Transcript of Short 38

“Your life is short. Don’t waste it living someone else’s.“

-Steve Jobs

On today’s show. I want to talk a little bit about the ONE THING that will help you to ensure success in your business.

You think it’s a secret, right?

You think that I’m going to tell you this magical secret that I’ve got the answer on exactly how to ensure that you’re going to have a successful business?

It’s actually not much of a secret at all.

It’s very simple! That one thing is to make sure that you first define and understand what SUCCESS is to YOU.

What does that mean?

Success looks different for every single one of us. What’s so important is that before you start building your business, or as you really start to scale your business, you’ll see that you can start being pulled in a million different directions.

Especially now with the onset of so much social media, TikTok ,instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, all the things.

And everyone wants to tell you what success actually is.

But here’s the thing, it’s not the same for all of us.

And so often we start striving towards things like, a seven-figure business, an eight-figure business, a 10 person team.

“And everyone wants to tell you what success actually is. But here’s the thing, it’s not the same for all of us.“

All these different things that in the end don’t make us happy.

They’re not the things that drive us as a human so all of a sudden you hit this illustrious six figure marker, seven figure mark… And you realize,” I don’t think this is actually what I wanted to begin with!”

Where’s the happiness in this? Where’s the excitement and the overwhelm that’s supposed to come with this?

But it doesn’t come because in the end, that wasn’t what you were really striving for anyway, You never really understood what success even meant to you.

There’s this quote by Steve Jobs, that I absolutely love, and it says, “Your life is short. Don’t waste it living someone else’s.”

And I can’t agree with that more because now more than ever.

We’re watching people on YouTube or TikTok say, “Oh my gosh. I started an Etsy store.”

If I hear one more TikTok about an Etsy store that you can start and do print-on-demand and be a millionaire tomorrow.

First of all, that’s not real. Okay? That’s just not how business works. I’m sorry.

But honestly, is that what you want?

I was working with a student earlier this week and she said to me that her God-sized dream, she has a God-sized dream to open a retreat center, and she wants so desperately to be able to impact women that can come and be filled at this retreat center. She wants to invite all kinds of different programs to be able to host their retreats in this sanctuary of a place. And she knows, that she knows ,that she knows, that that’s her vision of success. She’s been given this vision. She fully believes in it. She even says she knows where it’s going to be, like where the land is, that she’s supposed to buy it.

“What I want you to think about is, what does success look like to you?“

And so she’s telling me about this and I said, This is amazing. I love that, that’s what success is to you and that you already know that. So what are we doing to get there?

Then she spends about 30 minutes telling me all of these different things that she’s going to do. Open a coffee shop, open a venue, open a card shop.

And as we’re talking through it, and I’m listening to her, I started to say, But how are any of these things moving you toward this God-sized dream that you have this amazing, incredible definition of success? This sounds like a lot of busy work to keep you away from that vision of success that you have this is you living other people’s lives because, I don’t understand how any of these things align with your retreat center.

So the more we talked about it, the more that she started to understand and that we were able to kind of unpack that all of these other things are things that she likes to do. She loves paper, she loves, walking into a card shop and being able to, touch and feel these amazing papers, right? She loves the idea of a coffee shop where people can come in and get work done or, build community.

But at the end of the day, those are things that she likes. They’re not the thing that’s going to completely fill her cup and make her feel like she’s reached that place of success. Right?

And so as we started talking about it… Those are things that, may keep her off track. She’s building someone else’s life. She’s not building hers.

And so, what I want you to think about is what does success look like to you?

It could be that you’re building a seven figure business, but no matter what, there has to be a why behind it.

“You have to understand that you’re not trying to build a seven figure business just to be wealthy. What do you want to do with the wealth? Is the wealth going to allow you the flexibility to travel whenever you want? More time with your family?“

Why do you want to be wealthy?

Why do you want to have a million dollar business? Is it for status?

Listen, there’s no wrong answers. Your why is yours.

There’s no wrong answers necessarily. It’s just that you have to understand that you’re not trying to build a seven figure business just to be wealthy. What do you want to do with the wealth? Is the wealth going to allow you the flexibility to travel whenever you want? Is the wealth going to allow you more time with your family? Is the wealth going to allow you to get into certain boardrooms that you want to be in, or certain conversations that you want to be part of? Is it going to allow you to buy your way into certain circles?

None of those are wrong answers, but you have to understand what is the purpose behind that, “Why?” Right?

Because the other piece of it is, if you’re why or if the reason your definition of success is wealth or seven figures, how long is it going to take you to get there? And what are you giving up in the meantime?

Because for every single yes that you give, and yes, I’ll do that. Yes, I’ll do that. Yes, I’ll do that. There is an absolute opposite, No. Something else you’re giving up. When you say yes to one thing, you’re giving up something else. So what is that? And if you’re striving towards a seven figure business, for years, decades, possibly. And you’re giving up so much of your life, time with kids, time with family, time with your friends, right? You’re giving up these things. Is it worth it? Is that what you were looking for?

Again, there’s no wrong answers, but I really want you to think about that.

Is the definition of success wealth or a seven figure business, or are you just trying to build someone else’s definition of success?

“For me… the definition of success for me was being able to, at any point, at any time, be where I want to be, when I want to be, and be able to work from wherever.“

For me, one of the things that I realized was that the definition of success for me was being able to, at any point, at any time, be where I want to be, when I want to be, and be able to work from wherever. I’ve never desired to retire necessarily. I love my work. I love getting to impact other business owners. I love being able to impact my team at Blush, build up other wedding planners. I absolutely love that, but I do not necessarily want to plan weddings on my own anymore. I don’t want to have to be tied down on a Saturday, at a wedding, that’s not what fills my cup. I want to be able to be with my kids. I want to be able to travel with my family. I want to be able to be home or be at their sporting events. I want to be where I want, when I want.

And for me, To be able to do that, I had to give up some of the wealth because if I was still doing weddings every weekend or even half the weekends of the year, we would be making a lot more money than we pay ourselves now.

But we made the choice for me to scale back on the number of weddings that I did so that I could be more present with my family. Because at the end of the day, that’s what makes me feel successful. It’s not the amount of money in my bank account. Though I love having a comfortable lifestyle. I don’t necessarily need all the flashy things, and I’m willing to give those up to be able to have the time and freedom, flexibility to be where I want when I want.

So I want you to really consider how you’re going to define that for yourself. And I actually have a worksheet. It’s 100% free. There’s no catch. You can just absolutely go download it. I’ll link it in the show notes below. It’s a Defining Success Worksheet. And it really just walks you through helping you to understand what your core values are and what you actually value, at the core of your soul, like in your being. And then it helps you create a roadmap for your business.

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE DEFINING SUCCESS WORKSHEET!

It’s kind of almost like Waze or Google maps, right? If you’re taking a trip from Florida to California, And you don’t have your GPS on, you’re going to get off at all these wrong destinations. You could get off at an exit that might eventually get you there, but it took a lot longer and there were potholes along the way.

You really want to set your destination. You want to define what you’re striving for you want to define what that success is that you’re looking for. So this worksheet is going to help you just to create that roadmap for your business so that as opportunities come along, you know what you can say yes to and what you should maybe say no to. Go download that. It’s real quick in the show notes, you can just click the link and be sent right to your email.

And as you move towards defining and creating your 2023 business goals, this will help you a lot to just really think, “Okay, I want to build, my definition of success. I don’t want to build someone else’s life. I want to build mine. I want to create the life I dreamed of when I quit my nine to five. I don’t want to create someone else’s amazing life.”

I hope this was helpful. Go download the worksheet and I just want to say thank you so much for being here every single week, and I will see you next time.

Join the Movement!

Don’t forget to Join our FREE Facebook Community

Join the CEO Mastermind

Please share your biggest takeaway and review our podcast HERE!