Kristen (00:00.598)
Okay, first of all, I am so excited to be back. Second of all, I know the audio quality may not be the best that I've had on this show in the past. Since August of 2022, when I last created an episode for this podcast, I have since gotten a new laptop and because it's a Mac, has USB-C, not USB. So my microphone doesn't plug into USB-C and I tried to do an adapter and it didn't work.
I'm in a bit of a transition stage where I'm trying to figure out audio quality. So please have some grace for these first couple of episodes. Now that the podcast is back. Second of all, I am now committing to doing video podcasts. So if you prefer to watch your podcasts, I've linked the YouTube link for the video version of this podcast below in the show notes. So if you would rather watch this, go to YouTube.
I also linked my YouTube channel there if you want to subscribe to my channel. yeah, okay, anyway, I don't want to give away too much of what I'm going to tell you in this episode, but I did just want to give that little audio disclaimer. All right, see you in the episode.
Kristen (01:25.454)
Oh my gosh. Okay, I am freaking out because it is January 15th, 2025. And the last time I recorded a podcast episode was, let's see exactly what it was. Let me pull it up here on my podcasting app. August 25th, 2022. So it's been two, two and a half plus years. It's been close to three years since I've recorded.
podcast journey. Actually, I can't do math. It's been about two and a half years since I recorded a podcast episode for the Soul Expansion podcast. So much has changed in these two and a half years. And I think it's really interesting that my last episode was stop judging the journey. And I haven't listened. I haven't re listened to that episode since I posted it. So maybe I'll re listen to it before the next episode that I record for you. But essentially, after that moment, I stopped judging the journey. And what unfolded over the next two and a half years was
at first really horrible and not what I wanted to necessarily go through, but it's exactly what I needed to go through to get to where I am now, which is 2024. So we're in January of 2025. 2024 was my best year of my entire life in like literally every way. It was my best year in terms of my relationship with my husband. It was my best year in terms of our financial situation. It was my best year in terms of my career and
Now, that said, I didn't necessarily accomplish a lot financially through my career, but what I did accomplish, and I'll tell you more about this later in the episode, is I accomplished my lifelong dream of writing a fictional novel. And I know that's kind of crazy to think about because I've been in the coaching industry and I've been in the personal development space maybe since you've known me online, but that was...
not necessarily my dream. mean, I do love that stuff. I've always been lit up by following people in the personal development space and it's done a lot of good for my life. It's also done some toxic things, which I will talk about in this episode as well. But writing a fictional book was always something I wanted to do from when I was a little girl. I used to write stories on Microsoft Word with dial up internet, not that you needed the internet to write the story, right?
Kristen (03:47.938)
But if I wrote the story somewhere else, like at my grandparents house, with dial-up internet, I would have to like email it to myself and hope that it would make it to my email so I could keep writing the story at home. Like I have been writing stories since I knew how to write the English language. It is something that has been ingrained in my very DNA. It's also heavily expressed in all of my charts. My human design chart, I have the channel of
like marketing and I think there's also something about storytelling in my human design chart. And then I also have the in my astrology chart, I have heavy Aquarius placements. And my Aquarius is my son, but it's also my ninth house, which is the house of publishing. My Venus is an Aquarius. My son is an Aquarius. think my Mars is also an Aquarius. And I'm a Gemini rising. So words are kind of my thing. Words are my thing. And
I wrote a book in 2024. So 2024 was by far my best year yet. And I know 2025 is gonna be even better because I'm simply building upon the foundations that I set in 2024. But before I could even get there, and this is why I stopped judging the journey is such a perfect episode that I left off on. Before I could even get there, I had to go through a pretty profound breakdown and breakthrough.
And it might not be what you expect. If you listen to this podcast, if you've worked with me as a client, if you have been in any of my programs, you might be like, Kristen, are you really saying this now? But I will always tell the truth. I will always be authentic. I will always tell you what worked for me and what didn't when I'm ready to, right? Like I didn't necessarily share everything I'm about to share with you with anyone in 2023.
Maybe I did a little bit on Instagram, but I didn't, not like I'm gonna share with you now. So when I'm ready to share my authentic truth, I will always share the authentic truth. I will not sugarcoat things. I will not make things up because the whole point of me having a podcast is to help other people. So I really hope that my story and my journey will help you. So let's talk about it. What happened in 2023?
Kristen (06:16.674)
I'm gonna gloss over some details just to protect people because I have the belief deep in my soul that karma is real. I believe karma is real and I don't feel like I need to drag anyone through the mud in order to share my story. So I'm not gonna like name names or say anything that might be identifying because I just don't think it's necessary. And I also think there's two sides to every story.
My side of the story is my side of the story, but other people involved, have their side of the story too. And I might've been the villain in their story, right? And I'm not even saying like that these people were the villain in my story. I'm just saying that they led me to a situation and down a path that ultimately wasn't healthy for me, right? And they had the best intentions, right? Like you can have the best intentions and you can still based on
you know, people's personality types and their trauma and what they've been through, you can still lead them to a place that is not healthy for them. And that's exactly what happened to me in 2023. And really it was building up throughout 2022 as well. And sorry if I'm like fidgeting on the video. I'm like not used to video podcasting, but I wanted to try it out for 2025 since I've been enjoying watching video podcasts. Just as a side note, I'm not really into
TV these days anymore or movies. I mean, my husband still loves it. So I'll watch it with him. But when I think about like what I want to watch when I'm by myself, it's honestly like a video podcast. So that's why I'm getting into video podcasting myself, but it's going to be very imperfect and very messy at first. I'm new at this. I also don't have my lighting set up my ring light broke, but I didn't want to delay for me to get a new ring light from Amazon. I just wanted to record this while I was
excited to record it because that's how I do things. I do things when I'm lit up because I'm a manifesting generator in human design. So if I'm lit up and I want to do it, then I do it. I don't put it off and I let it be messy if it needs to be messy. So 2023 was my utter, utter breakdown year. And I really learned something profound. And I think it's a really important lesson I have to bring to my podcasting community because I have been talking about manifestation.
Kristen (08:37.838)
the entire time on this podcast. So I learned the difference between manifesting something crazy and unrealistic and wonderful and what that process actually entails and believing in delusions or not facing reality. So 2023 was a year where I had basically like gotten to this place where I was believing in delusions.
And what I mean by that is I was thinking that I was going to have certain success milestones, but I wasn't doing the foundational work with my mindset to actually back that up. The good news is I learned how to do that foundational work in the latter half of 2023 and 2024. And that's why 2024 was my most wonderful, abundant, happy, fulfilling, satisfying year yet of my life. So.
There is a happy ending to the story, but I think it's really important that I talk about the darker parts of this because if you followed me on this podcast back in 2022, then you might encounter this. And I don't want anyone to have to go through what I went through. So here it goes. I, you know, I was just really believing that I could have certain levels of success, for example, becoming a millionaire, but I wasn't doing the internal work to actually get there. The thing is I thought I was.
That's the mind, can I curse on here? Not if I put it on YouTube. That's the mind ass. That's the mind fudgy monkey. That's the mind fudgy monkey. Because I believed I was doing the inner work required of me in order to reach the level of becoming a millionaire. And I was so humbled. I was so humbled. And it's important that we are humbled at times and God humbled me.
in a really scary way, actually experienced so much stress and anxiety and I was having these panic attacks and it got to this place where I actually didn't sleep for five days and then I had a psychotic break, which is actually common if you don't sleep for multiple days in a row. Your brain is just like not functioning how it needs to, so psychosis can't happen.
Kristen (10:57.844)
And I also, my family was trying to get me to sleep, so they gave me a sleeping pill. But be careful if you've never taken a sleeping pill and you gotta work with a doctor for that sort of thing because some sleeping pills can also kick you into psychosis. no one knew that, of course, but they were trying to help. So anyway, I did end up having a psychotic episode.
Kristen (11:23.904)
It was fueled by the lack of sleep, but it was also fueled, like the reason why I wasn't sleeping was because I believed in these delusions that I was gonna have this high level of success without doing the identity level mindset work that I needed to do. So here's what I was doing, because I thought I was doing the work, right? Like I was convinced, I'm doing everything I need to be doing to achieve this level of success. And part of that, I think,
was putting my faith in the people that were not really serving me at that point in time. I don't blame them and I don't like wish anything ill on anyone who helped me or didn't help me during that time. But yeah, it was just not a good fit for what I needed and for where I was. But I was in that deep healing space. I was in that space where
you look at all of your childhood traumas and you go into the feelings and you feel the feelings, right? And I have kind of a fixating type brain. Like I can fixate on things and I've realized this about myself since 2023. And I can attach to things and become all consumed by things. And it can be a really beautiful thing. Like that's how I wrote my book in 111 days. And I'll tell you more about that toward the end of the show.
but it can also be a really unhealthy thing. So when I was in the healing space, I kept believing, there's more I need to heal, there's more I need to process, there's more emotions I need to feel. And so I would literally sit and meditate and think about what do I need to heal about myself now? And I'm not saying that that stuff didn't help me. I mean, I think it helped me tap into my emotions, which I needed to do after being in...
you know, a traumatic abusive relationship when I was 19, I needed to start feeling things again. And I do feel things now, but I really should have only have been in that space for maybe six months, but I was in that space for years, right? And I think this is important to say, you don't need to be in a healing space forever and ever and ever. And if someone is telling you that, this is my personal opinion.
Kristen (13:39.766)
Other people can have different opinions, but if someone is telling you that you need to stay in the healing space, that you need to keep going deeper, that you need to keep doing these things, then I think they're just misinformed. And they might have the best intentions, but I don't believe, and I know this to my core now after going through it the hard way, I don't believe that healing is this endless thing that you have to keep doing. Mindset work? Yes.
fully believe that working on your mindset is something that we have to do and practice. If we want to continue to be successful and reach new higher levels of success, we have to do that until the end of time. Healing, no. Healing, not so much. Healing, think, you know, six months, maybe to a year, if you've been through some really complex PTSD, and I believe I had complex PTSD. I mean, there are some things that sometimes come up.
And I know how to hold myself in those emotions, but I don't like let it rule my life anymore. Like I was in 2022, especially in the first part of 2023. I've completely let that go. I now hold the belief and I really do believe this to my core that I am not broken, that there's nothing wrong with me. There's nothing I need to heal about myself. I don't keep that trauma alive, which is really what
constant healing does. And this may not be popular to say with a lot of the communities I've been a part of, but I'm not afraid to speak the truth based on my own experiences. If you are constantly healing, you are keeping the trauma alive. You are keeping the negative identities alive. You are keeping the low vibrations alive. You are keeping the trauma alive. You're keeping it all alive and you're prolonging it. And what you're also doing, and this happened to me,
is you're getting your body addicted to emotional swings. If you're in the constant healing space, you're getting your body addicted to emotional swings. It's chemical, right? You have chemical reactions in your body when you have big emotional releases. And I just like, I look back and I'm like, wow, it seems so obvious now. But when I was in it, man, when I was in it,
Kristen (16:05.142)
me and one of my girlfriends talk about this because she was in it too. It was like a cult. Like when you were in it, you like felt like, yes, I need to express myself and release all these emotions and feel all these things and go to the depths of my soul. And I don't mean to make fun of it, but I also kind of have to because it's so obvious now that that was just keeping the trauma alive. It was keeping me in a victim state. It was preventing me.
from going to my next level of success, which was never gonna be found in my trauma. And it just blows my mind that people still push this narrative because I promise you, your success is not found in your trauma. It's not found in healing your trauma. Do you need to heal your trauma? Yes, but your success is found when you start focusing on where you're going, when you focus on the future, not the past. When you focus on the positive things, you wanna
Fill your brain and body up with not the negative things you want to get rid of and like Yeah, we got to get rid of those things. Can you tell I'm passionate about this man? I'm getting heated Yeah, we want to go get rid of those things and and move through them and feel our emotions. Okay, fine I get it all the therapists are gonna come at me, but I'm telling you You do not need to be doing that for years and years and years and I think that
So many people stall in therapy or in these healing type coaching relationships because they believe, if I just heal one more thing about myself, then all my problems will be solved. But nothing replaces mindset work. And I used to say the opposite. I used to say, well, if you're doing mindset work, but you're not doing the deeper healing, then blah, blah, blah. I don't even know what I used to say because I'm so far removed from that version of me.
and so much happier as a result. And that's the important thing. Like it's not just about success. The mindset work will absolutely bring you the success you're desiring, but it's not just about success. It's also about feeling good, being happy, enjoying your life, having great relationships with your partner, with your family, with your friends. And if you're in that constant healing space, it's really difficult to be a real human, right?
Kristen (18:28.45)
I'll talk about this as I move into the 2024 story, but one of the biggest shifts that I made that started to help me heal from the healing, so to speak, and move into back to being a normal human was I just came back to God and Jesus. And I was raised Catholic. I was not raised Christian. Now I identify as like a non-denominational Christian.
I believe in God, believe that Jesus died for our sins and he is our savior. And I also believe powerfully in the power of prayer. And I'm going to talk about how that absolutely transformed my 2024 and give you some actionable things for that. But I'm not like, like I don't belong to a specific church. don't, I understand on a deep level that religious centers can be just as cultish as the spiritual one.
right, that I've just described. So I'm kind of like in this space where I'm just developing a really sacred relationship between me and Jesus, me and God. And I think that's a really powerful place to be in because we don't necessarily need other people to tell us how things are. Like we don't, we don't need a church to tell us how things are. We don't need a spiritual mentor to tell us how things are. We need to have an actual relationship with God and that's going to tell us.
what we need to be doing. It's going to give us so much more wisdom and guidance than any human mentor ever could. So that's my soapbox about that. But it is, it's just so crazy to me.
how I believed that that constant emotional turmoil was gonna bring me joy and success. Like how can it? How can it? But that's the lie that were sold. And maybe for some people it works that way. For me it did not, it absolutely did not. It made me worse, not better. I thought I was getting better, but I wasn't. I was getting worse. And
Kristen (20:37.966)
I know there's gonna be people who hear this and they're gonna say, well, that's just because you didn't go deep enough. No, y'all, I went so deep. I went so deep that I felt God's presence and I went so deep that I dealt with some of the deepest traumas that could ever exist. the crazy thing is I don't even think they're mine. I was so deep on that healing journey that I think I just started.
Either my brain started inventing traumas to heal from because that was the cycle I was stuck in, or I was absorbing traumas from other people telepathically, or I was, who knows? But the bottom line is you do not need to be healing or this is very controversial to say, and I'll say this is only true for me. I do not need to be healing and I don't need to be in therapy for years on end.
Do I need spurts of it? Yes, I think that is very healthy. But I think it's very unhealthy to be just in this constant maintenance world with healers and therapists. think it just keeps you again trapped in your trauma trapped in all the things that you don't want and trapped in the past.
Kristen (21:54.67)
So what actually creates success? Focusing on the future. And at the start of this story about 2023, I mentioned that there's a difference between manifesting something crazy and wonderful and unrealistic and believing in delusions or not facing reality. So what makes up that gap, right? Because I know a lot of people when I
in the past would say, you can manifest unrealistic things, they would have the same conundrum. Like, how do I know I'm like, believing in something that I really want to come true that seems unrealistic or seems like a stretch goal versus believing in delusions and not facing reality? And it comes down to your identity.
And it's something you can actually feel when you do the correct work. And for me, the correct work is so freaking simple that you don't need to hire me as a mentor. I am gonna have a financial program come out at some point this year. I've already created it on the backend and I've had about 10 people go through it. And at the time it was based on light language, but the new version is gonna be based more on these much simpler principles that I've been
practicing for over a year now, because they're so effective. But the strategies I'm going to tell you are so simple that you're going to be like, I'm going to fire my coach, I'm going to fire this person like I don't need. I don't need all these people building me up and supporting me. I really can do this myself, me and God, me and Jesus, if you believe in Jesus, I really can do this myself. And I don't need all of this like,
support just to validate what I want, I can actually feel it internally. So for me, it's as simple as shifting the script in my mind and I do that with affirmations and I used to crap on affirmations all the live long day. I used to crap on them. But the truth is I never really tried them. I never tried them the way that I use them now, which is I have two major methods that are very effective and I highly recommend
Kristen (24:10.712)
that you use these methods. The first is I think about the end result that I want. So I wrote a book, The Queen Rises by Kristen Cipriano. It is a romantic fantasy book and I'll tell you more about it at the end. But I have these big dreams for this book, right? I want to sell millions of copies in my first year as a debut indie author. And an indie author is someone who doesn't go through a publishing house and have an agent and all of those things. I could have done that.
And my editor even said this book is good enough to do that, but I didn't want to. I wanted to keep more of my royalties. I wanted to pull a Taylor Swift and own my IP, own my intellectual property. So I am self-publishing, but that means that I'm the only one who's marketing it, right? And of course my readers, my readers are amazing. I have several ARC readers, advanced reader copies is what they got as part of my advanced reader copy team.
and they've loved the book and they've actually done an awesome job of commenting on my TikToks and posting videos about my book. And it's been really wonderful to have that support from them. But for the most part, it's me, right? For the most part, it's me doing all the marketing and I don't have a publishing house like pushing my book out. I don't have a press tour. I am the press tour. So, you know, I have these lofty goals like selling millions of books my first year as a debut indie author.
And I actually fully believe that they will happen. And the reason why I fully believe that they will happen is because my brain is now aligned with that, right? Like my actual thoughts, my actual identity is aligned with that. And the way I did it was I took the things I think I will believe when that happens and I made them affirmations, I made them positive, I made them present tense, and I'll give you a bunch of examples in a second.
and I put them on little sticky notes and I put them on the wall behind my computer. And as I was writing my book, they were just there like artwork. I never really look at them. Occasionally I'll look at them to like see what one of them is. If I want to write them in my sub stack or in an email and I'm like, well, I want to show this affirmation. Let me look for one that feels aligned to share right now. But it's things like people keep finding my book and buying it. People can't stop reading my book. People are so excited.
Kristen (26:37.004)
to get book two, millions of people are reviewing my book on Goodreads and Amazon, right? Like millions of people are obsessed with my book, things like this, things that I want to happen, things that I believe will happen. And I've just had it on the back of my wall, behind my computer as like artwork for months, at this point, almost a year.
Almost a year and that's why I fully believe that these things will happen because I'm not believing in something that is so far from what my brain comprehend that it's actually a delusion I'm believing in something that I've trained my brain to believe in and that's the difference you have to train your brain to believe in the things that you want to occur even those unrealistic things if you're not training your brain to believe
that it's possible, that it's easy, that it's common, it's accessible to you, that it's not this like far off thing, but it's something that's really close that you can access, you can reach, well then it can come into your reality so much easier. And it's not like you're believing in something that is so far away from you that it's a delusion. You're believing in something that you've trained your brain to know is possible for you. And if your brain knows it's possible, if your subconscious mind knows it's possible.
and has decided that it's easy, that it's accessible, that it's natural and normal for you. Now you've shifted into the identity of the version of you that has the thing. I have a perfect example for you. I wrote about this in my new sub stack, which is called Common Success with Kristen Cipriano. And the whole idea behind this sub stack is that success, what if success is common for you, right? Like I used to have this belief, especially about writing books that
Success is this rare thing that only a few people get to be successful at writing books. If I have that belief, how much harder is it going to be for me and my book to be successful, to have millions of readers buy it, love it, talk about it, celebrate it, review it? Like, how much harder is that gonna be if I believe that it's this rare thing that only happens to a few people?
Kristen (28:57.142)
I'm gonna believe it's like impossible. So we really wanna believe that the things that we want, even if like the external reality is showing us, this is very rare, you wanna train your brain to believe, no, this is really common for me. Maybe not for everyone, but for me, this is really common. I expect this. This is natural for me, this is normal for me. Because once you believe that to your core and it doesn't feel like a lie, like none of that feels like a lie to me when I say that millions of readers are obsessed with my book, that doesn't feel like a lie in my body, my whole body.
recognize that that will be the reality because I've been training my brain for like a year to believe that, right?
Okay. I had to pause and get a blanket and I did have to switch my microphone. So hopefully the audio quality doesn't go down too much, but I will definitely be working on getting everything back to the level of quality that I used to have, but my podcasting equipment doesn't work with my new laptop. So we're just kind of like being messy right now, but getting the show out there anyway, as I was saying, once you truly believe
that that thing that you want is natural and normal for you. It's something that is very calm. It very commonly happens to you. It is something that you expect to happen. And it's not this thing that actually feels like you're lying to yourself. At that point, then you're in the identity of the version of you that has the thing. So then it's going to come to you so much faster. And I think and I think like with the healing stuff, you're so focused on
what's wrong with me instead of focusing on what do I need to believe to align with the thing that I want. And I can't believe that I let that take over my life for so many years, but you know, I learned the hard way that ain't it. So I wanted to tell you the other way that I changed the script in my mind, which is the main thing that I do other than prayer and inspired action that actually led to my best year yet, which was 2024.
Kristen (30:52.46)
And the other thing I do besides doing the wall art with the sticky notes, with all my affirmations on the wall behind my computer where I sit and write all day is I also do subliminal audios. And for the most part, I do these when I sleep. Like right now I have my millionaire author affirmations going for eight hours every night while I sleep. And with subliminal audios, you can put them on a really low volume and your subconscious mind is still gonna pick it up. So for me, I put it on the lowest iPhone volume setting.
And not only do I do that, but also like the words, the affirmations that I'm saying, I turned the volume way down on that on my audio editing platform and I put rain sounds over it. So you can't even hear me saying the affirmations. So my subconscious mind is still picking up the beliefs, but I can't actually hear them or anything while I sleep, which is great. Cause I've tried actually listening to affirmations while I sleep. And that doesn't work for me because it'll keep me awake.
but if I put it on the lowest volume and I have like the rain sounds overlaying it and I can't even hear the words, then I can sleep like a baby. So that is the other main way that I changed the script in my mind, which puts me in the identity of having the thing I want, which makes it so that when I am trying to manifest these things that still kind of seem unrealistic to outsiders, right?
but they seem very realistic to me. Why do they seem so realistic to me? Because I've trained my brain to believe that they are. And I don't just do like the things that I want, right, with my affirmations. I also think about, okay, what else do I need to believe about how it will come about? So one thing I started to realize even just a couple of days ago is I had this belief that people could only find my book through me. Like,
through my videos, through my email list, through my website, through my podcast. Like I was really severely limiting the ability for people to find my book. And I made it all about me. And I'm only one person and I can't be like creating social media content all the live long day. You know what I mean? Like I have other things I need to be doing. I can't be constantly marketing. I try to market every day, but I can only do so much, right? As one person.
Kristen (33:08.29)
I realized, I need to start expanding this belief system and start believing that other people are talking about my book, perhaps my advanced readers, perhaps my friends, my family. And I already know it's true. mean, my husband tells everyone he knows about my book. My mom has been telling people about my book. And she's like, I've told a bunch of people to pre-order it. And I have advanced readers that talk about my book on social media. I already.
have evidence, my brain is able to see that other people are doing it. But now I'm trying to expand that even further towards like, well, like people are finding my book through people I know, but people are also just finding my book because God is driving them to it. Right? Like, so now I've expanded my belief about who can find my book and how they can find my book to be the infinite.
because God can guide people wherever God wants to guide them. So now if I'm like, okay, people are finding my book because God is guiding them to it. Not that my book is Christian, by the way. My book is a spicy romantic fantasy novel, but I believe that God also guides people to their sources of entertainment, right? And I think my book overall has a great message and.
has like profound themes in it that will resonate with people and it'll be highly entertaining. So it's not a Christian book, but I can see like in my heart, it doesn't feel like it would be that weird for God to guide people to my book, right? I think people are gonna really enjoy my book. So now that I've expanded it out to that, now it's much easier for me to believe that I'm gonna sell millions of books this year in 2025, because it's not just me.
doing the marketing. It's not just me talking about my book and it's not even just other people talking about my book. It's God guiding people to my book. It's God presenting my book in front of them on Amazon or on Goodreads or wherever, right? Or it's God inspiring someone in a conversation to recommend my book to one of their friends, right? I mean, God works in mysterious ways and I can't even pretend to comprehend
Kristen (35:20.024)
how many ways God will bring people to my book, there's going to be infinite ways that God brings people to my book. So now that I'm relying on the infinite, my goals feel so much easier, right? Because it's not just me. And that's the other big piece that really moved the needle for me was I started to really rely more on God doing the heavy lifting in my manifestations and my desires. Because it really does feel kind of like a delusion if you just
think to yourself, well, I as one person, as an independent author for my debut, I'm gonna sell millions of books. Like it does seem like kind of impossible when I look at it from that lens. But if I look at it from the lens of, God wants to support me in my desires and God is helping me sell millions of books this year. I mean, my whole body is like, yes, like that's possible because God is involved.
And that was the biggest shift of my entire life in 2023 and especially in 2024, I got God involved in my manifestations. I didn't make it something that I had to do all on my own because then you're limiting yourself. But if you start playing in the energy of God is helping me, God wants to help me, God is guiding people to my book, God is guiding people to your business, right?
then there truly are infinite possibilities and it's so much easier to wrap your head around these things becoming your reality. So other than changing the script in my mind, the second thing I did was bring God in on my manifestation process. And one of the main ways I do it is through prayer. And it's very simple. I don't have this complicated routine that I do with manifesting. It's literally like the sticky notes on my wall, the subliminal audios while I sleep and like a five
minute maximum prayer to God and Jesus each night. So each night I say a prayer and I say prayers for other people, because I do believe in the power of being generous and not coming back to you. I don't do it for that reason. I actually care about other people and want them, especially at the time I'm recording this, it's during the LA wildfires. So I've been praying for a lot of my friends that live in LA and even just people I like that live in LA.
Kristen (37:39.315)
like Spencer Pratt and Heidi Montag randomly, they lost their home. And so I've been praying for them and they've actually had a lot of blessings bestowed upon them thanks to TikTok. So I'll pray for other people just because it like feels good and it's something I want to do. And then I'll pray for the things that I desire. And it's very simple. I usually try to ask God for help with getting my mind right as well. So like when I
A couple of days ago when I was finishing up editing, I can't believe that was only like probably like five days ago at this point. I was finishing up editing my book, like the final final read through before I submit to Amazon. It's already been submitted now. It's already been approved. But when I was going through that final process.
I was feeling really insecure about my book and I prayed one of those nights I was like, hey God help me feel secure about my book again, help me feel confident and again. And it's a great book, like it's a fantastic book. So it was just like my mindset getting in the way, know? And God came back with some really profound wisdom. God said, you know, during editing you were looking for everything that was wrong with the book so that you could fix it. And you've been in that mode for months.
Right? Like I started editing, I want to say in like August or September. So September, October, November, December, January. So for like five months I was in editing mode and I was taking the manuscript apart. I was looking for everything wrong with it, much like I used to look for everything wrong with myself. Right. And God was like, that's important, but now it's time to let that go. Now you need to look for everything that's right.
with the manuscript, look for the things you love about what you wrote, look for the good and the beauty and the artistry in it again. And that like blew my mind. It changed my entire perspective. I fell in love with my book again. I was excited to market my book again. That was something else that I didn't really expect, but it makes sense now, given what I know now. When I was editing my book, I was having a harder time marketing it because I was picking it apart and I was seeing all the things that were wrong.
Kristen (39:43.788)
that was wrong with the manuscript. So when you're looking at what's wrong with something, you're gonna feel insecure about it. Same thing with yourself. If you're looking at what's wrong with you, you're gonna feel insecure about it. So you need to look for what's going right, you love about yourself or about your book or about your business or about the offer you're selling and make that your focus. And there are times to look at what needs to be fixed. Like when you're editing a book, you gotta do that. You gotta look at what needs to be fixed. Or when you have...
a big failure in your business, you gotta look at what went wrong, right? But that shouldn't be your permanent focus, right? You should do it, get it done, move on, focus on what looks right, focus on what is good and wonderful and artistic and beautiful and entertaining, right? Or transforming if you're a coach, right? That's what you need to shift your focus to. So I bring God into my manifestation process through prayer and...
Oftentimes I ask God to get my mind right, but sometimes I'm just like, hey God, you I really want this number of pre-orders by my birthday. Can you please help make that happen? I'm gonna do my part, but it looks really hard if it's just me. So God, can you do me a solid swoop in and help me out here, right? And I'll keep you updated on that, but.
That's how I involve God in my manifestation process and it has made a world of difference. So let's get to the fun stuff. Let's get to 2024 because holy moly, 2024 was freaking amazing for me. It was so good. It was my best year yet. Absolutely. And I'm actually going to pull up my, I have a list of like 111 wishes that I wanted to come true.
they were like my desires. That's a better word for it. was 111 desires that I wanted to come true in 2024. And I am not joking you. Hold on, I checked them all off my list. I don't know if I can count them actually. But basically, I achieved almost all of them. And I definitely achieved all of the ones that were actually really important to me. So like, that's crazy to me, because some of these were
Kristen (41:56.286)
I wrote them down on January 11th in 2024. know, some of them were like, I want to buy my dream car, which was, wrote a white, I said BMW X five, but I actually got a more expensive car. got a white Chevy Tahoe and I wanted to pay cash upfront for it. And we were able to do that. So,
We did that in December of 2024. So like some of these things felt like so crazy. Like there's no way that that could happen, right? Or it's a huge stretch to think that that could happen, but it did. And I fully believe it was because I simplified my process. I changed the script in my mind about things. So I changed the script in my mind with the sticky notes on the wall and with the subliminal audios and
I leaned on God, I let God do a lot of the heavy lifting. And when I needed help, instead of hiring a coach or a mentor, I went to God directly and I said, hey, Jesus, hey, God, help me think differently about this. Help me get my mind right about this or help me make this manifestation come true. Cause right now I feel like a human and I don't know if I can make it happen, but I know with your help, can, right? Made all the difference and
I'm gonna just share some of the highlights. So other than the car that we bought and paid cash upfront, I also had these amazing, my husband took me on these amazing shopping sprees, like I wanna say like once a quarter. And we spent like a good amount of money, definitely more than I've ever spent on a shopping spree. We got to do that every quarter. And you know, before like when I was working in corporate and I would take myself on a little shopping spree.
I would maybe spend, I don't know, maybe up to like 500, $600 if it was like a big shopping spree. And I would do that maybe like twice a year. No, we did this like four times and it was way, way, way, way more than five or $600. And it was things that I'd been wanting for like, I want to say even decades. Like there's some like designer shoes and designer dresses that even when I was like a little 10 year old reading Vogue, because 10 year olds apparently read Vogue.
Kristen (44:12.174)
that I wanted them. And so that was like just one thing that was really cool. We also went on this amazing, like super upscale trip to Napa Valley and Palm Springs. We stayed in the most amazing hotel, the Solage, which is an au bears resort, which is now our new favorite, like bougie hotel chain. And we rented a driver or we hired a driver. That's the way you say that we hired a driver.
to drive us around Napa Valley in a Bentley, no less. So we were like rolling up to all of these vineyards in a Bentley and I was wearing my fancy shoes, my Christian Louboutins and I was just like, living the high life. And it wasn't like we overspent or anything. Like we had the money to do this and that was just like so freaking cool to be able to experience that and to also know this is what we do now. Like this is the bare minimum standard and
I just, I mean, I got to give all the credit to God. I give a little credit to myself for figuring out the mindset stuff and realizing I can make it so much more simple and I don't need to do all these rituals or healings or all that crap. And so I do give credit to myself for that, but a lot of it is God. And when you let God into your manifestations, you are gonna be amazed at what you can achieve. You are gonna be blown away and...
I'm at the point now, I haven't even made my 2025 list yet, but I have added one thing. And I'll tell you about that in a second. But when I make my 2025 list, my 111 or more desires that I want to experience this year, I'm gonna think even bigger than I thought in 2024. And I don't mean even bigger, like if I went up maybe like 10 points, I'm gonna go up another 10 points.
I'm talking if I went up 10 points with what I desired in 2024, I'm gonna go up like a hundred points in 2025. Why? Because I know, I know for a fact now that if I let God in on my manifestations, if I let God do the heavy lifting and if I get my mind right and I use my tools, I can make impossible things happen. I can make the impossible possible. So I'm so confident in my tools and in my process now that I can afford.
Kristen (46:32.418)
to have those delusional goals and they're not gonna be delusions for me. They're not gonna send me into panic attacks because I know how to do the foundational work to keep myself grounded and to truly assume the identity of the version of me that has it and not in a place of like acting as if or pretending, but from a place of it actually is my identity. And I have the perfect example for how this works because my birthday is February 1st.
And that's also when my book comes out. So if you want to get my book, pre-order it. That'll be a great birthday present for me. But my birthday is February 1st, and it's January 15th at the time I'm making this podcast. And I was looking for a birthday gift that I want to receive from either my husband or my parents or both. Like if it was a more expensive gift, I would receive it from both, potentially.
first I was thinking I really want more rose gold jewelry. And I'm at the point now where I don't want fake jewelry. And I know that's kind of like weird to say. But I don't want like vermeal or like coated jewelry. Like I want 18 carat rose gold, I want real gold, I want real diamonds or gemstones, like sapphires or whatever it is, right? Like I want the real stuff. I'm at that level where
if I'm going to spend the money or if I'm going to ask for that type of gift, I want it to be real. I don't want it to be fake, right? I don't want it to be like costume jewelry. So, so I was looking at a Demi-Find, Demi-Find jewelry brand and Demi-Find is like, it's, it's real stuff. Like it's real rose gold. It's real diamonds potentially, but it's priced lower than like the designers, right?
And so an example of something that I thought I might want was there's this ring on there and it's got diamonds and it's made of rose gold. And I think it's like 1800 to $2,000. So it's, it's not like cheap, cheap, like it's not like a $50 ring, but it's, you know, it, it's a good amount of money, right? It's around $2,000 for a ring. But this is how I know my mindset work.
Kristen (48:47.66)
has been working because I've been affirming I'm a multimillionaire author. And when I started looking at this ring again, and some of the other pieces of this Demi fine jewelry brand, I just kept thinking to myself, this looks so cheap. Like this looks so cheap. This looks so I don't mean to be, I don't know. I'm just going to be honest. This looks so gross. This looks like even like not something I want to be seen wearing. Right? Like, so
It's kind of funny to say that out loud. sound so snobby, but I know that this means my mindset work is working because what I did after that, when I realized, okay, these demi-fine brands don't have what I want, I then was looking, okay, let me go outside my comfort zone. Let me look at luxury jewelry brands. And so I looked at luxury jewelry brands and I found this one and it was kind of like God sent it to me as like, this is what you actually desire when it comes to jewelry.
And it was the first one I clicked on. looked through the stuff and I'm like, I love all of these. This is so much more my taste. This is where I'm at in terms of my style. This is what I want to adorn myself with. And the bracelets that I picked out, one of them is $15,000. The other one is $35,000. And I mean, I'm laughing right now because that seems crazy to me at this point.
Right at this point, it's hard for me to imagine a reality where I drop $15,000 or $35,000 on a bracelet. Like, I don't like this word when it comes to money, but I can see how someone watching this might be like, oh, that's such a waste. I don't say that about money because I don't believe that money can be wasted, right? But I can see how someone would feel that way if they haven't done money mindset work. So I'm just telling you, like right now, a $35,000 bracelet seems absolutely bananas to me right now, but.
I also know that I'm not gonna shrink that desire one bit. Am I gonna get it for my birthday in a couple of weeks? No, I'm not gonna get it for my birthday, February 1st, 2025, but I'm gonna let myself desire it as the next piece of jewelry I wanna bring into my reality. And I believe it's gonna happen sometime this year. And the reason why I gave you this example is because that means the fact that I'm desiring $35,000 bracelets, that means I'm stepping into that millionaire author identity.
Kristen (51:13.026)
Because millionaire you isn't gonna desire $2,000 rings. I mean, maybe jewelry is not your thing, but if jewelry is your thing, millionaire you is gonna look at the nicest things that your money can buy, right? So for me, if I'm a millionaire and I'm gonna pick like one piece of jewelry to like celebrate my debut book, to celebrate the millions of readers.
that enjoyed my book, I'm not gonna buy a $2,000 ring, I'm gonna buy a $35,000 diamond bracelet, and I'm gonna fall in love with it, I'm gonna wear it every day, right? Like, that means the fact that I'm even desiring that $35,000 bracelet means to me, okay, my mindset work has been working, because my taste is that of a millionaire. So the other point with this is,
Don't shrink your desires. Let your desires be a little out of reach. And I wrote a gorgeous sub stack post. I don't even know what they're called anymore. Sub stack blog post. Anyway, I wrote a gorgeous post about this. I'll link it in the show notes, but don't shrink your desires because God, if you involve God in your manifestations, God can give you the whole world and more God can give you the whole universe. So don't shrink your desires. If you find yourself looking at the clothes you have and you're like,
this just feels cheap, this is not something I want to buy with the next amount of money I spend on clothes, then start believing that you are able to easily afford that higher quality clothing. And you don't have to go out and buy it today. To be clear, I am not buying this $35,000 bracelet today, nor am I gonna ask for it for my birthday. But what I am doing is I'm putting it on my desires list for 2025. And I'm trusting that because I desire this and I desire it now,
and I know I'm not gonna buy it now, but I'm gonna buy it soon, that means I'm lined up with millionaire author me. It has to, I mean, why else would I desire something that much? And I don't even think to myself, this is the other key indicator to me that my mind is in the right place with this, because I don't even think to myself, I would never spend that much on a bracelet. And I don't think to myself, that's too much money. Like, I don't think that at all.
Kristen (53:23.446)
Is it too much right now? Yes, but it's not something I'm not gonna buy. I am gonna buy that some point this year because I am gonna be a millionaire author. I am gonna sell millions of books. So that is just like when you're at that point where you're desiring those more luxury things or trips or experiences and you just know that they're yours, even if you can't buy them right now, but you know that they're yours. You know that they're within reach for you.
you are now in the identity of that higher level of you, right? Like I truly believe that bracelet is within my reach within this year. Right now, no, within this year, yes. So to me, that means I'm in alignment with my millionaire self. Okay, this podcast is getting long, but I did wanna share a little snippet of my story and what I've learned since. Okay, before we wrap it up, I have to tell you about my book.
So my book is called The Queen Rises by Kristen Cipriano. And this book follows Fiona Willowbark, who is our gorgeous protagonist. And she grew up in this dystopian elven patriarchy where a vengeful king stole all the magic from all the female elves. And her last family member has been arrested for a crime he didn't commit. Her father has been taken to prison. And for years, she's been biding her time with her grandmother.
but she always knew in the back of her mind she was gonna try and break him out or prove his innocence or something. So her grandmother's dead and for the past couple of months she's been working on breaking him out of this Elvin prison because he's innocent. It's a crime he didn't commit, right? And she's been successful so far at breaking into the prison and getting out but she hasn't been able to find his cell or actually get past the wards on his cell.
So on one of these little midnight trucks of hers where she's breaking into the prison to break her father out, she actually gets caught by a viciously powerful high guard warrior who is also the right hand to this horrible king who stole all the magic from all the female elves. And from that point forward, lots of stuff happens. There's forbidden romance, there's betrayal, there's a tangled web of secrets that makes it difficult to know who to trust.
Kristen (55:43.96)
There's secret societies and organizations, there's mythical creatures, and our lovely Fiana has animal friends. So all of this leads Fiana into this place where she thinks that there might be potential to return the magic back to the female elves. So if you like books like this, and I will say it is a really awesome book if you love romantic fantasy, and especially if you love romantic fantasy with
plot driven spicy scenes. So you know where they get it on? That's in the book and it's all plot driven. It's not just like a smut book. It's a spicy romantic fantasy book. Then pre-order it. comes out February 1st. It comes out on Kindle and you can pre-order the Kindle version right away. Even if you don't have a Kindle device, if you have like an iPad, you can download the Kindle app and then when you buy it, it'll be on the Kindle app. So you can pre-order it.
or if you join my email list, which you can do at KristenCipriano.com, just scroll to the bottom, enter your email address. Not only will I send you the first three chapters absolutely free so you can preview the book, but I will also keep you updated about when paperbacks are ready. And they should be ready February 1st release day. But if you're on my email list, you'll get notified and you'll get the link sent directly to you. So you'll be able to buy paperbacks if that's something that you wanna do. Anyway.
That's my book. I'm really excited to see it in the hands of millions of people this year and for it to become people's new favorite romantic fantasy book. Let me know how you like this podcast. This episode, let me know if you're excited that I'm back. You can send me a DM on Instagram. I'm Kristen.Cipriano. So my handle has changed since 2022.
Kristen.Cipriano, will link that in the show notes on TikTok. I am also Kristen.Cipriano and I have a larger following there and I create videos there more often. So if you want to keep up with me and my book, that's a good place to follow me. yeah, KristenCipriano.com is my website. That's where you can join my email list. And I also have a new sub stack. I'll link it in the show notes called Common Success with KristenCipriano.
Kristen (58:00.248)
That'll be separate from my email list, but you will get notified of new blog posts via email. But that's really where for this audience, my podcast audience, you'll probably like the sub stack a lot because I'll be talking about similar topics like I talk about on this podcast, but in a readable format. So if you don't always have time to tune into the podcast and you still want to get personal development, manifestation mindset type updates from me, then
go subscribe to the sub stack, which is completely free. And that's called, again, Common Success with Kristin Zipriano linked in the show notes. Okay, I will also link my book information in the show notes. I'll link the Amazon Kindle pre-order link, as well as the Goodreads link. So if you want to check it out on Goodreads, read some of the reviews on Goodreads before you buy. They're absolutely amazing reviews so far. Then go ahead and do that.
But yeah, I'm so excited to be back. I don't know the cadence, like how often I'll make a podcast. So I'm not gonna tell you, tune in every week or tune in twice a week. I'm not gonna tell you anything. Just hit subscribe on your podcasting app so you stay updated with new episodes and we'll see how often I push them out. Anyway, I love you. Thank you so much for tuning in. Thank you so much for still being here after years and years. And I'm excited for this new adventure together. Bye.