001: Stop Overthinking: 3 Simple Steps to Start the Business You Actually Want

Overthinking kills more businesses than failure ever will. 

We see so many women paralyze themselves trying to make the “perfect” decision, when the truth is that we learn by doing, not by stalling. 

In this episode, we’re walking you through three simple, practical steps that cut through the noise so you can start building momentum. 

Whether you’re building a blog, a shop, courses, or a coaching brand, this episode will help you finally take action toward the business you actually want.

We’ll cover:

• Why overthinking feels safe but keeps you stuck
• The 3 simple steps to clarify your direction today
• How to move forward without waiting for perfect

The role of faith + intuition in choosing what’s next.

This week’s free action guide: Start Here Checklist

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Transcript

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Becky Brown  0:01 
If you're a Christian woman building a business and want it to be purposeful and profitable, we've got you covered. I'm Becky.

Laurie Graham  0:08 
And I'm Laurie. We have both built successful businesses that we love without losing our faith, humor, or our sanity. This is Smart Soulful Business.

Becky Brown  0:17 
Real conversations to help your business fit your life, and not the other way around.

Laurie Graham  0:26 
Hey, hey, welcome to the very first episode of Smart Soulful Business with Becky and Laurie. I'm Laurie. 

Becky Brown  0:32 
And I'm Becky, and together, we help Christian women grow businesses that are both soulful and strategic. This podcast is for women who have already taken some steps, maybe a blog, a shop, a podcast, or a program, but you're not where you want to be yet. Too many women are working so hard, spinning their wheels, and sacrificing more than they need to, all while building businesses that aren't even giving them what they're hoping for. And we've been there too, but we're not there anymore.

Laurie Graham  1:03 
Amen. You know, Becky and I have both built businesses that we actually love. They are ones that are purposeful and profitable, and we did this without losing our faith, our fire, and our sense of humor. And it wasn't always easy, but we know you can do this too, and we don't just want to cheer you on. There are plenty of people out there who do that. We actually want to help save you time and money and maybe even a little bit of sanity. Around here, we are all about sustainable rhythms, emotional health, and building businesses that actually fit the lives we want to live, even now. So we're talking about both now and later.

Laurie Graham  1:42 
I know, Becky, I don't know where you started in business or what you were told, but I remember people telling me I had to sacrifice now for what I would get later. And you and I have both learned this: we don't have to sacrifice now. We can live the lives we want to live now and later while we're building our business.

Laurie Graham  1:57 
So anyway, in today's episode, we are kicking things off with a pretty big topic: how to stop overthinking and actually move forward. And let's be honest, overthinking is a big killer of dreams, and honestly, for me, that's been closer to killing more dreams than actual failure. Overthinking like stops us in our tracks, and by the end of this conversation today, you're going to walk away with some practical steps that you can use right now to stop spinning out through the noise and start building the businesses that all of us really want.

Laurie Graham  2:31 
A lot of our time with overthinking, as we jump into three great steps, a lot of our time overthinking comes from trying to build businesses that we think we should have instead of the one that actually fits us. So just consider that. Like, do you ever think, "What should I be doing?" "What business should I be building?" "What should I be looking at?" You know, all of those shoulds cause us to overthink a lot.

Laurie Graham  2:55 
So step one that we're going to talk about now is clarifying what you actually want. And as I say that, the song's going through my head: "Tell me what you want, what you really, really want." So Becky, I'm gonna toss this one out to you. What has helped you figure out what you actually wanted instead of following somebody else's idea of success or business?

Becky Brown  3:17 
Well, I would say it's kind of both, right? So I kind of had to try on—I think about it almost like an outfit change—like I had to try on what Amy Porterfield does. I had to try on what this other podcaster did, what this Pinterest lady did. I had to try them all on to see what felt really, really good, where results came, what resonated with my audience, but also just giving myself permission to not hang on to the things that kind of felt icky or just weren't fully aligned with my values or my audience or my personality.

Becky Brown  3:48 
And I think that was the hardest part: giving myself permission not to be a cookie-cutter copycat version of whatever that expert said to do. Because we all know, if you've listened to business podcasts or read business books, they give you the five-step system. This is five steps to doing exactly what I do. And so then we feel guilty if we stray on step three, we must not be doing it, and we're setting ourselves up for failure. And so I think one of the biggest keys for me was giving myself permission to let some things stick and let some things go. That was really important in my business building.

Laurie Graham  4:25 
I'm totally had the visual in my head of throwing the spaghetti at the wall right? Like, what sticks and what doesn't? You know, both of us have built businesses that that do not look like anyone else's like both of us have done that like, there's nobody who does what I do, there's nobody who does what you do, like all the different avenues of revenue and all sorts of things, but I think we've both kind of done that, like we've tested and tried, but also learned the foundations along the way, but clarifying what we want is so important.

Laurie Graham  4:53 
Okay. I'm totally having the visual in my head of throwing the spaghetti at the wall, right? Like, what sticks and what doesn't? You know, both of us have built businesses that that do not look like anyone else's. Both of us have done that. Like, there's nobody who does what I do, there's nobody who does what you do, like all the different avenues of revenue and all sorts of things, but I think we've both kind of done that. Like we've tested and tried, but also learned the foundations along the way, but clarifying what we want is so important. Why do you think we get stuck? Because I think we get stuck sometimes because we know what we want, but we don't want to admit it.

Becky Brown  5:05 
Yeah, for sure. Yep, I think that a lot of it is is allowing ourselves to pay attention to our own response, to what we're doing, to what we're trying, to what we're saying, and and also staying open enough to learn from people who are farther along and try new things, and having an openness, but also a closeness of like, but these are my values, and these are my priorities, and this is my audience, kind of thing. It's it's a tough thing to to navigate both of those, to find the clarity of, this is both wise and growth, and also, this is also me.

Laurie Graham  5:45 
Okay, so when, when we first started talking about, like, clarifying what we wanted, my first thought went to, like, what kind of business I want? But that's really not what we're talking about here. We're talking about what we want in our lives, like, how do we want to live? I think it was last year, the year before, I was meeting with Cledra Gross, who's an amazing life and business coach, and she asked me, she said, "So what do you actually dream for yourself? Like, what do you, what do you think? Like, how many hours you want to work?"

Laurie Graham  6:09 
And, and I was like, "Oh, I want to work like, eight to ten hours a day, and I want to work full time, and I want to work five days a week, and, you know, I want to love what I do." And she said, "You want to work that many hours?" And I'm telling you, I thought about that last week. Like I was kind of shaming myself for not working an eight-hour day. And I'm like, wait, I'm my own boss! Like, I don't have to make, like, make myself feel bad because I took a call with my daughter and spent an hour on the phone with her, and because I, you know, met my pastor for coffee, you know, down at Starbucks, and like, this is the life I want to be living. So I think sometimes, when it comes to clarifying what we want, it's hard to even say, "Well, that is what I want."

Becky Brown  6:58 
Yeah, yeah, especially if we think we're supposed to be like, feel like, have the same desires, want what another person wants, right? Yeah, yeah. "How could you not want to grow bigger?" "How could you not want to work more when you're earning more money?" "How could you not want that?" Well, sometimes you do.

Laurie Graham  7:16 
And I'm super creative and a bit ADHD, and I don't want a business that's the same every day.

Laurie Graham  7:28 
Do you?

Becky Brown  7:29 
I kind of do. I'm a consistent person. I like knowing what's coming. I like boxes and schedules and structure and consistency and predictability. So yeah, I would love to show up the exact same way every day, with spaces for creativity, but boxes in my schedule for creativity.

Laurie Graham  7:44 
And I figured you would say this. This is one of the reasons I'm so excited about this project that you and I are building, right, this Smart Soulful Business. You all, if you are just meeting us, Becky and I are opposites in a lot of ways, and we are also like the best of friends, and there is space for you to be you. And we're going to show you how that has popped up with our personalities, our life, our life stages, how different it is, and how the same foundations are like, they're consistent.

Laurie Graham  8:18 
Okay, Becky, if you had to ask people what questions to go through—like, we're we're telling everyone listening right now, we're giving you three steps, we're going to help you move through these—what questions would you ask them to help them, like, come up with like, "What do you want?"

Becky Brown  8:33 
Hmm, well, I would probably ask, what are you passionate about? What do you care about? What do you enjoy doing? What are you naturally good at doing? What are your strengths? That's just a good starting place to just consider. What impact do you want to make? How do you like showing your creativity? My creativity looks a lot different than Laurie's creativity, and we're both very creative people, and so if you allowed yourself the space to paint that picture without the shame, without the "I shoulds"—"I should look like this person," "I should want what they want"—what would that look like for you? And that can give you a lot of clarity on the unique impact that you can make on people out there who don't have another you in their life.

Laurie Graham  9:21 
I love it, and I think we can be clarifying what we want along the way. Like, you may have already started a blog, you may have already started an Etsy shop, you may already be podcasting. You might, and I still think there's times to pull back. That's what I've been doing over the past year. Or that's how, that's how this Smart Soulful Business came up. Becky and I have both been doing that. Like, what do we really want? What do we want it to look like? Who do we want to impact? So take some time to do that. Okay, let's move on to step two.

Becky Brown  9:46 
Yeah, okay, this is my favorite step, because once you know what you actually want, the next step is taking one action toward it. So if you have any background with me at all, you know that I talk about one small change all the time. This has become a life mantra of mine. It was really important in my 100-pound weight loss journey. It has spread into every area of my life: into budgeting, into relationships, into ministry, into business. And so Step Two is to stop spinning and pick one small thing you can actually try this week. This is not a whole business plan. This is not a life plan. This is not a five-year plan. This is a right-now, today, in the next two-hour plan. What is one thing that you could do to move yourself forward? And so Laurie, I want to hear from you—we talk about one small change all the time, because that's just how I think. So, what is an example of a one small change that has helped you get unstuck recently?

Laurie Graham  10:52 
Well, first off, it can be anything, because this is something you and I talk about a lot. Sometimes it's making one phone call, sometimes it's researching one thing, sometimes it's listening to a certain podcast. For me, I'm going to give one of the one things that helps me a lot, that I go back to a lot: it's making a phone call, inviting somebody on a Zoom, doing a call with somebody in my audience, having a like a Zoom call Q and A. And I have had to build these things into my life a lot, because when I get stuck on moving forward, I do so much better with feedback and with people. And so oftentimes it's not just like this action. For me, it's like a conversation, like I need to talk to somebody about that next step. And I don't mean I'm talking with them spinning. I mean, like, it actually motivates me to have another voice or another person with me. And I don't think that's specifically where you were going when you asked me this question. And if you want to curb that question again, but I just had to bring that up because I'm still dwelling on how different you and I are. Yeah, and I'm still sometimes figuring out that one simple, testable action, that one simple thing, but I will tell you that, like, just getting myself out of my own brain in front of another person, it is one of the best things I've learned.

Becky Brown  12:19 
Absolutely. And one of the things that that I would say helps in you reaching out to people is because people are something that lights up your passion. When you are meeting with people on a Zoom call, on a on a master class, you you light up and it changes how you're thinking. It changes how you're planning. It changes your motivation. It changes your trajectory when you when you can kind of harness that, that passion of yours that turn it back on.

Becky Brown  12:48 
I mean, I would say that I get stuck in in different areas. I am a planner, and so I get stuck in my plans. I will plan and I will plan and I will replan and replan. You saw me do it over this last week in my Bible study. I have a 30-minute teaching in my church, and I spent weeks, weeks, replanning, redoing, rewriting, and that same thing happens in my business. I will have really good plans and continue tweaking them, because there's always something to improve, right? And I won't actually put the plans into motion. And that's my one small change. Usually it's like pulling the trigger of, "Okay, I need to put this page live right now. I need to publish this blog post."

Laurie Graham  13:26 
I hate hitting that button!

Becky Brown  13:28 
I know.

Laurie Graham   13:30 
For those who are listening right now, and you have an email list, or you've done an online event, man, we get it. When you have to hit that Go button or Publish button or Send, like, still, after all this time...

Becky Brown  13:44 
There's so much vulnerability wrapped up in it, when you know it's not perfect yet. And if I don't do it now, I don't know if I ever will. Both of those are true.

Laurie Graham  13:54 
Okay, I want to just share just one other like, example of picking a small action to get going, because we're talking about overthinking. So Becky and I are on this journey with you. No matter where you're at, we are still on this journey. Like, I don't think we're ever going to arrive till we see Jesus face to face. So it's like it says in the Bible, like we're always going to be on this journey. So I get stuck in overthinking still, but I'm learning like to shorten that response time, that emotional response time, and get out of it sooner. But I'll give you two super quick examples.

Laurie Graham  14:24 
One is, I have a book that I've written, and it's in editing stages, but I'm still spinning because there are steps and who's going to format it and all this kind of stuff. And I'm telling you, the most exciting thing for me is to get the book cover done before the book is done. Like to see the artwork. There's—and that is not a logical thing that somebody is going to tell you to do in that order, right? Becky, how about picking the music for this podcast?

Becky Brown  14:48 
As soon as you brought that up, I thought about that and how it kind of turned the light bulb on. It brought, it brought it to life, this whole thing that we've been talking about and planning and like sharing information about. All of a sudden it turned on. When you gave it music, it was like, we have a tone. We have a vibe. Now this is us.

Laurie Graham  15:08 
Yeah, we do have a vibe.

Laurie Graham  15:09 
Do you love the music? Where, if you're listening from, did you love the opening music? Like most people probably didn't even notice it, but we're like, so jazzed by it, right? We love it, yeah? And simple things like that can get us out of overthinking. So when you're in this overthinking space, it's like putting a pause in or an interruption.

Laurie Graham  15:27 
So the first step was clarifying what we actually want. So important, get out of wanting what everybody else wants. Get out of the shoulds. What do you actually want?

Laurie Graham  15:37 
The second key to stop overthinking is picking this one simple thing—it might make sense to people, it might not, but it's got to be this one simple action that kind of breaks that.

Laurie Graham  15:48 
This brings us to step three. Yeah, we're going to talk about giving ourselves permission to move forward, even when it's not perfect. Becky, you have a phrase that you taught me. Do you remember?

Becky Brown  16:01 
No, I don't. What did I teach you?

Laurie Graham  16:03 
You said, done is better than perfect.

Becky Brown  16:05 
Oh yeah, oh yeah. We actually throw that around a lot, yeah.

Laurie Graham  16:11 
Becky, when we talk about progress beating perfection and done is better than perfect, do you remember a time that something turned out better because you just went for it, even though it wasn't polished?

Becky Brown  16:23 
Absolutely. So I just shared that I get stuck in the planning, and unless I feel like it's perfect, I don't release it. So, you know, one of the biggest examples that comes to mind is the first devotional I wrote. It was a 30-day weight loss devotional. I wrote it years ago. I had never written a devotional before, and so my internal bar was set pretty high. Like, if you're gonna write a devotional, this thing better be good. And I spent months writing that thing. I was so intentional and careful. I had a lady from my church who used to be an English teacher edit it, and I didn't even like a lot of her edits. I'm like, I'm losing my voice now. And, man, I put so much into it. And finally, it got to the point where I had stared at this thing so long that I was like, it just has to go out now. It just has to go out now. And in the years—and it's still selling regularly, without me even really promoting it—in the years that it's been out, it has changed so many people. Like, it has impacted. I hear from people still regularly today, and I'm so glad that I released it as it was.

Laurie Graham  17:30 
You went for it, and that's probably why you you tell me a lot, "Done is better than perfect. Just do it. Just do it. Just do it," because of your experience, because you spent months doing that devotional. And when I wrote my first devotional, which, by the way, I only wrote because you told me to, yeah, you said, "Just get it done. Just get it done. Just get it done. Just get it done." And I think I did it in a month's time. I think I did it in a month and put it out there. And as I think of this right now, I just want to let everybody listening know you'll hear more about our journeys along the way, but I'm more than a decade older than Becky. We're in different life stages. My kids are grown, out of the house, married, doing their own thing. Becky has littles at home, and Becky went first in business. Becky has 10 years of experience in business before I started. And so when you hear this, if you are younger, or if you're older, like, we're on both ends of this, right? Like it has no bearing on how successful you could be, or how fast you can be successful, or what your view of success is. Like, we're at such different edges of this. But I remember my biggest thing that was so hard for me: I love color, I love creativity, my website. Oh, you all, my first website. The name was different. I'm not even gonna say the name right now of my entire business. It has changed. So don't get hung up on all the details.

Laurie Graham  18:52 
A little church thing, a little great thing. But my website was bright orange and purple were the accent colors. It's nowhere near that. And I wasn't happy with it, but I thought it was close. And Becky's like, "Laurie, just do it. You're gonna change it." And I'm like, "No, I'm not. I want it to be perfect." "No, you're gonna change it. Just publish." I published it. You all, the business grew. We've changed our colors so many times. Thank goodness for my daughter for coming on board as a staff member to help me in all things branding. But all this to say, like, really, done is better than perfect. I have videos. Please don't look them up. Videos from, you know, even just a year or two ago, I'm totally embarrassed of the things that went out on social media, not of what I said, but how I looked at what I was wearing and the lights and the—it was awful. I mean, it's embarrassing. Like, you know, when you look back, and I think that's why we built our businesses, because we were willing to do progress over perfection. There is a risk, and it's so worth it. Yeah. So if you're in that place of overthinking again, clarify what you want. What was step two?

Becky Brown  20:07 
One small change, do something, pick one action that's going to move you forward.

Laurie Graham  20:12 
And then, practice progress over perfection. Or I love to say, done is better than perfect.

Becky Brown  20:17 
Was there anything else other than done is better than perfect? Was there anything else you told yourself along the way when you were tempted to stall out and not publish? What else?

Laurie Graham  20:32 
I'm not gonna die.

Becky Brown  20:35 
I see. I tell myself, "This is not brain surgery." When I put so much pressure on myself, I say, "This is not brain surgery. Somebody is not going to die because of your actions."

Laurie Graham  20:45 
Oh, yeah, that's, yeah, that's really true too. But sometimes I just say, "I'm not gonna die"—like, of embarrassment or of it's gonna be fine. It's gonna feel, and, you know, I think this is where faith comes in too, right? Like we either trust that things are gonna be okay or not, you know. And that's not the fluffy, you know, "Commit your way to the Lord and you're going to make a million dollars." Like, that's not what I'm saying. But I'm saying, in the end, we learn, we grow, we still have people who love us in the world. Failure is not the end. Even if it's going to fail, I would rather fail trying.

Becky Brown  21:20 
And it's a big ask that we have for ourselves if we expect ourselves—the first time you do this new thing, the first time you create a printable, the first time you put out a podcast—it's a big ask for you to ask yourself to do it perfectly without any practice, because hello, that's the natural learning process. Is practice and making mistakes and recognizing the feedback, pivoting, being responsive and flexible—that's how growth happens. And so it's a big ask, and let's say an impossible ask of ourselves, to say we'll just do it perfectly the first time.

Laurie Graham  21:56 
Yeah, I love that we're talking about overthinking, and I love that we're opening our podcast talking about overthinking, because I think it is such a common place that we get stuck, whether we're just starting out, whether we're in the middle, whether we're trying to launch a new project, whether something kind of did fail—like a launch failed, that's not going as well as we thought. We can get stuck in those things. I'm in the middle of a conference launch right now. I could be overthinking that and not doing anything else. Like, I think this conversation is so important. And as we're talking, there are so many more conversations I want to have. Like, I want to talk right now about "I've never done this before." I want to talk about emotional health. I want to talk about what I've learned about being responsive. And you know your word, attunement. What else are you so excited to talk about? Because this is like, our first—this is our first conversation. We've got hundreds more coming up. So what else for you?

Becky Brown  22:51 
Everything's on the tip of my tongue. I'm like, "Oh my goodness, all that we just talked about today." Well, what does it look like? The specifics, the nuts and bolts of how did we do this? What mistakes have we made that we can share with you so that you don't have to spend three, six months writing a devotional and using somebody else's voice when you see yourself like going away? You know, like all these things, we have so much to share with you, because we have not only been in it, we are in it right now with you.

Becky Brown  23:18 
And Laurie and I talk every single morning, five mornings a week, weekday mornings, and we talk about this stuff every day. Like, "How'd that go for you yesterday?" "Where are you stuck today?" We talk about it every day, and we can't wait to to bring you into that conversation with us.

Laurie Graham  23:34 
Yeah. So y'all, there's much more to come, and I just want to say it really is one step at a time, so don't overthink even some of the topics we just threw out to you. We don't have to learn it all in one day. We just take one thing and apply it in one day.

Laurie Graham  23:47 
As Becky and I have been dreaming about Smart Soulful Business for a while and really talking about, "How can we help people?" "How can we help women the most, who are building their businesses, who've started something, but they're not quite where they want to be yet, but they're out of the dream stages," like, what's our best way to serve people best? This is what you're going to hear from. This is what you're going to get from us. You're going to get this podcast. It's going to be released every single week. Along with that, on Becky's site, she's going to have some blog posts kind of coming up, which we'll share with you when when they're they're happening.

Laurie Graham  24:20 
But in addition to that, we decided to launch a Facebook community that's super low cost, and it is a private community because we're sharing our best. It's like the peek behind the curtain. It's going to be as active as you want it to be with live, like, Hot Seat questions. We're going to take questions you ask in there, so we know we haven't produced everything you need. You might be starting a podcast next month, and if you join this Facebook community and you say, "Hey, how do I do that? Your course isn't out yet on how to start a podcast," we're literally going to come on in there live and tell you how to start a podcast. Between the two of us, I mean, Becky's had, like, viral keto-friendly recipes, right? I mean, the the amount of experiences we've had between partnerships, hiring employees, contract workers. What else we've got, Becky?

Becky Brown  25:15 
Membership, Amazon merch, T-shirt design and selling through Amazon, KDP, books, memberships, courses...

Laurie Graham  25:24 
Live conferences, webinars—between the two of us, it's like we've lived, like, 1,000 years in business. So you're gonna get it all from us. So anyway, look for us in our Facebook community. It is called Smart Soulful Business, if you don't want to do this alone.

Becky Brown  25:45 
What is one thing that you are going to do in the next 24 hours to move forward? Say it out loud. Write it down. Tell a friend—whatever that looks like for you. Put it in your Asana checklist. Do One Thing in the next 24 hours that's going to move you forward.

Laurie Graham  26:01 
I love always going back to learn and do. Learn and do. Like, don't just consume, everybody. Learn and do. So every podcast, we're going to end with a do for you. So we're going to learn together, and we're going to do. If you do want a simple tool to help you do this, these three challenges, just go ahead and grab our Start Here Checklist. It's a free PDF. You'll see the link for it in the show notes. It walks you through these three steps and helps you decide what to do first. Again, you'll find the link in the show notes.

Becky Brown  26:29 
And if you don't want to do this alone, come join us in the Smart Soulful Business membership. It's just $9 a month, and it's a place where women like you get accountability, encouragement, and the clarity to keep moving forward with all the things we've talked about today. You've got this. We've got you. Go Team!