When it comes to hiring a coach, bettering your business, or joining a community — you’ve got roughly one biiilllion options. ::insert Dr. Evil laugh here::
There are plenty of opportunities you’re interested in, but immediately pass up because they seem to be expensive. Only they’re actually investments, and the best investments double or triple or quintuple in value over time.
We often make the mistake of seeing investment in an experience as the risk, when the far greater risk is being stuck exactly where we are.
With simple math, we can see that if you are trying to make triple your money back and invest $2,000, you’re likely to make close to six grand — but if you invest $39 in some ready-made solution or template, you’re likely to make…NEARLY $120 when your investment triples.
As humans, we get so much life, aliveness, vitality, and soul juice from growth — from growing into who we are — but our brains keep us stuck because of things being “too expensive” for years, if not decades. (Then we buy stopgap solutions, self-study courses that linger on hard drives, and/or self-help books we never finish. I mean, not that *I’ve* ever done *any* of those things…)
The very biggest investment I ever made in my business topped what seemed like a bajiliion dollars to me at the time — twenty thousand dollars. When I was teaching in the inner city, that was the entirety of my salary for a freaking YEAR. I currently drive a car that’s worth less than $4,000. It was freaking scary to invest so much into myself. BUT I made back five times my investment within three months. And I grew like crazy. I understood so much more about my business, myself, other people, and my place in the world than I did when I started…and I learned so much about my own attitudes toward money that never could have happened if my brain had won out with the ‘that’s too expensive’ logic.
Logic says you only have $200 or $2,000 or $X in the bank. (That number will never be enough to overcome the logical argument, by the way. You can have $2,000,000 in the bank, but it will all be mentally dogeared for something else.) Logic says you really should be saving for your kids’ education or something nice and “stable.”
From a logical place — and you can ask my accountant, Karl, about this — my business is just plain HOSED. I release projects all the time. I make stuff up and some of it works. Some of it most definitely doesn’t. I defy logic and enjoy doing so. That’s because my business is based in numbers, but I’m not tied to doing things just to make the numbers sing.
My true currency isn’t money, it’s freedom. I’m interested in going where I feel free-est.
Where are you most interested in going? To safety and security? To time away from your work? To a new job or new business? To a place where people envy you and want to BE you? To time in the spotlight?
Where are you most interested in going?
And will this thing you’re considering investing in help you get there?
If it will, find a way to get it. If you keep ending up at the sales page, particularly if your eyes are leaking when you get there. If you keep being drawn to something about it, or you can’t get it out of your mind. Buy it. You don’t have to know exactly why, but your body will know whether or not you want to take part.
If it feels heavy, run away. If it feels light, breezy, quiet, soft, or soulful — generally GOOD in your body — pick it up. Easy. If it feels scary but right, get it. If you feel like you SHOULD want it, leave it right now.
If it doesn’t sparkle for you, don’t buy it. Even if everyone else is buying it, or says it’s the greatest thing since sliced bread, or says you should get it RIGHT NOW. (More on sensing the sparkle here.)
Holy Dear Jesus Rollerskating in Heaven Above, the e-mails about new programs never stop. The videos, the advertising, the upgrades and bonuses and extra things and kickbacks and fist bumps and CRUSH IT NOW offers…yah, I know.
The question of cost isn’t nearly as important as whether you find this work compelling and necessary after you’ve taken a look.
Do you feel called to do this particular work?
That’s it. That’s the beginning and end of what you need to worry about when deciding to join a program or hire a coach.
I dive deeper into this and get really super-ultra-vulnerable in this episode of That’s What She Said, called Tell on Yourself Part II: The even more terrifying edition. I talk about why coaching matters and the way my business works at a deeper financial level while making myself cry with both terror and love. (Yay?)
Steer Your Ship is for you if you’re willing to do the work of aligning your source of income with your truest self — what some would call your soul. It’s a six month intensive that comes with two live retreats, one-on-one coaching, group calls, and unfettered access to me for the duration. It’s for examining those parts of your life that aren’t working — together — then tweaking them to see what happens. It’s for stepping away from ‘should’ and ‘can’t’ and toward your most courageous self, time after time. ::insert Phil Collins joke here::
Typically, peeps with businesses boost their income by 20 to 50% after finishing the program. But that’s not the best part! The best part is that you’re free to experiment and plan and struggle and strive and succeed while held in my support, as well as the support of your fellow sea(wo)men.
Read more about Steer Your Ship, or book a (quick, painless) call with me to talk about whether it’s right for you.
P.S. Steer Your Ship info is here, take a look.
Photo // Lauren Guilford, Steer Your Ship Costa Rica