Creating and Connecting With Your Vision (for Business and Life)
In the early years of my business, I asked one business coach after another, how do you create a vision for your business, keep it, and remember it? I can’t tell you how many times I wrote out a vision for my business, so excited about it only to forget it a week later.
These coaches couldn’t help me. Few understood the craziness of my brain (thankfully, I’ve met many other fellow crazies over the years) and that I would need to fight to find, understand, and connect with my core purpose and create a vision for my work.
It’s only been in the past few years that my core purpose and vision for my work have developed into something that I could see, understand, and connect with. I can see now who I want to be as a business owner and the type of business I want to have. There are a million gazillion reasons it has taken so long, but the biggest reason is that I wasn’t ready. I wasn’t ready…
- To do the deep dive and get to know myself as a business owner, who I wanted to be as a leader, mentor, or guide.
- To accept that I could step into these roles and actually help the businesses I come into contact with and help them find clarity and direction in their business.
- To push past the fear and do it, anyway.
- To keep acting, assessing, adjusting, and pivoting when necessary (sorry… couldn’t resist referring to last week’s post!)
What to Do When Your Clarity Dissolves Into Doubts
And it will. There are days, and even seasons when our clarity and purpose dissolve into fear and doubt. Even as I’ve gotten clarity, asked the tough questions, and finally understood what I want to do when I grow up, it’s taken a next-level fight to keep it.
Too often, the mission and plans that were so clear yesterday dissolve into doubt and questions today. So what do we do?
1) Remember: Clarity comes through action not thought
Clarity looks great on paper and sounds good when we talk about it, but until we take action and take a step forward in faith that clarity has no life, it’s only a stagnant, lifeless idea.
When we feel our clarity fade from view, taking action on the plans we created often helps bring it back into focus. It doesn’t have to be a huge giant action step, it can be something small that reminds you that you are heading in the right direction.
2) Document it:
Have a visual reminder of your vision. We live in a visual world, a world where pictures on Pinterest, Instagram, and Facebook tell stories, often with few words. A vision board can be an effective tool to use where you document in pictures your vision and what you would like to accomplish.
My way of documenting my vision and clarity has been in developing my Clarity Business Map, which has helped me more than anything else I’ve tried in the past. I needed something that I could pull out and remind myself of what I’m working on and where I’m headed. This map fills that need perfectly.
It’s nothing fancy. Right now it is just plain text on white paper. What makes it so helpful is that it includes meaningful reminders like verses, quotes, my core purpose, my core values, my current word of the year, whom I serve, the problems I help them solve, and how. Reading through this helps clear the cobwebs of doubt and get back on track.
3) Ask for Help:
Your business is a personal journey, and it takes a community to get you through it – I can’t tell you what a difference it has made to surround myself with other women business owners who get this crazy journey I’m on and the struggles we all encounter along the way. (Life is the same, and I wrote about that here.)
When my clarity fades, when my fear raises its ugly head, and when my imposter syndrome is running rampant, I can reach out and ask for help, and they can ask me.
And thank goodness, because I had to do this just today. Reached out to a friend and told her my fear and imposter syndrome were keeping me from moving forward on an idea. She understood and told me you’ve got this. What a gift!
These are just a few of the reasons I started the Selah Mastermind and soon the Selahpreneur Club. I often create what I need and share it with others.
The Selah Mastermind is a small but amazing community of supportive, creative women who reach out and ask for help and give it in return.
The Selahpreneur Club will focus on helping women develop their own Business Clarity Map to help them become intentional and confident business owners. (Phew, I’m talking about it!!! My fear and imposter syndrome have kept me from talking about this new program)
Is there an area of your life where your clarity is dissolving into doubt?
Do you need to take action, document it, or ask for help?
Marta Goertzen is an entrepreneur, writer, WordPress Website developer, and nature photographer. She daily explores the trails and beaches of the South Central Oregon Coast with her dogs Oliver & Mochi. You can follow along on their adventures on Instagram. Marta also fully believes that change starts with gratitude and that gratitude can change everything. Find out how with the “Grateful Friday 7-Days of Gratitude Starter Kit”