Episode 029 – How To Fall Back In Love With Your Business…

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Note: This blog post serves as an accompaniment to the corresponding podcast episode of A Changed Mind, where we’ll distill down the core ideas of this week’s theme, along with additional distinctions and insights. If you haven’t listened to the episode yet, you can go here to do so.  Enjoy.

Why is it that the businesses we once were so passionate about starting and growing turn into this sort of adversarial relationship?  What was once a source of excitement turns into anxiety and overwhelm? Carol and I were recently reminiscing about an experience we had about 7 years ago where this very situation was at the forefront of our minds.  We’d spent the previous 18 months trying to get our business off the ground and went out to dinner for sushi.  I believe it was Carol who said to me:

How can it be so hard to just help people?

We’d invested our life’s savings trying to start our business learning from the greatest business and marketing minds in the world.  We did all the Brendan Burchard programs, the Frank Kern programs, and the Tony Robbins programs.  I did a private intensive with Les Brown, I hired a story consultant and a messaging consultant, and I took Facebook ads courses and copywriting courses.

When The Hustle & Grind Doesn’t Work

Carol came home one day and told me she’d quit her job. She was making well over 6 figures but decided that she wanted to go all in on this business of helping entrepreneurs transform their mindset and grow their businesses.  She went and learned how to do marketing automation, in part because we were told we needed to build these marketing automation systems and grow our email list to be successful. 

We were told to create a digital course, film a four-part video series, pay for Facebook ads, build an email list, and then launch that digital course to everybody on our email list.  So we did that. We projected that we’d sell about 250 programs for $500 each.  That Friday evening, we checked the report and nobody had bought it. Saturday evening, we checked the report and nobody bought it. Sunday evening the cart closed, we checked the report, and nobody bought.  

That’s when we began questioning why it was so hard for us to get this business thing to work.  It was at that point that the very thing we’d been so passionate about became stressful for us. We were no longer in love with our business.  There was part of us that was, but now it was a matter of having to figure it out and it started to feel like hustle and grind.

The 4 Counterintuitive Principles of Business Success

Don’t get me wrong, we love what we’ve been able to create over these last 7 years, but there was always this tension between us and the business.  We’ve had some ups, we’ve had some downs – and those downs have been wonderful opportunities for us to step back and reevaluate our relationship with our business and what we believe about our business.  So hopefully, as we continue diving deeper you can learn from our mistakes and, if you’re inclined, build a multimillion-dollar business doing what you love in the world without having to carry the stress with you. 

When things aren’t going the way that you expect them to in your business, there’s always a tendency to start thinking that there’s something wrong with your business or something wrong with you.  You move into what we would call a Primal State and activate the sympathetic nervous system, resulting in feelings of stress, anxiety, jealousy, anger, procrastination, indecision, comparing yourself to others, feeling not good enough, feeling unworthy. Trying to build your business from one of these places is impossible to do.  

What we want is to be operating from a Powerful State – joy, curiosity, excitement, compassion, empathy, patience, and calm.  It’s from this parasympathetic state that you’re connected to Spirit, intuition, creativity, and vibrancy which activates more empowering opportunities, ideas, resources, and connections.  So if you were to ask me, “Hey Dave, what’s the number one thing I could focus on to grow a multimillion-dollar business that I’m passionate about without the stress?”  I’d tell you:

Notice when you’ve moved into a primal state and do whatever you can to move back into a powerful state of being.

The good news is that whether you’re in a primal state or powerful state is completely in your control because the only thing that determines how you feel is what you’re thinking. So it’s not the unfavorable circumstances of your business that move you into a primal state of anxiety or frustration – it’s the meaning that you’re giving to that circumstance or experience.  For instance, if a marketing campaign isn’t going the way you expected it is causing you to feel like you’re never going to experience the level of growth you want or that things are never going to work out for you.  It’s not the marketing campaign’s fault.  It’s the meaning that you give the experience, the thoughts you’re having about it, that determines whether you’re in a primal state or a powerful state. 

The second piece of this is the idea that your business, like it or not, is always reflecting your limiting beliefs back to you. It has no choice, just like life has no choice, to reflect back to what you believe – what you believe about yourself, others, money, sacrifice–everything you believe is showing up within your business.  In other words, it’s your limiting beliefs that are actually creating the challenges in your business. That’s good news, because our business becomes the vehicle that creates an extraordinary opportunity for us to heal.  As we heal ourselves, our business becomes less stressful and the business grows.  

The third thing has to do with the inherent fear that virtually all of us have, which is the fear of financial insecurity. We end up in a place where our business is not growing, causing us to operate from a primal state, experiencing the reflection back of our limiting beliefs, and as a result, we’re not generating income.  So this big hairy monster called fear of financial insecurity shows up.  We start stressing out over the urgency to get things working quickly.  We tell ourselves that if it doesn’t happen fast enough, we’re going to run out of money and have to live under a bridge.  It happens to the best of us. 

The reason why all of this happens is simply a misunderstanding.  But when you understand the four core philosophical principles I’m about to share, you’ll have the tools that will unlock the ability to relax around your business, return yourself to a place of joy and excitement, and continue on this journey of creating a vehicle for you to experience unlimited levels of abundance in your life.

Principle #1 – You must have a Spiritual Vision to guide you.

You need to have a vision for your business that’s authentic, true, exciting, heartfelt, and emotional.  We call this your Spiritual Vision.  Maybe you’ve gone through an experience of recovering your health and you’ve learned a lot of things that are different than traditional Western medicine, and now you’ve put that into a framework or methodology to help people overcome their autoimmune or chronic pain and you’re excited about it – that’s your vision.  It’s authentic, it’s true, it’s your Spiritual Vision. 

If you love business and you love the game of business and you support entrepreneurs because you understand that entrepreneurs are going to change the world and you’ve got some ways through online advertising or branding or messaging to help entrepreneurs more effectively get their message and their products out there to make the world a better place and you’re excited about that – that’s an authentic vision. 

But know this: your vision is not something that you invented.  That vision is something that you’re tuning into based on the frequency of who you are.  This isn’t “woo woo”, because we’re all electromagnetic, radioactive beings.  Therefore, as your thoughts metabolize into emotions in your body and get translated through your nervous system, you’re vibing at a very unique frequency.  

All of the ideas that we see people bringing into the world, both today and historically, have existed in consciousness forever.  The ideas are already floating out there.  It’s not something that you’re making up.  You’re tuning into something that exists, and you’re tuning into it because you’re resonating at that frequency.  Take Edison for example – he was perfectly designed based on his life experiences, how he thought, the way he acted, and the way he perceived the world, to tune into the idea of the light bulb at a time when the world desperately needed it.  He could take an idea and translate it through his thoughts, his emotions, his actions, and his activities into something physically material in the world.  Just as birds were designed to fly and fish were designed to swim, you were designed to take invisible ideas and materialize them into something that we can see in the world.

All of the resources, finances, people, skills, and resources you need are available to you to bring that idea into reality.  I don’t believe in a creator that would give you an idea but not give you the resources to fulfill it.  In much simpler terms, we’re talking about the importance of having faith.  There are inevitably going to be times in your business (and life) when you have doubts and experience obstacles, but if you can hold onto the faith that you live in a loving Universe that’s always working toward your greatest good, you’ll always find your way back to a Powerful State of being.

In other words: you are the one to be doing exactly what you’re doing in the world and all of the things you need to realize your potential are already laid out for you to realize your vision and your dream.

Principle #2 – Gratitude is the tool that allows you to close the gap between where you are and where you want to be.

We all have resistance that comes up in our business.  It might come up as doubt, it might come up as fear, it might come up as stress.  That’s your nervous system’s way of saying that the thoughts you’re having right now are not congruent with the future your mind has planned for you.  Why?  Because your nervous system is an emotional guidance system designed to tell you when you’re thinking is in alignment with what’s true.  When you’re thinking in alignment with what’s true, you’re in a powerful state.  When your thinking is in alignment with what’s not true, you move into a primal state. 

This is to say: your thoughts are creating your reality.  So if you’re having experience in your business right now and you start to think to yourself that it’s never going to work out for you, then it’s never going to work out for you.  Like Henry Ford said, “The man who believes he can and the man who believes he can’t are both right.”  Your brain is a goal-achieving machine and if you believe that it’s not going to work out for you, then over the day, the week, the month, those are the only thoughts you’re going to have access to.

As you have thoughts, you’ll experience those thoughts as emotions and you’ll feel primal emotions, stress, anxiety, overwhelm, or fear. As a result, you’ll take action from that place – or you won’t take action at all – which will produce results that reinforce the original belief that has come up for you, which is that it’s never going to work out for you. 

The real secret key to closing the gap between where you are and where you want to be is through gratitude.  See, if your brain is a goal-achieving machine, then what you want to be focusing on is what is working right now.  Because if you can focus on what’s working, then you will create more of what’s working in your life. If you’re focusing on what’s not working, then you’re going to create more of what’s not working in your life.

Most people spend inordinate amounts of time and energy focusing on what’s not working.  But I’d ask you to consider what is.  What’s showing promise in your business?  What’s keeping you excited?  Maybe you do have some clients – have gratitude for them.  It might not be as many as you want, but they’re the ones you’ve got.  Maybe you do have a current version of your messaging – have gratitude for it.  It might not be the messaging you want that’s going to attract a wider audience, but it’s the messaging you’ve got.  Maybe you’ve got a prospect, client, or mentor reflecting back to you that you are the one, that you’re capable of doing this work.   Have some appreciation for the fact that someone else sees that in you, even if you don’t currently see it in yourself.

If you want to have a business you love, love the business you have. If you want to have a bank account you love, love the bank account you have. If you want to have messaging you love, love the messaging you have.  If you want to have clients that you love, love the clients that you have. The key to closing the gap between where you are right now and where you want to go is not to think you need to be anywhere else than where you are right now, because you love where you are now and the opportunities that are right in front of you.

What I’m saying here is to stop waiting for the results that you’re looking for to justify yourself.  Love love yourself now.  Be happy now.  Stop waiting for more money in your bank account to feel prosperous or financially secure. Feel prosperous and financially secure now, regardless of how much money you have in the bank account. That’s the way that you can accelerate your growth. 

Principle #3 – Your plan is not the plan.

Know that what is happening right now is exactly what should be happening in your business. Like Eisenhower once said, “Planning is essential, but plans are useless.” So yes, you should have a plan for your business.  Go get a plan working with a mentor who’s already created what it is that you’ve created.  Invest a little bit of money and a little bit of time upfront to cut down on having to go and learn the mistakes yourself.  But know that it’s just a plan, and 100% of the time, your plan is not going to be the plan that produces the result. 

Your plan is not the plan.  There is a plan, but it’s a larger plan at work that is coordinating and encouraging you into it so that you can learn the skills that you need to learn, meet the people that you need to meet, and become the person that you need to be in order to get the outcome you want.  It’s something bigger than you – a highly intelligent plan that is not inherently “yours” – it’s life’s plan.

Your plan gets you on the court. Your plan gets you taking action. Rest assured, inaction is not going to produce any results in your business, nor is it going to bring you any joy.  You’re not going to sit on your sofa envisioning a multi-million dollar business doing what you’re passionate about and some Amazon delivery driver is going to show up delivering the impact and the income to you at your front door.  It’s simply not going to happen. You have to get out and you have to start playing with life.  You have to do your part. You have to put the deposit into the universe through the form of action so that you can get the return.

Think of your journey in business as going from A to Z in the alphabet.  We want to go straight to Z, but that’s not how it works.  You don’t get to B, C, D, or any other letter and start saying “Well, clearly this isn’t working” simply because you’re not at Z yet.  It’s important to understand that there’s a process unfolding, and you’re in that process all the time. 

I bet you can look back on any circumstance or situation in your life that at the time you would have judged as things not working out for you.  But chances are, you can see how it was part of a chain of cause-and-effect experiences that produced some of the things you cherish most in your life now.  You realize that it was exactly what was supposed to be happening at that time in that place.

Again, this comes back to trusting that everything that’s going on in your business today, regardless of whether the result is aligned with what you had expected, is actually working in your favor.  You’ve got the vision, you’re operating from a powerful state, you’re executing your plan while knowing there’s a greater plan unfolding, and you’re being guided with all of the resources, ideas, intuition, creativity, and vibrancy you need to not only enjoy the experience, but to stay true to the course that’s being unlocked for you to close the gap between where you are and the vision that you have. 

Principle #4 – You don’t have to do this (but the fact that you can is a gift)

If you want to be able to experience growth in your business and do it without the stress, the key is to realize that nobody told you you had to do this.  If you’re stressed in your business right now,  realize you don’t have to do this anymore if you don’t want to.  You can stop at any time.  You can go back and get a job. You could start something else if you want to. You could take a break. 

There are so many other ways you can make money.  You might not get rich doing them, you may not experience the levels of financial abundance you dream of, but you’re not going to end up under a bridge – you’re going to be okay.  This is something so many entrepreneurs seem to forget – you’re choosing to do what you’re doing right now.  Every day you’re working on growing your business, regardless of what stage you’re currently in, is a choice that you – and you alone – are making.  

I recently had one of my coaching clients come to me telling me about how stressed they were in their business.  They were trying so many different things that didn’t seem to be working.  They didn’t know if they wanted to keep doing it anymore. I could see that they were in an adversarial relationship with their business.  They hated what they were building and needed to fall back in love with it.  My prescription?  I told them to stop doing the business.  They were shocked.  But I was serious.  I said let’s finish this call, go take some time to think about it, and call me back and let me know what comes up.

Sure enough, a couple of days passed and they called me back. I asked them how things were going now.  Their answer?  Things were fantastic.  They told me they were feeling more productive and taking more joyful action than they ever had before.  So I asked them what happened and they told me that as soon as they realized that they didn’t have to do this business anymore, they started wanting to do the business again.  Shocker, right?

This happens all the time.  When we want to be able to do something, rather than feeling like we have to do something, what you’ll find is you’ll fall back in love with it simply because you get to.  You get to combine these other principles we’ve talked about and go back to the start where you were once so passionate about the thing you’re doing.

You go back to a place of knowing that the key is operating from a powerful state.  You get to identify the things that are working right now and focus less on the things that aren’t working. You understand that the brain is a goal-achieving machine, and the more that you operate from happiness, joy, and gratitude now, the more you’ll be creating happy, joyful experiences in the future.  You get to relax into knowing that your plan is not the plan. Your plan just gets you out of the starting gate before a greater plan takes over. Lastly, you realize that you don’t have to do it, but you get to – you choose to.

Falling Back In Love With Your Business – Without The Stress

If you can take this approach to your business, you can be in love with your business again.  If you can be in love with your business again, your business will flourish.  The only reason that your business is not growing the way you want it to is because you’ve developed an adversarial relationship with it and it’s time to heal that relationship.  You thought your plan was supposed to work out. You thought you were supposed to focus on all the things that aren’t working in your business because somehow that was the way that you’d be able to solve them.

You thought that maybe success wasn’t guaranteed for you but that you were somehow forced to keep at it.  But if you can just kind of reorient yourself to the reality that you get to do this and that it’s all working out exactly the way that it should – and if you stick with it – you’re going to produce the results and you can be happy right now.  You’ll create more growth in your business than you could have ever possibly imagined – without the stress.