How Honesty and Self-love Transformed my Business

In this episode I tell my story and talk about uncovering the secret unconscious drivers that may be keeping you stuck in your business and/or delaying going all in on your business. We talk about:

• Showing up for yourself
• Going back to work after mat leave
• Taking jobs we don't really want to do
• How self-love is expressed in your business and your prices
• How your self-value creates different clients and how much fun you have in your biz. 

I also outline what I did to go from dreading going back to draining, misaligned associate coaching work early during maternity leave to tripling my prices and instantly calling in soul clients, fulfilment and fun. 

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Transcript

Welcome to the Spiritual Sofapreneur, the podcast for female entrepreneurs who are ready for their business to feel fulfilling, fun and abundant. I'm your host, jenna Sinclair, business energetics coach and meditation teacher here to help women remember their personal power to create the life they truly want, in alignment with who they really are. It's time to get courageous as we explore our businesses as a reflection of our own inner worlds. So if you're ready to go deep, let's go. Okay, hello, first episode. Welcome to the Spiritual Sofapreneur. I'm Jenna, and you might hear my dog, alpha, in the background at some point. He's a husky malamute, so he's always making some sort of noise and he might come and say hi in a bit. So I'm giving myself permission for this podcast to be imperfect, for it to be messy. So come with me now on a journey through time and space. Um, but yeah, first episode. It's been coming for most of this year. Actually, I've just been quite busy. 

I made the decision to start the podcast in February, but I've been quite busy moving countries. I moved from Italy to the UK and then back to the UK four months later, and we've stayed in 13 different houses this year, which I will talk about on a later episode. So now we're in one place for longer than five minutes. I thought I'd just get this out there. We're down in Cornwall, which is where I'm from, in the southwest of the UK, and I want to help women to remember their personal power so that they can create lives that they truly want, with self-belief, self-trust and self-love. We want all these things right. I want you to know that you can create business success, time, freedom and all the beautiful things that go along with that, like slow mornings, making nice coffee, lots of time with your family, not too much time and a loving state of mind that's not reactive, where you're not stressing at your partner and kids, where you've got over scarcity mindset and you're just not feeling pressure and rushed. I've done it, and so can you, and I really want to help femalepreneurs to believe in their magic. So I'm going to tell you a little story of where this all started for me, and I've been through many evolutions and transformations, as I'm sure you all have right, because this work never stops, does it? 

But this particular story, in this particular transformation, starts a year ago. Um, I think it was around September 2023. So I was about four months into maternity leave in the garden in my house in Sussex with my baby outside on a blanket in the sun listening to, I think, abba, because I'd been in a steel band and playing the steel pans and we were playing quite a lot of ABBA at the time. So I was really loving it. And I received the call offering me this job and I went inside the house and heard the details of the job and, even though I could feel my heart dropping, knowing that this was just dry as fuck, it meant that I was going to be going back to work earlier than intended. It meant delivering this work was going to be as fun as pulling teeth. I knew I was going to hate it. I said yes. I said yes because my partner had been laid off his job a few weeks before and I didn't know it then, but I was actually in survival mode. I also said yes because, deep down, I was priding myself on my needs not mattering and I was sacrificing my desires to do the work that I really wanted to do so that I could feel chosen and so that I could feel responsible. I knew none of this at the time. This has only come up in hindsight and reflection, but it's really important. So I've been a coach since 2017 with my own business, but I've been taking associate work since around 2019 as a supplement because I was struggling to meet my income goals, as a lot of new coaches are. I didn't know anything about business. I was fully qualified as a coach but the whole business marketing world was completely new to me. So I ended up joining loads of associate works because I am accredited. It was really easy to just get that work and I I said yes to any work that fit my qualifications, really within the realm of positive psychology and coaching psychology, and the money was good. 

And as a recovering alcoholic who dealt with harbouring shame for the many nights spent in blackout, not remembering what I'd done or said, I was enjoying priding myself on being someone who'd been chosen to work there at this job and who could be relied upon to deliver this scientific work, for these information-packed workshops and trainings. I was enjoying priding myself on being able to handle reading the script on the slide while having to pretend I knew all the words and that I wasn't reading and just that inauthenticity and fakeness and pretending was so tiring. But I was priding myself on being someone who could handle it and I was priding myself, ultimately, on putting my energy levels last. I was also priding myself on being someone who had the courage to deliver to a room of 30 strangers, all with their cameras off, who were all staying silent in the chat. My ego loved it and I actually felt safe working my ass off. Because, subconsciously, I was equating hard work to money and that I was deserving of the money through all the hard work. Right, because, because that's what we're taught If we put in all the hours in the day and you don't see your loved ones and you sacrifice everything, then you deserve it. I was also subconsciously equating my self-worth to productivity. The more I worked, the more it would mean I was worthy of love from my partner partner right for making the sacrifice. 

So I said yes to this job and what happened next was incredible. So I was in my mum's house because we moved, we decided to sell 90% of our stuff and we moved down here to Cornwall and this was the first house in our 13 houses, or the second one in our 13 houses, and so I was preparing to be working in my mum's attic and and I was preparing to go from singing the wheels on the bus in as many different accents as I could, and having cuddles with my baby and giving her comfort whenever she needed, ensuring she had all her needs met, to the sadness and guilt of being away from her all day for weeks, because this job was going to go on for eight hours a day for weeks on end. Because this job was going to go on for eight hours a day for weeks on end and I didn't know how I was going to go from nursing any time to having to wake up earlier than I already was. I was having maximum three hours of unbroken sleep at a time. The sleep was just awful. So I was considering how I was going to wake up earlier to pump which I really struggled with, so that she'd have enough throughout the day so that I could continue breastfeeding which was really important to me and consider how I would try to learn and remember a ton of really uninteresting, dry AF information, uninspiring information related to immigration policy, in order to be able to teach it for two weeks straight for eight hours a day, with my sleep deprived. New mother's brain that was just distracted, thinking about my baby and whether she was okay, so I was just praying that there would be a way that I could get out of this. I didn't have to do all this and then a miracle happened right, the project got pulled and, as per my contract, I still got fucking paid, and the relief that I felt at that moment was phenomenal. So in that moment, a weight just dropped and I was like, ah, I don't have to do all that pretending and holding and being someone I'm not, and the relief was just immense. And I realized in that moment what the fuck was I doing? What was I, what was I thinking? Sacrificing that everything that's truly important to me out of fear and out of a lack of self-trust in myself and my business. And I decided there and then that my time and energy was far more valuable than what I was going to be paid for that project and all that fake pride I was getting, and that what mattered most to me was worth overcoming loads of fear for and stepping into the unknown for. 

So I'd actually reached a courage level I didn't know I was capable of, through the birth of my baby, which all new mums go through. We go through the birth portal and we're like fucking hell. Where did that come from, that inner strength? And I'd actually chosen to free birth, so I opted out of NHS healthcare. At 37 weeks I sent a letter and I said I'm going to do it. And I'd gone through three days of labour with no pain relief at home and I was just breathing through all the contractions. I'm not going to go into my birth story here, don't worry, but I'm just saying that through that portal I remembered what the fuck I was capable of. I didn't end up free birthing I had to go in in the end but I remembered what the fuck I was capable of. And I reached a new coverage level that day. 

So I emailed the company that had offered me this job and I said I'm actually no longer available for any of this type of work, and that felt amazing, super empowering. I've been believing that it was safer to take the given work that's guaranteed than to rely on myself, which is everyone in employment's belief, isn't it? Before, as entrepreneurs, we decided to take the leap of faith into entrepreneurship or sofapreneurship, but I'd sort of done it twice by taking all this associate work. It was almost like I'd gone into employment again, taking all this associate work. It was almost like I'd gone into employment again and it just reinforced the belief I can't trust myself to be successful. So when I sent that email and said I'm no longer available for any of this type of work, I recommitted to myself and my business and reignited my fire. 

And in committing to myself, I deepened my self-trust because I was listening to myself and my desires. At a core level, I was bringing in my empowered masculine, which is all decisiveness and commitment, and taking action to heal my disempowered feminine, which was stuck in the energy of over giving, under receiving and analysis, paralysis and inaction. As a result, I was over giving loads in my client sessions, going way over time, doing a lot of the heavy lifting for my clients, and the inaction and the analysis paralysis was showing up in thinking I didn't know what I really wanted to do in my business and thinking that I could just serve everyone. So the first step was getting really, really honest about what I wanted to be doing and that honesty again deepened my self-trust because I was listening to what I really wanted. So, as a coach, getting really honest about what I wanted to be doing meant niching and I'd been scared to niche for so many years because, again, it was pride. I prided myself on knowing that I could help everyone, so why choose a select group? But I know now that that was a subconscious belief that over delivering and over serving made me feel safe and protected from rejection. Is this landing with you? 

And then I started to love myself, slowly by slowly, slowly by slowly, and my business, because your business is an extension of you. It's a separate entity, but it is still an extension of you. So I thought what is my love language? And for me it's gift giving primarily. So I started gifting my business stuff, gifted myself the help of a business coach a one-to-one business coach instead of a group program, this time around a branding academy. 

I learned storytelling, I joined a high vibe community and I started showing the fuck up for myself and my desires to make the money I wanted that other coaches were making and talking about all over social media, who were way less qualified than me. I had a bloody master's in it. I wasited, I tripled my prices as an act of self-love, and by doing so I called in my sole clients, people that I actually fucking love working with. On the same day, I signed a sole client the same day that I tripled my prices, and I couldn't believe it. And this is the opposite of what I was doing before. So when my prices were lower, I was working with people and attracting people who didn't value themselves and didn't value my work because I wasn't valuing myself or my work and I wasn't able to have so much fun with them. So when you start to value yourself, the universe reflects that back to you because it's a mirror, because you are the universe. But we'll get into that in another session, in another episode.  

I started showing up more on social media. I became radically visible Because I realized I had worth. My services were important, were worthwhile. Talking about them, my offers were needed to be talked about. Selling was a service. So I started showing up on stories, face to camera every day, selling my services and my offers, and I started taking really good care of myself. And when I started giving to myself more and to my business more, I healed my receiving wounds and I started giving to myself more and to my business more, and the universe started giving to me more and more. So it was starting to become amazing right. 

The alignment I was feeling was really fulfilling to be finally creating offers that I was genuinely excited about. That was my own stuff, not just some generic coaching. Oh I, I'm available, because before all of this I was just available as a coach, right as a purpose or authenticity coach to anyone. And people were coming into my discovery calls and they were not my ideal client at all. I had loads of weirdos coming in. I had people signing up for discovery calls and then not showing up and that was just a reflection. Them not showing up was a reflection of the relationship that I had with myself and my business, which was one of disrespect, which was one of putting my knees last and myself last and feeling unworthy, and that's what the universe reflected back to me by these people not showing up. 

So I got really, really honest and I said I'm actually going to give myself permission to do business in the way that I want to do and, as well as niching, that meant things like removing discovery calls. I don't want to do discovery calls anymore. I don't like them, so they're gone. I don't even know if I want to do that much zoom sessions anymore. So I started offering boxer coaching and I love it. It's amazing. It works so much for me and for my clients. 

So I had the satisfaction of people buying my offers and the validation that it was working and that maybe I could just let go of my last safety net, the last bit, which was my associate coaching work, and in this I've been coaching people in the corporate world for about five years. I have done other associate coaching neurodiversity coaching as well which I did for about three years, um, before I quit that because it wasn't aligned, the the sessions were so long and it just wasn't. I wasn't getting paid my worth for that, which I realized a few years ago. But this was the last one, the last layer, the last safety net. So I thought I loved all these clients, right, but more I loved the idea of who I was, when I sacrificed my needs to serve others, my need for authenticity, my need for truth, my need for being honest with myself and taking myself seriously and loving myself. And I knew all along I wasn't aligned with these corporate giants, the companies. 

But the little boost of pride that I got after the call, after each coaching call, a little boost of purpose, meant that I could also avoid doing my marketing, meant that I could stay hidden, right. So I told myself that I'll just let all these clients come to me through this associate work because it it meant you know the secondary gain there was that I didn't have to put myself out there, I didn't have to market myself, which meant I was safe from rejection. Because, also, we're taught to not self-promote, because we're taught not to boast. So there was many, many layers to it. We're taught not to outshine other people don't talk about how good you are but ultimately I was safe from rejection by not putting myself out there and I was in my comfort zone massively. 

So I was finding it really, really hard to sustain the energy of self-promotion in my marketing, because of hormones, because of neurodiversity, because of despondency that I'd feel when my posts didn't get the result and the engagement that I'd hoped for and this was so. It was easy to just not do it because it meant I didn't have to sustain the energy if I wasn't doing it at all. But I also realized now that this was because of me not having the courage to choose a group to serve, to niche to. I didn't have the courage to be honest about who I wanted to serve. So my posts weren't even specific enough. 

Anyway, I was just posting out generic life coaching, self-improvement stuff and I was stuck in an identity of academia, thinking that this is what people want. They want to hear that I know my stuff. This is the patriarchy running deep and valuing knowledge over essence or experience over beingness. You are enough, just as you are, without everything. You know as well. So I was told all the time to just be myself, but I didn't actually know how to do that. I know now that I was scared to be through fear of rejection. I knew that knowledge is acceptable. Right, being in a shirt or talking in buzzwords is authoritative, but speaking how I speak and swearing and dressing largely like a child isn't. 

I eventually realized again that it was time to make the final leap into the unknown and to burn the boats, and I did that this summer in Milan. The cost of inaction was actually higher than staying where I was, and the cost of inaction was no time to work on my business and not being true to myself, and I realized that was higher than staying where I was and having the reliable income. So this courage on repeat has led to more confidence and more courage. Courage just compounds over time the more you take courageous action. So I started launching more offers that excited me and attracting more sole clients and going bigger, and since I've quit that last layer, I've called in more clients than ever before.

It's so funny how, when you make space, the universe sends you what you want and it honors your courage. So hence this podcast has been born, so I can share even more with you about my story and my lessons and what I'm learning in spirituality and business and quantum mechanics and law of attraction, manifesting travel, being a mom and navigating all of this to help you believe in yourself. And what's better than playing safe is the fulfillment that constantly leaning into courage and being vulnerable will positively impact someone else's entire life trajectory. That feels pretty fucking good. So hi, I'm Jenna, business energetics coach for female entrepeneurs.

Welcome to the podcast. We're going to be talking more and more about courage and spirituality, psychology, business energetics all this stuff quantum leaping, meditation and so so much more. So I hope you've enjoyed my story and I look forward to seeing you next time. Thank you so much for tuning in today. Come and say hi on instagram at jenna underscore sinclair underscore coaching. You can head to jenna sinclaircom for the show notes and if you're ready to reignite your business fire and become unstoppable, send me a little voicey about ways we can work together. Lots of love.