What if the intense drive that makes you successful in the sales comes at the cost of your family, your peace, and your life? What if you run so hard that you end up in the hospital? 

In our latest podcast, our new sales strategist Athina Lampru shares how running from her past fueled elite performance in sales, but nearly cost her everything. 

Athina sat down with me to share her story for the first time publicly. 

She was born in Venezuela, raised by a mother battling addiction, and grew up with a father she didn’t know had a second family in the United States until she was 13. She was born into trauma, and desperate to run away from an early age. 

As a teenager, she moved countries to live with her fathers new family and escape her life in Venezuela, barely spoke English, and spent her teens navigating a household that was not hers. She adopted survival mechanisms that kept her safe, and continued to run hard towards her goals as an immigrant including attending college on a Bright Futures Scholarship and graduating with honors. Then she found sales.

In sales, speed was rewarded. And for years, Athina ran very fast. Rookie of the Year,  President’s Club, and top performer at every company she worked at. She reached #1 globally in the commercial segment at Palo Alto Networks at the peak of her sales career. 

But here is the part nobody talks about. Along the way, she missed her first son’s first year of life. She developed intense migraines two to three days a week and pushed through them. She drove herself to the emergency room during a panic attack, convinced she was dying. She sat in the waiting room sobbing for 4 hours straight, because her pain had been stored up for so long. 

The very thing that made her successful in sales was slowly killing her outside of it.

In the hospital during a moment of  full surrender, she said to herself “I can’t go on like this anymore.” That’s when she decided to coach 1:1 with me. 

On our first call we dove deep and quickly realized that she needed to leave her job because it was causing so much stress and pain. She made the bold step of quitting, even though she had a huge pipeline and was leaving a massive commission on the table. 

Shortly thereafter, she joined AWS and sold 15M in under 5 months from a place of calm, quiet confidence. She proved to herself that it was possible to have incredible success at work without sacrificing her health or relationships. 

Then she had a deeper calling. She had experienced a full transformation through our work together, and wanted others to experience the same success she had. So she quit corporate sales altogether and decided to work for Untap Your Sales Potential this year. 

She found her dream job, deepened her faith, and got married and baptized in the same weekend in April. 

Here is what we covered on the podcast:

• Growing up in Venezuela with an alcoholic mother, an absent father, and a childhood defined by survival mode. 
• Why trauma is often the hidden fuel behind high-performing salespeople, and what it costs when you never deal with it
• The birth of her first son and the postpartum spiral that cracked everything open 
• What it actually looks like to miss your child’s first year because you cannot stop running
• The panic attack that finally forced her to face herself
• Walking away from millions because the cost to her family was too high
• The integrity gap: why the distance between your values and your actions is directly proportional to the shame you carry every day
• How slowing down at Amazon unlocked a $60 million pipeline and $15 million closed in under 5 months 
• Getting baptized and married on the same weekend, with both parents who hurt her most walking her down the aisle
• Her advice for anybody running so fast they can’t enjoy the life they are already living

Ahtina’s story is living proof that you can have it all if you are willing to slow down and face yourself. And when you finally slow down to face the person in the mirror and do the deep work on yourself, you come back more powerful than ever. 

Watch the full episode with Athina the Warrior here: 

https://youtu.be/vMXflHNpXIw