by Traci on August 26, 2010
As many of you may know, I moved from Atlanta to the Chicago area this month. I’m from the Chicago area, so actually, this is coming back home. We moved down to Atlanta 8 1/2 years ago for my career; we moved back for my husband’s career. Ah, the ying and the yang of marriage.
So, I spent this summer going through every drawer, cabinet and closet in my house, determined to purge all the “stuff” I’d accumulated over the years, but didn’t really use it (or in many cases, even remember that it existed). What in the world did I intend to do with all this stuff when I put it in the drawer of my nightstand or in a bag in the back of my front closet?
I’m certain I had a good reason for why I kept the electronic calorie counter, years after I stopped believing in even counting calories. And I’m sure I had a plan for the old coffee pot — the one where I dropped and broke the glass carafe three years ago — when I put it on a shelf in my garage (yeah, I know…I don’t know what I was thinking then).
But, this summer, I was taking an assessment of everything I owned, big or small, and making a critical decision to either a) throw it away; b) give it away; or c) pack it away. Nothing was going to make the trip into this next phase of my life accidentally, or out of sheer inertia. I was motivated to be very intentional in what I chose to purge and what I chose to pack. I sense that this move is bigger than just my husband’s new job.
It’s going to bring new opportunities for me in my businesses. New directions. New clients. New possibilities. And I felt that I needed to be nimble, flexible, and somehow, not weighted down, with useless “stuff” that I’ve held onto for inexplicable reasons.
I got on a roll. Maybe too much of a roll. Like I shouldn’t have purged 12 pairs of shoes all at once without taking time to replace them over time, because I am now extremely shoe-challenged in Chicago. But I digress.
The point is that in the midst of all this purging, I had an epiphany. Every now and then, we need to purge the junk and the stuff from our lives so that we can see more clearly, and be ready to take on new challenges and take advantage of new opportunities. So, I’m ready, and new opportunities in my new town have already come my way.
How about you? Can you purge some “stuff” from your life in order to explore new possibilities and for new opportunities to come your way?
Leave me a comment and let me know what you think. I’d love to hear from you.
by Traci on August 9, 2010
Do you look at other women business owners with envy? As in…”How do they get it all done? How do they make it all work?” You know the women I’m talking about. They’re the ones who always seem so organized and calm. They get reports done, articles written and published, and Quickbooks balanced on time…every month. And, they look fabulous doing it.
Yep, that woman.
Now contrast that woman with how you feel. Overwhelmed. Over-scheduled. Over-worked. Not enough resources to get everything done in your personal and business life that needs to be done. You’ve got 72 hours worth of stuff to get done in 12 hours. You need a cut and a rinse to hide the gray. And let’s not even talk about the last time you had a mani/pedi. You feel like you’re on a roller coaster: some days things are going well; other days, everything’s out of control.
It’s the ups and downs of owning a business. But others seem to have it all together while you feel lucky just to be able to remember to log in to that webinar you paid for.
But guess what? To someone else, YOU are one of those “got it all together” women! Believe it or not, there are women out there looking at you in awe and admiration of what you’ve accomplished and how you seemingly do it with such finesse. To those women, you ARE the woman you are in awe of.
So, breathe deeply. Relax. Pull yourself together. Meditate for 60 seconds on the fact that you are a fabulous woman. You are treading where few will dare to go. You are an entrepreneur and you’ve got that swag!
Now let go…of the need for perfection. Celebrate you and your accomplishments and even your failures (those are great moments of learning and growth!). Exhale.
Feel better? I hope so. Leave me a comment on how you feel about cutting yourself some slack.
by Traci on July 29, 2010
The last two weeks of my life could be summed up like this:
IT SUCKS TO BE ME.
I’ve been telling myself this consistently as my stress level rises daily to new levels. Why? Because I’m working and I’m packing up my house, and I have too much stuff, and I’m not approaching the packing in an orderly manner, and I can’t find my notary stamp because I packed it in some unlabeled box, and I can’t find that new pair of underwear I bought because I don’t know which box that’s in either, and…
Do you feel my pain? I just keep thinking if I was better at packing or more organized, life would be better. If I could just get focused, life would be better. If I wasn’t a procrastinator, life would better, and if I didn’t have ADHD, life would DEFINITELY BE BETTER. <=== More on that little nugget of info about me on another day.
Then, as if my own negative banter wasn’t enough to kill my motivation, I got totally bummed when I shared my excitement about launching a new business in Chicago, with a casual acquaintance and she said “Have you lost your ever-lovin’ mind? Why do you insist on steroid level multi-tasking? You’re setting yourself up for failure instead of success”. As the excitement rapidly drained from my body, I thought, “am I crazy?” ”Should I wait”? ”Maybe I’m too unorganized to take all this on”.
But today, I read this article on living passionately and loving your quirky self. And I decided to stop the negative self-talk. And more importantly, to stop internalizing other people’s negative opinions about me. It’s unproductive, brings me down, limits my creativity and just plain jacks up my mood. I don’t mean that I don’t want wise counsel from people who have my best interests at heart. I have a success support team that keeps it real with me and tells me when I’m heading off track. That’s a desirable thing. But just the negativity for negativity’s sake is not cool.
Are you living passionately and loving your quirky self? I am! And on that note, I’m off to find my notary stamp. Leave me a comment on what you’re thinking. I’d love to hear from you.
by Traci on July 26, 2010
As the therapist around here, I believe in being transparent, honest, putting-the-naked-monkey-on-the-table…you get the picture. So, in the spirit of being/doing all those things, I have a confession to make. Today’s therapy session is a weakness of mine.
In other words, I need therapy on this issue myself. Charging. What. I’m. Worth.
And based on some of the therapy sessions I have with clients, I’m not alone. You have trouble doing this too. So, let’s make a deal, ok? Let’s read this post by the Launch Coach and seriously consider which one of his points we need to work on. If you can work on all three, that’s great. But, let’s commit to just one.
I’ll share mine. I’m going to work on #1: Targeting Clients Who Can Afford Me. Duh. The simplicity of that makes me wonder what the heck I’ve been thinking of.
Ok, I shared mine. What’s yours? Leave me a comment below.
by Traci on July 16, 2010
Take a seat on the couch and get comfortable, because I’m about to bust open the conventional wisdom on starting a business. Are you ready? You DON’T NEED A BUSINESS PLAN.
I know that goes against all that you’ve ever heard about starting your own business, but I’m serious. Skip the business plan. I had started writing a blog post on this issue with a snarky title like “The Only Reason to Write a Business Plan is if You Make a Living Writing Business Plans”, or some such other equally sarcastic title.
But, before I finished writing my post, I serendipitously came across this post from Quick Sprout on the exact same issues, without all the snarkiness. Neil Patel is dead on. In fact, I could’ve written his post. In fact, I did–well, at least I was half way through mine on this subject. But, there’s no sense in re-creating the wheel, just so I could enjoy the pride of authorship, so I’m going to encourage you to read his blog post.
Really. If you are thinking about launching a business and are spending any time on a business plan…please read this post. And then, STOP working on that business plan.
Instead, Go. Launch. Your. Business.
What are your thoughts on business plans? I’m really curious, so drop me line and let me know.
Twitter: traciellisATL
Facebook: Launch Therapy
