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in today's episode we will have an incredible guest joining us Jen catsup Jen is an entrepreneur mental health
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expert and the creator of the dream method method that helps people overcome self-sabotage and build thriving
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businesses and lives Jen it's actually currently living in Bulgaria so today we will Explore her experiences as an
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expert and also her journey on helping others unlock their
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potential this is xat experts the podcast that dives into the fascinating lives of those who've lived and worked
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across borders exploring the challenges experiences and insights they've gained along the
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or become an expert please check the website experts podcast.com or check the
The expat: Jen Katsev
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link in the description the exper Jen
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cap so in this first part of the episode uh we'll explore a little bit 's
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experiences as an expert uh as you move to Bulgaria and we want try to check how
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much this influenced your life and but also your work and and if it really like defined the whole methodology that we
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will talk on the second part uh of the episode um but first of all like for
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thank you so much for accepting the invitation for being here today with us y oh thank you Mark my
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pleasure um so you're now living in Bulgaria but you're originally from United States uh which part of of USA
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you're um from Silicon Valley so it's like an hour south of San Francisco MH nice the the big hub for
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Tech uh so the first question I suppose is like
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mandatory like why Bulgaria like what inspired you to move to Bulgaria before
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I went on my first date with my now husband I had never heard of Bulgaria before so it's because of him um and
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when we got married like you said it's a h for tech people he came to Silicon Valley to work in it I was working in
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real estate at the time and uh we had no plans of moving to Bulgaria but on our wedding
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day his family gave us the deed to an apiary a bee farm apparently his
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family's been beekeeping since 1920 it's five generation family business um he's
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allergic to bees so he never thought that he would continue doing this um but
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yeah when that happened we just decided okay why don't we quit our jobs and move to Bulgaria and be beekeepers
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so okay yeah this is this is I'm swagged out today but um yes so we started
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Bulgarian honey company and that's how that started and it was November of 2019
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so it was literally pre-co and I am so glad that I spent Co here versus back in
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California so your husband is from Bulgaria and the family is from Bulgaria that's the main reason why he's
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Bulgarian what you said that you didn't even know
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that Bulgaria existed I mean I because you know that it existed but you didn't know anything about Bulgaria before
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meeting your husband when he said he was Bulgarian I was like excuse me I'm really sorry for being the ignorant
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American but I'm just going to Google real quick where that is on the map I literally searched it on Google
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Maps during our first state yeah in America we don't learn too much about geography you know America's kind
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of the center of the so
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so how long was it before you married him like did you build expectations of
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what Bulgaria was before moving to Bulgaria oh gosh yeah he proposed to me
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within like three and a half weeks of us meeting it was one of those when you know you know kind of things we were both you know looking for a serious
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relationship and so um he proposed to me and then um let's see the first time I I
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went to meet his parents was before we got
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married uh yeah so I saw let's see his
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hometown and the seaside very touristic experience and
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then the way he grew up reminds me a lot of When I visit my grandparents because Bulgaria's ex Soviet Block in you know
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communist China the architecture the mentality there's a lot of similarities with like the the Communist kind of
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approach um so it wasn't very like people were like oh wasn't it a big culture shock for me there was it was
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somewhat familiar actually in in a very strange way and then the second time I
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went there was for our wedding um and then we got the wedding gift and
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then the third time I went there was when we moved we packed literally two check-in suitcas cases per person and
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two carry-ons like one backpack and one small roller bag the maximum allowed
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baggage um and that's how yeah we sold everything else and we just
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moved wow not bad so it was your third time going into a country and you moved
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to it directly like okay that's also Brave I mean I suppose having a husband or a partner
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that is from that country prepares you a little bit about what you were going to find or that you could ask I think it's
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how is life there no like when you when you move to a country
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where neither person is from I think it's a lot harder I would have done a lot more research if one of us was not
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from there how did you had any like First
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Impressions on on on Bulgaria like something that shock you like okay this isn't
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I think not a lot of things surprise me I think I have a pretty good sense of humor in general as I go through life so
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but I think um some of the things that Shock Me are how grumpy people are like they
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think they have to be grumpy this is normal how bad customer services um how much people are not
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willing to make a sale even if they are the business owner um you know yesterday
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even this I it surprises me less but it still surprises me I was at a shop and I was like how much is this coffee table
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and she saysi can't see the price tag I'm like I couldn't find it either that's why I asked you she's like I don't
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know and that was it I was like okay you're not going to look it up in the system you're not going to find out like
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you don't want to sell this thing to me I don't I don't understand like I want to buy this thing and oh no price tag sorry I can't help you so there's a
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little bit of like this very um um this mindset that takes some
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getting than youed too not my problem mindset kind of
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yeah nice so you've been in Bulgaria for five years five years
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now and you said you arrived there and then so you quit your jobs first of all
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like tough decision I suppose like this is not easy to do like when you are in a
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or or you were like really in a situation with born out with job that you said okay this is the end of it I
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think for me I was ready for a change I didn't realize it then but I was looking for a reason to get out of my job
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because the thing is the job that I had it was it was very comfortable in many ways I had a good relationship with my
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co-workers and I was doing work that was meaningful I was growing in my career so there were a lot of reasons why not to
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leave and I couldn't come up with a good reason to leave but when this opportunity came up I was like this is
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it I got to go later after having done some therapy I processed like no
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subconsciously I did want to leave but I just couldn't justify leaving and this was the perfect reason why um I think
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just I was the more I was advancing in my career the more I realized this isn't the path that I want to take but I
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didn't have a justifiable reason why leaving because everything was looking so good um and uh yeah so I quit my job
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probably a month after the wedding and I started to learn beekeeping from a
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friend while my husband continued to work for maybe six more months and then he quit his job as well and then we
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moved yeah that's something that I wanted to ask what was your experience on beekeeping before building a
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beekeeping company yeah right a honey company in general like it's better to learn it from
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someone who speaks English before I go like everything is new you know the beekeeping is new plus the Bulgarian is
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New Plus that everything is I'm like no I should at least learn the beekeeping in English while I'm in America
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and it's it's an easy thing to learn like I I have no idea about beeping I have I had the friend okay so the actual
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doing of beekeeping is very easy beekeeping is literally opening boxes lifting looking that's mostly what
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beekeeping is but the part that requires expertise is what am I looking at what do I do with this information that is
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something that takes I think a lot of experience is to know exactly what you need to do to manipulate the bees um or
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when to do something um that is something I'm still learning even though it's been many
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years so the company is still alive you're still be keeping so because I know about the dream methodology and
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that you also like help people like coach that was a hard decision the
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company the honey company is still going and
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it's it's so my husband and I both have our own companies as well that are in addition to the the honey company the
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honey company is a family business so we're you know we're mostly working on like the marketing and Export and some
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tourism stuff around it more administrative we do help with beekeeping when it's busy in the summer
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but his family members are the ones who live full-time at the farm and they're doing the beekeeping daily like the
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farming side of it so it doesn't require like full-time attention
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um we are still very passionate about spreading the word about Bulgarian honey getting the brand around the world um
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but yeah the coaching business is something that I've wanted to do for a very long time I've been dabbling in
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life coaching for the last seven years and I never felt ready and that comes
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down to confidence right but um there was a life event that happened this
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February where I was suddenly like it's time to come out like I'm coming out as
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a life coach not yeah but so um I'm very glad that I did that and it was difficult because I already had so many
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other commitments including a lot of um Community organizing stuff for expats as
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well I decided to step down from a lot of what I was doing for the expats communities here to focus on launching
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my life Co coaching business well so it's a rather
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new thing in your life then the whole coaching approach like I mean you you've been doing it for long but the the step
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of like this the part where I put my own name on it is rather new and that was a
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scary part before I was doing um coaching for a company and then I was
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doing uh performance coaching with a business partner for two years as well
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and in those two situations I wasn't the only person whose expertise
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was under examination let's say and I always had like this impostor syndrome
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that oh these people are more um knowledgeable than me and I can kind of
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hide behind them and just you know I didn't feel ready I see and um yeah that
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that was a brave step I think that I took and I don't regret it at
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all I I also wanted to ask like because I suppose beeping it's it's rather like
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country s you liveing in in in the countryside of Bulgaria or are you in
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Sophia or where are you no I live in P it's the second largest city to Sophia
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and uh it's one hour away from the farm so we we drive it's not that bad but we
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live in the city I'm a city girl I need to be around things events people
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nice um one of the biggest questions that it pop up when I when I was
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checking your profile at the end on in social media was like coming from silcon Valley where the life might be hectic
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and like like whatever when you think about Bulgaria you don't think about a very super active life let's say like
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this so what are the biggest CH differences between yes coming from I literally making a course right now I am
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literally making a course right now to help busy female entrepreneurs in the Bay Area create work life balance
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because of what I've learned since moving here um I think even though I was in this
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environment where everyone takes it easy and is slow because my beliefs didn't change my mindset didn't change I was
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constantly creating busy around me I had like six Facebook groups I was still in
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the real estate I was doing the honey I was starting coaching I was running um
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God like weekly expats events and then monthly ones and then for the girls and for the entrepreneurs and for like the
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drinking socials and I was like I was basically recreating my Bay Area
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busyness uh here and I was very still stressed out and burning out in this
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environment and so um fortunately the environment around me
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kind of gave me a lot of examples of people who live a more relaxed life and
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I've also been doing a lot of work on myself to really um get rid of my fomo
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you know I I realized that I had really bad fomo if if this opportunity is in front of me I have to take it if I think
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I can do something I should do it and now I realize just because I can do
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something or the opportuni is there it doesn't mean I should do it I should focus on the things that I want to do because I ended up you know I like for
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example hosting events and things like that but it Burns me out it drains me as well I mean it takes so much energy and
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if I put that much energy into everything that I do then I'm just exhausted at the end of the day and I don't have to be here and I don't have
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to be right um so yeah the transition's been I think a very good one I also you
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know came from a very masculine um energy you know go do do do for the sake
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of doing and now I've discovered being more feminine just more relaxed more
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focused on what brings me joy connecting with people for the sake of the relationship not for the sake of X
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number of people I need to have in my network or you know the the whole mindset really has changed since I've
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been here you you said that you hosted like
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expert uh Community like meet outs and stuff like this how is the expert
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community in Bulgaria yeah I like the xat community intive it's one of the reasons I moved
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here actually so when we uh first arrived we stayed with his family his
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parents they have a one-bedroom apartment it's like 50 60 square meters
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tiny and we're four adults living there right so my husband and I decideed to
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borrow his father's car and take a road trip around the country and actually explore where do we want to live when I
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came to PV people were so welcoming I joined the xats and P a Facebook group
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they said hey I'm new I'm doing this Honey Thing and somebody said oh I've exported honey before I can share my
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notes with you and what I learned I was at a coffee shop and I was talking about how do we meet people a guy from the
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table next to me leans over he's like hey I heard you speak English and I heard you're trying to meet people my
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name is Larry I'm Bulgarian I used to live in Canada let me introduce you to my other friend who's you know moved
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back to Bulgaria from Canada and it was just so easy to connect with people and
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it's not like they do it just because they want to do business business with you or sell you something like they do where I'm from but like genuinely just
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people are so open and open to connection I just fell in
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love with the people here um and the expat's Facebook group is extremely well
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curated very helpful there isn't like a lot of um self-promoting spammy content
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and um I became an admin for it pretty shortly after I moved here um so this
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community has really been one of my anchors um to be
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here that's cool it doesn't happen everywhere like that you have a good
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community base of experts so that's also like it's it helps when when you're in
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there you actually thought of something that I wanted to ask you also and it's language like how is life did you move
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knowing any bulgar at all do you speak Bulgarian first first question this means yes in Bulgarian by
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the way this means no it's very confusing the second you land from a taxi uh from the airport and you say can
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you take me to my hotel and they say this and they always look
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grumpy and you think the taxi driver is like no I can't take you and then you walk away and they're like what are you where you going like yes I'll take you
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so yeah I do speak Bulgarian um
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and uh I learned a few words before my wedding because I wanted to be able to
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you know say basic greetings to my husband's family and then after moving here because his family doesn't speak
19:12
English and we have a business I had to learn it very very quickly so uh I
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picked it up relatively easily compared to a lot of other people I've spoken to um after my first year I was renewing my
19:25
own immigration documents um I do all of my errands I talk to government agencies
19:31
by myself I do business now in Bulgarian I have employees who don't speak English who I speak only Bulgarian too so um I
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think out of necessity I've had to learn it pretty
19:45
quickly well that's really cool I mean I I don't know much about Bulgarian but I don't I assume it's not one of the easy
19:52
languages that you just grab from from references from other languages I don't
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know it's very different so in the first year it was like a lot of hard memorization the grammar everything is
20:03
very different but once you learn it it's like Spanish right so you speak Spanish the words um are spelled exactly
20:13
as they're pronounced and you pronounce every single letter just like in Spanish so in terms of writing it has a
20:19
different alphabet it has the ceric um characters like in Russian but um it
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yeah so once you learn the alphabet words pronounce exactly the way you expect them to and the grammar is
20:32
extremely regular there's like very very few exceptions after you learn the grammar and I think there's like less
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verb tenses as well um than in English and um yeah so it's a very
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logical easy language after you get past the first year and if you can pronounce the stuff
20:52
as well because pronunciation is also it's very different sounds very cool I think actually
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Bulgaria was where the cilic alphabet was invented Bingo yeah yeah that's B
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monks I think yeah so nice there's a national holiday for the alphabet here
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actually oh yeah cool um what about the language the
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English level of the country itself because I I don't know sometimes it surprises the countries that you don't
21:24
really expect like here in Greece nobody like ects that the people speaks SC
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English and the level it's incredibly high but I don't know how is it in
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Bulgaria I think it's not very high um if you stay in the more touristic areas
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you'll be fine when you start to go into the neighborhoods even in a city then
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you even if kids have like now it's mandatory for kids to learn English in school but the English education is so
21:55
poor in most schools that they learn it from a textbook and it's not practical at all so even young people a lot of
22:01
them don't speak English um the older people definitely don't
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they speak Russian mostly and um the English
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is if you if you want to be an xat here I highly recommend learning English unless you want to be only hanging out
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with xats then that's very limiting so you you end requiring
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learning Bulgarian it's not one of these countries that you could survive 100% with English and then your life it's
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done you could could I suppose but depending yeah I know xats who've been
22:38
here for 20 years and they just speak English they never learn Bulgarian
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um but it's again it's very limiting it's not the kind of life that I like but for them it's fine to have your you
22:51
know smaller Circle yeah how how did you balance arriving to
22:59
a new country and building an an enter like a business like how how do you manage like balancing between learning
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language adapting culturally like everything arriving to a new country it's normally very demanding on top of
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that you need to start with a new company yeah how did you keep yourself
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saying in that there was no balance because I came and then Co happened so I
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only had my computer and an internet connection we had this big vision for um exporting
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and all this stuff when we got here and then having a store and then Co happened
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and we started first by selling through our online shop and that was okay pretty
23:45
much it so I didn't go to grocery stores I never had to like interact with people
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my first couple months here and um I did lessons over Skype for Bulgarian
23:59
language so my Situation's a little bit unique I
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think well it it I think everyone who moved to a new country either during Co
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or just before Co had this kind of moment of like yes I've been here for
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four years but it counts like two uh because whatever happened in Co it's a
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little bit like okay I don't know so yeah yeah I I can relate to to that
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also um how long have you been in I wanted to ask you oh uh now it's three years so we
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came here after covid at least after the hardcore wave so when it was already
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okay to travel around uh we were still wearing masks and everything and there
24:50
was still like vaccination like beginning of vaccination and this kind of stuff but it was already the the
24:57
going down let like this I I lived in Germany before and and that was like when I catch Kobi was in like KOB you
25:04
know stronger the big waves was in Germany but it was a little bit different for me because I was in
25:11
Germany already since 2018 so when I co started I already lived two three two
25:19
years and a half three years of Germany as a normal environment country but yeah
25:26
maybe the the the saddest part was living Germany in a in a down you know like a
25:32
little bit but but it's what it is it's happens um I wanted to ask you a little
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bit like I I try to do this kind of little bit more of personal recommendations uh uh or personal
25:46
Reflections on on the end of the the first part of the episode uh and the
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first one would be if you have any favorite memory from your for your time in Bulgaria so far like something that
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you remind it's like very yeah I have so many I I really
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really love being here uh in general and I have so
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many um gosh so we went to a place called Bellic
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that's in the north uh western border like corner of Bulgaria and we did a hot
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air balloon ride over this Mystic Rock Fortress Castle thing and it was snowing
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and it was so beautiful um I don't know I just think in general there's so many mountains and
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caves and beaches just it's just such a beautiful country and that's the nature
26:44
and then the cities as well I mean it's just so well preserved like five minutes from where I live I get to see operas
26:52
for €1 and an ancient theater you know made from the old marble like half Coliseum
26:59
so I think just my my regular life is constantly a highlight compared to what
27:06
it was before cool very nice um
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yeah it's always cool to have a nice nature to go out to escape a little bit
27:18
probably um what about I mean safe
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safety as a woman in Bulgaria how do you feel about so SA oh my gosh you know people here they say
27:30
all kinds of stuff like oh there's like the mafia and whatever and there's Gypsies and I mean yeah they they exists
27:36
but like my my daily experience of walking home at 2 am after
27:41
drinking by myself in the dark is like I've never felt unsafe before the worst
27:48
thing that's happened to me I think is like I caught a pick pocket trying to pick out of my
27:54
pocket um even the Beggars aren't sketchy here like um they're very
27:59
upfront they're you know they just ask you for the money and they go away and it's
28:07
um it just feels very safe and there's no gun culture here there's no
28:14
like I don't know there aren't a lot of crazy people in the street like the kind that you see in San Francisco for
28:20
example um I don't know yeah it's uh I feel very safe here and the first
28:28
neighborhood I lived in actually was a gypsy neighborhood and I would have to walk through it to go to the center um
28:35
and it was fine like they were just it was more run down like the architecture
28:41
some buildings were falling apart and whatever but like the people i' never felt unsafe
28:48
around that's very nice I think there is a lot of stigma about safety sometimes in the balcan countries and oh yeah when
28:55
they he Eastern Europe see the movies they see the mobs like the gangsters are
29:00
always from like Albania or Bulgaria or something no it's not like that here they exist those people also exist but
29:07
if you don't get in their way that you're fine yeah I mean and let's be honest you
29:14
can be big pocket right now everywhere in the world so that's not the B it's not a differentiat so catching a big
29:22
pocketer getting my car smashed into because the last time I went to the Bay Area which was like two months ago I
29:28
mean just it doesn't matter where you are if you're in a major I don't know par parking lot that's daylight full of
29:35
people um full of cars your car can still get smashed you know so it's just
29:41
like here you can leave your phone on the dashboard on accident when you go
29:46
into grocery shop and it'll your car won't get smashed so it's you still shouldn't but I mean I'm just saying
29:51
it's much safer here yeah nice what about Bea Pro
29:58
like I mean in your case I assume it was through marriage and that solves a lot
30:04
of things or it helps um so I am a non-eu citizen and even being married to
30:10
a Bulgarian uh it's one of the more I think difficult processes to get
30:16
residency so first I'm supposed to get my Visa D to be able to stay here for is
30:24
it six months I think in America I was supposed to get it before I came here I came here I have a 3mon tourist visa
30:31
where I don't need to apply for anything and I realized when I want to switch it to the six-month one that I have to go
30:37
back to America to do it and so um we wrote the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to
30:44
grant me an exception to go to either Athens or Bucharest to the Bulgarian
30:50
Embassy there to get my uh Visa D and they granted it uh doesn't happen with
30:56
everyone actually it's quite uncommon that they Grant exceptions okay um but they did for me so after that I have
31:06
this it's called like a long-term stay card that I have to renew
31:12
every 11 months I need to do this for five years I need to renew it six times because it's 11 months every year and
31:20
then after that I can apply for the fiveyear residency card so I've Ren r
31:28
that card the last time I need before I can apply for the residency card and then it's another 3 years to apply for
31:36
citizenship if I have kids if not then five
31:41
years wow it's a long process I was I wasn't expecting that you would think in
31:47
Bulgaria they would be really easy about it and the other thing too is the migration office here the immigration office nobody speaks English they're
31:53
dealing with foreigners all day I guess that gives more jobs to translators it's very like you know communist structure
32:00
okay great yeah more jobs for translators great and they always just their attitude is very like we hate
32:06
foreigners and they're the people who work there talking to foreigners
32:13
all yeah but sounds familiar that's that's everywhere I think like I mean
32:19
you always have The Stereotype of the people I don't know now I I had I get
32:24
all the Foreigner offices against me but uh it it happened to me in multiple places
32:31
like it's not a and it's a very common struggle bureaucracy and offices of
32:37
Foreigner Affairs in the countries are normally the places where the people F fell feel that that they are hostile
32:45
against them yeah and it's it's ridiculous because it's the place where you should be helped to become part of
32:51
this but it's also like I don't know with the Balkan countries it's also very different between them because I I for
32:57
example know that Albania process for visa for for Americans it's super easy for example and then from one country to
33:04
the other it changes so much so just like I was curious on to knowing how how
33:10
difficult is in Bulgaria but it sounds like a very long long process for for non-europeans yeah and the documents
33:16
it's not like available on the internet you know when you apply for the thing you have to go there physically get the
33:23
documents go home fill them out come back and each time the wait could be very long um and then or they're on a
33:30
coffee break which is like all the time pretty much they're like never actually working um and then yeah so for me I
33:38
have to get my husband to also sign a declaration that he will provide housing for me even though we my name is on the
33:44
title of our house here um and it's just very maybe patriarchal I don't know so
33:50
there's just like some really silly things that are part of the process but after doing this six times you know I
33:57
got it down you could yeah nice is there any particular
34:05
Bulgarian Traditions or cultures that you you like like or that you it stood
34:11
out out like you never consider that this would happen like any traditional
34:16
thing that they do oh gosh I'm sure there are a lot of
34:22
them like for New Year's Eve kids beat adults with uh
34:28
sticks that they decorate with popcorn um there is a day where like the
34:33
men go dance on the ice cold water uh and drink a bunch of rakia Bulgarian
34:39
weddings are so much fun like there's just I mean there's a ton of drinking and dancing um but you know the dances
34:47
here they're the line dances right and you do them for 20 minutes sometimes the song just doesn't
34:53
stop um at the nightclubs here they you know how in the US at the strip clubs
34:58
they make it rain dollar bills right well here it's the coins right so this is painful it would be more like hail
35:05
than making it rain so what they do is they get um so what they do is they get
35:10
napkins like cocktail napkins a whole sleeve of them you buy them for like 20 Lea which is like 10 and you throw
35:16
napkins at the nightclub for example not the strip club just the regular nightclub um it's really funny yeah uh I
35:25
don't know there's constantly funny stuff happening that's what I'm saying you have to have a great sense of humor
35:30
to to kind of navigate immigration and culture and stuff like
35:38
that I think you already talk touch Rocky so raak being one of the
35:46
traditional like whole B like everywhere does everyone does their own raaka uh
35:51
favorite food or drinks from Bulgaria that you discovered during this years living there like
35:58
I love everything that has to do with eggplant um and they make like a really
36:05
nice eggplant with ground meat with cheese on top and it it comes with tomato sauce I think oh also one of the
36:11
things that I love about being here and I think Europe in general is that I can actually eat dairy in America I thought
36:17
it was lactose intolerant which is very common for Asian people it turns out that I'm actually casine intolerant
36:23
which is another protein in milk like lactose um but European cows and American cows have
36:30
different casing protein I can actually eat dairy from European
36:36
cows and okay I've just yeah so there's like everything from like milk to cheese
36:43
and and yogurt and in between there's like things between yogurt and cheese it's like strained yogurt um and then
36:50
there's like there's so many kinds of dairy here it's a very very Dairy
36:56
Country and everything is just delicious so that's something I discovered that I didn't have access to at all
37:02
before um the tomatoes here are the best cows
37:08
were yeah yeah it's called A1 and A2 caseine cows anyway um then the tomatoes
37:16
the pink Tomatoes they're like this big the size of your head and they're very very sweet um especially during the
37:23
summer um oh gosh Bulgarian food in general is just about
37:28
drinks huh what's that what about drinks do you have any favorite drink from from Bulgaria just
37:35
say oh not rakia because I am not a hard liquor person I if I drink hard liquor I
37:42
will puke so not my thing but H Bulgarian wine is very good just even
37:49
when you go to a restaurant you order the house wine and they home brew it it's it's good I mean it is so easy to
37:58
get good wine cheap good wine here um what
38:05
else uh I have to think about that one I'm I'm sure there's stuff there's Idan
38:10
which is like the yogurt drink as well yes um tarator as well it's like a the
38:16
yogurt with cucumbers and Dill and garlic and walnuts it's like a soup but you can drink it out of a mug as well
38:22
it's like a a soup drink it's very refreshing in the summer
38:29
yeah nice um are you a music person do you like any Bulgarian
38:38
music yeah I have been to quite a few Bulgarian concerts anything from like
38:43
jazz there's a lot of jazz where I live um I've been to a lot of operas as well
38:49
because I live right next to a theater and so every time they have an opera I try to go um in terms of Bulgarian pop
38:56
music yeah I actually have been Bulgarian rock bands even as well um and
39:02
then the traditional music yeah I've been to quite a few festivals they have a lot of cultural events as well um
39:11
where I've heard like the more like kind of like yodeling but Bulgarian like the
39:18
traditional um it's not yodeling but it's like Village music as well i' yeah I'm just
39:26
thinking about it now I listen to way more music being here because it's just a part of the culture and the
39:35
lifestyle yeah I've been to Bulgarian pop concert as well yeah pop singer all kinds all
39:42
kinds very cool uh maybe the last question before we jump to the to the second part and we talk a little bit
39:48
more about the dream method and your enterpr ship and how you became a coach etc etc but um if someone of the
39:56
listeners need to visit Bulgaria right now what is your M or must do experience
40:02
that you need to recommend to them I would recommend the free pive tour they also have a free Sophia tour the free
40:09
tours are great they're like two hours long and you tip at the end if you like it and they're very comprehensive the
40:14
guides are great I personally know many of them um it's a great way to learn the city and then after that you can decide
40:20
where you want to spend more time cool so with that I would say that
40:26
we can jump directly to to the to the second part of the episode hey there everyone if you're loving this episode
40:32
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The expert: Coaching the DREAM method
41:07
today with that said let's go back to the episode the expert coaching the dream
41:16
method part I wanted to talk and let get your mind a little bit on on on your work and your your a little bit project
41:23
that you have I I need to ask you like about everything a little bit because I'm not
41:30
a coach I'm not an expert on that I know that you touch like from a different perspective from mental health to
41:35
entrepreneurship to having your own method uh in there a lot of it like
41:41
about self-sabotage and overcoming self-sabotage in general uh but maybe
41:47
the first question would be about the dream method uh I read a little bit about it
41:53
but can you explain what it is and what inspir you to create it absolutely so what inspired me to
42:01
create it is just my own Journey really and there tools that I've learned that I've that have changed my life that I am
42:09
just very passionate about giving other people access to because there's so many easier ways to deal with your problems
42:15
than to use your willpower and that's the only tool I had before is willpower oh you're struggling just push through
42:21
it you're tired work harder you know you're uncomfortable um just you know fake it
42:28
till you make it and so those were the only tools I had that made me miserable right and I wasn't even allowed to admit
42:33
that I was miserable that's just how much I shut down my own intuition so the
42:39
dream method is the d stands for defining the problem and it means
42:44
diagnosing it correctly because often like I use a very common example right dating online dating I hear this one all
42:50
the time where it's like there are no good guys on online dating that looks like the problem when
42:57
fact the real problem is I don't deserve to be happy or I'm unlovable or
43:02
something else right so this is a subconscious problem and we need to diagnose that problem correctly in order
43:08
to actually solve the problem so that's the D step number one step number two is removing the root cause so where did
43:15
this actually come from where did this belief start and actually learning how to process that usually going back into
43:23
childhood um and reprogramming some of those old beliefs to reflect our current
43:28
wisdom today as well as um processing negative emotions as well that um maybe
43:37
served us at one point back in time that today is just completely irrelevant we have to go back and kind of manually
43:43
update those old emotions and beliefs and then e is for exposing and
43:49
expressing your true self so this has a lot to do with discovering your core values and aligning your for actions
43:58
with those values as well as discovering your superpowers a lot of times we see
44:05
the things that we don't have as our weaknesses and then we start to hide and pretend to be something else that we're
44:10
not we're going to lose every single time we pretend to be something we're not because we're not um and that part of us who we actually are that we're
44:16
ashamed of we hide that's usually our superpower so um it has a lot to do with
44:23
self-acceptance learning what's what your core values are because often we inherit values that we get from other
44:30
people like I inherited a picture of success from what my S culture wants or
44:35
what my parents want or whatever and I didn't have my own definition of success so while I thought I was being
44:40
successful by being that picture I was unhappy and I didn't know why right um
44:46
so expressing and uh exposing your true self is the E A is for taking aligned
44:52
action towards your goals because nothing happens without action but you have to do the Dr E before you can
44:58
actually have a work for you otherwise like you know this happens all the time you have an action plan you know what
45:03
steps to take you can't stick to the plan because something in your subconscious is is sabotaging you or
45:08
saying but this doesn't feel aligned with me I don't want this really um and
45:14
so when you have all of those things aligned you're clear what your core values are and what your superpowers are
45:20
then you can actually start to take action sustainably motivated by yourself towards your goal because it's AC your
45:27
goal now and then the M is for manifestation because as you start to
45:33
take more aligned action you will naturally start to attract those things to you you won't have to be working hard
45:40
all the time chasing your results they will also be coming to you because you're putting out the right energy um
45:47
so that's in a nutshell what the dream method is and it can be
45:53
applied everywhere in life um and
45:59
yeah yes I I think it's one of the questions that I also wanted to ask you it's not a
46:06
specific method for let's say like I don't know leaders or entrepreneurs or anything it's your you're
46:13
coaching normal people you're not coaching a a niche of people a very specific niche of people of saying no I
46:19
only coach um CEOs of companies or whatever no like it's it's for everyone
46:25
What what is the normal or like the I don't want to call it normal but this
46:30
the standard Avatar of the persons who you coach okay so this is a very
46:35
interesting question because as I've by the way I've only invented the dream method in like March of this year okay I
46:42
mean it's been a long time coming so it's not like I just started coaching in March this year but like Yeah The Dream
46:47
method was like officially launched this year so I've only been working full-time with clients for a few months and I've
46:54
been going through this process of niching down because in the beginning it's like I think this can help everyone I want to help everyone I love all
47:01
people I had um students like teenagers come through my programs I've had
47:06
grandmothers come through my programs I've had entrepreneurs I've had people from like I don't know like 30 different
47:12
countries um come through my programs and what I've started to realize is so I
47:19
I have an ADHD brain I'm very intense and a lot of people find that after they
47:27
do like a five-day challenge with me they don't want to do the 10we program anymore because they're tired after five days and the people who stick with me
47:34
who continue to do the 10-week program with me happen to be mostly female
47:40
entrepreneurs so I'm like okay okay maybe that's my Niche then is is female
47:45
entrepreneurs lady bosses whatever you want to call them uh because I am one I
47:50
have a lot of um you know relatability and they want intensity so that's kind
47:57
of where I've been focusing more of of my marketing lately
48:03
I think starting to Niche down makes sense at the end I think you
48:10
need to Niche down no at some point because if you keep it so open at the end everyone is there but not everyone
48:17
like it's this final level balancing this kind of things I assume also my
48:23
coaching works for all kinds of people it works for teenagers it works for grandmothers it works for men it works
48:28
for like you know it works i' I've coached all these people before they've gotten results but it's like yeah like
48:36
you said with the business I need to focus somewhere so what what makes your method stand on
48:45
top of other methods that are out there like I think that's also an interesting question like when you put your method
48:53
what compare to other ones I think for me I this is what one of my clients said
48:59
she said I have a very good balance of business coaching um I I combine therapy
49:06
like I do a lot of work in the subconscious but it's also very practical it's very actionable it's not
49:11
like you know I had um interviewed a couple of other people what's missing when you go to therapy is they're missing the professional background
49:18
they're there's a lot of talking but there isn't a lot of like well now what do I do about it um so it's a
49:24
very it combines like business coaching and therapy
49:32
and people say they feel like I'm their best friend as well like just in terms of the the level of being there for them
49:42
I don't know how long that's going to last if my business starts the scale then you know I won't be able to give as much personal attention but where I'm at
49:50
right now is it's a very very personal like I'm very invested in
49:57
the people I coach for better or worse I don't know um but I really do see each
50:02
person who comes through my life as like a friend as well and they feel that and
50:08
I think that also makes it unique honestly I think like there are a lot of really good coaches and therapists out
50:14
there who have very effective methodologies what it boils down to when someone is choosing who to work with is
50:19
who do they resonate with the most and every single person has a unique background so um based off of my like
50:26
experiences or my style or whatever some people may just be naturally more drawn to me or
50:33
not yeah I mean the the resonating with the person then it's a it's big part no
50:39
I assume it's like trust it it what it builds the trust with that person at the end um how did you prepare yourself to
50:47
to like or how did you build this method did you did you take courses yourself
50:52
about coaching did you take certifications I know that there is certifications
50:58
becom a what the process so I did a program with a
51:04
personal development company called Landmark for I was with them for like five or six years I trained to be one of
51:11
their uh leaders and then that um it's
51:16
called ontological transformative coaching is their methodology I also got certified
51:22
in neural linguistic programming and my goal when my business is a certain point
51:27
uh is to go back and get my master in NLP as well as um an ICF uh whatever the
51:35
level three is certification um I've looked at some programs and that's just something I want to do is to deepen the
51:42
the coaching um as well so also with coming up with the dream
51:48
method what I actually did in March was I hired a marketing company that helps
51:53
coaches launch their programs and they they help me actually package it into
51:59
the dream method and um give it a name basically and and how to promote it and
52:06
how to make it stick so I think that was also a very strategic
52:12
move makes sense I mean yeah it's not only that you are out there and then I
52:18
mean I suppose there is some coaches that it's only about mouth to mouth but I suppose you need to have like
52:23
self-promotion involved also marketing campaigns ET oh my God it's like you know being an entrepreneur is like
52:29
freaking 80% marketing and 20% doing your services until you start to get traction I mean it's just like so much
52:35
of what I do I wish was coaching but right now it's so much marketing and it's just something that startups have
52:41
to go through yeah yeah you touched in the first part
52:48
actually already one part that I wanted to ask you here also which is a little bit this I don't know if calling itself
52:55
sabotage or or I think it's a little bit mixing between them no like you're
53:00
self-sabotaging yourself and there is also this feeling of like fear of missing out things like they always come
53:06
Hand by hand I think how much of this it's part of of the of the methodology
53:12
and that your work uh that you do with with your clients oh I mean it's integrated
53:18
everywhere in because whenever there's something that doesn't
53:25
work it's all always tied to some kind of subconscious belief so the r is very
53:32
very important and it's not like you do the r first and dream method and then e am and then you're completely done
53:38
forever you're going to start to notice when you're on the a part and there's something that's stopping you from
53:45
taking action we got to go back to the r again what did we miss what else came up that we didn't see the first time and
53:51
there's so many levels to like overcoming a limiting belief there's like oh you're aware of it okay now you
53:56
can start to take new actions knowing that this isn't really an obstacle and then you understand it a little more and
54:02
then you actually like don't have to think so hard to take the action you want and then you understand it a little
54:09
more and then you're naturally just like I'm done with this and I'm only going to
54:15
do things that align with me and it becomes like your own truth so there's like so many levels and layers
54:22
of um changing those limiting beliefs um especially the very very Dee rooted
54:28
ones where your whole identity kind of relies on that like for me for example um if I don't feel guilty then I can't
54:35
be successful that was like a very very deeply ingrained belief because in my
54:40
culture first of all if you've talked to other Chinese people um guilt is a very
54:45
very big part of what makes us excellent performers we excel at things because if
54:53
we don't we we're guilty we're ashamed we're worth unworthy and we keep this
54:59
emotion in place because we're so afraid if we let it go we're just going to be I don't know lazy useless
55:06
people um and so when you start to dig there that belief is going to do
55:12
everything in its power to stay there or not let you see that it's there because your entire identity is built on top of
55:18
it but once you remove the guilt then you can actually be motivated to continue doing big things great things
55:25
in life from being happy because it makes you happy and that's where I'm at is I was afraid that if I wasn't guilty
55:32
anymore I would just be this lazy person I wouldn't be an entrepreneur I wouldn't want to do anything with my life anymore
55:38
I just be complacent and that's very scary because
55:43
you know the way I was raised you don't get love unless you're excellent if
55:48
you're complacent your parents don't love you anymore I mean it's just it's very scary
55:55
right um but yeah so I've done a lot of work and now I realize that if if it's gone I
56:05
still want to do things but it's because it makes me happy to do them and being happy is a wonderful motivator because I
56:11
want more of it makes sense sounds simp not doing
56:17
work not simple yeah of course but I mean it's
56:23
always easier to say than to do no and maor of the things in this life actually and being happy it's definitely one of
56:30
them that people tend to forget very easy um um how much of living abroad living
56:40
in Bulgaria has affected your approach on on on the method and on on the
56:46
coaching that you doing yeah I think a ton one is like I said the environment
56:52
was very different so it interrupted a lot of patterns the survival patterns um
57:02
of needing to hustle and do for the sake of doing because everyone around me is doing it as well people here you know
57:10
they're very family oriented they have like a very slow pace of Life they enjoy things there's culture and Beauty
57:17
everywhere and I think um having a lot of examples of a different way of life
57:22
where people can be happy and peaceful is uh it was a very big factor also with
57:30
the expats community like the Bay Area is a very diverse Place lot of immigrants but they tend to
57:37
be the kind of immigrants that are there because they want to get into it or they
57:42
want to like be a very successful startup owner or it's a certain type of
57:47
people that it attracts which is great I I love those people you know I admire them a lot um I have a lot of qualities
57:54
that I love about myself as that um here in Bulgaria the xack
58:00
community is so diverse like so many people from so many backgrounds from so
58:06
many countries so many ages and because there's so few of us you kind of by default make friends with everybody you
58:12
don't get to be so picky there's nobody like me here as well and so there's
58:18
hardly any Asian people there's definitely no asian-americans and so it made me like a mirror look at my own
58:25
identity as like like um not like a fish not noticing
58:30
water anymore you know it's like the fish is in air now and it's noticing oh
58:35
my God that's what water is um and so it made me very aware of a lot of my
58:44
behaviors and beliefs and stuff as like something to examine versus before
58:51
I just assume that this is how everyone thinks and behaves and this is normal
58:57
so it's definitely impacted me a lot in a very positive
59:04
way I see I mean it makes sense no like at the end you it triggered things
59:11
triggered one another and at the end you want to share your experience and use your own experience to coach others and
59:16
that's part of your life it's being an expert no at the end um yeah what is the
59:23
vision that you have for for the dream method like what where do you want to go with with now that you already have some
59:29
months behind you and where do you want to bring the what it's the next steps there's the next steps and there's
59:36
the big Vision so someone had actually asked me this last week and what happened was I saw World
59:43
Peace you know if everyone had the tools to accept themselves and show compassion
59:50
towards other people world peace is possible I mean I alone can't do it it's going to take a whole Army of coaches
59:56
but I think by spreading the dream method as a movement around the world we
1:00:02
can start to shift the needle um I have been talking to a United Nations Peace
1:00:09
Ambassador about doing like a tour around Europe to schools to teach them self- Lov and acceptance and compassion
1:00:16
towards other people using the dream method and I've also started to work with some social entrepreneurs in East
1:00:22
Africa um there was a group of female entrepreneurs who just were very attractive to me and so I'm doing a
1:00:28
course for them next week and they're people who are already tackling some of the biggest problems like hunger and
1:00:38
housing and and basic needs you know um so I think you know as long as I just
1:00:45
continue putting my work out there people will I'll start to find who I will
1:00:51
impact I guess they'll come to me um that's what's already started to happen and it's just it's very humbling it's
1:00:57
very like I don't know I I feel very lucky to have discovered this so that I
1:01:03
can share it with people nice I suppose the the trigger
1:01:09
though it's very much like a change of mindset like a shift in the mindset of of what do you want for
1:01:17
yourself how how can people start with that what is what is the thing that you
1:01:23
see more commonly okay when people does click in their
1:01:29
life that's a really good question I think drawing on my own experience pain is the best motivator when something is
1:01:36
painful enough you don't you want to get away from that pain it's a very you know
1:01:41
you don't have to be self-aware to know you want the pain to stop basically so
1:01:47
one is stop numbing the pain stop pretending like it's not there if you
1:01:52
are unhappy and you allow yourself to fully feel the anger the hurt the sadness then
1:02:00
you can actually start to change um for me it was when I started my first
1:02:06
startup and failed and lost a lot of money I owed a lot of money actually it was very scary I was in a very bad
1:02:14
relationship um I had to move back in with my mom I was very ashamed and that was when I did my first
1:02:22
personal development course um and it really and I was ready I I was looking for answers I was like
1:02:30
you know this sucks um I think you don't have to get
1:02:36
to that point but often it does take some something happening that's just like oh my gosh I can't continue this
1:02:42
way anymore um for everyone else who is self-aware
1:02:47
enough I think I don't know just just um
1:02:56
starting to ask questions starting to question why things are this way the
1:03:01
word should also I hate the word should I removed it from my vocabulary because when you say something like I should be
1:03:07
happy I should be successful already I shouldn't you know feel this way about something should just means is I am
1:03:13
unhappy I am not as successful as I want to be I do feel this way and once you
1:03:18
accept is then you can actually ask well what got me in this place the first place what are my beliefs that made me
1:03:25
you know unhappy or or what actions have I taken to get me to this point where I feel unhappy or then you can actually start
1:03:31
to deal with the problems right so I think it's just just being honest um
1:03:37
with yourself which again sounds very simple not easy nothing is easy I suppose in the in
1:03:45
the process of changing your mindset and changing yourself like as a person but here's the thing it's like you know now
1:03:51
when I have a therapy session and I'm like crying my eyes out because I'm like oh my gosh this is so painful I can't
1:03:57
believe like I haven't processed this negative past event or whatever but as
1:04:03
I'm doing it I'm like very like oh yes this is good that I saw this now and this is good that I'm feeling this pain
1:04:09
now because I understand that going through that painful thing is what's
1:04:15
going to free me up in like the next 20 minutes so it's just like anything else
1:04:21
once you get used to training for a sport or whatever and your muscles are sore and you build it over time then
1:04:27
you're like oh yeah the muscle soreness means I'm getting stronger I'm getting better when I recover in two days from
1:04:32
now so you it is a muscle that you build
1:04:37
really brain need a muscle also no I had the teacher who used to tell me that uh
1:04:45
you need to train the brain because it's also a muscle um what maybe the last question before
1:04:53
we close the episode today would be what would be an advice that you would give
1:04:58
someone who is starting out on their entrepreneurial Journey let's Niche it
1:05:04
down for example to female entrepreneurs and it's feeling overwhelmed or it's feeling that it's too much for them or
1:05:10
that I don't know that it's not the right thing to do what what is the advice that you would give
1:05:16
yeah the first thing I would ask is are they clear why they're doing it because
1:05:21
I've had so many businesses that I've done because from fomo or there's an
1:05:28
opportunity here and I should do it um which is kind of like another version of fomo or um because I think someone else
1:05:38
would have wanted me to do it um and I didn't actually do it because I wanted to do it
1:05:43
so that's why they haven't like I've started what I'm like 30 years old and I've started seven businesses and close
1:05:50
five already including a Mexican restaurant I mean it's just like literally so first is getting very clear
1:05:56
is like are you doing it because it's internally motivated and this is something you want to do it's okay to try things out and know later that you
1:06:02
don't want to do them by the way um but there are some businesses that I clearly knew I'm doing this out of foam when I'm
1:06:08
going to do it anyway the second thing is um once you're clear that no I want
1:06:14
to do this because I want to do it then it's just having a very clear assessment
1:06:21
of where you're at in terms of your entrepreneurship skills and where you're not what resources you'll need and do you
1:06:27
have enough cash to actually like make mistakes and like have it take as long
1:06:35
as it might take for you to start seeing money if not I suggest um having a
1:06:41
source of income so you're not pressured to make bad decisions because you're running out of money
1:06:49
um for example you know with a lot of businesses you have to have marketing
1:06:54
skills or you need to hire the right marketing company but even if you hire the marketing company if you're an
1:06:59
inexperienced entrepreneur then you're not going to know it if this Mark like a
1:07:05
lot of times I've spent so much money on marketing but I wasn't clear for myself what I wanted and the money just went to waste it didn't produce results because
1:07:11
I wasn't clear in my own head and I thought that if I hired a marketing company they would just figure out the marketing for me I would get clients Nob
1:07:17
brainer doesn't work that way because I wasn't ready um so I think doing a lot
1:07:22
of research on like whatever industry it is that you want to start a business in like really what do you need to be
1:07:27
successful um and before you go spending a bunch of money on coaches or marketing or whatever um you know just be prepared
1:07:37
that it might take you some time before you start getting money in and can you financially wait that
1:07:45
long you know this is very practical I wish someone told me this because I took out a bunch of loans and then I couldn't pay them back and that was very scary so
1:07:52
yeah um and then have mentors have mentors it could be podcast mentors even if
1:07:58
they're not people you can afford to talk to yet oneon-one um learn from what other people have
1:08:04
gone through and try to collapse your timelines as much as possible and there are a lot of free
1:08:11
resources out there by the way before you go pay for anything there are a lot of free
1:08:17
resources nice th off the top my head yeah I'm sure I have a lot more but yeah
1:08:22
for for the free for the free advice let's say like this um yeah Jen thank
1:08:29
you so much for for sharing your story and sharing your experiences and and and the dream method I think the last
1:08:36
question now it's more like the extra thing but it's always mandatory it's where can my listeners connect with you
1:08:43
where they can find the dream method where in general where where they can connect and find your
1:08:49
your in the world yeah um well you can share my my
1:08:55
Facebook and Instagram links um and also I do a free five-day challenge it's
1:09:02
called the wake up in love with your life challenge I'm thinking of making it three days actually and it might be paid but low ticket I'm not sure yet anyway
1:09:09
this is like a very accessible way to get a very generous sample of my work um
1:09:15
and it's it's very impactful so I will share that link with you as
Outro
1:09:22
well perfect you will find all the links always in the in the description of the
1:09:27
episode uh so you can go and check out uh J's uh social media but also the
1:09:33
websites and the and the free or not free at that point depending on where you arrive uh to to it or five and three
1:09:40
days depending on when you enter F exactly but uh thanks again and to all
1:09:49
the listeners thank you also to for tuning in and listening to expat experts
1:09:54
until next time keep exploring stay curious and take care you've been listening to expat
1:10:01
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