SWIHA Blog

It took Lindsey Gemme a few years of mulling over what she wanted to do with her life before officially starting in the Holistic Nutrition Specialist program at the Southwest Institute of Healing Arts (SWIHA). She discovered SWIHA while on her original search for a school to study herbalism. Once she explored all of the degrees and certificate offered at the college she was in love. “SWIHA had programs for all of the healing disciplines I was interested in: Herbalism, Yoga, Reiki, and even Nutrition.” After choosing to specialize in nutrition, she chose to take the Transformational Life Coach program as well, realizing how hand-in-hand coaching and holistic nutrition go.

Like so many people before her, Lindsey declares that SWIHA felt like home. “Whenever you walk into SWIHA, you feel like you've come home because you know you are among your ‘tribe’ of like-minded people. There is such a feeling of community among holistic healers, and knowing that makes becoming an entrepreneur even easier. I learned that there are so many people out there who have the same mindset I do about healing. I love being a part of a conscious-community!”

Lindsey’s passion for nutrition started when her grandmother, the love of her life, passed away suddenly after having an undetected heart attack and subsequent stroke (and suspected throat cancer) five years ago.

Lindsey learned that all of those conditions could have been prevented through a healthy diet. Suddenly she became passionate about learning what healthy eating meant, so that she could prevent someone else from the same grueling hospital experience she did in losing someone so dear from preventable illnesses. So she explored all her options for nutrition, and supplemented her diet tech degree with SWIHA's nutrition program.

These days she is a Lifestyle Coach working online with people from all around the world. She uses her name as her business, Lindsey Gemme and the tag line – Helping Women Feel Whole Again. “I call myself a Holistic Wellness Specialist and Confidence Mentor. I work with women with severe low self-esteem in overcoming their personal hurdles that affect their career, health, relationships, etc., through a holistic approach.”

Women who work with Lindsey get coaching on everything from reframing negative thoughts and beliefs, to education and coaching around healthy eating and physical activity, sleep habits, cultivating creativity, designing a positive support system, stress reduction, time management, introducing more joy (activities they enjoy) and nature into their everyday life.

Her clients learn to feel great about who they are and their path in life, feel lighter, healthier, have more energy, connect deeper with people in their lives, and use gratitude and self-kindness to accept their perceived faults and have the confidence to ask for help to gain the strengths they desire. They learn vital skills for designing and living a healthier, fulfilled life.

Lindsey has always known that she wanted to help others. “From a very young age, I knew I wanted to help other women feel ‘pretty’ or happy about themselves, because I desperately wanted to feel that about myself. I fought debilitating low self-confidence and on-again, off-again depression throughout my life. In my 20s, I was overweight, fell into emotionally abusive relationships, stayed in a job that sucked the soul out of me, and hated my life in general. And when my grandmother passed away suddenly, the purpose of life became very clear to me. Life was far too short and precious to remain unhappy and miserable. A huge shift began in my life at that time.”

It took Lindsey almost five years to get her unhealthy habits and beliefs cleared. She knows that is a long time to be in pain. That’s why she is so passionate about reaching out to other women starting out on that journey - so they don't feel like they are doing it alone, and they have more guidance than she did when she began her journey.

Lindsey offers packages of sessions: A 12-session package, a 24-session package, and a 40-session package. Depending on the package, clients will receive an allotted amount of mentorship sessions where they will co-facilitate lifestyle changes and mind/body/spirit detox, which includes:

Clients who purchase a plan will receive an in-depth questionnaire about their lifestyle habits, and Lifestyle Logs will be sent to them right away. During the first session, a Discovery Session, goals are identified and how the client would like to proceed with her mentorship is discussed. “We will talk about how to make goals, and decide when she would like to begin working toward those goals. We will prioritize her goals, so that we can work on what is the most troublesome, and then work our way through the others in succession.”

Lindsey’s clients are in the driver's seat, and guide her as to when they are ready to work any of the goals within the allotted time frame of sessions they have purchased, including gaining self-confidence, losing weight/eating healthier, getting more physically active, developing healthier sleep habits, cultivating their creative side, stress reduction, time management, building a positive support system, etc. After the last session has ended, the client has the choice to purchase more sessions, or they are free to use the skills they have learned under Lindsey’s mentorship on the rest of their journey. The client will receive an exit interview email, and Lindsey will wish them well!

Lindsey promotes herself and her work through speaking engagements, Facebook/Twitter ads, YouTube videos, email marketing, webinars, and her upcoming book. When asked about whom she typically works with, she replied, “My clients are women who are tired of feeling broken, depressed, physically and emotionally drained, and sick of loathing themselves and their life, and want to move forward and do something about it. They may have experienced trauma in their life, from physical, emotional, or sexual abuse, which has colored their view of themselves. They may be overweight, and are dealing with health issues. I am very clear to let people know I am not a doctor, RD, or a therapist, and often remind clients that my work is a wonderful supplement to those other services.”

After Lindsey completed the nutrition program at SWIHA in 2013, she admits that she still felt she wanted more. She knew she wanted my own business, yet she felt like she had to go to school for another four years to even get there.

“SWIHA came to the rescue. I had never heard of Life Coaching until the program was offered to us at the completion of my nutrition program. I feel like it was the missing link to everything I felt uncertain about. SWIHA's Life Coaching program helped me understand that I didn't need more education; I had all the tools I needed to make real, meaningful change. I realized that I was more passionate about lifestyle coaching and prevention and that coaching was the perfect vehicle to help me get where I wanted to go. My passion and my drive to learn soon filled in all the gaps. It changed my entire life plan and business model.”

From a deep personal place of vulnerability, Lindsey shares that “after a long, laborious personal journey from being a frightened, unfocused and an overweight wallflower with a dead-end career to becoming a confident, driven and vibrantly healthy businesswoman, it’s all been worth it.”

Since then, I have grown a passion for mentoring other women into realizing and living their full potential and finding fulfillment in their lives through feeling healthy both emotionally and physically.

From a deep personal place of vulnerability, Lindsey shares that “after a long, laborious personal journey from being a frightened, unfocused and an overweight wallflower with a dead-end career to becoming a confident, driven and vibrantly healthy businesswoman, it’s all been worth it.”

Since then, I have grown a passion for mentoring other women into realizing and living their full potential and finding fulfillment in their lives through feeling healthy both emotionally and physically.

“It’s been a long, hard journey. The road I took was fraught with doubt and wrong turns, yet I now know that this is all a part of the process most people have to go through. The years have taught me many things about how to rid yourself of uncertainty and shame, and embrace love for yourself. The most sacred thing that I discovered over the last decade is that beauty and love for oneself has to come from the inside out. It’s a complete lifestyle change. Here I am today, feeling amazing about myself, inside and out, and confident about my future and ready to help women just like me to do the same!”

Lindsey's approach to wellness coaching is three-pronged. She starts with how her clients feel about themselves. "Cleansing yourself of outmoded, negative concepts of yourself is key. Then I also couple this coaching with a complementary physical wellness component, which is also pivotal to self-healing. The better you treat your body with proper physical movement and healthy eating, the better equipped you are to detox emotionally, as well."

The one major component that she lacked during her transformation was having someone there to help guide her through the process. "Someone to help me talk through my concerns, support me as I cultivated my identity and my dreams, and keep me accountable in taking steps toward making my goals and dreams a reality. Having a mentor (or coach) makes change a little easier and less painful to bear –because you aren’t doing it alone. Being a professional mentor is now one of the big things that I offer that most other coaches and practitioners do not. It really sets me apart from what others offers.”

When asked if she had a message to share with others she referred to a recent blog message she has written:

“It’s absolutely impossible to feel bad about your life when you choose to be grateful and think positively. You can start by writing a gratitude journal. Personally, I try to start out my day by writing five positive statements about my day and posting them on Facebook. Try it! Your positive statements or things you are grateful for can be as simple as “I am drinking tea…I like tea.” True story, I wrote that one day and posted it. Things like this put you in a receptive, positive and grateful frame of mind that can affect the rest of your day and let others know human and approachable you are.”

Lindsey’s story reminds us that once we choose to embrace our struggles, our struggles become the things others can identify with most. To check out the positive approach Lindsey uses in her life and with her clients, check out her social media posts.

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