Business and Mindset Mentor, Gina Keeping-Taverner is someone who can help people live the life they’ve always wanted. Originally from Port aux Basques, Keeping-Taverner has been living in St. John’s for years.
“I was a teacher for 15 years, and I climbed the ladder pretty quickly within my teaching career. I was vice-principal by the time I was 29, and my dad was diagnosed with cancer at that time, and I was his only caregiver, so after he passed away, we had to go through a legal battle where I was executor, and then working so hard as a teacher and learning how to represent my father’s estate, I got really sick, and then, when I came back to teaching, I had to go off work,” said Keeping-Taverner. “I was diagnosed with situational anxiety, PTSD, and depression, so my life took a complete change and after that, I went back to teaching, but I had a completely different perspective on life and everything I went through.”
A Tony Robbins event in San Jose was a turning point.
“It completely transformed my life. Then I took his life coaching training and I made it my mission to make this really hard thing in my life something beautiful to help other people on their journeys too,” said Keeping-Taverner.
“Once I started sharing my journey, and so many people had reached out and told me about everything they were going through too, it organically came into this beautiful business where I was able to leave my teaching career and go full-time into helping people do this, and then it organically transitioned during COVID to help people build their own businesses because I’d already built a life coaching business on my own.”
Soon after, Keeping-Taverner was invited to speak at events, like she did at the Bread and Roses gala.
“People started asking me to speak and it’s really taking off on its own as well. I just have this mission of helping people create lives and businesses that they are really happy to live and help them to realize they aren’t their circumstances. In a nutshell, that’s how I started doing what I’m doing.”
Despite a busy schedule of public speaking, offering programs and courses, a podcast, and the SHIFT event, a personal development conference, Keeping-Taverner is still able to keep a very healthy work-life balance.
“Self-care is really important to me because for so long I didn’t have it. I was very much a people pleaser, so once I started doing all the inner-work, I started to realize that I needed to take care of myself too,” said Keeping-Taverner.
“I do it all with a lot of help. I’ve been fortunate enough to hire a lot of really incredible women to help me with the events. I have an amazing business partner who are running the events as well. Our SHIFT event has been a huge success. We had two in one-year and our next one is May 2024. The events have been life-changing and the podcast is something I love doing. I love pouring into people and being able to help people all across the world. I’m really intentional with my time and energy. I’ve learned to say no to things that don’t serve me or light me up, so I’m really good with time management. Being a teacher, I’ve been able to hone in on that skill I think.”
Even though she is exceedingly happy now, it wasn’t always easy.
“There are definitely highs and lows with any business. I don’t want to ever put out there that this was smooth in every way. I feel the internal growth to build businesses is the hardest part, but I’ve been very fortunate that my life coaching business took off very quickly and now the work I am doing now, people need this connection and this inner work, this help. We’re in a place where people are craving to be seen and this allows them to create something different for themselves. So I feel I’m very blessed in how I’ve grown.”
Keeping-Taverner quickly realized she was on the right path.
“I had a knowing that this is what I’m meant to do. I would love to say that I had a lot of support when I was sick, so I think the lack of support when that happened was really a catalyst,” said Keeping-Taverner.
“I was always a person who gave so much of myself. I was the first teacher in, the last teacher out. I identified as a teacher, so when I was sick and I didn’t get that support, something changed in me and I didn’t feel like I had the support I gave so freely throughout my teaching career. So part of me knew that, if I didn’t take care of me, nobody else would. So there was that freedom of stepping into this, but also that fear, going from a decent salary to being completely reliant on myself to make my own income. That part was definitely scary, but the scarier part was staying stuck and feeling unhappy.”
There was one moment that really stood out for her.
“I really make a point to celebrate all the steps and not take this life for granted or anybody who comes into my life, but I think the biggest a-ha moment was my very first SHIFT event when we had over 100 people in the room and the energy was just so magnetic,” said Keeping-Taverner.
“I looked around at all of these incredible people in that room and had that moment of, ‘wow, that’s what this is all about’. I had left my teaching career and was really stepping forward into this business world, and it was like, ‘yes’,” said Keeping-Taverner. “I try to not hide any part of this journey because I feel like so many people have masks on and feel they can’t show emotions, so it’s very important for me as a leader to show all sides, to show that your emotions are actually your superpower.”
Keeping-Taverner doesn’t have a ‘cookie cutter’ method.
“People need different things. They are on different journeys, and one of my superpowers, if you will, is really knowing how to take people where they are and giving them the tools to go to where they want,” said Keeping-Taverner.
“I have a bunch of different ways that people work with me. Some people take my self-paced courses. We have a beautiful Mastermind going right now where we are taking people next month on a five-day cruise. It’s full-immersion with us and they’re in a six-month program where we help them build their businesses internally and externally, and then we deep dive into all their pain points, their struggles. So Mastermind is definitely the most beautiful component where we just pour into our clients.”
Her clients have left messages of support and thanks on her website, sharing how much of a positive impact she has had on their lives.
“I find it really hard to read the testimonials because, when you’re in it, it can be hard to hear that feedback, that you’re having such a positive impact on people’s lives, but it’s quite humbling and honouring that I get to do this work. And when I see me pouring into these incredible humans, to see they can change their lives and make more income for themselves and their families, be happier, change the course of their lives when they thought that was just who they are, that’s what it’s all about for me.”
By Jaymie White, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter
Original Published on May 08, 2023 at 06:00
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