Redefining Success: When a “Good Life” No Longer Feels Right

0:00It doesn't really bring me this happiness. I was so empty inside, disconnected, having issues with the sleep, having issues with the health. And yes, I had a lot of money at my account, and at that time it was a more golden jail with a lot of responsibilities, with a lot of achievements. And I had a lot of things to show to the world, but I was completely empty inside. The one thing that I wanted to do when I was coming back after 12, 14 hours of daily work, I just wanted to have the relationship. I just wanted to be happy and to have a time for the thing that I want to do. But I was so busy in creating success and to show it, showcase it for external world

0:52that I completely disconnected from the things that in reality were important to me, what were my values, what I was passionate about it. I didn't have time for it. Hi, I'm Debbie Thompson and this is A Stone in My Shoe. The podcast where we explore how midlife can become the most true purposeful and fulfilling chapter yet when we choose to follow our inner wisdom. Anno began her career as a corporate executive in Ukraine's largest seafood importing company before building her own highly successful and awarded international seafood company in Estonia. But alongside the success, Anno was also navigating deeper personal questions about

1:38purpose, alignment and leadership. After attending a transformational retreat and in working with a range of powerful teachers and modalities, her life shifted in ways she hadn't expected. The experience was so impactful that she later created I Am Creation Retreats, bringing together many of the mentors and approaches that had helped her transform her own journey. Today she lives in Bali with her family and as well as running her seafood company, she works with individuals, entrepreneurs and leaders around the world, helping them with hard mind and body coherence and a deep sense of purpose. Welcome Alona. Oh my god, I love it. Thank you so much.

2:23It was such a beautiful introduction and yeah, I'm so happy to be here with all of you guys and thank you. Where should we start, Debbie? Well, I thought a good place to start was before we go into your story and what a story it is, I wanted to frame it for the woman listening. So when she finishes this conversation, what do you hope she understands differently about success and living in alignment? You ask me? Yes. So for the person listening, almost I should, why should they listen to you? What are they going to get from you? What words of wisdom can you share with her? I think a lot of people, they don't understand the real meaning of success. They have some perceptions that they had from parents,

3:14from school, from the government, from society. And for a lot of people, success means how much money they have, how many cars they have, some material things. But in reality, success is at least for me and through the whole journey that I had in the corporate business, building my own business from zero to eight figures, creating the retreats, events and summits and festivals and working with the international speakers from around the world, success is about living your life the way you want, is about doing the things that you want, is about creating with someone that you are aligned, is about waking up in the morning and travel around

3:59Australia and you have the opportunity to do it and you have the possibilities to do it and you, the most important, you have a choice to do it. So for me, I shifted through the whole journey in the corporate and the business. I shifted the understanding of success and it took a lot of pressure from my shoulders, a lot of responsibilities and I feel redefining the success. Now I can live more happier life and have more freedom to do the things that I want to choose, the things that I want and to create the things with people that I want to create. So it brings more freedom, more happiness, more joy, more curiosity in everything what I'm doing now. Brilliant. So what I'm hearing is that success really is being authentically you,

4:51what lights you up and it's different for everybody and when you authentically connect with who you are and what lights you up and what you're kind of meant to do, there's more joy, there's more curiosity, there's more abundance, there's more of more of everything. Yes, for sure. It's so liberating as I told you and it shifted completely the trajectory of my life and it shifted the way I do the things and I create the things because before working in the corporate business and I started to work in the corporate business when I was just 20 years old and imagine a goal of 20 years old working in the field where 95% were males and

5:39I had to show to prove them that I can be there among the men. I had to be and play the same they were playing. I had to achieve the things. I had to hassle, achieve, scale in more masculine way and for me at the time success was how many deals I did during the week, how many contracts we concluded, how many trips I did with my management, how much money I had on my account and from one side at that time I was enjoying it because I could show to the men, yes I do it, look how many contracts I did, look how successful I am and it was almost a battle all the time between me and people that were in my team or suppliers or clients at that

6:28time and at some point I realized that it doesn't bring me this happiness. I was so empty inside, disconnected, having issues with the sleep, having issues with the health and yes I had a lot of money at my account and at that time it was a more golden jail with a lot of responsibilities, with a lot of achievements and I had a lot of things to show to the world but I was completely empty inside and the one thing that I wanted to do when I was coming back after 12, 14 hours of daily work I just wanted to have the relationship, I just wanted to be happy and to have a time for the thing that I want to do but I was so busy in creating success and

7:21to show it, showcase it for external world that I completely disconnected from the things that in reality were important to me what were my values, what I was passionate about it, I didn't have time for it. So Lona you started at 20 and you went into a very masculine world and you did exceptionally well and by doing very well you had to play the masculine game, do all those things and not just that it was success, money, travel, for most people reading it would be this is amazing, this is what I aspire to. At what point did you start feeling this disconnection? Was it immediate or was it a very slow burn? When in your 20s did you start

8:07feeling it and when did you actually take action? It took me 10 years to do the action because the Golden Jail was so beautiful and just 55 countries traveling and doing all these negotiations as you said it was a beautiful life as I saw it but again at that point imagine alcoholic or the drug-addicted person it is an addiction and for me at that time I was workaholic, I wasn't alcoholic I was workaholic and it was difficult for me to see this addiction to the success, to money, all these egomind games and all these achievements one after another etc so I as I told you it took me 10 years to realize it but as soon as I realized it I couldn't come

8:56back to the life that I had before and for me it was the moment when I was sharing with one of my friends that I'm I'm exhausted I I love my work and at the same time I hate my work yes it brings me money all these possibilities opportunities I'm not happy I feel emptiness and I'm done and he recommended me to go to the retreat and imagine retreat three days after I'm coming back and I go to my boss and I sign in the paper and I'm telling I'm done I don't know what I will do but I will not continue to do what I was doing before because that moment was so powerful in my life that you know someone took the glasses

9:42these pink glasses from my eyes and I started to see the reality and I realized that reality that I was living before it's not so beautiful as I described to myself or my mind and ego described to me and make me believe that it was the life and it was my dream life and that I was successful I was not wow that is so profound because that is what we're so you know particularly in the western world sold go and get a good job make a load of money you know be successful and success is all the things that you were talking about and and you were saying workaholism alcoholism or workaholism is very accepted and you know some of the other addictions are not and so I suppose in some ways it's very difficult for people who are addicted

10:33to work to actually see it because there's no real stigma and even if you got inklings of it and your body was telling you you're not sleeping you know and the disconnection it's very easy to override it to say I'm very successful so that is incredibly powerful but more a more wow factor is a fact in a retreat you turned your whole life around you were ready to go and give that all up can you tell me more about what happened there to literally turn you around 180 degrees in what three five days in three days yeah it in reality it was the practice where the coach put us created the inner circle and outer circle and they put

11:19people in front of us inner circle and at some point we closed the eyes and then the coach told okay can you open your eyes and imagine that this is your father and he died and you didn't have a chance to tell him the words of gratitude and how much you love him and it was the moment when I was standing in front of the guy imagining that he was my father and I was oh my god I didn't talk to my father for 15 years I hate him I hate myself and I can't forgive myself and him for the things that happened in the childhood and when my parents divorced my father told if I don't have a wife I

12:05don't need the kids and for me at the time I was 15 I told if you don't have a kids I don't need you and it was the moment when I was okay I will prove that I can live without you I will prove that I will achieve so much without you that I don't need your help and I don't need this and this and in reality that kind of words that I said that day when I was 15 literally it took me on this journey for the for 15 years to prove that I can do the things without support that I'm strong enough that I'm that I can achieve the things without any help that I'm that I can live the life I want but in reality at that day I realized that okay I did it all I did it was I happy no it didn't

12:58bring me happiness it took it disconnected me even more from him from the family from myself and from what I really wanted to create in my life so it was that moment where when I realized I'm done I was carrying this poison inside myself this hate this kind of negative feelings emotions for 15 years of my life destroying my body destroying my life and trying to playing the same patterns with other men in my life not feeling happy in the relationship and I just realized I'm done I don't want to for what for what I can't even tell to my father that I love him and that I'm

13:46grateful for him to bring me into this world so I can experience the life so it was very powerful moment that touched my heart so deeply and I could feel this kind of expansion in my heart and it was the moment that I could receive this love to myself to my father and this gratitude and could feel it inside because I was so disconnected and so much in my mind and yeah it was this first step for me to connect to myself and to reconnect with my father wow that's a that's an incredibly profound moment and prior to being in that inner circle and

14:31having to look at that person and you know and he died and you hadn't taught him he loved him there there was probably some sense of uncomfortable you know the stone in your shoe but at that moment that stone became so sharp and so visceral you could feel it in every part of your body that you kind of went I have to make a change I have to do something now most people I don't know would get such a profound and I know a lot of people act out all sorts of childhood wounds exactly you to prove that they lovable and worthy and and you know and all those and in some ways this fueled you this gave you this energy to be so you know successful in your life

15:19that that was such good fuel but it was negative fuel so my question to you is for the person listening who feels the disconnect or maybe doesn't even is not even aware of it because a highly successful workaholic you know on paper amazing is this almost 180 degree change so quickly something that is often happened was it quite unique I feel that all of us have this kind of moment of awakening where as I said for me it was the moment when my heart was opening and I felt this expansion and this is the moment when we are reconnecting with our soul with our spirit so I think a lot of people that experience this kind of awakening

16:07moments is when we are coming back connecting to the spirit through the heart because again the heart is the doorway for us to connect to the spirit higher self-universe whatever people call it and when you feel this connection again when you feel this kind of the force there is much bigger than just you that there is something else than just you and your mind and ego you you can't I came back to to the body and I felt that it's it's it's that I didn't have a space for me I became bigger I've expanded and the life that I had at that time

16:52I felt that it's small it's not my life anymore and I want to have to experience and to have a different life and it was the moment when I came back to this forgiveness to myself and the gratitude it was the moment where again this connection with the spirit which plays on much higher vibration start to guide me and yes for sure when I was coming back to to the work etc I come back to my mind and even now I am playing with my mind but I feel that it was the moment of me separating from just a body just a mind and seeing that I am how to say I'm bigger than

17:40just the physical body and the mind and there is something more and I was curious enough to start this journey and to see what do I really want to create and who I who am I and a lot of people when they have this moment of awakening they start to they start to ask this kind of profound questions and these questions take them on the journey so this is what happened to me so it was almost the the event that took the lid off so that everything could come out and then the journey starts of being curious doing the work because you know we've all got childhood patterns that we need to address and see so you you got this profound experience you

18:27felt this deep sense of there's so much more you're so much bigger than you are so going back to work and handing in your notice after so long being so successful was there a moment of hesitation or was was it so clear and you felt so kind of looked after and protected that it you went I'm going to be okay how did you how did you feel this is exactly how I felt and when I told to the to the bosses that I don't know what I will do but I know that I can't continue to do what I was doing before I knew I felt this kind of support and even when my bosses started to raise my salary and you know what people are doing in the corporate job it was no it was my inner compass was so strong and it was no I will not do it even if you will raise me

19:18the salary if you even if you will take me to more countries it was so I felt this moment I started to have my own integrity and understanding that what I want and what I don't want and it was this some kind of feelings inside my body where if I wanted to do something it was about expansion and this curiosity and it's joy and when people were telling me the things that I didn't want I could feel this contraction in the body and no so I found this connection more to my body at that time I didn't know this is intuition was talking through my body or a fire self and all I didn't have these words in my vocabulary because I'm I'm from Ukraine 10 years in corporate business

20:09and we didn't have all these gurus teachers or youtube's podcast and all these beautiful things but it was the moment when again I started to listen to myself and to these feelings inside my body and I started to trust more and more sort of the different experiences and see that my body was really guiding me wow and so you you came in you felt supported you you were so connected to your body you could feel it viscerally your intuition had really kicked in and you knew you wanted expansion you knew that what you were doing was not what you're in so what was the next step on your journey and because you've created so much

20:55since then can you just talk us through those steps and yeah it was after when I left the when I left the corporate business in all the suppliers because I was dealing with huge contracts and with the international suppliers I started to get so many calls and they were shocked how how I could leave them not just a company but them and at some point I started to get the invitations from different suppliers to work for them to expand their business etc and in half I've started to as as a representative of few international companies from US Canada from Norway and then in half a year I opened my own company and in reality I've started to have this beautiful life full of freedom expansion doing the things that I want to do earning much

21:44more money than I've earned in 10 years of my corporate judges doing the things that I love and having the freedom to work with the people that I wanted to work and I've met the man and it was so beautiful so my life was expanding and I saw this at the best time ever but then at some point I became pregnant and at the end months of pregnancy we broke up with the father of my child and I feel that this this was the moment where this happy life or the best life that I thought was completely broken let's say in that night and after some time I've just I've decided to go to Bali for holidays and I went to Bali before Covid I've stuck in Covid in Bali and

22:36at some point I went to Tantra and it was the moment before Tantra and after it was the moment it began this aha moment or awakening moment for my body and a reconnection even more deeper and connection to my spirit where I was oh my god I'm a woman I have this chakras energy meditation what is this I and it was completely new new world was open in front of me and it was so good just to feel myself home in my body and feel this energy and tickling and all these things and yeah after this it was this moment for me to understand that I'm not again in the business being in the business for 20 years now my mind is so powerful so powerful it can

23:28create so many stories but as a woman it's very important to connect to the body and there is a huge world inside us when we reconnect with it when we can start to feel all these sensations and energy when we can start to hear these voices when we can start to see these visions etc when we can talk with our higher self and it wasn't available for me before because I was so stuck in the mind and you are again as I shared before the heart is the gate to connect to this universe to connect to the quantum to connect to the higher self and when you are in the mind you are so much busy there you can't feel all these things because you can't be at the same time

24:15in the present moment in your mind and at the same time in in your heart so for me reconnecting again on the deeper level with my body with the spirit and starting to meditate and creating the space for my mind to stay in the silence it was such a powerful shift that gave me a lot of peace inside but at the same time gave me the space to hear this voice inner voice guidance and then at some point I was at the retreat in Costa Rica two years ago and I was taking a shower and I was just in the jungle sticking the shower and literally it just came to me

25:00the name of the retreat the visuals of the teachers the idea of the retreat and everything just came to me and then in two days I've just messaged the speakers that I saw in this download in two days I got a confirmation from 12 speakers that were ready to fly from six countries and in three months I had my first retreat and coming from two retreats last year we did three retreats two online summits one in person summit in Bali that we did in three months and we brought 40 speakers from different countries we launched mentorship program and now we opened the community just from one download just from taking the action on the

25:47guidance that I got from my higher self my life completely changed my the way how I feel myself changed the success and everything the identity the beliefs the quality of life everything just shifted so much so much so I know that's that's amazing you the first shift you you left your corporate job and you set up on your own and you create this life that had way more space more time earning more money and thought this is the perfect life but during that time you hadn't done tantra so you had done kind of version one but you haven't hadn't gone to the next level then went to Bali and that the tantra opened up in next level going back to just before the

26:33tantra had you any idea or any inkling that this would be the path that you would go on I went to Bali for three months and just single mother with a child in my hands doing the business at that time I didn't know anything about the meditation about spirituality about healing because again I was a single mom and I was trying to create a beautiful life for my child for myself I was still busy in my mind and making money let's say I was still playing this mind game and at the same time asking the questions and following the guidance that's how I got to tantra for sure I couldn't even imagine when the first time when I was meditating and getting

27:19when I got this download you should create a women's circle and I was me women's circle fish queen what what is this you know it was it was so different compared to what I was experiencing in my life and it was strange for me to create the women's circle I'm not a guru I'm not a teacher I don't know what it is but it was just this download and guidance I'm okay I know a lot of amazing people in Bali that I already went to some workshops let me let me start to create women's circles and invite them and this is how I started by being the organizer and host of different women's circles events then people started oh can you do my retreat oh let's do the festival oh let's do the collaboration and still trying to do all the things and traveling

28:08because I'm still in business and having all this network in events with 300 people one sound people etc and I was going to these events and it was oh my god people are such a service level conversations okay how how are you how much money you are doing what are you doing etc and you go to to Tantra or to the brasswork or to this kind of different events where you have this expansion of the heart but at the same time it's it's difficult to connect it with your real life because as soon as you come back to the real life you need to earn money pay the bills and all the things so for me it was okay how I can connect my business material life will with all this exploration of the spiritual life how I can connect it and this is how

28:57I am creation came to me I was putting this intention to the universe how I can create this balance and harmony in my life so I can inspire other people to do the same and this is how the idea was born but I've never ever ever thought that I will be leader authentic leader creating all these events and summits and programs and now we are doing this we are creation movement and we were having a call last Friday and we were checking in the community people in our community we have people from 87 countries 87 countries imagine just following my path just following this passion now I can reach people from 87 countries

29:45wow that's that's remarkable and the fact that you got this download and you trusted your intuition I mean you're obviously being curious you'd been doing some work this wasn't the first rodeo but you went I'm actually going to I'm gonna you know I'm gonna do something about this and I know people and and you made it happen when it was happening was it scary or did you just trust your intuition and feel I'm just the messenger I'm just going to do whatever download I get I'm gonna do or how did that how did that inner world work for you I I can tell you every time when I'm getting these downloads it's like no please not me again because

30:34it I know that my higher self see me much bigger and my higher self already know my potential and still yet I am I am a spirit in the human body living this beautiful experience cold life and I have a mind and mine had the fears so every time there is for the mind the unpredictable things bring this kind of fears but one of the things that I realized through my journey it's okay if we are talking about fire you know that the fire is hot right you understand it this is the fact you will not debate with me so the same is the same is the life it is unpredictable it was it is it will be but the mind starts to create this kind of fears inside because of the

31:27unpredictable things but in reality what we are doing we are starting to we are trying to control we are trying to do something about it and it takes us on this overwhelming journey when we where we are trying to control and manage our life but you can't it's illusion you the life is unpredictable you can't manage or control it you don't know what will happen in the next moment so we spend so much time to trying to manage and control the life instead of just being present and enjoying it right so for me when I realize it okay I'm getting this download it means I got it it's not my friends I got it it means that my higher self already know

32:16that I can do it I don't know how I will do it and I can be stuck in my fears and again my mind is very powerful creating all the stories movies failure and this and this I can stuck there or I can make the step of courage and just doing one step at a time and see what will open from there and surrender again the power of women is to trust and surrender and just flow so it took me some time to be in this flow it took me some time to learn how to trust because again with the business mind for 20 years and managing control and the teams the business etc it wasn't so easy for me to to let go of this control but but I realized when I was trying to

33:05control the result the end result I was not allowing the universe to show me what else is possible because everything what I was creating was based on the experience that I had in in the past but this past was was a lot of constructions limiting beliefs and and also my mind was creating all of these fears and then when I realized okay let's play with it universe okay I will trust you let's see where it will happen and then the people start to call you or send the message send the messages you or some synchronicity start to happen and at some point I realized that the results of me just doing one step at a time and trusting and surrendering to the process and to the flow of this universe co-creation with the universe brought me

33:52completely different result that I would not imagine with my mind because my mind was limited to the experiences from the past and here I am surrendering to the universal flow of energy of co-creation through through the through the quantum field with the people not just doing the things alone and trying to control and manage all these results and the project and creation itself but co-creating in the flow with the full trust and surrender it's just completely different quality results and you you can't you can't imagine every time I'm just wow it's it's Picasso is creating all these beautiful things and and then at the end it's wow wow I'm thank you for just I'm

34:40telling thank you to myself for trusting it because as the human being in the physical body I would not be able to create it I would not I love it trust surrender and flow and you're so right because so many of us are stuck in our heads where we're trying to control and even if we made even if you thought oh I could do this what we can imagine is our past experience and perhaps what we've learned but not what the universe could potentially open and without trusting first step and then just being open to what might happen and see what flows is is it's just magical now I've got a couple more questions before we go the first is what do you hope your work will

35:26leave for future generations for me it's about legacy as I say my mission is to create the revolution for the soul's evolution so I really want all the experiences everything and what we are doing to bring more consciousness into this world more light more love and more awakened authentic leaders that are more connected to their unique gifts because we we all have unique gift we all have unique blueprint and we all came here to create this legacy to give to create this impact in a completely unique way in completely unique way so the more people will

36:14realize that they are unique creations the more people will realize that they can create in a different way without trying to do the same things other people are doing or be someone else or the more they will come back to themselves to their unique expression their unique gifts to to the consciousness from within I really feel that we can create a new world where people will have more freedom more joy more happiness more abundance in in their life and they will be liberated from these constructions of the mind from this pressure from the society from the parents and they will live their unique life beautiful beautiful what a legacy what a legacy

37:07from trusting yes surrendering and seeing what's happened so the last thing I wanted to do is just to leave the listener with one message one sentence one word whatever of your you know of your wisdom or what you'd love to perhaps even have shared with your 30 or 30 year old self just some message I love this phrase we are human being not a human doing and the more we come back to our being to the presence the more we feel the more we create and the more aliveness will be in us and the more we can explore in in this life and yeah for me going from this life of doing

37:55building chasing achieving selling my soul for money and coming back to myself to to my being reconnecting with the spirit with the soul and creating this heart mind and body coherence this alignment from with these from within I've created much more peace inside harmony and balance in my life and I'm so passionate about what I'm doing what I'm creating and just different quality of life when you are enjoying when you have so much energy so for me it's it's just be just be who you are just be and for me this is one of the most important things that I am trying to convey into to adults to kids to children and and trying to create the

38:49spaces where people can really explore their uniqueness I love that Selena and I think that's where we started where being authentic being authentically who you are and trusting it and allowing you know allowing it to flow instead of trying to control because as you said it's very difficult to control life because it's unpredictable so I'd really like to thank you a number of things thank you so much for being on the podcast but also I came to your retreat in November last year November 2025 and it was you know life changing for me and my husband as well just opened up so many questions allowed my heart to open as well that real feeling of heart and trust because that's often the first thing is how can I trust particularly with a

39:35you know mind that is so logical but thank you so much for giving me trust and thank you so much for your time and for your wisdom really appreciate everything that you're doing thank you so much David for this opportunity to share and I love your family and it's so beautiful to see how you are expanding and seeing the seeds we put the seeds and to see how it's this beautiful flowers are blooming now and how much more you can both create and how much impact you you can bring to this world and inspire more people to live the life and enjoy it and really enjoy it oh my god enjoy it that's exactly it we're only here for a short time and we need to be authentically who

40:21we are and be rather than do you'll so right so thank you