Today’s Featured Uplifter: Candy Motzek

You know those rare conversations that feel like sinking into a comfortable chair? That's what it felt like talking with Candy Motzek. There's an immediate ease that settles over you – a superpower she didn't even recognize she had until people kept telling her how calm they felt in her presence. (Though she'll be the first to tell you that doesn't mean she's always calm inside.)

At 64, Candy embodies what it means to live life on your own terms. She's the engineer-turned-business-coach who takes ballet classes alongside teenagers, collects white feathers that fall from the sky, and chooses depth over small talk every single time. As the only person of color in her school growing up, she learned early that not fitting in could become its own kind of freedom.

What strikes me most about Candy is how she's transformed that early pain of not belonging into a profound sense of belonging to herself. It's a journey that's led her from corporate boardrooms to ballet bars, from engineering problems to solving the deeper equation of what makes a life feel meaningful.

Her Courage Practice

Every morning, Candy meets herself on the blank pages of her journal, creating a sacred space for reflection and possibility. But here's the twist – she saves the last pages of every journal for "great ideas that aren't ready yet," honoring the whispers of inspiration even when they can't be acted upon immediately. It's a practice that both grounds her in the present and keeps her connected to future possibilities, creating a bridge between who she is and who she's becoming.

"The relationship we have with ourselves is the only one that lasts for our entire life. Why wouldn't you give as much care and attention to the friendship with yourself as you would to your partner or to another person that you love?"

5 Ways She Shows Us How to Build Our Courage Capital:

1. Turn Your Differences into Your Superpowers: Instead of trying to fit in, use your unique perspective as a lens through which to see and serve the world

2. Listen to Your Body's Wisdom: Drop from your head into your heart (and gut) to access the intelligence that lives in every cell

3. Save Space for Future Dreams: Create a special place to capture inspiration, even (and especially) when you're not ready to act on it yet

4. Choose Depth Over Performance: Rather than trying to please everyone, focus on creating meaningful connections – starting with yourself

5. Let Your Weird Light Shine: When you fully embrace your authentic self, you give others permission to do the same

The Uplifters’ Web

Today’s opening is by Melanie Cohen.

Uplift With Us!

🌟 Wear your inspiration with an Uplifter necklace. Treat yourself or gift one HERE.

💡 Need clarity on your vision? Explore private coaching to illuminate your next chapter HERE.

🚀 Is your team ready to soar? Discover how I can boost your high-performers HERE.

👭 Join an Uplifters Circle for regular doses of support and sisterhood. Details HERE.

Aransas:. Welcome to the Uplifters podcast. I'm Arnasas Savas and I'm joined by Kandi Motzak. Today she's a business coach for coaches. And she uses her diverse [00:00:45] background with a long career in corporate world and as an engineer to help inform how she does that work. And Candy and I are going to talk about what it means to be weird and to find [00:01:00] power and empowerment in doing what I call with my clients, putting on the kimono.

I love it. I'm so excited to talk to you, Candy, as somebody who has led a rich and diverse life, who has thrived in many different stages of her career [00:01:45] and life, to talk about how we embrace our weird.

Candy: Thanks for being here. I love that. What a great thing. I'm so excited to be here and excited for our conversation too.

I

And since you use as part of your mission, helping people have success, I'm curious what your

I don't think we just have one. I agree. But one of mine is that I help people to feel calm so that people feel better and calmer when they come into my space. I have

Candy: Yeah, so the effect of it is that I don't really have to do much to keep [00:03:30] that space. Like I don't have to run around and dot all my I's and cross all my T's to keep that space, right? I just get to show up and accept that people will feel calmer around me, like that's kind of the thing. [00:03:45] The effect of it is that if we can reduce our stress, then we think better.

However, Each of us looks at it. So if I can help you to feel calmer, then it's easier for you to go within and not feel that you've got to [00:04:30] perform to be around me or that you've got to jump through all these hoops to keep up. When did you first discover that you had that superpower? I never really thought that it was a superpower.

I think that people have always felt calm around me, even as a kid.

And those things give us a foundational sense of integrity and authenticity, which is really at the heart of being

People feel calm in my space. And so they assume that I'm always calm. And so I want people to know that my [00:06:00] inner experience isn't always. what you're experiencing. And so there might be other people that kind of have that people feel good around me, but I'm still feel ups and downs and that's okay. [00:06:15] I don't have to feel like a Zen Buddhist monk to have that effect on somebody.

Aransas: such a diverse career, what has the journey been like to integrate your strengths, [00:06:45] your knowledge, and your experience?

into the fullest, truest version

to be. I always thought I should be a therapist or that I should be an author, but that wasn't really an unallowed career path, right? I had three careers that we were allowed to have in my family. You could be a doctor, a lawyer, or an [00:07:30] engineer. A

[00:08:30] And then there was that inner dense discontent. And so I think that's the theme of it is that when the things that you're doing on the outside. Although they look good, if you don't feel good on the inside, then you want to narrow that [00:08:45] gap. It doesn't mean that you have to drastically change your career.

Aransas: be hard to recognize. So what did it sound like for you or for

Candy: those you have coached? Discontent for myself and the people that I've worked with over the years often sounds like justifying.

Aransas: I was flashing back to when I worked at Weight Watchers with people who were looking to shift their [00:09:45] relationship with food.

Candy: Yeah, [00:10:15] a really good piece of chocolate can be savored and lots of pretend chocolate. It's like it never fills the hole. Nothing satisfies me when I have too much sugar, but when I'm [00:10:30] not eating sugar,

Candy: Super satisfying.

Aransas: Super satisfying.

It's very exciting. Cause it did, it had this [00:11:30] sense of being intended, right? Like it felt like we, we were meant to find each other, this chair and I, and it matches my new kitchen. I mean, it was just amazing and I've always wanted an [00:11:45] Eames chair, but I would never splurge on such a thing. And you know, it just, it's not how I spend my money.

Candy: it comes. And sometimes the knowing what you want is knowing what the quality is that you want. And that's why the chair is so satisfying because there's the quality of it, [00:12:15] that it was meant to be, that it was put out there waiting for you.

Aransas: so much [00:12:45] easier.

Candy: Yes. Agreed. [00:13:15] It's almost like a little bit of a loop because you think that that's going to give you the feeling and then you get obsessed with looking for only that particular widget or love of your life or car or whatever and you kind of [00:13:30] lose the connection with the feeling and so you keep going around because now you sort of lost your North Star.

So how do you feel temperature wise? Where do you feel tension? What [00:14:00] happens in your body when you're doing this thing? So it's starting to just notice the physical sensations, and then I love to connect it with what does my emotion feel like in my body when I feel [00:14:15] disappointed? How do I notice that? And then how is that different from rejected?

That fine tuning. It's like one of these fancy guitars. What a wonderful

Candy: come alive. It's like they forgot that they had this body. And even though they probably go to the gym five times a week, but they forgot that there's actually a sensation and that's part of the, [00:14:45] it all starts within, right?

Aransas: start to understand what the drivers are that create that felt sense so that they [00:15:15] develop a stronger intuition about what's what they want

Candy: more of and less of.

And then they take their power back and then they can make their choices and then they get [00:15:45] faster and faster at knowing what's right for them. So then the next time a promotion comes up. How do you feel? Mmm. No. Or, Oh, this feels interesting. So you can make your own

And so it's not about avoiding discomfort, but it's understanding the discomfort. Is this fear they could hurt me or help me?

Candy: Yeah.

Aransas: Is this excitement

Candy: or is this

Candy: in over and over again. That's what one of the roles of a coach is, is to help somebody live that fuller life.

They wouldn't be kind of hanging on, like, Oh, I can't lose this great job, because they'd know it's time for me to evolve to the next thing. It is the essence of self

Candy: off beat there.

I meditate every day. [00:18:00] Some people think that's weird. I journal every day. Some people think that's weird. I took up dance as an adult. It's not very often that you go to your daughter's ballet recital at the end of the [00:18:15] year, and there's an adult on stage with the teenagers. Some of the parents came up to me and said, Oh, you've been doing this for a few years now.

It sounds

Candy: And I grew up as the [00:19:15] only person of color in my elementary school, in my high school.

I know every kid feels awed that not belonging piece was huge and it was really painful. And then over time, you get to reframe how you think about that. And so I think that that's, you know, some of [00:20:00] the work that I've done that reframe of, well, that makes it okay for me to do things that don't fit in because I've never fit in anyway.

It's not that I don't think about what other people think, but I don't Always let that be the driver. So as long as I feel like I belong and I'm true to me, and I'm not doing anything to harm [00:20:45] anybody or harm the world, then that's good enough.

Aransas: Do you come back to that regularly? Am I staying true to myself?

I

A lot of it is, is all this journaling that I do. I do a lot of that processing as I journal. I love that. I believe

[00:21:45] Because I need that back and forth to figure out my own stuff, even verbally in my own brain when I'm out for a run and I have like my breakthroughs, but for a lot of people it is written. I think it's really powerful to know where you can do that. And for you, clearly there's something [00:22:00] powerful about pen to paper.

But I want to honor that the great idea came to me. [00:22:30] So I captured at the end, at the last page I've got, you know, the last couple of pages of every journal is that. And then that way I know that It kind of keeps that inspiration flow flowing. And it's fun because I can go back to [00:22:45] past journals and look at some of those great ideas and go, Oh, I never did anything with that.

Hmm. Okay. But some of them I'm like, Oh, cool. I did do that. I just hadn't realized I hadn't put the dots together. And that's kind of fun. You know, it's kind of

So interesting. And so I think that is [00:23:15] a practice again, however we do it, just the act of reflecting and there's, I hear short term and long term reflections that you're building into this process. Super cool. I am super interested in what you do professionally. [00:23:30] What do you think the biggest blocks are in our mindsets as coaches that keep us small?

We allow our fear to [00:24:00] slow us down and forget that somebody was supposed to listen to this podcast episode. Somebody else is supposed to read the book that you're writing. And so when I get all stuck up in my little head or any of the coaches, they get stuck up in their head. We [00:24:15] forget that it's a part of a conversation.

We're not. this little island alone.

So I didn't ask your [00:24:45] permission before asking you this, but are you comfortable sharing how old you are generally? Yes. I'm 64. Amazing. Yeah. So what do you still at 64 want to experience?

I've got some new things that I'm going to be launching in my business, helping people write small books so that they can get their [00:25:15] message out. More connection, more podcasting, more of what I'm doing now, helping people be who they want to be, who they are, live

Aransas: meaningful lives. I wonder if we have this in common.

This is what I dreamed of. And it is so thrilling to be in that [00:26:00] place.

This is that? I love it.

Candy: Hmm. So three things that energize me are meditating. every morning, [00:26:45] being out in nature, especially walking the dog out in nature, especially in the forest or at the beach, and good conversation.

Aransas: When I think about [00:27:15] thematically what I take from this conversation, I think we just had a conversation about acceptance at its heart.

Yeah. And awareness.

Candy: Yeah. And connection with self. Mm hmm.

Candy: Yeah, we forget that the relationship that we have with [00:27:45] ourselves is the only one that lasts for our entire life.

True. Who

So that's the one to be most concerned with. What are you saying to yourself? Because that's probably what you're going to believe. Oh, Candy, this was [00:28:45] so much fun.

Candy: The first time that we met, I was like, Oh, I like talking with this woman. She's great.

Aransas: I felt the same way. I'm so glad that we found each other in this world.

Here I am at 49 finding every week more people that I feel [00:29:30] like, Oh. I just freaking love these people. And then I get to introduce them to the other people I met. You talked about in the very beginning, feeling that sense of place and a sense of acceptance. And I just believe that the more we show up as [00:29:45] ourself, the more we find the people with whom we are organically, authentically the right fit.

Very much.

Candy: Yeah.

Aransas: I love

Candy: that.

I really want to see this. I'm picturing you in a little tutu by the way. [00:30:15] Bright yellow.

Everything. Yes, we need the photos, please.

It'll really help us connect with more uplifters and it'll ensure you never miss one of these [00:31:00] beautiful stories.

With that all hindsight, bring the sun to twilight. Lift you up, [00:31:30] whoa Lift you up, whoa Lift you up, whoa Lift you up [00:31:45] Lift you up, whoa Lift you up, whoa Lift you up, oh, oh, oh, [00:32:00] oh, oh, Lift you up. Do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do. Beautiful. I cried. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha! It's that little thing you did with your voice.[00:32:15]

Right? In the prechorus, right? Uh huh. I was like, Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha! I stopped crying. Mommy, stop crying. You're disturbing the peace.