In this episode of West Coast Women Rising, JJ sits down with financial coach Louise Bretz to explore the deeply personal and often emotional relationship we have with money.

Louise shares her journey from running a dance studio and accumulating significant debt to transforming her life through financial education and ultimately becoming a coach who helps others do the same.

Together, JJ and Louise dive into the realities of entrepreneurship, the emotional blocks around money, and how shifting your mindset from “budgeting” to a “spending plan” can create both freedom and empowerment.

This conversation is a powerful reminder that financial clarity isn’t about restriction—it’s about creating choice, confidence, and peace.

1. Louise’s entrepreneurial journey from dance instructor to financial coach
2. The financial mistakes that led to $40K+ in debt—and how she paid it off
3. How money struggles impact relationships, communication, and self-worth
4. Why people feel shame and avoidance around finances
5. The difference between budgeting vs. a “spending plan”
6. Entrepreneurship lessons: marketing, ROI, and long-term thinking
7. Why visibility and messaging matter more than tactics
8. Finding the right clients vs. trying to help everyone
9. The importance of patience and long-term investment in business growth
10. Real-life success story: helping a widow gain financial confidence and freedom

1. Financial clarity creates emotional freedom

When you understand your money, you gain confidence, choice, and peace of mind.

2. Budgeting isn’t restriction—it’s empowerment

Reframing it as a spending plan helps remove shame and creates ownership.

3. Discipline leads to freedom

Just like dance, structure gives you the ability to express and enjoy life more fully.

4. Money conversations are deeply emotional

Many people avoid finances due to shame, fear, or lack of education—not lack of intelligence.

5. Entrepreneurship is always a test

Success comes from experimenting, refining your message, and staying aligned with who you truly want to serve.

6. ROI isn’t always immediate

The biggest returns in business often come from relationships, connections, and long-term momentum.

Louise Bretz is a financial coach who helps individuals and couples take control of their money, eliminate debt, and create a clear plan for their financial future.

After overcoming her own financial challenges—including significant credit card debt—Louise now empowers others with practical tools, education, and personalized coaching to build confidence and freedom with money.

Louise works best with:

1. Individuals who earn good money but don’t know where it’s going
2. People who feel stuck and unable to get ahead financially
3. Couples struggling to communicate about money
4. Those ready for structure, clarity, and accountability

1. Start with a free consultation call
2. 3-month foundational coaching program
3. Weekly (then bi-weekly) Zoom sessions
4. Ongoing support and accountability options

🌐 Website: moneycoachlouise.com

📧 Email: coachlouisebretz@gmail.com

Everything in business—and in life—is a test.

Your message, your strategy, your finances… they all evolve as you do.

Give yourself permission to learn, adjust, and grow—because the clarity you’re seeking is built over time.

In this meaningful conversation, JJ Flizanes and Tawney Noriega explore the difference between operating from competition versus collaboration in business and community. What unfolds is a deeper conversation about self-trust, safety, courage, authenticity, and knowing your role in someone else's growth journey.

Tawney shares what she's seeing inside the Ventura County Business Women community: women navigating the discomfort of being around others who offer similar services, while still craving connection, support, and real community. JJ adds a personal layer by sharing insights from a recent birthday medicine journey that brought clarity around alignment, upper limits, visibility, and the fear that can surface when it's time to grow.

Together, they unpack how competition often comes from scarcity, insecurity, and disconnection from self, while collaboration asks us to know who we are, trust what we bring, and honor that not everyone is meant for us.

• Why collaboration requires self-trust

• How competition often comes from scarcity and fear

• The importance of creating internal safety

• Why your work is not meant for everyone

• How to recognize where you fit in someone's growth process

• Why community helps business owners grow faster

• How to become more discerning about collaborations

• The difference between transactional business and building an ecosystem

You are not for everyone.
That's not a problem — it's clarity. The more you know who you are and who you serve, the less you compare yourself to others.

Safety starts within.
External support matters, but true safety has to come from your connection to yourself, your values, and your higher guidance.

Collaboration takes courage.
It requires honesty, boundaries, discernment, and the willingness to say yes or no from alignment.

Community is an advantage.
The right relationships can accelerate growth, expand opportunities, and reduce the isolation that so many business owners feel.

00:00 – Why this conversation is so relevant in women's business communities
04:39 – JJ shares lessons from a recent personal healing journey
17:18 – Tawney explains why collaboration requires self-trust
22:07 – JJ talks about internal safety and not waiting for the outside world to validate you
34:08 – JJ offers a practical framework for choosing aligned collaboration partners
44:35 – Tawney shares why collaboration is part of a new business model built on shared opportunity
49:17 – JJ breaks down the masculine energy of competition and the feminine energy of allowing and co-creation

"Collaboration requires self-trust." — Tawney Noriega

"You are the magic. That's what sets you apart from anybody else." — Tawney Noriega

"When I'm out of alignment, I feel threatened and I'm in scarcity." — JJ Flizanes

"Safety cannot come from outside of you." — JJ Flizanes

This episode is a reminder that business is not about being for everyone or proving your worth through comparison. It's about knowing yourself, trusting your voice, and allowing the right people, partnerships, and opportunities to meet you where you are.

What does it really cost to live your purpose?

Many people dream about finding their calling, doing meaningful work, and living in alignment with their soul's mission. But what often gets overlooked is that purpose comes with a price. Growth requires change, and stepping into your purpose can mean letting go of old identities, relationships, comfort zones, and expectations.

In this episode, JJ Flizanes explores the emotional, energetic, and practical realities of pursuing your purpose. She shares insights into the internal shifts required to follow your path and why resistance, fear, and discomfort are often signs that you're moving in the right direction.

Living your purpose is not about perfection or constant ease. It's about choosing alignment over comfort and trusting that the challenges you encounter are part of the expansion required to become who you are meant to be.

JJ discusses how purpose-driven individuals often face periods of uncertainty, criticism, or loneliness, and why these moments are part of the journey toward authentic fulfillment. When you step into your truth, you may outgrow environments, beliefs, and roles that once felt safe.

This episode invites you to look honestly at what you are willing to release in order to live more fully aligned with your purpose. When you embrace the process, the rewards of meaning, freedom, and authentic expression far outweigh the temporary discomfort.

• What it truly means to live your purpose

• The emotional and energetic price of personal growth

• Why fear and resistance often appear when you step into alignment

• Letting go of comfort, approval, and outdated identities

• How purpose-driven living leads to deeper fulfillment and freedom

If you've ever felt called to something bigger but hesitated because of the risks or challenges, this episode will help you understand why the price of purpose is ultimately the pathway to your most authentic life.

JJ Flizanes is an Empowerment Strategist, business coach, and podcast host dedicated to helping people remove emotional blocks and step into their true purpose. She is the creator of the Empowering Minds Network, a global podcast network with millions of downloads that features shows focused on personal development, spirituality, health, business, and conscious living.

With over two decades of experience in coaching, personal transformation, and behavioral change, JJ integrates emotional healing, mindset work, and practical strategy to help entrepreneurs and truth seekers create aligned success in their lives and businesses.

JJ is the host of several podcasts, including Spirit, Purpose & Energy, where she explores the intersection of emotional healing, manifestation, and conscious living. She is also the creator of the Core Wound Map® and multiple transformational programs designed to help individuals release limiting patterns and thrive in all areas of life.

Through her coaching, courses, events, and media platform, JJ empowers people to transform their pain into purpose and create lives filled with clarity, joy, and authentic alignment.

Mariekie Quinn returns to West Coast Women Rising (after Episode 31: Mirrors, Misunderstanding & Repair)—and this time, the spotlight is on her and the business she's been quietly building behind the scenes.

Mariekie is the founder of MQ Admin Services, and her work goes way beyond "just admin." She helps entrepreneurs and organizations take chaos, overlap, and scattered systems and turn them into streamlined structure, clear workflows, and more peace day-to-day—so the business can actually support the life.

In this conversation, we talk about:

• Why podcasts create a deeper, faster sense of connection in a community (and why that matters for networking)

• Mariekie's transition from corporate burnout to entrepreneurship—and what changed during the COVID-era pivot

• The real problems she solves: overspending on tools, double-entry systems, messy workflows, and "signing up for everything"

• How her process works: consultations, brain-dumping the overwhelm, identifying the true goal line, and implementing systems that fit your brain

• The personal side of organization—how your home life and business patterns mirror each other, and why self-care impacts execution

• Her focus moving forward: building the MQ Method (habits + practices that support sustainable growth), expanding visibility, and refining offers with intention

• A powerful reminder for new entrepreneurs: you don't have to go fast, failure is feedback, and "don't decorate your ditch"

Website: MQAdminSVCS.com
Also on: Facebook + Instagram (and launching LinkedIn)

If you're ready for more clarity, calmer operations, and a business that feels supportive instead of exhausting—this episode is for you.

In this episode, JJ sits down with Galit Reuben, energy coach and founder of I Am Super Conscious, to unpack how healing work, nervous system safety, and "superconscious" practices can help people break free from self-sabotage and create real-life change.

Galit shares her origin story—from running the nonprofit Dogs Without Borders (saving thousands of dogs) to becoming what she calls a "secret healer," and eventually stepping fully into coaching after discovering superconscious work through Christopher Duncan. She explains how shifting unconscious patterns helped her stop waking up in overwhelm, change relationship dynamics, and expand income—then how she turned that transformation into a coaching practice serving mostly women.

JJ and Galit also dig into the business side of building a "woo" business: leveraging partnerships, understanding visibility as frequency, and being intentional about referrals, contracts, and alignment. They close with Galit's newest offering, Quantum Mantras—a 5-minutes-a-day app designed to support rewiring from the foundation up (starting with safety), plus where to find her online.

Guest links mentioned

• Website: IAmSuperConscious.com

• App: Quantum Mantras (check availability in your app store)

• Social: @GalitReuben (TikTok/Facebook) + "Quantum Mantras" searchable

In this solo episode, JJ breaks down how to move through the powerful momentum of the Fire Horse year without burnout by focusing on just three aligned priorities. Rather than getting swept up in urgency, overcommitment, or scattered action, she shares how to use this high-energy cycle for sustainable expansion through identity, intentional creation, and body-led balance. This conversation is your reminder that success this year comes from congruence, not doing more. If you're ready for guided support, join JJ's free 14-Day Manifestation Challenge starting April 1st at JJFlizanes.com/14day, and download her Metabolic Makeover program (a $500 value) completely free at JJFlizanes.com/mm using the code JJFREE.

JJ welcomes Sheila Donohue for a conversation that blends entrepreneurship, lifestyle, and the art of curated Italian wines and foods. Sheila shares how her company, Verovino, sources small-batch, farm-made wines, olive oils, and specialty foods—many not readily available in the U.S.—and delivers them to both consumers and businesses across America.

• Meet Sheila in Bologna: Sheila shares her life in Bologna, Italy, where she's lived since 2001, and how Italy shaped her expertise and relationships with producers.

• What Verovino does: Verovino curates and imports authentic, sustainably made, small-batch products—primarily from Italy, plus select producers from other countries and California—selling B2B and direct-to-consumer.

• From fintech to food & wine: Sheila explains her background in financial technology (fintech), her sommelier training in Italy, and how her personal immersion in artisan food culture inspired the company.

• Starting from a "clean slate": In 2017, after major life changes, Sheila began building Verovino—funded through savings—and took early action by importing product and going door-to-door to find customers.

• How the business grows: Sheila emphasizes the importance of continuity (repeat business), building scale, and covering operating expenses. She explains how an omni-channel strategy helps stabilize the business:

  • Distributors nationwide

  • Wine stores & restaurants (especially in California)

  • Direct-to-consumer shipping across the U.S.

  • Corporate gifting & events

• Marketing & education that compounds: Verovino invests in education and storytelling through digital marketing—especially their blog and YouTube channel—to build long-term brand trust and demand.

• Product philosophy: As a sommelier-led team, Sheila curates for variety and distinction: reds, whites, rosés, orange wines, sparkling (dry and sweet), plus standout olive oils—including single-varietal olive oils with specific pairing profiles.

• Events as a growth engine: Sheila shares how tastings, fundraisers, private events, and collaborations introduce people to the products—because tasting creates appreciation and connection.

• Specialty foods: The conversation highlights a Piedmont hazelnut producer offering toasted hazelnuts, caramelized hazelnuts, hazelnut creams, pasta, and pestos—plus JJ's enthusiasm for pistachio cream and clean ingredients.

• Wine club & gifting: Sheila describes Verovino's monthly or quarterly wine club, curated shipments with insider notes and stories, and a growing trend of gifting memberships (including personalized letters).

• Gift sets: Verovino offers curated gift sets—popular in December—and a standout option that pairs wine + olive oil, plus expanded options for non-wine drinkers.

• A second brand line for broader appeal: To avoid being pigeonholed and to meet different market needs, Sheila shares how Verovino expanded into a separate line for more "recognizable" wines, including Prosecco and kegs—ideal for events and high-volume restaurant service.

• Advice for new producers: Sheila emphasizes the need to stand out in a crowded market—especially as the wine industry faces headwinds—and to clearly differentiate your product and message.

• JJ connects her own journey as a winemaker (High Vibrational Wines) and discusses why she values small-batch, purpose-driven production over mass distribution.

• A fun community collaboration emerges: JJ invites Sheila to co-create a March event in Ojai with "Women Behind the Business: Real Conversations," potentially adding a wine tasting experience—and they discover their birthdays are both in March.

• Website: Verovino.com

• YouTube: Vero Vino

• Instagram & Facebook: VeroVinoGusto
  
  

Closing: JJ encourages listeners to explore Verovino for personal discovery, gifting, and creating meaningful food-and-wine experiences that bring "a taste of Italy" home.

In this episode of West Coast Women Rising, JJ sits down with photographer Leigha Smith to talk about building a creative business with both artistry and strategy. Leigha shares her journey from managing her husband's social media to stepping into her own identity as a sought-after headshot, branding, and family photographer.

They unpack what it really looks like to create a "year-long content gallery" in a single shoot—planning locations, outfits, and image variety so entrepreneurs can show (not tell) their brand online. Leigha also talks networking with intention, early client-getting strategies (Facebook groups, collaborations, pop-up headshot events), and why authenticity matters more than ever in the age of AI images.

Plus, Leigha previews her 2026 goals, including a new collaboration called The Archetype Approach (leadership + style + photography) and expanding into larger corporate branding packages.

Topics Covered

• How Leigha found photography through composition + creativity

• Branding photos that support your content for the entire year

• The difference between "headshots" and true "brand storytelling"

• Networking as community (not desperation marketing)

• AI photos vs. real connection and trust

• 2026 plans: The Archetype Approach + corporate rebrands

Guest Info
Leigha Smith Photography http://leighasmithphotography.com (headshots • branding • family)
Find Leigha on Instagram/Facebook