#awinewith Samantha Feast
MEET Samantha Feast, Founder of The Matreasance Mentor
You can find them here:
Transcript
Danielle Lewis (00:00):
You are listening to Spark TV, where we bring you daily interviews with real women in business at all stages. I'm your host, Danielle Lewis, and I am so grateful to have you here. Sam, welcome to Spark tv. I'm so excited to have you here.
Samantha Feast (00:17):
Thank you for having me. I do feel truly honored. I have lived by the words of many women on many podcasts over the last seven or so years. So yeah, so honored to be here. Thank you for having me.
Danielle Lewis (00:31):
Oh no, the honor and pleasure is all mine. You are so right, having access to other women's stories to know that you're not alone to shortcut, to get tips to do all the things. It's just we're so lucky that we live in a time where we have the technology where women can literally just jump on and share their experiences for us all to benefit from. It's so cool. It
Samantha Feast (00:58):
Really is because I'm not sure I would've, no, I definitely know I would not be on this journey and have not have dreamt so big and not have birthed what is coming into the world had I not had access to amazing women who have really been thought leaders in their field and done amazing things in business and motherhood. So yeah, truly
Danielle Lewis (01:24):
So good. I love it. Well, let's start out by telling everyone who you are and what you do.
Samantha Feast (01:30):
So I'm Samantha Feast, and I do many things. I have multiple hats as any I think woman, mom, nurse. I'm also a nurse, so I'm the heart center creator of the Mires Essence Mentor and the magic of Mires Essence coaching. It is sort of a broad term to use what I use. It's come through many iterations of some very challenging, as we spoke about before, we press record, and it's really been birthed from that. And I love, one of my first coaches said, our struggles do produce our strengths if we choose for them to be. And in all honesty, I wouldn't change a thing about what I've experienced because it's led me to be able to hold women and moms in such raw and life-changing capacity. And I know we have trouble as women tooting our own horns, but I've got the evidence to prove that the work I help facilitate allows that.
(02:35):
So I call myself a matress mentor. Matress coach is another word, probably more readily understood. And I really help guide women. I don't give advice. I don't tell women what to do or moms what to do. I really am about being a mirror for them to reflect and deepen into their own intuitive knowledge that I think over time we've just really become disconnected from. So I do that in a variety of ways. I do that online and via a lot of voice notes. Voice notes are my love language. So especially as a mom, especially as a mom of young children, three and seven, and I've got three older stepsons, four horses, two dogs, a husband, all the things, it's really important for me. Anything that I want to create and bring into the world has to work for me for my family, but also work for then the clients who are mostly moms or wanting to become a mom.
(03:36):
So it has to work. And in our lives that are so filled and full with many things, we need different modalities. We can't always sit down to absorb a two, three hour session, which in some cases that's definitely needed, but that's not where my genius is. So I love voice notes, tend to do them on a range of apps and provide coaching containers that way. And then I have this beautiful scents deck coming out, which is an affirmation deck for mothers on steroids. It is so much more than an affirmation deck. And I really wanted to bring something into the world that was, I guess more tactile, something that can be touched and felt and fully customizable for wherever a mom's at in her journey and whatever type of family or background she has or what she's doing in her life or what she wants out of her life, what's working, what's not working. Because mires essence is for every mom, every mom goes through mires essence. So this is before
Danielle Lewis (04:42):
You keep going. What does the word mires actually mean for anyone who's tuning in? Because I hadn't heard of it until I met you,
Samantha Feast (04:52):
And I love that because isn't it so we get so interested in a topic or subject and then we think everyone knows about it because we just surround ourselves with people. And I follow most of my social media is with around scent and motherhood. So scent was a term originally coined back in the 1970s by Donna Raphael who was an anthropologist. And it sort of just didn't really take off back in the seventies. It probably wasn't the time for it to take off. And then about a decade ago, another social anthropologist, orally ahan rediscovered Dana Raphael's work and brought this word forward. And so Trece is basically adolescence. Every child that develops into adulthood who reaches adulthood, goes through adolescence and adolescence, describes the physical changes, hormonal changes, brain changes. It describes mentally we know what teenagers are like and everything that they can experience emotionally, but even how they see themselves in society, they're moving from the child then to the adult, they're going to have different responsibilities thinking about their future.
(06:11):
Children are very in the moment, that's all they're thinking about. So adolescence has become so much more, we know about it, we sort of have a lot more understanding of what a teenager might be feeling or reacting in certain ways. So trence is what every mother, every woman goes through when she becomes a mom. And it happens from the moment that the woman thinks about herself as being a mother. So this could happen, even start happening preconception. I mean, from a very early age, I knew I was going to be a mom and identified as a mother. So for me, mares essence has been a long road, although I've only known about it for such a short time out of that road. And resin also doesn't have an endpoint. So adolescents, once you're an adult, it sort of has an endpoint. Whereas I think every mama will understand that you are forever a mom in whatever capacity your children, whether they are still with us or not in any capacity, you are still forever a mom.
(07:15):
And so Mires Essence also gives acknowledgement that it is a lifelong transition that happens. It is more of a cyclical transition as in we go through cycles. So we go through our own massive cycle upheavals as we grow a baby, as we birth a baby and bring this baby into the world. But then as that child grows, children I believe are our greatest teachers and they will trigger the hell out of us as my beautiful three-year-old daughter does. And they're here to really strip away anything that is not who we really are at our core. And because they do that, it can definitely trigger us. And so it's this cyclical growth of transition after transition and to keep learning and growing. And Matress essence really brings forth a lot of acknowledgement to the motherhood journey. It is not just a physical change in the body, it is not.
(08:12):
I think almost every mom will agree that their birth, they can tell you how they felt in their birth until they're on their deathbed because it is that transformational, but it's not just birth and so much, the focus of our society is just the birth. So mares essence just gives that beautiful acknowledgement to this whole massive transition that happens and it's wisdom that possibly was there back in more traditional cultures and has really been lost in our modern western society, especially because we are more isolated from family or from our wise women. So there's a lot of disconnect perhaps with, or grandmothers. We don't live in the same area. And so a lot of what my mom told me was after I became a mom and she said, oh yeah, that's being a mom. I'm like, why didn't you tell me? Why didn't you share what this was like? So yes, majority allows more of this dialogue and more of this conversation to start happening because it's a lost wisdom that women are really crying out for, even though they might not know what the word mares essence is just yet. Yeah,
Danielle Lewis (09:26):
Yeah. I absolutely love it because I think you're right, and I think after some of the conversations we've had, it is such a journey and I love how you called it a transition. It really is not just how to be a good mom book or how to deal with this. It is really a journey of who am I? Who is this new person, what is my identity? And I think the fact that you are providing have created this space for women who are going through this and solving this huge need, I think is just really impactful and really powerful for the women that you work with. How did you get into it? Where did this come from?
Samantha Feast (10:15):
That is such a beautiful question and I love that because how often do we not reflect on our journey? I mean, totally.
(10:22):
I practice what I preach, so I do reflect a bit on my journey, but generally speaking we're like, what's the next thing? And I love this question because it's actually a funny story. Well, my postpartums weren't funny at all. I had beautiful pregnancies and felt really lucky that only a few minor things. I loved being pregnant, and if I could be pregnant for the rest of my life, I probably would be. And I love pregnant women, I must admit. I think that no matter how they're feeling, there's this essence about them, but that's a whole nother podcast probably.
(11:00):
But so I had some really challenging postpartums and I did when I was pregnant with my son, my eldest, I did the prenatal yoga, I did all the things, I did the nursery shopping, and even though I'm a nurse, I did the antenatal classes and I just wanted to do all the things. And so I did some prenatal yoga with a lady called Wendy Jackson who has become a true friend and mentor to me. She has a background of midwifery and a yoga instructor, obviously focusing on pre and postnatal yoga. And I was doing these classes and I just felt so connected to my feminine, so connected to me and my body and everything like that. Fast forward. Then the birth of my son, which was empowering and very little trauma that I recognized at the time. That's again another story. But then went to do postnatal yoga and I hated it. I was so sleep deprived. Bob wouldn't settle to let me be able, even though Wendy held such beautiful space and there was no pressure. And anyway, it was probably within the first six to 12 months, it was a haze. My little boy didn't sleep for about two and a half years I feel like. And
(12:21):
So she whispered the word mares essence to me, and I say whispered because she was really gentle about it. And at that time I was like, great, that's a word. How was that going to help me? And this is what's the funny part. I was like, how's that going to help me? I don't even know who I am right now. I am struggling at this, which I thought I was really maternal and I'd grown up around babies. I'm a nurse for crying out loud, I should know how to do this. I should be loving this. And I really wasn't. And so she gently kept saying that to me. And at the same time, I really didn't want to go back to nursing. I had sort of realized that the operating room was not my area, but even just nursing in general, I really wanted to head down a more holistic path.
(13:15):
And I actually found entrepreneurship and business I'd never considered myself to be in business. I have no family history, nores in business, nothing. I'm like, I don't want to own a business bugger that. I just want to go to work too hard. You need money for this. You need to know people, you need to network. Even though I feel so passionate and I'm talking like I'm an extrovert, I am actually totally an introvert. The fire's on behind me here. I could be inside all day, that's fine. So I was not in that frame of mind at all, but I found this network marketing company through essential oils, and I just love the oils. And I thought, oh my gosh, I really could share this. However, what I was being taught about how to do that, I'm like, I've got a very good barometer or intuition or gut instinct, whatever you want to call it.
(14:15):
And I was like, this is just feeling icky. I don't want to do this then. But it was still through that company that I found leaders who were willing to share their work and how they had grown. And that led me to my first life coach, which I was So is it luck or is it the plan? Was I guided in that direction? I don't really know if it was luck, but I landed in her coaching program and it was like, so I did have to go back to nursing part-time and I'm still, as we mentioned before, we press record. I'm still nursing part-time at one of our regional hospitals. And so basically through iteration after iteration, really deepening and going through almost, so my son turns seven in April and it's been almost pretty much seven years a dark night of the soul. It's been unwrapping.
(15:16):
I've been like Shrek and unwrapping my onion layers as I have come up to be triggered and this isn't working and hasn't all been, it's not been easy. It's not been unicorns and rainbows as a lot of perhaps life coach or even spiritual people say. It's like, oh, it's light and love and that's definitely part of it, but it's like it is raw and it's real and it's hard and it's just been through this that I'm now studying Mama Rising under Amy Taylor Cab, who is an amazing matress essence activist here in Australia. And her course is just really confirming that understanding and deepening matress essence and my understanding of it and working understanding which has developed probably from six and a half years ago, is now blossoming into the way that I actually bring forward and coach and support women. And it's like the kind of pieces of a puzzle that you don't see all at once are now starting to form this picture.
(16:27):
And I just want to give a shout out to those women that it's taking a long time. I've actually connected with a beautiful lady through the Spark community who is also a theater nurse, which is amazing. Oh wow. We also working in not exactly, it's not postpartum, but in the birth scene and it's just so beautiful. But business taking years, I know it's so good when women are coming together. Yeah, it's gold. And so it's been through iteration and I just want to give acknowledgement to that because I didn't know, I laughed the first time I heard the word rece and I was like, great a word, how's that going to help me? And it has been many iterations. It has been many stop and starts. It's been many times of just taking a break and not being on social media at all and not being in a coaching container and that. But over the whole course of seven years, it has been consistently investing in my learning and my growth in business and in life, and I don't think you can have one without the other. I just truly believe that you can only exceed in business to as much as you are willing to put the inner work in to achieve the outer work, if that makes sense.
Danielle Lewis (17:51):
Yeah, I absolutely agree. I was thinking about before we hit record and you were talking about family and work and business and Oh, me too. I get a lot and all of these things that we juggle because I don't know if they're always in the air at the same time. But again, just to your point, I don't think you can have a great business without doing the inner work. I also think that there is this balance of all of our identities and you said someone asked, how do you do it all? And it is also what I'm hearing from you as well is it's not I made a decision seven years ago and that's it. It is this constant evolution and making sure your business and your life work for where you are and also how you choose your identity to evolve. We can't be the person that we thought we were at 20 or we'd be in a lot of trouble. So I really love that nod to the fact that it does take a long time. It is constantly investing in your learning and being totally okay with that and being totally okay that it might not ever be figured out.
Samantha Feast (19:08):
Exactly. I love the term messy motherhood,
(19:13):
Which is really interesting because I'm a Capricorn. I'm a theater nurse. I'm the eldest daughter, I'm the eldest granddaughter. I grew up very good Christian girl, do yes, say yes, cover everyone else's needs. Everything really on that line of perfectionism, which is the thief of joy by the way, and I'm a recovering perfectionist because motherhood totally unraveled that for me. It does not work in motherhood. It works for short periods of time, but eventually you'll burn out in some way, shape or form. And I've seen it time and time again. And so I think that same theme can be applied to business. You don't have to be perfect to launch. You don't have to be perfect to make that bold decision of investing in yourself or being part of a coaching group. You can take those wobbly steps, that baby bird trying to fly and bouncing back down on the ground. That is okay. And learning to be my own cheerleader and stoking my own fire has been one of the biggest, don't get me wrong. Being part of a group and getting that feedback from amazing women is so valuable and cannot be underrated. But also knowing that at eight o'clock at night the kids are in bed and I'm working on something with no evidence that it's going to work, but I believe in it that much
(20:47):
And believe in the impact it can have. That's a power that no one can take away from you or that no one can decide you do or don't have. Goose. I also find,
Danielle Lewis (20:59):
I know I love it. I love it. And it's funny you say that. I was just thinking there's an energy in that. There is an energy in creating something that you are so excited about and so passionate about. And people say that to me as well. They're like, oh my God, you're always doing so much. And I'm like, yeah, but I love it when I have an idea at 10 o'clock at night, there is an energy that happens where I want to jump on my laptop. I don't think, well, it's not before 5:00 PM and this is work, so I'm not doing it. I go, oh my God, this is so exciting that I get to create something. So I just love the frame and I also love the intentionality. Now you mentioned that through this there have been times of burnout and exhaustion and I just feel like you have to make sure you don't get there again. And it is in this, when we find that energy, it's almost that's how we avoid the burnout because we're actually dedicating our life to something that we're so excited about.
Samantha Feast (22:08):
And I think if we can tune into, I've done a lot of somatic work because I was a person very much in my head, very much in my brain, and which I think a lot of us walking this earth just are. That's just how we've sort of evolutionized I guess as humans. But bringing it back, not just to heart center, but in women actually to our womb space, and whether you have a womb or not is fine. It's still in that sort of chakra, that space. And I think when you can become, yes, excited and passionate about something but also deeply rooted in it, so deeply rooted that it's okay if you have six months off social media. It's okay if you need to take a break because it is so rooted in you that it's not a matter of if this will happen, it's a matter of when.
(23:02):
And then it almost takes a lot of pressure or internal pressure because again, women, we are really good at placing extraordinary amounts of pressure, and I know that because that's me straight a student all throughout high school and all the things. And I just feel like if we can really tune back into our bodies and into that womb space and be so deeply rooted in how to go forward, it is that pool of knowledge and power that we can call upon. So if we've got our three-year-old, the background, which she's not here at the moment, but needed me, I would pull her onto my lap and continue this podcast because I have the strength even for only a short period of time. This is so important to me and so valuable, and I'm so grateful for it that I would make it work. And
(24:04):
I think we also spoke, this is probably before we hit record too, but we also spoke about the resiliency and adaptability. I'm trying to remember what we've been speaking about, but the resiliency and adaptability that women in business and definitely in motherhood, we are almost forced into because of the volatile nature of business and entrepreneurship and motherhood, that we can't be such a set force because we are going to keep getting tried to be knocked over. Whereas if we can be more like that deeply rooted willow tree where the branches can move and sway, but in the end we are so deeply rooted that no storm is going to knock us over. We don't have to be strong all the time. We don't have to be rigid and in control and perfect all the time. We can actually be adaptable and flexible, and that's a lot of where the magic of Mires essence comes from. It's a bit woowoo because I like a bit of tarot cards and all that sort of thing.
Danielle Lewis (25:12):
Spark a pretty,
Samantha Feast (25:17):
Okay, I love that, I love that. But it's really about connecting that when we have things that aren't working, we feel so stressed and we need to be controlling everything and we need schedules to be just right, and we are having trouble going with the flow, which hands up that was me, still is me sometimes when I don't, when something doesn't happen my way, but we can lean into it rather than sort of being like, I just feel like that kind of, oh, like, oh, I don't want that to touch me or that's affecting me and it's really hurting if we can actually be more in flow with ourselves, knowing our center and knowing how deeply rooted we are, we can weather so many more storms. It'll still hurt, it's still wet, cold and raining, but we can weather a lot more storms.
Danielle Lewis (26:11):
I love this so much. If there is a spark listening right now who is just going, oh my God, this is me. I'm feeling triggered slash scene. Maybe scenes are nicer
Samantha Feast (26:26):
Work,
Danielle Lewis (26:27):
But would there be, if somebody is listening right now and just feeling overwhelmed, feeling that loss of identity, feeling like they're really unclear about the path ahead, would you have any advice for where they could just take one tiny small step?
Samantha Feast (26:47):
Definitely. And I again, love this question so much. Thank you for asking it because I have lived off the advice and not advice, but I guess, yeah, guidance and that of so many women before me and it's so reassuring and beautiful. So thank you for giving me this opportunity because it's really, really important. Firstly, I would say that if we can lean in and allow our triggers to actually activate us, if they can be activators rather than triggers, even listen to that sound of that word, I'm triggered or I'm activated. It's so different. Wow,
Danielle Lewis (27:26):
That's cool. No one's ever said that to me before. I love that.
Samantha Feast (27:30):
Oh, I love that so much. And it's sometimes, especially in this world where asked, we've got so much information and so many things we could do and so much stimuli and so many ways to go forward. I mean, I think I have seen or heard of successful women in business do things at opposite ends of the spectrum, like email list, no email list, social media, no social media fully funded, running off dollars and cents that they can scrounge out. And if you are feeling overwhelmed and you are hesitating or you're like, oh my gosh, this isn't working, first of all, listen to this full podcast because it's amazing and you will be activated and you will receive the juiciness that's here. But also it's the piece of probably one of the only pieces of advice that I actually give to every mom who comes to me feeling lost and overwhelmed.
(28:31):
The place you start, the place to come back to and to look at to your next step forward is to actually come back here and come back here in the way of, yes, we've got our beautiful intelligent brain. Don't try to work against our brain. Our brain will always try and keep us safe. And if we're trying to step out into something new, into entrepreneurship, into business, taking that leap of faith, our brain doesn't recognize that, and it won't, of course, it's scared because anything that it doesn't know, it fears and it's only trying to keep us safe. So if we can make sure that our brain's in the passenger seat, but we're driving second to that, our heart is also in the backseat and it's there and its emotions are leading us and guiding us. But neither of those two things are actually our GPS.
(29:24):
Neither of those two things we should, and I never like to say should either, but we don't want them to be driving the vehicle of our life. I cannot stress highly enough how coming back into our bodies, and I call it my womb space, but just into your body, into your somatic work, really rooting into who you are and knowing that nothing is broken, nothing needs to be repaired. You are enough just as you are to be wholly successful just as you are your next step, your whispers of what will come forward. Oh my gosh. The amount of opportunities and connections and how I've landed in the spaces I've landed in have come from me actually taking a step back into my body, into who I am, my womb wisdom, soul connection to our higher self, whatever you want to call it. And being guided by the whispers of that. Because if we don't sit still and listen, which is really hard to do as a woman in business, as a mum, we hardly ever sit, sit still. That's why our beautiful guidance comes at 10 o'clock at night or it comes as we're lying in bed because it's the only time that we get to be still and in quiet. Then that will guide you forward and will guide you to how you need to move forward.
Danielle Lewis (30:52):
And I love that you said then about women in business as well, because I was so, I'm not a mom, but secretly I've been thinking this whole time everything that you say I can connect with. And I just think that if there's a woman in business listening, this is just so relevant to her as well, even if she's not a mom, because the answer is in the rest, the answer is in the quiet. The answer is within your body. I feel like it's so applicable, so impactful for the mares essence period of one's life. But also I just feel like that is based on some ancient wisdom that we always have, the power within us, and whether it is motherhood, business, life, relationships, whatever journey anyone is on, I just feel like there is just such power in what you just said. So thank you so much. Thank you
Samantha Feast (31:51):
So much. I'm so blessed and my cheeks are even flushed. I just feel this beautiful energy. So I can't thank you enough for just allowing me this platform to speak. Speak.
Danielle Lewis (32:06):
Well, you're welcome back anytime. But yes, thank you so much, Sam, for sharing your journey and your story and your wisdom with the Spark community. I just believe that everyone listening to that would've gotten so much value. So thank you so much for coming on the show.
Samantha Feast (32:23):
Thanks, Danielle. So much appreciated.
Danielle Lewis (32:26):
That wraps another episode of Spark tv. Shout out to Spark TV sponsor IP Australia for their amazing support of the Spark Podcast and women in business. And if no one tells you today, you've got this.
✨ Thank you to IP Australia for supporting the SPARK podcast and women in business ✨
