Intuitive Impact

The Female Entrepreneur's Guide To Ditching The Doubts, Unlocking What's Already Inside You, And Creating A More Confident, Aligned And Intuitive Impact On Your Terms

Michelle Kerr

• Publisher: Wellbeing Weekly
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9780645191219
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Women in Business
• Index: Business

The female entrepreneur's guide to conquering the past, embracing the present and manifesting the future. Through Michelle's own stories of business and personal growth coupled with her insights and knowledge, you will be lovingly guided to release what's keeping you stuck, step into your full potential and attract the income and impact you deserve. This is the perfect handbook and reminder for anyone who wants to reclaim their power, trust in their capabilities and show up more powerfully for themselves, others and their business.

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Part 1 - Conquer the Past

1

The Masks We Wear

‘Muuuuuuum! Come and be my customer!’ I shouted out across the house. I was barely eight years old and I’d just put the finishing touches on my latest business venture.

This time it was a fancy restaurant serving up my plastic food toys. I would make my mum and brother sit down and choose their meals from the menu, so I could indulge in running my fully fledged restaurant from the lounge room. Hilarious to me now, because my cooking skills are less than stellar.

Over the next couple of years, I engaged in numerous ‘play’ businesses that were often sparked by the toys/gifts I received. They included ‘Shellz Soaps’ where I sold soaps from a soap making kit, nail design with my range of nail polishes, a book store selling my parents’ collection of books and of course a six month period where I was a stay at home mum with my new Baby Born doll pretending the garage was my house.

What was apparent from an early age, was my imagination and motivation to run my own business. I loved the idea of bringing my own ideas and creations to life and having people be interested in what I had to offer them.

My dad started a business when I was young, so I grew up around business and used to love visiting his office and playing with the invoice pad and cash register. I was always destined to end up running my own business—but then…I grew up.

Fast forward into my high school years and I became a part of the societal system of the ‘work hard at school, go to university, get a good job, retire’ mentality. There was nothing taught at school that fostered my entrepreneurial spirit and everything became focused on what university you could get into.

When I was nominated as Senior School Captain (the school’s elected spokesperson and female leader) in my final year, the pressure to perform only became more important as I was representing the school image. By that time, I’d fallen in love with psychology and despite knowing there was a set path ahead of ‘work hard, go to university, get a job’ for me there was also an additional step before the ‘retire’ part—a burning goal to run my own psychology practice by thirty years old.

But little did I know, there would be a lot of shedding of expectations, writing my own rules, and removal of masks along the way that would lead me onto a slightly different path…

The Masks We Wear

What if I told you that you were wearing a number of masks in your life? What would you think? Maybe you would laugh it off and think I’m ridiculous for suggesting such a thing, or maybe you would have a deeper knowing that it was true.

As we create our reality each day, we go about our lives conforming to rules and social expectations of what to think, feel and act. We’re told directly or indirectly what is appropriate and what is taboo, strange, illegal or immoral.

Over time we learn to fit into the molds of society and this is where we begin to don our masks. Different faces, attitudes and behaviours for different situations.

The problem with this is we can get so lost behind the masks that we wear, that we forget to show up as our true selves—without any mask at all.

The Collective

Whether you realise it or not, our society or the ‘collective’ dictates a large amount of what is considered normal and appropriate. Different cultures, religions, political parties, and sport supporters all have their own rules and social norms that dictate behaviour within that group—and ultimately a person’s life. We’re governed by rules and laws, kept in line by enforcement agencies, and raised in certain ways by our parents.

What many fail to realise for the majority or entirety of their lives, is that this is all a façade. It’s a creation of order by other humans, with chains of authority and income levels that separate people into particular groups. Sometimes you’re placed into a group that you don’t want to be part of—such as: unemployed, homeless, incarcerated or terminally ill—and might take on norms or behaviours that society comes to know (and expect) of these groups.

The good news is that you get to choose your reality. You get to choose what behaviours and ‘group think’ you take on board for yourself, and how you ultimately want to show up in your life.

I’m not saying you can show up to work naked, break into a shop and steal some stuff or start skipping on your taxes. But for many of the things that society tells us we should or shouldn’t do because of the mold we ‘fit’ into, you have the choice to take it or reject it.

In order to have a more intuitive impact, it’s time to start challenging the collective. It’s time to start thinking about what it is that you truly want and the kind of life you want to lead—and get ready to rise up to claim it for yourself.

The Roles We Play

Have you ever had moments where you feel like you’re living someone else’s life? Or moments where you wonder why or who you’re really doing it all for? I definitely have. As a perfectionist growing up, I was all about making others happy and proud of me. I worked hard in school so my parents would think I was smart and loveable. I stayed in jobs that were beneath me because I thought I had to ‘work my way up.’

I took on countless responsibilities and loaded my schedule with multiple jobs, study and business ideas so that people would see me as successful and driven. It wasn’t until years later, as you’ll see in this book, that I actually stopped and asked myself, ‘What do you want?!’

I knew what I didn’t want…I didn’t want to have to ‘prove’ myself, I didn’t want my adrenals to be on fire, I didn’t want to miss family events and be too busy to see friends for months and I didn’t want to miss out on the life that was right infront of me—my twenties! All because I was striving for external validation and success. I realized that it wouldn’t matter what I did with my time, I would still be loved and valued by the people that matter. And that’s when I committed to stop doing what I thought I should be doing, and started doing what I wanted to be doing. It wasn’t long after that Wellbeing Weekly was born—the work that I needed to be doing, not only for all of you, but also for me.

We play many different roles throughout our lifetime. Daughter, friend, mother, partner, business owner, football supporter…and each of the different roles we play requires different aspects of our personality or different ways in which we show up. You might not act the same in your business or workplace as you would when you’re at a bar with the girls, or at the local kids sport event. Again, we tend to adapt our personalities and our behaviour depending on the environment and situation.

There’s nothing wrong with being in these roles or changing your behaviour across roles…but where it can become problematic from a soul and authenticity perspective is when you lose your sense of self in the process. When you play along with what everyone else expects of you, and forget what things would look like if they were how you wanted. Perhaps you wouldn’t volunteer for the school carnival, or resist putting your kids in daycare, or hold back on how you feel with your friends.

It’s important to see what roles we play in the first place. Many people go through life and don’t really think about what they do or why they do it. So this isn’t about stepping away from everything in your life, but it’s about making sure it’s serving you and allowing your true self to shine through. That all the things you’re doing are ultimately making you happy…or whether there’s some role adjustments or replacements that need to take place.

When I started putting more of my own needs first and was honest about how I wanted to show up in my personal and professional life, I felt huge shifts that allowed me to step into a new way of both being and doing, and feel good about the process and the results.

Women in Society

It’s hard to talk about roles and masks in society without talking about how being a woman effects this. Historically, women have been seen as homemakers and not worthy of things like voting, running businesses or pursuing their dreams. As this has slowly evolved and women have started rising up and demanding equality, some expectations of women have adjusted and others have remained. Especially as mothers, there is an underlying expectation and pressure in society for women to effectively care for their children and also more commonly these days to contribute financially.

Many women I speak to feel the stretch to manage their children and family life, while also trying to run their business or be present in their job, and it often feels like there’s not enough hours in the day. It’s worthwhile thinking about how gender roles and expectations play out in your life, and whether you feel like there is an imbalance with the responsibilities placed on your shoulders.

A popular term that has been adopted by many women lately is that of the ‘mental load’. This refers to the list of tasks, responsibilities, deadlines etc. that accumulate in a woman’s brain. Of course this can be an issue for men too, but it is commonly being associated with the burden and expectations placed on women’s shoulders to be the primary caretaker, cleaner, cook and manager of the household. Things like remembering to pick up medication, new school socks, send out that work email, put three versions of dinner on the table for fussy eaters, book the vet appointment, pick up some bananas on the way to work—and all of the seemingly small little tasks that get done in the background but that pile up in a woman’s brain making for a heavy load.

As we see a wave of women starting their own businesses and working from home, there is suddenly far more opportunity for women to make money while also caring for their children. But this also increases the list of responsibilities and tasks to manage, if you’re expected to maintain the majority of household tasks while also managing a business.

Like with everything, there needs to be a balance (or as close as we can get to this often cringy word), and we can’t do it all…even though we’d like to think we can! I truly believe with the right supports, systems and strategies, women can successfully grow their businesses while also growing their families and there doesn’t need to be a ‘choice’ between the two. Perhaps that means certain sacrifices, and letting go of guilt or shame around some of those ‘societal expectations’ of what it means to be a mother. Like asking for help, getting childcare support or sharing more of the load with y...