The past few months have been a slow slide into feeling “meh” about my business…and it peaked on Instagram on Tuesday with a personal share I’ll title “I F*@king Hate My Business.”

 

 

 

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A post shared by Kirsten Foss Coaching (@kirsten_foss)

Thankfully I had a session scheduled with my business coach that day, and I opened up to her that I felt uninspired, tired and unmotivated. 

I LOVE innovating. When I’m in the zone, I draw incredible amounts of infectious energy, I feel super connected to my tribe and being in service to the spa industry simply lights my fire.

So when my motivation & innovation muscles seem to atrophy, I really feel it’s absence, and it lowers my get-up-and-go mojo…which sends me for a spin. I find myself muttering: what the hell I’m doing?

This week, I pull back the curtain on my own struggles with entrepreneurship, not to air my dirty laundry or seek attention but to be honest about the realities of owning a business and the roller coaster of emotions that go along with it. I know you go through the same hamster-wheel thinking about your self-worth and value of your own spa business and you shouldn't feel alone.

Holding back these experiences and keeping them private don’t help us grow. They deny us the expansion of our own personal development.

If you’re a private person, you certainly don’t have to post your struggles publicly. But I encourage you to find a trustworthy friend or mentor and unload your fearful (MIS)truths. Remember, Fear = False Evidence Appearing Real.

So go ahead, admit you feel scared and don’t know if you have it in you to be an entrepreneur, acknowledge that you feel worn-out, or be honest that you take your business so personally, sometimes you mistakenly tie it to your self-worth, and it (almost unbearably) wears you down some days.

After posting my Instagram, I had many emails and private messages from other entrepreneurs feeling the same way and sharing how they've moved through this inevitable rollercoaster. So I decided to dive deeper into the conversation with a video on my Facebook page. In the comments on this post in Spa Business Mastery, one of my wise and loving clients said she was feeling the same way about her business quite recently and “by sharing it all, not holding back anything, it was cathartic.” 

She was 100% right. But we can't rely on dumping out our feelings to make big shifts. I know that with anything I want to change, action is needed to design transformations. 

So yesterday I was lucky enough to have a light day of work and be able to focus on healing myself. Here's what happened:

• I did some gratitude writing & I came up with 29 amazing things that have happened to me since January!

• I exercised by taking 2 x 2km walks...I haven't been able to walk much this past month because of abdominal surgery so this felt great!

• I made healthy meals & kept reminding myself to drink water all day to nourish my body...so it could support my mind.

• I put pen-to-paper for what I want the next 6 months to look & feel like. I got granular & clarified my core values...and looked for ways to bring those to the surface and shine in my personal life, business communications & offerings. I felt a big release of tension with this exercise. Putting aside all the "shoulds" of the marketing/business world for 30 mins and exploring how I could be doing things differently...and that would be in perfect alignment with my values. Because I know that's truly how you attract new, meaningful business.

• My 18 yr old son surprised me by joining me on the patio and having a 40 min conversation about life. I would have missed this if I was slogging out my frustrations in my office.

• I rescued a lost dog running loose on the roads on my morning walk. I took him home and networked on Social Media to find his owners. They picked him up later in the day. He was a lovely, friendly mutt!

By the end of the day yesterday, I absolutely felt different about my business and myself: relief, compassion, clarity and rested.

Today I continue the gentleness in my business and start easing into innovating again. And what better way to get out of my own head than to GIVE and help others. #AmIRight?  I haven't done a free webinar in almost nine months! It' time!

I think this webinar will be perfect timing for many of you who find your fall bookings slow or have added summer staff and need to keep them.