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Overcoming Entrepreneurial Loneliness with Gratitude · The Jasmine Star Show

• 0:13
  What's your family tradition for Thanksgiving at our family?
• 0:17
  We always go through the same routine.
• 0:19
  It's very predictable.
• 0:21
  My twin sister, Bianca, she'll always pretend that she's not hosting.
• 0:25
  She'll always say, well, who's hosting this year?
• 0:27
  Because for the past five, six, maybe seven years, my sister has officially and unofficially taken over the hosting and nobody in our family is complaining.
• 0:38
  And yet she's the kind of person who wants to let everybody know that she's hosting without letting everybody know she's hosting.
• 0:47
  But it's hard for her not to be the automatic candidate because you walk into her house and then all of a sudden smells enter your nose and sounds of crackling and whipping and buttering fill the air and there and there is nothing that will come in between you and a bowl or 10,000 bowls of carbohydrates.
• 1:14
  Yes and amen cuz that's what Thanksgiving is all about.
• 1:18
  Now Bianca just doesn't do Thanksgiving.
• 1:21
  She's the kind of person that will collect recipes from things like Sunset Magazine or perhaps a casual mention in the New Yorker. And she's the kind of person that will hunt down a recipe.
• 1:33
  Some of her past dishes have included butter, net squash soup with roasted Chipotle.
• 1:39
  I mean it's like sweet, a little bit of tang, a little bit of heat.
• 1:44
  She also does Yukon cold.
• 1:46
  Ah, she also does Yukon gold meshed potatoes with, I'm gonna say this wrong, Booz and mage I y'all, it's some French cheese because apparently adding cheese to potatoes isn't enough. It must be French.
• 2:01
  She's, oh, one year she did this garlic polenta with Parmesan Reggiano.
• 2:06
  I mean, what she does and how she lays things out.
• 2:08
  In fact, she was at my house a couple days ago and she was talking about how she's gonna plan to do the decor.
• 2:13
  And she was inspired because Luna had painted a pumpkin and she's like, I'm gonna paint pumpkins for everybody and then I'm gonna use them as place setting cardholders.
• 2:25
  I mean, she's just all kinds of extra.
• 2:27
  And I think if I could speak on her behalf, and we've had conversations about this before, is Thanksgiving means a lot.
• 2:33
  It means a lot.
• 2:34
  Not just to her and not just to our siblings, but it means a lot to our family.
• 2:38
  Because when my dad came to this country from Mexico, my mom is from Puerto Rico, very simple upbringing.
• 2:45
  And then when we started having Thanksgiving on our own as a family, we didn't have much.
• 2:51
  In fact, it was common for people from church to gather a few goods in a box and drop off canned goods at our home. It was very common for my dad to shop from.
• 3:03
  I don't even know if you know, but in the back of the store, oftentimes by the bathroom or an employee entrance, you will see a bin or a stand full of items that aren't bad, but they're not exactly sellable on an aisle.
• 3:18
  So think of this as like a smash loaf of bread or a dented can of soup, right? So these are things that are like still edible, but not exactly like shelf worthy.
• 3:30
  And it was common for my dad to be shopping there for items as we went into Thanksgiving.
• 3:36
  And it was there probably that he got inspired to make waan soup one year for Thanksgiving.
• 3:43
  I think I might have mentioned this story on the podcast before, but it bears repeating because you know, WAAN soup, it's great.
• 3:51
  Waan soup for Thanksgiving is questionable because I just don't think Pocahontas would've approved, you know?
• 3:58
  And it's like, so there's my dad and he had this huge pot and it's not like he bought wontons, it's he bought the actual noodle casing.
• 4:09
  He made his own meat stuffing with scallions and beef I think, or pork.
• 4:15
  I have no idea.
• 4:16
  And then we all stood as a family and we stuffed these wontons and then he chopped up a myriad of other vegetables, most of which were not even necessarily Chinese.
• 4:26
  And he put it all in this big, big, big pot.
• 4:29
  And there it was the Thanksgiving, much to the chagrin of the pilgrims, we were eating bowls of waan soup.
• 4:37
  But he also included other side dishes as a part of it. You know, it's just like waan soup and sweet potatoes.
• 4:45
  Come on dad, come on.
• 4:47
  I'm forever scar.
• 4:48
  I will never look at a bowl of waan soup and ever think, oh, you know what?
• 4:51
  This is exactly what I wanna eat.
• 4:53
  In Thanksgiving, we also would just gather anybody, we had an open door policy in our home.
• 4:59
  And oftentimes my dad would tell whomever, cuz he believed that people should not be alone, especially during the holidays in life in general, but especially during the holidays.
• 5:07
  And so he always told anybody, he spoke to, our house is open, this is our address.
• 5:12
  And our house was open.
• 5:14
  In fact, our front door was always open because the house would get so hot because it was filled with a myriad of people.
• 5:19
  And so one year my parents are like, we're just gonna get fold out tables and we're just gonna roll out all these fold out tables and we're gonna squeeze them wherever we can in the house.
• 5:28
  And that costs money, right? And my mom is, you know, all about decor.
• 5:34
  I guess maybe that's where Bianca gets it from.
• 5:35
  And my mom found these gold reflective tablecloths at pick and save. I'm pretty sure they were 99 cents.
• 5:42
  And so my mom thought, oh, it'd be great for the tables to match in some way, shape, or form.
• 5:47
  So she bought these, and when I say they're gold reflective tablecloths, I am talking about you need to wear a pair of sunglasses. They reflect all the things.
• 5:56
  And so just imagine walking into our tiny house filled the broom with tables and all of these gold reflective tables like everybody's face was shining.
• 6:05
  We all collectively looked like Michael, the Arc angel.
• 6:07
  Like everybody looked like we were from the Jersey Shore.
• 6:10
  Our tans were so gold, people were complaining that their eyes were hurting at the end of the night.
• 6:14
  And let us not forget, you know, my mom deserves a shout out.
• 6:17
  My mom does deserve a shout out because while she's not very good in the kitchen one year, she was like, I'm gonna make a Turkey.
• 6:24
  So my brother-in-law, Matt Bianca's husband from Minnesota, and that guy does the most traditional Thanksgivings of all times, right? Like he does tradition.
• 6:34
  I'm pretty sure maybe his family hails from the pilgrims, maybe it could be, who knows?
• 6:40
  And so he comes to our house and it's a mix.
• 6:44
  It's always a mix.
• 6:45
  And please no judgment, but we have like four different types of salsa at our table during Thanksgiving.
• 6:50
  It's like Turkey and salsa.
• 6:52
  If you haven't had it, y'all just live your life.
• 6:54
  Okay? So anyway, he comes to our house and he's pretty vocal and he's kind of like, this is great.
• 6:59
  It's just really different.
• 7:02
  And so one year my mom was like, I need to go outta my way for Matthew because we're gonna give him a traditional Thanksgiving dinner.
• 7:08
  So my mom takes over making the Turkey and she puts the Turkey in and she's watching the Turkey brown, except for the fact that she doesn't notice that for some reason the oven is turned off after the Turkey had already been browned.
• 7:20
  So my mom's looking at this Turkey, a frozen Turkey that looks brown, and she's like, this is looking delicious.
• 7:26
  So after hours of being in the oven, my mom walks out proudly with this Turkey, and she places it in the middle.
• 7:33
  And then we say grace, and we talk about we're thankful for, and then my dad gets a massive knife to carve the Turkey and then realizes about two millimeters in the turkey's frozen.
• 7:45
  Those beautiful golden brown Turkey made, especially for Matt is frozen.
• 7:53
  I mean, talk about taking the wind out of your sails.
• 7:55
  It's like we would've made the Mayflower very sad.
• 7:59
  I think that despite all of those things, we have always made it a way to bring us together because we understand that sure, it's about food.
• 8:09
  It's not really about food, and sure it's about family, but more than family, it's about not being alone.
• 8:15
  And I've been raised to believe that being alone is something we can change.
• 8:19
  We can invite others into our space and we can ask others to be invited.
• 8:24
  Both of those take a little bit of courage, but I think that maybe it's easy on days like Thanksgiving to ensure that people aren't alone, right? Like you're like, oh, you're, you're heightened to the fact that some people aren't celebrating with others. But if I was being honest, I think being alone happens a lot in business.
• 8:40
  Like we're often so wrapped up in things that we're able to push aside, right? Like I'm feeling these feelings of aloneness, I'm feeling these feelings of doing it and feeling that nobody understands what I'm going through.
• 8:51
  I'm feeling alone.
• 8:52
  And sometimes it's easy to push those aside, but you know those emotions if gone unchecked, they're gonna rear their ugly head and loneliness.
• 9:01
  For me, I'm being very honest, loneliness makes an appearance when I'm feeling at my lowest.
• 9:08
  I like to stay busy.
• 9:09
  I like to be busy.
• 9:10
  I like to do things as a way to be productive, but also not fully address a particular emotion I might be feeling. So then all of a sudden when I'm feeling at my lowest, the number one emotion that comes up for me is loneliness.
• 9:23
  And as a business owner, I've gotten very used to things not going as planned or going as I hoped, but there are times when everything that could go wrong, oh, it all goes wrong and it all goes wrong at once. Have you been there before?
• 9:39
  I mean, it feels like a black domino fell and then kicked off a series of falling dominoes that left a mess in its wake. And I'm just staring at the mess and it's when I stared a mess.
• 9:51
  And when I feel like nobody understands what it feels like to have a billion dominoes fall at once, that's when I feel the most alone.
• 9:59
  I've had plenty of those moments, I've had a lot of those moments and I hate to admit it, but those moments are normal.
• 10:05
  If you're an entrepreneur, it's in those moments that we must choose to let the dominoes lay flat and walk away, or we decide to build again.
• 10:13
  Because what I've learned is that a setback isn't a step back. I feel like I need to say that again.
• 10:21
  I read it from Lela Hermo.
• 10:22
  A setback isn't a step back.
• 10:25
  And it might feel that way.
• 10:27
  It might feel like a massive step back, but it's impossible to step back.
• 10:31
  You can never return to the place or the person you once were.
• 10:35
  You know more, you've experienced more, you've learned more, you're stronger now.
• 10:41
  So now it's the time when you have to decide to pick up the pieces and build again.
• 10:46
  During this week, my good friend Amy Porterfield and fellow podcast host of online marketing made easy.
• 10:52
  She's amazing.
• 10:53
  She's been on this podcast before.
• 10:55
  Y'all love her.
• 10:55
  Who doesn't love her?
• 10:57
  Well, she's hosting a week of entrepreneurial gratitude, and I absolutely loved this idea.
• 11:01
  So she invited a group of business owners to share what they're most grateful for being an entrepreneur.
• 11:06
  And she asked me to record what I was grateful for and I thought I'd share it with you here on my podcast. So let's take a listen now at the time of this recording, I am holding a beige piece of parchment paper, the kind of parchment paper that's heavy, a thick card stock.
• 11:24
  If you ran your fingers over the top of it, you might feel different gradations of such a nice piece of paper. And on it, there's a note in thick black writing, you're already one because you're still in the game.
• 11:39
  Love Amy.
• 11:42
  I received a bouquet of flowers yesterday from no one other than Amy Porterfield.
• 11:48
  And it's not just any bouquet of flowers because if you know Amy, she doesn't do anything half or small or thoughtful.
• 11:59
  Amy only ever does things in Kardashian levels of amazingness.
• 12:04
  I think about Amy and I think about her pantry, and I think about her shoes and I think about her beauty routine.
• 12:11
  And I always say, Amy, you are a long lost Kardashian.
• 12:15
  And so of course, of course Amy would send a bouquet of flowers that included dahlia's and rich maroon colored roses.
• 12:24
  And it included feathers.
• 12:27
  This bouquet that spans almost the entire size of my dining room table included feathers because it's Amy Kardashian.
• 12:38
  And I have to say that while I make fun of what she does sometimes, and while I might poke fun at her lavishness that she pours on her friends, what I really mean is thank you.
• 12:54
  I appreciate you in this month of gratitude as an entrepreneur.
• 12:58
  Of course, I could list things of working from home or freedom or making my own rules or a thousand other things that are all really amazing is being an entrepreneur.
• 13:07
  But the thing I've realized it, the thing I'm most grateful for, or the people who stand beside you when the chips are down, I've had a really hard week, in fact, probably the hardest week in a really, really, really long time.
• 13:22
  And it's not something that you ever put out publicly, but it's something that you share with people who are close to you, people who see you, people who see your flaws and imperfections, and then they say, it's okay.
• 13:36
  We'll be fine.
• 13:38
  We'll keep on moving forward.
• 13:40
  And I think that that breed of friend, somebody who understands the depth and the darkness as you stare into the belly of ugliness, of lessons learned and perceived failures and what not to do the next time and trying to keep a positive mindset, is that it would be rather impossible to do it if it wasn't for the help of friends.
• 13:59
  So this month, the thing I am most grateful for is friendship.
• 14:05
  That a deep and profound understanding of an industry peer, somebody who said, I've been here before and it hurts and I've been here before and I'm sorry, it sucks.
• 14:18
  And while you might have a day to lick your wounds tomorrow, we're gonna get back up and we're gonna do it again. And she doesn't have to say that.
• 14:29
  All she has to do is send a note on parchment paper with thick black letters that says you've already won because you're still in the game.
• 14:39
  Love Amy.
• 14:41
  I'm gonna share that note with you because maybe if not today, a day in the future, you might have a really hard day.
• 14:48
  And I hope that you remember the kind and words that our friend Amy Porterfield says, you've already won because you're still in the game.
• 14:58
  Okay, I shared this audio recording with you because this year one of the hardest years of my professional career.
• 15:06
  I'm thankful for friends, and since you're listening to my podcast now, I consider you a friend to thank you for being on this journey.
• 15:13
  Thank you for spending time with me.
• 15:15
  Thank you for showing up and doing the hard work.
• 15:18
  Thank you for sharing my podcast on social media.
• 15:21
  Y'all. I love seeing your stories and when you post stories, it allows me to send you a personal note and say thank you for sharing them.
• 15:28
  Thank you for pushing me forward with all of my heart and dep appreciation.
• 15:34
  Thank you for being you, and thank you for being here with me.