We dive into the extraordinary journey of Cortney McDermott, a transformation catalyst who has spoken to audiences worldwide. Discover how her commitment to personal freedom and scientific mastery has shaped her path from humble beginnings to global influence.
You’ve spoken at Oxford, on Richard Branson’s private island, and to audiences around the world. But you started somewhere very different. What was the turning point that put you on this path?
Multiple turning points have put and kept me on this path. Perhaps the most significant pivot (taken over and over) was the decision to be free — to liberate myself from societal and self-imposed limitations.
The entry-level positions I came from — waitress, assistant, etc. — are reflections of my consciousness at that time, or what I thought was possible for me. Every turning point was a moment of deciding “there’s more!” and opening myself up to greater potential.
The arc of assistant to corporate executive to celebrity advisor, author, and speaker was not accidental. I learned through study, neurophysiological training, and optimization of the conscious mind to hold a specific probability outcome until it emerged in my lived experience.
The science behind your work – Neuroscience, epigenetics, quantum physics – sounds like it belongs in a lab, not a coaching session. How do you explain it to a skeptical room?
The rooms I step into are rooms of believers. Entrepreneurs and executives who have experienced glimpses of the power they hold and are ready to awaken to more of that.
These leaders know that there’s a science to success, that there are specific mechanics behind how to use the mind and body in the most effective and efficient ways possible.
My work provides the simplest, most direct route to understanding your “original equipment” and how to use your innate operating systems to create more of what you want (and less of what you don’t).
Word-of-mouth has also traveled fast around the breakthroughs and leaps that clients and audience have experienced around the world once they understand these fundamentals of success. When leaders find their way to my work and have the science delivered in this simple, direct way, they are able to quickly implement and master it within their own lives.
What’s the pattern you see most often in high achievers — the thing that’s quietly holding them back even when everything looks successful from the outside?
The pattern I see most often holding back high achievers is the fear of what happens when they “blow up the phoenix” — letting previous versions of themselves die so that new ones can be born.
Once one achieves certain normatives of success, something greater begins to beckon — a desire to move into a truer expression, one that is sourced from within and that becomes a constant flow of real power. This is the intersection where my work lives. Once we get the hang of this, each next evolution becomes more magnificent than the last, and it becomes easier to let old versions go quickly, as we embrace higher potentials for us all.
You’ve written two books for high achievers. What’s the one insight from each that you wish every reader would walk away with?
The only one who needs to give you permission is you. You are walking around with the most advanced operating systems ever created. Finding your way back to this “original equipment” and using it for universal benefit allows us all to rise.
Where are you focused right now — and what does the next chapter look like for you?
My focus is on evoking the genius that lives within every human, drawing forth magnificent talents so that we can all live in a much more harmonious, inspired, and liberated world.