Behind the Scenes: Are You Setting Conditional Goals that Won’t Give You What You Actually Want

INTRO: After generating over a million dollars in sales and selling one of her businesses with a single email, your host, Kathryn Thompson, takes an unconventional approach to marketing and sales. So if you're ready to tap into a more powerful way to be seen, heard, and a sought after entrepreneur in your industry, without having to spend endless hours marketing your business and chasing clients, you're in the right place. Be The Sought After Entrepreneur Podcast is here to help you ditch the cookie cutter, one size fits all approach to marketing and use your unique energy to effortlessly attract the most aligned clients. When you do this, you can spend less time marketing your business and more time doing your soul work and enjoying the richness of your life. Welcome to Be The Sought After Entrepreneur Podcast. And here's your host, Kathryn Thompson.

Kathryn Thompson: Hey, hey, super stoked that you're tuning in this week's episode. I cannot wait to dive into today's topic [00:01:00] because I want to share with you a reflection that I had yesterday and kind of have been reflecting on for a while now after attending a gala here.

I had the honor of going as a guest with my friend who had sponsored the event and the event was this beautiful gala where Gillian Harris was in attendance. and was, um, did a Q& A panel, um, where they asked her a bunch of questions about life, about business, herself, all of those sorts of things. And I want to share with you the reflection from that.

If you don't know who Jillian Harris is, then I highly suggest that you Take a look at her on Insta. She's a celebrity, uh, in her own right, and has a very successful brand. She was on The Bachelor and The Bachelorette, love it or list it, and now has this really beautiful business. She's an entrepreneur, a mom, a wife, all those sorts of things.

She comes with many colors to her bouquet, uh, But what I found very interesting about what she was sharing, I [00:02:00] think one is something I resonated with very much and something I've contemplated a lot, uh, but she shared so vulnerably. And I think it's sometimes really hard at the height of success, when you are a celebrity, when there's a lot of eyes on you, to really share publicly and openly about, Kind of where you're at in business, in life, maybe the hardships and whatnot.

And she has shared this on social media as well. But one of the things that she talked about was social media, entrepreneurship and that journey and whatnot, and where her priorities sort of really lie, which is her wanting to kind of slow down in life, but also really prioritize her time to be a mom to her kiddos, her young kiddos, which I think is really beautiful.

The reason I'm sharing this with you is because one of the things I'm constantly contemplating is, you know, our purpose, why we do what we do. And I've been [00:03:00] in this entrepreneurship game now for a very long time. I grew up in it. My grandfather was an entrepreneur. My dad's an entrepreneur. I've Supported businesses and their journey.

I've had my own companies and I have sort of been in this for a while now and one of the things I often hear from lots of you is this balance between being the entrepreneur, showing up on social media and showing up navigating that with the life that you ultimately want to live. And the thing about what Jillian Harris was sharing last night was this whole essence around this, right?

Really kind of looking at what is important, one, I think in life, and two, what we truly value and not saying that she doesn't value her company and her business. She absolutely does. But I think sometimes we can get wrapped up and lost in the pursuit of success in a lot of ways that we [00:04:00] lose ourselves in that process or we lose sight of ourselves in that process or we shift who we are in that process.

So what was true for us maybe in our twenties and our thirties is no longer true for us in our forties and our fifties and that the season of life that we're in changes. how we want to show up and how we want to be. And that is absolutely okay. And one of the things that I know that I, again, I hear a lot of is sort of these conditional promises that we put on ourselves.

This notion that if I have the followers and if I have the money, if I have the relationship, then I'll be happy. Then I'll be able to live a fulfilled life. Then I'll be joyful. And what's interesting is, is that. We witnessed yesterday on stage this high profile entrepreneur that has all of the success that many of us are chasing, [00:05:00] the money, the relationship, the business, the profile, the followers, you name it, the brand deals, whatever it might be, and yet, There's this internal battle that she's been navigating again, that she shared publicly on social many times and, and shared again with us last night, this notion of like, really wanting to sort of slow down and prioritize being a mom with her kiddos and how social media has really changed the way.

She's looked at life, and love, and whatnot, and almost become desensitized to some of these things because of this heightened exposure that she's experienced on social. I'm sharing this with you because if you resonate with her, With the notion of wanting to really do work that feels joyful and exciting and brings this sort of aliveness in your body while [00:06:00] simultaneously also wanting to create a life that you get to live and enjoy and be fulfilled by, then the thing that I would love to invite you to sort of sort of contemplate is now What does that actually really look like?

And where may I be believing that I have to create it a certain way? Because one of the underlying threads that she also pulled out, which I absolutely loved, which might not have been visible to everybody there, but was very visible to me. And that was the notion that we carry as women, a lot of invisible extra weight on our shoulders, especially if you're a mom, especially if you're running a household, also running a business.

And there's these invisible things that are like put on us from culture, from society, from condition, from patriarchy, where we are, you know, almost expected [00:07:00] to Have a baby and then turn around and not ever take a break. And then she shared about that. She shared about her experiences of having her kiddos and basically going right back to work and not allowing sort of her own body and whatnot to slow down.

And. Whether that's a right or wrong thing to do in the moment, I think when it's so conditioned and accepted for us to just go, go, go, go, go, go, go and not really ever take a break and continually push ourselves beyond a point of breaking, because she ended up getting to that point and she shared that way.

She got to this point of like, I feel like my world is sort of crumbling around me, even though I have all the success. but I'm not allowing myself to slow down and to rest and to be present for my family and my kids and all those sorts of things because there's always something else that needs to be managed to do and whatnot.[00:08:00] 

And that's just one example of one story. And like I said, it's something I've been contemplating a lot because I think it's, you know, So easy to just push through. For example, when I left corporate, right, my decision to leave corporate was that I knew I wanted to move out of that environment, but I never gave myself an opportunity to just like pause for a moment and just breathe, right?

There was this notion that, If I quit my corporate career, I had to replace it with something else immediately. Or else, like, what am I doing? You know? And what's interesting is, is that that doesn't necessarily have to be the case. I have this other beautiful friend of mine who, ended up quitting her career and has been taking sort of a sabbatical, which I think is really beautiful.

Um, but there's this preconceived notion that when we look at somebody like that, who's taking a break or sabbatical or [00:09:00] whatnot, it's like, well, what are you doing? You know, you have to do something. You've got to work. Um, you've got to be valuable. You've got to contribute to society, which is yes, we do need to earn money in order to live.

That's just the way our society is. built. But, but it doesn't mean that we can't take these intermittent breaks, you know, in our journey and there's nothing wrong with it. And so I wanted to share this sort of experience with you because one of the things, again, that I've been contemplating is the condition that I put on what it is I decide to do and how I do it.

For example, you know, If I make X amount of money, then I'll be happy. When I make this money, then I can book that trip and go on that trip. You know, when I reached the pinnacle of my career, then I will have some authority. Can you see how [00:10:00] there's these conditions that we put on it of like, I will only be happy when, I will only be considered successful when.

I'll only be fulfilled when I'll only be able to live a joyful life without worry when there's these conditions we put on ourselves. But what yesterday and last night showed me is, is that you can have all of those things. And I knew this inherently, right? But it's just a beautiful thing to be able to show you that.

juxtaposition in a real sort of time period here is that I actually saw a celebrity, you know, on stage talking about the difficulties of entrepreneurship, but also at the height of her success, so to speak, and still was grappling with the notion of being fulfilled and present and all those sorts of things.

And so it's like, when you can see that, because it's easy for us to look and to perceive and look at others and go, well, they have it all. So [00:11:00] therefore, Life is just bliss there. And I'm not saying it can't be, but I'm saying lots of times we're looking from the outside, looking like looking outside inward into their life.

And we think they have it all figured out. And that was one of the key themes she said, like, I don't have it all figured out. And that's a big misconception or assumption that many of us make about people that we might idolize. people that we compare ourselves to, uh, people that we think have what we want, quote unquote, again, sort of comparison to some degree, but it's not the case.

And that if we're not happy now, we're not living a joyful life. Now, if we don't feel like we're valuable or successful or worthy now, I promise you that thing that you're after and you're striving for is not going to give you that. And that might feel like a, duh, Kathryn, but [00:12:00] as you can see, I've experienced it.

There's celebrity entrepreneurs that experience it. So it's not exempt to the level of where you're at in your life or the experiences that you're experiencing, the success that you have. It's not exempt because there always is sort of this condition that we place on it and this striving and this chase.

for these things that we actually could create right now. So I want to ask you a few contemplative questions because I think in the early days of entrepreneurship, I'm talking like two to five to six years of business. There's this notion, unless you've like went from like zero to a million, Very quickly, there's going to be other problems that present themselves, but if you're in that sort of like growth stage where you're growing your audience, you're growing your sales and you're sort of chasing that, right, I [00:13:00] need to make money, I need to make money, I need to make money, and that feels like a slog, because it is, in my opinion, that I want to prompt you with some questions, because I think we don't often, either we don't spend enough time here, Or we lose sight of this in our journey or we have shifted and evolved in the season of business that we're in and therefore our why and what that looks like is different.

So the big question I often ask, I ask this on sales calls is like, why are you in business? Like why is this important to you? And If the person is saying something like, well, I want to make money, or I want freedom, or I want, you know, this thing for myself, this money thing, right? I want money. Then for me, I look at that as an unsustainable way.

to drive your [00:14:00] business forward. And the reason I say that is because money will not be enough to keep you going in the lowest points of low points. But money isn't the thing that's going to fulfill your why and your purpose. So if money is the only reason why you're in business to make money, it's not going to be sustainable, especially if you're somebody who wants to live in your highest purpose and have that creative expansion within your business.

And then the other question is, is like, who are you truly in service to? And if we put ourselves before the whole, right, if we put ourselves before everybody else, Then our entire approach to business becomes unsustainable. And then the other question I'd love to ask is what is the highest service that you can perform for [00:15:00] your own human beings on this planet and earth in order to elevate collective consciousness, the way we live for the betterment of the whole?

And what is the most that you can do? And then what is your priority in life? What is being prosperous really mean to you? And again, this can change in the seasons, right? If you think of Jillian Harris, right? Like she's looking at her children and going, I want to be more present for my kiddos. But when she was in her early 20s, late 20s, early 30s, that likely wasn't a priority because she didn't have kiddos at that time, right?

So again, your priorities can shift, but in this season of life right now, what's your priority? A big one for me is simplicity, right? Living a simple life, building a simple business, and reducing the over [00:16:00] complicated processes that Potentially, I believe, are required in order to be successful. So getting really curious about that, like, do we actually need that to create success?

Or is there a simpler way of doing it? That's the season of life I'm in. That's the contemplation that I've been contemplating, which is why that story she shared yesterday really resonated with me about slowing down. And there is this notion that if we go slow, it's less than or not as good as going fast.

And I had this conversation inside Spellbound recently where a client of mine said to me, you know, This has been a really humbling experience, because one of the things in Spellbound that I refuse to do is to play into the hyper productivity and over productivity that I believe is still very much [00:17:00] conditioned into our Take care.

business world. And, and again, we see this with Jillian Harris's story, right? Where it's like, I want to slow down. I've been going a mile a minute and I'm not present, and I'm not in my life. And her story is one of many. And I know that because I have resonated with that as well. I want to be more present.

I want to enjoy slow mornings. I want to enjoy Weekends and evenings. I don't want to be full throttle all the time. I don't want to be in this hyperproductive mode where I feel like I have to respond to an email within, you know, an hour, right? I think it was Corey Allen that posted recently about, um, it might've been him, might've been someone else, but he recently posted about, you know, like, there's no need to respond immediately.

There's no need to constantly have to be on the go and doing something, right? It's this reframing of what we believe. is [00:18:00] required in order to create success in our life. Now, if you want, if you're on that go, go, go, and you enjoy that, great. But what I want to showcase and illuminate for a lot of you is that there is a different way to do things.

And oftentimes it's just about getting curious. It's just about coming back to the core. Why are we in business? Who are we in service to? And if it's just about money and it's just about yourself, then that approach is going to be unsustainable because the purpose is shallow, right? There has to be some depth to that purpose in order for it to be sustainable in order for it to sustain you.

And then what does that highest service look like? And how can that be expressed? And this is where we get to be curious [00:19:00] about the way in which we look at how things are done, because your expression might come through some type of product. It might come through painting. It might come through writing.

It might come through making food or, uh, cooking food. It could come through photography, it could come through business coaching and mentorship, it could come through therapy. Like, there's so many different ways, which is just the vehicle of that expression. But what's the highest service that you can perform with your own unique genius?

And we all have our own genius. And that becomes sustainable. And then it's reevaluating that from time to time. If the seasons of your life change, if you become a parent, if you decide that you want to downsize some of your company, because it's no longer serving the purpose that you want going forward.

It could be pivoting altogether. It could be closing shop. I mean, there's many, [00:20:00] many reasons and seasons in life that are where our priorities are going to shift and change. But I wanted to share this with you because, like I said, the conversation we were having in Spellbound where I was like, I refuse to be on this like hyper productivity or infuse any of that energy.

So I'm not holding anybody accountable. I'm not hyperly motivating people. I'm not giving people deadlines to complete what they want to complete. Because to me, that's just, again, living within the model that is only perpetuating this over productivity, which eventually isn't going to be sustainable.

Eventually you will hit some sort of wall and your wall will depend on you, your body, your nervous system. All of it. And I know when I sold my brick and mortar business, I had hit a [00:21:00] massive wall there and I've shared that story. And my stamina for what I was capable of before was no longer possible for me.

And you might be feeling like that in your business and your life right now where, where the way in which you create requires spaciousness, requires rest, requires lots of slow movement rather than this like fast, quick action. And that was the one thing that, A client said to me, like I said, it's like, this is a very humbling experience.

And it's really hard when we live in fast action gets the best results or, you know, must make quick moves in your business, or you're going to be leaving money on the table, or you're going to lose out on clients. You're going to lose out on opportunities, which is all scarcity. When we talk about losing, when we talk about leaving money on the table, it's coming from a scarcity perspective.

[00:22:00] Because we don't lose clients, we don't lose the money because we didn't say it the right way, or we didn't show up quick enough, or we didn't respond fast enough, or whatever it might be. That's bullshit, right? That's, that's bullshit. That's a story that the patriarchy and whatnot wants you to believe so that you stay on this hyperproductive hamster wheel and never get off it.

But it also creates this, I don't know if you can feel it, but I can feel it in my body when somebody comes at me with this very rushed energy, so to speak, right? Like I need to talk to you now, or if I don't talk to you now, then I'm going to be running out of time. That is all scarcity. Cause what does running out of time actually mean?

To me, you get to choose the timeline that you're on, right? If you're self imposing a deadline on yourself, That's yourself choosing to put that deadline [00:23:00] on you. What's another week? It's a question I often ask my clients. What's another week? In the grand scheme of things, in the grand scheme of life and in business, what's another week?

What's another two weeks? What's another month? I'd love for you to sit in your body and feel and sense that what that actually does to your nervous system. When you feel like, what if I delayed or postponed my launch for another two months?

I have no emotional charge to that. And I'm so relaxed in that. Because I, I, I'm not self imposing this rush on myself that it has to be done by this date in order for me to have these results. Or I have to do all of these things in order for it to be enough to get the results I want. What does any of that actually mean?

What does enough mean? [00:24:00] Cause there is no script, right? And I think intellectually, Many of you, I'm sure, get this. There is no script, there's no formula, there's no right or wrong, and yet we find ourselves trying to continually shove ourselves into the script with the notion that if I don't send 15 emails and do this live launch and remind people with a bunch of emails and follow up with every single human, then I'm It's not going to be enough to quote unquote sell people into what it is that I'm doing.

And yet, I've seen many business owners, and there was one at this event last night, that she had thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands of people Hit her website and buy her products without any like paid marketing or anything. And you want to know why that's the case [00:25:00] because she knew exactly why she was in business and she knew exactly who she was in service to and the purpose and the mission behind the brand.

was bigger than she could ever imagine. And that was the thing. She couldn't imagine it. So when, you know, thousands, I'm talking 75, 000 people landing on her website to buy her products in and selling out within four minutes. It had nothing to do with the fact that she had this perfectly articulated marketing plan in place and strategy.

She had a vision, she had belief, and she had a very strong reason for why she was starting the business and who she was in service to and what she wanted to do with that brand.

It wasn't quote unquote to make money. It wasn't quote unquote to fulfill some prophecy of her own will in life. [00:26:00] The brand was far bigger than she. And people flocked. And what was interesting is, is they flocked to her booth last night as well. There was a lineup, so freaking long, standing at her booth.

Wanting to buy her products. In support of the mission. Not in support of, you know, The physical product itself, yes, the products are beautiful, and there's a lot of intention that has gone into them, but it was for the brand itself, and the mission behind that brand, and she is just the vocal, the voice, that is transmuting this out into the world.

She is the vehicle to get this message out there, to create an impact. To change generations. I'm talking this brand is a representation of a lot of generational trauma [00:27:00] and it's coming out through her clothing

and there is this deep rooted mission that people want to be part of in order to be the impact. Not only her being an impact, but those that wear the clothing are also part of that impact. And they believe in the cause, they believe in what it is she's saying.

So, I'm coming back to these questions often because One, we get to do it our way. And if you intellectually get that, while simultaneously questioning, well, how many emails should I send? Or when should I send them? Then this is the work that we need to unpack because it's not about that. And this individual that was there is living proof of [00:28:00] that.

Selling out in four minutes without any paid ads

is, is indicative of. of what's possible when we believe that we can create what it is we want to create and we're driven by a higher power, a higher purpose. So I'm going to leave you with those questions of contemplation so that you can kind of sit in your own business. Like, where am I just chasing the next client?

Where am I just chasing the money? Where am I doing things to get something in return? Cause most businesses that do really, really well are ones that say things like, I didn't intend this to be a business. I didn't, I went into it for the notion that I wanted to make something better. I wanted to get a message across and create an impact.[00:29:00] 

And Those are the businesses that just skyrocket so quickly and sustain that because they are not, they didn't start it to get something in return. They didn't start it to lend clients and get money. They did it because they believed in what it is they were doing and they, they are succeeding because There is a service that's far greater than them only fulfilling their own self-fulfilling prophecy.

They're not in it for this selfish reason. So I'm gonna leave you with that so that you can contemplate in your own business where you're chasing the clients and where you're chasing the money, and whether or not there's an opportunity here to reconnect to why you're in business in the first place, and who are you truly in service to.

And then how, what is the highest service that you can offer in order [00:30:00] to fulfill this mission and this purpose? And this can look like a variety of different ways. So with that, I hope that this has been helpful. I really look forward to hearing from you. If you've enjoyed it, please head on over to my Instagram at creativelyowned and shoot me a message.

I'd love to hear from you. Cheers. Thanks for listening. We'll see you right back here next time. You can also find us on social media at creativelyowned and online at creativelyowned. com. Until next time, keep showing up as your authentic self.