Founder Interview With Amy C. Willis, HOL + WELL
Photo Credit: HOL + WELL
Amy C. Willis is the Founder of HOL + WELL, a holistic sober coaching practice dedicated to supporting women and the LGBTQ+ community in their journey toward sobriety and wellness. With a compelling blend of personal experience and professional expertise, Amy has turned her life hurdles into a source of strength and inspiration. Her approach is deeply rooted in empathy and understanding, shaped by her own 15-year battle with alcohol addiction and the loss of her father to a similar struggle. By integrating dual coaching certifications, yoga, meditation, and EFT/tapping into her practice, Amy offers a comprehensive and compassionate pathway for those seeking to reclaim their lives from addiction.
During our interview with Amy, she shared the profound impact that her personal and professional journey has had on her work. From the tragic loss of her father to her own transformative experience with sobriety, Amy's story is one of resilience, empowerment, and the desire to support others through their most challenging times. She opened up about the obstacles she faced while establishing HOL + WELL, including financial stress and the learning curve of entrepreneurship without a formal business background. Yet, it's these very challenges that highlight her tenacity and dedication to her mission. Through our conversation, it became clear that Amy's work is not just a profession but a calling to create a more inclusive and supportive recovery environment for all.
1. Can you walk us through your professional journey and how you got to where you are today?
Given the nature of my work and my experiences with addiction – both mine and my dad's – my personal journey has largely influenced my professional journey. My dad's untimely and unexpected death (related to his addiction) in 2014 was the key event that led me to look curiously at my relationship with drinking, which then led me to get sober. Finding sobriety was one of the most influential and empowering things I've done in my life. Combined with my innate desire to support others, I felt inspired to get trained as a certified coach so that I had the skills and tools to support people in changing their lives.
I got sober in 2016 and completed my coaching training at the Health Coach Institute in 2019. I received a dual certification as a health and life coach and then launched HOL + WELL. Since then, I have developed a variety of practical and impactful offerings, including various 1:1 coaching packages, group coaching, and, more recently, a support group for folks with loved ones dealing with substance use issues/addiction. I am so proud and honored that my clients choose and trust me to support them and always experience such a deep sense of satisfaction when they show up and do the challenging and uncomfortable work of getting sober.
2. What inspired you to offer the services you provide?
As someone who struggled with addiction for many years, both as a woman and as a queer person, I have a unique perspective on how gender and sexuality can complicate navigating addiction, as well as a deep understanding of how alcohol companies target women and the queer community as untapped markets. They use strategies such as promoting 'mommy wine culture' as a solution to deal with stress and increasing their alcohol sponsorship at LGBTQ+ events. These approaches are predatory and problematic while ignoring the genuine need for support among mothers and failing to acknowledge the heightened risk of addiction within the queer community.
Also, I have always experienced an innate drive to support others in improving their lives. After getting sober myself in 2016 and experiencing this life-saving and changing experience, I felt a strong pull to get trained as a coach so that I could support other women and queers in reclaiming their lives and freedom through sobriety.
3. What is one of your biggest challenges in your professional journey, and how did you overcome this?
The first obstacle was when my long-term partner left our relationship less than two weeks before I was going full-time in my business. This meant that my regular paychecks were ending and my monthly expenses were doubling simultaneously. Coupled with the fact that I was (and have continued to) bootstrap my business entirely and have been supporting myself financially since I was 18, the realities of my financial stress were real and hard. It was definitely challenging as it was unfolding in real time. However, in hindsight, this situation lit a fire under me that forced me to hustle in a way I hadn't previously felt I needed to, and that level of hustle served me well. And it showed me that when my back is up against the wall, I can still thrive and figure it out, which is valuable to know about yourself as an entrepreneur.
As someone with no formal business or marketing training or degree (my women's & gender studies and sexual diversity studies degrees didn't cover this, shockingly!) my learning curve was especially steep. So much of the early days in building my business were spent in trial and error mode while also learning as much as I could about coaching, marketing, website design, SEO, business accounting, etc., as I was (and continue to be) a solopreneur who wears all the hats. I am also a staunch intersectional feminist, so I had to work harder to find feminist business owners to learn from. Especially because a lot of the bro marketing and business training out there, provided by mostly cishet men, just didn't jive with me as a feminist business owner.
“I have been through many challenging situations throughout my life, which have built my resiliency and made me gritty and tenacious as hell, so regardless of what came up, I knew I could and would figure it out.”
Of course, there have been quite a few times when I've considered closing my business because the challenges seemed too great, and in these moments, having other queer and female business owners to connect with and lean on was helpful. Along with all of the mindset work I have done and continue to do as so much of our experiences are shaped by what's happening in our heads.
Photo Credit: HOL + WELL
4. If you could give one piece of advice to future LGBTQ+ service providers within your field, what would it be?
You, your story and experiences, and your unique skill sets are needed in this space. We have far too little representation of queers in the addiction recovery space, and given the disproportionate way that addiction is experienced within our community, we need more folks like us doing this work.
I also recommend building a community and establishing strong relationships, which has been fundamental to the success of my business. And collaborating with a business coach can significantly accelerate your progress.
5. How does being openly queer inspire or impact your business?
Being openly queer has allowed me to show up fully as myself all the time in my business. When sharing my experiences both as a woman and as a queer person, I can speak directly to other women and queers, which is such a powerful point of connection. As an added bonus, because my messaging is for women and queer folks, I largely repel cishet men or anyone who is homophobic or misogynistic.
“Again, because of the disproportionate amount of addiction and substance use issues in the queer community, I think it can be powerful/inspiring/hopeful for queers who might be struggling with addiction/substance use issues to see a sober queer such as myself who is thriving in sobriety.”
I've written and spoken on this topic a lot and if you’re considering getting sober, I recommend this article, which has received a lot of engagement.
Photo Credit: HOL + WELL
6. What brands or services by LGBTQ+ founders are your go-to's and why?
Two of my favorites are Octopied Mind and RedSky. Both brands are women-owned and queer-owned, which immediately draws me to them. Red Sky does really weird, quirky pieces with inclusive sizing and ethical manufacturing, which is important to me. I appreciate brands that offer something different from the mainstream and embody cool, unique aesthetics. I like Octopied Mind for a lot of the same reasons. They put weird shit on t-shirts and it's cool. The aesthetic of both of them really speaks to me.
7. Who is your favorite LGBTQ+ celebrity and why?
Octavia Butler was a phenomenal author and arguably pioneered the sci-fi adjacent, Speculative Fiction, through works like Fledgling, Parable of the Sower and Kindred. She seamlessly tied together fantastical ideas and concepts into (old and current) topics of the time like slavery, racism, sexism and misogyny. She was brilliant and made countless, invaluable contributions in her time earthside.
Audre Lorde was a fierce lesbian, feminist, author and activist who had a profound impact on me and the world through her contributions to the feminist movement particularly as it intersects with race and sexuality.
8. Share one fun or unusual fact about yourself.
I played a lot of sports growing up, including basketball and hockey, and have broken all my fingers (except my thumbs) but not consecutively : )
