The 5 Biggest Things Stopping You From STARTING Your Business
Some of my clients follow my work for years before they hire me. Years!
They often don’t remember how they found me, but they know they’ve been around these business coaching-parts for a while.
Often, they’re lurkers. I don’t know them ’til they decide they want to be my client or have a consultation call.
I think about when they found me, and what resonated with them at that point. They were probably unsatisfied with their jobs. Unfulfilled. Unsettled. But they hadn’t decided, yet, to do something about it.
There’s usually a breaking-point-story that causes them to pull the trigger, hit the “Commit” button, and go down the unknown road towards their dream business and away from what’s familiar.
I think of those years in between, when they convince themselves that this is what adulting is – having a job you don’t like, but need to do anyway. When they feel guilty for wanting more, pushing their own entrepreneurial dreams deeper into the closet. When they feel selfish for wanting to feel valued and helpful, and feel more and more resentful at what they’re forced to do during each workday.
It made me think of what’s going through their heads in the years between “I’m unhappy” and “I’m ready to make a change.” Maybe not just “a” change… THE change.
If this sounds like you, I bet these are the 5 biggest things keeping you from launching your business:
1. Your mindset.
It’s hippy-dippy but absolutely true: If you don’t believe you can make a grown-up living with a business you love, then you won’t. I honestly believe it’s the biggest roadblock keeping you from your dream business, and once you shift your mindset from “can’t/won’t” to “what if?”, the possibilities open up. I hope it’s comforting to know that I’ve yet to work with a client who found their dream business (their WHAT) and then couldn’t find a way to make it happen (their HOW). There is always a way! We can find it together.
2. Your finances (but not for the reason you think).
It’s not that you don’t have enough money – it’s that you’ve been avoiding looking into it. I promise you that spending just a couple of hours working with the numbers will be more empowering than you think. Even if you do some crunching and realize it’ll take you X-number of years to save up the money you want in your emergency fund, you’re at least then able to work from a proactive place. What can you cut back on? How can you put more in savings? What can you do in those X-number of years (a number that will probably go down when you commit to cutting back and saving up!) to make your new business launch as comfortable for you as possible? In my experience, most of my clients realize they can make the transition earlier than they thought once they get familiar with their own numbers.
3. Your support system.
It might not be that your loving family members and trusted friends don’t support you and want the best for you – of course they do! But, they probably don't understand your choice. Why leave a “perfectly good” job to do something that’s not guaranteed? Why “waste” your experience and start all over? These aren’t safe choices, and those who love you want to see you safe and secure. While I feel it’s important to loop your family into your goals, plans, and challenges – it can only help if you can count on them for support! It’s also important to be around people who are like-minded in their own goals, plans, and challenges. Thankfully, there are both local and virtual places – and people! – for that (ahem ahem), so you can choose how you best receive support.
4. Your self-identity.
I’ve been hearing statements from my clients recently that go something like: “I don’t really like this idea of me being ABC, but I can’t get it out of my head because of XYZ.” They’re uncomfortable with the label of the thing they wanna do, not wanting to be seen as a “self-improvement person” or a “flaky artist.” I know this uneasiness first-hand from when I resisted becoming a coach because I did not want people to assume I’d read their crystals, tell their future, or give them the secret to life’s biggest questions. But! — once I realized that I could be the business coach for those who, um, weren't looking for me to read their auras – and that being a business coach fed into my grown-up passions, skill set, values, and priorities – then I bit the bullet and signed up for my certification.
5. Your Vampire Voices.
Vampire Voices are the voices in our heads that suck the good stuff right out of us. Their “why-do-you-think-you’re-so-special?” questions and “you-could-never-make-it-work” quips are our fears articulated, and they keep us away from The Thing That Matters. That’s their whole purpose. But, they also point us to what we need to specifically look at so that we can reach our goals. Does your Vampire Voice tell you that you don’t have enough experience for the new business you want to start? Then it might be worth looking at how you can build up your confidence in that arena. Does your Vampire Voice say that you’re not unique enough to stand out in a crowded marketplace? Then it might be worth talking to your loved ones about why they think you’re a special snowflake, write it all down, and start to see the common threads in the kudos you’re receiving.
Here is the best news I am happy to deliver to my clients over and over again: You can handle all 5 of these things. There is a solution for each obstacle. There is a workaround for each challenge. There is a dream business out there with your name on it, and these 5 things keeping you from launching your dream business can take a freaking hike.
In fact, in just 90 days these 5 things could feel like distant dreams. Tell them that you’re not letting them call the shots any longer, and follow me.