The Common Mindset Challenges of Entrepreneurship with Aimee Browne [Part 1]

February 28, 2022

Hello, welcome to this week’s episode of the Ambitious Introvert! As you know, all of my guests are special, but this guest is very, very special because she’s one of my closest friends. Aimee Browne is an online business strategist and we have been a part of each other’s business journeys for almost two and a half years now – we have literally seen each other grow from signing our first clients to where we are now. So I invited Aimee on today to share some of the mindset challenges that we’ve both encountered. It’s really important to see that whatever stage of business you’re in, these difficult things can still come up. We’ll share how we’ve worked through some of the lows and celebrated some of the highs. Enjoy this very vulnerable peek behind the scenes!

Aimee and I discuss:

  • How Aimee & I support each other with our opposite personality types 
  • Creating healthy boundaries as an online business owner 
  • Why a giveaway is one of the best things I did for my business early on (& how it’s still helping me grow now!)
  • The importance of separating your identity from your business 
  • Cultivating mindful activities and moving away from constant consumption so you can be a healthier CEO

Aimee Browne is a Time and Business Strategist that helps female entrepreneurs not only devise the strategies needed to build and scale their businesses but to execute it too – enabling them to scale and hit those dreamy 6/7 figure income goals without burnout. Learn how you can work with her here.

Connect with Aimee:

Connect with Me:

Click here for a raw, unedited transcript of this episode
[00:00:00] Emma-Louise Parkes: Hello, welcome to this week’s episode of the ambitious introvert with me, your host, Emma Louise, and all of my guests are special, but this guest is very, very, very special because my friends now not just randomly invite in any friends on the show and biting friends who obviously have stories to share value, to chat things, to teach us.

And I cannot think of a better teacher than Ms. Amy Brown. Hello. 

[00:00:37] Aimee Browne: Hello. I can’t believe we are finally just doing this so great to be here. 

[00:00:42] Emma-Louise Parkes: Is there anyone that is potentially in my Facebook group, but definitely if you’re on Instagram, you’re probably aware that Amy and I are really close, really good friends.

We have been at the side of each other’s business journey for almost two and a half years now, such a longer time. [00:01:00] Because of that. We have literally seen each other grow from signing our first clients to where we are now. So I invited Amy on today. Is this going to be a very, very different episode? We are going to share some of the mindset issues that we’ve both encountered, because I think it’s fair to say we’ve encountered the same things, but in different ways, Oh, different stories have shown up for sure.

Yeah. And I think it’s really important to see that whatever stage of business you’re in those things still come up. We’ll share like the stuff that’s, we’re still working through now. Um, so think of this as like a little sneaky peek behind the scenes of basically the kind of stuff that we voiced about everyday.

That’s going 

[00:01:47] Aimee Browne: on literally every day, apart from my name is on digital detox 

[00:01:52] Emma-Louise Parkes: every day, except one day at the week. Okay. Well, we dig in, please introduce yourself [00:02:00] professionally and to tell the audience a little bit about union. 

[00:02:03] Aimee Browne: Sure. So, um, my name is Amy Brown. I am the extrovert to introvert and I am a business strategist.

I work with a really diverse range of business owners, both online and offline and help them build, grow and scale their business without burnout. And I do this through a blend of business strategy. I can brilliance and high-performance habits. Ooh, 

[00:02:32] Emma-Louise Parkes: warms my heart. And so the next couple of questions that ask all of my guests at the start, the interview are going to be interesting.

Cause you’re going to answer a little bit, do you identify as an introvert, an empath or a highly sensitive entrepreneur? 

[00:02:49] Aimee Browne: Wow. So I, I’m definitely not an introvert. I’m very high on the extroversion scale. Hence the reason I am the young to the yen as we call ourselves, um, [00:03:00] we are very attuned to each other, but completely opposite and very opposite in lots and lots of ways, which is why I think our friendship works so well.

Um, but I have learned so much from Emma actually in that I am a real empath actually. I am quite highly sensitive, not quite up there on that, on that scale, but you know, I’ve really started to learn about how much time I actually do need on my own and how things do affect my nervous system. And I mean, like music just sets my whole nervous system alive.

I cry at everything I pick up people’s energy. There’s so much I’ve learned about myself in that respect. So yes, I am a very much an extra bats, but also an empath and highly sensitive. 

[00:03:51] Emma-Louise Parkes: It’s interesting. Isn’t it? Cause it’s, we’re getting to know each other and you would say things about how you felt or about something that happened with clients.

Pretty sure. You’re an empath. I’m pretty [00:04:00] sure you’re on the highly sensitive scale. And it’s interesting because your sensitivity and my sensitivity, actually that actually projects a little bit differently because you are very emotional. And like you say about music and art and people’s emotions and all that.

My sensitivity tends to be more the lights, the temperature that the noise, like those external stimulus. I’m not, I’m not that much. For a highly sensitive person. Yeah. 

[00:04:25] Aimee Browne: It’s funny because I call at my stop. I call over. Sorry. Yeah. It’s funny you say that because I think I feel things very deeply, very, uh, pickup on things very quickly.

I’ve always been very intuitive, which I know you are as well, but, um, yeah, you get it for more external or I love, I actually feed off those kind of key crowds or busy places or, you know, bright lights or like going to live music bands and things like that, which would absolutely just drain you 

[00:04:59] Emma-Louise Parkes: five [00:05:00] minutes.

I’d be 

[00:05:00] Aimee Browne: like, get me out of here. And this is the thing, like, because I feel things very deeply, um, especially like with my clients, I’m very invested in them and it’s. It’s hard. That’s definitely been something that I’ve had to learn and absolutely reflects back to me in terms of the boundaries around that and how personally responsible that I feel for my clients, my clients results and where that, where that line falls.

Um, because yeah, I’m just, I’m all, I’m all in, which is another story. That’s that’s another conversation. Isn’t it about this? 

[00:05:39] Emma-Louise Parkes: Yeah. All in, but for now, let’s go down boundaries. We’ve got no script by the way, we just played in this player. So let let’s go down boundaries because boundaries is obviously a huge one.

Um, for. Many of my clients. I would imagine many of my audience has been for me, a lot of friends who yeah. Are extrovert, but still have [00:06:00] very caring natures and you know, very, a lot of integrity and business. I think it can be very difficult, especially if you’ve grown a personal brand to separate yourself and your feelings from say a business decision.

Or if someone say something about your service or the business to not take that personally, do you agree? 

[00:06:18] Aimee Browne: Oh my gosh, absolutely. That’s something that I’ve really had to learn. I think, because as well as an extrovert, you, you want to be everyone’s friend and you love being a community is massive value.

So I want to, I want to be in and in amongst it, and it’s very hard. It’s been a big learning, should I say to detach from, okay. Friendships and building community versus business and commercial decision and things that happen with your clients and how to not let that move from a it’s really, I still find it really time.

And then even when I think [00:07:00] about it, the relationship that I build with my clients so often they become friends, but there has to be a line and a boundary around, um, serving them and having that authority within the relationship to be. Mentor or, you know, a strategic partner for them and not letting those things lines merge.

It’s been, it’s been very challenging and also for them to be not to take on their emotions and that all the problems that they’ve got in their business. And let me ruminate that all night, if I had to really detach myself. So I think there’s, it feels like two fold for me in terms of the boundaries in terms of the clients, but then also around how emotionally involved I am as a personal brand with my business and how I start to separate that and not make it when a client isn’t, um, wants to leave a program or when a team members happy or when something doesn’t go wrong.

That it’s not about [00:08:00] me, obviously. Yes, we look inside ourselves. What could I have done better, et cetera, but quite a lot of the time, it’s a commercial decision. And if you remember, I had that little sticky on my desk. I think it was actually. I want to say, I started doing that towards the backend of 2020.

What would my highest self do? How can I really zone out of this situation and gain some perspective to make it commercial and not about me? So, so challenging, 

[00:08:30] Emma-Louise Parkes: so important. It’s funny as you were saying, My experience of this. This is an old one. You might have forgotten about this, but I have 

[00:08:39] Aimee Browne: the goldfish.

I’m the goldfish. And you remember everything? 

[00:08:43] Emma-Louise Parkes: I have a fairly good memory. So yeah, again about like commercial decisions and. Yeah. I work with my clients a lot. Like they might sell all I feel bad or what if this person thinks this, but it’s differentiates in that, like, you’re making a business decision here that’s for the growth of the [00:09:00] business, or that’s for me to make sure that you appear professional versus like, you know, oh, I want everyone to be my friend or what are people going to think?

So back in March, 2020, just before the pandemic, um, when it was my 40th, I decided to do a giveaway because I was trying to grow my audience. So I was working with a coach at the time and I said, well, what about doing a giveaway for like some free sessions to grow my Insta? You know, people have to tag three people and whatever to enter.

And she was like, yeah, that’s great. A really small audience at the time I had like 200 and something people. So let’s give away, which went wild and like so much good stuff happened from it. But later on, I’ll talk about that in a minute, but I posted it in a Facebook group and I got. 

[00:09:45] Aimee Browne: Yes. I do remember 

[00:09:48] Emma-Louise Parkes: he was basically like, you know, take people and then you, you can get the chance to enter a free session or whatever.

Like I wasn’t giving away thousands, but someone left me a vicious message and it [00:10:00] was really quite, quite vicious about how I didn’t follow you myself. And I would attract the wrong clients. And I think that giving them a free session means they’re going to stay forever. And I’m so diluted. And this isn’t the way to grow my business.

Like it was really, it was very personal, but what was interesting, I remember you would go wild. Joe. Joe was going by a couple of other people are reading it, but I looked at her. Business page. And she was a coach, but that was her whole brands. She did like, what are the people aren’t doing? And it was about like, oh, you want to just say one thing to some it’s very horrible actually.

But it’s like, you want to say that one thing to someone that really like hits them in the gut and really makes them realize that you know them better than anyone else. So they’ll come and invest in you. So obviously she heard thought my giveaway is out of poor money mindset out of being desperate for clients.

Then it’s like, if it wasn’t, I still had a job, but it was like [00:11:00] build an audience. So again, like I could have taken that person, like I’ve been trolled or make it mean something about me, but it didn’t, it was I’d taken a commercial decision to do a giveaway. She had taken a commercial decision that this was a good post for her to, you know, display her weird manipulation marketing skills on that.

It, that is all it means. 

[00:11:24] Aimee Browne: It’s generic. And it’s funny you say that because I can see that growth in ourselves as well. And I think particularly you are more resilient around this stuff than, than I have been. Um, you know, something like that would have flawed me in the earlier days because I had a lot of work to do around fear of judgment.

And that’s probably a different conversation again, as we, as we go on about therapy around that. Um, so that would have flawed me, whereas now, If something like that happened to me, I’d be like, that says so much more about you as a person than [00:12:00] whatever it is that you’re kind of saying to me, you’ve just come out of nowhere and said something like that.

Um, it wouldn’t, it wouldn’t floor me in that way. I wouldn’t spy. Well, I would just be, yeah, just, 

[00:12:15] Emma-Louise Parkes: yeah, it wasn’t thrilling to 

[00:12:18] Aimee Browne: read, finish up and take a 

[00:12:19] Emma-Louise Parkes: breath. And then I was like, oh, okay. And the funny thing is it was in the litter, unloaded entrepreneur is in Lacey’s group and oh three or four months when we started working together and they said, well, someone told me in your group.

And she was like, oh, was it? So and so instead of name and she was like, yeah, she does it to everyone like it again. So I could have. Really make me spiral and mean something, but it’s like, it’s just what we do. Anyway, the side note is, and I think this is another good lesson because definitely at the start of our business, we expected that overnight growth, that immediate success, you know, you see people talking about online and it can feel like you’re failing or doing it wrong if you’re not making 10 K within like five minutes.

But I did that giveaway thinking like [00:13:00] there’s going to be instant return from it. And yeah, I had audience growth, but there wasn’t that instant return in the way of like, you know, people are seeing it and starting to sign up and work with me. But that giveaways given me so much over the last, well, almost two years now, the person that won the giveaway was Becky stern.

Oh Becky. So Becky has become a friend. She’s a paid client. She’s been a podcast guest. She’s been a client of yours. Hey, you know, that brought someone that’s, you know, very, I’m very close to now into my circle that it might not have done. And someone tagged Leslie Calvo away. I know. And at the time I was doing freelance work in Switzerland, listening lives in Switzerland and she sent me damn.

And she was like, someone’s just about me. You’ll give away. And I vented, but I’m actually in Switzerland. Would you like to meet up? Sadly we didn’t because I got repatriated as the borders were closing, but basically it’s going to be one of my closest friends in the business that also has [00:14:00] been a client also has been a podcast guest.

[00:14:03] Aimee Browne: Like I’m the client for me.

[00:14:07] Emma-Louise Parkes: It’s just crazy. And I think another client that I worked with on an intensive last year as a 2021 actually found me through that giveaway. So 18 months later, someone because. Uh, client, but you just never know what’s going to happen in the longer term of making these decisions. Not all about that instant, 

[00:14:28] Aimee Browne: that instant gratification, which we are, I think, you know, shoved down our throats every day that, you know, like you say about that instant success or that overnight success, or I just did this one thing and I got X amount of money and, um, 30 days, or do you want the dark light?

It’s just, it’s not the reality that it’s never just that one thing. It’s that cumulative effect, that compound effect of all of those elections. And we talk about this a lot in terms of, [00:15:00] gosh, our consistency. Are you for the time that we’ve both been in business, we time and time again, just keep showing up, keep doing the things, even though maybe things, you know, we’ve never really been the kind of, um, you know, posts that go viral or like all of this type of thing.

But that consistency is definitely built our reputation and our trust. But I suppose from a mindset perspective, you’ve got to just be so attached to, or your, your journey and what you believe, um, to keep going. Even when you’re not getting there, you’ve got to keep the faith. You’ve got, gotta be so passionate about what you want to create and what you want to do that you just keep on going without that pat on the head all the time, but it does come.

It does come again. I’ve had people in my audience for, um, you know, these long lengths of time that then. It comes and they come to invest in you or they’re a [00:16:00] part of your community, or, and it’s just so fantastic. 

[00:16:04] Emma-Louise Parkes: I know it is. And it’s the hardest thing with consistency, I think, because like you say, you don’t people think it’s not working.

That’s the, that’s the mistake. Cause because you don’t see anything straight away, but it’s really important. The biggest mindset flip on that for me, was understanding that the actions that are consistent, like I don’t post it on Instagram and releasing podcast episodes. Like again, they’re commercial decisions that business tasks and actions that need to be done, you know, on a certain day, every week or certain number of times every week and removing myself and how I feel from it, because at the start of my business, the reason I was inconsistent is I think, well, I don’t feel like posting.

Like, I don’t feel like going on Facebook, that’s helped you 

[00:16:50] Aimee Browne: in it. I used to tell myself that story too. And I remember my coach back in the day saying this to me actually, but you can’t have [00:17:00] your business run on how you feel within a given day. Like you can’t have your results attached to your energy.

And I think there’s a bit of a story around that in the online space as well, in terms of you’ve gotta be in that high vibe all the time to get the sale. Well, actually, if you create more of a system and it’s just something you do, and it’s just because, you know, you’re consistent with it, it doesn’t have to be attached to your energy at all.

[00:17:25] Emma-Louise Parkes: No, it does not. I had flu in October of 2021 and I was wiped out for two and a half weeks as you’ll probably remember aims. I was not in a good way. 

[00:17:37] Aimee Browne: Have not had a good couple of months. I’m 

[00:17:38] Emma-Louise Parkes: not, I’m just still getting a coach now. We’re January. That’s that flu was that was took to my bed. I, I counseled a whole week of client calls.

I don’t think I’d ever canceled a client call and like the entire history of my business. I was like, I just need to clear this week. And my friend Claire Stansfield said to me, I [00:18:00] about a week and a half in it she’d messaged me. And I messaged her and I was like, oh, I’ve got the flu. And she was like, I would never have known you were ill.

If we hadn’t had a direct message, like, oh your contents. So going out what Gusto going out, like your group’s still active, but because I batch and things are done so far in advance and scheduled, it means that we can absorb that. So, yeah, I did definitely did not feel like doing anything during those two weeks, but the hung, the ironic thing is I made sales.

I still made sales because I’ve got such a volume of value that people can access and we market it in a way that it’s evergreen. I can step away. Two weeks, not really do much. And the business still continues. And that is because of the consistency that we’ve built up over the last two and a half years.

[00:18:46] Aimee Browne: Yeah, absolutely. And I think that’s another mindset thing, which particularly, I think has been more, something that I’ve had to work on is about feeling okay. About taking time [00:19:00] out of your business. Um, if you don’t know my story, I had, um, a considerable burnout when I worked in the corporate environment and this is absolutely the big why behind, behind my business and what I support my clients do to do.

And however, you know, that deep conditioning is absolutely in that, around perfectionism overworking. Um, you know, because I am so passionate about my business and, um, I dunno, I suppose. When you hit overwhelm or fare, I go back to those safety mechanisms in terms of control and thinking that I need to work more, to create more.

And so luckily I think I’m very self-aware and I’m very conscious of what that looks like, but it’s still something that I have to work on. And Emma sometimes has to reflect back to me. You said that you were taking that [00:20:00] week off or you were going to do that thing, but yet you’re still saying, yeah, 

[00:20:04] Emma-Louise Parkes: we have a lot of those I’m like, I thought this was your week.

You didn’t have any calls this week. 

[00:20:10] Aimee Browne: What’s going on here. Um, so yeah, that’s, that’s definitely been a work in progress. So over the time, cause it’s something that I have continued to work on and that helps my clients help them build up. You have to build up the evidence, but it is okay to take time out for your business.

Um, and we used to, I think, I can’t remember if you started this game with me, but we played playing the game of I’m taking time out. I think we did. Cause I think it was when you first got to Salado and we were imagining like all of the leads, your leads and all your inquiries coming through to your inbox.

And so it was almost like playing a game. Okay. I’m going to take some time out with my business. So wouldn’t it be amazing if I came back to, to inquiries in my inbox or [00:21:00] there’s a, an amazing new opportunity, my DMS or something like that. And it almost becomes fun. And when something does happen, because actually I think for the most part, something great would happen when you take time out of your business.

Um, so many more benefits I could talk about, but yeah, you have to have that evidence that he’s okay. To build up, to build up that evidence, build up that belief. And that’s something that I’ve definitely had to consider, especially as my business has grown. Um, you have a tendency to get excited about the next thing, and you want to be in your business more, but actually 

[00:21:38] Emma-Louise Parkes: thanks for both of us.

We built the business during the lockdown here in the UK during the pandemic. So I, I don’t have as much of the perfectionist overworking tendencies as you, but I have got an open route in human design and I do struggle to stop working. Not because I, I don’t have the perfectionist or the compulsion necessarily, but if I’m not doing anything [00:22:00] else and I’m sat there with a laptop, I’ll just keep working.

Why not? Um, so, you know, I, I left corporate and started this business to work less and found myself actually working just as much because there was nothing else to do. I mean, it’s great. It enabled us to build businesses very quickly and. You to dedicate that time to them during the pandemic, but also then knowing when to say, oh, well actually the lockdown is over now and I can go up.

So I’m going to close the laptop earlier. Cause it’s easy just to get into that habit of I’m working, I’m working, I’m working. And then as you say, that creeps in, that was something that definitely crept into me. It’s like, well, what if, what if I stop? I’m not going to be as productive. I’m not going to reach as many people.

I’m not going to sign as many clients. 

[00:22:42] Aimee Browne: Do I want it enough? Am I committed enough? 

[00:22:45] Emma-Louise Parkes: Am I committed enough? Because I’d like to close the laptop at four o’clock 

[00:22:48] Aimee Browne: today, all of those crazy thoughts 

[00:22:52] Emma-Louise Parkes: and it’s, it’s insane. Whereas now I’m, I probably got very strong boundaries about when I stopped working and, [00:23:00] you know, taking time away and all of that.

So, and it doesn’t, it doesn’t impact my business only for the good. 

[00:23:07] Aimee Browne: Yeah, absolutely. I think that’s something that. Developed over over time. Like when I look back to that first year in business, as you say the first year of COVID, it was like, I mean, certainly for me, it was an absolute gift, um, coming out of my corporate role from a site for slang and then to be followed, give it gave me that vehicle to transition out of my full-time job to work my business full time.

I have a site. Yeah, this is it. This is my moment. You gotta go all in. You’ve gotta go. Uh, God just said it again. He said, oh, you gotta go all in. It’s a hundred percent Amy. Yeah, I can’t even remember what we’re talking about. We were talking about boundaries went way about overworking and, and stuff, and it did it merged, it merged the barrel and jeez, you ended up [00:24:00] working longer hours.

And I think when the wild did start to open up again, I was like, gosh, what does this whole new routine look like? What does my life actually look like as a full time working entrepreneur, I’m sick to death of the four walls of my, of my house. I’m really missing human connection. And, um, yeah, that, that was really challenging as well to find a new routine.

And also, I know that we’ve had conversations about who we are outside of our businesses in terms of like, what are our passions? What are our hobbies? So easy to actually not be in your business and that, and sit and consume business books and that spark new ideas and it’s all of the cycles. So actually you still feel quite consumed by your business, bother them.

Yeah. In. Going out and have an experience is. Painting a picture or

[00:24:59] Emma-Louise Parkes: we’re like Googling [00:25:00] lists of hobbies, generators. So both say driven needs creative. And I realized, I was like, what was my hobby? When I was in corporate, I was like, oh, it was building my business. 

[00:25:11] Aimee Browne: Oh no, we got to, we got to play in the drums ever used to play the drums. 

[00:25:15] Emma-Louise Parkes: I did used to play the drums. I love playing the drums.

And then I ate, I still got a bad association with playing the drums because, um, I slipped a disc in my neck and I remember it was painful. I didn’t know what I’d done it painful. And they went for a drum lesson. Because you’re crossing your arms over it, really, really pulling on it. And then that whole thing resulted in a lot of pain and drugs and surgery and, and things.

So I don’t think I’ve quite got, I think I’ve worked through the trauma of that yet, but I did love to play the drum, 

[00:25:48] Aimee Browne: you know, and I’ve just thought in that moment, ying and yang take it. We start a band. You could do the drum thing because singing cause singing is [00:26:00] my passion. You know, I started my singing lessons.

Um, there you go. And you, and you 

[00:26:07] Emma-Louise Parkes: Ave to explore businesses. Aren’t keeping us busy. Gosh, but gosh, but habits, like some people like to say they like to paint or they like to draw or, oh, I don’t know. They like to do geocashing or whatever. These things like none of this, it just doesn’t do it for me. I do Lyft.

So that is something that I’ve been leaning into more, especially at the weekends when I’m switched off. I like to cook from scratch, you know, chop it all up, all the ingredients and make it quite an event 

[00:26:37] Aimee Browne: mindful, mindful activity. I always like to think, I really I’ve just got some new knives discussing two knives for Christmas.

It’s just having just that mindful activity. And I think that’s the thing tuning into your senses and what you’re doing in that moment, so that you’re in the moment and not in your business. So [00:27:00] I really love that. I, yeah, I really love the cooking too. 

[00:27:03] Emma-Louise Parkes: Also, something you touched on there that I’m going to add is not reading business books.

Either like at a certain time of day, like once you’ve closed the laptop or maybe like, for me, I don’t read them at the weekend. So when I have my detox, like one of the days I’ll still have my phone and text people and things, and I’ll listen to podcasts and read books, but not business related. So I always do that in the week, but I need to make sure that I’ve got a couple of days at the weekend where I’m not consuming business stuff, because if you consume, you can’t create in the same way.

So it’s really important. Emotionally and mentally to have that break from it. 

[00:27:39] Aimee Browne: Absolutely. And you know, that’s something I did and still do quite a lot of actually is limit consumption. So I know for example, you have quite a lot muted and stuff out on social platforms, which I do more and more. I have time limits sat on my Instagram and things like that.

So as you say, are, I’m being rude, intentional about what I’m going to go and do on the platform. But [00:28:00] outside of my, in my day-to-day, I actually stopped listening to all podcasts and things for quite a while because I had enough, I had enough to do in my business. I was so focused on what I was doing. And I just found that listening to podcasts.

Of course, we want you to tune into this phone number. Um, it’s fine. Yes, yes. Yeah, it’s fine. Um, yeah, listening to podcasts, reading books all the time. I would be thinking some times, gosh, I’ve not got that figured out, oh, I need to do that. Or yeah. Generating all of those ideas of how I could improve or do this thing.

And you already got a never-ending list of things that you can always of course improve and unquantified and all this thing in your business. And sometimes you just need to quieten the noise. And at that point, I needed to really tune into myself and learn how to build my inner trust and deepen my intuition and all of those types of things.

So consumption was [00:29:00] something that I’ve really, really had to limit. And as I say, I still do. I’m still quite tight on that now. And as you say, I’ve actually switched out some of my books. So I’m getting really lost in. A really nice novel that’s about something completely different and it expands my mind in a different way and enables me to just kind of relax.

Um, that’s definitely really helped because honestly, when I was working my day job, every waking moment outside, and even probably that first year, if I’m going for a walk, it’s a podcast. If I’m even doing jobs around the house and the family on that, it’s another podcast. It’s something I’m learning. I’m doing the Inn, I’m doing a digital course.

Um, if I’m sitting down and doing a book and it is just a lot, it is, but you literally are then consumed. And when you’re with your family, well, my family I’ve got, I’ve got children, but, um, I was like vacant. I was like there, but not [00:30:00] there. And that’s not how I, that’s not how I want to. I want to be sorry.

That was definitely a change. And as you say about the creation 

[00:30:08] Emma-Louise Parkes: yeah. You don’t realize how much. But consuming things stops you being creative. And that’s a mistake that I definitely made earlier on in the business is, you know, waking up and open an Instagram and looking at what other people are doing and then going, I don’t know what to write.

I, apart of not knowing what to write it’s I wasn’t clear on my ideal client. I wasn’t clear on the transformation that I was providing. You know, we’ve, we’ve caught that sorted now, but if you don’t know those things, you’re going to find, create and very difficult. But then when you consume other people’s, it becomes this world in your head.

And especially, I think I know I have, you know, you have. You’ve just said, a lot of my clients have this, like, ah, I don’t know enough. Like there’s more, I should be doing this. You listened to a podcast. And someone talks about, I know digital course and you’re like, oh, I need a course. I haven’t got like, we can use this consumption as a way of feeling like not enough with, with [00:31:00] everything.

And actually when we stopped doing it and we just trust what we’ve got inside, we’ve got more than enough ideas and information to be able to go and, you know, create a post that someone could read and really connect with that’s it can just be that 

[00:31:14] Aimee Browne: simple. Absolutely. I think that has been. That’s been quite a journey for me in terms of, again, one of my stories and perhaps, you know, I’m not very, I’m not just not very good at writing.

I’m not very good at content creation. Um, you know, I, I’m definitely, I show up on lies or show up on video, um, that comes more natural to me than writing, even though I’m an, a star English student, I’m very, I’m more than capable. And actually if I just get out of my head, which that’s my natural go-to is, you know, analytical, logical.

I want to see it laid out, you know, system process. That that is probably more in my natural [00:32:00] thing. But actually when I find, you know, spending more time with myself and connecting more to my heart, to my call and shutting out the noise, oh my God, it’s much. It is honestly, and it just any flows when you connect to your ideal client and what you’re really passionate about and how you think about how you might have served somebody this week or that question and what you really want to support them, where then how, you know, you can help me.

Nobody knows everything. That’s the thing. You only know what you know, but all you’re trying to do is your best. We’re all just trying to do our best for, or just trying to support who we want to help and create impact in our own way. And so quiet and in the normal. And changing the story for myself. It’s been so, so important.

And the enjoyment that I now get, because yeah, as a, as a generator, frustration is [00:33:00] not just complete blocker, complete blocker to my creativity. So I have to be really mindful about, um, getting in that frustrated state. So how can I, how can I change? How can I be more creative and really problem solve around how I can make this easier for myself and change it.

So, and that has took me to probably just to the last couple of months in all honesty to get to that place where I can just really flow, get in a fire flow and write an email that has took me two years to get to the tune of eight years practice