Latest / Business for Humans / Facing Shame: Transform Your Business by Confronting Your Fears

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Facing Shame: Transform Your Business by Confronting Your Fears · Business for Humans

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  Music.
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  Humans. Let's talk about taking your business to a new level without the suits
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  and without being a robot.
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  Here you can be yourself, you can be imperfect, you can be flawed,
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  and you can still have raging success.
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  So let's go.
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  Hi, everyone. Oh my gosh, my voice.
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  It goes through periods of being scratchy and less scratchy.
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  That is because of my immune system disorder.
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  I used to have this very clear, very smooth radio voice.
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  And now it's a little raspier, a little scratchier because I have this whole
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  kind of like respiratory nasal stuff.
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  But it's a good reminder for me because I like to sing.
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  And when I sing, I sing from my diaphragm.
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  It kind of clears out the cobwebs and my voice sits back.
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  So I just need to remember to do that more. Maybe I need to start singing before
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  the podcast. That would be great.
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  So that's not what we're talking about today. Today, we are talking about shame. Fun.
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  I know you're like, I listen to Jamie's podcast because as it's informative
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  and funny and she's casual and I don't really want to talk about shame. Well, too bad.
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  That's what we're talking about today because it's been coming up a lot.
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  And it came up for a client and then it came up for me.
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  And I think that's because I was working with a client on it. So I was very aware of it.
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  So shame is this very powerful emotion. motion.
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  And shame is so internal, right?
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  Like nothing external needs to happen for us to feel shame.
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  We can just think a thought, maybe think a thought about the past,
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  something that we regret or we feel humiliated by or something we wish didn't
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  happen. And here we are in shame.
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  So it's It's interesting how it's so triggered by the past and it comes up in
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  these really interesting ways that we try to run away from.
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  But if you are willing to look at it, if you are willing to dive into the deep
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  end of shame, the magical things that are on the other side of that are just...
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  I can't even begin to explain.
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  It is a game changer if you dive in. If you run away from it,
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  which we all do, it's totally normal.
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  But if you run, as I like to say, you're only kicking the paint down the road.
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  It's going to to catch up to you and you're going to feel it.
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  But if you face it, then when it starts to show up in your life again, you have tools.
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  I kind of think of shame as a to-do list.
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  We all have these running lists, either in our mind or on the computer or on a piece of paper.
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  And it's so satisfying to check the things off, but it's also so easy to procrastinate.
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  There are millions of reasons why we procrastinate.
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  And I think that shame is kind of like a to-do list.
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  When we face it and we just check off the boxes, it's really satisfying.
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  And a lot of times facing shame is just that.
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  It's actually looking at the task that's in front of us and getting it done
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  or creating tasks that will help us get out of shame.
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  So what are some things that could trigger shame? so
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  I will just talk about the two things that have
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  come up recently so with my client the
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  thing that really triggered it for her was this
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  idea that she said she was gonna do something for someone and she didn't do
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  it and then she didn't tell them and then months later when they really needed
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  that thing they asked her for it and she was like a deer in headlights she was
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  like oh crap I didn't do that thing.
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  And now I feel like shit. And now I don't know what to do. Do I tell them I didn't do the thing?
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  What's the risk if I tell them I didn't do it? What's the risk if I tell them...
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  That I did do it. What's the risk if I, you know, it's, you go through this
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  whole cycle of like, now what happens, right?
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  And so much of shame is also triggered by not being honest, like not being honest
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  with other people, not being direct and not being honest with ourselves.
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  So what you need to do when those moments come up is just 100% face it.
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  And it's going to be so sucky and it's going going to be really awful and it's
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  going to feel terrible and you're going to want to just pull the covers over
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  your head because it's embarrassing and humiliating and you just don't feel
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  good about yourself when you have to face those things.
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  So just know when all those feelings come up and you're having to face it,
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  just think of it like a to-do list.
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  As soon as you face it, you check that thing off and guess what?
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  Shame is not going to come from that place anymore. It's going to start to creep in.
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  You're going to see yourself leaning into bad habits, but you won't because
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  you've faced it. You've faced it head on.
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  It's like beating the beast or like healing the wound when you just go straight into it.
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  So to be honest, I actually don't know what the outcome was,
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  but my suggestion to her was to face it head on, to talk to the person,
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  be super honest about what happened, all the reasons why,
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  and then see what she could do to make up for it. She missed the deadline for this thing.
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  It was really important to that person. What else could she do?
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  From this moment going forward, what could be helpful now?
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  Knowing that she missed the boat on that thing, what could she do now?
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  Right? So you can't always fix it, but you can make suggestions and be open
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  to the fact that, listen, I know I effed up.
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  What can I do now to make it up to you or to make it better or to support you
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  in this moment because I missed something?
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  That, right? And then going forward, it's like just being honest.
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  If you don't think you can do the thing, don't say yes to doing the thing.
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  You're kicking the pain down the road if you say yes to something that you know
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  you can't do. And there are lots of reasons why we can't do things.
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  You don't have to feel like it's quote unquote justified in the other person's eyes.
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  Like if you can't do it for your own reasons, that's enough.
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  There's no guilt around that.
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  You just have to be honest with what you can and can't do so that that person
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  can deal with that in the moment.
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  They get to make their own decisions in the moment about whether or not you
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  can or can't do that thing, right?
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  But if you tell them you can and you don't do it, you're kicking the pain down
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  the road for them too because they have an expectation of something you're going to deliver.
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  You don't deliver it. They don't know. They go on thinking the thing is done.
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  It's truly unfair. So when we make these mistakes, right, there's just a lot
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  of shame because we feel bad. We feel guilty. We feel bad.
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  Why didn't we do this? We should, I wish I could go back and change it.
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  You can't. But you can go forward from this moment on knowing what those moments
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  are where you may accidentally say yes and then just course correcting.
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  And the only way that you're going to change that habit is by changing it today,
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  is by facing it head on and making a change.
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  So what's my shame? It always is a trigger that's likely something from your
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  deep past or your subconscious.
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  So in the past, my family has had a very interesting relationship to money.
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  And when I say my family, I mean my parents.
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  There was a lot of up and down. And I won't go into the story.
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  It's a long story, truly fascinating story.
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  Someday I will write a book. And that's not today, but it's something that I
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  grew up just having this kind of slight fear.
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  Difficult relationship to money, right? It's just a thing.
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  And so I am really good at managing money and making money and keeping my money
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  consistent and making sure I'm safe.
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  But I do have a tendency to overspend.
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  And I have so much shame about it because I know it when it's happening.
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  I reason I reason with myself. I make all these excuses.
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  I mean, I could give you all the reasons why. I think the things I've overspent
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  on, there's a good reason for it.
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  I'm not like... I don't buy things.
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  I buy services, usually. And they're usually for my business.
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  So I can't... Listen to me. I can justify it.
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  I'm not going out and buying expensive purses.
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  I am buying things for my business. However, there's a moment where when you
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  know you're overspending, that you need to rein it in.
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  And that moment happens. So usually I'm pretty good at hiding it.
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  So I'll overspend and then I'll be like, okay, put the money back.
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  Okay, I'm good. Back to zero.
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  And then I'll overspend again. And so I can usually hide it.
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  But look, I mean, my pattern is like this up and down scarcity to abundance,
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  which is what I experienced as a kid.
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  So I like creating it in my own life. I totally know I'm doing it,
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  but I haven't done anything to change the pattern because I've been able to
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  sort of hide it and fix it in the background before anyone notices. Well...
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  Newsflash, I have an accountant. And my accountant was like,
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  dude, when we were wrapping up last year's taxes, he was like,
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  you need to rein it in, dude. Reign it in.
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  He said, I've been in business four or five years. He said, I got it.
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  Your first two years, you're spending more.
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  You need to ramp things up. You're experimenting with things.
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  You know what you know now, Jamie, me and you don't need to keep experimenting.
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  It's like noted.
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  So it shouldn't take someone calling you out or getting stuck in those moments
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  where you realize you're not being honest, right?
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  We want to take inventory of every place in our life and business that's triggering
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  shame and look really deeply at those things. Why is it triggering shame?
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  Sometimes that shame is something we just need to work through as a feeling.
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  We don't need to take action.
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  But we do, when we're taking inventory, need to be really honest,
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  really honest with ourselves and make decisions from that place of what we want,
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  who do we want to be, how do we want to stand up in our integrity, stand for our values.
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  So it's important to me. Stability, I think, is really like the fundamental
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  value in my life and business.
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  I never want to feel unsafe financially, right?
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  And it's pretty easy as a business owner to go into that space.
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  Like it's easy to have the feeling of not being safe.
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  And I don't want that. That is 100% the thing I want to make sure I'm maintaining
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  safety at all costs, whatever that means.
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  And I have a definition of what that means for me.
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  And if I'm overspending, I'm going against my own value, right?
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  In the case of my client, she's not delivering on something she says she's going to do.
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  Her value is, I do what I say I'm going to do. I stand up for this piece of
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  integrity, which is doing what I say I'm going to do.
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  That value is super important to her. But then there's this disconnect of living
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  into the value of doing the things that reflect that value.
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  I'm not doing it, right? And so when we don't do it, when we don't do what we
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  say we want to do or how we want to show up, we feel all this shame because
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  we just love beating ourselves up.
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  We all do it. And it's like a safety blanket it to just beat yourself up.
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  It makes you think you're going to improve or do better because you're knocking yourself down.
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  Well, that's not the case, right? We need to give ourselves grace.
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  Give ourselves space to heal this wound or this trigger or whatever this thing
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  is that keeps showing up.
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  And we need to be honest about it. And it doesn't mean that you're a bad person, right?
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  If I really thought I was a bad person, I might not be talking about it in a podcast.
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  There are a lot of people that overspend. There are a lot of people that procrastinate.
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  There are a lot of people who overpromise and deliver.
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  These are all like normal human things. But I want to get real.
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  I have big dreams for my business and big dreams for my, I don't know,
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  financial future, I guess.
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  I want to be a powerful, wealthy, successful woman.
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  And I don't want to feel bad for any of those things. I'm sure there's like
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  so much weight on all of those words when woman is at the end of that sentence.
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  I don't want to get in any of that. But it is a dream. It's not like being wealthy
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  is the only thing I care about.
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  But for growth, expansion, to help people, to be able to just not worry about things, safety.
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  Being able to give other people those same things, give other people safety and opportunity.
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  So I want to be able to do that.
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  And the way I'm spending money now is not in alignment with,
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  with those goals. So I had to get real.
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  I had to face it. I had to go and have some really uncomfortable conversations
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  with people that I was spending money on that was a little bit,
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  again, outside of where I needed to be with my spend.
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  And I like to bring people into my business. I like to pay people very healthy
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  amounts of money for them to do work for me.
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  Like I have also my values are in this idea of I never want to ask anybody to work for free.
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  Like I did that in my teens and 20s. I've done that enough.
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  I don't, you know, I don't want to do that. So I like to give people work, right?
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  I mean, that's something that I really want to be able to do.
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  Not that I had people working full time that I had to let go,
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  but I did have people helping me out, including some coaching.
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  And I needed to just really look at where I was at and what was reasonable for my business.
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  And I was just, again, overspending. And I think because I'm also generous and
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  I know what people's time is worth, I also noticed that I tend to overspend
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  and I'm not keeping people accountable to that spend all all the time either.
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  So then I get a few months down the road and I'm like, what am I really getting?
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  What am I really getting here? Is it in alignment? So that's a whole nother
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  thing, right? That's more of a management principle.
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  But I think with this overspending, I just had to get real.
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  And it's hard to have those conversations because when you want people to like
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  you, and when you want to build a team of people who support you,
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  you just want to give, right?
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  I mean, that is my nature. I want to give, I want to support people,
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  I want to pay people well.
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  And I just, you know, I had to get real and I had to have those conversations.
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  And thank God, because now when I look at the next few months,
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  because of course, summer is always a little bit slow and we're starting to
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  like ramp into the summer.
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  If I was overspending and then knew that my business tended to slow down in
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  the summer, I would be stuck in ultra scarcity.
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  So I had to face the shame, but it's paying off already.
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  And again, I don't want to make it sound like I'm pulling resources away from people either.
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  I gave people a lot of notice. I talked it through.
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  I negotiated with people. So I don't need to think I just was ripping the rug out from people.
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  I, you know, I made sure that I was being accountable,
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  but also having conversations with people and conversations with people that if I had more money,
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  I just maybe would have avoided because it's hard to have those conversations,
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  but you're just kicking the pain down the road.
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  I would have just kicked that pain down the road a few more months and been stuck.
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  Small business too. It's not like I'm running a multi-million dollar euro enterprise.
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  Not yet. Not quite there. So I haven't been employing anyone full-time,
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  just to put that out there.
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  So anyway, this thing meant, this recognition of the shame meant I needed to
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  look it square in the face and I needed to figure out what I needed to do and not avoid it.
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  And as soon as I sort of had that moment, I just, that same week, I made my to-do list.
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  I was like, I need to call this person. I need to get on the phone with this.
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  I need to negotiate this. I need to do this and I need to do this.
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  And it sucked. Like the realization you need to do it, the planning for those
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  calls, and then the calls suck.
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  And then after you make it through the to-do list, it's like the universe immediately
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  rewards you. Like immediately, doors started opening. I started getting new clients.
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  There were other things that were sort of falling into place.
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  And I was like, oh my God, I should have done this a really long time ago.
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  I should have done this a long time ago. But I'm not going to should myself.
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  I'm not going to guilt myself. I'm starting from today.
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  And I made that to-do list. I looked my shame straight in the face.
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  And now as I'm planning the next, you know, till the end of the year,
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  And as I'm starting to even plan into Q1 of next year and doing some projections,
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  I am looking at my business differently.
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  I am not thinking I have this sort of pot of money that's my flexible spend,
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  credit, investment money. I'm not thinking that way anymore.
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  I'm thinking this is how much money that comes in.
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  This is how much money can go out. And that's all based on the math I walk all
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  of my clients through, like how to set your rates, how to set your profit margin,
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  what your overhead cost is.
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  I do a very simple equation for all my clients.
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  And then for some reason, I think it doesn't apply to me. So I'm just getting real.
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  I'm getting real. And sometimes reality isn't fun because we want what we want right now.
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  We want to delay pain and we want immediate pleasure.
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  This is just the way we've built society.
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  This is the reward mechanism that everything that exists out in the world to
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  pull you in has this kind of algorithm, right? Kick the pain down the road and
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  just feel the pleasure now.
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  So we don't like to have to be uncomfortable.
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  And when you're saving or when you're getting out of procrastination or when
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  you're having to deliver things that it takes work to deliver,
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  we don't like to feel that level of effort slash discomfort.
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  So we run away from it. But as soon as you get in there, as soon as you you
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  dive in, as soon as you look at it straight in the face, you immediately feel stronger.
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  You immediately feel more confident. You immediately feel more capable rather
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  than shame because shame creates more shame.
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  We don't like it. We run away from it. Then we feel bad again.
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  Then we do something that makes us feel even worse. Then we procrastinate.
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  And we just run a cycle of growing the pain and the shame.
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  But when we go right into it, we condense it. We make it smaller.
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  We make the other feelings bigger because we know that we can face it.
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  We know we can do it. We start to build on that. We're like,
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  look, I looked that shame straight in the eye.
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  I can look that shame straight in the eye. And that means I can be more direct
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  with And I can negotiate with that person.
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  It just makes us take action from a totally different place and it immediately...
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  Makes our business bigger, stronger, more successful.
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  I mean, I literally, in less than a week, saw opportunities just flooding in.
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  And the kind of opportunities I've been wanting to align to,
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  like really great clients have come in really at my level.
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  I'm doing more operational strategy with people, really helping them bolster
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  and grow their businesses, which are already established.
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  I'm doing more consulting work, which I love, more work with women entrepreneurs
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  who are already, you know, in the middle of having a pretty successful business,
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  but wanting to make it stronger,
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  wanting to make it more stable, safer,
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  more calm, more rewarding.
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  And so I'm really getting those types of clients now.
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  And I really think it's immediately reflective of I faced something that was
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  hard and it makes me show up differently.
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  Plus the universe. The universe is rewarding me for facing that stuff head on.
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  So do it. Take inventory. Look at the places where that shame comes up for you,
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  particularly in your business.
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  But if it's It's coming up in themes and patterns across the board in your life too. Just take note.
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  Don't guilt yourself. Don't continue to shame yourself.
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  Don't make yourself feel bad. Just look at what can I do today to make this
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  better, to face this, to be honest about this, to try to shift this pattern
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  that I have, to try to shift out of it. What can I do today?
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  I don't have to look at the past. I don't have to replay all the past,
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  but I need to look at what I can do going forward.
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  And go from there. It's really amazing. It sucks ass.
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  I'm not going to lie. It sucks in the middle of it when you have to look it in the face.
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  But once you're on the other side of it, it's like, okay, I can do it.
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  It's kind of like anything in your business.
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  There are these little roadblocks and these little hurdles that we got to climb
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  over to get to the other side.
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  And during the climb, it might be rough and it might be tough.
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  And I didn't mean to rhyme that, but it might be Be windy up there.
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  We don't know how high this roadblock might be for you. It might be really a
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  big one for you to get over.
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  But when you get over it, you get to look back and go, dang, I did that. So cool.
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  It's really rewarding. It's amazing. And first, being right on the other side
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  of it, freshly on the other side of it, I can tell you, it's empowering.
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  And I'm not going to do this shit anymore because now I'm saying it out loud.
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  Like, you're going to hold me accountable now.
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  Like I have you all to hold me accountable. Not that we're going to talk about this in our day to day.
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  And I may never talk about it again on the podcast, but I said it out loud,
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  which means I'm proclaiming this not overspending thing.
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  And I'm looking at, I mean, I literally have my like cashflow spreadsheet open
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  right in front of me right now.
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  I can see like, this is my work.
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  This is my work. I'm going to keep the math.
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  Front and center and make sure that the map is working out.
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  So that is it for today, everybody. I'm going to leave it at that. I hope it was helpful.
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  And I will talk to you next week.
• 24:52
  You've been listening to Business for Humans.
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  Don't forget to subscribe so that you never miss an episode.
• 24:58
  And please leave a review so that other business owners can find the show. Learn more at.
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  Music.