This past year, I have learned that you can’t just level up your business as a sole endeavor. Leveling up your business means that you will view not only your business in a new light, but you will see possibilities where none might have been before. You will have to come face to face with the virtues you have possessed as you lived a comfortable life, but one that was relatively safe.
What I mean is that there is a difference in living a life where you strive with every breath of your being to take risks…with your time, money, future, relationships, etc.
You simply can’t be the same person as you were before…after all, can we be the same person year after year…without experiencing a significant shift of business? Of course, not, because it our job as humans to change. It is our job to adapt, to morph and transform. So, when you undergo the transformative process of simply being human and add in the element of game-changing business circumstances you are going to have a come-to-Jesus talk with yourself and likely with your partner.
There is a comfort in sameness.
There is comfort in predictability and when life is shaken up in negative or positive ways, we have to acknowledge every emotion that comes out of that experience. And surprise, that means calling on our human reality again. It means feeling emotions that don’t feel so good: jealousy, fear, grieving, overwhelm, and disbelief and it can also mean contending with the deep rattles that will shake your foundation. You will realize exuberance can seem an awful lot like panic!
Yes, you are implementing various methods in your business. You are automating steps, but how are you feeling about it all?
Where else are you leveling up in your life?
If you haven’t done the work to hold onto your money, it will be gone as soon as you get it.
Money mindset work is imperative if you want to build a lasting frame in your life.
Money mindset work needs to be focused on by both people in the relationship.
Roles need to be discussed and understood.
Time needs to be respected.
People need to be heard.
What is scary about expanding your business and why?
Are you actually afraid of having money? No, this isn’t some alternate, crazy dimension. Our relationships with money are complex and we usually don’t even bother to define this dynamic.
So, how are you really feeling about what’s happening?
Is your partner on the same page?
Ignore these emotions and suddenly, they will become too big to keep under wraps and as all emotions do, they will come out some other way…and maybe even sideways.
So, before you take that business class and invest in leveling up your company, take a moment and try to anticipate what it will mean to you and your family to level up your life.
Here are some real and raw questions to ask your partner:
- What do you like about having more money?
- What makes you uncomfortable?
- What do you think about the time spent working and is what we are doing working for our family?
- What can we do to address what we are fearful about?
- How can we better support each other as we grow?
- In what ways do we need to spend time as a couple/as a family?
- Can we find a compromise between the work that needs to be done in the business and at home?
Try to be open as you talk to each other honestly. It’s easy to feel as if the one who is doing the work is on trial, but this is an area of mindset leveling up and if you are going to preserve your family, you need to have these conversations. You need to make the commitment not only to work those extra hours, but to invest in improved communication and to ensure the expectations of the people you love the most are met…and even…exceeded.
I heard plenty about how I was working too much and because I didn’t feel like I was getting enough done, I didn’t take in the messages. It wasn’t until we had an argument that I forced myself to listen to what my husband was saying. It wasn’t okay that I was finding refuge in work from other stresses. It wasn’t okay that I was disengaging in my life because I was trying to outwork the fears cropping up surrounding my business…and surrounding my fears that I would change into a person I wouldn’t recognize.
Sound familiar?
It’s okay to acknowledge these alien feelings about success and it’s more than okay to work on them.
It’s even alright to adapt your plans so they fall more in line with the most important people in your life. You can still scale, but it definitely feels better to do it with support and the full awareness of what our values are…even if they are misplaced and we need to change them to accept abundance.
The only way that the state of our family and relationship improved was to take my family members’ feelings as seriously, as they took mine. When we did this, we could move forward as one unit, able to agree with the decisions that we chose together.
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This post is republished on Medium.
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Photo credit: iStock