Divas That Care Network
The #DivasThatCare movement is a dynamic force of positivity and progress. It's a collective of empowered women united by a shared vision: to pave the way for future generations. These women are not only breaking barriers—they’re also committed to equipping the next generation with the tools, resources, and confidence to lead with purpose.
By discovering and defining your purpose, you unlock the power to uplift those around you and contribute to a better world—every single day.
The Divas That Care Change Makers lead by example. They’ve walked the path, and now they’re using their voices to inspire others—one intentional day at a time.
Divas That Care Network
Empowered Living: Turning Dreams into Reality
What separates those who achieve their dreams from those who don't? According to Uchechi Asuikwe, it's not talent or luck—it's persistence and a willingness to start small.
Uchechi takes us through her remarkable journey from opening a wellness center during the 2008 recession to becoming an author, coach, TV host, and creator of the Dream Life Designer planner. Her story isn't one of overnight success, but rather of calculated evolution as her life circumstances and priorities changed. When motherhood made running a physical wellness center challenging, she didn't abandon her entrepreneurial spirit—she adapted it.
The cornerstone of Uchechi's philosophy is what she calls the "crawl, walk, run" approach. Too many aspiring entrepreneurs want to sprint before they've learned to stand, leading to frustration and burnout. Instead, Uchechi advocates for starting where you are, mastering each phase before moving to the next, and using the revenue from each stage to fund growth into the next. This approach allowed her to gradually build multiple income streams while maintaining balance in her personal life.
Perhaps most compelling is Uchechi's passion for sharing the struggles behind success stories. Through her TV show, she interviews accomplished individuals to reveal that everyone—even those who appear to have it all figured out—faced significant obstacles on their journey. She recounts the famous "three feet from gold" story, reminding us that breakthroughs often come right after our most challenging moments.
Ready to bridge the gap between where you are and where you want to be? Visit myempoweredliving.com to discover how Uchechi's coaching, books, and planners can help you create your own empowered life, one intentional step at a time.
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Speaker 2:Well, good morning divas, and welcome back to the Divas that Care Network. My name is Candice Gish and I am the host of this show. Well, ladies, we have an exciting show today. We had a couple of technical difficulties getting started today, but I'm excited and I know it's going to go really well. I'm excited, you know, for all of you that have just tuned in for the first time today.
Speaker 2:Our show has been going on for almost oh, we're going on almost eight years now, and we've had the opportunity to interview amazing women around the globe. We have our stories are about inspiration and empowerment. We have a lot of women that are entrepreneurs and authors and very creative and inspiring individuals, and I hope that you have a chance to check out some of their calls on our site at divasatcarecom. You know, we're just so excited. We love these amazing women and we're always so excited to have our brand new diva to our show. So we're going to be welcoming a brand new diva to our family, ladies.
Speaker 2:So make sure that after our show, you send this to your friends and family, because I know this lady is going to inspire all of you today. So welcome to our show, uchichi. I'm so excited to have you and I do apologize because I'm not going to say your name properly and I hope that you can pronounce your name so that all of our listeners will have it yeah, the last one is Uchechi, as we kibase is my name well, you know what we are excited and you know I do apologize, but you know I'm excited because you know you are an author, a speaker, a television host, so I want you just to spend a couple moments here.
Speaker 2:What I ask the ladies to do in our show is to tell spend about five minutes and tell us about yourself. We're so excited to welcome you to our family and we want to get to know as much about you as we can. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:So you know, one of my biggest thing I'm things. I'm a speaker, I'm a coach. I also have a show on my. It's my local TV station in my Durham region community, the region in Toronto, canada, and it's called Empowered Living in Durham Region, and I'm also the founder of my Empowered Living and I'm also the creator.
Speaker 3:I have a you you know my book I have is called from aspirations to fulfillment bridging the gap from where you are to where you want to be. And really that book was just born from the need of you know things that I see that I work with my clients on right and I wanted to share it because obviously in a book is more. It was a way for me to expand my reach, so, and also to be able to share my knowledge, my expertise and help people, um, you know, in a bigger way, because then they can pick up a book, it's less expensive for them to do and really to be able to get the knowledge that they have that can also help them. So, um, I have that as part of my book and um, I also um, in the past couple years also created there's a line of planners that I created called dreamlike designer planner, so it's really an extension of my work. So, you know, when I work with my clients, I'm really big on setting our goals, setting what we need to do. You know, really extracting the previous year, getting the lessons and really starting to set goals from a place that where you know that's intimate for you that you're going to be setting the right goals, because, as we know, we work towards certain goals and we want to ensure that it you that you're going to be setting the right goals, because, as we know, we work towards certain goals and we want to ensure that it's things that are in alignment to what it is that we want to create for ourselves. So I created a line of planners that helped with that and, as well, the weekly accountability and at the end of every month there's reflection questions. Really, that keeps them on track, because that's the biggest thing. I mean, we all write goals but we forget about them. I think you know people are listening now if I said to you what were your top goals in the beginning of the year? Um, some people may have to think about that right. So with this plan, I created it where it's on top of mind, you're rewriting it and, as we know, there's more of an impression of really rewriting your goals and also setting the intention, like every month they set an intention for the month and really to help put it out there. So my thing.
Speaker 3:So, when I just as a backtrack to how I really got into this industry years ago, probably back in 2008, my sister and I actually opened up a wellness center, so my first business was a 3000 square feet location. We had a fitness facility, therapy clinic, we had a spa, we had a yoga center, but we also opened in 2008. And that was the biggest recession that my generation has ever seen. So you know, there was a lot of when I had to really my personal development, really develop them. So, really, you know, I left a company that I was really a leader in to open up this wellness center. So it was really tough for the past, for the first couple years, and then we grew it and then we actually ended up selling the business Because I, when my sister and I first opened up the business, I didn't have any kids.
Speaker 3:I wasn't. You know, a few months later I met my now husband and so my needs changed right. I really longed to have something that was independent that was working from home, and a year or two later I got pregnant and so it was really hard working the wellness center. And then I also moved. Before I used to live like 10 minutes from my wellness center. I moved to a suburban area that's about 40 minutes away. So it was really hard to work, manage both and, like I said, I really got into my coaching certification. I got into where I really wanted to work from home and help other practitioners that I used to employ in my wellness center. So we did sell that wellness center and then that's when I really got into really working my coaching business.
Speaker 3:But at one time I was also went back to work full time.
Speaker 3:There was one time in my career where I still had the wellness center with my sister.
Speaker 3:I was working a full time career because, like I said, in 2008, it was really tough to get that wellness center going.
Speaker 3:And then I was building up my coaching practice because I knew that the full-time career was not something that was just a short-term gig for me, and so when we sold our wellness center and then I finally left the business, I was able to have a coaching practice that you know wasn't where it is now, but at least it was in the beginning stage. So it allowed me to have some money coming in that when I left my company full time and then when we sold the location, I was able to really invest that money into building my business even further. And that's when I got into putting on different group coaching program. I did some different online program and then really started to work, working one-on-one with my clients, to really and then write my book and invest in my planners to really grow my business in the way that it's actually grown to really help and impact as many people that I'm able to impact. Wow, well, you are definitely a busy diva.
Speaker 2:It's amazing to to hear that, because I understand the journey and how we evolve as individuals, and it's quite fascinating because I bet you, if you were to look back 10 years ago, you would never envision where you are today.
Speaker 2:But, I see that you know when I have to do that questionnaire, I find it quite fascinating because you heard about the secret and I heard about the secret, um, and I heard about the secret, and I think that's when I had that moment of. This is crazy, you know, I get it, I understood it, and I think that you probably got the same feeling as I did and I'm like this is amazing. You know, I love it when people have those moments, so I want you to talk a little bit about that because I find it quite fascinating.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so the first thing I read, like I was always like a searcher. I was always one like, even in my family, where just the positive thinking and knowing there's certain, you know, there was always that thing that call I've always wanted to do something, that I wanted to follow my heart and live with passion and really understanding that there's certain. I mean, I was an Oprah watcher for like years, right, so I loved it so much. But when I came across a secret, it felt like it was everything that I always have known and it was packaged. It was packaged up in this little thing called the secret.
Speaker 3:And so when I saw that, I felt like, oh my God, I am home, this is familiar. There was something inside of me that said, yes, this is the truth, right, um, but the challenge is, too, is where you know the secret. It's a movie, it's a book, it it. It had its limits because there was so much more. And then, but for me, I think for other people the secret was it and that was the end of it, and they're like they're trying to do it. But the secret actually became the beginning for me, because then I started researching the teachers, researching the concept and starting to see. You know, it's true, what they say, ask, believe, receive. But then what about the resistance that comes up? What about our subconscious programming that's kept us stuck? What about those patterns that keep us going up in our life? You know what the secret was? A great introduction no-transcript.
Speaker 2:You've got so many things on the go. I really love this. I love that you've got your book out there. I love that you're working in your planners for next year. Um, you're busy, obviously. You're a busy mom and wife and you know you've got a lot of things on your plate that you're doing, along with your television show. How, how, how can? When somebody is listening to the show today, they're probably like, oh my goodness, she is amazing, she's got this life. How can I even be a part of that? How can I be? How can I even live up to that? But our show is not about being the same as somebody else. But I want you to maybe step back.
Speaker 2:Is there some tips and tools and things that you can share with our ladies. How can they get started? How? How can they be inspired by you? And you know, start small and grow big oh yeah, and that's exactly.
Speaker 3:You just hit it there. And I always, when I work with my clients and even when I do workshops like there's a workshop that I do live that's called like multiple income creation, because I'm really big about building different networks, but it's all I would say crawl, walk, run. That is my model. I use for everything. I used it for myself and I mean anybody who has a small child. You know, if you start, if they started to run before they crawl or they walk, they would trip right. They would not be stable. So for me, and even when I you know, when I do my workshop and I show the different things that I do and things that I've created in my business, that has really helped sustain me where I'm such in a great place right now, you know I would show different years of when I created it, so it didn't just all happen now.
Speaker 3:The first year. You know, there was one time there's a year where it's tough, where I was transitioning in between certain things and I hadn't let things go and and that was a tough year. But I had that plan, where one was, you know, whether I sold my home-based business and I left my full-time job and I was focused on my business, but I was working with my coaching clients. And then you know what? I created one online program. And the one online program it was a business success bootcamp program where I ran it live, tweaked it, tested it out, then it became an online passive, you know, self-study program. Then there's a program that I wanted to create called my Money Miracles, which really was about utilizing law of attraction and going beyond it. You know a lot of the concepts that I show up in my book, right, and then I was able to, as the other one, I stabilized it. I added something else. What I find, sometimes too, when I work with a new client, is they have all these ideas and it's grandos and it's great. I always say we need to know the long-term goal, we need to know what that run stage looks like for you. But let's reverse engineering it, right. Let's start from where you're at, because when you're able to start from where you're at, it makes it um, it makes it less overwhelming, because we can say great, this is where you need to be. Okay's our crawl phase. What does crawl look like right now for you? It could be, you know what, doing a soft launch of a program, adding something in, and as you're creating one program, you can sort of plant the seed right. So to give you an example of what that looks like for me.
Speaker 3:So when I was creating my first couple programs, I was also in the back of my mind. I knew I wanted to write my book. So I started writing. You know I had a file where I'll put some information. I used Evernote. Whenever something came up where I thought would be a great chapter heading, I put that in there. But it wasn't something that I was jumping on right now. I knew that's going to be in the next year or two. So I sort of started to and I called it. That's, my planting the seeds, where I was at least doing some kind of thing, whether it's one hour a month on that, but at least there's something. And then I was focused on, okay, building the program and for me too, I focused on things that was going to bring me the most income. Right, because at this point when I left I had I didn't have when I first, I had my kids now to look after and obviously I have my husband but I did things, things where what can I leverage that would bring me the most income right now. And then still so I built and then so I created one, marketed it, grew it and then I started working on the other things.
Speaker 3:Adding that in my planners didn't really when I started it I did. The first one was um the 2017, but I only printed like maybe 40 and it was actually just as more as a thank you gift for my long-term client, and then people loved it. So then I'm like, oh, I'm going to mass produce it. So then for 2018, which was the first time I did it in a big way, but I tested it. I saw people wanting it, they want it so much, but I did small runs and I wasn't really making any money from it because it was more of a test and just really producing based on the demand. So then for 2018, I did it in a bigger way, where I produced a thousand.
Speaker 3:I went overseas, I got it hard copped Like it was hard cover, like it became in a big way right now and so. But there was big learning for me, for the planners, because then I didn't realize overseas how long it was going to take the price of coming from boat versus the plane. You know the manufacturer time, the sample time. So then you know, for 2019, I'm actually you know it's funny right now I just was on email with my manufacturer or my printing company just this morning because now I've worked five months ahead from what I did last year, because last year, when I got 2018, it didn't hit my location till November, which then I missed a lot of key selling season, right?
Speaker 3:So two things is where you crawl, walk, run. How do you reverse, engineering it from your big dreams. Going backwards Okay, this is where you're starting from. Where do you need to go? And understanding that it doesn't need to be perfect, it just needs to be shared. This is a thing that one of them there's somebody that I followed that used to say that all the time, and even when I looked at my first planner, oh my God, like I it was. It wasn't even hardcover, there was plastic thing over it. But you know what I just started? I would get feedback. I would know, okay, what's the next step, how can I get better?
Speaker 3:And the challenge most people have when they see, you know, they hear me doing certain things, I'm like, okay, I want to do that. I'm like, okay, well, right now I can invest X amount because I'm printing 1,000. You don't have that investment right now. You don't have that resource. What can you do right now? Go through the path, because those paths, the crawl, will give you enough money to invest in the walk stage, and the income, the revenues you'll get in that walk stage will help you invest even bigger into the run stage. And then you just keep going right. So don't be afraid of it, making things perfect, because if you wait until it's you feel perfect, it's never gonna happen, right. So crawl, walk, run and just start, perfected along the way. And even that, there's no such thing as perfection. You know there's always going to be room for improvement, but but don't let that hold you back.
Speaker 2:Oh, I love it, and isn't that the truth? And thank you so much for sharing that, because I think that people want to get to Zed before they've started.
Speaker 3:They've gotten to C and.
Speaker 2:D and you know. I always tell people over the years that we don't get to the stage overnight. It takes years.
Speaker 3:No, there's no such thing as an overnight stage?
Speaker 2:No, so I love that. I love the crawl, the walk and the run, and that's something that I'm going to definitely post on our Facebook pages and our groups, ladies, because you know what I love hearing that. I love the inspiration that you have, the love, the passion in your voice, because I think it's really important to bring that across to the individuals that you're talking to, and you know I know our listeners, they'll really appreciate that. So I want to thank you right there for, you know, sharing that aspect of your life with us today.
Speaker 3:Thank you.
Speaker 2:So okay. So one thing that I have a question for tell us about your show, your television show. I think it's great. Is this something that you know that our listeners can watch online? Do they have to tune into a channel? I know we do have listeners actually in the United States, canada, australia and the UK right now, so if they're listening right now to us, can they tune into you?
Speaker 3:It's only available in my local station. It's called Durham Region. It's only available in my local station. It's called Durham Region and it's sort of east of Toronto and right now we're not any more, we don't do more production, but it's just they've been showing the old reruns on and on, but it's where, like yeah, so you can watch it online, but you have there's a telecom company called Rogers in Canada and only if you have a Rogers account you may be able to get it online. But majority of it is just if you live in Durham region, which is like an area if you're in a GTA, from Pinkerton all the way to Clarington, like Bowmanville area, and if you go on channel 10 and then you put on channel 10, there's different. They show it all in different times mornings and nights. I think they just rotate the time.
Speaker 3:But really the show was brought about where because to me, when I work with people and people show me I the show was brought about is to show the um, the audience, the fact that people that they see that are doing great things are no different from them. So I feature a lot of prominent people in our community because it's a Durham region community in the greater Toronto area and it's just featuring them and showing their stories and how they overcome their struggles. Because I always find we see, or even people now are like just a question that you asked, are hearing us talk and seeing, and people will read my bio or go on my Facebook page. I'm like, oh, my gosh, you gosh, you're doing all this stuff. And it's like I am just like you and all it took was the fact that I made a decision to say you know what I'm? It was just a decision. I'm going to decide to just go forward and also to show people.
Speaker 3:For example, there is this one guy and a lot of people probably listen, even in the States. There's a big. A lot of people probably listen, even in the States there's a big. There's a popular show in the Home and Garden Network and it's like when there's a guy, paul LaFrance, he does a lot of deck like he does like amazing deck, but the show could be seen in Canada and in the States. So he lives in our community and so I had interviewed him. He was probably the last or the second last one that I had interviewed and it's hearing, and I was shocked to hear the stories how at one time in his journey he was like from $40,000 to $60,000 to like, I think, like $150,000 or almost $200,000 in debt, right, but we all see him and like, oh, he's on the TV and his show is like international, like people know him from all over the world Not seeing the journey. And I'm thinking to myself, half of us, you know, even at the 60 or 150 or 200, we're like you know to see that. And I remember asking him. You know we talked about that and a lot of people didn't know that about him, right, and so we see all these people and we think their life is perfect and their journey was perfect. So it was really important for me to highlight the struggle you're going through right now. They went through the same thing and even more. They have even greater struggles and the only thing was where it was their faith, it was their commitment and their goal and their passion and the fact that didn't give up. They just kept going, and so it was really important for me to highlight that, because that's the biggest thing we all have desires. But it's that commitment, is that faith, and there's certain tools and techniques people can use. But it's like, just keep going and don't give up, right, it's.
Speaker 3:There's that story I love from um, from think and grow rich, where it talks about three feet from gold, where I think it was in the beginning of the book, where that guy like I think you know, back in the day, where people went digging for gold and they were told there was gold found in this place and the man he had all his fancy equipment that he bought he's digging, digging, digging, you know, he couldn't find it. He couldn't find it and then eventually he was so frustrated he gave up. He's like there's no gold here and then he, like you know, sold it for half the his equipment to some guy who he's like yeah, let me, you know, buy it and I'm going to try it. And the guy was third to dig. Only three feet from where that man left off was the gold right.
Speaker 3:And sometimes the truth is right. Before a breakthrough, right before the big miracles and I've seen this in my life and I get it Like, when you're living it, you're just like I just can't Been there, done that, trust me. But oftentimes, in the midst of that struggle, that your miracle, the breakthrough is about to happen and it's just a matter of us being focused in our goal and not giving up before you know it's not stopping three feet from gold right.
Speaker 2:You know what it is right it is right. All right. Well, one last thing I'm going to ask you how can our ladies get a hold of you? I know that you said that you work with individuals. Do you work with people online and they do webinars with you, and can they work with you over that? And if so, how can they get a hold of you?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean I work with people all over the world. I have clients from Israel, sweden, everywhere, and, of course, a lot from Canada. But yeah, my website is myempoweredlivingcom, so M-Y-E-M-P-O-W-E-R-E-D-L-I-V-I-N-G and I'm also on Facebook. I have my Facebook page. It's under my name, uchechi Svekevase Not that you can people know how to follow that, but yeah, my, you know I have my Facebook page. It has a ton, like my website will have a ton of information about my stuff, what I do. I'm actually launching another website soon for my, because I have another I work with. Half my clients are product-based business owners, so really helping them get their product to market, get their product sold into stores, and how to leverage Amazon to really expand their sales. So that actually is going to be under Bozzarike B-O-Z-Z-U-R-I-K-E dot com. Yeah, but I mean through my website you can. I have, oops, I have a place where you can sign up for my email newsletter on my website as well.
Speaker 2:That is fantastic. And to all the ladies listening today the divas listening we are going to be posting that on our Facebook page and we're also going to be posting it on our website and on the Changemakers Cafe. So for all of you that are in the Changemakers Cafe, we will be posting it in there too. And you know what I want to take this moment to really thank you for being a guest today. It was a pleasure to have you. Thank you so much for taking the time today.
Speaker 3:Thank you. It was great being on. Thank you so much for the opportunity.
Speaker 2:It was fun and you know what. I hope that if you've got another program coming out and your next book or anything like that, we would love to have you back on it as a guest.
Speaker 3:Sounds good. Yeah, the next book is definitely being worked on in the back half of this year, so for sure.
Speaker 2:Oh, fantastic. And thank you to all of our listeners today. We appreciate each and every one of you. You are amazing. A lot of you listeners have been with us from the beginning, and you know. I just want to take this moment to really thank you and to let you know how grateful we are to you. You know, make sure that you check out our other hosts. We do now have eight hosts in the Divas that Care network, so make sure that you check them out, listen to their amazing shows and make sure that you take this show because all of our shows are recorded and pass it on to your friends and family, and you'll be able to see that at wwwdivasthatcarecom. So until next time, ladies, thank you so much and take care. Bye-bye, everybody, bye.
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