Finding Your Edge w. Erin Dimond

I think your first hundred grand that you ever make is the hardest.

Like, doesn't that sound so weird coming out of our mouths, though?

Everything else just feels easier after that.

You're 100% right. It's just like personal training. Like, when you start to flex that muscle, that muscle gets stronger. All right, welcome back to another fabulous episode of the yes and Podcast. Of course, I am your host for at least this week, Bunny Young. And I absolutely thrilled today to bring to you one incredible entrepreneur that is a multiple, multiple, multiple seven figure entrepreneur on the way to breaking eight figures by the end of this year. A mom, a wife, just sexy af and one of my good friends that I will text and laugh about the most random things, but also go super deep in business. And that is why I am thrilled to also bring to you a conversation about cold plunging with Aaron Diamond. So welcome to the yes and podcast, babe.

Yeah, I'm so excited to have this conversation with you because, you know, we have so many good, informal conversations and why not just hit record and share it?

I know, I've found, like, I don't know if you find this with podcasting, but I find, like, when I'm doing this with people like yourself, it's almost like capturing us, you know, in that informal discussion. But those are the best. Like, we could bottle our text messages and sell them because they've got some pretty good gems in there.

So.

So I'm excited.

Yeah. Yesterday I had a solid reframe. Jordan, who's my husband and business partner, he was like, you know those trendy reels where people ask one question on the spot and they go. And I'm like, yeah. He's like, let's do that. Today we had our videographer here. And I'm like, I don't want to do that. I don't know if I'll be good at that. And then finally he was like, it's like a podcast. I'm like, oh, yeah, let's just record a podcast. And we could take the reels from that. But for some reason, the podcast was less pressure, but having to do content was like, I don't know how to do that.

I love it. I absolutely love it. Yeah, I saw your Instagram around doing just kind of that shift, and I know we're going to go into there, but that shift around perspective of like, it was a light work day yesterday and that was. It wasn't always the case where you would look at your calendar and make up a story about what filming day would feel like and mean and all of that, so we can go there. But I want to jump into, pun intended, cold plunging, because you and I talked about this.

Yeah.

Have you been doing it daily?

Right now, I'm aiming for four times a week. I've been told that the science says 12 minutes a week is like, that sweet spot, so that's what I'm at least buying and doing.

And what was the. Like, what was the motivation to start doing it?

I just. I don't have to do a lot of things that really suck anymore, you know, my life. I've gotten too comfortable. My life is pretty good. So with fitness, I come from the fitness space, and I used to love working out first thing in the morning because if I put myself through a really tough workout first thing, I could do anything the rest of the day. And I hate being cold. And so I'm like, all right, if I can do this, I can do absolutely anything. So I'm trying to do it at the time of day when I am just starting to hit a wall and feel a little bit lazy. Maybe I've cranked through the first couple items on my power list, and I started to go, eh, let me just check off some admin tasks or let me do this, or whatever, so I'll go do that. And then everything else just feels easier after that.

Yeah. And you didn't make it the first. For the full three minutes the first time last week.

Yeah. I love things that allow me to conquer my mind. And so knowing that that really has nothing to do with physical. It's all mental and finding those blind spots where I. I get a little mentally weak. And it made me so mad the first time I got in, I lasted a minute, and I'm like, I just. I know that's in my head. And so it points out other things for me. What else is in my head? Right. Where else am I limiting myself and stopping myself? So I stood there for a couple minutes. I said, okay, going back, and then I got back in for three minutes, and just that feeling of just doing something that, you know, you broke past your own limiting belief or ceiling or whatever. I try to manufacture that whenever I can.

Did you use the breathing modification technique in any other areas of your life? And, like, just to give the audience some context, I was trolling on Aaron's Instagram and was like, you're not. You're not breathing. Right? Like, and it's something that I've learned on the power of breath. And I know that you know it from the fitness world, and it's something that, you know, allows you to access so much more of your bandwidth. And so I get curious if that little reminder from cold plunging brought anything else in any other areas of life.

I think it's made me realize how often I don't breathe actually. I go through my work day and I'm just very cerebral and very out of my body and it's so hard. We could get really deep on this. I've had a really hard time falling into my body, especially since becoming a mom. And I don't know why that's the trigger. I think it's biological and I need to keep this baby alive. So the way that I know how to do that is with my cerebral business brain and let me just stay three steps ahead of him and business and everything I have to do. So being a mom has just shot me into my brain all of the time. I'm just always in my head, always in my head. And I definitely notice it more because you can't do that in a cold plunge for three minutes. If you don't surrender to your breath and if you don't figure out a different mechanism, then you're not going to last. So I think I'm not quite there yet where I've gone. Oh, I'm doing it again. I'm powering through my list and I'm thinking about too many things and if I would just surrender, my day would be easier. But I'm at least noticing it. I'm at least going, I have kind of a headache probably because I haven't slown down all day and that's where I'm at.

And my awareness of it, that's awesome. And it just shows how, you know, like my perception of you saying I don't have anything in my life that doesn't suck or you know, that sucks. And that's why I took up something that sucked, such as cold water, which makes me laugh so much. In knowing you and in our friendship, it's like you do look for ways to push yourself to your edges because that's how you've grown a business like. And you can share a little bit of your own story. But in my very Reader's Digest understanding, it's like you were doing one to one access with fitness and then scaled that with being able to do one to few and then one to many and then taking that online and being able to scale it now being at a point where you've scaled it so far that you've sold that company and you're teaching other Trainers, how to do that exact process that you did. I see so many times in your life where you've pushed to the next edge. You just didn't sit at a multiple six figure personal training company or a multiple seven figure, you know, individual fitness company. You actually sold that company and said, no, I'm gonna, I'm gonna help the most amount. The money obviously follows that. That's kind of what I've noticed about your personality, is making sure that you're pushing those edges.

Yeah, I don't know that there's even another way to live. You know, I don't know how people don't do that, because for me, it's cliche. But it's all about the journey, not the destination. Right. So there are ways to do in business, there are ways to do it. In your personal fitness, there's ways to do it, do it through parenting. And if I'm not trying to get better every day, I feel like, what am I even doing, you know, what, what, what is this journey that I'm on if I'm not learning new things, being made aware of different blind spots that I have, learning new skills? I think from a. This, this goes rooted pretty deep for me. I strongly identify as being an enneagram 3. I'm the performer, entertainer. You know, I've always been that in my family. I got a lot of recognition early on from my parents of just doing good. And so I'm like, okay, you know, and it formed my whole personality. Do good, do better. And sometimes I think it comes from a healthy place. And other times, I don't know. Sometimes I think I'm pulled by passion. Other times I'm probably very much still pushed by my pain. I just don't know that I know any other way to be. Honestly.

Yeah. Have you found some edges that were not more, better, best, that were actually like, less Relax and, you know, recover?

Can you ask it in a different way?

Like, I'll work 10 hours, 12 hours, 14 hours, 24 hours. You know, like, that used to be my personality. For me, the hardest edge was. And I remember this. I remember being in the Dominican Republic with my husband and my oldest daughter, and we were stuck in a hurricane, and so we had like, no power for like three days. And my husband gave me the feedback that that was the first time that I sat through an entire movie, like, with them as a family, and it only took a natural disaster. And he was laughing about it. But, like, I wanted to prove him wrong. Aaron. I wanted to be like, no, I did It X, Y and Z. I'm.

Laughing because that's exactly what my husband would say about me right now.

Yeah. And so for me, my edge was actually in doing less and like resting and stepping away from the bigger, better, more.

Yeah. To be honest, I'm still very much on that journey. I would say the first. So I have a one year old for context. First time mom. And I'd say the first time I ever really took a break it was to learn how to like breastfeed and become a mom. And like my newly postpartum journey. And we all know that's not a break. Right. So that, that's really been my only experience, sadly, that I have been go, go, go, go, go for the 10 years that I've been an entrepreneur. And I just, I do have a lot of stories around that. I. Not even, it's not even about the money, it's not even about the business. I think it's just, well, who am I if I stop and I slow down? And I do have a lot of identity wrapped up in the doing rather than the being. So I'm certainly on that journey.

I would not recommend going the hurricane route. It wasn't the nicest experience, but I have found, you know, just to tell you for context, it's kind of like fitness where a spa day, a spa weekend, a one week retreat didn't reset. Like, I realized that I had had this set point for decades of the doing. And I want to be honest with our audience about that of like, and it's difficult to see when you're sitting in the storm. You're like, I'm succeeding at business, I'm making money, my family's taken care of. How could any of this be wrong?

Yeah.

And it's not wrong. It's just that was my edge. That's why I asked you is like my edge was like, how to surrender. Like, who am I outside of my company and outside of being a businesswoman and outside of being an achiever. Like, is that, is that it? And that was a, that's been a really interesting journey to be on.

Yeah, I, I have a timeline in my head and you're probably gonna be like, this is so stupid. But I've, I've spoken, talked to other moms and I feel like this is how it's kind of evolved for them. If anything was, is ever going to make me slow down, it's going to be my son and, you know, other kids that we plan to have in the future. And I'm getting there. But I feel like I'm going to hit this breaking point, which is how I have to learn most of my lessons. I can't just grad. I can't just learn it from someone else or gradually learn. I feel like I will hit this breaking point. When Jackson starts talking and being able to do things and really, like, I'll have fomo, I'll be like, I want to be outside playing baseball, and I want to do this and I want to do that. And then I do think I'll set my life up a little bit differently. And then I'll really have to be met. I'll have to just throw myself in the fire to be met with the challenge. I'm starting to get there. As he just started walking, those things just started happening where before I would justify it so much. As long as there's nothing else I'd rather be doing. I want to be serving my clients. I want to be playing this game. And if there's some personal development, not doing this, I've always been like, I don't really care. Everything in life is working out okay. I'm not being hurt by not doing the personal, deep work right now. But when it comes to the point of having the choice between more time with my child and more time in the business, I know it's going to be hard. I know it's going to be hard for me to work two hours and spend the rest of the day with him and go to the pool and not set up my daily life the way it is now.

If we're talking about fitness as in mental, emotional, physical, spiritual, how imperative is fitness to the success of business? Do you believe?

One of the main reasons I love working with fitness entrepreneurs is because it translates so well, right? Because fitness is really just about showing up and doing things consistently and waiting for delayed gratification and just keep going day after day after day after day after day, do the same things consistently. It's super boring, but you just got to keep going. You have to have a lot of faith. You have to have a lot of trust in yourself. And business is very much that way, too. Except nobody starting a business wants to do that until. Usually. The reason I love working with fitness professionals is because when I make that comparison and analogy, they're like, oh, I just have to hit my macros for the next 180 days and do 300 workouts. Like, yeah, like, that's what you signed up for. They're like, oh, okay, well, that sucks. Like, yeah. But the best things are, you know, are worth that. Worth it. And you feel the best after you put in that time and energy and effort. So I think if you have never shown up and done anything consistently for yourself, I think business will be really, really challenging. I think that's why a lot of entrepreneurs fail.

Yeah. And I'm just kind of thinking about that. Of I want to translate this into money for a second. Because a lot of the clients that I work with that are multiple six figure entrepreneurs. Well, first let me ask this question because I'm biased. I think six figures was more difficult than seven.

Oh, yeah. I think your first hundred grand that you ever make is the hardest.

Doesn't that sound so weird coming out of our mouths, though?

Yeah, it's so true. I mean, I feel like anything getting it off the ground is the hardest part because to get to say, a million dollars, you have to think of the thing that you're selling. You have to think of who to sell it to. You have to think of how to price it. Oh, and then you have to think about how to influence people to buy it. There are just so many skills in that. And then you get to seven figures and then it's like, okay, now I just need to, maybe I need to move into other markets or do other things. But at first it's so much creation. It's so much stuff coming out of your brain and there's so much imposter syndrome that comes with that. There's so much second guessing yourself. It's, it's really challenging.

I, I gave somebody that feedback that was making like 60k and I was like, once you get over that 100k, it's like a whole different ball game. And they messaged me because they got to like 120k and they were like, you were right. I didn't believe you, but you were right. Like, and, and it's exactly what you said is like you, you start to realize your systems and your processes and what's working and how to do more of that. So that's where I wanted to go with you with going from six figures to seven figures, even on your way to eight figures to that bigger, better, more. What took you to multiple six figures will not get you to multiple seven figures.

Yeah. And if you try to hang on to it, it'll be the very thing that keeps you stuck. The mindset especially that gets you from A to B does not ever get you from B to C. Well, let's.

Dive deeper in that because I know my examples like, of, you know, you could Be the most amazing coach charging 120k a year for individual coaching. You're going to max out. Yeah, very quickly. And so let's go deeper into how your business changes and what it really takes to go from multiple six figures to seven and eight figures.

Well, I'd say skill wise leadership, hiring, delegation, management, all of those things. I was stuck around the multiple six figure, say 400k year mark for a little while, for probably a year. And then I back and then I started digressing and so I was stuck between 300k and 400k for a little while. And it was just because I couldn't let go of control. It was total me thing. So I was a solopreneur doing that. And my mentality was always just work hard. That's the one thing I can control. It's the thing my dad just instilled in me. He always told me through sports, the only thing you have control over is how hard you work. And so that mentality was wrecking me. Because if your strategy is to 10x the business, okay, and say you're working 60 hours a week, so what's your plan? To work 600 hours a week, that strategy no longer applies. So you've got to let go of that. So then how do you actually get 600 hours of week of work? Well, and it has to be done through other people and there's just a whole lot of like mindset stuff wrapped up in that. I think the thing that shifted me the most in that way was to understand that if somebody could do something 80% as well as me, then I don't need to be doing it right, like nobody's going to be me. And I think I, I started out in the really micromanage y end watching every single message that would go out to every single client, to every single everything, every, like every nuance of the business. And then I realized that people were competent with the right guidance and understanding of the business. And then I swung to the other end of the pendulum where I would hire people and I would just be like, here you go, here's your job. And I would abdicate all responsibility immediately. And that didn't work. And so I found myself somewhere in the middle with, with leadership. But I'd say skill wise, that's the biggest thing. And just asking yourself, what belief have I held onto that has probably served me really well and got me here. Mine was hard work that now you have to let go of to get to the next level. Because it's just an Identity thing that you have to change.

Yeah. Yeah. Mine was you have to work hard for money.

Yeah.

Like, you have to work hard to make money. And I remember sitting with my coach, and my coach was like, tell me 10 ways that you've had money and not worked hard for it. And I was like, nothing. Isn't it funny how our brains are immediately like, no, you're wrong. Nothing. And my coach pushed and pushed and, like, it's just. Yeah. My refund check. Right. Like your tax refund check, which now I wear it as a badge of honor if I can not get a refund check. Because then I'm like, I didn't overpay. Like, the government didn't have my money for longer than they needed it. Are investment accounts, investment properties. Like, when you start to really. It's just like, you're 100% right. It's just like personal training. Like, when you start to flex that muscle, that muscle gets stronger.

Yeah.

So here's another wall I banged my head against for a bit. We've talked about the fact that I am, like, a course addict. Right. Of like, let's. Let's learn. Getting a master's degree, starting on my doctoral degree, I was addicted to learning. And there was a thought process that somebody else knew something that I didn't know, and I needed to learn that. And I remember I had a organizer, like a professional organizer of all people at my house, and I had all these magazines and books, and they made me throw them all out. And I was like, why? I'm going to read those. Those have, you know, the golden nuggets in them. They said, if there's anything that was worth reading, it will come back around when you have the time and energy and bandwidth to read it. And I also got addicted to, like, this was part of what we shared, was thinking that there was somebody else out there that you could just give your money and they would tell you all of the answers and tell you all of the things.

Oh, that's so nice. Wasn't it?

I know. And. And we. We agreed that this person is going to remain nameless. That was invested in, but a very, very, very big name in the entrepreneurial space. And if you're open to sharing a little bit about your thought process, writing that check, making that deal to, you know, go into that relationship, what you thought was going to happen, and then what you learned from that.

Yeah. So what you're referring to we call mental masturbation, which I think is perfect. Perfect phrase for it.

Come on. Is there Wait, is there a hand gesture with that for anybody that's watching video? Like, we need this.

Yeah, Now.

Now we need one.

So many of our students get caught in that trap where they just think the next certification, the next thing, the more they know what people are really waiting for is for someone else to qualify them. And there's literally just no such thing. The person who's qualified to do it is the one who's doing it. And you really learn your best through actually helping people, and you just have to stay one chapter ahead. It was when I uniquely, kind of always felt that way, just from my childhood and my upbringing. Just unique set of circumstances always left me in charge and gave me a ton of confidence to go, well, I know best. And so I meet other people. I'm like, oh, you weren't raised like that. Parents actually told you what to do and stuff. And so I feel like that really worked in my advantage. But anyway, I wanted to touch on that for a minute because so many people get stuck there. But, yeah, I have made a lot of investments and. And mentorship. And I look back and it's the whole, what gets you from A to B won't get you from B to C, right? So I always tell people, emulate before you iterate in the beginning, right. If you have never done the thing successfully and somebody else has done the exact thing you want to do successfully, it might make some sense to grab their frameworks, do what they're doing until you get to a certain level in business. And so I was such a good student to any coach I had, any mentor. They would tell me what to do, and I would. I captain. Like, I would just be like, how fast can I run? How high do you need me to jump? And this person that we're talking about actually warned me of this. She said, look, you guys are at A level. And she said, we made this mistake where we just blindly followed whatever mentors told us to do. I want to make sure you don't do that. And of course I did that. So we, you know, in working with them, they had a lot of ideas around our business, and I didn't use my intuition. And what had gotten me here and really just knowing my customer and knowing our market, and I said, well, they've got to know. They have to have the secrets. Like, of course they know better than me. What can happen is a little bit of, like, it was probably a little bit of imposter syndrome mixed with, like, celebrity effect. Okay. I really got look up to this person. So I just need to listen to everything that they say. So we made a lot of decisions in our business that went against my intuition. And even if they weren't the right decisions, I didn't believe in them. And nothing that I have never believed in has. Has worked. You know, I can't sell something. I can't price something at a point that I don't think it's the right price point. I can't. I just can't do things that go against my own internal compass. And so we did that a few times. We did that with hiring certain positions. We did that with doubling length of our offer, moving it to a different price point. Just a lot of things that I just. Man, I feel like this isn't going to work. And so we tested all that stuff for about three months, and we really saw our revenue drastically decline. Our profit margins were in a much worse spot. Just like the business just took a drastic turn in the wrong direction. And then finally I was, you know, I was finally smart enough to go, okay, I need to. I need to go back to what I really think is going to best serve our customer. What's going to work for us? And we undid a lot of those decisions, and. And it took about 90 days, but we. We turned it around. It was about a year ago, this time of year. Almost exactly. That was just such a great lesson. It was terrible at the time, but it was such a great lesson. And just really trusting my intuition and knowing that, you know, I've gotten here by doing. By doing some things right. And nobody has a secret.

No.

But nobody is going to come save you.

Yeah. For me, I think the best part of coaching has been the accountability. Yeah. It's been the frameworks. But let's be honest, like, we are not on our first company.

Yeah.

And so, you know, there's. At some point you're like, yeah, the frameworks are great. But look, you have your own frameworks. And I love the accountability part of it, but I love what you said of. And I know the growth, like, if we put it in numbers, if I asked you, like, year over year, where are you at? I know that you've had tremendous amount of growth, so thank goodness for that lesson to be like, yeah, you know what? Like, I can double down on me. Like, I am the greatest return on investment.

A lot of it came from my husband, too, and him not believing in himself and him thinking somebody else could step into this company and do it better than him. And of course I believe in him. And I think he's one of the smartest entrepreneurs that I know. And so, so, so good for him to have that lesson. Right. To stack himself up against one of his idols and go, man, I think I know how to run this business better than him. It just gave him so much confidence.

Yes, yes. I mean, that's worth the investment in gold. Right? And people don't get that sometimes. Like, the epic failure is life's curriculum.

Yes.

Not something.

And I don't regret that for a second. Like, I would pay all the money for him to, like, we pay for confidence. And that's like, that's the key.

Yes. I love that. I absolutely love that, man. We just went everywhere. And I so want to just thank you for being able to have that time and share your expertise and your honesty. And I know, like, this is for those of you listening, I did a podcast with Aaron last week that's coming out on her podcast as well. So we're going to link that in the show notes. But we've just, we're just vibing, like, on these podcasts, and so we blow through this time. So it's great. Before I let you go, I want to ask you that question about the yes and. And so, like, what your version of yes and is because we've, we've talked about, you're leading by example with anything that you want in life is absolutely possible. And so I want to know if you were to share with our audience one of your definitions or examples of living that yes and lifestyle and having that yes and brand what it would be.

First thing that comes to mind is just, you can have it all. Like, I think so many women especially want to put themselves in a box where a lot of highly successful women, they don't want to have kids because then that means something. Or they don't want a husband as a business partner because then that takes credit away from them or it takes away from their marriage, or they think, you know, one of the buckets needs to fall. Whether it's business is going well, marriage has to suffer. Well, if we have more kids, marriage has to suffer. Whatever. I think for me, it's just simply, you can have it all. Yes. And this is great. And what else is great?

I love that. I absolutely love that. And I love what you said about the buckets, too, because I used to think that there was a finite amount of me. And what I ended up realizing is that's not true at all. And by having it all in one area, I actually increased my bandwidth in multiple other areas. So that's a great thing to lead the audience with. Of you've, you've left them with a couple questions, but as far as like, where are you holding yourself back? And then what pattern? The other thing I heard, just for our you listening, your homework is like, what got you here? That served you probably so well, but that is actually standing in the way of your next level.

I had a client of mine asked me such a great question the other day and I've been thinking about it ever since. She just hit her first seven figure year and she's a rock star and such a great leader and she, you know, I see a lot of myself in her. She's like, just been a few steps behind me. And so she asked me, which I think is a really good question from her perspective. She was like, what limiting beliefs are you dealing with right now? And that's the funny thing about limiting beliefs. You don't know. So I'm like, man, great question. I'm looking over my shoulder, I'm thinking about it. So help me, as you know that I'm pondering that question. If you see a blind spot of mine, go ahead and just call me out.

Oh, I love that. I love that and I love your vulnerability. I just love you and I'm proud of you and grateful for you sharing your time here. And we'll make sure that you can connect with Aaron and listen to the podcast that we did. We'll put all of that in the show notes. And I'd strongly recommend you following her on Instagram because she gives just such gems and gold all the time. And from like how to post your stories in an engaging way to just like hacks on when your kiddo is learning how to walk, like how to navigate that. So I absolutely am so grateful for you being here. Thank you for being here. Thank you for sharing.

Thanks for having you.

Absolutely. And wherever you took us, whether you are working out in the gym, setting a new personal record, or you're walking on the beach, taking your dog for a walk, pushing a stroller, or just chilling at your desk, we want to thank you for being here for the yes. And podcast. This podcast has been completely designed to serve you, to elevate and get to that next level while enjoying the ride. You can have your cake and eat it too. And Erin and I are here to share with you the recipe on how we baked our cakes. So how's that for all of the analogies?

No, that was great. I'm like, is she reading off a script right now? Or is she riffing? This is really good.

No, freestyle, baby. Always freestyle. So, yes, until the next. Next episode, this has been the yes and podcast. And we will see you in the next episode.