5 Things I Wish I’d Learned Before Becoming An Entrepreneur.
Hey, ya’ll, Dr. Lee here-
I was reminiscing on my entrepreneurial journey a few days ago re: ALLLL the ups and downs I’ve been through, and what I wish I had known about being more trauma-sensitive toward myself.
Y’all know I like to share my pearls of wisdom with you (mostly so you don’t have to go through what I did to learn them).
I’m sharing 5 of the best ones below-
Focus on Internal Metrics To Hit the External Metrics (and not care if you don’t)
When I focused on what I needed to do to get the likes/sales/engagement, and not on things I could ACTUALLY control- I made some not-exactly-trauma-sensitive moves.
I remember starting my journey in network marketing and constantly focusing on what I needed to hit the next “rank” or income benchmark...and sometimes, what I did in order to hit those goals did NOT feel in alignment with my values (don’t worry, it was all legal, just not in integrity).
I pressured people into making a decision.
I stressed myself out over the numbers.
I used scarcity to sell and poked at people’s pain to get them to buy.
Blarffff, right?
Years later, I had enough.
When I realized I wanted to create a more trauma-sensitive way of selling, I shifted from asking myself the question “How do I hit the next goal?” to questions like:
How do I want to FEEL in my business?
If I watched someone ELSE run my business, would I want to learn from them?
What moves do I want to make that will help me act with integrity AND feel good?
And with that shift, my business started growing (and continues to do so).
The Trauma-Sensitive approach is to do the inner work to figure out how you want to FEEL on the daily in your biz + what moves you can make from that space, and be patient enough to let things shift.
2. Have the Long-Term Capacity to Do Everything to Which I Say “YES”
I used to say yes to EVERYTHING people offered, because I was focused on “ooh, another opportunity to make connections/sell!” (see point #1).
Welp, that lead to burnout, overwhelm, and me going back on my word, way more than I wanted to. It actually made me MORE inconsistent, because people couldn’t trust my yes- and had the exact opposite effect I was desiring (I wanted people to “like” me, and people don’t like people who let them down!)
Now?
I’m PICKY. I only say yes to things that I’m 99% sure I’ll have the desire and the capacity to follow through to completion.
As a former coach taught me- I’d rather disappoint you at the beginning, than disappoint you and/or resent you in the end.
Plus, people respect people who are honest about their capacity, even if they are bummed you told them no or not now.
3. Make sure I’m regulated before I hit “SEND”
Would you guess that I’ve got a MEAN girl inside of me?
It’s true. The inner teenager that lives inside me is SAVAGE. If you cross her, she’s ready to eat you alive and leave no crumbs.
She used to have full reign over what “we” said to people. I had no idea how to get her to stop popping up when someone said something triggering, and she hit enter on comments before I had a chance to tear my hands from the computer…
Basically, she got us in a LOT of trouble in the name of “protecting us”.
And after going through trauma therapy and emotional regulation work, I’ve realized that learning how to let my mean girl say what she needs to say is necessary, AND I get to choose where she says it.
My mean teen now gets to spew her venom in my journal, or in a vent session with my coach.
And when I hear what she says, it’s an insight into WHY we got triggered by what someone said or did.
Did we feel disrespected? Misunderstood? Rejected? Abandoned? Embarrassed?
Once I know what feeling she was protecting me from, I can then feel THAT feeling, and let it move through me till I’m back to a place of regulation.
From there- I can choose what (if anything) I want to say in response.
This has probably saved me over $200k in the last 2 years alone- it’s THAT impactful.
4. Nothing In Business Is An Emergency
When someone approaches me with something they want me to deal with urgently that doesn’t FEEL urgent, I respond PROMPTLY.
But not with an answer.
Instead, I say “Thank you for bringing this to my attention. May I have 24-48 hours to feel into this before I respond?”
This does THREE things
It slows the other person down enough to consider if this really even IS urgent.
Allows the other person to come up with a solution in the meantime
I ensure I do not respond from urgency myself and can seek out advice or take time to get more information if needed.
By implementing this technique, I’ve realized that so much of what looks like “fires” that need to be put out are just little lightning bugs that are lazily flitting around that don’t even need to be dealt with.
5. My Financial Success Is Independent Of My Clients’ Paying Me
The day I decided my client’s paying me didn’t decide if I was going to be financially secure and abundant was one of the most freeing days of my life.
I could stop treating missed payments like emergencies (see #4).
I could be more sensitive to clients when unexpected life events occurred and give them flexibility with payments.
And, I could focus on receiving more money from unexpected sources.
I started bringing in a LOT more money when I stopped pigeonholing where I excepted it to come from.
These are just a few of the CRUCIAL lessons I’ve learned over more than a decade of becoming a more trauma-sensitive entrepreneur.
If you want to hear HOW I learned these lessons, and how I apply them to my life and biz on a daily basis-
Invitation to join us at our upcoming event, the Trauma Sensitive Entrepreneur!
The Trauma-Sensitive Entrepreneur (TSE) will be run as a ONE-DAY, immersive virtual event on May 5th + with 12-month replay access + a bonus FB community group with coaching from me!
You can learn more [here]