🥳 Hey, Kasey here! Welcome to this week’s 🏔High Growth Founders🏔 newsletter.
Every email is full of actionable content designed to help you grow your self and your business. I sometimes have affiliate links, but only for products I genuinely love and use myself. If you haven’t already, subscribe to get each issue delivered right to your inbox.👇
In this issue:
What’s with the 🏔?
Creating the roadmap to Future You
The tool every person working from home needs. I truly don’t know how I’d record my podcast without this.
HGF interview with Roman Gonzalez — Success through belief in your own exceptionalism
Twitter thread to build your confidence
You might have noticed in the headline and subject line of the newsletter a new element, the mountain: 🏔.
This serves two purposes.
To help you identify the High Growth Founders newsletter, so you, hopefully, get excited when you see it in your e-mail every week.
To remind you that, as an entrepreneur, you are climbing a mountain. A beautiful, lofty one, but still one that requires grit, tenacity, and perseverance to scale.
Growth Insight of the Week:
Be, do, have.
A friend of mine, who also happens to be a powerful transformational coach, says this is the secret to life. In order to have what we dream of, we first must become the person who has such things, do the things they do, and then we will have the things, opportunities, and experiences they have.
Embodiment comes first.
Most of us have been taught a different order.
Do, have, become.
We are taught, especially in the startup and entrepreneurial world, to emphasize action. A worthy goal to be sure, but it misses the mark and sets us up for disappointment.
This is especially true when we struggle with insecurity, imposter syndrome, or fear. In that case, we will bring the energy of fear with us and it will block our ability to attract what we want in life.
Even James Clear, in his seminal work, Atomic Habits — the best book about habit formation and design — talks about how identity can play an influential role in habit design.
If you want to start exercising more, identifying as an athlete or a dedicated gym-goer is the key. Because when it gets tough — which it inevitably does — this identity can empower you to stay consistent.
When the alarm goes off at 5:30 am and you want to hit snooze, or simply turn it off, if you still think of yourself as the out-of-shape person who begrudgingly exercises, you are a lot more likely to sleep in. If instead, you self-identify as the person who always gets up and goes to the gym, you’re more likely to make it happen.
Identifying as Future You
When you imagine what you want in your life and business, who is the person who could make it happen? What do they do every day? What books do they read? What do they eat? How do they take care of their body? What do they wear? What are their habits, routines, and practices?
How do they get help in their life? What do they do every day and what do they, instead, delegate to others?
What do they do every day that you don’t?
What do you do every day that they stopped doing long ago?
Can you imagine this future you and become that Future You?
I’ve thought about this idea of identifying and describing future you to create a roadmap to become them for a long time and was reminded of this concept recently.
I’ve been reading the book, We Should All Be Millionaires by Rachel Rodgers — highly recommend it, by the way, a motivating and inspiring read. In it, she shares a story about falling in love with a beautiful $2.7M house and coming to the realization that while she ultimately didn’t need to live in a mansion quite that big, she did dream of a $1M home and the space, luxury, status, and beauty it could bring to her life.
She started to imagine what she wanted in her life and mapped out the budget she would need to make it happen.
The mortgage and insurance for her $1M home
The car payment for a Mercedes SUV
Private school for her kids
Help around the house — a maid and babysitters
Savings and investments
Once she figured out the take-home salary she would need to earn to live this dream life, she realized it wasn’t as high as she thought. And was fully within the realm of possibility for her.
She brainstormed all the ways she could increase her income to get to that level. And within 2-3 years she was there. But it wasn’t just about the money.
She also started making investments in her personal life that empowered her to start showing up in her professional life like the badass CEO she was actively evolving into.
She started with getting her hair cut more often. And finally trading in her old maternity clothes for an upgraded wardrobe that made her feel stylish and confident.
Quickly she began attending more events and recording marketing videos that helped build her brand awareness and make important connections to grow her business.
What changes can you make in your life and business that would empower you to embody the person, the founder, and the leader you dream of being?
What do you desire from others?
Another way to think about this concept of embodiment is to consider what you most desire from others. In Brianna Wiest’s book, The Mountain Is You: Transforming self-sabotage into self-mastery — another good read, especially if you’re on a personal growth journey and ready to let go of the behaviors that hold you back in life — she encourages us to give ourselves what we most want from others.
Personally, I get most upset when I feel someone is disrespecting me, either by lying, hiding things from me, or not following through on commitments without apologizing.
When sitting with this feeling, I realized its source is my own lack of self-worth. And I started to imagine what it would look like to treat myself as though I am worthy. Worthy of love, care, attention, respect.
I have a long track record of putting myself last.
Following my dog attack 2 years ago, I put on 20 pounds from medical complications. I can barely fit in any of my clothes and yet, have barely bought anything new — and certainly nothing that makes me feel professional, stylish, and confident.
I am slow to clean my house and don’t hire someone to help despite being able to afford it. I am more likely to keep working than make myself a healthy meal and priortize an invigorating workout (though I’m getting better at this). The list goes on and on.
I know the future me whom I dream of treats herself like a queen. She’s fit and healthy. She lives in a clean, organized, and beautiful home. She hires help to run her home and personal life more smoothly. As a big picture thinker, she delegates execution and detail focused tasks at work to ensure she focuses on her zone of genius. She says ‘no’ to projects and opportunities that don’t suit her so she can go big on the ones that do.
No, she still isn’t perfect, but she intentionally designs her life to maximize what energizes her, cultivates a sense of peace in her environment, and celebrates the simple things in her day-to-day.
As I intentionally work to embody my future self, I commit to a few things:
Improving my home to make it easier to stay clean, organized, and stress free. I want my home to feel like a beautiful sanctuary instead of a cute, but disorganized mess.
Investing in a stylist to help me rethink my wardrobe and find some clothes that fit my new body and make me feel like the confident and stylish leader I am.
Deconstruct my projects and commitments to ensure nothing I do feels ‘meh’ and reserve my time only for the people and activities that are a resounding ‘fuck yeah!’
How can you recreate your life to embody Future You?
#1. Imagine your Future You.
This requires a certain level of self-awareness. Before you can embody Future You, you must decide who you want to become? Who are they? Spend time getting to know yourself and dream big about where you want to go.
#2. Get curious about what can change
Notice the aspects of your life causing you the most stress, anxiety, or insecurity. Do you look in the mirror and complain about the same thing every time? Do you get so frustrated by the mess or disorganization in your house that it fills you with dread?
What are these things that you begrudgingly tolerate? By the way, these are also known as ‘tolerations’ and could be a whole newsletter issue someday because…damn…are they pesky and do they destroy your mood and energy.
#3. Do the “Chart Your Vision” exercise.
Write down all the thoughts and dreams you have about Future You. In 7 years, what do you want to have accomplished?
Try writing a short story about a day in your future life. From the moment you wake up until the moment you fall asleep. Be detailed. How do you wake up? The sun? An alarm?
What kind of bed are you sleeping in? What kind of sheets are you lying in? Who’s lying next to you? When you put your feet on the floor to get up, what does it feel like against your bare feet?
How do you spend your day? What are you doing? What projects are you wrapping up? What projects are you preparing for? Who do you spend time with? What are you wearing? What are you eating?
Write it all down.
#4. Advice from Future You
Now imagine if Future You transported themselves back into the present day. What about your life today would they immediately insist you change? Use their wisdom to inform your game plan about how to change your life.
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These four steps will transform you. They give you the roadmap to begin to embody the you that has achieved all your dreams. Future You.
This is the first step in be, do, have.
Once you have your roadmap, send me a message by replying here or DMing me on Twitter. I want to hear what you uncover, so I can help you create that plan to get there.
If you enjoy High Growth Founders, please share it with your network or another Founder who could use a dose of inspiration or an idea to spur their growth.
Growth Tool I Love:
My dog is impossibly sweet, but also kind of a pain in the ass. She’s a bird dog and she is always on patrol. Plus, I live on a busy street, so there’s a lot of foot traffic and cars whizzing by. This means she barks a lot during the day.
I used to absolutely HATE having to constantly apologize for her need to yell at the mailman. Until I started using Krisp. Seriously, this thing is a godsend. Madchen can even bark while I’m recording a podcast and even my audio engineer can’t tell. It’s a miracle.
It’s a super cool AI tool that eliminates background noise. And it’s inexpensive. They have a free option though it has some limitations. I pay $60 per year, which is worth every last penny.
HGF Episode of the Week:
This week’s episode is an interview with Roman Gonzalez, Founder and CEO of Gardenio, a startup creating a digital model of one of the oldest social communities of modern day society — the garden club.
Not only did I find his business fascinating as hell — it even convinced me I could get the help I need to develop a green thumb of my own — but his story about how they eventually got into Techstars was a downright rollercoaster.
We dive deep into the need to believe in yourself even when things get tough.
This one will inspire you. I guarantee it.
Listen now! Online | Apple | Spotify
As always, thanks for reading. I know your time is precious and I’m grateful you spend a few moments of it with me each week.
Please, let me know if there is anything I can do to support you. Any day.
In love and growth,
Kasey
If this issue of High Growth Founders resonated with you, consider sharing it with a Founder who could use the uplift.