Ep. 145 – Angelina Carleton – Designing Your Legacy

What does your legacy mean to you? How do you want to approach designing your legacy to be impactful?

Having a legacy means knowing yourself and being true to who you are beyond the career you’ve had. It’s important to have the right coaching to help you answer powerful questions and complete assignments to design your legacy.

In this episode of the Secure Your Retirement podcast, we have Angelina Carleton, a legacy planner helping leaders struggling with planning their personal legacy. Listen in to learn why designing your legacy requires courage and perseverance. 

In this episode, find out:

·      How Angelina came up with the idea of legacy coaching after years of being in commercial real estate.

·      Understanding your guiding principles and knowing yourself better to pursue your legacy.

·      Why legacy is about getting to know who you are beyond who you were in your career.

·      How powerful questioning and assignments in coaching allow people to find their legacy.

·      The importance of knowing yourself to achieve freedom, fulfillment, and satisfaction in your legacy.

·      Having the courage and the willingness to persevere towards your legacy.

·      Understand what legacy means to you and get the coaching that will help you get there.

·      How to get in touch with Angelina and the steps to her coaching to help you design your legacy. 

Tweetable Quotes:

·      “Legacy has a lot to do with integrity, being true to ourselves when we’re in this lifetime.”– Angelina Carleton

·      “A legacy is for those who are willing to persevere; it is a courageous journey to want to know yourself.”– Angelina Carleton

Get in Touch with Angelina:

·      Website: https://www.angelinacarleton.com/

·      LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/angelinacarleton/

Resources:

If you are in or nearing retirement and you want to gain clarity on what questions you should be asking, learn what the biggest retirement myths are, and identify what you can do to achieve peace of mind for your retirement, get started today by requesting our complimentary video course, Four Steps to Secure Your Retirement!

To access the course, simply visit POMWealth.net/podcast.

Here’s the full Transcript:

Radon Stancil:	Welcome everyone to our Monday podcast. And as you know, every single Monday, our goal is to bring someone to you that we have been able to identify as an expert, somebody can add value. And, we always tell you people that there’s three topics we talk about. We talk about financial stuff, we talk about lifestyle things, and we talk about legacy and that brings me to the guests we have today, which is Angelina Carlton right out of Beverly Hills, California. So first before I go any further, thank you so much for coming in and talking with us and our listeners today. Thank you very much.
Angelina Carleton:	Thank you. It’s my pleasure. I’m happy to collaborate in this conversation and I look forward to the ideas that we will share.
Radon Stancil:	Great. So now this idea of legacy is something that we talk about now, a lot of times, people in our world, Angelina convert this idea of legacy into monetary thing. So they’ll say I want to leave this to my kids, talking all about stuff, their house, their money, the material things. But I know in talking with you, you’ve got this company and mission that you’re working off the design, your legacy. Could you tell us about how you got to where you are in this world of legacy and what that means to you when you’re helping other individuals as well?
Angelina Carleton:	So let me think about how to make this answer as concise as possible. So I want to start off by saying what apathy is doing to your legacy is just not right. I’d like to start there. And for the background, it was about a decade ago, I was working as a commercial real estate broker, and I was working with multimillionaires that owned portfolios of properties. And I found myself at a six plated lunch in at the Lex Hotel on West Sunset. And the topic was private prisons. And I’ll connect this back to the origin of the inspiration of what started this. So at that time, a decade ago, I hadn’t realized that prisons are a property type, like hospitality, storage units, multifamily apartments. So I looked to the left and I look to the right and I’m thinking, does anyone else realize in this PowerPoint presentation that we’re profiting off of the misery of others?
	So I went to my car and I was just shocked and I’m holding the steering wheel, and I just had a moment. And I thought to myself, what if I left the world of commercial real estate? And I went into the industry of coaching. Now at this time a decade ago, I didn’t know about legacy. I just thought to myself, what if I could convert every one of those financial representatives in that room to instead of investing in private prisons, they invested in something else and I’m going to come in and save the day. Now this is a little bit idealistic, but I shared this story in that, I think that was the feel to have me begin this journey of looking at what does the industry and what does the commercial world offer regarding coaching and advisor services around legacy. So when I began and I looked in the field, I could find every coach that could help me stop smoking, lose weight and double my income, but I couldn’t find a coach or an advisor that could help me, let’s say if I wanted to create my own personal legacy.
	And at that time, I didn’t know about family offices. So it was about 2014. I had closed a transaction and then I completely left commercial really estate, went back to school with the coaches training institute. And so when you ask about processes in a moment, I will share, and that began the journey of coaching individuals all around the world from Dubai to England, to Asia. And then I began to notice what I call like the string that connects all humanity, it doesn’t matter the time zone that somebody is in or the culture that they come from, they deal with emotions. They still feel fear. If I take that chance, will it work out? If I step into my higher purpose, will the people around me except me? Because one of the things that happens with coaching that a lot of people don’t talk about is when you start changing, it affects the people around you. And some people are going to like it and other people are not. So that’s the origin of this.
Murs Tariq:	Gotcha. That’s a great explanation. And so I think people could think of what a legacy is and a bunch of different ways rate and mentioned it. Some people think it from a monetary perspective, others thinks it from a different way. And we work in the world of financial and mainly retirement planning and if we ask someone, as they’re approaching retirement, what is retirement going to look like for you? They usually don’t have an answer or maybe a well thought out answer. So I imagine you get the same when you’re talking about legacy planning and all of this. So what could you define maybe, what your opinion is on legacy and how someone should start to approach that?
Angelina Carleton:	Absolutely. So I realize that there is a dictionary definition, courtesy of Merriam-Webster. And I also realized there is a definition as it relates to etymology, but historically only those who had access to means could even pursue their legacy. Whereas these days I think that there is a hunger for those that want to leave a legacy, whether they’re just coming into retirement or they are coming to means because the industry is changing. For the answer of what does a legacy mean personally to me, I think it has a lot to do with integrity being true to ourselves when we are in this lifetime. People lot of times talk about how we will be remembered. And I think that is important. But I think that also while we are here, the name of your firm is peace of mind. And one of the things that my clients often talk to me about is they crave peace of mind, no matter their net worth.
	And I can share some of the projects that my clients are working on in a moment. But I think it’s this idea that for everything that they’ve done, can they just have some peace of mind. And I think that if they’ve had amazing careers, they feel proud of those careers and they feel proud of those achievements, but still they’re craving that sense of peace that comes with. And maybe it’s a soul contract, and I know that might be a little woo-woo. A soul contract when they come to this planet that they know they need to fulfill. But again, when somebody steps out into this world and they are looking for some type of support when it comes to achieving their legacy, I just don’t see a lot of it out there.
	And I’d love to see more coaches and advisors support individuals. So your other question about the process? I think that coaching is incredibly valuable because it allows individuals to become unstuck. What I call the loop around the airport or it’s like somebody feels like they’re like almost in a time loop and they don’t know how to get out of it. So sometimes where I start clients at is in understanding their guiding principles. So let’s say that one of your guiding principles might be, we’d like everyone to have peace of mind.
	A guiding principle is understanding why you do, what you do or why you wanted to pursue the legacy that you want to achieve and complete, why is it important? So maybe for the two of you, you would like more of your clients to have peace of mind, which then has a ripple effect into their community, their family, their generations to come. So that’s one place that I start, and I might call that self-knowledge, it’s being able to get to know themselves beyond who they were in their career. So I’m just going to check in for a moment. Does any of this resonating?
Radon Stancil:	So it sounds to me like what you’re doing is in your coaching is you’re basically helping somebody, so for example, you used us and we know our theme, peace of mind, but I’m assuming people come to you and maybe they don’t know their theme yet, or they can’t express it. So you’re helping them to identify what is my thing, my theme, my whatever it is [crosstalk] and I want to leave behind and helping them work that out, so that they know [inaudible] pass that along.
Angelina Carleton:	So let me let you in on a little secret, lot of the times clients will say, I don’t know. And one of the ways that I respond is if you didn’t know, what would it be, or if your subconscious knows what is it saying? Because sometimes when the initial answer is, I don’t know, there’s a limiting belief thereof, I can’t say it, it won’t be accepted. It’s not a good answer. It’s not the right answer. So I think a part of it is allowing somebody to come out of their shell. And it isn’t about how great the coach is. It’s about the client getting to know themselves better and allowing themselves to be more of who they are. A lot of the times when successful achievers are coming up in their careers, they will do everything right for their community and to be a climber and all of those things.
	But it might not have necessarily had to do a lot with, who they are or honoring their values. They may have just been good at something like a lot of the times when I chat with individuals and they talk about leadership, somebody could get promoted into a position of leadership because they were good at something else, but it doesn’t mean that they were meant to be a leader. So I find oftentimes when an individual comes into retirement and the individuals that I work with that are over age 60, this is really the exciting time of their life, where they can finally pursue what it is in their heart. And a lot of times with type A personalities, I don’t necessarily have to dig it out of them, because they’re going to go onto the next adventure. Now for those who are a little bit shy, it is creating a space for them where they can become more of who they are.
	So let me give you an example with that. One of the magical things with coaching is being able to ask powerful questions in the moment, because if the coach says it, it’s interesting information at best. But if the client says it, they own it. So one of the keys is to be able to ask them, and this is what the coactive training institute talks about and something that they call powerful questions. It questions that maybe nobody else has asked them, I’ll give you an example right now. If you didn’t have to impress anybody, who could you be? If you didn’t have to get it right, what could you create? If you had nothing to prove, what would your legacy be? And sometimes they might not be able to answer it in that moment and that’s fine, because the magic of coaching again or the transformation of coaching might happen three days later, it could happen a week later.
	It could happen a month later because how the human mind is, is sometimes it will think about an idea, like bee the bonnet. And then there’ll be a moment where they feel safe, they let their guard down and then they let that idea in, or let that question in. And then they’ll come back with an answer in the next session. And that’s another point that I wanted to make regarding coaching is sometimes sessions can be really deep. And so how I like to close out a session is with what I call an assignment. And this is another coactive coaching term, which is called forwarding the action. In other words, you don’t just like, leave your client there, like in a ball of emotion, you give them an assignment.
	And that assignment could be like in the next week, what could you do? So I’ll role play with the two of you for a moment. So let’s say, I gave you an assignment to frame your mission statement in your office, you could come back and you could accept, you could counter, make a counter offer, or you could just reject it. And so, let’s say, I said that. Would you frame your mission statement in your office? What say you.
Radon Stancil:	You’re saying like, would I be able to express that to you? I’m sorry.
Angelina Carleton:	If you frame it, if you take it, this is framed behind me.
Radon Stancil:	Yes. Would I do it? Absolutely. I would do it.
Angelina Carleton:	So there an example of something that’s forwarding the action. So it’s not like you just like abandon the client in their moment of like opening up. It’s something that it keeps the momentum moving forward. So that they feel like they have small wins and a part of the assignments, like at the end of each session, isn’t to be so grandiose, it’s not to ask them to do something that’s so huge that they become intimidated or if it’s to break up the monotony, it might be to ask them to do something that’s huge and they’ll laugh because they’re not going to do it. But then it will cause them to make a counter offer of like, okay, well here’s what I am willing to do. Because again, if the client says it, they own it.
Murs Tariq:	So, you spend all this time coaching and sessions and homework and coming up with this idea of what you want your legacy to be. And so is there a way that you put this all together, you jot it down because eventually someone’s going to inherit something and is there a good way to, I guess, make sure that your wishes were known or make sure that the whole concept of your thought process as to what this legacy should be and how it gets carried on going forward? How does that all get portrayed to the next generation?
Angelina Carleton:	That’s a beautiful question. So here is the answer. I’ll ask my clients if I can record the sessions and at the end of the six months or the 12 months or whatever the agreement is that we will collaborate. They get a hard cover coffee table book of those key points, because here is another example and it might be relevant to an individual who is retiring, or it might be relevant just from a human standpoint. So let me give you the example. Let’s say that there is a successor of a family business, and they are about to be given the navigational wheel to a huge Navy ship in their family business. That coffee table book will be something that will anchor them because if they don’t do this journey of self-knowledge of knowing like their values, their guiding principles, their vision statement, their mission statement, there’s a whole design that they get to go through.
	It’s like giving this freighter to someone, and if they’re not ready, it will overwhelm them. Or they will just waste it because they can get influence by I so many different factors that are out there. And if they don’t know themselves, it is a benefit if they can know themselves and self-knowledge, because when their values are aligned, that inheritance then, or the retirement or what it is that they are coming into it, it is aligned. And then it’s easier for them, it’s more fun, it’s meaningful or what I like to call the three things that I would like my clients to have is freedom, fulfillment, and satisfaction. And when they do the work, they come out the other end or the other side with more of that.
Radon Stancil:	So who would you like if you had to describe, the type of person that is interested in this concept or this idea of designing their legacy. And you start saying, well, who is this for? And I know you might say, oh, it’s for anybody, but I’m just thinking [crosstalk].
Angelina Carleton:	No, I won’t say that. I won’t say that.
Radon Stancil:	But who is it for? Who is it that would be listening to this and go, oh, that’s me. That’s what I’m thinking right now. So who is this for?
Angelina Carleton:	I would say that people who have had some type of exposure to coaching in their past, embrace it more, whether it is former athletes, former military individuals, former executives that have worked with a coach before, because to collaborate with coaches of relationship, and that coach is going to deliver some honest conversations that will make the client better. So I would say it’s not for the faint of heart. And so I even wrote an Instagram post about this recently, people think that a legacy is the lucky for instance. And I say that a legacy is for those who are willing to persevere, because it is a courageous journey to even want to know yourself, because a lot of the times people hide behind a mask their entire lives.
Radon Stancil:	I agree.
Angelina Carleton:	Because it’s familiar.
Murs Tariq:	Right. I’m can.
Angelina Carleton:	Sorry. Can you say it one more time?
Murs Tariq:	It’s comfortable. It’s familiar. And asking the questions and going down the process of creating your legacy, I think that is something really big, and it’s a big conversation. That’s why your process I think is pretty well thought out. And it has some multi-layered steps to it, but it’s also not overwhelming at any given time too.
Angelina Carleton:	I just wanted to share another thought. So when somebody first has a discovery session with me and probably with a lot of other different coaches, they do something called designing the Alliance. What that means is not just the timing of how often we will meet and payments and the terms and the conditions. It’s also understanding what do they need if they want a coach that delivers the message gently that gets designed in. If they want to coach that just tells it to them straight, and doesn’t sugarcoat it, that’s also designed in, and it’s understanding, what legacy means for them? And so it’s tailored in the sense of delivering the coaching, so it works for them. In other words, obviously it’s not cookie cutter, but again, it looks that who they are, what they want, and it meets them there.
	So I’ll give you another example. I could say in designing the Alliance, I’m going to bring all of me, but I need you to bring all of you. And so that also sets up the expectation that this isn’t just for entertainment or this isn’t just for that they can show pathway, and tell half truths. If we’re going to make miracles happen, they got to bring all of them. Even the stuff that they don’t want to talk about, that could be difficult. And I want to also bring up a lot of the times with legacy, no matter how successful someone might be there, I’m thinking of a particular lady that’s in Connecticut. She’s really turned to the idea of, is it really possible for me? And that’s working through a beliefs growing up, but it’s also being able to accept that somebody deserves it because people do walk around with limiting beliefs and they do walk around with almost sabotaging themselves before they can even get out of the gate.
Radon Stancil:	So let’s just say that most of our listeners, I think I said in earlier are folks that are close to who we call them 55 years of age and older. Most of our clients are individuals that were executives or professionals in some way. And we have quite a few that were in team sports and those things. So maybe they’re listening to this and they can, Hey, this sounds interesting to me, I would like to be able to identify how I can pass this along. How does it work if the person’s listening and they think I’d like to know more about Angelina Carleton and design your legacy and what are my steps? Could you walk us through what that looks like?
Angelina Carleton:	They would either send me an email or call me up or they can go directly to the website and book a discovery session. And then from there we figure out what it is they want and their ideas around the legacy. It’s like breaking the ice and what they’re willing to commit to, what their thoughts are about coaching. A part of coaching is also them being able to come out to say, Hey, I’ve worked with coaches before and it was fantastic, or I’ve worked with coaches before and it was awful. So again, it’s all of that honesty coming forward. And I think a lot of the times when individuals look into coaching, one of the questions that comes up is not necessarily how amazing is that coach it is. Can I trust this person?
	So it’s not so much like if a coach has got a Harvard MBA and this or that it’s can this person, I call it the metaphor of the bowling ball, take the heaviness of who I’m and everything that I’m and not run away or not get scared or not criticize, or will it be safe enough, they can handle the way of everything that I’m and we can move forward. And so I think that’s where the trust factor comes in. And so then from there, we coach and we come up with plans and accountability and wonderful things that manifest results. And I can share that some clients are doing just very humanitarian projects right now, whether that has to do with bringing back more of the phytoplankton with the oceans and that’s in a development stage or turning plastics that are in the Caribbean ocean into energy, there’s so much talent that’s out there.
	And I think a lot of the times for retired people, like you’ve said, they don’t want to just rest on their laurels. I think for a minute they would love the rest, the rest and the peace and all of that. But I think there’s another part of them that wants to get out there and they see the problems in this world and they know that they can do something about it because again, if they’re looking to the left and the right of themselves and no one else is doing it, that’s when that inner inspiration comes forward and dug on it, they are going to do it, especially if they’re former military or former athletes.
Radon Stancil:	Well, fantastic. Could you just refer our listeners, I know you said go to the website and we’re going to have it listed and everything on the website, but what is your website just everybody’s listening if they happen to jot it down.
Angelina Carleton:	Sure. And so again, this was created about back in 2014. So it’s designurlegacy.com, but the way that it’s spelled is. And, and I just wanted to close out with the thought that sometimes coaching is what I like to call the third rail. So if you’re on a railroad track, they always say avoid the third rail, but maybe that is exactly what you need to go towards to bring forward what you need to in this life, when I spoke about the soul contracts before, but also not to be afraid of what you think might be painful, because just as one of your guests talked about, I think his podcast was called how to lose money. We avoid these conversations that we think are painful, but then we bring like a bagged pack. We bring them with us subconsciously to the next week, to the next month, to the next year, until we are ready to unpack it and realize that third rail isn’t necessarily going to kill us, perhaps it will just strengthen us.
Murs Tariq:	Well, great. Angelina, thank you so much for your time. And for having this conversation with us today, I know our viewers are going to find it very beneficial.
Angelina Carleton:	Thank you so much. And I would just like to close with the thought of what apathy is doing to your legacy is just not right.