What If Your Differences Are The Advantage

Come and listen to our Host, Tina Spoletini, as she chats with today's guest, Belinda Sandor, for our “Unapologetically Unique” Podcast Series.

This mini-series serves to distill success into its truest form—standing firmly in your own identity. We are moving beyond the comparison game to help you lead with unapologetic confidence. By anchoring your habits in self-belief rather than outside expectations, you’ll shift from chasing temporary inspiration to becoming a changemaker with lasting, year-long momentum. 

Belinda Sandor is the founder of The VA Connection, a community of more than 60,000 Virtual Assistants across 47 countries, and VA School, where she teaches women to build profitable Virtual Assistant businesses from home.

She started her own VA business, RocketGirl Solutions, in 2010 and spent the next decade billing more than 20,000 hours and earning over a million dollars serving clients. 

In 2019, she began teaching others how to build a successful Virtual Assistant business.

Her signature message, Live Your Best Life as a Virtual Assistant™, is a promise she's lived out herself. Today she runs her business from a farm in rural Virginia, where she lives with her husband Greg, tends an orchard, and keeps chickens between coaching sessions.

https://www.instagram.com/thevirtualassistantconnection/

https://www.facebook.com/groups/thevaconnection

We talk with Belinda Sandor about being unapologetically unique and making decisions that protect joy, honesty, and self-trust. We dig into comparison, ADHD management, and why confidence grows after courage and action, not after perfection.

• using “will this make me mad later” as a regret filter
• choosing joy instead of people pleasing
• reframing ADHD as an asset you can manage
• picking one priority to get back on track
• avoiding comparison and writing in your true voice
• defining success away from status and external pressure
• holding on to personal power and giving yourself permission
• building confidence through action and repetition

If anything in today’s episode stirred something in you I want you to sit with that gently not to rush into fixing or changing but just to notice what feels true to you
You can find all the details in the show notes if you feel called to explore that

For more Divas That Care Network Episodes visit www.divasthatcare.com

Transcript

Divas That Care Opening

SPEAKER_00 0:00

It's Divas the Care Radio. Stories, strategies, and ideas to inspire positive change. Welcome to Divas That Care, a network of women committed to making our world a better place for everyone. This is a global movement for women, by women engaged in a collaborative effort to create a better world for future generations. To find out more about the movement, visit divas that care.com after the show. Right now, though, stay tuned for another jolt of inspiration.

SPEAKER_02 0:31

Welcome back to Confidence in Bloom, the space where we explore what it really means to come home to yourself and build a life that feels aligned, expansive, and fully your own. Today's theme, Unapologetically Unique, is a celebration of authenticity, individuality, and the kind of confidence that doesn't ask for permission. We're joined by someone who has very much lived this message, Belinda Sandor. Belinda is the founder of the VA Connection, a global community of over 60,000 virtual assistants across 47 countries and VA school, where she teaches women how to build profitable VA businesses from home. She started her own VA business, Rocket Girl Solutions, back in 2010. And over the next decade, she built a million-dollar business while serving clients and logging more than 20,000 hours of work. Today she runs her business from a farm in rural Virginia, balancing coaching, orchard life, and chickens in between. What I love about her story is that it's not just about success, it's about doing it in a way that feels true to her. And that's exactly what we're diving into today. What it looks like to stop fitting in and start fully owning who you are. Welcome, Glinda. Thank you. It's great to be here. Yes, thank you. So we're gonna start with our theme, unapologetically unique. I'm interested to know what that means to you in this season of your life.

SPEAKER_01 2:05

Ah, that's really a great question. So um authenticity. It means being authentically yourself. And that can mean a lot of different things. But one of the rules that I have for myself that helps me um to stay authentic is I I put everything through the question, is this going to make me mad? So I I make sure that I'm not saying yes to things because I'm people pleasing, uh, but that I authentically truly want to um to do whatever it is. And then the other thing that is really important to me about that is going inside myself when I'm speaking to someone, when I'm coaching, when I'm writing a newsletter, and really asking myself, is that what your heart wants to say? Right.

SPEAKER_02 2:53

So those are two very different questions, right? Is this what your heart really wants to say? And or is this going to make me mad? What would make you come up with that question? Because I've never heard that before.

SPEAKER_01 3:07

Really? Okay, so um, well, here you go. So I have something that I think about I in terms of regrets. So I don't want to have regrets. So if someone says, Will you go to the movies with me? And I say yes because I want to please them, but what I really want to do is stay home and bake cookies with my daughter, that would make me mad. So I would have a regret. So I think about, so it's not always um doing the easy thing, it's doing the authentic thing with the with the outcome in mind. So here's another example. Um, several years ago, my stepsons all wanted to go to the car show in New York City. We used to live a 50-minute train ride from New York, and I did not want to go. I was like, you should go. I don't need to go. And then I thought before I spoke, I thought, you know what? I want to have the experience of going with them to the car show. So I'm going to do it and I'm not going to be mad about it. I'm going to joyfully go.

SPEAKER_02 4:09

So it's, it's, it's, I guess it's more about choosing joy in my decisions and testing it against um decide, you know, against will that make me mad at, you know, when when I mad might not be something that everyone can relate with, but um, is there joy in it for me, right? Or where can I find the joy would resonate with most people. So yeah, so thank you for clarifying that because I've never heard anyone ask that question. Because not everything would make me mad, right? But there's lots of things that I don't want to do, right? Because there is no joy for me.

SPEAKER_01 4:47

Right, right, exactly, exactly. It's mostly around things like, you know, and and also being clear about it. So maybe that's a weird way to put it, make me mad, but that's just how I think about it in my head. Like if I if I were to, um, okay, here's another example. My daughter keeps her car really messy. It's just a feature of her. She's an equestrian, she's always got boots and stuff. And I and I know that. And so my husband and I helped her buy a car. And the question was when I see the car and there's cow manure in the back of it, is it gonna make me mad, or can I joyfully give her the car? So it's just sort of like an internal test. And I decided I could handle it, I could manage myself, and I could joyfully give her the car and not get triggered by the thing that would be my first thought. Right.

Turning 50 And Owning ADHD

SPEAKER_02 5:33

Yeah, that that resonates with me for sure. Right? Yeah, for sure. Because I don't like to see a mess. And if I'm gonna give you something that is a high-ticket item, I want to see that you're keeping it the way I would. That that's my view. Even though, like I get that, you know, if I'm buying you a car, it's your car. I have no responsibility for it, so you get to look after. Yeah, I totally get that. So when you look back at your journey, Belinda, when did you first realize that your differences weren't something to fix, but maybe something to build on?

SPEAKER_01 6:07

I am still learning that. Um, I am still learning that. Um, you know, I I think it really happened for me when I turned 50. So it was, you know, this epic moment in my life where I have a nine-year-old, I guess I was 49, um, uh a nine-year-old. Um, I'm in a marriage that is very unhappy. Um, I have a business that's failed. It's like the perfect storm. I have six figures of debt. I've got, you know, seven years of back taxes. It's was just this moment where I realized that pleasing everyone else and and and and doing doing things irregardless of how I felt wasn't working. And so that's when my differences stopped mattering. And I started getting really clear on, and that's probably where is this gonna make me mad comes from, but um, you know, getting really clear on my unique differences. Like, for example, I have ADHD, and a lot of people could think having ADHD is um, you know, puts you at a at a deficit in some way. And for me, I choose to look at it like my brain is a very exciting place, and I have lots of options all the time, and even kind of feel bad for people who don't have all that excitement in their brain, but I just have to learn how to manage it. So, really embracing the things about me that are different or could be a barrier and seeing how I can make them work for me.

One Priority And Self Talk

SPEAKER_02 7:36

I love that. I love that. And I think, I mean, we live in an age where everyone is struggling with that, right? Like we all seem to have squirrel brain. And I mean, obviously, with a diagnosis of ADHD, you know, it it's probably a lot high more heightened than most of us, right? You know, but we have to learn how to handle that, right? I mean, that's what it comes down to is how do I organize my thoughts? How do I plan my days, you know, around all the thoughts that I have and all the thoughts that are going to be because I mean we have how many? Like, I don't know, it's a crazy amount of like thoughts per minute, never mind per day. So we don't know what's what what the day is gonna look like because if we give into our thoughts, and we all are guilty of this to some degree, right? If we give into the thoughts that come into our mind while we're at a task, it changes the whole um end of day. Am I right?

SPEAKER_01 8:35

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. And so that's what I just actually finished a session with some of my students just a couple minutes ago, and we were talking about that. It was the session was about how to get back on track when you've, you know, fallen out, fallen off. And, you know, I I think the thing and and what I do every day with varying degrees of success is to pick one thing that's going to be the most important thing for the day. And I actively talk to myself and reassure myself, yep, this is a good use of your time. Yes, this is what you should be doing. And I have hundreds of ideas, a million projects that I want to do. But what I say to myself is you're going to be focusing on this project until X day when you will be finished according to your plan. And then you can go do whatever you want. Um, and so I that's how I hold myself accountable by not having it be something that's going on and on and on and on, but saying, okay, this project will end on this date. And so so my brain can relax and stop thinking about all the things that I've said no to in order to make this happen so I can say yes to that.

SPEAKER_02 9:43

I love that. That's it's it's bringing me back to motherhood, right? Like, you know, your kids want to get so many things done at one time, and you're like, okay, slow down, right? We can only do one thing at a time. So what is priority? What has to be done right now? Yeah, I love that. And it's funny, like I've heard that that term is we have to reparent ourselves, right, as we go through change, right? I don't call it that, but I mean, really, that's kind of what it comes down to, right?

SPEAKER_01 10:12

Yeah. Yeah, I think of it as soothing myself or settling down, you know, like how I need to settle down, need to settle down. And sometimes that means turning the music on, sometimes it means turning the music off, sometimes it means going to get the mail, you know, but just something so I can settle down and get back into the groove of what I want to accomplish. Because we all feel so good when we've accomplished something. And uh, but it's hard to do when we're doing more than one thing at a time.

SPEAKER_02 10:37

Yeah, and and I think we that that sense of accomplishment comes greater when it's something that we're really focusing on, right? Like when you have a project at hand and you're like, I'm gonna get this done today, and you don't allow that outer chatter and that those interruptions come in, right? I think we feel more accomplished, we feel more successful because it's like not only did I get the work done, I didn't allow all the other stuff to interrupt.

SPEAKER_01 11:04

Yeah. That's right. Yeah, because we're really in charge of that. You know, we're so for some people, if a tree fell in my front yard right now, they would stop everything they're doing and they would go cut the tree down. I would not do that. I would decide when the tree cutting down is going, you know, going to happen. Um, and it's tricky because I'm married to someone who would have the chainsaw out before the tree actually hit the ground. You know, right? He's very like um spontaneous and awesome and um has a lot of energy. But I would have to say to myself, no, no, no, no, no, we're not doing that right now. We are finishing this, and then we'll go do that. Um, but it is a lot of um, a lot of keeping myself in my lane. And maybe uh, you know, it's because I just love that feeling of accomplishment so much that that I'm willing to do it. But we do have to manage around other people too.

Comparison Spirals And Mimicking Online

SPEAKER_02 11:58

Yeah, yeah, exactly. So now this kind of leads into my next question for you is you know, women, I mean, in general, like there are many women who are struggling right now with that comparison, especially in like the online business space, right? And you'll know this. How did you learn to stay grounded in that lane? I mean, other than like what you already spoke about, right? And telling yourself this is what I'm focusing on. What else did you do that could help?

SPEAKER_01 12:28

Help stop with comparison? Yeah. Well, so usually how I learn a lesson is I do it like the way that's painful for a very long time. And I realize. So I had a um before I became a virtual assistant, I had a business called Blueberry Babies and it was an online baby gift boutique. And I used to sit up at night drinking wine, looking at the competition and feeling bad. And what the result ultimately was was that she is still in business. I had six figures of debt, and I didn't allow myself to trust myself to have act on any of my ideas because I just kept trying to chase hers. And the the result, I mean, it was huge. You know, the business failed and I had to start over. And um, and I'm I'm glad I'm doing what I'm doing now versus that, but I just saw the the huge consequence to it. And it's it's hard, especially with all the social media, not to fall into it. You know, there are people out, many people out in the world doing the same type of work that I do, and I see it on my feed. I, you know, I get some of their emails, and it's it's really takes a very um uh it takes a lot of strength to not look and to not um and not not to not compare. And because what happens is we just go into um mimicking them, you know, and that happens to me from time to time. In fact, this morning I was writing an email that was really important and and I I thought about was I writing, was I writing what I thought I was supposed to write, or was I really telling the truth? And and um I rewrote it. And in this day of AI, it's so easy just to put it into Claude or chat and say, oh yeah, that sounds really good. But does it sound like you? I mean, it gets back to the authentic question that you were asking. And when we're comparing ourselves to others, which is human nature, it just never goes well. Because we're either putting ourselves down or we're putting them down to feel better ourselves. Like there's never a like, oh yeah, look at us, we're both killing it. Like that's not what we did.

Redefining Success Away From Status

SPEAKER_02 14:31

Right, exactly. Or we're allowing the imposter syndrome to come in, right? Like, oh, I want to be just like her, and so now you start, you know, mimicking, like you said, the things that she's doing that's working for her, but it doesn't feel true to you, right? And it's not gonna look to the to the people that are watching you, it's not even gonna look like you because they're like, Well, what is she doing now? Right, right. But that wasn't who she was yesterday. Why is she like that today? Yeah, yeah. Now you've built many businesses, right? As you were saying, um, and living like an intentional lifestyle on your farm, I which okay, I'm not a farm person. I don't like I don't like the outdoors, to be honest. But you know, being around animals and all that stuff kind of is not my thing. But I I'm interested to know, like, kind of what helped you define success on your own terms instead of adopting someone else's version, which is like what we just talked about.

SPEAKER_01 15:29

Yeah, yeah. Well, you know, I did really try to adopt. So I grew up, I grew up in a lot of different places. My dad worked for IBM and we moved every three to five years. And part of that is that everywhere you move to, you know, the girls are dressing differently and they're acting differently, and you know, and some are in the band and some are Girl Scouts, and you know, and and every time you move, there there was this recalibration of myself of like what's cool and what do I need to do? And and I never solved that, you know, I I never solved that. So I I continued to to go on with it. But the the so we're gonna have to edit here because I can't remember the question. Sorry, what was the question again?

SPEAKER_02 16:09

Oh no, it's all good. What helped you define success on your terms instead of adopting someone else's? Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 16:16

So after years of of changing myself and being really like a chameleon, um, I I just I just really realized that I not only was I not making myself happy, I was actually not making the people I was trying to please happy either. And something just you know clicked in me. And moving to the town that I'm in now, I am in a very rural town. And and my whole life I grew up, you know, a train ride from Chicago, from New York, from DC, where my dad worked. And so there was very status-driven, you know, what kind of car, what kind of scarf are you wearing, what kind of this and what kind of that? And I have gotten so far away from that now. And it's such a gift to not feel that social pressure or climbing the ladder. The people around me are just not doing that here. Um, and it the conversations really are more about chickens and neighbors bringing you cookies they baked, and it's just refreshing. It's like going back in time. Um, but it was a big deal, and a lot of people thought I was crazy to, you know, move kind of off the grid. But my husband and I both feel like that this is where we belong, and we're enjoying all the projects. We bought a fixer upper, an 1880s fixer upper, and everything needs to be, you know, the lath and plaster needs to be removed, and bathrooms need to be updated, and and barns need to be resited. And it's just an and it's endless projects that I seem to have boundless energy for. Wow.

SPEAKER_02 17:51

So I applaud you because I'm we're about to paint our house and I'm dreading it, and we're just painting, right? Like, I know we have to move things, I mean, have to clean things, but I'm like, oh, just the mess, the idea of the mess. So renovations of any kind do not interest me. So good for you, right? But it also leads us, leads me to like it's it's a belief in ourselves too, right? Like, like you said, when we you are moving around from city to city, you're trying to fit in. You're not pleasing the people you're trying to fit in with, but you're not pleasing yourself, right? And it takes it takes us into like well into our adulthood before we realize that what am I doing? Who am I trying to be because this isn't feeling right? Right. Right. Why am I doing this for everyone else? They don't care, right? They don't, they really don't care. I mean, sure, you know, there's those people that, oh, you don't dress the way I like or you don't act the way I like. Yeah, but that's true, right? But truthfully, the true people that are in your life, they care about you because of who you truly are.

SPEAKER_01 19:01

Right. Right? Right, right. And so it's important not to try to win popularity contests. I mean, the people who are close to me is a small number, it's a very small number, and I'm okay with that, you know. Um, but when you're growing up and you're in high school and college, you want to be popular and you know, all the things. And then, you know, for me, I just got on the on the ladder, right out, you know, out of the gate, living in a um a town where status was really important. And, you know, it was where you bought your clothes and what kind of coach you had. And and also that was the 80s, you know, everyone was like Burberry raincoats and Mont Blanc pens and your coach briefcase and all of that nonsense, you know, that we were killing ourselves for, you know, to have and to feel um, you know, maybe it was imposter syndrome back then too, probably, you know, to fit the part of the life you're supposed to live based on where how you were raised, you know. And now I it what's hysterical about the whole thing is that my um mother grew up, my grandfather owned a gas station, they had a farm, they had chickens, my grandmother would go out literally and kill a chicken and cook it. And it was very dirt road, you know, and we moved so far beyond that. But who I truly am is connected to that in some way because that's what I'm choosing as an adult. So um your roots are in you, right?

SPEAKER_02 20:20

Like, I mean, they're still your roots, yeah. Yeah, I totally get that. I totally and I I actually see that in my in my own children, right? Like I see, you know, um a lot of like family that I have that have passed on, but I see a lot of their characteristics and personality traits in my kids who they've never even met, right? And I I always look at them in awe and I think it's amazing how the genetics work.

SPEAKER_01 20:47

Yeah, right. Yeah, and we have to let it through though. I mean, that's that's the thing because for 23 years I lived in the third uh floor of a Victorian brownstone in downtown Boston, you know, and that's a really very different lifestyle. Um, and my husband was teasing me just the other day, he's like, well, so when you were living in Boston, you know, and buying your groceries and carrying them home, you know, in a cart because there, you know, you didn't want to drive in the city, did you ever think you would be living on a farm with 20, you know, 21 acres and 24 chickens? I'm like, no, no, but but doing so, like nothing, nothing has felt more like an exhale than this.

Keeping Your Personal Power

SPEAKER_02 21:28

That I love that for you. I really do. I think when you come home to yourself and you're in the world that you know you belong in, you can't, there's no more joy, right? Like there's no no better joy.

SPEAKER_01 21:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 21:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 21:44

But to have that, I think at the core of it, we have to hold on to our personal power. You know, I think we give it away all day long. We give it away when someone asks us to do something we don't want to, or and and we can't reconcile it, and we do it anyway, but really. getting clearer because I know a lot of people in business they struggle they struggle to tell people about their work they struggle to you know to to um well I never have sold anything in my business it's really more about letting people know what I'm offering and if they want to come great let's do it um but you know people get all in their head about what being a business owner is instead of just realizing how much power you have in yourself if you allow it you know it's really about allowing the power and uh not giving it away yeah that is so key right allowing yourself giving yourself permission yeah yeah to not care what other people think and that doesn't mean I do things to hurt other people but I don't make decisions strictly based on other people's wishes and I did that for the majority of my life.

SPEAKER_02 22:50

Yeah yeah I really love that so for someone who's listening who feels like maybe they're too different or not quite fitting that mold what would you want them to hear today that is a really good question because I have felt that way pretty much all of my life and I still do but the difference is now I'm not trying to fit in I'm seeing how I can help people in different ways because I'm different because if I was like everyone else I'm not sure I would have the impact that I can have by bringing my different point of view into different conversations. Yeah yeah and then the only the only people we can help that are the same as us right the way is they have to fall like you either have to do it together or you can't do it right if you if you're the same as me.

Courage First Then Confidence

Where To Find Belinda

SPEAKER_01 23:44

Yeah I love that I love that is there anything else that you might want to share with our listeners today on this I I would say I would say as a woman in her 60s um who who's had a really varied path I I would say that everything that I've done in my life has led me here and even though there are times in my in my past where I might have had regrets or thought why did you do that it's all brought me here. And I think if we can be kind to ourselves and accepting of the twists and turns that we make in our life and understand now like I said from my 60s looking back I see the benefit of all of it where in my 20s definitely my 30s and my 40s and even in my 50s like I couldn't really see that because I was so bound to a specific path that that society family whoever was telling me that I had to be on if I was going to be deemed successful. And now I see that um success is enjoying what you do being able to to um have the experiences that you want and be with the people who are important to you. Yeah yeah well and you know it's so this conversation is really truly powerful because you know I mean I talk a lot about confidence and you know more and more I'm learning confidence doesn't happen or it doesn't come from becoming more like everyone else it really comes from allowing yourself to become more of who you already are and who you want to be yes and I think for me I think the primary way people get more confidence is getting into action because if you think about like riding a bike which is a good example because it's so silly you can't read a book about riding a bike and think about what riding a bike would be like and and really you know intellectualize bike riding you have to get on there and have someone hold the seat and you have to fall off you know and and and then know that you can get back up and eventually no one's holding the seat and you're going. But I think a lot of times we and so that's what builds the confidence you know the at the actually doing and so I think that the confidence comes after I think courage comes first courage action and then confidence.

Closing Reflection And Support

SPEAKER_02 26:10

Yes I totally totally agree yeah thank you for adding that um is there uh maybe let our listeners know um blinda what how they can get in touch with you absolutely so there's a few different ways one is you can go to my website thevaconnection.com scroll down to the bottom of the page and add yourself to my newsletter list I send an email newsletter out every Monday um telling you about events that I'm having and also I spend a couple of hours every Sunday just thinking about what's important in my industry what's important to me and writing about it so that's a a nice way for us to stay in touch also Instagram um my handle is the the virtual assistant connection I'd love to have you follow me there and keep in touch and you can send me um DMs or um uh or email at belinda at thevaconnection.com perfect perfect thank you thank you so much for joining me today this really was a great conversation I always like talking about you know um the changes that we go through in our lives right and when we can go back to our teenage years you know I mean I know not everyone enjoys their you know when they think back of their teenage years and they think oh my god high school was terrible but but it it show it really shows who we are today and all the stuff that our journey brought us through right and so I I love doing that with us yeah thank you so much my pleasure thanks for having me if anything in today's episode stirred something in you I want you to sit with that gently not to rush into fixing or changing but just to notice what feels true to you. And if you're in a season where you're rebuilding your confidence your clarity or your sense of direction that's exactly the work I support women with inside my coaching space. We don't rush the becoming we unfold it step by step in a way that actually feels sustainable and aligned. You can find all the details in the show notes if you feel called to explore that. Until next time stay rooted in who you are because that's exactly where your power lives for listening this show was brought to you by Divas That Care.

SPEAKER_00 28:24

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