Natalie Hennessey worked as a special education teacher for the last 15 years, but when she felt her life as a teacher was drawing to a close, Natalie had to look at what her options were. "Firstly, I looked at what my strengths are-connecting with people and communicating". She felt that a natural progression was through life coaching and supporting the community. So after completing a life coaching course and spotting a gap in the market, Natalie took the plunge and launched women's networking business, Spirited Women's Network.
Spirited Women’s Network serves women in business by raising their profile, contributing to the achievement of their goals and by providing exposure to a diverse range of businesses. It uses collective expertise, wisdom and experience of the community of Sunshine Coast women. “Spirited Women’s Network is an extension of my motivation to make a difference to the community”, Natalie says.
“My inspiration for this project came from my passion; to be a part of helping people to heal whatever it is that is stopping them from having the life they want to, and assisting women believe in themselves and believe that they can make a difference”.
Natalie describes her organisation as celebrating the individuality in women and connecting women with women, and with themselves.
Natalie says “supporting, connecting, empowering Sunshine Coast women is my philosophy. It is about choice, women have a choice”. Fundamentally, Natalie seeks to support women’s participation in business and provide inspiration to women, which enable them to gain the courage to break free from the chains of limiting belief patterns that have traditionally kept women suppressed and unable to see their true beauty and power.
“My vision is to become the most comprehensive directory of women’s services on the Sunshine Coast, continually expanding and evolving and keeping the philosophy alive”.
Natalie believes that the best piece of advice she received was "to follow your passion and be willing to take risks". In addition, keep your energy vertical. "As women, we tend to spread our energy horizontal-spreading it very thin, because we do that, we dissipate our power. Women need to keep their energy vertical so that they are balanced", she says.
Natalie's tip for 2008:
Learn to love who you are: “if you truly love who you are, then you will automatically make choices and decisions that honour you, which are ultimately the right ones. If you are going into business or you are at cross roads, having a hard time, the only thing you can do is love who you are and make choices from there”, Natalie says.
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