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Business Owners and Vulnerability

Business Owners and Vulnerability

I am a business coach. I have been doing this for about 10 years now. Before this, I was a business owner, I was a Business Manager for lots of small businesses, so I’ve been around a while, done this a while and have seen lots of different things. 

I have never seen where we are now with our world and with all of this that’s been going on. But the number one thing that I am seeing is the vulnerability. 

I think it’s pulling up for all of us or triggering for all of us. We don’t know what will happen in the future, we have no idea how long this will last at this point and how things will look like on the other side. We know we’ll get through it. I think that’s fairly common. However, we don’t know what’s gonna be going on.

What do we do with all these vulnerable feelings? 

As business owners, one of the things that I know is that we tend to see the good side of things for the most part, and we can kind of push away our feelings and not really share what’s really going on. So business owners sometimes like to look like everything is great. Everything is fine with my business, doing great, doing great. The part of that is a protection thing, I think, especially around competitors. Part of it is it’s scary to let people in and let people know the truth. And most of the time what I discover is that when I tell a business owner, “Look, you’re not the only one that goes through this or that is going through this”, they’re very relieved to learn that because they think everybody else is great and everything is easy for them, and it’s not for their own business.

So I think this time, what to me this is really teaching us is how do we acknowledge how we’re really feeling? It’s scary, it’s okay to feel scared, it’s okay to feel angry. There’s a lot of stuff going around now about the grief cycle and that’s probably very true. 

A lot of us are grieving our businesses or grieving our success or grieving employees we had to let go. I know for me, part of my grief is watching people I know who have businesses struggle so hard and they’ve worked so hard to get them to where they are. And I have my own grief about my own business because I’ve worked really hard. So all that stuff is real and if we deny that it’s there and just try to ignore it and just power through, we probably won’t make the best decisions for our business, for our lives, for our employees, for our own families.

We have to acknowledge where we are, we have to feel it, clear all that stuff out and then we’re able to make really, really clear decisions that are much better for our business. It also allows us to just keep our frequency higher, because as we clear out that old stuff and we acknowledge those feelings and we let them go and we process them, then we invite higher frequency feelings in. 

We can’t invite higher frequency feelings in if we’re feeling negative, if we’re feeling angry or we’re feeling scared and all that stuff, positive stuff will not come in. So this is not about just think positively. No, it’s not about that. It’s about acknowledging truly where you are, accepting truly where we are. This is where we are. Figuring out what can I actually do in this moment. How do I actually feel and process what I’m feeling, how do I connect with other people who are in the same place? And just share. Not to get down in the mud and stay upset or complaining or anything like that, but just to relate to other people, have people feel supported. Support other people.So we can only do that when we are truly honest about where we are and what we’re feeling. And so using this time of challenge for that is a great thing to do. 

Eckhart Tolle talks about when things get hard, use that to go deeper into consciousness, to go deeper into who you really are, to connect more with who you really are. 

So as a business coach, I work a lot with this on my clients and obviously with business skills, teaching them what they need to do, helping them create goals, all that good stuff. But on the emotional side, I find it super important because a lot of us may not always be aware of what we’re feeling and if we’re not, that can drive us to make some bad decisions. 

Join my community 

If you’re interested, I would love for you to join my group, SHiFT Your SH!T. We’ll be talking a lot about this. How do you get out of your own way so you can make the best decisions for your business, for your life, for your family, for your success. All that good stuff, and ultimately for your happiness.

I don’t want to be making decisions from a fear place. When I do that, it usually invites more trouble. How do I feel what I’m feeling, be present with it, acknowledge it, be okay with being vulnerable, getting comfortable with the uncomfortable-ness, which is not easy, and then using that as kind of my connection with other people. 

I can connect with other people on a deeper level because I’m being real, I’m being authentic, and then at the same time I can make better choices. My business is going to move in a better direction because I’m tuned in, I’m clear of a lot of the negativity stuff and I’m feeling I’m paying attention to what I need to do. 

So join my group, it’s a free Facebook group, SHiFT Your SH!T. It’ll be fun as well, I promise, not super heavy all the time.  

But the whole point is I want to share ideas, help build a community that can connect around this and let’s build our businesses stronger when we come back. We can use this time to really do that. And on the other side of this, we’re gonna be stronger, we’ll have better businesses. And yeah, just create more success in a healthier way, in a more mindful way. So, join me.

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