Do you ever feel like you have been too stale, stagnant, or just plain old rusty at what you are doing?

I know that owning a business gives me two ways to feel:

1. FEELING INCREDIBLE: Having an outlet to fully create new things from my bursting, innovative ideas to express my value, service. All while challenging myself to provide a stream of income replacement from the 9-5 job that still offers so much time and support for me and my family, along with my self-esteem and fulfillment of what I love doing.

AND AT THE SAME TIME…

2. FEELING OVERWHELMED & STUCK/ LOST. It goes hand-in-hand with having almost TOO much control and choice that when new ideas pop-up, I can’t help but feel a little derailed and distracted from operating a business focused on the bottom line. Afterall, there is so much fun to be had and good to be done outside of just the operations, revenue-generation, and marketing!

What I have learned after this month of working with attendees at CEO Day’s March event and building our workbook, being involved fully in discussions and providing marketing content that was opening conversations around this topic, that businesses need adventure too!

My husband and I have been discussing that too much “human” in our business can often time take away from the mission and the bottom line if not being intentional about the focus.

I used to completely argue with him about this, but lately, I have seen this coming more true as I dove too deep into transforming everything about the way I ran my business, and doing so too frequently.

I work with my clients to provide a direction to a larger vision, a bird’s eye view of the big picture, while still keeping adventure and spontaneity in marketing along the way during the day-to-day.

Are you feeling VALUABLE enough- try to add some more adventure to what you are already doing! 

​​IN YOUR BUSINESS....

Do you take the path of least resistance.... or blaze your own?

Are you stuck in a stale habit & routine that isn’t working anymore?  

Lately, have you edited anything about your

business

processes

community

offerings

or workflow?

Do you feel like the impact you are making on your big mission isn’t where you want it to be?

Does the problems of the world get you feeling actionable or keep you feeling small, stuck or depressed?

Are you surrounded by people who don’t challenge, inspire, or motivate you?

Does the number in your bank account make you feel proud of the hard work you are putting forth?

When you look at your life, do you as, “is this what I really wanted to build for myself- is this really “it”? 

Do you see a clear vision for “what’s next”? 

When you wake up in the morning, how often do you spring out of bed with new ideas that you can’t wait to jot down?

Does the way you run your business feel “enough”?

If you liked this exercise, imagine how much more we can dive deeper with a 1-1 strategic session for your marketing. I’m happy to take a look at what you wrote down and make some actionable steps and suggestions for you in your Q2 marketing plan for this year! 

• Dana 

Welcome to Sunday Intentions

Today's Sunday Intention was a punch in the gut for me to reflect upon and I go into the past of my CEO journey that you may not yet know about me.

Since starting chiropractic care with Dr. Katie Ray of New Day, the care taught me to not resist emotions so much, but to allow them to pass through our bodies.

To think- a nearly 30-year-old realizes that welcoming emotions with a sense of empowerment for the very first time: no matter how good or bad the emotion- welcome it all. And being fully expressed with feeling each warm, electric current pass through me.  What a powerful lesson to take away from this and apply it to business & the CEO Journey that always is more about who we are as humans rather than how well we follow a path to do business a certain way.  

“Let everything happen to you
Beauty and terror
Just keep going
No feeling is final”
 – Rainer Maria Rilke

No feeling is final. Let's begin at the start.

My career story always involved fierce competition, losing one opportunity after the next, and was surrounded by a lot of resistance from people who were supposed to be encouraging me, not telling me that I was incapable. There were a few amazing people of inspiration who did, however, really give me that chance!

Entrepreneurship came about when I experienced the ‘I’ve had enough’ moment

It was this experience as a 23-year-old starting my career that I was always fighting up a current to challenge myself and think as a self-starter. I didn’t always have the support I needed to build to where I am today, but I feel like I always was challenged to feel the “bad” emotion first of doubt, fear, and lack of confidence first that now allows me to feel victorious, successful, and aligned. Do you see how you have to take the chance to accept the challenging parts that transform you into something MORE?!

I have wanted to be a photographer since I was 10 years old. My parents were encouraging by helping me with the hobby and supporting me to the stores to get my film developed and pay for my rolls, they gifted me my first $100 digital camera at 13, and then as I reached 17, they got really nervous but took me to Best Buy to celebrate the $800 I saved up working all summer long cutting grass and working at the park district to buy my first DSLR camera -the professional-looking ones. 

When it came to choosing a college major- however, the doubt started to sink in from them. They wanted me to not be a “starving artist” without a real job- I followed their fear of being broke and pursued a career in advertising / PR instead. 

In my first job, I was working in a department I made up and the concept of “social media for business” was just being introduced to the company I was working with by, guess who- me, myself, and I. 

The idea was so off the wall, I got told how often that social media was a waste of time, a distraction for business, and my employers simply didn’t “get it,” when I was trying to coach the staff how to use their LinkedIn pages and grow a following. 

Yesterday, I had a chat with one of my previous employers at my very first marketing position. It was so amazing to see him and hear these words. He said one very important thing to me I’d been waiting for over the past 7 years: “Dana, we knew all along you were ahead of our time with marketing & social media. We just resisted it and fought to grow and now we look back and thought, wow, we had someone SO eager to teach us and excel in this- we just weren’t ready for it.” 

Fast forward, I was making my own path then just out of spite to my parents and doubters that photography IS a way to earn income- they just didn’t see a formal job setup for it. And I run a marketing consulting business where people are paying me for my ideas on a marketing strategy that helps them grow, scale, and become more visible. I like to say being an entrepreneur is completely about experiencing the “Bad” emotions first to know what it feels like to want to change the world so badly, you are striving to find the solution and make it work!!! 

I stopped following my mom’s anxiety-driven advice. Not Because I don’t love her. Not because I doubt that as a mom, she should stop worrying about me (this is something in the brain that is instilled in mothers that physically makes them worry about us until they die).

I stopped feeding into the idea that I wasn’t doing a good enough job and instead, view a company’s lack of adaptability with changing times something that I can grow past and serve others who are ready for me! It’s incredible when we change our perspective, how much more valuable we can perceive ourselves as!

But because 99% of ALL things she worries about never comes true and is more limiting than I can take. Not once has anything she feared actually happened to me! Not one thing I could have said to this company I worked for would have made a big impact because it was just the wrong ears to listen. That feeling of not being good enough was just temporary once I gained the experience of perspective.

If I changed MY life based on the temporary emotion of fear of the made-up worries, experiencing the life I want wouldn’t be possible. Can you relate? 

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Have you been living in so much fear for the 1% chance things could actually go wrong? Does that stop you from taking major action because you are so resistant to feeling a temporary emotion that will pass through you and make way for you to welcome a very powerful, incredible feeling which lies ahead on your journey? 

Looking at our business, we have to choose for ourselves who we are really listening to and if we are making each decision out of fear or scarcity, or truly willing to welcome all emotions of both worry, doubt, and success, achievement. Yet another reason I call this a “CEO Journey,” not a “CEO Roadmap". It’s YOUR journey to experience and define exactly what YOU want to. 

This week's Intention:

I intend to ask myself today who I am really listening to and why do they have too much power over me?
Do I really want to live out life and build a business more fully without fear of something always going wrong? Can I handle a temporary feeling of discomfort to allow the most incredible feelings on the other side of it once I grow past it?   

With so much uncertainty and fear surrounding us in the media, the news feeds, and our peers' anxiety, demand that you will “make it work '' to allow the good emotions to be celebrated more than focusing on the bad emotions. They are coming anyway- so let them in with a new perspective that nothing is final- it’s just a TEMPORARY feeling! You got this! 

Have a great rest of your week,

Dana