Ep. 020: Let's Get Coffee: Motherhood + Business Catch-Up

In this conversational, sitting-down-for-coffee-style episode, I share what I’ve been up to lately, including another break from business, celebrating new life, reflecting on loss*, and continuing to tweak my business model and marketing in line with my real, messy life as a homeschooling mom. (*tw: miscarriage)

Resources:
The Income Filter
“Flow” by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

Transcript

 Welcome back to the podcast. It's been a hot minute, so I just wanted to catch up a little bit. I don't have an outline for this episode. I'm literally just gonna drink my coffee and we can catch up chat about life and business. So. It is the end of April. I cannot believe how fast this year is going, and at the time of releasing this episode, I'll be about 29 weeks pregnant with my double rainbow baby. So very exciting. This whole week I've been very emotional because pregnancy, but also because if you didn't know. As I kind of just alluded to, I lost two pregnancies last year and my last like coffee chat episode was last April after my first loss, and um, this month, April would've been the due date of my second baby that I lost. So, lots of emotions, lots of things going on with me, but I am very. Grateful. I feel very blessed to be solidly in my third trimester with this rainbow babe. So can't wait to meet him or her. We're not going to find out until the birth, so starting to prep, you know, freezer things and get a little bit of nesting energy going on, getting ready for their arrival, and I'll just. Briefly tell this story. This whole thing won't be about pregnancy, but if you haven't heard this story, I feel like it's worth sharing. Shortly after my second loss is when I found out, like very quickly after, like pretty immediately after that we were pregnant again, and I had not shared with anyone yet, hadn't told my husband, and. My middle daughter, who was still three at the time, was laying with me and she said, mom, I can hear my baby brother is in your tummy again. While we were sleeping, an angel came and took me to heaven so I could get him back and put him back in your tummy. So I thought that that was just mind blowing. And I wept of course, and thought that that was so sweet and there's no way that she could have known. 'cause I hadn't told anyone yet. So I did tell my husband and I was like, you know, she's been saying that. Well, it's true. So there's my cool story. Other than that and all that that entails, I have been homeschooling. My kiddos. So at the time of this, my kids are five, four and two and a half, and my oldest is in kindergarten. Um, you probably know if you've listened to my podcast before that I taught kindergarten back in the day, and so I felt pretty confident in. Doing homeschool, kindergarten, and it's been really fun. We've kept it very low key. I definitely lean more towards the way of life is learning and following my kids' lead on the things that they're interested in. So we did very light on the curriculum side of things and lots of play and fun and experiments, and it's been a joy. So I think my kids have really liked it and we've been involved in a co-op once a week just to, you know, hang out with other families who are homeschooling. And, um, my kids have made some friends and it's been a good time for me to also just make some friends and bounced ideas off of other moms and that sort of thing. So that has been fun and we'll probably continue that next year or another Co-op, I don't know. Um, we'll see. But that just ended for us, so we're not like quite done with our semester, so to speak. But my husband does work with college students and their semester is rapidly coming to an end, and then we're going like, take our family vacation and everything. So I feel like once we do that, I might be ready for summer to start. Um, but because we have been so. Like relaxed overall about the homeschooling process. Like I don't think a whole lot of our rhythm is really going to change, which is another great thing about homeschooling. Like you can just do as you please, like we're just over here living our life. So on the business side of things, I don't think I really shared here on the podcast since I took such a long break and I didn't really. Jump back into things until January. I initially was wanting to kind of do a bridge income experiment, um, and it was like, like a side hustle, if you will. And I, so I started a cottage bakery, uh, selling sourdough goods, and it honestly did not really go super well. Like it did not pick up. Very much momentum as much as I had hoped. Um, and I did, like I did a whole series on Instagram talking about how I came to decide that sourdough was the thing I was gonna try and like my five criteria for income that was going to be worth it to fit into my life. And I very much stand by like everything that I shared with that. And that's where. My guide, the income filter came from was that five criteria. Um, and I, I still think that that's like a very good way to filter through opportunities like that that could really fit into your life. But I kind of came to the conclusion that it was sort of a way for me to deflect. My real work. Um, unfortunately, so I think that I was feeling like a lack of confidence in the message that I share, which is about fitting work into your real life as a mother and being who you really are in your business and letting that, letting your life's work be what you do. Like it is all interconnected part of your life. Um. I was feeling a lack of confidence in sharing that and was feeling like I needed some kind of proof of concept. And so the sourdough experiment was sort of a way for me to show in real time, like how my methodology comes to life. And I think that that was like great in theory, but I don't think that that is really how my. How I operate, like how my design is meant to work, to like, like try to build the plane while I'm flying it in front of others. Like I don't operate in a way where I am publicly experimenting. Um, I think part of my strength is really. Reflecting and going inward and then coming out and sharing from the wisdom that I've learned after the fact. Um, and I know that the whole in real time is very trendy right now. And for a lot of people it's great and they work like that and I love it. Um, but I realized as I was attempting to do that, that it was really like closing off. My energy, if you will, not to be woo about it, but it was, it was giving me an, a level of anxiety that I didn't, that wasn't beneficial for the whole process. And so I have kind of put that on the back burner, especially also because I was entering first trimester of pregnancy. Again, for the third time in a year, I was feeling very exhausted physically, and so that just, it didn't, it just wasn't a good time anyway. It just didn't work out for me to do that, and I realized that my focus really needed to be on this work and doing that inner reflection and the back side. Work to come forward and bring that wisdom, like once it's integrated. So that's what I'm gonna continue doing forward. I, I mean, I don't know, maybe I will, I always have some kind of. Side hustle going on. Honestly, like I just dabble. I'm just a dabbler. And again, you can watch my series on Instagram about all the side side hustles that I've had over the years because it's been, it's a lot like I've done a lot of things, um, not always for like a huge income need, but just because I enjoy making things. Excuse me, because I enjoy making things and doing things and sometimes we'll make things for my own kids or do things and other people express interest. Um, and those tend to just like pop off for a brief time or something. So I'll probably always be dabbling and I may continue to dabble on the sourdough, but we will see. I'm also again like. Nearing the end of my pregnancy. So things like that. Um, it's not always the best time for, I am pretty constantly in reflection about my work and my own, like sense of self and identity as part of our work, um, integrated business. All of these things, iterating. All of that. So I've been thinking a lot about my business model and the sort of traditional funnel business model and sort of what that looks like for most people is having, and I'm sure most of you listening here are business owners, so you know exactly what I mean of. At the top of the funnel, your like content, your freebie leading into some kind of low ticket to group, to high touch, one-to-one, et cetera, et cetera. Um, that sort of funnel model and really contemplating how much of that fits my natural way of being and how much of it doesn't. And I think. You know, I have done so much work around getting to know myself and what feels natural to me. What feels, uh, not necessarily always easy, but what feels right and good and sustainable for me, and fulfilling. And even then, even after like doing all that work, it can be so hard to remove yourself from. Uh, the way of doing things that's around you, that's modeled for you. And this is my sixth year of business, which is crazy to believe, but October will be six years. And, you know, I entered very much in a girl boss era of business in 2020. And that model, that funnel model is just. Rampant and it's, it works for, for most people. Like it, it, there's a reason that that is the way that most people do business and it makes sense. And I think that there's a way to lay that over, like using our own lens of who we are to sort of juxtapose that model with. Like our more natural way of being. So I'm kind of playing with what that can look like and have kind of come to like, you know, concentric circles of my work. I have like the core of my work and it sort of goes outward. And that's not, it's not that different honestly, from I guess the funnel model, although. I just, I really just wanna pare down my offer suite and stop worrying so much about every single little step along the way of a funnel. Like I just wanna do my best work and have my best like body of work to offer the world and stop hindering myself by being worried that I don't have like all of the little steps in place, if that makes sense. I think that that's been one thing that's really. Holding me back and keeping my confidence low is thinking that I need to have this level of perfection and precision, which is also a part of my design, that I am worried about those things. Like I'm a Virgo and I, so I worry about all of the details falling into place and I see all of the details, but it can really. End up being like a perpetual preparation mode instead of just really offering to the world what I have to offer. So I am working on slimming down my offer suite, which I don't even, I don't have that much out there right now. Um, it's been a slow unraveling as I get back into things this year. Um. But we're already already in Q2 and already rocking and rolling into Q3 pretty soon, so it has gone really fast. But along with that, I have been, I've been reading a book called Flow, um, cannot remember the author's name. Michi, I think something like that is the first name. I can't remember. I'll have to. I'll try to stick it in the show notes once I look it up. But, um, just speaking to what it looks like for us to be in a true flow state and for us to be present and how that lends itself to more joy in our lives and the people who experience like the most joy are able to. Enter a state of consciousness basically that allows them to be their whole self and not worried in that moment about, um, about threats to, to the self, basically. And it's been really good. But that is one of those things that I've been thinking a lot about as. As I create like sort of my own business model and, and up update or tweak my business model is how can I spend more of my time doing those things that bring me into a state of flow and bring me into that state of being my whole self while offering things that people want and that will impact people. Um. Yeah. And of course, you know, there are all those little tasks that come with business that are kind of unavoidable, and that's okay too. And not all of life has to be only things that we love to do or feel like we're good at, but maximizing the amount of time that I'm just being myself, like business that's. That's how it should be. That's what I truly believe, is that we should be able to be ourselves and not feel like we are constantly having to change or rubbing up against like this level of not even discomfort because again, yeah, sometimes it is uncomfortable and we meet like our edges, but not having to always feel like we are. Squeezing ourselves into somebody else's version of things in order for it to work. And so that's kind of what I'm doing with, with tweaking my, the way that my offer suite looks is just not trying to squeeze myself into the conventional model anymore because it, it isn't feeling good, it's not feeling right. And. I know that I will feel more fulfilled and it will be more sustainable if I do things in the way that actually fits for me and actually makes sense. And along with that, and I've spoken to this on the podcast several times, is not building my business based around like a scalability model. I know that's controversial because. People say that we're, you know, building our own income ceiling by not building things in a way to scale. And they say that it's more sustainable if, if it's scalable. But the thing is, I don't wanna build a business that I want to not be doing. Like, I don't wanna build a business that I see myself like pulling away from. Through scaling, and I think that there's like two kind of sides of that. Like I see really successful business owners who have definitely scaled their businesses, like they have a very wide reach, they have a team, they have all this stuff going on, and yet they are able to continue doing. The thing that they most enjoy about their business and staying in their zone of genius and flow and they love the work that they're doing and at the same time are able to reach more and more and more people through the their team and various like passive income products and all of that kind of stuff, which is fine. And then there are people who, I think to them the idea of scaling is so that. Eventually they can like pass all of it off to their team or to their systems, to their products, and they can just like back off and like, not really like be the face of it without being a part of it. And, and that is totally also fine and their choice, but I don't see myself. I doing that because I truly wanna be doing the work that I enjoy, which is working with mothers in like a hands-on way and presenting, you know, the, the things that I have, uh, researched and contemplated and thought about and that wisdom, you know, that I have. Cultivated from others, um, and sharing that without ever like, just removing myself from that whole process. Like, I, that's not what my business is for. And so I think more people are wanting to have that conversation about, you know, I'm not trying to build. An empire, and I'm not trying to build a billion dollar business that has tons and tons of employees and like that. I just become the face of it, and I'm not really involved. Like I just wanna be doing the work that I love to do. I just wanna be living my life's work in a way that is fulfilling and sustainable. Like I, I, obviously, I want it. And need it to, uh, sustain our life financially and be a good fit for the lifestyle that I want to live. Being home with my kids, homeschooling them, you know, having our little garden and all of that. And I truly don't think that that's me putting a cap on my dreams or something. Like, that's not me limiting myself. That is truly just the reality of what I desire to have a business that I actually love doing. If that's YouTube, please let me know so that I don't feel like I'm alone. Another way that I'm kind of playing with tweaking my approach to my business is with like the marketing side of things. Obviously social media has been the biggest like marketing tool that I have used, but I also have like my Substack and I have this podcast and even, you know, like in-person networking and that sort of thing. And the conventional advice, and I know this is already something lots of people have talked about before, but is, you know, the idea of being very consistent in your marketing and being very consistent on social media, especially if you're using a platform like Instagram, because the content really is there and gone like it. The shelf life of an Instagram post is just so. Ridiculously short that sometimes it doesn't always feel worth it because we spend so much time creating content and then it feels like it's just a blip. Whereas some things like blogs and podcasts are very easily searchable and sort of live out there for longer. Um, so I have been considering like, what, what consistency. Looks like for me and what is the most sustainable for me, because I definitely get in these spurts where I do post on Instagram every day or multiple times a day, uh, except for the weekend, but like five times a week rapidly posting content. And I get in these seasons where I have lots of ideas and I batch a lot of content, and I don't want to necessarily stop that when I have that as. Like an urge, a creative momentum that have the energy for that. I think it's like good to roll with it. But there are other seasons when I don't have that energy and I don't wanna just, um, ghost necessarily. But I have been thinking about more of like a happy middle for me and what would work for me. And I, I think that my. Energy and the way that I'm designed lends itself to less frequent posting, um, than I sometimes get myself into like a rhythm of, because my energy does fluctuate so much and really going with quality over quantity. And when I post allowing it to be a very thought. Uh, thought through posts like a very well thought, very well written, very potent kind of piece of content that sticks with people rather than like really churning out tons and tons of content, which again, I know is controversial also because of the algorithm, like the algorithm does reward constant frequent posting. So we'll see how things go as I play around with that and what that could look like, and allowing more of my long form content to make the short form content. Obviously, repurposing is. Really helpful, uh, to cut down on like the amount of time that we're spending creating content. So I really have not been in a mode where I've been making a lot of long form content because I have been putting so much of my energy into really frequent posting on Instagram. So allowing myself to kind of cut back on that a little bit in order to focus on. Podcast episodes, SUBSTACK articles, things like that. And then taking those things and making the short form content from there. So I think I just wanna end with a reiteration of my message, I guess, and why, why I am doing this and why it's important to me is for mothers who are holding onto their. Vision of like, ambition and a message that they have to share with the world and a thing that they're creating and like birthing into this world and like holding that alongside, you know, a need for financial income. For their families, sustaining their families, and also like wanting that to be fulfilling, like wanting their work to be meaningful and not just a paycheck and not, you know, especially not wanting to go back to like some kind of traditional form of work, like a nine to five or sometimes even like a side hustle can be. Exhausting and not super fulfilling, but like really wanting to find their thing that feels like their life's work, like feels like the thing that they are here to offer to people. And you know, that can look different in different seasons, but I just really want to encourage. Mothers that as they look at their real messy life, the constraints that they have and the challenges that they have, that that is not the obstacle to their ambition, but it is the map for what their business can look like. Like it is the design brief, it is the outline, the blueprint for. What can lead them into the most fulfilling means of work for them? Um, not in spite of their life and their motherhood, but because of it, because they are living their life, their vision, their values in that way as a mother raising their kids and living their life and being exactly who they are, like that is. The means of creating a sustainable and fulfilling business. And I really believe that, and that's what I'm here to do for myself and also to teach others. And I hope that as I share here and, and various places online, that when you come across my work that. You just feel encouraged to continue being exactly who you are to discover the person that you were created to be and and live that out in your motherhood and in your work. And. That you feel encouraged that that's exactly as it's meant to be, and your life isn't something that is separate from your work, like it gets to be this beautifully messy integration that actually feels right for you. That's my update on life and motherhood and business. Thanks for chatting with me. And I'll see you in the next one. Thanks for listening. I hope what you heard today leaves you feeling a little lighter, a little more rooted, and a lot more you. Be sure to subscribe and follow along for more and come say, Hey, I'll run Instagram at Live Wholly You. grace and peace to you.