Success Tips For Women Entrepreneurs

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Success Tips For Female Entrepreneurs

Corrina Gordon-Barnes is 28, lives in Cambridge in the UK and is the founder of You Inspire Me, and now works full time as a coach. She's previously traveled the world as a tour manager, and then worked as teacher, but left teaching in 2004... In her coaching practice, she works with passionate women who have a business idea that makes a difference in the world, and she helps them turn their ideas into action. She interviews Nick about how women who've been in business for 2-3 years can progress to a new level of success and fulfillment.

Nick specifically answers the following questions, which can apply to anyone in business, but especially women entrepreners -

CORRINA: This is Corrina Gordon-Barnes from www.youinspireme.co.uk and I’m here today with Nick Williams - the legendary Nick Williams - and Nick you’ve been an inspiration to me for many years and -

CORRINA: … you've been very, very instrumental for me on my journey from being employed to self-employed, and to being an entrepreneur, and I really want to ask you some questions that will hopefully help my clients.

CORRINA: Okay, fantastic. I work with women at different stages of business development, and the particular stage that I’m hoping to get some wisdom about is this: there are women who have already established themselves as entrepreneurs, they’re self-employed, and to the outside world they may seem successful - because they’re firmly established doing work they love - but they are struggling and they’re feeling like maybe they’re not making the money they want to be making, or that they’re not experiencing the personal fulfillment they desire. What would you say to women at that stage?

NICK WILLIAMS: I think there are a number of things that could be going on here.... I think one of the major things that goes on is this: in our first couple of years of being in business - we’re just grateful to be in business, and in a way, we’re just trying to get clients and exist and just keep it going and trying not to give in to those nay-saying voices around us – and in our head – that tell us we’re stupid and that we should’ve never done this in the first place! So I think that, especially for the first couple of years, it's all about survival. So I think that many of these women are just surviving – and they’re probably thinking - there must be more to this than just survival. They want to flourish and to be fulfilled in what they’re doing. So that might be part of it - you have to go from survival to real fulfillment, and I think that fulfillment is about building a business that really works for you and your lifestyle rather than feeling a slave to your business. So I think often what happens is – and one of the best ways I’ve heard it expressed is by Michael Gerber - he wrote a book called The E-Myth Revisited...

NICK WILLIAMS: ….which I thought was a very strange book and I didn’t like a lot of it - but there were some great nuggets. And one of the things that really struck me was this: he said often when we’re entrepreneurs - and we’re running our own businesses - we spend much of our time working in that business. i.e. delivering, coaching or seminars or child-care - or whatever it is our business is about - we’re delivering it all the time. But actually what we should be doing is to take a step back and consider how we can develop the business - how can we grow ourselves - what do we want to be doing in 6 months time or 12 or 24… and then developing the business instead of just focusing on delivering products and services. So I think the very natural tendency for us – and this might seem a little paradoxical - because I’m all about loving what we do - but it’s very easy not to love it, especially if you don't keep evolving and if you don't keep growing and evolving the business. I think that often what happens is that - once you have been in business for a couple of years - the thrill can wear off and you can begin to think to yourself ‘this isn't quite working for me any more’.

CORRINA: So on a very practical level what do you think people need to do at that stage? How can they literally – kind of – maneuver themselves into being back in love with their businesses?

NICK WILLIAMS: Several things. One major place to begin is by looking carefully at your business model. What I mean by this is that - if you’ve got the kind of businesses that’s intensive in terms of product and service delivery – begin to look at how you can change it so that you're not having to be trapped in ‘delivery mode’ all the time. With me, for example, I love coaching, and I love speaking, and I love writing, but I wouldn't want to do any of these things every single day. If I had to turn up and give a talk every day I’d soon get to hate it. If I had to spend every day on the phone talking to coaching clients I’d get lonely and bored. If I spent every day at my computer just writing, I’d start to feel very isolated. I love all of these things but I need variety in my life. So it’s all about developing a business model that, firstly, suits your talents and, secondly, provides for your income needs. So one of the things that I have done over the last couple of years, which has really liberated me, is to create more products around what I do - so that I can earn money even when I'm not working.

CORRINA: And what I understand is that this means you’re also able to reach more people with you message?

CORRINA: … and that’s not only good for you, but it’s also great for your audience?

NICK WILLIAMS: … the two words I would use, and some people don’t liked these words because they sound almost like ‘corporate words’, are leveraged and strategic … and what I like about these words is that they invite you to consider, firstly, where do you want to 'get to'? … so your strategy is your plan to get to were you want to be, but with the minimum amount of stress and effort. I think that many people starting out in business confuse being busy with being effective and I think that often – after a couple of years – it’s easy to end up with a business that’s working, but that’s also bloody exhausting. So the question is - how do you be more strategic? … and for me the ‘leverage’ part of the equation – and this is true especially if it’s knowledge, information or expertise that you're delivering – invites you to consider how you can take what you know and deliver it to the maximum number of people, in the most effective way, for the most income - and to some extent - for the most free time and greatest ‘quality of life’ for yourself … so that your not working really hard all the time. And there’s also one other dimension I’d add, and I see this for so many entrepreneurs generally, and perhaps women specifically fall foul of this… most of us have grown up with ‘the hard work ethic’. This ethic tells us that in order to achieve any kind of success, we have to work hard, and we’re not entitled to enjoy our work very much, but we just have to ‘knuckle down’ nonetheless. This is sometimes called the protestant work ethic… So I think that often what happens – and this can occur even after several years of being self-employed even if you’re doing something you love – is that your passion can easily turn into hard work. So the big question is: how do you put the joy and love back into your work and how do you reignite your passion around it? …and that can be to do with evolving your work as a whole, or just being more strategic or finding new incomes streams… and for many of us - and perhaps for women especially – it can be about playing bigger and becoming more visible through your work and playing a bigger game…

CORRINA: Yes! … and many people are so scared of becoming more visible... But Nick, you're very visible; you’ve got books published; you have your web site; you’ve been interviewed by many people and you run seminars and workshops in person. So how did you conquer your fear of being visible, that is, if you had any in the first place?

NICK WILLIAMS: I remember the first time I had an article in the press about me - and that’s probably 12, 13 years ago - when my photo first appeared in a newspaper after a journalist had interviewed me. I was terrified - utterly terrified - thinking ‘what have I set myself up for?’ and ‘can I live up to all they might say about me?’ - all that stuff. So I think many of us have very mixed feelings about visibility. On the one hand we know that in order to be successful we need to be seen and known. But on the other hand we might also be afraid of being attacked, or criticized, or setting ourselves up for humiliation, or feeling ashamed; old feelings in the past can get triggered, and some of us are just uncomfortable with too much tension … some of us are more happy being ‘behind the scenes’ rather than ‘in the spotlight’. So yet I’ve had massive lessons around being visible - and I am not over it yet – I’m still learning and growing too. There are certain places I’m still afraid to ‘go to’ in terms of my own visibility. It’s a learning curve…

CORRINA: Yeah - just because you have a passion and a business, it doesn’t mean that you’re necessarily going to love the fame and fortune - some people love it - but you might not, and yet, you might feel like you have to somehow learn to strike a balance.

NICK WILLIAMS: Yes, and I think what I’ve come to realize – and I don’t know if it’s a decision I made consciously - but I guess it almost happened by default - was this: I realized that for me to be successful I had to be seen and be known. I couldn’t be invisible AND be successful… and I think I then had to ask myself a number of tough questions such as: why do I want to be visible? Is it an ‘ego trip’ – do I want people to tell me ‘how wonderful’ I am - or do I really want to help and serve people and contribute … and I’ve realized that - yes - there is a part of me that does enjoy the attention, and I’ve made peace with that, but more than anything, I have struggled with so many things in my own life that I wanted to be more visible so that I could say to people ‘if you are struggling with things in your life - I understand - I’ve been there! But I’ve found some ways through for myself and I can help you too’. So, I want to use my visibility to connect, inspire and touch as many people as I can... So if I can keep that as my motivation, then I know I won’t lose my way...

NICK WILLIAMS: Yes and the other side of it - I think we really need to touch on - is that if you’re visible you can also invite criticism and attack…

NICK WILLIAMS: … there is no way that you’re going to be able to be highly visible and have absolutely everybody love you.

CORRINA: Yes …and how have you dealt with that? How have you handled any criticism that’s been directed at you – and what have been your strategies for dealing with it?

NICK WILLIAMS: … and upset and to want to ‘throw my toys out of the pram’… and it does hurt! Sometimes it really does hurt - and I’ve probably had only three press interviews that went badly – but I can remember them vividly. One was with a woman from The Observer, one was on Scottish radio … and they really misrepresented me and were quite nasty in the way they dealt with me… but I’ve probably done over one thousand press interviews in the media. So, three out of a thousand isn't bad!

NICK WILLIAMS: …so it does hurt sometimes. Have enough interviews and you will be misrepresented…. You will get misunderstood… but you have to get used to it, and what I’ve found useful is that - instead of worrying about the things you dread somebody saying - anticipate those things and start preparing the answers. I realized that every time I did a radio interview I was probably going to get asked more-or-less the same tough questions over and over again. So instead of becoming defensive, I focused my attention on developing really good answers for those kinds of questions. So, it’s almost like - ‘bring on the tough questions – I’m ready for them!’… not that I am arrogant, but I know that half of the people listening to the interview are probably asking themselves the same questions. So if I can give full, reasoned and thorough answers then it actually does me good and it does my cause good. … because I feel like I'm representing something bigger than me. So it’s not just about me looking good - it's about helping the listeners or readers to open their minds to greater possibilities.

CORRINA: … it sounds that the fear of criticism has actually ‘catalyzed you’ into having even more of a reason to be visible?

NICK WILLIAMS: Yeah. I love growing bigger than my fears and taking criticism head-on where necessary. So whatever I’m afraid -I know there’s a part of me that actually wants to encounter my fear - and grow bigger than the fear… and I had a really big example of this about four or five years ago. I’ve been to South Africa a few times to work, and one of the trips was going to be my first time in Johannesburg, and the woman organizing the trip said ‘we’d like you to do a breakfast presentation to some people in Johannesburg. Can you give us an outline for it?’… so I sent her an outline, but it wasn't until about two weeks before I was due to get on the plane that I suddenly realized what I said I was going to talk about! …I was going to give a presentation to 400 of Johannesburg's top business people about why ‘love is the most powerful force in business’ … and I realized that what seemed like a safe idea from my desk in North London - months ahead - suddenly seemed terrifying!. Part of me was going - ‘what the heck have I done! They’re going to crucify me! They’re all about making money – why would they want to hear me talking about love in business?’ So, I was doing a ‘hatchet job’ on myself - but what I realized was this: the ways in which I was anticipating them criticizing me where actually the ways in which I was already criticizing myself.

NICK WILLIAMS: So, I think what I learned from this experience, and this is something that many business owners need to learn, was this: whatever we’re afraid of somebody else doing to us - we only fear it because (at some level) - we’re probably already doing it to ourselves.

CORRINA: That's interesting! So let’s see how this links in with something I’ve seen a great deal of… Many people seem to have a very real fear of making money – and it sounds bizarre – but I see all of these spiritual people, running all of these wonderful spiritual businesses, and yet they seem to believe that they should remain poor and not make a great deal of money. So, what is it that they fear others will say about them?

NICK WILLIAMS: I think the biggest issue for many people (men and women alike) around work and spirituality is that if you’re successful – especially financially – then it proves you’re ‘not that spiritual’. So many of us have a perverted idea that ‘to be spiritual’ means ‘to be poor’....

NICK WILLIAMS: Well you know, in the Bible, it says that ‘it's easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to get into heaven’. Many people use this to support the false belief that spirituality and money don’t belong together - but it’s been said to me that the true meaning of this phrase is very different… the ‘eye of the needle’ doesn’t actually mean a needle - as in - cotton and thread. The eye of the needle was actually a term used to describe a gated entrance to a city. And the metaphor was that in order for a camel to pass through it, it simply had to shed its load. So the real meaning of this phrase is that you shouldn’t get too attached to money, otherwise you can't reach the consciousness of Heaven. But it didn't say don't have money… and I think there is a deep belief within so many people that it’s somehow ‘spiritual’ to be poor. And my personal belief - and it’s taken me years to undo the conditioning - is that, actually, material and financial abundance are simply byproducts of doing something that you really love - and wealth ought to be welcomed because it proves your spirituality rather than disproving it. I think it’s a huge stumbling block, because I see so many entrepreneurs who are doing great work, but they’re overdrawn, in debt, and their businesses are in jeopardy. We have to learn to get ‘over that hump’ and be willing to say ‘it's okay to be abundant – it’s spiritual to be prosperous’. I think this is a demonstration of prosperity and spirituality, and not a perversion or a denial of it.

CORRINA: Definitely... So how is it that you’ve been able to marry those two together: obviously having the spiritual principles that you do… and having money?

NICK WILLIAMS: Some times, with great difficulty, because I’ve feared people’s jealousy, and some times I think I’ve had people’s jealousy – ‘it’s alright for him, he’s doing alight’ – but they don't know what my journey has been to get to where I've got to. I’ve personally had to face a lot of guilt. I think for many people – and especially perhaps for women – guilt is a big issue: ‘how dare you have more… how dare you be happier… how dare you have your life too good?’ It all comes back to the Protestant Work Ethic – life is ‘supposed’ to be a struggle, and it’s not ‘supposed’ to be too easy… and for me spirituality is also about ease - it's about grace - it's about abundance. Sometimes we have to face guilt. But I think you need to recognize that, if you want to have a long-term sustainable business, you got to receive on a level equal to that at which you’re giving. I think that a lot of women are trained to be great givers - they are not necessarily trained to be great receivers. One of the people that I admire is Marianne Williamson…

NICK WILLIAMS: One of her books, A Return To Love, has been a million seller. Through my work at St James’ and via Alternatives I’ve actually met her a couple of times, and I remember after one of the evening talks, she stayed on and took the time to personally sign as many books as people wanted signing. I waited until everyone else had gone (I was organizing the event) and then at the end I asked if she’d be willing to sign my book. As she was writing I said to her ‘Marianne – I want you to know that reading to A Return to Love truly open me up to my spirituality… it opened me up to A Course In Miracles’ … and I gave her a number of other great compliments and she looked me in the eye and said ‘Thank you so much, I really appreciate you telling me that’… and I am sure I was probably the 10,000th person to have said these things to her, but she made me feel that I was the first person ever... I realized at that moment she was a really gracious receiver and in that moment I thought - I want to learn to become a really gracious receiver too. So I think that one thing we can all do – and perhaps women especially – is to learn to become gracious receivers of appreciation, support and sometimes - most importantly of all - money. Let people appreciate you by giving you money! Ask yourself, how many people have you been excited about spending money to learn from… Many I would guess…

CORRINA: Oh yes. Definitely… Without a doubt... and there is actually something really beautiful about giving money to those people who you admire, or who inspire you, or who’s energy you want to be around… It feels like a fair exchange.

NICK WILLIAMS: Right. So I like to turn the tables and ask: would you be willing to believe that people could feel exactly the same way about you?

NICK WILLIAMS: … they’d love to give you money. But we've first got to clear out those blocks to receiving, or first of all, the blocks we have to asking for money in the first place. So that instead of feeling guilty about receiving, we can welcome the experience, and bless it by being truly grateful. So, I’m not saying I’m perfect at doing this by any means – but as much as I can – I try to bless all the money I receive. I feel so grateful for it....

CORRINA: Yes, and there is something about clearing out the self-righteousness as well… I was working with a particular woman - and she was completely honest about this – actually she felt very self-righteous about money. She would say - ‘I’m so wonderful that I live on very little – and that I’m so poor – and doing all this good work in the world’. We need to let go of this – that ‘ego stuff’ actually…

NICK WILLIAMS: Yeah, you’re right… I had a bit of that myself when I was running Alternatives, because at the time I was making money around Alternatives – I wasn’t yet director of the project, and there was the opportunity for me to earn literally £40 or £50 per week. It was a tiny amount of money – but there was a part of me saying ‘look how wonderful I am because I don’t earn much money!’ … and it was a bit of an ‘ego trip’. But eventually I had to get pragmatic about earning money, and get-over myself, because I needed the cash!

NICK WILLIAMS: So, on one level, it's about being pragmatic - not ‘virtuous’ and ‘righteous’ …

CORRINA: Yes, and it's not like the mortgage company is going to say – ‘Oh, you do great work, you don't have to -

NICK WILLIAMS: … yeah, we won’t send you a telephone bill this month and you can skip your mortgage payment!’…they don’t give a damn – they just want their money!

CORRINA: … and it’s kinda like redistributing the wealth! You can use the house and the car, or whatever it is you buy with that money, for good as well! Money can just be good, good, good!

NICK WILLIAMS: … yes, and bless people with the money that you receive! If you want to channel it into other places, then you need to have it in the first place to be able to make those choices.

CORRINA: So, what’s been the biggest shift for you over your journey? …when you started really having great success…. What permission did you have to give yourself? What was the shift?

NICK WILLIAMS: Probably, the big one for me as always been around self-worth… many people find this difficult to believe, but even though I do very visible things, and I have written successful books - and so on - there’s always been a part of me that believes I’m nothing, really. So I guess my biggest shift was to believe that I have value - innate value.

NICK WILLIAMS: … and I suppose that perhaps the hardest thing - and I almost still feel embarrassed to say it - but I know so many people who, without them, my life would not be what it is today… and I am so grateful to them, for who they’ve been, and for what they’ve done for me, or if I've not met them - perhaps they’ve written a book - but they've all helped me to transform my life in some way. And I have to turn that around and say to myself - I know I must do that for other people too. So if I can do that for other people, I don't want to play smaller that I can. If I genuinely can help people - give them inspiration - give them hope, give them possibility and strategy. I don't want to rob anybody of that. It can easily sound like an ego-trip but I believe that life is like a tapestry, and we are all helping each other, and our lives are all woven together somehow. So people are coming to my life to help me transform myself, and if I can do the same for others, then I'm delighted to do that. And to me that’s about serving a higher purpose – I’m not doing it for an ego-trip – I’m doing it because I think that's why each of us is here: to make life a bit better for each other.

CORRINA: And what you’re doing is that you’re playing as big as you can - but you've got that humility - so when you put them together, it’s clearly not an ego trip. I can clearly see that with you.

NICK WILLIAMS: Thank-you… But I’ve had to work through a lot of stuff in my life – and asked myself a lot of tough questions – and finally I’ve let myself ‘off the hook’ and learned self acceptance. I suppose my big lesson for anybody listening to this interview would be just to say: always aim to help and serve others, but that doesn't mean playing small, and it cetainly doesn't mean being overly humble. Because perhaps the best service you can do is to be really well known and visible… and I suppose what I’ve always wanted to do is to share my heart with people - and if sharing my heart with somebody can help them to reconnect with their heart, their inspiration, and their sense of possibility - then I want to find every way I can to share my heart with people.

CORRINA: I what I love about what you’re saying is that it’s so honest and transparent. When you say share your heart, you don't just mean to share the joy and the success - but you mean to share the stuff that you have found challenging as well… So that people are getting the authentic you.

NICK WILLIAMS: Yes. If there’s anything that people have said to me over the years that’s really meant a lot to me as it’s - ‘that you don't set yourself up to be anything other than what you are’. I spent many years working in the field of personal development… and I loved meeting Susan Jeffers, Wayne Dyer and Deepak Chopra, etc, but a part of me thought ‘but they’re not like me’… I don’t want to be like them, I don’t want to be ‘a guru’ - I just want to be me.

NICK WILLIAMS: …but thinking that being myself was not enough… and I know that many people think that being themselves is not enough. But it is enough!

NICK WILLIAMS: So it’s just about being authentically and naturally ourselves… and talking about our struggles – it’s not like we’ve reached some nirvana and we’ve magically overcome all of our struggles and sufferings. I struggle and suffer most days. But I’ve got something that motivates me to get through it, and to play a bigger game.

CORRINA: And I think that people feel safer with that… because they can identify with you – ‘ohh - Nick’s human’. They can actually identify with you and feel that you’re a trustworthy person rather than living in some kind of idyllic world….

NICK WILLIAMS: … yes and it’s the paradox of being willing to embrace our ‘dark’ - our pain, our suffering and our difficulties - and at the same time embrace our light - which is our talent and our brilliance and ability - to inspire other people… and somehow keep the two together and not let one overtake the other… because so many people I meet say things like ‘but I’m not together enough to ever teach anybody else anything - I’m suffering so much myself’… and I say – ‘yes may be you are, but maybe you’ve still got hope to give to other people’. It’s like – so many people think they need to get their lives ‘perfectly together’ before they can offer any kind of inspiration or motivation to anybody else - and that’s just not true. Even in your darkest days you can be still be authentic and you can still inspire people.

CORRINA: Yes. I think that’s very true… but what about fear of success? … because this is a big one, I think. We’ve talked about fear of failure before - but what about fear of success - like really huge big success. What is it the people fear most do you think?

NICK WILLIAMS: And several things; loss of approval - ‘people aren’t going to like me anymore’; loss of belonging – ‘I won’t fit-in anymore’ and ‘I’ve hung out with my victim friends for 20 years and if I change my life - and suddenly become more powerful and potent - then I’m not going to belong with them anymore’. So I think its loss of approval; loss of love; loss of belonging; I think they’re the things we really fear… and some of them can be true - maybe you do loose some friends along the way as you become more successful - but you'll find new friends too. So that’s why I think it’s got to be partly about your personal life and journey, but it’s also about serving something bigger. If you’re going to hold yourself back from serving a bigger purpose in life - because you’re afraid somebody isn’t going to like you anymore - then everybody loses. So it’s about making a commitment to service - which is to me is at the heart of it all.

CORRINA: Yeah… and as you said - maybe you do loose some things along the way - but you gain more - so it’s more than worth it.

NICK WILLIAMS: Yes but it’s also about not judging the people that can’t (or don’t) come with you.

NICK WILLIAMS: So not judging the naysayers - they’re on a journey of their own. For example, a couple of years ago there was somebody I used to sell computers with - who was out of my life for 15 years or so – had he suddenly came back into my life and made contact with me… and I coached him a bit - and now we have become friends again - and I still don’t quite think he understands what I do, but we’ve become friends again. So it is amazing that sometimes your paths can go in entirely different directions, but then you reconnect, and at another level as well.

CORRINA: Yes. And the thing that I think you and I have in common – that’s drawn us together – is this idea of inspiration. My company is called ‘You Inspire Me’… You’ve written a book called ‘How To Be Inspired’. How do you stay inspired?

NICK WILLIAMS: Well I talk about several different ways. Number one is to know what actually inspires you – and to know what your ‘wells of inspiration’ are. Secondly, to make sure you spend time at your wells of inspiration regularly. So, for example, I regularly read spiritual books and go to talks and workshops - to keep myself inspired… and we must constantly discover new wells of inspiration, because I believe that the world is a potentially endlessly inspiring place, but you don't necessarily ‘get that’ by watching the six o'clock news or the ten o'clock news. You only get one ‘slice of life’ - whereas I believe that for every act of war and aggression there are millions of acts of love and kindness, beauty and creativity happening everyday - every minute even… but they are not ‘the news’ - you have to go and seek them out for yourself. So I'm great believer in ‘inspirational input’, but then I think the most important aspect of being inspired is to actually act on what you feel inspired to do. So it's not thinking ‘oh, one day, when I’ve overcome my resistance, and I don’t have any fears left - and I feel totally confident and secure - then I’ll do what I want to do’. It's acting in the face of your resistance and your fear. That, I think, is inspiring. You become a source of inspiration to yourself so you don't just think ‘oh, Susan Jeffers or Marianne Williamson is wonderful because they’ve done what they’ve done’. It’s because you’ve been putting off something for 10 years - and today you took the first step to do it – THAT inspires you to do more. So it’s about becoming a source of inspiration to yourself, and I think that’s what I’ve got into over the years I think somehow that - I don’t know when it was – but I crossed the threshold such that it became too painful not to keep moving forward with my inspiration.

NICK WILLIAMS: Yes. ... and you become proud of yourself, and again, for many people that’s challenging… because we think ‘oh, we shouldn’t think too highly of ourselves’or ‘who am I to think I could inspire myself, let alone inspire any body else!’ … but I think there’s a true spiritual place. To love yourself and be proud of yourself - not from an ego perspective - but just because you are a child of the universe - or whatever you believe you are - a precious soul. I’m about helping people liberate that potential, and the ‘beacon’ for me about liberating potential is always following that sense of inspiration.

CORRINA: How do you work with people that are very creative and inspired, but maybe don’t have any knowledge of business at all, or any of the ‘how-to’ skills?

NICK WILLIAMS: I think there are two things… there’s the ‘how-to’, but I also think that alot of people have alot of judgments about ‘business’ as well. They see business as intrinsically bad. Just as people often have a lot of negative ideas about money, I think a lot of people also have negative judgments about business, and make business into the ‘big baddy’ of the world - and obviously there are bad things caused by businesses – but there are also many wonderful things that business does… and I think actually business can be one of the greatest vehicles for personal transformation as well. A teacher of mine, a few years ago, said that she thought that running your own business was the best personal growth seminar on the planet - and I think it is. So I think you have to grow. So, if you want to stay ‘stable’ then my advice is don’t start your own business! It will always change! So I think firstly you need to rid yourself of your judgments about business - and maybe we are actually creating the new paradigm for business… because I think there’s the old masculine model of ‘it’s all about goals and targets’… and then there’s the very feminine model ‘just follow your heart and everything will probably turn out okay’… and that can happen, but I think there’s actually a place where we can bring the two together. That’s probably where I’m getting to now, and it’s taken me a long time to get here. But I really feel that my business is an integration of my heart, my inspiration, and my spirituality - and it’s an integration of great business skills and strategies - to get out into the world and find the people that can benefit from my expertise. So I am a great believer in bringing the two together - so whether you call that ‘the head and the heart’ or ‘the masculine and the feminine’ - I th