EEC 422: How to Overcome Adversity and Make a Thriving Business, with Brit Nicole

Summary

Episode Overview

Podcast: Excellent Executive Coaching: Growing Your Business and Enhancing Your Craft
Host: Dr. Katrina Burrus, PhD, MCC
Episode: 422 – How to Overcome Adversity and Make a Thriving Business, with Brit Nicole
Guest: Brit Nicole
Date: March 3, 2026

This episode centers on overcoming profound personal and professional adversity to build and sustain a thriving business. Brit Nicole shares her deeply personal journey through an abusive marriage, devastating betrayal by an employee, and eventual success as both an entrepreneur and business coach. Together with host Dr. Katrina Burrus, they explore the intersection of trauma, resilience, and entrepreneurship, offering actionable insights for leaders and coaches supporting others through hardship.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. From Trauma to Entrepreneurship

• Brit’s Background and Traumatic Challenges ([01:16]-[02:16])
  • Grew up unable to control her circumstances, trapped in an abusive marriage.
  • Wasn’t allowed to have a job, money, or connections.
  • Left the relationship at her lowest and turned to entrepreneurship:
    • “Why go work for someone else when I could use that same time frame to build my own dreams?” – Brit Nicole [01:55]
  • Inspired partly by seeing her father run his own business.

2. Rebuilding Identity and Confidence

• Confronting Loss of Self-Identity ([02:46]-[04:29])
  • Brit describes a pivotal moment during a violent episode that led to an awakening.
    • “‘Where is your God now?’ …what am I doing with my life? …I’m created to be more than where I’m positioning myself.” – Brit Nicole [03:06]
  • After leaving, she embarked on a journey to rediscover her identity and self-worth.
• Unconventional Route to Confidence ([02:16]-[04:29])
  • Attributes strength to seeing parental example, and inner resolve to “tired of the life I was living.”

3. Defining Happiness—Without External Agendas

• Finding Purpose Beyond Ego and Money ([05:03]-[06:48])
  • Early entrepreneurship brought initial happiness—being paid for authentic talents.
  • A major business betrayal (the theft of 16 years’ worth of intellectual property and a three-year legal battle) forced her to re-evaluate priorities.
    • “I was chasing after money. I was living in my ego. I feel like I was doing everything for all of the wrong reasons.” – Brit Nicole [06:35]
  • True happiness found in daily life and personal fulfillment, not external validation.

4. Betrayal, Legal Battles, and Lessons Learned

• Intellectual Property Theft ([07:03]-[15:21])

  • Faced legal and personal devastation after a trusted employee stole vital IP.
  • Lessons in hiring, trust, and legal protection:
    • “It took me three years for my body to come out of fight or flight mode of survival… I could not function the way that I used to for three whole years because of the trauma behind the betrayal.” – Brit Nicole [07:36]

• Discovering the Betrayal ([12:49]-[14:38])

  • The “aha moment” came during the exit interview; discovery through social media and disguised inquiries.
    • “She started crying… ‘I didn’t think you were going to hold me accountable to that.’ And I said, ‘Absolutely, I am.’” – Brit Nicole [13:08]
  • Used metadata and contract evidence to pursue legal action.

• Legal Realities for Entrepreneurs

  • Despite careful contracts, enforcement is about financial resources.
    • “It didn’t matter how well I protected myself. It matters how much money do you have to keep pursuing justice?” – Brit Nicole [16:31]
  • Emotional toll often outweighs material loss.

5. Similarities Between Personal and Business Trauma

• Parallels in Red Flags and People Management ([11:15]-[12:37])

  • Ignored warnings about both abusive husband and problematic employee, believing she could “fix” them.
    • “Same thing… There’s just too many red flags… I can fix her. Those are the similarities between the two.” – Brit Nicole [12:26]

• Impact of Abusive Relationship’s End ([09:05]-[10:35])

  • Husband’s suicide post-separation felt like “freedom”—allowed her to fully focus on future without fear.

6. Healing, Helping Others, and the “Unstoppable CEO”

• Coaching Female Entrepreneurs Navigating Trauma ([17:22]-[18:43])
  • Specializes in guiding women through “trauma brain,” helping convert scattered, fearful thinking into strategic action.
    • “Helping women that have like trauma brain… being able to bring them down into linear terms so that we can start making needle-moving decisions.” – Brit Nicole [17:52]
  • Two and a half years with “Unstoppable CEO”; 18 years in business coaching overall.

7. Entrepreneurial Mindset Dynamics

• Balancing Different Mindsets at Home ([19:01]-[20:39])

  • Her husband’s journey: From “employee mindset” to entrepreneur after years of reluctance.
  • “I finally broke through to him after years of beating him down… You’re never going to get the freedom that you are seeking… until you make a move… Now he is running [a business] and he’s now understanding, oh my gosh, this is a completely different feeling.” – Brit Nicole [19:57]

• Benefits of Entrepreneurship ([20:39]-[21:50])

  • Flexibility for family life, modeling independence for kids, and fostering creativity.
    • “Showing my children, you can literally do anything with this life that you want to do.” – Brit Nicole [21:08]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “Why go work for someone else when I could use that same time frame to build my own dreams?” – Brit Nicole [01:55]
• “For so long, I was being told who to be, how to be, and how to just put a smile on my face and act like everything’s okay just to appease other people.” – Brit Nicole [03:46]
• “I was chasing after… fame. My ego was so big, I just wanted all the money that I possibly could.” – Brit Nicole [08:28]
• “It didn’t matter how well I protected myself. It matters how much money do you have to keep pursuing justice?” – Brit Nicole [16:31]
• “Those are the similarities between the two… I can fix her. Those are the similarities between the two.” – Brit Nicole [12:36]
• “Copycat is never like a creator, so I know that she could never be like me.” – Brit Nicole [17:14]
• “Helping women that have like trauma brain… bring them down into linear terms so we can start making needle-moving decisions.” – Brit Nicole [17:52]
• “You can literally do anything with this life that you want to do.” – Brit Nicole [21:09]

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• Brit’s Backstory & Leaving Abuse: [01:16] – [04:29]
• Entrepreneurship Beginnings & Inspiration: [01:55], [04:29]
• Business Loss and Shift in Priorities: [06:35] – [07:36]
• The Betrayal and Legal Fight: [12:49] – [15:21]
• Red Flags in Relationships & Hiring: [11:15] – [12:37]
• Husband’s Suicide and Its Aftermath: [09:53] – [10:35]
• Coaching Other Women Through Trauma: [17:37] – [18:43]
• Supporting Entrepreneurial Shifts at Home: [19:01] – [20:39]
• Empowering Children With Entrepreneurial Thinking: [20:44] – [21:50]

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Resources & Contact

• Brit Nicole’s Website: BritNicole.com
• Instagram: @its.Brit.Nicole

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Tone & Takeaways

Brit Nicole’s account is raw, candid, and hopeful, emphasizing the power of self-discovery, resilience, and reorienting goals around personal fulfillment rather than external measures like money or fame. The conversation reinforces that deep trauma—whether personal or professional—can be transformed into wisdom, strength, and ultimately, a platform to help others. The episode provides both practical and emotional guidance for leaders, executive coaches, and entrepreneurs facing betrayal, loss, or fear on their journey.

Transcript

[A]

We all face challenges, but some people freeze when they're challenged because it's a huge setback. And others use these challenges and setbacks to make a successful business. So what's the difference? So let's ask Britt Nicole, who not only had an abusive husband, but also was destroyed her business by an employee that stole her intellectual capital, and yet she survives today with a successful business. So let's ask her. Welcome to the excellent executive coaching podcast. I'm your host, Dr. Katrina Burus, and today we have Britt Nicol. Britt, welcome.

[B]

Hey, thank you so much for having me.

[A]

Well, we're happy to have you. So tell us a little bit some of the challenges you have been confronted with, which despite all those challenges, you're very successful. So first, tell us your challenges.

[B]

My challenges. Oh, my gosh. I feel like it stems for years, but trying to control my situations around me, I started off in a bad marriage. I ended up being abusive, and I wasn't allowed to have anything. I wasn't allowed to have a job, couldn't have money, friends, family around the whole. Whole thing. And when I finally left that situation, I told myself, I was like, why am I going to go work for someone else when I'm literally at the lowest low I could possibly be at with not having money or. Or anything? Why go work for someone else when I could use that same time frame to build my own dreams and do what I want to do in life? And so that's when I started my entrepreneurship of doing things for myself and learning how does Brittany work within this entrepreneurship instead of listening to all the other entrepreneurs of how they did stuff?

[A]

Well, that's very courageous of you, but usually when you're in an abusive relationship, they really tear your confidence apart. So how did you get over being in an abusive relationship and have the confidence to break away and even start your own business? That's almost counterintuitive. Usually you would want to be supported by a company that's already established and whatever.

[B]

I am a very backwards person if you compare me to, like, normal people. I feel like one thing that really hit me was when it was a really bad night, and just because I didn't want to do dishes, he got mad. I actually started getting choked by him up against the wall. And that's whenever he asked me during that time, like, where is your God now? And for some reason, it snapped in my brain of, what am I doing with my life? Like, honestly, what am I doing here? Why am I choosing to live in this type of Environment when I know within my soul that I'm created to do more. I'm created to be more than where I'm positioning myself. And so the next day, I grabbed what I could and I got my husky dog and I went back to the house that I had before. My parents were renting it out. Those people left, and so I moved back into there. And during that time, I had to really deep dive into who is Brittany? What does Brittany want in life? Because I lost all of my identity. For so long, I was being told who to be, how to be, and how to just put a smile on my face and act like everything's okay just to appease other people. And I can't really answer the question of what made it different of not going to work for someone. I think it's because I saw my dad growing up. He owns his own business, and I saw what he could do versus what employees could do. And I didn't want to start my life out like that because I was already tired of the life that I was living.

[A]

Well, congratulations. Takes a lot of courage. Yeah. Well, I'm glad your father had that positive model for you that, in fact, you could develop. You perceived that developing your own business, you could do more things than if you were an employee. I'm not sure that's a wrong perception, but yes. So you mentioned here what really finally made you happy and maybe not be tied down to an agenda that was imposed by somebody else. So how did you get to that state, too?

[B]

I've had a few that I could think of, states of where I've been able to be happy without an agenda. And one of those, the first times, was definitely the healing that I sought after. After the abuse, I was able to actually use who I was and not feeling apologetic for who I am and trying to accommodate other people around me for just like walking on eggshells of what other people wanted from you and being able to take my talents and be who I am to my core. And people pay me for that. That was one of the coolest things that I had experienced earlier on in my career. And then when I went through building and scaling a part of my business, I had to. I had a pretty bad employee situation. And whenever we let her go, she ended up taking 16 years worth of intellectual property at that time, on top of 66 federally federal councillors against her for stealing. And that almost bankrupt me. I went into a really horrific place of this was my baby that I built, and now it's being taken away. So once I Got healing from that. I was then able to find the happiness without an agenda then because the agenda there was. I was chasing after money. I was living in my ego. I feel like I was doing everything for all of the wrong reasons. My happiness was tied into where my face was being seen, who all knew me and how big I could make myself.

[A]

And so her taking all your intellectual property made you realize that that was the wrong objectives or the more you were living not really the way you wanted to tell us a little bit more. Because that's a big transition.

[B]

It is. Whenever I was building my company, I feel like I was living the American dream of what everybody could have ever wanted. I was able to make a lot of money from what I was doing. My kids were in private school, we had lavish vacations. It was fantastic. And with having the mistake of not actually knowing how to hire, especially a first time hire, I learned a pretty big lesson from that. But what ended up happening is when you're going through a federal lawsuit with, especially with the amounts of 66 federal copyright infringements that we were going after, that's a lot of money. That is a lot of mental and emotional time. And during that time it took me three years for my body to come out of fight or flight mode of survival that oh my gosh, I'm making my whole family go bankrupt. What am I doing? I did that to myself. There was a lot of guilt that set in and I truly could not function the way that I used to for three whole years because of the trauma behind the betrayal. And when I was finally able to get free from that of finding happiness where I wasn't brought down by guilt or, or thinking that my life was going to end or anything like that, I was able to find happiness within the everyday aspects instead of chasing after the fame and chasing after the money. Because that's exactly what I was doing when I was building my business, I was chasing after the fame. My ego was so big, I just, I wanted all the money that I possibly could.

[A]

So tell us a little bit about the difference in transition. Leaving an abusive husband and this transition of recuperating from a big betrayal that nearly bankrupt you. What is the similitudes and differences?

[B]

So the first time with the abusive husbands, while I was healing myself and starting to build my very first business, he actually ended up taking his life. It was going to be felt like it was going to be one of those murder suicide type situations that happened. Which is another reason why I didn't also go out and get another Job because I was terrified of coming home and someone being in my house when they should not be.

[A]

So just one second, because this is a big, huge issue. So you had built a business while you were married with your abusive husband? No, no, no.

[B]

Because he wasn't allowed to have income, right?

[A]

Yeah. So he committed suicide.

[B]

He did.

[A]

And then you left him or you left him?

[B]

No, I left and then he. He committed suicide.

[A]

So huge. So how did you feel about that? Did you feel you're the cause of it or.

[B]

Oh, I got blamed for it. I 100% got blamed for it from his family, which. I'm gonna be completely honest with you, because that's what we want. Right. It didn't bother me the way that people think that it should have bothered me. It felt like freedom. It did. It felt like I didn't have to fear anymore. It didn't feel like I had to fear for my future spouse and my future children if anything were to happen as I start building my happy life.

[A]

So I see. So he had a strong hold on your psyche.

[B]

Very much so.

[A]

And a fear that he would be violent. Obviously. It's sort of okay. So, Britt, you went through an abusive relationship and a traumatic experience, and then also years later, when you have done your business, you went through another traumatic experience with somebody. Absolutely. Stealing all your intellectual property and bringing down your company. I know it's very different, but explain to us the differences, and if there's any similitude.

[B]

100% there is. When I was with my first husband, I remember very vividly people coming and telling me, hey, this doesn't have, like, a good feeling. Like, I was feeling some red flags from him. We can kind of see this going a different way than what it should. And me being young and naive, I can fix him. It'll be okay. Type situation. You don't know him the way that I know him. Starting to get in my head. Type. And when I started interviewing, I found this girl that didn't really know anything about the industry that she was applying for. And I. I actually really enjoyed that. I wanted to be able to train her to be like me so that the brand stayed consistent throughout. And same thing started happening. Clients, even my husband that I have now, who is amazing, Godsend, most incredible human being on the face of this planet, was even telling me, hey, I think you might need to let her go. There's just too many red flags. There's too many dumpster fires that you keep having to put out. No, it's okay. I'll Be able to correct it. I'll be able to train her better. I can fix her. Those are the similarities between the two.

[A]

Aha. Aha. Well, that's very interesting. So you thought you could fix her and then when was the aha moment that she was stealing your intellectual property?

[B]

When we were having our. When we were having our exit interview. That put a little flag in my brain as I was going over the contracts, going over what you can, what you can't do. I don't care if you go do this, but you can't do it in this type of way. Because back then Texas was able to hold on to, what is it called, the non compete clause. Texas no longer has that, but back then it did. And I will never forget this for as long as I live. When we were going. When we were going over all of the stuff that she signed, she started crying and she said, I didn't think that you were going to hold me accountable to that. And I said, absolutely, I am. Of course I'm going to. And she was just so heartbroken over that. Well, the call ended and it wasn't about maybe a week to a week and a half where one of my employees sent me a message and said, you would never guess who popped up on my timeline with my photos and other things that were within my company. And so I sent a fake inquiry in. And naturally the response back was one of my templates that I use for my inquiries that come in. And I set up a consultation with her. And the consultation was a word for word of what is listed in my templates for my employees to do. So it was, it was very interesting, to say the least. There was more things that were actually sent on the back end that were not visually seen in public. So before she sent the consultation, that's whenever she sent more photos of here's what I could do, here's the places I could go, which they were all mine.

[A]

Oh, wow. And so you have proof of all this?

[B]

Oh, yes, absolutely.

[A]

How did that help you to pursue her legally?

[B]

How did it help me? I was able to say, hey, it literally shows my name. Whenever you have a photo, especially if it's done by a professional photographer, you can read the metadata on that actual photo of where it was made, like what camera, the location, if you have the addresses listed for the camera to take on there. And whenever I took those photos and I was reading the back end of them, it literally still said my name on the images.

[A]

So.

[B]

And even on the copyright, literally had the copyright symbol with My name on it and the file name was my name. So I mean they're just. It would be on a shadow of a doubt. I was able to pursue legal action on Great.

[A]

And so now she was forced to stop, thank God. And you can all use that again. But what does it leave you with? What have you done since to protect yourself that this doesn't happen anymore?

[B]

You know, I'm going to be honest. I did everything that I could in the beginning. Like I had a lawyer who told me, here's what we need to do. Here is how we need to do it before I ever hired anybody. So I knew that my contracts were. They were good to go. I knew going in what I needed, how I needed it in order to protect myself. That didn't mean jack, especially whenever it came to the lawsuits and trying to defend my business, making the bleeding stop type thing. It doesn't matter. Like those contracts didn't matter where it ended up happening. They were very smart in a way to where they drained my money because they prolonged the whole entire thing. So yeah, that part was. Was awful. So it didn't matter how well I protected myself. It matters. How much money do you have to keep pursuing justice?

[A]

I see. Well, that's a very important point. So. But she stopped stealing her stuff. You don't know.

[B]

Who's to say now I haven't checked up on her in a few years. So she could still be using stuff. She could still not be using stuff. Don't know.

[A]

But a copycut is never like a

[B]

creator, so I know that she could never be like me. I know.

[A]

Yeah. So after experiencing deep trauma from betrayal and legal battles to protect your business, how do you help clients navigate the emotional aspects of entrepreneurship while still making

[B]

strategic decisions where this has truly catapulted me into the career that I'm in now. I'm still doing the other industry, but I'm doing exactly what you're talking about, helping other female entrepreneurs. What I'm really, really good at is helping women that have like trauma brain. The fog that comes upon you where you can't make decisions, where everything feels really hard to complete a task. Even like the ADHD squirrel type brain, being able to help them navigate from thinking in sporadic terms like the spider webs that branch out from our brain whenever we're going through that stuff and be able to bring them down into linear terms so that we can start making needle moving decisions within the business instead of it just being a hope and a prayer.

[A]

Very good. And how long have you been Doing

[B]

this about two and a half years. The unstoppable CEO has been doing that. I have been business coaching, though, for the past 18 years.

[A]

I see. And you've got an entrepreneurial mindset, to say the least. So. And usually when you have an entrepreneurial mindset, other people around you are fearful of that because they don't have the same mindset. So how do you handle that?

[B]

I have a great example for you. My husband, he is a employee mindset through and through. Go to college, get your degree, go work for someone which is complete opposite of me. He, for the past few years, just miserable at his corporate job. Things change, gets different bosses having to. It's just not fun for him. And then he sees me being able to have this. I don't want to say free time, because as an entrepreneur, you're pretty much dedicating your life to your business. But it's a different way of life than what it is working for someone else. And a few months ago, I finally broke through to him after years of beating him down of, you're never going to get the freedom that you are seeking, not just financially seeking, but the freedom like within you of being happy with your life. You're not going to get that until you make a move. And that's exactly what happened. We ended up buying a lawn irrigation business that's been around for 51 years. And now he is running it and he's now understanding, oh my gosh, this is a completely different feeling. Like, I can't believe I was fighting this with you this whole entire time because of his own fears of what he would and wouldn't do. And now that he's past those fears and actually diving head first, learning head first, it's a night and day difference. It's pretty cool to watch somebody come full circle into that.

[A]

And what would you say are the biggest benefits to be an entrepreneur?

[B]

I think it just depends on what your priorities are. The biggest benefits for me is being able to be with my kids at any time that I want to. I can leave to go to one of their class programs. I can do anything that I want. And then also showing my children, you can literally do anything with this life that you want to do. You don't have to go to college if you don't want to go to college. You don't have to pursue certain type of degrees or a certain type of job if you don't want to do that. So that's been really cool, seeing my kids start their own little. My son, who is 10. He started. You see the wheels turning. Mom, I'm really, really good at building these robots and they're doing these certain things, kind of like the Mark Robar type stuff. Like, do you think I would be able to make money from that? Absolutely. Let's. Let's work on a little business plan for a little kid. And so he'd start working things out, start writing things out, and it's just, it's really cool to see in kids. It's exciting, that.

[A]

Mm, that's good. Well, we're coming at the end of our podcast, so tell us where people can get a hold of you.

[B]

You can go to my [e-mail] or you can find me on Instagram under its. Brit B R I T. Nicole.

[A]

Okay, well, thank you so very much for sharing your knowledge and experience, and I hope this was helpful for our listeners.

[B]

Thank you. Thank you for listening to the Excellent Executive Coaching podcast. You can subscribe to all Future podcasts@excellent executive coaching.com join us each Wednesday to learn more about the latest trends in leadership techniques and bring your coaching to the next level. To learn more about Dr. Burris CEO mastermind, use the contact [e-mail].