Welcome to Dietitian Boss. My name is Libby Rothschild. I'm the CEO and founder of the Dietitian Boss Method. Our company is here to help you get started in private practice, even before you think you're ready. I've created a proprietary process to help you increase visibility, create organic content.
Enroll clients into an offer and learn sales skills that don't even feel salesy. Listen every week to your colleagues as they're being interviewed and we chat about their progress and success from when they got it started from zero to all the way to creating million dollar businesses and beyond. Hi there, Dietitian Bosses.
This is Coach Heather with Team Dietitian Boss, and today I am joined by one of our Rebellion members who's really been making some amazing progress and we're so proud of her. We're here with Mariah R. And we are going to be talking about how it is to balance life and working full-time and doing rebellion, and creating a business that you love.
Mariah, thank you so much for joining us here. Yes, thank you so much for having me. Yeah. So can you share a little bit about where people can find you, how they can connect with you, and what area are you focusing in? Diet. Yes, so I am primarily on Instagram as at First Foods nutritionist. I'm also on TikTok at First Foods Nutritionist.
I help moms make peace with food while they confidently feed their kids. So I take a non diet approach from Babies' First Foods and beyond, and that's kind of where I hang out on social. That's so cool. Like that's a unique way to apply the Food Freedom Movement and really a great audience, I think because moms are so stressed about food, they're stressed about their own food, they're stressed about their baby's food, how they're introducing food to their child.
And so how did you tie that, those two pieces together, how did that come together for. Well, I'm so glad you asked. I originally kind of focused on, you know, first foods feeding, feeding, baby solids, picky eating, and I still focus in that area. But what I found with that experience is it's really hard to confidently feed your kids if your relationship with.
Is a little bit complicated. So what I found is that moms really need support with their relationship, not only with food, with their bodies, et cetera, if they're gonna confidently raise their kids to listen to their bodies too, right? So not only focusing on that food freedom, intuitive eating, but. , while we're still faced with, I have to feed my kids, right?
It's not like we can pause that and focus on just intuitive eating. We need to, they need support in both areas. So that's kinda how I came to that. And yeah, I love it. It fills me up. That's so cool. And as somebody who has a toddler in her life my boyfriend's toddler comes over a lot. Mm-hmm. . And so I understand like the stress of trying to get toddlers to.
Eat food. , . Yeah, it's, it's a struggle here in this household. And of course like being like, I'm sure you guys can relate. I'm like reading all the research on toddlers and food and colors and all those things of how to overcome some of the hurdles of introducing new foods to a toddler palette. How do you teach a toddler intuitive?
Yeah, such a good question. So the biggest thing to remember is that children, babies are born with this natural skill to kind of self-regulate, right? They kind of know what they need as far as calories, and our job as parents is really to help them. Facilitate, keep that skill as they grow. So as all things parenthood, we are tasked with helping them kind of do what they know to do, but giving them the structure to really learn and develop those skills.
So when it comes to. Toddlers and teaching them how to listen to their bodies. Really, it comes down to I teach a framework that revolves around what we call the division of responsibility. My job as the parent is to provide the food. I help my clients figure out what exactly that means. And their job as toddlers is to decide.
Decide whether or not they eat, what they eat from what I serve, and how much they want to eat. And of course there's tons of nuances to help them navigate that. And some days are easier than others. I can definitely say that I have two toddlers myself and not always a walk in the park. We know. Yeah, and it's so interesting because as adults, we trust a baby to intuitively eat, right?
They communicate with us when they're hungry and we learn how to pick up on those cues and we feed 'em on demand. And then there's some. Where in there, when food introduction happens, where like that trust of knowing when a child is hungry and not hungry and them knowing themselves when they're hungry and not hungry seems to like flip a switch in our brain, if you will.
Yeah, absolutely. And I think it's, I always like to emphasize with my clients it is with such good intentions, but we start to maybe question. Are you getting everything you need to grow? Should I be worried about the way you're growing? You know, growing too quickly, weighing too much, too little. We worry about these things as parents, and like I said, it comes out of the best intentions.
But we have to take a step back and really understand what their bodies can do for them and how we, like I said, can facilitate those skills, help them keep those skills as they develop through different life stages. So it's tricky, but again, we really can, we can do that. And it's something that I love to see when those light bulb moments happen for my.
So awesome. I think my boyfriend needs your course. . I love it. Cause it's so stressful. He comes from an Italian family and it's like manja, . It's so stressful. Know like just picking at things. It's okay. Eating is so, I like to, you know, empathize with my clients and just letting them know that the way we feed our kids is so vulnerable because it's so visible, right?
People see. what we serve our kids, they see what our kids eat or don't eat. They see that in our lives and that can feel really vulnerable as a parent. Like what are they gonna think if my child doesn't eat this? What are they gonna think if I feed my child this? And so that is also part of what I teach and coach through, especially my one-on-one clients, is, you know, we have to kind of get through some of those mindset shifts because it can be really vulnerable and kind of scary when we're feeding our kids a certain way and others see.
Absolutely. So you joined Rebellion and you've been applying so many of the principles that we teach in the Dietitian Boss Method. What was the trigger for you to be like, I'm ready. I'm ready for rebellion now I'm gonna take this next step in this moment in my life. Yeah, great question. So I dove into private practice starting my business in February of 2022, so not too long ago.
And right away I knew like, I'm gonna need some help, right? We as Dietitians, we just don't learn a lot about business in school. And so I knew I needed help, but I was still working a full-time job. I have two toddlers, like I said. I knew that I needed help, but it needed to be realistic because I didn't have a ton of, I didn't have a full-time private practice yet.
And so rebellion really came at the perfect time for me because it was an entry into support from Libby who I'd been following for years and really, you know, loved her. Approach, and I knew I wanted her support, but I knew it needed to be in a more manageable way. And so rebellion was just that perfect storm for me where it was like, oh, I can do this.
And yeah, that was kind of the trigger for me. It came very shortly after I had already started where I was already starting to feel really scattered. I didn't really know where to focus my time. I had so little time each week to put into my private practice and I wasn't really sure where to begin.
Right. As a business owner, there's so. Things that I think maybe I should be doing this, should I be pouring time and money into this? And so what I loved about Rebellion to start was a very. Manageable action steps, you know, this week, focus on this, this week, focus on that. So my type A brain just loved that because I had a focus and a plan and it wasn't overwhelming to me when I only had so many hours each week to put into it.
Yeah. Cuz one of the things that you mentioned before we started the podcast is that you still work your full-time job, right? I do. Mm-hmm. . So not only are you a mom and juggling that and then starting a private practice, you're still working in your full-time job as well. So how has Rebellion supported you in figuring out how to block out your time or figuring out how to focus, where to focus?
Cuz. So, so important. Yeah. Well, one of the things that Libby talks about so much in rebellion that I love is just this, let's not get distracted, right? There's so many things you could do, but right now pour your time and energy into this thing each week. So I think just having that clear understanding has been so helpful.
But she also focuses a lot on time management. Specifically. One of the things that I've really had to work hard at is not. Stuck in like scrolling social media, right? When I have downtime at the end of the day, she talks a lot about setting your boundaries, and I've learned that as my social media following has grown.
You know, when I get dms or emails from potential clients or. Just target audience members. I have to set boundaries on when I reply to that and when I am active on social media. Otherwise, as I've experienced, it gets to be sort of this endless cycle of being on social media and not really knowing where the line is between myself scrolling and enjoying content.
but being a business owner on Instagram, and so the time management piece has been really helpful. She talks about, you know, things like timing yourself when you're doing tasks. That's been really helpful for me to, again, hold myself accountable to the goals and the time that I have each week to accomplish those things.
Yeah, that's so important, right? Because as business owners, moms, people who work full-time jobs, a million other hats that Dietitian, bosses wear, that's just a couple of them that you represent. Our time can get away from us. Right. It can get so lost in the jumble. And you said that before joining Rebellion, you were in that jumbled space.
Yeah. , like not really sure where to put your time, where to put your money. You even just mentioned, and there's so many like bells, whistles, shiny object syndrome out there when starting your business. So did you really stick to like the one project per week or did sometimes you have more time and you worked ahead?
How did you. Work through the rebellion information. You know, it did vary a little bit. What I loved is that I kind of, I had enough flexibility to be able to work ahead if I wanted to, but it wasn't, it didn't feel urgent to go ahead and do way too many projects at once. So I did, at some weeks I would really focus heavily on just one project and you know, I had to work through like feeling okay with that.
I think sometimes as an overachiever I thought I needed to do more. In some weeks I had a little bit of, you know, more flexibility to work a little bit further ahead. So it did vary a little bit. . But what I loved is just that framework of keeping me on track where I knew like, okay, maybe I get two projects done this week, that's great, but I know that I'm still doing just fine if I do one.
And the way that Libby has set it up, one project is so manageable and it's very doable. You know, even if it's something that requires work, she lays it out in a way that feels really doable. And that was so comforting to me. Whereas, I was lost in the jumble, and I don't know if anyone else can relate, but I would feel like I have so many things I could do, so many things I should do, and so I'm overwhelmed, so I pretty much just do nothing and I didn't know where to go.
yes, the freeze response is yes, a real scenario. I think everyone can relate to that. Just be like, okay. Especially with, you know, we know that Dietitians, you guys are highly educated there. Tend to be this theme of perfectionism, which I think is a reflection of being able to achieve a lot in your education and in your internships and everything.
It takes a certain level of perfectionism, but that freeze mode is real and it can prevent you from moving forward and taking the action steps that you want to take in your life and starting a business. So when you think about. , the things that you've learned in rebellion. So time management, you've created a course now.
Yeah. How much time did it take you if you were sticking to this one project that week? Because I think, you know, we say, and Dietitian boss like take an hour per week. But was that true for you? Does it really take an hour per week? Was it a little bit more? A little bit. Yeah, I would say definitely with the framework, Libby lays out one hour a week.
Yes, I feel like that was pretty accurate. Like I said, there were some weeks where I did a little more of my own will, but I will say at the beginning, before I really had a grasp of time management, it took me longer. because I wasn't really setting those boundaries for myself. You know, when we talk about like things like market research and different things I wasn't very good at holding those boundaries and keeping myself accountable.
And so, like I said, that temptation to get distracted sometimes would cause me to spend longer. But that was again, something I learned and I'm working through. But as I learned that time management skill, one hour a week has been. Absolutely adequate. And yeah, creating the course allowed me to continue to pour into my business, you know, in a reasonable amount each week, while also experiencing passive income from the course that was set up and created.
Awesome. And so you went through the projects, you created a course, you started market research. Can you share with our audience a little bit about that process for you? How did you figure out what kind of course to make? What do you mean by market research? You know, ? Yeah. So I really started by figuring out like who is my audience?
Who am I trying to serve, and what is their biggest problem? So for my case, again, when I. Started, I was focusing on baby's first food. So you know, starting solids, what are some of the struggles that moms face when they are starting solids with their babies? So yeah, I went to, did some market research. You know, I was listening to other moms, whether that be, you know, in conversations, in person in different scenarios or looking at mom groups, really understanding what are the conversations they're having.
And one of the themes I noticed early on is this phrasing of. My baby is just struggling with solids or struggling to like it, or I'm struggling to know what to serve them. Should I do baby lead weening or not? Right? These are the themes I started to notice, and so by doing that, I noticed, okay, these are the problems they're having.
how can I as a registered Dietitian and mom help them solve these problems? And so that's kinda how I got the focus of my course. Libby gives great structure to what we kind of want that to look like, and that's kinda how I came to what the course would contain and how to clearly relay that to those.
Yeah. So you identified the word struggle or struggling, right? Yeah. As something that your ideal client was using A lot that moms using solids were using a lot. And how has that translated into content creation for you? Yeah, so it's really helped me to clearly hit those pain points, right? When moms are seeing my content, I'm able to quickly help them identify and quickly say like, oh, I have that problem.
I can totally relate, and it looks like there's a solution, right? Or hitting that pain point to say, Hey, , it doesn't have to be this way. And so it's helped me to be really clear on what that pain point is and to hit that in different ways in my content so that they can identify with the content, but also resonate with it and understand, you know, how I can help them.
And like I said, I'm starting to shift my focus just a bit after the experience with working with those moms and finding that they have some greater needs in their own relationship with food. But those same, that groundwork that I laid of, how do I do that? Market research. How do I plan my content in a way that hits those pain points that is all the same?
And so shifting my focus a little bit has been made so much less scary because I have that groundwork laid and I know what I need to do to speak to my audience. Yeah, that's such an important thing to highlight, right? Because sometimes, especially as perfectionist, it can be like, oh man, I have to pick this one lane and this one to focus on, which you do from a time management perspective, and we highly recommend you do that.
but the principles apply. Like that's one of the things we really highlight in the Rebellion program is if you didn't nail it on your first course and you find out as you do your market research that there's actually really something else that people need that you're not addressing yet. Yeah. Then you can shift.
But the hardest part is figuring out how to do it the first time, and then you can always refine from there. And that's what's really, really, I. Absolutely. Yeah, and I think it came down too, to my values of why did I start a private practice to begin with? Because I think I had some fear that, well, I picked this one lane just starting solid, so I have to focus of that.
But really I had to stop and think, you know, wait a minute, why did I start this practice? What's important to me and how can I, you know, Make sure that this business is really aligned with my values. And at the end of the day, it was because, you know, I wanna be able to serve my clients in a way that feels good to me, in a way that is flexible for my family.
I'm in a way that, you know, can provide, et cetera. And so shifting my niche just a little bit helps me to do that. But I had that fear right away of like, oh, I don't know. I picked this. I have to stay here. And so, yeah, again, some of those mindset shifts that Libby walks us through in the program were really.
I am so excited that you have navigated this process, that you have ma taken the leap to make some changes of who you're speaking to and really addressing problem that people are not really speaking to these moms that are trying to feed their kids and need some help. , but also want to grow competent eaters.
But their lack of confidence in their own diet and then their own food choices is really being reflected in their kids. Thank you so much, Mariah, for sharing your journey with us and sharing some of your tips and what you've learned along the way. If there was one thing you would want to say to somebody listening, Today and being like, oh, I wonder if I could do this.
I wonder if I could still do this while I'm working my clinical job, or I wonder if I could do this while I'm in school. What would you say to them? , I would say yes, you absolutely can. I would encourage 'em to take a moment and think about your why. Why is private practice important to you? What's driving you?
And then see if you can get some focus. But yes, I would say you can absolutely do this. I work a full-time job. Two kids run a private practice. And I have thanks to Libby time spare to do things that I like in my free time. So you can absolutely do it, but get clear with your values and find some focus.
I love that piece of advice. That is so good. Knowing your North Star, knowing your why is critical in making the most impactful steps forward. Thank you again, Mariah, for sharing with us, and just in case somebody didn't catch it at the top of the podcast, how can. Connect with you. Yeah, so you can find me on Instagram at First Foods dot nutritionist.
You can find me on TikTok at First Foods dot nutritionist, and I am online at www.firstfoodsrd.com. Awesome. Alright, Dietitian bosses. You heard it here. You can actually do this in your time and you can achieve what you want to in starting your own business. Thank you so much for joining. I'm the Dietitian Boss podcast today.
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