Y’all, I had many many projects to take on during the winter break.
While I was taking a break from client work, I had big plans for the quiet time since I wasn’t traveling.
- Finish the first draft of my book.
- Send end of year client gifts.
- Build a new onboarding series and foundational curriculum for the membership.
- Do 2025 planning, including my financial forecast, end of year expense review, and personal plans.
- Sketch out 2025 courses.
And while I made a lot of progress (Deeper Business Members and clients, you’ll love the new Onboarding and Core Foundations roadmap courses, with some net-new content just for you!), I ran up against the reality:
Your projects may take more time than you expect.
As I was doing my reflecting on last year and the year to come, I came up with so many ideas for courses and programs, so many ideas to implement for my 1:1 clients and for the membership…
… and these projects will all have to wait until Q2.
I already have projects in motion in this quarter that I need to finish before I start anything new.
The projects I am in process with now are taking longer than I had anticipated, even though I’m making large strides and thoughtful progress.
Like the book. I re-wrote the entirety of the first portion and added another 10,000 words because my thoughts had deepened since my initial draft a year ago. I’m so proud of what it will be, but to do it well I need to focus on it, even though I have many many ideas for what comes after the book and want to get to them RIGHT NOW. But that would be distracting from my ultimate, long-term vision.
And talking with the Deeper Foundations cohort participants this week, many of you are in the same place.
We have concrete projects for January and February, mostly carried over from the prior year.
We have glimmers and sparks of ideas that were born from the quiet and the dark, whose time has not quite come yet.
But we don’t have the capacity to action on them yet, given what’s already in flight.
And then one participant said, “we have permission to patience”. We all released our breath.
The ideas that are birthed… they might be for us to execute on now. But they might be meant for later.
And instead of getting wrapped up with exactly when they’ll happen, we’re embracing patience.
Having ideas and having sparks, and letting them marinate and collect momentum in our minds. Collecting resources and insights to make the ideas even better when they arrive.
Releasing the pressure to plan exactly when you’ll deliver on those ideas, and instead just working on what’s in the here and now.
Narrowing in on the next 1-2 key root deepening areas in our business. And recognizing that moving those forward may take more time and focus than you expect.
Once those projects are complete enough, we can then go back and look at our idea list (and our data) and choose what’s next based on our circumstances, energy, and business needs. I promise you that if the idea is meant to be, it will come back. The timing of when that will happen? Might be less predictable than you’d like.
I’ve given up planning for the full year, with the exception of my repeatable program launches.
Who knows when I’m going to be done with the book? (To my publisher and editor - JANUARY. The first draft will be handed over in January.)
Who knows what will happen in January with the change of a new US political party?
When I’m done with the book, what idea might be then be most powerful and potent?
What will the market and my clients need most then? What will my business need next?
I certainly have ideas, but I’m releasing the pressure to know when they’ll take place, and instead embracing patience.
I’m releasing the pressure to hustle through implementing everything at once, and trying to cram all of these projects into a month or quarter. I did that last year in some cases, and while I’m happy for the outcome, my body said, “Let’s not do that again, m’kay?”. And I’m listening. I have time. I’m playing the long game in my business, as are you.
And I am confident that if it’s the right idea, and meant for me, it will circle back when its time has come and when I’m ready for it.
So before trying to have “your best year ever" (by the end of January)… where can you grant yourself the permission for patience in your business?