097. How to Make It Safe for Yourself to Go Bigger in Your Business

Welcome. I am marketing expert and business coach Melissa Kellogg Lueck. And this is the Doing Business Like a Woman podcast where we are exploring and teaching you how women are reinventing the way business is done and money is made to help you create greater impact and financial freedom one business at a time. Well, hello. Hello ladies. How's it going? I hope you're having a fabulous day where you are. I am doing pretty well. It's a Friday as I'm recording this and I'm just kind of winding down the week but I wanted to make sure I get this podcast recorded for you. And my kiddos are off school today, so it's kind of a looser schedule which I like. I'm dressed casual. I feel comfortable. It's a good day. How's your day going? I hope it's going well. I hope your month is going well. Your Q4. I want you to remember that it is never too late to finish this year strong. And I've been thinking a lot about that this week in my own business and it's been fun to really realize, you know, there's still plenty of time left in this year. So don't give up. Don't give up on yourself, don't give up on your business. Keep it going and kind of fits in with what I'm talking about today. Today I want to continue our theme around planning and goal setting and thinking about who you are being and strategic planning. And today I want to talk about how to make it safe to make big plans. Make make it safe for yourself to go bigger in your business. And I know on episode 1 95, which was two episodes ago, I totally nerded out on you on this theme for the month about the power of planning and acting from our future. And I hope it was valuable to you. I re relistened to it and I know it was a lot in the episode, it was a short episode. But I hope the message really came across that when you harness that motivation from your future, you will have such a much easier time getting done what you want to get done. Because I know we all struggle at some point in time with learning and perfecting and knowing what we need to do and the actual doing of it and practicing what I'm going to be teaching in this entire month of November will really help you. It's going to change so much. It's going to change everything for you if you really take it all in. But you will get out of that learning and planning mode and into doing and making money mode. What a Great way to end the year and start a new year, right? All right, so if you're like me and you have been frustrated by knowing what you need to do and not doing it over and over, this podcast episode and episode 95 to start is for you. So this podcast, this time around, I'm going to be much more practical and tactical because what I was thinking after re listening to episode 95 was, okay, I've got all this great information, but I need to know, what do I do with it? What do I do next? So this podcast and the following ones is going to answer that question. So. So to begin changing how we behave in the future, we first need to reframe our past stories to those that serve us. And our future is what motivates us. But our past can be what holds us back or prevents us from finding hope for our future. And if we have no hope that our future is going to be better than or that we're, we will be able to achieve our goals in the future, if we have no hope that that's possible for us, then you know, the, the proverbs say, the people without hope, the people perish. So, you know, we're kind of dead in the water if we don't have hope that we can make our goals and achieve our goals in the future. So at any moment, and this is so cool to think about, right? At any moment, right now, you are your past self, you are your present self, and you are your future self. So at any moment, we are our past, present and future selves coming together. They're not linear. They are all in convergence at all times. It's kind of mind blowing, right? It's kind of. Yeah, it's kind of a meta thing to think. But stick with me, you can do this. So the relationship that you have with your past self will color the relationships that you have with your present self and your future self. And so this is really what I want to dive in today is how is your relationship with your past self? Right. So we tend to beat ourselves up for decisions we've made or mistakes we've made or actions we've taken in the past. And if we're critical and mean and angry at our past self, it's going to be so much harder to believe that there's any hope for her in the future. And so this might be coloring and you might notice, just take a moment and just notice how that might be possible for you right now. Right. And what are you beating yourself up for having done in the past? So it's important to retell the stories that we criticize ourselves selves for the most. And when you retell or reframe these stories to those to make them stories that serve you and serve your growth, then you move from avoidance decision making, which can really mess things up for your future self. You move from avoidance decision making because you don't, you know, if you're stuck in criticizing and feeling like I can't make good decisions, look at how, look at what's happened in my past, look at what I've done in the past, and you don't have any confidence in your decision making. For example, then believing that you can make good decisions in the future is going to be really hard. Right? So we want to repair that relationship we have with our past self. And this is not like denying what the true facts are. This is actually taking the true facts, what. What is the truth of the situation, and then deciding what we're going to think on purpose about that situation in a way that serves us and serves our future. Right? So it's also. I know I said this before, but I want to remind you that tearing down your past self will never make you better in the present or the future. So making peace with her and lovingly reframing decisions or actions that you've taken in the past will serve you for your future. Okay? So it's super important that we're able to distinguish between the facts and then the stories we tell about the facts and the stories we tell and the meaning that we give. That is where the work is. Right? Okay. So for example, so that's what we're going to be working on today is reframing, retelling these stories that we've been holding on and criticizing our past self about. So for, for example, a story that I often hear and that I myself have experienced, a story I often hear is that I bought into a program thinking it was going to be the one thing that changed everything for me, and it ended up not being that. And I spent lots of money, I trusted this person, and I didn't get the results I wanted. And now I can't trust others. And, and I don't buy programs because I don't want to get ripped off again. Does anybody. Can you relate to that at all? Or any, anything that has happened in, in your past that's along those same lines, Right? So think about how that might relate to you. Okay, so that might be the story that I'm telling myself or I've been telling myself for years. Right. So this is how you're going to reframe them. Reframe the story. So number one, you're going to take the true facts of the story. So in this instance, the true fact is I bought into a program, I didn't create the result I wanted. Right? That's just the truth of the matter that anybody would agree with that you could take that into a court of law and that would be the true facts. Right? So then there's all the stories that go along with that. Right? So what did I make it mean? Right. What did you make that mean? That I made it mean I make bad decisions, I can't trust others, and programs are a big ripoff and I won't buy them again. Can you see that? That's what I made it mean. But that doesn't serve me. It doesn't serve you when we have these overly critical, negative stories around things that happened. So how could you retell the story truthfully? I'm not suggesting that you create some airy fairy lie to yourself, but truthfully, in a way that serves you. Sometimes it helps me to think about how did this happen for me rather than to me or how would love tell the story from a loving filter on the story. Right. For me, when I retell, it often looks like something like this. Like I made the best decision with the information and the experience I had at the time. Right? And that is 100% true. I made the best decision with the information and the experience I had at the time. That's truthful. And I never meant for it to turn out the way it did. But man, did I learn some important lessons. Right? So that is an example of how you can reframe a story. But when you have your own back like this and create a more supportive, understanding relationship with your past self, then you become freer to hope for a better future. To know that you learned. You can see how you keep getting better. You can see how this experience was actually a gain and not just a failure. You can see the learning and improving and that hope begins to spring forth. And when you're, when you have hope that you, you can learn and get better. And no matter what you know how you've messed up in the past, when you have that hope, it's a great motivator for your future and from the future, Right? So it also allows you to set a precedent for your future self that you will always have your own back. So even when you fail or things didn't turn out like you wanted them to, creating this creates safety for yourself. So, yes, you make a great decision. You make the best decision that you can at the time with the information you have, you move forward, you do the thing, and it doesn't turn out the way you wanted. You know, you're going to be okay because you've created safety for yourself, and it's a great way to go bigger. So if you always know that you're committed to reframing your stories for good and not for destroying yourself. Right. Then you know that it's okay to experiment. It's okay if things don't go the way that you thought they would. It's okay to move forward imperfectly. This is how we create safety for ourselves, by reframing these stories and by deciding that in the future we are going to have our own backs and create that safety and by having and repairing that relationship with our past self. By letting her know that it's okay that it didn't turn out the way we thought it would, that it's okay that we know that she meant the best. She was making the best decision with the information that she had. She was doing the best that she could. Right? And I think it's fair that we can all believe that about ourselves, that whatever failures or when things didn't go wrong go the way we wanted them to in the past. That was not our intention. Right. Our intention was for things to go well and be successful. But at the same time, we're experimenting, we're trying, we're learning, we're growing. And it's impossible for everything to be a success. There's always going to be failures, and our successes are always built on a mountain of failures. That is the learning. So we're not failing, we're learning. Right? And so we can offer that grace and that compassion to our past self and repair that relationship with her. And when we do that, it helps us create safety for ourselves to go bigger because we know we always have our own back. We're always safe. Right? And no matter what happens, we're going to figure it out because we've figured it out in the past. Right? So this work benefits you right now and in the future going forward. Right. But it will benefit you right now because it instantly changes how your mind and body react to trying new things, new strategies, and experimenting with new ways of marketing. For example, it's easier. You make it easier for yourself to step. Step out of your comfort zone because you know that no matter what the result is, no matter what happens, you're going to give it your best, you're going to do your best and you learn from it no matter what happens. Right? And so the flavor of everything that you do in your business, your marketing, your leadership, your communication, the flow flavor of all that is much more fun and less filled with pressure. Like, oh my gosh, this one thing has to be the thing or we're going down in flames. And you know I'm going to feel terrible about it. Right? So I hope you can see that this really is such an amazing first step. So I just encourage you to consider this this weekend. I would love to hear from you. Feel free to reach out to me on social or if you're on my email list and you get my email reply and let me know how this work is going for you. But making peace with your past, with your past self and really having this compassion and grace for her that she has always been doing her best and she's gotten you to where you are now. Right? So she's amazing. And that sort of thinking is going to help you to really be able to harness what I'm going to teach you next week, which is I just put it down here. Where did I put it? In my notes. But really in the next episode I want to talk about how to discover what you most want and commit to it. Because commitment is the secret to all of this work, in behaving from our future because we can make a plan and then we commit to it from our future. And that helps us to go from this planning and learning mode to actually the doing mode. Right. It really is the glue that bridges that gap. So that's going to be our next step is, is discovering what you most want. Because I think oftentimes as women we don't ask ourselves and we don't know what we most want. So it's such a fun adventure and of discovery of what do I most want and sitting down and just thinking about that. So. But in the meantime, I want you to really think about reframing and what are those stories? Maybe it's just a couple. I would think of maybe three big stories that you criticize yourself, your past self for the most and reframe those. And how could you use the filter of love to reframe that story and think about that story for yourself? So. So let me know how that's going for you and I will see you next time. Bye ladies.

I can't believe I'm saying this, but we are nearing our 100th episode.

Woohoo.

I would love to hear from you. In celebration of our 100th episode, I am wondering wondering if you would share with me a question you would love.

To ask me or a topic you'd.

Love to hear me cover on the podcast. And I'd love to hear how this podcast has impacted or served you over the last two years and 100 episodes.

So I have a really cool new.

App that I'm trying. It's called Speak Pipe. And so there's a link to Speak Pipe in the episode description, description and show notes that you can just click on and it'll take you to Speak Pipe and you can ask a question or suggest a topic that you'd love to hear me cover on the podcast and share with us how this podcast.

Has impacted or served you.

So you can visit www.speakpipe.com forward/doing business like a Woman podcast and record your voice message and we may even feature you on the podcast.

Yay. Thank you.