Sincerely, Future You - Adversity into Opportunity
Good and bad things happen to everyone, but how we react to them — positively or negatively — is in our hands. You can turn every circumstance into something that works for you instead of against you, and learn how to change your situation for the better. Today, on Sincerely Future You, Jessica McKinley talks about how in every situation you have options to create a plan and commit to a path forward.
Sincerely, Future You on YouTube
Full Transcript
Jessica McKinley 00:00
Someone will say, Oh, well, I'm the youngest in my industry. So people don't take me seriously. Meanwhile, the other client that I have will say that they're the oldest in the industry. So people think they're out of touch. Whereas if you were presenting either of those things as your advantage, the youngest in the industry could say, I'm the most impressive person in my industry, because I'm doing this and I don't even have the same experience as them. I am cutting edge, right? Whereas the oldest in the industry could say I am the most seasoned experienced and why is this person in this industry? There is nothing that tik Tok can take away from me right.
Jessica McKinley 00:44
Welcome to sincerely future you a podcast that helps ambitious women like you make decisions today with the future you in mind.
Jessica McKinley 00:58
Hi, Happsters, I am so excited to be here, mostly because I'm thinking about maternity leave and how it is imminent, and how during maternity leave, I've set it up so that I don't have any podcast recordings, which is making me so sad because I just look forward to this time that I intentionally connect with you all. And also, of course, I get to hang out with my producer Danny. And it's just, it's such a lovely part of my week. I love coaching. And that's like the action of the application. But this is the super thinking time, this is the time when I really slow down and think about how to tell you guys something I've never told you before, or say something to you in a way that I've never quite said it before. And lately, I have been in you know, the third trimester right now I'm approaching 37 weeks, and I am not sleeping very well. So I've been writing a lot of these episodes in the middle of the night. And this one is no exception. I wrote a couple of bullet points to it. And the idea came to me in the middle of the night proximately like 3:45 am. And then I flushed out this morning. So I'm excited. These are just very inspired episodes coming to, to me from the I don't know, the motherhood part aspect of me. So just as a catch up the happening session, the September Class launch is now closed. I'm so excited about this class, I'm excited about every class, like I just always say the classes get, they get results faster and faster every round. And so it's really fun to see the high level of entrepreneurs that were applying this around, and people also that have been interested and listening for a really long time and just applying things via the podcast ready to take it to the next level for this round. So I'm so excited. I can't wait to share it with you. But now I really want to share with you something that's relevant to all of you guys. So stay tuned, I will have some definite transparency episodes coming up. Sam Laura Brown, the host of the perfectionism, or I think it's called perfectionist getting shit done podcast. She does these quarterly transparency episodes. I don't know what she calls them. I think she just gives insights behind the scenes and the numbers of her business. And I started listening to that podcast like four years ago. And I remember being like, Oh, this is so cool. Like it's so helpful to hear these numbers. And so she's the one that inspired me to always do that with you guys within my own show. And now ironically, she is in the 200k mastermind with me and I have even more access to her and to the insights of her business, I get updates monthly on where she's at with her revenue like what all the stuff is but I'm just even more inspired to give you guys more access to what it looks like on the other side of a launch. So I will be sharing all of the hurdles the things I learned the failures collected the winds soon so you can stay tuned for that.
Jessica McKinley 04:48
And also stay tuned because I have been wanting to offer a scholarship for happening sessions for BIPOC women at And so I am going to be announcing that application coming out soon. One of the beautiful things about launching SOS, so early from September is that I have lots of room in between the launch, to make other decisions to make sure that everything in this room is exactly as I wanted it to be designed. And one of those things includes diversity, I think women already are at an advantage when it comes to accessing the time and the money or really the thoughts. societally, that we can invest in ourselves in this ways, especially when we're mothers or when we are just nurturing humans that are constantly putting ourselves last. So women of color, just really have it the hardest? And, again, yes, maybe some of those things are fueled by thoughts. But I do think that thoughts can be almost like an epidemic of thoughts that are that we can get out of, but are really difficult to see as thoughts and not as certain circumstances from the outside because society backs them up. And kind of tells you know, this is a fact, it is harder for XYZ and, and your family might have a legacy or a history of evidence that this is true, or this is difficult. And this is a struggle, and it's always going to be for you. So I am so excited to offer that finally. So that will be coming soon. So stay tuned. But in the meantime, if you're looking for a transparency episode before it's up, I recently posted a live video on my Instagram, going into detail about how I troubleshot the 14k that I noticed that I was going to need during maternity leave that I didn't yet have, without working any more hours. And a lot of people had some really y questions in response to that video. And it's been starting some really great conversations. So if you want some, a look into how I handle it when the money doesn't seem to be there, but I still have an investment that I want to make in my business. Go over and listen to that episode, because it's exactly how I did it. Share every detail.
Jessica McKinley 07:25
So okay. Happster of the week, we got to shatter out Happsters of the week this week is Susan Susan Prasad. So Susan is a lawyer, amongst other things, she also flips homes. She has several businesses, and she has been one of my hamsters that I first worked with one on one and then moved to the group. And she had lots of reservations about, quote, unquote, losing all the access to me to that one-on-one time with me. And I can say until I'm blue in the fact that you guys, that's not what creates your results. But I do understand that you kind of has to experience it yourself to believe it. And she just said to me last week that she is getting results even faster in happening sessions than she did over the entire six months of us working one on one. And I'm not even offended, because that's how it's designed to be you guys. I curate the room intentionally with very specific goals. And we pare everything down. And I do think being in a room with other women, even at all different levels of their business growth, you kind of see the things, the threads that run through, that can point out, oh, wow, these things never go away. These are just human problems. These aren't business problems. And it helps you to put into context, what you do need to work on and also that there's no rush. And because of that thought your results actually speed up. It's so counterintuitive, but I was so pleased to hear this from Susan because she's one of those people that comes to the session and doesn't always raise her hand for coaching. So it's harder for me to understand for those clients that aren't, you know, journaling regularly, or, you know, tracking everything. Some people do still use the portal to gain lots of access to me in between sessions. And she's not one of those people. And I was like, I don't know if she enjoys it, she may not enjoy it, she gets results. And she's just the silent killer of the group like she's just coming in, taking notes feverishly during the sessions while other people are being coached and going and applying it and getting it done. And now out, she is also going to be in the September class and was talking about how she plans to apply it in a different way to balancing her personal life and her business life and scaling back time. Whereas money was always a focus and, you know, putting in policies and some back-end stuff. Now, it's going to be about time. So for those of you who are kind of curious, like, okay, is this like school where I go when I graduate, and then I just have all the answers. Coaching is different. It's like one of those things that you're gonna get a different thing out of it every time you apply. It's why I am in my third round of the 200k mastermind going in in August, and will am committed to six rounds of it, even though she sends the same workbook every time. I know my experience of it, of applying those answering those questions, the workbooks are going to be different every time because I'm different. I am evolving, my business is evolving. And it's the same thing for you all. So shout out to Susan, I am not at all surprised. But I'm very pleased to see how you've been applying for this work and see how you can let go of me and access me. Or having any impact on the results that you're getting. It is all about you guys, and minding your own brain and learning how to use it as the greatest resource that you have. Because it is
Jessica McKinley 11:31
alright, so let's talk about the topic today, which we're going to call it making your circumstances your advantage. Alright, so it's Gemini season, I'm learning from my business partner, Daphne, who's very in tune with the moon, and I am not. But Gemini season comes with a lot of dualities. I'm told I'm married to a Gemini. So I know this. But also, I've been very inspired by it. Because I think in dualities, which might also explain why this episode came to me in the middle of the night, how hamsters seek a big life. And that comes with a greater duality, a wider range of emotions, albeit still 5050. I always like to think of it as this graph, where you have the median that's running through that's like neutral emotion, right. And as you are experiencing life, if you're not taking risks, if you're not if you're playing very small, the line goes 5050, but just very narrow up and down, over the line, right a little bit positive emotion, a little bit negative emotion, and that feel very safe to people. Pursuing a big life doesn't just mean that you skyrocket up, it means that you skyrocket up, and it drops way down and it skyrockets up, and it drops way down. And a lot of people think that that sounds worse. And by all means, probably shut off this podcast, because if that is not the life that you want a big life is not the life that you want. You are what you're saying is I'm unwilling to experience deep negative emotion. And that is the requirement of experiencing everything big that you want to experience. You need to be willing to experience fear, like visceral fear, you need to be willing to experience failure, struggle, discomfort and constraint, and delayed gratification. And that shit hurts. It's not doesn't feel good. And I get it. That on paper, it looks a lot scarier. It looks like a wilder roller coaster. And it kind of is. But when you're the type of person that loves roller coasters and loves to like thrill seek and go into it, you start to actually neutralize the experience of going all the way down. And of going all the way up.
Jessica McKinley 14:21
Like recently I got a notification from the stripe, that multiple 10s of 1000s of dollars were being sent to my thing like the biggest number I've ever seen come in because this is the biggest launch I've ever had. And I was like, oh, and I'm not joking. Like I felt more extreme positive emotion. When I made my very first $600 As a coach than I did when I made this amount of money came in because I am so used to everything that I needed to go through in order to get here is that it's like, okay, this is part of it. This is just. And also, the more you do this, the more you realize that those results are not the point. It's just about evolving, right? So I wanted to if you're, hopefully, you're watching the YouTube, so you could see my little graph analogy. Otherwise, hopefully, you're not confused. But I love to remind myself and my clients of this duality and this varied newness when we're focusing on the negative, the more negative, this the position that they're in the starting point, the rock bottom, the emotion, the better the reward will be.
Jessica McKinley 15:41
On the flip side, for example, I have a client that had to collect 100 I kid you not, I'm not exaggerating. 100 knows before she got her first, yes, when she was making offers for a client, right? The emotion she felt creating that client that first Yes, was deep. It was profound. It was much greater than anything she could have ever accessed had the first cut console that she had said, yes. So I want you to be all-in on your negative because it doesn't deprive you of the positive. It just deepens it. I have a client, Ashley, who I've mentioned before on the podcast, who has had to overcome a ton of adversity to get into coaching, she sourced money, and she had to wait for several rounds painfully. And now she is living in the coaching. Her winds that come out of coaching feel so earned to her. There are pros and cons to every circumstance, our only job is to decide that our current circumstance is our advantage. So here's how you do it. I want to give you some examples, right?
Jessica McKinley 17:02
Because my clients come to me with these sorts of excuses, I think of them all of the time. And they're using their current circumstance as their disadvantage. That's how they're presenting it to me. Someone will say, Well, I'm the youngest in my industry, so people don't take me seriously. Meanwhile, the other clients that I have, will say that they're the oldest in the industry, so people think they're out of touch. Whereas if you were presenting either of those things as your advantage, the youngest in the industry could say, I'm the most impressive person in my industry, because I'm doing this and I don't even have the same experience as them. I am cutting edge, right. Whereas the oldest in the industry could say I am the most seasoned, experienced, and wisest person in this industry. There is nothing that Tik Tok can take away from me, right. So I see people do this with just being a beginner in general, versus being more experienced. I saw it a lot when I was doing Beachbody coaching, I would have these people come in, and they'd be beginners. And if they had this mindset of, it's my advantage, they would come in, they'd be like, Oh, I have nothing to lose. I'm just inviting people. I'm just a beginner, it's no big deal. It's it's great. And they would have all these people interested. And the more experienced people that weren't using their experience to their advantage, we're looking and being like, it's so much easier when you're a beginner because you haven't gone through your warm market yet. And people are still just excited to hear what you have to say they're not sick of what you're saying, right? Whereas the beginners that are not using beginner energy to their advantage, are looking at the experienced people and being like, Well, I'm just a beginner, I can't, I can't claim that I'm the best coach for them because they just don't have the experience yet. And they would look to other people that were more experienced and be like when I get there when I have more experience, then I'll be at an advantage. And being both beginners and experienced as a life coach a business coach and as a fitness coach back then I know that there's no a difference.
Jessica McKinley 19:25
There are different pros and cons. There are different advantages and disadvantages to every circumstance. People do this with gender. People will say, Oh, being a woman is an advantage or it's a disadvantage. Being a man is an advantage or a disadvantage. You see it all the time. So I'm a woman. Of course, I think being a woman is the best option there is. But if I was a man, I'd be like Hell yeah, being a man. It's pretty easy. So that's what right so like, it doesn't matter what's true to you. I feel like people are really good They dig their heels into their perspective. And they're like, no, no, here's all the evidence for why it's a disadvantage, or like, Why are you arguing for your limitation here? There are always two ways to look at your circumstances. And I don't understand the downside of looking at where you're at, as your advantage. Okay? Another example would be no clients versus lots of clients. Now, at face value, some people are like, well, having lots of clients, that's the advantage having no clients, there's no advantage to that.
Jessica McKinley 20:37
But I promise you, I see this all the time. My clients who have no clients are wanting to have lots of clients because they want more money, and they want more demand. And they want more consistency in the clients who have lots of clients, and they've created it, or looking at the beginning phases of their business. And they're like, Oh, I just had more time, then. I didn't appreciate it. I didn't use it as wisely. I things was simpler. They weren't so complicated, or complex. And, and people who have no staff versus staff, people that have no stuff, they want staff, people that have staff, they want no staff telling you, right? So one year into the business versus 10 years, I can go all day with the examples, you guys because this duality does not create a difference in advantage, I will always always always be able to find the advantage to where you're at. In fact, just on a walk the other day with my husband, he was talking about the place that he was at and his circumstance he was like, you cannot find it advantageous to me. He was talking about his football in his college football days, where he, you know, I think it was about his record. Like he never scored a touchdown that resulted in the winner of a game. And he's like, You can't tell me that that's an advantage. And I was like absolutely a candidate. We went back and forth. And ultimately he ended up agreeing that the emotion he felt from the one touchdown that he had his senior year that ended up creating a difference in the game was the highlight of like, the people that caught touchdowns all throughout the season, never got to feel what he felt on the field that day. And I was like you, you can't compare it because you haven't been in their shoes. But I promise you, it's an advantage. And he talks about the stories. It's such a treasured memory for him. And I'm like, I'm so glad for you. Like he was a walk-on. He wasn't expected to start and then he ended up starting like kick ass. It's so awesome. So I want you guys to find this.
Jessica McKinley 23:03
Now, I want to make a quick note here. This is not an endorsement of toxic positivity. If you don't know what that is toxic positivity is basically when you just pretend that everything is great. I'm not suggesting that you love every phase that you're in. I'm not suggesting that you think I love having no customers or I love having negative profit, right love failing to achieve my goal. You don't have to want to stay where you're at, in order to recognize and love the role that where you're at plays in where you're going. I love to dream bigger. I use my future self as my guide and evolve towards her. But I do not. Like I do not pretend that when I get there, it's going to be better there than here. One story that I tell my clients all the time, I believe I've told it once on the podcast here was when I was pregnant with my son Calvin and financially we were paycheck to paycheck constantly worried about over drafting and my car got towed. And I was supposed to it was an accident that the car got towed was in my own complex, that weird happenstance I won't go into but basically, the complex was like we're so sorry, go and get it out. And then like, we'll just take that off of your rent next month. And I didn't have the money to get my car out of the car and I can feel how I felt on that day. Like when I think about how low I fell. I was just like, how am I going to bring a child into this world and provide for this child? How am I going to do it? I don't even know how to provide for myself. I was at a real low. And I remember crying and being on my way to the sonogram appointment we had To borrow my mother and my ex-mother-in-law's car, and we were both kinds of just really stressed out, and I remembered being like, pull it together. And just the one thought I kept thinking was like, this is going to make an epic opening to my TED Talk.
Jessica McKinley 25:18
Adversity has a purpose. Failure is necessary negative emotion is required to experience its counter emotion. So don't rush to where you think it'll be better. My coach Brooke always says It's not better there than here. And I used to resent that. She said it and romance and be like, wink, wink, okay, okay, it's not better there than here. But we all know it's better. But the only thing that makes it better is the deeper understanding of the fact that you won't ever escape the human experience, that this is as good as it gets. It helps you relax into the 5050 of the pursuit of your big life. It helps you take bigger leaps, and also slow the F down. I've stopped making decisions at the expense of myself just to reach my goal. Because when I reached the new state of being, that new state is just going to shift to my advantage. It doesn't actually give me take me from a disadvantage to an advantage. It just shifts what the advantage is. So let's be where we're at. I want you to take a deep breath hampster and say, I am exactly where I meant to be. You should not have failed less or succeeded quicker. Your particular situation is your exact advantage. You just have to make sure you're finding out exactly how.
Jessica McKinley 26:52
So here's the high-quality question that I'm going to leave you with. How exactly is where you're at right now, in your business growth, or in your personal growth? Or a hybrid of both? Your advantage? Your only unacceptable answer is I don't know. Love to you. Happsters have a beautiful, amazing, super fantastic stupendous weekend.
Jessica McKinley 27:21
Hey Happters. If you want to learn more about today's topic, head over to what's happening.com forward-slash podcasts. That's what's happening. podcast that's what's happening w-h-a-t-s-h-a-p-p-y-n-i-n-g com forward slash podcast if you're a business owner and you're resonating with what we talk about here what are you even doing come hang out with me over where the party's at on Instagram at what's happening w jets again that's happy h-a-p-p-y-n-i-n-g and book a discovery call to see if coaching is your next best step
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