If we keep denying the truth, if we keep pretending it’s some other way… the truth will always keep PUSHING against us, looking for ways to come out.
So, let me lay some truth on you right now.
My very first mentor sold me into a room for $9000. May as well have been $90K back then to me. When everyone got there, he was honest: “I created this program because I had a 6-figure tax debt I had to pay.” I loved him for it. I saw that there was no money problem that a great sales invite can’t solve. There was no band, no fireworks, not even a stage. Just truth. About how to make money as a coach. Changed my life. (Also, my first check to him bounced. Fortunately, my next went through… lol…)
One of my other original — and current — business mentors has been an employee for nearly 20 years. I have come to realize that the business I have paid nearly $100K into over the years… hasn’t been profitable — not for ONE SINGLE month — in nearly that same amount of time.
And NEVER (since I became involved as a paying client almost 20 years ago) has the business operated as a TRULY small business.
There have always been investors…. with investor money.
A “back end” office handling ALL deliverables.
A team of consultants doing, doing, doing…
often for “stock” vs. an actual paycheck.
All of this, but with the FACE(s) / PERSONALITY(ies) of the company talking to entrepreneurs, AS entrepreneurs, which they are not, or which they are no longer.
And so they sit up there preaching and teaching and talking about grit and determination and sweat equity… but relying really on NONE of it. Nada.
All the while… WE sit in the audience, looking at their numbers. Comparing ourselves to them, building our businesses to “match,” trying to FOLLOW their lead, which is complicated, because:
1) They are leading in a direction that DEMANDS and RELIES upon millions of dollars in ad spend / infrastructure spend AND 10-20 full time employees.
and
2) Their messages are a confusing mix of a nostalgic love for the freedom they ONCE had as true self-bossers and a vision they’re selling, which can only be created with #1. (This mixture is a heady delusion, too. It IS EXACTLY what sells MORE from the stage.)
I am not here to say you can’t have what you want. You can have EXACTLY what you want, so long as you’re willing to create it. And maybe a huge team IS for you, although I will say that the romanticizing of THAT vision is often very different from the reality of that vision.
What I AM saying is that the “business success” world is FULL of mirages DELIBERATELY created to:
👢 SHAPE our wants. 👢
Do you know I actually used to feel BAD about my lifestyle? It just felt so…. boring. In interviews, I used to REFUSE to even be asked about my hobbies or “the most interesting thing about me.”
The truth is, though, I LOVE my life. I love my small town. I do NOT love traveling. I don’t take a lot of selfies because I’m busy LIVING the freedom this entrepreneurial venture has created for me. Hiking. Reading. Writing. Mosey-ing. Trying new recipes. Grabbing coffee with my girl friends. Meeting a friend for lunch.
My success is in time and money freedom, absolute autonomy, living life ENTIRELY on my terms… and doing work that I genuinely love with people I genuinely KNOW and care about.
👢 Convince us that there is a one-path, one-software, one-blueprint SECRET that will give us what they just conditioned us to want. 👢
This is such faulty — deliberately misleading — thinking. Because 1) There is NEVER just one way to create something. That’s just not how the world was formed. 2) If their simple, direct, no risk solution worked, EVERYONE would do it… and succeed. 3) What if it WORKED but it ankle-chained you to this life of constant 3-ring circus of travel / constant adjusting of ad spend to meet algorithm changes and other things that YOU may not love?? 4) They are LEAVING OFF massive parts of their system, namely million dollar ad spends and dozens of full time employees that SOMEONE ELSE is managing.
It’s possible that you WANT that life.
But I don’t. I never have.
And I was deceived by this world for too long.
Fortunately, I never went into debt trying to follow suit. (I’m debt averse.) I always ADJUSTED their suggestions to align with the way I WANTED to grow. And I have been well-served by EVERY mentor I have ever hired,
as well as by those I never hired,
but watched from afar.
And no matter WHICH BIG NAME you are watching right now…
I will stack my profit against theirs
ANY DAY OF THE WEEK,
and most often,
despite their private jet pics and
constant new headshots in luxury settings,
I will be the one with the bigger stack.
That’s the truth, but it’s not remotely the most important truth. The MORE important truth is that what i have done,
what I have built
has NEVER demanded loans or investors, ad budgets or ANY more than one regular team member and a VERY small handful of project based support staff.
And the MOST important truth is that I’ve been doing the same thing for decades and have NEVER “burnt out.” I LOVE this gig. I am doing what I love, exactly the way I want to do it, with people I want to do it with.
And THAT,
in my humble opinion
is success.
THAT, woman..
is the Women Who WOW Way.
If this resonates with you… message me about joining Women Who WOW. No sales pitch. No bots. No funnel, even. (Although I DO use funnels.) Just message me. Let me know where you are. Let me tell you how I can help. Or not. 😊
