Why Your Business Growth Feels STUCK (& What to Do About It)

All right, everyone. Welcome to Reality Check. You are here because you signed up for this free workshop and are— I appreciate those of you that are attending the live session. You're in the right place. If you are feeling like you're doing everything right, but still aren't making the progress you want. We've been talking a lot about this in the Solopreneur Success Circle community calls. Mid-February is halfway through our first quarter of the new year. A lot of us spent some time together setting our first quarter objectives and our, in our plan for how we were going to accomplish those. A lot of us are, have become stuck or are spinning our wheels or maybe feeling like we lost our way. So what we're gonna do today is we're going to spend some time talking about what I am calling the hidden barrier between you and solopreneur success. And I think for those of you that have been following my stuff or have, have been with me for a while, the hidden barrier is not gonna be any great surprise. But if you want to take a second just to check in And if you open up this little speech bubble at the bottom of the screen where it says chat, you can drop an emoji, a fire emoji, or you can just put in a ready, or you can put in the number 1 if you feel like you're ready to take an honest look at what is holding you back from making the kind of progress that you would like to make. And just to check in with everybody, see if we're all on the same page and ready to go. We have some 1s, we have some yeses. We have yeses and ones. That's fantastic. So everybody's on board. That's fantastic. And now if you wouldn't mind also quickly just put in if you have an idea of what is holding you back right now, keeping you from making the kind of progress you would like with your— it can be your quarterly objective, it could be an overall business priority of the moment. But what is it that is— that is— that you feel is holding you back now? Rabbit trails. Fear, perfectionism, common one also. These are great. Imposter syndrome or fear, very good. Finding connection, awesome. All right, well, I appreciate everybody's generosity and vulnerability in sharing these. Yes, looks like many of us are in the same boat. And just, you know, so that no one feels about the share here, you know, these are, these are everything that has been shared are amongst the most common things that I see with the work that I do with clients, but And for those of you in the Solopreneur Success Circle community, these are things that we have talked about and continue to talk about over and over and over again, many, many times. Because guess what? We're all human beings and these are human responses to human situations. So what I'm going to do now is, again, those of you that have been with me before know my style. I'm going to share my screen. I'm going to walk you through an outline that I put together. I'm going to do my best to get us through the public presentation here in about 30, 45 minutes, and then we'll have time for the Solopreneur Success Circle members to participate in Q&A. And I think what we're going to find is that the Q&A and implementation session is going to be where the real value is here, because I think once we get to the punchline, you're going to find that there's no big surprise as to what it is that might be holding you back. So with that, let's go ahead and I will share my screen. Okay. So the first thing that we want to do is kind of identify our stuck point. Why is it that we're stuck? What is it is it that is frequently the main cause of keeping a solopreneur feeling like they are trapped or stuck? And one of those things is what I call the illusion of progress. As solopreneurs, we have at some point defined that there is this thing that we can do that is maybe— I like to call it the difference that only we can make in the way that only we can make it. And we've decided that it would be a brilliant idea to build a business around this. Now, this might be a side hustle type of thing that you're doing alongside of another career or another job, or maybe it's something that you're doing alongside your duties as a, as a parent or as a student or what have you. And what ends up happening is that you, you start your business because you know that there's this talent that you have, this thing that you're really good at, and that it feels like a sound business idea to build, or sounds like a great idea to build this business around it. And then you get into the business stuff, right? Now it's marketing and it's sales and it's administration, it's, it's fulfillment and dealing with customer or client questions and so forth. And suddenly you find that the business that you started your endeavor around is something that you spend very little time in. You spend most of your time in the marketing, in the sales, in the fulfillment, in the customer service type of thing. And so What we do is we start to look for all the ways that we can build a business and we start looking to the gurus and the digital marketers. We can't help but look to the gurus and digital marketers because they are everywhere, especially if you spend any time on social media. So we're looking for courses or we're watching YouTube videos or we're looking for book recommendations or reading books, maybe joining some sort of mastermind, always on the lookout for what's that missing piece. In my business? What's the tool that I'm missing? What's the tactic that I'm missing? What's the strategy that, that I need to adopt in order to make my business succeed in the way that I know that it can because I'm so good at what I do? And so you end up doing a lot of things, working really, really hard, and that productivity feels like progress. And that's why I call it the illusion of of progress. Those of you that— Penny is one. I think Jackie, you and I were in some workshops together back in the Akimbo days, back way back in altMBA 6. My peers gave me the nickname Productivity Man. I don't know if they meant it kindly or not, but it was based on the fact that I could do— like, clearly I was doing a lot of things, lots of blog posts, lots of broadcasts, lots of offers, lots of workshops and trainings and all sorts of things. And so it always appeared— wrote several books— that I was always churning out content. I was highly productive. But over the course of the first 5 years of my business, I— although I was very productive, I wasn't making any real progress in terms of a business that brought in a level of revenue that could sustain me and my family in the way that I had back when I was a professional musician or even in the time I spent as an akimbo head coach. So the illusion of progress is something that's really dangerous, right? We're doing a lot of things, but we're not necessarily getting any closer to our dream, our— the solopreneur dream of building a business that funds and fits around our ideal lifestyle. So what I want you to consider here is asking yourself, what do you think is holding you back? Is it not enough time? Is it not enough money to invest in the things that you think you need? Is it that you don't have an effective strategy? Do you feel like there's some sort of tactical element that you're missing? Um, or is there, you know, some sort of specific tool that you need to acquire or that you're unaware of, but know that there is something out there that can fill this need. And so if you want to open up that chat bubble again, if it's any of those things, that you think is kind of the source of your being stuck or held back. I would love to hear what you have to say. So Jennifer says tactics, mindset, tools, not analyzing my list and actually reaching out to leads. And that's based on some work that we've done together. Strategies is what Penny says. So these are, you know, this is great because this is again, very, very common for any of these things to be seen as like we're it always feels like we just need to, we need to fix something that's not quite working as optimally as we would like, or that we must just be missing one thing, which is why we go into addition mode. Like, everything is, everything, I'm doing everything I'm supposed to do. I must be missing an Instagram strategy or a YouTube channel, or maybe I need a podcast, or maybe I should listen to the guru that tells me I need to write a book. Maybe I need to create an online course. And so You know, we're always in search for this. I call it the missing piece. But what if I told you that none of those things is actually your biggest constraint? That is where we get into what I call the 3 sins of solopreneurship. So those of you that have purchased the— or now you can get a free copy of the Close the Gap Handbook. This is my manual for defining the 3 things that have to be done right enough for you to build a business that is both fulfilling, but also funds and fits your ideal lifestyle. And what I have found is that these 3 sins, these come from Dr. Jeff Spencer, who is a partner in the Arena Catalyst program. For those that don't know Dr. Jeff Spencer, he is, he is a performance coach. He has been the performance coach for Lance Armstrong and the American Tour de France team. He has been Tiger Woods's performance coach. He has been U2's performance coach. I mean, he is a very well-known and highly respected performance coach, and he says that the three sins are dull, distracted, or delusional. Dull— just putting it into a solopreneur context— we wake up every day and do exactly what we did yesterday without any evidence or experience or data logic or reasoning that it's working. But we just wake up every morning, open up, answer the emails, get— create content for social media, surf around for some digital marketer guru's latest, uh, you know, gimmick or tactic or tool or what have you. So dullness is something that we're all very, very prone to as solopreneurs. Distracted is— we all experience this if you, if you are on social media and you have drunk the Kool-Aid that you have to have social— that social media is how you're going to get new prospects and new leads. But then, of course, you know, in addition to all the time that it takes to post content on social media, you find yourself going down the rabbit holes of other people's content, or listening to the gurus and digital marketers, or maybe you've bought into some sort of direct messaging strategy on Facebook or LinkedIn, and you're, and you're spending time on social media, having inane conversations with people that will probably never buy anything from you. Or then, then there's just delusional. And again, I'm using words that, you know, they may be triggering, but I, I'm sharing these, um, in the full knowledge that I am as guilty, uh, as anybody into falling into all three of these sins. And my guess is most of you all have experienced, um, all or some of these three. And, you know, delusional is just this idea that, you know, somehow there's just something missing that we— and we just need to find what it is. Or maybe if we just worked a little harder or a little longer at any of these things that aren't working, maybe they'll start to work then. So this idea of working harder instead of smarter is part of this delusion that a lot of solopreneurs fit into. So now open up that chat bubble. And which of these 3 do you find yourself most prone to? If it's dull, put a D in the chat. If it's distracted, put a D in the chat. If it's delusional, put a D in the chat. And I'm being somewhat facetious here, but you all get it because it doesn't matter which D you put in. We're all prone to all 3 at any given time on any given day. And most of the time, it's all 3 at some point every single day, many times 2 or 3 of them at the same time. So appreciate you all playing along with that. So that brings us to step 2. What is this the real constraint? What I want to do here is just recognize that this whole idea of chasing after more, chasing after a new tool, strategy, tactic, listening to a new guru, buying a new book, watching some more YouTube videos, taking another course, whatever it is that we are chasing more in order to fulfill our desire, our need, our clinging to a sense of certainty, and that instead What we need to do is let go of all of these cognitive biases, distortions, self-limiting beliefs, and narrative fallacies that are keeping us stuck. And instead, what we need to recognize is that if we can abandon this, this need for certainty and our attachment to the false certainties that we have and embrace a posture of greater curiosity and also being a little bit more objective about assessing our situation, ourselves, our abilities, uh, and, and our systems, that we can actually get closer to identifying the real problem. So many of you have heard me share this quote from Virginia Satir. She is a, a family psychologist. She especially specializes in juvenile psychology, working with teens and preteens. But she has this great quote that people prefer the certainty to misery over the misery of uncertainty, meaning that we cling to the, to the things and the feelings that we have that keep us feeling stuck that keep us humble and hiding and not leaning into the edges of our understanding and ability and growing and developing and becoming the kind of person that can, um, be— become a little bit more curious and become a little bit more objective. Because we are comfortable with our current status quo. This is just, again, a fundamental human thing, is to go with what we know, even if it's not serving our mental health or our happiness, that we prefer to stay miserable because we know what to do where we are. Uh, if any of you have ever been in an unhealthy relationship or know someone that has, you've seen this dynamic. Rather than dump someone that is clearly not good for us, not— and instead of ending an unhealthy relationship, we go with the devil we know. We know what to do with the abusive partner or the person that gaslights us all the time or any of those things because we know what to expect. We know how to handle it. We know what it feels like to be there, and that feels safer than ending a relationship and pursuing healthier relationships that are going to promote our happiness. So the analogy that I shared here is, if you're a trapeze artist and you're not swinging from ring to ring, if you're not letting go of one— one swing to grab onto the next one, you're actually not a trapeze artist. You're some— somebody just hanging from a rope. And it can feel safe to just hang on to the rope that you're on as opposed to swinging for the next bar and grabbing on to what's next. But that's, that's the kind of transformational inflection point that we're all at. We have to be willing to let go of the tools, tactics, strategy, mindsets, behaviors, uh, beliefs that are keeping us stuck where we are and start to create, uh, or support or practice the behaviors that will help us develop the mindset that will help us make real progress towards our solopreneur objectives, our pro— and achieve our priorities. So the, the reframe here is, what if uncertainty wasn't something to fear but something to harness, right? And so at the beginning of this workshop, some of you talked about imposter syndrome and fear, um, over, uh, overthinking, overworking, perfectionism. I think of these as all different faces of the same thing, which is fear. Fear might be tied to feelings of regret about things that we've done in the past that haven't worked out, or think people that have done us wrong, or situations, you know, mistakes that we've made. Fear might manifest as anxiety about the unknown, about the future, or fear might just be the angst and the overwhelm of the moment we're in. There's, you know, we don't know what to do, there's too many choices, whatever it is. I always think of fear as I break it down to those 3 things: regret, fear of the past; anxiety, fear about the future; angst, fear about everything that's going on right now. And the reframe that I want to suggest to you all is that if you are feeling any of these things— and again, you all expressed some version of this at the beginning— what if instead of the excuse that you're using for staying humble and hiding and stuck where you are, what if that was actually a compass that was pointing, that was letting you know that you're pointing in a direction worth exploring. And that's the way that I, I think about fear. Fear only comes up, especially when it comes up in, in terms of anxiety, which may be perfectionism or imposter syndrome or any of those things, um, because we are having to— we're dealing with uncertainty, yes, but we're also dealing with possibility. Like, holy cow, if I head in that direction, maybe I will succeed. Maybe I will fulfill my potential. Maybe there is a possibility that things will be better for me, or at the very least, I'll learn more about myself and what I'm capable of and earn the courage to take the next step beyond that. And that's something that can be incredibly frightening for us. But that's the gift. It's a signal.

Fear—

when you're trying to decide what to watch at night, you don't have a lot of anxiety and fear. Your imposter doesn't come in and say, oh, you're not— who are you to be worthy of watching the next show on Netflix or what have you, right? So fear is something that only happens when there are stakes worth playing for is the way that I would encourage you to think about it. Which brings us to step 3, which I think of as one of the solutions and the solution that I use most frequently with members of the Solopreneur Success Circle community and also with my clients, right? The Close the Gap framework. And for those of you that haven't seen the book or looked at the book, if you want a copy, I'll send you a way that you can download a free digital copy of the book. It's a framework that has worked for hundreds of clients. And I don't even know how many people have read it and used it to get themselves unstuck and stepping into possibility and closing the gap between where they are and where they want to be. And so this is just a structured solution. To eliminating false beliefs, overcoming your cognitive biases and distortions, um, setting achievable goals and developing strategies, uh, a plan for how you're going to accomplish it. And it basically boils down to these 3 steps. The first is clarifying direction. Clarifying direction, not doing a lot of things in the hope that the more things you do, the more progress you make, and not going faster. Because doing more things will not get you closer. Talk about that again in a second with the second step about crafting your path. Um, but going faster will also not help you close the gap because you can go fast in circles. A lot of you probably feel like that you're going really fast in circles right now. You can go really fast backwards and it will feel good because the wind is in your hair because you're going fast. You just don't understand that you're going in reverse. Uh, you can be going really fast in a wrong direction. That can be an extremely wrong direction or a slightly wrong direction. Uh, but it, whether you're 1 degree off or 50 degrees off, it still feels like you're miles away from where you want to be. Direction requires a vector. You need to know where you're heading, a specific destination, and you need to know where you're starting and what you're starting with. You have to have two points to create velocity, speed in a direction. To achieve directionality, you need to know, and I've shared this many times, but I'll share it again. As solopreneurs, as freelancers, as bootstrappers, as entrepreneurs, whatever, setting goals, aims, aspirations is not the hard part. Most of us probably have enough clarity about what the businesses that we're building, or, you know, what, what that ideal lifestyle that we want to be living, that our business funds and fits around. What, in my experience, is we are much worse when it comes to truly identifying where we are and what we're starting with. And so you need to have both of those things defined. And so the, the handbook goes through a bunch of processes that will help you identify and clarify both. Crafting your path. The, the, the key here is that number one, in order to get from where you are to where you want to be, assuming that you have those things clearly enough defined— they will never be ultimately or absolutely defined, they will, they are subject to change, um, and that's an entirely different discussion— but once you have enough clarity, the way that you will get more clear and more confident in your ability to close the gap is if you can define the 2 or 3 things that have to go right to get you from where you are to where you want to be. And when I say 2 or 3 things, I'm talking about reasoning from first principles. What has to happen? What are the 2 or 3 things that have to happen for me to get from where I am to where I want to be? It will almost— in my experience, I've never had anybody that has truly identified more than 3. If you're a solopreneur, basically all you need to succeed is you need to have an irresistible offer, an eager audience, and some sort of marketing sales strategy to put that offer in front of the, that audience. You need those 3 things. Again, most of us probably have some clarity about the offer. Most of us have some clarity about the audience. What's hanging us up is, um, the, the marketing and the sales strategy is way over bloated. We're doing way too many things, and what we need to do is clear the cruft, get rid of all the things that are unnecessary, and concentrate on the one or two things that we need to do, leveraging the resources and assets that we already have. That's the other part about crafting your path, is it doesn't require that you take a new course or join a new coaching program or a mastermind or start a new marketing channel. If you have been in business for any amount of time, you've already proven that you can sell a thing. You've already demonstrated that you can get a result. And so it's identifying— we talk about this quite a bit in the community— like, look in the rearview mirror. Mirror. What worked in the past? Do more of that. Optimize what's already worked. And you will get there where you want to get much, much faster than it— than you will if you just keep adding more things to your to-do list. And that's also how, how we arrive at collapsing time to target. If we can identify the 2 or 3 things that need to happen for us to achieve our business objectives, whether that's a revenue goal or filling a program or whatever it is. Collapsing time to target comes down to making sure that we don't add anything to a system that's already working and that we raise the floor, improve the efficiency and effectiveness of whatever component is performing the least effective and efficiently. Raising the floor on the thing that— and again, defying human programming, which is I should push on the ceiling and try to improve the thing that's already working best. So, you know, for anybody that's ever participated in athletics, if you've ever had, you know, done a personal best, you know, when I was a runner in my 40s and 50s and performing in 5Ks and 10Ks, you know, every time I got a personal best, I was like, oh, I've broken a plateau, and now I'm gonna, you know, I'll beat it again next time. And of course, I would just injure myself trying to beat something that I had never done before. I finally did it, and I just assumed that that was, um, the new minimum that I was capable of. And then I would blow myself up or burn myself out trying to beat my personal best. Much, much better to just, like, beat your worst time ever, every single time, and you will raise the floor on your system, and you will increase your velocity. You will increase your improvement over time. So again, the, the big takeaway here is why most of us are failing is that we are focused on tools, tactics, and strategy, and we are not focused on the principles. We only need 3 things to go right enough for us to accomplish our lifestyle goals, uh, through our business. Um, so instead of working harder, instead of doing more, we need to do less and we need to do less better. And, um, instead of working harder, we need to learn— work smarter. So you can ask yourself at this point, which of these things do you feel you need to work on right now? I would suggest that they should be done in order. If you don't know exactly where you're starting from and what you're starting with, or exactly where you're heading, get your vector set first. That's the first thing. If you have directionality, then you need to know what are the 2 or 3 things that have to go right. And you need to do an audit of all the things that you're doing because you're gonna have to get rid of some of those things. And if you already have your path crafted and your directionality, established, then you can start to work on optimizing your time to target. But you need to make sure that you are clear enough on all of those things, um, in, in that order, right? I often say being a solopreneur, being a successful solopreneur is mostly about doing the right things at the right time in the right order. So that's, that would be my suggested order. All right, so the shift that we're searching for here, and again, I write about this in the book, is the shift from falling prey to the 3 sins of solopreneurship to cultivating the 3 virtues of solopreneurship. And so this is where I think it was Jennifer shared, you know, that mindset was kind of an issue. My assertion is that, you know, and apologies for anybody that's a mindset coach. I'm not a big believer in mindset coaching, and I'm not a big believer in mindset development. I have never in my life been able to accomplish something after I got my mindset right. What I have found is that when I change my behavior, my mindset automatically follows. So You know, my assertion is mindset doesn't precede action or posture. Posture informs mindset. If you build better habits, then you will build a better mindset as a side effect of building better habits. By doing the thing, you become the thing, is my assertion. So the key mindset thing here is that it's not just about what you think, it's about what you do. It's about who you are becoming. And becoming is a verb. It's an action. It's a daily discipline of taking a small step into possibility every single day. Um, to quote my favorite philosopher from Frozen 2, to wake up every day and just do the next right thing. If you can do that every single day and you dedicate yourself and commit to doing that on a daily basis, you will make progress. You will be changing your behavior. You will be improving your mindset, and you will Increase the velocity, um, to, to target, uh, by becoming the thing, by doing the thing. So the 3 virtues of solopreneurship are self-awareness, right? Being able to actually objectively see and assess and audit your daily activities, your cognitive biases and distortions, uh, and be able— being able to see the actual restraints as opposed to the ones that, you know, we, we invent through narrative fallacies. Then we can get ready for self-efficacy, our ability to trust ourselves and trust in our ability to figure things out as we do them, to make, to be more decisive and to take intentional action and become the kind of person that can set achievable priorities and figure out the path to achieve them. And then all of this will result in self-actualization. We will develop our potential by stepping into possibility, uh, every day that we can learn to play the game of life on our terms instead of the terms that we inherited through our human programming or institutionalized educational and occupational conditioning. And then this idea— so at the end of every single Akimbo workshop during the commencement, my parting words were, hey, congratulations, you just crossed the finish line. The workshop is over. Oops, that finish line was actually a thinly disguised starting line. You just learned a bunch of things that now you have to take out and put, you know, put to work in the world, um, become the person, the kind of person that gets closer to what they want by changing your behavior, by applying this knowledge to what you're doing. So, um, this idea, you know, I think that purpose is an emergent property that, you know, what we are meant to do, supposed to do, what destiny is calling us to do, however you want to frame it. What life is calling you to, what your sacred duty is. However you frame your purpose, that is something that emerges by stepping into possibility every single day. It's not something that's inside you that you have to spend a lot of time meditating on and excavating so that you can do something with it. And it's not some— something out there in the world, out in the wilderness, that you have to hunt down and find before you can do something with it. You will become, uh, you will, you will develop purpose and develop purpose by doing the work right in front of you with purpose, by applying yourself purposefully to the work right in front of you, to the relationships right in front of you. Purpose will be cultivated and greater purpose will emerge, that you become the thing by doing the thing. So just, uh, again, you know, where are you at? Are, are you still needing to become a little bit more self-aware as to, you know, what your values are, what your guiding principles are, what your skills are, what your talents are? Do you need to develop that trust in your ability to accomplish the kind of things that you want to accomplish in your business and trust yourself and trust the processes that you developed to accomplish those things, um, or are you, um, accelerating or climbing Maslow's hierarchy of needs and approaching the self-actualization at the top? You've satisfied your existential needs and your psychological needs and your needs around belonging, and now you're just trying to become the best person that you can be, the kind of person that can see and do what needs to be done every single day. And that brings us to the final piece here, which is the solution. And, you know, how are we going to do all this with greater clarity, ease, and velocity? How do you get clear about what you're supposed to do next? How do you get clear about what you need to focus on next? How do you create more ease in your ability to strive for and reach your goals? How do you increase the velocity? And so these, these are, again, emergent qualities. Clarity begets clarity. Confidence begets confidence. One of the things that I frequently will ask clients when we are, you know, in the midst of clarifying direction and crafting our path, when we are looking for collapsing time to target, is just how can it be easier? Because it can always be easier. And it's a way of interrupting our default programming, which is I have to grind harder, I have to hustle faster, I have to do more. You don't. Um, the hardest thing for me in the development of my business is, is as I achieve more and more free time in my day, as I distill things down to the 2 or 3 things that I need to do, um, and have increased the amount of slack and free time and, you know, the reserves of time, attention, money, and effort, is to not try to just fill them up with things that are unnecessary. So, you know, it all, all to say that none of this work ever really ends. You know, the, the, the hardest part in many ways is when you start to get some success in your business, when you have, uh, less anxiety around raising revenue, when you have more time, when you have more revenue, when you have more attention is making sure that you don't, that, that you don't waste it on things that aren't going to serve you, that don't serve your, your health and happiness. So the punchline for what's really holding you back is most of us spend all of our time looking out the window. It's got to be the economy. It's got to be the political situation. It's got to be I live in too small a town, I got to— or I live in too big a town and there's too much competition. I can't work today because it's raining outside. I can't— you know, we're always looking out the window for the reason for why we're not succeeding. The answer to what your biggest constraint is always is the person that looks back at you when you look in the mirror. It always will come down to dealing with your— identifying your narrative fallacies, identifying your cognitive biases that are in action in the moment that you're in, the cognitive distortions, however you want to describe the fear, whether it's perfectionism or imposter syndrome or what have you, whatever your worthiness narrative is. Um, and when it comes down to the things that you need to succeed, you already have them. And I will prove this unequivocally because we have all accomplished impossible things in our lives. You just forgot. I witness it every single day with my grandson. When he was born, number one, he was born 3 months early, so the fact that he's alive is, is a miracle. Um, so he accomplished— he, he, he hung on and clung to and became a thriving human being against all odds. He learned to walk and talk without any instruction. He didn't watch any YouTube videos, he didn't read any books, he didn't take any online courses. He saw the people around him doing this ambulatory thing, and he decided at one point That looks like it would be something that's worth doing. That looks like a great way to get to the cookie jar. That looks like a great way to get to Grandpa's guitar and start banging around on it. And so he started pulling himself up and falling down and took— taking steps and falling down. And, you know, in his pursuit of becoming a walker, he did a lot of failed walking. In your pursuit of building a thriving solopreneur business, you will have many, many failures. Are they failures? Are they, um, do they have to feed a narrative about your worthiness and your value as a human being? Or are they just necessary things that happen on your way to becoming a thriving, prosperous, fulfilled solopreneur? And so there is literally nothing that anybody in this room needs. You possess everything you need. You are sufficient as you are, even as you strive to become more and better at whatever you do. That's just a fact. It has been proven since you were an infant, toddler, preteen, teen, what have you. It's all the things that happen along the way through conditioning and our human programming that are hanging us up. So the antidote, as far as I'm concerned, what I have found over and over and over again is that you need the supportive system. You know, these are the people in your life. We talk about relationships are the biggest force multiplier to your success or failure. As a solopreneur. Force multipliers work in both directions. Force multipliers are things that, um, amplify and accelerate your ability to accomplish the things that you want to accomplish. So the people that you spend the most time with, the people that you pay the most attention to, the people that you surround yourself with, they can be leveraged to propel you forward, or they can be leveraged to propel you backward. Forward or to, to keep you stuck. I'm not suggesting anybody ditch all their loser family and friends that are holding them back, but you do get to decide how much of your time, attention, and energy you dedicate to the people in your life, even the people that you can't necessarily just, you know, shed, um, so that you can up your average. And you can be a little bit more judicious and deliberate about the people that you seek out as mentors, as guides, as as fellow travelers and as peers, as clients, as marketplaces, what have you. So you want to surround yourself with people that won't let you stay stuck, that don't keep you stuck. And you want to leverage the frameworks like the ones that I've shared with you today that will help you stay on track, stay the course, and keep making meaningful progress and maintain your commitment to become the very best in the world at what you do in the way that only you can do it. So this whole idea of stop looking out the window, start looking in the mirror, and without the value judgments, without, uh, you know, without beating yourself up, start looking at yourself and your situation a little bit more objectively. Start looking at the places where you already have leverage and the tools and skills and talents that you already possess so that you can leverage those to define the 2 or 3 things that need to go right to just get you to that next level in your business. So last but not least, if anybody that is not already a member of the community wants to hang out for the Q&A. I'll drop this in the chat now. You can go ahead and opt in to join us now, or you can do that in the future. But for right now— yes, you can still see my screen. If we're about to go into the exclusive Q&A and implementation session, if you are interested in booking some time to get some coaching with me, there's several ways that you can do that. You can just drop an I'm ready, uh, by direct message or email or, or in the comments here. I'd be happy to talk to you about, um, ways that we can work together to help again be a force multiplier to your success. But what I want to leave you all before we go into Q&A is this: your biggest constraint isn't time, money, tactics, tools, or strategy. It's settling for the way things are and the way that you are, because we all are prone to fall into the identity trap and to cling to the status quo, even when these identities and the status quo is not serving us. And that you already possess everything that you need. And the fastest way to get real results is to develop the relationships and execute on the concepts, the principles, and the strategies that will get you exploring the edges of your understanding and ability and stepping into possibility, developing your potential and moving forward. And again, the best way that I know to do that is to find a supportive community and some mentors or guides that can help you. Get there. And with that, we're going to, uh, we're going to move on into the Q&A. So for everyone that's still here, how was, uh, how was that? We did about 45 minutes. Was that good? Was that just okay? Or Scott Perry, what the hell are you talking about? Okay, looks like we got mostly thumbs up. Um, yeah, I, I can, uh, I've got plenty of time, so hang out for as long as you want to hang out. I'm going to hang out until the last person falls to the ground. But questions, implementation help, reflections, comments— how can, how can I help you? Or we can all just sit here and stare at each other. For a little bit before. Go ahead, Bree.

Well, the things I write about are the things I'm struggling with, you know, and I find clarity as I write about them and face things. And that's partly why I write about it and also to help with, you know, people identify with that stuff, like the rabbit trails. Sure, I'm in some of those, but I'm learning how to get out of them. Another piece is What was the other thing? Oh yes, rejection in business. Like, for example, community calls. I'll show up to them and sometimes people show up, but I guess I do feel a little, you know, like when no one shows up. I don't know what the feeling is, but, you know, that needs to go right for me to get closer. You know, people showing up, I can't control whether they show up or not. But then if I don't announce it, it's not going to happen. So I don't know, that needs to go right is one thing.

Yeah. I've shared this before, but as a performing musician, one of the earliest and most important lessons I learned was to be comfortable with and embrace the sound of one fan clapping. Right. And I remember early on in my Akimbo coaching tenure, jumping on a community call with Marie, who had just taken over as kind of the provost of Akimbo Workshops. And, you know, it was like 1 minute before showtime and nobody had come into the waiting room. And I told Marie the story, like, I was like, I'm fine if nobody comes. I mean, I am used to the sound of one fan clapping. Um, and I remember her being like, you mean it's possible that people wouldn't even show up? It's like, you know, anything's possible. So there's, there's the embracing that, you know, and this is— we talk— I've been ranting about this a little bit on Substack because all the gurus and marketers on Substack right now are running notes workshops, right? And so it's all about Like, yeah, how to, how to write a viral note. Like, okay, so like, what does a viral note get you, right? Because if you're, you know, are you chasing impressions or are you trying to make an impact? Because they're, they're not the same. It's actually easier to make an impact with just a few of the right people than it is to have an impact when you're trying to fill a funnel with thousands of people just so that you can get 2 or 3 of them to drip out at the bottom of the funnel, um, and pay you to become clients. So after you've kind of embraced, you know, when you've truly been able to embrace the idea that less is more and that it's not about the impressions, the reach, the scale, but it's more about the impact and, you know, doing the best you can with whatever you have in the moment. I do think that you can engineer things, design things to optimize for the minimum viable number of people that you— like, this community is a perfect example. You know, on most of these workshops, you know, we'll have 20 to 25 people. And there's, you know, there were 6 of you today. And so when I, you know, when I create an event, when I created a community, I, I design and engineer things so that I don't— I set myself up to avoid not having anybody show up. So I didn't start this community. I had a community. Penny was a part of the Difference Maker community that preceded this. I think Jackie might have even been there for a little bit. Um, I kind of kept that going as I got the paid subscriber community going. And when I had enough activity to know that, you know, there's very little chance that nobody will show up, then I moved everything over to the, the paid Substack community, the Soulpreneur Success Circle. Um, and you all have seen me share the pictures. And so like, I am letting— one of the ways I get more people to become members of this community is by sharing clips of the calls or pictures of the calls. Like, it's clear that there's something going on here, right? So creating the FOMO, creating, um, the sense that there is something going on that's worth paying attention to, that's worth exploring. Like, just thinking about that, Brave, might be help. Like, how, how do I— it doesn't take many. Uh, I think it was one of the, one of the recent call calls. Everybody remember the, the, the power of the third dancer? Anybody not know the power of the third dancer?

I don't remember exactly.

So it's something that Seth talks about. I I think in the marketing seminar and in, in the book, um, but initially it was a Derek Sivers, um, uh, TEDx talk where he shows the video of this music festival and there's all these people on a hillside and there's this one kid, you know, and his shorts and no, no shirt that gets up and starts like flailing around. Calling it dancing would be being very generous. I mean, there's— he's moving and there's music playing. Whether you call it dancing or not is a matter of, of, um, speculation. But one person dancing is just some idiot moving or flailing around to the music on the hillside. Then the second dancer comes in. Now everyone, you would think, okay, two dancers, now it's a party. But actually, while the second dancer does validate the activity of the first dancer, it's not actually any kind of movement or any kind of cause or any kind of happening. What happens is the two of them dance around for a little while, and then the third dancer comes in, at which point now, by validating the other two, there is an event happening, there is a movement, and it has become safe for other people to come in. So after that third dancer, the fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh join, and then people start coming in by the dozens, and pretty soon the whole hillside is alive with this dance. But it doesn't happen until you have that third dancer. And so I love that metaphor when I'm thinking about events, when I'm thinking about communities, you know, when I'm thinking about hosting anything. It's like I have to make sure that I'm not one lone lunatic dancing in a Zoom room, and that, that it's not just two lone lunatics. And Penny has been there, right, Penny? And in the early days of the, of the Difference Maker community, it was me and Penny.

Um, but I gained, I won.

Oh, it was— Benny got some of the cheapest one-on-one coaching I've ever offered on those calls. Right. But, oh yeah, just thinking about how can I design, how can I engineer, how can I strategize to make the thing actually be happening even before the people come in. That's the way I would kind of encourage you to think about it. That's why I think it's also like with any kind of group coaching program. And if you look at the way I design a lot of my programs, it's like I always go after one-on-one clients first. Number one, it's a higher paying gig. So I'm creating viability and sustainability from a revenue point of view. People generally Seth would argue that— I, I know that Seth has, has talked about the, um, the power of starting with a group coaching model. In my experience, um, the group is the, is the second piece, that not just from a financial point of view but also just in terms of, um, it's, it's hard for people to show up in a group, especially if it's a group of strangers and, you know, people like share in the way that's necessary to share for real change to happen. But if I get a bunch of— if I can get half a dozen one-on-one clients, I can then say, oh, guess what? We're also going to do a group call on Wednesdays at 1 o'clock. And now it's an unannounced feature benefit of the program that feels like this huge extra bonus to everyone that's already in it. And I've created— yeah, the group that I can get other people— now I can get other people to pay just for the group, and, and they can come in at a lower ticket, uh, lower impact on my time, attention, and effort, um, offer. And I can upgrade them to, to one-on-one coaching. So again, strategically, how— like, how— right thing, right time, right sequence.

That's so good. Thank you.

Yeah, you're very welcome. What else we got?

So I wanted to say that, um, sometimes when we have our expectations, it's like an illusion because, uh, we are measuring to things that we haven't done before. So then when we set our goals, if we haven't done it before, then we're going to practically set to fail. And that's something that it took me like few months to learn. I didn't, I didn't understand that. So also the mastery like you were talking about your grandson, mastery, we tend to, I guess, it's also an illusion because we think that there is no failure. Okay, we're going to master something and there is no failure. And I, my daughter is a musician and I noticed that she just practiced her songs over and over and over. And I don't see that she's saying, oh, I need to learn this song in in one sitting. And I asked her, so would you sit, would you sit there for 10 hours and you're going to learn the last song faster than she knows? She's not. So then I think that me, that I'm not a musician, I tend to have these illusions, uh, and these, uh, they're— and I think wrong expectations. That's my thing.

Yeah, well, there's a lot of good things, um, some threads to pull on, Emma. One is, um, the power of scrutiny and expectations. These are the two, um, villains that Randy Massengale— for those that don't know Randy's work, I've interviewed him on my broadcast. He was the lead advisor to Bill Gates and the Microsoft team in the '90s. Uh, he's a professor at Seattle University. Nobody knows who he is, and he's like one of the most brilliant human beings on the planet. Um, but he's, he's had a huge impact because of the people that he's worked with. And he talks about, um, the, the, um, the dangers of scrutiny and expectations. And the way that I think about it is there's a scrutiny and expectations of others, right? Like when you decide you're going to be a freelancer and your parents are like, what the hell are you doing? Like, why did we pay for that college education? Like, I've been through all of this, right? So, you know, they— it's, it's the scrutiny and expectations of other people. And, and it can be the people that care about you the most is like the, in some ways, the most harmful. Just an interesting aside, after I had like a 30-year career as a professional musician, when I was closing down my, my guitar studio and ending my career as a musician so I could do what I'm doing now, my parents were like, what the hell are you doing? Why Why would you stop being a musician when it's so— like, it's, you know, like scrutiny and expectations, like it's status quo, identity traps. Like, these are things that we're all prone to. And but then the other piece of the scrutiny and expectations that you're kind of speaking to, Ama, is the scrutiny and expectations we have that we impose upon ourselves based on comparing ourselves to what we see other people doing or comparing us or, um, comparing ourselves to the gurus and the digital marketers, right? Or what I find with solopreneurs is we act like we are entrepreneurs. Bless you. We act like we have unlimited resources, financial, um, you know, personnel, uh, marketing talent, sales. Like, I remember catching myself at one point thinking, like, what with my social media strategy, it's like I'm acting like Goodyear Tire. Like, I have to have a blimp over every stadium. Like, I'm Goodyear Tire, but I'm not Goodyear Tire. I don't have employees. I don't have a marketing team. I don't have a sales team. I don't have a fulfillment team. I don't have a distribution network. I don't have a janitor. I don't— like, I have nothing. It's just me, and I'm trying to act like I am this humongous brand. So scrutiny and expectations, um, is a big one. And the other thing that you're speaking to, Emma, that I think is worth highlighting is the idea of minimum, uh, effective dose.

Right?

So there's the, like, we can all start a business with a minimum viable audience and a minimal viable offer and a minimal viable strategy to put that offer in front of that audience. Like, it really doesn't take any more than what you already have, which is why most of my clients are marketing. We don't do any marketing. We look at our network of connections that we already have and say, okay, well, How can I reach out to the people who already know, like, and trust me so that I can create and deliver some value to those people? Because if I could do that and build the reputation, the social proof and so forth, then they become my evangelicals. They become my marketing strategy. They become my sales system. So, but minimum effective dose is this idea, and we talked about this in the barbell, right? The Seneca's barbell. Like, if we're in explore mode, yeah, we're trying a bunch of things, and the whole point is to not just keep adding more things that we're trying, but, you know, explore a possibility, an option, experiment with something that we have some sort of instinct or intuition will become a viable enterprise. And once we prove viability, move it all the way over to a sustainable, profitable thing, and then reduce it to the minimum amount of time, attention, money, and effort it takes to continue to bring in results. And we forget that it really doesn't take that much. That takes a very— like, it takes a very little minimum effective dose to keep something that— once the flywheel has started turning, it doesn't take much to keep it turning. It takes a lot to get it to turn. So just remembering, it's, it's true of being a musician, like practicing for 10 hours a day is not a great way to become a better musician. If you can do effectively practice for 30 minutes to an hour a day, you will become a better musician faster and add more to your repertoire. And that just gives you more time and attention and energy to do the other things that are necessary to have a music career. So just a couple things that came to my mind as you were sharing all that, Emma. I appreciate it. What else we got?

I can share something that I have. I have just had the worst time about trusting myself, I think, putting out this new idea. Most of the time people, oh, that's nice, you know, but there wasn't any awareness that it could help them. And I, it was making me more just not trusting myself. So I tried something this week to break that. I took some training in improv. And I met this woman and she does it. She did it online. So it was easy, even though she lives here near me and we are becoming friends and And I think her work can actually help fundraisers. But I always put in my mind what I'm going to say, which is what you say to be more open and that. And in this improv, I couldn't prepare for what I was. There was another woman in the class, so there were two of us. And it was so funny because I came up with better responses when I just responded. And it was like, there's so much inside us, which is— you've told me that a million times, but I never trusted it. So I'm gonna continue to do that a little bit to see, because when I went out, when I had I had several conversations. I attended a meeting with fundraisers. I mentored this fundraiser. It was all so much easier. Just one of those trainings. So I don't know, but that's what I found. It's like I had to break a wall. I had to break— I just couldn't do it by myself, and I couldn't figure it out until just, this popped up in my life. I said, I'm gonna try that.

Do you remember what my favorite Goethe quote is, Penny?

Not right off the top.

You've heard me say it a million times, I'm sure. As soon as you trust yourself, you will know how to live. And I think that is one of the most profound things I have ever heard because it never, like, it just never ends, right? But it, it is ultimately the truth. And I've tried to convey this in, in, in the past with you all. I, I was really super lucky in my transition from music into what I'm doing now, in that I had that experience working with Seth at Akimbo, and, you know, being a head coach and coaching every day and, and holding calls like this, you know, every week and so forth. Um, but at the beginning, I had— I wrestled with all the things that we all wrestle with, right? So I was the third coach brought in to a team of four at the beginning, and then, you know, there's other coaches that were brought in, um, behind me. But, and so there was like all the— it was the comparison trap, right? Like, oh, I wasn't I was one of the first two, so I must not be as good. And then there's all these people and like, how, you know, I don't want to lose this gig. This is, this is, you know, I've got this like clinging to the status, um, craving the reputation, uh, trying to outdo the other coaches, um, all the things that we're all prone to. And I remember Um, I mean, I, I was absolutely miserable for the first 2 sessions of the marketing seminar that I coached in. And I just remember there was a moment where I was just like, you know, I am, I'm supposed to work an hour a day. I'm working 4 hours a day. I'm trying to comment on everybody's stuff. I'm trying to, you know, I'm doing like these bullet-pointed assessments of everything they've written, and it's just unsustainable, and I'm— I can't do this anymore. And so I started to just adopt this new way of approaching it where I, I put guardrails. Like, I, I'm only allowing myself 90 minutes a day in the workshop, an hour in the morning, a half hour in the evening, period. And by putting in that constraint It forced me to, you know, as I went through student work, I, I only had time to like glance, like to really just scan. And I would just find like one thing and I would comment on that one thing. And sometimes it was like, hey, this is a great insight. I would pay more attention to this. Or asking a reflective question or clarifying question or just saying, this is what I hear you saying. Do I have that right?

Just—

and I was able to cover, you know, dozens of students in that hour. So I wasn't losing the impact in terms of the number of students I was, um, helping. It became much more effective help. And I remember at one point, um, a friend of mine in the workshop who was also a client, Karina, who was an active student, wanted to be a coach, and was paying attention to me. And I remember at one point she was like, how do you always know the right thing to say? And I said, Karina, I never know the right thing to say. I just keep saying things and I figure The law of averages will play to my benefit. And on those rare instances where I say something wrong or it's interpreted in a way that, you know, is triggering or harmful or whatever, I can always apologize. Like, I can fix it afterwards. But it was basically that— an entire posture shift in trusting myself so I could live. And so, like, I just trusted that I would figure— be able to find something to say, that I would say something that was worth saying, and that if I said something that wasn't worth saying or that was misinterpreted, that I would figure out how to apologize and move on to the next thing. And rinsing and repeating that, I've, like, completely changed my relationship with my role as a coach. I loved it. I even loved it when there was like these little kerfuffles, these little tempest in a teapot moments where students were arguing with students, or students were arguing with Seth, or students were arguing with coaches, or coaches were arguing with coaches or students, or what. Like, I would be like, oh, this is so awesome, I can't wait to dive in and figure this shit out and get everybody back on track. Um, And so, but you know, that, that's that whole thing about, of being, that I was saying at the beginning of the workshop, you have to become the kind of person that is willing to embrace the uncertainty and be curious and playful about figuring stuff out and trusting yourself that you can figure it out. And that at the very least, like, even if you can't figure out knowing that nobody's really going to get hurt, including you, right? So, um, and I love the idea of doing improv. Jen was just— Jennifer was just sharing that her— she's putting her kids into the Second City group. I mean, I think improv— that I have the benefit of my musical training, right? I remember the very— one of the very first kind of opening gigs I did was for Little Charlie and the Night Cats and Rick Estrin, who is in the blues world, a really famous front man I was open— like, me and my little acoustic guitar was opening for Rick Estrada, like this big band type of group, to a— at a festival, at— as it was getting dark, thousands of people out there, you know, one spotlight on, you know, little chubby Scott and his little metal guitar. And he came up and goes, man, what are you gonna do?

What are you gonna play?

And I was like, I don't know, because I'm not out there yet. And he goes, come on, man, you know what you're going to do. I was like, no, I really don't. I just know— I, I know there's a lot of things I can do, and I just kind of trust that once I get there and start opening my mouth, that the song that I need to play will come. And that was the way I did my entire career. No setlist ever, no plan. Like, I know thousands of songs. I've played thousands of shows. When I get out there, I'll know what to do. And that's the gift of improv, is that you just, you trust. It's what's, what, what are they saying in improv? Um, the answer is always yes and.

Yeah.

So I, I love that you're, that's what I want.

That's what I want. I just, I don't think I saw how much I was holding myself. In by wanting to have what I'm going to say already put in place. And it changed the conversations I had this week. So after a few more months of it, I think it's once a month. And I, I, it's just great. And it's on Zoom, so it's easy.

Well, one of my other favorite quotes that might help with maintaining this posture, Penny, is think of yourself as dead. You have lived your life. Now take what is left and live it properly. Like, that's the thing is we are going to— like, the only guarantee in life is that it will end, right? And it's— if you are lucky enough, privileged enough to be able to have a conversation with yourself before you take your last breath, like, are you going to is that conversation going to be? Oh, good for you, Scott Perry Perry Perry. You never took any chances. You never tried. You never did anything that people didn't expect. You always, you know, only took the— like, that's not the conversation you want to have. Like, that's why I became a musician. I was 29 years old. I was like, wow, I had one kid, and it was like, I'm going to have a career and, and do what my dad did and probably develop all the, all the bad habits my dad did, or I'm gonna like take a chance on this thing that I just had this burning need to try, just so that I don't die never having tried it. And I remember the conversation with my wife was, I just want to try this, and if I can make enough tonight to do it again tomorrow night, I just want to know it's okay for me to continue doing that. And I promise that if I ever reach the point where I can't afford to do it I'll do it again the next night. I'll get myself another teaching gig. I'll get myself a, you know, a real job and take care of what I need to take care of. Um, and I, I made enough every single night to do it again the next night for 30 years, right? It's always about to find like, what's the smallest step that you can, can you can imagine taking? And if you can just take care of the thing that's right in front of you right now, it's like one of my big issues with, um, is it Ikagi? Is that how you say it? Um, that's the four-circle band that says like you have to like what you're passionate about, what the world needs from you, blah, blah. I can't remember. There's, but the, the, the fourth one is what people will pay you for. And I just, I never, like, money should never be the aim. Like, money is a revenue, is a byproduct of doing work that's worth doing with people that are worth doing it with. If money is the aim, like, if you're a solopreneur and you're not doing it for the money, because if you want to make money, there are way easier ways than starting your own business. If you are, you know, but if you build your business thoughtfully, deliberately, you know, are judicious about your choices and about your planning and implementation, in my experience, revenue always follows, reputation always follows. Like all the things that normally people are chasing is ends in and of themselves are side effects of just doing the things that you should be doing. I did want to comment just on one thing that, um, good to have you with us, Jackie. Um, Jennifer put in the chat this idea of people feeling safe, and I think I just want to highlight that because it's true of you and it's true of the people that you want to work with. The fundamental Like, anybody that can afford the technology to be on this call, really, number one, you're not experiencing any existential threats to your existence. Food, clothing, and shelter is not a problem. Access to resources is not a problem. In Maslow's hierarchy, after you take care of your existential needs for food, clothing, and shelter, the next need in the hierarchy of needs is security, safety. What's interesting about that is that it doesn't— like, at any stage up the hierarchy subsequently, we're still always answering the question, am I going to be okay? And that is something that you have to wrestle with yourselves every day. But it's also whatever, like when you are marketing, when you are selling, when you're, you're creating an offer, creating a community, whatever, the fundamental question the people on the receiving end are asking is, is this safe? And a lot of the times we think it's, they don't trust me. And that can obviously be true depending on how familiar the marketplace or the, your audiences with who you are and what you do and your reliability and all that. But most of the time it's actually the, the real issue is that it's not that they don't think think you'll deliver. And it's not that they don't think that it'll work. It's they don't think it'll work for them. They're actually dealing with their, um, their worthiness narrative. I've told the story many times about, um, you know, working with a a woman that was a yoga instructor that just was having a really difficult time getting enough people. She primarily— her market was primarily, um, women and primarily mothers, um, some of them professionals and some of them full-time moms. But she was really struggling. And it, you know, and I— it's like the issue was not they didn't believe that yoga would be good for them or that she could teach them, And it wasn't even an issue with— they didn't think that they were capable of being yoga students. The narrative was, if I spend money on myself and take time for myself to do something for myself, for my own happiness and health, it will— it makes me a bad mom. Because I'm taking time away from my kids. And so once you identify the false belief beneath the false belief, then you can address that. Like, how, how do you make it clear to them that actually by taking an hour a day, 3 days a week for themselves, they'll be more energetic, more present, and more be a better influence on— with their kids all the other hours of the day of their existence. But if, you know, what the mindset that most sales and marketing people go into is you got to identify, um, and blast through all the obstacles. Like, oh, just offer daycare as part of your yoga school. It's like, that's not really like It's not the issue. The issue is how do you get them to see the value of investing in themselves? And how do they— you see them see the value that they will bring to the people that they really care about by investing in themselves first? That whole idea of fill your cup, oxygen mask on you before you put it on your kids, that sort of thing. So that safety, that feeling of safety, safety and belonging. That's like the whole thing. It's identity and belonging is always, is always the core, at the core of the issues.

When we get caught like that in something that maybe we don't understand where it came from, I mean, is it helpful to think about whether it's school, with our family, parents, siblings, what kind of things happened that taught us that in order to be safe, we needed to do this. And then those become rules. And then how do you— first, it's like building awareness they're there and then dumping them. Do you know, does that make sense?

Well, it's, um, it's number one, awareness of the programming and the conditioning, right? Right. It's like we are pro— we are social creatures, but by virtue of our programming. And so, as you know, there is that— like, in your work, you realize that that means reciprocity can be a really important lever to pull on. But the social— our social nature also creates the comparison trap and the idea of competition as opposed to collaboration and all these other things. So there is an awareness piece of that. I think, Penny, that when it comes to addressing it, clear, direct, and respectful. Like, I believe in naming things. And so if someone is like naming it for myself, Oh, like, why am I, you know, like I was saying, I keep trying to add things to my to-do list because it makes me feel better.

Where did you get that? You know, where do we get that? You know, I just was listening to a discussion. My daughter is an educator, and I was listening to her discussion this morning, and she said teachers and and our education system sets us up to be we and them, us and them. So what kind of ways can we interact with the children so that it becomes something that's more we and— and I don't know how exactly to say that, but I thought conceptually that's true. We learned that way back in the beginning, and then we're carrying it so that we and them, as we interpret it in any given moment, it's that we think them is going to kick us off and we're not going to feel safe, kick us off our path or whatever it is. Do you know what I mean? I mean, that's kind of crazy and kind of—

no, it's all human programming and conditioning because there's the programming, but then the conditioning is what happens in our relationship with our parents and our siblings, with our circle of friends, in school, on the— like, the conditioning plays on these inherent dangers or downsides of our— like, our programming is good. Like, fight, flight, or freeze is great when you want to survive in a, in a world where everything wants to chase you down and eat you for lunch and you're the slowest and the weakest right, and the tastiest. The problem is that we don't live in prehistoric times where there's saber-toothed tigers in the underbrush. And so, but the narrative continues to spin in terms of how our feelings of safety and so forth.

Um, and being aware of that, being—

oh, so the first awareness, again, awareness is the— and that's why Clear, Direct Respect respectful, right? So it's the naming of the thing, naming of the thing without the adjectives and adverbs, all the narrative fallacies, all the value judgments, all the comparisons. Like, here's— that's the stepping into possibility framework. Name what's happening objectively. No adjectives, no adverbs, no value judgments. I don't have enough money in my bank account to cover my bills this month. That is the problem. So once you, you've named what's happening, once you've noticed it and named it, then you can actually look at how am I going to navigate this. And that's when you can look at, you know, maybe you need to get a little therapeutic help. Maybe you need to go talk to Dr. Bree and, and get her to help you navigate this inherent you know, this, this, this narrative that you inherited from your childhood or whatever, or, you know, the trauma from your upbringing or past relate, like, but you can't do it. Like, you can't actually frame your choices and make your decision and do the next thing that needs to be done if you are trapped in a cycle where you're, you're spinning out because of all the narrative fallacies and value judgments. Like, you have to name it objectively, clear, direct, and respectful, see all of the possibilities, keep the open loops, etc., and then decide and do the next thing without, without unnecessary risk, without unnecessary overinvestment of time, attention, money, and effort. Like the whole— that's why it's always about just nudging at the edges. Like take the next smallest step. Because if you take a small step, you probably won't burn out. You probably won't blow yourself up. You'll put yourself in a new situation. You will have collected data. Um, and then you can assess the data, strategize your next step, execute the next step. But at every step it's clear, direct, like what's, what's actually happening now. What are my choices now? Okay, what am I going to do now so that I can put myself in the next, you know, in the next situation? And that incremental progress will lead to better making decisions, better and making them more instinctively and with more intuition as opposed to cognition. And creating this momentum, you're creating movement. And it's just like, you know, objects in motion tend to stay in motion, objects at rest tend to stay in rest. The whole thing is don't get stuck and don't get, you know, don't, don't run away in fear, don't be humble and hiding. You have to keep yourself making—

well, I think you can do the strategies. I think it's really hard to do the is the emotional piece of it, the emotion that goes with the rules that we've learned. Or, you know, like what all of the things you're referring to, there's, there's, there's an emotion to that, which is, as you were calling, safety and protection, you know, to do that. So you can have the best strategies in your head and still not be to move out of your box.

Well, but only if you are not able to and willing to pay attention to the emotion. Like, emotion— yeah, again, emotions are— that's just basic human stuff. Like, we have emotional reactions to situations. You cannot— like, this is the great misunderstanding about Stoicism, is Stoicism does not say to deny your emotions or suppress your emotions. It says to recognize the emotions for what they are and don't let them become sustained feelings that impede your ability to make better decisions and to make progress towards the things that actually matter. Like, if, if someone jumps out in front of you when you're driving down the road, you're going to have an emotional reaction. You're going to to, you know, have some anxiety and fear and fright and all that kind of stuff. Like, cool, but not cool to cling to that so that, you know, you're never willing to get in the car again, right? So that's what, you know, the emotional information comes from your body.

I think a lot of it. I don't know, I listened to some of what Bree was talking about, social emotional, and one the reason emotions always come first.

And yes, they do, they do arise in the body, and we have visceral— but that doesn't mean that you have to let them take the lead or continue to take the lead.

No, you don't have to.

Exactly. And so that's the thing, is the way that I think about it is I'm trying, by cultivating this feeling of equanimity, like I I don't get carried away by exuberance when things are going well, and I don't get carried away by depression when things are not going well. I try to just keep this even hum. That doesn't mean that I don't have moments of anxiety, fear, where fight, flight, or freeze pops up, but I, I don't act upon it. I sit with it long enough to recognize what it is, why it is, thank it for showing up, and let it go so that I can get back on track as quickly as possible. And that's a skill. Equanimity is a skill. This ability to not be dragged around by your emotions and to let them become sustained feelings that impede your ability to operate in the world. But those are skills. And it ties into what I was saying about being an akimbo coach. Like, did I trust myself every single time at the beginning, you know, when I was trying to comment in this new way? Of course not. But I just kept doing it until I proved over and over and over again that I wasn't going to die and I wasn't going to get fired and I wasn't going to get yelled at. I wasn't going to hurt anybody's feelings by continuing to just do what I was doing. And then when things did, you know, I definitely had run-ins with my boss and I had run-ins students, and I had run-ins with my peers on the coaching team, but it was nothing, you know. Over time, I just— I was able to also earn the skill of navigating, you know, those different, even more challenging moments, you know. So it's one thing to deal with an actual difficulty than it is to invent a difficulty that you have to then navigate.

Well, and Emma just wrote that it's also your philosophy that's part of that too. And I agree with that because our emotion, everything can kind of like you have the Stoic that you've learned and have as a structure for you and that represents a philosophy too, right?

Mm-hmm.

It's just, uh, it's a set of principles that I can just always— it's just a way of reminding myself over and over and over. I, I remind myself that all the things that we're talking about every single day, almost every moment of every day, I am navigating all of the same challenges that I'm trying to help you all notice and navigate. Um, that's, that's the game. All right, gang, I think that we've done plenty of good work here.

I just laughed at the use of the word game. Wouldn't you call it process in this situation? Or do you call it— is it a game?

It's always— for me, it's all fun and game. It's all fun and games until somebody gets hurt, as we used to say to the boys.

Right.

But to me, the framing everything thing as a game, as an opportunity to play, has been immensely helpful to me. It's been helpful in my music career. Like, I would literally— like, people say, what do you do for a living? And I, and I would say, I play. And they'd be like, what does that mean? It's like, well, I play music. You don't work music. Like, that's not— nobody— it's not called the grind, grinding music or working It's called playing music. And, you know, when you're a musician, you get to arrange play dates with your friends. You know, your practice sessions are play dates. When you have a gig, you're going out to play. Everything is play, play, play, play, play. And thinking about that, and, and I, I recognize that part of my kind of my innate temperament personality is I am like, I like to have fun. I like to tease. I like to be teased. I like to make fun. Like, I, I've always had a certain amount of an ability to not take myself or anything too seriously. And some people would say to my detriment at times. But, um, no, I'm framing things— it's called the game of life, and games are meant to be played.

So after we do our work here, we'll go play.

Well, this is— this is— yeah, we've been— we've been playing ever since we got on this Zoom room. So, you know, it's all— it's what life— what's the Shakespeare quote? Life's a play, and we are all players, or something like that. Anyway, all right, gang, enjoy the rest of your weekend. Hope to see you on Monday. Hope this was helpful. And call her if you need any additional help.

Thanks.

Bye.

Thank you. Bye-bye.