I read an article once about being an entrepreneur that stuck with me. The basic gist was that in entrepreneurship there are far more lows than highs. There are far more bad days than good. The highs however are higher than you can find anywhere else, and the bad days are better than your wildest dreams.
I COMPLETELY AGREE.
Starting my own company as a coach, just over 4 years ago, was the scariest thing I have ever done. I had no people skills, no emotional maturity, had done no personal development, and just generally liked to be alone. I had business experience as an employee, but not an owner.
For those of you who know my story, you know that I started my businesses out of fear and desperation. Not because I needed a job, I had a great job actually. Not because I needed the money, I had actually been slowly recovering from my bankruptcy and was doing okay when I actually started helping others.
It was because even after 8 months of working on myself physically, NOTHING had really changed that was going to help me long term. I hadn’t learned to eat right, I hadn’t become a better person, I hadn’t stopped binge eating or binge drinking. After an injury that took me out of the workout game, I started to gain weight back. I TOTALLY LOST MY SH*T.
I knew that if I didn’t make health and fitness my whole life, I’d never reach my goals. I’d end up back at almost 300 pounds, miserable and depressed and drunk. That is some motivation stuff right there. So still well over 200 pounds, I threw myself ALL IN as a health coach.
Now I help others do the same thing I do. I teach them how to lead, how to help, how to share. The thing is that so many people want to “try it out” or “give it a few months” and “just see if it works out”. To that I say “HA! Yeah right…you’ll never last…”.
Here is the thing: Starting a business, personal growth, working out, being a leader, putting yourself out there for criticism, accepting feedback, reading books, skipping happy hour to go to a local training, asking people if they’d like to join you just to have them say no … it can suck.
It sucks 1000 times more if you aren’t ALL IN for the long haul. If you don’t have a big vision, if you can’t see the positive in every situation, if you don’t have a passion for making a difference, having a purpose and growing as a person…it’s gonna suck big time. You’ll want to quit on every hard day, and every “low” will seem like the biggest failure of all time. You’ll constantly question yourself and your worth.
Now if you DO HAVE A VISION, passion, dedication, and commitment, it sucks waaaaay less. Now I realize it just sounds like everything sucks all the time, and that is just not the case. Like I mentioned above, you will have amazing highs and there will be moments of what seems like pure euphoria.
Yeah … it’s that good. Like amazeballs. Seriously.
It’s still hard of course, but nothing like it is if you aren’t ALL IN. I thought I’d make a quick list of some things you will most likely experience your first year as a coach.
Check it out below:
| You will … | You will … |
|---|---|
| be Terrified | be So Excited |
| be Overwhelmed | Do More Thank You Thought Possible |
| Reconsider Your Choice to Sign Up | Continually Find Reasons to Recommit |
| Get Your First Hater | Get Your First Coach, First Sale and First Success Club Point |
| be Self Concious | Find Incredible Confidence |
| Get Bored When the Novelty Wears Off | be Given New Chances for Recognition Constantly |
| Compare Yourself to Other Coaches | Feel Completely Unstoppable |
| Backslide in Your Fitness | Learn to Not Let a Slip Become a Slide When You Get Off Track |
| Lose Your First Coaches or Challengers | Help Someone You Never Would Have Thought Would Say Yes |
| Stop Reading Personal Development (and Blame Everything but That When Your Business Slows Down) | Read Incredible Books That Will Change the Way You Look at the World |
| Get Lazy with Your Tracking and Pay the Price | Learn How to Make a Schedule and Use It |
| Not “Feel Like It” Most of the Time | Learn Discipline and Skills to Lead Yourself |
| Consider Quitting | Learn What It Means to See Things Through |
| Have Friends Block You On Facebook | Get Messages from Strangers You Never Even Knew Were Watching |
| Your Family Will Assume You’re Going to Quit … Again. | Prove that You Can and WILL Stick With Something |
| Have Friends Who Think This is Dumb | Have Friends and Family Support You More Than You Thought! |
| Lose Some of Those Friends | Make Friends You Couldn’t Picture Your Life Without |
| Feel Like a Neglectful Parent | Set an Incredible Example for Your Children |
| Fight with Your Spouse | Earn the Admiration of Your Spouse |
| Spend Money You Didn’t Expect to | Earn More Income than You Ever Expected |
| Go to Events That are Far or Inconvenient | Get to Be Around AMAZING People at Events |
| Need to Learn a LOT | Get to Learn a LOT |
| Have Everyone Watching You | Become a Leader |
| Need a Lot of Leadership | Find Value in Everyone Around You |
| Totally Screw Up | Try New Things |
| Question Your Purpose | Discover Your Purpose |
| Not Really Feel Like You “Get It” Yet | Lay a Foundation On Which You Can Build a Huge Organization |
| Face Competition | be Rewarded with Trips, Prizes, and Amazing Recognition |
| Cry … Many Times | Cry … Many Times |
I am not trying to single handedly tank my own business by posting this and scaring all the potential coaches away LOL. Really though, this list could go on forever. I could probably come up with a few hundred things to add to this list. That is not the point.
The point is simply that I am under no delusion that starting a company is an easy task that is mostly just rainbows farting unicorns. It’s work. Real, grown-up, challenging, work.
It also is one of the most fulfilling, fun, rewarding, passionate, loving, freeing experiences that exists. I cannot think of a way that I get to work with whomever I choose, whenever I choose, wherever I choose, and make an income that makes life worry free and my dreams possible.
I COULD go punch a clock. I could take breaks when I’m told, turn in vacation requests and hope I can get the time off, let someone else dictate my promotions and raises. I mean we all COULD build someone else’s dreams for them, but that sounds like it sucks more than everything I mentioned above.
Instead I get to spend my days changing lives, having a purpose, making a difference, empowering others and creating financial freedom for myself. All of that on my schedule with the most incredible human beings I’ve ever encountered.
COMPLETE AND TOTAL FREEDOM OF CHOICE in exchange for a few years of hard work.
I don’t about you…but I’m ALL IN.
If you haven’t run away yet, and you’d like to talk about what the possibilities are for you joining me on this incredible journey, just send me your info and thoughts on the JOIN THE TEAM page and we’ll get to know each other. Can wait to partner with you on the way to living your dreams <3
This post was actually inspired by a call I did for my team, if you’d like to watch the video, you can see that below =)
thank you for this post