If You’re Still Holding On, What Are You Really Afraid Of?

Foreign. Welcome back. I'm Chris Blackie. How are you? It's nice to have you here. So we have been doing each week one of the transitions that I've identified in my beyond the CEO work. Right. Your. Your sages, your path to your sage era, like, moving into this next level of yourself. And I know that I. I kind of have vacillated. Is this the beyond the CEO? Is this really just next? Like, is that really what I want to call it? I'm playing with that still. But I want to share the wisdom with you because I think it's valuable. You know, this was all born out of my own kind of body of work. As I work with more and more women, and I recognize that there are so many of us, especially those of us who are in the identify as Gen X. Right. So somewhere between your mid-40s and early 60s, nobody knows who the hell we are. Everybody thinks we're boomers or not. And I did a whole series on Gen X female founders that's in my podcast. If you didn't ever tune into that, I would love to invite you to go find those episodes. They're a few. They're about a year and a half ago from right now in the Leadership is Feminine library. I just know that there are a lot of us who are in this phase, right? So we're in a phase where our kids are growing up. Many of my clients, their kids are in their preteens or in teens. Like, they've got a couple years left and they're going to move out. Many of my clients or kids have moved out. Many of my clients have kids who are married and have kids and are doing all those things. So we're all in different phases this Gen X generation because so many of us had children at such different ages. But. And also we are also the really the first generation women to follow the boomers and the great generation. My mother is part of the great generation to really be the first generation of women who have forayed into entrepreneurship. Especially the majority of female entrepreneurs across the globe are Gen X. And so I believe, just like we've all been challenging the antiquated wisdom and availability of medical support and treatment and even, like, honest conversations about menopause. I think that we all need to be having a similar conversation about what happens to us when we get on this side of our professional experience. Whether you've had a business, you've achieved a very high level of leadership within business. Who. Who are you if you are no longer this woman, this leader, Woman, how do you transition? And I see a lot of people who. Who really aren't sure what that is. If you own a company, do you sell it? Do you pass it on? How do you do that? Right. That's what the last two weeks have been about. This week, we're going to talk about false truths. The way that I want to do this episode is I'm actually going to read you what I wrote. This is going to be either a book or a guide. I'm still working on it, but I'm going to read you what I have so far as a way to sort of introduce this transition. Transition three, I call dismantling the false truths that keep you stuck. So I'm going to actually read the copy from the book, but I'm also going to expound upon what I've said. And I want you to really think about if this. Where any of this resonates for you and how this could be part of your story. And as a reminder, this is, you know, the private work I do with my clients in Sage. These are the conversations that we have. And even if you're not a Gen X, love, if you're a millennial or if you're what, it doesn't matter. If you find that you are at a point in the life of your business, in the life of your leadership career where you know it's time for something else, but you don't even know what that is, this is for you. Okay? Okay. So dismantling the false truths that keep you stuck. There comes a moment in every founder's life where she realizes she's not trapped by her team, her business model, or even her schedule. She's trapped by belief. A belief that if she steps back, everything might fall apart. A belief that what she built will only have been successful if it thrives without her. A belief that she has to guarantee the future of something she already brought into the world. But here's the truth I want to offer you. What happens to the business without you is none of your business. I'm going to pause there because I have said this to a few people and watched their mouth freeze and their face freeze. And so I want to illuminate on this. What happens to the business without you is none of your business. What I wrote here is what is your business is what you created, what you nurtured, what you sacrificed for, what you led into existence. But once it's built, once you've raised the team, the systems, and the leaders, it's not your job to make sure, it lives forever. It's your job to decide if you're still the one who should be running it, if you've built a business. So I say this about myself, right? I've built a business that over the life of the business has generated probably 7 or 8 million dollars. So I'm not like the huge double digit millionaire person that so many of the women I coach, but I, I made, I've made $8 million coaching women through my expertise. I am so frickin proud of that. And you know what else is so cool about that? I've lived a beautiful life through it. I've traveled with my family, I've built, we have beautiful homes, we've had beautiful life experiences. I have been able to be present in so many of my kids lives, life choices, experiences, events. I have met so many amazing people. I have lived independently with my own agency. I have had an environment to express my creativity. I am so proud if it stopped today and if nothing happened after. I am so proud that out of my mind I built a world that supported a life that has been beautiful. And I would just ask you to really think about that for yourself. Because this notion that if you walk away and it doesn't exist without you, somehow that's a failure is a lie. It's built on a model of what business is supposed to be that I don't know that you necessarily have to subscribe to. It's not your job to make it live forever. It's your job to decide if you're still the one who should be running it. That, my love, is your next step. This is where so many brilliant women say suck stuck. Not because the business needs them, but because they're afraid of what it means if it doesn't. It's like parenting. You raise a child to become independent, but the moment they start to make their own choices, live their own life, make their own mistakes, it's not a reflection of your failure, it's a reflection of their humanity. The same is true for the business. You birthed it, you guided it, you resourced it. But you do not have to be the one to carry it forever. So I just, I just want you to sit with that. This is if you, if you like to listen to my podcast and, and then you like to journal. This is a really good one for that. Now I'm going to go through some of these false truths that I, that I have witnessed my clients believe as truth when they're not, they're just beliefs. If I step back, false truth Number one, if I step back and the business doesn't thrive, I've failed. The truth. The business already succeeded because you built it. What it does without you is its own journey, not yours. What would shift if you stopped measuring your success by what happens after you leave? False truth number two. I can't leave. Everyone still needs me. The truth? If everyone still needs you. You haven't created leaders, you've created dependencies. It's not your job to remain the central nervous system of your business. It's your job to build one that can operate on its own. Letting them need each other builds something sustainable, letting them keep needing you build you a cage. False truth number three. If I'm not in it, who am I? The truth. You are still the woman who built it. You're just no longer the woman who has to run it. You don't owe the world another decade of busyness to prove you're valuable. You're valuable because you exist, not because you produce the identity. Work is hard, but it's also holy. You're not disappearing. You're arriving in a new form. The challenge, I would say, is that you don't know what that is. And so you stay connected to the thing where you feel really safe about who you are. Even if defining yourself as that version of yourself doesn't feel authentic anymore. It doesn't feel right anymore. You stay there because you don't see what's next. But I would argue that you can't explore what's next until you actually decide to leave it. You can't explore what's next until you actually decide to segue out of it. Right. Okay. False truth number four. I feel guilty for wanting something else. The truth. Of course you do. We've been conditioned to believe that wanting more when we already have so much is greedy or ungrateful. But there is a difference between greed and growth. Wanting what's next doesn't mean you don't love what you built. It means you love yourself enough to keep evolving. You know, there's so much baked into what it means to be feminine, what it means to be a woman. Putting other people's needs ahead of yours. Being gracious, being nurturing, not putting your needs in front of other people's, right? Like, really considering everyone else. You go last. All this nonsense. And I want you to look at what. What you've built in your life. Because you said yes to challenge, you said yes to your own growth. I want you to look at what you've. What you've built. You've built agency for yourself and other people. My clients have built multimillion dollar operations. They've created jobs, they've created careers. In some cases, they've created industry that didn't exist. Come on. When you feed your own desire, your own passion, your own interests, your own stretch, you create something for everybody in your world. That's why the vision for my business is to prove the power of one thriving woman. When one woman thrives, the entire ecosystem that she's the center of goes with her. Rising tide lifts all boats. False truth number five. If I slow down, I'll become irrelevant. A client of mine actually said this to me, so I have a posit the truth. What if relevance was never the goal? What if resonance is? There's a kind of quiet, powerful relevance that doesn't scream for attention, it just is. If your presence is only felt when you're producing, you've built a house you'll never get to leave. But if your presence is felt because of your wisdom, your essence, your point of view, you get to become timeless. I would argue everyone listening to this who has had a leadership role and has been, has had influence and mentorship impact. That is resonance, right? When I studied life coach training with Martha Beck, one of her sort of mantras was, can you change a life in 10 minutes? That's always stuck with me. And I do use it still as sort of my kind of litmus. Right? Can I have an impact on someone just within 10 minutes? Even a. Even a person I just have a consult call with? Even if they never hire me, if you never work with me? Does one 10 minute podcast make a difference for you? That's resonance. That's an experience, a conversation, a sentence, a question that carries forward. And I do believe that the more we are willing to invest in our resonance and our impact on others rather than our relevance. Listen, relevance is 5 seconds away from changing. I was just at Pickleball yesterday, and this guy, the pro, had a playlist we were doing around Robin. It was so fun. The playlist was amazing. And we were commenting like, oh, my gosh, this music's so great. And he's like, yeah, I made a playlist. And I was like, oh, that's so awesome. Is it on Spotify? Like, where is it? He's like, no, it's on YouTube music. And I was like, what? Why? He's like, yeah, it's part of their paid premium. Like, why do. Why do we need YouTube music? Seriously? We need another music channel. I just can't. That is an example of how. Of relevance. I'm already irrelevant in my knowing and understanding of music apps. Right. I'm like, thought I was cool saying Spotify. Not Spotify anymore, dude. It's YouTube music. Like, what? So relevance is. Is like, it's not up to you. Things are going to just move so fast. Yeah. And with AI, get ready. But resonance, I just think that's so fantastic. I love that. I wrote that. Okay, false truth number six. I'm scared of aging. Who am I if I'm not at my peak? Oh, I have so much to say about this. The truth. You're not fading, you're deepening. There's no expiration date on value, but there is an expiration date on tolerating a life you've outgrown. The woman you are becoming is not less than. She is more true. She's more honest. She's more real. We just went to Disneyland with my family, and this is very. This is just on my mind because. Because we spent. We've gotten. You know, we used to go for five days when the kids were little, and we did all this stuff and we'd take our time. We take huge breaks during the day and we go to the pool. And it was like, just the vacation, really. And as they've gotten older and older, we've shrunk the time down because even the kids are like, we don't really have to be here that long to get it all in. And we're such masters at our process. And now that we have our membership into the club, we get some bonuses there too. So that helps us get through the park and do all the rides and all the things that we love. So we just went. We arrived on Friday, we spent all day Saturday, an incredible dinner, and then Sunday till about 1 o', clock, I got about 45,000 steps in or something ridiculous. And I'm literally dead. Sunday night, like, can't function. So exhausted. Like, okay, I'm just gonna wake up tomorrow and I'll feel better. Monday. Nope, had to. Literally was on the couch all day, couldn't function. Kept thinking, okay, I'm going to rally. I'm going to rally. No, Monday was a wasted day. Tuesday, I had pickleball. So I got up early, 7 o', clock, had 7am, had 8am, finished pickleball. Driving home thinking, this is not okay. How exhausted I am. I'm in relatively good shape. Like, what is happening? And I had all this. I'm getting old. Oh, my God, I'm getting old. I'm getting old. And So I went to a drip IV place and. And I filled myself up with all sorts of things just to. And I do feel so much better today. But what I recognize is I can reevaluate how I have these experiences in my life without depleting myself. So value. Focus on value rather than production. And I just want to really invite you to look at, you know, the older we get, the more seasoned we are. And I think a lot of us carry a lot of old BS with us and we regurgitate a lot of crap that we don't have to regurgitate anymore. These patterns, these frustrations, these circles that we get into, these problems, focuses, focusing on these same kinds of problems. Like there's so much opportunity for us to leverage what we know and have. Have experienced instead of just immediately going to, I don't know how to do this or I don't want to do this or whatever. Like, you have so much deep knowing, and that is a gift of aging. Right. I know a lot of people who didn't make it to my age, and I'm only 55, so I choose to recognize how much more there is for me, not how much less. So how do we unhook from all this? Well, in the book, I go, I'm going to go through this much more in depth. And certainly I do that with my coaching. But what the. The. The most important things you can do is journal, like, talk to yourself. Recognize what you tell yourself about where you are in this moment in your life. If you are identifying like, this business is not sating me. I am bored. I am frustrated. I am restless. I am ready. What are you ready for? What is limiting you? What's keeping you? Tell someone. Talk about it. What I love about the environment that I've created is this is a normal. There's normalcy in this conversation. Not everybody who is in Sage is done with their business. And in fact, I would say less than half of them really. But I want them to be ready when they are. And then we have to start to invest in the next transitions that I'm going to be talking about with you over the coming weeks. Okay, so there's so much that you can unpack here. I can't wait to share this book with you. So just know that's coming. If you're not on our mailing list or subscriber list, I'd really encourage you to get on there. There's a lot. I've taken most of July off and I'm doing a lot of really cool brainstorming and thinking. I'm going to be going to a couple of personal retreats next week. And so I know that when we start getting into August, September, I'm going to start sharing with you some other opportunities for how we can work together. And it's all going to go to my subscriber list first. So if you aren't on the subscriber list, just go to my website, TheVisionary CEO. There's an opportunity there for you to opt in, gain some access, and then you'll have updates as they come out because I always release things to my list first. So stay tuned. Next week we're going to be talking about how you get more clarity about the future, because I know that's a huge reason why we stay where we are, is we can't see where we're going. And when you're a visionary, that's kind of a big fat drag. All right, I'll talk to you next time. Thanks for tuning in. We have so many great things coming up. Are you on the list? Go to TheVisionary CEO Notes and add your name. I will send you some fun things and you'll be first to know about some really fun and interesting things that are coming up, like, say, the Hawaii Retreat, so Visionary CEO Notes and get your name on our list.