As ambitious women, our thoughts can come at us with an energy like no other. Life Coach Stefani McCullah shares her tips for how to make your thoughts work for you.

First, we have to recognize our thoughts and how they make us react. Once we access that understanding, we can focus on categorizing them into personas. Lastly, we can implement practices to help process our thoughts.

Ultimately, the goal is to transform our thoughts into positive forces that work for us and align with our life’s vision. Check out the video and read the transcripts below to get a taste for Stefani’s grasp on mindset and the power of our thoughts.

How To Make Your Thoughts Work For You: A ComePlum Chat With Stefani McCullah

Praise: Hey everyone! I’m back here at the studio with my friend Stefani. I’ve known Stefani for… it’s been a year/year and a half, right?

Stefani: Yeah!

Praise: I did a personal brand session for her at her home and now she’s here in my home! We’re just talking about fun things, our paths have crossed quite a bit in the last year and a half and we’ve got to talk about really juicy things that we wanted to share with you all!

First, can you introduce yourself? Tell us a bit about who you are and how you spend your time:

Stefani: I’m Stefani McCullah, and I am a personal trainer turned life coach. That’s what I’m transitioning into and I’ve been in San Francisco for about 10 years. I started out in fashion and through some ups and downs, I decided to kind of pivot into health and fitness.

That’s really what my passion was and through those transitions I’m really learning that I love behavioral change and shifting mindset and the power of thoughts. So, I decided to get into coaching to help people do the same!

Praise: Who doesn’t need help? We all need a good coach in our lives!

Stefani: Yeah we do… Or five.

Praise: 1-2-3-4-5, we need all of them, for sure. One of my big passion points because it’s something I struggle with and have found great tips for is mental health. We were talking a bit about all the thoughts that go into our heads…

Stefani: So many thoughts.

Praise: You have quite a bit of a story about that, so why don’t you tell us a bit about why you’re passionate about mental health and give us a few tips of how we can make our thoughts work for ourselves.

1. Recognize The Thoughts & Notice How They Influence You

Stefani: Over the years I have had moments in time where I’ve dealt with a little bit of depression here and there. About five years ago when I was really taking that change from working in fashion and corporate to making a big leap… I was in kind of a really low point so I was going to see a therapist and talking through these things.

She started to really help me gain awareness to my thoughts and we would talk about my thoughts. Through this process of identifying my thoughts and what they were saying I started to recognize that they were three different types of voices and thoughts I was having.

I’d have these thoughts that were super negative and judgmental and really hurtful. So I started calling that my inner mean girl. Then I would have the thoughts of the achiever: I have to do this… I want to start this business… I have all these ideas… I’d have a checklist, like, “this, this, this, this, this.” I think we all, entrepreneurs definitely know that feeling. 

Praise: Writing lists all the time.

Stefani: And then as I started to get clear with those thoughts. I started to pay attention to that more quiet, more subtle one that was really kind and gentle; kind of like your best friend saying “I’m doing great” and “you are really beautiful” and “you’re on the right path.” So, getting more attuned to those voices and learning how to see where I needed to shift those thoughts a little bit. 

2. Categorize The Thoughts: Mean Girl, Best Friend, & Go-Getter

Praise: Totally, that’s the key thing is to recognize the thoughts that you’re having. It’s that self-awareness of thinking, wow okay these are the thoughts that are going into my brain, but then also categorizing them, inner mean girl… ugh she is so annoying!

Stefani: She’s a pain.

Praise: She is there. We think we only have that mean girl and everyone else just has the best friend… No, we all have that mean girl.

Stefani: We all have the mean girl.

Praise: But, it’s trying to build up that best friend. And then, how do you continue to hone in on those thoughts: the mean girl, the best friend, the go-getter in all of us, how do we even put all those thoughts in one place? There are all of these voices we have in our head, how can we tune into them? Do you have some ticks and tricks?

3. Practice Journaling, Speaking The Thoughts Out To Someone Trusted, And Meditation

Stefani: Something that’s really helpful for me, as I love to journal, and I’m kind of an internal processor. For me I would start to journal this out, stream of consciousness, and then go back and read it. Those thoughts are pretty negative, some of them are kind of judgy and mean.

Journaling Your Thoughts

So I identify that: I’ll say, that’s clearly my inner mean girl. Usually, what I like to do is go through that journaling and you can see if this person is my achiever or is this my mean girl?

Is that pretty true? Really seeing what’s actually true and so that’s one way: journaling and going back and looking it over and paying attention to what those thoughts even are.

Verbal Processing

The second one is talking to a friend and getting verbal processing going. Whether you’re talking to a therapist or a friend and say “hey, I’m having a lot of like thoughts lately; I’m kind of spiraling a little bit” or “I have these ideas, can I get your thoughts or your opinion on what you think, because, you know my heart and you know my values.”

Really going to somebody that you trust and getting their feedback. Many times we all have those people in our lives that can really speak truth to who we are. So, that one can be really powerful.

Meditation

Also, meditation is really great, too. You’re able to get yourself kind of quiet and for a little while you might be having all the thoughts… the achiever thoughts, I don’t have time to do this because I need to do this and blah, blah, blah… but then when you take a few breaths and you’re able to settle into your body, those thoughts come and go and you’re able to see: this thought was kind of mean. I don’t love that one. Maybe where they’re coming from or, this is still that achiever that wants to get up and go do something else.

Then maybe at that point in your meditation where you’re able to hear “hey, you’re doing great! Sit back, take a breather, maybe go to the beach today. It’s that friend that you want to spend more time with. The more that you’re able to notice these things, whether it’s through journaling or talking to somebody or through meditation, you can see, are these thoughts that I’m giving power to positive or negative?

Then you can start to shift. Maybe these more negative thoughts are coming from patterns of hanging around certain people that are constantly talking about negative things or gossiping or comparing themselves to people. You start to see where you can take actions — whether it’s through people you’re spending time with, through TV or music, or whatever you’re consuming or just how you’re spending time in your own thoughts.

You can see where you need to start to shift them, and then, hopefully, over time there’s more nice wise friend thoughts than inner mean girl thoughts.

Praise: I dig that. It’s like feeding that best friend until that voice gets louder and it sounds like meditation is a key way to do that, along with journaling. I love that, almost script, of how to say to your best friend, or to a person in real life, “hey, I’m going through some of these thoughts, can you tell me if these things are true? Are these true thoughts? Should I keep on tuning into them?” I think that’s super helpful.

Stefani: Yeah, they’re really helpful.

Praise: Well, thank you so much for sharing those tips with us! How can our friends find you online?

Stefani: I have an Instagram, @Stefani_McCullah I spell my name a little funny, so with an F, and and I. Also, my website is just StefaniMcCullah.com so you can check me out there. 

Praise: Easy peezy, well thank you for sharing all those wonderful mentions of us: the inner mean girl to technology right now (my camera stopped filming and I had to hit record again, **photographernotvideographer** but my best friend voice said, “it’s gonna be alright!” So thank you again! 

Stefani: Thank you, it was so great hanging out with you! 

Praise: Okay, and we’re going to record a dance video now!

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