The reintroduction: where we've been, where we are, and what's next

You look at your practice and a quiet thought creeps in… what would actually happen if I stepped away? Could the revenue hold? Could the team cope? Or would the whole thing wobble the moment you're not in the room? This episode is the honest answer. We're back for Season 4 (and now on video!), and we're pulling back the curtain on the six months we paused the podcast, closed our doors to new clients, and welcomed Jay's gorgeous boy Leonardo earth-side… all while the clinic quietly hit record revenue weeks. This is the difference between a business that holds you and a job dressed up as one.

In this episode:

👉 Why pressing pause on a top 3% podcast and saying no to new clients can be the most profitable decision you make
👉 The gardening principle Andy lives by for deciding what to ruthlessly cut before a season of growth
👉 What actually has to be in place before you can step away for six months and still hit record weeks
👉 The 2021 maternity leave that went sideways (toxic team, stolen money, no systems) and the exact lessons it taught us
👉 Why "inspect what you expect" lets you step out of the chair without taking your eyes off the business
👉 The difference between building a business and building a job that only pays you when you show up
👉 How Jay runs her "five hours of CEO power" a week and gets more done than she did in a 40-hour week
👉 Why your business runs on your energy first, and what happens to your revenue when you stop nourishing yourself

Mentioned in this episode:

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If this episode lit something up in you and you're ready to build a business that supports your life instead of consuming it, book a free Practice Plan call and let's map out your next chapter together.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

So for the past couple of weeks I've been telling clients that I am taking a sabbatical, I'm moving on, retiring. And the result, the answer that they give me is welcome back to the first episode of season four of the Wealthy Warner's Business Podcast. I'm Andy and I'm Jay. And we are so so excited for this. You may have noticed that we are on video and there is a big reason behind it because so many of you love the podcast and binge it, and we're getting with the times so that you can see more of us, we can share more of the juicy behind the scenes. So without further ado, let's get into the first episode and speak into what we've been doing for the last six months or so. Now, you may have noticed that we've had a bit of a hiatus. So we decided to pause the podcast. And not only that, we also paused taking on new clients, new mentoring clients into the Freedom Academy.

SPEAKER_00 1:14

And just into I am the reason. Well, actually, my son is the reason. So for those of you who don't know, I now have a beautiful boy, Leonardo. He is like the light of my life. He's now five months old. So we took a bit of time off so that I can be present with him and um, you know, enjoy all new mum life. But you know what? New mum life is great, but I love business and I love this side of who I am, and so I'm so excited to be back here sharing this information with you guys.

SPEAKER_01 1:50

Yeah, and potentially in the future we might do a full birth story episode. However, I just have to bow down to you, Jay, because you are a queen, beautiful home birth who has birthed into the into the bathtub. Yes. And like that, it you're you just did a phenomenal job. Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 2:08

Well, I have I had you to follow in your footsteps of you know three home births at home. So yeah. I was like, okay, I'm gonna do this because Andy did it.

SPEAKER_01 2:17

Yeah, yeah. Expander. Expander. So yeah, if Annie can do it, I can do it too. Absolutely. Absolutely, absolutely. Um, so when we're thinking about, okay, well, what can we really share for this episode? The main lesson from the last six months, I think between us really, is that by taking the pause, and if you've been in our world for any length of time, you know how challenging that may have been. Because we love working. Like we are extremely high achievers, and to actually say no to stopping a podcast, and you know, currently we're top 3% in the world podcast, to stop it and also to turn clients away, that was really challenging for us. However, we knew that if we did keep those doors open, then that would be doing a disservice to not only the people coming in, but also our families, ourselves, and ultimately both of our companies as well. So we followed what we knew was most in alignment for ourselves, backed ourselves, trusted. And I'm so grateful to share that within that time of six months or so, the clinic has done record on record revenue weeks. Now I understand that money and revenue is one aspect of success, and I think that is a huge aspect of it. Um, not only has the revenue increased, the profit has increased as well, and the team has bonded and become even more of a unified unit. Um, our families have thrived as well. And I think that it was because we said no to what we knew wasn't in alignment and we we went with creating that that pause. And I like to think of the analogy of in order to gardening, I am not a gardener, however, this is the best analogy that I can think of. When you're getting ready for the next season and you're pruning the fruit trees, you need to be ruthless. You need to cut away all of the branches that are dead so that the tree has the energy to sustain the growth for the next season and can bear a lot of fruit. And that's what we did. Yeah, we got rid of the projects and the things that we knew were going to take away from our energy so that we could come back even bigger and better than ever. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 5:20

I absolutely resonate with that analogy. And for me personally as well, it was a huge evolution that period of time taking off everything, really, because for me, I was in that postpartum bubble. I literally couldn't even pick up my phone and answer an email. I took off all the apps off my phone, and I think that that is, I feel very privileged that I was able to do that. I had you as a support as well. We had set up systems and processes in our business that planned for that too. So so much of the people that we work with that come and join us in the Freedom Academy, they are wanting that for themselves as well. It's like maybe they're planning family, maybe, you know, maybe you want to go on a holiday. These things don't just happen. You can't just step away from your business for six months and expect record weeks. Yeah. There's things that have to happen before that time that make that a possibility. And I think this is really the missing piece that a lot of people don't think about. They think, okay, cool, maybe if I'm feeling abundant, maybe I have lots of money happening in the practice right now, and so I can just take time off. But have you actually crunched your KPIs around that? Do you actually know what the gap is that you are leaving behind? Because if you're not in the business as much, especially if you're not hands-on clients, then you're that's a huge dip in your income. And we actually did this previously. Maybe we can speak a little bit into what it looked like last time one of us took Matt leave, and we didn't have this mindset around, okay, what does it look like from a KPR perspective? What are the numbers that our team needs to hit in order for us to be profitable, and what are the systems that we need to put in place to make that happen?

SPEAKER_01 7:11

Yeah, yeah. So I think that we've spoken about this in previous episodes, so you can go back and listen to more of that. It was a really different time. So this was around 2021 when I had my third child, Aria. And at that time, we didn't have the right key team players in place. There was some toxic people in the company as well, to the point of actually stealing money, a lot of money. And so that is also a huge factor. However, as well, we were servicing too many of the clients as well. So even though we had a huge amount of uh buffer within the company, it quickly dwindled down to nothing. And we had to go back in to servicing clients full-time. So there were so many lessons in that, in getting the right people in place and also having the systems in place so that not one person is in charge of too many knock-on um procedures. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 8:28

Yeah. And when you're taking time away from your business, I also think it's really important to have the headspace of you're not actually removing yourself completely. You are removing yourself from a certain role. But your role then shifts to um, I guess, being the observer. And um I love the phrase, inspect what you expect. Yeah, it's not that you have your eyes off what is happening, but you don't necessarily, you're not necessarily the one answering phones, hands-on clients, following up emails, right? You put key people in place for that. But one of those big lessons that we learn is not to put all of your eggs into one person's bucket, whether or not that's a practice manager or a lead practitioner.

SPEAKER_01 9:14

So now we are in the position again where we are fully both stepping away from consulting, so in the practice, hands-on clients. And you know, depending on where you're at in business, that maybe for you, may not be, for us, it is the natural evolution and progression. It is where our energy wants to go. And we are excited about being able to move into new projects with this with this freedom and space. And so for the past couple of weeks, I've been telling our clients that I am taking a sabbatical, I'm I'm moving on, retiring. And the result, the answer that they give me is also what are you gonna do? And part of me just freaks out because I'm like, excuse me, what am I gonna do? Because if you saw how stretched thin I am and how many hats I'm wearing and what my days actually look like, to the point of I schedule every 15 minutes some days, then you wouldn't be asking that question. And it makes me think that there's a real problem out there because most people don't actually know what it takes to build a true business, a real bee business, where you're not the one servicing all of the all of the patrons, the clients. Most people out there, I think, especially in the health space and business owners, they think that they're building a business, however, they're actually building a job that pays them for showing up. And as soon as they stop showing up, then the job pays nothing. Oof. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:18

Busy, busy badges.

SPEAKER_01 11:19

Yeah. And in my in my reality, that's not true freedom. Because what happens if you want to take some time out to have a child, or you want to do some extended traveling, or there's a health crisis, then you don't have that flexibility and freedom.

SPEAKER_00 11:42

Yeah, and I'm seeing this currently in a lot of our members as well, um, especially the ones that we've onboarded more recently. They are some of them have, you know, four kids, FIFO partners, um, they are full-time in practice. And it's like they're seeing people after hours as well. And so so much of this also comes down to not just having the awareness about okay, um, maybe hands-on is not the best use of my time, but also I feel like in the health profession itself, it can feel a little bit icky, or people don't really feel like they have permission to just work on their business because it's like, oh, well, I'm here to heal, I'm here to serve. We hear that all the time, right? Um to overextend yourself. You're the caregiver. What about caring for yourself? What about caring enough for your family at home that you can set up a framework and a business for yourself that you can actually show up for your family dinner and be present for it and not be feeling like you have to check your emails 24-7. Like that is wealth to me. And that is what I feel so grateful that where we're at in the business right now has is allowing me to do for Leonardo as well. And it's really interesting the uh evolution that I found within myself with this journey too, because I was always someone who would be just like, you know, I would get up, I'd be thinking about work, I would be on my emails, phone, go to the cafe, hours of work, and I loved it, right? I thrived off it. But what is so interesting is because my work hours have been minimized so much now, I have to be so specific about what I am working on and how in which I do that. And you know what? I don't feel much less productive than I was before when I was doing a 40-hour week. Now, within my even five hours of power, I'll call them my five hours of CEO hours a week, I am getting things done way quicker and with more impact than ever before. And I really do believe it's because so much of the energy expenditure that I was utilizing before was going into thinking about a project or faffing about a project or marinating in a project and not just making a decision, uh deciding on an action. And it's so interesting because I was only having this conversation with one of our members the other day around this problem that she was having. And I was like, you just need to have one conversation. That is your only action. All of this time that this is taking up, right? And if you just have one conversation that is a 30-second action, hey, can I have a chat with you tomorrow? Is the action, we're done, right? But as business owners, we make things so much more complicated. Yeah. So I'm loving that for me right now. And I'm loving now that I have um I'm looking into hiring a nanny for a few hours a week. So anyone out there, if you know any recommendations, this is me asking for some recommendations because it's like giving me, making me break out in hives a little, thinking about it. But um, yeah, you know, we'll be winning back some of that time again. But I'm so excited to see what I do with it now because I'm like, oh, this is this is why they say that mothers are the most productive um people on the planet, right?

SPEAKER_01 15:24

Absolutely, absolutely 110% agree because you have to be, you have to be ruthless because your time and your priorities have completely changed. So that leads me on to another thought that I had as you as you were talking about energy, and essentially as a business owner, and I know because if you're listening, you're in the business of wellness, and hopefully you are so aligned with your vision and your mission and your impact and what you want to create in this world. And so, if that's the case, then your business and yourself, the energy and the success and how well your business and your life will thrive is based on you. It's on your energy. And so if you are tired, you're not nourishing yourself, you're not playing, you're not doing the things that actually light you up and give you life, whether that's an early morning beach swim or playing pedell or whatever it is, then I'll introduce you. So if you're not doing the things that light you up and looking after yourself, what do you think is going to happen to your business? It's going to suffer as well. And that is where the magic is, but it's in taking that aligned action and in looking after yourself that that ripples out and extends into your business and also the people around you. So from doing what lights me up, following those butterflies, taking aligned action, tons of action, over it's been 20 years that I've been in clinical practice now, in private practice. Repeatedly doing that, what a Monday looks like for me now is it's a slow morning. Yes, there's three kids running around, however, there's no alarm. I take the kids to school, then check in with team. We're either creating some type of content or um checking in with clients. And this type of morning three years ago would never have been possible. It's only because of taking that aligned action that I've been able to create this type of life.

SPEAKER_00 17:54

Yeah, and I want to really acknowledge you and seeing that because I know that it's been curated exactly that way. And um, yeah, so I'm so so happy to see that for you. And I could only imagine what another two versions of Leah running around would do to my nervous system, and you do it so well. So, obviously, so many moving parts the last six months have been so big, but because we are the high achievers that we are, our next six months is going to be even bigger. I just know it. There's so many things that are transitional moments for us right now. So we have our practice manager who is no longer going to be with us at Open Space. She's transitioning out, and we are looking at hiring another practice manager, but doing it a little differently because there's so much AI and um ways to make processes in your health practice so much more efficient these days that I'm wondering whether or not we need to completely transform what that role really looks like moving forward. So looking at okay, what is it that AI can take over? What are the things that are the actual essential things that need to be done in the practice? And what are just the things that are fluffy, that don't really have a huge amount of impact, to be honest, and just take a lot of time for admin staff to do. So I'm looking forward to mapping a whole bunch of uh mapping that rollout again and seeing really what our gap is. And then because obviously we're both now no longer hands-on clients, I'm so excited to be having a hundred percent of our time being spent working on the business. Now, just because hands aren't on clients, that doesn't mean that hands are off the business. And I think that's what you were you were referring to before, right? Just because you are taking time off consulting doesn't mean that it's time off business. It's actually business time. Yeah. So so many projects we're sinking our teeth into. Obviously, this podcast and doing this in a video format has been a project that has been in our hearts for so, so long. It's something that I'm really I've been loving, like, you know, looking at the set and um, you know, obviously shopping for the crystal that we needed to absolutely have on.

SPEAKER_01 20:16

I coined Jacinta, the aesthetic police.

SPEAKER_00 20:22

I am, yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 20:23

Sorry for the studio for all of all of accommodating all of just a police. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:29

Went shopping, bought this fun top as well so that we I could wear this today. So if you want to comment on our outfits, then we're gonna do different outfits every episode. Um, but also bringing this episode into our Instagram feed as well. So our a big project for us this year is making our podcast much more accessible to people on different platforms. So you'll be noticing a lot of sound bites coming out onto our Instagram and a lot of us promoting through there as well. And then also a big project that I really am excited to sink our teeth into is doubling and tripling down on our delivery of loving on our people inside the Freedom Academy. We have we did a lot of that over the last six months in terms of building out ways to keep people accountable, building out ways to put in support through the different days, weeks, and months that people are a part of the Academy. But I'm really excited to start building that container as a community in and of itself, just like we did in our physical location in open space. So that's what we'll be doing for the next six months, as well as I'm sure many other projects. For me, I'll be navigating coming back off maternity leave. So, you know, watch this space to see if I'm still really excited about the whole thing in a month's time. But join us back here next week. And look, if you're loving what we're doing, if you are like, yes, I'm loving watching this video format, please give us a comment on the put this episode. Let us know what you're loving about it, share it with a loved one, and of course, please do subscribe because that is the only way that we get our voices into other people's ears.

SPEAKER_01 22:16

So thank you so, so much from the bottom of our hearts for joining us for this episode. As you can tell, we're super excited about it. It is a passion project. Um, we just want to love on people. We see this as one of the main ways that we can give back to the industry, to the community, sharing all of our knowledge over the last 25 years of episode. So thank you. See you next week.