706 - How People-Pleasing nearly broke my business

Welcome to the Next Level Life podcast with Christine Corcoran. This podcast is made for the powerhouse business women who are ready to ignite their fullest potential. This is where we will dive deep into mindset breakthroughs and sprinkle in some pick up the butt motivation so you can scale your business with confidence and clarity. Whether you're craving more income, impact or inspiration, this podcast will be your ultimate resource for all things next level. Listen in as we have authentic conversations with game changing female entrepreneurs as we reveal the secrets of what it takes to rise and thrive. So go ahead, ignite your inner fire and let's get you taking massive aligned action. Are you ready to elevate? Let's go. Hey. Hey. Welcome back to the podcast. Thank you so much for tuning in. I have an awesome episode for you today. How people pleasing nearly broke my business and so if you're a people, please, like you're listening to this. I hope you're going to get so much gold out of this episode because people pleasing is one of the things I love to help my clients with because I'm a recovered people pleaser and I think that there's a lot of fear around even recovering from being people pleasing because you've gotten so much validation, so much connection, so much love from people pleasing and you think that it's going to keep the peace and you think it's going to keep everyone happy when really it's one of the things that you are abandoning yourself for. You're putting everybody else first instead of yourself and it feels uncomfortable to put yourself first. But it is imperative if you do want to achieve the things that you want to achieve for your life and you do want to be happy. So before I even dive into the episode though, I just want to give you a little bit of an update as well. I am heading to America and Canada this this week. I'm so excited to head over. I've been invited to speak at an event in Canada and I'm just so excited to be there. It's for an event called High Vibe Women and it's through a connection that I had as part of Masterminds that I've been a part of in America and the beautiful community that this beautiful lady Christina has created. I'm just so excited to be a part of and it is my first international speaking gig, which is so incredibly exciting and I'm going to take you along the journey. So make sure that you're following me along on Instagram and to come along for and be a part of It I'm going to head to, I'm going to head to Palm Springs for a couple of days as well, just to have a little bit of downtime, but also to break up the flights because the trip is all the way in Toronto which is a very, very far. Like you're going across multiple time zones. So I'm going to do my best to function and then when I get back from Canada, I'm actually speaking at the own conference by One Roof in Brisbane. So if you haven't got tickets to that, make sure that you grab tickets to that, which is going to be on the 24th of October in Brisbane, which I'm excited for as well. October shaping up to be an incredible month. Not only do I get to do some international travel, which, you know, I love so much, but it's also where I am taking my clients to the next level. So I've been working with my beautiful, unstoppable sales ladies for a few months now. And this month we're diving into high ticket selling, getting really confident in their sales process. Before we can start to scale your sales, you've absolutely got to be comfortable in selling and reframing what selling really means. And I love to teach feminine sales rather than masculine bro marketing sales. And so I'm really excited for them to start diving into that. We're going to be doing a practice session on their sales call scripts. So we create, we create a sales script and then they get to practice it within the community. So that way it's a safe space for you to feel comfortable just practicing it and getting it wrong and making mistakes and tweaking your language and tweaking your messaging through the process which I always love, love, love that session. Everyone always feels really nervous beforehand but then once they do it they're like, oh, that was so good. And often what happens is at the end because they are supporting each other so they partner up. One person's a client, the other person is the person selling the offer. And at the end it's always the case where the other person's like, oh my gosh, I think I need what it is that they're selling because it's such an authentic sales process that it feels really encouraging and supportive and uplifting rather than shame based or fear based that you know, where the bro marketing comes into play. We don't have to pressure or convince people to buy. We need to take them along the journey and support them through the decision making process. So I'm excited for everyone to experience that this week. And then for the next level Mastermind, I'm prepping for our Mastermind in Person day which is happening in November on the Gold Coast. So excited for it. I've got some incredible experiences, plus a mini branding shoot with one of my favorite photographers. And I cannot wait for everyone to start stepping into their unapologetic authority. I got some beautiful feedback so far for the ladies that are in the Mastermind and it's just such a beautiful group. So I'm just excited for the next six months with them. If either of those programs light you up and you would love to be part of the next round, make sure that you add your name to the wait list for the next round, which will be unstoppable. Sales is actually an November and then the next round for next level will be in 2026 in March. So check out the details in the show notes. All right, let's talk about people pleasing. So there is such a cost hidden ways that we people please in our business and because we're so used to doing it, like if you've, if you're a people pleaser, identify as a people pleaser. You've most likely done it for a majority of your life. And so firstly, what we want to do is acknowledge where does it come from? Where did you learn it? Because some of the times it is absolutely a learnt behavior that you have adopted from someone that you know. So a caregiver, so a provider, so someone like a family member or a sister, a brother, a mother, a father, some other form of caregiver, someone that was a form of authority in your life. And usually what happens is we saw them do the behavior, so we modeled it and then we end up then taking that behavior into our adult life and we then don't know any other way to go about connecting with people or keeping people happy or making people like us. And so we end up people pleasing until it gets to the point where you realize that it is actually quite damaging to yourself, to your self worth, to your self belief, but also to your energy into your time. And so if you are acknowledging that people pleasing is one of those things that has held you back in the past or causes you to burn out or causes you to get resentful or frustrated, usually this is what happens, right? We get into business, we want to please. We. And it is a beautiful trait to have. I just want to highlight that first. Like, yes, we want to please. We want our clients to be happy. We want our clients to have a great experience, experience with us. And it is absolutely okay for you to have boundaries in place to protect your own energy, to protect your own time, to protect your own investments. Like, you need to take care of yourself first. And it's the old adage of when you're on a plane and it's going down, you have to make sure that you put your oxygen mask on first. It's honestly the same thing with business. If you are not putting your oxygen mask on first, you won't have a business for very long and you'll end up either burning out, which means you won't be able to work, or you'll end up just burning down the business. Because I've seen this so many times where we get ourselves into situations where we are teaching people how to treat us and they end up treating us based on our people pleasing tendencies. And then we get to a point where we're like, this is not okay. We feel exhausted, we feel burnt out, we feel like we're always putting everybody else above ourselves, we're not taking care of ourselves. And then we end up just getting resentful. And then you end up self sabotaging as well. Like I can see, I've seen this happen in the past where people are like, oh, I don't want to disappoint people. So then we avoid conversations that you need to be having. You avoid communicating changes of deadlines or timelines and things that need to change. And that's just pissing people off. So it is such a cost to our business because it's a cost to you as a human and you are the business. So if you are not taking care of yourself, you cannot create a really successful business. But you also cannot give your best. And that's where I think was the. Where the rubber hit the road for me. I recognized that I was putting everybody else's needs above my own and giving so much of myself that I was getting to the point of close to burnout. And I recognized that I wasn't being the best coach I could be. This is quite a few years ago now. And I recognize that I was exhausted. I was showing up to sessions unprepared. I was taking care of everybody else instead of actually putting my own business needs first. And so there were reasons why I was doing it. Like, I wanted people to like me. I wanted to make sure that they were happy. I wanted to get the connection. Like I wanted to make sure that everything was perfect. And so you want to be conscious of like what is driving you to do that. And so what often happens and I see this again and again and happened for me. I started to become resentful towards the clients I was working with because it felt like they were requiring so much from me. And that actually had nothing to do with them. So that's where I want to start with you first. Your resentfulness or your unhappiness or your exhaustion has nothing to do with other people. It has everything to do with you and the boundaries you're creating or not creating and the way that you're teaching people to treat you. And I know that sometimes a really hard truth to take on board. But the beauty of that is that you have the power to be able to change it. And so for about six to 12 months I worked on my people pleasing tendencies. Started to uncover where they were showing up, where they showed up the most, where it came from, why I felt like I needed to do it that way. And some of it came from not knowing any better or not knowing any different. So I needed to work on like, what are the relationships that I wanted to have with my clients? And how can I allow myself to have a great relationship but still have good boundaries in place? And how can I teach people how to treat me? And one of the things that I've learned with boundaries is the earlier you set them, the better. Like honestly, the earlier you set them, the better. So it needs to happen at the beginning of every relationship with a client, with a vendor, with a contractor. Like whoever. Whatever relationships you have in your business, it needs to begin from the beginning, which means you need to know what your boundaries are. You need to know what your non negotiables are. You need to get so clear on what's important to you and what you want to protect in order for you to be able to set those clear boundaries. So start there. How do you want your business to look? What do you want to be experiencing? How do you want to work? I recognize that in my early days of business, I gave people 24 hour access to me. Like when I look at it, like now I laugh at it because I'm like, why did I ever think like as a coach, right? There is no psychologist out there saying, hey, you can call me or message me or email me at any time. No psychologist is doing that, no lawyer is doing that. Like no doctor is doing that. So why in my head did I think that that would be important for me to give all of my clients? So I would wake up to messages first thing in the morning that people had messaged me at 5am I would get messages late at night and I would respond to them at 9pm So I had no boundaries in place for myself. I had no boundaries to protect my energy. I had no boundaries even to protect my sanity. Right. Like when you're starting the day by looking at emails or messages from clients, you are basically setting yourself up to be running your business and your life on their terms instead of yours. And so I needed to take that power back and so I set new boundaries. I recommunicated and said, you only have access to message me that I know. Actually the way that I put it was I will respond that you can message me anytime. But my apps now switch off. So my apps are only active between 9am and 5pm and I will only respond within those times. So I communicate that right at the beginning of my containers, right at the beginning of my relationships with my one on one clients so they can message outside of that. But now the boundaries that I don't check them and I also have the app literally switch off so I can't access it outside of those hours. And when I did that, honestly, it was like I got my life back. It was like I got my life back and I was able to shop. It's the way that I want to shop in my business with the energy that I really wanted to so really like there is so much positive things that can come out of this. And so I also want to say, like it's, it's hard to put in place to begin with because I think sometimes it feels like you're taking away from people when you're setting those boundaries in place. But the way that you want to communicate it is that what you're going to be able to give them. So by putting these boundaries in place or these requirements in place, it's allowing you to be able to then give your best. It's allowing you to be able to shop and serve in a way that you want to serve. And so it ended up like being from, you know, 24 hour access seven days a week to then telling people that I want to respect your weekends. So I'm not going to be responding on weekends. Which then set the implication that I will also not be open to receiving messages on the weekends. And business owners are only working 9 to 5, Monday to Friday anyway. So why did I ever think that they should have weekend access to me, like it's so laughable now, but I know when I was back there I was like, I feel like this is going to be value add, but it really was abandoning my own Self worth. It was abandoning my own boundaries and taking care of myself. And so by putting that in place, it was first I kind of like took away the weekends and then later on track I was like, okay, now I need to cut the hours back because it used to say 7am to 7pm or actually 9pm in my contract even so I needed to go back to my contract and like reduce those. So right from the beginning I would communicate with new clients. It's 9am to 5pm, Monday to Friday and my apps turn off outside of those hours. So please don't expect a response from me outside of those hours. Now I don't ever have a client that messages me on the weekend. I don't ever have a client that messages me. Usually I mean some message like seven o' clock at night, but again I don't see it until the next day, which is great. And so I want you to think about like for you, what boundaries do you need to have in place in order to get your life back, in order to get your energy and your time back? Same thing with like, I have certain times throughout the week where I have blocked times where I work on the growth focused activities in my business and I am putting my phone away, I've got all my notifications turned off. So I've got set times where I'm actively active in the communities. So and by doing that I feel like I'm actually able to get better at being, getting back to them more effectively. And also I'm able to give better advice because when you're reactive you don't give great advice, honestly, like when you're reactive and you're just responding to every notification, you're responding from emotion. Whereas now I have set times in my calendar in my time, sorry, in my days where I literally go, okay, it's time to now jump into slack and answer the questions. And so I dive in there intentionally and take the time to respond or take the time to give proper feedback. If I have someone that submitted something for a review and I'm like, I need to take time to look at that. I'll actually put that time in my calendar the next day or the day after and let them know ahead of time, I've got time to work on this on Friday, I'm gonn to you by 5pm Friday. So that way I've got it allocated and that way I've got dedicated time to work on these things. Otherwise it's a shit show. Like an absolute shit show. And so I want you to know that on the other side of people pleasing are really happy clients, really great service and you get your life back. It is so worth moving through the uncomfortable period of retraining people how to treat you, implementing boundaries and taking care of your own boundaries as well. Because sometimes that's the hardest part is almost like it's a withdrawal, right? Like you have to go through almost like a withdrawal when you like stop responding to those messages before or after hours where you have to delay your response to that email because you know that you're not going to be your best responding to that at 10pm or even 6pm, like acknowledging what you need in order for you to be the best version of yourself in your business. So you can absolutely have an incredible business that you love without having people pleasing tendencies. Because this shows up in so many areas from the way that you present your offers, the way that you price your marketing. Because if you are always focused on pleasing other people, you're really not coming from a place of purpose and impact. Do you know what I mean? Like, it's hard for me to describe, but it's like if you're always so worried about other people being upset or disappointed, you're not really considering that they have manage themselves to take care of themselves to make themselves happy and you're just the catalyst for change or you're just the supporter for an outcome and it's not the be all and end all. You do not have to manage other people's emotions. And that was the next biggest breakthrough that I had was like by people pleasing, I was trying not to rock the boat. I was trying not to let other people be upset, whereas other people's emotions are not my responsibility. Yes, I can communicate effectively. I can set boundaries, I can communicate with kindness. I don't have to be rude. I don't have to be like, I'm going to always be in integrity because it's one of my highest values. But you can absolutely have great relationships with people and also disconnect from their emotions. They get to have their emotional responses to things and whatever that means for them. So I try to understand as best I can, but I'm not taking it on board, right? Because when we're people pleasing, we're trying to keep the peace, we're trying to appease and that is literally trying to take away their emotional response to a situation that maybe they need to handle. Right? So I hope this episode has really activated something within you to be like, hey, it's time. It's time to really work on my people pleasing. Now if you're not really sure if the people pleasing thing is yours, it might be something else that's showing up for you. So I would suggest you take my CEO Confidence quiz because it'll help you uncover any other self sabotaging behavior that might be holding you back. The link is in the show notes, you can check it out. All right lovely. I hope this resonated with you. If you have any questions or anything that's showing up for you in this episode, feel free to send me a DM on Instagram as well. I always love hearing from my listeners. All right lovely. Enjoy the rest of your week. I'll see you soon. Thank you for listening. And if you found any value out of this episode, make sure you hit the follow button so you get access to the episodes as soon as they are live. And make sure you come hang out with me on Instagram. You can find me at christinecorcorancoach. Have an incredible week Sam.