[00:00:00] Christine: So basically was a misdiagnosis, but it shook up my entire life and how I see things in a good way. So obviously in hindsight, I believe also, as always, that everything happens for a reason, and there's a positive spin that you can take on almost everything in life, and I did that on that because it made me reprioritize everything.
[00:00:21] Aneta: We often hear people wishing us a long, happy, and healthy life, but what if the length isn't what matters most? What if instead, it's the breath depth and purpose of each day that matters most? Welcome to the Live the Width of Your Life podcast. My name is Aneta Ardelian Kuzma, and join me weekly as I interview guests who have made changes in their own lives to live more fully with intention, gratitude, and joy. Be prepared to be inspired by their stories of how they shifted their mindset, took courageous action, and designed the life that they always wanted to live.
[00:00:56] Welcome back to Live With Your Life podcast. My guest today is Christine Michaelis, and she's the founder of the Creative Startup Academy and Let's Talk. She's the author of multiple books, a public speaker podcaster. She has more than two decades of experience in the communication industry and over a decade running her own business. And with her hands-on approach, she's helped hundreds of individuals create a successful business, as well as co-create trainings with enterprise companies that have an immediate positive effect and can be implemented right away.
[00:01:24] She is passionate about communication and how it shapes everything that we do, and she's also passionate about training others to make an impact in people's lives and the company's success. Christine also talked about her diagnosis of a brain tumor. A few years ago how it helped her to reprioritize her life and create the work-life balance for herself that a lot of entrepreneurs missed.
[00:01:49] And it also led her to rewrite her book, The Happiness Formula. It was such a great conversation, and her story is just so inspiring. Take a listen.
[00:01:58] Christine, welcome to the Live The Width Of Your Life podcast.
[00:02:03] Christine: Thank you so much for having me. Looking forward to our conversation.
[00:02:08] Aneta: Me too. So excited. And you said you're dialing in, actually, from Berlin today.
[00:02:14] Christine: Yes, that's right. That's where I was born and bred in Berlin.
[00:02:18] Aneta: And where do you live today? Where do you live currently?
[00:02:21] Christine: I live in Northern Italy. I live near Milan in a small town, but it's a strategic location, it's a really good location because it's close to the airport. It's close to Switzerland with all the mountains. It's close to all the lakes in Italy. It's close to France. It's close to the beach as well. Two, three hours by car, but still. Yeah. So that's where I live today.
[00:02:41] Aneta: That's wonderful. I always envy folks who live in Europe because you can get to anywhere that you want to go with planes, but also with trains, and it's just so beautiful and scenic.
[00:02:51] Christine: So true.
[00:02:52] Aneta: How wonderful. Did you intentionally choose to move to Italy?
[00:02:56] Christine: Yes, probably I manifested it
[00:02:59] Aneta: You did?
[00:02:59] Christine: Yeah, I did. So I left Germany 14 years ago. I lived in the UK for almost 10 years, and I moved to Sweden, but I always wanted to live in Italy. I put everything in there, even what kinds of things that I was creating digitally. And I was trying to find Italian friends to start making connections to that country, and I found my future husband, who is Italian, and most, actually, for love. So that's how it worked out. Yes.
[00:03:26] Aneta: I loved that it worked out the way you were hoping, and so for those that are not familiar with you, tell me a little bit more about your background. I know I've shared that you are an entrepreneur, you're an author, but tell me a little bit more about your passions and the things that you love.
[00:03:41] Christine: Of course. Yeah, so like I said, business-wise, if we look at that and location-wise, you already know everything, but yeah, so I'm an entrepreneur. I have supported entrepreneurs for more than a decade with my creative startup Academy, and I support big organizations with Better communication, and that's not to communicate only to the world, but with yourself and with your team.
[00:04:05] So, going into leadership development, and I think that it's something that everything in life for me comes down to communication, everything, all the issues, and all the solutions as well. And that's why I focus on that. And that's why I can see that as a thread going through my life as well.
[00:04:22] And everything that I'm doing is about that with communication. What lights me up is working with people and constantly learning. I'm one of these people who can't sit still and always need to soak up new information. I'm still learning to do nothing from time to time. Living in Italy is helpful.
[00:04:46] I'm not saying that's a stereotype, of course, but it does help. It's a very different culture from German culture. So that is something that I'm passionate about. Meeting people, maybe inspiring people, getting this energy out there. And I'm feeding off people's energy as well.
[00:05:01] I think most people suffered a bit during what happened in the world now, four years ago, pretty much where we weren't allowed to see people. I'm a hugger, I hug people, but doing things, creating things, constantly exploring, this is what I like.
[00:05:16] Aneta: So good. Is that something that you always had in your life? Were you always so curious about exploring and just meeting new people, trying new things?
[00:05:25] Christine: Yes, I think so. My mom tells me, and I remember some of the bits from my childhood as well, because I was always writing short stories. I was reading a lot. I was doing a lot. I traveled and discovered a lot also by myself with a backpack. And also wasn't afraid to try new things in my career, let's say. Actually, after school, I did three years’ worth of internship, finding out what I didn't want to do until I found what I wanted to do.
[00:05:51] And then I did that. And then I said, you know what, it's not what I want to do anymore. And then started my own thing. So yeah, it's this curiosity is, I think something that goes through all my life. Everyone tells me, at least those who know me.
[00:06:04] Aneta: Yeah. Tell me more about your creative startup academy. How long have you been doing that, and who or what types of clients typically participate?
[00:06:14] Christine: Okay, so it's something that evolved, of course, because it's about 13 years ago when I started this whole thing. I started with one-to-one coaching. So I trained as a neuro-linguistic programming practitioner. So that's all about communication as well. So, understanding the brain, understanding yourself, and how you communicate better?
[00:06:33] And then I trained as a coach and didn't know what I wanted to do actually with that. I just knew that something that I was interested in still had a full-time job in a design agency, also communication there, and yeah, it just happened that I started working with entrepreneurs, and that's how that developed.
[00:06:50] So I started with one-on-one coaching, and I did some online courses, and then I started creating an online community because I could see the value of having a community in some way. Again, it comes down to meeting people to support each other to share challenges, because in the end, if someone is an entrepreneur, we all go through the same stuff.
[00:07:10] Every single one will come to a specific point that everyone has been or will be, no matter the industry, no matter what you offer. So it has developed into this creative startup academy. It is a membership-based platform where you can sign up, and there's even a free version for people, because I'm a big believer in giving back and supporting as many people as I can.
[00:07:31] And there you get what kind of resources that you have available 24/7, like online courses, seven-day challenges, how-to videos, and things like that. And also, I go live twice a month. So if you can ask me a question or we do some coworking together, there's, of course, something where you can ask questions in between, something like a Facebook wall, but it's not on Facebook because it's all on that one platform that I created on my website.
[00:07:55] And, all kinds of other things in there. So there's fully packed with everything that I developed basically over the last 13 years, I put that together in a bundle so that people can access it easily and pick out the bits and pieces they need, like the three pillars. So starting out marketing on, and the health and well-being as well, which I added about two years ago.
[00:08:18] Aneta: It's so good. It's so important to be part of a community as an entrepreneur because it can get so lonely. And so did you have a community or a mastermind or something that you were part of when you first started as well?
[00:08:30] Christine: Yes, I would say so, because I'm that outgoing person, and like I said, I love meeting people. So I always from day one, I went to networking events and I found groups that I like and continue meeting them regularly. So, let's say a real-life community wasn't so much online. I tried a few, but it was a bit difficult.
[00:08:50] With the ones I found, and so I always have a yeah network. And I always believe that's the most important thing. If you're an entrepreneur, you need a network and support. And yeah, since everything went online, actually, that has developed more online as well to be part of a specific community.
[00:09:11] Aneta: And I love that you added the health and wellness piece a couple of years ago, you said to your academy. And I'm seeing more and more, even with my coaching, of course, that's a large part of what we do and we talk about. But you had your wellness journey. You had something that happened with a diagnosis that happened to you. Can you talk a little bit about what happened and how that has impacted the way life is, and what changed?
[00:09:39] Christine: When I was 19, I started having tinnitus, so then ringing in both of my ears. That's usually breast-related as well. And it didn't go away, and I haven't changed. And I tried everything back then. All the treatments, everything, even injections, oxygen therapy. Everything, nothing worked, of course. The only thing that did work a few years back was mindfulness as well and meditation, and slowing down.
[00:10:07] I'm saying that because of that 20 years on. I went to an ENT, so ear, nose, throat doctor, because I thought maybe some new things could be done. And they said, we're going to do a scan of your head just to make sure that nothing's wrong with your ears. Went to these scans, which I didn't like because I'm also a bit claustrophobic, and that was horrible. And two weeks later, he said, Good news, everything is good. Everything is fine with your ears. There's nothing wrong there. But you have a brain tumor. I just didn't understand. I don't know if I would've understood in German, because that's my mother tongue, but I was in the UK, no problem. But these medical terms, maybe even other native speakers, wouldn't understand.
[00:10:49] So I wrote everything down. I did what you should never do. I Googled what that is, and thought, okay, that is it. And I had to do. Lots and lots of tests and other scans and blood tests, because what they said is it's on the Pituitary gland.
[00:11:05] So I had to go to an endocrinologist, basically they took lots of blood and tests and other scans. And I think about 3 months later, I had the results of everything, and they said, Oh, good news. It's not a brain tumor.
[00:11:18] So it was a misdiagnosis, but it shook up my entire life and how I see things in a good way. So obviously in hindsight, I believe also, as always, that everything happens for a reason, and there's a positive spin that you can take on almost everything in life, and I did that on that because it made me reprioritize everything.
[00:11:41] It was a time when I was very close to burnout anyway, because I was overworked and I was working at least 16 hours a day, seven days a week. And all of this made me stop, slow down, but not from one day to another, because, of course, you can't just go from one extreme to the other. And coming back to the question, how that changed, it was like, okay, there are things like that that can happen.
[00:12:06] Diagnosis like this or, even worse, if it turns out to be a real thing or something other happens in life, where someone close to you dies or something, and usually that's the moment when people wake up and think, okay, I need to do something in life. And that's also my message. Do not wait for that to happen because you can change whatever you want.
[00:12:28] It's really funny how priorities can shift, isn't it? It's always I don't have time for this. I don't have time for that until something like that happens. And then all of a sudden, you have time for everything. So you have, you can make time, you can do what you want to do in life, and you do not have to wait for that to happen.
[00:12:47] Aneta: How old were you when you got this misdiagnosis?
[00:12:50] Christine: 35, maybe 36.
[00:12:54] Aneta: Yeah. So young. So you were working, did you say 16 hours a day, seven days a week? So, how long after this happened, and then you were re-shifted, you're thinking about things. Did you decide, okay, I need to move, and I want to manifest a new life.
[00:13:12] Christine: It was during that time, probably even, and then right after that, I started making changes. But again, it's not so easy because, first of all, you're in that rhythm to do that, and then you have also built something that requires you to do that. So what I did, for example, I said, okay, I'm going to try not to work in the evenings anymore, so to have shorter days, and then I was like, okay, I'm going to have a lunch hour.
[00:13:36] I'm going to take lunch, not in front of the computer, but behind the emails. I'm going to take lunch outside, off the screen, and go out in nature. Little wallow, crazy, it's crazy. Then I was like, I'm not going to work on Sundays. And then I was like, I'm not going to work on Saturday. And then I've also met my now fiancé, and so even before that, I was still working a bit, let's say also Saturday, for example, because why not? But since I'm with him and he has a job where he's employed and he's working starting around 8 o'clock and finishing at 5, so do I. So I have an 8:30 - 9 start, and I finish at 5, and I do not work on weekends.
[00:14:15] But it took a long time to get there. And like I said, at the beginning, I'm still learning also to do nothing because my brain is always going crazy, even with ideas of everything I want to do. So that's that.
[00:14:27] Aneta: Isn't it amazing how we can establish new boundaries for ourselves when something so shocking happens, but like you said, why do we need to wait for something to happen to us or to someone that we care about to wake up?
[00:14:43] Christine: Yeah, there's a thing that I would like to suggest to people because sometimes, I don't know, it's something probably that happens in the brain to you need that talking moment. I know someone who's done a death meditation, which is you do a meditation on what it's like when you're dead, and you go on and things like that.
[00:15:02] And that is like a little thing that you could do to wake yourself up even though nothing has happened in real life really to pretend and trick your brain, let's say into that state of, okay, I need to do something now and I need to live the life that I always said I wanted, that I'm not doing because I blame others or I blame a job or I blame I don't have money or whatever that you can't do. You can.
[00:15:26] Aneta: You absolutely can. It's so interesting. I've never heard of the death meditation. I've heard that people sometimes spend time meditating on thinking about the legacy they want to leave behind, or thinking through that, but that's fascinating. But you also started studying happiness as a result of this. I know that you have your journey, led you to something called the happiness formula. So tell me a little bit more about that.
[00:15:50] Christine: Yes, exactly. Like most people, it's, we want to be happy. But what does it mean? And what does it mean for each one of us? Because I think it's a very first thing to recognize that it means different things to different people. One thing that came up for me. So what I did I read all kinds of books on happiness that are already out there.
[00:16:08] I did health and well-being courses. I became a certified happiness facilitator. Everything I could do around that topic to see what that means. I try to soak all of that in. And then because I'm a very, let's say, I always have systematic approaches too when I transmit information to other people. I like to put that into something that they can work their way through because that's the way I like to do it.
[00:16:34] And that's what I've done before with other topics. So I decided to create the happiness formula.
[00:16:39] So I came up with this formula, like I said, that will help you. And one of the things that stood out to me about everything is to understand that happiness is not the same thing as joy, and if you want to be happy, it doesn't mean that you cannot be sad, because we all have that.
[00:16:55] And that's, I think sometimes also misconception, but yeah, sometimes I have a bad day, or even if we dwell on things that we shouldn't which is not helping our happiness and our joy, let's say, but we can still be happy because happiness is that underlying base. I don't want to say contentment, but if being happy, because the way you're happy with who you are, and you're happy with the life you're living, and the people you surround yourself with, and what you do also for others.
[00:17:29] And it doesn't mean that you cannot be sad. It doesn't mean that you cannot be angry. It doesn't mean that you cannot cry or shout or whatever. It just means, if someone asked me, Are you happy? The answer should be yes, because at the moment, maybe not, because something bad happened. I'm sad, but overall, I'm happy. I'm a happy person. Yeah.
[00:17:53] Aneta: It's so important to ask the questions and just to create even that activity of saying, checking in with yourself, and saying, am I fulfilled? Am I happy? Am I content in this moment? What could contribute to that in a different way, which I think is so important, and we don't do very often? Tell me a little bit more about your book because I know that you're also a public speaker and a podcaster, and you've written a book as well. Tell us more about your book and why you wrote it.
[00:18:22] Christine: Yeah, actually, so far, I've written 21 books.
[00:18:25] Aneta: 21.
[00:18:27] Christine: Yes.
[00:18:28] Aneta: Wow.
[00:18:28] Christine: I just wrote a book. It's a children's book. It's trilingual to help children learn new languages. But the one book that we were talking about is the happiness formula, of course, as well. So all of what I said, I've put that into a book.
[00:18:42] So it's called the happiness formula. It's available in German and English. And I'm still working on the Italian version. It's taking a bit longer. It's available on Amazon. So the formula is an acronym, because again, I like to make it easy, and also follow along and smile. After all, a smile is contagious.
[00:19:01] And I like that. So what does it stand for? It's start your journey. Make sure you're ready. It's implant happiness into your brain, learn about the model, and engage with the tools. And I just like, in a few sentences, I'll say a bit more about it. So start your journeys about understanding what happiness is.
[00:19:23] What it isn't. So again, for example, the difference between joy and happiness. What does it mean for you? So you start exploring that. It comes with a lot of questions. So it's like a workbook. And actually, people tell me Wow, it's so good that it's in the book. I'm writing in that book because you make space for that as well.
[00:19:41] So that's what I've done. Then we have to make sure you're ready, and then we go into a bit of neurolinguistic programming techniques as well, overcoming obstacles, setting goals for yourself, and implanting happiness into your brain, which is where we go into the science and the biology of happiness. So what the science has to say about it and what happens in your body and the happiness hormones and all of that, people might have heard of it's about building habits, and then, of course, I'm not the first one who's writing about happiness.
[00:20:11] There are so many models out there, also officially, and I've looked at some and explored them in that book as well to give some other ideas as well, even though they all come down to the same things, I think. Everyone has their spin on it, like I did. And then the last one is engage with the tools, where we look into gratitude, meditation, affirmation, visualization, these kinds of things that you can do.
[00:20:35] I recorded a lot of meditations, so there's a lot of interaction as well, there's a page where people can get, download a gratitude journal, and things like that.
[00:20:44] Aneta: That's so beautiful. When did you have time to write 21 books? That is so amazing.
[00:20:50] Christine: Thank you. Yeah, I got a bit of a book bug, let's say, because the first one took me quite a long time. And then once I did the first one, the other ones blew down because I think in 2016, I started writing my first book. So that was the first one that was published. And then, since then, that's already eight years. I've published 21 books.
[00:21:12] Aneta: That is so amazing. Do you write every day?
[00:21:14] Christine: No, I tried that because I like routines and things like that, but then I wasn't creative enough when I said I make it a habit every day. No, but when I have an idea, I then just, so the last book, like I said, the first children's book, I had the idea and then within two weeks I published it because I was so obsessed with that, and it just all came out.
[00:21:35] And I did things, and it's between zero and six years. So it's a short story. It's not a lot of words, character building, or anything. But it's like that. Once I have an idea about the book, then I just need to get it out because I think my head is exploding if I don't.
[00:21:52] Aneta: I love that. Do you self-publish or do you work with a publishing house? You self
[00:21:56] publish.
[00:21:57] Christine: I self-publish.
[00:21:59] Aneta: That's so good. And do you have creative activities that you like to do that kind of build the inspiration, or do you just allow the inspiration to come to you, and then you act on it when it arrives? I'm always curious.
[00:22:12] Christine: Yeah, I use the letter, I would say, but then it's quite a creative process for me to write. One, because I use a lot of post it notes to structure a book and things like that. But then most of them were like business books, not business books, some are business books, but let's say non-fiction books.
[00:22:29] So I would say, a bit easier to write than fictional books because there you need to build characters. I'm writing on one of the last 10 years that I might publish at some point. But otherwise, it's like a wall full of post-it notes that is outlining my book and I move them around to make sure also I don't double content, and where does that fit best, and how does it and does it flow well enough and then I put numbers on the post it notes.
[00:22:52] You can take them off the wall, and then I have a big pile of post it notes, which is the book, and then in the past, I used to go away and just write them. In two or three weeks, just write, and there I wrote every day because I already had everything there on the post-it notes and just had to write them.
[00:23:10] And people always tell me as well when they read my books, it's like having a one-to-one with me or having a conversation because I write the way I see. I'm not caring too much about specific structure or anything, and I write everything in English. Even though I'm German, I've been out of Germany for so long, and I've just been speaking English for 14 years. It's easier for me to write in English rather than my native language.
[00:23:36] Aneta: Isn't it fascinating how the brain starts to shift in terms of how you think? And sometimes, I had a coaching client, and he was originally from Morocco, and he said English was like what he thought of for business, and when he thought of the arts or culture, he spoke in French and thought in French.
[00:23:56] And then, it was interesting just to see the way the brain works sometimes. And it's interesting that maybe over time you started thinking more in English, especially as a writer, do you identify primarily as a writer first and foremost, or is it just one of many passions that you identify with?
[00:24:14] Christine: One of many things.. I would say a creator, a communicator, because again, it comes down to that, because yeah, I just need to communicate that and love communicating with people, getting feedback, listening to people's stories, exploring other people's views, and things like that, fascinating.
[00:24:33] Aneta: Yeah. When did you start podcasting?
[00:24:37] Christine: Three years ago, pretty much exactly three years ago, three and a half years ago, maybe.
[00:24:41] Aneta: What have you learned through that?
[00:24:43] Christine: It was like, I always wanted to do a podcast, and it took me about two, three years to understand which one I wanted to do and what I wanted to do. And sorry, what was your question? What did I learned?
[00:24:53] Aneta: Yeah. What have you learned about yourself, and also just from the guests that you've interviewed?
[00:24:59] Christine: So much. It's the best way to learn, because it depends, of course, on what kind of topics, but I know that we can learn from every single person that we talk to children, adults, the elderly, or whatever age, there's always something to learn. And also, if we look at societal banking, I don't know if someone wants to talk about that.
[00:25:20] I believe that, first of all, we should have respect for everyone. Just respect is not something that needs to be earned. And that also means that you can learn from everyone something, and it's so important to keep your eyes and ears open when someone speaks, rather than just speaking at someone.
[00:25:39] And that's exactly the podcast. It's like this one. It's like easy conversations. So many things I've learned, it's unbelievable. What I discovered about myself is that, again, it's a lot to do as well that comes with that. So it's something maybe at some point, or so I learned, okay, I outsource certain things because it's taking a lot of time, and I focus on many other things, but it's incredible.
[00:26:05] It was a really good way for me to test a lot of people that I then worked with further. So either I became a client, they became a client, or we collaborated on a project.
[00:26:15] Aneta: Yeah. It just opens up the world. If I find that, like you,u just open up this world of people who are interesting and curious and like you, I find that I learned something from every single person and their experience. So, if people wanted to work with you, Christine, what is the best way that they can get hold of you? Like, where are you most active?
[00:26:37] Christine: So I'm on social media. I'm most active on LinkedIn. So I'm LinkedIn would be the go-to thing. That's also where you can just connect with me. You can go to one of my websites. So I have a creativestartupacademy.com or letstalk. training. So these are my two companies. And there you always find the link to my LinkedIn, where you can connect with me too.
[00:27:01] Aneta: Wonderful. Perfect. And the final question I ask all my guests is What does it mean to you to live the width of your life?
[00:27:09] Christine: We talked a lot about happiness, so doing what makes me happy more often, because we can't do it all the time. I do understand. We have a life. We need to work. We need to make money. We need to pay the rent. And this is just like how life works. And sometimes we need to do things that we don't enjoy as much.
[00:27:24] But again, joy is not the same as happiness. Seeking time for yourself and for your loved ones, which I didn't do in the past, a lot until everything happened. Not dwelling on things is important. I think, and that means on negative things not to widen those. Dwelling on good things is good for your happiness. And trying to see things in a positive light, even if that's not easy.
[00:27:51] I tend to also look back at things like what we talked about to say there's something good that came out of that. And everyone is perfect the way they are, and they are the because of things that happen to them, and with them, and what they make happen. But yeah, this would be maybe the thing I would say.
[00:28:13] Aneta: That's beautiful. I enjoy that. Thank you so much for coming on today. I just really enjoyed our conversation, and thanks for the great work that you are doing in the world. We all need a little extra support. And for those that are interested, definitely check out Christine on LinkedIn, I'll include all the details in the show notes, and just wish you continued success. Thank you.
[00:28:34] Christine: Thank you. Thanks so much for having me.
[00:28:36] Aneta: Thank you for listening to today's episode. If today's conversation inspired you to dream again, break out of your comfort zones or reflect on what it means to you to live more fully, then please follow this podcast because every week you'll hear more stories from people just like you who took imperfect action towards their goals, created more joy and are living the life that they always dreamt of living.