Episode Summary

Jenna discusses the five common reasons people don’t sign on or renew with a coach.

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Show Notes

Signing on or renewing with a coach can be a source of stress for many. Internal conflict or hesitation arises around the common question, “Is it really worth it?” Regardless of your answer, I can promise you that it is.

This episode of “The Uncommon Way'' is for anyone on the fence about continuing with their coach, in the process of renewal, or is continuing and just wants to set themselves up for success. I discuss the five common patterns and discomforts that emerge when people are considering reinvesting in coaching. I share a list of questions that you can ask yourself in order to get clear and be sure you’re making the right decision for your best self.

Whether you decide to move forward with your coach or not, you’ll have a much more substantial plan and understanding of yourself, actions, and direction from this episode. Tune in to learn how you can create purposeful forward movement regardless of your situation.

What You’ll Learn From This Episode:

• The five common patterns people experience when considering coaching.

• The questions to ask yourself if you are considering working with coaching or renewing your current coaching relationship.

• Ways to explore the discomfort triggered by our internal patterns and choices.

• How a coach not only offers tactics and support but also a space for creating an energetic imprint together.

Listen to the Full Episode:

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• The Uncommon Way Black Friday Offer available through December 15th.

• Ep #43: How to Win at the Game of Entrepreneurship

• Ep #68: Uncommon Perspectives: Keeping Your Name

Full Episode Transcript:

So, the time with your coach is drawing to a close. Regardless of whether you think you're going to continue into another round or take a break, or move on to something different. This episode will help you ask yourself the kinds of questions that are going to set you up for success and create a clear plan forward. And if you're a coach whose own clients aren't sure if they'll renew or not, this episode is going to be really helpful for you, too.

You're listening to The Uncommon Way Business and Life Coaching Podcast, the only podcast that helps you unlock your next level in business and life by prioritizing your clarity and your own Uncommon Way. You will learn to maximize your mindset, mission, messaging, and strategy in order to create a true legacy. Here's your host, top-ranked business coach and reformed over-analyzer turned queen of clarity, Jenna Harrison.

Hi, everyone, and welcome back to The Uncommon Way. I am so looking forward to bringing you this episode today. Because I knew it you can cause a lot of hand wringing for some of you, and for others a huge loss in opportunity. I want to help you feel more calm and decisive when you're thinking about your renewal or your decision not to renew. But also, to make sure you are maximizing your chances of success.

I have had a front row seat over the years to probably thousands of brains, who are going through this decision-making process of what to do after a coaching program ends. Of course, I've been watching my own brain too.

What I've realized, is that A, there are certain ways of thinking that we tend to have when we're not as used to investing in coaching, that tend to change for us over time but not always. And B, this is a tremendous opportunity for increased clarity about your next steps. Because after all, there's nothing like a deadline for bringing forth a decision.

I'm going to break down for you how to get the most out of this time. But speaking of deadlines, we're doing something new here at The Uncommon Way. We have a special offer for Black Friday. Well, sort of. For the end of the year, really.

That is something I don't do usually, Black Friday. I honestly don't remember ever doing it. I don't really love Black Friday as an event, I'm not the person who rushes out to get the TV. I also just don't discount what I do. I don't think there's anything to discount in what I offer.

However, I'm working with a new podcast consultant, and the other day he asked me about my email open rates. I really only look at that every six months or so. So, I opened up my dashboard, and I was floored. Because we consistently have open rates between 63% and 74%. It just hit me full force to see how interested people are in what we're doing here at The Uncommon Way. Even as the list continues to grow, the open rates continue to grow.

So, of course, I hear it every week from people who find me through Google and they sign up for a discovery call. And, of course, I know people are interested in what we're doing here at The Uncommon Way, right? Because I hear it when they sign up for a discovery call with me and they find me through Google.

But this here is really showing me that it's a much broader group that is hungry for these things. Like, hungry for a comprehensive support, not just tactics or just mindset or just energetics or just the nervous system, they want help with all the things. I get it, I am the same way. I got tired of hiring different coaches for all those things, which is why I created what I wish I'd had.

People are really hungry, I'm seeing, for their uniqueness, finding their uncommon way towards a wildly successful business and life. You don't want to force yourself into a carbon copy of someone else's successful strategy. I think maybe a lot of us, especially after COVID, maybe got into entrepreneurship and we immediately rushed to just follow someone else's blueprint. And we're realizing that doesn't really work for us.

We want something that feels right for us. And people are really, really yearning now to belong to a small tight-knit community of extremely driven women who are going to challenge us and inspire us. There's kind of a palpable longing for connection, I think, as social media becomes more prevalent in our lives, as our lives get busier and busier and busier, and we aren't addressing that core human need of ours.

Of course, women are longing have become that version who feels clear and confident, and knows what you're doing and can play big. We are so tired of playing small. So, given that there is all this brewing interest, and I can tell there's interest, I decided to just create something special for these women. To help them get clear about whether or not they want to join.

Because if you're going to join, there is no better time than now. This is going on through December 15, so I'm kind of helping those people with a deadline. I really sat with this, and brought forth the best of the best that I have to offer. I've only shared this stuff with a handful of my private clients. All of it, all the things that I'm offering, they're just total game changers.

So, if you want to check that out, head to TheUncommonWay.com/black-Friday. Again, TheUncommonWay.com/black-Friday.

All right, back to our episode, and oh, it's a juicy one. Again, this is for you if you're on the fence about whether to continue with your coach, or you're thinking you're not going to continue at this time, or you're thinking you are but you just want to set yourself up for success.

It's also great for those of you who are coaches and you want some new ways to think about your client renewals. But I'm not going to be speaking to you directly. I'm really speaking to those of us who are personally considering our next steps.

I'm going to give that group some things to get curious about, think about, and answer for yourself, that will help you create really purposeful forward movement, regardless of whether you continue or you return later, or you go a completely different direction. Because these kinds of questions, these are the big questions that will give you clarity, and let you get better results, no matter what.

Now, I do have some strong points of view that I'll share, as I do. But the truth is, I don't know what the right decision for you is. So, I'm always fine with whatever decision my clients make. And if you are one of them, of course, I would love to support you through whatever is next for you.

But sometimes we need to learn through experience, right? We wouldn't learn the lesson from our coach. Our coach could lay out everything perfectly for us, they could be the most supportive person, they could be the most wonderful, but we need it to be a little bumpy or drawn out or whatever, in order for it to really sink in. And maybe the Universe has other plans for us.

I have been on the phone with people where I would just long to bring them on as a client, I remember, and they've decided to go their own way. It took them a year, year and a half, to finally come back to work with me.

On the one hand, you could think, “Oh, they last a year and a half,” but the truth is, that they really needed that time to kind of… I hate to say suffer a little more… but to really integrate it into their bones why they were going to be making this change in their life.

And then, when they did come back as clients, they were such great clients because they'd had that extra year and a half to kind of percolate. And then, they were so sure and so decided and so ready to just get after it, when they came on.

So, I will always trust that you will find your way, and that you are very held and supported in finding your way. But here's the deal. If you're my client, and I'm going to be speaking to all of you frankly right now, as if you are my clients, up until the day you're not my client, you are paying me to help you think about things you might not have considered.

So, I need to fulfill that obligation and be totally straight up with you, even though you might have thoughts… You might think it's only because it makes business sense for me to do so. Or you might think that it's pure self-interest; you may have judgments about it.

I'm willing to risk that in order to fulfill my obligation of presenting alternate thoughts to you. But that doesn't mean I'm trying to convince you, because it actually doesn't make business sense for me to continue working with someone who's not all in. It's okay for you to have doubts and hesitations leading up to the decision, but once you're in, you're in. So, that's exactly the energy I'm going to be in as I talk with you today.

I'm totally open to the idea that continuing with me, or whomever your coach is, might not be the right choice for you. But I'm still going to give you what I've learned, and I'm going to help you get set up for success by getting clear on what you need to work on next and what your next steps are.

So, I remember once, when I had finally hit my first $10k/month. That happened to fall right when it was time for renewal with my coach. At that time, my coach was working with people for a year at a time. So, this would mean another 12 months of investment. I can't remember if it was like $24,000 or something like that.

And so, I told her I wasn't going to renew. That, really, I had now gotten to the point where I had everything I wanted. I was making $10k months, and that's really the size of the business that I wanted at that point in time; I had a very, very young son.

I remember her taking a pause. We'd had dinner together, because we were at a mastermind retreat in New York City. It was just her and I at the end of the evening. We'd stepped out onto the curb waiting for a taxi, and I remember wanting to be very upfront with her and honest, and tell her why I was deciding not to continue, and how grateful I'd been for all of her support; all the things.

I saw her kind of take a pause, and then she looked at me and she said, “Jen, I'm so excited for you. So proud of you that you've reached this milestone. But I have to let you know, you're not there yet. You have just scratched the surface. Hitting one $10k month does not mean that you're going to be able to sustain that. It just means that this is your first entry point into that next level. I would love to continue to support you, to really cement that in and get that to be your new normal.”

I ended up siding with her. In fact, I decided right there, on the sidewalk, that I was going to continue with her. And as we talked through it, she really breathed a sigh of relief. She was like, “I have to tell you, I felt a little awkward about saying that to you. I didn't know what you’d think.”

But what really changed my mind, was when we were sitting there at dinner, I was asking you about a mastermind sister of mine in the last round, who had decided then not to continue with my coach. My coach didn't speak up and say what she really thought.

I told her that my friend had had some difficulties. Had had a year where she was kind of at loose ends. That really sat with my coach, it really sunk into her. And she felt really bad that she had not spoken up.

The reason we, as coaches, don't speak up to our clients is because we don't want to be perceived in the wrong way. We're human too. But part of the growth is being able to stand in that discomfort for the sake of our clients. Luisa, my coach then, was absolutely right.

It was much more difficult for me to sustain the energy of $10k than it was to have hit it once. I can see how true it is now. And so, I also tell people that they've just scratched the surface. Or I help them see what maybe they're not seen. And the truth is, I'd love to continue supporting my clients because I want them to get where they're going faster, better, and easier than I did, for sure.

So, over the years of observing, like I said, my own thoughts, and observing the thoughts of my colleagues who are telling me about their decisions, and mentors who are talking about their investment decisions, and especially some of my most successful clients… Who, even though they've gotten life-changing results working with me. Things that, frankly, I've never seen in any other coaching program… they're telling me that they're not going to renew, or that they're not sure about renewing.

In these situations, I've seen that the reason usually comes down to one of five things that I've tried to categorize here, that I'm going to share with you and I'm going to kind of talk through with you.

So, one might be, you find yourself thinking, “I'm good. I got this now.” Which, obviously, was my line of thinking in the story I just told you about with my coach. I want to just acknowledge that is possible. You might be good. You might have everything you need. Especially if you've been learning some tactical skill, maybe like, I don't know, learning a new software or something. That might be absolutely true.

But another possibility is that the Dunning-Kruger effect is skewing your perception. So, the Dunning-Kruger effect is a very well-researched cognitive bias that all humans have. It's like a negativity bias or a confirmation bias.

What it shows, is that when we first gain an initial level of understanding or competency in a certain subject, we overestimate our abilities and our expertise. So, you take a year or two of a foreign language, and you think you're good, right? You're breezing through that conversation with the waiter, no problem. But then you go into the actual country, and it turns out you can't participate in a normal conversation with locals; ask me how I know.

I have fallen victim to this effect so many times. Obviously, as I did in the story I just told you with that first mastermind coach. Assuming that because I had a $10k month once, I'd be able to do it again and again and again.

I had a client who was an acupuncturist. She was noticing a pattern where a lot of her clients were leaving. She had helped them completely transform their health and wellbeing, and now they were “cured.”

Which, of course, is the model we're brought up with here in the west. So, it’s understandable why they’d think that. There's some acute condition, you take medicine, and then the condition goes away, problem solved.

But my client knew that there were underlying patterns that were driving the discomfort and the disease of her patients. That wasn't an isolated incident. And so, they needed to drastically change how they were living and thinking, keep coming in to keep this all flowing and to integrate this, make this actually part of their lifestyle, and to make really deep changes. And so, it was kind of heartbreaking to her that people were leaving just when they had scratched the surface.

Right then another woman on the collective call spoke up, and she said, “Wow, you know what? I’ve been working with an acupuncturist, and I stopped working with her because I got to such a great level of health. But I've noticed things deteriorating. I really need to go back to my acupuncturist.”

So, what I'm saying, is that what might be going on for you is that you don't know what you don't know, in terms of what is coming down the pipeline for you, what's next for you. Maybe it's not that you don't need support, it's that you aren't able to imagine the areas in which you'll need support. Through no fault of your own, of course, how could you know?

But this is why you want to ask yourself some really good questions. These questions are going to help you get the most out of your next round of coaching, even if you do stay. That's the beauty of this kind of work. So, they're definitely worth some attention.

You can ask yourself: What is my next greatest area of growth? If the ‘me of 10 years from now’ is looking back on this time, what needed to happen now to let me succeed later? What is that person so grateful that I worked on sooner rather than later?

Another great line of questioning is: What pitfalls or potential detours might be ahead of me that I will need help avoiding? How will I prepare for that? Where might I fall back into some default patterns without objective support? If I do, where will that lead me? What will happen? What is the result of that? And so, what am I going to do about it? How am I going to plan for that?

If you are coming up blank with all of that, but you do really want to give this your full consideration and you're like, “Maybe there is just some blind spot,” ask your coach, who has the bird's eye view. Who has a different long-term perspective than you. What do you see as my next greatest area of growth? How would you support me in that?

Again, great question, even if you're going to continue with the coach because it creates clarity for both of you. What are some things up ahead in my journey that I might not even realize are part of the journey? So, don't let a failure of imagination lead you into taking your foot off the gas when you don't consciously want to take your foot off the gas.

Hey, if you do want to take your foot off the gas, I'm going to talk about that in a second. So, hold tight. I remember working with a client who after our first round together was like, “Wow, this has been amazing. Major up-level. Thank you so much. I think we're good.” I had the kind of conversation with her that I'm having with you now, and she did decide to stay.

There were so many things that happened in that next timeframe that I was just so glad, again, that I had stepped forward to have that conversation with her. Because I could see so many ways in which she could have been derailed. Or certain patterns were still coming out that were influencing her ways of being and her decisions, and the things she was doing.

Like, a need for not wanting to look bad, or to let people down, was causing her to bring on a lot of extra work for herself. There were a couple of really big situations with clients where I was like, “Whoa, hold up,” and it led to big up levels in income, big up levels in the way she was working, and the way in which her clients were able to trust her and see her as an authority.

Also, her own quality of living was improved. These were just things that she couldn't have seen in advance because she had never gone through those specific stages before.

A last thing on this topic. Sometimes you're like, “I really feel like I've reached a level of mastery with this subject that the coach is teaching. I think I'm complete.” Again, this might be true. But this episode is about trying on some new ways of thinking. So, if anything, just to test them out, bounce them around your head, right? Then you can be like, “Nope, now I have even more clarity and certainty about my decision.

But here's something I've learned to pay attention to, is your coach the kind of person who's in continual self-development or continual professional development, and continually working with new coaches and learning new things? Because if so, they are going to have more and more tools to bring to you.

Remember before, when I told you I had a mastermind sister who left the mastermind, and then I stayed with the coach? Well, ironically, the coach ended up moving in to kind of a different way of coaching that I think really would have been a great fit for that mastermind sister of mine.

I'm not saying that you should just take a blind leap of faith, hoping that things will work out well for you. But don't ever assume that this is where it ends for your coach. You're going to grow and they're going to grow. So, I like to think about it like, do I have a really good rapport with this person? Am I getting results with this person? Am I seeing that they are continually in growth and I'm in growth?

Do I want to continue to cocreate and evolve with that coach? I know that's kind of coach-y language, but I'm just telling you exactly my thought pattern. I have a client that chose not to continue with me, for instance. I'm just like oh, because I can see now that exactly where I'm going, the new certification that I'm working on, would have been so helpful for her.

Of course, I pass everything that I learned on to my clients. But I know a very specific sticking point she's had in her belief in her ability to grow her business, and I really believe that this just would have anchored it in for her in such a deep way, and would have transformed her business.

Again, I can hold that with the parallel belief that both she and I are divinely supported on our paths, and so that it's all good. She will absolutely get where she's going, and I'll get where I'm going. But I have a deep, deep trust in this philosophy of ‘we've only just scratched the surface.’ How good can it get? Let's keep going.

Alright, so we talked about the belief of ‘I'm good, I got this.’ Now, let's go into when you do consciously want to take your foot off the gas. Because I can relate to that line of thinking, too. It's like, “Oof, that was a lot. Lots of changes in a relatively short time. I think I just want to take a break for a bit.” So, that's the second rationale that might be coming up.

I want to break that into two parts. Okay, Part A, is that sometimes taking a break is actually just a nice way of breaking up. It's much better to be fully on it, so that you can make the decision consciously, if so.

I've had clients who really believed they were taking a break, but then something else would come up, and then something else, and they didn't return. I wouldn't want that to be you. You can't make a conscious decision about two choices when you're pulling the wool over your eyes about what those two choices are.

Now, I have had clients say, and I felt myself, “But I'm tired. When am I going to stop pushing myself? When do I get to take a break?” And this is part B. You might genuinely be feeling tired, but usually nobody really wants their business to take a break; like, stop providing income, or stop providing more income.

What they want is for their feelings to take a break. For their brain to take a break; the overwhelm, or the not-enoughness, or the feelings of whipping yourself harder and harder. So, you could change the circumstance of not being in a coaching program. You could change that, to try to make your feelings change.

And they might for a little bit, but chances are those feelings will come up again, right? Because it's driven by that inner patterning, that inner belief system. So, wouldn't it be better just to learn to change the pattern that's causing them in the first place? Weed out the perfectionism or the scarcity or the worry or the overdoing it.

That is exactly why you need a coach. Because pushing is not an intrinsic property of growth. The skill that you haven't acquired is learning to manage growth without it being so effort-ey. To not have the business building or the mind building drain you so much. Having less emotional reactivity to the experience of change and self-inquiry. Learning to build rest into your normal, throughout your day, so that it's not something that's finally granted at the end of a big push.

It actually can fuel your expansion, sustain your expansion. And so, even the experience of growth is more loving, more expansive. A marathon runner doesn't stop running after a marathon. Maybe for a day or two, yes. But not for months. You would start to lose all of that muscle growth, all of that conditioning. So, you actually continue your running regimen, just differently, in different ways.

Learning to manage this long term is what you want to do, so that growth can become a manageable and sustainable constant in your business. So, you don't have the starting-and-stopping effect, or the long-plateau effect that many business owners experience. And then, all that frustration that comes with it.

Now, as you're building the skill of doing this, obviously, you don't go straight from it's all-or-nothing into a more modulated experience. Some days you might feel exhausted, that's what we get to dig into and work on.

That's how you get to the point where you'll notice you're spending only half the time feeling activated. And the other half you feel pretty regulated. You feel okay. Then, you're noticing how much more quickly you reacclimate when you do get all spun up. Eventually, it's only certain days here and there when you're really feeling like it's too much.

Essentially you build your capacity for, and you improve your experience of, growth. I have seen it very often that people have the best of intentions when they say they're just going to take a break. But then there's inertia to get back into the saddle.

Maybe when they plan to come back life ends up getting crazy. So, they think, “Oh, I'll go back next month,” and then next month. Or they get sidetracked, and maybe they're on someone's list who has a launch and so they get pulled in and they end up doing some other totally different program. So, instead of moving forward with what they're doing, they're context switching to a new system.

This is sometimes a reflection of the desire to chase that new honeymoon feel of when you first begin a coaching program. I will talk about that more in the very last topic that I address. But sometimes it's a completely different type of coaching, on a personal talk for instance, they just get more interested in that. It's like, “Squirrel!”

Since that can sometimes coincide with the belief that, “I can't do more than one thing at a time. I just have to focus on one coaching investment at a time,” then your timeline ends up getting pushed out much longer than you anticipated, or maybe forever.

I remember once, I was talking to a client and I said, “It's kind of like going back to school. If you stopped college halfway through, and you say you’ll go back later after a break. But then, people don't tend to actually go back later.”

She said, “Well, actually, I did stop college. And, I did end up going back. So really, I am absolutely going to do this. I'm the kind of person that will be the one that breaks this pattern. I'll be the one that comes back, and it'll happen this fall.” But it still hasn't happened, between you and me. So, looking forward to an update in the future. Maybe she does have me eating my words. I will be the first to admit it.

What I'm saying is, it's very important to ask yourself: Is this break important enough to me that I'm willing to risk never coming back to coaching? I know that sounds dramatic, but hear me out. It can provide exactly the fire and clarity you need to decide that, “No, dammit, that's not going to happen to me.”

Then, you can come up with some plans. What am I going to do in a month or two, if I get to that point, and I find I'm delaying my return? How am I going to meet the possible resistance? What are the things that my brain is likely to do or tell me? Does it tend to distract me? Does it tend to overwhelm me? Does it tend to tell me certain things that keep me in the status quo, where I would be playing smaller over time than what I'm capable of?

Since, if you're listening to this, you're not the type of person that wants to play small, then how are you going to navigate your way through that? Does this help you, thinking through these questions, does this help this ground in? Does this help you create the mental momentum you need in order to continue, rather than taking a break?

Maybe you decide to continue in a certain way. Maybe you decide to continue, but you want to do things differently this time. Or for the first month you want to have a different experience of it? All of this will provide clarity for you about how you can meet all of your needs.

Okay, here's another one that I hear, “It just doesn't fit in my budget right now.” Now, for some people, you're in a very dire economic circumstance. You have no access to credit, or the available rates to you are so high that you couldn't even afford the payments. And everything you're earning is just paying for your rent and your kid’s needs. If that's you, you are not the person I'm talking to in this particular topic.

Okay, of course, make sure your survival and your subsistence are taken care of, absolutely. But for most of the people listening, that is not your circumstance. For most of the people I speak with, that express concerns around money, maybe they're a little tight on cash. Or they're pretty okay, but they're afraid they might become tight on cash. Or they just don't want to use family funds. Or they just don't want to take on debt.

Now, that's totally okay. You're an adult, and you get to make those choices. I get that what I'm about to suggest might sound a little triggering to you. I remember, about 15 years ago or so, I had some friends. They both had a very strong abundance mindset. They were leaps and bounds ahead of me in terms of personal development and mindset work and energetics, and all the things.

I remember when they would talk to me about topics like abundance, I would get so triggered. I just remember thinking, “Of course, it's easy for you to talk like that, because you guys have all of this money.” Meanwhile, I had just given up my job in order to follow my new husband to Germany, and he was earning a military paycheck. I was like, “Some of us don't have the cash that you have, you all.”

But of course, now I can see in hindsight, that my way of being around money was exactly what was keeping me poor. That's a bit of a mind twister, but for instance, that's also, not coincidentally, the time in my life where I was sitting on Marie Forleo's list for years and years. Because I just couldn't bear to spend $2,000 to start investing in my business.

So, the way I felt about money, and the choices I was making about money, were really contributing to the fact that I didn't have money. Just like when I was struggling with clarity, and that coach had the gall to ask me what I’d do if I were guaranteed success in anything.

I got so mad, because that's so ridiculous. No rational adult would say they can be successful at just anything. There were a million things that could fail. And not realizing that my fear of failure is what was keeping my clarity and my truths from coming through. Because every time they started to, I’d squash them down and say, “But what if that doesn't work? Here's all the reasons why it wouldn't work, or might not work.”

So, if the only reason you're not moving forward with coaching is that you don't want to spend the money, even though you've gotten great results, and you have an idea of what you'd be working on next, then chances are there's an underlying pattern that is keeping you from having the abundance that you do so want.

Which, again, there is nothing wrong with you. I think we've all been there. It's just the soup that most of us were raised in. But remember, the point of this episode is to help you really think through your decisions in a different way, and make a plan for the future.

So, just sitting with yourself, and recognizing that you could get the money and you are choosing not to, is really helpful. Because then we can be like, “Okay, why? Why am I choosing not to?” Maybe, for some of you, another investment might just activate your nervous systems so much that you just curl up in a tiny, little ball and you can't do anything. That freeze response kicks in.

If that's your feeling about what will happen, good to know. In that case, you now know that what you need to be working on is nervous system resiliency. You need to expand your system's capacity to tolerate discomfort, and to readjust back to a baseline of comfort.

Because the longer you stay in that reactivity, just reacting to uncomfortable things, you're going to be challenged in so many ways in life and business. And thank God that you recognized it now, so that you know what to work on.

Or maybe it's just that you have the thought, “Good girls like me don't do selfish things like that. We don't just keep spending all this money on ourselves.” Not the business, on ourselves. Again, good to know, right? “That way of thinking might be holding me back from showing up fully as a CEO.” So, maybe you need to work on expanding your self-concept, the way that you think about yourself.

Or if it's, “What would so-and-so think of me if I did that?” Then maybe your work is in really having your own back, rather than putting so much weight on what others think of you.

And then of course, a lot of us women have beliefs around not being trustworthy with money. Or that they can only really let themselves spend on themselves when things get really, really bad. Like, “I can't buy myself a new pair of slippers just because I want them. I have to wait till my current ones are filled with holes.”

I have to laugh as I'm saying that, because I'm actually sitting here in slippers with holes in them. But it's because my son buys me a new pair every Christmas. And so, I don't know, I guess I could get another pair. Anyway, maybe that was a bad example. Maybe it just hits too close to home for me. But I just remember this thinking so clearly, and I see it all around me.

Once you have identified a route, like why you really are making that choice, then you also want to just get clear on the opportunity cost. Because there is a real opportunity cost when you decelerate your timeline. Or the better way to say it, is when you don't get supported to accelerate your timeline.

It's not the end of the world, you'll be totally okay. But in order to make clean, clear decisions from the highest part of our brain, we do need to get real. If your brain is telling you there's absolutely no downside to just taking six months off, or whatever, it is lying to you. It is not giving you the full picture.

Again, nothing to be ashamed of, humans have been proven again and again to be really poor decision makers in the long term. Our brains don't naturally examine all the variables, especially when there's a strong feeling or a limbic response of, “Run away. Run away.” We're not going to sit there and analyze.

This is not something that happens only with people that are just starting their business. I have seen this with people at multiple six figures. I've seen this with people who are earning seven figures in their business; this same type of thinking.

So, if you're telling yourself it's only because of this situation now, I hate to break it to you, that's just not true. If you have a thought pattern, that thought pattern will continue to repeat itself until you do the work to unwind it.

I've had so many fellow mastermind sisters over the years that have chosen not to reinvest, and they'll say something like, “Oh, I just want to save some money this round.” But it's so interesting to see, what did that decision actually cost you? In the short term, it looks like I'm out, let's say, $25,000 for my mastermind, and they have saved $25,000.

But I'll touch base with them a year later, and they're often still right where they were. But with a fuck-ton more mind drama now. They're just wondering, “What's wrong with me? Why is this taking me so long? Why isn't this working? What's wrong with my audience?” All the things. And that is a cost, that extra mental turmoil is a cost.

Now, they're coming to me for advice because my business has grown, and they think I must have some magic formula. Which, of course, I do, and I share with my clients. But really, the magic formula is stick with it. Keep going. That is what separates the successful entrepreneurs from the people that don't become successful, right?

We invest, we keep going, we figure things out, we work through the kinks, and we get where we need to go. Oh, I just had this flashback of hearing this same thing from people when I was starting out, and it's just so ironic that it took me years, but here I am saying the same damn thing.

Okay, remember before when I was addressing this concern of ‘I need to take my foot off the gas?’ We talked about how that can be a response to uncomfortable emotions. But that by changing the circumstance of the coaching program, or whatnot, not only do we not get to do the important work of managing our response to emotions, we're going to sweeping that under the rug, but those thoughts will likely just pop up again in another circumstance.

ere again, when you're choosing to save some money because it's feeling bad to you to be spending so much on your business, you're changing a circumstance in order to try to change a feeling. “I don't like the feelings of discomfort that come with the thought of reinvesting. So, I'll just avoid them altogether by not reinvesting.”

Rather than, “I know reinvesting is what will help move my business forward. And so, I'm going to change my thought about that, in order to serve my long-term vision.”

My mastermind sisters perceived they'd feel better in the short term, and maybe they did. But they weren't accounting for how bad it would feel later on when they were feeling unsupported and really frustrated in their business.

I gave the example of people whose businesses haven't grown, but I have actually seen some businesses that lost money, started earning less, and then would blame it on the economy or whatever.

I've also seen other ones whose businesses have grown, but what's happened is that they've entered into a new level that they weren't prepared for and didn't have the coaching support for, and so their time has extended at that income level, rather than continuing to grow.

So, what is the value to you, and this is going to be different for everyone… and it may not be high… but what is the value to you of being supported up until your ultimate goal? Versus, band-aid methods where you only intervene in the poorest performing years? Or in the most extreme mental circumstances where you're just filled with self-loathing? When the pain gets bad enough. When otherwise, it's just too much luxury.

Another thing is, maybe didn't see the results that you expected before. And so, you feel shame. So much shame that you don't want to spend money again. It's like, “I'm going to punish myself. Therefore, that will make the shame go away.”

But shame is optional, right? If you don't get the results you expected, it just means that you had never tried it before, and you didn't know how long it was going to take for you to accomplish that thing you've never accomplished. It's different for all of us, because we all have different levels of baggage that we have to shed, in order to fully show up and receive more and more money, and put out more and more value.

Or sometimes people don't really believe they're worth spending money on. Maybe they had some sort of arbitrary number in their head, like, “Oh, I'm worth spending $5,000 on. I'm worth spending $10,000 on,” and they spend that. But then, after that, it's like the gate shuts. “No more beyond that. I can't spend more than that on myself.”

I was certainly there. I remember when I finally spent that $2,000 on the program. I'm like, “Okay, but that's it. No more money is getting spent on my business.” Two-thousand dollars, which is just ridiculous to me, looking back on that. Because other companies, huge companies, will spend years investing in their business before they expect to see a profit.

But for some reason, when you're a solopreneur, we have… especially women and high performers… we have these standards for ourselves where we should just be able to knock it out of the park from day one. With a completely new skill set triggering every bit of our vulnerability and fears.

Another thing might be that you don't feel trust in yourself to keep going, or you don't feel trust in the Universe to support you. And so, you deal with that by kind of drawing back into your shell, and not continuing to expand and take risk. Honestly, when we are feeling threatened, of course we're less likely to take risk. That's just basic neuroscience.

Well, luckily, we have this thing called the cerebral cortex, where we can start to analyze all of this and see what's going on, and think from a less reactionary place. So, again, you definitely could choose to avoid the discomfort by not making an expenditure. But until you deal with what is driving that decision, that thing is not going to go away.

If you're driven by the belief ‘this isn't a real business,’ I guarantee that's going to be filtering its way into your messaging, and a whole lot of other areas too. Or you could, instead, be like, “Whoa, so glad I uncovered this. Jeez, that wasn't going to be helpful for me. Let's work through that one, so I can release it and move on.”

I also hear people saying, “Well, I just don't do debt. Debt is just wrong.” It's as if the 11th commandment is “Thou shall not incur debt.” I get it that comes from, and I've talked about this before on the podcast, there are a lot of very strong and persuasive financial gurus telling us, showing us, how crippling debt can be for us and how unmanageable it can be. And that is a scary thought.

However, that line of reasoning is meant for employees that can never increase their income beyond a certain amount, and therefore, their only method of wealth generation is through spending less. And maybe investing in something like the stock market, where they can get a modest rate of return.

We, however, are entrepreneurs. We know that we are our best bet. That we will definitely, over the long term, outperform the stock market. Therefore, it makes rational, logical sense for us to invest in ourselves. Because our minds are our businesses.

Even billion dollar companies like Meta and Berkshire Hathaway take on debt. They issue bonds, because they realize that using that money to invest in their company now will yield far greater returns than if they just slowly saved that money and then invested it later. It's just a numbers game. The accountants at Meta are not making it mean anything about themselves that they're taking on debt, they're just crunching numbers and seeing that it makes sense to take on debt.

If it's helpful, that experience that I told you about with my mastermind coach, Luisa, when she told me I just scratched the surface, was a big turning point for me. I've talked about this before too, but this might be your first episode tuning in. So, I'm just going to lay it all out for you.

I was, of course, so grateful that I had her support a couple of months later, and that was when I decided that I was no longer going to take breaks in coaching, in business building. I wasn't going to think of my coaching expenditures as investments anymore.

Investments are, you build a bridge, you have this big outlay, construct the bridge, and then it's done, right? But I decided to start thinking of it as an operating expense. This was something that I would always be doing. I would always be investing in my brain and my business as an ongoing cost of doing business. It's the mental hygiene that it takes to maintain the brain of a CEO.

Do you know how highly valuable our brains are? What is the amount you think you'll earn? Maybe it's $100,000. You're like I used to be, and you're like, “I just want $100,000 business.” Alright, so how long do you plan to be in business? For the next 20 years? So, earning $100,000 each year, that's a valuable brain.

If you are projecting to reach seven figures, or multiple seven figures, you have a very valuable brain. You need to start treating yourself to the fuel your brain needs. It's like you've got this Ferrari brain, but you're like, “Oh, I think I should save three cents and get myself the bargain unleaded.” No, at least not for my clients.

I can see I attract amazing people, and I can see the gold in them. I can see where they're going, and I need them performing at a very high level because they have such great things to do in the world. It's like, “We don't have time for your money scarcity, right now. You have big things to do. Let's get with it.” Ooh, I'm feeling a little spicy right now.

Okay, so one last point I want to bring in, and this is from the episode I did called “How to Win at the Game of Entrepreneurship.” You want to go and listen to that. But it was based on a conversation I had with my husband, who's active duty military. He was talking about the difference between tactics and strategy.

So, when you think about tactics, it's more like, “Okay, we're going to go take that hill. How are we going to go take that hill?” But when you think about strategy, it's much more long term. For instance, “What is our strategy with China?” It's not about taking one hill or accomplishing one small goal. It's really about a very dynamic situation that will involve decades.

I know that, for me, when I have been able to step back and see that long-term view, it's taken so much pressure off of me. It's given me so much resiliency and fortitude. But also it's kept me chugging away at, “Okay, how am I going to get there?”

All right, let's move on to the fourth topic. Now, remember, the first was when you're thinking, “Oh, I'm good. I got this. Now I learned what I needed to learn.” The second, is when you want to take your foot off the gas. You're like, “This is too much. I need a break.” And the third was, “It's too expensive. I don't want to do it.”

Well, the fourth is, “I just need to try implementing what I've learned already on my own.” Now, that might be some variation of the first one, right? That ‘I'm good now, I know what to do.’ But usually there's some kind of deeper root. It's something like, “I hold myself to such high standards, that if I didn't do every single training, or try every single thing my coach suggested, I'm not yet allowed to move forward.”

Now, I've gone through entire masterminds and never even touched the curriculum. I decide what my intention is when I enter a new coaching program, and how I want to develop. I allow myself sometimes to just go to the coaching calls, or just go to some of the coaching calls.

For some of you, especially those of you in number three ‘I can't afford that,’ that might freak you out because you're calculating every single dollar. What is the value of each coaching call? What is the value of the curriculum? “I can't waste that. Then, I'm spending money on things that I didn't even use.”

That's not how I think of it. I think, “What is the result that I want to accomplish by joining this?” How do I want to change and develop, is a better question. “How do I want to change and develop, through this concentrated effort of mine, on this subject?” Then, I trust that it will happen.

I still take aligned action to make it so, but I just trust that the downloads come to me, that I show up on the days that I need to, to really hear the lesson I need. I just trust that it will come, and it does.

Okay, this is getting a little woo, but I'm just going to put it out there. Sometimes I'm investing in a program, and that is the intention and the focus, but it just leads me to then listen to different podcasts on the subject. And I end up getting kind of an epiphany or a-ha from something completely different, outside of that coaching program. But the point is, that investing got me that result. That's how I see it. I see that my concerted effort, and my dedication and commitment to making it happen, which I demonstrate through my investment, opens my brain to what it needs in order to move forward.

Okay, I probably talked about this before in my episode on Uncommon Perspectives, where I talk about investing. We'll link to that in the show notes, too. But since we're on the topic, I want to make sure you have all of the highlights.

So, I do have a very high trust in being led by my Higher Self. I understand that some of you don't have that trust, right now. And I also have a very healthy relationship with all of the investments I've made in the past. Which again, a lot of you don't have. You're still beating yourself up about some of the investments in your past. I think even the “not so good” experiences were often the most valuable, they showed me exactly what I didn't want to do.

Another root cause of this ‘I need to try implementing,’ and what I've already learned is, “I'm not ready to move forward.” That is a big one, because that ‘I'm not ready’ belief will tend to sneak in to so many other things, too. So, I'll give you some examples here.

I had a client who chose not to reinvest with me, or to take a break, however you want to look at it. Very shortly thereafter, she announced that she was pursuing a business strategy that I definitely would not have recommended. She was putting out a new course, and I could see it as very much something that she didn't yet have the skills to roll out.

I could also see that it was going to take away a lot of time, and totally break the momentum of everything we had put together for her in the Clarity Accelerator. But she wasn't my client anymore, and so I couldn't catch that and let her know what was ahead of her.

Now, if she had been my client, and we'd had that conversation, she might have still said, “This is a deep intuitive hit, I have to run with it.” And then I would have said, “Great, I'll support you. As long as you are clear on what might result because of it.” But I don't know if she understood all of that.

If you're launching something completely new… and notice, it was like, “I just want to try implementing this on my own.” But then, she didn't just implement what we'd worked on, on her own, she switched course and started doing something completely different.

Those are the kinds of things that brains just do. You don't catch it when you're inside your own brain, because, of course, it always seems like the perfectly rational thing to do. And it's something you can't anticipate when you're making that decision.

So, again, it's just a way of showing how having a coach is like an insurance policy. Someone who can objectively see your patterns and your actions in a way that you might not be able to.

I have another client who, when I communicated with her over the years, I would notice that even though we had gotten very clear in our time together, she didn't seem quite so clear. Then I saw her, about five years after I had worked with her, in another group.

She was saying, “Oh, my gosh, this is so great.” She had just joined the group. “This is so great. I've never felt clearer and more aligned than I do right now.” But I remembered her saying those exact same words to me five years ago.

What this shows me, is that her brain has a pattern of being confused. Again, that's the kind of thing that when you are with a coach who's seen you long term, when you have this great idea that, of course… again, I work with very smart women who can articulate their point of view really well about why they should go down this path… If you have a coach who knows you over time, they will be able to point out, “I hear you, and I just want to remind you, there was also this time when… And over here, there was also the pattern of confusion again. So, what do we really need to work on here?”

Sometimes the route of ‘I need to try implementing what I've learned on my own’ is, again, “I don't want to spend money, unless things are really bad.” But think about that. Why? Why wouldn't you want the experience of support? I guess you could physically build a house all on your own, and get blueprints and YouTube everything, but why would you want to do that?

Often, with clients who would say something like, “Oh, I just want to do this on my own,” if I were to say, “Okay, well, do you want to join us for free for the next few months and get my support?” They'd say, okay.

That just shows that it's not that they really want to do it on their own, it's just that they don't want to spend the money when they think they're not maybe taking enough action to justify the expenditure. But again, justifying the expenditure is something that only they can decide. They get to choose whether that expenditure is justified. Only you get to do that.

I said this before, but sometimes they have the thought, “I'll be paying again, for what I already should have accomplished, and that's just too much shame. So, rather than get more support, to now get to the point where I wish I had been, I'm just going to slog through it alone for a while. And kind of punish myself, and then not have to explore the discomfort of shame.”

Quite honestly, you're also not going to explore the discomfort of setting goals and not always reaching your goals. Because guess what? That's going to happen over and over and over again, as an entrepreneur.

Hey, maybe you just have something coming up, maybe in your personal life or whatever, that you really want to spend your money on rather than coaching. And for whatever reason, you don't want to accrue debt, or pull from savings, or sell off an asset, or find a way to earn extra money.

I had a client once who really wanted to buy a Range Rover instead of getting coaching. Not the choice I would make, but again, totally your choice as an adult. I don't mean to imply that all budgetary calculations are superficial. The Range Rover, it actually didn't feel that way for my client; she put a lot of meaning behind it.

I remember one of my own calculations, at one point, was around hiring a gestational surrogate. That was as meaningful to me as my business. Whatever the case, if this is truly you, and there's something that important to you, I recommend you relisten to the previous topic, the one about taking a break and taking your foot off the gas.

Ask yourself all the questions at the very end. Build up some fire for what you do want to create long term, and when and how you will choose to be supported in that. And get real with yourself, and think through all the ways you might get sidetracked.

And since patterns can repeat themselves… For you, it might be something around another expenditure, or feeling like you don't have enough money. Again, just make a plan for how you're going to solve for that now rather than later.

Maybe you'll decide you're going to set a certain amount aside each month, to help you remember why you want support and how committed you are to creating your vision.

Then, just pay attention, over time. Are you able to stick to that? If not, if you're constantly coming up short and having to put things on hold, then honestly, that's a huge reason why you need to get into a great coaching program ASAP.

I've talked to potential clients who say, “I just want to pay off my debt first, and then I'll invest.” But if your pattern has always been to carry debt and hold off on this change you're making, then this might be the time that you actually want to go more into debt to break that pattern.

I know that might ruffle some feathers, even some coaches are very anti-debt. I'm not one of them, obviously. I would trade a few hundred dollars, or even a thousand dollars, in interest, any day, if it would help me vastly improve the rest of my life. I have, my friend, I have. I was you, once upon a time.

Okay, the final one I have is, “I'm not feeling that same gut hit, or that same excitement that I did when I signed up before.” I have been through this, too. I remember once, I worked with a coach, and I got amazing results. Then, when it was time to re-invest, it was like, “I got nothing.” I said the exact words, “I'm just not as jazzed as I want to be.”

To make matters worse, I was working with her on energetics and intuition. Really learning to lean in to that sacral fire. And now, all of a sudden, it made no logical sense in my brain. Why wouldn't I be excited about continuing these great results?

Luckily, I was able to talk with her really openly about it. She asked me, “Well, when you think about the goal that you want to accomplish, the end result, do you feel jazzed about that?” And then, it was a clear yes, “Absolutely. I feel jazzed about that.”

What I can see, in hindsight, what I wasn't feeling jazzed about, was the work of it, was the showing up for calls each week, was the… Well, I'll just tell you this, too. So, after I did tap into that and then decide to reinvest, I had a massive clarity download very shortly after. I realized that what had been holding me back was really the method.

So, she had a very active do-do-do approach, and I'd had a lot of that up until then, a lot of that masculine energy. What I was really craving was just a space to be able to work on the intuition and the energetics. And so, I could care less about whether my business grew, I just wanted to nail this piece of it.

Then we had a great conversation, and I was able to have, again, an amazing next round with her. I was so glad I did it. But notice how I took responsibility for uncovering that. I kept asking myself the questions, and asking my coach the questions, and being open to finding the way that would work. And, really weeding out the things that didn't feel right.

Now, maybe I would have brought this up to her and she be like, “Nope, sorry, that's the way I work. That's what I want to work on,” and then it would have been a perfectly amicable parting of ways. We would have realized that we just weren't a fit anymore. That didn't happen, she was very open to it. Really, it was about me taking charge of my coaching experience, and thus my results.

While I'm here, I'll just pop in another. This is not as common, this reason I hear for not continuing, but it's that, “I'm afraid my coach has too much influence on me. They're rubbing off too much on me.” But any good coach is going to welcome this kind of feedback, and will be honest about either not being able to support you in that new way you're thinking of, or being excited to co-create this new different experience together.

So really, you just want to be thinking about, when you're testing yourself for your excitement level about reinvesting, what are you focusing on? Are you focusing on the work involved? The weekly calls? Or are you focused on the end result?

Because it's very, very natural that brains would rather not have to stay aware of their thoughts, or process disappointment. Of course, any smart brain that wants to avoid that, would tamp down feelings of excitement for moving forward with that. The brain’s like, “Whoa, whoa, we're good. We don't want to grow. We don't want to do all that stuff.”

So, we won't get all those feel good neurons firing. It doesn't feel the same as that honeymoon phase of ‘let's just take the leap. This is the key to everything. Let's just do it, and then I'll live happily ever after.’ That's a huge dopamine release.

But just because there's less dopamine doesn't necessarily mean it's less worth it. It just means you're having a more mature experience of it. And, you have to ask yourself some more questions about it.

There's a saying in therapy, which is, “Just when you don't want to come to therapy, is probably when you need to.” This is when the things that really need to be uncovered are getting uncovered. That can be true, in some instances, with coaching as well.

I believe that one of the most important things I can teach a client, because this is essential for accomplishing big goals, is how do you weather those low dopamine periods? Those natural slumps that happen in your journey. Like, when you come home from a great vacation where you were pinging on all levels, and then wahh-wahh, it just feels like a deficit, relatively.

How can you roll with that, rather than let it take you off course? Just imagine two people, both had the same experience of a great honeymoon period with a coach, both begin to feel the more mature experience, it's kind of like marriage, right? They start to feel that more mature experience of the day-to-day and the long-term work. And when it's time to renew and reinvest, one of them continues to get support for three years straight.

While the other one takes some time off here or there. Maybe it finally gets to the point where they hit some new difficulties, but they're learning that the hard way. They hire a new coach, they re-explain their business, and the coach has to get to know their patterns. And after that honeymoon the pattern kind of repeats. Just imagine how different the two businesses are after the three years.

So, just to be really clear here, I'm sharing this with you so that you can ask yourself questions. Not so that you can gaslight yourself, and then brute force your way into something that isn't right for you. That is not The Uncommon Way.

Just ask yourself if you're still excited about the vision. Do you need to shift the goal in any way? Do you need to change the way you've been working towards your goal? Or the way that you've been supported in working towards your goal?

Then, assuming you do want to get to that vision and you do want support to get there, because why wouldn't you, do you want this coach to support you?

So, I had a client that went through the same line of thinking for herself. Because the same thing was happening with her that had happened before with me and my coach. She'd had amazing results, all logic would point to the fact that we would continue, but she just wasn't feeling that excitement.

And so, she did the work that she needed to do to figure out if she really wanted to get clear, if she really wanted to move forward, and why. Came back reinvested with all of that fire, and decisiveness. And then, within the first or second call, we uncovered a decision she was making about her clients that was really driven by a very unhelpful pattern.

A bit later, she underwent a huge expansion of her vision, with this massive download about where she's really heading long term. It wasn't exactly what she originally thought. That vision, previously, was kind of step one. And this, was step three.

So, those things wouldn't have happened… Which, that isn't true. I do believe they absolutely would have happened if that's the direction she needed to go. But they wouldn't have happened in the same ways and with the same timelines, if we weren't creating this together.

Yes, there are the tactics that your coach gives you, but there's also the energetic imprint of the two of you creating a reality together, that's different or better than if either of you did it on your own. I couldn't create the businesses that my clients have on my own. But their businesses wouldn't look the same if they created them alone or with someone else.

Alright, so those are the five patterns I see come up when people are thinking about reinvesting, and the corresponding questions you have around what to ask yourself if you're finding that you're in that place. You want to get really clear and make sure you're making a very clean decision from your highest place.

Also, if you're deciding not to move forward, or you're deciding to move forward, you really have a much more substantial plan of action and better direction.

As always, I hope that this has served you deeply. If so, please take a moment to leave a review, or to share this with a friend that you think could benefit from hearing it.

Thank you very much for tuning in. Remember, you know who you are, and each day you're stepping further into what you're here to create.

Hey, if you want true clarity about your secret sauce, your people, your best way of doing business, and how you talk about your offer, then I invite you to join us in the Clarity Accelerator. I'll teach you to connect all the dots, the dots that have always been there for you, so that you can show up like you were born for exactly this.

Come join us and supercharge every other tool or tactic you'll ever learn, from Facebook ads to manifestation. Just go to TheUncommonWay.com/schedule and set up a time to talk. I can't wait to be your coach.

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