Women Are Standing in Their Own Way: Here’s What We Need To Do with Micah Larsen

Hey, hey, you're listening to the Level Up Creators Podcast. Amanda Northcutt here, founder and CEO. We help digital creators build thriving, sustainable businesses they love, and we are so glad you're here. Welcome. My guest today, Micah Larson, and I have a killer conversation lined up for y'all, and it's all about female entrepreneurship. And yes, I'm using the term female specifically on purpose because we're talking about some topics today that Micah and I, and frankly many other people who help other women in business, find to be major hurdles that actively prevent women from enjoying all the success that we should be having. But first, a little more about Micah. Micah Larson is a marketing educator for women creatives and service providers. She teaches organic content marketing methods that allow small business owners to be visible and profitable, attract their ideal customers, and see more sales, traffic, and engagement. Micah is a former business school professor, published social scientist, and is writing a book on infertility, entrepreneurship, and motherhood. Wow. Welcome, Micah.

Thank you so much for asking me.

Again, I'm so excited to have this conversation with you today. Uh, as I was telling you offline, I've been like just dropping hints about this convo and all the prep that we've been doing to put it together today to like really bring it for, uh, women entrepreneurs. But before we fully jump into it, um, I would love to kick off, uh, with you sharing more about your background, what led you to become an entrepreneur, your book, and anything else you wanna share.

Sure. I don't know if this is the case for you, Amanda, but a lot of women business owners that I work with are like, we did not take a direct route to owning a business or entrepreneurship. It's like kind of a zigzag. I did not know what I wanted to be when I grew up. Like, I was not one of those people. And I came from a family of artists, and that's not what I wanted to do. Yeah, I ended up going into social science research, and I was always a really sensitive kid, and I wanted to know how people ticked, and I was really introverted. And like, my son is the same way now too. He's a watcher, they call him at school. And now as an adult, I know that I really wanted to be able to read people so I could predict their behavior, which for kids is like, is a really important thing for like her feeling safe around people. And then that personality, I guess, turned into— I was a really good academic studying people and doing research. I published social science research on social influence, so persuasion, and how can we change people's attitudes and get them to buy into cool stuff like donating their organs or like getting tested for STDs. And I did that at a private Christian university in the South, which was like a hard sell, not popular there. And then to top that off, I started working in politics for a Black woman freshman representative in the House of Representatives. And I started writing speeches for her on women's rights, reproductive healthcare. access to abortion and started writing legislation with her, which made me even more unpopular in the circles where I was working. So I did something that a lot of my clients do, which is like try to strike out on my own. And around that time I met a tattooed motorcycle riding medical student, and he asked me to move to Wyoming with him in the middle of nowhere. And I said yes. And that kind of precipitated me wanting to work with small business owners. Yeah. And I, that was not my plan, but it's a very roundabout way of coming into entrepreneurship. But when I was pregnant with my son 5 years ago, I got very ill and was hospitalized for for a month and he was born prematurely. And then during that time, I spent like all of this time working from my bed around, like in a labor and delivery unit. And I came out of that knowing I wanna work with women and mothers and their small businesses. And it evolved to what it is today.

Wow. Oh my gosh, that is so much, and so much I did not know about you that I'm so— I'm even more happy to have this conversation if that was even remotely possible. Uh, so cool. Okay, and a little bit about your book, if you don't mind sharing just a tidbit.

Yeah, so the book came from writing about— actually journaling. When I was in the hospital. I was hospitalized actually 5 years ago, maybe even today, this week. Oh, wow. And I was almost 7 months pregnant with my son. And I started journaling, writing to him during that time because it was super scary. And so I have like— and I kept doing that after he was born. And I still do it most days. And so now I have like this stack of notebooks that unintentionally, because I was writing to him and I was like, I have a terrible memory. I want to have like all this stuff written down that I know I'm going to forget. And now it's become like this series of journals that really detail my transformation from someone who was like, I was an entrepreneur. getting pregnant, going through a really traumatic, like, entry into motherhood and what it looked and felt like to navigate that. The money, my marriage, like, the financial aspects. And, like, it gave me so much clarity about the specific challenges we have as women, moms, business owners. Mhmm. And so the book is— it follows my journals and So it's like this interesting intersection of infertility, reproduction, motherhood, and entrepreneurship. So it's a personal memoir with an entrepreneurial bent.

Awesome. Well, I can't wait to read that. I mean, that sounds like that's, that's gonna hit home for a lot of women. And we talk a lot about like nonlinear journeys for entrepreneurs and content creators and the like. And it's like, I have not, I've yet to speak to any individual like content creator or entrepreneur who set out to do what they are now doing. And so It's a lot of twists and turns. And, you know, life is nonlinear and we don't get to choose when we get hit with a massive health crisis or anything like that. Actually, like the last couple podcast interviews have hit on that very specific thing. And so it's like the more women I speak with, the more similar our stories are sounding and the more vulnerable people are willing to be like you are being right now, the more it gives permission for other people to bring those kinds of struggles, the real life struggles to life, you know, not the shiny stuff that we put on social media. social media, but like the real, real stuff that's going on behind the scenes. And I think that is just incredibly, incredibly important. So thank you for sharing that, being vulnerable. And I'm going to give just a little bit more background on like how you and I got to this conversation today in case that's helpful for context for anyone listening. So Micah and I were introduced by Level Up's head of revenue strategy and my frequent co-host this season, Natalie Williams. So she introduced Micah and I late last year and we hit it off immediately. So Mike and I have both dedicated our professional lives to helping women be as successful as they can or want to be, but we are both hearing the same negative things over and over and over again from some of the most badass, brilliant, talented, creative, hardworking women on planet Earth. And so, I mean, we truly feel like it would be doing a disservice to women everywhere if we didn't sit down together and record a conversation about what's keeping women from reaching greater heights of success, and most importantly, what we can all do about it on both a community and individual level. So again, super pumped for the convo we're about to have. I hope you find it both illuminating and provocative. We're going to kind of like lay it out here as we see it. And because we're looking to incite some action, y'all, this is not just a cutesy in-theory conversation. We're really going to get into it because there are changes that need to be made. And super quick medical disclaimer to make my lawyer smile. Micah and I are going to talk about mindset and health today, but neither of us medical professionals, and this is not medical advice. We're speaking purely from our own lived experiences. All right, that's out of the way. Let's get into it. Micah, can you tell me what you hear women say about their businesses and themselves along the lines of limiting beliefs that are keeping them from being successful?

Yeah, and I love that you asked this question because just like you said a moment ago, when we share our stories It validates what is true for other people. And when we hear other people talk about their limiting beliefs and name them, then we can make a different choice about it, which is a huge benefit of being connected with other women entrepreneurs and business owners. But I actually sent an email today about this because I've had so many conversations in the last few weeks with clients who have seen like these huge gains in their businesses. Like, you know, I got 15,000 Instagram followers this month, or like 5 ideal clients just booked with me this week because they saw my Instagram stories. And that, that's really meaningful. But they follow it with something like, I don't even know how that happened, or I just got super lucky. And that is the type of thing that I call out in my conversations with them because it's like— Mm-hmm. If you are just writing that off as luck, then you're not, and you're not taking credit for it, then you don't see yourself as the agent of change there, and you're not recognizing that you took those action steps necessary to get in front of those people. And somewhere along the way, you shared content or sent an email or put something on your website, or, you know, did good business with someone else that led them to you. And I think that also contributes to another limiting belief about imposter syndrome. And that's an important keyword phrase because it's very real. Even like you said, so many of those really badass, high-performing women that I work with are— when you look at their business from the outside, you might be like, Wow, they really have it going on. But when you talk to them, they're like, I have no idea what I'm doing. I'm a fake and I'm a fraud. And I don't even know why people would work with me. And that also translates to sometimes underpricing our offers because we're like, I don't even know, am I worth this? Mm-hmm. Or another related limiting belief is, That if you're judging your business success by the number of likes or followers you have on Instagram, and sometimes, you know, how much money is in your business bank account or how many sales you made, and some of those things are more meaningful than others. But there's a lot of talk out there about like, we need to be making 6 figures or make 6 figures. working X number of hours per week. And that becomes this arbitrary, like, measure of success where if I'm not doing that, then am I not successful? And all of those things, you know, separately and together contribute to us not realizing the value that we bring to the world and to our customers. And I think that really hampers our ambition.

Yeah, it does. And I like what you said at the very beginning of your response here about women saying, oh, well, because I was so lucky in this, or I can't believe this happened, or whatever. It's like you're just immediately stripping yourself of your own power, your own confidence. And when you attribute your success to only external factors, yeah, it's so easy to let imposter syndrome paralyze you. I mean, truly, truly paralyze you. And, you know, I think the last conversation you and I had, Micah, we were talking about the differences in how men speak about themselves and how women speak about themselves. And like, they could not be more night and day, which we're going to get into like more and more here. But, and we can also talk about the patriarchy all day. And I feel like you and I are kind of doing our part to bring gender equity to bear. But again, for the purposes of this conversation, let's really focus on the things that we as women can do for ourselves and for other women. to smash the obstacles that are in our way and continue to move up in the world. So with that in mind, really, you know, women-centric conversation. Micah, how do you coach women on what we can do to elevate ourselves and one another?

That's a great question too. What can we do to elevate ourselves and each other? There's— I think we often get stuck in this place where we're living in a patriarchy. We are raised with this belief that because women have less access to power, whether we know that consciously or not, that it's every woman out for themselves. There's not enough room for us all to be successful. Mm-hmm. And so we end up Like feeling competitive. And again, these are things that we may not even recognize consciously, but that's why I think there's a lot of like, you see a lot of women trolling each other on social media, and there's a lot of like competition rather than community. And when we recognize that, that it's because we're put in a position of scarcity, because patriarchy— and I've been having this like debate a lot with people— patriarchy does not mean Men are good, women are bad. It means that there's a disproportionate amount of power that belongs to men historically. And smashing the patriarchy means that we just want everyone to have equal access to power.

Mm-hmm.

And when women do not have equal access to power, then we squabble amongst ourselves, and it turns into like, tearing each other down and working moms versus stay-at-home moms and moms versus women who don't want to have children versus, like, I don't know, influencers versus entrepreneurs or whatever. And it's the infighting just serves to— well, it serves the patriarchy because— Yeah. If we're not, like, working together and cheering each other on, then You know what I mean? We're not, um, having conversations.

Yes. And this starts when we are really young as well. Um, and you're totally hitting the nail on the head. This is the juicy stuff, right? That, um, what we have to own as women, like, how are we perpetuating the patriarchy, which is systemic, endemic, pervasive? Um, not all of the blame lies with men. There is some semblance of like a shared responsibility here. And I know that may turn off a lot of people. If it does, that's okay. But if you are relying on external factors and, and giving away your power in order to— like leaving your success and, and your self-sense of worth and things like that just up to completely external things, like you have no power, you are helpless, and, you know, may exhibit behaviors sort of like a doormat, like letting people walk all over you, um, not setting boundaries, not showing leadership when you know like in your heart that that is for you and that you have something to say here, not standing up to voice your opinion and things like that. So I want everybody to take personal responsibility here, starting in this conversation with, hey, what part of this do I own and what can I do about it? Because I mean, I really believe that like that's how change begins like on these one-on-one individual levels and also in the policy level. We're going to come back to that. But it's like this meeting of these individual one-on-one and within ourselves conversations and policy changes, which we need money to pay the politicians that we want to have in office to make the policy changes. But when policy meets the individual level, at some point those are going to come together. But we can't just leave it up to the men or the politicians or anyone like that. Everyone has a personal individual responsibility to better themselves. And we are all coming from very different circumstances, backgrounds, socioeconomic statuses. I mean, there's a number of different ways that you could slice the pie and say that, you know, we're divided along these lines, and what's true for you is not true for me. And a lot of that is very possible. But please be honest and ask yourself, like, what can I do? What responsibility do I hold? Because I have power as an individual. How can I make this change? Like, are you calling other women, you know, a bitch or, um, tearing someone down because like you chose your career but, you know, she stays at home and like, oh, that's doing terrible things for, uh, smashing the patriarchy because like if all the women still stay at home. But like, no, that's her personal choice. That's not your— that's not your decision. That's not your call. There is a line there. Like, support her instead and realize that maybe her situation is different than yours. Her ambitions and her calling are different than yours. And remember, it takes all kinds, right? Okay, I'm gonna stop preaching, but I am like extremely passionate about this issue and I just hate that we tear each other down. It starts in the freaking playground in kindergarten or before that, and it's really disgusting. And I hate that for us as like, you know, the elder millennial. I'm assuming what your age is. I'm an elder millennial.

Yeah, same.

And our daughters— I don't have a daughter, but I have nieces and, you know, see this playing out in their lives from ages like, I mean, 3 to 10 for my nieces. And so it's really gross and I want to change it. We got to be better role models. We have to do better.

I know, because it's so unconscious. That's what's so slippery about it is that you don't even realize. And you know who's a really interesting— I'm fascinated with this right now. Do you know Ballerina Farm is?

No.

Okay. So, gosh, I can never remember her first name. Sorry, Ballerina Farm. She has like 8 million followers, I think, on TikTok now. She is an influencer. She is kind of homesteading. She sells— she has an e-commerce business and she sells like sourdough making stuff. Ballerina Farm because she was a professional ballerina. Now she's competing in Mrs. America and she is a Fits a very like specific standard of Western beauty. Like, she looks like a dollina. She has like eight kids, and they all they you know she makes lasagna on TikTok. She makes she milks the cow and makes the ricotta, and she hand makes the noodles, and she like gardens. And it is like everything is beautiful and aesthetic. But people started to pick apart her content like to the nth degree about like she. Her stove is like $35,000 or something like that. And then people are accusing her of cosplaying poverty because she's like homesteading. And there are definitely, I think, some good questions to be asked about what kind of messages are we sending with that content. And but it is so interesting to see she just had a baby. And then 2 days later, She got on the stage in the pageant for Mrs. America. And she's like— you can see her doing yoga and stuff. And she's nursing while they're putting her makeup on. And she is getting ripped apart, Amanda, because why? And I try my best to approach life as someone who's done a lot of therapy with curiosity instead of judgment.

Yeah.

But we can see judgment comes to the forefront so much when we are women looking at other women who are succeeding in something. And I think that's what— motivates so much of that, like people ripping her apart in the comments. And what a case study for like women tearing each other down when truly, like, she— if she has her 8th child and it just probably slips on out, honestly, I've had one, but by that time I imagine it's pretty easy and you like know the drill. She knows she can deliver that. And then she gets on the stage and she puts on her tiara and she wears a dang swimsuit and More power to her because that's what makes her powerful. And I think a really good way to take responsibility, like you said, personally, is for us to think about, am I judging someone? And can I get curious about what part of me is activated by seeing somebody else successful?

Yeah. Yeah. Why is that stirring something in me? What of my background that I've picked up consciously or subconsciously that's triggering an alarm bell and my defense stones, right? It's, it's a defense posture, um, and we feel the need to like tear someone else down or rip them apart, um, because of something in us. It may not be something in them. Like, I love that. Yeah, just— and this all starts with your mindset, right? Like, you've got to be able to capture thoughts like that. So next time you find yourself like judging your neighbor who like rolls up with a $150,000 car or something like that, instead of being like, God, what a show-off, that bitch, you know, just be like, man, maybe she got a big promotion. What a badass. Good for her. Like, that's great. Show up with a little bit more grace and opportunity for wiggle room. And it's not just what you see. You never know what's going on in someone else's life. We show up and we have our own lived experiences and we apply those in situations that are often like very inappropriate because our life— my life is not your life. Your life is not, you know, whoever's life and/or wife. And I think that's just such an important thing to approach with curiosity, catch yourself in that judgmental zone, and try and kind of extricate yourself with it and flip the script. Like, people are judging you too, you know? So, um, I don't know, I guess just stop. Like, could we all just, just stop by, by taking personal responsibility to change our posture and approach? Like, that's step one, right?

Yeah. And when people say, oh, she's just jealous, you know, you— in all kinds of contexts, like when women are being unkind to each other, a lot of times People will, um, say, you know, she's just jealous. And I think that's what that means, is that when we're living in a place of scarcity, whatever that might look like, like things are not the way I want them to be, then it's so easy to fall into that place of judgment, which comes out as jealousy.

Mm-hmm.

And like trolling each other, or just like, um, we can do so much more When we're on each other's team. I know we're on the same page about that.

100%. Totally. Okay. So yeah, that feels like step 1. Catch yourself and start to change your thought and approach situations where you would ordinarily just sort of default to judgment. Like, pull that back and instead be curious, right? Ask questions. Okay. Let's talk about what happens when women have money. This is a very interesting subject I've been doing a lot of research on lately. So I mean, the general vibe of what I found is like when women have money, they have power. And statistically speaking, women give of their money and resources at a higher rate than men do, no matter their socioeconomic status. That means that women, well, most of us anyway, aren't like squirreling away our money into Swiss bank accounts, but rather using our money as a tool to provide not just stability, but abundance for our families, investments in our communities, and financial support for causes we believe in. Those that are making the world a place we want to live in and raise our children in. So, Micah, can you tell us about some of the women in your community or your network who are using their money with a great deal of intention and again, making the world a place we actually want to be?

Yeah, absolutely. So I lead a women's circle for women business owners here in Missoula, and we have tea once a month and we talk about a theme, and we've talked a lot about money. And how it intertwines with our emotions and how that changes how we make decisions about it. And what it comes back to is that money gives us not just, you know, what does it mean to have money in our bank account? Because money is just a, you know, it's a concept that we made up in our culture. Yeah. But the reason it's important is that it gives us relationship freedom. intellectual freedom, financial freedom, and time freedom. And that's the so what of money. Um, that's why it's powerful. That's what it buys us. And so like relationship freedom means that you don't have to stay in a relationship with someone if it is unhealthy because you have the power, financial power to make it a move out for yourself and to protect yourself. You don't have to rely on anybody in a relationship. You have intellectual freedom in that you can spend your time devoting, like, your energy to things that fill you up intellectually. Financial freedom. Obviously, you can save your money so you have security. You can buy the things that you want for your family and invest in your community. And you have time freedom, so you're not So you can choose what to do with your time. And we, in my client community, we talk about, you know, the nuts and bolts of having a separate bank account, paying yourself, setting enough aside for taxes because nobody teaches you this stuff until you need to learn it. But beyond that, like, what can we do? Yeah. Beyond those nuts and bolts, I am always so proud to work with clients who are intentional about donating a percentage of their profit or their revenue monthly or quarterly. And I have a lot of clients who do this to causes that are really close to their hearts. Planting a tree, Doctors Without Borders, Planned Parenthood. A lot of them change the recipient up, and I always recommend, you know, choose something that's close to your heart, but also your customer's heart. And because this is a win-win, And that not only helps justify like the warm and fuzzies for people who make purchases with them, but it allows you to pour back into your community. And I, I really am proud to have so many clients who their values are very forward, like top of mind. They're in the forefront of their business. Yeah.

That's awesome.

Yeah,

I, I mean, I love that. I mean, and it goes along that with the kind of like results of my research, right? Like, we need businesses that are very purpose-driven. And again, like, when we can inject money into the causes that we want to support, that's another lever that we can pull to bring about change. Um, and I know that a lot of content creators and women in particular, just again based on my experience, feel really one, like icky about money and sales and asking people to spend money with them and stuff like that. Like, I've never heard a man do this and I've been an executive 6 times, companies all over the world. The vast majority of my career I have worked with men and for male-owned businesses. And we're not having these conversations, right? This is not part of the coaching that I would do or just, you know, as an executive partner. This is something that is quite specific in many ways to women and something I've started to talk about a little bit, this concept of like a mutual value exchange cycle and like in the best businesses in the world, you know, I'm solving a problem for you and you are giving me an amount of money that is commensurate with the value that I am providing for you. And, you know, the best businesses, they start by solving a problem typically that like that business owner has, and then they identify people who are similar to them who have that need that need to be filled, needs to be filled. And again, it's just like, I provide you this cool thing, you provide me with money, everybody's happy. You tell your friends, we move on, the business grows, things like that. So, Micah, you know, I want to bring this back to this like bit about like the intersection between capitalism and the patriarchy. Uh, so you and I were talking about this, uh, last week, I think. And just, you kind of had a conversation about, uh, capitalism and Black Friday. Uh, so I'd love for you to just kind of summarize that for listeners and we can unpack that a little bit.

Yeah. And I wish I had like a way to tie that up with a bow, but I do not have the answers. For this, it definitely came, it was very top of mind during September, October, November when I'm helping my clients plan their promotions. And for so many women, like small business owners, they never run a promotion.

Yeah.

They never given discounts or, you know, sent sales emails because of those exact reasons you just mentioned. It's icky. They feel Presumptuous. They feel like they are butting up against this societal pressure on women to be good and easy and not ask for the spotlight and not be full of themselves. And I think it always comes back to this ingrained value that we put on girls and women to be likable. Because that's our, like, social currency. Being likable keeps you safe in a patriarchy. And so if you're doing things that run up against, like, like, what if I send too many emails or, like, ask people to buy my stuff and that means I'm not likable? And that's, again, like, subconscious, but I see it played out all the time. And so I have to talk a lot of my clients into Send that sales email because you're just selling yourself short and shooting yourself in the foot. And there's a lot of connection to this. Like, I don't really— not an expert on the intersection between the patriarchy and capitalism, but I do know that I think the reason We see a lot of women business owners having trouble with feeling confident in their sales and marketing is because we have so many generations less experience in this. Like, it has not been that long since, at least in the state of Montana, like, women couldn't own businesses. And when it made more than $10,000, it belonged to your husband. And like, we haven't been able to have a credit card. Like, For more than— like, it's been 50 years since we've been able to have, like, a bank account or a credit card, right?

Yep.

So, like, we just don't have the breadth of generational experience. And, like, I don't know about you, Amanda, but I don't come from a, like, family of women who had a lot of access to money or power, right? And so, like, we're kind of making this up as we go. And that comes out. Like, it still feels socially unacceptable to tell people, I have a thing that's valuable and you should pay money for it. Because we haven't seen— we don't have a lot of good role models for that, especially in the small business space. So I find myself having to, like, in my community of clients, we have a lot of conversations about that, and we have to say it to ourselves over and over again that what you have is valuable and you are not being icky when you tell people, hey, I can solve your problem with this, and your product or service can legitimately improve people's lives in some way. And like, working with men, or like, I help my husband negotiate his contracts, and never has it crossed his mind not to ask for more money.

Right.

It also didn't cross his mind to ask for paternity leave, but like, Totally different set of needs. And, um, but I see all of these women like grinding away in their businesses all the time, and they're like, I don't want to tell people about my stuff.

Mm-hmm.

And, um, that, that has a lot of downstream effects. But I think that our generation and having these conversations like with you, when we shine a light on that, then we can, we can do it differently.

Yes. So I hope that's what we're doing for some people today. But I mean, you and I, we are only working with women and clients who are providing value and like transformation, value transformation outcomes to their customers and community of followers via, you know, social media, nurturing an email list and things like that. Like, we're not helping shitty people. And so like If you have something of value, the people who are following you on social media and who have given you their real estate inbox via their email address want to hear from you. And some new research came out last year. I think it was a ConvertKit report, like 40% of followers have a genuine desire to support the creators that they are most attached to, I guess you could say. Like 40% of those people actually want to spend their money with you just for the sake of supporting you, not even because of some cool thing that you're selling them, but they just want to be able to give you money. Like freaking ask them to give you some money for some cool thing that you made. Like if you're making products that solve problems, provide a transformation, make someone's life better, give them, you know, power, respect, knowledge, any of those like foundational desires that we all really need, sense of community, things like that. Make the thing and sell it to them. Ask them to buy it. And when you have such a strong match between value outcomes, transformation, and the audience that you're selling to, there's actually not very much selling going on at all. It's more just like, hey, I've got this thing coming up. Can I get y'all's feedback on it as I'm building it out? And da da da, kind of leading up to soft launch or whatever. And then you just, you know, you say it's available and like you've nurtured the relationship so long, you want to ask people to buy for sure. But it's not— it doesn't need to be this like crazy used car salesman stereotype, yucky, yucky, yucky. Um, like, you're not trying to bait and switch or pull the wool over anybody's eyes or anything like that. You're making amazing things. You deserve to be respected and paid for them, period. You have value. You are providing value. You need to be paid, again, the dollars that are commensurate with the value that you are providing. Um, so like, if you're only charging $25 or $50 an hour for like a coaching service or something like that, Please stop. Oh my gosh. Please think in terms of like, just a quick pricing lesson, value-based pricing. And so you are charging a rate, uh, that is like 10 to 20% of the total value that your client is expecting to receive from your services. So if I have a service that is guaranteed to make you $50,000 more this year, I need to price that service at $5,000 to $10,000. Again, that's 10 to 20% of $50,000. And so Like, start to change that in your mind. Like, if you're providing, you know, a parenting course or something like that that will save, you know, upper middle class millennial parents 3 hours a week for the next year, that's worth a lot more than $99. That's more like, you know, $999 or $1,999 or something like that. And so please, please flip that switch in your brain that is afraid to ask for what you are actually worth, and that will be Huge driver for increasing revenue in women-owned businesses, very few of which actually even get close to 7 figures a year in annual revenue. And many women like, you know, that want to reach that level too. Like, price is your biggest lever that you can pull. There's nothing that will change your bottom line in your current circumstances more than raising your prices. So please consider that and know that what you have is of value, especially if people are like giving you testimonials and saying it's awesome. Like, You're on to something. Do more of it. Ask for more.

No, I totally agree.

Yeah. So, okay, let's talk about limiting beliefs around money. So we have limiting beliefs around success, we have judgmental tendencies to other women, we're kind of like dragging everyone down instead of like a rising tide lifts all boats thing. It's like we're all tied to anchors and we're pulling each other down. So if we could like flip the script on that too, that would be cool. But specifically about Money, which we've already kind of touched on. You know, people of all walks of life at times feel that money is icky, sleazy, yucky, and that people who have it think they're better than everyone else, amongst other not-so-nice stereotypes. So, Micah, how is money talked about in your community with your individual clients? And again, like, how do you coach women on money mindset?

So in my client community, The Content Creation Lab is the membership. So we address the emotional and the rational revenue aspects of money because it would be silly not to be realistic about it. And we have a lot of those conversations about how can we overcome some of our feelings about money? What's, what is a real reflection of our value and what is just our baggage, our head trash that we bring into it? Mm-hmm. Maybe from our upbringing or Our home life, our own expectations. And we talk about how our sales, our revenue, our bank accounts affect how we see ourselves and our success and our work and what we charge. A lot of the women that I work with start out never having paid themselves or having set a concrete goal for themselves because we just get caught up in the day-to-day. Like, we're flying by the seat of our pants and we don't really have a game plan. So we're like, what do we get just done? Today, and I hope that I make more sales, but I am usually the first person to push them to set a measurable goal.

Mm-hmm.

And I set them myself. It's not always easy, but we decide this is the revenue, the sales, you know, the number of client bookings I want to make this year. The more concrete, the better, but something measurable. So we know what the finish line is.

Yeah.

And we— I just did a big training on this yesterday. We took time to set a goal that's SMART, specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and timely. And then we break it into quarters. We break it into months, and then we make it an action plan. So instead of like this big scary goal, it becomes the roadmap for how we see the results, not just like, okay, I'm gonna write it on a Post-it and I wanna make $70,000. It's, here's what I'm gonna do every day to move toward that. Mm-hmm. Um, and when we're living in that, just the day-to-day and not really having a roadmap, a plan for the week, the month, the quarter, um, we end up having a lot more anxiety and uncertainty about money. Having that action plan, we know here's the lever that I pull that I know is going to bring more people into my business. So, and again, I don't come from a family of women who had power or control over their finances. And so I'm dealing with this stuff too. And I'm setting goals for myself and it's still really, it is uncomfy. But, and I also Encourage my clients to think about if you called yourself from 2025 and you were like, things are amazing. What does that look like in terms of your personal goals and like your work-life integration, your balance? What does that look like? Sales? What kind of tasks are you doing in your business? What could you delegate? What is your income? And try to get pretty specific about that. And working with my own mentor, I set a 10-year, 3-year, 1-year goal and quarterly, which really shoots me, like forces me to think much bigger picture. But it's also revolutionized how much I achieve. And so I never want my clients to set goals that are demotivating because they're out of reach or they're actually somebody else's goal. Like I said, you know, we hear a lot of

people talking

about like making 6 figures But for a lot of women that I work with, it's like making an extra $1,000 a month would totally change the game for them and it would allow them more time freedom, relationship freedom, financial freedom, intellectual freedom. And that's really like quality of life. And so really think about what— and now I have clients who are like, if I just made 5 more sales. You know, this month, that would be a huge game changer to clients who are like, I wanna make another— I'm— wanna make $500,000 this year and I'm making $110,000. So like, how am I gonna bridge the gap? And those are both appropriate for those people. So setting goals that really make sense for you and not thinking, well, 6 figures has to be— has to be it.

Mm-hmm. Yeah. Oh, that's so practical. I really love that. I love the process of like long-term planning and sort of vision casting, if you will. I call that what you describe basically like an ideal day exercise. And so it's, you have to look at it at a macro level to get to like an ideal day. I started doing this 15 years ago and it just completely transformed my life. I was like, oh, here's where I actually want to go in life. And so just sitting down to set the intention, reverse engineering the path. your success path and like knowing you can, you know, how do you eat the elephant? Elephant, you know, one bite at a time kind of a thing. There's a quote I really like from Oprah, and it is like, cast the highest possible vision for your life because you become what you believe. It's something like that. I probably butchered that a little bit, but it's like, if you can't envision yourself in that place, you're not going to get there, right? If you don't know where you're going, you're not going to get there. And so Again, that self-belief and practicing not stripping your power and not letting other people strip your power, whether it's emotional, physical, psychological, whatever, like hold that in and give it to other women. I think it's actually more like a self-perpetuating flywheel if we can remind each other that like we have this individual power, we can lift each other up instead of tear each other down because of jealousy or whatever that red flag that gets triggered in us when we see something that does not fit our paradigm of what we feel is normal or the box that a woman should fit in, like smash the box. Like your idea of what a woman should look like is not the idea of what that woman should look like. Like, stop, please. And I'm talking to myself too. Like, I still struggle with this to some degree. But again, that awareness piece is super important. Okay. Well, I had my next question was basically moving into more like practical things that we can do. And I think that we are very much on that track. So just to kind of like recap about like what's it going to take for women to start thinking differently, recognizing your thoughts and approaching things with curiosity rather than judgment, remembering that you do have value, worth, and power separate and distinct from your work and accomplishments. Like your work is not your worth. We are human beings, not human doings. And so just remembering that you have this like innate power in yourself. Um, so that's like kind of the, the thinking differently part. The acting differently, um, I love, you know, kind of like just super practical exercises. It's like vision casting, reverse engineering, making SMART goals. I love that you have a mentor, Micah. Um, I do as well. It's extraordinarily valuable, um, to have like a woman in your life who's just a little bit further along than you are, who is bringing you up with her, right? Um, we talked about treating other women differently. talked about raising your prices and like having value in your business and like, why are we thinking the way that we are? And like, men don't do this. But I like the general— we haven't had generations and generations of practice in doing this. We are kind of built to be people pleasers and well-liked. Actually reread Sheryl Sandberg's Lean In book. I think it's like 10 years old at this point, but I sort of like read that. It got me super fired up for this conversation and Yeah, you're talking about you helping your husband negotiate contracts and stuff. And like, I'm sure first thing in his mind was like, counter, make a counteroffer to get more money, right? For sure. And just statistically speaking, men never take the first offer. Women almost always take the first offer. Stop. Like, a business is incentivized to get you at the lowest dollar amount that they can so that they make more profit. Push, push, push, push, push. You know, put on like borrow that confidence from a man and go to bat for yourself. And we're talking about like entrepreneurship, but a lot of the women that we work with and probably that you work with also have a day job and they're trying to make it with a side hustle. But like, you can maximize your income where you're at right now also. Do you have any other like practical, tactical, actionable advice for any of this? I know we've got a, got a couple more like hot topics I want to hit before we wrap up.

Man. Yeah. So Oh, Amanda, I could go different directions with that. Like,

yeah,

I want to leap off into like marketing stuff, but I often encourage my clients to think about, like, maybe to be really realistic about what would move the needle in your quality of life. Like maybe just paying for childcare is your goal because that's hard. Like maybe just breaking even or like putting money in a retirement account. And I've had a lot of questions recently about probably because tax time, you know, but Yeah. about paying yourself and it's like, what are the logistics of that? And even my financial advisor is like, you know, even if you're just putting a little bit of money from your business into your son's college savings account,

like,

That is going to make you feel good. And so setting realistic goals based on your priorities and what improves your quality of life, not what other people think is metrics of success, is actionable.

Right. OK. All right. Yeah, I love that. And kind of to come back to— you made a comment at the beginning of the, the recording here about imposter syndrome. One thing that I really like to talk to women about is because, you know, imposter syndrome is obviously quite prevalent again, more so for women than for men. And so the way that I like to tackle imposter syndrome is this little formula. It's competence plus daily action equals earned confidence, emphasis on earned. So it's like Learn the things that you need to learn. Remember that you are capable. One thing that— another trend that I see in women is like a lack of growth mindset. It's a fixed mindset, like, oh, I— okay, uh, Micah says I need to go do this, um, and I need to watch 1, 2, 3 videos that she made for me in order to get there, and I can do that, and I can make the technical connection required to hook up my lead magnet or my email list or whatever it is, as opposed to a fixed mindset that would say like Oh snap! There's no way I can do that. Like I am way too old for this shit, and Micah has lost her mind. Kind of a thing, or like Amanda, I would say the same. I kind of require the same things from from clients, right? But having a growth mindset is so unbelievably important. I mean, that is just absolutely life-changing, and just consistently challenging yourself to learn new things. First, like ten twelve years of my career, I knew that I had very significant gaps to. Bridge in terms of just like, in order to create like the vast knowledge of, vast body of business knowledge that I now have, I very systematically every year close a major gap. And so I'll read maybe a dozen books on a subject. I read at least 50 books a year, consume like a lot of content. I'm just like a learning and regurgitation machine, right? I did not— I was not raised that way. I did not used to be that way. I'm not sure what switch like flipped in me in order to sort of like turn that on. But when I realized what I could be capable of if I learned XYZ and was able to apply that, I mean, there's just absolutely no stopping me whatsoever. I mean, I am like relentless. I'm very like Type A. I have a very relentless personality. Like if I say I'm going to do something, you can just consider it done sort of a situation. So I will let nothing and no one stand in my way of a goal. And, um, so if you're listening to this and you're like, I'm not like that at all, that makes me so incredibly uncomfortable, you can do that in a little bit more of like a chill, quiet way. But like, if you know you need to learn something to achieve one of your goals, go find YouTube videos at the very least and sit down, take a deep breath, and before you start the video or start the book or whatever it is, say like, I can do this. I can learn this. I am capable. I am smart. You know, I'm calm. I'm centered. And I'm ready to sort of like receive this. And I'm ready to receive the resulting success that's going to come to me because I was able to learn and implement this. So I think that's kind of a way to like harness your power as well as like practice improving your competence. But again, like, again, that confidence is not necessarily going to come as quickly if you're not putting that newfound competence into action in service of a specific SMART goal, like you said earlier.

And I also have a relentless personality, so I can totally relate. Like, I am incredibly stubborn, which I now see in my child reflected to me. So I'm like, OK, I understand what a blessing and a curse that is. And I think— now tell me if this is true for you, Amanda— that also can mean that we try to do everything. Like, I can do everything and I can learn everything. And then I can DIY everything because I'm really smart. And if I just like spend enough time learning it, which like relatedly, right now there's a ton of new email requirements for people sending marketing emails. Like, and all the things that I sometimes— and all my clients are like, yucky, I need to do authenticate a what, a domain. And so having a lot of conversations about that. Definitely before February, Google that if you're a business owner and you send marketing emails, like, what is domain authentication? But like 5 years ago, I would sit and YouTube everything and I was like, I can write the code on my website. Was I qualified to do that? Absolutely not. Did I break my website? Absolutely. Because I was like, I'm relentless and I'm so stubborn and I hate asking for help. I hated asking for help. Mm-hmm. And because that was a weakness. to me, which is not true at all. I realize now. But I— so I was stubbornly trying to DIY everything instead of realizing I'm actually like, I would be so much happier and more productive and actually successful in my business if I was better at delegating stuff that I sucked at and I hated. And so one very actionable exercise is to make a quadrant, like a little chart with 4 squares. And the top row is stuff I'm good at. And the columns are stuff I'm good at and stuff I'm bad at. And the columns are stuff I like, stuff I don't like. And so what you're going to end up with is a— so 4 quadrants. One of them, stuff I like, stuff I'm good at. Stuff I dislike, stuff I'm good at. Stuff I dislike and I'm bad at. And stuff I— am good at, but I dislike. I think I said those right.

You got it.

Okay. Okay. So, uh, that's a very actionable exercise and where you can just list the stuff that you do in your business and, um, keep doing the stuff in that first quadrant that's like, you like it, you're good at it. And there's gonna be stuff in, um, in a couple of the quadrants that maybe you're gonna have to do for now. But if you're looking at that quadrant, it's like, I hate it and I'm bad at it. Can you delegate that to somebody? And I swear by having online business managers and virtual assistants. And often, like, hire them before you think you need one, because when you can offload those things in your business that not only take you a long time, but they sap all your energy to someone who's better at it and can do it with joy, it is so worth your money, because then you can apply that saved time to stuff that really generates you income, and you shine in those things. And not only does this make your business more fun, but it actually like, oh my gosh, does it free you up to do more of those things that only you can do. So highly recommend.

I'm so glad you brought that up because I don't want to give the wrong impression. I used to be that way. I was a like full-on workaholic, uh, in my early 20s. Um, I started working full-time when I was 19, actually still in school. Um, I should have done a harder degree program, but it worked out. I, yes, I used to be the woman that was like, I know it all and I'm everything to all people and I do not need help. Asking for help is a weakness, like full-on like a freaking freight train. Um, and then in my mid-20s, the bottom fell out of my health and, um, I was hanging on for dear life. And I'm not saying that as an exaggeration. Um, I just did a podcast interview about like my whole health situation, so I like won't get into that fully. But basically I had like multiple underlying very, very serious infections like Lyme disease, Epstein-Barr, and a number of other things. And like my workaholism, um, I mean, really just the bottom fell out. It was very, very, very, very scary. It was very touch and go. Um, and I was forced to take like medical leave of absence, and I just, I mean, I could not work. I could not perform. And that was what triggered me to start building standard operating procedures and teams and delegating. And I describe this like what you described, just a little bit differently. I use the Pareto principle, principle out of context frequently. So this particular application is if I spend at least 80% of my time doing the things that only I can do that are highest value, highest and best value, like to the business, to my personal life, to my relationships, Everything else gets delegated. And then when someone— you've trained someone up to do something just 80% as well as you can do it, you have to hand that task off. And so that's kind of like the framework I like. I like the quadrant as well. So I was forced to get out of this mindset, and that was very, very, very difficult. That was the hardest time of my life for sure. It was really, really awful and dark. But now I'm living into that 80/20 rule. Helped— I've helped scale many, many businesses. And this is all based on the practice of like repeated documented systems that can be delegated so that everyone is used to put to their highest and best use in service of these goals. And so it's kind of like a more complex version of what we're talking about with like individual goal setting and vision casting and stuff like that. So yeah, I'm really big on asking for help and getting help, and there's no way that I would be where I am today if I did not have the help and support of the teams that I have led before and that I'm leading right now. There's just no way. There's no way. I would just die. And so I'm super glad you said that. Thank you for bringing that up. I know we need to wrap. And so I do just want to reiterate real quickly again that how women treat each other and how we talk to ourselves have a profound impact on how we view ourselves, how we act, and in turn, again, like how we treat other women. And another reminder, like the conversation today specifically about what women can do to promote equity. Obviously, there is a major shared responsibility on what men need to do to improve opportunity and equity for women. But yeah, we're just talking about what women can do. So any like parting shot on that note, Micah, with regard to like any other practical advice?

Yeah, I'm just— I love that topic and, like, and how you wrap that up, because the power that we have to give each other support and feedback is everything. And I'm so proud of that norm that I created in the community.

Yeah.

Because we all thrive on that. When I have— and there are women from across the world now who are in Content Creation Lab, and we meet live. And I do encourage live because we can give each other real-time feedback. Because it does take a village, and they say that about motherhood and, you know, raising a child. But it also takes a village to raise a business. And, and that's why I like so much of my work has centered around the community of women business owners, because we shouldn't be doing it alone, and we have the power to give each other like the energy and the validation we need. to succeed. And one of the most meaningful examples of this is from, from actually from our women's circle in Missoula where I live. And one of the gals said between our meetings, she said she was going through a really hard time personally, and she kept encountering people who invalidated what she was going through, and they kind of gaslit her about her situation, and she felt really isolated. And she said, She kept hearing in her head the voices of the women from our women's circle, other women business owners, like telling her what, what you're going through is real and you're not alone. And she knew she would have a place to come talk about that. And like, this is— that's why to me, it's the spaces like that, like this, where you and I are talking, are sacred because For me, if that's all I could ever like accomplish in this lifetime, that would be enough for me. That's my why, is to reveal the unseen so women can speak their truths. That's why I'm writing a book. That's why I do Women's Circle. That's why I work with women entrepreneurs, because we need a place where we know we're gonna be seen and heard. And nothing bad happens when women make more money, but we also like We were so much more powerful together.

Oh, amen. Wow, I wish we had a whole entire other hour to go, but I just want to be clear here. There is such an incredibly bright future to be had where gender equity is recognized both at home and in the workplace, and each and every one of us has a responsibility to bring that to bear. And I feel like it's Very valuable to have practical instructions and examples, if you will, on what you as an individual can do. Like, I hate having, you know, these discussions in theory that don't take it down to, okay, well, that was cute. Like, what the hell do I actually do about it? So I hope this— that you found this practical. And please don't fall into the trap that your actions as an individual don't matter or aren't going to be impactful. They absolutely are. The big shift happens when we have millions and eventually billions of women all rowing in the same direction toward equity. But big shifts start on the individual and the community level, like we talked about at the beginning of this show. It starts with you. It starts with me. We all have responsibility. Nobody gets a ticket out of this, right? If we want to make the change, we've all got to be in on it. And to bring this conversation like just totally 100% full circle, women having money in their hands means that women can support, again, politicians and therefore policy change that bring about equity on a macro scale within And I firmly believe that you— if we can make— we're making changes on both the individual level and the policy level, the micro will meet the macro again. And that's where the big shift is going to occur. And as women, like, we hold the power within ourselves and within our communities to bring this about. We just need the playbook and a commitment from each of us. We all undoubtedly have a list of behaviors that need to be unlearned and new habits established. But considering the track record of all the women, all that women have done throughout history, like, I think we've got this. We can make this happen. Micah, any last words? And where can our listeners find you online?

Thank you for having me here to have this conversation. And you can find me on Instagram @micahlarson. That's a great place also to see all of our upcoming free trainings for women creatives and service providers. I do one at least once a month. The next one is on February 6th. It is a free Instagram audit for women creatives and service providers.

Mm-hmm.

And I do a lot of free trainings and they are, like you said, super actionable because I want you to always leave working with me knowing here's the exact step that I need to take next to actually see measurable results in my bank account, in my business. And so my core values are no gaslighting, no BS. We're actionable, practical, and it's not just another sales pitch. Like, you are there to learn and you're gonna walk away with something that you can use. And community over competition. So I think I'm most well known now for the Content Creation Lab, and that's our monthly membership. And we meet 3 times a month at least. We have quarterly Instagram audits privately there too, but we have tutorials, work sessions, office hours. And the whole point there is it's community-driven and we— it's your, like you said, you have the power, you just need the playbook. And that is a monthly playbook for how you drive engagement, sales, and traffic.

Hmm. I like that. Like power plus playbook equals something. Results, success. Yeah. Okay. We need a framework.

Yeah. Yeah. We need a framework.

Awesome. Thank you so much. Uh, your trainings are fully on point and we'll definitely make sure that all that information is linked up in the show notes. But otherwise, time is precious. Thank you for sharing yours with us. Level Up Creators exists to amplify the voice, reach, and impact of creators making a positive difference in the world with your expertise as our focus, our team of strategists, marketers, sales pros, product developers, administrators, and tech gurus handle the heavy lifting of building and optimizing a profitable business that will transform your life for good. Subscribe to the show and check out welevelupcreators.com to sign up for our newsletter where we share weekly actionable business tips for creators just like you. See you next time on the Level Up Creators Podcast.