Sonja Williams shared their story and experiences with us recently and you can find our conversation below.
Hi Sonja, thank you for taking the time to reflect back on your journey with us. I think our readers are in for a real treat. There is so much we can all learn from each other and so thank you again for opening up with us. Let’s get into it: What do the first 90 minutes of your day look like?
Oh! The first 90 minutes of my day are jammed packed with things that move me forward in my dreams and goals! I actually wake up pretty early because I learned early on that I’m most effective in the morning so I wake up at 430 am. I know I know! That’s super early but it works best for what I desire to do with life. Once I wake up I drink a big glass of water, get ready and then go to the gym. Once I get back from the gym my next thing is prayer! Prayer helps me ground myself in the truth, center my heart and even gain strategy for the day. Then after that it’s a mad dash to get ready for work and get on that morning commute. I definitely try to make that part of the morning easy by prepping the night before. I start my mornings like this because this is the best time for me to get at least two of the most important things I do to live intentionally out the way! I figured out this works the best for me but I don’t encourage people to follow exactly after me for success. I want you to figure out what works best for you and build the morning that works for you.
Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
Hi Voyager family! Well my name is Sonja Williams and I am a statistician by trade who loves God and loves people and lives to help people into living their most impactful life by building their lives intentionally. As a first born, first generation Barbadian American I had to fight against the desire to “be perfect” and through that fight I learned that my dreams are worth dreaming and that being intentional with my life and values will bring those dreams to reality. Now my goal in life is to help as many people as possible to live in the same bold way and I get to do that through one-on-one coaching, and my weekly podcast “A Little Less Chaos” on YouTube and everywhere you listen to podcasts! If you want to begin living intentionally and make an impact come find me on YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram at sonjawcoaching.
Amazing, so let’s take a moment to go back in time. What did you believe about yourself as a child that you no longer believe?
One thing that plagued me was the thought that “I don’t have what it takes. I’m not good enough”. These thoughts plagued me and pushed me to move at a pace and veracity that allowed me to achieve much but also ran me ragged. I strove to be the best at the expense of my health and happiness. If you are a first born and/or a child of an immigrant you know! You know the expectations of that role and the funny thing is my parents didn’t put those expectations on me. I put them there myself.
And it was a weird place to be because though I was super busy and honestly stressed I was still “happy.” It was in this place of “happy” where I also felt like there was more and I just couldn’t figure out how to get to where the “more” was! It made me sit back and analyze what was wrong. I realized I wasn’t acknowledging my dreams and therefore couldn’t do the work to execute the true desires of my heart and having the winning life I knew could be mine! It also made me realize that this is why I felt like I didn’t have what I needed and always felt like I wasn’t good enough. I was trying to be something I wasn’t supposed to be. Once I realized that I began studying all types of productivity methodologies and realized that one key thing was missing — No one acknowledged that each of us was made to impact and that the dreams we have are indications of what that impact is supposed to be. I realized we all need to acknowledge our dreams, live by principles (what you value), execute by process (goals, habits etc.) and win by practice (build routines that help you win at life). I took these four things and implemented them throughout my life and finally had the freedom to dream and live more fully in what I was called to be. I finally realized that I am enough and that I do have what it takes. I just needed to learn what I was supposed to be focused on. Now my goal is to help others along that same journey.
What fear has held you back the most in your life?
Fear of man. Fear of not being perfect and messing up. Those were the things that held me back for a lot of my life. I took a long time to open my business because I didn’t think I had the qualifications for it though I’ve been helping people organize their lives and set up right priorities for years. I took forever to go for promotions even when people told me I was a shoe in (guess what I got each one of them). I even took long to get a surgery I needed because of my fear of what people would think about my faith in God. Right? Isn’t that weird? I seriously considered that if I got this surgery then it would be telling the world that I didn’t believe God was the healer I claimed He was via His Word and that was important to me. Sidenote- God is still a healer and He heals miraculously AND through the hands of doctors.
In the past I’ve allowed fear to dictate so much of what I would do and not do but I realized that we can’t live like that! Fear is like a vice that holds you in place; stuck somewhere you don’t want to be but it doesn’t have to be like that at all! I listened to this message from a well known speaker. I can’t remember what the premise was but she said something that stuck with me. The things you have desire to do were placed there by God to impact many and when fear pops up after you’ve assessed the good and the bad you know it’s the enemy trying to stop you from impacting the world around you, so run past that fear and do it anyway. Your impact is too important to allow fear to stop you. So I work hard to not let fear stop me any longer!
I think our readers would appreciate hearing more about your values and what you think matters in life and career, etc. So our next question is along those lines. Is the public version of you the real you?
Yes! Isn’t having different versions of yourself tiring? Trying to keep up with different personas is a lot of work for no true reason. And when you live with integrity there is no need to build a public and private persona. Now, I would say that its important to know what environment you are in but it shouldn’t change who you are. For instance, I am a joyous person everywhere I am (typically) but how I present that joy would be different at a funeral versus at a concert. When you are clear and confident in and comfortable with who you are you can truly show up authentically everywhere you go. And I’ve done the work to get to that place because I wasn’t always confident in who I was. I had to learn that I was made on purpose for a great purpose and honestly a lot of that growth came from learning more about how intentional God was with making me and carving purpose into me. It even led me to write a devotional called “Planted: 30 day devotional journey for the overwhelmed multi passionate woman” where we delve deeper in three areas of God we all need to be planted in to flourish.
Okay, so let’s keep going with one more question that means a lot to us: If you laid down your name, role, and possessions—what would remain?
If I laid all these things down joy love peace and grace would remain. My impact would remain. These are the things that would remain because those are the things that truly last in this world. My goal in life is to help as many people as possible understand that their dreams are worth it and with living intentionally they can see them truly meet reality. And my name, my role as a coach, volunteer leader, statistician etc, and my possessions aren’t needed to do that. My prayer is that others realize that as well. That we would realize that its how we treat others, who we lift up that will truly remain- not how famous our names are.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.sonjaw.com
- Instagram: sonjawcoaching
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sonjawilliamspmp
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SonjaWCoaching
- Youtube: sonjawcoaching
- Other: spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2VBTJTOWocKp8mlPa8lkc6?si=6782c6c2281049fc
