EXPANDED Podcast Ep. 390: "How to Listen to Your Intuition and Bet on Yourself – The Process with Eugenia Ali"

Main Theme/Purpose

This episode centers on how to cultivate and trust your intuition, take bold steps toward an authentic life, and bet on yourself—using guest Eugenia Ali’s recent life and career transformation as a powerful case study. Host Jessica Gill (Chief Content Officer at To Be Magnetic™) interviews Eugenia on reconnecting with childhood passions, dismantling limiting career beliefs, navigating burnout, and leaning into massive career shifts through the To Be Magnetic™ (TBM) manifestation process.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Eugenia's Backstory: Root Wounds & Upbringing

• Cultural background: Venezuelan, raised moving between Venezuela, Ohio, Russia, and New York due to her mother’s corporate Procter & Gamble career.
• Core wounds: Difficulty with belonging due to constant relocation and a big age gap between her and her sisters.
• Impact of family on beliefs: Her mother’s corporate role modeled success via the traditional 9–5 path, creating an internal blueprint that “success is corporate.”
• Childhood passions: Ballet, arts and crafts, fairy tales, and creativity.
  • Quote (Eugenia, 06:44): “I loved arts and crafts…Working with my hands very often…A huge part of my life was ballet up until I was 15…I’ve looked into ballet classes, like adult ballet classes, and I know I’m gonna do it, but I’m still scared to.”

2. Reconnecting With the Inner Child Through Hobbies and Leisure (08:29–11:55)

• Hobbies aren’t just for productivity—they’re core to self-worth and holistic manifestation.
• Introducing non-productive “play” helps expand self-worth and create energetic “space” for abundance.
• Jess (09:43): “What you’re communicating to the universe, when you are crocheting and knitting and when you inevitably are taking your ballet lessons…is, ‘I actually feel so worthy of taking this leisure time.’”

3. Eugenia’s Corporate Career: Success, Burnout, and Misalignment (11:55–18:01)

• Early start at Sakara, then unexpectedly landed a coveted Google job after a serendipitous chain of events.
  • Eugenia (13:22): “I applied to Google on a whim, not at all thinking I would ever get it…The woman doing my hair was like, ‘I know someone at Google…I’ll refer you.’”
• At Google: Climbed quickly, worked on glamorous, high-pressure projects (Emily in Paris, NY/Paris Fashion Week, Met Gala).
• Behind the scenes: Stress, health neglect, and dysregulation; ultimately led to a wake-up call after a miscarriage.
  • Eugenia (18:01): “I cannot carry a baby while at this job with the amount of stress that I’m under.”

4. The Leap to Freelance: Navigating the Unknown (18:01–39:34)

• Recognizing a misalignment and receiving an intuitive “whisper” to make a change.
• Using TBM tools/supported by expanders (e.g., doing pathways, seeing role models in freelance via Grace Abbott).
• Taking aligned action—sent an authentically detached DM to Jess offering freelance help, which led almost miraculously to her TBM role.
  • Eugenia (19:38): “I DMed you, I came out of a DI and in the DI heard the message to DM you…There was no desperation. And…I had forgotten I had texted you first.”
• Jess (21:13): “All manifestation is moving miracles to expand your thinking that anything is possible, with a sense of detachment. That is really the secret sauce.”
• Balancing between Google and freelance work for a “test run” before making the final leap. Consciously choosing not to operate from a place of desperation.

5. Expansion, Nervous System Regulation, and “Betting On Yourself” (29:50–39:34)

• How having professional “expanders” helped lessen fear around freelancing.
• Recognizing life/career moves aren’t always permanent—reframing risks.
  • Eugenia (33:25): “Maybe I take this huge step…and I don’t like it, I’ll come back to corporate. It doesn’t have to feel so scary.”
• Open, honest conversations with her partner about finances and values before resigning.

6. Practical Process: Using TBM Tools to Manifest Change (44:09–53:22)

• DI (“Deep Imaginings”) Practice: Eugenia struggled initially due to difficulty with memory/perfectionism. The breakthrough came when, instead of looking for exact memories, she allowed herself to focus on the feeling or “make it up”—still achieving emotional release and healing.
  • Eugenia (46:35): “If I don’t know the feeling, I can make it up. I know that girls were mean to me in middle school…I don’t remember why, but you remember the feeling.”
• Making DIs her own: Walking, cleaning, journaling, or just being relaxed—not rigid or “perfect.”
  • Eugenia (50:25): “Sometimes when I’m cleaning up…pick things up as I’m listening…Or journaling through them…Let yourself have fun with it.”
• Letting go of “optimization”/perfectionism in self-development practices.

7. Intuition: Trusting and Strengthening the Muscle (52:00–56:02)

• Intuition isn’t always a whisper—sometimes it’s a bolt.
• Disconnection from intuition often reflects a larger misalignment in life.
  • Eugenia (54:13): “When I was at Google… I lost sight of the synchronicities and the intuition…It wasn’t until I took this really big leap…that now all of these different synchronicities and things pop up.”

8. On the Other Side of the Leap: Healing, Hope & Manifestation (56:02–62:24)

• Expansion from living your truth and betting on yourself; belonging “mask” dissolves as you act in alignment.
  • Eugenia (56:13): “It feels really good to take a bet on myself…to follow through with promises that I’ve made to myself…Now having to take [the mask] off is uncomfortable, but I feel much more in tune with whatever’s gonna come next.”
• The universe as partner/teacher—viewing life’s obstacles as invitations for growth rather than reasons for victimization.
  • Eugenia (58:16): “Everyone in your life is a teacher…What is it she’s here to show me?”
• Celebrating “miraculous” manifestations—from stretch goals (appearing on the podcast itself) to finding new self-trust.
  • Eugenia (62:24): “It really works…It is heavy, it can feel hard. Sometimes it’s light…As long as you can really commit to it and be disciplined with yourself, there’s so much to life that we can squeeze out.”

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On following pings and acting without attachment

  “There was no desperation. There was no ‘I need her to respond in order for me to get this or feel valued.’ I put my phone down…and when I opened my phone and saw your response, I was like, did you just message me? I had forgotten I had texted you first.”
  —Eugenia (19:38)

• On the energetic ripple of doing what you love

  “If you can really give yourself that love, that attention—not needing to constantly produce—you can actually sit back and let more come into your life by expanding your capacity in that way.”
  —Eugenia (11:39)

• On intuition and trust

  “When you get the message, you follow through with it, you…keep that little promise even if you can’t take the major jump right now…The more will come through. But when we shut it down preemptively, …that’s when it’s blocking the channel.”
  —Jess (54:53)

• On the feeling after betting on yourself

  “It feels really good to take a bet on myself. It feels really good to follow through with promises that I’ve made to myself… I feel really hopeful and really excited about whatever it is that comes next into my life.”
  —Eugenia (56:13)

• On manifestation and full-circle moments

  “Danny and I wrote our manifestation lists for 2026 together…Going on the Expanded podcast. And he was like, totally…And I think it was like 1/6 when you texted me…Six days into the year and you’ve already manifested…what we both thought was the toughest thing on my list.”
  —Eugenia (61:39)

Timestamps for Important Segments

| Timestamp | Segment/Topic | |------------|-----------------------------------------------------| | 03:34 | Eugenia’s background, childhood, and belonging | | 06:44 | Reconnecting with childhood passions | | 09:43 | Leisure, hobbies, holistic self-worth in manifesting| | 11:55 | Corporate cycle: Success, burnout, blueprint | | 13:22 | Story of serendipity: Landing Google | | 15:31 | TBM Authentic Code exercise impact | | 18:01 | Wake-up call: Miscarriage, burnout, intuition | | 19:38 | Intuitive aligned action: The life-changing DM | | 29:50 | Expansion for freelance: Grace Abbott’s impact | | 33:25 | Reframing risk: Non-permanence, “life is a game” | | 36:02 | Testing/straddling worlds: Freelance while at Google| | 44:09 | Eugenia’s personal process with DI’s and unblocking | | 50:25 | Making DI’s your own, letting go of optimization | | 52:00 | Learning self-trust, intuition part-body exercise | | 54:13 | Loss—> reconnection to intuition after “the leap” | | 56:13 | The feeling after betting on yourself | | 58:16 | Seeing challenges as growth invitations | | 61:39 | Full-circle manifestation: Appearing on this podcast|

Additional Takeaways

• Self-Compassion: Healing is not about perfect memory recall, but about somatic/emotional release and self-support.
• Aligned Action > Overthinking: Manifestation is equal parts unblocking and taking brave, detached action.
• Your Pain Is Not a Stop Sign: Rock bottoms, burnout, and wounding are invitations to up-level with the right support.
• Community & Expansion: We need expanders—witnessing others do the “impossible” makes it accessible for us.

Summary Tone

The episode is candid, honest, encouraging, and practical—mixing vulnerability (sharing about loss, burnout, and shame) with TBM’s signature actionable confidence. Jess and Eugenia keep the conversation lively, relatable, and supportive for listeners at any stage of self-growth.

This episode is a compulsory listen for anyone feeling disconnected from their intuition, contemplating a career leap, or seeking permission to bet on themselves and live more authentically.