Focusing on Ourselves Instead of Our Business in Order to Grow
Episode 220: Show Notes
Today on the show we discuss what has happened this year, outside of business. Our personal development, things we’ve been focusing on in our personal lives, the things we’ve been doing, the books we’ve been reading, what we need, what we want, what we like and ultimately, how we’ve been trying to grow as individuals. For the first time in a long time we have taken a small step away from the goals of the business and worked on identifying where our heads are at, who we are as people and what our personal goals are. We decided to tackle our personal development ahead of the game, i.e before the business became all-consuming and everything in our lives was falling apart! Nothing in our personal lives up until this point has been necessarily broken, but we just realized that, hey, things could be better!
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We think that a lot of you listening out there might really identify with what we’ve been going through in our personal lives and this episode is here to offer you some helpful resources and to let you know girl, you are not alone! In this episode, we’ll be discussing who we are and who we want to be outside of work and why life is not just a bunch of boxes you can tick. We also discuss the weight of societal expectations we’ve experienced, especially as women, and how we are working to love ourselves a little more.
Recognizing That Life Is Not Just A Bunch Of Boxes You Tick
Emylee got to a point where she had checked all the boxes. She had built the dream business, the house, the car, the family – but there was nothing that felt like it was for her. For Abbie, she felt like she had run out of boxes to tick and got to a point where she was wondering, “What am I even striving towards?” Abbie had to identify for the first time in literally a decade, “What do I want?” This was one of the hardest things she’d ever had to do because she didn’t even know who she wanted to be. Abbie remembers saying to Emylee over and over again, “I don’t know who I am outside of work. I don’t have an identity.” She felt that society had placed limits on the type of woman she was supposed to become. For both of us, we had been riding the train of what we “should” be doing for so long. Knowing the difference between “I should” and “I want” is a really hard thing to figure out!
The second pivotal moment for Abbie was when she attended a workshop. In the workshop, they talked about the four-quadrants that people put themselves in: fight, flight, freeze or freedom. We both really identified with fight and what Abbie realized was that just getting things done for the sake of getting things done, wasn’t necessary. The bottom line is that we have both been ticking societal boxes since we were 15 years old. And waiting until 28 years old to really come into our own – is a long time! This was when we really started questioning everything…
Be Kind To Yourself: Abbie’s Recommended Self-Help Book List
A book that really helped Abbie around this time of deep questioning was Mastin Kipp’s book, Claim Your Power: A 40-Day Journey to Dissolve the Hidden Blocks That Keep You Stuck and Finally Thrive in Your Life's Unique Purpose. The first seven days of reading this book, Abbie dissolved into an emotional puddle of disaster, because it revealed so much to herself that she had been covering up. On day five of the book, it asks: “What beliefs about yourself and your life have created these emotions?” For Abbie, she felt heavy in her chest, weak in the limbs, a fire in her belly, head spinning, body in pain. So what were her beliefs about that? Well, Abbie is so mean to herself. She tells herself things like, “I am a bad wife” and “I suck.” And we know that a lot of you listening do that too! So be aware of it and apologize to yourself! Awareness of this was the first stage for Abbie and it was for sure the hardest.
What was helpful for Abbie in accepting herself was realizing where the power lied. So after obsessing over the question, “Who am I outside of work?” What she realized is that she is who she is right this second, and she has the power to change that whenever she wants. This was really empowering for Abbie, because she could now identify where she wanted to go and the qualities of the person she wants to be. Another author that Abbie has been listening to to help her on this journey is Brendon Burchard, who put his entire book in audio for free up on his podcast called High Performance Habits. Another self-help book Abbie recommends is The 15 Invaluable Laws of Growth by John Maxwell. If you’re in the same position we are in in life, then reach out and get some help.
Changing Your Outside Environment: Emylee’s Tools For Budgeting
Emylee on the other hand felt like she needed help changing her outside environment before she could dive deeper into her own self. So she decided to tackle the outside personal stresses that were limiting her personal growth. The first thing she tackled was budgeting. For the longest time Emylee was really relying on her partner to make the changes she wanted made when it came to finance and budgeting. But she soon realized that if it was going to be done in the way she wanted it to be done, she had to then do that. She was having decision fatigue, playing boss so hard all day that when she was off work and at home, she still had the boss of the home hat on. Which is exhausting! And if we don’t know how to bring this up with our partner, it get even harder to keep up with. Emylee’s partner doesn’t mind stepping up for her, but sometimes he just doesn’t know that he needs to.
So Emylee decided she couldn’t play the blissfully ignorant card about their finances, so she spent an entire day figuring out everything – student debts, mortgages, every account they had everywhere and learned about it all. She and her husband had been using Mint to monitor it all but the truth is, it was a hot mess! So she looked at two systems that day, You Need A Budget (YNAB) and Every Dollar and decided to start from scratch. She decided to go with Every Dollar, which is a simpler system, and she loves it. Emylee’s husband was a little shocked she had taken the initiative and organized their budget, but in the end, this was something in her outside environment that she needed to tackle first before she could breathe easy and start some deep, hard personal work. What are the things in your outside environment that are blocking you in your personal growth? Identify them and tackle them!
Essential Oils and Abstract Art: Where We’re At With Our Side Hustles
As you probably already know, we both started our own personal side hustle businesses last year. An update on Emylee’s side art hustle is she is having her artwork exhibited at a gallery on June 1st in Sedalia, Missouri. Woohoo! She is still selling her work online but has moved some stuff over to Squarespace from Etsy just because it’s prettier and she didn’t want to deal with Etsy anymore. But her new goal for this month is to use her Friday’s to do activations for her side hustle. Such as participate in pop-ups and work on getting some of her work into a few cute shops. So she’s on to something!
For Abbie, in her oily essential oils biz, she was running full steam ahead into the horizon. The business was soaring but with her identity crisis, the biz got put on the back-burner. It wasn’t like she was giving up but she was just not as active. She came to terms that it is something she is really passionate about but she has to be really intentional about how much time and energy she spends on it. Because at the end of the day, it is another business. But she has joined a Mastermind specifically to growing that and has also joined a membership community and is going to a convention in June. The community is growing, there is a new energy moving it and things are looking up! It’s important to identify what is draining you and what is invigorating you and make adjustments to your life accordingly!
Quote This
I realized that just getting things done for the sake of getting things done wasn’t necessary.
Highlights
Recognizing That Life Is Not Just A Bunch Of Boxes You Tick. [0:04:00.1]
Be Kind To Yourself: Abbie’s Recommended Self-Help Book List. [0:15:22.1]
Changing Your Outside Environment: Emylee’s Tools For Budgeting. [0:26:30.1]
Essential Oils and Abstract Art: Where We’re At With Our Side Hustles. [0:40:30.1]
ON TODAY’S SHOW
Abagail & Emylee
The Strategy Hour Podcast
We help overwhelmed and creative entrepreneurs break down their Oprah-sized dreams to create a functioning command center to tame the chaos of their business. Basically, we think you’re totally bomb diggity, we’re about to uplevel the shiz out of your business.
KEY TOPICS
Self-help books, Personal development, Personal growth, Identity crisis, Who am I, Personal journey, Self love, Motivational, Women’s stories, Societal pressures, Women in business, Mental health
