Founder Psychology Lessons From Making $7 Million Dollars

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Welcome to Write This Down with Maddie Birdcage.
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As a global marketing advisory founder, a business educator and psychology-informed strategist with a full family life and an addiction to luxury travel, I'm here to let you into the inner workings of my businesses, my family life, and my mind to show you how to live the good life.
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Each episode I promise to give you practical takeaways you can take action on right away to get you closer to being that calmed, road focused CEO in control of your business, your marketing, and your life.
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So make sure you write this down.
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Welcome back to Write This Down.
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Today's episode is very special because we have officially surpassed$7 million.
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And honestly, I'd never thought we would ever get to a number like that.
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I didn't think we'd get to our 11th year being in business because for the most part of starting and growing my agency for the first seven years, I would say, I was the most unhappy, anxious, unhealthy, people-pleasing person you could ever imagine.
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So this episode, while I am celebrating, it is not the highlight reel.
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It is the full breakdown of all of the things that I went through up to then reach this turning point in my business where I then was able to transform not just the business and how we operate and how we make an impact and help our clients and our students, but how I quite literally changed my entire life, my entire family's life, everything.
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I think this episode is especially important because there are a lot of businesses struggling right now with the economic and the political conditions that exist out in the world.
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But there are a lot of businesses still thriving and still cutting through and still serving their purpose and helping their people.
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If anything, it just feels like this massive cleansing that we are going through where the brands that were never really meant to succeed, they simply won't because they're not willing to put in the work.
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It's not this idea that, oh, I'm going to start a business and I'm going to succeed.
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I'm going to work my own hours and be my own boss.
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That's not what entrepreneurship is.
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That's what we've been brainwashed to believe it is, but it's actually really pretty shit.
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If you are starting on the journey of starting your own business, of being an entrepreneur, of being a founder, there is so much required of you, not just from a digital marketing front.
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We know that.
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And my whole goal in what I do with my marketing is to simplify that for you, what you have to do and what you don't have to do.
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Also, it's a mind fuck.
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My favorite quote is entrepreneurship is just personal development disguised as a business.
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And so what I want to take you through today is my journey over the last 11 years to reach this$7 million mark, but also all of the mistakes I made, not so much when it came to business, when it came to marketing or any operational, tactical stuff like that.
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The realization that I had to have a few years ago to make the changes that allow me to celebrate these milestones.
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When I first started my agency, I call it an agency with quotation marks because it was just me in a spare bedroom.
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At that time, I was working at another agency after I just relocated up from Sydney to where I live now in regional Queensland.
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And I had this other job at another agency in town.
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And I remember calling my mum on my lunch break on my first day at that job saying, What the fuck am I doing?
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Why am I not doing this for myself?
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I'm sitting here making business cards.
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And this, I mean, my expectations were a little bit off, I think, because I'd come from this quite high-paced creative agency down in Sydney where when I left, I was the account manager for a TV commercial with Oral B.
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We were filming Michael Clark, the Australian cricket captain, well, ex-cricket captain.
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We were filming a TV commercial across all of these Sydney locations and everything that was involved in that.
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And then I moved to a small town where I was back to doing business cards.
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And hey, I don't care about that.
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I always say that I'm literally the boss that will clean the toilet.
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There is nothing beneath me.
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But I just feel this pull at that time that I should be working for myself.
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And yet it still took me another eight months to actually do it.
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Eight months of being miserable.
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And actually, it wasn't until I found out I was pregnant and had a pretty severe autoimmune diagnosis in that same week and then had severe morning sickness that I was actually brave enough to say, I can't actually hold down a job right now between all of these appointments.
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I'm going to go and start my business finally.
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And my only client at the time was my parents' business.
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And then over the next seven or so years, it grew.
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Not without effort.
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I was working some very long hours, and I remember the first time I replaced my salary of 60 grand a year through my business.
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I was so excited for that.
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I started to get employees that stayed with me for almost 10 years.
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And we slowly moved through different office spaces.
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We had a container in my front yard at one point.
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Then I moved into a house that had a separate setup, which turned into our office.
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And then slowly but surely I kept taking more and more parts of that office, which was half a shed for my husband.
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And we eventually took over pretty much that entire space.
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And we were up to eight people by that point.
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Now, through all of that, I had my till two children.
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I never truly got to take any maternity leave.
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More on my second child, I was able to, because I had a team by that stage.
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But this is where the people pleasing came in.
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There were still clients that only wanted to speak to me.
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And I would be so sleep deprived and dealing with a premature baby and all of the things that come along with that.
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And I was still taking phone calls when really I should have just been enjoying and focusing on that point with my family, which I will never get that back.
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And I don't regret doing that.
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I don't regret focusing on my business as a mum with young children.
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But I'm glad that I did the hard yards at that point so that now when they're at school, I can be more present for them now.
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So during that growth period, we were growing really quickly.
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We were hiring two people at a time.
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I was able to take on an operations manager, we were able to get a receptionist.
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I moved, I purchased the 200 square meter studio that we are now in, and I did a very expensive renovation on it.
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I bought my dream car, everything was going really well.
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And yet, I just remember driving around and having this overwhelming feeling that everything was going to disappear.
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That my clients were angry with me.
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When they weren't, we were making them millions of dollars.
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I felt like my staff hated me, which in the end I'm pretty sure they did, but they were unhappy because I wasn't stepping up as a leader.
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When we had anonymous submission in our suggestion box, it was very hurtful to receive.
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Instead of standing up for myself and standing up for my business, instead I went out and bought an office treadmill and went and did all of the things to try and keep them happy.
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So that is lesson number one that I learned that people pleasing has no place in entrepreneurship.
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But the good news is if you are a people pleaser, you can learn not to be.
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It is something I still constantly deal with, but seeing what happens when you don't believe that you have the right to set boundaries and to keep those boundaries with your staff, with your clients, with your family, with your friends, that's when things start to unravel, when you break your promises to yourself, when you don't prioritize your own needs in order to try and appease someone else.
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Because what you have to remember is you can you are not responsible for other people's feelings.
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Okay?
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You are not responsible for how they feel.
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And if they have a problem when you are not doing anything but your best and have the best intentions and the best intentions of your company, and if they're still unhappy, they're always going to be unhappy no matter what you do, no matter how much you give them.
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Write that one down.
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That is a big lesson.
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So during that time, everything looked from the outside like it was going so well, and everyone's like, oh my God, she's so successful and making so much money.
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And yeah, I was, but I was really unhappy.
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I was 35 kilos heavier than what I am now.
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And I'm not saying that weight is everything, but my body was not healthy.
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I was so stressed.
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I had the worst anxiety.
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I was going in and out of bouts of depression.
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My OCD was flaring out like cray cray.
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And I had no real handle on where I was actually going or what I was actually building for.
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All I cared about was income figure, hitting that revenue mark, hitting all of that stuff.
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And when I did hit those numbers, it felt really good for like a second.
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And then if we didn't hit those numbers the next month, I would just spile into a pit of despair because the external mattered so much to me.
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I mean, I want to say I've always been the type of person who doesn't care what people think.
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And I think that was still true, but it was more a sense of I need to hit these numbers, I need to have this size team, I need to have this office, I need to drive this car or have this wardrobe or look this way to prove and show that I am successful.
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And what that all is, that is old wounds, that is old programming, that is old psychology that was in my brain.
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And you would have these stories in your brain as well.
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Maybe exactly the same as mine, maybe something completely different.
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But those stories are what is running the show.
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To have those kind of stories and be ambitious, and it will take you to a certain point in your business, in your life.
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It will drive you because you have this unstoppable motion that's happening, that's being driven from this deep, deep stories, this programming in our heads that we have that we get from when we're children.
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The way that psychology works, the way that the brain works, is that we are all running off programs, just like a computer, right?
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So when is that programming installed?
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It gets installed when we are children, when we are little sponges absorbing everything around us, taking in everything that our parents or our caregivers are saying to us, what our teachers say, what our friends say to us.
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If we have experienced something, if we are shamed, for example, for maybe wearing something unusual or putting ourselves out there, you know, we're yelled at about it.
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And it doesn't have to be like trauma with a big T.
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Obviously, big traumatic events do happen, and that is huge, and that is something that you really need to work with a professional on.
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But there's also trauma with a little T.
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And they're the tiny little things that happen to us over and over where it could be something as simple as, you know, you were always criticized for not doing well enough when you know you tried your best.
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And if it may be your parents were trying to encourage you just to want you to try better, but as a little child where you don't quite understand the whole picture, your internal programming starts to say, if I don't achieve things, I'm not safe, I'm not loved, I'm not good enough.
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That is where your subconscious mind starts to get imprinted with these rules about how the world works.
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And the big thing about this is that our subconscious mind actually drives up to 96% of our daily actions, our daily decisions.
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That's your brain's job.
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It is to put you on autopilot.
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Because if we actually had to process every little step we take, think about even when you're driving home from work and it's a route that you take all the time.
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Sometimes you you wake up and you're like, how did I get here?
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And yet your subconscious, your brain knew how to drive you there because it's done so many times before, because that is your brain essentially reducing the cognitive load by just repeating what it's always repeated before.
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So we have these programs that exist in our brain, which is fine and everybody has them, and it you're not supposed to not have them.
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But what happens is it only gets you to a certain point where then those stories, that programming, won't get you to the next point.
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And you may have heard the phrase, what got you here won't take you there.
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And that is why entrepreneurship and being in this world of constantly going to that next level and finding solutions to things that have never been found before and really kind of being out on your own.
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It's like being out on your own in the wilderness.
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If you've never had to light fire before out of a stick and a rock, or two rocks, I don't know, flint and steel, if you've never had to do that before, then it's very hard for you to do it, right?
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But that is what entrepreneurship is.
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It's being Tom Hanks and being a castaway.
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Because that's what you are.
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You're a fucking castaway.
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You are not normal.
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Who would choose this if they were fucking normal?
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But as I always tell my children, the best people are never normal.
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You don't want to be normal.
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So, anyway, that was a little bit of a psychology breakdown, which is something that I actually cover in week one in flight school, and it's something that I think is so important to understand how our brains work.
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And I've always loved psychology.
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I did my master's in communication management, which was obviously more advertising and consumer behavior focused.
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But while I was going through this period of just feeling so miserable and unhappy, I actually started my diploma in positive psychology.
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And that's where things started to click into place for me.
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That's where I started to realize I know these things about consumer behavior and consumer psychology and how we can get people to buy through the marketing psychology.
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But what I didn't realize was that there is this whole psychological piece that you need to master.
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I think we can never have true control over our psychology, but we can definitely hack our psychology and do things and use tools and use modalities to break through and to rewire our brains.
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They actually didn't believe that you could rewire your brain up until I think it was a few decades ago, but prior to that, neuroscientists always believed that once your brain was wired a particular way, it can't change.
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Well, it can change.
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They found it can change.
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They found we can rewire our neural pathways.
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Now, all a neural pathway is, think of it like when you're walking through in a national park or in a forest, for example.
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There is a path that is well trodden.
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It is used by a lot of people, it is a wide path.
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It's like a highway, right?
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So, again, another way for our brains to reduce the mental load on us is to follow the path that is most trodden, follow the widest path, the strongest pathway.
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But what that means is that if your strongest neural pathway has been to always see the negative side of things, that if something good happens to you, your instant reaction was to say, oh, well, something's gonna go wrong now.
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Or how can this not be, you know, I'm not safe right now.
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There's actually something that's bad about to happen, and I need to make sure I'm in control of this, right?
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Or if your neural pathway is to, it must be perfect before it's launched, because if it's not perfect, I'm not safe because maybe you were dealt with, you had a lot of criticism growing up.
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Or if your neural pathway was because your most important people in your lives as a child, they broke a lot of promises to you.
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They left you behind at school, they didn't show up to things that they said they would show up to.
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You just felt like a lot of promises were broken.
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That is going to be your default setting when you go and try anything that's out of your comfort zone, out of your regular day.
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So if that means, for example, oh, you're thinking, I would really love to enroll in this course.
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It looks really good.
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I really believe in what the person is saying, but you've lived a lifetime of your default setting being, I can't trust people.
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That's the default pathway that your brain is taking without you even realizing it.
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And yeah, hey, I don't disagree.
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There are a lot of fucking scammers on the internet selling courses and a lot of coaches who have no idea what they're talking about trying to take your money.
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But there's also a lot of good ones.
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I would like to consider myself in the good pile.
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But I also have a lot of industry colleagues that are also doing doing really great things.
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You need to stand on the shoulders of giants in order to get that next level.
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Why would you try and figure something out alone when someone's already figured it out?
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Why would you go through 11 years of bullshit like I did when I've already done that and I'm willing to share what I know and willing to show you the right path?
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Why would you deprive yourself of that knowledge, of that help, simply because your dad was an asshole and didn't keep his promises?
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So you need to become aware of what your lens is, what your cognitive bias is, what your psychology, what your neural pathways are, so that you can be aware of them.
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And awareness is the first step.
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Don't worry too much about what happens next.
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That's something that I can certainly help you with.
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And I've got a lot of advice trying a lot of different things, some scientific, some woo-woo as hell, some sitting somewhere in the middle.
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But the first step of actually changing your life is an awareness that you have these stories, you have these limiting beliefs, you have these versions of yourself of how you see the world that are running in your head that are driving 96% of your daily decisions.
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And so when I was building my business back in the day from a place of needing to prove something, because if I didn't succeed, I wasn't worthy of my parents' love.
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I wasn't worthy of love from others, I wasn't a worthwhile, I didn't deserve the good things.
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When I was building a business from that point, when things actually started to go really well and we were hitting revenue breakthroughs, I had a full team, so I really didn't actually need to be doing a lot of the work anymore.
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When all of that started happening, my brain was like, uh-uh-uh, you cannot slow down, you cannot slack off, you cannot start living the life that you've always wanted, of working less, being more present with your family, of not killing yourself to get the work done because you are only worthy if you are working very hard.
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You are only worthy of success, you are only worthy of love, you are only worthy of feeling good if you've killed yourself to get there.
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That is the belief that was running in my head at the time.
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And so guess what happened next?
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Without me realizing, because I didn't know any of this at the time, right?
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But without me realizing, I started to kill it all.
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I started to ruin my business that I had spent so many years building when I was so close to getting exactly what I wanted, because my brain was saying, you're not safe here.
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If I would have gone through that now, I could see the pattern.
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I would have the awareness and the understanding to know how to stop that in its tracks and to get to that next level.
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But instead, when I was all the way up here, my subconscious brought me back to where I felt safe, in the building, in the working hard, in the working late hours, in the dealing with shit, in the feeling shit, in the working myself to the bone stage because that is what was familiar to me.
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That is where I got my sense of worth.
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And so that is where it put me.
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And it did that so sneakily by hiring an operations manager who was definitely not qualified for the job and completely overpaid, by hiring someone like that to then take over my business.
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And at one stage, I actually she convinced me to step back from my business and let her run it.
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Lucky, that was pretty much the turning point when I woke up to myself, I'm like, hold on a minute, this doesn't feel right.
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And even small decisions like I used to do my savage marketing reviews, right?
00:20:07.519 --> 00:20:08.079
On TikTok.
00:20:08.160 --> 00:20:13.200
And that is how I built a really great, loyal audience and quite quickly.
00:20:13.359 --> 00:20:15.119
And then all of a sudden I just stopped.
00:20:15.279 --> 00:20:20.960
And I actually didn't think back to that until the other day when my husband said, Why don't you do them anymore?
00:20:21.200 --> 00:20:25.440
And then another friend said, Why can you Savage Marketing review me?
00:20:25.599 --> 00:20:28.079
And I'm like, Yeah, why did I ever stop?
00:20:28.640 --> 00:20:29.680
And do you know why?
00:20:29.839 --> 00:20:32.720
Again, because things were coming too easily to me.
00:20:32.799 --> 00:20:45.519
The growth and the success and the clients and the revenue and all of the good things that I deserve and that I've always wanted were coming too easily for to me because I can review marketing with my eyes closed.
00:20:45.599 --> 00:20:48.079
And I'm like, yeah, it's not an interesting thing to post about.
00:20:48.319 --> 00:20:49.119
It's not interesting.
00:20:49.279 --> 00:20:52.480
I need to go back and reinvent exactly what my content looks like.
00:20:52.720 --> 00:20:56.799
And I mean, it was fine, it didn't do badly, but it wasn't truly me.
00:20:56.960 --> 00:21:03.680
As soon as I start to outsource, I believe in outsourcing, don't get me wrong, but but there are certain things that you should not outsource.
00:21:03.759 --> 00:21:05.200
And it's different for all of us.
00:21:05.279 --> 00:21:07.920
We all have special talents, hidden skills.
00:21:08.079 --> 00:21:11.920
We all have our party trick, and you should never outsource your party trick.
00:21:12.079 --> 00:21:17.279
For me, it is making content and doing my marketing and the strategy and everything behind that.
00:21:17.440 --> 00:21:19.440
That is what I should never be outsourcing.
00:21:19.599 --> 00:21:21.839
I can get help with it, but I can never outsource it.
00:21:21.920 --> 00:21:23.440
But you might be the complete opposite.
00:21:23.599 --> 00:21:29.440
And so there is no coincidence that the first stage of flat school is the no phase.
00:21:29.599 --> 00:21:37.200
It's the know what programming, know what stories are looping in your head and that are holding you back without you even realizing.
00:21:37.359 --> 00:21:44.079
Know what your secret source is, know what makes you you, know what makes you magnetic to your audiences and how you can best help them.
00:21:44.240 --> 00:21:46.319
That is what that first no phase is all about.
00:21:46.480 --> 00:21:50.480
Because then we shape your brand around that and your message gets shaped all around that.
00:21:50.640 --> 00:21:59.759
Now let's get back into that turning point for me when things started to click and I started to realize that okay, this is not a marketing problem.
00:22:00.240 --> 00:22:01.200
For my business.
00:22:01.440 --> 00:22:03.279
We were going down.
00:22:03.440 --> 00:22:11.039
We were in the red every single month in big ways to the point where we ended up owing$100,000 to the tax department.
00:22:11.200 --> 00:22:13.279
And yet I was still digging myself in the sand.
00:22:13.440 --> 00:22:23.279
If I just work harder, if I just post more content, if I just do more marketing, because marketing is what I can do, as I said, with my eyes closed, if I just do more of that, I can fix it.
00:22:23.599 --> 00:22:32.000
But then I realized no amount of marketing can possibly fix what is happening right now because it wasn't a marketing problem.
00:22:32.480 --> 00:22:34.000
It wasn't an offer problem.
00:22:34.160 --> 00:22:36.000
It wasn't a visibility problem.
00:22:36.319 --> 00:22:38.000
It was a me problem.
00:22:38.319 --> 00:22:41.039
It was an old version of me problem.
00:22:41.440 --> 00:22:44.960
That version of me got me to that point of success.
00:22:45.359 --> 00:22:53.200
But because I was unaware of how our brains actually work at the time, I wasn't able to upgrade my brain.
00:22:53.359 --> 00:22:56.720
Just like our phones need upgrades, just like our computers need upgrades.
00:22:56.880 --> 00:23:01.839
If you have an old iPhone that you've never upgraded, you can only do so much on that phone.
00:23:02.000 --> 00:23:03.839
You can only get so many of those apps.
00:23:03.920 --> 00:23:08.400
You will only be able to get a certain amount of output from that phone.
00:23:08.799 --> 00:23:12.640
But just like phones, our brains need upgrading.
00:23:12.880 --> 00:23:19.680
We need to upgrade ourselves in order to be able to accept the new software, do more things.
00:23:20.079 --> 00:23:26.640
And that is why you need to know this information and know yourself in order to keep going to that next level.
00:23:27.200 --> 00:23:31.200
Don't get me wrong, there are plenty of people in this world that don't need to do this work, right?
00:23:31.359 --> 00:23:37.440
There are plenty of people that might be so happy and content to stay at the level that they're at forever and ever and ever.
00:23:38.319 --> 00:23:39.599
I'm not one of those people.
00:23:39.759 --> 00:23:42.720
And I'm guessing if you're listening to this, you are not either.
00:23:42.880 --> 00:23:47.680
And it's not just money we're chasing, it's not success we're chasing, it's not any of those things.
00:23:47.839 --> 00:23:53.680
For me, it's chasing impact, almost being an artist in what I do and rethinking how can I make things better?
00:23:53.839 --> 00:23:55.359
How can I fix what's broken?
00:23:55.519 --> 00:24:01.039
How can I improve the world and leave my even the tiniest little mark on the world?
00:24:01.200 --> 00:24:07.680
How can I do that with the knowledge and the skills and the passions and the magic that I have?
00:24:07.839 --> 00:24:09.599
A lot of people say, oh, this is my number.
00:24:09.680 --> 00:24:14.720
If I make this and I can happily stop working, I don't have a number because I actually don't give a fuck.
00:24:14.960 --> 00:24:17.119
I just want to express myself.
00:24:17.359 --> 00:24:20.240
I just want to help other people express themselves.
00:24:20.400 --> 00:24:27.599
I just want to create freedom and sovereignty for myself and for the people who are in my world.
00:24:27.759 --> 00:24:30.400
And that's why I do what I do every single day.
00:24:30.559 --> 00:24:32.720
So, how did I really make the big shift?
00:24:32.960 --> 00:24:39.359
What I want to say is it wasn't one big thing that resulted in everything changing for me.
00:24:39.599 --> 00:24:51.440
There was a moment where I did come in and completely step out of myself and become this brand new bitch and actually set boundaries, and I had to let more than half my team go.
00:24:51.599 --> 00:24:53.519
Number one, because I couldn't afford to keep them.
00:24:53.680 --> 00:24:57.279
But also number two, they didn't have the best intentions of the business at heart either.
00:24:57.359 --> 00:24:59.200
And so I had to lay that boundary.
00:24:59.279 --> 00:25:03.039
And then I started to rebuild the business in a different way.
00:25:03.279 --> 00:25:04.480
And it wasn't easy.
00:25:04.559 --> 00:25:08.880
And I will always be grateful to the team that stuck around during that time because they could have just fucked off.
00:25:08.960 --> 00:25:09.359
100%.
00:25:09.839 --> 00:25:11.839
They could have abandoned ship, but they didn't.
00:25:11.920 --> 00:25:13.039
They helped me rebuild.
00:25:13.200 --> 00:25:31.599
The way I stepped in as a leader, the way I actually started planning things, rather than just leaving everything to the last minute, because again, that's another self-sabotaging behavior that we do to stay in our comfort zone, to feel that stress, because that level of cortisol I was used to feeling, and I my body, even though I really didn't want it anymore.
00:25:31.839 --> 00:25:33.119
So I started planning things.
00:25:33.200 --> 00:25:36.480
And that's where my life strategy and vision boarding started to come into play.
00:25:36.640 --> 00:25:40.079
And again, that's the first week of flight school is all about that.
00:25:40.240 --> 00:25:50.880
And when I did that, when I actually was, I took my strategy approach the way I do marketing, I took it into what can a vision board actually look like, not just pretty pictures, that's the last step.
00:25:51.039 --> 00:25:56.480
But what can we actually do to make sure that these goals are inevitable that I achieve?
00:25:56.880 --> 00:26:02.799
When I did that, I ended up achieving my 12-month goals in like three or four months.
00:26:03.119 --> 00:26:04.319
It was insane.
00:26:04.400 --> 00:26:05.440
I actually couldn't believe it.
00:26:05.519 --> 00:26:07.680
And I was looking back at my phone only today.
00:26:07.920 --> 00:26:11.839
I have a folder on there with the year that says vision board.
00:26:11.920 --> 00:26:16.720
And I was looking at it and I'm like, number one, we've we're reaching a lot higher now.
00:26:16.880 --> 00:26:18.960
But number two, all of those things have happened.
00:26:19.200 --> 00:26:29.359
Going on those special holidays, having the ocean front home, having my sauna and my treadmill and my Pilates reformer in the bottom left-hand side of my house, looking over the ocean.
00:26:29.440 --> 00:26:33.279
That was something that I had on my vision board, and it is literally what I have now.
00:26:33.519 --> 00:26:42.319
Not just my G-Wagon, yes, I do love that, but actually having this vintage Series 3 Land Rover, which is so old and basic, but she brings me so much joy.
00:26:42.480 --> 00:26:44.880
That was on my vision board, and now she's here.
00:26:45.119 --> 00:26:50.160
The yacht that we bought was on both of our vision board for so fucking long and then we got it.
00:26:50.240 --> 00:26:53.119
And it just seemingly appears out of nowhere.
00:26:53.279 --> 00:26:58.880
But it's because I've allowed myself to believe that I'm someone that can have those things.
00:26:59.039 --> 00:27:01.119
The other step is seeing to believing.
00:27:01.200 --> 00:27:12.640
I engaged and I followed and I enrolled in programs and I went to lunch spots and holiday destinations where those types of people that had those things, they were there.
00:27:12.720 --> 00:27:17.200
And so it didn't seem like such a far-off vision.
00:27:17.440 --> 00:27:19.279
It was actually really achievable.
00:27:19.519 --> 00:27:33.599
Breaking down, breaking through, feeling emotionally so shit because I was going back into my subconscious through the audio activations that I like to do, which I've actually recorded for myself and that I now provide our students.
00:27:33.839 --> 00:27:37.440
It is about meditating, but like in this hypnosis state.
00:27:37.519 --> 00:27:40.160
And if you've never tried hypnosis, it's not scary.
00:27:40.400 --> 00:27:48.400
You're half asleep and you just listen to these things, and that is when your subconscious mind is most receptive to being reprogrammed.
00:27:48.559 --> 00:28:02.559
And it's funny because I actually used to do this when I was in high school, where I had a very high, we called it UAI at the time, but I I got a 96.6 and I got into law school, which I later dropped out of because I had no desire to be in law school.
00:28:02.720 --> 00:28:04.240
Could you imagine me a lawyer?
00:28:04.400 --> 00:28:08.480
Although I do find it very interesting still, and I have huge respect for lawyers.
00:28:08.640 --> 00:28:09.920
I think you guys are amazing.
00:28:10.079 --> 00:28:11.599
And nurses too, and doctors.
00:28:11.680 --> 00:28:12.960
I don't know how you do what you do.
00:28:13.119 --> 00:28:27.519
But I used to record my essays back on my computer back in the day, which wasn't easy to do, transfer it to my MP3 player, which I mean I was pretty tech savvy, but even back then, and I would just listen to the recording of my essays on repeat while I slept.
00:28:27.680 --> 00:28:29.440
And I don't know what drove me to do that.
00:28:29.599 --> 00:28:30.079
I don't know.
00:28:30.240 --> 00:28:32.400
But I mean, I got really great marks.
00:28:32.640 --> 00:28:47.920
Interesting to think now, and I only just realized I used to do this, even now when I feel like when I've had a bad day or something didn't work out the way I wanted it to, if I just put on audio activation, even when I'm just like going to sleep, I wake up feeling so much better.
00:28:48.160 --> 00:28:50.640
Doing that every single day, it's a consistency thing.
00:28:50.720 --> 00:28:53.839
It doesn't have to be these huge things, it doesn't have to be these huge retreats.
00:28:53.920 --> 00:29:06.720
I'm actually good just like focusing on my beach walks, connecting in nature, getting sunshine on me first thing in the morning, using my sauna, working out in my Pilates reforma, listening to my audio activations, journaling when I can remember to do it.
00:29:06.799 --> 00:29:07.839
I'm not great at that.
00:29:08.000 --> 00:29:12.640
And yeah, having the occasional wine and cigarette on the balcony with my husband.
00:29:12.880 --> 00:29:16.079
All of these things, they make me feel good.
00:29:16.640 --> 00:29:18.799
And that's what you need to be focusing on.
00:29:18.960 --> 00:29:24.960
Understanding what is driving, having that awareness of what's going on in your brain, actively reprogramming that.
00:29:25.119 --> 00:29:28.240
That's what I take you through in flight school in the first part.
00:29:28.400 --> 00:29:34.079
Not only know and understand what our limiting beliefs are, but how do we actually switch them up and then change that?
00:29:34.160 --> 00:29:36.319
And how do we do the work to reprogram that?
00:29:36.400 --> 00:29:40.319
Because even when I started learning about this, I was like, yeah, but how do you actually then fix this?
00:29:40.480 --> 00:29:41.440
Think happy thoughts?
00:29:41.599 --> 00:29:43.759
No, nope, it's not how you do it.
00:29:43.920 --> 00:29:45.279
It needs to be deeper.
00:29:45.440 --> 00:29:47.039
We need new neural pathways.
00:29:47.200 --> 00:29:49.599
And then eventually that becomes your new normal.
00:29:49.759 --> 00:29:52.960
Because that is the sneakiness of our brains, of our subconscious.
00:29:53.039 --> 00:30:01.599
We don't even realize it is happening until three months later you look back and you go, Whoa, I still have really shit days.
00:30:01.759 --> 00:30:18.720
By doing the activation work, by focusing on things that make me feel good, by exposing myself and being around other people who have the things that I want to have, not just material things, but are living the type of life and having the lifestyle that I want to live.
00:30:19.039 --> 00:30:23.920
By doing all of those things consistently, and I'm not saying every single day, it doesn't have to be.
00:30:24.000 --> 00:30:27.519
Don't feel like if you fall off the wagon that you'll never get back on.
00:30:27.680 --> 00:30:35.839
If you start doing this work, especially if you are in flight school, for example, those first couple of weeks, that go hard then.
00:30:36.000 --> 00:30:36.880
Go hard.
00:30:37.119 --> 00:30:39.839
Because the more you can dive into this stuff in the beginning, the better.
00:30:40.000 --> 00:30:58.319
Maybe start to retreat a little bit as you start to reflect and maybe realize that you need to upgrade some relationships, upgrade situations, upgrade environments, spend some time within yourself to then come back as a better person, to be able to take on and hold this next level of what it is that you're looking for.
00:30:58.559 --> 00:31:05.200
So if you are someone, beginning of your business journey, and you're like, I am so terrified, I have no idea what I'm doing.
00:31:05.440 --> 00:31:08.319
That's where I would say get some guidance and get some assistance.
00:31:08.480 --> 00:31:14.559
We actually have Hatch, which is our purely self-paced program for brand new businesses.
00:31:14.640 --> 00:31:19.759
It's 129 US dollars, very cost effective, won't take you very long to get through.
00:31:19.920 --> 00:31:24.880
And it does a lot of this work that I've been mentioning on a lighter level.
00:31:25.039 --> 00:31:30.799
It takes you through a very detailed checklist and recommendations of what you need to have sorted in order to launch your business.
00:31:30.880 --> 00:31:33.839
So if that is you where you're starting, that's what I would recommend.
00:31:34.000 --> 00:31:46.799
If you want to go deeper from the very start, or if you're someone like me who's maybe been in business for seven, 10, 20 years and is like, I'm not getting anywhere, I'm stuck, then Flight School is what will help you.
00:31:46.880 --> 00:31:51.119
And that is the 12-week guided program, which is online work for you.
00:31:51.279 --> 00:32:02.160
It is some mindset work that happens, it is strategy work, and then we get into your marketing work where we build your funnels, build your socials, build your website, do your analytics, do your ads, do all of that, but we do it together.
00:32:02.319 --> 00:32:04.880
So you get weekly feedback from myself.
00:32:05.039 --> 00:32:10.240
You also get two one-on-one coaching calls with me, and I promise I am very nice on a coaching call.
00:32:10.319 --> 00:32:13.599
But I will also kick you up the butt if that what if needs to happen.
00:32:13.759 --> 00:32:16.400
And that is why people hire me, because that is my job.
00:32:16.480 --> 00:32:18.720
And I'm not here to people please you.
00:32:18.799 --> 00:32:21.359
I'm here to get you what you want to achieve.
00:32:21.599 --> 00:32:27.200
If you love what we're putting down, but you're just like, I just need to like get someone to handle this shit.
00:32:27.279 --> 00:32:29.200
That is what Built by Birdcage is all about.
00:32:29.279 --> 00:32:31.039
That is more traditional agency work.
00:32:31.200 --> 00:32:34.240
We still do all of that, but we are quite selective with who we work with.
00:32:34.319 --> 00:32:36.480
It doesn't mean you have to be a big brand or a small brand.
00:32:36.640 --> 00:32:40.960
It just means that I won't take you on if I don't feel like we're gonna get the results that you want.
00:32:41.119 --> 00:32:45.359
And after 11 years, I'm very good at knowing that from the first initial phone call.
00:32:45.519 --> 00:32:49.200
And and and something that we just launched today, it's actually a freebie.
00:32:49.680 --> 00:32:57.519
It is a four-minute quiz that will probably knock you flat on your feet and be like, whoa, how did she get in my head like that?
00:32:57.680 --> 00:32:58.319
What can I say?
00:32:58.400 --> 00:33:00.160
It's my skill, it's my party trick.
00:33:00.319 --> 00:33:04.720
It is a quiz that will reveal to you where are you holding yourself back?
00:33:04.880 --> 00:33:12.400
What version of you is actually running your business right at this point in time, and what do you need to do next in order to get out of that space?
00:33:12.480 --> 00:33:13.920
And that is completely free.
00:33:14.079 --> 00:33:21.039
So if you want that, send us a DM either at Maddie Birdcage on Instagram or at Birdcage Business Builders on Instagram.
00:33:21.200 --> 00:33:25.839
Send us a DM with the word stuck and we will get that over to you.
00:33:26.079 --> 00:33:29.519
I could have absolutely charged for that because it is like wow.
00:33:29.680 --> 00:33:32.720
But it was more important for me that you start this journey.
00:33:32.799 --> 00:33:45.119
And as I said in one of the posts, I expect this to be so monumental for you, these results that you get, that one day when you're famous and have everything that you want, and you're interviewed on that podcast, and we'll say, Where did this all start for you?
00:33:45.200 --> 00:33:47.440
You'll say, Maddie made me do a free quiz.
00:33:47.599 --> 00:33:50.640
And it made me realize I'm the fucking problem.
00:33:50.960 --> 00:34:13.119
My brain, my old programming is the problem, not my marketing per se, because it doesn't matter how much marketing you do, if you are just going to be building from an old operating, if you're going to be building, if you're going to be doing that marketing as the old version of you who doesn't even think it's possible, or you don't even think you're allowed to have what you want, nothing's gonna work.
00:34:13.440 --> 00:34:15.039
All right, thank you everyone.
00:34:15.280 --> 00:34:17.360
Make sure you leave a review.
00:34:17.440 --> 00:34:20.800
If you like this episode, make sure you share it with someone who needs to know it.
00:34:21.039 --> 00:34:27.920
Make sure you send me a DM and let me know if you love this episode or even if you fucking hated it, because I do this stuff for you.