9 Transformational Truths for Healing, Self-Discovery & Embodied Leadership

00:00 Reconnecting After Years: A Journey of Transformation

Melanie Webb (00:00)

Well, today’s guest is someone who lives and breathes transformation in its truest form. I am so excited to welcome Isabelle Gold to The Mindful Trainer. Hi, Isabelle.

Isabelle (00:11)

Hey Melanie, thank you for having me.

Melanie Webb (00:14)

It’s such a pleasure to see you. It’s been a long time.

Isabelle (00:18)

Yeah, 15 years.

Melanie Webb (00:20)

15, yes, I can’t believe it because I mean, I guess that is one of the beauties of social media is that it lets you see what’s happening in people’s lives. But you think you know what’s happening in someone’s life and you really don’t until you connect in person.

Isabelle (00:36)

So true. The math.

Melanie Webb (00:37)

Well, you’re living a really interesting life. My first question for you is where are you today?

Isabelle (00:45)

I am in my ex-husband’s house living here with my boys in LA watching his dog feeding his fish.

Melanie Webb (00:51)

In LA. I love fish. Fish are my favorite kind of pets.

Isabelle (00:57)

Yeah, but I’m here. Yeah, it’s been a wild journey to be here in his space. I made him dinner the other night and yeah, it’s quite a journey, divorce.

Melanie Webb (01:00)

Yeah, I know it’s such a painful journey. And you’re co-parenting. And you have two boys. Remind me how old they are.

Isabelle (01:16)

They’re almost nine and 11.

Melanie Webb (01:18)

So big. haven’t seen them. I don’t think I ever saw your second son, but I remember seeing your older son when he was a little boy. Yeah. Well, we might get into that divorce territory a little bit later. And I know you’re really in it right now. I have so many questions for you about the kind of work that you do. 

I’m really excited about this conversation too, because so far on The Mindful Trainer, we have explored some really emotionally rich territory and, we’ve primarily been in the physical realms and your work takes place in so much more of what I have started calling the subtle body realms that influence our physicality and how we experience our life here. 

I have a million questions for you but I thought it would be fun, especially for me, but hopefully for the listeners, to go back to where this all started and where we last saw each other. I did see you in California a couple of years after this, but we met in 2013 while guiding a super high end trip. 

We guided billionaires and A-listers from Hollywood on a jet-set vacation to what was at the time the world’s most expensive hotel, Amangiri. And then we also moonlighted with them on a yacht at Lake Powell, which is a setting really close to my heart and that I’ve spent a lot of time. But it also is a setting where people certainly appear to have it all. 

You made a post recently about that time in your life, and I’m curious what you remember about the trip and also what was going on in the background for you at that time.

Before the Transformation: Numbness

Isabelle (03:06)

Yeah, that was a wild experience. Well, I made the post because I was reminded of everything that happens in our life just happens for a reason. Like it’s not random. Nothing’s random. And I feel like I’m just being reminded I’m at this phase in my life where I’m being reminded nothing’s random. And that trip was so not random because it prepared me to be able to be with people in that space and navigate those realms and see very close to myself. 

At that point though, in Lake Powell, I was very disconnected from myself. I remember being numb and wondering, what am I doing here? Who are these people? Feeling uncomfortable, but also not really caring at the same time, because…I’ve never really cared too much about fame and who you are. Living in Los Angeles, it’s kind of a crazy experience to be in that space.

But I was very disconnected from who I am today. And yeah, my post was like an honoring to that part of myself. Like, wow, you were there and you learned a lot and now you’re here.

Melanie Webb (04:26)

Yeah, it has been some years since 2013 to 2025. And that’s so interesting. Yeah, now you’re in LA and these are the kind of people you work with day in, day out. 

I remember that trip being really high stakes, being very demanding physically. We worked some very long days to ensure that this trip went off without a hitch to anticipate every need of our guests and to make sure that they had an amazing time together. But I remember it really taking a toll on us and on my body. I remember talking to you about that. That’s a world of adventure travel and guiding that we can get into another time. 

It’s interesting how we both have had some parallel experiences, guiding, and these really are the kind of people I wanna connect with on the show because that guiding and way-showing part, like in that situation, we were literally in person, in real life, 24 seven for, I don’t know, four or five days, with this handful of people guiding them through the day and the experience. 

I remember you were kind of the set designer, making sure that yacht was incredible. And it was, it was beautiful. And the trip went off without a hitch and everything was great. I do have a funny story about it and then I wanted to get into a much richer topic or conversation here. 

I don’t know if you remember, but we did have some free time in the afternoon and I had actually already worked at Amangiri for a year and a half before that trip. I wasn’t working there any longer at this time, but we got to go spend some time in the spa. I can really enjoy the spa and the spa there at Amangiri is beautiful. And anyway, I remember washing my hair. This is so silly now, but it just knotted up and the conditioner would not wash out. And I spent like 30 minutes trying to pick my hair out.

And then I came out of the spa and I was supposed to meet you guys at the front desk. And there was very poor cell service at this location. It’s in the middle of nowhere in the desert. And I couldn’t let you guys know that I was struggling. And I came out and you guys had already left me and you were at the restaurant. And I walked out and one of our guests was standing in the lobby of the spa. And I just looked at him like, deer in the headlights, knots in my hair, like, you’re not supposed to see me right now. 

It sounds so silly, but I remember showing up at the restaurant and you just looked at me and you said, you’re late.

Melanie Webb (07:05)

And I’m laughing about it now because truly what you said earlier about like, you’ve always been so real and not affected by fame, right? And I think, and I also like, I have always refused to respond or call my clients, Mr. or Mrs. and especially in those settings where I’m responsible for their health and safety in an outdoor environment, I refuse, we’re on equal ground as far as I’m concerned. And I think that’s one reason, like I saw in you such a kindred, confident spirit, and I had no idea that you had this inner turmoil going on at the time. 

Isabelle (07:48)

Yeah, I think I was so numb at that point that it all feels like a blur. But it is really interesting to see how we have like we’re still doing the same thing. We’re still guiding people, but it’s just in such a different way. You know, I sometimes describe it as like I used to make beautiful spaces on the outside world and now we make them on the inside and then the outside transforms. 

I don’t remember that you were late. I just remember really connecting with you as like, I felt you as a real person. 

“We make beautiful spaces on the inside.”

Melanie Webb (08:14)

I love that.

Yeah, I think that’s why we’re here today as the guides who we are today in our different realms. It’s been really beautiful to watch your unfolding and your way you masterfully communicate your thoughts about these realms and our energy bodies and everything else. 

I’m just curious, if you do go back to that time of numbness in your own life, How does that help you as you observe other people’s pain and disconnection? Like as a guide, how does that help you hold the space for others?

09:55 Navigating Personal Pain and Healing

Isabelle (09:02)

I mean, when you’ve been somewhere, right? When you have the experience of when you can see it, you can feel it in the other person. And I feel like really healing is when you have found that compassion and have worked with all these parts within yourself so many times that you can find the compassion in the other as well. 

And I think that…That’s the way. Yeah.

Melanie Webb (09:32)

The way of transformation is compassion and love. I don’t know if any great guides get there without going through it themselves.

Isabelle (09:34)

Yeah.

No, I train some of my clients to do the same kind of work and I always tell them like you’re gonna be working with people through which the journey that you just went through because you know it, you know all the facets, you know the ins and outs, you know how it feels and you know how you got out, you know what worked and then you can be a light in the dark, dark tunnel, you know.

Melanie Webb (10:04)

Yeah, because life is yin and yang. Life is light and dark. I do want to get into your work more, more deeply, richly. So you blend somatics, which I’d love for you to give a how you view that for listeners who might not have heard that word with hypnotic and energetic practices. So how do those modalities create real lasting shifts in someone’s being? Like what actually happens in the body when you’re working with those modalities?

“Life is yin and yang, light and dark.”

Isabelle (10:37)

Yeah, I see it as a journey inward. So I, you know, we’re so numbed in our society, right? I’ve used that word earlier. I felt numb. So I had to really learn to allow these deep, rich feelings that I have within my own body to actually be in a safe space to bring them out.

I believe that everything’s connected. So if we have pain in our body, you know, can we actually feel it? Can we go into the emotional and the spiritual level of what our body is trying to communicate to us? And so through creating a safe space and teaching a person to actually safely start feeling, even if it’s just a little bit and then a little bit more.

There’s something that happens which is very hypnotic, is that the story will start revealing itself when we actually allow the feeling to arise. The story will take shape and people will have visions, they’ll go back to childhood, they’ll go back to being in a womb, to the root cause of where the specific trigger or intense feeling that they’re having in the moment started. 

So we start with, what are you feeling right now? I’m not feeling anything, or I’m angry, or I’m triggered by my husband, or whatever it is. And that’s the point that we take deep inside through the hypnotic and the energetic modalities to, this is what the program is.

I see where it’s coming from. And actually, I want to have a different program. And then we let the body feel again what the new program would feel like. So it’s combining the seeing and the feeling, the knowing, turning all of our senses on. I’m all about being the antenna that we are, you know, connected to the universe.

“Let your trigger be the medicine.”

Melanie Webb (12:42)

It is easy to numb out. It is easy to feel overwhelmed and to feel like we have to shut things out. I remember going to a breathwork conference once and the instructor said, look, the days of speaking of the body, the mind and the emotions as three separate entities are over. So I love interacting with people like you who are immersed in that work.

all the time because we know that so many chronic illnesses and pain in the body is really emotion being expressed. And you talked about that too, you’ve, well, maybe I can just ask you to talk about how those emotions might influence chronic pain and illness.

Isabelle (13:24)

Yeah, I mean the example of how we started our conversation and talking about migraines comes up to share actually with the listeners. I used to have every month I would be in bed, have to be in a dark, dark room with massive migraines, vomiting, just being out for a couple days even. 

Isabelle (13:47)

As I went through my process of starting to feel and learning to navigate, like I look at our body as this most intelligent creation that will ever exist. Right? So now when a migraine comes on, I’ll actually allow myself to feel it instead of wanting it to go away, which is what we do in our society is say, I don’t want to feel this. I’m going to take a pain solver. I don’t want to feel this. I’m going to go shopping. You know, we all have our distractions to actually have the capacity to say, I’m going to be with this. I’m going to listen and I’m going to feel what’s coming up in my head.

What I was explaining earlier is you feel the feeling, you are with it instead of wanting it to go away, you let it be. And from that place, your body tells you like my body will tell me you’re dehydrated, you’re in your head too much. It’ll show me what I’m thinking about, where I’m consuming all this energy. And then I can start closing the tabs and the migraine does not come through anymore.

Like I haven’t had a migraine using this way of being with myself in many years. It’ll start and I use it and it never really becomes a migraine.

Melanie Webb (15:14)

That’s incredible to know your own body to that extent. Yeah, we were talking about this because I also had a terrible migraine a few days ago. And I did suffer from these chronically after a couple of concussions that I’ve talked about on an earlier episode of the show. And then they’ve pretty much gone away as I’ve healed. And that energy from brain trauma has dissipated and been healed, but this one got me pretty bad and it let me know. 

I like that expression that you used, the tabs in my brain. I had a million tabs open in my brain and energetically my energy was spread thin and tapped. And this was my brain’s way of saying like, hey, reel it in, bring it back. 

I have also learned to take it as, yes, it’s a warning shot. It’s also like, just hold that with so much tenderness and compassion rather than scolding myself. It’s a reminder that I am a different person than I used to be and that sensitivity is valuable. And if I want to show up in the world and continue to do the work that I do one-on-one with individuals, I have to take care of this first. And going back to how you started, you’re in your ex-husband’s home right now. And you guys are fairly fresh, I mean, you’re still in it, right? You’re still in the throes of working things out, so.

Isabelle (16:39)

Yeah, we were in court on Monday. Just two days ago. So yeah, it’s a lot of different pieces that are moving and everything is very present right now. Like that is the part. And then there’s also the part that we actually do get along and we want to raise our boys in a healthy way.

Melanie Webb (16:43)

Just two days ago.

Yeah, the good side of a hard experience. Yeah. Thank you for being so open and vulnerable about it.

Isabelle (17:05)

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, it’s what I’m here to do. Speak the truth.

Melanie Webb (17:17)

You’ve been, like I said, a good truth speaker. Were you raised to be a truth speaker?

Isabelle (17:23)

What do you think?

Melanie Webb (17:25)

I don’t know because you’re from Belgium. And I’ve been to Belgium years ago. Such a beautiful country, but I don’t know the culture of a place, you know, and how that influences a person’s upbringing. I think it’s very, we all come from our, we have an origin story and we have an ancestral origin story. Do you work much with ancestral threads in somebody’s life?

Isabelle (17:27)

Yes, yes.

Melanie Webb (17:51)

Is that something that gets uncovered as you’re following that pin in and deeper?

Isabelle (17:55)

Yeah, it’s very present, you know, it just gets passed on. I do want to hold it in a space of, because I feel like in a spiritual community, it often becomes this, I’m holding, I’m cleaning up my whole ancestral patterns. It’s like, yes, you are, but also don’t take on all that weight. Like, what is the pattern that is showing up?

Coming to a place where you become aware of your patterns and you can track it back but not take the entire weight of the lineage on. But yes, it shows up and I work with a lot of people in Belgium actually, a lot of clients are Belgian because I know that texture of being, there’s some like gentle suppression that goes on into our culture. 

Belgium was overrun by so many different nations and we have two languages now and the two languages don’t agree and it’s like two sides and and everybody just or that was my experience of myself and a lot of people around me just kind of just sat back and became gray and very neutral. Just, you know, dress the same, act the same, just do your nine to five. 

And it’s the same in the U.S., right? Like a little less, I think, in the circles that I’ve explored here. I feel like people are more expressive here. That’s why I moved here. But yeah, I grew up being…not being able to speak the weird thoughts that would come up in my mind or having a place where I could express what I was sensing in my body and what I was seeing and what I was feeling and so it became a story of I’m just gonna not share. I’ll just hold it in and feel it all and not let it out.

19:42 The Power of Somatic and Energetic Practices

Melanie Webb (19:48)

Internalizing and turning it inward on yourself. I’ve experienced a lot of that as well.

Yeah, which I think also leads people like us to become guides and way showers because we’ve had to do some deep reflection also if we’re willing to, right? If we’re willing to go there. That’s interesting. Thanks for letting me ask about your Belgian roots. I do love that you’re spending time in Belgium with your fellow Belgians in your jungle setting, which to me just reflects this wildish nature that you’ve re-cultivated? Is cultivation the right word? Rediscovered, maybe that’s the right word.

Isabelle (20:27)

Yeah, it’s always been there, right? It’s like I look back at times when I was like 16 sneaking out of my parents’ house and putting on some inappropriate outfits to go out to the club and, you know, do drugs. And then I numbed her down, right?

And now it’s like, yeah, I can be wild. I don’t need to be that kind of wild anymore, but I can be the expressed self. I don’t need to do it in a rebellious way where it’s not, not channeled the right way.

Melanie Webb (21:10)

Yeah, yeah, without boundaries. Yeah, I like the rebellious note. We are so similar. One of the biggest times I got in the most trouble was sneaking out of the house at age 16 to, maybe I was 15, I wasn’t 16 yet and I was sneaking out to go drive cars with friends. So that didn’t go over very well.

Isabelle (21:14)

No, I ended up in the jungle re-wilding and then I can go back to home and just be myself now, which is really refreshing. It took a long time.

The Transformational Healing Hack of Our Time

Melanie Webb (21:41)

Yeah, I’m sure.

Yeah, it’s beautiful, beautiful that you’ve been able to reclaim that. You said something a few minutes ago that I want to go back to. You said turning yourself on all the way. And you’ve said to me before that that is the healing hack of our time. So tell us, what does it mean to be fully turned on? And why is that level of self-truth so important for healing?

Isabelle (22:11)

I feel turned on just to you asking that question. I’m like, yes, that’s such a good question. She got it. Like turning ourselves on is like feeling all of that life is right. And for women and for men too, like it’s our sexual energy. We work a lot with sexual energy actually. Once we  take away the layers and we can allow that energy to flow through, which is our life force energy.

And I feel like most people live with that faucet closed or like it’s stuck. And so we unstuck that and we allow it to move through and we’re turned on by life again

Like I was talking to a friend the other day and she’s like, I don’t have those experiences Isabelle. Like you think of something and it happens and you come across these magical people and I’m like, yeah. And I feel like it is because I allow myself to feel. Louie, come here. I allow myself to feel all of it.

Isabelle (23:21)

Like the good and the bad.

And so these reflections can come in. It’s like being turned on by being in the shower and touching your skin. It doesn’t have to be sexual in order to, and there’s a lot of stories, right, that we can go into as to why we’re not living that way anymore.

But yeah, does that make sense?

Melanie Webb (23:43)

It does, yeah. And again, it goes back to that light and darkness, right? You don’t get the fullness of one without the experience of the other. And I think we like to pretend that we can. But the body does have so much capacity. And yes, we do receive so many different messages from the time we’re born, these programs that are.

And I’d love to hear your version of what a program is. I know from the work I’ve done that it’s essentially, you know, it’s like the information that was given to me. It was the air that I breathed.

Isabelle (24:19)

Talking about being turned on and an example would be that it’s wrong to be turned on, that it’s not safe to walk and be seen and receive the energy because it has been unsafe. there’s a lot of nuances, right? Like can we feel safe again to be seen? Can we be in that energy and walk the street like that and be safe?

Melanie Webb (24:53)

That lands in me. I think there were a lot of years where I didn’t dare shine my light because someone wasn’t going to like that.

Isabelle (24:56)

Yeah. Yeah, and that’s very real, right? You know, we have that with our parents, we have that with friends. The sister wound is such a deep one. And every time we shine, every time we are really that light in the room, you’re going to trigger someone. Because you’re triggering that exact part inside of them that isn’t doing the same thing.

Isabelle (25:30)

So let your trigger be the medicine, right?

Melanie Webb (25:33)

That’s beautiful too. Let your trigger be the medicine. So that’s noticing what our triggers are. 

Isabelle (25:41)

Both. You know, if we are triggered by someone, if you trigger me, I can be with that and be like, okay, what is it about her that triggers me? And again, allowing the story to come up. She’s triggering me because she’s so healthy. And there’s a part of me that wants that too.

Right? So, if you would stop being healthy, would that serve me?

Melanie Webb (26:00)

Right. Absolutely not.

Isabelle (26:06)

If I stop sharing my truth and if I stop being myself in the rooms that I walk into, it’s not gonna help anyone because I can walk into a room and a woman will be like, wow, she’s a lot or whatever she’s saying is a lot. She can use that as her medicine as well and be like, where am I not showing all of me?

Melanie Webb (26:29)

Yes.

Isabelle (26:30)

But our society makes it, you know, gossipy or, you know, women are very good at this too. Or they’ll turn it where they just don’t want to look at the mirror that’s in front of them. And usually the mirror is beautiful.

Melanie Webb (26:44)

The mirror is so beautiful, but we have a hard time looking in the mirror, number one, let alone seeing the mirror reflected accurately, I think. Yeah. Well, I love how you also explore the masculine, the feminine, which we all have. Those are equal parts of us. 

And that you also said that it’s not the work of just one of us, this work, this hacking in and turning our light on, right? This is the work of both the male and the female.

Isabelle (27:17)

Yeah, we’re in some potent times around that.

Melanie Webb (27:20)

Yeah, we certainly are. I won’t go into, we won’t go into gender here. Right? Only in the context of the energy of the masculine and the feminine, which I think we can all agree. Well, I’m sure not everyone will agree with me that everyone has both. there’s the, you know, I think it’s safe to say that.

The expectation that we all examine our triggers and allow each other to show up in our full selves is equal.

Isabelle (27:52)

Yeah, my feminine wouldn’t feel safe expressing if my inner masculine wasn’t able to hold that, that truth. And if I’m depending on the outer masculine, that’s very unsafe, right? Because I don’t know if that’s really safe. I just know if I’m connected to that part of me, my inner masculine trusts and follows my feminine’s lead. I know it’s like walking the street and knowing I shouldn’t go into that street.

The feminine is giving you the information and the masculine is listening. It’s like, okay, no, we’re gonna go another way. That is a beautiful example of how I play with those two energies within myself.

Melanie Webb (28:40)

That is beautiful and so attuned.

The listening, the presencing. Yeah. Did that take practice?

Isabelle (28:48)

It’s still, it’s ongoing, you know, as we, I feel like we’re always evolving and we’re always contracting and expanding.

But yeah, it took going into those layers and working with where in my life have I not trusted both? Why am I not trusting my intuition? Right? 

And we all have it. We all have these senses. I feel like this is really the medicine of our…of this generation, of this time on this planet is like really tuning into the vehicle that we’re in and learning to listen to what’s being told and like, wait, that doesn’t feel safe. Is that me or that? And like just being in a constant dance with it.

Melanie Webb (29:34)

Well, to be in a constant dance with you, Isabelle, I think it would be amazing to have you engage in. Yes, yes. And I think going back to the tabs open in our brain and the migraines that I experienced a few days ago and you this week, again, like for me, it was a listening. I guess that was the masculine and the feminine at play. If we looked at it at that layer.

29:02 Embracing the Inner Masculine and Feminine

Isabelle (29:34)

That’s it. Or in the kitchen, answer it yourself.

Melanie Webb (30:03)

Recognizing that I was pushing really hard. There was a whole lot of energetic output and giving, giving, giving going on. The masculine needed to protect a little bit and say, hey, remember, I got you in this boundaries.

38:05 Leading from the Heart in Corporate Spaces

Isabelle (30:16)

Can you soften? Can you give this, the feminine, more space? So, then she can be more intuitive. She can feel more, but she needs to be given the space. And that’s not just internally, right? It’s also in the collective, like where.

Can we take more of the space to bring the intuition into corporate businesses and the government and healthcare and like, yeah, let’s make it yummy again.

Melanie Webb (30:50)

And nurturing and compassionate and human. All of us. Yeah. That is the perfect segue into the kind of work you’re doing now and or the individuals who you’re working with at the corporate level. How are they not only engaging with you in these conversations, but applying it in their sphere of influence? Because you’re working with some C-suite leaders.

Isabelle (31:15)

Yeah, they usually come because they are stuck and they don’t know where to go anymore or it’s a physical thing or they’ve seen their daughter work with me and they’ll be like, wait, there’s something here. And it’s just a call of moving into hard space.

and leading from the heart, right? Leading their business from the heart. I feel like the energetics of what’s going on in the cosmos and the collective is just not allowing us to rule from the ego anymore. Like we’re all being asked to anchor in and we’re seeing that in the corporate spaces as well. Like there’s some, the people that are awakened enough to sense there’s something going on, I need to do something differently, are all wanting to return back to the heart and the intuitive space.

Melanie Webb (32:11)

That is beautiful. Those are the kind of products I want in my life. And those are the kind of workplace cultures we want to be. You can feel, really feel the energy, like you said, of a culture that wants that. So I’m encouraged by the fact that you’re working with people in leadership at that level who recognize that.

It’s really exciting.

I am really happy that you’re out there doing the work with them. And like I said, I could talk your ear off for hours about these topics and learning more from you. I want to thank you for showing up today and sharing from the heart with us. And I’d love for you to share with people how they can work with you, follow your work.

Isabelle (32:49)

Yeah, I share quite a bit on Instagram. IsabelleGold___ is my Instagram. There’s links there that you can book a call with with me. Or you can email support at isabellegold@gold.co and and we can set up a call. That’s super easy.

Melanie Webb (33:08)

Fantastic.

Super easy, and I’m going to include all of that in the show notes in case someone didn’t have a little piece of paper. Isabelle, thank you again. I can’t wait to release this and share it with everyone and just share that wisdom.

Isabelle (33:23)

Thank you for having me. So sweet to reconnect with you.

Melanie Webb (33:25)

It’s good to see you.