The Game-Changing Question Every Entrepreneur Should Ask Themselves
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The Game-Changing Question Every Entrepreneur Should Ask Themselves
To Crush Their Goals and Kick Procrastination to the Curb
5 minute read
Hey there, welcome to another edition of the Liberation Letters! Today, we’re diving into a question that has the power to revolutionize your business. Asking this single question can save you tons of time, streamline your workflow, and dramatically reduce the amount of frustration you experience while playing the game of business. This question is also a fabulous tool to help you bust through procrastination with ease.
This letter might be a bit shorter than usual, but don’t let its size fool you—it packs a punch.
So let’s dig in.
The Complication Conundrum
Entrepreneurs and overcomplicating things go together like peanut butter and jelly. I believe entrepreneurs have a particular knack for turning even the simplest tasks into Herculean feats. Why the heck do we do this to ourselves?
As a business strategist that’s borderline obsessed with human behaviour and psychology I have come to realize that this tendency to overcomplicate everything often stems from our deeply ingrained belief that hard work is synonymous with our worth and societal value. We were often raised with the notion that success only comes to those who toil relentlessly, and without hard work, we are undeserving of success.
If you didn’t chug down a plate of dry broccoli do you really even deserve dessert?
Unfortunately, this unconscious belief has led to some serious confusion and often sets entrepreneurs up to work ridiculous hours, far beyond what’s necessary to achieve the results they’re looking for – all in the name of being ‘worthy’ of success. Because after all, if it didn’t cost you blood, sweat, tears and sleepless nights, did you really deserve it?
And if you could do it in a fraction of the time and spend the afternoon sipping a margarita with a good book, does that make you lazy?
Aren’t lazy people destroying society – and the economy?
It’s kinda messed up right?
Embracing Simplicity
Now, as a self-proclaimed “lazy entrepreneur,” I’ve made it my mission to always be on the hunt for the simplest path to get what I want. And in my quest for simplicity, I stumbled upon a question that changed the game for me.
I started to ask:
“What would it look like if this could be easy?”
This question became my North Star whenever I faced challenges in my business or personal life.
Want to see it in action?
This year, I made the commitment to getting in the best shape of my life. I knew this meant moving more, eating more nourishing foods and creating a calorie deficit for slow sustainable success.
To do this, I could:
* Obsessively count my calories and macros.
* Run on the treadmill for hours.
* Spend all week cooking the complicated (bland) meals recommended by fitness influencers (Come on guys, you can’t put protein powder in EVERYTHING.)
* Force down copious amounts of water and nasty artificial green protein shakes.
* And refrain from eating anything that I had previously found joyful. Bye bye chocolate and Italian food.
P.S. Fun fact – my background was in nutrition and natural medicine before I found my muse in the world of business and I have actually tried most of the stuff listed above in the name of experimenting with wellness.
Or – I could choose a way easier path.
Let me break it down for you:
it all starts with the outcome
When you encounter a tough problem, it’s helpful to break it down into two key questions:
What outcome do you want to achieve, and what’s the easiest way to get there?
In this case, I wanted to focus on losing excess body-fat while building muscle mass.
We’ve already covered how I could go about doing this the hard way.
Want to know what I did instead?
Here we go:
* I tracked my food intake for 2 weeks on an easy-to-use tracking app without making any changes to my diet. Yep – I carried on being my usual self. Bring on the gnocchi!
*I immediately identified that my problem was simple. While I was eating healthy foods most of the time – I was consuming too many calories for my current level of activity.
*Next, I looked at the easiest change I could make that would get me closer to my goals. I realized that a huge amount of my calorie over-consumption was the result of my borderline addiction to sweet milky tea and snacking on something sugary in the afternoon. Yep.
*I adjusted the balance by reducing the amount of milk and sugar in my tea-drinking habit and swapped my usual snack for something a little more wholesome – and voila significant calorie difference.
What about building strength?
* I focused on activities I already enjoyed – like ballroom dancing and horse riding – and simply doubled down on those activities so I was doing them multiple times a week.
Notice that I didn’t try to override my nature.
I wasn’t suddenly going to stop drinking tea – or loving Italian food.
I wasn’t suddenly going to think green smoothies were wonderful.
And I definitely wasn’t going to be consistent if I filled my schedule with workouts I hated.
The result?
Getting what I want without baking my back or working unnecessarily hard to achieve the outcome.
Forcing down nasty green juices not required.
simplifying your business
How does this apply to business?
Let’s take packaging up your offers – and launching them to the world, for instance.
This is a place where I see loads of entrepreneurs getting hung up – and overcomplicating the heck out of things.
There are at least a dozen ways that you can put your offer out into the world to book clients.
And if I had a dollar for every time an entrepreneur procrastinated on their launch because they felt that they needed a fancy sales page with checkout buttons and a video sales letter, I’d probably be sitting in the bahamas right now.
But if we apply our new formula for success we can redefine what is essential and get a result with a fraction of the effort and energy.
1) What outcome do I want to achieve?
I want to get information about my offer out to leads who are interested so I can sell my services.
2) What’s the easiest way to achieve this?
I could put all the information on an un-fancy google doc with a link to where clients could make a payment if they want to join.
Or I could spend hours turning my house into a youtube studio, filming a video sales letter (read filming it 5 times because the first 4 takes sucked), building a landing page and overthinking the copy for another 3 hours.
Want to know something funny? I’ve sold 5-figure offers on ugly google docs – and the mentors who taught me how to do this have used the same methods to sell multiple 6-figure offers while their competition were too busy debating what shade of red to use on their checkout buttons.
Remember, results come from getting in the ring and doing your thing.
The more time you spend overthinking, the less time you spend implementing.
fear all dressed up
At this stage in the article, you’ve probably realized that there are a few things in your business that are not as easeful as you’d like them to be.
You’ve also learned how to find easier ways to achieve what you desire.
But you may find yourself dipping back into complexity for complexity’s sake. Why is that?
When coaching clients through their first launch, I often notice a reluctance to put their work out to the world despite having all the essential boxes checked.
They have an intense desire to return to a more complex way of doing things.
They want to build fancy landing pages, buy a better microphone or wait until next week to launch.
You see, some people use complexity as a shield.
For some people, perfectionism and complexity go hand in hand.
They think that complexity and the pursuit of perfectionism will protect them from what they fear.
And in many cases, this looks like rejection.
Perfectionism is a sneaky seductress, whispering sweet promises of never facing judgment or criticism from others. It’s so enticing to think, “If I do things perfectly, I’ll be safe from rejection.” But here’s the thing: it just doesn’t work that way.
Perfectionism is often just fear that’s well dressed.
So if you find yourself sliding back into a desire to overcomplicate, ask yourself one more simple question:
“What am I afraid of?”
in summary
In our never-ending quest for success, we often forget the power of simplicity. When we question the need for complexity, we unlock the potential for ease and efficiency in our businesses and lives. So let go of the belief that hard work equals worth, and open yourself up to the path of least resistance by asking yourself, “What would it look like if this could be easy?
journaling & reflection:
Here are some of my favorite reflection questions from today’s topic:
* How often do I find myself overcomplicating tasks or challenges in my business or personal life?
* What unconscious beliefs or societal values contribute to my tendency to equate hard work with worth and success?
* Can I recall a specific situation where embracing simplicity and asking, “What would it look like if this could be easy?” led to a more efficient and effective outcome?
* What are some areas in my business where I could benefit from applying the principle of simplicity and identifying the easiest path to achieve desired outcomes?
* How can I shift my mindset and let go of the belief that hard work is the only path to success, and instead open myself up to the path of least resistance?
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about me
I am a business coach and writer with a cappuccino fetish and a 3-day work-week. I’m obsessed with dissecting profitable businesses and teaching people how to break the system by designing lives and businesses that they can’t wait to wake up to on a Monday morning.
take the next step
When you’re ready, here are some ways I can support you to take your business to the next level:
free client-getting guide
Free Fully-Booked workshop
my signature program