Hi Beauty
Welcome to my blog and website, I am so excited to have you here.
Most know me as Natalie Annandale, but for my brand, I opted for Nat Anna because I love to be called by my nickname and Anna is so much shorter than the original.
My intention for this blog is to share valuable content filled with tools, tips and insights that will support you in living a life that’s more aligned and empowered.
As my first post, I wanted to share a little bit about my crazy journey over the last year.
My life was very different a year ago—I was working an agency job, deeply unfulfilled and unhappy. For most of my twenties, this was the case, I felt so lost, I knew there had to be more to life than what I was doing but I had no idea what that was and how to get there.
Yoga was my gateway to spirituality and after completing a 200hr Yoga teacher training in 2017 I thought I had finally found my calling.
As much as I enjoyed teaching, I was limited to how much I could teach because I was still stuck working a desk job with no clear view of a way out.
Fast forward to 2019 and my boyfriend and I decided we wanted to get out of South Africa and do something else. We thought of maybe going to China to teach English (this was something he had already done before), but that didn’t work out and then we got offered a potential job opportunity to work in Bali with an old friend of my boyfriend’s.
This Bali opportunity seemed like the real deal, we would be able to use our digital marketing know-how AND I would get to teach yoga—what could be better—or so I thought.
This job hadn’t yet been confirmed and our timeline to leave was drawing to a close as the lease to our flat was coming to an end that July.
In perfect timing, my dad (who lives in Mauritius) had come to visit Cape Town and offered for us to come and stay in Mauritius for 6 months while we decide what our next move would be.
We thought that this was the greatest solution to our dilemma and thought that if the job in Bali were to work out we could always head over there after our 6-month Mauritian stay.
So we booked our tickets to fly out to Mauritius later that year in October. I decided that if I was going to potentially teach yoga in Bali I really wanted to do a 300hr advanced teacher training, but this time in India.
So we sold all of our belongings (car included), I resigned from my full-time job and my boyfriend Dee decided he would go do some of his own travelling and then go back to Joburg to spend some time with his parents while I go to India.
I booked my flights to India at the end of Aug to do a Sept course and then worked out my notice period.
About a week or so before I was set to go, I went down a rabbit hole of looking at various online coaching courses. This is something that called to me after working with a life coach who helped me through some of my darkest days, but I had been feeling so lost I didn’t ever think this could be a possible career path for me.
After looking at various courses online I saw an email from my now coach and mentor Natalia Benson advertising her Coaching Certification for which early-enrollment would be opening up.
As soon as I read through the course outline I just knew that this was THE coaching certification I was meant to do. As I scrolled down to see the investment cost, my heart stopped when I saw how much it was.
This investment for this course was more than all 3 years of my University Degree, I had no idea how I was going to pay for it—this was my first real lesson in surrendering to the universe and trusting that the “HOW” is not up to me, but aligned action is and the rest will come.
So I took the biggest risk I’ve ever taken in my entire life and used my credit card to pay for the deposit, not knowing how I was going to pay that off or how I was going to afford the monthly instalments when the course would start in Jan 2020.
And then I set off to India, had the time of my life, not really thinking about this looming debt or commitment I just made.
I arrived back in South Africa, broke and jobless. A few days later we flew to Mauritius and when I arrived reality started to kick in.
I was so overwhelmed, I had spent the last of my savings (I had never been good with money, but this is finally changing) in India and I now had to build a freelance business from scratch.
Some would say that this was probably not the smartest of ways to go about becoming an entrepreneur, but with pure divine intervention and trust I did it.
Taking this risk was cushioned by the fact that we were able to stay with my Dad and step-mom rent-free and supported in many ways. This has been the biggest blessing and I would likely still be working that desk job.
The first few weeks of being here were a rollercoaster of emotions, in fact I was dealing with some pretty heavy waves of anxiety.
I knew that I had to get on top of my mindset, as I knew that this would ultimately dictate how things would turn out for me. Why? Because our internal world reflects our external world.
As I had been following Natalia vehemently for a while I really applied all of her guidance that she was sharing on her Instagram.
She spoke about how important a morning routine is for self-empowerment and setting your day up for success—so I cultivated a morning ritual that I committed myself to.
She was also sharing the powerful practice of working with Lakshmi Ma, a Hindu Goddess deity who represents wealth and abundance.
It’s said that if you sing her mantra ‘Om Shreem Maha Lakshmiye Swaha” you will call in an abundance of wealth into your life. So I began a 40-day practice of chanting this mantra, which then turned into 4 months.
Having a dedicated morning ritual and diving headfirst into all things spirituality and self-development was a total gamechanger for me. I had never in my life before had so much time to work on myself.
I slowly but surely started to get a couple of freelance clients, I was making peanuts but it still allowed me to start paying off some of my debt, which I was so grateful for. I finally started to feel like being my own boss was actually something I could do.
January arrived and the course began, the monthly instalments were set up to go off my credit card and then I just pay what I can back into my card each month.
The course started shifting so much for me and we were also added into Natalia’s Magical Women & Money Membership which has done so much for my money trauma healing. I will go more into the certification and membership in another blog post.
March came around and I was still struggling in terms of finances, through all of this I kept up with my spiritual practices and I had even begun a new 40-day abundance practice.
A few weeks into this Dee and I landed a UK client on retainer for digital marketing services and she would pay us in Pounds!!
I couldn’t believe it, I would literally make an almost full-time salary from one client and then all the other freelance projects starting pouring in.
Something big shifted for me when I did this abundance practice—when I stopped worrying about where the money was going to come from and trusted that my supply is continuously provided by Divine Source, money just started rolling in (enough for me to feel secure).
And this brings us to today, my freelance business is picking up and I’m building a coaching business on the side. I was able to pay my initial deposit off and pay towards my monthly course payments.
If you had told me that this is where I would be 11 months ago I would have laughed. I signed up to Natalia’s certification on complete blind faith, my intuition told me that this is something I had to do and so when I made that commitment to myself the Universe responded.
Signing up to this course has been one the scariest things I’ve ever done in my life, but transmuting that fear and turning it into aligned action has taught me so much about myself and what I’m capable of.
Like Natalia always says “Take one leap towards the Universe, so the Universe can take a giant leap towards you”.
Learn More About My Story & Soul Mission Here
Choose the Life You Want So it Can Choose You!
If you’re still here, thank you so much for taking the time to read some of my story.
I have grown in so many ways over the last year and I am truly grateful to be where I am (even though I’ve had to endure a lot getting here, it’s my journey and I wouldn’t change it).
I have never felt more in alignment with my purpose than by choosing this path to become a coach.
If you can relate to my story at all, or if you’re in a similar space of wanting to move into a career that’s more in alignment with your soul, I would love to support you. Contact me here.
Here’s to your infinite medicine within, ready to change your life if you let it.
With deep love and gratitude,
Nat
XOXO
