for a while but just
(05:22):
here's all the skills that I've developed andthen here's the skills that I love, the things
that bring me joy.
Especially as entrepreneurs, if we've been inour business for a while sometimes we forget
everything that we've learned or everythingthat we've done.
So I love the idea of taking a sheet of paperand just saying what are the skills that I've
developed?
Because as an entrepreneur you're learningevery single day.
(05:44):
You're learning something new, right?
And sometimes we forget to acknowledge all ofthose things that we've learned and then
looking at really what does bring us joy andhow are we going to pull that together.
Then, you know, again, finding that thread thatbrings you joy through all of the things that
you've done in your career is really powerfulto help guide you if you're especially if
(06:07):
you're making a decision to transition intosomething new, right?
Taking that time to just do that worksheet is asimple exercise.
It's not necessarily simple, right?
It's easy to do, not simple, right?
So it can take some time to go back through andrealize and put some thought into it.
If you haven't updated your resume, I've beenan entrepreneur for twelve years now.
(06:29):
I haven't updated my resume.
And before that, I worked for ten years at thatjob.
I I haven't updated my resume for twenty years.
An official one, So it's good for us to takethat stock of what we've learned and really
identify what it is that brings us joy.
So thank you for sharing that tool.
I really appreciate that.
You're welcome.
(06:51):
So you kind of answered this next question, butdid you always know what was your purpose?
Really, at what point did you give yourselfpermission to take that leap to success?
Right?
So from going into where you know yourcorporate career or being a hairstylist and
then moving into the the products basedbusiness, right?
(07:14):
And that was one leap.
And then taking a leap and saying I'm donehere.
I've done what I can here.
What was what drove you to take that leap intostarting your own company?
Love this question.
It's a big question.
It's no, I didn't always know what my purposewas.
I've been on search like I would always ask,you know, put it out there.
(07:36):
Ask the universe.
You put me on the earth for a reason.
What am I supposed to be doing?
I didn't find what I was passionate about untilI was in my forties.
Good.
In why is because I was ready.
A lot of people aren't really ready.
They might be in transition because they don'tlike where they're at right now, but they don't
know where they're supposed to go.
(07:57):
But asking questions like that, such as why didyou put me here?
What is my purpose?
I have no idea what I'm supposed to be doing.
But I knew, I knew one thing and I kept sayingthis to myself.
I knew that I loved the beauty industry.
I loved being a hairstylist.
I love working with my clients.
(08:18):
I love making them feel good.
I love the way they walked out the door.
I loved it when they came back and they said,hey, do that again.
But what was it about that that was really,really intriguing to me?
Was it, it was connecting.
It was connecting with my clients in buildingthese relationships that stay with you forever.
(08:40):
They end up becoming your friends.
They tell you about themselves, their families,their kids, what they're doing in their work,
all of this.
So I knew that was a big piece that I needed tokeep in my life.
And I knew there was a purpose for that.
Why?
Because it just made me feel good.
And when you know it makes you feel good, youstick with that.
(09:03):
You don't get rid of what makes you feel good.
You get rid of what doesn't make you feel good.
Yes.
Hopefully, yes.
Get rid of the ick and stay with the goodfeeling.
So then, and when I knew that it had to stillbe in the beauty industry.
And that's when I was at a networking event andall of a sudden I was sitting at this table.
(09:23):
I must've said this three times this weekalready.
I was sitting at this table and everybody, butprobably about 10 of us at one big round table.
And every woman started with telling us whothey were and what they did.
And it was a coach, coach, coach, coach, coach,coach came to me and I sold products.
(09:46):
So I wasn't really a coach.
I told them what I did, work for a company andsold skincare and cosmetics and nutrition,
coach, coach, coach, coach, image consultant.
And when that person said image consultant, itsunk so deep in the gut of my gut that said,
there it is.
Oh my God, I need to talk to you.
(10:08):
And, and and it hit me that hard where I'mgoing, okay, this is it.
I've been on the search for this for almost sixto eight months looking for what that next
piece was.
Mhmm.
And when that hit me, I met with her.
I had her come and, you know, clean out mycloset or whatever you you don't, arrange my
(10:30):
closet, talk to her a little bit about how shegot started and everything, and I ran with it.
And that's when my career started in imageconsulting.
I love it.
I love it.
So you kind of got that thunderbolt like that'swhat I've been looking for and then you took
the leap right and said okay I am this is whatit is now how do I get started in this career
(10:51):
Right?
Even though you had pieces of that that you youcould pull in, but still it's starting
something brand new for you.
Yes.
Yeah.
Which is a scary leap.
I I wanted to go back to something you saidearlier, Dawn, about really finding your
passion in your 40s.
As a mother of two daughters in their mid-20s,there's so much pressure, and even as women in
(11:15):
our mid-50s, there's so much pressure to say,What's your passion?
Find this one thing and find this, you know,your one purpose.
And there's so much pressure around thatsometimes.
I think it can be sometimes disabling forpeople, they just want to check out and say,
Nope, not going to do it.
I don't have a purpose.
I don't have a passion or whatever, which canlead us down a bad path.
(11:38):
But hearing people talk about it and say, Ididn't have a clear passion until I was older,
gives younger people that space to keepexploring and keep trying new things.
That's how we discover what brings us joy.
Going back to your list, right?
What are all the things that you've learned howto do and what things bring you joy?
(11:59):
And that will help lead you to your passion,but it's not something that you know, you turn
21 and here's your passion for the rest of yourlife and that's it, right?
So I love that you shared you found it reallyin your 40s.
And that's so true, Mary, because we don't knowwho we are when we're in our 20s.
We really don't.
We're still young.
We're still trying to explore life andadulthood at the same time.
(12:23):
You're growing out of childhood into adulthood.
Now you have to grow up a little bit.
You've gone to college or if you didn't, you'reworking, you're trying to find your way in your
work.
And then 30s is another whole story.
Some people have kids in their 30s and nowthey've got to stay home with their kids for a
little while and raise them until they are at acertain age where they go to school, you can go
(12:44):
back to work again.
Some of us have, had my kids younger.
I'm a young mom.
So by the time I was 40, my kids were not in myhouse anymore.
Oh yeah.
Nice.
So I had, that's when I said 40 because that,what am I gonna do now?
I'm not kids at home that are constantlyneeding my help, my advice, whatever.
(13:08):
I mean, I'm always there for them, but what amI gonna do?
And always think about, I love what you saidabout, do get, you know, in our later years, we
do find our passion in our later years isbecause we may already have our passion in our
younger years.
We just don't know what it is.
Yeah.
Because we don't hear those words until we getolder.
(13:32):
So we sit with ourselves and say, okay, nowwhat am I gonna do?
What do I wanna do?
What would I love to do?
What am I passionate about?
Like, do I love teaching?
Or maybe you love, paddle boarding or canoeing.
It could be anything like that.
(13:52):
Or hiking.
Maybe you wanna teach things like that or haveretreats you don't know until you really sit
with it until you really observe and then whenyou talk about taking the leap I never
underestimate myself.
I'm always one of those that just jumps in andgoes for it if it feels good.
Feels right, I do it.
(14:14):
Yes.
It doesn't.
If I'm at all, second guessing the way I feel,then you don't do it because you're just going
to feel icky all the time.
And you're going why did I spend that money onsomething I'm not passionate about?
And I've done that a lot.
I've hired coaches that, you know, never got meto where I wanted to go.
(14:38):
I just never felt good about it.
Listen to your intuition.
Intuition is going to tell you and and thatmight sound a little woo woo to some people but
for me it isn't anymore because I've beenworking with this for a long time.
Right.
But you have an intuition and your intuition isspeaking to you.
It's almost like you have the angel on oneside, the devil on the other, and the angel
says this and the devil says, no, you do itthis way, do it this way, no, no, no, do it
(15:01):
this way, do it this way, no, no, no.
And then you
end up doing what the devil says instead ofwhat the angel says, and then you just feel
horrible.
Right,
Always listen to your gut feeling.
If it doesn't feel good, don't do it.
I love that.
I love that.
And as a mom, again, that's something I reallytry to instill in my kids is pay attention to
(15:25):
that intuition.
We all have it.
So even as you go up and talk to a stranger,right, do you get the icky feeling?
Do you get the good feeling?
Pay attention to those feelings, right?
So from a very little age when you talk aboutstranger danger or those kind of things, right?
But paying attention, we do have that innerguide, that inner wisdom.
So, how have you learned to develop that andlearn to be able to hear that intuition, get
(15:51):
those downloads over the years?
And do you have some tips that you payattention to?
Yeah, making mistakes.
We will always make mistakes, and thosemistakes is what we learn from.
I think having surrounding yourself with goodpeople that will always, if you wanna run
(16:14):
something by somebody and always listening tosomebody that has your back, that's one.
Or I believe your body speaks louder than yourwords sometimes.
Mhmm.
And if your body is at all in a disruption likeyour health or anything like that, that means
you're doing something that doesn't feel rightin your body.
(16:35):
Yeah.
I'm going go back to even when you put clotheson, if you look in the mirror and it doesn't
feel right, it doesn't look right and you go,oh, this is good enough or this will do or
there's something wrong but I don't have timeto change type.
Your day is going to be completely off.
You want to look in that mirror and say, I loveit.
(16:56):
Yeah.
Just like in when you're doing any type ofwork, anything that you get yourself into,
listen to what you're saying, what you'rethinking, what is going on with your body.
And if you can say that I love it, or I knowthis is what I need, and I know I need to speak
to that person or talk to that person to helpme get to that place, then jump in or have a
(17:18):
conversation.
And if the conversation doesn't go the way youwant it to, don't sign up.
Don't go with that person.
I've made a lot of mistakes in my life andthese mistakes are what helped me grow and get
better, but I never stopped.
Never, I'm gonna say, I don't ever say never,not conclude, never say never.
(17:41):
I'm never gonna say never shut down because Ido and I have.
And when you shut down, those are the momentsthat you have to sit quietly and listen to
what's going on.
What happened?
Why did that happen?
Don't beat yourself up too long.
Just get back on the horse and start ridingagain because you will fall off.
(18:01):
You will get back on.
You will fall off.
You will get back on.
But there are people out there that can helpyou stay focused and accountable.
And accountability for me, I loveaccountability.
When I'm held accountable, I'm on track.
If I'm not held accountable, especially ifyou're at home sitting me on the computer 20
fourseven and nobody to talk to, my husband hasno idea really what I do.
(18:25):
I mean, does, but he doesn't.
I don't talk to him about my business becausehe doesn't understand it Where I stand it.
He's not in that mindset or that frame of mindthat I can go to him and say, hey, can I run
this by you?
No.
I have to look at people like you and mygirlfriends and colleagues and things like that
(18:46):
to get my answers.
Just going up and listening to other people isreally what helps too.
It is.
And for those listeners that know me, I wrote abook called Vitamin C3 and the three C's are
Connect, Contribute, and Celebrate.
And that's what I think all entrepreneurs need,that group of people that they can connect to
at a deeper level, on a relatable level, we'reall dealing with the same kind of problems.
(19:11):
We have a way to contribute to each other.
As we mentioned earlier, we're learning so muchevery day.
So having a way to share that knowledge withother people and contribute to them and then
celebrating together.
There's a big difference between celebratingtogether with other entrepreneurs that you
finally got your website done or you finallygot that newsletter out or whatever it is.
You reached 100 people on your newsletter list.
(19:33):
If I say that to my husband as well or mygirlfriends who have W-two jobs, they're like,
Oh, that's great, Mary.
But say that to an entrepreneur who understandswhat it takes to reach those milestones, it's a
different level of celebration.
Right?
So I love that.
I wanted to go back to something you said, Don,where you started to talk about you know, that
(19:54):
intuition when you get dressed in the morningand how what you're wearing and how you feel
about that can set you up for success for yourday.
So this is what you get to do every day.
So tell us a little bit about how women cankind of tweak their closets.
I know that's a big subject as well, right?
(20:16):
But what are some ways that we can work withour closets to help us feel more powerful and
more successful and more attuned in with thathigher self?
I love that question.
And and it is it's not an easy task.
Okay?
But let me share some simple tips.
(20:37):
Great.
First of all, if you can just take, you know,small segments of your day out on Saturday or a
Sunday when you're not doing much and look atyour closet and take things out that do not
resonate with who you are today.
And women have a hard time giving things upbecause it's about the money or somebody gave
(20:58):
it to them or whatever the thing is.
And let me talk about the gave, someone gave itto you.
Someone gave you something and you're going,well, I can't, I gotta wear it.
No, this is the thing about women.
They don't know how to say no.
Don't know how to say, hey, thank you so muchfor offering this to me, but it's really not my
(21:20):
style and not my color.
I don't want to hurt your feelings, but it'snot going I'm probably never going to wear it.
Do you think that woman is going to be pissy atyou for the rest of your life?
No, She's going to say, thank you for sharing.
I'll share it with somebody else and it mightfit.
You're just being honest.
You're being, you gotta stand in your owntruth.
You gotta step into your own self and say,things that may not resonate with other people.
(21:43):
Stop pretending you're making someone feel goodbecause if you never wear it and they know that
you never wear it, you're just making them feelawful.
They gave it to you when they could have gaveit to somebody else or handed it to the Google
or did something like that.
So go in your closet, take things out thatdoesn't resonate with you, and you can either
(22:04):
pass it on or give it to goodwill or consignit.
That's number one.
Number two is color coordinate your yourcloset.
That's a real simple task.
You can put all your blues, your greens, youryellows, your purples, your whites, all of it
color coordinate.
And then make sure they all fit you really,really well.
(22:26):
Take the things that you love and pair themtogether.
Now this can go, I'm not gonna go into thewhole thing.
You want more, I would be more than happy towork with you this because it is a task.
It doesn't happen overnight.
But what I come up with, what I help my clientswith is I want you to love everything that you
will walk out the door in.
(22:47):
In other words, if you can't say I love it,you're walking out the door and you're feeling
confident in that outfit, then there's adisconnect.
Everything in your closet should be in yourcolor fan.
Everything in your closet should fit you reallywell at the weight you are at right now.
Not five years ago, not five years in thefuture, yes.
(23:07):
Right.
And everything should look great on you andfeel fabulous on you.
Now, for women that go up and down the scaleall the time, well, we might have to segment
your closet and put those over here in the goodthings right now here.
Don't wait until you lose 20 pounds and 10pounds because you don't know when that's gonna
(23:30):
happen.
Now I'll just share something that happenedjust recently with me.
I was at a certain weight for the longest time.
I lost probably maybe eight good pounds in thelast few months.
Didn't have any reason.
Well, my reasoning was I had surgery.
I was carrying a fibroid in my stomach the sizeof a little baby.
(23:54):
Oh, goodness.
Yeah had no idea.
I ended up losing a lot of weight.
Now yes do my clothes fit differently?
Yes they do.
I bought pants over a year ago and they are toobig for me right now.
Oh okay.
I'm just gonna put them aside because they'restill new and then I'm gonna wear what fits me
today.
Do you see where I'm going with that?
(24:15):
Because if it doesn't, if they're too big andthey don't feel right on your body, you're
gonna be fiddling and looking at, oh, I looksloppy today or I don't feel right in these
pants.
I'm sharing that with you because it happens toeven the best of us.
Mhmm.
Even I know that.
But take what you have in your closet.
These are just some simple tips is colorcoordinate, take out the things that are not
(24:40):
working for you that absolutely do not lookgood on you.
If you still have tags on something, try themon, see if it fits.
If it doesn't, get rid of it or move it.
And I'm not your wardrobe wardrobe Nazi, but Ican find ways to make it work for you.
And I have, and I've had amazing success withwomen that go, I bought this, but I wanna take
(25:03):
it back because I don't have anything thatmatches in my closet.
And I've ended up finding ways to make five orsix outfits out of this one thing.
Nice.
I love that.
I love that.
And again, that's Yeah.
That's the value of working with a professionallike yourself.
Right?
(25:23):
That's not style has never really been a I'mabout let's find a style that's easy for me to
manage.
I've got my own style that's worked for methrough my career.
Now that I work at home and I'm on Zoom all thetime, right, usually it's style from the waist
up.
(25:44):
Do find that asking for somebody or justgetting second opinions about something, You
know, I grew up with five sisters and so wewere always constantly like, you wearing that?
Are you leaving the house in that?
Or, you know, oh, I can't wait to borrow thatfrom you.
So we always were reading each other's closetsand commenting on what we were wearing.
(26:06):
So I got that little bit of a style advice.
But as a more mature woman, it's sometimes hardto find somebody to ask those questions of.
Like, does this look good on my body?
What does look good on my body?
How do I match something with something else?
And I think that, you know, I'm trying to be amore conscious consumer and not just go out and
(26:28):
buy a bunch of things.
Right?
So, really, I love the fact that you can saythis one piece, I can make it work five
different ways so we don't have to buy as manyof those things, as many tops or whatever,
because we can mix and match and coordinate.
And that's where having that outside advice,like, from somebody with with your experience
and your credentials.
(26:50):
You have lots of credentials, right?
So, all of those things can help us to show upmore professionally, more confident, and that's
what we as businesswomen need.
Need every little ounce of confidence that wecan get to go out and do the things that we
have to do to run our business.
And so this is just one of the ways that we cansupport ourselves by hiring people like you.
(27:14):
So I love the fact that you said, you know, wecan help you reorganize our closet and take
advantage of the things that we already have.
You know, I'm sure you encourage people not togo out and just buy a a whole new wardrobe.
Right.
So starting with what we have.
And I've worked from with minimalists all theway up to maximalists.
(27:37):
Yeah.
Like, I was just saying this earlier today tosomeone that my office was the size of
someone's closet.
One person that was just for her, not herhusband or significant other, anybody was just
her.
And I thought, oh my gosh, you know, what doyou do with all this?
And so it it does make a big difference forthat.
(27:58):
Another point to what you were saying too aboutconfidence.
If you're not confidence in who you are on theinside and how you show up on the outside, you
are not gonna have confidence in selling whatyou sell.
Mhmm.
Being who you are, stepping into a leadershiproles, doing what you wanna do out there, have,
(28:19):
serving your purpose or whatever your purposeis.
And does that mean you have to be a Barbiedoll?
No, I don't teach anybody to be a Barbie doll.
Are you, you are unique to who you are.
And I come up with this other work that I doabout finding out these three to five words
(28:40):
that represent who you are.
And once I find that out, I'm able to dress youin a way that represents that.
You feel confident both inside and out when youleave the house every day.
And the confidence will come out in what yousell, in your work, in your play, in your
dating, all aspects of your whole life.
(29:01):
This isn't just a one and done thing.
And I also teach you to utilize your wardrobefor all different parts of personal life
because your personal life and your career canbe one in the same.
It's just how do you change that outfit up?
Okay I went for work now I'm going on a datetonight I don't have time to go home and change
(29:24):
what can I do?
Right Love that.
Again, how to tweak things without having to gobuy a whole new separate thing for each area of
your life.
I know many women, as we work with women thatare maybe in transition from a corporate job to
entrepreneurship, I know my wardrobe definitelychanged from when I was working at a law firm
(29:46):
and had to wear suits and skirts and a littlebit more dressed up.
We're in Colorado so it's not New Yorkprofessional but Colorado professional.
I'm finding that out.
Now I'm a solopreneur and I get to wear what Iwant.
I don't necessarily have to dress in a suit allthe time, depending on the occasion.
(30:09):
But I used to find when I had my corporatewardrobe, I had a harder time on the weekends
because I didn't have as many casual kind ofthings.
So now I have more of the casual all the timeand then have some dress up things if I need to
be more professional or go to a bigger event orsomething like that.
But those, how do you help women that are kindof transitioning from one and figuring out who
(30:34):
they are in this new role where they may haveto look differently?
They might have had to look a certain way inthe industry that they were leaving.
Oh, I've been there.
I've been there because I grew up to dress forsuccess.
So I grew up knowing that you had to dress forinterviews and dress for the part that you
(30:55):
wanted and you got the part.
The one thing is when you do go from acorporate career to an entrepreneur career, you
don't want to conform to what everybody else isdoing.
Because when you conform, you look likeeverybody else.
You don't stand out like who you are, unique.
(31:15):
And you wanna be unique to yourself.
And I bring that uniqueness out of you.
It's okay, let's find out where you've been,what are you doing, where are you going?
How are we gonna get you to where you wanna be?
And in order to do that, we have to change.
Sometimes the look helps you step into thatnext role because it takes a while for us to
(31:39):
get rid of this corporate persona that we'vehad.
Like I didn't know how to dress down for awhile, quite a while until I figured out, okay,
and it wasn't jeans because jeans didn't comeout at that time when I was doing this.
So even wearing jeans on a daily basis, I'm notcutting jeans at all because there's so many
(32:03):
people that do.
Again, who is your target audience?
Who do you want to be in front of and how doyou wanna be perceived by this audience?
And what is it that is in your message thatyou're trying to get across?
So when you go from, oh, I was a lawyer, let'stake that one for instance, and now I'm an
entrepreneur.
(32:23):
You still have leadership roles.
You still have that upper echelon title thatyou deserve.
But how do you step back and not be so stuffyor corporate culture looking.
Yeah.
How do I look myself?
Bring out my uniqueness.
(32:44):
What do I wear that resonates with who I amtoday?
And I'm just gonna mention a couple things likea a leather jacket or broaches.
You know, you would have a a slew of grandma'sbroaches that you inherited and love em but
don't know what to do with them.
Do you know what you can do with them?
Oh my gosh.
Yeah.
You can make those into belt loops or or beltbuckles or pins or earrings or hair pieces,
(33:12):
necklaces.
You can make them out of It's being creativewith those things and being able to wear them.
It could be, I don't wear, like to wear my hairdown or I wanna wear my hair down because it's
been up for so long.
And I've done this before was what do you dowith your hair?
If your hair is up 95% of the time, might needand you might need a new hairstyle.
(33:37):
Yeah.
Yeah.
And the reason why I say that is because why doyou have it up?
Because it's in my face.
I don't like it hanging in my face.
Well, then let's think of a new hairstyle.
Yes.
I don't want to go short because my husband maynot like me in short hair.
Let's think about what I just said in a hairsalon.
This is your body.
(33:58):
This is your life.
This is your time.
They will get used to it.
You've gotta wear it.
You've gotta love it.
You gotta feel good in it.
Yes.
It's about you, not somebody else.
You have to be selfish and be about you.
Nice.
And when I say
selfish, I say that in a good way.
Yes.
It goes back to what something you saidearlier.
(34:20):
We we have to learn to say no.
We and and own what brings us joy so that wecan have that joy in our lives, right?
So.
Totally.
Yes.
I I've I've loved our conversation, Don.
I could just keep talking to you forever but wegotta wrap it up.
So, how can people set up an appointment totalk to you if they need some help with their
(34:44):
look or their closet or just building thatconfidence in how they look and how they show
up?
What's the best way for them to get in touchwith you?
First of all, you can go website and check outmy website.
That's going to be redone here in the nextmonth here.
Dawn, dawndawnstebbing dot com.
(35:05):
It's s t e b b I n g dot com.
Or you can reach out to me, dawnstepping dotcom or dawndawnstepping dot com is my email.
You can reach me by email.
Reach out to me.
I offer a complimentary conversation with you.
There is no pressure.
I just had this conversation with you to findout what is it that you're needing.
(35:29):
If I'm not a good fit, I know somebody thatwould be a good fit.
It's not about me.
It's really about helping you find what youneed.
And if we're a good fit, then we'll talk aboutwhat we can do to work together.
And I'm on LinkedIn.
I'm on Facebook.
I'm on Instagram.
So you can check out all my and they're allunder my name.
(35:49):
Easy branding.
Yes.
I love it.
I love it.
And we will have all of those in the shownotes, everywhere you're listening to your
podcast to the podcast.
We'll put all of Dawn's information in there aswell so you can check the show notes for each
for whatever platform you're listening on.
But again, thank you so much, Dawn, for showingup today, sharing your expertise with us, and
(36:11):
sharing your story about how you took someleaps to success.
And, I really appreciate you coming on the showtoday.
Thank you for having me.
I appreciate Great.
Thank you.
You're welcome.
Thank you.
Hello
and welcome to the Leap for Ladies Leap toSuccess podcast.
I am Mary Gahl, the host and now owner of Leapfor Ladies Community, and so excited to be able
to interview Dawn Stebing today with us as ourguest.
(00:21):
And just a little bit about the Leap forSuccess podcast.
So it is the conduit by which we share women'sstories of courage, bravery, success, and
diversity.
Each week, we interview women entrepreneurs andleaders that have taken the leap in their lives
to inspire our global listeners to be more,have more, show up more, and live a life filled
(00:43):
with joy and happiness through believing inyou.
So with that being said, welcome Dawn to theLeap for Success podcast.
And I would like to, just get started by havingyou tell us a little bit about yourself and
your business.
How little do you want it, Mary?
Yeah, I know.
(01:03):
Tell us your life story in thirty seconds,right?
Thirty seconds or more.
Right now.
Just in a short synopsis is right now I presentmyself as a sales and image expert and I work
with professional women and professional womenentrepreneurs to help them empower them to
(01:27):
build confidence, create credibility, and standout in their marketplace.
And I've been doing this work for, it's goingon fifteen years this year in April, I'll be
15.
Nice.
Congratulations.
Yes, thank you.
It's wonderful.
Yeah.
And how did you kind of, you know, you've beendoing this for fifteen years, but how did you
(01:52):
kind of get to this as a career option?
Right.
Kind of
talk to the long story.
I love that because, you know, it didn't happenovernight.
It wasn't something I dreamt that I would bedoing ever.
It was something that I think throughout mycareer, in my early twenties, thirties on up,
(02:19):
you change every ten years.
Every ten years, something different willhappen in your life.
But I always listened to this little thing inthe back of my head that there's more out there
for you.
There's always more out there for you.
Or what should I be doing now?
If you're not, if something is gnawing at yousaying, hey, there's more for you, or this
(02:42):
isn't it, or I'm not sure if I'm passionateabout what I'm doing anymore, then you aren't
fulfilling your purpose yet.
You need to keep looking and searching for yourpurpose.
So as I've done this through my life, and I dothis with some of my clients sometimes is it's
a piece of paper.
I take a eight and a half sheet of paper.
I split down the middle and I go, okay, whatare everything I've ever done since I started
(03:06):
working in my life from the earliest ages onuntil up till today?
And then all of that, and then take bits andpieces of that and put it into the second
column and say, now, what did I love about eachone of And then you'll find the common
denominator.
Now, what that does is it sparks you to look atit in a way like, okay, I'm not doing what I'm
(03:33):
supposed to be doing.
I'm like, I love this.
I love customers.
Let's say I love being with people.
I love customers.
I've always loved customer service.
I've always loved to make women feel good aboutthemselves, which led me one into a form being
a former hairstylist.
(03:54):
I'm a hairstylist, which also led into almostopening up my own salon at one time but didn't
happen because I didn't have the passion forit.
Yeah.
And that word alone, if you don't have passion,it doesn't fulfill your heart.
Don't push it.
Don't go for it because you're not gonna behappy.
(04:14):
And that led into, well, when if I didn't havethe passion, but in that process of research,
was looking for products to put in my salon.
And I came across a direct sales company, whichhad skincare, cosmetics, and nutrition, which
was all natural.
Got into that, ran with that, built my way tothe top of that company.
(04:36):
And then all of a sudden I'm going, somethingis still not feeling right.
And that's how I ended up in as building mybusiness as an image consultant fifteen years
ago.
And I'm still evolving.
I'm still evolving because I still have so muchto teach women.
It's not just about how you look on theoutside, it's about how you feel on the inside
(05:00):
and resonates with how you show up for otherpeople.
Great.
I love that.
I love your work sheet and dividing the twocolumns, everything I've done, and then the
pieces that I loved of that.
That is such a great tip, for our listeners andfor everyone.
So whether you have a corporate job or a W-twojob and you've been there for a while but just
(05:22):
here's all the skills that I've developed andthen here's the skills that I love, the things
that bring me joy.
Especially as entrepreneurs, if we've been inour business for a while sometimes we forget
everything that we've learned or everythingthat we've done.
So I love the idea of taking a sheet of paperand just saying what are the skills that I've
developed?
Because as an entrepreneur you're learningevery single day.
(05:44):
You're learning something new, right?
And sometimes we forget to acknowledge all ofthose things that we've learned and then
looking at really what does bring us joy andhow are we going to pull that together.
Then, you know, again, finding that thread thatbrings you joy through all of the things that
you've done in your career is really powerfulto help guide you if you're especially if
(06:07):
you're making a decision to transition intosomething new, right?
Taking that time to just do that worksheet is asimple exercise.
It's not necessarily simple, right?
It's easy to do, not simple, right?
So it can take some time to go back through andrealize and put some thought into it.
If you haven't updated your resume, I've beenan entrepreneur for twelve years now.
(06:29):
I haven't updated my resume.
And before that, I worked for ten years at thatjob.
I I haven't updated my resume for twenty years.
An official one, So it's good for us to takethat stock of what we've learned and really
identify what it is that brings us joy.
So thank you for sharing that tool.
I really appreciate that.
You're welcome.
(06:51):
So you kind of answered this next question, butdid you always know what was your purpose?
Really, at what point did you give yourselfpermission to take that leap to success?
Right?
So from going into where you know yourcorporate career or being a hairstylist and
then moving into the the products basedbusiness, right?
(07:14):
And that was one leap.
And then taking a leap and saying I'm donehere.
I've done what I can here.
What was what drove you to take that leap intostarting your own company?
Love this question.
It's a big question.
It's no, I didn't always know what my purposewas.
I've been on search like I would always ask,you know, put it out there.
(07:36):
Ask the universe.
You put me on the earth for a reason.
What am I supposed to be doing?
I didn't find what I was passionate about untilI was in my forties.
Good.
In why is because I was ready.
A lot of people aren't really ready.
They might be in transition because they don'tlike where they're at right now, but they don't
know where they're supposed to go.
(07:57):
But asking questions like that, such as why didyou put me here?
What is my purpose?
I have no idea what I'm supposed to be doing.
But I knew, I knew one thing and I kept sayingthis to myself.
I knew that I loved the beauty industry.
I loved being a hairstylist.
I love working with my clients.
(08:18):
I love making them feel good.
I love the way they walked out the door.
I loved it when they came back and they said,hey, do that again.
But what was it about that that was really,really intriguing to me?
Was it, it was connecting.
It was connecting with my clients in buildingthese relationships that stay with you forever.
(08:40):
They end up becoming your friends.
They tell you about themselves, their families,their kids, what they're doing in their work,
all of this.
So I knew that was a big piece that I needed tokeep in my life.
And I knew there was a purpose for that.
Why?
Because it just made me feel good.
And when you know it makes you feel good, youstick with that.
(09:03):
You don't get rid of what makes you feel good.
You get rid of what doesn't make you feel good.
Yes.
Hopefully, yes.
Get rid of the ick and stay with the goodfeeling.
So then, and when I knew that it had to stillbe in the beauty industry.
And that's when I was at a networking event andall of a sudden I was sitting at this table.
(09:23):
I must've said this three times this weekalready.
I was sitting at this table and everybody, butprobably about 10 of us at one big round table.
And every woman started with telling us whothey were and what they did.
And it was a coach, coach, coach, coach, coach,coach came to me and I sold products.
(09:46):
So I wasn't really a coach.
I told them what I did, work for a company andsold skincare and cosmetics and nutrition,
coach, coach, coach, coach, image consultant.
And when that person said image consultant, itsunk so deep in the gut of my gut that said,
there it is.
Oh my God, I need to talk to you.
(10:08):
And, and and it hit me that hard where I'mgoing, okay, this is it.
I've been on the search for this for almost sixto eight months looking for what that next
piece was.
Mhmm.
And when that hit me, I met with her.
I had her come and, you know, clean out mycloset or whatever you you don't, arrange my
(10:30):
closet, talk to her a little bit about how shegot started and everything, and I ran with it.
And that's when my career started in imageconsulting.
I love it.
I love it.
So you kind of got that thunderbolt like that'swhat I've been looking for and then you took
the leap right and said okay I am this is whatit is now how do I get started in this career
(10:51):
Right?
Even though you had pieces of that that you youcould pull in, but still it's starting
something brand new for you.
Yes.
Yeah.
Which is a scary leap.
I I wanted to go back to something you saidearlier, Dawn, about really finding your
passion in your 40s.
As a mother of two daughters in their mid-20s,there's so much pressure, and even as women in
(11:15):
our mid-50s, there's so much pressure to say,What's your passion?
Find this one thing and find this, you know,your one purpose.
And there's so much pressure around thatsometimes.
I think it can be sometimes disabling forpeople, they just want to check out and say,
Nope, not going to do it.
I don't have a purpose.
I don't have a passion or whatever, which canlead us down a bad path.
(11:38):
But hearing people talk about it and say, Ididn't have a clear passion until I was older,
gives younger people that space to keepexploring and keep trying new things.
That's how we discover what brings us joy.
Going back to your list, right?
What are all the things that you've learned howto do and what things bring you joy?
(11:59):
And that will help lead you to your passion,but it's not something that you know, you turn
21 and here's your passion for the rest of yourlife and that's it, right?
So I love that you shared you found it reallyin your 40s.
And that's so true, Mary, because we don't knowwho we are when we're in our 20s.
We really don't.
We're still young.
We're still trying to explore life andadulthood at the same time.
(12:23):
You're growing out of childhood into adulthood.
Now you have to grow up a little bit.
You've gone to college or if you didn't, you'reworking, you're trying to find your way in your
work.
And then 30s is another whole story.
Some people have kids in their 30s and nowthey've got to stay home with their kids for a
little while and raise them until they are at acertain age where they go to school, you can go
(12:44):
back to work again.
Some of us have, had my kids younger.
I'm a young mom.
So by the time I was 40, my kids were not in myhouse anymore.
Oh yeah.
Nice.
So I had, that's when I said 40 because that,what am I gonna do now?
I'm not kids at home that are constantlyneeding my help, my advice, whatever.
(13:08):
I mean, I'm always there for them, but what amI gonna do?
And always think about, I love what you saidabout, do get, you know, in our later years, we
do find our passion in our later years isbecause we may already have our passion in our
younger years.
We just don't know what it is.
Yeah.
Because we don't hear those words until we getolder.
(13:32):
So we sit with ourselves and say, okay, nowwhat am I gonna do?
What do I wanna do?
What would I love to do?
What am I passionate about?
Like, do I love teaching?
Or maybe you love, paddle boarding or canoeing.
It could be anything like that.
(13:52):
Or hiking.
Maybe you wanna teach things like that or haveretreats you don't know until you really sit
with it until you really observe and then whenyou talk about taking the leap I never
underestimate myself.
I'm always one of those that just jumps in andgoes for it if it feels good.
Feels right, I do it.
(14:14):
Yes.
It doesn't.
If I'm at all, second guessing the way I feel,then you don't do it because you're just going
to feel icky all the time.
And you're going why did I spend that money onsomething I'm not passionate about?
And I've done that a lot.
I've hired coaches that, you know, never got meto where I wanted to go.
(14:38):
I just never felt good about it.
Listen to your intuition.
Intuition is going to tell you and and thatmight sound a little woo woo to some people but
for me it isn't anymore because I've beenworking with this for a long time.
Right.
But you have an intuition and your intuition isspeaking to you.
It's almost like you have the angel on oneside, the devil on the other, and the angel
says this and the devil says, no, you do itthis way, do it this way, no, no, no, do it
(15:01):
this way, do it this way, no, no, no.
And then you
end up doing what the devil says instead ofwhat the angel says, and then you just feel
horrible.
Right,
Always listen to your gut feeling.
If it doesn't feel good, don't do it.
I love that.
I love that.
And as a mom, again, that's something I reallytry to instill in my kids is pay attention to
(15:25):
that intuition.
We all have it.
So even as you go up and talk to a stranger,right, do you get the icky feeling?
Do you get the good feeling?
Pay attention to those feelings, right?
So from a very little age when you talk aboutstranger danger or those kind of things, right?
But paying attention, we do have that innerguide, that inner wisdom.
So, how have you learned to develop that andlearn to be able to hear that intuition, get
(15:51):
those downloads over the years?
And do you have some tips that you payattention to?
Yeah, making mistakes.
We will always make mistakes, and thosemistakes is what we learn from.
I think having surrounding yourself with goodpeople that will always, if you wanna run
(16:14):
something by somebody and always listening tosomebody that has your back, that's one.
Or I believe your body speaks louder than yourwords sometimes.
Mhmm.
And if your body is at all in a disruption likeyour health or anything like that, that means
you're doing something that doesn't feel rightin your body.
(16:35):
Yeah.
I'm going go back to even when you put clotheson, if you look in the mirror and it doesn't
feel right, it doesn't look right and you go,oh, this is good enough or this will do or
there's something wrong but I don't have timeto change type.
Your day is going to be completely off.
You want to look in that mirror and say, I loveit.
(16:56):
Yeah.
Just like in when you're doing any type ofwork, anything that you get yourself into,
listen to what you're saying, what you'rethinking, what is going on with your body.
And if you can say that I love it, or I knowthis is what I need, and I know I need to speak
to that person or talk to that person to helpme get to that place, then jump in or have a
(17:18):
conversation.
And if the conversation doesn't go the way youwant it to, don't sign up.
Don't go with that person.
I've made a lot of mistakes in my life andthese mistakes are what helped me grow and get
better, but I never stopped.
Never, I'm gonna say, I don't ever say never,not conclude, never say never.
(17:41):
I'm never gonna say never shut down because Ido and I have.
And when you shut down, those are the momentsthat you have to sit quietly and listen to
what's going on.
What happened?
Why did that happen?
Don't beat yourself up too long.
Just get back on the horse and start ridingagain because you will fall off.
(18:01):
You will get back on.
You will fall off.
You will get back on.
But there are people out there that can helpyou stay focused and accountable.
And accountability for me, I loveaccountability.
When I'm held accountable, I'm on track.
If I'm not held accountable, especially ifyou're at home sitting me on the computer 20
fourseven and nobody to talk to, my husband hasno idea really what I do.
(18:25):
I mean, does, but he doesn't.
I don't talk to him about my business becausehe doesn't understand it Where I stand it.
He's not in that mindset or that frame of mindthat I can go to him and say, hey, can I run
this by you?
No.
I have to look at people like you and mygirlfriends and colleagues and things like that
(18:46):
to get my answers.
Just going up and listening to other people isreally what helps too.
It is.
And for those listeners that know me, I wrote abook called Vitamin C3 and the three C's are
Connect, Contribute, and Celebrate.
And that's what I think all entrepreneurs need,that group of people that they can connect to
at a deeper level, on a relatable level, we'reall dealing with the same kind of problems.
(19:11):
We have a way to contribute to each other.
As we mentioned earlier, we're learning so muchevery day.
So having a way to share that knowledge withother people and contribute to them and then
celebrating together.
There's a big difference between celebratingtogether with other entrepreneurs that you
finally got your website done or you finallygot that newsletter out or whatever it is.
You reached 100 people on your newsletter list.
(19:33):
If I say that to my husband as well or mygirlfriends who have W-two jobs, they're like,
Oh, that's great, Mary.
But say that to an entrepreneur who understandswhat it takes to reach those milestones, it's a
different level of celebration.
Right?
So I love that.
I wanted to go back to something you said, Don,where you started to talk about you know, that
(19:54):
intuition when you get dressed in the morningand how what you're wearing and how you feel
about that can set you up for success for yourday.
So this is what you get to do every day.
So tell us a little bit about how women cankind of tweak their closets.
I know that's a big subject as well, right?
(20:16):
But what are some ways that we can work withour closets to help us feel more powerful and
more successful and more attuned in with thathigher self?
I love that question.
And and it is it's not an easy task.
Okay?
But let me share some simple tips.
(20:37):
Great.
First of all, if you can just take, you know,small segments of your day out on Saturday or a
Sunday when you're not doing much and look atyour closet and take things out that do not
resonate with who you are today.
And women have a hard time giving things upbecause it's about the money or somebody gave
(20:58):
it to them or whatever the thing is.
And let me talk about the gave, someone gave itto you.
Someone gave you something and you're going,well, I can't, I gotta wear it.
No, this is the thing about women.
They don't know how to say no.
Don't know how to say, hey, thank you so muchfor offering this to me, but it's really not my
(21:20):
style and not my color.
I don't want to hurt your feelings, but it'snot going I'm probably never going to wear it.
Do you think that woman is going to be pissy atyou for the rest of your life?
No, She's going to say, thank you for sharing.
I'll share it with somebody else and it mightfit.
You're just being honest.
You're being, you gotta stand in your owntruth.
You gotta step into your own self and say,things that may not resonate with other people.
(21:43):
Stop pretending you're making someone feel goodbecause if you never wear it and they know that
you never wear it, you're just making them feelawful.
They gave it to you when they could have gaveit to somebody else or handed it to the Google
or did something like that.
So go in your closet, take things out thatdoesn't resonate with you, and you can either
(22:04):
pass it on or give it to goodwill or consignit.
That's number one.
Number two is color coordinate your yourcloset.
That's a real simple task.
You can put all your blues, your greens, youryellows, your purples, your whites, all of it
color coordinate.
And then make sure they all fit you really,really well.
(22:26):
Take the things that you love and pair themtogether.
Now this can go, I'm not gonna go into thewhole thing.
You want more, I would be more than happy towork with you this because it is a task.
It doesn't happen overnight.
But what I come up with, what I help my clientswith is I want you to love everything that you
will walk out the door in.
(22:47):
In other words, if you can't say I love it,you're walking out the door and you're feeling
confident in that outfit, then there's adisconnect.
Everything in your closet should be in yourcolor fan.
Everything in your closet should fit you reallywell at the weight you are at right now.
Not five years ago, not five years in thefuture, yes.
(23:07):
Right.
And everything should look great on you andfeel fabulous on you.
Now, for women that go up and down the scaleall the time, well, we might have to segment
your closet and put those over here in the goodthings right now here.
Don't wait until you lose 20 pounds and 10pounds because you don't know when that's gonna
(23:30):
happen.
Now I'll just share something that happenedjust recently with me.
I was at a certain weight for the longest time.
I lost probably maybe eight good pounds in thelast few months.
Didn't have any reason.
Well, my reasoning was I had surgery.
I was carrying a fibroid in my stomach the sizeof a little baby.
(23:54):
Oh, goodness.
Yeah had no idea.
I ended up losing a lot of weight.
Now yes do my clothes fit differently?
Yes they do.
I bought pants over a year ago and they are toobig for me right now.
Oh okay.
I'm just gonna put them aside because they'restill new and then I'm gonna wear what fits me
today.
Do you see where I'm going with that?
(24:15):
Because if it doesn't, if they're too big andthey don't feel right on your body, you're
gonna be fiddling and looking at, oh, I looksloppy today or I don't feel right in these
pants.
I'm sharing that with you because it happens toeven the best of us.
Mhmm.
Even I know that.
But take what you have in your closet.
These are just some simple tips is colorcoordinate, take out the things that are not
(24:40):
working for you that absolutely do not lookgood on you.
If you still have tags on something, try themon, see if it fits.
If it doesn't, get rid of it or move it.
And I'm not your wardrobe wardrobe Nazi, but Ican find ways to make it work for you.
And I have, and I've had amazing success withwomen that go, I bought this, but I wanna take
(25:03):
it back because I don't have anything thatmatches in my closet.
And I've ended up finding ways to make five orsix outfits out of this one thing.
Nice.
I love that.
I love that.
And again, that's Yeah.
That's the value of working with a professionallike yourself.
Right?
(25:23):
That's not style has never really been a I'mabout let's find a style that's easy for me to
manage.
I've got my own style that's worked for methrough my career.
Now that I work at home and I'm on Zoom all thetime, right, usually it's style from the waist
up.
(25:44):
Do find that asking for somebody or justgetting second opinions about something, You
know, I grew up with five sisters and so wewere always constantly like, you wearing that?
Are you leaving the house in that?
Or, you know, oh, I can't wait to borrow thatfrom you.
So we always were reading each other's closetsand commenting on what we were wearing.
(26:06):
So I got that little bit of a style advice.
But as a more mature woman, it's sometimes hardto find somebody to ask those questions of.
Like, does this look good on my body?
What does look good on my body?
How do I match something with something else?
And I think that, you know, I'm trying to be amore conscious consumer and not just go out and
(26:28):
buy a bunch of things.
Right?
So, really, I love the fact that you can saythis one piece, I can make it work five
different ways so we don't have to buy as manyof those things, as many tops or whatever,
because we can mix and match and coordinate.
And that's where having that outside advice,like, from somebody with with your experience
and your credentials.
(26:50):
You have lots of credentials, right?
So, all of those things can help us to show upmore professionally, more confident, and that's
what we as businesswomen need.
Need every little ounce of confidence that wecan get to go out and do the things that we
have to do to run our business.
And so this is just one of the ways that we cansupport ourselves by hiring people like you.
(27:14):
So I love the fact that you said, you know, wecan help you reorganize our closet and take
advantage of the things that we already have.
You know, I'm sure you encourage people not togo out and just buy a a whole new wardrobe.
Right.
So starting with what we have.
And I've worked from with minimalists all theway up to maximalists.
(27:37):
Yeah.
Like, I was just saying this earlier today tosomeone that my office was the size of
someone's closet.
One person that was just for her, not herhusband or significant other, anybody was just
her.
And I thought, oh my gosh, you know, what doyou do with all this?
And so it it does make a big difference forthat.
(27:58):
Another point to what you were saying too aboutconfidence.
If you're not confidence in who you are on theinside and how you show up on the outside, you
are not gonna have confidence in selling whatyou sell.
Mhmm.
Being who you are, stepping into a leadershiproles, doing what you wanna do out there, have,
(28:19):
serving your purpose or whatever your purposeis.
And does that mean you have to be a Barbiedoll?
No, I don't teach anybody to be a Barbie doll.
Are you, you are unique to who you are.
And I come up with this other work that I doabout finding out these three to five words
(28:40):
that represent who you are.
And once I find that out, I'm able to dress youin a way that represents that.
You feel confident both inside and out when youleave the house every day.
And the confidence will come out in what yousell, in your work, in your play, in your
dating, all aspects of your whole life.
(29:01):
This isn't just a one and done thing.
And I also teach you to utilize your wardrobefor all different parts of personal life
because your personal life and your career canbe one in the same.
It's just how do you change that outfit up?
Okay I went for work now I'm going on a datetonight I don't have time to go home and change
(29:24):
what can I do?
Right Love that.
Again, how to tweak things without having to gobuy a whole new separate thing for each area of
your life.
I know many women, as we work with women thatare maybe in transition from a corporate job to
entrepreneurship, I know my wardrobe definitelychanged from when I was working at a law firm
(29:46):
and had to wear suits and skirts and a littlebit more dressed up.
We're in Colorado so it's not New Yorkprofessional but Colorado professional.
I'm finding that out.
Now I'm a solopreneur and I get to wear what Iwant.
I don't necessarily have to dress in a suit allthe time, depending on the occasion.
(30:09):
But I used to find when I had my corporatewardrobe, I had a harder time on the weekends
because I didn't have as many casual kind ofthings.
So now I have more of the casual all the timeand then have some dress up things if I need to
be more professional or go to a bigger event orsomething like that.
But those, how do you help women that are kindof transitioning from one and figuring out who
(30:34):
they are in this new role where they may haveto look differently?
They might have had to look a certain way inthe industry that they were leaving.
Oh, I've been there.
I've been there because I grew up to dress forsuccess.
So I grew up knowing that you had to dress forinterviews and dress for the part that you
(30:55):
wanted and you got the part.
The one thing is when you do go from acorporate career to an entrepreneur career, you
don't want to conform to what everybody else isdoing.
Because when you conform, you look likeeverybody else.
You don't stand out like who you are, unique.
(31:15):
And you wanna be unique to yourself.
And I bring that uniqueness out of you.
It's okay, let's find out where you've been,what are you doing, where are you going?
How are we gonna get you to where you wanna be?
And in order to do that, we have to change.
Sometimes the look helps you step into thatnext role because it takes a while for us to
(31:39):
get rid of this corporate persona that we'vehad.
Like I didn't know how to dress down for awhile, quite a while until I figured out, okay,
and it wasn't jeans because jeans didn't comeout at that time when I was doing this.
So even wearing jeans on a daily basis, I'm notcutting jeans at all because there's so many
(32:03):
people that do.
Again, who is your target audience?
Who do you want to be in front of and how doyou wanna be perceived by this audience?
And what is it that is in your message thatyou're trying to get across?
So when you go from, oh, I was a lawyer, let'stake that one for instance, and now I'm an
entrepreneur.
(32:23):
You still have leadership roles.
You still have that upper echelon title thatyou deserve.
But how do you step back and not be so stuffyor corporate culture looking.
Yeah.
How do I look myself?
Bring out my uniqueness.
(32:44):
What do I wear that resonates with who I amtoday?
And I'm just gonna mention a couple things likea a leather jacket or broaches.
You know, you would have a a slew of grandma'sbroaches that you inherited and love em but
don't know what to do with them.
Do you know what you can do with them?
Oh my gosh.
Yeah.
You can make those into belt loops or or beltbuckles or pins or earrings or hair pieces,
(33:12):
necklaces.
You can make them out of It's being creativewith those things and being able to wear them.
It could be, I don't wear, like to wear my hairdown or I wanna wear my hair down because it's
been up for so long.
And I've done this before was what do you dowith your hair?
If your hair is up 95% of the time, might needand you might need a new hairstyle.
(33:37):
Yeah.
Yeah.
And the reason why I say that is because why doyou have it up?
Because it's in my face.
I don't like it hanging in my face.
Well, then let's think of a new hairstyle.
Yes.
I don't want to go short because my husband maynot like me in short hair.
Let's think about what I just said in a hairsalon.
This is your body.
(33:58):
This is your life.
This is your time.
They will get used to it.
You've gotta wear it.
You've gotta love it.
You gotta feel good in it.
Yes.
It's about you, not somebody else.
You have to be selfish and be about you.
Nice.
And when I say
selfish, I say that in a good way.
Yes.
It goes back to what something you saidearlier.
(34:20):
We we have to learn to say no.
We and and own what brings us joy so that wecan have that joy in our lives, right?
So.
Totally.
Yes.
I I've I've loved our conversation, Don.
I could just keep talking to you forever but wegotta wrap it up.
So, how can people set up an appointment totalk to you if they need some help with their
(34:44):
look or their closet or just building thatconfidence in how they look and how they show
up?
What's the best way for them to get in touchwith you?
First of all, you can go website and check outmy website.
That's going to be redone here in the nextmonth here.
Dawn, dawndawnstebbing dot com.
(35:05):
It's s t e b b I n g dot com.
Or you can reach out to me, dawnstepping dotcom or dawndawnstepping dot com is my email.
You can reach me by email.
Reach out to me.
I offer a complimentary conversation with you.
There is no pressure.
I just had this conversation with you to findout what is it that you're needing.
(35:29):
If I'm not a good fit, I know somebody thatwould be a good fit.
It's not about me.
It's really about helping you find what youneed.
And if we're a good fit, then we'll talk aboutwhat we can do to work together.
And I'm on LinkedIn.
I'm on Facebook.
I'm on Instagram.
So you can check out all my and they're allunder my name.
(35:49):
Easy branding.
Yes.
I love it.
I love it.
And we will have all of those in the shownotes, everywhere you're listening to your
podcast to the podcast.
We'll put all of Dawn's information in there aswell so you can check the show notes for each
for whatever platform you're listening on.
But again, thank you so much, Dawn, for showingup today, sharing your expertise with us, and
(36:11):
sharing your story about how you took someleaps to success.
And, I really appreciate you coming on the showtoday.
Thank you for having me.
I appreciate Great.
Thank you.
You're welcome.
Thank you.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Special Summer Offer: Exclusively on Apple Podcasts, try our Dateline Premium subscription completely free for one month! With Dateline Premium, you get every episode ad-free plus exclusive bonus content.
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!