How Do You Know It's Time to Stop Playing Small

And I set up like 30 coffee chats in a matter of few days and I ended up talking with everyone and actually made 30 new friends. Welcome to the Decision Maker podcast with me, your host, Ali Bjerg. What's up everybody? Welcome back to another episode of the Decision Maker show. I am so excited to be here talking to you today about our current topic at hand and that is how to identify when you are still playing small. So something I see a lot with my clients at all different levels is the ability to identify when you have hit a plateau, when you feel like you're still still not quite on the right path, maybe you're out of alignment, maybe you feel like there's something even bigger out there for you in the world. And I just really been thinking about this a lot. I've had a lot of time in the last couple weeks. Last week I got to hang out with my mastermind in person, my seven figure mastermind. Tons of amazing business owners and sitting around a table and going through strategy and talking about what's next and doing their hot seats with them and looking at their entire business models and where they're feeling stuck. And the thing that always seems to come up over and over again is like, there's this thing that I've been thinking about doing and I want to pivot or I want to expand or I want to shift into the next level of my knowledge and my experience. But I'm stuck. I'm scared. I'm not doing a thing. Like I want to stop. For most of them, it's like I want to fully stop doing one on one coaching. I don't ever want to coach one on one again. It's like how they're feeling, but it's easy, it's easy to sell, it's fast cash and it keeps them safe in a way and it keeps them from actually stepping forward into really becoming the authority that they have become because of all the one on one coaching that they've done. It's really scary to put a pin in something that you know is working. So even if it's not one on one coaching, maybe you're watching and you're like, I'm a service provider and I'm like building funnels for people or I'm running ads for people, I'm copywriting, I'm a graphic designer, I have a full time job. Like, it's really scary. It's always gonna be scary to jump into that next level. It's always gonna be scary to shift something that's Safe. Something that you know is working, something that you've told your family you're doing, and it feels safe. And they're like, don't do the new thing. The new thing is scary. People are always gonna try to keep you safe, just like your own brain is always gonna try to keep you safe. And it often comes in this realization of, like, hearing other people's ideas and meeting people in person and, like, telling them about your dreams or sharing something. And it's so much easier for other people to see it for us, right? Like, it's so much easier for me personally to be like, I wanna write a book. And people are like, okay, go write the book. And I'm like, but how? Like, I don't know how to do it. You know, it's like we come up with all of these stories and reasons why we can't or why we're not ready yet, or why we need to keep waiting or why we need some type of giant sign from the universe that it's time to move forward. Well, this is your sign. If you're watching this and you have anything in your back pocket or anything in your brain that's like, I'm still doing the thing over here, but I want to do this new thing over here. This is your sign to finally go after it and figure out what it's going to take to make that happen. And you don't have to have total clarity in what it looks like yet. You don't have to know what the exact steps are. You just have to have the idea and have the vision that this is what's next for you and identify what it could be or what it could look like. And then start actually putting rubber to the road and finding a mentor or finding a guide who can help you make that next step possible. That's how I've always thought about things in my business, is like, how do I get someone else to help me learn the strategy? Or how do I keep moving forward and have somebody else tell me what to do? Like, I've learned in my. With my personality. And you may have a totally different personality type where you're like, heck, no. I don't want anybody else to boss me around. But it's always worked best for me to find a mentor or join a group coaching program or a mastermind from someone who already has what I want. So someone who has already gone through the tough stuff, has already been down that path on that journey, and they can tell me what was harder than they thought, what they wish they had done differently. Someone who can shorten my learning curve so that I can go from 0 to 60 as fast as possible. Because also, I'm a high d. I'm an enneagram3. Like, I like to move fast. And if I can find someone who helps me go further, faster, more efficiently, I'm going to go on that path. So think through, like, what is the next step for you? And it could be anything. Like, if I reflect on my personal journey over the last 10 years, the first journey or the first belief that I had to overcome for myself was that I wasn't awkward on camera. My biggest thing six or seven years ago, I realized the block that I had was that I couldn't put my face on camera. I felt so uncomfortable in doing a Skype call in those days. I was running ads for people. I was a launch manager. I was doing graphic design. I was a master of none, but doing all the things. And I remember I wouldn't do video interviews with people who were potentially a client. So if someone sent me a message, like, I had, you know, networked with them, I was a referral. And they were like, hey, let's meet on Skype and talk about the project. I was like, not doing it. Sorry, not your girl. I'm not gonna. I'm not gonna get on this Skype call because I'm awkward. I'm too uncomfortable. My biggest fear was that my face was gonna, like, freeze in a weird position, and I'd be like this. And then it would be frozen or something, or I'd be like. It would get sp. Stuck, and I'd be sitting there in a room by myself. Like, can you hear me now? How about now? Like, did I lose you? Did I hear you? But in hindsight, like, who cares? Those are things that happen on video calls, and nobody's judging. But I think it was the fact that I felt like I didn't have control on how I was being perceived on a video call. I was giving up some type of complete control on what people thought about me or, you know, I couldn't maybe necessarily read how they were responding to me over video the same way I could in person. Because my defense mechanism at that time was to be able to chameleon into becoming whatever anybody else needed me to be and to be able to shapeshift into being relatable for anybody. And that, you know, that's either a skill or that's like. I don't know what it would be considered, but it's worked really well in sales. It's worked well in growth, but at some point, you hit a road or you hit a block where it's like, I need to be so ironclad in who I am for myself that I don't need to shapeshift for anybody else. So that's, of course, like, my life journey is still working towards that and becoming that person. But it became so apparent to me in that moment of not being able to put my face on camera that I knew it was a block I had to overcome if I wanted to get past making the three to $5,000 a month that I was making at that time, just from referrals and not being on camera. So what I ended up doing was committing to this challenge and committing to overcoming this fear. And I went in Facebook groups and I was like, hey, will you do a coffee chat with me? I'm an extrovert. I work in my basement. Like, I really just want to chat with people. And I set up, like, 30 coffee chats in a matter of few days. And I ended up talking with everyone and actually made 30 new friends. Lo and behold, these 30 new friends started referring me traffic or started referring me new clients. And before I knew it, I had a new problem. Like, I had too many leads. I didn't have enough time in the day to work with all of the people that I wanted to serve or all the people I wanted help. So then my new problem became, I need a digital product. I need another revenue stream, because I can't serve all of these people. I can't teach them everything I know one on one. I have to leverage my expertise, and I have to get to know them enough that I can create a product that I create once, and then I can sell over and over and over again. And that's when the tiny offers were born. It was still easy for me to create something that was small and be able to sell it and use all of the expertise I'd created over the past few years or the previous few years, like running ads, building sales pages, building offers for other people. Like, I finally did it for myself. And that offer hit $10,000 in the first two weeks and went on to sell another 30,000 copies because of how well I knew my audience before creating it. So there was that expansion, and then it. Then it got into, like, people wanting to learn how I did that. So all of a sudden, a group coaching program was the next level. And it was the thing that I felt like I couldn't do. Can't lead a group. I can't Be the one in charge of the zoom room again. It's like this idea of myself that I'm a super awkward human being, but who isn't? Like, that's what I've really discovered is that we all feel a little weird leading. We all feel a little uncomfortable stepping into that expert role and becoming an authority and asking people to come along with us. It's a super common feeling for most people. And I think when I realized that, like, I wasn't unique or weirder, you know, there wasn't something wrong with me because I felt this way about having my face on camera or leading a zoom group of people who all had, you know, wanted to learn what I knew and were, you know, it was a lot of pressure of like, what's the advice Allie's gonna give me? Or what's the strategy? Or, you know, does she have the magic wand? And the answer, when you can detach from that expectation and know that you're just there to serve and you're there to give them your best ideas and you will help people as much as you can can, but, but know that you're not solely responsible for the results of your clients. That was a huge aha moment for me to be able to keep moving forward. So from there it became, you know, having higher level programs selling super high ticket, which is uncomfortable for me to get used to. What you should charge for a high ticket Mastermind going from $27 to $50,000, it was really hard to, to start thinking about that jump and becoming comfortable saying those numbers and knowing that there's still a clear return on investment at both of those price points for the people who are right for those offers. Right. So expanding into that and now it's even expanding into what's my legacy move. What's the bigger impact that I want to make with my brand? What kind of book would I write? Like, what am I going to say on stages? Who can I help? What is the bigger movement and mission for everything that I've been doing up until this point? But I think if you put too much pressure on yourself to have that all figured out in the beginning when you're, you're over here and you're like, I can't put my face on camera and you're trying to solve the problems that you see other people that you're looking up to solving. Like, you know, having a mass movement and something you can put on T shirts that people want to wear and like represent the brands. Like, that's what I always thought I Had to do back when I just needed to get my face on camera. So we can put all of this pressure on ourselves when we do feel stuck, that we're trying to leap too far. We're trying to. We're trying to expand way beyond what our comfort levels can actually handle. So if you can just take tiny baby steps and get yourself unstuck and pivot slightly or expand slightly, a little bit at a time, it's going to be way easier than feeling like you have to make this gigantic quantum leap into becoming a completely different person. Sometimes that happens too. Sometimes you might attend an event or you might get a coach who helps you see yourself in an entirely different light. Maybe you have an aha moment or you have a download that does shift your being entirely and it's more of a quantum leap. But. But be okay with the tiny baby steps on the ladder too. As long as you're moving forward and you're experimenting with new price points or new offers and you're always listening to your audience, that's going to help you get way further than putting all this pressure on yourself to know it all now and to be, you know, like a guru, expert, authority now. Sometimes it's just the baby steps and just raising your price a little bit at a time or just testing out a new offer that's a, you know, a slightly higher price point. When I was in person with my seven figure year mastermind, I, one of the things that came up is like, how do I know I'm ready to raise my prices? How do I know that I'm ready for a new offer? And the biggest thing that came up for me that I suggested is like, anytime you feel a hint of resentment or you feel some type of unhappiness when somebody buys your product, if they pay you, you should be excited. But if they pay you and you're like, I should have made more for that, or like, I'm not charging enough, like, now I don't want to deliver the thing, it's probably time to either sunset the offer that you're not excited about anymore or raise your prices. If there's some level of resentment because you are the boss of your business, yes, you're the person setting the prices. You're the person deciding what you're going to sell. You get to be in charge of those things. So anytime that starts coming up for you and it's like, I don't want to do this thing anymore, stop. There's always going to be a new opportunity. There's always going to be more offers you can create, more people you can serve. If your energy is not behind it and you're not excited about selling it, somehow universally, it will always not sell as well when you're not excited about it. It's science, it's energy, it's all of those things. But you have to really be amped up about what it is that you have to sell and to serve in order for it to truly work in your business and in order to make an impact on your clients and help them get their results. If you're not excited about it and you're checked out, people are going to feel that and they're not going to buy. So make sure that you are. When you're ready to pivot and when you feel yourself up against that wall of like, I'm still doing this thing, but I know I'm ready for the next, make sure you don't stay stuck there for too long. Make sure you move through that and get the support that you need to go to the next level. To stop coaching one on one to launch a group program, to launch a mastermind to start selling digital products. Doing that next step, that is like a natural. Yes. For you, that you're actually excited about doing. You're only doing a disservice to your clients if you're not excited about what you're selling them. So that's our story today. That's what we're talking about. If you have ever felt like this, let me know. I would love to hear your stories about pivoting or expansion or feeling stuck because I think it's something we all resonate with and we've all experienced. So let me know. Let me know what that feels like for you, what that's looked like for you. If you're currently in it and you need help moving through that or you want to launch something new, you want to do a group program, digital product mastermind. Those are my jams. Like, I would love to help strategize that with you. So let me know. I'm happy to chat with you anytime. Or you can book a call with one of our head coaches who can help you figure that out and see if we might be able to support you in that. So I hope you're having an awesome day. Thanks so much for being here on the Decision Maker show and I will see you on the next episode. Have a great day.