Monica Ferguson’s journey from portrait photography to mindset coaching is a powerful testament to transformation and purpose. After years of capturing the beauty and vulnerabilities of countless individuals behind the camera, Monica felt a deep calling to delve even deeper into personal development and self-worth. Her experiences with intimate client interactions and the profound realizations about self-doubt and insecurity led her to become a Mindset Coach. In this inspiring interview, Monica shares how her own battles with trauma and self-worth have shaped her approach to coaching, her challenges and breakthroughs, and her unwavering commitment to helping others break free from their past and embrace their true potential. Join us as Monica opens up about her remarkable path and the impactful work she now does to empower and uplift others.
1. Can you tell us about your journey from portrait photography to becoming a coach? What inspired this transition?
Photographing SO many women and being in such an intimate space with them inspired me to become a Coach. Being photographed is deeply confronting for people, as for so many of us we hold beliefs & fears that we are not good enough. Not pretty enough, skinny enough, successful enough, good enough. I noticed there was a theme with almost every single person I got to photograph, men included. This deep rooted set of fears & stories & insecurities that people would share with me. It deeply upset me so see so many absolutely incredible people battling with these false beliefs and I wanted to be a part of the solution. That started with my podcast World Domination where I was able to start having conversations about the real things that everyone experiences but doesn’t talk about, and led to me training up as a Mindset Coach so I could help people at a much deeper level.
2. How did the experience of working closely with people in your photography business influence your decision to become a coach?
As a Photographer I was deeply privileged to be granted access into people’s inner most thoughts. I spent a lot of time connecting with my clients, understanding their stories, their fears and their goals. The deeper I could go with them and the more trust we could build, the more of their beauty & magnificence I could capture in photographs as they truly felt safe with me and let me in. It was in this state that I could truly help people breakthrough their old stories of not being good enough etc because I could literally see their truest self and capture it so they could see it too. Those first moments of turning my camera around and showing my clients the most incredible photographs of themselves where they could see themselves in a way they had never seen before… damn. It still makes me cry when I think about it. The moments where someone realises they are actually beautiful and just could never see it until now…. There are no words for how that feels to be able to help people remember who they are. I noticed that I had a real knack for creating a space of safety for my clients and it was these intimate moments where my clients let me in that helped me to believe I could be a Coach. I wondered what impact I could have on people if I combined a feeling of trust and safety with deep transformational tools that work at the subconscious level (95%) of the mind. And so as they say, the rest is history.
3. What was the initial inspiration behind Monica Ferguson Coach, and how has your vision evolved since then?
Initially, it was about saving myself. I grew up in domestic violence, poverty, with narcissistic abuse and an incredibly broken home. My brother Fergus (the reason my last name is Ferguson now) passed in 2007 and I had deeply struggled with depression and anxiety since I was a teenager. I hated myself, I didn’t see the value in my life and I had learned that I was completely unloveable, unworthy & was used to feeling abandoned and therefore (in my mind) not good enough.
One night several years ago, I found myself in a hotel room with an ex-partner (who was a narcissist) and I thought he was going to hit me. He didn’t, he pushed me over instead and stormed out but it deeply rattled me. I asked myself how on earth I ended up in that situation when I knew so much about self-worth? It was then that I realised I was following the cycles I had observed as a child and in that moment I refused to let that be my path. I packed my bag, and walked out of the room. I then committed to learning so much about trauma, the subconscious mind and the patterns and cycles within myself that had led me to ending up in that situation.
For the next several years, I completely focused on myself. I studied, I went seriously inwards and started to heal & process my whole life up to that point alongside building my business and podcast with the incredible tools I was learning. When I saw what was possible, I wanted to help as many people break free from their past, their feelings of unworthiness and their old beliefs that were holding them back like I had. The vision now is quite literally what my podcast is called, World Domination. We aim high right!?
4. What were some of the biggest fears or challenges you faced when starting your coaching business, and how did you overcome them?
There were so many it’s unreal. Truly, I had no idea how hard it was going to be. I think the big distinction was that as a Photographer I was behind the camera and it was about the experience and my photographs, but as a Coach it was about me and so I had a lot of inner work to do. Starting a business is the quickest way to supercharge our personal development I reckon!
-I had imposter syndrome and felt like I didn’t know enough.-I felt unworthy & not good enough.-I was so scared of rejection and people thinking that what I was doing was stupid. -I was scared to be seen & heard – this was the biggest limit I had to work through (growing up in a home where I had learned to be a people pleaser to survive meant that I had a lot of resistance to truly putting myself out there as it didn’t feel safe).- And actually, I had a fear of success. Lots of people think it’s failure they’re afraid of but actually it’s success.
I utilised NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming), Hypnotherapy & EFT (Tapping) to help navigate these fears & teach my nervous system that I am safe now. Every fear was acknowledged and explored. There’s a reason all of these fears were there and so as I explored each one with self-compassion and then reframed things, I was able to learn the lesson, show love & self-compassion to myself and then release them.
Lastly, I find spirituality & faith very useful. I always felt called to do more with my life and that the experiences I had were for me to learn from and then go and help others. Connecting to God always helps me remember my purpose, how loved I am and to be able to trust the process, especially in the hard moments where we can’t see the path.
5. Can you share a particular moment or experience that made you realize coaching was the right path for you?
I went to a launch party for a client of mine as she opened her dream business, her bakery that was a legacy to her late mother. Three months earlier she had been so consumed by comparing herself to everyone else, feeling burnt out and not good enough and was too afraid to take her dream out of her home kitchen and into the world. It made me so deeply realise how powerful this work is and what a difference I can make in the world by walking alongside the beautiful heart-led brave people who are making big moves.
6. How did you deal with imposter syndrome and feelings of unworthiness during the early stages of your business?
The truth? Massive self-sabotage. I hid. I didn’t do anything because I didn’t feel safe to be seen and I didn’t feel good enough. But then, I went inwards and I started working on my mindset & my belief system and I started challenging these thoughts. As time went on. I developed a new relationship with fear and understood it was there trying to protect me, not telling me I was’t good enough. So now when fear comes up I actually get excited because I know I’m about to reach a new level, and so I always go inward and explore which part of me feels afraid/unsafe & then support myself through that.
7. In what ways has overcoming childhood trauma impacted your approach to coaching and supporting others?
I have so much empathy for people, but it’s paired with massive belief in what they can become. My approach is so deeply rooted in self-compassion and self-worth FIRST, but then I so deeply believe that truly we are here to make a massive difference in the world. I always validate what people have gone through, but then I help them to release the weight of the past and focus forward on what they choose to create. I do not believe we should continue to suffer by carrying other people’s choices and mistakes with us for the rest of our lives.
8. What role has mental health played in your journey, and how do you manage your own mental health while helping others?
I worked in Community Mental Health for 6 years and I actually think that so many of the people skills I learned in that role impact how I work now. As a Photographer and as a Coach, it was always about creating a space of trust, and building rapport as quickly as possible. People need to know they’re safe with me, no matter the context. Working in Mental Health, that skill had to be cultivated because often you have a couple of minutes to create that environment with someone who is already feeling so vulnerable and so I think it really helped me to strip back the BS pretend layers and be real upfront. Authenticity cultivates trust. Every time.
For my own Mental Health, there are several things I do. I’m actually quite an introvert and I need quite a bit of alone time to recharge. I love meditation and prayer time, nature, music and movies for resetting myself. I also have become extremely discerning about who is in my life, and where I am putting my energy. I set boundaries as I need to. My inner circle is small but absolutely solid and my close friends are my family. They’re my biggest cheerleaders and the loves of my life. It is SO important not to be a yes person and try to be everything to everyone.
9. Can you describe a time when you saw a client achieve a breakthrough, and how did that experience impact you personally and professionally?
I had a client who was really wanting to be a speaker. She was a born leader, passionate about standing up for the rights of people but had so much fear as she said I was literally the only person who believed in her. She had a lot of resistance from her friends and family. It was SO obvious she was here to be an absolute force for good on this planet and so we worked on her vision, her confidence, her fear and her self-belief. A few months later, I walked into a protest where she was on a stage, speaking to 10,000 people, absolutely pouring her heart out and inspiring everyone to do good. It still makes me cry as I remembered how far she had come and what she had overcome to be standing there with that microphone. It impacted me on every level, but more than anything I felt like YES, this is my purpose, to help the beautiful heart-led people find their self-belief and take their gifts out into the world where they can have a huge impact.
10. What are some common struggles or fears that your clients face, and how do you help them address these issues?
Everyone has a fear of not being good enough, and not being worthy. These are the 2 most dominant limiting beliefs.
– I built my entire podcast to help people navigate navigate these and understand how their mind works and therefore how to navigate these triggers and others.- I also have a hypnosis I created called I AM Worthy Beyond Belief which all my 1:1 clients receive & is also available in my online store. Because the subconscious mind is 95% of our mind, when we can use tools like this, it helps to create change very quickly as it’s not based on willpower or trying to force change.- My 1:1 Coaching also goes deep into dealing with these limiting beliefs as well as all others that emerge so we can reframe them so people can go and open their businesses and stand on stages etc!
11. What advice would you give to other women who are aspiring to start their own businesses or creative projects but are struggling with self-doubt?
1- Work on your relationship with yourself first. Really build yourself up and start being your own cheerleader.2- Know that it’s on your heart because you’re meant to do it. Desire= of the father. It’s God given. It was given to you because you have what it takes & you’re the one to bring it to life!3- Understand that self-doubt & fear are natural parts of being human and stepping into the unknown. You ALWAYS have a choice as to how you respond. You could let it stop you, or you could choose to celebrate your courage and how amazing you are for starting something new. Most people never get to that point!
12. Looking back on your journey, what are you most proud of, and what do you hope to achieve in the future with Monica Ferguson Coach?
I am most proud of my own journey. I was so close to not being here, and I now get to spend my life helping people all over the world free themselves from the past, step into their calling and passions and help to make the world a better place. I truly never would have believed this a few years ago when I was absolutely consumed with feeling so alone, unloveable and unworthy. What comes next is expansion! I am currently building online programmes to help people learn the exact steps on how to transform their lives, there will be in person and online communities as well as a book & so much more.
IG and TikTok: @themonicaferguson
Podcast: Itunes: https://podcasts.apple.com/nz/podcast/world-domination/id1457647332
W: www.MonicaFerguson.me
