102: Listener Q&A

As a way to celebrate our 100th episode today I am going to dive into some of your questions and give you some of my answers. So this is a listener Q and A. And again, just want to say thank you so much for celebrating with me as we reach the hundred episode milestone. I've been looking forward to this episode, it feels like ever since we started and so I want to just pour back into you today and answer some of the questions that you have submitted for me for this very podcast. I'm Bonnie Christine and this is where all things creativity, design, business and marketing unite. I'm a mama living in a tiny town tucked right inside the Smoky Mountains, running a multi seven figure business, doing the most creative and impactful work of my life.

But when I first set out to

become an entrepreneur, I was struggling to make ends meet and wrestling with how to accomplish my biggest dream of becoming a fabric designer. Fast forward to today. I'm not only licensing my artwork all over the world, but also teaching others how to design their creative life and experience the same success. I'm here to help you spend spend

your life doing something that lights you up.

I'll help you build a creative business that also creates an impact, changes people's lives, gives you all of the freedom you want, and is wildly profitable. Welcome to the Professional Creative Podcast. So I have about 10 questions that we're going to dive into. The first one is from Jessine. Jessine says, how do you find empowerment in the beginning stages when you know it's your dream to be a professional artist and you feel destined to be, but you procrastinate because you don't feel good enough or fear that no one will buy what you make. Jessine this is something that I think we really all manage and we probably don't talk about it as much as we should because there is a lot of fear and procrastination that we deal with. And so I actually want to focus on procrastination. We'll actually talk about fear in a minute, but I've talked about procrastination a lot because I think that it's something that maybe creatives are more prone to than maybe anyone else, and especially entrepreneurs. And so I do want to send you to two episodes that I've done in the past. One is episode number 48, this one is called Three Strategies to Beat Procrastination. And the next one is episode number 55. And this one is called Dethroning the Queen of Procrastination. And so really when we're, when we realize that we are procrastinating. We've got to overcome it. This is a tool that we use in order to delay the difficult thing. And oftentimes we know that starting is just simply the hardest part. And once you just begin, things become easier. And so we have to just be willing to get over that initial motion of just starting and trust that things will begin to flow once you begin to start. There are some affirmations that I say that help me overcome this. And I go over them in episode number 55. But one of them is that I am focused and productive. I'm in control of my time and my life. I value my time and I use it wisely. So there are some really powerful truths that you need to know and believe and remind yourself of in order to really get over that procrastination. You know, sometimes I think about how if we weren't entrepreneurs, if we were working for someone else and someone else gave us a deadline, I would say that the vast majority of us would do everything in our power to do good work and do it on time and meet the deadline. And so something just happens when all of a sudden we are our own boss and we've given ourselves permission to procrastinate. Because even if we set those deadlines, we kind of know, right, that, well, we're the ones who them, and so that they're flexible and they're really not. You have to really hold yourself accountable. And that's probably the trickiest part of being an entrepreneur, because you don't have anyone else holding yourself accountable. It's only you. And so if you can figure out any way to really build in those deadlines in a way that you will hold yourself accountable to meeting them, for instance, maybe you end up posting them publicly because you know that with that little bit of social outside pressure, you won't let people down. And so you always meet that deadline. I'm not sure what it'll be for you, but it's absolutely worth taking some time to figure out what would motivate you to make sure that you're meeting the deadlines that you have put in place for yourself. And then sometimes we just have to get a little bit aggressive with this. Like, enough with the procrastination, right? We just have to start. We have to get over this and just do the thing that we know we need to do in order to move forward. Now the next question is from Kaz, and it's going to help me talk about fear a little bit. Kaz says, how do you stay motivated and energized. Do you get anxieties over the big things that you set up? And I think in this context, Kaz really means, are you afraid? Do you get afraid? Or do you have fear around the big things that you set up? And yeah, absolutely. And so I think it's important to really say, I don't think anybody is doing this unafraid. I think that we're all have different levels of fear. And it's the willingness to show up and do it anyways in spite of the fear. We're willing to show up and just move forward and do it anyways. Actually don't know anybody who's functioning at any level in their business that don't manage some level of fear around what they're doing. We're kind of always afraid that, you know, we'll be misunderstood or something that we try will fail or, you know, we'll say something we didn't mean to say on a live call or something. We're going to talk about that in a minute. But I think it's the willingness to just show up and do it afraid anyways. And this has to come down to a mission and a reason for doing it that's bigger than any fear that you can imagine. And so sometimes when I'm feeling afraid, I really have to remember, well, why am I willing to do this? Or is the reason that I want to do this particular thing, is it bigger than the fear? And it always is my mission, my bigger why. The reason that I do what I do is always at least a little bit bigger than the fear. And so it wins every single time. Now the fear does change, and it gets easier. For instance, I used to have a lot of fear around showing up live, maybe doing like a live call on Facebook or Zoom or something. And some of that fear just goes away with more practice, right? So I'm not afraid of that kind of thing anymore. But as soon as I get comfortable with something, my tendency is to stretch myself to the next big thing, right? And so I'm always comfortable with a level of fear involved in what I'm doing. If I'm completely comfortable, I know that I'm not stretching myself. And so that is. Is how I do it, is get really clear on my why. And then it's just a simple equation, well, is my mission bigger than the fear, or am I going to let fear win out? Is my fear bigger than the mission and my big why? If so, the fear wins and we don't move forward. And so it's really important to get clear on that. Janice says, how do you handle information overload and how do you decipher what is a good goal versus just what is distraction? I feel this, Janice, because there is a lot of information, a lot of options, a lot of different things that you could focus on, a lot different, you know, roads that you could go down. So there are a couple of things that I use to really help me with this.

Picture this. Your creative business thriving beyond your wildest dreams. More than just a business, a entire legacy. It's not just possible, but I want you to feel how close it is to within your reach. I want to unfold the map of success together with you. In fact, I want to invite you to join me on a journey unlike any other with my brand new professional creative business coaching program. If you're currently making in between 50 and $200,000 a year in your business, it's time to think bigger. Imagine expanding your team, honing your leadership, and overcoming the challenges most businesses face. You know, what got you to where you are today isn't going to be the same thing that gets you to where you're going. If you're nodding along, I made this program for you. We'll have weekly live coaching calls, accountability pods to keep you on track, and a vault of resources and bonuses, along with a community of fellow creative big thinkers. Because growing together is where all the magic happens. We've got the time management lab, my $5 million launch debrief, and a creative profits training which you'll have as a launchpad for all your revenue streams. But if you're unsure if this is your next step, I would love to chat with you. So in order to do that, I need you to send me a DM on Instagram or fill out our short interest form over@bonniecristine.com coach so that I can personally follow up with you and just ask you a few questions because I want to make sure that this is the perfect fit for you and your journey right now. You have my word. If I don't think I can truly move the needle for you, I'll tell you. So if you're ready to elevate your creative business and step into your power and into a room of some really big thinkers, join me by filling out the interest form@bonniecristine.com coach or just DM me over on Instagram the word coach and I'll respond with my first few questions for you. Together, let's make your passion your legacy.

Number one is Almost like a checklist of things that must be true in order for me to say yes to something. And I do this in all sorts of different ways. So let's say you're being asked for interviews. Well, if you have no kind of criteria on what you say yes to and what you say no to, then you're going to be over committed potentially. And so you make a checklist. Well, if they're want to talk about this, this or this, or if their audience is a particular size or something like that, you make a checklist to run through before you make that decision. Same thing with like a revenue stream. So when I'm thinking about a new project that would be a potentially new revenue stream, there are certain things that must be true for me to move forward with it. It has to be a particular type of revenue. Like I don't typically don't trade time for money. So it has to be something that can scale and not be bound directly to the time that I put into it. There's a whole list of things there as well that will at least mean. It doesn't necessarily mean it's a. It's an absolute yes, but it does help me really decipher well, what ideas are really worth pursuing and what ideas are not wor pursuing. This also brought to mind this concept of a qbr. So QBR stands for queen bee role. And it's a concept that Mike Michalowicz teaches in Clockwork. If you haven't read Clockwork, I highly recommend it for any, any entrepreneur. It's amazing. And so one of the things that Mike has you do is identify your queen bee role, which is really like the one thing that your entire business kind of boils down to. And so I won't go into great depths here because it's a somewhat, I don't want to say complicated, but it's an important concept that I don't have time to really go into on this episode. So go read the book for sure. But once you really are clear on your qbr, then you can kind of use that as a lens in your business to help you make decisions. So if something arises like a new idea for you to kind of go with in your business, you can put it up against your QBR and say, well, does it really serve our qbr? Does it serve the one thing that we boil our business down to, our greater mission? And if it helps accomplish that, then okay, it's worth considering. And if not, it's maybe worth letting go. And so it's important to have those kind of lenses that you identify. It takes a little bit of time to just almost slow down in order to speed up. So take a step back, kind of figure out what these checklists might look like for you, what has to be true for a new idea to be worth pursuing in your business, and then use it as a way to help you make decisions moving forward. Okay. Laura says, who are your creative role models and who inspires you? I love this question, and two people come to mind right off the bat. The first one is Erin Benzocaine. Erin runs Floret, and she, if you're not familiar, she runs a beautiful business where she grows flowers and sells the seeds. So all the flowers in my garden are always from Florette. She also has a couple of incredible books. She has a TV show on the Magnolia Network, and she just shows up in her business in a way that I find deeply inspiring. I think we have a lot of parallels in common, meaning our work is beautiful, like, flowers are beautiful and artwork is beautiful. But the business kind of behind the scenes is also really similar. And so I so appreciate having someone kind of in a parallel industry that I can look to and just see how beautifully they're showing up and serving their audience. And so I love Erin. I'm a big fan of Florette. And related, sort of, is Joanna Gaines. I have always been so inspired by how Joanna runs her business, how she shows up in the world, how she takes big ideas and turns them into fruition, and how she prioritizes family first. And so I love having Joanna to follow who does really, really big things in this world. And those are the two that I would say inspire me the most. Shannon's question is, what strategies do you use to ensure students have success when planning immersion? So immersion is surface design, immersion. It's the course we teach. I teach once a year, and we give a lot of thought to student success. We actually measure the success of the course by the success of the students, meaning maybe many people might measure the success of the course by how many students you have or how the launch went or something like that, but we take it all the way to the end. We measure the success of the course by the success of students who are coming out of it, and that's because nothing else matters. If you're not getting the success that you want from this class, it's all for nothing, right? I do it so that students find success and for no other reason. So it's a great way to really look at everything that we do for this course, does it help students succeed? Succeed or does it not? That's a good example of kind of that checklist, the lens that we put up against. Because of course we have a lot of ideas when it comes to this course and so we're always taking it back. Well, does this actually help students find success and succeed? And so this is a great question because I am in the midst of re recording this course. It is a beast, it is a huge undertaking, but it is the fourth time that I've done it. So I re record the entire course every two years and, and it's time. So I'm in the middle of it right now. And so this is front of mind for me is success of students. And I've added several lessons that really I think will help students very proactively and tangibly walk away with success from this course. There are some other things that we do as well. So I would say that our study groups are a big part of this. We offer students the chance to also be a part of a study group. So study groups are smaller groups of typically around eight people that we place based on a whole bunch of attributes, where you're at in your business, where you're at in the world, when you can meet. And then we supply kind of questions to guide you throughout the course so that you also have this small pot of people to rely on as well. Then of course we also have our guide and expert team. So we have about 25 extra experts that come on. These are all alumni from the course that have done an amazing job and had a lot of success and they know the course like the back of their hands and so they come alongside me and to help support students. And our goal is that no question goes unanswered for more than 24 hours. So we're really working to constantly get students unstuck throughout the course. We also try to gamify it a little bit. So gamify is where you really make it interactive and almost like a game to work your way through the course. So we have a lot of ideas around this this upcoming year as well. But an example of this in the past is that each module we open up an envelope and inside the envelope is a puzzle piece and they go together to build an entire puzzle. And at the end of the course the puzzle has like a link on it to go get a finisher's prize. So it's a way to really just get people excited about every module and moving through it, tracking their progress and then rewarding them at the end. Okay, Nina says, what beauty products do you use? And I love this question. Actually have to tease that I'm going to be sharing an episode coming up in just a around my favorite things. And so I've got a lot of favorite things and I'll be kind of sharing all of them with you in that upcoming episode. But what beauty products do I use? I mean, the makeup that I use is from Juice Beauty. I love Juice Beauty makeup. It is clean and good for you. And I'm a big fan of really their entire lineup, but I have more and I'll be sharing them with you in that upcoming episode. Wendy says, I would love to know how you work through your anxiety while managing a creative business and your family. Thank you for this question, Wendy. If you don't know, I experienced a really hard year back in 2020 and experienced, like, anxiety for the first time pretty severely. And you know, Wendy, it was, it was, it was messy. That's how I did it. I worked through it very messily with a lot of grace from both my family and support and love, of course, from both my family and the business. I took a couple of weeks off. I kind of just stepped back and took a couple of weeks off when I was at the very beginning and trying to really work through, okay, what is happening and what do I need to do to work my way through this? And I started working with a counselor. I started doing some cognitive behavioral therapy. That was a lifesaver. It was incredible. It really changed everything for me. And so I had that kind of as my base to help me work through this. But I also set up several things that helped me. I was able to identify certain things that made my anxiety worse and certain things that made it better. And so I really got very proactive, proactive about setting up my day in a way that would set me up for as much success as I could expect at the time. So, for instance, I realized that checking my phone in the morning before I got out of bed and rushing into work, you know, like, listening to work messages and things like that before I was actually at work kind of led to some anxiety. And so I started putting boundaries up and I changed my entire morning routine. And so rather than doing any of that, I would read, I would do devotional work. I would listen to some, like, praise and worship music in the morning, like, very intentional about how I approached my day. This is also when I started writing affirmations and truths about myself and my mental health and my anxiety and how I wanted to show up in the world as, as a woman, as a mother, as a business owner. And I would read them every single day. And then so the goal was to not even open or crack open business until I was at a place like literally at my desk in my studio where I could go ahead and dive into my work. And that was incredibly helpful because the risk is, right, that you see something an hour and a half before you're going to be at your, at your workstation that needs your attention now. And so then the next hour and a half you have opened up this open loop, peaked your anxiety and you can't do anything in the meantime because you can't stop thinking about it, right? So that's the kind of thing is just to really do yourself a favor and set up your day for success. Likewise, those things that really help you bring that anxiety down, doing more of that, having like tricks in your tool bag, if you will, to pull out when you need it. And again, a lot of that was made possible by working with a counselor. And so I highly recommend that. I loved the therapy that I got at it. It helped so incredibly much. And so thankfully I'm at a great place today, in the last few years. But I just, after experiencing what I experienced, have so much empathy, so much more understanding for people who are really struggling with anxiety, specifically when sometimes you don't even have a reason for it to be there, but it is just there and it's something that you manage day over day. It's exhausting. And there is a way, there is a way out. There is a light at the end of the road and we do just all need to really support each other more. Okay, the next one is a little more light hearted. It's from Jennifer and she says, what were you like as a kid? I loved thinking about this question. Jennifer. I was a gymnast when I was a kid. I grew up doing gymnastics. I ended up being a cheerleader and actually cheering at the college level. And it's fun to think about that because now my daughter is in gymnastics and it, it makes me miss it. I was also very creative, so I loved to draw. I love to do crafts of any kind. So my mom would always help me do all sorts of crafts and sew things. But it wasn't just sewing. It was also like painting and pottery and making, just making things all the time. But I remember specifically keeping several sketchbooks and I would copy Disney characters and so I would reference a character in a book that I had and I would recreate it and draw it over and over and over again so I could draw Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse like a pro, and I would just draw and learn along the way. Excuse me. I forgot to apologize for my voice. I'm coming off of being sick. But I'm back. I'm back in the saddle now. I feel great, but my voice is still a little funny. Okay. So I used to just look at the images in. In my cartoon books and recreate them, and I loved that so much. I think I still have some of those sketchbooks. And, yeah, I've just always loved to draw. And then, of course, I always loved to. Always love to sew as well. So I used to make skirts and pillow things for my dorm room when I went to college. And. And just always very creative. Okay, Rim says please talk about talking in front of a camera or doing a live stream and recording yourself, talking confidently. All your tips and secrets, please. It's the biggest hurdle in my creative journey. Rim, you are not alone. And I did do a podcast on this. It's episode number 20. It's called Love Going Live. So that's where you'll find all my tip tips and secrets. But the biggest one that I can tell you today is that the only way for this to get easier is to simply do it. Do it more. Do it. The more and more you do it and just become more comfortable in front of the camera, then the easier it gets. And it's just those baby steps. One thing at a time. I will say that understanding the tech and making sure that, you know, you're comfortable with how it's all set up will ease some of your nerves, because the last thing you want is to be nervous about, you know, having to manage a zoom room or something like that. And so sometimes it's really helpful to have someone on the call with you. They're joining, and they're just kind of your backup buddy, so they can monitor the chat, they can be a co host, so they can do all kinds of things like shut. Shut down the call if you need that to happen, or. Or unmute themselves or mute someone else. It's just really nice to feel like you've got one person who's there solely to support you when you're on a live. And, yeah, I would just say get after it. Go schedule one today and just show up and do it. And then it will get easier and easier and easier. No one's comfortable doing this for the first time, so you have to just do it. You have to just start and know that it'll get easier as you go. Okay, the last question is from Just Jane Arts. Just Jane Arts says tips for when you feel all the pressure to do things in a short amount of time, like you have 15 minutes. I get so overwhelmed that I end up doing little things that don't actually move the needle in my business. So, for example, I want to make a new piece of art, but that takes up a lot of time. So at the end, I end up not making anything because I filled that hour up with things like emails or research. I kind of feel blocked. Any tips on that? Yes. So I know how this feels. I think probably everyone is nodding along and part of this is procrastination. So I would reference those two episodes, number 48 and number 55, that I mentioned earlier. But some of this just has to do with not having a plan. We have to make a plan for those 15 minute increments. We have to make a plan for those 15 minute increments. And when you know, okay, I've got 15 minutes coming up in an hour and this is exactly what I'm going to do during that time, then you, you don't waste any time figuring out what you're going to do. So a couple of tricks on that is to have a list. I love to do a brain dump at the end of a day so that when I come back to my station the next day, I know exactly where I left off and I can pick up right away without having to figure out that like, well, what am I going to do right now or what needs to be done right now type of feeling. And then I like to prioritize that list and do the most important tasks first. And so that's how you go to sleep at night, really feeling like you move the needle in your business rather than just do all these little random things that do need to be done. You mentioned research and email, and those are the types of things that will just take your entire day if you let them. They're unruly. And so you have to prioritize. I like, like a big top three for a day. And I know that if I get through these top three tasks, I will feel accomplished, I will have made a difference in my goals that day and then fill in, you know, the margins with all the other little stuff that has to be done. But again, you have to be a little bit aggressive with this. You have to just say, I know that I have 30 different things on my plate right now, but I'm choosing to do this one thing, this one thing right Now I'm going to give 100% of my focus and attention to until I'm done with it. And that's how you get things done, because you're never not going to have 30 things. This very podcast is actually a great example of this. So I'm coming off of being sick. So I had about a week where I was just kind of down. So I had about a week where I was just out of the studio. And so I'm coming back with a million loose ends, right? So things pulling at me, people needing me to get back to them on certain things. But I have a list of top three things that have to be done today. One is this podcast episode. One is preparing for an upcoming speech that I have have, and one is preparing and delivering my coaching program for the professional creative business coaching students. And so I am going to prioritize those three things and kind of get all the other loose ends taken care of in the margins. So as soon as I'm done with this podcast, I'll spend some time doing some of those more little things, and then I'll go into another time block so that I can really, really prioritize getting what absolutely needs to be done first. That has to get our full focus, our full attention. And when I do those things, you have to do just that one thing. Otherwise you get pulled in a million directions. So then you can have like a miscellaneous hour, right, where you let yourself get pulled and take care of that random research or emails that need your attention. Now, I know it sounds like you could just use more time than you have. And so when you know you only have 15 minutes to get something done, I love to think about it ahead of time so that when I sit down, I can immediately get to work on the one thing. So let's say that is taking a course or writing or something like that. I would have all the tabs open already signed in on my computer. That way I know right when I sit down, I can get to work. Or if it's an art project, I'll have all my supplies already laid out for me so that when I sit down, I can get right to it. Otherwise it's going to take me 15 minutes to fill my, you know, cup of water and find my paints and, you know, pull all of the supplies together. Then your 15 minutes are up already. So lowering that barrier to entry so that you can utilize those little bits of time as efficiently and effectively as possible. These are great questions, you know, because what we're doing is not easy. What we're doing is not easy. It requires showing up afraid. It requires working through procrastination and overwhelm and really being a boss to ourselves. Right? Like really being able to set the tone for our day day, hold ourselves accountable, act like that future, more successful version of ourselves when it's really easier to just not right. But it is absolutely worth it to figure all of this out. Figure out how to overcome overwhelm, how to structure our day in a way that we can really get every last drop of productivity and effectiveness out of the time that we have to contribute to our goals and our business. So it's not easy work. I want to recognize that these questions are things that we all work through all the time. But it is work that is absolutely worth it and very much needed. And it's a long journey. Are you up for it? I think you are. My friends. Create the beauty that you want to see. Come alive in the world. And remember, there's room for you. I'll see you next time.