You are Not Your Business

I started my business in 2014, at the dawn of the “girl boss” era.

In the Little Havana studio (2016)

During this time, we embraced the personal brand in full force. Suddenly, there was an opportunity to “get paid to be who you are” to “infuse your personality into your business” and to “show the people your real life.”

The message was that the more authentically you showed up through your content on social media platforms, the more credibility you would gain, and the more business you would get. When paired with a solid case for your product or service, you would be unstoppable.

At the time, I was a marketing coach. I lived it. I taught it. I believed it.

Nowhere was this more evident than Instagram. A platform built to tell visual stories began to showcase awesome new ideas, next to intriguing new products, next to photos of our most personal moments.

Somewhere along the way, the lines got far too blurry.

The energies got enmeshed. It became harder to recognize where your business ended and where you began.

This energetic entanglement becomes a huge block for you to step into your next level as a business owner.

Here’s what this environment can create:

• A belief that your business results are a reflection of your worth as a person.

• Stressing every Like, Comment and Share (or lack thereof) as a reflection of your ability to bring in an income.

• Visibility starts to feel intrusive, and you feel pressure to exploit your life to make your business work. You resent all of it.

• It feels like you’re always working or thinking about work and it’s never enough.

• Whatever personal growth highs and lows you are experiencing get woven into the business.

The result is a loop of projection from you to your business and back again that leads to stagnation, shame, burnout and overwhelm. You’re unable to see either you or your business clearly because there is so much energetic entanglement.

It is absolutely exhausting.

The good news?

There is a simple solution. It just may sound counter to all that personal brand advice we learned years ago.

You get to draw a much clearer line between you, the human and your business, the entity.

Your business is born of you, but it is not you.

This is crucial to ensuring your potency and expansion as a business owner.

Your business has it own energy, its own identity, its own timeline.

It is an entity separate from you.

Even when it feels so personal or when it was created from a place of so much love within you - it is still separate from you.

Honoring your business’s own separate energy is in fact, one of the most impactful moves you can take for your business growth and for your wellbeing.

Drawing these clear lines in your life opens both you and your business to breathe, expand and thrive.

Below are some ideas for how you can honor your business’s own, unique energy, and free yourself from feeling so entangled with it:

Meditate on your business:

Visualize and feel into it. Does it have a look and feel? How is it unique? See it physically outside of you. Hold it in gratitude for the gifts you’ve exchanged. Speak to it. What do you want to say? Ask it how you should honor it. Ask for a symbol to keep as a reminder. Journal afterwards about your experience.

Consciously measure your business results:

Sit and look at the big numbers. What has been working well? What needs to improve? Notice how you feel when you do this exercise. Is there a strong emotional charge? Are there are any stories coming up about you? Remember that results are simply information. Take deep breaths and keep coming back to the energy of your business as separate. From here, with curiosity and objectivity, make the decisions that are necessary to reach your aims.

Create an energy-rich sharing experience:

How will you share about your business in a way that leaves you feeling excited and lit up? Are there any boundaries you’d like to establish with what you’ll share about and what you won’t? Remember that there are a million ways to share about your business and you don’t need to follow anyone else’s formulas. What platforms or spaces feel good to you? Trust that your personality and essence continue to flow into your business through your words and your presence.

Ritualize work time:

Start your work day with a ritual. It can be lighting a candle at your desk, playing some jazz, taking three deep breaths or all of the above. As you open to your work day in this way - you honor yourself and your business. Having clear work spaces and hours will help preserve your potency.

Honor your experience outside of “business owner”:

Make real space in your life for all the things that light you up outside of work. Calendar them in. Notice how often you speak about work. Notice how much of it feels like a reflection of you. Have friends hold you accountable to healthy space between you and your business. Commit to new hobbies,

Once you make this break, so much begins to shift and open up.

Imagine the expansive space you will create.

Recognize the clarity that will flow into your experience.

Embrace the potency that you will now honor and preserve within you as you show up everywhere in your life.

Expand energetically into abundance actually allowing your business the space to work for you.

Let me know how it goes? I am excited to hear from you.

Our Work Together:

If this is the kind of soul-level perspective shift and traction you're looking for, I'd love to connect with you about how we can work together through coaching and mentorship. This is work you take with you for the rest of your life. Click below and let's get started.