Building a Business with Chronic Illness + Disabilities | What It’s Like, What Works For Me
hello my fellow entrepreneurs I am assuming that if you're watching this video you are either just curious what my situation is or you're struggling with the same thing so here's my hope my hope is that this video inspires you and encourages you to realize that success is possible for you if I can do this you can do this so what I’m gonna do is I’m gonna walk you through what I deal with health-wise I don't think I’ve ever shared everything anywhere so this is it I’m gonna share um what it all stems from you know what it's like like what I’m struggling with what the experience of it is like and then I want to walk through what works for me what has allowed me to build a multi-six figure m growing business despite the fact that I have chronic illnesses chronic pain injuries disabilities you name it we're gonna name it we're gonna name all of it and here's what I would like to ask of you if you are dealing with this as well comment below maybe you don't feel like you have anything helpful to add but just other business owners knowing that they're not alone in dealing with this that it is a legit thing and that it is different for all of us it's encouraging and so maybe share your story maybe share what works for you um let's do what we can to just encourage one another because I know how hard it is to get that kind of support when we're talking about business this was a really timely video because I planned to record today and then started not feeling good last night woke up this morning not feeling good I’m not feeling awesome now which is why I’m on the floor with my emotional support puppy I’m having more and more good days now because of some of the things I’ve been doing but it's helpful to remember very very very well attuned to um how the struggle is real how difficult it is to run a business to have plans and you wake up and you feel like crap and you're just like how do I do this right so I again I’m going to walk you through how I do this and what this looks like and and a little bit of the timeline of what it looks like because what it looks like now is different than what it looked like two years ago or five years ago so let's jump into it okay so I deal with a lot of health things so much so that I actually had to list them all out so I’m going to show them on the screen wherever we put them on the screen the ones with the stars are things that I still deal with on a regular basis the ones without the stars are things that I have dealt with that maybe had an impact that is not so severe or not so much of an issue now so I don't really consider it an active issue um some of it is is completely inactive just stuff that happened in the past but I want to kind of give you an insight because I deal with a lot I joke that I got the lemon on the lot and I have pretty much since birth had a lot of health issues and so um again I want you to know like if I can deal with all of this you can do this too it's just a matter of figuring out what's gonna work for you so let's go through this list um Spinal Meningitis this was something I had as a baby almost killed me we wonder potentially if it led to some of these other things but we don't really know um I was actually my mom had been given a medication when she was pregnant with me and there's a theory that some that could have created some of this we don't really know scoliosis this is a big one I was diagnosed at 10 I had surgery at 14 and it has created a lot of secondary issues most of the ones that I’m about to mention so bone spurs, Cervical Foraminal Stenosis, which is the narrowing of the Foramina which is where your nerves come out so that creates a lot of issues bulging discs herniated discs disc degeneration, Degenerative Disc Disease - I don't know why those are two different things but they are Tendinitis, Carpal Tunnel this never got past the early stages thankfully we were able to reverse it early on Neuralgia and Neuropathy these are things that I’m definitely struggling with today scar tissue issues I don't know what they would actually call this but the surgery that I had as a teenager left some scarring around nerves that can cause a lot of issues. Sciatica Piriformis Syndrome, Chondromalacia Patella (short for knee pain) you can google any of these that you want to know more about a torn meniscus this is in both knees asthma six strains of Lyme Disease apparently I got the promiscuous tick Hashimoto's, Celiac now my Celiac is technically non-celiac gluten intolerance because my doctor does not want to test me for celiac because that means going back on gluten and my reactions to gluten are so severe that it really just doesn't make sense to put me through that the last time I had gluten my mouth even swelled up so we just we just avoid it but because I haven't had the actual test it is it is called non-celiac gluten intolerance but my doctors like it is probably gluten or celiac like let's just assume um Leaky Gut, mold toxicity, heavy metal poisoning, Interstitial Cystitis I can't even say this one Vesicerol Reflux the valves of my bladder don't work properly if you got into this video not expecting tmi you just got some tmi yes all the things that that involves bladder issues are fun um hydro cell pinks again don't know if I’m pronouncing it right this is fluid and your fallopian tube causes a lot of pain ovarian cysts infertility mthfrg mutation I call this that mother because it creates a lot of issues uh histamine intolerance nightshade intolerance allergies basic seasonal allergies eustachian tube dysfunction so what does all of this actually mean um I deal with chronic inflammation chronic fatigue chronic pain hormonal imbalances that can lead to massive mood swings or all kinds of other issues headaches and migraines digestive issues of all sorts and kinds um loss of motor control any like brain fog lack of clarity my ears like I can get pain in any part of my body essentially my um my you know allergy basic allergy symptoms but that can make it hard to talk sometimes my ears can get plugged up and it can make it really hard to focus or think or talk or anything so it's a lot it's a lot that I deal with the biggest ones the hardest ones are the chronic pain and the chronic fatigue because he's about to hit the microphone because those are the ones that are the most debilitating the rest of them slow me down they can frustrate me they can lay me out for a little bit if I have a flare-up that can put me out anywhere from a couple of days to a couple weeks in the past my energy levels would never get above a four on a scale of one to ten my mood would never really get above a four or five despite the fact that I’m doing massive mindset work because that's my business um it's it's a lot it could be a lot and they could drop at any time and it can make it really difficult when you have clients you have appointments you have deadlines you have people waiting on you collaborations you're working on and you really have to figure out how do I navigate all these things to be able to move stuff forward it's not easy and anyone who tells you that it is obviously does not know what they're talking about it's not easy so where does all this stem from yes there are some potential things that happen during my pregnancy my mom's pregnancy with me there are some things that happen afterwards so for instance with the scoliosis that created a lot of secondary issues because after my surgery I was not given pt I never learned how to use my body properly post-surgery and I really learned how to protect certain muscles that had been sliced open during that healing process I didn't use them and so it was about 10 years later when I realized that you know I was putting a lot of strain on my body without proper body mechanics I also went into the field of massage I had a massage therapy company that was my first business and I was either doing the work myself or it was contracting the work which meant I was on the phone and on the computer all the time two things that can be really hard on your body when you don't have good body mechanics so I’m never gonna have perfect body mechanics because I still have scoliosis it's not like they get it back to exactly where it should be and because I didn't learn how to reuse my body after surgery a lot of those structural issues that I mentioned those are actually stemming from that scoliosis that surgery and the lack of body mechanics and the pressure that I put on my body for so many years now a lot of the other issues the chronic illnesses those actually stemmed from outside of like the Lyme disease which obviously came from a tick the rest of those almost all of them stemmed from the stress that I put on my body in that first business I was working myself to the bone I was in my 20s I thought it's not a big deal everybody who wants to be successful has got a hustle and I burnt myself out and I killed my adrenals I killed my thyroid I screwed up my hormones also you have to understand that when you have surgery and you have scoliosis the nerve endings that go to every single area of your body now have pressure put on them because everything's kind of out of whack and you've got scar tissue you've got all of this so there is also another theory that just that has created a lot of these issues that my body's not getting the messaging it's not getting the support that it needs on a regular basis so things kind of deteriorated but I know that they deteriorated more quickly for me than most people who have this surgery because I was overworking my body and I was overworking my mind I had a very unhealthy mindset I had tons of fears impostor syndrome you know limiting beliefs the whole nine yards that created some really unhealthy dynamics in my life that led to a lot of stress and that just just destroyed areas of my body that I am still over 10 years later trying to now repair so that's my first piece of advice if you don't want health issues or you don't want you don't want more health issues you got to get your your shiz together like you you've got to get your mind in the right place you've got to get your habits in the right place and you've got to stop working like the garyvee's of the world because either the garyvees of the world are genetic anomalies and they're just never going to feel it the way that most of us will feel it or they just haven't felt it yet they haven't learned that lesson yet so they keep telling people these are the things you got to do to be successful this is the type of work you got to do if you want to be successful and I’m telling you it's bs maybe if you want to do it at that pace so you want to do it that quickly sure kill yourself to get there but what's the point if you then have to spend all of the time and the money that you've created for yourself trying to heal yourself right like I it just it's nonsense it's absolute nonsense it really I’m going to step off my soapbox I’ll probably get back up on this at some point in this video but I’m going to step off of this because it really pisses me off that they say this is the way it has to be done simply because that's the way they did it and the only way they saw modeled it's not the only way I’m promising you and I’m going to share what I’ve done what's allowed me to build a multi-six-figure business and growing our goal is half a million this year and many many more than that after that and I have mentors now and I have people that can show me this is possible I know it's possible to get to where I’m at now and I know it's possible to get to where I’m going but I know and you need to know it looks different and it's not going to look like the traditional you know story out there of how it needs to look okay so soapbox aside all of my issues all of that what is it actually like to live with this so I kind of want to talk about the emotions behind it and I want to talk about the frustrations I’ve been through multiple stages of grief multiple stages from denial to acceptance multiple stages of mindset around this I’ve been through times in my life where I just ignored it and I just tried to push through it not a good idea that always leads to more problems I’ve been through times in my life where I just thought that this was my life sentence and there was nothing I could do about it and I was really just at a fixed mindset very limited in my thinking I’ve been in times where I thought mind over matter you know I can just I can make this happen I can make myself feel good and I do believe that there is some value to that and it's a really important thing to bring in but I i have found that the healthy approach is the middle ground meaning you don't want to be looking and focusing on the negative but you don't want to be hyping yourself up for something that you don't know right you don't know how far you're going to be able to get you don't know what it's going to look like and if you keep telling yourself one story or the other either way it leads to more frustration but if you tell the story of I can figure this out there are options there are people that are doing this let me see what this can look like for me that's a much more empowering stance I’ve been in the place where it was like what was me you know I’m frustrated I’m overwhelmed I’m depressed it you know like this sucks why is this happening and if you're in that place I just want to like give you a virtual hug because I know how much that sucks I know how hard that is and I just want you to understand that that I get it at least somebody gets it because I know not everybody does but I want you to understand that there are more possibilities that you can see when you're in that place when you're in that place it's naturally it puts blinders on to the periphery and what could be possible for you what is the potential for you and so I would encourage you to work on your mindset around yourself and your body loving yourself and your body just the way it is realizing that your freaking body just the way it is right now is a miracle worker it is literally working miracles for you and it may not be the best at it and it may be really struggling but the more that you can come out your body with so much love and gratitude and appreciation and just compassion for how freaking hard it's working for you and how much it's trying to do what that's going to do is set you free in so many ways I think I’m gonna start crying you guys it's gonna set you free because when you come at this as your body is your enemy you can't win with that mentality but when you come at this with god look what my body is trying to do for me all of a sudden your mentality around how you're gonna treat your body is gonna change how you prioritize your health is gonna change and that has to happen in order for you to move forward so literally I could cry right now and I’m really trying to hold it together because there's so much I want to say but I just want you to know like you're not going to be able to reach the goals have the success create the vision that you want if you're coming at this from a place of I hate my body and I hate that it can't do what it wants to do and this is where I was for years I get it I know how hard it is but you gotta heal that before anything else will change it's like that carl rogers quote I think it was carl rogers that said the curious paradox is when I accept myself just as I am then I can change except I would change the words to be then I can grow because I don't want you to think about changing yourself I don't want you to think about ditching who you are now and stepping into some other thing I want you to think about loving who you are now enough to grow and to nurture and to develop that person and that body so oh god okay let's get into um what's next on my list let's get into what works for me this is in no particular order and I had to write it all down because there's so many things that I’ve done over the years but we're gonna go through these one at a time and hopefully here's what I want you to remember not everything that I do is going to work for you but use it in terms of like okay how could I apply the principles behind this not what it looks like not the rules but the principles behind this how can I make it apply to my life my situation what could I take away from this to improve where I’m at even if it's just one degree in no particular order but here's number one on the list the first thing that I had to do is I had to learn my patterns and I had to learn my triggers so this meant starting to track everything from sleep to stress to food to individual symptoms to mood to mindset I needed to track my cycle I needed to track what was happening so that I could start to understand the patterns behind it I could really start to understand what was working in my body and what wasn't working in my body and I know that this is not fun however once you start doing this you start to understand okay if I avoid these things and I do more of these things and I follow this pattern that my body is showing me I can start to work with it instead of against it before it was like I’m trying to do a regular nine to five schedule five days a week whatever and just kept trying to do those things forcing it to happen you're not going to be able to do that I’m telling you right now you've got to start working with your body and the only way to do that is to start tuning into it really understanding its patterns and what it's telling you start um taking apart those patterns and understanding what are my triggers what are the things that really flare me up the most what are the small changes that I can make this is not a fast solution this is going to take you months years to be able to start doing but start it now because if you don't you're going to wish a year from now that you had the progress that you'll make a year from now learning how to work with your body versus against it it could be mind-blowing but it's not fun you're not gonna like it but just create a checklist put it on your nightstand every night and just like write one to ten where were all of these things at today just so that you can start feeling like you have some semblance of a control over it you don't have total control over it but you do have a really strong influence when you understand those patterns number two and this probably should be number one um I had to adopt the mindset that my body is my first business priority and this helped me to get out of the mentality of let me just get some stuff done and then I’ll take care of myself I really had to shift to my body is my business priority my body is the number one tool in my business my mind is the number one tool in my business and if I’m not feeling good or doing the things that will help me to at least feel my best I’m not going to be able to do anything at all so shifting that mentality getting into the mindset of my body comes first what this actually looks like in practice is that I have to take impeccable care of myself this is why I have a 5 a.m morning routine this is why I have a night routine this is why I see the doctors that I see this is why I take breaks but also if there's a day like this morning I woke up not feeling good I meant to start recording at eight that wasn't gonna happen I woke up at seven I laid around for about two and a half hours I got in the tub for about two hours and then I started getting up and moving and you know it's not like the content was perfect this round I was recording four videos I had a hard time my brain couldn't totally focus it took longer it was a little frustrating but because I took care of myself I was able to take care of what needed to be taken care of it wasn't perfect you're definitely gonna get to let that go but I was able to make progress versus waiting for perfection treat your body as a business task put it on your business to do list every day it's the thing that comes first treat it like an appointment with a client or a customer you're not going to neglect it right you're going to take care of it because it matters and I will say you know I was talking about seeing your body with love and appreciation and compassion for what it's doing for you I think separating myself from my body a little bit was actually helpful and I know a lot of people will talk about like that's not helpful but it was for me I started to see my body as like its own being and that helped me to respect it a little bit more and honor it a little bit more and keep it as a priority versus like oh it's just me so I can just neglect it which is what a lot of times we want to do so maybe that's helpful for you play with that a little bit and see but definitely start start putting the things that put you in a better place on your to-do list and make sure that they are staying prioritized in your calendar they don't necessarily need more time they need first dibs on your time right like we were talking about in the big rocks video if you haven't watched that make sure you go and watch that because that is going to help you to figure out how do you make more time for this kind of stuff okay number three this was something that I started um about eight years ago no seven years ago no eight years ago and this is creating residual passive income streams at the time I was just coaching I was just doing service based business which is trading hours for dollars which means if you don't feel good you don't work you don't get paid so my shift was okay I need to start creating residual streams that give me a baseline foundation and that way if I need to take time off I’ve got that cushion so there's a lot of ways you can do this I did this through residual income with a direct sales company essential oils you can check out links below if you want to understand more about how I did it or what I did with it but what was really important with this is that I just shifted my mindset to thinking more in the long term versus my monthly bills I wasn't just trying to figure out how to make enough money every month I was figuring out how to make monthly recurring revenue that I would be able to access years from now so that when I had the energy I had a good week a good month whatever a good day even good hour sometimes I could spend it building something that would continue to support me later on down the road I did this because around that time I actually got feedback from a doctor who's no longer a doctor who said that I would be in a wheelchair by now by the way so big middle finger to him but because I had that in the back of my mind I was like I don't know what the future is going to hold I need to create something that can continue to live beyond me or or thrive without me should I need to take time off that has been the biggest gift that I ever created because I’ve had not just health issues but family crises um emergencies where I needed to take weeks months off at a time and I didn't have to worry about bills because I had that residual income coming in so I highly recommend looking at that in your own business what are you doing now and can you get it to the place where it's like a machine right like you've got automated stuff going in and you've got income coming out of it you need that in your business even if you're a service provider you need some level of automated income in your business to be able to create that cushion so that you can have the breathing space to be able to take care of yourself all right number four I hired before I was ready to hire I made a lot of mistakes I screwed a lot of things up but here's what you got to know I don't care if you are a solopreneur you can't do this on your own it's just not what you get to do let me take that back if you really want to try I’m sure you could figure it out however the sooner you can hire even if it's just an assistant to help take care of nitty gritty stuff that just frees up time and energy or somebody to take care of the stuff that mentally and emotionally drains you which then physically drains you whatever that is you need to start outsourcing taxes bookkeeping design tech whatever it is higher before you're ready to hire and then use that time that you've now freed up to create some residual income streams so that you're you're able to pay for them and take off that stress it was scary to do and again I made a lot of mistakes but the sooner you start making those mistakes the sooner you learn the better you get and the better you're able to really grow your business to a place of real financial freedom and time freedom over time so stop trying to do it all yourself girlfriend boyfriend whoever's watching this stop trying to do it all yourself you've got to bring in support whether that's family whether that's bartering trading begging whatever you got to do bring in support so that you're not doing it on your own number five I systemize and streamline and templatize everything I batch everything so if I’m having a good day I already have content created and I can go in and create all that content everything is a template so I am wasting no extra time or energy you need to know where I’m at in my business right now I work four days a week ideally six hours a day although the last couple of months have been a little bit crazy so it's more like eight to nine hours a day which is really taking a toll on me and I’m cutting that back down now but I’m only able to do that because I have systems in place sops right things that you can easily hand over to someone else and say do this for me if you're not able to do it you got to get those things in place I’ve done a lot of videos on batching on time blocking on systems I did a video on how I get more done than you highly recommend checking that one out it'll go deeper into this and give you some more examples but you got to start looking everything in your business anything that you do on repeat how can you streamline it make it more efficient even if you just seem like you're shaving 30 seconds off over time that really adds up to more mental energy and we all know if you're mentally drained it's gonna affect your body so anything you can do to free up the active parts of your brain put more things on autopilot get things like thinking for you so you don't have to do it the better you're gonna be this is why I use click up every uh most of my brain is in click up so that all I have to do in the morning is pull up my to-do list for that day and I’m not looking at the big picture I’m just looking at okay what am I focusing on right now and then obviously you know the CEO days and things like that that you do to be able to have those plans in place every day but you got to start getting those into place and I know that this feels overwhelming chip away at it you're not gonna do this overnight I didn't do this overnight it is messy it is confusing there'll be trial and error you can do it though you just gotta like slowly work at it all right number six is finding business mentors who get it I’ve worked with a lot of coaches mindset coaches health and wellness coaches business coaches and if they don't fully understand that you have this one part of you that has these big goals and visions and you have this other part of you the physical part that says not today if they don't get it you're going to be so frustrated you need to work with somebody who understands that challenge that specific challenge I call it being an overachiever and an underachiever's body if if I’m working with somebody who doesn't understand that I need to pace myself that I can't go balls to the wall even for 30 days my body won't manage that that I can't pull out all the stops that I can't overwhelm myself that I can't make myself grow too fast or step myself into big scary things too quickly because the mental capacity that it requires will drain me physically if they don't get that then I either don't work with them or over time I’ve gotten to the place where I’m better at creating those boundaries and filtering the advice that comes from them but this is something that you need a coach that gets it and if you don't have a coach that gets it we need to talk you need to get into the inner circle because I do not let women build businesses that will burn them out they will cause health issues that are not sustainable that do not honor the other values in their life like their family or their friends I won't do it I won't allow somebody to do it because I understand the impact of it but most business owners are just like you know it's an excuse it's um it's all a mindset mind over matter you should be able to do this you know you're just complaining don't get me wrong we can do that we can all get into that mode where we're complaining we're not being helpful we're staying stuck and our mindset is is keeping us there and also the ones that tell you that you need to tell them to go shove it don't do that mentally do that um you need to explain to them that no this is not realistic sustainable or what I want you need to work with somebody who understands that what you're creating and how you're creating it need to be aligned with you and what's realistic and what's healthy for you and this is not a mindset issue this is not something where you can just push yourself through it I had so many of you I asked in the Facebook group and in the YouTube community like what kind of things you guys struggled with and so many of you were like how do I just push through it I’m like you can't you don't push through it you get better strategies you skill up both mindset and practical skills just business skills you skill up so that you can do this in a healthy way I really want you to see this as a gift though you have the gift of creating a business that can be sustained all these other people out there hustling pulling out all the stops killing themselves to get there are going to kill themselves before they get there or they're going to get there and they're so burnt out they don't love it and they close it down right they're going to come back to their next business and hopefully do it better your you get the privilege the the gift the opportunity to learn how to do this now versus having to figure it out later when everything is a mess so I know that it doesn't seem like that but I really want you to remind yourself of that this is a gift this is allowing me to create something that I can sustain down the road this is something that even if I had the health I would still want to be doing it in a healthy way now not trying to create the success and then make up for the issues with my health so constant reminders of that one okay number seven master your mother-loving mindset so again this is not all mindset anybody who tells you it is is out of it they they're just clueless this is not all mindset however we do need to recognize that how we mentally and emotionally feel what our stress levels are what we're focusing on is going to show up in our body too and you know this you know that when you're under a lot of stress you flare up right you're under a lot of stress you have more pain you have more issues I want you to realize that your mind and your body are connected we all know mind-body connection right you can't force your mindset up here and expect your body to go with it that doesn't happen if your body drops down here it is gonna pull your mindset I talk about this all the time your hormones your health will hijack your mindset it doesn't matter how much mindset work you've done it will hijack it your job is to incrementally inch forward your mindset so it can pull your health up a little bit or so at least everything you're doing for your health has the ability to work a little bit better because it's not working through all the freaking stress and the inflammation that stress creates and then you work on your body and you pull that up and it allows your mindset to go a little bit further a little bit higher and that's what you're doing you're just inching yourself further and further up that scale getting to a healthier and healthier place this is what I’ve been doing really religiously over the last couple years and I’ve gone from having energy levels that were a one two three four to now my lowest energy levels when we had covet I got down to a four again but otherwise my energy levels are a seven and an eight when you consider that long list of issues that I deal with huge progress was made because I was working on my health but I was also working on my mindset my beliefs my emotional skills all the things that would allow my body to actually utilize what I was giving it number eight you really gotta find a better health team if you have doctors who are telling you this is your life sentence there's very few cases where that's actually true where you can't live a high quality of life despite whatever health issues you personally are dealing with you want to make sure that you find health providers health care providers who have a growth mindset who understand the importance of quality of life who aren't just saying you're going to be in a wheelchair in eight years or you know there's nothing you can do about this you got to do more surgeries you got to do you know more steroid shots and that's all you've got for it you've got to find people who are on the cutting edge of medicine and that are holistic and that have a really healthy mental approach to it as well if you go in and you have somebody who's just disengaged and they're like this is what it is if they're just laying that blanket statement over you walk out because their statement is going to become your future unless you do something about it but if you can go to doctors who say yes this is tricky you don't want somebody who's going to hype you up nobody needs a hype man but if you can go to a doctor who says yes this is tricky yes this is serious but there is potential here let's see what we can do together you know let's see how far we can take you let's see what your possibilities are the mindset shift that you're going to have is is huge and makes all of the difference so my health team now consists of functional medicine doctors because they're holistic they look at the whole picture not just traditional medicine and you know going that route but how does mindset how does diet how does exercise how does sleep fit into all of these things what can we do to get the cells functioning at their best despite whatever it is that you're dealing with so functional doctors are huge um acupuncturists chiropractors now this wasn't all stuff that I could afford in the beginning right and so this is why the residual income and just building income and like slowly building the business up mattered this is why having my health be my number one business priority and investment mattered because as I started making more money I started investing it in myself right people will talk about investing in your learning and your skills and developing yourself well we get to defend we get to invest it in our body and in our health because the healthier we are the better our business is going to be the further we can take it and the less healthy we are the bigger mess we're going to be so it's important that you start taking a percentage of your income and you invest it in the things that are going to make the biggest impact first there's a lot of things you can do yourself I’m going to go into those next but you've got to have a good team behind you you've got to have people who know how to do the right testing you've got to have people that know how to really get to the core of the matter and address it at that root core issue and help your body do the healing that it can do doesn't mean you're going to be able to do everything but you can do so much more than what so many doctors out there will tell you as possible find those people who are doing it they're on the fringe a lot of people think they're crazy the really good ones are the ones that have the medical background and have gotten into functional medicine later because they were realizing the limitations find them do everything you can to immerse yourself in them listen to podcasts watch videos read books on all of it do what you can do to surround yourself with the type of support that sees your potential and not just your limitations okay so um number nine along the lines of this is natural wellness now here's the thing um you gotta find what works for you there's a lot of stuff out there that might not there's a lot of stuff out there that might work temporarily and not long term or that might not work at first but will over time for me the things that have made the biggest difference is diet specifically an AIP diet if you're dealing with any sort of pain or any sort of autoimmune disease you need to be on the AIP diet it's not easy to do but it is the one with the best results for people with autoimmune disorders or other physical issues so that's a big one um essential oils they're integral to me and I’m kind of limited in terms of what I can say and how they do or what they do but they've kept me away from a lot of things that I wanted to avoid for a very long time and if it's something that you're interested in there's a link below you can you can reach out to me we can chat more about it supplementation now I did a lot of supplementation on my own but once I got testing done and really understood you know what was going on then I could get supplements from my functional medicine doctor that were specific to my needs and the protocols that we're on right now they actually cycle like we do something for a month or two or three and then we do something else and then might come back to it and we ship to something else because it's a process so don't try to wing all of this yourself there is a lot that you can do yourself and financially you may need to do some of it yourself but definitely do what you can do to work with somebody as well if you can do nothing else do the oils and do Doterra supplements I’ve gotten the biggest results out of those and do the diet and then start working towards working with a functional medicine practitioner doctor nurse whoever you can find that is good so that you can start getting deeper results getting deeper into the root of it understanding what that root is first because otherwise you're kind of just throwing stuff at it to see what works but and there's a time and a place but as soon as you can get some clear answers and a clear path that's better number 10 is a non-negotiable morning routine now my non-negotiable morning routine does not mean it's the exact same it just means that I address my needs first I get myself in the best place possible and then I go into my day now this is the tricky thing about this um I’ve talked about my morning routine before you can watch videos on it it's absolutely imperative I didn't start off with this long morning routine I started off with like 20 30 minutes if that it was just a matter of like before I start my day let me build the habit of addressing my body my mind and my spirit over time I was able to add more and more to it but it just goes back to you got to treat your business or your body as your first business priority and when you do that that means how are you starting your day either your day or your work day like what can you do first to make sure you feel good now here's the thing the more that I have practiced this principle feel good first so you can do good later the better things have been and that means sometimes I push back deadlines that means sometimes I don't have deadlines on something which I know is not a great solution for a lot of people that actually goes against psychology you want to have some sort of timeline to something when you're setting goals however for us that might not always work right so I set a target but I don't set a hard deadline for as many things as possible and I will move that if I need to move that I really focus on what do I need to do to feel good first so that what I’m creating what I’m doing can actually be good because if I try to push through it and I try to just do the thing when I feel like crap everything I create is crap and so this isn't easy you need to look at the type of business you have and ask yourself is this realistic is this business realistic if I were to start over honestly I’d probably still be doing this like this is my life's work but if I were to tell somebody who was starting over I would say look at a product-based business because there's so many things there that are scalable and outsourceable that you won't have to do yourself you can run and operate the business and not have to do all the things and when I say product-based I don't mean like homemade products I mean like something that you can have created and sell simply because you're gonna have so much more freedom and flexibility if nothing else I want you to just take that mindset of like what can I do to feel good first even if all I’ve got is five minutes and I have a hard deadline and I gotta get something done can I take five ten fifteen thirty minutes to do something that will allow me to feel good so that I have a little bit more to give this project this person this task this whatever hi buddy so that I can get a little bit more done or I can be a little bit more efficient the better you feel the better things are gonna flow right and so that has really been my lesson over the last couple years as I’ve had the ability to invest more time in myself invest more money in myself I’ve really learned that if you can do that first even just five minutes here five minutes there it really does make the biggest difference doing what you can do to um and here's the thing you need to understand about this if you do this if you take that 30 minutes you make up the 30 minutes because you feel a little bit better right so it's not like you're losing that time you tend to make up make up for it in the time that you're going into work simply because you're feeling a little bit better and the more you do this the more it compounds it's like a snowball effect so if you really consistently practice getting in there taking good care of yourself you're going to become much more efficient much more proficient you're more productive like things are going to start going better but the hardest part is going to be just stopping and doing what you need to do to feel good first it's not easy your mind is going to want to fight you on it my mind still fights me on it even though I have proof that it's the best thing possible to do it's necessary and you just kind of have to like pep talk yourself if you're gonna push orpush your way through anything or force anything force yourself to take good care of yourself when you don't want to and then take that energy and pour it into your business when you have it I had some frequently asked questions that I want to go through Nicole asked me how do you plan without an idea of how much physical energy you will have on any given day the way that I do this is I plan a lot of white space into my plans um once you start tracking things you really start to understand your patterns to things all of that's going to make this a lot easier your plan gets a lot clearer and easier but you got to create a lot of white space if you're working with people you got to give them a heads up right you got to let them know like hey there is a potential that you know if I have a flare up or something I may have to reschedule um if you've got good clients and customers if you have attracted good clients and customers that won't be a problem um and again flexible goals I don't use hard deadlines for very many things the moment that I do even if I’m feeling really good if I start to create that stress it takes everything from my body my adrenals oh I didn't mention adrenal fatigue that was the other one my adrenals cannot keep up with it and so um yeah you work it into the plant you work that white space into the plant once you know your patterns you say okay chances are this week of the month we all know what week that is tends to be a bad week or you know these types of days tend to happen about this frequently and you work it in so Kim asked how do you avoid burnout again how do you balance the physical need to rest and the physical needs of the business basically just how and I give me a like if you can relate to that so here's the thing everything that I described is how I do it right but there's also you need to add in realistic expectations and it really just comes down to mindset and making sure that you're setting yourself up for success you're setting realistic goals you are setting realistic expectations on what you're going to be able to do and you stop pushing yourself to do more than what your body is capable of you start working with it instead of against it barbie said I think my biggest health hang up is when depression anxiety and related fatigue kick me off my plan for the day I would love some strategies to deal with this again it's going to go back to those patterns it's going to go back to realistic expectations it's going to go back to honoring your body and where it's at and what it needs and having a making the decision upfront what it is that you want to do when that happens right so knowing in advance don't try to make that decision when you feel like crap because you're going to make a crappy decision but knowing in advance okay when I have this happen what is my go-to strategy to help myself feel better what works for me right so this might be mindset tools like we teach in the inner circle this might be self-care strategies this might be going for a walk calling a friend watching a movie know for yourself when this happens I will do this create the plan ahead of time you'll have more success with it than if you wake up you had a plan now you feel this way and then you add on all the frustration and everything else if you go into it knowing like hey these things are gonna happen here's what I do when this happens it's gonna allow you to start doing better and better so that you're not adding the insult to injury with the guilt and the shame and the frustration and the overwhelm and the stories that you're telling about you're telling yourself about why you shouldn't feel this way or how you're never going to make it or whatever other stories that we have come up you'll really just be able to focus on okay this is what's happening what do I need to do what can I do to help myself feel better in this moment that's the only solution there's no solution to making all of the flare-ups the emotions the struggles go away instantaneously especially when they're all right there right when you have the flare-up it's too late to prevent the flare-up or make it go away you gotta just love on it nurture yourself and then slowly over time increase your health increase your energy increase your strategies get better strategies if you're in the moment it's already too late you just gotta know okay I’m here given these circumstances how do I get to show up to this Michelle said I’m trying to figure out when to prioritize my current health versus my future business I think this is a really great thing to consider when I made the decision to really scale this business to take this idea and this passion that I had as far as I could take it I had this vision of where I wanted it to go I looked and I just I had an honest talk with myself like what are the things that I need to do to be able to get there and the very first one was like you you got to address this health stuff you got to stop ignoring it and you got to start taking it seriously the first two to three years into this vision this ten year plan that I had have really been about focusing on my health right and so if you're starting a business or you're in a place of business it may mean the business needs to coast for a little while or it may mean the business idea needs to sit for a little while because stage one of this plan is to take better care of yourself stage one is to get the right people the right health team the right tools the right supplements the right whatever it is that you need so that stage two you've got the mental clarity the focus the energy to be able to create what you want to create that's how I went into this I went into this knowing I have this big vision step one is I’m gonna work on my business but my first goal is how do I how do I really tackle my health like what do I really do about my health and so that started me off gosh that was almost three years ago that really started me off finding the right people doing the right things getting the better strategies getting the better diet plan all of those things that have helped me get to where I am now three years ago I was really struggling guys pain every single day at levels anywhere from like four to seven headaches all the time fatigue all the time frustration like I was constantly just slogging through it all and now today because I made my health a priority a business priority it wasn't a personal priority and then I’ll look at my business it was I’m constantly focusing on my business which means focusing on my health because I was able to do that I’m now in a place where my energy levels are generally an eight every single day maybe I’ll drop down to a seven or a six on a bad day my brain fog is just about gone completely um every once in a while I’ll have it like a couple times a month if that um my pain is like next to nothing a zero or a one like all of these things have been able to be sorted out because I finally started appreciating and nurturing and loving my body the way that it deserved everything you want in your business everything you want in your life is not gonna happen unless you love yourself and treat yourself with love in other words love yourself not as an emotion but a verb an action do the things that are loving for your body so that you can feel as good as you can feel so that you can do as good as you can do and again the strategies the route the path you take the things that work for you they might look different both health-wise and business you might get to do things in a different way but that doesn't mean that there aren't possibilities we it's the hardest thing to see when we're in the midst of it like I said but I really want you to just remind yourself of this over and over you're not alone you're not the only business owner that's creating a sustainable healthy business in a healthy way but you will get to decide what it gets to look like for you because what's worked for me or where what I’ve been able to create it might not work for you but something will so don't allow the mind to tell you that there's only this much potential or you can only do this or you can't do that just start telling yourself what could I do what could be next what are my possibilities let me see what I can figure out let's see how far we can take this that's been my new mantra I don't know how healthy I can get I don't know how strong I can get I don't know what I’ll be able to do as I’m losing function to one hand and I’m unable to write lately like I have no idea what to expect but my mindset now is let's see what's possible let's see how far I can take this let's see how healthy I can get and I might at some point who knows I might end up in a wheelchair or I might not have a functioning arm in some of my videos and that's okay because I know that I’m still gonna do all the things I need to do to feel the best that I can feel and I’m gonna do everything I can do to have a successful business and a positive impact in the world because my mindset's in the right place I’m able to feel my best and I’m able to do my best so that's what I really hope that you take away from this video that it's not going to be easy it is not going to be easy you are going to want to quit you might even quit many times you might say this is just impossible and I hope that when that happens you just put yourself to bed and wake up the next morning with a pep talk and get back to it because this is possible and you need this you need financial freedom you need time freedom because you don't have the luxury of being able to work your ass off forever you need to be smart with your time your energy your efforts your strategies so that you can create the things that you need so you can feel good so you can do good so you can make a difference so you can help others all of the things so again it's not easy but it's so freaking worth it I hope that this has been helpful and if you need support with us check out the links below I have tons and tons of support from you free challenges free trainings coaching programs all the things that you could possibly need to be able to create the mindset and create the business that will allow you to create a the life that you're really after so leave me a fist bump in the comments if you watch this whole thing because I love you if you did thank you guys for watching and I’ll see you in the next one.
2021-03-09 10:23
