🇬🇧🇫🇷 In this episode of Expat Experts Podcast, Marc sits down with Anna Roberts, a dynamic Mindset Coach dedicated to helping digital nomads thrive no matter where they call “home.” Anna shares her inspiring journey as an expat in France and reveals how the right mindset can transform life abroad. From cultural surprises to navigating life without a fixed address, Anna discusses the real challenges faced by digital nomads and the mental shifts needed to overcome them. Whether you’re a remote worker, an expat, or dreaming of a life untethered, this episode is packed with powerful insights and practical advice to empower your journey.
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Episode Transcript:
in this episode we have a truly inspiring guest joining us Anna Roberts a dynamic mindset coach who has
dedicated her career to help experts and immigrants feel at home in their new
surroundings with a decade of experience living in the Romantic City of Paris and now back in the UK where she was born
Anna brings to the episode a bunch of personal stories and professional insights about her expert life get ready
to Deep dive in her journey and discover what it truly means to live abroad
this is expat experts the podcast that dives into the fascinating lives of those who've lived and worked across
borders exploring the challenges experiences and insights they've gained along the
way before we dive in today's episode I want to remind you all listeners that
the way to stay tuned with the latest content and episodes is hitting subscribe in YouTube and also in your favorite audio platform for more
insights and exclusive one-on-one calls on how to create your own podcast your YouTube channel or navigating your life
as an expert visit our website expat experts podcast.com or check the link in
the description the expat Anna
robits you well again thanks a lot for for accepting the invitation but uh
we're really just say it like you moved to France was France the first move ever
BR like you're originally from UK let's start from there no maybe um yeah so I'm from um Manchester in the
Northwest England and yeah I moved to France just after University so I was
22 and um yeah that was my first experience of of living living abroad
and I kind of had this Affinity with France which I I moved around a bit and then I ended up in Paris for 10 years so
yeah okay not bad so you just finished studies and then why why did you decide to go to
France it was a job reason or um yeah so I had a job but I always
Lov so I finished my studies I did I studied history I studied um modern social history and after that I was like I'm
not quite ready to go into the corporate world I'm not quite quite ready to like settle down and have a a job like a like
an adult job so there was that was also I always loved France when I was a kid I
used to go on holiday to France with my parents with my family and I loved learning French in school and I missed
that connection that I had so um I found
out that there was a way of getting um the call them assistantships where I could work in a
school and teach English in in France and I chose France they actually do this
all around the world it's with the British Council and I chose France and this was perfect it was like seven
months in France away to reconnect to a country that I absolutely love so that's
what took me there um and then the rest kind of LED on from that so you went
theorically for seven months and you stayed 10 years that's uh that's kind of common also with with experts uh you
said that you you most of this time you lived in Paris but you also lived in other places so
was due to the school you were sent somewhere else before that or yes so the
schools I was working in I was working in two um Lis which is like kind of high school and that was in Britany so the
area to the to the west of France and I that's why I used to go on holiday there so that was perfect because it was kind
of reconnect to my childhood and after that I moved to the south of France I worked on a campsite
for three months just to learn French just to really learn all like I was
literally thrown in at the deep end there was nobody there who could speak English and it was really hard I don't
know if I can swear on this podcast because I like to swear absolutely yes okay great I'm not gonna
any I was say it's really hard um just to give that emphasis and I
loved it though it was in provance like in the South it's absolutely gorgeous down there and I I loved it and when I
went back to to the UK after that I wasn't ready to settle down I just I was
just like no my time in France is not it's not over and I was applying for so many jobs and most of them were based in
Paris because you know that's where the majority of of jobs are especially for um for expats and where they we having
English is obviously a huge advantage and um I applied for a load of jobs and
I applied for a job at the British Embassy in Paris and I ended up getting that job so that's what took me to Paris
um so it was amazing cool so you went back like you went for this for like
this uh how much like nearly a year then uh in the first time after University no
I mean like in the France when you went after University yeah oh yeah yeah then you came back UK and then you went back
again like to to to Paris and that's when you stayed for for the whole years
yes well um I moved to to Paris I was originally on a six-month contract with
the British Embassy and that so I would I moved to France to Paris with this
intention that I was going to be there for six months I was like yes it's great let's just like party and have fun and I
was in my early 20s so it was great and then it got extended my contract and then it got made permanent and then four
years later I was still at the embassy and then I was like oh okay what do I do what do I do now and then it just kind
of LED on from there um so that's how it happened it was meant to be temporary
and then it kind of just got extended so yeah
cool well that's good like if if you like the the life there and and as you
said actually you you already SP spoke the language back then so you you knew France French from school but also I
suppose being in in regions where the English it's not that that common also helps to catch up with language a little
bit faster yeah the so the language thing I was really really fortunate that I did
speak French already when I moved to to Paris and I know so many people don't and that is a big um kind
of a block in terms of the integration um but when I moved to Britany my French
was like when I first moved to French my French was really bad and I just had basic kind of school level French and I
was also living with another Brit and an American girl so we didn't speak much French and that's what kind of led me to
go on the campsite so I was just I had no option but to learn nice how was adapting to a city
like Paris because I mean everyone has the Romantic part of Paris like as a as a city of love and whatever but at the
end when you live there it's a it's an enormous City it's can be brutal in some senses I suppose so how how was
adaptation for you it smells of piss everywhere this dog
I mean this is the reality of Paris it's like it's obviously a gorgeous city
um but it's real life as well you know there's it's not Emily in Paris and that
can be very triggering for people to watch Emily in Paris and be like my life is not like that what is this what am I
doing wrong um the adaptation I think because I went with only six months in
mind I didn't really have many expectations it was more afterwards which I'm sure we're going to get into
that's when it started to be difficult for me um and really when I first moved because
I was at the embassy I already had that structure in terms of um routine in
terms of friendships um I had that already so I was in a very comfortable position if
anything it was too easy because it was going from the UK to another UK
establishment and it was like there wasn't much difference other than I was living in
Paris um but in term like it was a very soft very gradual transition and that
was I feel very fortunate to have had that so yeah but basically your job in
the embassy was mainly with British people so like it also so it's like it's
it's literally British territory you know like yeah um so I suppose that also
soft it a little bit the adaptation also because it's just like okay you meet other people you said you had friends
already in Paris back in the time or no I didn't have friends but I but my colleagues at the embassy became my
friends and that was that was great it also led to some problems as well
because when you are in such a a bubble that your friends and your colleagues are all the same and it can create some
tension um but I in went to France with
a dream to live a French life I don't you know I always loved France I always love speaking French I wanted to be
integrated and I wanted to be immersed in the culture in the language and have French friends which is such a common thing for experts to have they want to
have local friends um and I had that too I wanted I wanted that that was my dream
so yes it was an easier transition but I still didn't feel like I was living the
dream that I had in my head h um so so yeah so it's easy to see withlight
now that it was it was kind of like a gentle um a gentler approach rather than
just going from this to this um but I was still effectively in this bubble and
I kind of wanted something different I see and when you realized that did you
change it I mean it's not an easy normally like you have your bubble and and what you're saying no a lot of experts with their colleagues being
their friends whatever because if you work in an international environment you are similar to these persons and at the
end you were other experts around you who had similar experiences and that becomes your colleagues becomes your
friends uh work becomes your circle and all of that how how did you break with
that um it took me a while honestly it took me a while I remembered going
through a phase of trying to have French friends and it never works like that
because when you hold on to it too hard too tightly that's when it never happens and
because they kind of feel that desperate needy energy and when I when I think about it now like I wanted French
friends because it helped me feel more belonging it would make it would legitimize my place in Paris and that
was all like a mindset thing rather than it was kind of like in a way using not
it wasn't really using but it was subconsciously using somebody to make me feel better about myself and it when I
let go of that and I kind of realized that I am an expert and a lot of experts
will have friends with other expats and it's okay that's when I started to have local friends but it started when I had
that realization and I made friends with other expats outside of the embassy um
through things things like Bumble BFF which is great I really love this as a
12:04
way of meeting people and then getting really um like pushing myself to do
things that I always wanted to do but I was scared to do like sports activities things that I actually really genuinely
wanted to do not just random meetups which um I you know there's a lot of
those in the XA Community just International meetups and over a drink and it never really worked for me
because I like something that's deeper more a deeper connection rather than something that's
surface um I I call it U life Tinder with alcohol the meetups expert meetups
it's it's it's kind of that there is a lot of people like trying to crash on
other people and people gets drunk and then it's it's leads to uncomfortable situations with people that you don't
know at all and that you don't have the connection with them I I I totally get
it like it's the expert life yeah and I I did do quite a few I think like if
you've not never done them like definitely try them but I did quite a few of them I just felt like it never
really worked for me because um maybe it's a different vibe in Paris you know different cities have different Vibes um
13:17
but I just felt like there was something lacking and I after a while I wanted
more than just a shared International I wanted something real cuz I had a lot of
acquaintances already and I didn't want more acquaintances I wanted friends deeper friends so deeper friendship so
um yeah that's when I started pushing myself to actually do things do activities that scared me yeah makes
13:43
sense like at the end you end meeting people through these activities like um I don't know like you said sports for
13:49
example and then you have a connection that it's not Solly the fact of being experts no like and you had something
else to talk about for example exactly but they did to be experts and that was fine but it was it wasn't just that that
14:02
reunited us it was also you know like I've signed up to a netball event um I don't know if you know about net um it's
really big in the UK so it was really random to find that there was a netball uh kind of activity happening in
Paris and I went one time with the intention of just because I wanted to do
nappal and then I met two girls who became really good friends just that one
14:29
time we all went one time and that was it we just exchanged numbers and we just kept contact every inide and we're
really close now so yeah random things like that it was like it was
14:43
Destiny cool so you said for example in the embassy like for work you had a six
Monon contract and then directly they made you permanent position uh or it was an
extension was Progressive okay in francey you have a maximum of 18
months I think extension on a temporary contract and then once they reached that they were like they have to make a
decision whether to keep me or let me go and they kept me so yay okay good for
you in anyway like it was that the moment that you decided that you wanted
to stay like it was when you had a permanent contract in your hands or before that you already had it clear
that even if it wasn't going to work with the embassy for example you would like to stay in France for a long or in
Paris for a longer time I don't think I had any clear
moment when I was like okay I definitely want to stay but I remember really being
now you mention it like I'm just thinking about now I remember really being concerned about not having a permanent contract so I so obviously
15:49
that shows that I did want to stay I think it was more I wasn't ready to go back to the UK and there was still more
15:57
to experience in Paris um but yeah I think I'd already
16:02
made that decision that's why I was kind of pushing as well like I was um pushing for them to to make my contract
permanent and I did H I did have a few backup plans as well I had some interviews in different organizations as
well nice so yeah I guess the decision was already made cool what about
culturally shocks like did you have any like hard moment culturally wise or
16:26
trying difficulties adapting to to to Baris for example do you remember in a
specifically heart moment for you
16:38
um culturally I think something that was quite difficult was
um French French people are very different to British people especially in in the Northwest like people from
Manchester are known for being very friendly the people in Paris are known for not being friendly and you know that
is The Stereotype and if we take that too personally we can really get poured into
that and and it is it can be quite shocking um I remember working with
somebody once and they described it as having PTSD from living in having lived
17:19
in Paris um whenever they going quite extreme but you know some people have um
very um they're just not used to the reactions which can be quite can be interpreted as
being rude but it's just directness that's just the way they are not everybody but you know in general big
generalizations here but if you're not used to it or if you're especially if you're coming from North America where
everyone's very open and friendly um it can be quite shocking to the system so I
think there were certain times when I was like what's wrong with these people why why are they so mean but it's and
it's so easy to take it personally but it's not a personal thing so that would be one thing and then also in terms of
finding apartments that's just an absolute nightmare the system
and um cities in Europe oh gosh nightmare yeah that was that was really
tricky and you have to navigate all that by yourself and yeah challenging so
there was some kind of system in there that you didn't like is there a system for finding a flat in Paris to be honest
like or it's just like being a little bit lucky and having context uh to I know someone who know
someone kind of like that knowing somebody who knows someone getting lucky
18:45
um let's say embellishing the truth on certain things when it comes to your
18:52
your dossy like your folder that you hand in um but yeah look look comes down
to it a lot yeah okay and just being really persistent and having to drop
your standards in a way as well not to the point where you're going to go somewhere where you really don't want to
go but um the dream apartment that you have in your head you might not get it
19:14
so maybe apply for everything and just see what you what you like and what
19:19
accepts who accepts your dossier that's it I see I mean I suppose the prices
also increased during these 10 years you lived in Paris has did the city change a
lot during these 10 years that you were there not only pricewise but in general honestly yeah when I look back
now um like when I moved back when I moved out of Paris this
February and I was packing up my stuff and I was looking back and I was like oh man yeah like taking me back to 20 2015
and everything things have changed in terms
of I don't know like this very subtle very subtle changes um fashion wise things you know
everything changes fashion wise anyway but in Paris it was very quite conservative and I feel like now with
20:11
the Y2K Vibe and everything's kind of going androgynous style I know that's kind of like a global thing but um I
feel like before Paris had still held on to its
um a typical perisian look whereas now it's a bit more I would say more new yorky
even um Apartments yeah I mean like the prices have just skyrocketed it's insane
20:35
now when I think about how much my apartment my last apartment cost when I moved in in 2020 has probably gone up by
at least 25% and yeah yeah I think that's a global thingy um I actually
interviewed a another coach some episodes ago uh who helps experts
quitting alcohol Susan and she's IR she live yeah so she lived in Paris actually
and and now she moved outside of the like of the city center in the suburbs also because has a family Etc but um
also because price when she arrived 20 years ago to Paris or more than 20 years ago in Paris you could live in the
center center with with whatever you had no even with a with a rather uh small
job and and now I mean I think that's the tendency that we are seeing in all
big city is in in whole Europe probably I I definitely feel like feel that when
I moved to Paris when I was at the embassy um you know even on a a smaller
salary I was able to live very very comfortably in Paris and my apartment
21:44
was bigger than the apartment that I had one like four years ago when I moved in
21:49
so yeah big changes it happens I suppose like it's part of life It's Tricky that everything
21:57
goes up and the salaries uh but yeah uh without entering too much
in politics um if you want we can enter I don't have a problem with that but when
22:11
so when it's the moment that you like realize what I'm doing in Paris when
it's the moment that you decide to go back to UK why the movement like the repatriation let's call it like like a
going back home um realization
oh um so I would say in last year
2023 I started to have that feeling I was starting to just feel like I want
more space um and I want more Greenery and I
miss nature and I was missing nature a lot I actually set up a hiking group
22:56
with a few of my girlfriends and I organ it every month because I missed hiking and I missed nature so much so every
month we would go out into into the France like and go for a hike around there but it wasn't enough I needed more
23:10
Greenery and when I you know I've been living in a concrete jungle effectively for the past 10 years
23:17
and um the colum was there and I didn't want to listen to it for a while because
all my life was in Paris all my friends were in Paris everything I knew on my adult Life I Lived in
23:30
Paris and it was quite challenging because I was resisting that calling and
then after a while I would say November last year I
23:43
just had that moment when I was like I think it's time to go back cry that out
23:49
for maybe about a week and then I things set in motion and then I I I tested the
water actually first I sat I wrote my letter um to the agency to give my apartment
24:02
back I just had it typed out and I said to myself if I can type this out and see
how I feel afterwards I don't have to send it let's just let's just test and I did it and it felt okay and then I
printed out and it felt okay and then I put it in a letter and I was like it feels okay it's a little bit scary but
it's okay so I felt like it was good it was like an aligned decision um and then yeah everything
kind of just you on from that you were not working for the embassy anymore at the point of time you already
coaching or yes um I worked at the embassy for four years and then I did a a few other
jobs in French companies um and then it was at the beginning of last
year that I I started a job in a consulting firm and instantly I knew
that it it wasn't the right thing for me the coaching thing was already in my mind and I was like you know Anna we've
got to go with this now um so last year was a big year for me there was a lot of changes and um yeah so I was already
working on my my coaching thing which allowed me to have that that freedom yeah cool so you probably would
say that the hardest part of the decision of going back to the UK is of course like the emotional part of
friends and yeah people that you leave behind I think that's also a common feeling for experts who needs to move
regularly yeah yeah and I always talk about a grieving process with um with clients and on my
Instagram I talk about it a lot that we need to um Embrace changes and cry like give
yourself time and give yourself time to to really feel it and ugly cry like get
it all out of your system have all those thoughts that are saying to you you're a failure what you doing this for what if
25:57
this doesn't work what if it's the wrong decision what about if you regret it just let the thoughts be there and just give it some time to like
in a way listen to it and just cry out because it needs to be addressed and then afterwards you'll have a period of
26:12
like feeling more peaceful but um something that I will say about this uh
26:19
which really shocked me and it's not really to do with Paris but it's more on a philosophical level it's I lived in
Paris for 10 years and I left I arrived when I was 24 and I'm almost 34 now
and I had this moment when I was like that's 10 years of my life that's
gone like that that's that's scary like that was scary for me just to
acknowledge that and I didn't want to let go of Paris because like I realized I was holding on to that because I didn't want to accept um in a way like
my mortality you know um the shortness of life so yeah to get it pretty deep on
a all of a sudden but yeah no it makes a lot of sense I think for a lot of people
27:11
suddenly realizing oh wow I've been I don't know in my case it's like
seven Li years of my life BR from home and it's suddenly like wow 7 years it's
a lot of time like 10 years it's a lot of time and and life has changed around me like I Chang a lot during this time
I'm not the same person that I left home when I when I left um that's also something that I wanted to ask you
because that's the typical also like going back home feelings also expecting
that everything it's a little bit like you left it at some point did you had any of these feelings did you had any of
these troubles a lot of experts when they go back home half um that they
don't feel that they belong there anymore for example or they don't find their friends in the same state that
they were when you left them also like did you had this yeah
um I not so much actually and
I'm and I think that's because I really accepted that this is where I am and and
I made a very big effort to I understand what I I understand that I needed to be
grounded in myself and understand myself and take care of myself give myself space um the thing that I did worry
about a little bit and it is normal you know to a certain extent when you go back especially to your hometown it's
easy to regress it's easy to forget about who you've become and all the
experiences that you've had and that you're not the same person anymore because that poll when you go back to your hometown and especially you're
staying with family it's very strong and it can be quite easy to Lose Yourself so M um
29:00
ensuring that you've have you have in place structures to to get back into yourself to get back like ground into
29:06
yourself into your adult self um and kind of acknowledge and honor all the
experiences and who you are today um it's quite difficult as well when you
meet with friends who you've not seen for a long time and family who still see you as a person who you were and you're
not that person anymore and like I said it's very easy to to regress and move back into that person but then instant
29:31
you instantly you'll feel like a uh like it's jarring like it doesn't feel good it feels very unnatural and very
misaligned and you're like that's because I'm not being me I'm not being my myself so yeah it's going to feel
like and then that will um motivate you to get back into your who you are
like so yeah makes sense what about plans future plans are
you planning to move again or it's now the idea of like staying in in the UK at
least for some time well the UK was was always just like a temporary thing for
me it just felt you know um it was a right time my business-wise um you know
like I mentioned I wanted connection to Nature and I have all that and it's great because um I'm going from Paris to
pretty much the countryside it's very rural around here so it's amazing but
the city life is calling me back and in a couple of weeks I'm going to Madrid
30:35
and I don't know how long I'm going to go there um I'm going with the flow and
I'll see I'll see but yeah for a long time I was like I'm not I'm going to the UK and that's it like I think it's good
to be committed to where you are rather than in your hair too much but I always said when I get a feeling when I get
that call in I'm going to go with it and um a few weeks ago I felt more and more
31:00
like I wanted to go to Madrid it was always kind of there lingering in the background so going for
31:06
it nice how is your Spanish yeah it's uh I mean I did a
level so you know like high school level um but we'll see I I feel like going
back going there will help me for sure I mean it's it's it's
becoming a very International City City anyway so I suppose he can now
survive I mean also in Barcelona I when I go back home in Barcelona sometimes I
31:37
listen more English than than than Catalan or Spanish so it's kind of weird especially in the center uh but yeah
31:44
it's very testified lately um so yeah you're planning a little bit to go the
31:49
digital Nomad way now or like you can no I suppose you work fully remote so are
you planning to to go a little bit like that that's the dream that's the dream um I haven't done
32:04
it yet because I just felt like I I wanted a bit more stability whilst I'm at the beginning of my business and
wanted to just spend time focusing on it but um but yeah I would love to to spend
um time traveling I absolutely love traveling I've not done it properly since just before covid um like
backpacking and stuff and I would love to to get back into that so yeah nice
32:33
with a laptop though now my laptop still working but I think you know when you're
32:39
um when you're a coach it's so important to to be filling your own cup you know
like making sure that you're feel happy you you've got the right energetics because if you put too much focus and
too much time in other people you're giv too much but you're you're not given
from a full cup so you're going to get burnt out pretty quick and it's just
really important to to spend so much time on on how on my internal world and
33:10
my energetics so I can give properly and and be really present and there for
people um so yeah so that's what I'm kind of leaning into is like the traveling I really love it I've missed
it so doing that and working at the same time I think it would be the best combination
for me m sounds cool yeah makes sense so maybe already we are talking about you
coaching I would like to ask you a couple of questions that I do at the end of the expat part and it's basically top
recommendations um on this case I suppose it will be Paris it's the place
where you live the most but um do you have any favorite French food
actually H um I mean French food is just it's it's so
good that what I love about French food is they have it's quite simple and yeah it's
very good quality it's very different to the UK um I mean just like a a steak fre you
know like steak and chips is it's very very simple with like a a pepper sauce
or something like that but it's really good um yeah I mean and any stews like
Bon and all the classics like K so good um but I really love steak and chips
it's just done in Paris done in Francis okay Sor it's the evolution of
fish and chips I see uh okay what about drinks I suppose I mean come on do do
you drink wine that's the biggest question ever because of course France it's known for its wine so I don't know
if I want to ask about the drinks itself yeah French wine is amazing
and I I don't really have much to add yeah that that's a good
sentence French wine it's amazing yeah uh then I would say music-
wise do you listen a lot of French music there is any band that you like a lot
from France um I love uh it's not a band it's
a it's a guy um I I never know how to say his name properly so like app people who
listening to us and be like she just butchered that um he he's a he's a rapper and um I love
him he's just he's amazing um yeah and I saw him at a festival last
year so that great and then there's some Classics as well from the 80s
which I I started to learn about this when I was living on the campsite and then I hear him all the time when I'm in
35:57
Paris because they bring them up all the time like on especially um in in nightclubs and stuff and like anden so a
band from the 80s and uh there's like that voyage voyage song which everyone I don't know
famous yeah nice things like that I mean they're so good yeah of course I still prefer old
old music than new one so it's okay I love music and
nice what about restaurants or coffee places or bars do you have a favorite
spot in bars um so restaurants there's
the there's like a chain in in Paris um bu and it's it's interesting because
it's quite touristy but at the same time there are so many locals who go there because the food is very well priced and
36:57
really good quality and you have to queue up outside there's a there's quite
37:03
a few of them dotted around Paris you have to queue up a normally you queing up for about half an hour 40 minutes but
it's so worth it and the food's great and I love just the mixture of Taurus
and you know everybody goes and that's what because the food is just great nice
um and then bars I was living in the 15th um for the past four years and
which is a qu part of Paris more residential um we wouldn't really go
there for a n out and stuff but I used to go to this one bar called LEL very
original and the mine was it's more of a low you know you don't get many tourists
going down in the 15s unless you live there um and the wine was just really good the
service was great so I always went there that was kind of my my local even sometimes just go there after work and just be like have one on the on the
37:59
Terrace like watching the world go by I have lots of nice memories from that cool very nice so the last question
before we go to to the expert first part of the episode and you as a coach uh any
secret spot that you want to share in Paris if there is any secret spot remaining in
38:21
Paris um secret spot what what does this is this like
38:27
the cat no more like the place that you would love to go oh CU you know the catacombs are all
underground tunnels apparently all under Paris which is um yeah but you might get
lost which is a bit dangerous um a secret spot
38:45
so it's not really secret spot I mean it's very well known but the 11th
District um Al I just love it there because it's such it's such a cool vibe
and everyone's really trendy there's everyone's so fashionable and there's loads of amazing um independent cafes
and loads of cool bars where you can just sit there for hours just you know on the corner and just watching people
go by like that's that's the number one sport in Paris so anywhere in the 11th I
just love it I mean that that was that was always my dream to to have an apartment there
um it's also kind of over because it's not got many tourist attractions you know it's
it's not really known for anything in particular can't think not really like it's got at the top but other than that
um it's just a cool cool place okay sounds good so yeah with these
recommendations I would say we jump directly to the to the second part of the episode hey there everyone if you're
loving this episode so far and you want to stay tuned with other experiences make sure to hit the Subscribe button
40:00
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link in the description and book your session today with that said let's go back to the
episode the expert coach experts how to love their lives abroad um yeah as I we've already been
touching it and talking about it a little bit here and there no at the end but uh the biggest question I think
it's when did you realize that you wanted to become a coach and how it
happen why why did you decided to be a coach um so I decided I wed to be a
41:06
coach probably about four years ago three or four years ago um I always I
realized that I had a passion for psychology which I didn't know about I
love psychology love philosophy and I was getting into it more and more researching things reading about lots of
self-help things it just fascinated me and um learn about human behavior and um
spending a lot of time on YouTube and learned so much and I was moving towards
wanting to do maybe relationship coaching or something like that the idea of coaching was already in my mind it
just felt more like a natural progression in that direction and also
I'd had like a a very brief um Encounter of Entrepreneurship I was doing that for
for a period of time after I left the embassy with a friend so I got that experience it nothing to do with
42:04
coaching it was to do with um sustainable jewelry uh a brand but I
loved that entrepreneurial feel and having that freedom and having that kind
of drive to um create something that's my own so there was that and then there was the desire for Co the desire for
moving in Psychology that was kind of my passion so I kind of combined the two and um coaching and expa coaching
because I also had my own difficulties and I was starting to notice other people were having similar difficulties
and yet they didn't see many people on the market um who I would feel I didn't
42:45
see anybody in par um anybody I didn't even know that it was a niche and then I dug a little bit more and then realize
42:51
it is but it's still very small see yeah so a lot of it like maybe that
not the the the whole idea of coaching maybe not but the idea of like coaching experts and the
whole um idea of like helping people to feel part of of a place that they are
living it's du majority through your own experience like do you coach or through
what you've have lived before yeah so my um my experience like
I mentioned I I moved for the embassy and then I everything was great and then it was after a while I started to
question things I had a lot of uncertainty about how long I was going to be there there was like wanting local
friends but not feeling good enough to have local friends or why weren't things happening what was wrong why wasn't you
know all these kind of questions were coming in and I felt very alone in my
questions even though I wasn't alone you know I had friends but I felt I felt alone I felt like no no one was
really um understanding or resonating with me and when I got through that and I
started noticing wait there's a whole other bunch of experts who also feel the same which is not very honest with each
other because we don't want to admit um that we're having difficulties um because it takes a level
of vulnerability to talk about things like that obviously and um so yeah it kind of just felt I'm
struggling there must be so other PE so many other people who struggling and it's not really talked about
so there is definitely a need here to to help people and when I was coming out of
my difficulties and I started to think well this seems like a really good Niche for me and to be honest it wasn't even a
a a decision it was just like I always knew I wanted to help experts really
because the relationship coaching thing was very shortlived and then I was like I think I can help experts there are so
many people who are lonely and so many people who are suffer in unnecessarily
45:04
you know by putting more pressure on themselves from um mindset issues which
don't need to be there and and and I just want people to feel at home because
it is really about how you feel in yourself so that's what led me to to
work in with experts cool very nice um did you study
or did you take any certification for becoming a coach it's it's something common okay yeah yeah um yeah I did a
45:36
coaching um certification yeah nice yeah in in France back in
45:43
France or or no um it was online so the the school is based in London and um so
I did it with them yeah does it change between countries what you mean if you
45:57
have a certification you could coach in multiple countries or the problem with
the problem the thing with coaching is it's um unregulated and so it so you don't have
to have a specific certification in in one country it's just you don't even have to have a certification to do
coaching but I wanted to have one because I wanted to gain the skill set and I wanted to have it official as
well yeah okay makes yeah makes a lot of sense
um so in a general way what what is your approach how how would you define your your coaching like what is your focus
when you when you have people coming to you
um about I mean I kind of touched on this already about how you feel in
yourself basically um I I want people to feel settled but it's not necessarily about getting settled where you live
it's being settled in your body being settled in your mind and diffusing um the the beliefs that you
have about yourself or the beliefs about how your life should be how it should look when you live abroad and a lot of
this is what's causing the unnecessary loneliness and the unnecessary pain
obviously there's a layer of strategy involved in this in terms of building a
47:19
a bond with your community and having a routine and and making real friendships
47:25
like um deeper level of friendships um but a lot of it is about the mindset
which is why I love talking about the mindset a lot of it is about the connection to yourself if you don't feel the connection to yourself if you're not
listening to yourself no matter where you go you will feel lonely you will feel like you don't belong you will feel
unsettled and this is the root of it so I like to go deep I like to get into
that nice so it's a lot about self-esteem before like working with
self-esteem with the people and then mindset around yourself to be able to accept whatever it comes around you at
the end somehow
um yes and and like kind of building on that um
main character energy which everyone's talking about now is um you don't have
to try and fit yourself into a box of how you think you should be in order to behave in order to belong when you know
that you belong somewhere when you are yourself and you're being authentic it's about
authenticity really that is that changes everything like you can literally go to a country
where you don't speak the language but if you are owning your your place where you're living and if you know that you
belong there people will act to you differently whereas if you go thinking I a foreigner I don't belong
I'm really lucky to live here like um it gives off a certain Vibe and yeah of course we are lucky we are very
privileged to have this but we don't have to see it as
um from a disempowered place I see so it's building up that empowerment really
yeah I think it's a lot of preconception now funny enough that you talk about the
the main character energy there there was also an episode with a coach who who's focused on that Tanya Rose she's
she's here in Greece yeah yeah she's she she's coaching mainly main character
energy and we talk about it and but at the end also like the I think the fact
uh that where your focus also like it's very important what you have in your mind when you are or where you push
yourself being an expert no like the whole expectation bundles baggage that you're carrying with you when you move
abroad on a my life abroad needs to be not only as an expertise so I suppose
like people who are refugees or everything like even even this package is even bigger because you have a very
very high set idea of what your life needs to become in the new country that you are arriving to um how how do you
tackle it because I I see the focus and I understand a lot the focus but how do you work with these people how what is
your process with them so um the process would be we kind
I kind of follow a framework in terms of building that connection so building connection with other people looking at
your friendships looking at um how connected do you feel to the society and
building on that like language and things like that and the resistance that comes up start digging into what is that
resistance and normally it's around a belief like oh um I don't know we talk
about friendships for example uh these people on the they're not my type of person or something like that and then
we look into that and we dig into that and there normally because of a belief that it's
51:06
around the way that they think it should be and we want to drop that dream in a
way because when we drop the dream when we drop the idea of how should something
should be how we should look the dream normally arrives so once we just
understand what the belief is it's not going to disappear like that but it will
start to slow down and it will start to break down and over time you can start to shift that perception that you have
51:37
about things and then you you've taken the pressure off yourself you know like local friendships for your local friends
51:44
once you take that pressure off that a lot of exports will have exper friends and it's okay there is nothing wrong
with you you know it's like oh okay there's nothing wrong with me I'm not doing anything wrong and instantly you just feel better
51:57
um but in order to get to those beliefs we need to set in place actions and need to have someone level of commitment to
52:04
where you're living now in order to get clarity in order to to know and even at the end of it maybe you'll realize that
you don't want to live there anymore and that's okay but first of all we need to
start doing the work in order to investigate what's what's coming up what's coming up for
you makes sense um
how do you do that like how do you organize your day like I'm I'm curious about how is your normal day work day
look like you have a lot of like one-on-one calls or you have like group calls with multiple people at the same
time how how is the work done yeah so I have oneon-one clients um
and that's my focus right now but yeah interestingly you mentioned about the group thing because that's something
that I'm bringing out very very same because I know I realize that there's one key element which is the community
and I really really believe in group coaching because you don't have just one mirror which is the coach you have all
these other people who are going to be teaching you and also bouncing things off you and um when we realize as well
that you know it's not just country specific a lot of the expa problems that people have are just expa problems
globally it's a human thing it's not people in Paris have this and people in Athens have this very much um you know
obviously there's Do's Place specific issues but that tends be more
53:35
administrative and things like that or maybe political but the human side of it
the feeling loss aloneness and stuff that's that's just like a a shared thing and I think just taking that stigma out
of it takes the pressure off instantly um and people can share and bounce ideas
off and create more of a community and go through the process of learning and feeling settled and trying to feel at
home in themselves with other people so yeah that's something that's that's cooking um nice I'm excited that
yeah maybe when the episode goes out because it takes some weeks uh it's
already there so maybe you can take yeah yeah if any of the listeners is
interested they can check it out directly uh I also wanted to ask you because you are very active in social
media actually like you have quite a lot I mean you post you do stories nearly
every day if not every day uh you're like having post you're you're you're pretty active in there so how much of
your current work it's also right now not only the one-on-one calls and the coaching part but like I don't know if
calling it self-promotion or marketing like or or like helping also in a more
like open way in social media yeah I mean it I it's marketing
54:57
and it's also it's how I get my clients CU I'm only on Instagram right now okay
55:04
um but you know like the whole reason why I wanted to do this in the first place is to help other people and I
really love writing as well so it's it's just a way of you know sometimes it does get overwhelming and you can think you
can have like a mental block a writers block kind of thing and we run out of creativity and then I remind myself why
I started this to begin with and it's really just to share things I don't want people to
55:30
feel alone I don't want feel people to feel like the the only one who's struggling
55:36
through this and just knowing that they have that little bit of reassurance is really good um but yeah U I'm on
Instagram I I love the plat I love Instagram platform although it's very glitchy right now
um but yeah cool very nice
55:57
um maybe the last question because before we close the the episode and um
well of course afterwards I would like to share your channels and I would like you to to see where where listeners can
find you but what is the joy that you have behind coaching
like what what do you feel it's the part that keeps you motivated to continue coaching with with
people um oh I love this question it's like a CO coaching question I feel like I'm being coached um sorry about
56:33
that no it's great it's I just I really do love talking to people I love just
like the building that connection and and knowing that I'm just easing
someone's helping someone to ease that pain a little bit and um if I can show them that they
don't have to be like that as in they don't have to be sitting in the the pain and that there is there is kind of like
an empowered and feeling on the other side of this um that's great and you
know like at the same time when I'm coaching people I also gain something from that um from I learn things about
myself as well so it's not just like a one way think it's it's a partnership
and yeah just being able to be um so understand people and understand
how the the mind works as well and um yeah have that level of of connection with someone who's and knowing that they
putting their trust in me as well which is is great I just really love the the feeling that I get when I'm coaching
someone nice so yeah before closing the episode
I suppose one of the most important parts is where can listeners find you what I you said that right now it's
Instagram but um what it's the the the handle right now what is your profile
name basically yeah it's Anna Robert's coaching very simple and yeah only on
Instagram at well I'm on LinkedIn as well but I'm not very very present I'm very present on Instagram as you
mentioned um so yeah Anna rabbit's coaching and I always say my DMs are
open if anyone has any queries perfect so yeah you know where
to find Anna yeah of course the links are always in the description of the episode so you can go directly to
Instagram and if you're searching for a coach and you're interested after listening to this episode and you feel
you resonate with the with the work that Anna it's doing just uh DM her directly
58:40
just said that it's open to everyone so uh don't over spam her too much though
um thanks a lot Anna it has been a pleasure ting to know you bit thanks a
lot and yeah I hope uh some of the listeners will will contact you and if
59:00
they do uh you can just hopefully they say that they are coming from here um
59:06
but I hope that people enjoyed this episode also thank
you you've been listening to expat experts the podcast that takes you
59:19
around the world through the stories of those who've lived it subscribe now to
YouTube and your favorite podcast platform and stay tuned for more
59:31
inspiring interviews
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