Vinyl records once considered a relic of the past, have made a surprising comeback in recent years. Despite the convenience of digital music, vinyl sales have been steadily increasing, with many music lovers preferring the warm, rich sound of a record over the cold, digital sound of a streaming service.

In 2023, Americans are pulling back on their spending due to a variety of factors. The COVID-19 pandemic and other events over the last few years have had a lasting impact on the economy, and many individuals and families are struggling to make ends meet. As a result, many people are cutting back on non-essential expenses, including coaching services. While it's understandable that people are looking to save money wherever they can, it's important to consider the value that coaches can bring to your life and your business.

As business owners, we often feel the pressure to constantly hustle, grind, and push ourselves to the limit. The fast-paced world of entrepreneurship can be exhilarating, but it can also be exhausting. In the pursuit of success, we often neglect our own well-being and fail to take the time to slow down and recharge. However, just like in working out, slowing down can actually be more effective in the long run. In this post, we’ll explore the importance of slowing down as business owners, and the similarities between slowing down in business and working out. 

As a creative professional, I've spent the last fifteen years helping clients bring their visions to life. It's been a rewarding career, but last year, I started to come to a realization: I needed to let go.

Recently, I was watching the iconic movie Apollo 13 with my father-in-law. He and I are both massive fans of aeronautics, the space program, and space exploration. As I was watching the film, for the umpteenth time, I recognized a powerful lesson in the final voiceover just before the credits rolled. It was two words that caught my attention, and that seemed fitting for us as business owners and entrepreneurs. Two words remind us of some valuable lessons about overcoming failure and achieving success.

At Ärtful, I’ve been building on a dream I’ve had since one fateful day in 2016. I worked at an ed-tech startup that was a magical company filled with amazing, talented people, and supported fellow creatives and craftspeople by sharing their expertise through online educational videos. It was the third startup I had helped get to acquisition.

This week’s blog is going to be a little different. I want to tell you a story — with a little bit of help from my dear friend, Jude Schweppe. 

Last week I continued sharing insights from “Stutz”, the recent documentary by Jonah Hill on Netflix. I started with Part X, the villain in our story. Then I broke down some of the tools that Phil Stutz, Hill’s therapist, uses to help Jonah and others on their journey in life, like The Snapshot, The Maze, and The Shadow. This week I’m going to share the final set of tools Stutz provides that focus predominantly on acceptance as well as some visual exercises you can use to break out of overwhelm, get into a flow, and even process loss.

A few weeks ago I shared why we’re miserable and what I’ve been learning about Positive Intelligence, our Master Judge, and his nine Saboteur buddies. I shared a link to an assessment so you can learn more about your saboteurs and which ones show up the most in your life. Since then, I’ve been learning about the five different Sage Powers that we have inside us, which are Empathize, Explore, Innovate, Navigate, and Activate (this is your Jedi Mind Training, laser-focused and confident).

How do you handle prospects and leads? Do you send countless cold emails in the DMs with a tailored-yet-generic template that rarely gets a response? Do you do anything but make cold calls to complete strangers to ask them if they could use your services? Do you put off calling clients about more work because you hate selling your services, and would rather be making, creating, or designing instead?

It’s been a few weeks since I shared THE SIXTH DECISION FOR SUCCESS from Andy Andrew’s book, “The Traveler’s Gift”. Ok, be honest. Reading the last decision was a bit hard to do every day, wasn’t it? It’s longer than the other decisions and it takes things to a whole other level by diving into the very real and very difficult topic of forgiveness. I missed a couple of days myself during the three-week exercise. It’s ok.

Over the last few years, we have seen some of the worst sides of humans. Things are shifting back to normal for some people and for others not so much. I’ve had tons of conversations with people over this year about the discoveries we’ve had since our world got flipped upside down. No, not that upside down, thank goodness.

Life isn’t a marathon or a sprint. It’s a series of sprints.

I’m a member of the Elevated Coaches Academy, helmed by Raylen Davis. He is a powerful coach and has brought a group of gifted, purpose-driven coaches together that are making an impact in the world. Recently he shared an interesting insight that he learned from his wrestling coach when he was younger.

It’s been a few weeks since I shared THE FIFTH DECISION FOR SUCCESS from Andy Andrew’s book, “The Traveler’s Gift”. I hope you’ve been following along with this journey. These decisions and the insights they convey are powerful and truly life-changing. It can be tough starting a new habit, but by reading a decision daily for several weeks and the entire seven decisions over twenty-one weeks will establish a simple, quick habit to support your life in a meaningful way. 

Do you feel like if you did map out your process you’d be boxed in or a conformist? As creative beings, many of us don't like to paint in the lines or feel constrained. We like to be free to create.