On the Couch | Michelle Fortuna | Intuition Coach | McNeill Real Estate
Recently we were delighted to have Michelle Fortuna, a local Intuition Coach and a healing practitioner, join us #onthecouch.
Michelle spoke about her business and how it helps people to connect with themselves and gain confidence to truly trust their intuition.
SCROLL TO THE BOTTOM TO WATCH THE VIDEO, or read the transcript below
Michelle is know for being a gentle healing practitioner who listens deeply to the needs of her clients.
Her unique method of healing has been developed over 12 years of mentoring clients and running weekly groups and courses for the past ten years.
Michelle is know for her powerful workshops such as “Thrive as an Empath”, “How to Create Healthy Boundaries” and so much more!
She is a highly regarded speaker who consistently receives positive feedback and deep appreciaton from her clients.
“Michelle, thank you so much for a beautiful session! You have made a wonderful connection with us all!”
“Great workshop! “
“Good speaker!”
“Informative and practical”
Clients who work with her describe the experience to be profound and healing.
Michelle is always happy to be interviewed and has a strong desire to support as many people as possible. She is deeply committed to her work.
She lives with her husband and their much loved whippets and ragdoll cat on the Mornington Pennisula.
Michelle has a love of nature, snorkelling and being creative.
She is a mother and a stepmum of four dynamic young adults.
Michelle runs regular GUIDED meditation groups and courses.
Topics include:
- DEEPENING YOUR INTUITION
- How to thrive as an EMPATH or HSP
- LOVE YOUR Relationships ~ A study group
- CREATE Boundaries which work for you ~ FOCUS GROUP and WORKSHOP
- Dedicated to listening ~ STUDY GROUP
- How to build foundations to support you in life
She has written a book called; LOVE YOUR RELATIONSHIPS ~ Improve the quality of your relationships through AWARENESS, CONNECTION and COMMUNICATION, which is available on Amazon Love Your Relationships
McNeill Real Estate are delighted to be hosting local business owners, identities' and personalities from around the Mornington Peninsula, to share their great products, services, and events with others.
This idea to share came about when the team, Janet McNeill and David Kershaw, realised that during the course of running their own business, they were meeting so many amazing people with great stories, that they wanted to let others know what was on their doorstep.
If you would like to be involved in sharing your own story, contact Janet or David to discuss further.... we cannot wait to meet you!
Videos are uploaded every Tuesday, so make sure you subscribe to our channel here to learn all about the Mornington Peninsula, how to buy, sell or rent and meet some fascinating people!!
Janet and David
TRANSCRIPT
JANET: Wow we have just had the most incredible interview with Michelle Fortuna who is an intuitive coach and also teaches meditation. If you're really unsure about trusting your own intuition, or you really think that you could benefit from some meditation, then you must watch this video because Michelle explains it all for you.
JANET: So welcome to another episode of On the Couch with McNeill Real Estate. My name is Janet and today I'm delighted to introduce you to Michelle Fortuna, who is an intuitive mentor, who teaches everything about health and well-being, as well as meditation. So welcome Michelle.
MICHELLE: Thank you so much Janet for having me here today, I really appreciate it.
JANET: It's a real pleasure and we're looking forward to learning more about you. So that is my first question - tell us about yourself and your background.
MICHELLE: Okay so I as an intuitive mentor, my speciality is supporting people in becoming clear, so that they trust their intuition. So I have been, look my background is actually, originally working with children. Okay. On to study creative art therapy, so have a very creative background and then was running groups with parents, with children of all ages, and the continual thing that used to come up, people would say - what's different about you Michelle? Yeah so I've always been real highly intuitive, and there came a point when I turned 40, where I was like, I need to offer this as something to support people. Because I could see the enormous value in being able to support people. In listening to their own intuition, so what started off as me originally offering house clearings, because it was something I was naturally skilled at doing, and I had studied it as well. Ended up being working one-on-one with clients. They would come along and before I knew it, they were wanting to come back regularly, and I started to understand what it was that I was offering, became clear myself and then I've just focused on intuition. And all that's going to support you in becoming clear, so you can trust your own.
JANET: Okay that sounds fantastic. So what do you actually love most about the Mornington Peninsula?
MICHELLE: Well I have actually just recently moved to the Mornington Peninsula and there's so many things that I love about it. I'm totally in love. Probably my favorite thing is actually snorkeling. I actually spent a lot of time snorkeling and or paddle boarding, or any time, any opportunity I can, I'm actually in the water and it's just become a tradition to, every time what whatever I'm doing, when I return back home. My husband and I will go to the pier, local pier. Let's go. Beautiful do you ever go to the Blairgowrie pier and snorkel there when the crabs come in? All the time ,yeah that'd be amazing. one of my favorite, see me down yep.
JANET: that's fabulous. so Michelle when, you've sort of touched a little bit on why, but when and why did you actually start your business?
MICHELLE: look I was really motivated from my own experience. Seeing a need in the market, and my children, probably my children motivated me more than anything. So being a mum, they're all young adults now, being a mum and a stepmom and seeing how aware they were. Sensitive and recognizing that in other children that I'd either worked with, or parents that I've worked with, and just really wanting to give more space and normalize intuition. because there's a whole lot of people out there that are enormously intuitive, but are not trusting their instincts. And really young children have this ability, we all have it within us ourselves, and yeah no I've went I really supported my children. They don't know any different, because they've grown up with me, to follow their instincts and you know I'm loving watching how they navigate the world, and how they make their decisions. And they've, you know they're down to earth. They're smart, they're really skilled, and they're highly intuitive. It's just a great life skill.
JANET: Yeah it sounds amazing. It's as you say, quite often you sort of get a gut feeling about something, and you go no, no I'm just going to forget about that, and I'm just going to do this, because I think that's what I should do. Whereas really, what you should do is, what you actually felt, and ultimately that's the right sort of track to take.
JANET: So what sort of services do you provide and what's involved in working with you?
MICHELLE: Yes, so I do a lot of groups and I really love to provide a really safe space for people to explore their own awareness, and just to deepen their understanding of themselves and their relationships. They're all based around very similar things and I also do one-on-one mentoring and workshops. I'm keen to be more involved in the community, having just moved here. So I spent almost 17 years in the in central Victoria. Which a beautiful community, I loved working and being involved there. So I'm really keen to be involved in the community in, in a way that's valuable. To live to them. Yeah okay that's great. So when you're talking about intuition and people learning more about that, when would a person know that they would benefit from a session with you? Probably the biggest thing, so when, if you're feeling overwhelmed, or if you're feeling, just finding it difficult to make decisions, or that that inner knowing that there's more to life, or you're just not wanting to be involved in life, or you're feeling scared that you're going in the wrong direction, or you don't know what work you want to do, or you're struggling in your relationship. It pretty much covers a lot of topics.
JANET: Yeah that sounds amazing. So I guess from that point of view, I mean all of us at times really do doubt ourselves and where we're going and where we're heading, and things change in our lives that, you know, we feel that we have no control over, so that's great advice, for looking into, you know, when people can sort of see a benefit from working with you. How then does connecting with yourself improve a relationship with others?
MICHELLE: So the biggest thing about when you truly embody and deeply connect with yourself, you're listening to yourself, and when you're able to listen to yourself and give yourself space for who you are, you're no longer seeking validation from others yourself and that allows you to really connect with another and listen, and listen to another at a level and and I'm talking about listening with our ears. But also listening with our heart, and being able to read a situation. Because for all different reasons, sometimes maybe a child, or someone you're in relationship with, can be expressing something, but there can be something going on underneath, that maybe you're not hearing. Yes and if you've got that ability to connect at a level, it's amazing how that will strengthen your relationship with that person, or allow them to feel safe in the dynamic.
JANET: Okay, yep it's quite fascinating. It's a completely different sort of level of communication isn't it. Yeah. Which would be important for people in all aspects of life, home, friends, work, everything. Yes that sounds great. So how easy is it for a person to change their outlook and grow into happiness?
MICHELLE: That's a really big question I don't want to say it's easy, because it's so personal. Everyone's different, every everybody, and what I have found, though is that people that are drawn to working with me. It's like the tip of the iceberg. It's a little bit like people that that come and work with me are really intuitive. Yeah and really aware. They're already recognized that they need it. And you know, with the happiness, sometimes it's it could be as simple as you're not wanting to follow your intuition because it's scary. But that's on the other side of you, actually feeling happy, but it can be scary, especially if you're following everyone else's point of view, or you're not, or you're following what you feel you should do. Yeah which or people pleasing, which is common.
JANET: Yes guilty, everybody does it I think to a large degree, and as you say, until they become confident in their own selves and their own decisions, you are you're influenced. Even as you say, even from a child in school, you're influenced by your friends, your peers, your teachers, your parents, so it's certainly quite an interesting topic and one that would be great to be able to manage.
JANET: Yeah that's great. Now you've written a book. Yes - love your relationships. So what inspired you to write it and who would benefit from reading it?
MICHELLE: Okay so, well interestingly enough I suppose, I've got, I've had the experience of following my intuition with, with my relationship. I've been with my husband now for 15-16 years, and if I hadn't followed my intuition, I wouldn't be with him and I'm not suggesting that other people are anything at all like me, but that was part of my building my awareness around how important it is to follow your instincts. This book is, has come from how I've re-learned relationships. How I've been, had great insight from working with so many people and exploring all the different, you know blocks, and all the different things that interfere the quality of relationships.
MICHELLE: It's who would have benefit anyone at all who's again who's got an interest in awareness who feels like they're doing repetitive patterns in relationships. Who you know, maybe you're feeling like you, you're really committed to your relationship, but you just want a little bit more insight on different ways of relating and understanding how you relate with yourself and it can be in an intimate relationship with a partner or it can be in your relationship with your children, or your or family members, or even friends.
JANET: Yeah okay that's great. And I guess it's sort of a gentle way of, of sort of feeding, into what you do is that you can read that in your privacy of your own home, and sort of get an idea as to whether that's the type of thing that's going to help you and then open your mind, broaden your mind then, for being able to meet with you and talk more in, you know face to face. Absolutely.
JANET: Okay that sounds brilliant. Okay so Michelle we were talking a little bit about, off camera, a little bit about your meditation. So what's involved in your meditation, because all I can imagine is, you know you sit on a on the floor with your legs crossed, and you're doing hmm. And which is not me, I can't do that, but tell me what's involved in the way you do meditation?
MICHELLE: Yes so from my experience of working with people, I've really wanted to make a really relatable, down-to-earth way, that to meditate that is going to support you in, in your day-to-day living and it, really honestly, came about for me from every time before I go into work, I would meditate sitting in the car. So basically, Ii'm really supporting people to be in their body. So it's an embodied meditation. It's about body awareness, being in your body. You're sitting down, so it's accessible to everybody and anybody, and it's enormously beneficial and also the meditations I run, they're guided. So I am guiding people through it. So it just takes away, you don't have to do anything other than be present and what happens over time, that becomes easier, and you benefit greatly from it and you know take it away with you.
JANET: Yeah so you're say for example it's me, I'm sitting in a chair. Then what do I do?
MICHELLE: Yes so I would support you in being 100 present, and but having said that, there's no right or wrong way, because that can mean something different to everybody, and it may not be something that you're familiar with doing. So I would just bring you into your body awareness. When you're ready, get you to close your eyes and be aware of all the points of contact. Allow your body to sink into the couch, and then I would talk you through a meditation. I actually, with all my meditations I start from the feet, or the ground. Yes and then we work up the body, and a meditation can be as short as 10 minutes and as long as 30 minutes. And with what's unique about my meditations is, I bring in a level of clearing into it, to support people to be clear in themselves and deepen their own awareness.
JANET: Okay that's fantastic, and do people fall asleep?
MICHELLE: But people afterwards, it's their consistent thing is, that they feel like, they feel great. They'll often after meditation go oh my god I've got this great insight. Or I know what I'm going to do this week, right. Or the feedback, because I do, I've been doing it for years now, if there's groups week after week yeah and it helps people sleep. Okay. Ii'll give people recordings as well, so then they listen to it and they'll use it again.
JANET: I was going to ask you that. So you that's what's in your class. But what do people take home? Yes so if you're doing, yeah if you're sitting in your car, or sitting here, or whatever, what do we take home to do it?
MICHELLE: Yes so I would give them a recording of their personalised meditation. Or of a group meditation. I offer lots of recordings, because then it's enormously valuable to be able to do it in your own space. Yes and in your own life.
JANET: Yes yeah okay, that's fantastic. Thank you very much for that, that's very interesting.
MICHELLE: So if you feel that you might be interested in working with me, please feel free to email me and I'm very happy to offer a 10% discount on any of my services.
JANET: Okay so thank you that's fantastic. So that's to anyone who's watching this video, if you mention the video when you contact Michelle, you'll get a great 10% discount on any of the workshops. So that's fantastic.
JANET: Thank you and how do people find you?
MICHELLE: The best way to find me is either on instagram or on facebook. Yep and your website.
JANET: That's great all that information will be below, so you can have a look for that. And Michelle what do you do when you're not working?
MICHELLE: When I'm not working I am writing, snorkeling, playing with my dogs, or going on adventures with my husband.
JANET: Fabulous, that's great thank you. Well that was really very interesting. Thank you Michelle for joining us, and that concludes another episode of on the couch with McNeill Real Estate. Now stay tuned, subscribe to our channel, and stay tuned because there'll be many more fabulous interviews coming up in the future. So thank you for watching and bye for now
