Episode 206 - Leslie Kuster On Unveiling the 7 Keys to 7 Figures - A Journey to Empowerment

Hey, everyone. Welcome to the do the Thing podcast. This is your host, Stacy Lauren. All right, guys. Well, here's another example of how and why I love Doing the Thing because I get to meet the coolest freaking people. From getting a chance to talk to her privately on the limo bus that we were on, transporting to another event, and then having dinner next to each other, and then just from all these moments that we've had to have these conversations, I'm like, oh, my gosh, I have got to get you on the do the Thing podcast and let the do the Thing community members hear from you. So I am so excited to welcome Leslie to the show. Hi, Leslie.

Hi, Stacy. Yeah, I'm so happy to be here too. You and I connected really fast. We just wanted to keep talking and talking and talking to each other. So I really appreciated the connection that we made. And yeah, it was great. And I'm really happy to be here to talk all things, whatever you want to talk about, books, to e commerce, to publishing, to whatever you want to talk about. And I just wanted to add, I love do the Thing. One of my father's favorite sayings always was, just do it. And I just think that's such a powerful thing to remind people because so many times people are like, well, I can't do it yet because of whatever reason. And my father was just like, just do it. And then you kind of figure it out from there.

And look at you here now, talking about this book that you're about to launch when so many people could be waiting to launch it. Not only that, but you created an incredible business before that. And there's so many things that you're doing that are just so inspiring. And so those words just do it got you to really have that ingrained in you.

Yeah, it did. And just so everybody knows, I'm in E commerce. And my business is called Back From Bali, and it's a women's bohemian style resort where I manufacture in Bali, Indonesia, and I then import it into the US and I sell it 100% online. And that has been my business that I've built over, honestly, like the last 20 to 30 years. And my story is that I've been an entrepreneur for a really long time, but I was not a financially successful entrepreneur until about 10 years ago. And that is about 20 years into being an entrepreneur where my business was basically under a hundred thousand a year in revenue. And so my story is in my early 50s, about 10 years ago, I said, enough is enough. I want to be more successful. I Want to make money. And I put a lot of practices into place and I brought the business to multiple seven figures, which is where it is now. And that is also why I wrote this book called Seven Keys to Seven Figures, the Women Entrepreneurs Guide to Money and Freedom. Because I really wanted to get my ideas in place to answer the question, how in the world did I do it? How is this actually done? And that is why it's called Seven Keys, because there were really seven things that I put into place that changed everything for me.

Yeah. And the thing that's so incredible is when you have this wisdom right from the pain and the grit and the exhaustion that comes with building a business, and then you figure out what that button was that turned on for you and the 10 years that then it took for you to really dial it in. And now you've compressed all of that into this book that's about to be released.

Yeah, exactly.

What does that even feel like? To know that you're putting something out there that could save someone 10 years of angst?

I love that. I love that you said it in that way. I don't have children. I had a lot of miscarriages. I wanted to have children and had. And it didn't. And so I feel that this book also is going to be some kind of legacy that I've been able to put my wisdom and what I've learned into something that can kind of be carried along. And I remember when I joined Book Doulas, which was this book writing course that I joined at the very beginning when I decided I wanted to write the book. And I remember Chris Carlton, who was teaching it, said, even if somebody finds your book many years from now in some kind of flea market and somebody reads it and it changes their life, then that book is worth it. And so that's kind of how I feel. I feel it's kind of my legacy and something I could leave out to the world. And so it feels complete. That's how it feels.

Yeah. As you're talking, I'm thinking, so it's helping one, the person that maybe already said, I want to start this business, I really want to create my own financial freedom. And they're in the grind right now, and they're going to read your book and go, seven keys to seven figures. And then that potentially could untap whatever could be blocking them. And then you also have the person that doesn't even know it's possible for them to leave that professional job and to be able to start a business. And so they're going to learn those points, right, that get them to move the needle or just even give them hope that they can start.

Yeah, exactly. And that is really what I want everybody to know. First of all, it has nothing to do with age. As I already said, this was entrepreneur long time, but it wasn't until I was in my early 50s that I started to change the business around. So it has nothing to do with age. It actually has nothing to do with intelligence either, because the re. Why? Because everything is learnable. That's why. Everything is learnable. And so it just. It really has to do primarily with one thing, one of the most important things, which is key number one in the book, which is you have to really, really, really want it. And you have to say really three times, because you need that passion behind it without that strong wanting, wanting to be successful, wanting to make more money, wanting to change your life, wanting to be independent, wanting to have the ability to leave a relationship that doesn't work for you anymore that you're dependent on financially. Unless you have that incredibly strong wanting, nothing will happen. And that was really, for me, my first step.

And there was something you had said in the group when we met that just really stuck with me. It was almost like you were giving us all permission to want it.

Oh, yeah, absolutely. Because especially for women, it's not really considered politically correct or very feminine to be a woman who just says, I want to make a damn a lot of money, and this is really important to me, and I want to be successful, and I want this and I want that. And I really did not give myself the permission to be saying those things for a really long time. And that's because I had an identity about myself that I wasn't, quote, that kind of person. You know, I was nice person, I was a sweet person, I was a spiritual person. That was my identity. And if I start saying, no, I really want to make money and I want to be successful, then this is a change in my own perception of myself and everybody else around me, too. I decided, when I made my decision in my early 50s, that I wanted to change everything. I decided I wanted to give myself the permission to say what I really wanted. And what I realized is I had been lying to myself for a very long time, lying to myself that I didn't want the things that I wanted. And I think that's also something that many of us do, is we think we're supposed to want things for reasons that just feel more aligned with what we're supposed to be doing. But when you really start to question it, what do you really, really, really want? And even if it butts up against who you think you're supposed to be, and you step into taking the action on what you really, really want, then things start really unfolding. And that is what happened to me when I stopped lying to myself, when I got clear what I wanted and I said, enough is enough. That's it. What I said to myself was, there's just no effing way I'm waking up on my next birthday not doing over a hundred thousand a year in revenue. No way. And that was my decision. And then everything started to unfold.

Well, yeah, because through action is when you're able to then see what is there for you, right? But when you're sitting there sort of waiting, then all you're doing is waiting.

And we wait a lot, don't we? And that's the other thing I've learned. As I mentioned before, I'm a spiritual person. I do dream boards and I write in journals and I hug trees and all those things. But what I realize is all the vision boarding and writing and praying and all of that means da, da. Unless you actually take action. And that is the one thing that most people don't do. They think their website has to be perfect or they think their program has to be perfect or their product. And when I think about my own story with Back from Bali putting it up on Amazon, when I first did it, I mean, I didn't even know what SEO stood for. Search Engine Optimization. I had no clue of what a good listing page looked like. But I got my products up there and my products were kind of selling. And that's what we all have to do. We have to stop waiting for it to be perfect and making kind of the excuses. And just as your podcast says, just do it well.

So are you open to sharing the seven keys?

I can share some of them. Absolutely. I'll share. Just how about the first three with you? The first one I said already, which is, you have to want it. This is absolutely the most important thing when I'm coaching. I remember this one woman I had been working with and she said, I would like to make maybe fifteen hundred dollars a month, but I don't want to work that hard, but I don't want to this, but I don't want this. And I said, leave me alone. Even if it's just 1500amonth, whatever it is, you have to really want it. That is absolutely key number one. Key number two is Focus. And that was the problem that I had. Even though I had. I actually had two businesses, I had back From Bali, the business I have now, and I had a business called Girl Power, which was a empowerment program for young girls. And my experience was just that I would go to Back From Bali and start building that business. And that business would start rising, sales would go up, I would get new products in, and Back From Bali would rise, and the other Girl power would start going down. And then I would run over to Girl Power, I would start building that up, girls would start coming into my program that was getting more successful. And Back From Bali went down. Now, I did that for, oh, a good 10 years. I would say something like that. All right. And so what happened there is. It was just mediocre. On Both of them Back From Bali was mediocre. Girl Power is mediocre. So what I had done, what the decision that I made is I realized that if I don't focus on one of them, both of them are not going to do well. And that's something you and I talked about, actually, Stacy, is that this need for more focus. Because we, especially as women, think we're great multitaskers, but in reality, we're not at all okay. Because whatever you focus on expands, and whatever you don't focus on starts to go down. So that was my decision. I decided to go full in on Back From Bali to drop Girl Power and to give 100% focus to one business. And that is key number two.

That is so huge. And I do remember talking about this on the bus, because I think that people don't realize that letting something go is also doing the thing, because it is scary to let something go like that with empowering girls and the work that you were doing, I'm sure that meant something to you. And then to be able to say goodbye to it and focus on this other thing, that's hard. But what you're also missing out in is the opportunity cost from being able to focus. And so I'd love to hear how you made that decision.

Yeah, that's a great question. And what happened was I was. There really was literally a moment in my life of sitting at my desk when all of these things were happening, when I realized there's no way I'm not making myself successful. There's no way I'm not going to start making more money. And I realized it had to do with focusing and that I needed to drop one of the businesses. Okay, so which one do you drop? And this is where my Head got into it as well. And this is what we often do. Once again, we start thinking with our heads about what is better. What would the perception be better? What do we think it's better, rather than going with our hearts and our guts. So what was going on in my head was, don't do Back from Bali. That's superficial. It has to do with clothing. It's just about money, Leslie. It's just about you and Girl Power. Oh, my God. That's lifting young girls up and how powerful and so spiritual. That's the one you should do. And that was what I was going on in my head. And I knew either of them, both of them, if I chose, I could make successful. But there was something in my gut, and thank goodness there was, because I don't know about you, sometimes I can't tell what's going on in my gut or what's going on in my head. But in this case, I really felt it in my gut, literally in my stomach. And it just said, drop Girl Power and put all your energy into Back from Bali. And I literally, sitting in the chair, I said that out loud. That is what I'm gonna do. And I felt like, Stacy, there were angels in the room singing hallelujah, what took you so long? And I got chills up my spine. I have them right now as I'm talking about it. It was so visceral that I made the right decision, not with the head, but with my gut. And within that week, I worked fast. I closed Girl Power. A lot of the moms said to me, why are you giving up girl power? And my answer was, I've decided to give myself my own girl power.

It's so incredible. And when you really think about it, I mean, I think that this is where the chills come. Because you focused on back to Bali. You then were able to figure out how to scale that business, which is now why you were able to write the book, which now you're able to help, I mean, people on an international level from empowerment. And so it's that same message. And the thing that called you to create that other business is now what you're going to get to do, but on such a bigger level.

I love that. And you're right, exactly. Because my intention always with Girl Power, was to help women, help young women, women, inspire them and show them what is possible. And it's really all possible. And this is really my message. At any age, you have to want it. You have to focus. There's certain things you need to put into place, interaction, outer action. But it's all possible, and there's lots of people to guide you to do it.

And if people are struggling, kind of tapping into that gut, I actually use the words heart, but I think it's similar. Right. Just being able to get out of your head and follow what feels good to you. What do you suggest for them? How do they quiet down the voice in their head to be able to really feel it?

Yeah, that's actually key number seven, by the way. Key number seven is what I call making empty time. So in order to really be successful in business, one of the keys to success is to stop doing business and to make empty time in your life. And that can be things like meditation or going for walks in the woods or whatever those things are. So you could connect to your higher self, so you can connect to your heart, your gut, to nature, whatever you want to call it. And when we are just following our to do lists and we're just busy, busy, busy, busy, we then start following basically our to do list, and we no longer feel what it is that we really want. Okay. It all kind of ties in a circle. The seven keys start with wanting, and it actually ends with doing nothing. Because you need to do nothing and to empty out in order for you to really feel that gut or your heart. Otherwise, you'll never feel it. You'll just be busy doing what you think the action steps are. So this is really, really important. And I've been doing, quote, empty time for a very long time and going to a retreat every single summer for literally decades. And what was interesting to me is I didn't stop doing that during this last 10 years when I brought the business from five figures to multiple seven. So even during this time, when the business grew hugely compared to the previous 20 years, I was taking empty time. And I do believe that that is one of the reasons for my success, too.

Well, yeah, and there's so much about that, right? Because it's not only the reason for your success, but it's the reason that your success is coming from inside of you and not some prescribed path that someone else has for you, but because you're able to make that empty time, you're able to really kind of feel what you want, not what other people want for you.

Yeah, totally. And I call that authentic success. And that's actually in chapter two, where I talk about authentic success. Because what I realized is I wanted a business that worked for me rather than me working for my business. So I wanted my own definition of what authentic success meant. And I wasn't always doing it. And there were so many times in my business where you hear these ideas, authentic success. You hear the idea of you working your business, working for you, you not working for your business, and these ideas that we hear out there. And in my case, that's what I heard when went to an Ali Brown workshop, who's one of my mentors, I met a whole bunch of women there who had seven figure businesses, and they were working five to ten hours a week. Okay, sure, they had teams and all that, but they were working five to ten hours a week. And I was doing probably at that time, maybe 500,000 a year in sales or something like that. And I was working like seven days a week at that time. And I thought, oh my God, if someone can do it with a seven figure business, why can't I do it with a six figure business? And I went home and restructured everything again. So you have to. Sometimes we just go, go, go, go, go. And we get super busy and we start working for the business, and then we have to remind ourselves, wait, wait, who's in charge here? Is that business in charge? Or am I in charge? And if I'm in charge, then how can I change things, restructure things, get team, look at my operations, all of that, to change it so that you can have the authentic success that you want.

This is so good, Leslie. I really love this because it's so easy for us to get caught in that hamster wheel, right? Of go, go, go. So I'm curious if you have suggestions for people of when you're doing that empty time, when you're used to that noise, constant, the movement and all the noise of life and people, and when you actually do quiet it, and then all of a sudden you're alone with yourself, maybe for some people, for the first time. How do you. How do you do that?

You have a good point. When I just recently, when I was going off to New Mexico to this retreat that I go to every single summer, this woman I met recently, I didn't know her very well, she was like, where are you going? I said, into kind of a spiritual retreat. And she said, well, what happens there? I said, well, you get in touch with your inner self. And she was like, well, I don't even want to know anything about my inner self. And that could be some people listening too. But this is not how we create an authentic success if we don't.

Right?

And I think, honestly, it's probably the most important thing you could do with your life is to develop an inner life. So it's not unfamiliar with you. So you do know what I'm talking about. And I know many people listening right now know exactly what we're talking about and do it. But it needs to be done consciously. It doesn't come naturally because our society has not built spirituality into our day to day life. I was talking to my husband about it this morning. Like in the Muslim countries, they all stop and pray. It's normal. Okay? It's not normal for us. I never saw my parents even talk about the word spiritual. So it's really something we have to actively do. I've been doing it by going to the spiritual retreat every summer and knowing chance and knowing meditation and training for years and years to do it. But it's basically anything you can do that connects you with your authentic self, with who you really, really are. Not that you're a woman, not that you're a mother, not that you're a worker, not that you're any of those things, but just you those things. Because we all have the US without all of those things. And the only way to connect with those, with spirit, which is really who we are, is by getting quiet and by also, and this is really important, bringing joy, fun and happiness in our lives to do things more that make us feel happy. Lately for me, what is that? Pickleball. Okay. I've become a pickleball nut. And I am so happy when I'm doing it and afterwards. So we want to really increase our vibration and that's what happiness does. We are apparently, if you have some kind of special camera, you could see the energy coming out of all of us. Okay. We're not just physical what we see. There's other things around us. Energy. And we want to raise our energy. And the way to raise our energy, one of the best ways is just enjoy your life and have fun and do things that make you feel good.

And it's so funny. I forgot about that in the intro. But you also did. You taught me how to play pickleball and you were so patient with me. And I think it was your excitement and your joy when you're showing it to me that it got me excited to try it.

Yeah. That was also why I went to the event. I was like, okay, we're going to talk about business and e commerce and play pickleball. I mean, really, that's why I went. I was like, that's so funny. Such a great way to do a conference. Because we all know how conferences could be not so fun, right?

Totally.

Having fun is really important to raising our vibration.

Okay, what's the third key?

The third key is become a ferocious learner. That is the third key. We have to be kind of innocent. A lot of people often feel like, oh, they did it already, or they already know. They already took the course. They already this, they already that. But I think we always have to be beginners. Okay. And think of our businesses as beginners. And I've made the mistake of that, of not doing that. I think it was about. Well, it was Covid, actually, now that I think about it. I've been very fortunate in that. I don't know, let's call it the four years or so before COVID My business was running smoothly and easily, and I was running it on five to ten hours a week for a really long time. Okay. Enter in all the challenges we had with supply chains. I have a physical product back from Bali is a physical product. So we're talking about supply chain. We're talking about shipping costs, we're talking about issues. Amazon had themselves, all this stuff. It was a punch in the stomach. That's what it was, because I had gotten lazy. It was just working, and all of a sudden, it wasn't working any longer. So we always have to go back to being that ferocious learner, that beginner again. Because I was like, okay, well, the way I've been doing it doesn't work any longer. Everything's changed. The way Amazon is handling how much inventory they're accepting into their warehouses. The prices have changed. Everything has just changed. I can't get that product anymore. They can't make it, all of these things. And I had to become a ferocious learner again. And that is one of the keys to success, is to never stop learning. So how do you learn? The easiest and the most free way is podcasts, right? I mean, it's just the best. And all of that is free. YouTube videos are free. So there's a lot of free information out there. But then, of course, there's coaches and there's consultants. And what I did when I was sitting in that chair, for example, and saying, enough is enough, one of my commitments was taking the action. And one of the first things I did is go to a conference. I went to an Amazon conference. There was a great speaker there, this woman named Lisa Satora. I was blown away because when I went to that conference, I don't know how much I was doing a month at that time. Maybe $1,500 a month in sales. It was very early and I was hearing about people doing 40,000amonth on Amazon. Now I do much, much more than that. But at that time I was like, wow, that's outrageous. Met a woman there who is a consultant, Elisa Satora, and hired her. And to this day I still work with her. So this is how you really can elevate yourself. And I like to, when people ask, well, how do you find the right coach? How do you find the right consultant? Life coaching and business coaching are different, especially when it comes to business. You always want to hire someone who is where you want to be and was where you are now. You don't want to hire someone who just went to coaching school or business coach. How to do a business school, you need to learn from people who have done it already. And in this case this woman, Lisa Sotora, she had done it already and that's who I to this day work with. So you always are a ferocious learner.

There's just so many ways that you can learn when your mind is open to be able to see it and then as you learn, it's kind of cool. That's where you get to meet great people. It's not just you're learning then you're meeting people that are doing what you want to do and then you're able to kind of elevate even more.

Yeah, I mean, that's why I want to. Well, besides the pickleball, you know Ryan Daniel Moran, we're both, I think, in his membership. I'm in his membership and he's been one of my teachers for a very long time. Where I learned from his programs, his podcast, the membership I'm in. Ali Brown, Claire Zamit, these are all have been my teachers and, and I've invested, financially invested into these people's programs. And it has then come back, it's back by you and I. All right. I never would have met you, this recording would never have happened unless you, you. I jumped on an airplane. Well, maybe me, I know you live nearby. I jumped on an airplane to go there. Relationships that I've built, have been built over because of going to these mentor teachers conferences, spending the money, making the effort, the time. The other women I've met there who have now endorse my book. When you look at my book and look at the blurbs and the endorsements at the beginning of my book, I have amazing, powerful, well known women endorsing my book. And why did they endorse my book? Because they know me. And why do they Know me because I've been to their events and I've supported them as well. This is the other side of being a ferocious learner, is what you give to others will come back to you as well.

Okay, I'd love you to talk to a few people right now. So let's talk to the person that is a teacher and they have been a teacher for 20 years, and they're ready to make a change, but they're just scared and they don't know what to do or that it's even possible for them. What would you say to that person?

Do they want to be an entrepreneur? Is that what they. You think they want to be?

So that's. That's a great question. I don't know exactly if it's wanting to be an entrepreneur or if it's just want, because I don't know if they even know that's possible yet. I think it's more feeling stuck in where they're at, but not knowing all the different possibilities that are open to them.

Okay. We need to really find out the yearning behind the wanting. Okay, so maybe this, I guess she's a woman, she's a teacher, okay? She is feeling different things. Like maybe I don't make enough money or I'm bored in my job or I'm tired of these kids, or she needs to first start to feel what are the things that she is frustrated about and unhappy about. For me, when I made quite the change, I was so frustrated with myself. I was so. I was so disappointed. Here I was like 52, 53 years old and waiting for my husband to buy me my dream house or whatever it is. So she needs to feel her disappointment, okay? Because we don't make changes unless we kind of start hitting that frustration or that rock bottom feeling. And then she needs to find out what is behind that wanting, that she. She wants something different. But what does she want? What is the yearning behind the wanting? So yearning is really, and I write about this in the book, the yearning is really the authentic and real reason behind our wanting. And even though I talk about you have to know what you want, want, want, what we really have to do is know what we really yearn for. For example, you may want to want a new car. All right? He may want a new car. But actually what you are yearning for is to be perceived as successful, Right? You may want a different relationship.

Really good point. Yeah.

But what you're yearning for is to be loved more. All right? You might want to have a better wardrobe or something or Buy something nice so you could look pretty. But what you're yearning for is to be seen because you're so tired of being invisible all the time. So the problem with wanting is that we sometimes get stuck on the outer reasons for wanting things rather than the yearning reasons, which are the inner reasons for wanting things. So in her case, I would, number one, like, identify the frustration, the anger, whatever, the feelings of feeling frustrated with where she's at, and then to really start getting, once again, honest about what is she yearning for. In my case, I said, I want more money. I want to make more money. But honestly, now that I reflect on this whole time that I've done in building this business over the last 10 years, I realized it had to do with feeling not valuable enough, that that is what it was. And now that I have brought the business to where I wanted it to be, I feel valuable now. I needed to feel more valuable in the world. That was my yearning inside. And I think it's really, really important that we identify our yearnings because that is really what's going to give us the fuel, really, to make these big changes and to choose the authentic thing to do.

Wow. Something just came up for me that is. I don't know if it's relevant. We'll kind of see where it goes when I say it out loud. I do a standup comedy class, and it's kind of cool because you get to hear people's stories because they're trying to find the funny in their story. And one of the guys in there, he's a professor at a college. And I was up there trying to say, because I'm trying to spin it back, to do the thing and just kind of be entertaining when I talk. So I had asked the people in there. It was like 10 people in the class. I'm like, okay, so what are you guys struggling with? What's your biggest, deepest desire? And he's a professor at a college. And he was like, I'm just really worried that I'm not going to make any contribution in the world. And I was like, how is that even possible? He's a professor at a college. And I guess because you don't see it, right? You're still living in this vacuum. And so anyway, I just feel like that yearning and that wanting, it's so important to identify it. So then you're able to start to get the things that you want.

Yeah, exactly. And also start to attract them and also not run after the things that you think you're wanting. But it's actually not those things. And once again, back to empty time. How do you find out? What do you yearn for? How do you do this? We have to become empty and start to have a relationship with God, with spiritual selves, with our higher self or feminine self, whatever you want to call it, in order to really know where we want to go. Because I've had. And I talk about this in the book, and one thing about the book I have to say is that it is definitely a how to book and it gives incredible amount of action, steps and what to do. But I also have put in the book a lot of personal tragic stories that I've had in my life because they've been really good examples of how they pushed me in new directions even in my business. And life is I've had a lot of deaths and losses and all kinds of stuff. And we have to realize there's a time ticking by, you know, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick. And I think about this really a lot. And we don't want to be wasting our time, our precious time, which is really what's most valuable by doing stuff that isn't really fulfilling, those things that we really are could be yearning for.

Okay, so I have another person for you to talk to. Can we still play this game? Okay, so this person is divorced. They're in their early 50s and they lost everything in the divorce. But they do have a good job, maybe making 70 grand a year, but not enough to really buy your own home and to be able to really kind of stake your claim in something. And they never worked for themselves, so they don't even know what that is yet. They've just only worked this job. And so what do you say to that person? Just to show them that there's another way or just to be open to just even exploring it?

Yeah, I, first of all, really being an entrepreneur is not for everybody and it's not really easy. So you have to again, have a wanting, desire, whatever strong feeling of kind of being on your own. And you need to have self discipline because there's nobody else telling you what to do. So in her case, if she is feeling like I'm really tired of people telling me what to do in my job, I could do it better than them. If those kind of feelings are coming up and have always come up for her, then maybe it's time for her to go off on her own. So she obviously has a great job and she obviously has done well to have a nice salary like that. So what are her skills and this is what I would start to ask her. What are your skills? What are the things in the job you have right now that you've been really good at? Where is your genius? That question, which is so difficult to answer, by the way. But anyway, I'm trying to bring up the point of it, because where your genius is, is really what do you yearn for? But that's what I would ask her. So what are the skills she has? What is it that she would like to do? Maybe she's worked in sales, for example, and wants to start her own sales team. Or maybe she's a really great writer and she realizes every time she writes, people are like, your writing is really good. And maybe she wants to go into copywriting or website development. So where are her skills? That's what I would start looking at in her case.

Okay, one more person. This person has a business and they are just grinding, and they still are getting discouraged, and they just haven't seen the light, but they still want to do it. They're just exhausted and they're like, is this even going to work? All that stuff that's coming up for them, how do you think you help that person?

Okay, you know that old water pump, right? The old water pump that we don't see anymore, But I happen to have seen one in June, I was in Rhinebeck, New York, and in the backyard, they actually had an old water pump, which I was like, wow, this is so great to see this. And the reason why it is, is that pump is something that you have to put a lot of muscle into it and really pump it up and down and up and down. And it could even take 10 or 15 minutes, maybe even longer before the water comes out. And that is what being an entrepreneur is. You have to pump that water, and you see absolutely nothing coming from it. You have to persevere for it. And if you don't have that perseverance, you will fail. Because that is actually one of the other keys is called get used to setbacks and failures. Because that is what being an entrepreneur is. So when you're in the grind and you're not seeing any money improvement or anything in any way, you have to keep remembering that you want to keep pumping the water without seeing anything from it. As long as you're taking action every day, you're not just sitting there waiting. As long as you're not doing that, and you actually are taking actions. Improving your listing page, if you have a physical product, or improving your program, if you have some kind of coaching program or improving your social media or improving something and taking action. As long as you're doing that, you will succeed. It just takes time of pumping the water.

That's such a good metaphor. Okay, who do you want to read this book?

This book is especially for women who already have a business. A woman entrepreneur who has not yet hit six figures. Okay, so they're doing under 100,000 a year in revenue or they're doing in the low hundred thousands and they're sick and tired of not making enough money and being where they are. That's who this book is for. It also could definitely help women who already are in jobs and are considering being an entrepreneur, because it's going to show you what that means and what you need to do in order to move out of your corporate or wherever you are into being an entrepreneur. And it will also inspire young women, too, women who are in their 20s and their 30s who maybe do have a business or are thinking about doing a business. But it's really specifically very much for women, 40s, 50s, 60s and beyond who feel like maybe it's too late or they can't do it or they're not good enough or smart enough or this enough. And I'm here to tell you you are.

And what do you want her to say to you after she's read it?

Thank you. I've made this, this, and this change, and I'm so glad I have. I mean, this book is. This book came out of my own frustration. And so I'm looking for women who are frustrated, basically, and are sick and tired of being sick and tired. There's too many stories out there of women who are not standing on their own feet and being dependent on other people financially to give them what they want. And I'm tired of hearing about that. I personally am tired of it. I want to give women the opportunity to stand on their own feet, to be independent, to live their life, to go after their dreams in all ways. And it starts with mindset. It starts with wanting it. It starts with taking all of these actions with empty time. And that's what I want for women. I kind of want them to wake up. That's what I want. I'm looking for women who want to wake up, wake up, spirit trigged, wake up in this world, wake up and seize their life, seize their time. So, yeah, seven piece to Seven Figures. The Women Entrepreneurs Guide to Money and Freedom. And the book page is called seven keys to seven figures book.com and the book page has a lot of bonuses in it as well. So for example, when you go to that page and if you choose to buy the book, then you get part of my course that I've created called Keys to Success, you get an opportunity to win a free consulting call with me as well. And also I've created a 10 minute visualization video that you get as well. So it's 7keystosvenfiguresbook.com I have one more.

Question that we touched on earlier, but I want to say it again because I think this is a common thing that happens to people, women especially. It's like that shame of wanting it right. How can you just give them one mindset shift to just feel safe and feel like you own that space to be able to want what you want. And it doesn't have to be for other people, it could be for yourself.

I had that shame myself. So I know exactly what you're talking about. And I gotten over it. I got over the shame, but I know just what you're talking about. Those people that make you feel ashamed are not your people. That's the only thing to say. And once again, we have to go back to tick, tick, tick, tick, tick. Life short, really. And ask yourself, what life do you want to be living for yourself? Other people don't really care what you're doing and it's really, are you following your authentic success? Are you proud of yourself? Are you feeling proud of what you're doing in your life? And that's truly what is most important. And are you having fun doing it?

This is resonating so much. What would be your number one piece of advice for people on doing the thing?

On doing the thing, the thing. I mean, really, I'll go back to my dad. Just do it. I mean, my website, my clothing didn't look good, My listing page didn't look good. I didn't even know what SEO was. All that stuff. Just do it. Forget about making your website perfect, your products perfect. Just put something up, get one sale. Try to get one sale. That is really the most important thing because 1 becomes 2, 2 becomes 4, 4 becomes. And that's how you get started, is just to do it. And just to start even when it's not good.

Well, share again where they can learn about you and your book. Yep.

So you can go to my website, which is lesliecooster.com and you can also go to the book page, which is 7keystosvenbook.com and there you get all the free bonuses.

Thank you so much for coming on. This has been amazing. Leslie.

Thank you, Stacy. So happy we connected.

And for you guys, do the thing. Don't wait for opportunity, create it.