Ep #14: The #1 Skill for Entrepreneurship
Episode Summary
Jenna shares one of the most important skills an entrepreneur can have in their business, and how to use this skill to transform your business, and create dramatic results in all areas of your life.
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Show Notes
It is amazing the lengths that we humans go to in order to avoid our emotions. Our brain’s default setting is to avoid feeling discomfort, meaning we aren’t often willing to feel what we perceive to be negative emotions. But this is one of the most important skills you can develop as an entrepreneur, and once you learn to acknowledge and feel your emotions – even when they hurt – you will notice the difference it makes in your business and life.
If you are ready to transform your business, you don’t want to miss this episode. What I’m teaching you this week has nothing to do with tactics or drive, yet it will open you up to the keys that will make the biggest difference and create the most dramatic results for you in all areas of your life.
Join me this week as I’m teaching you what to do with negative emotions and how to transform feelings like hurt or stress into something more useful, productive, and helpful. I’m sharing some tools to help you transform your negative emotions into wisdom, and showing you how this work will make you so much more resilient and less self-sabotaging in the long run.
What You’ll Learn From This Episode:
Why emotions and sensations do so much more damage when you avoid them.
The reason this work can be so difficult at first.
Some questions to ask yourself to help you start acknowledging your emotions.
Why so many people are unwilling to do this work.
What is happening with your emotions when you don’t pay attention to them.
The problem with resisting your emotions.
Why developing this skill is so crucial in your business.
Listen to the Full Episode:
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Full Episode Transcript:
The number one skill for entrepreneurship and building your business has nothing to do with tactics or drive. It's definitely not sexy. But it's what will open you up to the keys that make the biggest difference, create the most dramatic results in your business. But you've gotta go through a little bit of fire to get there. It's what most of the world won't do. And yet, you can do it from the comfort of your sofa in just 60 seconds. Stick around.
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 overanalyzer turned queen of clarity, Jenna Harrison.
Welcome back to The Uncommon Way. This is my last week in Italy. After delayed flights, and being denied a rental car, even though we were hours away from our house. Driving down one lane roads in pitch dark night, only to find out that all of the stores and restaurants had closed already, and not being able to eat.
Waking up to an ant infestation. And then, continued days with food scarcity and no showers. Wind so high that the national weather service was issuing alerts about it; then, finally flew in. And then, we had about nine days of rain.
But now, my brother and sister-in-law have come from Texas, and they brought the sun and the warm weather to us. So, this last, oh, I don't know, 10 days, maybe week, has been so joyous. We have rented a boat, and sailed around hidden coves of water so blue that it looks like a snow cone or something; it looks so fake and yet it’s real. Fresh seafood lunches right on the beach, with our toes in the sand, was great.
We were talking to my sister-in-law, who has never been out of the U.S. And, we were talking about how different it is here. Like, you can sit down at a table, you order your meal, and then the waiters just disappear. They're not bringing the check to you and expecting to turn over the table for the next, you know, group coming in.
And, she described it as an absence of micro stressors. Back in the States, there are all of these little stressors; things that need to be done, or people that are upset because you're staying at the table too long. And there's so many other things; you have to think about tipping, how much to tip, is this person worthy of a tip, right? And here, we don't even tip.
And there are so many of these things throughout the day that just create such a laid-back experience, and such a different amount of stress in our lives. That conversation, combined with the horrific shooting in Thailand, has me wanting to talk about what to do when things hurt. What to do with those negative emotions, and how to transform hurt or stress into wisdom.
This may be the number one skill for entrepreneurship; it will change everything in your business and life. And this is really what so much of the world doesn't know how to do, or is not willing to do. To me, this really is the secret to world peace. Because you can't insulate yourself from negative emotions.
Whether those are the small micro stressors that eventually build up to the pot boiling over, or it's those big volcano emotions like a major disappointment, we think we can insulate ourselves, right? This is what the brain does. The brain says, when I have the business, for instance, when I have this amount of money in the bank, then I'll feel financially secure.
We think we can insulate ourselves from ever feeling disappointed, but we're always carrying around a human brain. The human brain is always creating meaning. And the human brain has a natural negativity bias. So, this is something that we consciously have to counteract, if we want to live a life that is not as painful as would naturally be.
Our brains say, if I do this or accomplish this thing, whatever it is, then I'll feel satisfied, for instance, and can be a calmer person, right? Notice that sequence that our brain sees as a do or accomplish, and then feel, and then be.
Another variation is, have-do-be, right? If I have an audience that loves me, I will do more Instagram® lives, and I will be more confident. But it's always the other way around. It's always; when I'm feeling confident, I do more lives, and I create an audience that loves me.
And it's so amazing, because really, if you follow the trail of breadcrumbs for anything of what people most want, or what they most want to avoid, it always comes down to a feeling.
Like, sometimes I'll have a client who is really afraid, and I'll say, “What are you most afraid of?” And it's that, “My business won't work and I'll be penniless.” Okay, then what? What will happen, then? “Well, maybe then I'll have to move back in with my parents, or ask them for a loan.”
Okay, and what would happen then, right? What's the consequence of that? “Oh my gosh, I would feel like such a failure. I would feel so ashamed having to ask them.” So, you see? It all comes down to a feeling. And it is amazing what lengths we humans go to, to avoid a feeling, avoid an emotion.
I have a mentor, Brooke Castillo, who uses this example of Martians coming down to the planet, and being like; oh, wow, what are these feeling things? What are these emotions, right? Is it like, you know, you form boils on your skin? And then, it just peels off your face as if you're on fire?
And you're like; no, it just feels more kind of like a pressure in your chest. They’ll be like, that's it? That's it, and yet, you go through all of these lengths to avoid that? Because what is an emotion, really? It’s a sensation, right? It's a vibration passing through your body. And if you fully allow that sensation, they don't even last that long, which is the crazy part.
They last so much longer, they do so much more damage, when you resist them or avoid them. And I still catch myself, right? There is not a single one of you listening that's; like, oh, I don't do that. Or, I'm above that. I've learned that. No, no, no. Because you're human, right? And the brain, your brain, knows you better than anyone. And, your brain can take you out of the consciousness of what it's doing behind the scenes.
I catch myself in this all the time, right? I'll go a whole day, not thinking about something, right? Like, I don't want to think about it. Or, looking on the bright side. Or, something that seems so helpful, until I realize this is not helpful. This is not helpful, at all.
And, how many actions do you take from that place? Do you take from that place of avoiding that emotion or not thinking about it, but it's still there, right? And, it's driving all of your actions.
So, maybe you're feeling devastated, but you're not really dealing with that emotion. And so, you're moving into inaction, right? Your body just shuts down. You have this collapsing energy; I just can't do anything. Like, I'm just too… I need to watch the news, right?
Or, you're feeling rejected, maybe by your audience. And so, your language switches to this convincing energy or this kind of chastising energy, like; why don't you wake up and see what you need to do? And that doesn't create the results you want. That doesn't bring on any new clients.
Or, maybe you're feeling ashamed because you think that the actions you're taking or need to take, or your coach is telling you to take, will make you be perceived as salesy. So, what do you do? You don't follow up with that client, right? Or, you avoid sales calls, because the truth is, you don't want to have clients, or you don't want to have sales calls.
This is why improving this skill, of dealing with things when they hurt, when they feel uncomfortable, is so necessary. In the Clarity Accelerator, right during the modules, where we first start interacting with people and we start selling something, that's when this comes up. So, that's when we have this training on emotional maturity.
I have my clients start to experience this kind of discomfort early on. And part of that is purposeful, it is the muscle they need to build, to become resilient entrepreneurs and keep taking bigger and bigger risks. But also, it just makes sense.
Rather than spending years building an audience on social media, we prove that the offer has legs, and is viable, by actually selling it, or at least selling a part of it. You can tell me, 50 of your friends said they think your offer’s so valuable. You can tell me, it changed your life, and you know other people need it; I don't care.
Is someone willing to pull out their credit card now? That is what proves viability. So yes, this brings up some emotions, earlier on. But that's what makes my clients so much more resilient and less self-sabotaging in the long run.
And now, I want to give you some body-based tools, or somatic tools, for transforming hurts and stressors into wisdom, to really processing these emotions. If you haven't processed the emotions from Thailand, yet, and you are sensitive to the topic, I recommend you do that now with me.
Otherwise, practice with a personal issue or your strongest uncomfortable feeling in your business. Okay, you ready?
First, you need to establish safety. So, you need to tell your nervous system that you are safe right now. When you start to actually feel the emotion, it will feel activated. It may think you're being chased by a tiger, right, so first, we're going to establish safety.
And, let a part of your brain know that you are perfectly safe right here. And to do that, all you need to do is feel the seat beneath you, feel the floor beneath you. And then tell yourself, show your eyes, that you're in a room. That you are in a safe place with a roof over your head. The temperature is amenable. There is no immediate threat in your environment.
Take a breath, and then, slowly exhale that breath. Then, invite that emotion in, feel it, feel it in your body. Now, most people can't do this at first, when they're not used to it. And so, they'll use their brains. If I ask a client; what are you feeling in your body? They will use their brains to describe it; I'm feeling shut down. And then, I will ask; what does shutdown feel like? What does constricted feel like? How can you describe that to me as if I needed to feel it?
I have physician clients, as well. And they'll sometimes start telling me like, the musculature of what's going on with them. And I'm like, no, no, no. Tell me, let me feel it, too. So, I want you to think in that way about the sensation of your emotion.
Does it tingle? Is there movement? Is there temperature? Is there pressure? Is it dense? Is it light? Is it large? Is it small? What does it actually feel like? This is something we rarely do, just sit and feel an emotion. Because it's uncomfortable. Our brain wants to avoid feeling uncomfortable emotions.
But you can do this, you can do hard things. Accept that emotion being there. You can literally tell it; it's okay. It's okay for you to be in my body right now. Just like, we are not our thoughts, we are not our emotions, you can get curious about it. And most of all, have no judgement about it being there. This is the human experience, in your human body, right now. And you're just watching it all unfold.
Now next, I'm going to ask you to dial it up. This is something we would never do, we always want less of the emotion, not more of the emotion. But I want you to imagine you had an old-fashioned radio with dials, and you could just turn it up. I want you to increase the intensity of that emotion, just for a small bit of time.
When you do that, when you're calling the shots, you will instantly feel a shift of some sort, you will feel it lose its power. It's when we resist the emotions, that it gathers more power. I've had a coach say, “What do you tend to do, if someone in your household is not listening to you, and you really know that they're about to hurt themselves, or that they really need to hear that thing? You keep following them around and speaking louder, right?”
And that's exactly what's going on with these emotions, when we're not paying attention to them. They're just trying to get heard. So, soften into the fact that they're there, invite more of it in. Invite more of that intensity in, and just sit with it and watch it.
It's like, if we were ever going to drink a potion of a certain emotion, we could do that for… Even if we'd know it would last 30 seconds, we'd be like; ooh, let me try sadness. And we'd feel that sadness for 30 seconds. It would probably feel very cathartic afterwards, right? Like, a tear jerker movie, and then we would be in an altered state.
So, soften and invite this emotion in, as if it's not such a terrible thing. It's a part of your experience, and you can be with it. And then, just check in. In what ways does it feel different than it used to? Is there anything that it wants to say to you? Is there anything it wants you to do, shift your body, move in a certain way? Check back in with it, in a week?
And then, you can turn the dials back down when you're ready, and you can move on with your day. That whole process can take 60 seconds or it can take five minutes. But what it leaves you with, is that clarity, right? That neutrality. Because I always say, “Clarity is very, very simple.” It's that sudden understanding, right? It's like the curtain opening, or the fog lifting, then it's like, oh, this; it’s that groundedness.
And, you cannot get there from a reactive state. Your higher self or your neocortex speaks to you when you settle your nervous system. We can call this whatever we want, right? Whatever you call your most elevated consciousness, whether that's your Higher Self, your neocortex; I am completely language agnostic here. I'm happy to speak to people about brain science, if they're more attuned to that. Spirituality, if they're more attuned to that.
But you think about your most elevated consciousness. Either way, your repressed intense emotions and negativity only lead to an activated nervous system. And science shows us that the higher parts of our brains shut down under bad stress.
Therefore, the longer you deny this work, the less access you have to the wisdom, the inspiration, the insights, that are the biggest drivers of your business success. In fact, I had an early business mentor, who had made a million dollars her first year in business. What she credited to that success was spending hours upon hours, doing mindset work on her biggest hang-ups and fears, and thinking back about unhelpful stories and beliefs that she had.
And she would not stop the work for that day until she had made herself cry. She needed to get to that level of emotion, in order to purge the past and move on with the future, and gain the insights to show up in a much bigger way.
Said with love, “Fuck consistency. Fuck willpower. Fuck the hustle, and fuck the latest tactics for Instagram.” Your greatest business successes will come from a much different place, that's a far more beautiful place to be in, too. If you're willing to do the mindset and emotional work that precedes it.
Okay, friends, that's it for today. And remember, on a certain level you know who you are. And, each day you're stepping further into what you are here to create.
Hey, if you enjoyed today’s show, you do not want to miss next week’s. Seriously. Follow the show wherever you listen to your podcast so you don’t miss an episode. And would you please, leave a super quick rating and review about this episode?
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Thanks for joining us here at The Uncommon Way. If you want more tips and resources for developing clarity in your business and life, including the Clarity for Strategy for Growing and Scaling Your Business, visit TheUncommonWay.com. See you next time.
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