→ Embody the CEO you can be, with a marketing plan to hit your next level. Early Bird Pricing for Embodied Marketing LIVE is now available: https://get.embodiedmarketing.com/live

Sometimes you feel like burning it all down. This episode is about what I tell myself on those days.

We get into the reality of entrepreneurship: the pressure, the challenges, and why that doesn’t go away at the next level (even though we think it will).

I’m sharing a coaching conversation about building a business online, what people miss when they think they’re “starting from scratch,” and why your natural strengths matter more than any strategy.

This episode is about staying in the game, trusting your own blueprint, and understanding what this actually feels like behind the scenes.

Key Takeaways

• Why you’re never starting from scratch
• My 50/50 rule to stop dramatizing everywhere
• Why believing there’s something “easy” is making everything harder for you

 ____________________________________

More ways Embodied Marketing can support you:

Turn your expertise into consistent revenue. Funnels, strategy, launches—everything done for YOU. Apply here: https://get.embodiedmarketing.com/app

SUBSCRIBE & REVIEW THE PODCAST!

Thanks for tuning into this week’s episode of the Embodied Podcast! If this podcast has added value and helped you in your business journey, please head over to Apple Podcast, subscribe to the show, and leave us an honest review.

Your reviews and feedback will not only help us continue to deliver great, helpful content, but it will also help us reach even more amazing entrepreneurs just like you.

♥ LISTEN ON SPOTIFY

READ THE EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Emily Hirsh:

Oh, I’m not doing it right. The another person knows it better than me. Another person can do this better than me, so I need to become like them. And in that process, we lose that connection to our natural gifts and our strengths and what’s easy for us.

There are things that are going to come natural to you. So instead of trying to mold yourself to somebody else, to a business coach, or to somebody you follow and trying to be just like them, get really clear on what are you naturally good at.

Embodied CEOs don’t chase trends. They pave the way they lead from within. Move by purpose, unshaken by noise. When you are the source, you do not need permission.

Hello everybody. Welcome back to the podcast.

This is probably one of the busiest weeks of our year in my family. Both of my kids, my oldest two kids have birthdays two days apart, two years, two days apart, and so it’s like Christmas week for us. And so they both have their birthdays and then they also wanna have, of course, separate birthday parties.

And so in a seven day period, I have. Two birthdays and then two sleepover parties. Like we’re not just having a quick birthday party. Both of them wanted, and we did it last year too. Partly because of my kids are homeschooled. It’s not like I can invite this like big group of kids. They have a lot more like intimate groups of friends.

So I’m like, okay, if it’s a smaller group, we can make it a sleepover party. But last weekend I literally had kids at my house. It felt like a 24 hour party. I had a. Kids come over and then stay over the camp out in the backyard and it rained. And my house was a total mess with a bunch of wet clothes.

But it was great core memories. And my mom growing up, she made birthdays really special. It’s one of the things I’m so grateful for so many for my mom, but one of them is like holidays and birthdays. Like she always. Made it really special. And so I carry that into my kids. Like I like to take them out on a little special date, but basically it’s hard for me to get work done this week, but that’s okay.

My kids, my oldest kids are turning 11 and nine, which is wild. And my oldest is, I told him this today. I took up today as his birthday and I took him out. And I told him like, you being born was a catalyst into my entire business and the entire life we have today. And I explained to him like I was a really young mom, and that’s not usual.

And it’s cool because he’s 11 now. I can have these conversations with him where he gets it. So it’s always, special. My oldest, especially, both of them represented many things, but my oldest represented the start of my business. Like I. Literally, I think as many of us feel with our kids, wouldn’t be where I am today had that not happened the way that it happened.

So anyways, last few podcast episodes have been fun. We’re not talking about any more gym drama. I am done with that. But hopefully they became good lessons. I actually got a lot of positive feedback outside of people who even, cared about this gym. Got a lot of people in the CrossFit community, listened to it, but also I tried really hard to turn it into lessons and it was a real experience. Today I have a few things I wanna talk about. It’s gonna be one of those where like none of these were an episode that could be all on its own, but they’re all relevant recent things that have come up in either coaching conversations I’ve had or with myself in my own business.

And I think they’re all helpful and we’ll see where that goes. So the first one is, this core. Message I talk about a lot, which is connecting back to yourself, I think is ultimately so much of our journey as a human, as an entrepreneur is like connecting back to the truth, to what we already know, to our wisdom, and letting that drive your business growth and letting that drive, You know your decisions and your mental state, and I was having a coaching conversation today with someone who had a bonus call with me, and basically they have a successful business in person, and then they’re building this whole online component, which is why they hired our team, and she was looking at it very much as I built this successful in-person business, I have no idea how to build the online, and so I feel very uncomfortable and I’m in the unknown, which is.

Understandable, in person to online is different. But the, but my point to her was there’s a lot of similarities. And so one thing as she was talking that I picked up on was that when she built her in-person business, she did a really good job and she’s naturally really good at. Networking and building relationships and word of mouth and like building really strong relationships that built her business.

She’s I didn’t really try to market it, it happened at the park and at, different. She’s a at the park, she is in the birthing space and so moms right where her target audience. So she said it happened at the park, it happened at like coffee meetups. And so one thing that came outta that conversation that I think is really important for every entrepreneur to remember is I said, just because it’s a different, type like model, right?

That the digital compared to the in-person doesn’t mean that. You have to start from the beginning and let’s look at what worked really well to build that in-person business. And let’s also look at what came natural to you and is your natural strength. And I was like, clearly networking and relationship building is something that you don’t even have to try.

You just did it. It came natural to you. So how can we repeat that in, your digital business? And I said, have you thought about what are relationships you could build with people who have your same audience, but you’re not competitive to them that you can build a relationship with, whether that’s you be a guest on a podcast or they maybe promote your offer even.

And I said, what if spent, my strategy idea was for her to spend if I reach out to two or three people a week and try to build a genuine connection and see where those goes and that will compliment everything my team’s doing for her. And so this point I wanted to make, because I think that I see this so much, and I see this even in myself because there’s so much noise because we’re constantly bombarded with.

Social media, content advice, what other people are doing to build their business and automatically we normally go to and default to. Oh, I’m not doing it right. The another person knows it better than me. Another person can do this better than me, so I need to become like them. And in that process, we lose that connection to our natural gifts and our strengths and what’s easy for us.

And I think. I know that every one of you and myself included, we are unique. We have unique strengths that just naturally come easy to us. We have experience, we have wisdom. We have a blueprint of us. We have a way that we creatively express it is different. That is the cool thing about being a human right.

You are unique, and so nobody has that blueprint that you have. F and the more that you can align your business and the way that you operate your business, both in the marketing, to the operations, to the structure, all of it, to compliment what is already. Coming natural to you, what you’re already good at, the less resistance you’re gonna feel in the path.

And when you look at successful people, even beyond business, like when I look at athletes, when I look at very successful athletes, there is an element to their success that is genetics. It’s like they are pursuing a sport that they also are naturally gonna be good at because of their height, because of their build, whatever, slow fist, slow twitch, fast twitch muscles.

Same in business. There are things that are going to come natural to you. So instead of trying to mold yourself to somebody else, to a business coach, or to somebody you follow and trying to be just like them, get really clear on what are you naturally good at. And how can you amplify that and how can you leverage that in your business more?

And for some people, like for example, when I create content, I’m really good at riffing. I’m really good at conversation. I’m really good at like off the cuff. Not really preparing, just talking. I am terrible at scripts like when my content girl comes and we record, and if I have a little script, I have to do it in five takes because I’m like, I can’t even remember the line that I just read.

10 seconds ago, my brain does not work that way. And so if this podcast, if I made it and I was like, oh, because so and so has this overly scripted podcast, or it’s very scripted, it’s very intentional, it’s very put together. That’s how I have to podcast. First of all, I probably wouldn’t even do it because I’d be like, this sucks so much and I suck at this.

And it would have so much resistance. I try to align content creation and how I spend my time and even the business model that we have, I think is molded to my strengths is molded to what comes natural to me because then I can lead a team. I’m really good at experience, which is I have a service business. I’m really good at experience, so I host events, and so I try to naturally align.

My time and energy, the business model where we invest, strategies into strategies and how we do things to align with my strengths. Now, that doesn’t mean that I swing that pendulum so far that I don’t do anything that makes me uncomfortable. I think it’s also important that you do things that you’re not good at to get better at them.

Like I would say in content creation right now, the more I do it, the more I create social content, the more we’re gonna get better at it. The more both I’m gonna get better at it, the more my social girl, Hailey is gonna get better at adapting, what works and what doesn’t work and my voice.

And we’re gonna build a relationship and it naturally is gonna get better. And there are pieces to the content creation that I’m like, I’m not good at this. Like I am not good at this part of it. So it doesn’t mean never do things that you’re not quote good at, but I really think in business, if you can align your strategy and how you spend your time and energy on things that you are naturally good at, it’s like a competitive advantage.

It’s just like with athletes, if you take someone, let’s just use CrossFit for an example. ’cause I do it all the time. A shorter person. Has an easier job in CrossFit just by being shorter at most things because of the lift weightlifting, you’ve got less room that you have to go off the ground. The rig you are easier to do pull-ups, easier to do all those movements.

There’s some things that they’re not, but like you put me right next to someone who’s five foot five compared to me who’s five 10, if we are the same level of an athlete, they’re gonna do better than me. So it’s a competitive advantage. So how can you use that competitive advantage inside of your business?

And have you in any way allowed somebody to tell you otherwise? And because I think I could see with this person, not in a negative way, but they had overthought it to the point of they don’t know what to do. And I’m like, but you do know what to do. You built a successful in-person business. Sure it’s different, but it is just about relationships.

You’re really good at relationships. How can you repeat that? In a new environment. So when you look at your business, look at how could I leverage, like what are your strengths? What would you tell me if I was like, what are your strengths? What are you naturally really good at as a person, if you ask me that, I would be like, I’m really good at moving fast.

I’m really good at taking action. I’m really good at creating off the cuff content and telling stories and connecting with people in that way. I’m really good at creating experiences. And I would take those things and say, okay, now here’s what I’m really good at. Here’s what I naturally know. And then also looking at I have, 11 years of business experience.

And you can do the same thing if you’ve been in business for a little while. What has worked really well? What has led to the most success? And then combining those things and saying, can we align our strategy and how we spend our resources? To those strengths and how do we leverage that competitive advantage?

And that’s where authenticity comes in. I talk about this a lot in marketing too. Like you can try to chase all day long, the funnel structure or how many times someone is posting content and the tactics that they are doing. We look at other entrepreneurs and people who are where we wanna be.

And we compare the tactics and we think, okay, if I follow those exact tactics, then I will be successful. But it’s not just about the tactics, it’s also about the layer deeper than that in, in terms of the authenticity, the identity behind the tactics, the edge that they have, that they used some sort of creativity.

So when you look at a successful entrepreneur, let’s say you look at the hermo. Both of them are very successful. You could look at them and you could say, okay, they’re posting this many times a day, so I should post this many times a day. You could say, okay, they have this exact type of funnel. They have this type of offer, they have this business model.

I’m gonna go take that and I’m gonna copy it exactly into my business, and nine times outta 10, you’re not gonna be successful. If. You don’t have the unique identity and unique edge to go with that, because what you’re missing when you take those tactics like that, what you’re missing is the background, the entire background that led them to where they are today.

Like actually, especially with them, where they basically host these events and they have investment portfolio companies. Like you can’t just replicate that. They had all these, you’d have to replicate the whole timeline of their entrepreneur journey, which you couldn’t. To get there. And so when you go a layer deeper, there’s the identity behind it.

There is Alex and Layla’s strengths, Alex’s marketing, Layla’s operations. There is their unique creative expression. There’s their entire experience of all the things that led to their business journey. And this is where, the game is honestly so fun because there is no one right way to do things.

And our brain loves to break things down into very black and white into tell me the right and the wrong strategy. Tell me how many times to post. Tell me if I should do a webinar funnel. Should I live launch? Should I have this type of an offer? And this is where it can be frustrating because there is no right or wrong.

There is unlimited ways to grow a successful business because also there are ways that people haven’t even proven yet that they will. There’s constantly opportunity for new ways of doing things, new models, new problems to solve, and that is where the visionary, unique person you are gets to come in.

And that’s also why I am so obsessed and so passionate about your connection back to yourself because nothing can trump that. Nothing can beat that connection. And I know this because I’ve seen it over and over again that all of the things you are trying to outsource to a coach, to a mentor, to somebody who’s ahead of you to a friend that you look up to.

Whatever. All of those things you’re trying to outsource, you really do already know. You are just waiting for permission. You are waiting for validation. You are waiting for clarity to come from somebody else, or you’re allowing fear to drive things because you don’t trust yourself and absolutely. Is it helpful to have other perspectives?

I love having a coach. I am in multiple masterminds. I have coaches for different things in different areas of my life, a hundred percent, but it, those never override me. And any good coach, any good mentor should be turning you back to yourself. I think it’s a huge red flag. If they’re not, if they’re like, do what I say, override your dis your misalignment if you have it.

And it’s great to get perspective, but never lose that connection and align your business and your strategy and how you spend your time and how you spend your energy with what you’re naturally good at, and it will be a massive competitive advantage and stop getting caught up in needing the tactics or the strategies or the mechanics of what somebody else is doing.

Yeah. And get clear on what’s the intention, where am I going, what is the objective here, and what do I already know is true. So that’s the first thing I wanted to talk about. The second thing that was on my mind today that I just wanted to share because I just think it’s such an important message for entrepreneurs, is I think that we can get caught in a thought loop of.

Expecting business to get to a place where it’s easy, or what I’ve seen a lot is entrepreneurs where they go through a struggling time in their business. Whether that’s team is a big one that causes a lot of people stress. Team is probably the hardest part and best part of business, but whether it’s team or operations, whether it’s cash flow, whether it’s sales, whether it’s marketing, like they hit this point where it’s challenging.

And they convinced themselves that if they had a different business in a different industry or selling a different offer or whatever, like changing, completely changing things. And this is where that feeling of an entrepreneur, we’ve all been there, right? Where you have a day like burn it all down I don’t wanna do this anymore.

Burn it all down. And this kind of delusion of there is a world where it’s all easy. And I reminded myself of this today as it was just one of those days. It was one of those days where I was just hit with four things. First thing in the morning. Email this thing, like nothing crazy, but just, oh my God, seriously, was how I felt, right?

And I had this thought of I wonder if I could, have an eight figure business that is. Not in this industry. Like I had that thought. Of course it was fleeting, but I’m like, that doesn’t exist, right? This dream of easy of not having to navigate a challenge or have stress, or have pressure or have overwhelm or some, a fire happen in a business.

It just doesn’t exist. And I think not enough people talk about that. And because not enough people talk about it, especially with social media, it’s such a highlight reel. It’s such let me just show you the good. But I have seen behind a lot of businesses, eight figure down to brand new, like my family’s an entrepreneur, my mom, my dad, my brother.

Now I’ve seen behind the scenes a. And I have yet to find a business that’s like perfectly smoothly run every single day easy. Everything’s always working between marketing and sales and operations and team and all the things, it just doesn’t exist. You’ll have weeks where everything’s great and then you’ll have a season where it’s not, and maybe it’s a day, maybe it’s a week.

And I also think that’s the way life is. Brooke Castillo, who I used to follow a lot. I don’t listen to as much of her content anymore, but I really liked her content and she talked about the 50%, 50 50, which is life for everyone. No matter what level you’re at, no matter how successful you are, is 50% happy, 50%.

The other emotions, sad, frustrated, overwhelmed, and. I constantly find myself coming back to that because I think in the moments where you are feeling one of those emotions of overwhelm or stress or angry or sad, you think that you’re not supposed to, you’re like, I don’t wanna feel this. Something is wrong.

If I’m feeling this, I need to shift my life. Or it’s my business, or it’s my partner, it’s my friend, or whatever. And if you look at it, no. Instead of no, no matter what, it’s just 50 50, it’s 50%. Good, 50% bad, no matter what level you’re at, then you’re like, okay, I’m just riding a wave of that 50%. And then of course when you make those emotions go into thoughts and beliefs and actions, that’s a whole different level to that of everything really is driven by an emotion, right?

How we feel. We actually do have some control over. We can focus on gratitude and we can focus on joy, and we can actually create those emotions in our body without suppressing and overriding the other emotions. But they’re just that they’re emotions. They’re energy and motion. And so they’re not, they’re temporary.

When we then make it mean something and we go, because I’m overwhelmed, that means that my business is not working, or that means that this isn’t working. Sometimes that could mean that, and sometimes it doesn’t. You have to check those thoughts. If you’re overwhelmed every single day and you actually have a misalignment in your business, maybe that should drive some of your actions.

Your emotions can be a signal in that, but. Not every single time. And when you allow your emotions to own you and run those thoughts and beliefs, now you no longer are in control of the one thing you can be in control of, which is how you show up. So anyways, I was having, this morning, I was driving with my kid and I was frustrated at myself because I let myself get spiraled a little bit into this message with a team that I needed to respond to something and get back to something.

And I was like, Emily. If you wait two hours to respond to this, it is not the end of the world. I think that’s what gets to me sometimes is the the urgency at which life tries to pull you in, right? We live, we definitely live in a time where everybody expects an answer immediately or a response immediately, including me, like when I ask something, I would, I love to get the response right back, right?

Like speed. I love it. But life is gonna draw you into that constantly, to the noise, to the stress, to the urgency. And you don’t have to always choose it. And so I was having one of those mornings where I was like four things thrown at me. And I had that thought, just fleeting thought of I wonder if I should just totally have a different business model.

And of course, no I shouldn’t. But it’s like that lie that we believe that it’s not supposed to have challenges, that life is not supposed to have challenges that business can get to this place where it’s easy and smooth all the time and it’s just not reality. And I find myself, the more that I accept that the challenges are part of the game and I’m just like, oh, here we go.

We’ll solve this. It’ll be fine in a week. We won’t even remember this. The more I accept the challenges. The easier they are. It’s when I resist them and I tell myself, there’s something wrong and this happening means there’s something wrong. There’s something we’re doing wrong, there’s something wrong with the model, there’s something wrong with the industry, whatever.

And I feed into that, that then I have more resistance and I’m trying to make it wrong versus just accept it and move through it. So I say this because I want you guys to understand. I don’t care what level you’re at. You could be just starting your business. You could be making six figures. You could be making seven, you could be making eight.

You could be making any number. I have eight and nine figure business owner friends. Everyone has challenges. Everyone has days. They wanna burn it all down. Everyone has pressure, has overwhelmed just at different levels and different places. But it is part of this game and every human. Has life things that is giving that 50 50, the 50% joy and happy and excited, and 50% sad and upset and angry, and that is the human experience period.

There’s no exception to that. We convince ourselves that there is a place that we can get to where that doesn’t happen. It’s if I just get my business to this revenue number, if I just fix my marketing, if I just hire this team member, if I just leave my marriage, if I just have kids like all these things that we externally convince ourselves that once we have it, then we will be happy.

It’s, I think we know that’s the biggest lie, but we convince ourselves of that, then we chase it, and then guess what? It happens. And we still have the same 50 50 experience of 50% positive, 50% negative emotions. So the more we can just accept it, the easier it is. And I just had that reminder today.

And I’ve also witnessed this in a lot of entrepreneurs where they lean too hard into a hard season and think this means I need to blow up my business. This means I need to totally pivot. I need to pivot offers, I need to pivot industries and I’m gonna blow this up and I’m gonna start from the beginning.

And maybe sometimes that’s the right choice, but I think that it’s never the wrong choice. You can do whatever you want. But have you convinced yourself that’s gonna back to this idea of what, where’s it coming from? what’s the connection back to yourself? Are you running from something or is this really in alignment?

And only you can really answer that, but definitely don’t get caught up in the lie that we tell ourselves that there is a world. Where close to 100% of the time, it’s all positive and good. And this is where I get frustrated with social media to an extent because there are people who spew this, who spew on social media I don’t work very much and my life is so easy and I make seven figures and, whatever.

You know those messages. And it’s I guarantee you, if I pulled the cover back behind that business. There’s struggles, there’s challenges, there’s pressure, there’s things that didn’t work. There’s days where that person felt overwhelmed or stressed. I guarantee you I saw this video the other day that was like, if you’re a small business owner and basically like things are perfect you’re either like outta business or lying, I don’t know, something like that.

Just something that like everybody has these struggles, these are normal. Let’s normalize these. So that’s what I’m doing is I had a morning and I’m like. This if the more that I just lean into it and go, all right, I’m here for the ride. But what lesson is this here to teach us? Because, I’ve talked about this so much on the podcast, but anything that is a quote negative experience let’s say for me, sometimes it’s like when a team member leaves, initially I will feel like, oh no, I wanna save this and.

I wanna control this and this means that X, Y, Z about the team and it’s gonna mean this. And then it’s every single time, without a doubt, 100% of the time, it has always led to either realizing we didn’t even need that role and we could move things around or somebody better in the next role. And I’ve, so I’ve gotten to a point when things like that happen that I’m like.

I trust, I fully trust I’ve got that tattooed on me because I’m constantly reminding myself of that. So those are two lessons and just relevant things on my mind that I wanted to share today. Hopefully you guys got some value from that. Thank you so much for tuning in and I will talk to you guys next week.