I have been having lots of tough-love conversations recently with my coaching clients around their plans for their businesses and their goals for this year, and I wanted to share some of that energy with you.
Now, 2020 was a mo-fo of a year, there is no escaping that. Many of us faced challenges or hurdles like we’ve never faced before. Many of our businesses had to be totally overhauled or revamped. Many of our lives were rocked by lockdown. And many of us are still reeling from the uncertainties of the world around us.
BUT. Many of us also flourished in 2020. We made massive progress. We launched new businesses. We pivoted and persevered and helped others along the way. We made stuff happen day in, day out.
And that’s why sometimes we need to shake ourselves and remember how easy it is for us to do hard things. And that if we really want to build the life and success we want then we can either make excuses or we can make things happen.
This is always true.
Even before COVID, there have been challenges and shocks. Even before COVID we have faced uncertainty and upheaval. Even before COVID our personal lives have been overhauled by change.
After my first daughter was born I ran a business full-time and held investor meetings or important phone calls while breastfeeding. After a health complication, I went for daily hour-plus walks because I needed time away from the gym to recouperate but didn’t want to give up on my body. After a major financial shock, I mercilessly eliminated costs in my personal and business life and got hustling to make more money and get more clients.
I bring up these very personal examples because each of them represent a choice: self-respect over self-sacrifice, self-care over self-pity, self-preservation over self-destruction. And I say this not because I am super-human or perfect in any way, but because I am very normal. I am just like you.
You have done the same. You have persevered when you wanted to give up. You have fought when you wanted to let go. You have found a way forward when it would have been easier to float backward. You made the same types of proactive and productive choices in different parts of your life at different times of your life. You did that.
And I’m here to remind you of your own power because it’s so easy to think others are better, more resilient, harder working, or luckier than we are. But we know that’s not true. We are ALL doers.
So, remember my dear Entreprenoras, as you look to the year ahead, as you look to grow past the year that’s gone, YOU can do hard things. You have done hard things. And YOU are either already the type of woman who makes things happen, or you already have it in you to be her more often.