Episode 127 transcript:

You guys, okay, it is almost four months into 2022 by the time this episode will air meaning our entire first quarter is closed up. I know. I looked at the calendar like really looked at the calendar and I have so much lifee things on my calendar this month and next month beautiful things and I'm like this year is zipping by. So something that I was doing for myself that I wanted to share with you and invite you to do also is to look back and debrief. Your first quarter of your business and introduce a way for you to transform your performance of the first quarter into a successful year and I'm using words that are nuanced. So performance is a complicated word to me, because there's a lot of ways we can interpret performance and successful right so there's a lot of ways we can define successful I'm using those words though, because that's generally what they're generally accepted and commonly understood terms for business, but I do believe that words like successful and performance are complicated. That's probably for a separate discussion, but let's get into the into the juice of the discussion. So three months into 2022. If you look back at those first three months, I don't know about you. But to me, it feels like there was a whole lot of life happening. For many of us, you know, it's not just me, my clients, people in the membership people in the Instagram communities and Facebook communities. It feels like there was just a lot of life and a lot of things are evolving quickly. And a lot of changes happening pretty quickly between January and March. Right? You too. Please say yes, please. I don't feel like I'm alone in this. So when you look at your business, and your debriefing, and unpacking. Or other words you could use sometimes you'd say like analyzing q1, you know, when I was in corporate business world, we would analyze the performance of quarters and it was generally just numbers and we'd have some words to explain fluctuations and numbers. But when you're looking at your business, in terms of your goals, your plans. I don't love this word either but resolutions, at least I don't love how we have been led to believe it. You know the definition that we've learned about like New Year's resolutions so how did your last three months go in your business in terms of the things that you set out to do this year your New Year's resolutions? I don't personally create new year's resolutions anymore, but if you do, that's fine, whatever words you want to use, to what your intentions were coming into 2022 And frankly, did you even get to the point, that point where you were making specific plans and goals for the year? Full disclosure I did a pretty deep, intense unpacking of 2021 and I got a head start on 2022 and then life just smacked me in the face. And I didn't even do my vision board for this year. I'm into the fourth month of the year and I don't have a 2022 vision board on my screen. My screensaver. I know I'm like a little bit embarrassed about that. But also that's the whole point of having this conversation. A great example of why this is important. This exercise in this conversation is not to pass judgment on ourselves or anybody else or to start criticizing ourselves. Or anybody else. So this is not me getting on you and saying well why didn't you reach your goals? What are you doing wrong? This is not that conversation. So wherever you're at right now, in mid April, by the time this airs is perfect. It's perfectly fine. So leave your judgment at the door as we go into the episode for yourself for others we're not doing that this is a no judge his own. Okay. So the point of this episode and exercise is really the things that we're going to talk about is to help you get out of the mud and shift things so that you can keep moving forward. Because making your first quarter results in air quotes mean something about you as a person is not the vibe. Now, if you're on track for all of your goals and all of the things that you put out for the year and your plans for the year, that's great. Honestly, we're going to talk about that still. You should still listen because there will be something for you. If you're not yet the key is not to make it mean something about you or about your business.

When you do that, if you look back at your results, these arbitrary dates and numbers, assuming that those are the only measures of your success, if you make it mean something particularly negative about you, it can leave you feeling stagnant and not moving. And be cautious of a downward spiral with that one negative thought. So if we cleaned that up, which we're going to talk about later in the episode, it can help you keep moving, right? Because really, your income is not the only indicator of success. So what now what do we do after we've looked at the first quarter? We've looked at our numbers, we've looked at all the other things that we were planning on measuring how many times am I going to exercise in the quarter how many walks am I going to go on how many minutes outside of activity am I going to have? How many how many personal hours am I going to take for myself or all these different things that you may have gone into the year with intentions right? What now? So in turn we're going to talk about specifically in terms of your business. We're going to do some spring cleaning why do we want to do spring cleaning in our businesses? Because cleaning out stagnant energy meaning containers, physical things, limiting beliefs, relationships, can create space for what you desire. So what I mean by those examples that cleaning out stagnant energy containers was the first one I said containers in your business and in your life. Have energy everything has energy. So when I say containers, gonna give you a couple of tactile tactile examples. The Facebook groups that you're a member of or if you host Facebook groups, those are different energetic containers. Let me give you another example in my business because I know that oftentimes my community you all tell me you enjoy hearing the examples in my business. So I'm going to share a couple and these are public information. It's nothing that's like a secret, right? But there's different containers in my business. There's a container for businesses owners in the birth your online business Facebook group, formerly known as doulas going digital. So this is a container right? I had another container called empowered moms. That I opened in 2017 2018, late 17. I actually paused and archived that container this morning. Because this is what was on this has been something that's been on my heart and on my mind for some time now several months and finally this morning, I'm like, You know what, I'm going to practice what I preach at Spring cleaning so the Empower moms group is an energetic container in my business. I'm a member of lots of Facebook groups as well, right? So those are one example of containers but also in my business. There's the groups that I host, then there's paid programs. So the online business school membership is a container. It's an energetic container, in my business, my work with one on one clients, each person that I work with privately we have a private container, a private energetic container together. Level two of the Online Business School is a smaller group that gets a little bit higher level of support than the more private support and mentorship so like Voxer access and group calls and private calls. So level two is its own energetic container. My website is a container my Instagram is an energetic container. This podcast is an energetic container. So when I say cleaning out stagnant energy and I refer to containers an example of doing that was me archiving the the Empowered moms group because it felt like stagnant energy for where the next steps of the business are going. And who I'm helping along the next steps of the of the journey.

The next example I gave after containers was physical things which also have energy, right because I said cleaning out stagnant energy like physical things. example from my life and my business. I shared this perhaps a couple weeks ago at this point that I had this camera right a couple years ago, I bought this fancy camera to me it was fancy. And I thought okay, I'm going to learn how to take professional quality photos. I'm going to take my own pictures of my kids and my family all the time and bla bla bla bla bla and that sounds beautiful and all the things but listen, I started taking photography, trying to watch even YouTube tutorials on how to take professional photos and you know, I know my things It wasn't fun. So I sold the camera. I sold it on this app, which is really cool, by the way, but that was an example of me cleaning out this physical thing, the stagnant energy. It was a physical item though. And you can look around your office space, whether it's the corner of your master bedroom or the basement or just your laptop, what can you clean out? Is there anything physical in your environment that's just stagnant energy that you can clean out old papers that can be shredded. Organizing some papers into folders, clean up the physical things, those have energy. I also mentioned limiting beliefs. Are you recognizing any beliefs that you're carrying? That you can clean out? And if that one's a little bit tricky, what we're going to walk through through the rest of this episode is a perfect example of cleaning out an old belief pattern and pattern. And then the fourth one I mentioned was relationships. So number one was containers. Number two was physical things Number three was limiting beliefs. Number four was relationships and by the way, these are not limited to these four. It's just the four examples I came up with this morning. But what relationships feel stagnant what relationships in business, feel like they're not moving forward feel like feet are stuck in the mud feel like they're not a space and energetic container that supports evolution expansion and growth and highest possibility. This doesn't mean like go and break up with your partner. Because you're having a rough moment might by no means is that what I'm saying? I'm saying we're talking about business, look at your business relationships. So we are in relationships, with our clients, with our communities, with Facebook groups, with vendors with people that we've worked with, with people that we are working with, with mentors with you can look around, right there's a lot of relationships that you have in business and which of those are stagnant. And the reason that we do this again, let's go back I'm going to say this again. The reason we're doing this is because cleaning out stagnant energy in all these little areas, different spaces can create space for what you desire to bring in. When they say spring, clean your closet. Part of that is because you're cleaning the energy out of your closet spaces, but you're making room for this new spring wardrobe. Right and we're doing this because we get to start again. We get to start fresh. What better season to do that to clean to start fresh than Spring. Spring is a

season of renewal and rebirth. And I've shared with you in the Welcome Back Episode quite a bit about the backstory of my business rebirth, but this is your permission to start again.

And go back to the drawing board if you need to, or your journal, or whatever it is that you use. Whatever act activities or actions or tools that you use to go back to starting over in a way and revisiting your desires, your goals. And even if you're on track for those of you earlier in the episode that said yeah, I'm on track for all of my goals and you're doing all the things that you claimed that you desired to do coming into 2022 this one is parts for you. I still think it could be helpful to revisit your goals particularly if you are into the generally accepted or commonly known phrase of like self help. But the way I'm understanding it now is particularly if you're into expansion and evolution of self because it's likely that you're a different person today than you were three months ago.

Amen. It may be time to recalibrate. Maybe the goals you set for 2022 or the plans the intentions. Maybe they're too small. Maybe you want to bust out of that box a little bit.

So what we're going to do and walk through together is clearing out the things that don't fit. Specifically for this week. The conversation is on the generally accepted calendar. So your unschool your business Thought of the Week is on deprogramming your beliefs about the calendar as we know it.

The generally accepted calendar presents that the new year begins on January 1. Right? There's all of this energy around January 1. One one new year new me resolutions. Blah, blah, blah. Blah, blah, blah, blah. Not a bad thing. The thing though, is that it's not the only way to start a new energetic structure of time. It's not the only way to measure time. Unless you're asking the IRS in which case 1123 31 is q1 for which you will owe a certain amount in taxes. One one to 1231 is an annual year for which you will either owe or be returned money for which we're measuring. Right? Those are the parameters that the IRS decided or somebody else decided that the IRS took on and said this is the year and a lot of industries. Really interesting. I didn't plan to talk about this part but a lot of industries really capitalize on that story on that that belief. The weight loss industry, which is what billions billions of dollars, I'm sure hopefully crumbling, with some of the other systems that are just not very helpful to our expansion. But the weight loss industry for example, they really, really capitalize on that. That new year, right? New Year get in shape. Join the gym challenges and lose a million pounds in this many days. Two days you can lose inches and you can sleep and in stomach wraps. You can sleep in all day every day and you can wear waist trainers to squeeze your poor little organs so that they can't breathe. I mean, I'm making light of this but the truth is like there's a lot of industries that really capitalize on the New Year energy but what I am presenting to you are options because that's kind of how I like to do it is presenting options right? And these are outside of the generally accepted rules. I was inspired to think like this after a conversation with my mentor last year. She shared with me that she starts her new year, not on one one, like there is some energy of one one and it doesn't mean you can't do stuff for one one of course you can it just means that like there may be alternatives. So for example, we are in the spring but if you started your new year in the spring like much of nature does. New flowers new babies new bunnies, new animals, new growth new life. We are being reversed after winter. What if you started in the spring? Which would mean like right now what if you started with the astrological new year which is Aries season? I'm not an astrologist for the record. But I have learned that Aries season which ends I believe the day that this episode will come out on for 19 that the Aries season is the first of the new year in astrology. What if you use that if you're into astrology? If you're Jewish, the new year starts in September, usually around Rosh Hashanah. That's where my dad starts his new year if you follow Islam the New Year's in July I looked that up this morning. I didn't really I didn't know that before, but I looked it up. And I'm certain that there are lots of other faiths and beliefs and backgrounds that start their new year in different times. So I don't mean that for this to be exclusive and not share everybody's stuff. I just don't know all of them. Another way you could start your new year is on your birthday, which was what my mentor does. She shared with me that she starts her new year on her birthday every year. Which for me is exciting because my birthday is coming up in May and I have a lot of stuff that I'm bringing into my new my new year that would start on my birthday. So when you're deprogramming your beliefs about the calendar ask yourself like why one one to 1231 Is it because of taxes? And this is a great example of time being kind of arbitrary.

Kind of like daylight savings time, which is also possibly going to be changing. I think that the last time I checked there were something like 12 or 13 states in the United States that do not change their clocks. Arizona and Hawaii I know for sure, but I don't know the others. For the rest of us, particularly if you're a parent of young children. It's basically like holy hell, it's seventh house to change your clocks forward, backward, forward, backward. So last time, I looked, I believe the Senate passed that we're not going to change anymore. I think we were holding up in the house. I don't know I don't mean to be all political. Just saying that there are conversations happening about making it commonly accepted that we don't change the clocks. And I for 1am really excited about this so time and how we measure time, and how we structure time, is kind of arbitrary. So what I'll present to you as an option is to try on any of those options to see how it fits. It might change the way that you think about the calendar. Because the important thing about that is that when you change the way you think about the calendar and your measurements of success in a structured amount of time, it could change the meaning you assigned to that performance in that given period which can help you move and evolve instead of spiraling on a negative thought or meaning that you may be assigning to not meeting a performance. So for example, let's say you're looking back at q1 And you didn't reach the income goal that you desired for q1. If you're assigning a negative feeling to that and a negative meaning like Oh, I'm not good at this, oh, I suck. My business isn't good. I'm not helping. I'm not blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, whatever you're telling yourself. That thought that negative thought can really spiral and going down that spiral is not helpful. It keeps you stagnant. Like your feet are in the mud. And when your feet are in the mud, it's really hard to move forward. And what we want to be doing is moving, moving and evolving. So if you catch that negative thought before it spirals and shift the way you're thinking about the thing that was causing the negative thought, in this example, the amount of time and the measure of success. Your feet are getting out of the mud and you're moving. Right. It's changing the way you think about performance in a given period, changing the way you think about that arbitrary time period. Now we're moving forward and to me, that is success.