Empowering Women Through Intuition And Self-Mastery With Angie Biln

Nick McGowan (00:01.506)
Hello and welcome to the Mindset Self Mastery Show. I’m your host, Nick McGowan McGowan. And today on the show, have Angie Biln. Angie, how you doing today?

Angie Biln (00:13.196)
I’m great, thank you so much for having me.

Nick McGowan (00:14.927)
Yeah, I’m excited that you’re here. I’m looking forward to us getting in all the stuff that we’re going to be able to get into. I know I’d literally said like moments ago, that I appreciate that you’ve done the work that you’ve done for close to two decades. There’s a lot of things that you can experience by yourself, but then doing the work that you do along with your own things and your own stories and all of that. So I’m excited for us to be able to get in everything that we’ve got. But why don’t you kick us off? Tell us what you do for a living. And what’s one thing most people don’t know about you that’s maybe a little odd or bizarre.

Angie Biln (00:45.25)
So I am a life coach and I’m also a registered social worker. And as you said, I’ve been doing that for about 18 years. In terms of something bizarre, most people don’t know this about me. When I was pursuing the work of social work, I did a term abroad program in India and I was there for four months. But while I was there studying and working as a social worker, I was asked to do a backup dance video for Bollywood.

Yeah, totally out of my comfort level, but I did it. It was fun and amazing experience back then.

Nick McGowan (01:23.924)
So I can’t help but think of like, they’re like the stories of the creepy people that’ll go up to young girls and malls and be like, you know, you could be a model. Like, that just has like story like serial killer written all over it. But to be in another country and have something kind of like that, I’m assuming some things here, but give us some context.

Angie Biln (01:36.258)
You

Angie Biln (01:41.311)
Yeah.

Angie Biln (01:47.37)
Yeah. So when I think back to it, I mean, I have a daughter, I would never, ever, ever let her do that. I was 21 at that time and there was a group of us, but you’re right. People were super creepy. And these producers who approached us said they wanted foreign women to do this video. And they were paying us like good money, right? In rupees back then in India. And we were like, yeah, let’s do it. It’ll be fun. We get to be in Bollywood. on like, you we’re on this, on this video, but then also we wanted the

Nick McGowan (01:50.881)
You

Angie Biln (02:17.306)
money so we could use it to like travel around the country. And you know, at the age of 2021, you’re like, you’re not making good money. So it’s like, okay, this is an experience.

Nick McGowan (02:27.416)
Sure, and I can understand, I don’t have any children, but I could imagine being like, a 21 year old, and having a 21 year old daughter, and being like, no way, no way at all. But as a 21 year old kid, you’re like, fuck it, let’s go. Yeah, why not? Sure. You got candy in that van of yours? Like, giddy up, let’s go.

Angie Biln (02:41.964)
Yeah.

And thinking back though, like we were obviously everything was safe. went well, like it went as planned, but you know, looking at what our climate society is like now, like no way, never, would not happen. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (02:58.957)
Yeah, it’s wild. I guess I don’t really want to go down the path of like the serial killer talk and stuff, but this does tie into psychology and just how we all think of things. Like it’s kind of messed up, especially now with the amount of information that’s out there, the amount of different types of shows, the amount of true crime and all that stuff. Like it’s prevalent, but it’s also relevant and it’s also real. And you don’t know.

We can also look back at like the 50s, 60s, 70s, like, yeah, they didn’t know either, but they also didn’t have social media and all these videos and stuff. And kids were still getting picked up on the side of the road. And like, they were still, at Gacy’s and all these other different people. But what a weird thing because it can also remove, opportunities, like to be able to want to be, in an experience that’s maybe different. Like, yeah, why not?

Angie Biln (03:43.958)
Yeah, yeah, I agree.

Nick McGowan (03:56.845)
Let me be in this video. But I don’t know, like, what’s the actual statistics there? Is it like 80 % creepy and 20 % great? Like you found the 20 %?

Angie Biln (03:59.55)
Yep.

Angie Biln (04:06.156)
Pretty much.

I think so. think we lucked out. And it’s interesting that, you know, as I was thinking about this, you know, I talked to a lot of women now about follow your intuition and your gut. So that is something obviously that kind of helped back then. Not that I was aware at that moment, but I feel like I have a pretty good intuition where I wouldn’t do something if I didn’t feel good about it. But I mean, like obviously in your early twenties is totally different. You’re just having fun, right? But yeah, no, no, super bizarre. Like I said, it was a one time thing that I experienced. It was great. Good experience. was safe.

but I would never do that again nor would I allow my daughter to go down that road. you know something’s fun to remember.

Nick McGowan (04:45.728)
Well, from a parent’s perspective, and somebody who is now deeply in tune with their intuition, I’m sure you could probably look back and be like, well, when I was 21, maybe I could have felt that but you can also kind of project from your older self onto your younger self and like, well, I think I would have, you know, but knowing your daughter, does your daughter have that deep connection to her intuition where if you weren’t her mom, playing the mom role of like, don’t you fucking do it, but the like friend role.

do think you would trust her to be able to understand if her gut was leading her in one direction or the other?

Angie Biln (05:21.914)
I totally would. My daughter is 14 and I’m already so proud of who she’s becoming because I feel like she has a really good head on her shoulders, but she is very strong and she is very much about what’s right and wrong. I mean, I feel like she’s going down the right path. Obviously we can’t predict the future, but yeah, definitely. I don’t think it’s just because I’m her mom and I’m guiding her. think, yeah, I just think.

It’s about teaching women to trust your gut, but at a younger age, because not a lot of us were taught that, you know, like I was not taught that by my parents or grandparents or anything like, know, you, you have this intuition, follow it. If something doesn’t feel right, don’t, don’t feel pressured, you know, but anyway, so back to my daughter. Yes. No, think she, she definitely is going down the right path. And I feel like she’s going to be able to follow her gut and intuition already is. Yes. She’s very close. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (06:10.388)
That’s good. She’s real close to you, though. She’s your daughter. And I’m sure you’re also a bit biased. Like you want her to be that way, too. But hopefully she really is. So for the people that are outside of that, can be really difficult to look at anybody and just say like, well, I assume they trust their gut. Even friends or family or people you’ve had relationship with for a long time. You can see things over the course of time where you go, yeah, I saw you do it this time or I saw you didn’t and you learned from it like

Angie Biln (06:18.306)
Could be, yeah. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (06:39.754)
Like how we do, where it’s like you learn something or you go off, fuck, maybe I shouldn’t have done that. Or maybe I should do this differently next time. but how does that tie into the work that you’re not only doing within the social work that you’ve been doing for a long time, but the work that you’re doing to be able to help people to become more self-aware and to be able to trust specifically women, to be able to trust their gut and step outside of the systems of shit. Like there’s still a lot of stuff that’s like a woman’s supposed to do this. A man’s supposed to do this.

Angie Biln (06:41.452)
Yep.

Nick McGowan (07:09.277)
And then there’s all the bullshit bias and stories that people tell themselves about things, but how do you help them women separate from that and trust themselves and not seeing through a certain shade of glass in a way?

Angie Biln (07:23.01)
Yeah, no great question because.

And so the work I do, I’m a life coach and a social worker, as I mentioned. So my position and role as a life coach is really to empower women. It’s to help them ignite their power. It’s to help them rewrite their life story. And of course that comes from not just my professional experience, but mostly from my personal journey. You know, it’s not been an easy two decades. I think my personal journey is actually what fueled the passion to do this work. So I like to lead with that because, you know, I was, I am a social worker and I have been for a long time, but I

was in a very unhealthy and unhappy marriage, you know, and like you said, do you look back and you can say, okay, I made a mistake here, I made a mistake here. So that’s really important, obviously, to be able to go back and reflect on where we make mistakes or where there was roadblocks or where we could have chose different and done things differently, right? But you don’t know until you actually go down that road. Like you have to experience something and trauma and whatever it is or journeys and be able to heal and move forward. So the irony is, that I was working in an emergency department for

almost 16 years. So day in day out, I’m going to work, I’m helping women who are in abusive relationships, who are married to alcoholics and all that stuff. But I’m coming home to the same life. You know, my partner was unfortunately an alcoholic, he was abusive and I couldn’t help myself. So it was just bizarre to me. It was like, I was living this life, but I was numb. Like I was kind of living a life as an observer, if that makes sense. So I go to work, do my job, you know, help people come home. And then I’m like, my God, I’m

Nick McGowan (08:49.63)
Hmm, sure.

Angie Biln (08:56.262)
so unhappy. Like, why am I putting up with this? But I could not do anything to get myself in that situation for several years. And obviously I did at some point, but so I really like to tell that story to women. It’s like, you know, you do have choices and I know it’s hard. Like I can definitely resonate with that. How hard it is to get out of an unhealthy relationship where there’s kids involved, where there’s like you said, limiting beliefs and cultural dynamics, family dynamics, all that stuff. It’s super hard, but we have choices and that’s why the mindset is super important, right? Because if we can shift our mindset,

and be consistent with our mindfulness, our behaviors, our thought processes, our subconscious patterns and intentions, then we can definitely make those shifts.

Nick McGowan (09:38.076)
Yeah, I appreciate you know, the the plug in a sense with the mindful and mindset side of it. I, I really think there’s also a piece to that that’s not just the the mindset or the attitude or the awareness of it, but the courage at that point to be able to make a jump. The amount of times that I’ve heard people in different conversations, the amount of times I’ve even said over the course of my life where someone’s like, Well, you can do this thing. It’s like, yeah, fuck, it’s that easy. Like, okay, cool.

Angie Biln (10:05.698)
You

Nick McGowan (10:06.984)
Why didn’t I think about that before? Duh, I should have just done the thing. And I know that I went through a marriage that was about eight years long and probably could have been three or four, but it took years and there was no abuse or anything like that. I mean, I was an alcoholic, but I didn’t abuse or anything. And there was just deep things that people can go through and just I’m relating in the sense of just from that relationship of going, well, fuck, what do we do? How do we do this? And

being able to take those initial steps, it’s not one big step. And I think sometimes people will look at that. Men, women, whatever, they’re gonna say, well, this thing is this one giant leap. When in all reality, it’s painfully more steps than that. But also if you can break that down and this can also be easier said than done, looking back at it and going, oh, those tiny steps helped get to this point where we went, hey, we need to have this conversation or we need to talk to a lawyer.

we need to whatever. But it’s not just like one day you’re like, that’s it. And blow everything up. But I think people fear that like they fear even doing work like this. We’re like, well, fuck what if everything has to change? So I gots a tough question. But what if like

Angie Biln (11:13.538)
you

Angie Biln (11:22.861)
Yeah.

And I think that’s really important because like, you know, I always tell my clients like, be ready to get, to be uncomfortable, right? Cause when you’re uncomfortable, that means you’re going down the right path. So of course, like you said, you mentioned courage. I’ve, I was in the same boat. Like I didn’t have the courage to walk away. I didn’t have the courage and I had all these beliefs that I can’t break up the family. You know, my core programming was telling me like, you know, you stay in marriage because you chose this, right? This is your life. So no one’s telling me this, but these are my limiting beliefs. And I know we talked.

prior a little bit about like, you know, healing and where do we learn these things? So I really had to do that work, which took another five to six years. And I’m still doing it, but I had to do a lot of work of connecting, where am I learning this from? Like, where did my limiting beliefs come from? Where did my core programming come from? You know, because it didn’t come from the marriage. Although when I was in the marriage, I did play the role of victim, right? Like, you know, I didn’t take accountability. But that part where the transformation started and the healing started is when I was able to step back.

Nick McGowan (12:16.186)
Mm-hmm.

Angie Biln (12:23.852)
and say, you know what, this is where I made a mistake. This is where I’m accountable. This is where I didn’t put my all into the marriage. And of course, I’m not taking accountability for someone else choosing to be an alcoholic or abusive or anything like that. But, you know, we have to take accountability in relationships and you can’t do that until you really understand what events took place in your childhood or teen years that still affect you today because these feelings and emotions linger, you know, and that takes a lot of work. So when you mentioned, yeah, people don’t want to do the work, it’s true. A lot of my clients just say like,

no, this is it. Like I’m stuck. Like this is my life. Yeah. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (12:57.234)
Yeah, and the story, you just believe it at that point. I wanna put some light on something that you said really quickly that people that were listening to this could just hear it, maybe comprehend it and just keep moving along, because it was just quickly within a sentence. But you had said that then it took you five or six more years and you’re still doing the work. So the reason why I bring that back up, it’s almost like anytime I hear somebody say they’re a guru in something,

I instantly write them off like instantly. Because if you feel you’re done, then I don’t know, I don’t want to talk to you at all. Like I don’t want to be anywhere close to that. Because the more that we learn, and the more that we understand, and I brought this up so many fucking times in the podcast, it’s self awareness, like the once you’re self aware, and you become more self aware, then you’re more self aware. And like you can’t not see those things. But as you continue to do the work,

Angie Biln (13:34.988)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (13:53.126)
you are able to help more people and in kind of a coach mentality, like you really only need to be a step or a few steps ahead to be able to guide or mentor somebody. But being able to go through that stuff over and over and over and over and over and God, could probably say and over another 400,000 times and still be short of it. It’s not just a matter of getting to some promised land and saying that’s the end of it. So what does that work look like for you on a daily basis now? tying in kind of the

Angie Biln (14:01.674)
Right, exactly.

Angie Biln (14:11.116)
Yep.

Nick McGowan (14:22.361)
self mastery side of it, like what disciplines do you have that help you with that sort of stuff?

Angie Biln (14:25.987)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, definitely. So some of the disciplines that I’ve incorporated into my self care or mastery plan is one, getting up early. So I do not sleep past 6 a.m. and then incorporating physical, you know, some type of exercise. I go to the gym four to five times a week. So that’s definitely something that takes place in the morning. Starting my day early, making sure that the first thing I do as soon as my eyes open, I’m not grabbing my phone. I’m not on social media. Even before I check in on my kids is gratitude. You know, that morning, what am I grateful for?

say it out loud, say to myself, whatever, doesn’t matter. But it could be something simple like I’m grateful for this bed I have to sleep on. So I like to start my day with gratitude. Right after that, I’ll do my affirmations, which, again, I do them so often that they’re already kind of part of my conscious mind. So I’ll do those. And then I’ll start with the meditation in the morning, sometimes five minutes, depending on how much time, sometimes 30 minutes. And then from that, I’ll do some EFT tapping. And I’m not sure if everyone knows what that is, but it’s another form of affirmations. then

tapping into different points of your body. So I’ll do that and then start the day, know, different, the day is different, obviously, given every single chore task, routine, whatever. And then at night, I’m always journaling. So again, people always say, look, what do I journal? Like what am I supposed to write about? It doesn’t matter. It’s just a form of you to get those words onto paper because that’s a form of energy release. And that is super important to me. And I’ll tell you why, because sometimes I go to ruts and a week, two weeks might go by

and I’m not doing the meditations or the journaling and I feel it. Like I feel like I’m not grounded. I feel scattered. I feel chaotic. I feel it in my body, like physical pain. And so that’s what I know. I’m like, okay, something’s off and I need to realign. So when you say like, what is your mind, you know, your mindset, your mastery plan, it’s all of those things, but you have to be consistent. Yeah, like it has to be routine.

Nick McGowan (16:00.591)
Hmm.

Nick McGowan (16:18.186)
Mm hmm. Yeah. I, I can’t help but like, laugh with some of that because I know that wasn’t the thing you created last Tuesday. Like it’s something you’ve done for a long time. But I’ve had different people I’ve talked with them about like just starting off with something small and getting up to a point but there’s some times where people are like, why spend like 15 hours in the day doing meditations and this that and other thing and it’s like

Angie Biln (16:30.198)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (16:47.611)
Do you? Cause that’s a lot. And how did you get to that point? Which is part of the reason why I have this show is like, let’s actually break that shit down. Because when you go through those different sections of it and even figuring out like what works for you. I journaled for a few years, my handwriting is atrocious and after a while I was just mechanical with it. Like I was just doing the thing and then was like, this isn’t actually helping me. But meditation does and breathing and different things.

Angie Biln (17:09.858)
The breath workout.

Nick McGowan (17:14.343)
Yeah, so it’s like going through those things to then be able to say, all right, well, I’m consistent with this as much as I can be, but I’m not feeling it and trusting our intuition and being able to kind of bounce around from that. So how do you help people as they’re trying to figure that stuff out and not just follow your plan? Because your plan is different than the plan that would work for me or somebody else.

Angie Biln (17:34.22)
Yep.

And that’s a great question and point because my plan is not always the same either, right? Like I said, there’s weeks where I don’t do anything and I’m like, okay, this is not working either. So it’s good to obviously do what works for you, but you won’t know until you try something. what the first thing I always tell people is do not come to me and complain until you’ve done it for 30 days consistently. Okay. So do the journaling for 30 days, do the meditation for 30 days, do your breath work, you know, your mantras, whatever 30 days, and then you come to me and we’ll talk about any progress or if there is any progress, that’s okay too. But I think the key to

remember is you have to be ready to deal with the wounds. You have to be able to be vulnerable. So how can we move forward if you’re not ready to address some of these wounds that have affected you for maybe like a decade, two decades, three decades, whatever. So for me,

Like I’ll give you an example. So my healing journey started in 2019. So that’s when my husband and I first separated. And when I say first, it’s because we reconciled and then we separate again. But anyways, so 2019 we separated. I was literally at the point of having a meltdown. probably did. You know, I couldn’t get out of bed. I was emotional. I was a wreck. And then I met my Reiki teacher at that point who I didn’t know, but she and I started doing the work together. And then she guided me through some inner child healing. And I was the person who

before that was not spiritual at all. Like, so I was like, this is not going to work. I’m just here because I’m willing to try anything because I feel like crap. And at that point, you know, I was not in a good state. It was a very dark time. was contemplating like, do I need to be here? Is my life worth it? You know, all these really dark thoughts were going through my head. Thank God I met this woman because she really pulled me out of those moments, but also taught me that, you know what, you need to start doing some of this work because it’s time. She’s like, you’ve been putting it off for a long time and you need to do it. So anyways,

Angie Biln (19:23.996)
Long story short, that’s what I started doing. Like I mentioned, the meditation, journaling, all that stuff.

But you can’t get ready to do that work and have success or have some progress until you’re ready to really open up and be vulnerable and address those things that have been bothering you or lingering. What is it that your fear is? What is it that you’re holding onto that was such a hurtful or painful memory for you in the past? So when you can start addressing those things and opening up that can of worms, which is not easy, then you can start making that progress. And then you’ll see, okay, you know what? This affirmation actually makes me feel better if it’s not this

it’s something better, like, you know, some type of affirmation that resonates with you. And I always tell my clients like, my affirmations may not resonate with you, but you know what, you got to look in the mirror, give yourself compassion and then try it and see if it resonates. practice is probably the best thing, but repetition is good and routine is good. And then don’t be hard on yourself because it’s so easy for us to fall back into our subconscious patterns, right? Like our repetitive patterns and that’s okay too. So I think that compassion work is really important.

Nick McGowan (20:25.282)
Hmm. There’s like an inner game with the entire game and life being a giant ass game. So there’s like these little pieces of things where I had a friend that, he was doing meditation and was only trying to do the meditations to keep his streak going. So he lost like the reasons why, because the app was telling him you’ve done it for 400 days straight or whatever. And instead of actually

Angie Biln (20:45.973)
okay.

Nick McGowan (20:54.296)
diving into the meditation and trying to do it. We can also then say, Well, I did a meditation for 10 seconds, and that’s good enough. And that’s it. But I think there’s a balance all that and us like, I guess in a simple way with what you’re saying, give it 30 days, like, fuck around, find out, test it out, be off of it for a few days, really go at it for another few days. And like, let yourself bumble through and work through all of that. And I think that’s great. Yeah.

Angie Biln (21:16.278)
Yep. Yep. And what’s the worst that can happen? Yeah.

Nick McGowan (21:22.569)
you get a little better or you have some things different. And but that is a, it could be easy for us to kind of chuckle about because as I get into deeper conversations with people either on the show or just in life or people I’ve mentored, where they’re like, well, really, I don’t know what is underneath. And I’m afraid of if I start to do the work, then it’s like I have to put everything else to the side and just do all of that. That can be a thing, but it doesn’t have to be a thing.

Angie Biln (21:29.868)
Yep.

Nick McGowan (21:51.15)
but it can and you don’t really know until you start to get into it, do the work. I’ve had different people that are like, I don’t know and then they start to get into it they’re like, this is great, I’m feeling things, it sucks at times, but, and they get excited about other people or like, I’m not there yet and that’s okay too. So it just kind of figuring that stuff out. But for all the stuff that you’ve talked about, everything you’ve gone through and for the work that you do with the women that you work with and social work and all of that.

What’s the advice you’d give to somebody that’s on their path towards self-mastery?

Angie Biln (22:23.456)
What’s the advice I would give someone? would say, well, two things. One, always look at perspective. That’s something that I’ve learned over the years, right?

put yourself in the other person’s shoes. And I know that’s hard, but there’s always another perspective, right? So it’s not like this is going to be the rest of your life. Like this is, you know, there is options, there’s choices. You can have change if you want it. It’s not going to be easy. but I think we touched on this earlier. Like the advice I always give to women is you got to build that courage and that confidence because you did have it at one point, you know, at some point in your life, you were this courageous, confident, beautiful women and you still are, but we got to find it. We got to help you tap into that.

person again. And so that’s like a lot of the work that I do is, you know, helping women build their positive self image, like, you know, positive self talk, build that confidence, look at the perspective that you’re in and look at the other person’s perspective, because that really allows us to be empathetic and be compassionate towards ourselves, but also to whatever situation or event or relationship you’re dealing with, right. But courage is huge.

Nick McGowan (23:30.071)
Yeah. Yeah, that can literally make or break. And sometimes we don’t know it, you know, it’s, but it can be a mechanical set of courage to where it’s like, if I just take this step, like, let me lift my damn leg and start to move. Because then that can also give us some courage because hey, you did this thing, you started to move on that stuff. But there’s a lot that goes into it. And Angie, I appreciate you getting everything you’ve gotten into. It’s been great having you on today. Before I let you go.

Angie Biln (23:36.13)
Yes.

Angie Biln (23:57.356)
Thank

Nick McGowan (23:59.756)
Where can people find you and where can they connect with you?

Angie Biln (24:02.944)
Yes, so on social media, would be just my name, Angie Biln Billen, A-N-G-I-E-B-I-L-N, website is the same, angibillen.ca. Yeah, and so just follow socials, follow the website if you want to see the programs that I have coming up. Thank you. Thank you. It’s wonderful.

Nick McGowan (24:16.418)
Again, thanks for being on today.