Episode 46: The Big Transition

Welcome to the Create youe Laptop Life podcast, where entrepreneurs all around the world come to learn how to market and grow their online business right from their laptops, wherever they are. We don't have traditional nine to five jobs, and we don't want them because financial and lifestyle security and freedom is too important to us. We know the world is changing for the better and that the freelance and entrepreneur economy is the cleaner, greener, smarter way to work for both families and businesses. My name is Julie, and this podcast will teach you everything you need to know about creating and growing your laptop life. Hey, everyone, this is Julie. It's been a while since I published a podcast. I'm so bad. Last time I came to you guys, I was talking about how to make a hard decision. I believe it was July 9, and that was in response to a really big move I've made in my business personally, which was to step down as the VP of Marketing from Click Funnels and to go back out on my own. So basically, since then, until now, I have been transitioning, really in a lot of transition, and for someone who doesn't like transition, that's been a little tough. So this podcast episode today is really just to kind of tell you how the transition has been going. And I don't. I feel bad sometimes because I'm like, I know everyone listening to me wants to, like, have really good takeaways for their own business. So I'm going to try to make this as. As approachable for you guys as it is just me sort of explaining where I've been, because I know a lot of us go through transition. We have a nine to five and we leave the nine to five. We have partnerships, we leave partnerships, we have business ideas, we pivot. And, you know, it's funny, I realize that I have left the nine to five twice now. The first time that I did it was in what I would consider great crisis in my life. I was pregnant, I was getting a divorce, three kids, baby on the way. Not a lot of money, just tons of upheaval. And so I remember leaving that nine to five and it felt like the scariest decision I'd ever made in my life. And I actually help a lot of People leave the 9 to 5 through Create youe Laptop Life, Digital Gangsta, other courses that I put out there. And. And, you know, it was five years ago, so I think part of me had forgotten just how scary it is, even though I knew it was at the time. And leaving ClickFunnels was really scary. And I had this Epiphany that even though it was a completely different situation, right, I was working remotely, I was working from my laptop, so to speak. I was a partner at ClickFunnels, not just like an employee. There was a lot of things different about it. The biggest difference being that my life is a lot more stable now. My financial situation is entirely different. I realized that it was still scary to leave. And I say that to you, for any of you listening who either haven't left your 9 to 5 yet or you're in a business model and you're considering pivoting, the realization that it will never feel good to do that, it will never feel good to pivot, it will never feel good to leave. It'll never. Like, if you're waiting for a feeling to drive your decision making, you're going to wait forever. And this was no more real to me than when I had to say that I was leaving ClickFunnels because from a, from an objective point of view, my life situation, my financial situation, my business, everything is fine. Like, I'm not like, jumping into the great unknown with no money or no business model to lean back on. There was a lot of security, really, logically looking at my life, and yet I still felt afraid. And so you're going to need courage. Anytime you make a big pivot, you make a big change. The one thing that I realized in this whole process of leaving was that my anticipation of the event is always far greater than the event itself. The amount of anxiety and fear and turmoil that I felt leading up to making the decision to leave was far more painful than the actual leaving. And so for, especially if you're a worrier, anticipation is brutal. And so just remind yourself when you're in that swirl and you're not sure whether or not to make a decision in one way or another, probably the emotional turmoil you're feeling in that moment is worse than what it's actually going to be to actually walk it out. I remember in church when I was younger, a mentor youth leader said to me, julie, you always only have the grace that you need for the moment that you're in. It's never like grace gets stored up or strength or courage gets stored up, and it's like in reserve. And like some vat for you later, it always comes at the moment you need it. So worrying and anxiety and anticipation, all that stuff is so useless because it doesn't build up your vat of courage or strength or grace. Like, it literally just makes it less likely that you will be able to handle the grace and strength, once you get it, to do what you have to do because you're so exhausted. And so I hope that like, speaks to somebody today listening to this. And you know, I recognize that oftentimes if you are a control freak or if you are a worrier or someone like that, you wrongly associate your success or your, you know, the fact that you have what you have, you wrongly associate that the worry or the turmoil is what caused that success when it really isn't that at all. So I have been in transition now. I've also started an email series for any of you guys who are following me on email, which you should be. And if you're not, I really recommend that you go to juliestoyen.com that's s t O I A N. That's how you spell my last name. And you go and you opt in right on the homepage of my website. Because I spend a lot of time writing emails to my followers and this is probably the most the clearest way that I communicate. So if you're not on my email list, you should totally get on my email list. Since the transition, so since July 9th to today, so many things have happened. I'm going to try to catch you up in a few minutes or less. So the first thing is I announced my plans for the Digital Insiders. For those of you who don't know what that is, it is a mastermind and coaching program designed not for beginners, but for people who are growing, who are in the process. They've already validated an offer and now they're trying to grow and scale. So that program, I brought a new coach and a new coach that has actually been a friend and a fellow colleague for over a year. And he's absolutely brilliant. You probably heard me speak about him. His name is James Friel and he is partnering with me in the Digital Insiders to bring delivery, operations, finance, that type of training and coaching into the program, which he is an expert in, whereas I am more an expert in marketing and sales. So we are actively looking for Digital Insiders, new insiders. The program is entirely capped. It's not a scalable program. It's never designed to be more than 100 people. Once a hundred people are in, we close the doors and don't open it again until someone leaves. So if you are interested, if you have, if you're listening to this and you have a business, you've hit your first 10k month, you have your first hundred students or hundred customers and you're ready For a mastermind and a coaching program, I would invite you to apply. So that was the first big announcement I made. Second one, Digital Gangsta is open. Again, a lot of people, in fact, randomly, as an aside, I googled my name the other day and someone is running an ad on Google that says Julie's Digital Gangsta may be closed, but Agency Igniter is open. I was like, wow, look at that. But actually the ad is wrong. The Digital Gangsta is open. It is open for enrollment from now until August 12th. So if you are listening to this and it's past August 12th, you may want to check in with me. But if it is before, I am doing a big all day teaching event giving the Digital Gangsta students all kinds of new content that's going to be happening August 12th. It's going to happen live. You will definitely want to be enrolled in the program by then. So that was the second big announcement. The third is that we are coming up on our one year anniversary of Funnel Gorgeous. This is a brand that Kathy Olson and myself co founded a year ago. So we're doing a couple things. Number one, we just finished our first Funnel Gorgeous retreat which I'm going to be writing and doing a podcast episode on marketing lessons I learned by being at Disney World with my Funnel Gorgeous people. So that was super fun with. We're also going to be deep diving into what the first year of business looked like for us. All the numbers, what we did right, what we did wrong. And she and I are going to be giving that presentation to anyone who is in either her inner circle or in my Digital gangster program. And that is going to be, I think, probably one of the most valuable things that I could give my students because it goes through step by step in order. What we did in the first year in our info product online business. So that was another announcement I made. I'm telling you, there's a lot happened in the last like 20 days. And lastly, the next announcement that I've made is that Create youe Laptop Life, which is the name of this podcast, which is my membership for beginning entrepreneurs that are trying to leave that nine to five and get into online business. That program is now officially back under my brand. It was tied up in partnership with ClickFunnels, but it is back under my brand. So you can, can go to createyourlaptoplife.com and you can join. It's a dollar trial for two weeks and then $49 a month. Inside that program there are job opportunities, there are content, and the most valuable part for most of the members in there is that I will go live once a week and answer all your questions. So consider it like a safety net for you as you're building out your business. So basically, that's what I've announced in the last, I don't know, 20 days or so through my email. So I just wanted to give you guys a catch up here. Who are my podcast listeners? Just as a reminder, leaving ClickFunnels reminded me so much of how much it pays to not be afraid to be who you really are. And I was afraid because I thought I was going to let people down at ClickFunnels in the community, you know, my mentor, Russell Brunson, I thought that my students and my followers would feel let down. I was really gripped with a lot of fear. And when I finally stepped outside of that fear and did what I needed to do for myself, for my family, I found so much support. And so if you are not being who you really are, if you're afraid to be who you really are on social media, if you're afraid to be who you really are in your marriage or to your family, or you are sort of like kind of changing your personality to make someone happy, I just want to encourage you that most of that fear is completely unfounded, that there are people that will support and cheer you on in your real self. And also, really, the best impact that you can make on this world, on the people that you care about, is when you are living authentically as yourself. And that's not a cliche term. That's really when the things that you think and the things that you say and the things that you do are all in alignment. And so that has been a big lesson for me. And I just appreciate all of you who've been following on my journey and thank you. For those of you who've reached out and just supported my transparency, which has been hard and felt a little bit like a vulnerability hangover. But I know it was the right thing to do. So I appreciate you all and I will talk to you soon. If you're ready to create, grow, scale your online business, you can go to createyourlaptoplife.com podcast and get a free plan on how you can get started today. It.