Video Blog

I once had a client who really wanted to connect with the VP of marketing for a huge Fortune 100, but felt SO MUCH ANXIETY about reaching out to him because the guy was SOOOO successful!

He kept telling me that if he could just build up his own confidence, THEN he would feel powerful enough to reach out to the big wig marketing dude!

I smiled and nodded (genuinely, I promise!) and then I asked him if he would be open to playing a GAME…

He agreed and so I asked him to find this VP’s FULL BIO – one that listed all of his “PEDESTAL-WORTHY” accomplishments – and to print it out…

Next, I invited him to circle EVERY accomplishment that was listed in the bio…

“I was the youngest VP in the company,” “graduated from Harvard,” “created a new business unit that ended up bringing in $17M per quarter into the company.” WHATEVER the accomplishment, JUST CIRCLE IT…

AND THEN I told him to write next to each one of those accomplishments, what MIGHT have been going on in this VP’s world – in the VP’s mind and in the VP’s words – as he was achieving all of these things…

For example: “I became the youngest VP of marketing in the company…AND what nobody knows is that I was SO ANXIOUS going into my FIRST day that I would be ‘found out’ as a FRAUD and wouldn’t live up to the EXPECTATIONS they had of me”…

Or “I graduated top of my class at Harvard…AND what nobody knows is that I lost several of my personal relationships because I was so obsessive about my schoolwork”…

It DIDN’T MATTER if any of the stuff that was TRUE…

ALL that mattered was that it helped my client HUMANIZE this UBER-SUCCESSFUL dude – no need to “Pump Himself UP” to be GOOD ENOUGH to reach out…

Who is the “VP of Marketing” in your world right now? The person you REALLY want to connect with, but seems so “OUT OF YOUR LEAGUE” that you are terrified to reach out?

Remember that everyone has experienced some kind of STRUGGLE or SUFFERING on their way to becoming the person they are today…

Never forget that underneath it all, they are still humans AND, just like you and me, EVERYBODY POOPS!

I can truly say that every part of my business has been POSITIVELY impacted by becoming more masterful at CRAFTING and TELLING more powerful STORIES!

It helps me to connect with my audience & makes creating valuable content so much easier (because stories help DRAW OUT the value in what you are teaching)…

I get asked all the time – “How can I tell more powerful stories?” – so here are 3 tips to do just that!

1 – Focus on RELATABLE over SENSATIONAL

People often think that if they haven’t survived a plane crash or delivered a baby in the back of a speeding NYC Taxi, that they don’t have a story worth telling. That’s total BS! In fact, as SENSATIONAL as those stories may be, they are harder to relate to for most people. If your goal is to build intimacy with your audience, don’t try to impress them. Instead share REAL and RELATABLE stories and the lessons you learned from those experiences. Your HUMANITY will shine through and people will feel more connected to you…

2 – Never WAG YOUR FINGER unless you first RAISE YOUR HAND

One thing I see people do quite often is to go from TEACHER into PREACHER. No one likes to have the proverbial FINGER of some “all-knowing guru” wagged in their face accusing them of doing life WRONG! If you want to call out a way of thinking, being or doing things in the world, make sure you always RAISE YOUR HAND FIRST! Never instruct or assess until you first CONFESS! Remember, no one NEEDS to change, but if you can share YOUR before and after, they may be more curious to experiment with that for themselves…

3 – It starts as YOURS but ends as THEIRS

Your stories may START with being about you but ULTIMATELY, you MUST find a way to make YOUR story into THEIR story. Going back to tip number 1, we want people to SEE THEMSELVES in your story. Your experience is the backdrop for the lesson, NOT the focal point for the takeaway. The power will come from you helping them see the IMPLICATIONS and APPLICATION of the lessons from YOUR story in THEIR lives…

Practice these 3 tips and watch the power of your connection INCREASE tremendously!

 

If you are anything like me, you’ve probably thought “(and by “thought”, I mean OBSESSED)” at some point (or maybe DAILY if you were ADVANCED like me ) about needing to be the ALL-KNOWING EXPERT in order to be successful…

Like you needed to have some Nobel Prize-winning, research-backed, proprietary system that you can be KNOWN FOR if you’re ever going to STAND OUT among all of the OTHER people DOING what you DO…

(I definitely wasn’t the ONLY one who believed that, right?)

It wasn’t until I was WILLING to SHIFT – by even 5% – OUT of my WORTHINESS-SEEKING EGO and into LOVING SERVICE that I had a HUGE realization about where the REAL power of my work exists – and HERE is what I discovered.

The way to be of REAL value and to create MASSIVE impact with our work is to stop trying to be REVOLUTIONARY and instead focus on being EVOLUTIONARY…

When we obsess over being REVOLUTIONARY we end up getting weighed down by the (self-imposed) PRESSURE of having to create something totally UNIQUE in order to make an impact…

EVOLUTIONARY coaches and teachers recognize instead that their POWER comes from sharing INCREMENTAL improvements and insights of the lessons they have learned through their OWN personal journey or the journey they go on with their clients…

When we are EVOLUTIONARY, we GET that the value of our work doesn’t come from providing “never-heard-before” INFORMATION, but instead by using our own TRANSFORMATION as the BACKDROP and ROADMAP for what’s possible for others…

When we drop the “REVOLUTIONARY” obsession and start committing to SHOWING UP, sharing OUR experiences, and what WE’VE learned in a way that resonates with OUR tribe, we have the foundations for a fully-aligned “Competition-Proof” Business!

What have you been putting off creating and sharing with the world because you think it isn’t REVOLUTIONARY enough?

What if instead, you took the idea that your heart is calling you to talk about and simply focused on sharing YOUR experience and how YOU have EVOLVED as a result of practicing it?

What do I mean when I say I help coaches create a “Competition-PROOF” business?

Isn’t that UNREASONABLE given the number of coaches, online educators, business mentors, and transformational speakers out there?

Maybe…but instead of answering THAT question, I have a different question for YOU…

Have you ever been in love?

I mean like head over heels, IN LOOOVE!!!

I’m talking, can’t stop thinking about someone LOVE…

Where every minute away from them feels like an hour…

Where a single word from their lips can instantly transform your day from BS to bliss…

Where you look at them and are in awe of just how beautiful or handsome or sexy or amazing they are?

And the funny thing is that if we remove the emotions and objectively look around, there are people that are JUST as beautiful or handsome or sexy or amazing as ‘that person’ all around you…

In fact, at least 5 such people probably cross your path every single day – whether strangers, acquaintances or friends…

And yet it’s almost as if, to YOU at least, they don’t exist…you just DON’T SEE THEM…

Because the reasons you are in love with the person you are in love with go beyond a surface-level “checklist” of qualities…

It’s a deeper connection…and you know EXACTLY what I mean!

It’s an energetic, FEELING state that magnetizes you to someone.

Well, that same “PHENOMENON” applies to our businesses. WE can be THAT person for OUR people! OUR TRIBE!

And just like love in a personal relationship, the business version of this ‘LOVE CONNECTION’ is not to be manufactured or manipulated…

It’s the natural by-product of people in full alignment whose experiences of life are enhanced by being in each other’s world!

THAT level of relevance, resonance, and relationship is at the CORE of a truly COMPETITION-PROOF business.

Is this the kind of business and the impact YOU want to create?

If so, you DEFINITELY wanna join my FREE Facebook Tribe where I give you the “BEHIND THE SCENES” of me building MY Competition-Proof Biz while helping YOU do the same!

Ok so maybe I didn’t have lunch WITH Vince, BUT recently I was grubbin’ with a dear friend of mine when she pointed out that he was sitting RIGHT behind me…

I had to SNEAK a PEEK, but once I confirmed that it was “VV” I turned my attention BACK to my friend…

She, on the other hand, kept getting DISTRACTED by the fact that he was 10 feet away, her gaze fixed over my left shoulder and I could tell that she wasn’t really PRESENT with me any more…

No biggie… It was “Mr. Wedding Crasher” himself.

But what I got from watching her struggle to stay focused on our conversation was an AMAZING lesson about FEAR.

There’s a lot of talk about how to OVERCOME fear or PUSH THROUGH it so that we can finally take ACTION…

But what I was reminded of during that lunch is that the greatest thing we can PRACTICE is to ACKNOWLEDGE the fear when it sits down at the table behind us and THEN CHOOSE to get back to LIFE and back to REALITY…

(If you are singing the “Soul II Soul” song in your head right now, I love you! )

Imagine in that situation Vince Vaughn represented FEAR…

My goal (and I’m sure my friend’s goal as well) was to have a fun lunch and great conversation…

Now, I KNEW Vince Vaughn was sitting behind me. I didn’t pretend he WASN’T there nor did I try to get RID of him or LIE to myself about his presence…

But I also didn’t let it affect my experience of having lunch with my friend because it was IRRELEVANT to my goal…

My friend, on the other hand, made Vince Vaughn’s presence RELEVANT and SIGNIFICANT—aka FOCUSING on “FEAR”—so it instantly derailed her from the goal in front of her…

When we make fear SIGNIFICANT, it takes over our experience of life and IMPACTS our ability to take ACTION…

Think of ONE thing you are feeling FEAR around today – something that is distracting your attention…

Now try to acknowledge it, see it for what it is (a present but harmless thought) and ask whether you can make it IRRELEVANT without making it DISAPPEAR and then get back IN ACTION.

I grew up with lots of MONEY stories – that it was hard to create, that it was even harder to keep, that there was never enough of it…

And because of the stress that money seemed to play in my and my family’s life, I vowed to focus on making a LOT of it when I was pretty young…

Unfortunately, that often led me to work to the point of burnout to ensure my “financial security” – making well over $100k a year in my mid-20’s and still worrying about it all disappearing!

Then I was told that the solution was to redefine my RELATIONSHIP to money, to treat it or speak about it differently – BUT still, the focus was on making money something OTHER than a simpler way to exchange goods and services than carrying around chickens or goats for trade…

But one day it occurred to me, through being coached around this myself, WHAT IF it’s possible that we are wasting our creative energy trying to create a different RELATIONSHIP with money?

WHAT IF instead of treating it like a person that we needed to have more effective “communication” with, that focusing all of our energy on purposeful SERVICE and seeing how we can make a real difference in the lives of others is the missing link?

Water boiling is simply the side effect of applying focused and consistent heat to a pot of otherwise still, room temperature water

If I want it to boil, I don’t need to change my RELATIONSHIP with water, I simply need to shift my attention to how to increase the heat being applied in a focused manner…

Apply YOUR HEAT, YOUR POWER, and YOUR IMAGINATION to consistently SERVING and watch how WEALTH becomes a natural side effect!

AND NOW to TOTALLY sound like I’m contradicting myself…

I had a moment about 18 months ago where I was in TOTAL scarcity mode about money…

I had just moved to Los Angeles where the cost of living was LITERALLY double where I moved from and my “MONEY STORIES” went on FULL BLAST!

So as a way to keep myself in a place of CREATIVITY and SERVICE with a “salt bae” pinch of SURRENDER, I wrote something that I STILL read to myself once in a while…

Thoughts about money will get NO more of my time or energy UNLESS it is to be creative and easy around it…

Fear of “running out of money” will NO LONGER be a belief I hold…

My NEW TRUTH is that money is ALWAYS on its way…

…AND proportionally so to how LIGHT, LOOSE-GRIPPED, PLAY-FULL and CREATIVE I am being in the world each and every day!

I can’t HIDE from money! It is like a HEAT SEEKING MISSILE that has me in its crosshairs and is ALWAYS coming for me-I can DODGE it for a while, but it will ALWAYS find me…

It feels SOOOO GOOOD to no longer have any HEAVY STORIES about Money!

My challenge for you is a simple one.  If you took your focus OFF of changing your relationship with the CONCEPT of money and instead asked yourself, “what is ONE way I can dial up the VALUE and SERVICE I bring to the world today?” – what might that look like for you?  It might be astonishing a current client, it might be crafting a creative offer to help those who aren’t able to afford to work with you at your full rate, or it may even be giving the gift of a complimentary coaching session to a FORMER client, just to deepen your bond and intimacy with them. 

Raise your hand if you’ve ever held back from sharing your message because you were afraid of being judged, criticized, or ridiculed…

OR if you’ve ever NOT created something because you were worried it wouldn’t be as POWERFUL or as CLEAR as you wanted it to be…

OR if you’ve ever not SHARED something because it didn’t feel PERFECT yet…

Is your hand up? Yea, mine too…

It’s SO easy to fall into the trap of believing that we have to write the PERFECT post, or the BEST blog, or the most TRANSFORMATIONAL course because THIS is the thing that is going to MAKE or BREAK our biz!

But that’s total BULLPOOP and just PARALYZES us from taking ACTION because NOTHING can EVER be PERFECT…

So what’s my secret for overcoming PERFECTION PARALYSIS? So glad you asked…

SNAPCHAT!

Yep, even though I don’t actually USE Snapchat, last year I had the pleasure of hosting a 24hr Snapchat takeover for SoulPancake and the experience reminded me of an important lesson around thought-leadership and building a Competition-Proof business. And it was this…

The power of EPHEMERAL DESIGN, aka creating something that is MEANT to disappear in the near future…

Granted, Snapchat didn’t INVENT this idea, but it definitely POPULARIZED it by building an entire platform around posts that are only visible for 24hrs…

And the beauty of Snaps and of ephemeral design in general is that if we KNOW that something is going to DISAPPEAR, then we don’t feel pressured to make it the PERFECT thing, because it’s not going to LAST anyway…

So even though I don’t USE Snapchat, I try to treat EVERYTHING I create as it if WERE a Snap…

Which doesn’t mean that I don’t give my all or put sincere love, attention and focus into what I’m creating, It just means I avoid getting caught up in needing anything to be PERFECT (which keeps me in ACTION)…

So if your content ONLY had 24 hours to live, would then disappear into the ether and you never had to worry about it being seen again, what would you create TODAY that you’ve been WAITING to share?

 

My clients and students ask me all the time, once they’ve connected with someone over email and had a bit of back-and-forth, they want to know how to best convert the PROSPECT into a PAYING CLIENT…

So, since I’ve gotten this question SO MANY times now, I thought I’d publicly share my FOOLPROOF method for “closing” someone over EMAIL…

Incidentally, this technique would also work for closing someone over “text” or “DM.” Really, it’s just a method for closing someone via ANY form of written communication, and it’s SUPER SIMPLE…

First, go to the email, text, or DM thread you have with that person…

Then…

DON’T.

DON’T DO IT!

DON’T try to PERSUADE or SELL over email, text, DM, fax, or carrier pigeon. Pick up the phone, get on a Zoom video call, do SOMETHING that puts you into ACTUAL conversation!

THAT’s how you create a COMPETITION-PROOF business…

Emails are GREAT. Text messages are GREAT. Carrier pigeons are GREAT (if you want to send an important message with a side of bird flu)…

But if you want to sell a high-value, high-intimacy service that promises TRANSFORMATION, then the PROCESS of selling it should ALSO include intimacy and the possibility for transformation…

If you’re selling a commoditized thing like pencils en mass or even a $27 e-book, then sure… use email (though I’d say selling either of those is not going to give you the impact or income you desire…)

But if you’re trying to sell something that SERVES people and TRANSFORMS their lives, their businesses, their health, or their relationships, then SHOW UP from a place of SERVICE when you’re selling it…

That is my ENTIRE mantra for selling: SELL by SERVING…

Reach out to them—and THIS part you CAN do over email—and offer to waive your fee and set aside some time to REALLY dive in and HELP!

And then…show up and SERVE them. Let them EXPERIENCE what it’s like to work with you so that they see the VALUE in continuing to do so…

If you want WEEKLY LIVE trainings from me on how to create a COMPETITION-PROOF Business through SERVING instead of SELLING, join our DOPE free Facebook Group!

If you ever feel like your clients need you to have it “ALL FIGURED OUT,” keep reading…

Before I became an entrepreneur, I spent most of my career working in technology consulting, primarily partnering with Cisco (the tech company, not the thong song singer 😂🍑) and their advanced networking technologies…

At the time VoIP (voice over IP) – aka making phone calls over the internet – had become HUGE and Cisco was dominating the market…

My team would design the infrastructure to make this possible for businesses and then we would go in, deploy it and make it all work…

Except, there was a PROBLEM…

Cisco VoIP was so CRISP, so CLEAR, so PERFECT in its lack of background noise, that when people were on the phone with each other, they often thought that they had gotten disconnected…”Hello, Hello, are you still there???”

And this became a problem; we were getting complaints from companies who had just spent sometimes $100k+ purchasing this supposedly NEW and BETTER technology…

So Cisco got SUPER creative and decided that in order to make the most of the technology but keep it FAMILIAR for the end users, they would inject ARTIFICIAL STATIC on the line…

It almost sounds ridiculous, but the BIGGEST networking infrastructure company in the world had to make their technology LESS perfect in order for people to feel comfortable using it and to lower their resistance to adopting the new system…

Do you see what I’m getting at?

In order for US to show up most powerfully for the people we serve and to give them the BEST chance of maximizing the BENEFITS of our work with them, we need to establish a foundational level of CONNECTEDNESS!

We want to build INTIMACY which is created through REALNESS, through RELATABILITY, through sharing our own FLAWS and STORIES, through injecting some “noise onto the line” by our own missteps, mistakes, victories and all…THAT is what truly brings us together!

Are YOU willing to be REAL and RELATABLE instead of POLISHED and PERFECT with your clients? See for yourself the difference it makes!

Alright, so when you first got into this “coaching thing”, you were probably super excited and eager and hopeful to make your passion for helping others into a business.  But then, within a few weeks or a few months, something starts to change…

I KNOW for a fact when I first got started (and I’ve heard the same from the coaches I work with), as soon as we are “Coaches trying to build a business”, the seriousness sets in!

And then, all the things I “HATE” doing start fighting with all the things I “LOVE” doing…

I HATE social media, I HATE getting out there and connecting, I HATE “marketing”, I HATE “sales”, I HATE trying to “close people”, etc etc…

AND simultaneously…

I LOVE coaching, I LOVE helping, I LOVE making money, I LOVE feeling fulfilled, I LOVE seeing people transform, I LOVE feeling a sense of significance and purpose from the work I do, I LOVE seeing others LIT UP…

So if THOSE are the COMPETING INTERESTS inherent in ‘BUILDING A COACHING BUSINESS’, then OF COURSE it is going to be SERIOUS, STRESSFUL, NEEDY, PANICKY “business” indeed!

F THAT!

From now on, YOU are an “ACTIVIST”!

Because ACTIVISTS only care about making a difference…

They wake up EVERY day asking themselves:

“who can I share this message with today?”

“how can I further this movement for the greater good?”

“who probably has no idea that this opportunity for betterment of the world exists that I can turn up and inform?”

“how amazing would it be if I was able to make SOME small difference in the world today – some DENT in this thing that I care so much about?”

ACTIVISTS don’t see sales or marketing or getting out there or social media as “things to hate” OR “things to overcome their hatred for”…they are too committed to making a DIFFERENCE to give any SIGNIFICANCE to stories that distract them from that mission!

The root word of activist is ACT!

And THAT is their default state…true activists are in CONSTANT motion, CONSTANT service, CONSTANT belief in what they stand for, what they do and the possibilities that are available to all of us…

So please, QUIT your coaching business, even if #JFT (just for today), and go be the most engaged, loving, fearless, service-centered, playful ACTIVIST for human potential and energy activation that the world has ever seen!