Quarter One Review: You Don’t Get Invited—You Build the Table

→ Check out the New Rules Of Marketing In 2026 (That Actually Get You Sales) Masterclass at jasminestar.com/newrules ←

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This episode almost didn’t happen the way I planned… and that’s exactly why I had to record it.

What you’re about to hear isn’t polished—it’s the messy middle of building a business and a life that actually means something.

A last-minute pivot at the start of the year forced me to choose alignment over expectation… and that decision set the tone for everything that followed.

Inside this episode, I’m sharing what’s really happening behind the scenes—from unexpected personal moments to hosting a room full of seven-figure entrepreneurs all facing the same challenge:

Focus.

Not a lack of ideas—but too many.

Because the truth is, we think we’re diversifying… but we’re actually diluting our results.

So here’s the shift:

Focus isn’t about adding more.

It’s about subtracting.

This is a real-time look at the decisions, pivots, and priorities it takes to scale—and why choosing less might be the most powerful move you make.

If you’ve ever wondered what it really looks like to build a 7- or 8-figure business… this is your front-row seat.

Let’s get into it.

Click play to hear all of this and:

[00:00] Why You Must Build Your Own Table (Not Wait for an Invite)

[01:45] The New Year That Didn’t Go As Planned (And Why It Mattered)

[05:00] Choosing Alignment Over Expectation in Real Time

[06:00] Inside My 7-Figure Mastermind: The Real Struggle? Focus

[06:45] Why Entrepreneurs Dilute Results by “Diversifying Risk”

[07:30] How Ruthless Prioritization Creates Real Growth

[08:00] Why “Boring” Strategies Actually Scale Faster

Listen to Related Episodes:

• The Truth About Scaling, Criticism, and Letting Go with Leila Hormozi
• The Real Reason Customers Choose You (It’s Not What You Think)
• Laying the Bricks for Your 2026: Lessons from Quarter 4

We’re hiring! Visit Jasminestar.com/careers to learn more!

For full show notes, visit jasminestar.com/podcast/episode632

Transcript

Jasmine Star 00:00:00  For many years. I was never invited in the room or to sit at a table. And this is your reminder. You build your own tables. You won't get invited to rooms or tables if you have not built your own peer at the end. Welcome to the Jasmine Star Show, where we talk about building a business and doing whatever it takes to get exactly what we want from our definition of success. So every quarter I drop what I call laying bricks, because I believe that we lay bricks for the future foundation of the skyscraper we want to build. And so this particular episode is just an opportunity to talk real, talk about business, what's happening behind the scenes. Because a dare, a dare fool in 2030 to tell me I got lucky. Luck is when preparation meets opportunity. And so what I am doing with these episodes is just documenting the messy middle. What are you doing to get ultimately what you want? And I'm here to talk about the losses. I'm here to talk about cool things.

Jasmine Star 00:00:57  And this is now oh goodness. I think this is like the sixth Laying bricks episode I've done. And so I've been able to say, okay, so in quarter one or, you know, of 2025, this happened. And look what happens in quarter two of 2026. So you never know like the relationships that you create, you never know the opportunities that come your way. And so this is really important for me just to kind of document what's happening behind the scenes. And so if you've ever wanted to get a front row seat of what it looks like to build a seven and eight figure business, well, then pick up a cup of tea, we're going to be getting in that today. So normally I start with like here are a series of business things that happened. And I don't tell too much about my personal life. And I think it really does behoove all of us to keep the real, the real, because business and life are often very intersected. So let's go back. It's December 30th, 2025.

Jasmine Star 00:01:47  This is before we start the year and my very first business online business mentor. He was getting married. He was having a very small wedding in Austin, Texas, and I was invited. Cool venue. It was going to be a New Year's Eve like we were so excited. So my husband and I arranged for our daughter to stay at my mother in law's, and we were going to ring in 2026, and I just imagined myself. It was a black tie wedding and oh, we're gonna dance. We're gonna have like, a great time. So on December 30th at 430 in the morning, we rouse our daughter and we already told her she's going to be celebrating New Year with her grandma and cousins. And she's excited. She even buys her own decor for a new year. So we arrived to my mother in law's house in LA at 515 in the morning. It is pitch black and my daughter promptly has a panic attack. And no, not a tantrum. Not a cry fest. She's like can't breathe.

Jasmine Star 00:02:41  And she says, you can't go, you can't go, you can't go. And so I tried to stay calm and say, we've discussed this and you're going to be okay. And then there's just something about being a mom where you know, this isn't normal and it's probably not right. And so immediately I go on and I see if I can buy a ticket for her. Just see if she can come with us. Austin, no, kids aren't invited to the wedding. But I was like, we can just figure it out. We'll just get her there. And of course, every ticket is booked and we're flying the day before the wedding and I'm like, oh my gosh, this is not happening. So my husband and I quickly have a conversation and meeting in the mind and he said, listen, I'll drop you off at LAX and you can go by yourself and I'll stay home with her. And I sat there and I thought, that's actually the antithesis of what I want to start 2026.

Jasmine Star 00:03:28  Because if you've been around the podcast for a while, you'll know that 2025 was like a year of ups and downs for me, and I didn't want to start 2026, especially Lunar New Year. It's the year of the horse, right? It was new beginnings, fast go. And I knew that my word of the year that had downloaded was my word of the year was to relax. And so, ironically, I feel like what you step into is what you're gonna be challenged to at the beginning. And I was like, am I relaxing right now? Am I relaxing with this child who's probably having a panic attack in the back of my car at 5:00 in the morning? Absolutely not. So OMG, welcome to 2026. You're going to practice it right now. And what I decide is that I envision myself bringing in the new year by myself, and I envision it outside of him, and I immediately knew that was my answer. I'm not going. So I turned to my daughter and I say, we are not angry and we love you, but mommy needs a second.

Jasmine Star 00:04:16  So we drive back home. We put her back in bed and my husband is like, okay. And I said, I feel angry. I was like, I'm not mad. All I feel is anger and I don't know what to do with it. And I'm having a logical conversation with him before 6 a.m. and he's like, no problem. I said, I think I'm going to go to the grocery store. And he like, slowly blinks and he's like, you haven't been to the grocery store since 2001? What are you doing? What? He said, I don't know, nothing's open right now except for the grocery store. I just need a walk, bro. I just need a walk. And he's like, oh, okay, so go to the grocery store and I'm just putting things in my cart and I'm like, explore these emotions. What's going on? And I said, I feel disappointed that the thing I wanted to do wasn't happening the way that I wanted. And by the time I checked out, I had decided I'm going to choose to believe that everything is happening for me.

Jasmine Star 00:05:05  I don't know what would happen with my flight. I don't know what had happened on the right in. I don't know what happened on the dance floor. Maybe I broken ankle, or maybe it was just supposed to be that I was supposed to start my year fully relaxing. So I got back home. Back to groceries. We have coffee at home, baby girl. We have conversations about what it means around our emotions, and next time we get to try again and then we just book a staycation, go to Laguna Beach. We check into a hotel. Actually. How do we bring in the new year? Completely and totally relaxed? Was it how I wanted? No, but I really do think it started quarter one in the best way possible. So let's get into January 13th to the 15th. This is where I hosted my seven figure mastermind. People come to Newport Beach, and the goal here is to gather a group of women who have a seven figure business who are scaling to eight, and this was an opportunity for people to get together and say, what are we going to do this year and how do we do it on our own terms? So I decided to set the intention and the focus of this particular in-person mastermind.

Jasmine Star 00:06:06  And the word was focus. And I don't know if you've ever heard, like, you have to teach the things you have to learn. And so if I decide like, oh, I need to learn patience, what will I be tested with? Everything will try my dang patience. So it's like I knew that I needed to speak about focus, because what was I really struggling in? The ruthless prioritization of what I needed to do and what I found myself doing and saying is like, okay. So my three focuses for the quarter are this. My four focus is for the year. Is this. And so it was once described to me that focus becomes more palatable and more effective. So focus is more effective by subtraction not addition. And so if I say I'm focused on four things and I only have 100% of my focus, well then each of those things have a 25% chance of my effort focusing on that, and which is fine, but I'm only going to be getting results in 25% of the time.

Jasmine Star 00:07:00  Now, if I only focused on one thing, well, then it would be 100% of my attention in 100% of the time. And how much do you think I'd be getting those results? So the intention of the mastermind was focus. And boy oh boy, was I definitely challenged on that. So we were really focusing on why. Why do we struggle with focus now? Number one, we like to diversify risk. You know, it's like, do I go all in in this. Because if I had three business options instead of one. Well, I'm just thinking that one doesn't work out. Well then this one's going to work. I understand that our brain is hardwired to stay safe, and as an entrepreneur, risk is not safe. So if risk is not safe, diversify risk, we're safe. But what happens with that is that dilution of results. And so our brain, if we just say, okay brain, I know what you're trying to do, but I'm actually smart enough and I got here.

Jasmine Star 00:07:51  I'm going to trust that my focus, my ruthless elimination of other things. This is where we're going to stay. Number two entrepreneurs. We're creative and basic is boring. Like one one thing you want me to eat like porridge for the rest of my life? Like, no, no. And here's the thing. We love porridge. We did every morning until we're told that we can only eat porridge. And we're like, no, no, absolutely not. So why do we struggle with it is because we classify it as boring. And what we like is new beginnings. Now, seasoned entrepreneurs, they're like, this is the game. Foundations are the game. Basic is the game. Now, if we put this in like a sports analogy, some of the best athletes like let's take Kobe Bryant. Kobe Bryant was unrivaled at doing the foundation every day. He's dribbling the ball down the court, one of the best NBA players at the time, and still will be one of the best players. And what does he do? He spends hours on the basics.

Jasmine Star 00:08:48  He's eaten his porridge every day and more often than the other person. Why do we struggle with focus? Number three quick money is exciting. Oh, as entrepreneurs, it's like, oh, we're we're hardwired to find ways to make money, which is great. But what I've realized that now is when you have a series of short ladders, you actually are missing the opportunity to build the one ladder to get you to where you want to go. And so the short ladder will preclude you from building the one letter higher. So at this mastermind, I was teaching the very thing that I needed to set this year, and then I had to step into it and tell them, these are the things I'm letting go. And you should have seen, like the jaws on the floor. Like what? Like that is a massive revenue stream for you. To which I replied, I know, but that massive revenue stream is actually slowing me from the revenue stream I want to build and that I'm called to build.

Jasmine Star 00:09:43  So it goes. The antithesis going all in actually increases risk. So our brain is like, stop going all in means that I am going to eat porridge for the rest of my life, and I'm gonna love it and give me a second bowl. And then thirdly, it really does mean that there is going to be a slowing of quick money. You will have sustenance, but I don't want quick money as much as I want strong money, dependable money, consistent money. Let's go to legacy money. I'm going to share a podcast from the mastermind. A little tidbits of it, because I've always said I promised God there's no reason I should have to start a business. I'm the most unqualified, uneducated, unfunded, unconnected person that there ever was. So I promised God if I ever got to a place where my opinion would matter or anybody would care, I'm going to share everything I know so I don't charge you for the podcast. We don't run ads on the podcast, and I'm not even charging you to come into the mastermind.

Jasmine Star 00:10:33  Right? I'm going to share these tidbits with you because I'm staying true to my promise. I'm staying true to my purpose of saying, I'm going to fulfill on this, and I want you in the room, but you and I need to agree on something. You need to agree to focus. You need to have the ruthless elimination to understand where it is you want to go. Let's get to January 20th and 21st. I hosted a class called The New Rules of Marketing. So I was like, I'm gonna put together this free class. What's really changed in marketing 2026? Here again, I want to share everything I know. So 2026 social marketing. And the concept was what to stop doing, what to start doing and what to double down on. I was like, that's the three parts to this amazing class that I just felt like it was a download. I'm like, oh, we're going to do this thing. And the feedback was incredible. And I'm still getting DMs from people because I have that out on the internet.

Jasmine Star 00:11:18  Like, check out that class. You can watch the replay at Jasmine Comm forward slash new rules. So put a lot of time in intention. We got it off the ground. Put it out there. Awesome. So seeds. Now after the webinar I drove to LA to help my mom. This year has been really tough. You know she's struggling with her health. She was diagnosed and went through like nine, ten years of brain cancer and cancer of the nervous central system. She wasn't supposed to be here. The fact that she is still here is incredible, but there's a lot of complications with her health. And so I'm just adding that here because I think that what is seen online is Jasmine hosted this webinar and it went really well. And it was like a lot of buzz. And then little behind like little known behind the scenes is like I close my computer, get baby girl, get JD in the car, and I'm like, okay, let's make my mom dinner, let's clean the house, let's do these other things.

Jasmine Star 00:12:04  And that's entrepreneurship. You know, that's balancing what is important and what is right and what is good with what is exciting, sexy, and also at the same time, extraordinarily overwhelming, but unfortunate that I have built a business that serves my life and not my life that serves my business. Let's go to January 22nd. I took the day off. Why? It's my daughter's birthday. I will not work on her birthday. She is too much and she is too big of a blessing. So she told me this year that she would like to go to Legoland now. Never been, never been, and I wasn't. You know, it wasn't like bursting at the seams to really be there. My daughter is my daughter. Let me just tell you, y'all know, like on this podcast, we're like, we have a plan. Like we can't control the plan, but at least we have a plan. I'm gonna sit down. This girl came to me with her plan. What rides? That she was going to go on.

Jasmine Star 00:12:51  The order in which we were going. Then I was like, yes, baby girl, do that dang thing. So one thing that I watched my daughter that I'm going to take deep pride in is I've always told her, when you have a plan, you can get what you want. And boy, did she get what she wanted. She got all her rides. We finished the day and it was such a great day because it had rained unseasonably. It had rained in California the day before. And so we got in like that day. It was a little cloudy. It was a little chilly. Nobody was in the park like we went on every ride, like less than, like a five minute wait. So we got to the whole park in like three hours and then we're like, well, I guess we're gonna go to lunch. It was beautiful. So we decided I'd like to work on my terms from wherever in the world. So we decided to stay down in San Diego. It worked from the hotel and then my right hand, kind of like she is the director of consistent 10-K.

Jasmine Star 00:13:36  She was a former president, a social curator. I mean, the girl has been with me for a while and she's pregnant. She said, Jasmine, I know that you were a professional photographer and you haven't taken clients in, gosh, like eight years. Can you shoot my maternity session? I was like, absolutely. Absolutely no. Side note have I ever done a maternity shoot? Never in my dang life. Does it intimidate me to work with a woman's body that's growing another human on the inside of it after eight months and I'm like, yeah, absolutely. So this was not me, like literally driving to the shoot like JD husband driving me to the shoot. I'm looking on Pinterest, pregnant photos of women, how to make women look beautiful. So we went to the beach. We had a really, really great time. JD and I went to dinner. We reflected and the next morning was Katie's baby shower. Now I have to tell you that the ability to work with people who you just genuinely like.

Jasmine Star 00:14:22  They invited me into their home. I met their families and people would say, oh, you're Katie's boss. And I'm like, technically. But like Katie and I build, I don't look at her as my boss. I look her as a cold builder. What an honor and what a privilege. January 29th I was a keynote speaker in San Diego. Now, here's one of those things we talk about laying bricks. I wasn't doing the laying bricks. I wasn't doing quarterly reviews on the podcast back in 2020. And so I met a CEO in a mastermind in 2020. Now we just met online. She came in as the guest speaker, and then I sent her an Instagram message and I just thanked her for her time and we have since stayed connected. Now, she hired me back in 2021 to speak at a digital conference. Now, remember, back in the days of the pandemic where nobody was going out and doing anything? They hosted a virtual conference. They hired me as their keynote speaker, and since then we had still stayed in contact.

Jasmine Star 00:15:10  Now, I was invited back for their in-person event in 2026, which was an honor. Really, really, really great. What's the biggest takeaway like? What you can apply to your business is to cultivate long term relationships. I was invited as a keynote speaker. And what do people see online? Oh, Jasmine's doing more keynote speaking. Yes, but that started six years of cultivating a relationship. So understand that it is the long game. And so how do you cultivate long term relationships? That sounds like pretty nebulous and high level. No, it's leaving comments on their post showing them that you care. Sending DMs about like, oh, I'm like, Costa Rica looks amazing. It's a Christmas card. I send Christmas cards, I do. And people are like, pleasant surprise. Exactly. And whenever I see something happening to somebody else, I've trained my brain to celebrate it so that I can welcome the space and abundance for it to happen to me. So when she's doing really incredible things, I'm sending her text messages, being like, so proud of you.

Jasmine Star 00:16:00  Job well done. This is incredible. That's how you can also cultivate long term relationships. All right. We're at the end of the month, January 30th to February 2nd. And so we head to Las Vegas. We head to Las Vegas. This is what we do every single year because February 2nd is a massive day for us. But since this is a business podcast and nobody really cares about my personal life, let's answer the question. What is a brand? A brand is a series and a set of expectations of stories, memories, endorsements that empower a consumer to choose one brand over another. It's why you choose to wear Asics instead of Nike Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf versus Starbucks, Nordstrom versus Neiman Max. It's a brand. And so the simplest way that I've learned to describe it is the brand is what you make somebody feel. That's it. How did you make that person feel? And that's why we're going to choose to go back to that business, to that entrepreneur. And so I have to tell you that when I think of the brand for seasons, I used to think fancy hotel, lovely.

Jasmine Star 00:17:04  And now what I think about the Four Seasons is it will be unrivaled, untouched, as the highest class of any experience I have ever had around the world. Why? We were placed for adoption with less than 24 hour notice, and we had to find a place on the Las Vegas Strip to meet and welcome our daughter. Ha! I just get a little cheer. I it was the hardest time in my life. We had waited three years for the adoption and I'm like, I'm in Las Vegas and I'm going to usher my daughter and do I really want to do it, like in a smoky casino, like at the base level and be like, welcome to the world. Cha ching ching ching, cha ching. Yeah. I was like, this is energetically not in alignment. So I found a hotel that didn't have smoking and it didn't have a casino, and it happened to be the Four Seasons. Was I expecting that? Absolutely not. So we go in. We booked like on Las Vegas Boulevard.

Jasmine Star 00:17:55  I'm talking to somebody like, is there a room available? And she's like, yes, are you celebrating anything? And to which I replied, I'm going to become a mom tomorrow. And so I explained and she's like, great. Well, we look forward to welcoming you. We get in there and they check in and we're so excited. We've upgraded you to the Presidential suite. We can't wait for you to meet your daughter. So we walk into the presidential suite and I'm like, oh my God, if this is not an omen. So I started calling Baby Girl before we even met her, it was like, Madam President, we welcome you into the presidential suite. You might just run this country. We meet our daughter and we went with nothing. And when I say we went with nothing, our best friends had called a Nordstrom, ordered us a baby carseat, and they're like, you need this. And it didn't even occur to me, you're right. How am I going to transfer this? Like, you know, £8 human back home? So we pick up the car seat in a box and we go to Vegas and we have nothing.

Jasmine Star 00:18:43  And the hotel brings us a crib with freshly washed sheets. They bring us a Diaper Genie. Didn't even know what that thing was. Brought us a bottle warmer. Offered to wash everything. Brought her her first little stuffed teddy bear. They made her a welcome cake. And so we became a family. And what does that brand say? We care about the details. And so every year since then, we've gone back on February 2nd, and we check in, and you want to know what they tell us? Welcome home. That was the first time we ever had a home together. And I will tell you oh we oh we man, if that ain't a brand. So every year I block off time from work and how fortunate. And please know how fortunate. All that sacrifice and dedication to build a business that empowers me to say these days are hers in these days are mine, and I'm not going to work. And I wish you the same as you build your business. Because when people ask like, what's your definition of success? I'm not necessarily pointing to a bank account, although that matters.

Jasmine Star 00:19:42  Definitely not pointing to cars, not pointing to zip codes. I'm literally pointing to. I get to live life on my terms and I get to modeled for her. What's actually possible? So February 3rd, I did a podcast with Lila Hermosa. That podcast had already debuted, but what happens is we don't talk about a lot of stuff. And her and her husband are building this massive, massive business and brand. And what people don't really talk about was when she first started creating content in a very public way. I was the second podcast she had ever done, and the story I was telling myself was that I totally botched the interview. It was really bad. And this is oh my God. Okay, so this is the team. I rented a studio in Las Vegas that was close to at the time where her office was up is what? So I rent this studio. I walk in like, sight unseen. I have no idea what's going on. And I'm like, okay, well, here we go.

Jasmine Star 00:20:27  We're gonna get this party started. And so she comes in with her video crew, even though I had a podcast studio that was recording video, but she was like letting it go. And I said, absolutely no problem. This is what we're going to do. So we record the video and then I get an email from the podcast producer and he says, Jasmine, I don't know what happened, but I don't have the audio from the last ten minutes of the podcast where like, tears were shed and we got really personal and I was like, oh, oh God, oh God. And this podcast meant so much to me. I was so nervous. I don't even think that I was really myself. I don't think it was really that big of an interview. But I was mortified because I looked like the most unprofessional podcaster of all time. Because what is the podcast? Audio. And guess what? I don't have it. So then I have to eat humble pie. And it reached out to her team and I said, I know this sounds really bad.

Jasmine Star 00:21:09  Dear videographers have like the last ten minutes of the audio. I was so embarrassed. Like the whole thing. Soup to nuts was not. It was not a highlight. I got the audio, everything was okay and ended up working out and I was like, I don't think she's ever going to work with me again, to be totally honest. Did that stop me from pitching her again? Absolutely not. Like I'm unafraid of no, I believe that no is just a not yet. And if I am relentless and then continue to ask that one day it's going to turn into a yes. So that was 2023. And every year we go back to Las Vegas, which is where she lives. And I was like, I'm going to ask her again. So 2024, it didn't work out. She agreed to podcast in 2025, and so at the time, she wasn't taking other podcasts. But I was watching her content. I was understanding what she was producing, I was understanding how she was working.

Jasmine Star 00:21:52  And at the time when she was walking the streets around her like office space, and they would record content and then she would post it. So what I did was I pitched a custom pitch and I said, I can create third party content, ask you questions, give you insight from like a viewer, but we're going to do it on your walk. You had to be doing it anyway. But I'm going to bring my videographer and you can take your videographer and it's going to be a win win. She agreed. I was like, amazing. So we're in Vegas every year we celebrate her daughter and then February 3rd, I have this podcast set up and I fly my videographer out there, and of course it's a torrential downpour. And I'm not talking about it's like rainy spring. It's like the Nile River was just down Las Vegas Boulevard. And I was like, okay, this is not going to happen. So we canceled the shoot. And I'm just so disappointed because I thought this was like, this is my chance.

Jasmine Star 00:22:34  This is my Do-Over. This was a chance to be like, hey, I'm like a regular human. I'm a business owner. I'm a podcaster. And how I showed up was not exactly the way that I'm, like, all that proud of. And it didn't happen. And so now 2025 rolls around and I was listening to one of her podcast and I was like, you're gonna pitch her again? I bet you again. So I took a screenshot of me listen to the podcast. I was in Miami for an event. I took a photo of me and I was like, this is me. Listen to your podcast. I have like 18 questions from this that I know. If I have it, other people have it like, let's, let's, let's do this. And then I emailed her and I don't hear anything. And I was like, okay. Then I email again, I don't hear anything. And so I emailed in like September, I emailed in November. And then here is December, and I'm kind of gearing up for my February trip and I'm like, am I going to do it? Am I not going to do it? How do I book the tickets? And so then, January 2026, I sent her a DM.

Jasmine Star 00:23:22  I was like, I don't know if you were able to get like these emails. And she was like, I never got them. I was like, great, well, I want to do this. Are you available? She's like, here's a series of emails of people that you need to connect with. She agrees to do the podcast. And what I will say is, yes, the podcast was really great to like have a through line that was great but was not lost on me was the extension of the question what is a brand? Because I will tell you, like what we did in that podcast and you've already seen it, it's out on YouTube and you've probably heard it. I'm going to link it in the show notes. It was actually really great. It was a very personal look at what she's stepping into professionally. However, when we talk about like, what is a brand? And I just explained what is a brand? A brand is how you feel. That was the Four Seasons when I walked into acquisition.

Jasmine Star 00:24:07  Com, the company that her and her husband are building, and they have this massive building in Las Vegas. And when you walk in and you ask what is a brand? It is how you make somebody feel. It was everybody from the the security guard. We walked in so kind, professional, made this walk in and then there wasn't 1 or 2. It was four people who greeted us at the front doors. And then there was two people who escorted us up the escalators, and every single person even walking down the hallway. Can I get you anything? Anything? Water? Drinks, snacks. Are you. Are you guys okay? Then we went in and we met like a secretary at the entry, part of where her division is, and then her brand director came out and introduced himself in the videographers. Are you guys all fully set up? And I thought to myself, if the Four Seasons is really great at training people on how to create experiences and how to see somebody, then what Layla and Alex Hermosa have done is the same thing.

Jasmine Star 00:24:57  They have a culture of making sure everybody's looking at each other and saying, are you okay? How can we take care of you? And to me, that is business and that is a brand. Whatever people say about all, you can have an opinion about how they build or whatever. That's not it. The testament of a business is how you are greeted from the person on the ground floor to the person in the penthouse, and everybody across the board had said, I see you. Can I get you anything? How do you become the best version of you? Hot dang hot dang. Now we're back. Newport Beach, February 10th. There was a woman by the name of Emma Greed. She is business partners to Kim Kardashian and Kourtney Kardashian for Good American and for skims. And she has a podcast called aspire, and she recently dropped a book New York Times bestseller, The Whole Thing. Well, she hosted a Woman in Podcasting dinner, and this started back as a WhatsApp group in 2024, I believe, and I joined this WhatsApp group in 20.

Jasmine Star 00:25:55  Yeah, 2024. And so we meet every other month. Just get on zoom and female podcasters will get together and talk about what they're seeing across the industry of learning. How do we get better, what's going on? How do we become collectively better and stronger? So we share insights, trends? We share ideas. And so what did I learn at this in-person event? I learned more of what podcasting really is. Now there is a difference. There are podcasters and that's their business. And then there are business owners who podcast. I'm in the latter category. I'm a business owner. I don't make money from my podcast. It's a way to drive revenue towards the business, but it's not my business builder. Most of the women in the room were using the podcast to make money, and I thought, just so here's the thing. Most people watch sports. My free time, what I want to do, I just want, I just want to watch business. I want to study business. I look at entrepreneurs the way that I look at athletes, like if there was trading cards, I definitely would be trading a Gary Vee.

Jasmine Star 00:26:53  Oh yes I would. I'd also be trading Cody Sanchez. Yes I would. I study people, and so I'm studying the room of the business to try to understand, because I believe in synchronicity. Like I'm going to learn somebody from something at some other time that like a year later, I'll be like, oh, I know how to answer that. Why? Because I was in the dang room. So speaking of being in the dang room, I think that here again on social media, it looks very flashy. Sexy people were like, how did you get in that room? And I will say that for many years I was never invited in the room or to sit at a table. And this is your reminder. You build your own tables. You won't get invited to rooms or tables if you have not built your own peer in the end. So for years I would be inviting men, women, anybody to a table to talk. And the minute that you have other people who are vying to sit at your table, is the minute that you get invited to a different table.

Jasmine Star 00:27:42  So wherever you are, however it looks, invite people to join you online. Build a connection, share insights, share what you're learning, and you guys become stronger. So February 12th to the 13th I was a keynote speaker in Dallas, Texas. Now here again, long term cultivation. I had met the founders in 2023. I was introduced by way of a friend. We had a call to get to know each other and like, I know what this was about, like this CEO who's very successful, like nine figure CEO was trying to be like, If I'm gonna put you on my stage, I want to know who you are. And so I was commissioned to record a recorded training. So they said they met me. They were kind of like, okay, I think we're here for our people, but we're not gonna put you on the keynote stage. So they commissioned me to create a training around branding and social media, and it had a positive response. So because of the positive response, they said you'd earned your way to the flagship event in Texas.

Jasmine Star 00:28:29  Now, I'm not going to talk about the keynote because it's a keynote. I'm going to talk to you about things that I saw that I want to model, because again, when you're in other rooms, the CEO brought his wife and daughters to the event and the daughters were sitting in the front row. And I know I've said it before in the podcast, there are people who are expanders. They expand your idea and version of what life could be. And so I saw the CEO, I saw his wife, and I saw his daughters, who were, I believe, 12 and 14 respectively. And they were sitting in the front row and I was like, this is what you're going to do. You're going to bring your daughter and she's going to sit in any row she darn well pleases, but she will be in the room to experience things from the outside. So I want you to as you're building your business, look for other expanders in your life and say, what do I like of this? And what do I want to start implementing? On that lesson I wrote, I wrote in my notes, I came back home and I was preparing for the podcast, and my daughter said, mom, when you were little, did you invite your friends to be on your podcast? I was like, no, but you will.

Jasmine Star 00:29:25  You want to use my podcast? You want to invite your friends. You want to let your friends on your podcast? Yes. So let me call my shot. Like the Luna Sol show. It might be dropping, might be dropping late 2014. You never know. You don't know. And now we have it on camera. February 19th. Attracting connections. I believe that we attract things. So let's talk about two connections on the same day. This was on February 19th. Ashley Brock Ashley Brock came on my podcast. I'm going to be linking it in the show notes. It was very fascinating around content and creating ads strategically. She's an ads specialist. And so after us meeting, she had said, Jasmine, I really think that you belong to speak at my event in Palm Springs at my mastermind. So I gave a keynote about long form video marketing and branding, and I'm going to be sharing that on the podcast soon. So you're going to see the behind the scenes of that. Remember what I said that promise to God I will put you in the room like her mastermind is like, I think it's like $100,000 or something like that.

Jasmine Star 00:30:18  And like, what am I going to do? I'll put you in the room. Yes. Okay. And then number two, the second thing that happened on February 19th, on the same day, I was a guest on Leanne Mosley's podcast. And so she has this new concept. And here again, our freaking expanders. Remember I mentioned I posted a podcast episode and how I was introduced, and how I got to know a gentleman by the name of Omar. And that podcast is already. Now I'm looking at people doing things in new ways. Leon Mosley has never podcast, and what she says is my podcast is just a season. My podcast is going to be filmed like it's a Netflix series. My podcast is going to be lifestyle and I was pitched by her team. I've been watching what Leanne is doing and I was like, get in the room, see what she's doing. What does that look like? And I will say, I was absolutely freaking blown away because she has a vision she executed in it.

Jasmine Star 00:31:06  And I'm telling you, if that's what podcasts are turning into, Holy Mother of God, I'll raise the bar. I'll raise a bar. This looks like a reality show meets podcast meets business. And y'all, I made guacamole live. I no, listen, I am not even a person who is in the kitchen, but I will say my guacamole unrivaled. My husband who loves to cook. He doesn't make his whack a mole. He says, Jasmine, make your walk. Holy. So I got to make it on Leanne Mosley's show. Definitely. I'll link it in the show notes. Now we are in March, y'all, we're getting into the end of the quarter. February 20th 5th to March 1st. I was in Vermont for an eight figure boardroom. This is a mastermind hosted by Cole Gordon, and it's all I'm going to be sharing a full debrief breakdown here. Again, what I've always done, I promise I'm gonna get you in the room. You might not be eligible to get into an eight figure mastermind.

Jasmine Star 00:31:51  What am I going to do? Am I share my experience? I record behind the scenes. I even give you the tea. I sit at my phone and I was like, okay, so this is what I'm learning here. This is what I got to change. And I think that when you see that podcast, it's going to come out and look a certain way. You know, Jasmine has access to those rooms. Jasmine is building that kind of business. Maybe or maybe not. What I'm going to do is offer an inside look. There is an inside look to behind the scenes of what people see on the outside, and what I will tell you, I felt sick from everything I didn't know. Nobody knows that I'm having it here. And I'm literally saying I felt physically sick by everything I didn't know. And I was trying to build a business similar to the people in the room. And if I listed everything I didn't know. I have never had a better reason to quit. I'll tell you that much, because you have to ask yourself, am I willing to do whatever it takes to learn that level of what they know? And do I have it in me? And I'll tell you, when I was in Ron, I don't even know.

Jasmine Star 00:32:48  I don't even know. So I divided because I'm highly logical. I was like, are you feeling emotions? Let's logic this out. My overwhelm was in two buckets. Bucket number one things I could do in three months. Bucket number two things I could do but four months from now. So what I told myself if it ain't in bucket one, you ain't thinking about it. Yeah, I'm worrying about it. Because if you leave an event and you have 103 things to do, you're probably not even get started on one. So what I just did was I'm like, you know what? Whatever is four months out, I might not even get to it. So what we're going to do is we're going to focus on these things. And if it was if I was listening and I'm watching somebody and I'm like, you can't figure that out in less than in less than three months, I'll put my pen down. My pen was the signal to me. Sit where you are. Sit where you are.

Jasmine Star 00:33:38  Do not pass. Go. Do not collect $200. You have to earn the right to solve that problem. So if it. If it ain't done in three months, you're not doing it. March 2nd, we returned back from the Vermont event, and I knew it was time to make a very difficult decision. And these are things that I do not talk publicly. I will share this here because just a few gangsters, the low riders, are going to be here for this podcast. I needed to step back in as sales manager, and I had to let the sales manager go. And I kind of felt prior to going to that event, I felt a little conflicted. I mean, she's an amazing person, like awesome person. I really, really liked her. She was talented and I felt gutted. And these are the things that we just don't talk about as entrepreneurs is like letting people go is very, very, very hard. But I knew that I wasn't making a human decision. I was making a business decision.

Jasmine Star 00:34:26  So the minute I let her go, my schedule, my life, my calendar got three times more complicated because my right hand. Remember how I said earlier that quarter I had taken maternity photos for Katie? Katie was on maternity leave. Was I going to hire a substitute for Katie being gone on maternity leave? Absolutely not. So I stepped in and started doing what Katie was doing in addition to what I was doing. And so then I let go of the sales manager and it is humanly impossible to do three full time jobs. I should know because I tried and failed miserably. And so here again, I come back from an event where I was wildly overwhelmed. And then in my business and here again, I am overwhelmed and I'm overwhelmed by the systems to build. I'm overwhelmed by the standards that I have to build for. I have to excuse me that I get to. I was overwhelmed by this. The standards that I get to build for the team. I was overwhelmed by the idea that I get the honor of coaching them, but OMG, that is a lot.

Jasmine Star 00:35:25  And what I've discovered is I am going to sit here and I'm going to build the department and I'm going to systemize the department, and I'm going to build the culture of the department. And I'm gonna, I'm going to know more about this department than I ever have before, so that when I hire a sales manager, I'm going to ask the sales manager, if you can't keep this bar, then this is not the place for you. And I know this bar because I set that bar and that was my mistake. I didn't do it the first time around. I didn't set the bar. Why? I wasn't confident. It's the first time I've ever created a whole entire sales division with a sales team, with a setting team, with a call setting team. I mean, the whole thing. And I was like, great. Let me just hire somebody who's highly qualified to do it. I knew enough to be dangerous, but not enough to call somebody out in the crowd. So I've been sitting at that.

Jasmine Star 00:36:09  I'm going to be hiring. I'm going to be hiring. You can always be looking at Jasmine Starcom, forward slash careers. You know, if it pops up and it's calling to you, there it is. But the main lesson that I'm sharing with you is how do I avoid this in the future if I'm not learning lessons and everything that I'm doing in life, then I'm doing it wrong, because if I don't learn the lesson, I'm going to repeat the mistake until I do so how do I avoid this in the future? I made a long list of things not to do. Now we're getting towards the end of the month. March 18th to the 21st, y'all. Austin, Texas. Austin has a piece of my heart. I always joke with my friends that like, Austin is California right smack in the middle of of of Texas. There you go. This is why I feel this is why I feel at home here. So I flew to Austin to meet with my CEO, my chief operating officer.

Jasmine Star 00:36:53  She is the ying to my yang. She is the peas to my carrots. I will look at anybody across the face and say the reason why the business is what it is, is because she is flawless and she is good, and she's kind and she's hard nosed and she's hard to win over, and she is relentless and she does not cut corners and she holds a standard very, very high. We've been working together for six years, and she's always told me, I don't want anybody to know who I am. I want to be behind the scenes. I've never been called to be in front of a camera, nor do I have any desire to. And I believe that there is nothing she can't figure out. And so I came to Austin and I had one focus here again, the theme. We're closing out the episode the way that we started. What is our relentless focus and our relentless focus is how do we rebuild and restructure a sales division that will get us to where we want to go in the next three months, because we met at the beginning of the year when? Oh 2026, when everything's optimistic and we do these things and then all of a sudden life will come in and slap you upside your face and say, what is it that you actually want? So based on the series of mistakes and gut punches and like sleepless nights, you know, it's like one of the perks of being an entrepreneur is you get to set your own hours, you know, like waking up at 2:00 in the morning being like, oh, maybe I should not be thinking about it right now.

Jasmine Star 00:38:12  And then rethinking the whole thing at around 11 p.m.. Okay, that's the perk of being an entrepreneur. Come and join the club. It's really great here. And so I think that when you're working with somebody in that capacity and I say, I think this is the thing that we can do, and I have literally a vision for it. She will go through and she just puts numbers and math and systems and says, if we want to do that, this is who you need to be. This is who I need to be. This is the bar we need to hold the whole team to. That is what we did in Austin. So from now to the end of the month, just a few days, in the end of the month, I'm going to be home. I'm not going to be traveling for two full weeks, which feels pretty good. I started the episode and I was talking about getting grounded and here we are. I'm going to be focusing on the team and the sales system.

Jasmine Star 00:38:51  I'm going to be creating content and that's it. That's it. That is all I'm doing from now to the end of the quarter, because what I want is multiplication of the business by subtraction and not addition. I'm going to be traveling quite a bit in April. I will be going to Nashville. I will be going to Dallas, and I will be going to Mexico City. And like I said, to the best of my ability, I will be putting you in the room with me. That was my promise. That is where I'll stay, because anything I learned I want to share with you. So you go out and do the same thing so that all of us, all the crew who's unqualified, uneducated, unconnected, underfunded, all of us. We could do it and we can change the game. And that's why I am doing this. I get to build this business anywhere in the world. I get to work with incredible people. I get to serve the kindest, hardest working clients.

Jasmine Star 00:39:37  And so for those of you who fall into those buckets, thank you. For those of you who are listening and watching. If I look back at this quarter, I will say that this word was foundation like this quarter. Like the theme of this quarter, the theme of the year is to focus. My word of the year is to relax. But the theme of the quarter Foundation fundamentals methodical, strategic. I want to feel I want to feel like the game is getting slower. It's not. But the best athletes say that when they know they're good, the game gets slow and when the game gets slow, they become intentional. So this is me saying I will gladly work on the foundations. I will gladly eat porridge and I will ask for a second bowl. I want to say thank you for watching and listening to the Jasmine Star Show.