Finding Your Voice as a Sleep Consultant with Rachel Lubchansky
There is a lot of pressure in the online space to sound right.
To say things perfectly. To figure out the exact words that will land, connect, and convert.
But what if finding your voice isn’t about getting it right… it’s about using it?
In today’s episode, I’m joined by Rachel Lubchansky for a conversation about what it really looks like to find your voice in business, and why this is something that evolves over time.
We talk about the internal shifts, the external noise, and the process of learning to trust yourself as you show up and communicate with your audience.
Because the goal isn’t to sound like someone else.
The goal is to sound like you.
I hope you enjoy this conversation!
Links:
Website: Rachel Lubchansky
Instagram: @rachel.lubchansky
If you’d like to learn more about becoming a Sleep Consultant, please join our Facebook Group: Becoming A Sleep Consultant
CPSM Website: Center for Pediatric Sleep Management
Book a free discovery call to learn how you can become a Certified Sleep Consultant here.
Transcript:
Intro: Welcome to Becoming a Sleep Consultant! I’m your host Jayne Havens, a certified sleep consultant and founder of both Snooze Fest by Jayne Havens and Center for Pediatric Sleep Management.
On this podcast, I’ll be discussing the business side of sleep consulting. You’ll have an insider’s view on launching, growing, and even scaling a sleep consulting business. This is not a podcast about sleep training. This is a podcast about business building and entrepreneurship.
There is a lot of pressure in the online space to sound right, to say things perfectly, to figure out the exact words that will land, connect, and convert. But what if finding your voice isn’t about getting it right? It’s about using it.
In today’s episode, I’m joined by Rachel Lubchansky for a conversation about what it really looks like to find your voice in your business, and why this is something that evolves over time.
We talk about the internal shifts, the external noise, and the process of learning to trust yourself as you show up and communicate with your audience.
Because the goal isn’t to sound like someone else. The goal is to sound like you.
I hope you enjoy this conversation!
Jayne Havens: Rachel, welcome to the Becoming a Sleep Consultant Podcast. I’m so excited you’re here with me today.
Rachel Lubchansky: Thank you so much, Jayne. Really looking forward to our conversation.
Jayne Havens: Before we get started, why don’t you share a little bit about yourself? Who are you and what do you do?
Rachel Lubchansky: Thank you. I am currently a business mentor and strategist working with women entrepreneurs—primarily solopreneurs and small business owners who have some level of expertise or have launched a business around a passion—and struggle with the business side of things. I came to this work because I actually founded my first business over 20 years ago. I was in the fashion industry, and I discovered an untapped niche in the market of women’s apparel, and I set out to fill it.
And as many of us are, at 25 years old, I was pretty carefree and just felt like nothing could stop me, even though the odds were stacked against me. There were no business coaches at the time. There were no women’s networking groups. I really had to piece everything together myself, but I learned so much along the way and mostly ignited in me this deep passion for building businesses from the seed of an idea. And I just fell in love with every aspect of it, from the behind the scenes of number crunching and buying and merchandising and marketing and building a brand, to working with customers and learning a lot about the market.
And so what I did after five years, I actually became pregnant with triplets, and I decided there and then that I would sell my business, stay home with my babies. Because it’s like a lot of babies, as you can imagine.
From there, about when my kids were around seven, I decided to start another business. And it became clear that there were so many other women out there looking to start their own businesses, and they’re expert at their own thing. Like, they know how to do the thing, but they’re not feeling confident, or comfortable, or well-equipped on the business side of things. And so I set out to support women on their journey by giving them the skills, the tools, the resources, helping them build strategies that are in alignment with who they are and the life that they’re building, and support them along the way, so that they can build sustainable businesses that work for the kind of lifestyle that they’re hoping to live.
Jayne Havens: Yeah, such needed service. I see this all the time with female entrepreneurs, that they are so passionate about the service that they’re providing, the work that they’re doing, but sometimes all they need is a little bit of support and coaching to really get them up and running.
Today, I wanted to talk to you specifically about finding your voice in your business, something that I think you’re actually really, really good at. You have such a specific voice and a way of communicating what you do. Why do you think that so many people struggle with this early in the beginning stages of their businesses?
Rachel Lubchansky: I think a lot of women struggle because, well, for a lot of reasons. First of all, we’re taught to be nice. We’re taught to be nice. And so as we’re trying to build our businesses, we’re really trying to figure out like, well, we’re applying sort of these narratives that we took with us from our earlier years into our business. And then we think about, okay, how are we then applying those ideas to our businesses?
So we’re taught to be nice. We have a fear of being judged. We potentially feel disconnected from ourselves, and, you know, specifically in this very loud and busy world. And I think when we then go into our businesses, it’s like, okay, well, how do we adapt to using our voices in different ways that we haven’t yet done in adulthood? And so there’s a whole process to doing it. And it’s really understandable when we look at what’s coming up for women, why they’re feeling stuck in this specific area. We could probably honestly talk about that for like an hour.
Jayne Havens: So let’s talk about that. I’ve heard you say “practice over perfection” when it comes to communicating in your business. What does that actually look like for somebody? How do we put this into play?
Rachel Lubchansky: Yeah, so first of all, I do want to just define what it means to find your voice. Because I think a lot of people hear that and they’re like, “What do you mean?” Like, it sounds like maybe those are just some buzz words that you’re throwing around.
I didn’t share this at the beginning of the show, but I actually trained to be a singer my entire childhood. I took voice lessons with the best vocal coaches in St. Louis, and my dream was always to be a Broadway singer. In my freshman year of college, I was in a master class, and I got what I call the worst case of imposter syndrome. It actually told me right there and then that I was done with singing, that there was no way I felt like I could compete with the other people that I was up against to get where I wanted to go. And so I gave up on my dream at 19 years old.
Fast forward, I always talk about how I actually ended up finding my voice through the process of business ownership, through becoming an entrepreneur. And so I think that building a business is one of the greatest personal development journeys that we can give ourselves. And it’s really a gift, because so many of us move through the world without doing this work.
So the practice of finding your voice is really just about figuring out how to communicate in a way that feels natural to who you are. This is like saying what you think and expressing what you believe and trusting yourself and letting your values and your perspectives sort of lead and also sharing your lived experience. I think a lot of times we don’t give enough value to all of that.
So back to your question, in terms of practice over perfection, it’s about getting out there and just doing the thing. And I think so often we’re scared to do that because of some of the things I mentioned earlier. But we get there by posting, by writing, by talking, by coaching, by repeating ourselves over and over again, and noticing what’s working, what’s landing, what’s not, and then iterating along the way. And for many of us, we’re seeking perfection.
Maybe for people who are coming into your program, who came out of a corporate life, maybe they were coming from a professional background that really rewarded perfection. But in this small business space, perfection is not what people are looking for. They’re looking for relatability. And so the process of practice over perfection really is exactly as it sounds. Just get out there and start practicing with the language. Start practicing using your voice and figuring out what feels natural, what doesn’t, and then make those adjustments.
Jayne Havens: Yeah, I agree with you so full heartedly. I regularly am having conversations with people who come out of my sleep consultant certification program, where they’re really anxious to land that first client. They really want to find the first family to support. And I am always trying to encourage them to just slow down, have really good conversations with people. Every single discovery call that you get onto, even if you don’t land that client, is such a valuable learning experience.
We all fumble through those calls for a few weeks, a few months before we really get a handle on how we want to show up, how we want to articulate our value, how we want to connect with the person on the other side of the phone. That is all a part of the process. And if you don’t take the time to really develop your language, then you’re just continuing to fumble and feeling frustrated.
Rachel Lubchansky: Absolutely. I think what’s amazing about a program like yours is you’re giving people probably templates and scripts, and you’re giving them a lot of language as a jumping off point. This is an opportunity.
Once they sort of see what the mechanics are and what the process is that a successful sleep consultant might follow to build her pipeline, then we get to go deeper, right? And then really make those scripts your own and really think about what have you learned along the way about the way that you are expressing this that actually works better for you. Once you start putting all this into play, you get so much more comfortable. But there’s no skipping that piece of it. There’s no just jumping over the learning curve. Everybody literally has to move through it.
Jayne Havens: Yeah, I do give my students a lot of — I wouldn’t say scripts, but I would say a lot of verbiage, a lot of language. I regularly teach them the way that I communicate. I’m always more than happy to share my language, share my communication strategies. But at the end of the day, I do think that my students or my grads who are most successful are those who have taken the time to use that as a jumping off point and then really develop their own way of communicating things. Because if you’re just going to show up like Jayne, then how can you be Julie, right? You really have to figure out how to show up in a way that resonates with you.
I think a lot of the people who are listening to this podcast know that in the past couple of years, I’ve really leaned heavily into parent coaching, not just sleep consulting. I have somebody who’s taught me a lot about how to support families as a parent coach. A lot of her verbiage, which is 10 out of 10, it’s brilliant. It just wasn’t coming out of my mouth in a way that felt great for me. And whenever she said it, I’m like, “That’s brilliant.” And then I would say it and I felt like an idiot.
And so I really needed — it took me probably a year, maybe longer, to sit with everything that I learned from her, but then really develop my own way of communicating in a way that felt truly authentic to my personality, to my coaching style, to my brand. You’re right. You literally cannot skip that part. If you try and skip it, then I think you’re always showing up as somebody else rather than truly committing to showing up as yourself.
Rachel Lubchansky: Absolutely. And it’s the process of integrating. Like integrating what you’re seeing in the market from other providers, integrating what you’re learning, but then connecting that with who you are and what your truth is. I think the more self-reflective you are and the more you know about just genuinely who you are, what your values are and what your beliefs are, and you look at the expertise that you’re bringing, and then you put all of that together, you start to realize that there’s nobody else who can replicate you.
That your voice, your expertise, you as a service provider in this space is needed. And it’s not going to sound like Julie next door. It’s not going to sound like you, Jayne. It’s going to sound like whoever you are, and that’s going to be the perfect way for your clients. And so you really want to figure out like how do you make that integration, and again, going back to practicing.
Jayne Havens: So I’ve heard you talk about building a voice bank. Can you explain what that is, and how does someone create their own voice bank?
Rachel Lubchansky: Sure. So a voice bank is really just a set of language that you’re creating, that you’re pulling from conversations that you’re having. So this is real language that’s coming from your audience that maybe you’re seeing on social media when they’re describing who they are, what they’re experiencing, what they’re looking for, or from client conversations that you’re having, or from prospects. And so this voice bank can be as simple as some sort of a notes app or a notebook, if you like pen and paper. You can give it a fun title. But really, what it’s about is capturing the language that you say and also capturing the language that your ideal client is utilizing to share where they’re at in their journey.
The more that we can utilize their language and then harness our own phrases and messages that we’re seeing and continue to repeat those over and over, like people who follow me know I always am talking about practice or progress over perfection all the time. So what are the things that you say all the time that are true to you?
And when you have this voice bank, it becomes so much easier to create content for your ideal client, to write your sales pages, to write your website, to speak on a podcast, to create something for social media, to create a webinar that’s going to solve some sort of a micro problem or take them to the next level in their own journey. And so this voice bank is invaluable. I refer back to mine all the time, and I’m constantly adding to it. So it’s huge by this point.
Jayne Havens: I just found another little nugget for my voice bank. The other day, I was speaking with a mentor of mine where we were talking about how sometimes I struggle with the idea that my clients are my peers. I feel like sometimes they would receive the coaching better if I was maybe half a generation older than them or even an entire generation older than them.
Because I don’t want them to feel judged by me as a peer, like I have it all together. My kids sleep fine. My kids have really good behavior. We have a harmonious home, and they’re feeling like they are underwater and gasping for air. I never want them to feel judged that I am sort of in the same season as them and sort of like excelling in the area where they’re really having a hard time.
And so, recently, I’ve just been sort of dropping in the line, “Well, my kids are older now. They’re 9 and 13.” So I’ve sort of separated myself from the parents who have kids who are ages 2 to 5. They’re in this season, and I’m in a different season. My kids are 9 and 13. And so I’ve really been able to find the language to separate myself, put myself like a quarter step generation ahead of them so that we’re not peers, we’re not in the same season, and I can speak to them with a level of authority and a level of confidence.
Like, I’ve been there. I see you, and you will get to the other side. And so it’s just like a little nugget that came up recently that I’ve really been using. And it’s really been helping me to feel confident that I’m not showing up as a peer giving them so much critique on how they’re showing up. I wanted to separate myself, and I finally figured out how to do that.
Rachel Lubchansky: That’s amazing. I think that’s such a great thing you brought up. And I think it also speaks to the concept that in businesses, I think a lot of times people who are newer as a sleep consultant or in business on their own, they feel like they have to be 1,000 steps ahead of their clients—and you don’t. You just have to be three to five steps ahead of your clients from where they are. And so I think this is a perfect example of like, I’m no longer in that stage that you’re at with a nine year old.
Now, Jayne, my kids are 17 years old. So I’m now at the next stage of parenting three teenagers. But this is such a good reminder for your listeners and for all the sleep consultants out there who are thinking, “Well, so and so has more experience,” or, “So and so maybe has more lived experience,” whatever it is. But at the end of the day, you just need to have the expertise to take your person, your ideal client, from where they are to the place that they want to be. You only need to be a few steps ahead to do that.
Jayne Havens: In addition to coming up with your language, there’s also this element of really needing to hone in on who you are, what makes you unique, and what is your why. Like, who are you in your business? Right? If you’re a sleep consultant and you’re on Instagram and there’s 1,000 other sleep consultants on your feed, how are you identifying yourself, or how are you sort of making yourself seem different? How do we separate ourselves from all the noise online? Do you have any thoughts on that?
Rachel Lubchansky: I do. I have a lot of thoughts. I want to talk about competition, and I want to talk about your why. Okay. So on competition, because I think one of the downsides to social media is it makes it really easy for us to look around and go, “Oh my gosh. There are 85 other sleep consultants showing up in my feed. Why would anybody need me to comment in this Facebook group or to say anything about sleep training your child?”
I think that the more you own what makes you and the more that you lean into your authentic voice and who you are and bring together all these elements of truth about yourself that we’ve been talking about in today’s episode, the more people see that. It’s going to come out in the stories you share. It’s going to come out in the parts of your life that you share on social media. It’s going to come out in the client examples that you share and in so many different ways.
And so it’s really important that when we’re looking around, like, thinking back to the Yellow Pages days, I don’t think anybody sat with the Yellow Pages and was like, “Oh my gosh. I’m going to become a sleep consultant.” But look, I went to the category section of the Yellow Pages and there are also 23 other sleep consultants in town. Who cares? Who cares? Because there’s only one you. And truly, your people are looking for you. So the more ‘you’ you can be, the more easily it’s going to be for them to find you.
The second thing I want to talk about is leveraging your why. Everybody’s why is going to be unique to who they are. It’s a very personal, individual thing. And so your voice gets a lot clearer when you stop trying to sound like an expert and you just lean into why you’re doing this work.
Ask yourself, like, why did you start this? Almost nobody I work with says, “Because I want to make this amount of money.”
Everybody who goes into this line of work is doing it because they had some sort of an experience. They want to pay it forward, or they want to share everything that they learned through their own troubles or challenges, or because they became passionate about it. Maybe it’s a teacher or a preschool teacher who then became passionate about helping other parents sleep train their children so that when their kids get to preschool, the napping is easier. Whatever it is, everybody has their own story. But what is it that lights that fire for you to jump out of bed in the morning, and why do you keep coming back to this work?
I often talk about two aspects of the why: the internal why and then the external why. That external why is kind of what I was just talking about. It’s like why do you want to do this work? What’s the impact you want to make through this work? The internal why might be something a little bit more personal. Like, I want to do this because I need the freedom and flexibility to be able to be around for my family. And so I wanted to build some sort of a career path for myself that enables me to work on my own time and terms, enables me to be around for my children, take them to doctor’s appointments, run their carpools, whatever it might be.
You can have these multiple layers to your why, but just anchoring into why you are doing this work and reminding yourself over and over. Because Jayne, you and I both know that when you get started in business, you’re not successful on day one. You’re not successful in terms of what your vision is on day 60 either. It takes getting out of bed every single morning and putting one foot in front of the other and continuing to learn and grow and adapt and iterate through all of that. You have to keep reminding yourself, okay, why am I doing this? This can be really hard. But you know what? I can do hard things, and here’s why I’m sticking with it.
Also, when you share this with other people, then they start to understand and internalize why you care so deeply about this work. Nobody wants to be sold to with the reasoning of, “Come buy my services because I’m hoping to bring in $10,000 this month to my business.”
Nobody cares about how much money you want to bring into your business or your family. What they care about is what their needs are. And so the more that we can connect our why to what it is that they’re seeking — but when I say that, it’s not that you’re adopting it or changing it. It’s about becoming magnetic because of it and finding those people that are attracted to you because of why you’re showing up and because of what you’re sharing.
Jayne Havens: Yeah, I think that’s brilliant. I have been sharing my story for 13 years now. Because my story goes back to when my son was born. And when I listen back, if I’m on a podcast or if I’m being interviewed for something, that’s usually the first question. It’s like, who are you? Tell me about you. How did you get into this work? And if I listen back to those episodes, I can literally almost word for word, I know exactly what I’m going to say. Because I have my story so nailed down that I know exactly the way that I communicate it, the way that I share my experience, the way that I exude passion in my work. The words always come out the same.
I think it’s so valuable to really hone in, nail down your verbiage, connect it. So when I think about my why, I got into this line of work for a couple of reasons. One, it was just really transformative to get my own baby sleeping through the night. It changed my life. It changed my household dynamic, and I wanted to share that with the world.
The other reason is I wanted to be present with my family. I didn’t want to go back to a nine to five. I wanted to have that freedom and flexibility that you talk about. And so, really, I took what I was good at, what I was passionate about, and I turned it into a business that fit the lifestyle that I wanted to build for myself. I think if you’re really thinking about those two things, the internal why and the external why—
Rachel Lubchansky: The internal and the external why.
Jayne Havens: Yeah, I think that’s exactly right. It’s really honing in on those two things and figuring out how you’re going to communicate with those who are watching, listening, observing, connecting with you, and how are they going to resonate with the message of why you’re so passionate about this work and why you’re so excited about it.
When I share my story about sleep training my son at four months old, I always say like he cried for 27 minutes. I cried for 27 minutes. That’s a part of my story. And that I think really resonates with parents. Because they’re like, “Oh, I’m going to cry for 27 minutes too, but I’m going to have support.” I didn’t have the support. I did it alone. These parents who I’m going to help, like just the fact that they know, okay, I’ve been through that, I cried for 27 minutes, I’m going to hold your hand if your baby is crying for 27 minutes. It’s a moment of connection.
Rachel Lubchansky: Absolutely. And that is what it’s all about — connection and building real relationships. And you know, when you think about your friend group, nobody likes the girl who is perfect or tries to be perfect all the time or has every little hair in place and walks around in high heels and red lipstick every single day. It’s not real. So the more real you can be, the more you can create a connection with other people, it’s really the name of the game.
Jayne Havens: This was an amazing conversation. I hope that everybody listening really has gotten a ton of value out of this conversation. If people want to learn more from you, where can they find you?
Rachel Lubchansky: Thanks. I’m on Instagram, LinkedIn, and Facebook. My last name is Lubchansky, so I’m @rachel.lubchansky. I assume you’re going to link it all in the show notes because it’s a whole mouthful for people.
Jayne Havens: No worries. I absolutely will do that.
Rachel, it was fantastic chatting with you today, and I really appreciate you being willing to share your zone of genius with my community.
Rachel Lubchansky: Thank you so much for having me. This was great.
Outro: Thank you so much for listening to this episode of the Becoming a Sleep Consultant Podcast. If you enjoyed today’s episode, it would mean so much to me if you would rate, review, and subscribe. When you rate, review, and subscribe, this helps the podcast reach a greater audience. I am so grateful for your support.
If you would like to learn more about how you can become a certified sleep consultant, head over to my Facebook Group, Becoming a Sleep Consultant or to my website thecpsm.com. Thanks so much, and I hope you will tune in for the next episode