Let’s chat about the concept of work. More specifically, how to make your business FUN and redefine what it means to actually work.

I want to give my perspective on what it actually means to work less, because I think there is this kind of misconception that when people talk about working less, that they mean putting less physical hours into something. 

And whilst there are many cases where this is the pursuit

When it comes to the concept of free time, or work time versus leisure time.

I think the reality is that it’s all just time. And it’s a matter of perspective as to how you spend that. 

We all have the exact same amount of hours in the day. Nobody has more, nobody has less. There is literally no way that we can stop time, slower time, make it go faster. It is just time. It is what it is. It is solid. And it is always moving. 

How we choose to spend that time is a matter of perspective. 

When it comes to working less, in my opinion, it’s not always about “doing less.”

We’re all going to spend our hours doing something, whether it’s sleeping, whether it’s eating, whether it’s watching Netflix, whether it’s recording a podcast, whether it’s going horse riding, whether it’s underwater basket weaving, whatever you’re going to fill those hours, doing something.

But, how you view those hours spent is up to you.

If you did like this episode be sure to screenshot and share on Instagram and of course tag me + Elley, @erinmayhenry and @elleymae.

Here’s how I built a business that feels “less work”:

Chose your perspective

What do you consider to be work? 

For example, running, for some people, is hard work. It is extremely difficult. It is extremely draining. They don’t enjoy it. 

To others, running is pure bliss, a meditation, if you will. 

And so the same concept or the same action to two people can be classified for one as hard work. And for the other, as meditation, as something that fills their soul. 

It’s all a matter of perspective. It’s all a matter of personal joy, of personal opinion. 

And so when it comes to your business, it’s a matter of perspective as to whether or not what you are doing is “work.” 

Now, I don’t want to be the person to create a false representation that you don’t need to do anything in order to make money online. Because you do, you do, you have to do a lot of stuff. 

You have to build an audience. You have to be frequent with your content creation. You have to be consistent with your content creation. You have to show up. You have to create products. You have to sell, you have to launch, you have to do all the things, all of the things that are required to build a business. 

Now, for some people, they follow these very, very traditional concepts and ideas that anything that makes you money is work right? 

But we don’t live in that time-space anymore. We don’t live in the time-space where you’re punching a card. You know, you’re clocking in, you’re sitting down, you’re doing the hours. Honestly, it is really, really important that you recognize that you have the freedom of choice. 

You have the freedom to be able to build a business that you enjoy so that you can work less because the things that you’re doing can be classified as leisure.

Let’s break down what a normal week looks like for me. 

First, I have a lot of client calls.  And the way these client-calls generally run are I sit down with either a group of people or one on one. And I am, for the most part, talking about things that I like, you know, I’m having conversations about life, about business, about mindset. 

I create content, you know, my Instagram reels my stories, again, pretty much just showing up with a camera on my face, doing a bunch of talking about a bunch of stuff that I enjoy.

I have team meetings with people that light me up, motivate me, and that I love talking to. 

Now, what do I do in my free time? 

Well, a lot of my free time is filled with having conversations with people about things that I enjoy. 

My perspective is that my business is my free time. And my free time is my business. Like it’s all joined into one. I don’t see a lot of what I do as work because it’s what I would do regardless of whether I was getting paid for it or not. And I have chosen to build my business in that way.

I have chosen to build my business, not doing things that I don’t enjoy, cutting out anything that I feel like I should do just to be successful and replacing it with things that I want to do and trusting that it is going to make me successful. 

And by society’s standards, recording this podcast, having those client calls, doing launches, recording my Instagram reels is my work because I’m getting paid for it. But just because you’re getting paid. Something doesn’t mean it has to feel like work, but it all comes down to you really embracing the concept that you’re allowed to have fun and get paid for it.

You’re allowed to, I’m giving you permission right now. I am going to be the one to stand here and say, “Hey, you stop making everything so difficult for yourself.” 

I know this is what we do. We all do it. 

You deserve everything you want, even if it comes easy. Relationships, business, anything in life, even if it’s simple, even if it flows and especially if it feels good. 

So we need to start changing our perspective on this, changing our perspective around the fact that you can achieve success in a way that feels good. 

You can achieve success and be deserving of it. Even if it’s not draining the living soul out of you. And you can spend your time doing things that feel like leisure, that feel like a hobby that feels like free time and still get paid for them. It takes time. 

Again, I don’t want to sit here and just say, you’re going to find your perfect formula. It took me a long time to get to this point. It took me years. As a matter of fact, to get to this point, to break through all the mindset struggles, to actually find a combination of strategies that not only made me money but actually did feel good. 

I’m not saying that this is going to be an overnight journey. You’re going to have to do a ton of experimentation because nobody, nobody can sit here and tell you what feels good for you. 

I can share all the different strategies that I have used as a business coach. I can help you explore if you join me and let’s say simply business, I am never going to sit there and say, you need to do this. You need to do that. You need to do this. I’m going to say here are all the different options that I know work. How about you go off and experiment until you find something that feels good for you?

It takes time.

Take the time to actually explore different options. Let’s break this down a little bit more so it feels a little more tangible when it comes to content creation. 

I’m going to talk about reels because you know, I love them. There are so many different ways that you can create reels. You don’t have to dance. You don’t have to point. You don’t have to do trending sounds with photos. You could do whatever feels good for you. There are so many different options. There are so many different combinations. Do what feels good for you. 

When it comes to product development, you don’t have to do one-on-one coaching. You don’t have to do a done-for-you service. You don’t have to do a course, a membership. You could do a combination. You could come up with a completely different approach. 

Finding a strategy that works well for you to the point that it’s so much fun, that it doesn’t feel like work is going to take a process of exploration, of testing and trialing. 

I would rather take two
years to find a strategy that feels extremely good for me than build a business that was “financially successful” from the beginning, but then makes me feel like I’ve pigeonholed myself, makes me feel like I’ve got no room for expansion. That makes me feel like I’m trapped and working in my business. I don’t want to work in my business. I don’t want to work at all. 

I’m going to work on my business by being creative and having fun and vibing with life and for it just to work because I’ve let go of the expectation that I need to hustle in order to make money. 

Be yourself

There is nothing more strenuous than performance. And when I say performance, I mean acting like somebody else. 

Being totally, totally yourself, allows you to just drop the shoulders, drop the gut out, drop the arms, drop everything, drop the F-bombs like whatever you need to do to just feel so relaxed and yourself and content.

Bring that energy online because the more that you perform or put on a facade, the more that you’re going to attract people, networks, clients, relationships that are basing your connection with them on your facade. And therefore you always need to keep up that facade. 

So how do we actually not work? 

By society standards, you’re going to work. You’re going to have to put hours in to build a successful business. You have to show up, you have to be consistent. You have to be frequent. You have to do the things. 

How do we make those things feel joyous and pleasurable and not take so much energy and drain the energy out of you? Be yourself, experiment to find a strategy that feels good for you. 

Look for someone whose strategy intuitively feels good. And try that. Learn from people who’ve already created success in that kind of way. 

You don’t have to struggle. You don’t have to hustle or sacrifice. You are worthy of making a ton of money and having a huge impact and having this incredible, incredible business without having to suffer for it. You do not need to suffer for success. And so stop letting your subconscious mind tell you that this is the case. 

We get suspicious when things are easy. And then we, what we do is we self-sabotage, we try to make it more difficult, whether it be in a relationship, whether it be in business, a friendship when things are too easy, it’s almost like when someone is gonna pull the rug out from underneath me. And so what we do is we pull it out from underneath ourselves. We make it more difficult by overthinking, by procrastinating, by being impatient, by thinking we need a different strategy by convincing ourselves that we don’t actually like it, or we don’t have good enough. Stop doing that stop. Stop it, stop doing that stuff.

You are deserving of having all of the success that you want just because you are incredible, just because you want it. And it doesn’t need to be difficult, ok? 

You can change your perspective and find a way to make it fun.

[20:00] HEAR HOW ELLEY INFUSED MORE FUN INTO HER BUSINESS

It comes down to how you want to live your life.

Because ultimately I don’t want to live my life, where I’m constantly working. I don’t want to live my life where I’m constantly on my phone or on my computer[…] I don’t want to be constantly on in my business.

I really value time with myself. I really value time in the garden, time with my dogs, time to sleep in, time to chill out in the afternoons. Like I really value downtime.

It’s balancing growing your business and establishing your business and making money and supporting your clients and all of that.

But it’s understanding that if it’s not allowing you to live the life you want to live, is it really worth it?

Make sure to tag us with this episode #chillpreneurpodcast @erinmayhenry

Follow Elley: https://www.instagram.com/elleymae/

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