Somewhere along the way, you absorbed the idea that building something real means giving something up. That ambition and presence can't live in the same body. That the business has to wait, or the kids do. Cait Scudder, known as The Millionaire Mother, has spent the last several years proving that wrong. She's a multiple seven-figure entrepreneur, mother of three, and the woman who had a six-figure cash month in her third trimester. Not because she found a perfect system. Because she stopped believing the story that she had to choose. In this conversation, Cait and I talk about what it actually looks like to build both. The identity shift from maiden to mother and what it costs you. The neuroscience behind why your maternal instinct might be your greatest business asset. How her home birth with her son Jack changed the way she thinks about leading a company. And why being a well-resourced woman is not something to apologize for. This is not a conversation about having it all. It's a conversation about refusing to start from the assumption that you can't. 00:00 Choosing your motherhood journey 06:06 Struggling with success and motherhood 08:20 Balancing work and motherhood guilt 11:44 Navigating motherhood guilt 16:03 Modern challenges for mothers 17:33 Balancing motherhood and career expectations 21:28 Balancing entrepreneurship and motherhood 26:21 Balancing personal needs and motherhood 30:02 Harnessing maternal instincts in business 32:56 Managing business during pregnancy 35:51 Strategic planning and personal growth 37:10 Pivoting the company for motherhood 41:20 Feeling the biggerness of life 43:51 Launching a high-ticket coaching offer 47:41 Rethinking money and material beliefs 51:17 Creating spaces for mother entrepreneurs 54:51 Introducing ClutterLab experience 57:47 Live Q&A and support group
Cait’s driving mission is to dispel the myth that mothers must choose between ambition and presence, and to equip modern mothers with the tools they need to build profitable businesses and rich, meaningful home lives. Through her coaching company, media platform, and soon-to-launch tech ecosystem, she equips growth-minded women with the strategy, support, and community required to scale businesses, expand wealth, and rise in their leadership, all while navigating the messy, real-life realities of raising children.
Connect with Cait: https://themillionairemother.com/
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Speaker A [00:00:00]:
Good morning, good afternoon, good evening. Hi, everybody. Welcome to Create the Space.
Speaker B [00:00:06]:
I'm so excited I finally get to bring you this conversation that I recorded in the fall. But as you know, Create the Space recently went through a big upgrade and I wanted to wait until that was complete to bring you this amazing conversation. So today I am so, so honored to have on the podcast the one and only Kate Scudder, otherwise known as the Millionaire Mother. Kate is a multiple seven figure business owner. She supports a community of over 30,000 mother entrepreneurs from 28 countries. She's helped hundreds of women generate collectively multiple eight figures in revenue, all while birthing babies, raising a family, and building generational wealth. I have personally also been in Kate's world. I've been to her retreat. I was part of her mastermind, and she is really an incredible human person, businesswoman, mother, all the things.
Speaker A [00:01:00]:
So to all my fellow mamas out there who are building businesses and families,
Speaker B [00:01:04]:
this conversation is for you. Welcome, Kate.
Speaker A [00:01:06]:
I'm so excited you're here. Good morning, Kate.
Speaker C [00:01:12]:
Hi, Kody. Thank you for having me.
Speaker A [00:01:14]:
I usually start with a little bit about, like, how you are, blah, blah, blah. But I kind of want to jump right in. And we will get to all that because I have been reading this book. Have you read this book? I'm showing it to Kate right now. It's called the Mother Code.
Speaker C [00:01:25]:
No.
Speaker A [00:01:25]:
By Ruthie Ackerman. And I picked it up actually at the Omega center when I was there this fall. For any of you that know that it's like a healing center that's been there for a gajillion years, and I hadn't. I didn't read it for months. And then I finished my other book. This is so boring. But I started reading this one and I was reading it last night and I was like, oh, my God, this is so. The timing couldn't be better. She's talking about. I mean, she's talking about motherhood, but she's talking about it from this perspective of, like, getting to choose the types of mothers that we want to be, being revolutionary mothers, and sort of this narrative that I didn't even realize that I was so programmed into to until I read this, which is around, like, sacrifice and that we have to give everything up when we become mothers. And, you know, the way you blend motherhood and business is what drew me to your work initially. So I really want to start there because I'm curious how you came to care so much about that intersection and, you know, how you felt about motherhood as a Maiden, like, just. I'm ready for you to jam on all the things I've just babbled about.
Speaker C [00:02:34]:
Oh, my gosh. Well, thank you. I just wrote that book down. You know, I love me a good motherhood resource, so I love that so much. And. And what perfect timing. So, yeah, I. You know, I think a lot of us form, as I'm sure exists for a lot of people. A lot of us form our visions of motherhood based on the upbringing that we had. And I think also probably for most people. I'll speak for myself, but I would imagine this is true for a lot of women based on the our partnership situation. Like, I was. Am so blessed to have grown up in a household with a moment who was so loving and so devoted and really left a legacy of, you know, the idea of motherhood is just warmth and devotion and care and loving. And so I always felt really great about being a mom. However, I was also a super tomboy, like, super tomboy athlete on all the boys teams, like, played boys ice hockey. Like, I was. I was feral. I was such a tomboy. And. And. And so I. It wasn't like, oh, I'm just, like, dreaming of baking sourdough, and I can't wait to like, have my own little dolly. Like, I didn't play with dolls. I was, like, playing with, like, sports balls. And so when I was in, I don't know, I guess, my early 20s, I was sort of, like, ambivalent. I was like, I'm too busy traveling and doing cool shit with my life. Like, I'm not even thinking about motherhood. But I didn't have. I didn't have, like, a subconscious programming aversion to it because of some childhood trauma. Like, that wasn't my story. I have a wonderful mom. And. But I also wasn't, like, super drawn to it. And then I met my now husband, Toby, which is a whole. I could go into that whole Eat pray love story. We met on a beach in Bali. I was supposed to fly out. Two days later, I canceled my flight. We had this, like, whirlwind love story. I stayed out in Bali. He, like, whisked me to every. And was living in this, like, gorgeous villa there and took me to all these places. I canceled my flight again. Then he invited me to Australia to meet his whole family, asked his mom for this wedding ring, which was his grandmother's, three weeks after knowing me, and we got engaged four months later. So that's just the short version of what a whirlwind love story. But I Kid you not? I think it was like maybe the third time we made love. I was like, holy shit balls, this is my baby daddy. Like this, I'm going to have children with this man. Like, whoa. And that was this first moment of like, oh, I can see the glimmer from the other side. Like it was one of those like sliding doors moment. I can see my future with this man. Like not just I love him, I want to build a life together, but like, oh, we're going to like co create in a big way. And so fast forward to January of 2020. Toby and I had just moved out to LA. We lived in Bali together for nearly four years, moved together to the States, to Maine. He's Australian, so it was his first move to the States. We're kind of deciding where we wanted to be. We landed on la, we road trip, tripped across the country. We conceived Ella on New Year's Day. And just as I, I remember the day that I got the positive pregnancy test and I like, was like, babe, I was just about to hop on a call actually and I was like, babe, I'm pregnant. All right, I'll talk to you in an hour. And he was like, what? And it was just this moment of just so much elation, so much excitement. And at that point I had already created a successful business. I had built a multi six figure business. I'd been featured in Forbes, I'd done a TedX talk, I'd like gotten all this momentum. But secretly, Cody, I was like falling apart. I was like right after that excitement, hot on the heels of all that excitement, I was taking terrified. I didn't have any mentors. Like now this is, and this is a big part of my whole body of work. But now this is a more, I don't want to say mainstream, but it's not like as fringe of a conversation. Nobody was talking about what does it mean to blend motherhood and ambition back in 2019 because the coaching industry in general, it's not to say there were no mothers, but like nobody was really talking about that. And everywhere I looked I was seeing like goddessy maidens, like living in Bali, not to throw shade, that literally was me. But like, you know, promoting lifestyle ease and like a floating breakfast in an infinity pool and like a four hour gua Sha morning routine. Nobody was like, hey, this is how you do this with like little people like barfing and sneezing and like tugging at every like limb of your body. Nobody was having that conversation. And so I was like, there's Just no way. Because I know I don't want to half ass anything. I don't want to my motherhood and I don't want to have as my business. And so I, this is so crazy to me but I literally, I was running a multi six figure business. I was like digging through my Google Drive to try to find my resume. I was like I better polish up my LinkedIn and maybe get an Indeed.com account because I'm going to have to apply for jobs or like I don't know, but I'm not going to be able to like run a company, let alone scale it. And my experience actually it was like so the opposite. As in every woman's experience I think is very different. But for me in that first pregnancy with Ella, I just felt everything start to grow. My fears and worries, but also my, my focus and like my conviction and it just like elevated the game. I don't know how else to say that. And that has just been my consistent experience ever since.
Speaker A [00:08:20]:
Well, thank you for sharing that incredibly magical story. And that is such a juicy and amazing place to begin and just. Wow. Yeah, I, I resonate with a lot of that in my own experience which is when I look back I feel like my maiden self knew how to waste time and a lot better than you know, like I would sit down at my desk and do 87 different things before I actually did what I was intending to do. Whereas now it's, I've got an hour, I sit down, I'm doing it, you know. So I really do feel you on that like drive and focus coming into play. And I'm curious if at any point like how you dealt with what was your experience because personally I still am swirling in this from time to time around like the guilt of what I think being a good mother is. And I think a lot of women have this right. And it's like it's so deep and it's so. I feel it has like a lot of tentacles. I feel like it's just so. Yeah, messy.
Speaker C [00:09:18]:
Okay. Literally this is just for the real conversation. Half an hour ago I just got back from dropping Ella and Jack off. They now Jack is in preschool, Ella is in kindergarten. What is even happening? James, My youngest is 18 months. I got back, James started crying. We have a really tenuous like held together by scotch tape childcare situation right now. Blessed. But we are in the trenches and it is, is not the woman we have right now is not going to be with us like full time. And so I was just transitioning him getting him changed, like, getting him. We went out to do the chickens, and then I was, like, handing him over to our au pair that we have at the moment, and he started crying. And there was so a part of me. I mean, I was so excited to come on here and talk to you, Cody. And I'm like, I'm not missing this call, but there was so a part of me that was like, I belong with my baby. Like, I. That cry. He does not feel. It's not that he doesn't feel safe, but he definitely doesn't feel a bond with this person, which is part of the reason that she will not be staying with us. But it just is, like, so suboptimal, and I think it's this, like, primal knowing of, like, as a mom, I want to be with my kid, and yet I had this moment of coming into. When I stepped into my office and I was like, all right, I'm transitioning. I'm about to hop on this. This interview. I'm so excited for this conversation. It was this moment of, like, I am going to let him have his experience today. I know that I am working on an incredible solution he has had. Our kids have had incredible care providers who are, like, extra family members and nurture that beautiful attachment. I think that guilt, for me, kicks in even more when I know that they are not in. Not. I don't want to say, like, bad hands, but they're not in, like, my standard, which is, like, extremely high. And. But I just had to have this moment of, like, you know what, like, the on the net. Net. Greater whole. Like, this is where I meant to be in this moment. And it's like, I think as mothers, two things can be true at the same time. And I think that is the whole. That's my whole, like, battle cry. And I really think that's what modern motherhood is. Is like the. What does it mean to live our full expression of motherhood? That's going to look different for every single person. But I think, you know, it's a really old, old paradigm that, you know, to be a good mother means being physically with our children 100% of the time and absenting ourselves, letting go of every other pursuit in the name of motherhood. Because I know if I did that, I wouldn't be bringing my best self to my kids, and I would be, probably, equally importantly, feeling something decay inside of me. So the way I deal with that guilt when it comes up is like, number one, what is that? That guilt is a messenger. What is it, guilt in and of itself I don't think is like a primary emotion. It's a, it's an arrow pointing to something. And for me, when I experience that guilt, usually I'm tapping into a need that needs attention. So for me, if I'm feeling guilty about my something to do with my kids for some reason, normally that's information of like, well, I'm aware that they have a need that is being under serviced at the moment. So what can I do about that now? Not every need is going to have an instantaneous solution, but for me, the way that I like make peace with that is like I'm on it, I'm working it, I'm working it as fast as we can. And, and gosh, wouldn't this be, this would probably be one of my top five lessons of motherhood. I am going to let good enough be good enough today. So even though we are not, you know, we don't have our all time, you know, a player, child care person in this exact moment at the time of this recording, he's good, he's in safe hands, the big kids are good and like we're good. And I'm able to show up for the things that matter here and spend so much time with my kids and like that's good enough. And so really letting ourselves off the hook in those ways while also paying attention because I think that that feeling of guilt, it doesn't do anything for us if we're just stewing in it and we internalize it and make it mean something bad about us as a person. Like that's, I really think that's wasting that information. Like you know, electrical current if we're tuning into okay. My maternal intuition is telling me that there's a need here that needs to be met. I'm on it. I'm working on it. I think that that is like more than good enough.
Speaker A [00:13:57]:
Yeah, that's so, so deeply true for me. I agree. And also I think you highlighted something that I just want to double highlight, which is I think, I think my daughter was only like 2 months old and a trusted person in my life said to me like, spend the next, what is it, 10 months until she turns a year getting really comfortable. As comfortable as you can with her being uncomfortable. Because our job, I don't believe our job as mothers is to prevent discomfort. Right. We cannot prevent discomfort. And so I think for me a lot of that guilt is really tolerating her discomfort.
Speaker B [00:14:32]:
Right.
Speaker A [00:14:33]:
And also knowing that I'm not here to make her life A padded room. Like, I'm here to support her in all of her feelings. And, you know, and so it's like, yeah, there's something. There's something still in that unraveling of, like, it's my job to fix every single moment. Right. It's my job to make sure she never. It's my job to make sure that when she cries for me, I am there 100% of the time, which is actually impossible. Right. And so, yeah, I really feel you. And I think that was just such a beautiful and honest way of unraveling that moment of guilt, of really, like, you're on it on the macro and in the micro. It's okay that your boy is experiencing some uncomfortable feelings.
Speaker C [00:15:13]:
Totally. And knowing that, like, I'm, like, I'm making eye contact with you, buddy. I'm gonna see you at lunchtime, buddy. You're gonna have an awesome time. And just, like, reorienting. Re. You know, infusing that. That connection. And. Yeah. I just think it is giving ourselves permission to not have to be at all, you know, at every single moment, because we'd make ourselves crazy.
Speaker A [00:15:38]:
Well, we do make ourselves crazy.
Speaker C [00:15:40]:
Yeah, totally.
Speaker A [00:15:40]:
And that's also a little bit inevitable. Right. And I want to talk. Of course we're going to talk about the business side, guys. Don't worry. I know she's brilliant at that, too. But where this conversation is going for me is I feel like, you know, you mentioned that this wasn't really a conversation in 2019, and now it is, and that I hear that, and I'm probably more aware of it now that I'm actually a mother than I was when I wasn't. Right. But I think there's so much happening in this conversation and in this moment for mothers, you know, from the work of Greer Kirschenbaum and the nurture revolution to the type of work you're doing. And you're not alone out there. You're definitely a pioneer and a trailblazer in that. But there are other people, like you said, taught. So it's just really fascinating to me that this is this time where it's like, mothers are kind of, like, trying to figure out, like, where do we land? You know, like, all of this. All of the things that certain mothers were told in maybe the 70s, 80s, 90s, about how sleep works and how, you know, nurture and spoiling babies is kind of being unraveled. And at the same time, parallel to that, the idea that we have to give up our lives until our kids are 10 or whatever 20 and then we can maybe have some time for ourselves is also unraveling. So I just think it's like. And kind of those things are the same but different in a way. So I'm just, I'm curious like how you feel about the time and the movement and being a mother in this time where things are unraveling.
Speaker C [00:17:06]:
I'm so glad you are so good at this, Cody. I'm like I'm obsessed with this show. I love it. You're so good at this. Okay, so I, I love this question because I feel I don't know Greer personally but I would love to know her. I love her work, I love following her on Instagram and I very much, you know, I. Half an hour before this call I was literally, I'm still in this moment. I've got my bloodstones on. They're probably covered in chicken poop. I was out in my, you know, hen house collecting eggs. Like I think that we have this, this and I'm a 7 multi 7 figure CEO and so we have. But we have in this modern day we have such an extreme. I mean in so many areas this is true. I think this extremely polarized view of what it means to be a mother right now. Either you are in camp, you know, shoulder pads and like sleek haircut and like cash, cash money money or you know, washboard abs, whatever or you are like in the sourdough starter wearing my grandma's apron, you know, kumbaya side but like these tone fit and you know one side over here co sleeps and Breastfeeds till age 6 and the other side is like on that formula and empowering moms to make choice that are best for them and sleep training coast. It's like there's all these lines of division and what I, how I understand both my. I don't even want to say my role like how I'm doing it and how I think about it is exactly like there's. There are really, really important voices. Erica. I don't know how to pronounce her last. Yeah, I think her name is. I think her book called Being There. It's all about the importance of the first three years. I love her work and I, I know she really advocates for mothers to like take a break and just focus primarily on mothering in those first three years. What I will tell you is that the being a CEO and working from home. I'm not talking about being a CEO of like a Fortune 500 company. I mean running your own business, starting your own business this is why I am such a fierce advocate of mothers being entrepreneurs. This is why I have programs that moms to take their gifts, many of whom had successful careers as therapists or teachers or some other, you know, external practice that was not conducive to motherhood and learn the skills of online business. Because right now I am able to ebb and flow and cross that permeable membrane during the day so that I. And in fact am here. Like, I'm not with my child in this hour, but, like, he's probably going to go down for a sleep. He'll probably be sleeping through 45 minutes of this one hour interview. I am there. I was with my kid, you know, okay, my big kids now, big three and five. But they're at preschool and kindergarten. But during their years here at the house, like, every single morning, we made family breakfast together every single day. We came together for lunch, all five of us, Monday through Friday, and then adventures and whatever we're doing on the weekend. Some days farm day, some days going out. Every single day, every single day together for dinner. Like that cadence and that rhythm. I think that we are in a moment in the culture where we don't really have a definition for what it means to be this woman embodying both. And I'm not saying that every woman's path needs to be starting her own business, but what I am saying is that, I mean, all you have to do is look at like, maternity leave policies or paid time off to realize that corporate America is not set up for motherhood. And the solution is not just saying, like, we need more moms back in the home so, like, don't work at all. Personally, that's what I believe. I. And yet I do hold some of these, like, I guess you would say, quote, unquote, traditional values from a lifestyle perspective. But I did this post yesterday that is getting a ton of engagement right now, which is like, I'm seeing a lot of content calling for mothers to reassume their vital role in the home as the homemaker and the heartbeat that only we can do. And I agree with that 100%. And I don't believe that that means we need to give up our income, our agency, our professional voice. What I do think is that we need to figure out how can I not only live that expression for my own, like, personal soul's fulfillment, but for a sense of, like, Dharma living out through me? How can I find a way for my gifts to be expressed in a way that is sympathico with motherhood in a way that is conducive to flowing with and blending with motherhood. And I have not found a more viable pairing than entrepreneurship and motherhood. And that is what enables me to, you know, integrate these, like, ancestral wisdom. Yesterday, I'll just give you, like, I don't know, this is maybe a silly example, but yesterday my mom came over after she was working because I was interviewing another potential nanny and she was helping me around the house with the kiddos, giving them a snack so I could interview this nanny. And I had these pork chops in the fridge that I knew, like, I needed to cook yesterday, but it turned out, I mean, I was making like apple cider braised pork chops with like sauteed cabbage roast potatoes. It was really like a Sunday dinner. I don't know, but I needed to
Speaker A [00:22:42]:
cook on a Monday, guys. On a Monday.
Speaker C [00:22:44]:
On a Monday. And I'm like, this is ridiculous. But I'm cooking this because, like, I value. I want my kids to have home cooked meals. I want my kids to. And this is not like, please, we do our fair share of chicken nuggets over here, so don't, don't eye roll me right now. Like, we do that. But I was like, in my head, I could be like, oh, I'm solo parenting this week. Which I am. Oh, I'm like, coming off of work and this interview and I don't want to, but I'm like, I get to live this expression of both. And I think when we're so we, We. We have to be really careful of the ways we almost, like categorize ourself of like, oh, it's hard, so I have to do this. Or it's, you know, it's we, I don't know, we like type ourselves into like, oh, this, I'm this kind of mother, or that kind of mother. And I. What I stand for more than anything is like, what is the fullness of what you actually desire financially, Lifestyle was energetically in your home, relationally, what do you want and how are you making choices that allow yourself and your family to get to experience the fullness of whatever that is?
Speaker A [00:23:50]:
Yeah, yeah. And we don't have a map, right? Like, there's a lot of things where maybe we do have a map for them sort of. But it's just, again, like, such an interesting time. I mean, probably everybody said this, but, you know, for me it's like there's one version which is like the 1950s version, right? And then there's maybe the 80s version where it's like working nine to five, you know, like the power suit and like there's nothing so real. Right. I mean, yeah, I'm aging myself, but that's okay. And there's no. Yeah, like no one.
Speaker B [00:24:21]:
There's no, there's no.
Speaker A [00:24:22]:
Also, there's no ritual around this. Like, there's not a lot of. Yeah. Ritual when you're moving from maiden. When one is. Or personally me moving from maidenhood to motherhood. Like, I didn't. I just kind of fell in there and you know, thought. Had the things and thought I would do the things that you're supposed to do and that didn't work for my kid.
Speaker C [00:24:42]:
Oh my gosh. I so feel you with this. And it's really funny because my experience, like, I'll. I'm so, I'll be so curious to know, you know, how. What you think about this. But my experience of this is I almost feel like for me, of course going from not having children to having a baby was like life altering and massively identity changing. But in many ways, I don't know how else to say this, my experience was like, I. And maybe I. I don't know. I don't know why, but it almost felt like I was able to be. Still be in many ways like my maiden self as a mother. And then having two under two, the universe was like, like, that's out the window. Like, it was almost like everything fell to the ground, everything had to be repacked. There was no more like muscle memory of the way of doing things. Because in many ways it's like, okay, you know, we can tag team my, my husband and I or we can get childcare in. But like, whoa, whoa, whoa. Now this constellation and now having three, I'm like, there is only now three. This evolution into a totally different way of operating. And it's not that like, you know, I think that our maiden self, our maiden self has different capacity, she has different design. She's. She is different. She's accustomed to different things. She's accustomed to being able to like, do things when she wants and how she wants. And as a mother, you know, it's not often I say, like, this whole idea of like, we have to sacrifice as a mom is rubbish. And sometimes I get pushback of like, well, isn't there a noble sacrifice? And it's like, of course, if your child is crying and you're tired in the middle of the night and like your child needs you, like, yes, you're sacrificing that sleep to go check on them and make sure they're okay. So from that instance, it's not to say there is nothing that we're giving up, but this idea that we have to abandon ourself entirely, that's the thing that I take issue with. And so for me, it's really honoring. You were speaking about this rite of passage and this ritual or this lack of ritual. And for me, there's almost this, like, honoring of that maiden identity and how she served and how she's actually so capable in so many ways. And yet this evolution and rising more into that mother matriarch identity archetype frequency is really about stewardship, benevolent stewardship, and taking into account needs of the collective of my home that are greater than just, like my personal desires in the moment.
Speaker A [00:27:28]:
Totally.
Speaker C [00:27:29]:
Yeah.
Speaker A [00:27:29]:
And it, you know, there's a lot of black and white in this. Like, like you were saying before, people feel the need to identify themselves in this way or that way. And I think sort of my experience of you and your work is that there's a lot of room and a lot of space to create your own definition. Like, you don't have to do it. Like you were saying, you don't have to be barefoot and covered in sourdough starter or, like wearing heels and a power suit. You could do both or none. Right. And so, yeah, it's just really interesting. And I think, you know, I don't have two kids yet. God, knock on wood. But I mean, I want to have two kids. Not knock on wood, I won't. But for me, I think that I almost feel more myself. And my intuition is much stronger. And I've been seeing that over and over again, like, because I also came up against this good girl thing, right? Like, oh, I didn't realize how badly I wanted to be good until I had a baby. And there was all this advice, like, you need to do this and you need to do this. And we lied to people about what we were doing at first because I didn't want the judgment. Like, my baby was in bed when she was four days old, and we were like, yes, she's sleeping in the bassinet and she's blah, blah, blah, you know?
Speaker C [00:28:38]:
Yes.
Speaker A [00:28:39]:
And eventually I was like, f that and told people the truth. But. But I've seen with these milestones, for me, it's come out like breastfeeding, toileting, that. Actually, I know. I know what's right for her and I know when you know when to do these things and sort of how like, yes, there can be some study,
Speaker C [00:28:59]:
but I Know well, okay, I love that you are saying this because this to me, like this is my whole thesis around why mothers are the. And it's not just a thesis. There's so much data to back it up. Like this intuitive spidey sense. So there's a whole like neurochemical reasoning for this during pregnancy and into postpartum. The gray matter of the brain. So the center that is responsible for short term memory recall, you know, vocabulary, executive functioning. It's why we say, oh, I have pregnancy brain or I have mom brain. And we're like, can you pass me the. The thingy? And it's like the word is spoon. And yet somehow that just has left the building, exited the chat, don't know how to that word. And yet our kid can be on the other side of the room, we are not even looking and we just turn around. I don't know if this is true for you, but I'm like, James has been quiet for 11 seconds. He is in a corner. I know he has a marker or he's pooping in a corner. See what's going on. And sure enough, today, green everywhere. I'm like, but that is how we know. And that is a biological development that's called the default mode network inside of the brain astronomically grows. It's like if you look at a graph it astronomically or brain mapping, that part of the brain explodes because that and that's responsible for human evolution. It's why mothers have, you know, you've heard this before as well. Mother's instinct, that exact same instinctive. I actually know that my child should be in bed with me right now or I know how to do this potty training moment or I know X, Y, Z thing. If we as mothers bring that same knowing into our businesses, that same amount of self trust, Imagine what it means like when I talk about growing our business from the root of our motherly power. That is what I'm talking about is like what happens when I allow my instinct to lead the way. Doesn't mean there's no space for like skill building or taking a course here or there or like accentuating my intuitive knowing. But my intuitive knowing is in the driver's seat. And I think I agree, I could not agree with you more, Cody, that letting our intuition guide us, letting ourselves really be so mindful of who we're taking advice from. But know that I my instinct and my gut is the authority. My instinct in my gut is the number one most equipped person to raise my child. What would it be like if we trusted ourselves to run and grow and build our companies in that exact same way.
Speaker A [00:31:34]:
Yeah, let's talk about it because I want to hear more about this, which, I mean, I. Yeah, so what I mean by that is in the, A little bit ago in the conversation you said when you first found out you were pregnant, you were like, gotta get a job. Right? Like, kind of work on that Indeed.com profile. We're not knocking Indeed.com, but how did you go from that to this?
Speaker C [00:31:58]:
Yeah, well, I definitely like cried to my mentor, who was not a mom at the time, and she, she was like, you're amazing, you'll figure it out. I really cried a lot to my husband. I think that, you know, I was and still am the breadwinner in my family and my husband was, at that time he was in real startup mode, so he wasn't really making any money. And I, one of the things that I needed, I needed to have a really honest and raw conversation with him of like, if I need to take a break or if I need to scale back, I need to know that you've, you can pick up the baton. And it was just. That was not the only thing, but that was one of the things. It was just knowing that I, that he had me and that it wasn't all going to be on me released a huge amount of pressure that I was feeling so that I could exhale and soften. And then I, it. So it was part of that, like, energetic and, you know, relational agreement and then one part, like really looking at my own, you know, fears and how my mind was making up a whole story about it. It was one part having the right resources and making sure we were in the right place. So we ended up leaving la, coming back to Maine, making sure we were close to my parents, hiring a postpartum doula, having that hands on support, which made it so practically possible. But then it was also really ripping up the narrative of like, oh, my life is about to be over, or like, oh, I need to take again, you know, shoulds of motherhood, of feeding, sleeping, whatever. Also the shoulds of how we're supposed to do maternity leave. It's like, you know, I was told, you know, definitely take off the last, like month, maybe two months of your pregnancy and like, you're going to want to take a few months off. And for me, like, my business astronomically exploded during that pregnancy. I think I did 300k in sales in the final 2 weeks of my pregnancy. This is 2020 and I pre sold Mastermind. This was in September, early October, that didn't start until January. And we did like multi six figures in sales, like a six figure cash month. Did that again. Pregnant with Jack. And it was just so. Part of it was like strategic timing, but part of it was also giving myself permission to do it in a different way when everyone was like, slow down. It wasn't like I was speeding up for the sake of speeding up, but my experience was like, I am literally bursting. I'm plump with all of this ideation, all of this creative energy. And hello, not surprising, you are literally channeling like an electrical current. So much creative energy at that time. Of course it wants to go somewhere and not making ourselves wrong. Like, I remember a mentor said to me, make sure you pick up a hobby. Like, you might want to try knitting. Literally, she said this to me, I want to try knitting. And I was like, I'm not going to knit, I'm not going to make a sweater, but I will make some money. And just letting that be okay. And so, yeah, that for me was a real tipping point. A tipping point of like, oh, I don't have to do this and pretend. See, like, I feel like the maiden expression in business and I'm being, you know, reductive. But just to speak about it in this way kind of has two modes. It's either like uber leaned back, feed me grapes, manifest from the bathtub, you know, masturbate to millions, whatever, like that sort of vibe, or it's like, go get it, grind it out. You know, if you want it, go get it, chase it down. And in motherhood, like, neither of those approaches really work and in a sustainable way. And I've seen that not only for myself, but just for my clients as well. And what it took for me and what helped me really start to see, oh, there is this other way is like, I am being highly strategic right now, but I'm not selling. I'm not like burning myself out to sell something that I have to turn around and deliver straight away. I am like, strategically planning to sell something that starts in five months. I'm giving myself a little bit of a buffer, but also giving myself permission to like, dive back in when I'm feeling inspired to. And I'm not putting myself in a box. And for me, that was just so, so incredibly helpful. And then it was actually on Ella's first birthday that I took the. On the day itself that I took the pregnancy test and found out I was pregnant with Jack. So that was such an emotional day. We were in Santorini. I'll never forget that. I took my parents. It was their 60th wedding anniversary that year. So I took them. Like, I'm such a good gift giver. I'll take you and myself and my family to Greece to celebrate.
Speaker A [00:36:52]:
So we watch the kids.
Speaker C [00:36:53]:
Yeah, exactly. I got you a babysitting gig in Santorini. So we took. We took them to Greece and I was like a few days late. I just want to check. And we found out. And it was really the birth of Jack. This was back in 2022. My birth experience with him really solidified for me the desire to pivot the whole company that really planted the seed. And it was about nine or 10 months after his birth that I finally ripped off the band A and rebranded the company from Heat Scudder International to the Millionaire Mother and changed the name of the podcast and really shifted the conversation because for me, you know, I was a business coach before. Blending energy and strategy, similar in essence to what I do now. But motherhood was always this, like, tangential cute side. Like, maybe once in a blue moon, I'd, like, mention it. Or like, here's a cute picture of me and Ella, meanwhile, especially when I had two, Everything about my reality was being rewritten. My entire personality, my entire daily rhythm, my entire sense of who I am and how I wanted to operate in the world and what it meant to be in the world and how I even felt about achievement. So real quick, I'll just share this story here. So with Ella, I had a hospital birth. We were planning for a home birth. It didn't go the way that we wanted. I had a lot of trauma around that. I really devoted myself to healing from that, completely rewriting the story. And I had the most incredible home water birth with Jack, my little cancer baby. It makes me just cry just remembering it. Because with Jack, Jack was 10 pounds and 15 ounces. He was a toddler. And at, oh, gosh, he came out of me without me pushing. I experienced what a lot of women experience called fer the fetal ejection reflex. So my body basically expelled him. Now, please don't hear that and think, wow, she just slipped an 11 pounder right out. Like, absolutely not. It was so much work, but the work was allowing myself to stay open and surrender to this extraordinary power wanting to move through me. The work. Work was not getting in the way. And the. The. And so for me, Jack, oh, I'm like, right back there talking about this. For me, that experience changed everything. And like I shared with you at the Beginning of this, Cody, I am like a tomboy athlete. I was recruited in college to play collegiate basketball. My old podcast was called Born to Rise. I'm like, you know, a very much like I would have been a great Nike poster child girl. Like, like go just do it. Just get out there if you want to achieve it. Go dream it, go do it. And for me with Jack, it was like it was not my conscious doing that brought him here. It was my allowing this extraordinary, this tsunami like power that is dormant inside of me, inside of every woman to bring him here. And I'm like, hold the phone. If that is how I can birth an 11 pound miracle into the world, what does this mean about how I'm running my business? And what does this mean about what I am letting lead? Is it my mind and my willpower and just my push or is it something else? And I really, that was confronting as hell because I had like a multi million dollar offering which I ended up closing and I had a lot of, you know, pre existing proof of concept, if you will. And my knowing, my maternal instinct was like, there's a deeper conversation that has to be have had here. And it is all about this. And I finally gave myself permission to go all in, not have motherhood is just a cute little side caption or a pop up four week program here or there, but to be the center of the brand. And, and so I made that pivot in 2023 and we welcomed when I did, we did that in July, I opened a masterclass in August. We welcomed 15,000 new women into our community in a month.
Speaker A [00:41:16]:
Wow.
Speaker C [00:41:16]:
And it was just like off to the races.
Speaker A [00:41:20]:
Wow, that's incredible. It just reminds me of a lot of times I say to myself or my daughter, whoever's around these moments where we just, just feel the biggerness of life, right? Like get stuck in the mundane and we're human. And then every once in a while there's these times in our lives where we're like, whoa, there's so much more going on here. There's so much more driving force around my life and around what's happening than just like what I'm experiencing in the moment. And so yeah, like how all these experience we have, we might not know in the moment. Like I'm sure 2020, you didn't know that 2023 you would be where she is, right? It's just sort of following that intuition and seeing that. So yeah, it's just so powerful and I am sure that everyone is feeling as inspired as I am right now. And the question I want to ask you might feel like a bit of a veer, but I don't think it is. Which is I'd love in our remaining time to really talk to you about money because I'm curious about how in this shift that you were having, how your concept of money changes and how you came to own and live in this very bold title of the millionaire mother.
Speaker C [00:42:33]:
Yes, I love this question so much. So, okay, I'm going to take you back to 2020 when I was still pregnant. And at the time, my VIP coaching practice, my mentor, my private coaching was 4K a month. It was $48,000 a year. And I was like completely booked out and I had more demand than I did capacity. And Toby was like, you need to change your rate. You need to raise your rates to 100k. And I was like, babe, you are insane. Like I again, remember, I'm the financial breadwinner. I'm pregnant. I've got a lot of fear about money and stuff coming up. And he's like, this is like basic economics. There is more supply that are more demand than there is supply. You need to raise your. This is crazy. You need to raise your rates. And I, this was my first little initiation and surrender. I was like, okay, I'm gonna do it. And I raised my rates to a hundred thousand dollars for the year. I'm like, you know, yeah, no one is ever going to buy this, but sure, I'll do it. Because I knew he was right. I knew I couldn't just keep, you know, taking on more and more and more onetoone clients. Well, I was teaching a group program at the time and about sales and I remember mentioning in one of our live coaching calls the, we were talking about like offer suite and pricing and I just dropped. I didn't even like pitch at all. But I just mentioned, you know, this is why I have like a six figure private coaching container. Not like 1%, half of a percent of my audience is ever going to buy that, but it is the offer for the right woman. And when I did that, I had one of the women reach out to me and she said, that has got my name on it. And she signed up that week and I was like, okay, we have just really landed at a whole new level. And so I share that story and I really have to give credit to Toby because I think a lot of the time sometimes we need someone to reflect back to us. It's not that he like planted something in me that wasn't there. Before, but to reflect what they already see, which is this knowing of like, you are worth that every single day of the week. Do you know that there are, there are coaches that get paid a million dollars a year to be like, at McKenzie or whatever, like, to provide. I hear you. He's like, babe, I hear you every day. I can't. You're so loud. I cannot hear you. You are so good. And like, you are worth that every day of the week. So not only strategically, like basic economics, he's like that, you are that person. And I borrowed his belief and just let myself stand in that and let it happen. And that's such a powerful. That was a real turning point moment for me of, okay, we're doing this. And like I mentioned to you, really riding that a lot of the momentum in that pregnancy and having that strategic build and like having a multi six figure month, like in my third trimester, I'm like, oh, this is what it gets to be like. This is what it gets to be like. And I think for me, part of the journey with money, because I did not grow up, you know, wealthy. My mom paid for milk and eggs on, you know, government assistance. And I remember going grocery shopping with her and like, not getting grapes the weeks that they weren't on sale and having that consciousness around money of like, there's not always enough. We never were like, you know, on the street, God forbid, but we, we definitely were not like in the lap of luxury at all. And for me, calibrating to wealth or however you want to call it, it was less about like, oh, just like, buy fancy things and like kind of act as if or something like that. That wasn't, it was more like, don't you see that, like, it is meant for you? And it was really an identity, self concept shift and like letting myself see myself in that way and carry myself in that way. And that, that same nugget has been true for me in every single area of my life. And so I know you're going to be at my house so soon, Cody, for homecoming. And this is something that I get reflected every single time I have. I've run events at my house or I have people in my home. We have a, an incredible home staff that is here. Our housekeeper, Jeannie, God bless her, I love her so, so much. Every. And she's been such an incredibly important part of our family. But every time people come into our home and they're here and they see like, wow, you have like a staff at your house and like you get you operate with so much grace, but you're also not like, shy about the fact that you have support. And I think that same like, kind of, ooh, contraction, like, it's a dirty little secret that I have help, or it's a dirty little secret that I have money. Letting go of that, for me, it's this really graceful acceptance and acknowledgment that of course, being a well resourced woman and mother makes life better for everyone. So removing any ounce of shame, greediness, and. You've heard me riff on this before, Cody, but. But when we boil it down like the. The lie, right? And this has been perpetuated culturally for any vast number of reasons, but that the material, like, from this almost like moral kind of archaic overtone, the material is like the realm of sin and badness and corruption and the realm of the spirit, like no body, non material, just essence, soul. That is the realm of the eternal, when actually the roots of material is the same root of the word maternal, which is mater, the Latin word for matter. And all of matter, all that is material, all that has ever been created came through that matter, that matter, that mother, and letting. So for me, so much of the journey with. With money has been letting go of any cultural conditioning of, like, money is bad, and really recognizing that, like, I am a portal of creation and when I am richly resourced, that gets to impact everything around me. And that identity shift might not sound practical, but I will tell you it has shifted my relationship with money and my attraction of money more exponentially than anything else.
Speaker A [00:48:58]:
I feel like this podcast today has been like a brain rewiring, which is so beautiful. I think we should put some undertones, like some hurts under here. I'll work on that. No, seriously, I really do. I feel like there, you know, just are so. In so many ways, we've talked about how important it is no matter where you are in motherhood. And I'm assuming many people listening to this are probably mothers in business because they're going to be attracted to this, right?
Speaker B [00:49:28]:
But to just really watch for those
Speaker A [00:49:30]:
things that say you're supposed to be this way. And so, you know, I'm so thankful I am in Kate's. One of Kate's mastermind spaces. And I'm so thankful that I said yes, even though it was a real leap for me, guys, because that rewire. I mean, there's so much practical stuff in there. Guys, I'm gonna give Kate some space to talk about her spaces in a minute. But there's so much. But this part of just like rewiring what it means and, and all of the stuff that we've talked about is just, is important and is going to help our kids and is just such a big deal. So, yeah, as we wrap up, I do want to give you a little space to talk about how people can connect with you, what you've got going on right now or in a month and a half, because that's probably when people are going to hear this conversation. But yeah, take it away.
Speaker C [00:50:16]:
Amazing. Well, thank you so much for having me, Kody. This was so fun and I just loved every minute of it. So I run two masterminds for mother entrepreneurs, the Foundry, which is our six month mastermind container for women who are building those six figure foundations and scaling to their first six figure year. So you could be brand new to business, you could be pivoting, you could be getting your, you know, ducks in a row to go in a different direction, but are really, really working to build a solid, profitable online business to that six figure level. So if you're interested in the Foundry, we're going to be opening up a fall cohort. You can either click the link in the show notes or send me a DM and comment the word wait list to be added to the wait list for that. And then I also run the Inner Circle mme, the Inner Circle, which is a year long container for women at the six multi, six, even seven figure level who are wanting that space to grow and rise alongside other mother entrepreneurs. So both spaces are intentionally designed for mother entrepreneurs specifically. So no tactics and strategies that are really optimal for, you know, people who don't have kids or that require you to overextend beyond your motherhood capacity. Doesn't matter what your childcare situation is, doesn't matter if you're pregnant and don't have any littles around the house. Doesn't matter if you have seven running around. You're gonna find your people there. So. And you can DM me the word circle if you're interested in hearing more about that. I also have a brand new free workshop coming up called Inheritance and we'll leave a link for that as well.
Speaker A [00:51:54]:
Yeah, amazing. And follow Kate on Instagram. That link will be there. She's got amazing content and I highly, highly recommend Kate for so many reasons and I can tell you that she is a woman of integrity. I have had moments with Kate that have been, you know, have shown me that over and over and over again. So thank you so much, Kate. I really appreciate this conversation and this is a little wacky, what I'm about to do, but I'm gonna do it any in the last three minutes. I never do this. But we started this conversation before we record. You're like, oh, no, is Cody gonna tell me to reorganize my desk? And I promised you this would be about you. But then when you were talking about childcare. This has been up for me a lot this week. So just as a little ending, I'm gonna give you this really simple feng shui ritual. So for anyone, so for anyone that needs a little help. I've shared this many times in many different spaces, but I'm gonna share it here again. It's called the silver box box ritual, and it's very simple. All you're gonna do is you're gonna find any kind of silver box. You can literally take a ball jar and put tin foil around it. That can work too. And you're gonna find a red pen and ideally some red string. If you don't have red string, that's okay. And you're gonna write up to three intentions in the present. Like, I have the most loving, incredible, up to my standards, childcare, blah, blah, blah. Right. Thank you so much. Thank you so much. You're going to roll it up and wrap it 108 times with this red string. You're going to place it in your little silver box, and you're going to put it in anywhere in the front right of your home. So this is the helpful people and travel area of your home. So this is the area of our home in the Bagua map where we call and support. So this is just a fun little way to sort of get the energetics going along with the practical.
Speaker C [00:53:37]:
Oh, my gosh. I love this. And my office is in the front right of our home. Perfect.
Speaker A [00:53:43]:
So you can just.
Speaker C [00:53:44]:
I'm doing it.
Speaker A [00:53:44]:
Tuck it in. You're still there. See, that was funny. Cause that was like that mental thing. She's gonna tell me something about my office, Right? So, yeah, that's just a fun little ritual. And try it out. And then I have one right here. I have no idea what's written in that, but I'm gonna refresh mine because I've been meaning to do that. So I'm really curious to see what happens. We'll have to connect and.
Speaker C [00:54:01]:
Oh, my gosh. Okay. I love it. Doing it today. Doing it right now. Cody, thank you so much for having me. This is a class.
Speaker A [00:54:08]:
I'll talk to you soon.
Speaker C [00:54:09]:
Bye. Bye.
Speaker B [00:54:22]:
Friends, be sure to go Follow Kate on social media. Jump into everything she's got going on. You all know I know. Kate is so incredible. Thank you again so much for being here, Kate. I really appreciate it. All right, but let's wrap this up with a little feng shui, shall we? So, as you might have seen, or
Speaker A [00:54:40]:
if not, I'm going to tell you
Speaker B [00:54:41]:
right now, one of my signature offers, Clutter Lab is now available for you to join at any time.
Speaker A [00:54:47]:
In fact, I've got a discount code going on right now. If you're listening in real time, the
Speaker B [00:54:51]:
code is just spring and it will give you 20% off. ClutterLab is a two week experience that is really geared for you to create a new understanding around why you buy things, why you keep things, and how to create a peaceful, abundant and happy home that really nourishes your family. ClutterLab is also delivered in a super digestible format. Daily voice notes under 10 minutes a day. A vault of all sorts of resources that you can tap into at any time and you get lifetime access so you can really work through the lab at your own pace. Now. Now, why is clutter such an important thing? Well, here's a couple reasons why. One, it is proven there is study after study after study that show us that women especially really experience a greater level of stress in cluttered environments. And that does not have to be big C clutter. This could be just things that kind of bother you on a daily basis, but that you've learned to ignore, right?
Speaker A [00:55:54]:
Whether that's clothes in your closet that
Speaker B [00:55:56]:
you don't love anymore or the entryway that just has a bunch of stuff in it that you're not sure what to do. Or the pile in the kitchen, right? These things tug on our nervous system and create this underlying stress that really impacts our quality of life. Plus, from a feng shui perspective, there's a couple ways we can look at clutter. One is that it's an incredibly yin, heavy energy. And while by nature that is not a bad thing. Yin is part of our life. We want yin in our life, but, but overly yin excess of yin is going to create an imbalance. It's going to create a heavier feeling, a more tired feeling. Again, it's this drain, this strain on our bodies and on our minds that's constantly running in the background whether we're conscious of it or not. In addition, we really can't get to the like fun, fancy, you know, activating parts of feng shui until we've dealt with the clutter. Because you really, you know, that would
Speaker A [00:56:52]:
be like, if there's.
Speaker B [00:56:54]:
Let's just say there's a bunch of, like, dirty cat litter in a room, and you go and light a candle, you're not getting rid of the smell, you're just masking it. So when we're activating our homes with the power of feng shui, we really want to make sure that we've cleared clutter and that we've created optimal space for these activations, for these desires to really land in our house and in our life. So it's a really important first line of action, first course of action. And if that's all you end up
Speaker A [00:57:23]:
doing, when it comes to feng shui,
Speaker B [00:57:25]:
it is so powerful, because waking up in an environment that supports you, that's clear, that's filled with things that you truly want in your life, is a very, very powerful way to live.
Speaker A [00:57:38]:
So go check out clutter lab again.
Speaker B [00:57:40]:
It's 20% off right now. Cold spring. And I hope to see you in there while I am not in that course.
Speaker A [00:57:46]:
Live.
Speaker B [00:57:47]:
There is a live component month you will have access to in the month that you join a live Q and A with me where you can ask your questions. There is also a telegram support group for the entirety of the course, which is the two weeks of content plus four additional weeks of support. So you get me for six weeks to ask any kind of question that you might have. Okay. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you for listening. Please, if you can be sure and take two seconds to go, click that rate and review button.
Speaker A [00:58:14]:
It really, really helps this show grow
Speaker B [00:58:16]:
and other people hear this amazing conversation. And I will see you next time.
Speaker A [00:58:20]:
Have a beautiful day, friends. Bye.