Business meets Personal with Special Guest Laurel Holland

Right.

Okay.

I'm super excited to be able to go live. Thank you for reminding me that I should probably put my glasses on so I can actually see what I'm doing. Thanks.

I need to see things.

So we were talking about, like, the new year and planning and all of that. And so one of the fun things to think about when planning for your business, there's obviously, like, the growth of the business. But one of the reasons that this is so meaningful for me to have you on as a guest and by the way, difference makers and starfish community. If you don't know who I'm speaking to, not only is it right there on the text, but it is Laurel Holland, who is life coach extraordinaire. You know, so much more than that accomplished author. Now you have this amazing journal.

But.

Yeah. So the reason that we were going to talk is because one of the biggest epiphanies for me was when you're planning the growth of your company was to planning the growth of your. And also planning growth around your family. And if you're hearing little minion noises in the background, I have my family with me curled up in my office today that are not feeling so great. So that's the noise in the background. But, Laurel, tell me a little bit about this concept of business meets personal as well as, you know, how you kind of learned in your learning experience around, you know, the difference between business and the difference between business and the relationship with your personal life.

So I would say that when you think about yourself as entrepreneur, what you want to think about is you are the channel through which your business develops and comes to life and comes into form. Right. So it essentially is just certain aspects of you that are being represented in the world in a certain kind of form. And so when you're thinking about your business and growing your business or taking your business in a certain direction or going through a transformation in your business, what you want to become aware of is simply a representation of something that you are going through in yourself. When you. If as an entrepreneur, if you're really taking it to a very high level, you would see your entrepreneurial experience literally as a spiritual journey that you are here to develop and grow in a certain way as a soul, as a being in the human evolution, and that you're taking part in this experience and this experiment. And when you do it, you are being called on to literally come forth and evolve in a certain way so that you can evolve humanity in a certain way. So you got to do your work, you got to do Your inner work. And you've got to know what's going on in here in order to know how to proceed in your business. Right. Oh, I lost my sound with you, Bonnie. Lost my sound. There we go.

Okay. Yeah, I muted myself so we didn't have the sisterly love behind us. I'm an only child, so that's been a huge learning experience for me is the relationship between them. And I know we've talked about the fact that it's an evolution as a business owner. It's an evolution as a human for me in my life, it's an evolution as a wife and a partner and then also now as a mom. And obviously that's ever changing because raising an 8 year old was different than a 7 year old and the second one is different than the first one. And so the consciousness that I carry with me as a business owner in my personal life, you know, or as a being, as energy in my personal life definitely helps me be more aware in my business life as well of, you know, the fact that raising my company. Right, let's call it raising instead of growing. So raising my company last year is going to look different than what it is to raise my company this year. And it's a relationship of who I am as a mom today and who this other being that I'm interacting with, as, you know, my child is today. But it's the same thing as a business in the environment, in the community, the economics. I mean, there are just so many factors. It's just not as simple as, well, let's beat the numbers from last year because, you know, that could be accurate, that could not be accurate, or success could look like something completely different. And this idea of constantly having.

Like.

An inner window to be able to say as I go on this journey, you know, how is this impacting me? Or how is this, you know, good for me? And what's, what I've learned is that what's good for me is oftentimes good for my best clients, even if that means saying no to not my best clients. And that was a huge learning curve for me, was, you know, essentially saying no meant financial repercussions for my family. But, you know, and we went through this, you went through this together with me in 2000, I guess 17. Now it's almost three years that I had Victoria. Next week she'll be three. And, you know, going from being on a plane 32 weeks out of the year and then just saying no, like I'm. That was great. And that was a chapter of my life. But, you know, where business meets personal, which is what we're talking about, is we have to realize what's good for the entire holistic picture. And that's not necessarily what's just best for the business. I've seen so many business owners, and I know you have too, and I've been there where you feed yourself to the business. You're like, here's what's best for the business. So just, just take from me. And you end up just kind of losing yourself. So what, what is some homework that we can do in January, since we're starting with the planning and with this awareness. Right. So even before the planning, like with the awareness, what's some homework that we can do that. Oh, and Stacy Thomas is with us. I can see the comments. I know you can't, Laurel, because you're on Skype.

Does she have a question? Stacey, do you have a question out there? Pop a question if you have a question.

Yeah. And I'll let you know if it comes up. But as you know, Stacy and other starfish are working on their awareness and then into planning for January and for 2020. What is some homework that we can be doing?

Yeah. So you definitely, you absolutely need to take time to reflect on last year, and you need to take time to reflect on what didn't work in your business and what also drained your energy. So when you're looking at what didn't work in your business and what drains your energy, they're probably pretty linked together. And they're also things that are only going to drain your business and drain yourself going forward. So there are places where you definitely want to say, I need to either move that out of my hands or. Or move that out of my business. Right. Because always the business, what's come before is kind of like the push to get you onto the path you need to go on next. So it's never a straight line. It's a winding curve always. So to think it's a straight line is where we get messed up. Right. That's kind of that old school thinking, which is not the age that we're living in anymore. We change ages. So like the industrial age is we've gone from that and all the things that worked and the strategies that worked in that way aren't going to work anymore. So part of it is us being able to evolve in ourselves. And when you acknowledge what's being pushed from within and what's not working and what you want more of, that's the indication of how you're supposed to be evolving business and it's going to take, it's going to be risk taking. So like when you said, you know, three years ago when you made the leap of saying, I'm not run my business that way anymore, I'm not going to get on a plane, had to give up some business to do that, that's taking a risk. You know, you have to trust that your business will evolve in other areas and you can get on that path of going there so that you can let go of what's not working anymore, what's draining you, or it doesn't fit into your life anymore. Yeah, right.

So help. This was one of the biggest things that I needed help with is indications. And for me, like, I'm still consciously right now working on what I'm calling decreasing my baseline because I do have all of these plates to kind of juggle. And so I feel like sometimes I walk into a situation where it should just take my stress level to like from a 1 to a 4, but because I'm already at an 8, I'm at a 12, and I just feel overwhelmed.

Right.

So that's one of the, my indicators that I'm looking at is like when I'm interacting on a daily basis, not, not on a daily. But the compound effect of everything is what does my baseline look like? Because if my baseline is constantly at a 7 or 8 and I'm. I'm anxious and I'm stressed, then obviously the environment that I'm functioning in is not optimal and not working for me.

Right.

The other, you know, some of the other things that I needed help with was learning, you know, some other awareness factors other than my P and L in business that was saying your this is working for you or this is not working for you. So what are some other things for business owners that personally and maybe even professionally that indicate the health the business and indicate the health of how you're doing?

Yeah. I mean, I think your physical health is one thing. And Bunny, you know, this, this is such a journey for you, your own physical health because you've got your own personal challenges in that way. Right. And you're. And so your, your lens through which you look, you know, is going to be a certain way and other people's is going to be their own way. So you have to know your own personal health situation and then what you, what your limits are there, you know, and how you need your business to also support that part of your life. So health is always an indicator. And when you say health it's physical health, emotional health and mental health and then your spiritual health, which we kind of started out with, you know, that whole overall, what is your evolution? What's your, what's your inner push for your. What you want to evolve to. Right. So that's more of your spiritual look. But your emotional health, your mental health, and your physical health, all lenses through which if they are being stressed any way beyond what is, you know, just general good wellness, then you know, you're entering territory that you can't sustain.

Yeah, yeah.

And when you can't sustain, then you're setting yourself up for failure in the long haul.

Yeah.

So part of this is being able to, you know, really be honest with yourself. And I think, you know, that's great that you were talking about, you know, that idea of being at a stress level of eight and then adding four more. And now you're beyond that zone and you're in overwhelm. And a lot of people don't now today, because we're so used to living with high levels of stress, we're not even aware what is a good baseline to be working with. So you learn the right baseline. I mean, if you don't know what's a good stress baseline, your stress should feel like a positive stress. And a positive stress feels like, oh, I feel this inner push and inner anxiety that's calling me to do something that I actually want to do. When it's make a change. Right. When it's an unhealthy stress, it's, oh my God, what am I going to do? How am I going to manage this? How can I get myself out of this mess? It's all like negative oriented thinking, positive stress, which we want and we need is forward evolutionary, oh, yay, I want to do more of this, or, oh gosh, I need to figure this one out. And it's with a good energy, it's with a good energy of growth and excitement versus confusion and overwhelm.

So the last thing that I want to do, and I know it's a shameless plug, but I, I honestly, from the bottom of my heart believe Starfish community and Laurel knows this, that this daily work of awareness and weekly work of awareness for me with journaling, you know, was so helpful, but it's also so intimidating to open up a blank sheet of paper and not, not know what to put there or, you know, I spent years trying to figure out how to spend safely open Pandora's box, you know, because it was just kind of like, well, if you're Gonna go there. Like, I don't. I don't want to go all the way there. So, like, where do I even start at that point? And one of the things that I love is that I know that you've created this journal that's almost like carrying Laurel with me in my pocket or in my purse or in my backpack, so that on a daily basis you can kind of be there and, you know, coach me through what to put on the pieces of paper and help business owners and women kind of have this awareness of self and awareness of growth. So tell me a little bit about the Journal and tell people where to connect with you and get more information on that and living your inner power and also the journal.

Yeah, thanks, Bunny. I appreciate that. So my website is liveyourinnerpower.com and everything about my work and my coaching is all there. The journal access is there, the sales for the Journal is there. It's available on amaz, but it's more expensive through Amazon than it is through my website right now. So, you know, that's the best avenue right now. Now the Journal is, I think it's an absolutely revolutionary tool because it's a tool that is not only asking you and prompting you questions that are really important for your own personal and complete self evolution, but it's also guiding you to learn eight practices that will replace a lot of the habits that have been condition into us, that don't serve us anymore. And so a lot of the times what we're doing, we spend a lot of time trying to change habits and patterns that we're in that aren't working, and a lot of times unsuccessfully because we're not actually developing other habits that actually work for what we need. And so that's really what the Journal is for. It's really about helping you kind of relax into, you know, your deeper inner truth. The impulses, the natural impulses you have of how you want to grow and how you want to evolve and to do the work of looking at your old story, which is really what your life is built on right now, and then hopefully gently helping you create the new story that's going to be your new foundation that can create your life forward. Because what we really need to do is create a present foundation that will build our future. Our past foundation is building our future right now. And so whatever troubles, whatever negative stories, whatever traumas and burdens you carry are the things that are interrupting your ability to really create forward. So we have to look at that. We can't just disregard it.

So Stacy saying, wow, and then she asked you to say the website again. So you're getting, like, a ton of hearts on this side. Thanks.

Thanks. Live your inner power dot com. And we'll put up. We'll pop in there and put it in.

Okay.

The link. Okay.

I have so much love for you.

Inviting me to share in your group today. I love your group. I love your work. Bunny, you know how much I love just what you're putting out into the world makes me so happy. Yes.

And there's no one else that I would have felt as comfortable, you know, sharing this nonsense that's going on than you. And you have an amazing, beautiful family and grandkids. For those of you who can't tell, Laurel's a grandmother. I know she doesn't look like it, but she is, and she's amazing. So love, love, love to you.

Thank you. Thank you. And for anybody else, if you have any comments, questions, pop them in here and we'll get them answered.

Yes, yes. Laurel's in the difference makers community, which is great. And then if there's comments that come up through YouTube, I'll send them your way as well. So thank you so much for making the world a better place, for being here.

Thank you for doing what you do, and safe travels next week.

Thank you so much. All right. Bye, Laurel.

So much love. Bye.