Episode 58: Raeanne Lacatena
Raeanne Lacatena: Even the word self-transcendence that we referenced earlier in our conversation, to say that to someone that doesn't know who, where their next meal is going to come from is disrespectful of reality. And their listening cannot be attuned to divine connection and purpose and fulfillment when their bellies are not filled. It just doesn't make sense.
Jessica Fowler: Welcome back to What Your Therapist Is Reading. I'm your host, Jessica Fowler. Today, we are speaking with Raeanne Lacatena about her book, The Integrated Entrepreneur, Actualize Your Potential and Fulfill Your Purpose. Raeanne is a holistic certified personal business coach, licensed registered mental health practitioner, and Reiki master with two decades of experience in the business coaching and professional development team. She is the mother of three children under seven who help her understand and live the principles she teaches more deeply every day. If you have someone in your life who's an entrepreneur, make sure you pass along this episode. And after today's episode, make sure you follow along. on social media @TherapyBooksPodcast to find out about the latest giveaway.
And as always, the information shared on this podcast is for informational and educational purposes only.
Welcome, Raeanne.
Raeanne Lacatena: Hi, good to see you today.
Jessica Fowler: It is so nice to see you. I'm glad that we could make this work.
Raeanne Lacatena: Yeah, me too. It's been a long time coming. I'm happy to be here today.
Jessica Fowler: I know, I'm excited. So, we, we've met before. You're from Rochester, so I feel like, you know, that's an important thing for our listeners to know.
Raeanne Lacatena: Yeah.
Jessica Fowler: Well, in this podcast, as we've talked, I like to start with the question, can you share a memory of how reading has impacted you?
Raeanne Lacatena: That's such an important question, and it's really meaningful to me right now. I'll share a recent memory, actually, that happened just a couple weeks ago. I was I just launched my book not too long ago. I've been working on it for many, many years now, and I'm a mom of three children. I have a two-year-old, a five year old, and a seven year old, and one of the most amazing things happened to me the other evening. My son was writing in a journal, and I just noticed it wasn't something he'd ever done before. He was just writing, my five-year-old, and he was very focused and very attentive to what he was doing, and then he came over to me and he said, Mama, I wrote a book like you did. I pretty much melted into a puddle on the floor in that moment. And then he told me, the book is called the mystery of kindness. And I was just like completely in awe. First of all, because one of the reasons that I wrote the book, the dedication is actually to all three of my babies. And so, they are my, why they are the reason that I'm doing all that I do. And to see in that moment, soon after I had published my book, that I had already created impact for them was so edifying. And then to hear that he was writing a book called The Mystery of Kindness, which I think is a phenomenal title, by the way. I instantly went to Amazon. I was like, is this done? Because if not, I'm totally stealing this from my five-year-old son, but it was, it's already, it's already been a book that's been written. Not that it matters. Um, and just the fact that he was thinking about kindness in this way, and then he related it to the book writing process, and then he wanted to share this special book with me. It was just such a heartwarming experience. I don't think I'll ever forget how I felt in that moment.
Jessica Fowler: That is, I don't know, I love that that's the impact that it's had on and like your kids to see that, right? And that's something that we want as parents to model the stuff for our kids, right, that you can go and you can work and you can have an impact and they can see that this could be a part of their life too if they choose for it to be.
Raeanne Lacatena: And for it, and for the kindness element also, right? That sometimes as a working mom, I'm, I have a very busy business, three kids, the whole, the whole thing, and I decided to write a book in this season of life, and to see him connect, that kindness is a, is a, is something that might be a part of the book writing process that was just so meaningful to me in particular, because I never want him to feel like I'm not attentive to him or present to him or first his mama, as opposed to just an author and a business owner and a mom. And so, the fact that he took that messaging, uh, one way or another through this process was epic for me.
Jessica Fowler: That is special and it is a great title.
Raeanne Lacatena: It is. Yeah, totally snagging that. Sorry, bud.
Jessica Fowler: Or maybe you can write it together.
Raeanne Lacatena: Yeah, that's probably a little better.
Jessica Fowler: And so for you, what is your hope with your readers?
Raeanne Lacatena: So, the book is called The Integrated Entrepreneur, Actualize Your Potential and Fulfill Your Purpose. And so when someone picks up this book, I really want them to understand as a business owner and just as a human being, that The internal work that we have to do, the, the internal mindset work, the spiritual development, the personal development is how we receive the external results that we want in our, our world.
And so if we want happiness, if we want purpose, it's an inside job. And that's really what the book is about is helping people understand that business, yes, is a brilliantly disguised personal development plan that we have to do that internal work to get the external results. And that actually applies to everything in life. And that's why I call myself a holistic business coach, because that applies to parenting. If we want to be an excellent parent, we have to do internal work to resolve our own traumas, our own internal belief systems that are negating what we want to showcase to our kids. If we want to be a good spouse, if we want to have good friendships, if we want to have a lot of money and a lot of success or fame. And All of that requires internal work, and so that's really what I hope the readers gain from enjoying The Integrated Entrepreneur.
Jessica Fowler: And so how do you share that within the book?
Raeanne Lacatena: I, when I started writing the book writing process, I, the original intention of the book was to present a framework that I created that is actually based on evidence-based practices that I learned as a trained mental health therapist and culminated into also energy work as a, Reiki master. And so I'm a certified professional coach, Reiki master and, and, um, clinically licensed social worker. And I really bring a lot of the evidence-based practices from these different elements together. And the intention was to present that framework as something that I use all the time with my clients. And so, it came from this very neuroscience clinical based, uh, original intention, and it morphed into so much more because when I was writing, what I realized was that the framework was falling flat and I had to like scratch my head and like, I know. This framework is very impactful. Why am I reading this? Is it falling flat? And what I realized is that the people element, the actual humans that were utilizing the framework, that's what made it impactful. And so, what ended up morphing throughout the process of writing this book is that included. Much to my surprise, as an introvert and a mental health therapist, a lot of very personal stories of my own. So, it has a little bit of element of a memoir as well as client stories, which is not something I was naturally comfortable with as someone who has to respect HIPAA. I'm not used to sharing client stories from a, a coaching perspective. I was able to get permission from my clients, and this is a very different experience. They were all 100 percent interested and supported sharing their own stories in an effort to showcase how impactful that framework and my work with the principles that I teach and the philosophies that I teach within the book. to use their own story to illustrate what I was teaching, they offered up as well. And so, there's a lot of stories again for myself and my clients to illustrate principles and concrete action steps that help people to do that inner work to get those outer results in their life and business.
Jessica Fowler: So I did notice that about the stories and so the client ones I was expecting, I don't know that I was expecting the ones from you, which I really appreciated because you highlighted how to apply or how you applied. Using this framework for yourself and some struggles that you've had. So, it did bring a different element. And I always ask this question, like how it is for, you know, a trained mental health professional to share, right. We're taught in our training, not to talk about ourselves or to share, which I think changing, and I say that over in this podcast, but that is a different experience to write about yourself in that way.
Raeanne Lacatena: It was, you know, one of the metaphors that I talk about in this book is it's called self-transcendence. And this idea is that we overcome. Ourselves. We take care of ourselves. We steward what we need for ourselves. We put our oxygen mask on first, but there's comes a point in our career where we transcend our own needs and service to others. And if it meant that I had to be super uncomfortable and really do this work and then be integrity with what I teach to be vulnerable and brave enough to share my own struggles. And if it helps more individuals to do this work, then that is something that I was willing to do. Was it comfortable? No. Was it something I would have chosen at first gate? No, absolutely not. I didn't choose it at first gate. And it became one of the most transformative experiences in the process of becoming an author of this book. To be able to do the inner work that I teach in those pages to overcome my own fears of visibility and vulnerability was a further edification of the work in the pages and it's opened up parts of me that I didn't know needed to be opened up and it's connected me more deeply with the clients that I serve now, but also other people who've said similar things like the fact that you were vulnerable was what what made this book accessible to me, which is really why I decided to include that it wasn't a healing by any stretch because I had done it. It was the intention wasn't my own personal healing, which is what you want to avoid in therapy is to bring yourself into that room for the sake of healing yourself. And even though that wasn't the intention, it still is something I received in the process of writing the book and sharing some of my stories. The intention was to serve. The intention was to make the, the framework come to life, the principles come to life, the foundations come to life. And I think that's what happened in the process of the storytelling. And I got the healing as well. So it was very uncomfortable and transformative as a result of being uncomfortable, um, but all, all the while worth it.
Jessica Fowler: That's good. I'm glad that you had that experience because I think you can see that through the book, the way that you utilized it is showcasing it, but I totally get what you're saying.
Raeanne Lacatena: Yeah.
Jessica Fowler: One of the things that I appreciated about this book, being a social worker is. This idea that you looked at you have to work on healing yourself, however, and primarily focus on getting your other needs met. So you talked about Maslow's hierarchy of needs, and I think sometimes we have this can read a message is sometimes out there that you just have to put it out there and you just have to work harder. And don't identify that there's some real needs that people need. And it's somehow their fault that they're not making the amount of money that they want to be making when they have some real struggles that are happening, whether it's housing, food, parenting, all of these things that matter. And so I could see the social worker in you, like you set up the book in this way. I could see that. And I appreciated that when sometimes I think we get these other messages or you just have to work hard or you just have to do this.
Raeanne Lacatena: Yeah. Yeah. It's very important to me. Yeah. Well, there's. It's sort of both, right? That's really what I was hoping to communicate in the book is that we, when, even the word self-transcendence that we referenced earlier in our conversation, to say that to someone that doesn't know who, where their next meal is going to come from is disrespectful of reality. And their listening cannot be attuned to divine connection and purpose and fulfillment when their bellies are not filled. It just doesn't make sense logistically, from, you know, a bio, biological standpoint, we need to respect the basic needs in order to fulfill those higher level needs. With that said, that you, you can skip steps, right? You don't need to go step one, step two, step three, step four, step five, step six to, to climb in, in Maslow's hierarchy of need. And the other interesting thing that I really experienced as a social worker, as a, as a therapist and as a coach, is that both of them can exist at the same time, right? That even though it's tempting to think that our listening is shut off about self-transcendence, I have met some of the most transcendent people who have some of the most simplest lives, who, who don't need the lavish, uh, you know, big lives that they lead, that they're happy with the bare necessities that they have. And that's what's transcendent for them. And so, it's really coming from this place of non-judgment, that each individual handles their life and their experience differently. And it's more importantly, more important to meet someone where they are in their journey than to say that it's always this way and this is what needs to happen next, which is the thing that really upsets me and the personal development world is that there is absolutely not only one way to live your life and to get something done and while somebody may struggle with their own purpose when they're having a difficult time in the lower level needs, not lower from a judgment place from just basic needs met, another person actually thrives in that environment. And so, we really need to be willing to listen to what the other person is trying to tell you and meet them where they are instead of just casting judgment or making blanket statements that everybody needs to do it in this particular way to be successful.
Jessica Fowler: I just, I, I just thought it was good and appreciated it because I like how you said a nonjudgmental way because it's not assuming that somebody automatically even has those needs who's picking up this book, right?
Raeanne Lacatena: It's true. It's true.
Jessica Fowler: Because I think sometimes we do, we just assume and that's not the case for everybody.
Raeanne Lacatena: No, right. Yeah, I appreciate that. Coming from a fellow social worker.
Jessica Fowler: Can't unsee the social work lens.
Raeanne Lacatena: No, you can take the social worker out of the social work. It turns out you can't. And it's true. I talk about that in the book too. Everything that I learned in my more traditional presentation of my career as a social worker informs everything that I do as a business coach now, every single day. I'm grateful for the families that I've in that traditional social work world. And the needs are still the same. The limiting beliefs are still the same. The struggles are still the same. I still talk about grief every day. I still talk about the challenges with finances. Yes, the challenges with insurance and the frustrations with politics. I still have these same human conversations every single day, even though the traditional format of social work is something that I no longer engage in directly.
Jessica Fowler: I, I joke that we all could use some social work classes for schooling. I joke, but don't joke.
Raeanne Lacatena: Yeah, no, right? Just like I think everybody should have a little bit of experience as a server and, or some kind of retail experience. I think everybody needs a little bit of that. What does it look like to engage with humans on that human level and create customer service experiences? I think that would be good for everybody too.
Jessica Fowler: I can see that. I've done that.
Raeanne Lacatena: Yeah. As have I.
Jessica Fowler: The other thing that I want to say that I liked about your book is the tools that you offered in the book. So you talk about Reiki in there, but you offer how to do emotional freedom tapping technique. So, EFT. Um, and I thought that that, like you don't having like some real tools for people to use, I always think is worth highlighting in these interviews so people can know that they can walk away with something to use.
Raeanne Lacatena: Yeah. Yeah, the book really ended up being almost like a workbook that some people are reading it straight through. Then they'll also slow down and do the journal prompts, the, the real concrete exercises. And it comes with a free downloadable, actually 50-page workbook that you can have alongside of writing or reading the book. Because there is, there are, there's business planning tools, but there's also personal development tools, limiting belief tools. There's, there's inner work that you can do. There's those, uh, the Western medicine type tools. There's the Eastern medicine type tools, things like the emotional freedom technique. And they're all the elements that I use every day in my coaching practice that I found so incredibly successful with the people that I serve that I wanted to make it more accessible via a book. I'm glad that you found value in that too.
Raeanne Lacatena: And I was wondering too if you could talk a little bit about this idea of money mindset and the limiting beliefs that we can come to our work or business or whatever that we bring with us. I thought that was an interesting section too. Can you say a little bit about that?
Raeanne Lacatena: Yeah. Well, as therapists, we understand that. Our ideas about all things are formed very early in our life often, right? They say from zero to seven is when we really get a lot of our identity markers, and that applies to money as well. And so when a business owner comes into my world and they're struggling either with scarcity in their business or they're struggling with, sometimes it'll be a ceiling of complexity in their business where, for example, they, they hit a hundred K and they can't break through the next hundred K or they hit seven figures and they can't hit eight or any wherever they land.
Maybe they just aren't willing to leave their full time job and step into entrepreneurship because they have fears around money. Those usually stem from early experiences with money or internal belief systems around money. And so sometimes it can be useful to do timeline work, to help people, to really look at what are those beliefs that you're carrying around money that either come from your past that are currently affecting your present tense and will continue to affect your future tense if we don't look at the future. Where all of this comes from. And so, I walk the readers through my own timeline journey of how my money story affected and evolved and shifted over times and how I moved from being a very employee minded person to actually being a teacher of entrepreneurship. Um, and so getting familiar with the messaging that you had as a child when it comes to money is, is an important step, but then also deciding how you're going to reprogram those neurons and synapses to change those stories, because even though you have maybe some default patterns around the way money works and operates in your world, there is plenty of ways to, to leverage the malleability of the brain and the mindset to change the way that you experience money. And it's really important because they don't take service at the bank. They don't take, you know, they don't take love and kindness at the bank. They take currency at the bank. And so, no matter what your profession is, whether you're a therapist, whether you're a landscaper, whether you're a financial planner, whatever you are, you're going to interface with the bank currency and if you carry around a lot of negative beliefs about it, it's going to impact the way that you engage with your entire life and so learning that for ourselves as we move into entrepreneurship before we move into entrepreneurship and frankly, to teach our children differently to teach our teammates and our coworkers differently and just to use and leverage the universal principles because the more we think for example about scarcity or not enough in our life, the more of that comes back to us. So, there's lots and lots of angles. It's not just like past, present, future. It's also, how are you showing up and engaging with money in your current set of circumstances? All of that wraps up into a bow to create what you called is our money mindset. And there's lots of different angles, therefore, that we can shift and change and mold that as well.
Jessica Fowler: Yeah, it's interesting. Well, I think that was like such a great example in the book of you sharing your personal story. And I think a lot of people can connect with that. And it's something that I think you know, often I see people don't think about until you start talking about it, their belief around money or that realization if they, you know, or trying to hoard their money or don't believe that they deserve money or whatever can come up or I don't know, lots of different beliefs that people have. And so it's, it's. It's a really good exercise to look at that your history what you were taught about money and I know right like owning a business that's something I had to go through and figure out my beliefs around money and then thinking about what am I going to teach my kids differently or what am I going to teach them the same and what am I going to teach them differently.
Raeanne Lacatena: Yeah. Yeah.
Jessica Fowler: Because some of it was good. Yeah. So thinking about that and how to apply that, but it was something about owning a business that made me think differently about, about money in that way.
Raeanne Lacatena: Yeah, it's, even though it's, it ultimately is the same thing that you are still producing as an employee and that's why you get your paycheck, there's something about the security of the same amount that comes every single month that makes us feel the illusion of more security, but if you really look around at the market right now, there's actually tons of layoffs and happening all of the time. So, the illusion of security and employment is really all, that's all it is. It's an illusion and delusion, frankly. And so, we have to learn how to take ownership or how we want our lives to look when it comes to our currency and our money. And we get to, if we allow ourselves to, to instead of just running those same patterns over and over again, begin to look at things a little bit differently.
It could be very empowering.
Jessica Fowler: Definitely. I think it's something we have to think about. We have to.
Raeanne Lacatena: We do.
Jessica Fowler: We need money. When we think about the hierarchy of needs, right? We need, we gotta start somewhere.
Raeanne Lacatena: Yeah, and it actually fulfills a lot of the lower modes, frankly. And so, if we're going to climb in Maslow's hierarchy of need, addressing the currency situation is an important step to take.
Jessica Fowler: Absolutely. So, who should be reading your book?
Raeanne Lacatena: I, there was a review that came through the other day, which was alarming and humorous, that said, rethink the title of this book. I was like, oh no, am I getting a negative review? Well, ultimately what this review ended up saying was that this book is not just for entrepreneurs. And although it's called the integrated entrepreneur, it's really, about how to live a holistic lifestyle. And if you use entrepreneurship as a metaphor for all the other parts of ourselves that can be holistically brought together, it actually can create impact for anyone, frankly, it is meant to for entrepreneurs. That is a love letter for entrepreneurs. And the reason that I specifically wrote it for business owners is that I believe that entrepreneurs are the difference makers, the game changers, the rule breakers. They think outside the box differently. And I have a big mission to make a big splash and a big difference in the world with entrepreneurs. And so helping them in particular, learn how to steward their inner world. I, it's a particular endeavor that I have to help business owners. However, I do know that a lot of people who are not entrepreneurs are reading the book and getting a lot of value as well.
Jessica Fowler: I think that's a great mission to have.
Raeanne Lacatena: Thank you.
Jessica Fowler: Well, thank you so much for coming on today. Where is the best place that our listeners can connect with you?
Raeanne Lacatena: Luckily, you can find me anywhere. I'm the only RaeAnn LaCatina in the world, as long as you can handle all the vowels. And I know Jessica is going to link everything in the show notes, but raeannelacatina.com is where you can find me to reach out and any on the social media handles as well.
Jessica Fowler: Wonderful. Well, thank you so much.
Raeanne Lacatena: Thank you for having me.
Jessica Fowler: Thank you for listening to this week's episode of What Your Therapist Is Reading. Make sure you head on over to the website or social media to find out about the latest giveaway.
The information provided in this program is for educational and informational purposes only. And although I'm a social worker licensed in the state of New York, this program is not intended to provide mental health treatment and does not constitute a patient therapist relationship.