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Jessica Grace Coleman

Welcome to the Travel Transformation Podcast. I'm your host, Jessica Grace Coleman, and today I have a special guest, Rosie Milsom. She is a self-worth and success mindset coach who helps women heal their relationship with themselves, know their worth, and feel good enough in love and work so they can create a life they truly enjoy. 

I met Rosie a couple of weeks ago when we both went to a business conference in London called Expert Empires, and she actually lives just down the road from my childhood home in Stafford. So it was really cool to meet her. I love the work she does; I think it really goes well with the whole travel coaching thing. We both talk a lot about confidence, self-worth, believing that you deserve happiness and that you deserve to go travelling and that you're capable of going travelling… all that good stuff. 

We talk about the services she offers, her course that's coming out, how we can really start digging down and getting deeper into the reason why we don't feel that we're worthy of success or happiness or whatever it might be, and we also talk about how it relates to travel and talk a little bit about her favourite travel spots as well. So, let's get straight to the interview. 

Hi, Rosie. Welcome to the Travel Transformation Podcast. How are you doing today?

Rosie Milsom

Hi, Jessica. Yeah, I'm great, thank you. And thanks so much for having me. Really pleased to be here.

Jessica Grace Coleman

No problem. It's nice to have you on here! So, for our listeners, can you just give me a little bit of background info on you, what you do, and where you're from?

Rosie Milsom

Yeah, sure. So, my name is Rosie Milsom. I live in Stafford in the UK, and I'm a women's self-worth and success coach. So I essentially work with women to help them know their worth, and feel good enough so that they can create the career or the love and relationships or just the identity they deserve, that they feel good and worthy about.

Jessica Grace Coleman

I love that. I think it's so important. It's such an important foundation for everything we do, but it's something that we don't really think about that much or think that we can really work on. Or it's not always something that immediately comes to mind as something that would help us but, I mean, it would help every aspect of our life, literally.

Rosie Milsom

I literally did a post about this yesterday, about how self-worth is at the core of everything. And I think when I first trained to become a coach, I think I thought I was going to be more of a career and purpose coach – and I do do that within my work, one of my courses is about people finding their identity and their purpose – but with the clients that started coming to me, even though they were dealing with different kinds of issues, like some of them would be struggling to find lasting love or find their soulmate and some of them just didn't really like themselves or were struggling to progress in their career… but no matter what their issue was, it all came down to the fact that they didn't feel good enough, that they didn't have this sense of self-worth. 

And it literally affects every part of your life. The decisions that you make for yourself, how you present yourself… it affects career success and it affects your income, the way that you deal with money, it affects the kind of love that you expect and attract. It's what you feel worthy and deserving of. It’s at the core of your relationship with your family, with your friends… it really does affect every single area of your life. 

And you might be good in one. You might be feeling like you have confidence at work, say, but struggle in love. And I think there's also this sense that people have this idea of what low self-worth means or looks like, and you can be a confident person and have low self-worth. It doesn't necessarily come hand in hand, but you're right. I think people just think, oh well, having a high sense of self-worth is nice to have, but is it really that important? But when you dig into the root of it…

Jessica Grace Coleman

Yeah, definitely. And it's one of those things that you might not even realise it's happening. Like, if you don't have a high sense of self-worth or if you don't truly believe that you deserve something, then it will stop you from going after that promotion or asking for that raise. Or if you wanted to start your own business but you just didn't have the confidence and you just thought, oh well, everyone thinks like that, but it's coming from a place of you don't actually think you deserve it, and it's not until you start working on that that you actually realise how much you're holding yourself back by not addressing it. So I think it's so important to think about. Yeah. I just want to point out that – are you from Stafford or do you just live here?

Rosie Milsom

Yes, it's one of those weird ones. I've lived in the Staffordshire area for the majority of my life. I was born in London, lived in Cambridge for a few years. I lived in Bedford when I was there at university. But yeah, I've been Staffordshire-based now since 2006.

Jessica Grace Coleman

Nice. For my listeners who don't know, I am from Stafford – well, from a little village near Stafford called Little Haywood. And I have a couple of friends who are into the whole entrepreneurship thing and having their own business, but I hardly ever meet anyone from Stafford and we went to an event together – a business event in London – the other week and I saw your post on the Facebook group saying, I'm from Stafford. And I was like, ‘oh my god, there's another one!’ And we met and it led to this. So that's just really cool, wanted to point that out. 

Okay, so how did you first get into this work? You mentioned that you were thinking about career coaching and things, but what made you want to become a coach in the first place? What specifically made you go into the whole self-worth and success area?

Rosie Milsom

Sure. So I'd always been the one that would give my friends advice or that my sisters would come to when they needed someone to anchor them – I've got two sisters – so I always kind of unofficially coached people. And I had a sense that that was what I enjoyed doing. Because, in my other life, I'm a fundraiser. I work in the fundraising sector, and I started delivering fundraising training and I really enjoyed that as well. 

How I actually moved into coaching… it’s coming up to… God, nine years ago now. My husband and I started trying for children. It didn't happen for us. We went through a number of rounds of IVF and it was really difficult, and I did absolutely everything that I could do on the physical side to make it work and none of it was working. So I kind of thought, okay, well, what do I need to look at next? So then I was like, well, maybe I need to look a bit more internally. 

So I started discovering the world of mindset and how you can use that to go through the challenges that you're going through, but also look at things differently and change what you're attracting to yourself. And, obviously, going through a fertility journey like that did affect my sense of self-worth. It did make me wonder what I'd done to deserve it. Why was it so easy for everybody else? Through doing that mindset work, I came across other coaches online and started to see what they did and I started to delve into who I was – self-discovery work. And the things that were coming out as my strengths and values were things like perspective and kindness, spirituality and helping others, and personal growth. And they're obviously really linked to coaching. 

And then I did this purpose course. It just kind of reaffirmed that I was already on that path, thinking, this is where I want to go. But I think I just needed that… well, I needed to go through the process, and it came out and I was like, ‘Yeah, I want to be a coach.’ So I found the coaching that spoke to me, studied, and launched my business in May of last year, and started working with clients. 

And, as I say, when I first started, I thought it was going to be like working on people's confidence to go either specifically for their career or what have you. The reason I moved into self-worth was because the clients that I was attracting or that I was working with, it was through transforming their relationship with themselves and how they saw themselves – essentially their self-worth – that was getting them those results. And I enjoyed working with people about their self-worth across different aspects. I didn't want to just work with people who were trying to find love and couldn't, although I really enjoyed that. I also wanted to work with women who are struggling to put in boundaries or make decisions or move forward in their career, or who have lost their sense of self or are settling for a life that just isn't making them happy. 

And you touched on that before, that people just assume this is the way life is because they look around at their friends, their loved ones, and they see everyone having the same issue. Not enough time for yourself, not being able to set boundaries, having relationships that are just kind of mediocre, and they just go, ‘Well, this is just how life is.’ And I want people to know that that isn't how life is. You're supposed to thrive and be happy and have a healthy relationship with yourself and with other people, and you're supposed to feel like you're doing what you're meant to do. And that isn't just something that's for the privileged few. That is something to complete in a life game, isn't it? It's like, are you absolutely going to smash it? Are you going to treat life like a game that you're trying to win? Or are you going to just survive and just get by? I just think there's so much more than that. And if I can help women – or whoever follows my posts or whatever – to see themselves and their lives differently, then, yeah, that's a huge sense of purpose and fulfilment for me.

Jessica Grace Coleman

Yeah, I love that. And you're so right. So many people just coast through life or just exist or just struggle because they think that's how it is. And there's so much more out there. If you really start digging deep and, like you say, starting with yourself… and I think a lot of people kind of shy away from that because they think that that's maybe selfish, like if they've got a family or something, they always want to help other people first. But it's the cliche of being in the plane and having the oxygen things come down and put yours on first. It's so true. I think maybe some people get put off by that because, like you say, they think ‘I don't have time’.

Rosie Milsom

My clients say that all the time, you know, especially if they've got kids; there are other people, there are other priorities. I need to put these people first. I need to make decisions based on these people. But the thing is… it's something that I'm going through with one particular client at the moment, is that if you're not making decisions that are based on your own happiness, that's going to come out sooner or later. And the thing is, you're only teaching your children – or those around you – that you come last, and then that's what they're going to do and they're going to sacrifice. 

And it's not about choosing your happiness over everybody else's; it's just saying if you look after yourself and you are satisfied and fulfilled, that is going to go out to the whole of your life. That's going to improve your quality of life in all areas because you're going to be happier in your relationships, you're going to feel less resentful, you're going to make the impact that you were here to do. You're going to do the things that you were meant to do, that make sense for you to do, and that kind of resentment or unhappiness you feel… people can sense that. And let's say there’s a difference, I think, between being selfish – which some people see it as – and just actually making decisions that do benefit everyone, and there's also a difference between selflessness and just destroying yourself inside.

Jessica Grace Coleman

Yeah, and I also think there's just a general ripple effect. Like if you're walking down the street and you're in a bad mood and someone gives you a genuine smile – especially in England when we don't really make eye contact and stuff – a lot of the time that can change your mood in an instant. And if you're happy and if you've got kids or family or friends or whatever and they see you being happy, then they'll more likely be happy or be happier around you, feel easier around you. And even that in itself is a huge thing that can affect other people without you really knowing it. So starting with yourself is always a good thing. 

You mentioned there that you help people with lots of different things and I said how people might not know that they need this. So how do you actually get clients? Is it just a case of putting content out there and people will resonate with it and then contact you? Or how does it work when there are so many different aspects to what you do and people might not even know they need it?

Rosie Milsom

Yeah, I think it definitely is through content. It's like speaking to the potential issues that they're coming across or the thoughts that they're having, and starting to reveal the reason why they believe that about themselves or why they believe that about their life. I've had referrals as well, perhaps from family or friends, and from members that are seeing my stuff and are sharing it with people that they know would benefit from it. So yeah, it's speaking to the things that people are experiencing and showing them how it could be different or how what they've thought or believed might not actually be the case. 

And I think we all do have that sense of wanting more, or wanting to feel like we deserve more. So for me, it's just about pointing out that you absolutely can and should have that. So yeah, it'll either be through my networks or through my content that people read a message that they resonate with, whether it is about finding purpose and your identity, or if it is about finally feeling worthy and able to call in the love that you want. And they reach out and they either join one of my courses or my one-to-one coaching or whatever suits them best. 

But I generally find it's people that have either been moved by or resonated with the content, or they've got to the point where they're not willing to compromise themselves and their happiness anymore and they know that something needs to change because it's having an effect on their life that they don't want anymore.

Jessica Grace Coleman

Yeah. Again, you mentioned your course there, which I'm going to ask you about in a moment, but for the coaching services, for anyone who has never tried anything like this before, what do they actually entail? What is the process? I know it's different for everyone, but could you explain a bit about what your coaching services entail?

Rosie Milsom

Yeah, sure. My self-worth coaching is very much about understanding, first of all, why you think and feel the way that you do. Because, as I'm sure quite a lot of listeners have heard before, when we all have these beliefs and behaviours that are formed through things that we've learned through childhood, or through our life experiences, that have made you see yourself in some kind of light – or you created beliefs about yourself or what you believe you should expect in life – that are false… that's how we start: by understanding and identifying them. Because some of these beliefs that you'll be aware of, there'll be things that you're thinking to yourself all the time. But there are certain beliefs that are so hardwired into your subconscious that you just do them naturally. You live by them. You don't even realise that you're thinking this about yourself. 

Like a recent client that I've been working with, she came to me because she was struggling to make decisions for herself. She never trusted how to make decisions for herself. She was struggling to move forward in her business. She was struggling to put boundaries in at work. She was over-committing herself, making herself stressed and tired, trying to feel like she was enough. And it wasn't until we broke down beliefs and dived into it that she realised the reason she was acting this way was because she made some bad choices as a teenager and she felt like she was a bad person. She didn't feel like she deserved joy and happiness, she felt like she had to work really, really hard to get it, and she would only feel like she'd earned it if someone else had told her that she deserved it. Because she didn't believe that she did. 

But, obviously, nothing that she did was good enough to make her feel that. Her top level thought was, ‘I’m crap at making decisions. I don't know how to make decisions,’ but it only came out because she didn't trust her decisions, because she made a bad one once. And she wasn't creating or really going after the stuff that she wanted in life because she felt like she didn't deserve it. She felt like a bad person. But if we hadn't gone through that, she would have just continued with that top-level belief. ‘The reason I'm not moving forward or the reason I'm stressed and tired is because I make bad decisions.’ But it was a hell of a lot deeper than that. And so that's what we dive into, and then they start to transform. They see themselves differently, and realise that how they've seen themselves for such a long time isn't true. And there are reasons behind the way that they feel. 

So that's how we start. And then, depending on what their issue is – if it's around identity and purpose – then we'll dive into that self-awareness so they get to know themselves a bit better. If it's around love and relationships, again, it's building back that sense of confidence of who they are, trusting in the timing of their life, and having faith that what they want will come in time. Not that it's meant to, because I feel like sometimes that's a bit of a cop-out. I think it's just more about being okay with yourself whether you have this thing or not. Because if you need something in order to feel worthy, then that's always going to hold you to ransom. 

So yeah, the core part is about identifying why they've acted the way that they have, or thought or felt, and healing their relationship with themselves, giving them a sense of purpose. We work together to create a plan for where they're going now, whether that's love, career, life, or general identity, and how they're going to help themselves stay committed and accountable. Because I think that's something that people often worry about in the coaching, like clients. It's like, ‘oh, what if I spend this money and I don't actually stick to it and I just go back to doing what I did before?’ So I make sure that they've got all the tools they need not to do that.

Jessica Grace Coleman

Accountability is so important. I find I need it in so many areas of my life. I just won't do anything otherwise.

Rosie Milsom

Yeah, absolutely.

Jessica Grace Coleman

So do you do these on Zoom or in person?

Rosie Milsom

I work across the UK, so yeah, I mostly work on Zoom.

Jessica Grace Coleman

Okay. And for that example you just gave with the decision-making lady, for example… I know it's going to be completely different with each client… but how long does that kind of realisation and then transformation take? If someone's considering doing it, is it an ongoing thing that will keep going forever? Or is it, like, you work with them for a few months and then if they need help again, they contact you again? Or how does that work?

Rosie Milsom

Yeah, so the woman I was just referring to, we've had five sessions and she has already come to that conclusion and we're going to be working together for twelve months. It depends on a number of factors. It depends on how deeply ingrained you feel like your behaviour is. I do packages for people that are perhaps it's just one area of their life or like a particular challenge or obstacle that they just want to be coached through for a few weeks. And then I do like an eight and twelve-week package. 

And then I've had transformations – and massive spiritual awakening transformations – when working with clients for six weeks, and then I've worked with clients up to twelve weeks. There's one client that I work with now, just on a monthly basis, to keep her topped up and with that accountability. We started working together in the summer of last year. So it really depends on the person and the issue they've got and how much support they feel like they need. 

But as those transformations and discoveries can happen quite quickly, then it's just about making a plan for moving forward and having that accountability whilst you're instilling those new actions in your life, your new habits, your new mindset, tools and practices and stuff like that. Yeah, I always do it just based on the client, what they need really.

Jessica Grace Coleman

If you have so many clients and you're going really deep on certain topics – like really serious topics, I find, because I'm really introverted, I just get drained doing Zoom calls sometimes without even going into the really deep stuff. So does this affect you personally when you're talking about really deep subjects or have you learned to separate yourself from their problems and not relate it to your life, if that makes any sense?

Rosie Milsom

Yeah, that is something that's talked about quite a lot in the coaching industry, especially if you are someone that believes in energy and frequency and taking all that on and stuff – which I do – but no, it hasn't been an issue for me so far. I think perhaps just because of the achievement and purpose that I find in helping people find those discoveries and unlocking a key or an answer that they just didn't even know about and how that is going to change their life and empower them from there on in is just an amazing feeling. 

But I do know of and am aware of some practices for protecting energy when it comes to, say, if you're talking about quite serious or deep things. It's not something I've had to do so far, but I absolutely understand how it can happen. I'd say I'm quite an extroverted person, so I'm probably happiest when I am talking and serving and helping. So maybe that's why it doesn't affect me as much, or I'm just quite good at putting that barrier between my life and my clients and not allowing it to project too much onto me.

Jessica Grace Coleman

And, like you say, it works both ways. So if they have an epiphany and that light bulb moment and are amazes and really happy, then that would rub off on you and that's a great thing. So yeah, that's really cool. So you mentioned your course that you have. Could you tell us what that's called and what it's about?

Rosie Milsom

Yeah, sure. So I'm just going through a beta run of this course – which is basically a first-time-round test run of a course – called Found. So this came about through the work that I've been doing with my one-to-one clients since I qualified last year. I found that so many of them had lost their sense of self, their drive or motivation. I did a little bit of market research, and just the number of women – especially those who had become mothers – that were just kind of drifting… they used to know exactly what they stood for. They used to be really passionate about their career, their life direction, and they just lost themselves. They'd lost sight of what was important. They didn't know what they stood for anymore. And it was really affecting their sense of self-worth and their happiness, and they were just feeling like they were failing at everything and that they were just consumed by that mundane, everyday stuff that you have to do. 

And I think the problem is, when you release your sense of self… which I kind of did for a while when I was going through fertility, because it was literally in everything I breathed, I felt… like it was on my mind every single second of every day in everything that I ate, everything that I drank, everything I put in my body. When you become so focused on one thing or you make your identity about one thing, you lose sight of everything else, and you kind of put your life on hold. And yeah, it's a really bizarre feeling. 

So I spoke to these women about what do they need? Like, what do they feel they need to know themselves? What do they need to get the confidence back, that spark back in themselves, and to actually go after, or make more time for themselves to do the things that they want to do? And some of them said, ‘I don't know what to do anymore. I don't know what that is.’ So, yes, I created a seven-week course that helps people find their sense of self again, to uncover their purpose in life and feel absolutely 100% sure of who they are, what they stand for, what they care about, what they want to do. Help them make a bit of a life vision and a life plan, and be excited to live their life again. 

So the reason it's called Found is because it's about finding yourself. And it's for people that are feeling lost and want to understand what their unique identity blueprint is so that they can create a life that satisfies them, that they feel fulfilled by, and gives that sense that's missing at the moment. So I’m going through that with a few amazing women, and we'll be looking to do my next cohort in the next couple of months.

Jessica Grace Coleman

Nice. I love that – I’m all about life goals, life purpose, legacy… I love all that stuff. So that sounds really interesting. Okay, so if we were to talk about self-worth in terms of going travelling, exploring, putting yourself out there, spending money on things like travel – because I hear a lot of people say they can't justify the cost or the time to go travelling, or they think it's frivolous or it sounds a lot like what we were talking about earlier, like it all comes down to not believing you're worth spending the time on a trip or something like that – what would you say about this? Because I think it all links together really well. What would you say to someone who is thinking in that way or who wants to go travelling but has got some issues over putting themselves out there? Such as with solo travelling?

Rosie Milsom

It’s getting to the root of… what are the excuses you're telling yourself and what are the real reasons behind that? Because, again, I think the story that was sold is: You do this. You make decisions based on this. You go to school, you get a job, you do this. You don't just leave and sell your house and go travel, or you don't just go solo travelling around the world. But we don't all need to live this same archaic life description. If there's something that you want to do, if it excites you, if it lights you up, if adventuring or going somewhere new is something that feels good to you, then you've got to ask yourself, whose opinion or approval am I basing this decision not to go on? 

Because if it's other people's, or because you don't feel like you're worthy – ‘I'm not the type of person that can go out there on my own. I don't think I should be spending this money. I should invest it in a house’ and what have you – but I think it is really getting the sense of, like you say, is it coming down to the fact that you don't believe that you’re capable or worthy of this? Is it that you are struggling to see yourself as deserving of spending this money on? I think it's getting to the root of that, and really questioning if this is something that's going to make you happy and feels like part of your life journey… in which case, why are you denying yourself from doing it? And also thinking, what are all the things that you're going to gain from doing it? 

Like, you know about travelling and how that can transform you as a person and open your eyes to new experiences, new parts of yourself. And I think the stories that you hear about travel transformation – I'm sure you've had loads on here – is that it does completely change your view of yourself and your sense of self-worth and how you carry yourself. 

I remember when I met my husband, I'd just come back from backpacking around Europe for a couple of months. I was 22, I think, and I went for a job. We worked together, and I went for a job, and I was at the second interview stage, and I was up against one other person. And I’ve said to him, in the past – once we were together – I said, ‘What made you go for me in the end?’ Because he said it was quite close, and said, ‘It was the way that you carried yourself, especially when you spoke about having gone travelling; you had this sense of someone who'd been somewhere and seen things and it had given you that level of confidence.’ 

And I think having that level of independence and exploration into yourself and moving yourself outside of your comfort zone… it does show up in who you are afterwards. So, yeah, I probably went off on a bit of a tangent, but I think… if you're stopping yourself, if you're not doing it… yes, there are the logical, sensible – I say that with air quotes – reasons why you're stopping yourself. But really, if you were to dig a little bit deeper, there's probably something more in there, because anyone can get over those logical things. It's about whether or not you love yourself and believe in yourself enough that you can go on this path that perhaps is a little less travelled.

Jessica Grace Coleman

I love that! And the fear of what other people would think… I think is a huge thing stopping a lot of people, maybe from solo travelling, because people will be like, ‘It's too dangerous, you're going to get killed, you're going to get kidnapped.’ And obviously, those terrible things happen, but you can't let it stop you from living your life. And also, like you say… I didn't own a house, but I was renting one, and I stopped renting it and I put my stuff in the storage unit and now I don't really have a base until I figure out where I want that to be. And I think a lot of people would love to do that, but it's the fear of what their family would say or their friends would say. They'd be like, ‘Are you crazy? What are you doing? You're just becoming like a travelling hippie or something.’ Like, some people see it that way as, like, it's not a viable life choice for someone maybe over 30 or something. It's definitely the fear of what other people would think. 

And also, I love the example you gave with the job because I think another thing that stops people going – especially as they're getting older – if they're still working for other people, and they want a career break or something… they worry that that gap on their CV… people will see that and be like, ‘I don't know about hiring this one,’ but you made such a great point that it completely changed the way you carried yourself, it boosted your confidence. And I'm all about using travel to boost your confidence. That's like, my whole thing. 

And the fact that he saw that in you just after you came back from your trip and that's why you got it, that's such a great story – and also just such a great permission to give other people to go. It’s not going to mean you're never going to be able to get hired again, it's not going to stop you in your future prospects. All those excuses can just be easily overcome if you really stop and think about it and hear other people like you doing similar things. And I think that will give people permission to be like, okay, maybe it won't stop me from getting hired.

Rosie Milsom

And what you're saying about worrying about the decisions of others, again, a very timely thing because I was literally writing a post about that this morning – or an email to my subscribers. They're saying when you are letting fear of disapproval – particularly in this instance – play a part in the decisions that you're making about your life, you are essentially living your life based on the expectations and judgments of others. You're making decisions about your life based on the opinions of other people rather than your own. And that means you're placing the power of your future, your potential, your experiences, into the hands of people that aren't even the ones that have to live it. 

And you'll be doing less of the things that you want, or not doing something that you're really excited to do, based on either an assumption of what people are going to think about it or because of an opinion that they have about it. And I think, when you look at it, when you put the bare bones of it down and go, ‘I'm not doing something’ – and this could be travel or anything that you want to do when you don't do it – because of what other people think… it is pretty crazy to think you're putting that power all on someone else and you're living your life based on what other people are going to think about it rather than you. And they're not going to be thinking about that at their end of life.

Jessica Grace Coleman

Yeah, definitely. And like you say, most of the time it's not even what they're thinking; it's what you're assuming. And that's probably not the same thing at all.

Rosie Milsom

But yeah, I think we're saying the only judgement that really matters at the end of the day is yours, because you're the one that's going to have to live your life. You're the one that's with you all of the time. So yeah, I think you're saying you can assume that people might think that, but you might not know, and obviously you wouldn't want to do something based on what you think people are going to think.

Jessica Grace Coleman

Yeah, definitely. And you mentioned backpacking around Europe then – where did you go? I'm intrigued.

Rosie Milsom

Yeah, we went all over. So we started in Holland, so we went to Rotterdam and Amsterdam, and then we went over to Germany. So we went to Hamburg and Berlin, and we were in Berlin when the 2006 World Cup started. So we watched the first match up Brandenburg Gate – they shut the road. That was a real experience because Germany were hosting. And then we went to Prague, Budapest, Vienna… and then we spent two and a half weeks around Italy, going to Venice and Genoa and Rome and Florence, Naples… and then we went up to Switzerland, and then we came down and did the south of France, like Nice and Toulon and Beziers. And then we went down to Barcelona, just one stop in Spain. And then we came back through France – Limoges and Paris – and then flew back home from there.

Jessica Grace Coleman

Very nice – you packed a lot in! Was it a full-on backpacking trip? Like staying in hostels and all that kind of stuff?

Rosie Milsom

It was with my uni boyfriend at the time, so, yeah, it was like two, three… I think the most we stayed somewhere was four or five nights. So, yeah, it was shared dorms in hostels or we shared a tent on a camping site in Florence and like a tiny little mobile home on a holiday park in Venice. So, yeah, it was a great experience. And I met a lot of Americans, not so many Brits, but, yeah, it really does expand – it’s cheesy, but it really does expand your horizons. And also, you identify places that you really love and that you might want to go back to someday. I just went back to Venice a few weeks ago, which obviously was a completely different experience, from backpacking to being there with my husband as a proper adult.

Jessica Grace Coleman

Yeah, nice. And I asked you what your three favourite places to travel to were and you said Mexico, Parga, and Lake Como. So what's so special about these places?

Rosie Milsom

Mexico is where I went for my honeymoon with my husband. So we went to the Riviera Maya side and yeah, just really beautiful beaches. Probably partly because of the resort and obviously the fact that I was there for my honeymoon, but there's a lot to discover around there. And I really enjoyed the culture, and obviously I’ve been travelling around Europe, and I'd done quite a lot of that, but it was really crazy when we landed to just think ‘I'm in Mexico.’ Do you know? It just kind of blows your mind. 

So I was tossing up between Parga and Skiathos because my husband and I, we really love Greece and we've been out there the last eight or so times we've been abroad. I don't know, probably Italy's up there as well, but it's definitely tossed between Greece and Italy. We've been there a lot. We've been to Corfu, we've been to Crete, we've been to Parga, I've been to Gavdos, and Parga is just a really beautiful Greek town. Again, we just had a really lovely time. It's on the mainland, but it's very much an island vibe. And they've got lots of colourful houses on the harbour. They've got like a Venetian castle, so it's almost like part Greek, part Venetian style, and just lots of really nice restaurants. 

And it's one of those… it's big enough for you to walk around and explore, but not so big. But I think one of the things that we really like to feel is that we're in Greece, because I think when we went to Crete, we stayed in a Greek village up on a hill called Koutouloufari, which again, was very Greek, which was lovely. But then we went down into Hersonissos and it was like banging music at the beach and you wouldn't have necessarily known that you were in Greece. You could have been in any abroad town. So we quite enjoyed that sense of authenticity that still has enough going on. But, yeah, we just had a really beautiful week in Parga, and again, the sea was gorgeous and just lots of really great memories. 

Then Lake Como, we went there last year, and it’s as beautiful as you think it will be and more. We stayed in an amazing Airbnb property that had a view over the lake. We stayed in Bellagio, and again, my husband and I would joke that we have a very specific love of certain types of towns where there's like, terracotta roofs and different coloured buildings, and that's very much like Lake Como. And Skiathos has an element of that. Venice has an element of that. We went to Lisbon last year and that very much has that kind of vibe as well. So, yeah, that was the reason that I put those down.

Jessica Grace Coleman

Nice. I might have to ask you which Airbnb you had at Lake Como because I'm a huge lake fan, and if it's overlooking the lake and I can just sit there on my laptop… that sounds amazing to me. Yeah, one of the places I want to go and work from. Nice. Okay, so just before we go, two last quick questions. Please can you let our listeners know where they can find you online and how they can learn more about your services? And I believe you have a free guide, a free challenge?

Rosie Milsom

Yes, I've got a free guide they can get either by my website or the best place to find me is probably on Instagram or TikTok. So, on Instagram, I'm there as rosie_milsom_coaching. Or if you type in Rosie Milson Coaching, hopefully I'll come up. I share various posts and content on there, and by the link in my bio, you can find out more about my services. You could download a free guide. I've got a free 30-minute masterclass on how to make your life more awesome. The challenge, I think, was doing it in the lead-up to my course, which I probably will open again at some point. It was like an email challenge with video trainings on how to discover yourself. So if you want to head there… or there's also my website, rosiemilsom.com, where they can get the free guide and check out more about my services as well.

Jessica Grace Coleman

Nice. And I'll put that in the show notes as well. And is there anything else you want to mention or talk about or any message you want to get across before we go?

Rosie Milsom

I think… just in terms of travel and transformation and linking all that with self-worth and making decisions for your life that feel good to you… I would just encourage people to live their life from a sense of something that makes them feel good and makes them feel like them. Don't not decide to go somewhere that you really want to go, as we talked about, through either a fear that you're not able to do it or that you don't deserve to have experiences like that, or because of what other people say. 

I don't want anybody to have any regrets about their life or hold them back from experiences that are just going to make them feel amazing. And you never know who you're going to meet, what's going to happen, what you're going to see, and what you're going to experience. So just believe that you are worthy, that you are capable, and travel can be an amazing tool for discovering that about yourself. So, yeah, just crack on, go and see views that light you up, that inspire you, and yeah, just do it.

Jessica Grace Coleman

Could not agree more with that. Perfectly put. Great. Well, thank you so much for coming on the podcast today. I really appreciate you taking the time.

Rosie Milsom

Thank you so much, Jess, for having me and letting me talk about my work, and yeah, I love travel. It's been a big part of our lives, especially over the last couple of years, so always a pleasure to talk about kind of thing.

Jessica Grace Coleman

Great. Thank you! 

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