Confessions of a Frustrated Business Woman: A Sixty-Day Journal to Freedom

by Louise Plant

Overview

Louise Plant wants to be more than just okay. She wants to be bloody fantastic, especially when it comes to managing a business. In a candid diary logged over sixty days, solopreneur Louise shares insight into her journey of self-discovery as she uncovered the secrets to turning her life and failing business around by writing down what she wanted for ten to twenty minutes every day. Louise, who is a therapist, naturopath, and business owner, leads others through her thoughts and reflections as she looked inward to stop the frustrations, picture her future, focus her intention, create and follow seventeen steps to business success, become mindful of the people that surrounded her life, step into her power, express gratitude, and celebrate the present. Confessions of a Frustrated Business Woman is a valuable guidebook that offers insight, tips, and techniques from a solopreneur that will help anyone transform a struggling business into a successful venture that not only offers financial benefits, but also personal fulfillment.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781504314015
Publisher:	Balboa Press AU
Publication date:	08/10/2018
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	202
File size:	355 KB

About the Author

Louise Plant is a spiritual educator and complementary therapist who embraces change, awakening, and freedom from struggle and pain. She has over thirty years of experience as a naturopath, master herbalist, holistic nutritionist, counselor, teacher, and spiritual healer treating primarily women in Australia and overseas. Louise runs and operates Vitae Amor Seminars and a herb wholesale business. She lives in Victoria, Australia.

Read an Excerpt

CHAPTER 1

Day 1

9 A.M-ISH

Dear Diary,

This diary is my journal and confessions about being a frustrated business woman.

I am writing this journal or diary because I have had enough of being another friggin unsuccessful business statistic and a woman running another little hobby business, rather than a successful, growing, exciting and expanding business.

I have written my way out of other holes so I am going to write myself out of this one as well.

I choose to commit to sixty days of writing about my wimpy frustrating business.

I will write about how it feels, what I want, what I need. In fact I'll write anything about my business.

Why am I doing this?

For now I can give you two reasons, though I am sure that over time, there will be many more.

The first reason is that I have been self-employed for thirty years or so and I have had business successes and failures. I have had enough of just being sustainably successful. I am so done with being just okay.

I want fantastic, exceptional and profitable success. This means that okay can just buzz off.

The second reason is that on the back of my toilet door, I have printed out inspiring words, phrases, affirmations and quotes that I read when doing other more personal business.

I put something new up there last week about self-confidence, which I had not read for months. I read it yesterday and it said to spend thirty minutes a day focusing on the person you want to be. I believe in the law of attraction and I know that it works. My toilet reading inspired me to embark on this sixty day journey to see what I can learn.

In full disclosure, I'm writing this, for myself with the possible added intention to benefit others in similar positions. I want an exceptional business or nothing at all. This is what I want. I do not want to settle for being okay, or having money trickling in. I want to have the lifestyle and choices I dream of.

I could go and get a 9 - 5 job and just accept my lot. But that is not something I want to do. It's not who I am. I find it soul destroying. I like being an entrepreneur or an infopreneur as I call myself.

Perhaps I just need to accept my feelings and that I AM enough.

Who knows?

One purpose of this dairy to explore my beliefs, habits, patterns and behaviours about my business and how I love to live it, run it, explore it and express it.

I know I have enough and I have something of value to give to those who come to me or are around me.

Nevertheless, who knows? I know that there is so much more out there, however I have to be the one who knows and believes this.

I know I love to write. And I love to teach, so that is what I will do.

I also read something else this week that asked 'What three unique things do you do?' I couldn't answer because I didn't know. It is time to explore my life and delve into my business and what drives it.

I have no idea where I am going at this point in my life when it comes to my business, though that's not an issue.

What is an issue is my desire for more than just okay. I have the desire for feeling and being bloody fantastic.

But I digress. This is a diary after all.

Currently I am on a train. With the typical majority of the population on their phones, everyone is locked into the bondage of their screens. There is not a hint of interaction, just the flicking of touch screens, people swiping up, down, left or right. Everyone is consumed in their own worlds. So am observing this and during the next sixty days I will put my pen to paper and share my life's ventures and journey over the next two months, with the major focus being on my business.

My train ride is taking me to the city for a course I am taking and I do not know why. I am still searching for that why.

I want to know what my unique selling point is. I want to know what is unique about me. I know I have many unique qualities. There can seem to be so many of them that I do not know what the umbrella uniqueness is that covers them all. I would like more clarity and more answers and I know this diary will uncover some of them. I want success. I want freedom. I want travel. I want to stop this overwhelming feeling I have of being frustrated, skint, and a failure.

I want to feel fabulous instead. I want to not keep jumping from one shiny object to the next.

I will sit in my business space, to own it, step into it and accept where I am.

In this diary I will state the day and time and I know from past journaling that writing is a great way to shed light on things, to express oneself, to allow the creative juices and energy to flow.

That is all for now.

8.45 P.M.

I have had such an eventful day. I feel so different from how I was feeling this morning.

I learnt what my natural gifts are today and that I have four major gifts. These gifts are innately in us and are the very things that make our soul sing, bring passion into our lives and is almost like us following our true purpose.

My four gifts are writing, cultural integration, teaching and evangelism. These are my primary gifts.

This makes so much sense to me as I love to speak and write. I think this is why I like writing my wimpy diaries and journals, they are very cathartic and healing. This is good confirmation to do this venture and keep writing my confessions of a frustrated business woman.

I know this new knowledge has made me start to think. Now that could be dangerous! I know a good way to change any current situation is to put energy into what new things that I want. I am going to do this regularly through this diary. It will be a bit like dreaming about the life and lifestyle that I truly want.

I am going to write down my dream life of being a successful businesswoman.

So what I will do is to keep writing about my future and what it is that I would like to see happening, how it feels, what I am doing, hearing, experiencing and to really get a taste of what this future life will be like.

So let's start.

I will step into my life in five years in the future as a successful business woman and I will imagine what my life will be like in the future.

In five years. ... ...

I will look so hot. I will have my own seamstress or tailor who will make suits that I love to wear and that make me feel sooo good when I have them on.

I look hot because I have more time. I have time and the financial freedom to go home and relax when I need.

I have weekly massages, regular healing sessions and even facials and natural beauty treatments. I have time and money to pamper myself and I look damn good.

As well as looking hot I also have my team around me.

They make me magical breakfasts packed full of nutrients. Organic berries, caramelised buckinis, coconut yoghurt, sliced banana, slivered almonds, and a little coconut sugar. All made especially for me.

They make it ready with a fresh organic juice, which they will always insist that I eat and drink. This is fabulous as I can easily get lost in the business of the day.

They also create my super smoothie blend for the day and hand it to me to drink. I love my team. I love how they support me in my health and wellbeing, knowing this is of vital importance to me.

A platter of organic fruit is prepared by our wonderful organic superfood caterers. This is available for us all to eat all day. Yum.

I feel great starting my day this way. I love being pampered and therapized on a regular basis. It feels great having people around me who really care for my health and welfare and want the best for me. I gratefully return that, as I truly want the best for them as well. We all mutually benefit.

How else will I spend my working days?

I have a warm spot to create and write with a fabulous view of nature. This is where the sun shines and the birds are singing. I love it when my friends the birds, come and say hello to me in the morning. This is our morning routine. The birds and I make ourselves happy. They get some healthy breakfast too and I get to hear them sing their joy.

It is good to picture my future space and focus my intention. It makes me feel good and it puts out energy for my future goals. I will spend time writing about my future. What I will explore what I will look like, be like, dress like and feel like.

This is an interesting exercise that will help me further my business future and as I write about it I will have it documented here in black and white.

Will it come true? Who knows?

Does it matter?

No it doesn't matter. I am not doing this for a desired outcome.

I know the benefits of being grateful for what I have. This is a bit of an experiment really and I will show my excitement towards what it is that I want and desire in life.

I now feel a lot better than I did this morning. Before I felt lost and without hope. I am so sick of not having the money and the choices to do what I truly want.

This afternoon I feel like I have more direction, which is good. I believe that I either want to be remarkable or nothing at all.

It's a bit like my life. Go hard or go home.

I have been pondering over what is my message to the world as I want a message that sits right with me. I would like to spread this message.

My message is that we all have the power to heal ourselves. We also can manifest instantaneously. I believe that we have the ability to go from being f**ked to finding freedom, simply and easily if we choose. It is all a matter of time, focus and action.

I like this message. I believe that this is remarkable and it is exactly what I am looking for.

CHAPTER 2

Day 2

10.30 A.M.

It is not so cold today.

How is my business being frustrated and wimpy today?

I have $83 in the bank and I have to pay a bill for $113, so that will make life interesting.

I transferred $150 from my PayPal account over to the business account, so hopefully this is how I can soon pay this bill.

This is sort of how I have been living. How does the saying go, 'hand to mouth, robbing Peter to pay Paul,' something like that?

I had a little herb order come in, as I sell herbs online as well as doing many other things. That herb order came to $63 which might go through on Monday as well.

I think it would be a good idea if I will write about my financial status. I want to be transparent and also because I have to be honest about where I am.

I spent the money in my purse, so I have $150 + $83 = $233 dollars, minus $113 to come out which leaves $123, then on Tuesday I have $53 coming out, which gives me the grand total of $70 for food and other stuff for the week. $70 to feed a family is stressful and hard.

This is how I have been living and I am sick of it.

I know that there can be obstacles that can block a successful business from thriving. I have been studying business mastery the past twelve months and have been learning a lot.

I created a list and it is a handout that I give to my coaching clients. I call it my Seventeen Steps to Business Success.

I know that when I am in a certain space I find business just comes in. In ten days I earnt over $3,000 and I did it easily. I can happen. Part of this journey with writing this diary is to get to the bottom of this.

Anyway. Here are my Seventeen Steps to Business Success.

Seventeen Steps to Business Success

We all have blocks and locks that stop us from moving through our doorway to success.

Explore these locks and see which of these locks you have to unlock to walk into your world of success.

The analogy here is that you have a door to success and there are seventeen locks on it.

For us to succeed we need to have all these blocks unlocked. Just one item being locked will keep the door to success closed.

1. The need to be liked. We all need to be liked and we can do things so that we can be liked, though does it benefit our business success? What stops you moving forward, making those calls, making those changes? Is there a need to be liked? Are you pleasing others, rather than pleasing yourself?

2. You time. Alone time and space to allow your desires and ambitions to flourish is vital. For us to create we have to have the space to do so, energy has to flow. Is your house cluttered? Do you feel you have a space that you can call your own? Do you have a sacred and special healing and growing place? If you do not have a space, create one NOW.

3. A supportive environment. Do you have peers who tell you "You can do it!"? Are you surrounded with loving, supportive and helpful people? If you are not then it may be time to change your environment or choose to bring a new more supportive group of peers and friends into your life?

4. Facing your fears. Are you avoiding what you most need to confront? You know what this is and yet you are still doing it. Our fear can leave us immobilised and paralysed. There are many ways to face our fears and one of those ways is to 'Just Do It.'

5. Being Healthy. Do you have a vibrant, energised, fit and healthy body? Most successful people focus on their fitness and health, as they know a healthy body, gives us a healthy focus and happiness. A healthy body is a less stressed body.

6. Mentor. Do you have a mentor who has done what you want to do and can guide you to achieve that? Having a mentor means you can get the work done in half the time. It means you are investing in yourself and your personal growth. It means that you are important and are validated.

7. Consistent leads. Do you have a stream of consistent leads of the right people coming to your door? If not, is it a mindset problem or a maths problem? Are you connecting to others or not?

8. A clear message. Do you have a clear and passionate, focused vision? Is it an attractive marketing message? Does it excite you?

9. Freebies. Do you have an exciting and valuable free offer that will give value to others? Is it something that will demonstrates what you do and will get them walking in the door?

10. Pitching. Are you able to pitch the right offer to the right person at the right time? Do you know when the right person or the right time is right in front of you?

11. Confidence. Are you confident on how you can solve their problem and help them to get what they want? Do you have an understanding of their urgent pain? Can you ethically and confidently share the knowledge that their pain is greater than your solution?

12. Follow up. Do you have the commitment to follow up with calls and leads?

13. Your offers. Do you have enough offers to give? Are you clear on your services?

14. Close the deal. Are you able to close the lead?

15. Mindset. Do you have the belief and mindset that you have value to offer the world and to your clients? Can you see your value and how it is actually helping people and not just making sales?

16. Alignment. Do you meditate and practice presence? Do you know when you are aligned or not?

17. Ongoing tweaking. Are you constantly tweaking of yourself and your offerings so that they get a more consistent and bigger results for you and your clients? Are you collecting data, testimonials and leads?

When I first learnt about this list I had six blocks.

At the very moment of writing this I believe I have two blocks stopping my success. Success does take dedication, focus, consistency, practise and work.

It does not have to be hard. It can be easy and enjoyable.

I hope this diary will unlock the last ones of those, as I have worked hard the past two years, studied many programs and numerous courses on building tribes, public speaking, launching programs, sales, marketing, creating your vision, exploring your avatar's, and so on.

So part of the reason why I am writing this is that I am an amazing teacher, writer, facilitator, healer, therapist, herbalist, nutritionist, coach who is highly qualified, has lots of skills, abilities, expertise and qualifications and still has many frustrations around money and business.

Are you getting the picture?

You can see why I have to find a solution to this. I have been self-employed for about thirty years and my business has been an up and down ongoing journey.

There have been failures, huge debts almost to bankruptcy. This brought huge stress, a marriage break up and great instability and fear.

This has been playing out on and off all my life. Having said that, I have never invested into myself as much as I have the past two years and I think this has been a huge turning point as I have some clarity and understanding now.

To be brutally honest, it does not matter whether you understand, it is important that I understand and acknowledge where and what has been happening in my life.

I know you cannot see my situation, though some of you may resonate with it. I write this to help me to overcome my frustrations.

I think it would be good to do a daily tally of my bank situation to get real with my situation. I cannot change it until I can see where I am at.

Day 2 looks like this - $83 in bank and $150 in PayPal.

I will keep a tally of the bank balance, though not of the bills.

The purpose of this diary is to focus on what I want so let's go to the land of imagination and look into my future. We will go ten years ahead.

In ten years ... ... ...

(Continues…)

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Excerpted from "Confessions of a Frustrated Business Woman"
by .
Copyright © 2018 Louise Plant.
Excerpted by permission of Balboa Press.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

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