Is business not as _______ as it used to be?

A massive mistake that even smart, successful CEOs and Business owners make that keeps them stressed carrying the huge load associated with their business responsibilities, pivots & growth….

…is admitting it’s not as _______ as it used to be!

What I mean is that this is a fill-in-the-blank sentence. For example, Admitting it’s not as easy as it used to be. Admitting it’s not as fun as it used to be. Or as joyous, or as fulfilling as it used to be.

I want you to take 30 seconds right now and write what your word or words are for that blank. I admit it’s not as _____ as it used to be.

You know, one of my clients runs a multi-million dollar business. At about year 10 of her business, she was trucking along, but she began having health issues and was dreading going to work the next day. She was fantasizing about quitting her business, and in fact, she started having issues with her business partner.

My client was genuinely confused about why her business that had fulfilled her for so many years was now something she felt really resentful about. She told me she thought there was something seriously wrong with her that she would feel so resentful of having a successful $7 million business.

Did you know that in marriages there is a 7-year itch? Or that people often start to question their marriage around year 7? The same thing happens in business.

Did you know that 20% of businesses in the US fail in the first year?

45% of businesses fail in the first 6 years.

65% of businesses fail in the first 10 years.

Only 25% of businesses make it to the 15-year mark.

(From Investopia - January 2022)

That’s because even smart, successful business owners and leaders never admit to themselves when they’re not feeling great about their businesses.

Let me give a caveat here - because there are VERY normal growing pains in the business, especially in the first 15 years. I’m not talking about the normal growth that we all go through as we are scaling our businesses. For example, at certain points, you’re going to hire new team members and take yourself more and more out of the day-to-day management of your business. That can be stressful, and you may have days where you feel over-stretched. All of that is normal, and honestly, sometimes it’s a pain in the ass to have to address that kind of organizational growth.

What I’m talking about is when the overarching energetic feel of the business isn’t feeling good to you anymore.

Going back to my client from before with the multi-million dollar company. She started to hear those small whispers in her mind telling her that something was significantly wrong with her business. You know those whispers that gently try to nudge us in the right direction? Those whispers that are so quiet and soft that they are easy to ignore?

My client heard those whispers and flat out ignored them. Eventually, she started to lose some sleep. Then she started to resent getting out of bed on Monday mornings. But she ignored what her body and her energy were telling her. She told herself she just needed to put on her big girl pants and get over it. About a year into feeling off about her business she was diagnosed with an auto-immune disorder, and she stopped being able to sleep through the night.  She was gaining weight and feeling exhausted all of the time. Then the shit literally hit the fan and she ended up in a full blowout conflict with her business partners.

She went from the quiet whispers telling her something wasn’t working in her business, to the shouting of her body crying out for support, to getting hit in the proverbial head with the 2x4 of business partner conflict.

All of us are getting the signs all of the time about what’s working and not working - sometimes weren’t just not willing to listen to what our intuition is telling us. 

The first step with this is to admit you’ve got an issue. You’ve already begun this process by writing your word down. You’ve started to identify the energy that’s NOT working for you in your business. I encourage you to dive into that some more - are there any other words that are also relevant for you? Take some time in your journaling, or during your meditation time, to reflect on other underlying energies impacting you.

The next step is to schedule a 15-minute complimentary Executive Chat with me, where I’ll ask you 3 powerful questions to help you get to the root what's costing you time, money, and energy.

Schedule Your Executive Chat