Winter 2014 by Shari Miller

WWW.HAPPYENTREPRENEURMAGAZINE.COM

the happy entrepreneur

NO. 05/WINTER 2014

TIPS

for urs e n e r p entre

ashley wilhite

get more done and make more money melissa dawn:

10 the girlfriend’s guide to {Finally } keeping a va by tiffany manley

habits of an orgasmically joyful entrepreneur

CONTENTS

the happy entrepreneur Tiffany

Shari

Angela

Lauren

Manley

Editor in Chief Sarah Dew

Miller

Assistant to the Editor Tiffany Manley Art Director Shari Miller Phone: 734-272-1371 E-mail. inquiries@happyentrepreneur.com Web. www.happyentrepreneurmagazinecom Sarah’s makeup: Rachel Lisa Photos of Sarah: Lauren Difulvio Stylist: Angela Harrison Style

Harrison

Difulvio

ALSO: 6.

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Rachel

Lisa

18.

30.

40.

kiva

Millicent

Ashley

Six Steps to Create a Life You Love

Top Ten Tips for Accomplishing Your Dreams

Get More Done and Make More Money

Leatherman 2

Chu

Wilhite

56. Melissa Dawn 10 Habits of an Orgasmically Joyful Entrepreneur

49.

64.

74.

Heather

Lara

Tiffany

Mindful Change

Need Title

The Girlfriend’s Guide to {Finally} Keeping a VA

82.

91.

Deborah

Holly

Mojo: Your 4-Step Plan to Confidence and Personal Power

3 Step System to Seling Your Services with Your Website

Elliott

Kagan

Adler

Manley

Chantal the happy entrepreneur

EDITOR’S NOTE

A Letter from the Editor

It’s been a year since the first edition of the happy entrepreneur magazine was released. It still feels like yesterday that I sat down with my amazing team and put this baby together. I have been asked many times over the last year, How did you decide to put this together? And what does it take to make it happen every quarter? How did I decide? It was actually a very fast decision for me... about 30 seconds. I was asked to participate in a colleague’s magazine that she was doing as a one time offer. I thought to myself what a cool idea, like taking the telesummit model and putting it in print. I am always looking for new and innovative marketing strategies and this certainly fit the bill. Also, back in my home and blogger days, I was OBSESSED with this magazine “House of Fifty.” It was published quarterly by a fellow blogger, Janell Beals, who I had the biggest business crush on (still do). Anyway, I had been in her magazine once in a little advertisement for rub n’ buff. If you are a craft person you know what I am talking about. I always remember thinking, I want to have a magazine like this one day. So when the opportunity came across my desk, I was a huge yes. I immediately reached out to the art director who designed the “House Of Fifty” magazine and asked if she would be interested and she was on board. I also have an amazing business manager who helps keep everything organized and ensures that this magazine keeps rolling out each quarter. Which leads me to the next ques-

Sarah Dew Business Strategist & Productivity Expert www.happyentrepreneurmagazine.com

tion. What does it take to create and launch a magazine each quarter? Team: Truth be told, at this point my involvement in the creation of the magazine is not much. My Business Manager and Art Director do most of the heavy lifting. Which is so important these days as a single parent; I am only working about 25 hours a week so I can still be mom. Systems: At the beginning and with the first edition I was very much involved in each little piece making sure that everything went according to plan. But because our team was able to systematize everything, we have been able to do it again and again without becoming overwhelmed. My job, which to me is the best part, is finding new contributors and interviewing them (this edition is the first to include video interviews, which I am thrilled to be doing). Communication: The only way to organize 10 busy business owners into producing amazing pictures, great articles, and a great video interview every quarter requires some seriously good communication skills among our team. Without it, deadlines would be missed, edits would be skipped, and launch dates would come and go without a magazine. So because of the amazing team I have, our ability to plan, systematize, and communicate we will continue to put out a great, informative magazine every quarter for you to enjoy. I hope you will share it with your friends. Here is to another great year of amazing magazines.

xo, Sarah

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Stephanie Six Steps to Create a Life that You Love…

Even When You’re Not Sure What You Want

BY KIVA LEATHERMAN

the happy entrepreneur

I remember being at a business conference about 5 years ago. Everyone was singing a song about “their thing.” They all seemed to know their purpose and the work that they wanted to do in the world. I threw up a little in my mouth - nope. I didn’t have a clue. Then I cried. Here’s what I did know: I knew I wanted to create a business where I could make money, have tons of time to be with my kids and husband, be able to work from anywhere (I start to feel claustrophobic if I don’t have an airplane ticket in hand), and make a big difference on the planet… so that my life held meaning. But what did I actually do that would allow all that to happen? I can tell you I tried many things. I made so many “errors” and “mistakes.” I lost a lot of money and I got my heart broken. Big time. But I kept going. So what have I learned along the way? Well, I guess mostly to trust the journey, and stay out of the way, but I’ve gone ahead and made this a bit more specific for you. I now consider myself a “multi-faceted entrepreneur.” I am a coach, I’ve manufactured a kitchen gadget (it’s called the RinseMate and yes I do want to be on Shark Tank!!), I am a marketing consultant and I create info products in the parenting space. I still don’t have “a thing” but everything else on the list above… check. My life is full. It is messy. But it is real and it is mine. I want this for you, and for more and more women on the planet. I want you to have a meaningful life - moving beyond trite ideas of happiness and into true fulfillment and gratification, where you are free because you know how to be self-reliant and powerful. So what does it actually take? Here are SIX powerful ideas to move you forward on your journey:

#1: Follow YOUR Inspiration, especially when it doesn’t make sense I remember the years of looking outside myself for the answers. I’d see a woman on facebook, Facebook or maybe in an article like this. I’d think to myself, “wow, she’s got IT figured out… I’ll have what she’s having.” And I’d try to copy her. But it never worked. Every success that I’ve had in business has been when I’ve followed my own inspiration instead of someone else’s path or plan.

If you’re not feeling inspired about an idea, a business or a project - step away. Take a walk. Take a bath. Take a vacation. Inspired ideas rise up when we have plenty of sleep, energy and self-love. And inspired ideas are the ones that give us the mojo to stay up writing late into the night, to pick up the phone and make the difficult phone call to the person who can help us, or to take the money out of our savings account to fund our dream. Notice when you’re doing something because it seems that someone or something outside of yourself has the answers versus when you hear the answers from within. Always trust your own voice first, especially when it seems crazy (see #’s 2 and 6, for more about trusting crazy).

#2: Challenge the “Rules” Nothing that you believe is real. None of it. The ideas that you came to believe over the course of your childhood create your reality – because they inform your perceptions and your actions. But they’re not true – they are truly nothing more than a firing of electrical synapses in your brain. Were you taught that wanting money makes you greedy? Were you taught that you’ll never be good enough? Were you taught that you needed to value security over freedom? These are just ideas. They don’t actually exist. You can’t touch them or see them, but they are keeping you trapped. The awesome-est thing on the planet, though, is that you can choose to disregard them at will. The thing is that you have to know what the beliefs are that are running your life so that you can take over. Otherwise known as… do your work… on yourself.

#3 Be Uncompromising This is an all or nothing game. I’ve spoken to so many women who have traveled the path of entrepreneurship and each speaks of a moment when she realized that she could no longer settle. Not in business, not in parenting, not in marriage, not in her commitment to herself. It becomes toxic to the soul to hold on to that which no longer serves. This of course is a blessing and a curse. Letting go hurts. A mentor once told me a story (I hope not true) about a tribe who would hunt monkeys by placing a nut inside of an empty log. The monkey would grab the nut and then his fist would get stuck so the hunters could simply club him on the noggin. And all the monkey had to do to escape was to let go of the nut. But he really wanted to keep it.

challenge

The Rules And this is what we do too. We hold on for dear life to the things we think we need and in so doing, stay exactly where we are. Let go of the nut, love.

#4 Stop trying to avoid discomfort When I think of all of the money that entrepreneurs spend on strategies to avoid discomfort I get a little grumpy. From my perspective, you have to be willing to get uncomfortable and pretty much stay there to play this game. Put yourself out there. Ask for the sale. Increase your prices.

Feel that resistance in your chest and your tummy? Good. It means you are growing yourself and your soul, and doing the thing that will actually bring you the results you are looking for. When I coach women who are building sustainable businesses, I always tell them they can spend years with personal growth programs, or tapping, or hypnotherapy, or online sales funnels, or magical emails that do the selling for them, all so that they don’t feel like they are going to puke when they make a sales call. Or… they can just simply make the sales call, and realize that they will live to tell about it. Pretty soon, they can’t wait to have sales calls because they are actually fun, and not anything like their thoughts would have led them to believe.

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See my point? Make money instead of spend money. It’s really quite logical. Have results and revenue and then by all means… invest in yourself to grow. But not to avoid discomfort. Eventually, if you want to be successful in business - you have to sell something. There are no shortcuts through uncomfortable.

#5 Embrace Reality AND Magical Thinking Business is quantum, not linear. Let me explain what I mean. If you make a call to book a talk with your local women’s group, but they are full for the following year, you have still created positive flow in your business and you will see results - most often from a seemingly unrelated source. You’ll suddenly get a phone call asking you to speak at a group you’re not even aware of. I see it time and time again. You join a women’s group to focus on sisterhood and you meet a gal who can get your products into Target (yes, this happened to me). Sometimes things work out the way we plan, but not often. Here’s the thing though: your actions matter. A does not lead to B, it leads to M. No A…. no M. The Magic needs your help. It needs you to be in the present moment making the decisions and taking the actions that apply to your current reality, so that synchronicity and inspiration can take you even further. Relying on the Universe is a lovely idea, but it only works when you pull your weight.

only 3 out of 10 things that they try work. So relax. Breathe. It’s all learning and it will all be ok. This is the fear that I see holding people back.

#6 Make LOTS of mistakes (and do what The fear of failing, when your mom can see, and your who told you that you were crazy for starting a busiyou need to do to get over caring about sister ness. making mistakes) You’re going to mess up…. publicly. You’re going to have a client who is angry with you. You’re going to send out an email with a major typo. You’re going to launch a new product or program and no one is going to buy it.

Who do you need to become to no longer fear failing - or being seen as less than anything other than perfect? As a mom, I think this is the greatest gift that I can teach my children through my actions. That when I fail, I love myself and I move on.

So what. And this is the gift I want for you today too. Your business is not your worth. You, my dear, are priceless. There is not an amount of money on the planet that could possibly indicate your value. Business is business. The most successful people on the planet make the most mistakes. They fail constantly. One of the wealthiest internet marketers around told me that

Because when you really get this, you look up one day, after all of the mistakes, and the letting go, and the crazy decisions and “failed” ideas, and you realize that you are among the lucky ones… who somehow has everything you ever wanted, despite the fact that you weren’t even sure what that was.

BIOGRAPHY:

Kiva Leatherman, Chief Experience Officer Eyes Wide Open Life

Kiva Leatherman is a coach, speaker and innovator in the new paradigm of women, money and business. She has a proven ability to create leveraged brands, products and services that generate “whole”istic wealth: supporting our independence, flexibility and freedom. Kiva honed her sales and marketing skills and financial expertise over the course of a 12-year career in the investment management industry, where she managed a sales territory that generated over $100 million in annual revenue. However, Kiva began to feel a disconnect with the mainstream information and products being sold to consumers, and realized that she was passionate about discovering a new way to generate sustainable wealth. This lead to several entrepreneurial ventures, a radio show called “A Woman’s Worth,” and the creation of a coach training business, along with several other entrepreneurial ventures, including a new kitchen gadget that she really wants to get onto QVC and Home Shopping Network. Kiva has a personal mission to ensure that each of us is in charge of our own money, our own time and our own emotional experience. She teaches others to create a framework for success, in business and in life, which gives them the power and freedom to live well and to stop living vicariously through or in responsibility to others. Kiva inspires us to live without compromise and find fulfillment and gratification, while happily embracing an authentic, honest and real approach to the challenges that all of us face. Kiva lives on the Seacoast of New Hampshire with her young family and lots and lots of animals.

A NOTE TO FEMALE ENTREPRENEURS: You take my breath away. I feel your desire to be all that you can for yourself, your children and the planet. I feel you wanting to navigate a new path forward of your own design, and claim ownership of your time, money and intellectual capacity. You are brave. This is not the easy path. It is far easier to maintain the status quo and to remain small so as not to attract atten-

tion, ruffle any feathers or invite any comparison. My wish for you? That you keep breaking the rules, challenging the system and standing tall. That you allow criticism to flow off of you like water off of a duck, and that you embrace failure as one more step forward. And that when you find your version of success, that you recognize it, breathe it in, and give yourself a huge hug of appreciation for a journey well traveled.

MY FAVORITE BOOK: The first book I ever read that I felt that I was a different person after I read it than before was “Fierce Conversations” by Susan Scott. I remember being decidedly unsure at the time of whether this was a good thing or not. “Crap,” I thought, “I’m going to need to start to tell people the truth about who I am, what I think, and accept the consequences.”

This turned out to be a very good thing, and now this book is the first I send to all of my clients.

the happy entrepreneur

My Story:

So the very quick version of my entrepreneurial journey… I used to work in investment management. But after I had two children in 18 months, I wasn’t good at my work anymore. Because I hated it. But, I was making significant money and the truth was that quitting was not an option, at least from my hubbie, Micheal’s, point of view. So, I got myself fired. And I thought I was done. I had my two babes at home, I started teaching an aerobics class (yes I went from multiple six-figures to $12/hour… two hours a week), and I THOUGHT that this was the answer to all of my problems. I could DVR all of the TV I wanted and watch all of it! I taught myself to crochet! I watched my kids play! I was bored out of my mind. In hindsight, I’m quite sure I was depressed, not that anyone would have known. We women hide our truths so well. So with my happy-face on I started to think that I might want to do something. That it might not be such a wise (or fair) decision to place the financial future of our family squarely on Michael’s shoulders. That my four years of a world-class education, and all my licensing and training as an investment professional should lead to an obsession with Gray’s Anatomy wasn’t “enough.” I knew I did not want to go back to a job, but I desperately wanted to do “something” that inspired me, generated revenue and allow me to take care of my kids. There had to be a way to make this an “AND” conversation instead of an “OR” conversation. And so, my first business, WISE, was born. I figured I could take my love of all things financial and my love of teaching women to shake their booties and do things they never believed into a very cool business.

It flopped. Two years in, and I’d made a whopping $14,438. But boy did I have a pretty website! Then inspiration struck. As a mom of two young children, parenting was a huge passion. I’d started a parenting interview series, called Feed, Play, Love, and had the opportunity to interview some of the preeminent experts in the field. Through that series I met a woman named Jolette Jai and through our connection the Jai Institute for Parenting was born. Within two years we’d trained over 100 parenting coaches around the world and generated over $500,000. Partnerships, however, are hard. And Jolette and I spent an incredibly difficult year trying to hold on to ours. Entrepreneurial heart break. I spent a month in bed after I let go of my half of that business. I loved her so. As they say, though, nature abhors a vacuum, and an invitation presented itself to become a business partner along with two women that I knew and loved - Alexis Neely and Amrita Khalsa. The company: Eyes Wide Open Life. At EWO we are reinventing online marketing for the New Economy. We embrace collaboration, integrity, and abundance. I have the honor of working on the launch campaigns of some of the most brilliant people on the planet, while coaching truly incredible souls. This 7-figure business is truly a team effort, where we embrace authentic relating and have a team coach on staff so that we are all showing up, in each moment as our highest selves. I’m still pinching myself. So you see, it’s all perfect. Even the “bad” stuff. And, yes, it’s all possible.

And yes, it’s all possible.

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By Millie Chu Founder and Executive Director, A2 LEAP Authentically Awesome, Leaders, Entrepreneurs, Achievers, and Professionals www.A2LEAP.com

top ten tips for accomplishing

Your Dreams

...I believe true success revolves around issues that go deeper than the bottom line.

Why are you in business? To make money? To help satisfy a need? To do the kind of work you love doing? All your answers should be a yes. If you had any no’s, it’s time to reevaluate. However, professional and personal success is not only satisfying those three questions, it’s much more than that. I believe true success revolves around issues that go deeper than the bottom line. You. Let’s start at the

root of who you are. No matter what business you are in, what industry you work for, you need to work on YOU first. Adapt the “Top 10 Tips for Accomplishing your Dreams”, and begin to live your music and live true success.

1. Develop YOUR most valuable strength, Willpower! It’s normal to have limita-

the happy entrepreneur

tions on what we can handle. We are only human. Imagine if you went beyond what you think you could handle and became successful at it! Remember, everything that is worth doing does not come easy, otherwise everyone would be doing it. If your WILL is strong enough, you’ll find a way. If your WILL is weak, you’ll find excuses.

2. Focus on the Positive. Remain valiant (or try to be) despite the challenges, hurts, and heartaches. Don’t dwell on the negative or stay in defeat for very long. Focus on growing your true self. Discover who you are, who you were meant to be, what you were meant to do. I know that sometimes you may stray off course but in your darkness, always look to find your path again and chase the sun. We can learn so much about ourselves through the toughest times. Even with a trembling heart, let your spirit and vision for the future be greater than your fears. Be relentless and empowered. Though you may be a vessel repeatedly broken and shattered into a million pieces, know you are not alone and you will stand stronger if you choose to mold yourself back together. You were meant for beauty and greatness. Put yourself back together beloved and chase the sun.

3. Be Real. It’s alright to be having a rough day. That’s life! We don’t need a world of pretenders. Maintain a good attitude when dealing with challenging circumstances so that we can be an example for others. Hold on to your peace and joy.

4. Get your Priorities Straight! Stop living superficially and start being the person you truly want to be. Dominate over your fears, step out in faith, start living your vision, and earn it! Things don’t always go as planned and plans rarely ever go as intended. That means that your plan needs to be flexible! Recalculate, re-engineer, and do whatever it takes. It’s not going to fix itself until you put it into action. You are responsible for your own success.

5. Be an Over-Achiever. The conditions may never be perfect to take action but those who are Over-Achievers do them anyway. That’s what separates them from the rest. They do things others wouldn’t do and that’s why they achieve things that others have not. 6.

Be Thankful for the People around You.

Make sure you let your friends and family know your ap-

preciate them. As busy business owners, it’s easy to take the people we love for granted or overlook the chance to show them how much we care. True friendship and true love are rare gems. When in need, they will be your support and walk with you through fires; so always take the opportunity to say a few kind words, send them a note, and do something nice to express your love for them. It only takes a minute to do to make a world of difference.

7. Give, Give, Give. If you don’t give, why should you receive? I’m not just talking about giving money but your time, talent, effort, attention, and true hearted concern. And if you give, don’t expect to receive something in return because that’s not the true heart of giving. Stop rambling about yourself all the time and take a moment to listen to others. If you want to build a network of trust whether it’s for business or social reasons, you have to start by focusing on them, not you. Meditate on what it means to offer pure love.

8. Be Relentless. Act like an addict when it comes to making yourself better, stronger, faster, tougher, smarter, wiser...

9. Win – Win, Never Win - Lose Have the mindset that you will always win but what’s even better, is no one has to lose. You shouldn’t want them to. A truly good hearted entrepreneur, has their customer’s best interest in mind. This should be the case in both the professional and personal realm.

10. Be a Life-Long Learner As entrepreneurs, we need to stay abrupt with new developments in our industry so we can best cater to our customers. The world of business changes rapidly and to continue to be successful, we must embrace the changes we need to make, incorporate new ideas, technologies, and processes. With that being said, to be successful in our professional and personal lives, we must also train our minds in developing a habit to seek knowledge, to learn new concepts, and adapt good insights, and never, ever, stop learning.

Walk in victory! ~Millie

Millie Chu

BIO:

Oliver Wendell Holmes, the supreme court justice in the late 1800’s said, “The greatest tragedy in America is not the great waste of natural resources, although that is tragic, the greatest tragedy is the waste of human resources, where the average man goes to his grave with his music still in him.” My passion and mission is to ignite the fervor in leaders and entrepreneurs today and cultivate leaders and entrepreneurs of tomorrow! It is for that purpose that I have chosen to devote my life to encouraging those to live beyond their grasp and live their music! My corporate experience, academic background, and educational experience is my testimony in living mine.

Corporate Career: I am the Founder and Executive Director of A2 LEAP (Authentically Awesome Entrepreneurs, Achievers, and Professionals). We are a revolutionary way to learn, connect, and network with like-minded driven professionals. I am currently also a Business Counselor with a non-profit where I help businesses to start, improve, and grow. In the past, I have served as the Vice President of Management for an accounting firm, General Manager of restaurants, and a reporter for a thriving web based business and economic development news portal. Much of my corporate experience integrates in purpose and responsibility. I am exceptionally integrated in the business community and the public through active membership and support of more than 12 societies, business associations, and non-profit organizations.

Educational Background: I earned a Master in Business Administration in Management from Spring Arbor University. I hold a Bachelor of Applied Science in Business Management from Davenport University and a Bachelor of Religious Education in Theology from Great Lakes Christian College. I am living my music through my work and experiences and I am so excited for what is yet to come! Make no mistake, my purpose is not to convince anyone that the business industry is the right path for them, but rather be a resource in guiding and equipping people with information and skills, so they can discover it on their own! You are responsible for your own success, how much you want to learn, the action you will take utilizing the information, and the path you chose for yourself. The true test of self is not through the easiest of times but through the most challenging. Today and every day, no matter what you are facing, keep your head up, be bold, be strong, and do what you got to do; for you will see the most beautiful sunrise once you climb over the boulders and push yourself over the hills.

Academic Career: I have been a business professor at a local college since 2010 and have taught face to face and online courses. Previously, I held the title as the Graduate Admissions Counselor for Master of Business Administration and Organizational Leadership programs at a University. Before that, I was the Campus Coordinator for another University where I managed corporate relations and student services for the campus and served as an academic counselor for social work and counseling programs.

the happy entrepreneur

my favorite book PURPOSE DRIVEN LIFE: What On Earth Am I Here For? By Rick Warren Interestingly enough, it is not a business book that changed me, it is a spiritual book. I have read hundreds of business books and love many of them. However, the one that resonated within me the greatest is, Purpose Driven Life, by Rick Warren. When I read this book many years ago, it made me evaluate who I am, my thinking, and what I should focus on. One of the many great pieces of advice from the book, said, “Love should be your top priority, primary objective, and greatest ambition. Love is not a good part of your life; it’s the most important part” (Rick Warren, The Purpose Driven Life: What on Earth Am I Here For?). Therefore, it led me to discover what I was meant to do, and what I love doing --- business, entrepreneurship, teaching, and be a resource for the community. Through A2 LEAP, I get the opportunity to encourage others to live their vision and follow their passions. Through such an endeavor, I get to live mine. I am so honored to be able to serve and live a purpose driven life.

Motivation

MILLIE CHU

My Story

I came to the United States when I was four years old; a child with interested eyes and candid heart, born in China, raised in Manhattan, New York, and Ann Arbor, Michigan. My family moved us to NY in search for better life. My dad worked 3 hours subway-ride away and worked as a cook, while my mom worked in factories. We lived modestly in a small 1 bedroom apt with family of 5. We didn’t have a lot and I learned to conserve and waste nothing. My family moved us to Michigan when I was 7 years old for a job opportunity my father had. In Michigan, I was teased, kids threw rocks at me when I walked home from school, they made fun of me, called

me ugly, and I was the kid that was often picked last to be on a team in gym class. Throughout elementary and high school I was afraid of being teased so I did not speak up, became withdrawn, shy, quiet, and was called stupid because I pretended to not know the answers to questions when the teacher asked me. Fast forward to my college years, a teacher asked me how I was doing. When I gave the general automated response, “I’m fine”, he said “No, I mean how ARE YOU REALLY DOING??” Wow, I thought, somebody actually cares.

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I kept to myself, didn’t share my emotions with my peers, family or friends. I was having a hard time with school, and with life. I was about to quit college, then one day, I walked back to my room on campus and my classmates threw me a surprise pizza party just because. There was live guitar music, singing, and hugs and I barely even knew these people! The next morning, I decided to stay in school. So three degrees later....here I am. The pain of the past could not defeat the beauty I saw in people. I’m the woman I am today and I do what I do at A2 LEAP, because of wonderful people like you. That is the short version. The teachers who cared to care, the classmates who barely knew me who showed me they cared, the kindness and beautiful hearts of everyday people from diverse backgrounds and ethnicities who looked for nothing in return. Who didn’t see me just as a Chinese girl but as a human being, and gave unselfishly of their time and lifted me up and healed a broken heart. From being a child broken and suppressed. I realized who I wanted to be and was meant to be. A women who gives back, enriches other lives through talents I possess --- business, education, entrepreneurship, and developing others to who they were

meant to be, beyond societal norms, or the suppression of the world. In 2011, I started a group called A2 LEAP (authentically awesome, leaders, entrepreneurs, achievers, and professionals). Originally, I started this group to help bring awareness to the MBA and Leadership programs for a university I was working full time for. When they had to lay off 30% of administration, my whole department was eliminated. I was told I could keep A2 LEAP going on as my own. So it grew from a handful of members gathering at small coffee shops to collectively over 600 members with corporate sponsors and expert guest speakers. I am who I am today, founder of A2 LEAP, because of beautiful people with big hearts that ignited the passion in me to give back and help others learn, network, connect, and inspire. My purpose and mission is to be a resource to help others discover their music and challenge them to live out their vision and passion. Thank you. ~Millie

My purpose and mission is to be a resource to help others discover their music and challenge them to live out their vision and Passion

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CLICK HERE FOR FREE GIFT! FREE PASS plus a Guest - to all A2 LEAP events for 2015

A2 LEAP = Authentically Awesome (A2), Leaders, Entrepreneurs, Achievers, and Professionals (LEAP)! We at A2 LEAP believe in the power of igniting the fervor in entrepreneurs and leaders today and cultivating leaders and entrepreneurs of tomorrow. Our passion is to help others learn, network, connect, and be inspired. We are a revolutionary way of learning, networking, and invigorating your mind! What’s our message? Success to A2 LEAP is a 6 spectrum holistic approach and our mission is to be a resource for you in reaching success. So you can expect our topics to be in areas of: 1. Career --- or as we like to say it, Living Your Music 2. Financial Freedom 3. Life-Long Learning 4. Emotional Health 5. Physical Health 6. Spiritual Health

This group is a good fit for: * Individuals who are looking to become a better leader or manager. * Business owners and professionals who would like to network with other businesses and professionals. * Aspiring business owners who are interested in learning tips and gathering informational resources to get started. * Those who have been called an achiever or would like to become better at what you do. * Professionals who are interested in connecting with like-minded professionals in the area. Do any of these descriptions sound like you? Join A2 LEAP and get connected!

What to Expect: You can expect our events to be much like a gathering with friends and meeting new ones. During our 2 hour mixers, a 20 min learning session is incorporated into the evening and presented by a dynamic expert in their field while being able to network and connect before and after.

Prize Drawings Included

CLICK HERE FOR FREE GIFT! the happy entrepreneur

Get More Done + Make More With This 6-Month Action Planning Calendar by Ashley Wilhite

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My favorite way to work with clients is to spend 90 minutes creating their 6-month action plan.

Step 2: My Top 10 List

Why do I love planning so much?

Spend a few minutes reviewing your Idea Brain Dump and pull out the top 10 ideas that you deﬁnitely want to accomplish in the next six months.

When you have a plan, it shows you exactly what steps you must take to get to where you want to be. Having a plan in place shows you that you don’t have to do it all at the same time and I LOVE that.

Your list may include creating a new program, writing the first draft of your book, taking a vacation to Italy with your family, or hiring a VA.

I’m super excited to share my step-by-step process for setting goals and creating action plans that will help you get more clients and make more money.

It’s a fun way to prioritize your goals and see what’s truly important to you right now. Plus, it’s a tool to reflect back on how much progress you’ve made at the end of 6 months.

This simple system was something I created a few years ago, when I first started my business. I noticed that I felt overwhelmed every time I sat down to begin a new project and finally I realized that it was because I had too many ideas, but no structure to see them through. I used this action plan to map out the next six months so I could see where new projects + new goals would ﬁt in. I’ll walk you through each of the five steps and give you the tools to create your own 6month Action Planning Calendar in case you’d like to tweak your own process. I would recommend setting aside two hours to do this exercise. It will seriously save you soooo many headaches in the future.

Step 1: Idea Brain Dump The ﬁrst step in your action planning calendar is to sit down and do a complete brain dump of everything you would absolutely love to do in the future. (Sometimes I let my mind wander as far out as the next 5 years.)

Step 3: My Monthly Calendar The next step is to take your Top 10 List and break your ideas, projects, and goals up into months. I start by ﬁlling in my personal dates first, like vacation time, conferences, and any other time commitments I’ve already made. Then, I ﬁll in my business projects because that’s one of my top priorities. I schedule in time for writing blog posts, creating new programs, one-on-one clients, group coaching, marketing, and launching. Finally, I add in my other ideas and goals, like running a marathon, reading, and traveling with friends.

Step 4: Schedule it This is the most important step (and the one most people fail to do consistently).

A Brain Dump is a list of all of your ideas, regardless of if you’ll ever do them or not. We just want to make sure you have them in writing.

Take out the 6 Month Calendar you’ve created and open up your daily calendar of choice. I’m a paper planner gal, but Google Calendar works too!

You know all those magical ideas you get right as you’re falling asleep? This is a great way to keep track of them.

On the first day of each month, I sit down and review my upcoming monthly calendar. I decide which tasks are a priority and which ones I’m going to focus on. I write this down as “Review Goals Party” on the first of each month.

Your list can be ongoing, so whenever you have a new idea, just add it to the brain dump list! I love Google Docs and Evernote for this. When you’ve finished your Brain Dump, read back over your list and put a star or smiley face next to the ideas that you are definitely going to act upon in the next six mont

I start by focusing on one goal at a time and ask myself, “Where do I want to be with this goal at the end of the month? How much progress do I want to have made?” Then, I backtrack and figure out exactly what needs to

Why do I love planning so much?

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Step 5: celebrate happen each week in order to reach my desired point of progress for the month. Once I know my weekly goals, I can create daily action items. Do this with each of your Top 10 List items until your calendar is booked and you’re full of excitement.

Pour yourself a delicious glass of wine because you’re a rock star and... you’re done!

BIO: ashley wilhite

Ashley Wilhite is the founder of Your Super Awesome Life and creator of Cubicle to $10k. With over 3,000 hours as a Licensed Professional Counselor, she combines her natural talents with passion and inspiration, and now coaches daring women to hone the confidence and action plan they need do what they love and make their first $10k.

The Coaching Blueprint, Tiny Buddha, MindBodyGreen, Yes and Yes, Stratejoy, and The Brazen Careerist. When she’s not celebrating the jaw-dropping progress of her clients on Facebook, you can find her training for 2nd marathon, eating insane amounts of ice cream, and exploring her hometown of Austin, Texas. Check out her stories, tips, and inspiration on life, business, and living on your own terms at www.yoursuperawesomelife.com, and grab your copy of her free book by clicking here.

As a sought-after coach and writer, she’s been featured on

favorite book: If I could only recommend one book to other entrepreneurs, it would be Change Your Thinking, Change Your Life by Brian Tracy. It’s full of practical advice on how to get more done without wasting time, along with deep nuggets of wisdom that will completely transform the way you look your life and your business. After reading this book, I was able to simplify my marketing strategy to focus on what’s really important, organize my to-do lists, and implement systems in my business that have helped me earn thousands more each month. If you haven’t read this yet, go get your hands on a copy ASAP, friend.

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Ashley Wilhite is the creator of Your Super Awesome Life where she coaches daring women in honing the confidence and action plan they need to do what they love and make their first $10k. Though she now runs a successful business that allows her to travel, set her own schedule, and work from anywhere in the world doing what she loves, just a few years ago she was stuck in a job where she felt unfulfilled, unchallenged, and under-appreciated. After earning her B.A. from Baylor University, teaching English for a year in France, and earning Masters in Psychological Counseling from Columbia University, Ashley believed she had all the pieces necessary to live her dream life. It was during her internship in graduate school where she counseled adults with schizophrenia and taught them how to cope with grief and loss that she discovered her passion for helping others. Motivated by this, Ashley then transitioned to a job counseling teenage runaways with the ultimate goal of opening a private practice. While it was an exciting path to be on, after a year and half she was burned out, exhausted, and emotionally drained. Recognizing that something needed to change, she began a journey that involved a lot of soul searching with some concentrated support from a life coach. It was during this stage of exploration that she finally admitted that she wanted to own her own business, be her own boss, and have control over who she worked with. Once these puzzle pieces clicked, she immediately went to work creating a website (www.yoursuperawesomelife.com), building her business, and in February 2013, she quit her job as a counselor. Combining her acquired experience of over 3,000 hours as a Licensed Professional Counselor, with her natural talents, passion, and inspiration, she has successfully built a business that supports exactly the kind of lifestyle she had previously only dreamed about. Over the past three years, she has coached hundreds of brilliant women on how to make money doing what they love. She wakes up feeling refreshed and excited to get out of bed (most mornings). When she’s not celebrating the progress of her clients, you can find her training for her 4th half-marathon, eating

insane amounts of ice cream, exploring her hometown of Austin, Texas, dancing around her bedroom like no one’s watching, and never taking life too seriously to have fun. Her Life List includes becoming a certified yoga instructor, seeing Hanson in concert at least one more time, and having coffee with Brene Brown. She dreams of living in a world where following your passion is required, tiaras are the accessory of choice, and cupcakes for breakfast are a regular occurrence. Check out her stories, tips, and inspiration on life, business, and living on your own terms at www.yoursuperawesomelife.com, and be sure to grab your copy of her free book, “The 5 Things That Hold You Back!”

the happy entrepreneur

mindful by heather elliot When I was at my business school meeting 2 weeks ago, I made a commitment to achieve 3 specific things before we reconvene in September.

further, faster, I need to develop a new mindset based on success strategies that I’m learning and a sense of responsibility to the goals I lay out for myself.

Making a commitment to these outcomes really made a shift in how I saw things. I realized that I needed to do things differently. I had to use my time better and I needed to get better at doing the right things and finding other people to do the things that needed to be done that were no longer right for me to do.

It brought home a key point I would like to make to you. What you ‘prefer’ to do, how you ‘do’ life is NOT who you are – it is NOT an identity that is fixed and rigid. How you behave and your preferred way of operating in the world is a mindset that you execute daily because it feels ‘right’ or ‘good’ or ‘comfortable’.

From that awareness, I immediately set forth to prioritize all of the things that I would need to do in order to return in 90 days with these outcomes. It is a tall order, but I am committed.

A mindset is simply a pattern of neurons in your brain that have been hard-wired through repeated use to cause you to think and act in a specific way. And that’s all it is… there is no reality to it other than the fact that you have repeated the pattern so often it has formatted your brain so that it will execute it without thinking.

From that list of priorities I drew out a weekly schedule that will carve out time on a weekly basis that will move each goal forward. Each week I pull out that template and insert the names of the clients I will see and the activities I will do on each day that fit within those categories. And then I execute. It is harder than anticipated because up till now I have allowed myself to FLOW more rather than boxing myself into a specific agenda. But as I grow my business, I’m realizing the necessity for routines and structures that support the building of the business and the achievement of my outcomes. As I’m doing this, I become aware of the new mindset that I’m building that supports the business success I desire to experience. My old habit – FLOWING – worked well to get to me a certain level of success. But in order to move

What is neat about this understanding is that how you ‘do’ life is entirely changeable. I love to FLOW but in this instance, it holds me back. So becoming more structured and more defined is what I need to do. I need to build that neural habit, but I first needed to define what that would look like – what would I be doing differently than what I have done in the past. Once I was clear on what that new pattern is, I begin to ‘do’ it, which begins to build the neural net that will make this new action a routine – a habit. After a while, it will feel comfortable and normal and more like ME. At the moment, it still feels a little odd – and that’s OK because it is all brand new. The key to successfully using it will be consis-

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tency. You can use this method on any behavior you have – it doesn’t matter what it is. Perhaps you would like to express your opinion more or you would like to exercise more. Perhaps you would like to learn to walk into conflict rather than away from it. The key with this method is repetition, commitment, and consistency. It takes time to hard-wire your brain to a new habit. And it takes time to disconnect the wiring you already have in place.

So what habits do you have that you would like to change? Try using the system I’ve described above and allow yourself to define your new behaviours – and then become committed to and responsible for making the change you desire to make. Be open-minded about adapting the new system – when you first execute it, it may need some tweaks. But over time, the new pattern will become the new habit and it will feel much more like ‘you’ the longer you use it.

my story:

I was an overweight, insecure little girl who grew up in a great family but was overly sensitive to the harshness and rejection of the world. I was an A student, but I didn’t trust other children to like me. I was very shy. I focused on my marks so I could withdraw from the other kids. I was adored by adults but did not fit in with my peers. I struggled to talk to others, relate and simply be human. In the arena of boys, I was flattered and charmed by those who pursued me. I married a man who was my best friend because he wanted me. Inside, I knew things were wrong, but I didn’t know how to fix them. Neither of us had the tools to make a marriage work. The most crushing and pivotal moment came when I strayed from my marriage. I had an affair with someone that paid attention to me and I betrayed my best friend. It was devastating and shameful to me. My father wouldn’t tell people I was separated; my mother was told she couldn’t talk about it. I was instructed by my father to return to my husband. I succumbed because the insecurity in me would not allow me to be alone – yet I was deeply confused about whether or not I loved him and I struggled with my commitment to be married. I had never made a mistake so big and obvious that the world would see before. It was devastating to be associated with such an embarrassment. In my mind, what I had done was unacceptable. I traveled down many roads in the pursuit of the ‘cure’ for such wrongful behavior – I felt like I was flawed and that I needed to get better. I needed to be happy. I worked with a therapist, adjusted my lifestyle, started to exercise and I watched my food intake. In the 80’s this was considered self-help. I tried it all in the hope that I could remedy the reason why I had left my husband. In 1987 I left that marriage and eventually entered a new one after realizing that what I needed in a partner was different than what I had in my first marriage. My second husband was different in ways that allowed me to really

connect and commit to him in the way I knew I could. I was finally happy and had learned a powerful lesson: If you love someone, don’t judge their ways. My current husband taught me how to really love – I blossomed as a result! My next love affair was with the mind. It became my life passion in 1988 when I first encountered the Ramtha School of Enlightenment a school designed to reveal and unfold the power of the human mind to create reality. I studied consciousness before consciousness was cool and I learned that reality was a product of our thoughts. I wanted to know why we experience what we experience. Why do some people have wealth and others don’t? Why do some people experience love and others don’t? Why are some people strong, brave and successful while others are insecure, timid and experience only small successes? I needed to know why. If mind created reality, then there had to be a reason! I started my own business, Mindful Change, in 2005. Through this work I have been able to study our reality from the inside out. I have helped others overcome all manner of limiting thoughts, emotions and circumstances. I have been able to see the effect these changes in beliefs have on people’s lives. I LOVE my work. I feel like I understand reality and am empowered as a creator of my reality. I have used this

• The person who needs to forgive you is YOU. • Self-esteem develops because you like and love yourself. • Self worth is measured by the respect you show to yourself. • Limitation occurs when YOU look outside of you for these things. • We are the most sophisticated and yet the most unconscious reality TV show going – everything you experience, every event in your life, every person you meet – it all happens because of you. • Quantum physics explains how you are the power behind your world, and when you come to see it this way, you gain work to resolve all of the insecurity that plagued me as a child – that I still carried with me even as I entered my second marriage and my career transition. My work has taught me to connect to people and I have resolved all of that sensitivity that caused me to withdraw from them in my youth. I feel strong, confident and self-assured in my life, and I know that this can be reality for others too. I am grateful for how this learning has impacted my life and the lives of many others who have worked with me. I now understand why my first marriage failed and am able to help others to see where the challenges are in their own relationships. In 1982 I set out on a quest to understand myself. Everything that I have ever done in my career has contributed something to this understanding. I am now able to support others through my work. I Believe… • The future YOU is within YOU and the pathway is accessed through YOUR MIND. • It takes about 6 hours to release you from your past so that the FUTURE YOU can be born.

the power over your destiny. • We create every bit of our reality – with every thought we think, every word we say, every attitude we possess, and every behavior we choose. • To become the FUTURE you, you need to release the PAST YOU that operates unconsciously in your life.

favorite book

Stepping back from my success to really understand how my thought processes created it has helped me understand how powerful we really are. I call the process that creates success ‘Mindful Change,’ and I know that without it, businesses get stuck and remain limited in their growth. You see, succeeding in business is only partially due to the people, technology, marketing, business systems, etc., employed. True success starts with a leader or an ownership team. It’s the clearly defined vision and consistent work toward it that drives a business into success. And that doesn’t happen without a leadership that’s aware of Mindful Change (even if they use a different term for it). I’ve seen firsthand that a business will only become as big as the mind at its helm. Likewise, the problems in a business are the result of the mind of its leadership — the issues on its team or with its people are also a reflection it.

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You can have the best marketing, the best operations, a great building or office, and all the right technology, but those things don’t guarantee long-term success. What separates those who succeed from those who don’t is beyond common business practices. It’s who you are — what’s in your mind consciously and subconsciously — that drives your business. Frankly, trying to succeed in business without examining the infrastructure of the mind leading the business wastes time and money.

some lessons from the school of hard knocks. But once I had succeeded and could look back and analyze why, I realized that it all came down to working through my own limiting beliefs and behaviors. That’s why I wrote 7 Critical Mindset Strategies for Entrepreneurs to Succeed… Starting Today! It captures the highlights of my own research and journey and distills it into what’s necessary to drive your business to its ultimate success.

I read a lot of great books, took excellent courses, and got

Having everything I needed to run a successful business didn’t come naturally to me. Instead, realizing that dream was a process that built slowly over many years. But I got there, and I did it in a way that others can imitate for much faster and efficient results than I had the luxury of knowing. It started with a love of business that led me to pursue teaching business courses full time from 1979 to 1990. My hands-on training started in 1995 when I started my own business and worked for other businesses. I learned what it takes to run a successful business, and just as importantly, I learned about what doesn’t work. However, it wasn’t until I combined my love of business with my love for the power of Mindful Change that my business started flourishing to high levels of success. I’ve had a passion for the mind and what working with it can accomplish since the 80’s — using things like affirmations, vision boards, and subliminal tapes to consistently and successfully drive my life forward. Discovering a way to help others directly rewire and reprogram their minds was nirvana for me. So, key ingredient #1 in building a successful business was a love for what I did. The 2nd ingredient was client happiness. The fact that this work helped 98%+ of my clients to change their lives for the better led to referrals that drove my business forward. In the early days, I made time for clients and for continued ‘rewiring’ of myself — getting rid of fear, negative thinking, old emotional wounds and traumas, and limiting thinking. I rewrote my own stories and tidied my own mind (what I call ‘Mindful Change’). I discovered that the more I helped myself, the faster and more efficient I helped others. And that’s when my business started to really take off and make money.

Better results drove my confidence. My confidence drove better results. And my personal Mindful Change work unblocked me in unexpected ways, releasing my own ability to power my world. What I focused on started to manifest much faster. Taking charge and fully leading my business brought success and helped me realize that I needed to build and commit to a vision. With a clearly defined destination, it was easy to create yearly goals capable of moving my business even further forward. That’s also when I started looking outside of myself for the people that would help drive my business forward. Although we can all get there with time, learning, and hard work, it’s much faster to network with others that have the knowledge and experience capable of building the business of your and my dreams. I discovered that finding those people allowed me to focus on my best skills and the things I enjoy the most while assuring that people that excel in other niches tended the those aspects of my business. So, the most important thing I’ve learned by going through the process and building a successful business is that, more than any other tool or technique, my business is a manifestation of how I use my mind. Business schools teach about the details of business — the marketing, social media, networking, operational systems, etc. — and those things are important, but they are the outward mechanisms that help you succeed. They do NOT guarantee or create success by themselves. They’ll take you to a certain level, but it takes Mindful Change to break through the ceiling and see the success of your dreams. My business grew with the expansion of my thought pro-

cesses, an increased belief in myself that resulted from that work, and greater skill at using Mindful Change to shape my world. Combined with clear goals and visions, it makes for a powerful, winning team that works for me, you, and anyone that implements it.

Professional Background: My entire career has been devoted to people – teaching, facilitating, motivating, coaching, helping them to understand themselves and their lives, and finding the ways to help them to change. My passion is helping people, teams or organizations tap into their potential so that they can create/become the biggest, best, brightest version of themselves. And I do that because I know it is possible!

Education: Practitioner – Core Belief Engineering – License #761, College of Core Belief Engineering, White Rock, BC B.A. – Psychology – Carleton University, Ottawa, ON B.Ed. – Business Education, Special Education – University of Western Ontario, London, ON Additional Qualifications: Mediation/Negotiation Personality Dimensions – Level II Trainer Teambuilding Effective Presentations Training Facilitation Training Neurolinguistic Programming (NLP) Mastering Tough Communication Visionary Leadership

Professional Skills: Workshop Design and Facilitation • A secondary school teacher for 12 years. • Since 1995, I have operated as my own business. Its focus has been helping others uncover and reach their potential – personally and professionally. • As part of my business, I have developed, and facilitated the delivery of, a wide range of soft-skill programs. My training was focused mainly in soft skill areas including: o Leadership/Management courses o Conflict Resolution o Time Management o Stress Management o Career planning & development o Development Planning o Effective Communication o Client Service Excellence o Presentation Skills o Coaching o Teambuilding Coaching: • Since 1995 I have coached people (individuals, managers, leaders, teams) in a wide range of soft skills that relate to the workshops that I deliver • Since 2005 I have developed and used an advanced

coaching methodology that allows me to help people to ‘re-wire’ their brain, transforming a variety of limiting attitudes, mindsets and belief systems that ‘get in the way’ of people achieving their potential. • In 2006 my work focused more on individuals going through separation and divorce. My coaching skills were used to help people transcend the pain, trauma and low self-esteem that resulted from relationship breakdown. • Combining my soft-skills training with the advanced coaching skills, I also help couples overcome relationship challenges so that they can stay together. • The relationship knowledge gained from working with individuals and couples forms the foundation of the workshops and coaching I now offer to teams, businesses and organizations. Management/Leadership Skills: • Management of the operations of The Change Partnership o Ensuring the smooth operation of our Learning Centres o Participating in planning our business, managing business performance, forecasting & planning for our future o Supporting Marketing initiatives o Preparing proposals for clients o Recruitment and selection of associates o Conflict Resolution/Creating team • Director/Assistant Director of the Business Department at Ernestown Secondary School o Liaison with other Departments and the school as a whole so that our Department was moving in harmony with what was happening elsewhere o Timetabling the department’s activities o Creating budgets for each program o Monitoring the implementation of curriculum o Helping teachers address a wide variety of professional problems and challenges o Assessing teacher effectiveness in the classroom o Overseeing the general functioning of the department in accordance with Board and School policies & procedures o Establishing goals for the Department, both short and long term, and monitoring timing and performanc Testimonials I came to see Heather with tons of baggage from my past which was hindering my present. I never thought I could

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make such a huge turn for the best in so little time after seeing her. Thanks to her method and time with me, in just one day I came to powerful realizations which transformed my life and allowed me to rid myself of all of my anxiety and fear; I gained a sense of calm and confidence that has allowed me to move on to great horizons.— M.M., Osteopath

I am so grateful to have seen Heather. She is highly intelligent and intuitive when it comes to relationship coaching. I followed her suggestions the very same night after our session and within 24hrs my relationship took an incredible turn for the best, thanks to the fact that I followed her advice. We got engaged soon after and we can’t wait to get married. Thank you for your great eye openers and life changing advice Heather!— M.M., Osteopath

What I like most about heather’s approach is that she she moves beyond superficial theory and brings science into her work. In a very short time with Heather I could tell that she’s not your average coach; she has mastered her craft and has the science to back it up. In a world where everyone is a “law of attraction expert”, Heather stands out as being one who actually has the chops.— Steve Lowell – International Speaker & Professional Speaking Mentor, http://www.stevelowell.com

I started seeing Heather a little over 3 years ago and she has done what no other could do with me in 46 yrs. I am an extremely successful business woman, interior designer and mother of two; however I always felt that there was something really blocking me from reaching my true potential. I was at a loss as to how to get past it, over it, or through it – but I was determined to find a way – one way or another! In working with Heather, my road blocks became very visible – even within the first session. You can’t fix or change what you don’t know. The first step is awareness. Second step – replacing old, outdated, non-valid thought patterns with accurate, empowering ones. Mindful Change sessions helped me to do all that. Today I feel more in control of my life, more at peace with me. I feel more confident that I can build a life I desire. I am calmer in relationships with others – able to understand them better – I’m more compassionate and open to them than ever before. This allows me to begin to build a relationship to a partner that I desire to experience. I have also achieved career success that tops what I had already achieved, and I possess a calmer attitude towards my life.— P.S., Television Personality, Business Owner, Mother

to 2 fabulous children! (my most important job!)

And you managed to do the entire session without talking about yourself or your experiences – AT ALL – which is nearly impossible for most people (including myself!). You are an awesome listener/facilitator. Your ability to connect the dots in my life, like you have, to gain greater understanding and heal past hurts is very impressive indeed. Since our session, I HAVE noticed an increase in my desire to ‘get serious’ again, like when I was 22. I was serious and committed before our session, but at a ‘low simmer’ level of energy/enthusiasm. I was going through the motions, but I was scattered, unfocused, and plodding/muddling along. Now I feel more SERIOUSLY COMMITTED at a much higher level (more like the ‘committed’ energy I had when I was 22) to doing the work that is necessary to gain focus in, and market, my business, set and achieve goals, projects and tasks that measurably and progressively move me forward to much higher levels of success. It’s like a cloud has been lifted that I didn’t fully realize (or acknowledge) was there. I’m constantly amazed at how much I have to learn! Yesterday I had a meeting with a marketing friend/colleague and we agreed on 6 things for me to do by next Sunday to move my business forward. I had 2 of them finished the same day (yesterday). Also, yesterday I hung pictures and awards and black belt certificates in my dojo (a place to practice karate) which I’ve been meaning to do for over two years. Today I’m going to hang my non-karate related awards and certifications in my office. Why SHOULDN’T I proudly display these things to remind me of my accomplishments and deservingness?! Okay, enough already! Thank you for this gift. YOU are a great gift to the world. You are a great facilitator of healing and internal roadblock (or suppression) removal.— D.H., Happiness Expert

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10 Habit s of an Orgasmically Joyful Ent repreneur

As soon as I wake up, I give thanks for my sleep, my bed, my health, my son, my career, my clients, the air that I breathe… 56

Melissa Dawn

It’s funny, I don’t know why…but people keep on asking me about my habits… I must admit I have quite a few, and I do feel they contribute greatly to where I am today. I started with one habit at a time, and I gradually built on each one. So here goes…It all starts at 5:00 AM…. HABIT #1 – GRATITUDE As soon as I wake up, I give thanks for my sleep, my bed, my health, my son, my career, my clients, the air that I breathe….and everything I am truly grateful for. I really do believe that when you are grateful for what you have, you keep on attracting more of it. HABIT #2 – BREATH OF FIRE I do the breath of fire. The breath of Fire is one of the foundational breath techniques used in Kundalini Yoga. It is done by pumping the navel point in and out while breathing rapidly through the nose. It is practiced through the nostrils with the mouth closed. The navel point is pulled in only on the exhalation. There are many benefits to the BOF including: It releases toxins, it releases natural energy throughout the body, increases vital strength, increases internal harmony and health…and so much more…if you could do this for a minimum of 5 minutes every morning, you’ll see a huge shift in your wellbeing. HABIT #3 – YOGA I do a few minutes of yoga to help increase my flexibility. There is a book I really like that I use as a guide called Aroma Yoga by Ashley Turner. She shows you how to use essential oils in your yoga practice to help achieve radiant health. HABIT #4 – MEDITATE Meditation helps me tune my attention within and connect with what is really going on. Sometimes I start my meditation with a question…I ask a question to something I would like an answer to…sometimes I just meditate to see what presents itself…some days I just can’t seem to quiet my mind so I tune into the meditations from Deva Premal & Miten. These meditations are actually songs that are sung in Sanskrit. They cover different topics from love to peace to protection, liberation, abundance, perfecting wisdom, happiness, healing, compassion, tantra and more…Whatever you may be seeking…they have a meditation for you to sing along to… it’s cleansing for the soul…notice the breakdown of the words (clean)(sing). Yes, singing does cleanse the soul. HABIT #5 – VISUALIZATION I visualize everything I want to attract in my life from the clients I want to have, where I am taking my business, my family, my health, my twin flame, my spirituality…I visualize it to the point where I feel it’s in my life NOW. I feel it, I believe it and assume the energy of what I want to experience. Visualization is powerful. It helps you move through life with intention. When you continuously visualize what you want, every

cell in your body is involved in that image and you start to resonate with everything in harmony with it. HABIT #6 – STATE MY AFFIRMATIONS I say out loud a few affirmations. Evidence is building that thoughts which are repeated, are absorbed by the subconscious, which does not judge but simply accepts. Imagine how much more positive, joyful and energized you can be when most of your thoughts are uplifting ones! My favorite affirmation is, “All of life comes to me with ease, joy and glory.” All of life- meaning- good, bad and ugly, everything that life might throw at you. Glory is an exuberant expression and abundance of life. Imagine how amazing it would be if everything you wanted came with ease, joy & glory? I must admit things have been coming my way with more and more ease…. Keep in mind…we are what we repeat… HABIT #7 – STATE MY LIFE PURPOSE Your life purpose is like the North Star. It steers you on a course through life that resonates deeply with the truth of who you are. There is an exercise I like to do with each of my clients to help them figure out their life purpose. I feel it’s so important to tap into it every morning and to try to live it as much as you can throughout your day. Mine is, “I am the energizing bunny that helps you create an orgasmically joyful life.” So yes, I try to show up all day full energized and somehow contribute to help make everyone happier. Whether it’s through my coaching or smiling to a stranger that I meet. HABIT #8 – BELLY DANCING I am quite attracted to the shamanic societies. Do you know if you went to a medicine person complaining of being disheartened, dispirited, or depressed, one of the questions they would ask you is “When did you stop dancing?” I love dancing. It’s my drug. I take at least 5 minutes every morning to practice a belly dancing choreography. ---------------------------------------------------------------OK…enough about my morning routine… now let me share two habits of my night routine… ---------------------------------------------------------------HABIT #9 – PLAN MY DAY THE NIGHT BEFORE I make a point of planning my schedule for the following day the night before and take a few minutes to visualize my day going exactly as I would like it to. This enables your subconscious to work at night in creating what you want to happen. By doing this, when you wake up in the next morning you don’t waste any time trying to organize your day, it’s already organized in your mind which allows you to flow into it with ease. HABIT #10 – HOT BATH WITH DEAD SEA SALT & ESSENTIAL OILS OK I must admit, I don’t do this one every night…but the nights that I do I get the best sleep! I like to use Bokek sea salt. I love it so much I actually get it shipped from the United States. Dead sea salt helps bring out

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your skin’s natural radiance and tone. It also has detoxifying, healing and restoring properties. I add a few drops of lavender oil to make my hot bath extra relaxing . Aggh. I am feeling good just writing about it. There you go…now you know a few of my habits that contribute to me being an orgasmically joyful person, entrepreneur and coach! And now…I am off to prepare my hot bath….

My St ory: How did I come to run a successful business? Being a single mom, I got into my business slowly. I started building my coaching practice while holding a day job as a VP Marketing for a technology company. It’s funny, because I was asking the Universe for more time to work on my business…and within two weeks of that request, my boss came to me and told me he had to cut my work week in half as some funding the company was expecting had not come through. My first reaction was panic. What was I going to do? My second reaction was laughter. I knew this was the Universe’s way of telling me that I had to work on my business. Within a month, I made up the income in my coaching to replace the salary loss of my VP of Marketing job. Four months after that, I actually replaced my entire marketing salary. What contributed to this? I invested quite a bit of money in getting the right mentors. I have a mentor who is a Life, Soul & Image Coach. He helped me build my brand based on the truth of who I really am. When people come to my website, they can see my personality right away, and they either resonate with me or they don’t. The people I actually have coaching conversations with usually end up signing up for a coaching package with me, because they know what I am about before they even speak to me. This

has helped me have a high conversion ratio. This coach is also a Shaman. He also helped me remove all the energetic components of what was holding me back from being successful and helped me connect more with my heart and make decisions from that place. My second mentor was a business coach. Even though I have a business background, I never ran my own business and I wanted to have everything on my side to make it work. She provided me with all the tools and insight I needed. Her program also included being part of a weekly mastermind. Masterminding with other business owners on each other’s business continuously fuels you and gives you new ideas to help you make your business all the more successful. I truly believe that to run a successful business, having the right mentors is key. You need to have the right people show you the way and support you through every step. The only thing that is more important than having the right mentors is to be truly passionate about what you do! I love coaching so much, I love helping people create lives and careers they are truly passionate about. It fuels me to the point where I actually have to force myself to stop working.

I must admit that I have a lot of favorite books. I love to read. However one of the most important business lessons I learned was from the book “Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap...And Others Don’t” by Jim Collins.

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Bio:

As a life, business & career coach, I help people create lives, careers and businesses they are totally energized about. I certainly know all the twist and turns in finding the right career. I have successfully transitioned through many careers and industries throughout my life. I have worked my way up from a retail promotional assistant to VP Marketing. I have also had the opportunity to work in a variety of roles such as Management, Leadership, HR, Business Development, Operations and in industries ranging from cosmetics, to travel and technology.

Although I thrive in the business world, receiving awards for high achievement in marketing and sales, I ache to make a bigger difference. Not being satisfied with just “creating successful products, marketing campaigns and surpassing sales objectives,” I am passionate about being of a greater service to others, to help people realize that they are the CEO of their life, and that they can pretty much design their future any way they want. I am now able to do so through my own company with my six-month “CEO of Your Life” Coaching Programs.

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by Lara Adler

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There are currently over 84,000 chemicals in use in the United States - with up to 1000 new ones being added each year. While many of these chemicals have benefited us new building materials, things that have made our lives easier, better, safer, and even longer - the vast majority of them have never been tested for safety. No one has even looked to see if these chemicals are harmful to people or animals, or the environment, though they are are freely, and legally able to be used in the products that we buy and use every day. They are found in our shampoos, dish soap, and lipstick... our laundry detergent, our dry cleaned clothes, and inside our furniture. They’re in our food, our water, and our air, and consistently, they are found inside of us. Babies are exposed to hundreds of industrial chemicals before they are even born, passed on through umbilical cord blood, and once born, they are further exposed through breast milk. Every time the CDC tests for chemicals in people - they find them, including ones that have been banned for 30+ years. Thousands and thousands of studies have been linking these common, everyday chemicals to rising rates of disease - everything from weight gain, and diabetes, to cancer, infertility, learning disabilities, allergies, autism, and Alzheimer’s.   Yet they continue to be used, and ingested, and most people are none-the-wiser. To me, this is fundamentally not okay - not even a little. The number of people struggling with chronic health issues has been steadily increasing, not decreasing, despite how advanced our medical system is, and how much we know about things like good nutrition. How is this possible?

Years ago, when I still had an office job doing corporate sales, long before I got plugged into the professional side of the health world, I was miserable. I hated the work I was doing. I felt frustrated having to sit in a gray cubicle, florescent lights humming overhead, and used to say that my work did nothing but “contribute to the garbage of society.” Towards the end of my rope in that career, when people asked me what I did, I would literally say “I contribute to the garbage of society.” Yikes! Basically, I didn’t feel connected in any way to my job, and didn’t feel like the thing I was spending 8 hours a day doing was having any kind of positive impact in the world. I was miserable.

Since my early teens I was always interested in health and food and nutrition... it was something I geeked out on, but I never once considered turning it into a job. The lightbulb moment, and total career change came for me when I learned about health coaching. This seemed like the first bona-fide way that I could take this thing I was interested in, and make it be my job. A job that contributed to the world in a positive way. So I dumped my account executive job, went back to school and became a newly minted health coach - eager, excited and passionate about helping people and making a real difference in the world. I first stumbled into this unusual and often overwhelming world of environmental toxins on accident thanks to two unrelated things happening. First, some of my health coaching clients were really struggling with weight loss... despite doing everything right, their weight wasn’t really shifting. This bothered me, so I started digging, and ended up uncovering this heap of research connecting chemicals in our daily environment with weight gain, and resistant weight loss. It was fascinating! At the same time, my brother and sister-in-law were expecting their first child, my niece. The research nerd in me couldn’t help but do a little digging into the best products they should be buying for the baby, and what I found was actually scary. Babies mattresses with neurotoxic chemicals, baby bottles with hormone disrupting chemicals, baby shampoo with known carcinogens... what?! What struck me was that this was the first time I’d heard about this... despite studying health and diet and all things wellness related for years, this was the first time I’d read anything about chemicals in consumer products being linked to diseases and health struggles. When I started talking to my colleagues - other health coaches and nutritionists, I quickly realized that this was a subject that they didn’t know anything about either! It wasn’t addressed in any of the course curriculums for health professionals - not in a way that allowed them to support clients on a practical level. This also struck me as not okay! How could health professionals comprehensively support their clients if they weren’t helping them reduce exposure to chemicals that were impacting their weight, or messing with their thyroid, or contributing to their difficulty in getting pregnant? The short answer is that they couldn’t. The more I read about chemicals, and the thousands of places that we’re exposed, the more passionate I became about changing this. In my bones I knew it wasn’t right. I

So I dumped my account executive job, went back to school and became a newly minted health coach - eager, excited and passionate about helping people and making a real difference in the world.

wondered how the heads of these companies could sleep at night knowing their products contained potentially harmful ingredients. I became totally fired up and ultimately changed the entire focus of my practice towards educating the health practitioner, so they could support their clients in the most comprehensive way. My mission and goal became clear: I want to encourage and inspire enough individual people, through the work of the health practitioner, to change, and demand change in the marketplace that industry has no choice but to change in response. My goal is achieved when my clients are able to take what they learn from me, and support their clients in reaching their health goals. This is a win/win/ win scenario: The client’s health is improved, the health practitioners business becomes stronger, and I’m finally able to feel like I’ve contributed to the world in a way that I’m proud of. Over the past three years I’ve had the honor of working with over 500 health professionals in my training courses - teaching them the nuts and bolts of environmental chemicals, and sharing the concept of practical avoidance.   We can’t avoid all exposures out there in the world - trying would be an exercise in crazy-making - but we can absolutely control the things we bring into our homes, and the food we eat! So that’s where my work focuses. The idea is to change the things that we can control, so that we worry

less about the ones that we can’t. Running my business has been one of the most difficult, yet most rewarding thing I’ve ever done. It’s pushed every emotional button I have, plus some ones I didn’t know were there! There have been moments when I’ve longed for a j.o.b. and moments when I just wanted to curl up on the couch and check out with bad tv. There have been tears, and late nights and technical failures. But there have also been enormous wins - for me and for my clients. I feel hugely proud to not only have created a successful business that’s helped people all over the world (my client base spans 38 states and 12 countries!), but that through this work, so many people are being inspired to make healthier choices for themselves and their families. I’ve also created a space where I get to by myself, fully, and completely. I’m the boss, I make the rules and set the tone, which is so much fun! I’m a funny, nutty, and pottymouthed person - there was no way my work was going to recreate the stuffy atmosphere of that old cubicle! I’m free to be my authentic self, and I’ve learned over the years that this is what my clients are magnetized to! Look, it’s no surprise that environmental toxins can be a dry and boring subject, but when someone is able to sprinkle humor and curse words into the lesson, it suddenly becomes a lot more fun. I feel blessed to get to make such a positive impact in the world completely on my own terms!

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bio: Lara Adler is Environmental Toxins Expert and Certified Holistic Health Coach who trains and educates practitioners within the health & wellness community to better understand the links between environmental toxins and their impact on disease states – from weight gain and diabetes, to thyroid disease and developmental disorders – so they can better support their clients. Lara is deeply committed to peeling back the curtain and opening up the conversation about environmental toxins to people in a way that’s informative, accessible, actionable and totally free from overwhelm. She takes a practical, real-world approach to minimizing toxic exposure to safeguard our health.

a note To

Female Entrepreneurs If you’ve had a business dream - whether it’s opening an amazing cafe, or running a design studio, or walking dogs just do it. Don’t worry if there are a million other people out there with cafes, design studios, or dogs on leashes - there is no one out there like YOU. What people ultimately gravitate towards is how you do what you do... your unique voice, your passion and your personality. Be authentic. Be who you are and the right people will not only find you, but they’ll totally love you!

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book recommendation: This is an unusual choice for a favorite book, but it’s one that’s stuck with me for years, and one that I think of often. The book follows a group of soldiers during the Vietnam war, telling the stories of their lives through the things they carried; tangible items like matches, candies, and rifles, and intangible things like guilt and fear and regret. I first read it in college as part of a literature class, and was totally moved by the story and the way that O’Brien was able to dig right to the heart of human emotion, and the strange way that people just are, emotional baggage and all. We all have baggage that we carry around with us that weighs us down, emotionally and physically. Past mistakes, lost loves, echo’s of failure that are heavy, hard to face, and that can ultimately keep us from having the life we want, or reaching our goals. Deciding what to hold on to (and why) and what to let go of (and why) are constant lessons for all of us. Running a business is for sure one of the hardest, and most rewarding, things anyone can do, and it forces you to examine and weigh a lot of your personal baggage. Learning to let it go can serve to lighten your mental and emotional load, allowing you to be more focused and present in your life and work, which is a great thing!

Learning to let it go can serve to lighten your mental and emotional load, allowing you to be more focused and present in your life and work, which is a

great thing!

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The girlfriend’s guide to keeping a va

{Finally } 74

by Tiffany Manley

You {after an awkward silence}: “Remember, I did mention that to you… I sent an email about it.” Your VA {trying to be as polite as possible}: “I’m sorry, I didn’t receive an email with that info. When did you send it? Do you remember the subject line?” You {getting increasingly frustrated}: “I sent it on Tuesday. Let me check my sent folder; I can’t remember the subject.” Silence. You: “It’s sitting in my outbox; I never sent it.” If I had a nickel for every bad VA-related story I heard, I’d have a very rich future ahead of me. They’re that common, but I have a feeling I don’t need to tell you that. We could spend this entire article relishing in the worst stories out there, or I could take this opportunity to teach you how to have a great relationship with your VA. I’m choosing the latter, and I am qualified to do so: I’m a VA and I have super-awesome relationships with my clients. Like, been-together-for-two-years-we-finish-each-other’ssentences awesome. I’ve learned what works and what doesn’t and I’m ready to share that knowledge with you. This isn’t a bunch of BS that sounds lovely on paper but is utter crap in execution; these are tried and true ways of getting down and dirty and making stuff work. But first - you must understand this paradox: It’s not you, it’s your VA. But, it’s not your VA, it’s you. Translation: both of you shoulder the responsibility of the quality of your relationship. If you didn’t do your due-diligence when hiring, and instead chose to go with your cousin’s sister’s roommate’s hairdresser’s niece {a floundering 19-year old who hates the world and just wants to earn some money for partying on the weekend without actually having to put pants on during the day}, how can you possibly expect great results? It’s not your VA baby, it’s you. If your VA comes highly recommended, is top-notch in her field, and makes every attempt to make your business

better, but you’re completely and utterly disorganized and refuse to respect her expertise and gentle suggestions for improvement, how can you possibly expect great results? It’s not your VA, it’s you. If you make yourself available, attempt to document systems and procedures to ease the transition, understand that a grace period is necessary in this environment, and really work to implement any suggestions she might have that better the business, yet your VA is still pretty much sucking after six months? It’s not you, it’s your VA. Now do you understand what I’m talking about? Yes? Good. You can pass GO. You can collect $200. In the form of these handy insider secrets:

Insider Secret #1: You must understand that each virtual working relationship requires a grace period.

And honestly, it should be longer than you think. In my experience, it takes a good six months for a new team {whether that’s just you and your VA or even more people} to really come together. Are things really bad that entire time? No, things pick up the pace rapidly. But six months seems to be the magic number for really seeing true collaboration, cohesion, and ease. Disclaimer: if your VA is missing appointments, sending snide emails to clients, and is an all-around sucky person, don’t adhere to the six month rule. Drop her like she’s hot and find someone else.

Insider Secret #2: If you don’t have task management software in place, your VA must have a recommendation.

Any VA worth her salt knows task management software. Tasks are the bread and butter of what we do.

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If she doesn’t have a system in place for managing them Whether you have this done by a professional or you ask your VA to jot stuff down as she does it, you really should effectively, that’s a red flag. A good VA can come into bihave working documents for every aspect of running your your company and quickly learn the software you curbusiness. For various reasons, VAs might come and go, and rently have in place, and if you don’t have something, it makes your life as a business owner insanely easier if you she can make a recommendation and get the company have this information ready to hand over to the new person. started. Ideally, you commit to using it with her, but it’s not absolutely necessary. Sometimes I have to manage the If you’re already knee-deep in stuff and don’t have this info tasks myself in my program of choice, independent of the in place, ask your VA to start documenting things as she goes. It’ll give you peace of mind and it will actually help her do business owner. her job faster when she knows exactly how to perform each task. If you have the means and time, hire someone to help you through this process and document this information for you. Trust me, it’s well worth it.

Respect her time and she will respect yours.

Your VA likely has other clients which means you’re not the only apple of her eye. Respect her time and don’t send over tasks that MUST BE DONE RIGHT NOW. Here’s the thing: everything isn’t an emergency. Nope, sorry. It’s not. Most things aren’t. And if I’m going to be brutally honest, your fowl-up // failure to plan // poor management are not her problems either. If she can accommodate you, great, but don’t expect it. Ask her what deadlines she’d like for recurring tasks like sending out newsletters. Ask her what turnaround time she’d like to have for tasks {24 to 48 hours is better than industry standard}.

Insider Secret: Understand what she does {and does not} do.

VA is there for a variety of reasons, depending on the She is not your b*&^h, she Your VA, but ultimately it boils down to helping you implement things in your business. She may have a marketing backis your partner. ground, or experience with heavy duty software, or any

You need her and she needs you. It’s a pretty sweet deal. If you look at her as your slave, as a standard employee you’re paying to do things, as someone you can bark orders at, you won’t be together for long. Her sole purpose in life isn’t to serve you. The faster you understand this, the more you’ll respect her and the expertise she brings to the table. And what can this do for you? It creates ease and flow, it creates an environment in which she’s not afraid to make suggestions to better the business, it creates a VA who feels compelled to ensure the successful running of your business. Trust me, there’s nothing that kills a VA/client relationship faster than feeling as if the client views you as dispensable, stupid, or someone to order around. Just as there are tons of VAs in the sea, so there are clients.

Bonus

She is not your b*&^h, she is your partner.

number of other things she brings to the table, but what she is not is your business owner or your business coach. She cannot care more about your business than you do. She is not the person to run your business, to make the marketing decisions, to tell you what to do. If you expect this of her, you’ll lose her to the frustration that comes from working with a business owner who doesn’t know what they’re doing and a} refuses to get help or b} won’t invest in the right help. These secrets are just a drop in the bucket of what I could share with you. There are so many nuances involved in this type of working relationship that nobody ever thinks about until it’s too late. Keep these secrets in mind, though, and you’ll be well on your way to a rocking relationship with your VA. It’s my mission to help create better, well-equipped VAs {from how to successfully manage a client’s business to how to use Infusionsoft to planning for the future of a business and more}. If you think your VA would benefit from such training, feel free to raise your hand for more info on my upcoming VA retreat or Boutique Business Labs.

bio: Tiffany Manley is founder of Sweet Phenomena, LLC, the parent company of The VA Boutique, From Under the Shade, and Sweet Phenomena. As a trusted expert in the boutique business industry and a lifelong learner who likes to stay ahead of trends, she has created a respected online brand devoted to delivering the tools, techniques, savvy, and sparkle women and girls require to blow the roof off this mother.

was born! Tiffany’s newest venture, From Under the Shade, provides subscription services, books, and workbooks that help girls realize they are already powerful and have everything they need to be the face of change in this world.

Being a young mother and Navy wife newly stationed outside of Seattle was the first time Tiffany had not worked. To her, it felt like she wasn’t “doing” anything. In her quest to having something her own {aside from being a mother and wife}, a friend suggested that she take cake decorating classes. After months of practice, Tiffany took her first steps into entrepreneurship. She launched a licensed custom cake business that was booked almost instantly! Today, five years after leaving Washington, she still gets calls for cakes! After Tiffany’s husband left the Navy, the family moved to Alabama. Tiffany loved writing and there she began homeschooling her now school-aged daughter, which required lots of research. She decided to combine the two to create a homeschool blog and her first eBook titled So, You Think You Wanna Homeschool?. After working virtually for someone on an hourly basis, it all came together for this blossoming entrepreneur. Tiffany realized she had the skills to create her own VA business. She had already launched two successful business ventures, plus she possessed an amazing skill set: awesome publisher and blogger, social media maven, stellar business manager, and expert techie. The VA Boutique

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a note to female entrepreneurs:

Sparkle.

Let your intuition guide you. Set the best example possible. Others are watching you and will look to you for guidance on their own path. Laugh. At yourself. At your mistakes. At how totally awesome it is to be able to go to work without pants if you want.

Don’t let anyone tell you that you should only deal in reality, not in how you feel. Believe in yourself. Refuse to tolerate anything less than epicness in others. Don’t be afraid to use exclamation points gratuitously.

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Don’t be afraid to have the difficult conversations. Find people who get you. And get what you do. They’ll be sanity savers for you, and if you’re fortunate, you’ll be able to return the favor. Realize that some of the best business decisions are often preceded by a queasy feeling. Invest in yourself and your business. With money. And time.

Just because everyone else is doing it doesn’t mean you should. Giving value, for free, isn’t stupid. Don’t ever be afraid to ask. Believe in magic.

Jump before you’re ready. Sparkle. Yes. Again. Know what your mission and vision are. Dream.

book recommendation:

Sparkle.

From the time I can remember, one of my favorite things to do was curl up with a book. I could escape to cool places, build characters in my mind, and get totally lost in other worlds. I generally read fiction {with the exception of a few dry, sarcastic, witty non-fiction business book-ish writers like Erika Lyremark and Sophia Amoruso} and so, my recommendation is not one you’ll generally come across in this magazine. So often our lives as entrepreneurs become bogged down by all the details of running a business. We love what we do, so we want to learn as much as possible and it becomes consuming. That’s why I’m recommending The Mysterious Benedict Society series. It’s important to enjoy time away from our businesses and to immerse ourselves in something completely and utterly nonsensical and entertaining. The series is technically young adult fiction, but it was an incredibly fun read: the first set of books I could not stand to put down in a long time. You’ve got mystery, brain teasers and puzzles, intrigue, suspense, and whimsy all rolled into one. The vivid writing in the books makes it incredibly easy to build the scenes in your mind. Definitely check it out and let me know what you think!

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Mojo:

Your Four-Step Plan to Confidence and Personal Power DEBORAH KAGAN This might come as a shocker, however…I didn’t trust women. For a long time. I walked around thinking that other women were competition or, at the very least, going to let me down in some way. Thankfully, I can laugh at that version of myself now. Today, my business is all about supporting women to rock their mojo. I crave connecting with women. I finally understand the power of being with women—wherever two or more are gathered. And that’s what I want to share with you. It’s timely because I regularly hear from female clients (prospective and current) that “I’m not comfortable with women” and I understand, yet do not subscribe to that life stance anymore. The uncomfortable truth is: if you’re a woman that’s not comfortable with other women, that’s

because you’re not comfortable BEING a woman. What you resist persists, and does so loudly. It’s mandatory that women step up to the plate, look in the mirror and get really acquainted with themselves. Deeply intimate. Know thyself. Can this be scary? Sure. But can you really wait any longer? Let’s look at this through the M.O.J.O landscape. Mojo is your life force. It’s your personal magnetism that people feel from you before you ever say a word. It will bring you more power, energy, confidence, comfort in your own skin and support living a turned on life. You want your mojo dial on top volume and in order to do so, there are four steps to your mojo plan.

SIMPLE TIPS:

MINDSET

You have to get your head screwed on straight as a woman and discover what’s The Truth. All of us have influences starting from an early age that polluted our minds and caused separation from our mojo. Like the false beliefs so many of us carry about other women. These were piled onto our psyches due to crappy experiences in our formative years, poor examples, cultural chaos, confused families and bad messaging.

Mojo Tip: Take 15-30 minutes and journal about your TRUE feelings about being a woman. Ask yourself, the deeper/all knowing self; to express what’s in there. If you find the false beliefs pouring out on to the page, then ask yourself, what is the best way to turn these beliefs around to be aligned with who I know myself to be?

ORACLE

Your body is an oracle. It’s the all-knowing rental vehicle that’s carrying you around this lifetime. Your oracle also houses your power center, which is your storehouse of mojo. You were born with it. It never goes away. What happens over time is the volume dial can fall drastically low due to a variety of influences. In order to access your full power and be a mojolicious woman, you must become embodied. A woman who’s comfortable in her own skin is one of the most magnetic, engaging and delicious sights to behold. This kind of woman has presence. This kind of woman influences people. This kind of woman takes up space in the world.

Mojo Tip: Learn how to activate your power center (access the lesson in your free gift, The Sensually Empowered Woman Video Series). Practice the exercise for 2-3 minutes every day for a minimum of one week. Notice how you feel. Notice how your day flows. Notice your energy level. And of course, notice your state of being. Then, continue to use the exercise multiple times a week to maintain and cultivate your mojo.

3. JOIN WITH ALL THE ROLES YOU PLAY

Women are 31 flavors and then some. Especially in our modern day society where we have an abundance of opportunities and lead very full lives. What happens over the course of time is, as a woman, you shrink yourself down and only allow a portion of who you are out in the world. Usually this consists of the personal you and the professional you. But what about the you who loves to travel? The you who loves to cook? The you who loves to be sassy? Or silly? Or wild? Or spiritual? Or woo-woo? Or rebellious? Where are those parts of you? When you let ALL your roles come out to play on the grand stage of your life you will be more fulfilled, self-expressed and drop all your shame around being a woman.

Mojo Tip: Make a chart with columns to represent at least 5 roles. Three of those will be: professional you, personal you and {pick one of your hobbies} you. Down the rows give each of your roles a name, a signature outfit, list that role’s pinnacle strength as well as what they seriously are no good with and finally, the role’s ‘happy place.’ When you create your role-play chart, you can easily see the bigger picture of who you are, what you offer and how to navigate between the roles.

4. Oasis As an entrepreneur, you have the luxury of working wherever you’d like. Which is a blessing and sometimes not when you tend to work at home like many entrepreneurs do. However, you can amp up your mojo by creating your environment to be an oasis. This is often overlooked. But please listen up. Our outer environment radically effects your inner environment. Your home and office is it’s own living, breathing entity that will support you or deplete you. Your mojo is ramped up to celebrity status when you pay attention to what you surround yourself with, incorporate beauty and honor your oasis.

Mojo Tip: Your bedroom is the closest thing to you and has the greatest effect on your life. Make sure you incorporate inspiring things that represent all the senses (find

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endless tips and tools in my book, Find Your ME Spot: 52 Ways to Reclaim Your Confidence, Feel Good in Your Own Skin and Live a Turned on Life), have it be beautiful to you and remove all non bedroom related distractions (ahem, no work in there!). Use these mojo tools. Share them with the women in your life because the TRUTH is: women need to be with other women. Check this out:

Women learn by osmosis. Seriously. We absorb energy. Ever notice when you spend enough time with someone, you start to talk, move and react like they do?

Women pick up signals. No matter what kind of game face you’ve got on, a woman knows what’s up with you. She can tell if you’re BSing—most especially yourself.

Women gather. This one’s from cave people time. It’s in our DNA to collect things, share stories and create a tight knit community together.

with good women, women who can support your dreams, women who are willing to see you thrive, women who know the power of being with other women—your life will be richer (in spirit and in the bank).

Take the Mojolicious Woman challenge this month: - Take action in getting to know yourself, truly. Work with a coach, therapist or healer if you really want to make quantum leaps. - Find a tribe of women who will lift you up. - Honor the women in your life that are already a part of your tribe. Call them just to say, “I’m grateful for you.” Send them a handwritten card (remember those?). Take them out for a coffee or cocktail. - Find some reverence for your mother, no matter what’s gone down between you. Engaging in all of the above brings you more joy, confidence and vitality. So get out there ladies, and knock ‘em alive!

Remember, when you take the time to surround yourself

jOY! cONFIDENCE! vITALITY!

MY FAVORITE BOOK: Seducing the Demon: Writing for My Life, by Erica Jong

MY STORY:

“Talent without guts gets you exactly nowhere.” This quote pretty much nails it for me. Erica Jong is the powerhouse who took the literary world and popular culture by storm in the 1970’s with her breakout book, Fear of Flying. She’s been a hero of mine for a long time. When Seducing the Demon came out I had the pleasure of finally meeting her. This book reminds me to go for it. Period. Whether it be in life or business (to me they are intimately connected). She reminds me that our expression is needed AND it takes effort to hone a good craft no matter what you offer in the world. While this isn’t a traditional ‘business’ book, I urge every entrepreneur to read it because what we do as entrepreneurs is not an in-the-box mentality. Through Erica’s stories, you’ll be inspired (possibly offended) and definitely moved to share your work from a more authentic and powerful space.

Deborah Kagan is a Sensual Lifestyle Specialist with years of practice being a turned-on woman. She helps women tap into their innate power and connect with their mojo, which is the source of true self-esteem. From this place, women gain increased enthusiasm for life allowing for great selfconfidence resulting in the ability to earn more money, reduce stress and create thriving relationships (personally and professionally). She attributes her methods and business success to the unique combination of over 20 years of information and experience with her creative endeavors, an insatiable passion for traveling around the world, a boundless interest in life’s infinite experiences, a dedicated spiritual practice, always being a student, surrounding herself with high vibration people, learning from and investing in those farther along the path, spontaneous dance breaks, a healthy love life and always fueling her senses with empowering input. One of her main mottos that consistently ups her game is: Awareness without action is simply mental masturbation. Giving back to the community is an important aspect of Deborah’s success. As a philanthropist and community activist, Deborah is founder of and executive producer of VDAY Santa Monica, a benefit raising awareness and funds to end violence against women and girls. And she is on the board of advisors to Peace Over Violence.

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A NOTE TO FEMALE ENTREPRENEURS

Dear Fellow Entrepreneur, We are in a class amongst ourselves. We are misunderstood. We are an anomaly to many. Kindred to some. What we do is blaze trails. We make something from nothing and create value for our communities. We innovate. We trip and fall. We get back up again. Never let them get you down. Find the perfect cocktail for YOUR success. Make the daily intake of ingredi-

ents non negotiable. Surround yourself with the things, people, places and experiences that lift you up, inspire you and most importantly, challenge you to be the next best version of yourself. Always learn. Grow. And for goodness sake, go rock your mojo! Mojoliciously, Deborah Kagan, Sensual Lifestyle Specialist www.deborah-kagan.com

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Click Here for Your

free gift Offer: The 4 Keys to Being a Sensually Empowered Woman: How ANY Woman Can Eliminate Doubt and Create Self-Confidence, Enthusiasm and Feminine Power - RIGHT NOW!

3 Step System to Selling Your Services With Your Website

by Holly Chantal

There are two misconceptions that many online entrepreneurs have that are killing their sales: 1. That marketing gets them clients. 2. That their website is for selling.

You’re probably wondering how those two things could possibly be misconceptions, I mean they seem to be pretty much common sense! And yes, you can’t get clients without marketing, and when you optimize your sales process like I’m going to show you how to do in this article your website can become a sales machine. The key is that these are not the primary purposes of these two tools and if you ignore this fact, you’ll be one of the thousands that are wasting their best business building resources. So let’s take a second look then, what is marketing? Marketing is all about creating awareness of your brand. Marketing is how you share your content and knowledge, get your brand in front of your audience, and how you drive traffic back to your website. By doing so you create awareness and begin showing up on your prospects radars. When you’re marketing well you’ll become known as an expert and for your unique perspective on the challenges your prospects are facing. Marketing in and of itself is not a sales activity. When done right, you use marketing to attract you audience to a page where they can take action to engage you further. In most cases this is your website, it may also be a particular sales page, social media profile, or something else that you want eyeballs and action on.

ing a ton of traffic to your website. If your website is all about Buy! Buy! Buy! not only are you going to sound like a popular 90’s band, but unless your visitor is ready right then to make a buying decision they’re going to leave your site – most likely never to return again. Not because they don’t want to, but the chances of the planets aligning and them finding you again are slimmer. Your website should be geared toward starting a conversation so that you can begin to build trust with your prospect and be top of mind when they are ready to make a buying decision. You do this on your website by engaging visitors with an extremely low barrier to entry offer, such as asking for their email address in exchange for a free digital product geared toward solving the challenge they’re facing. This is easy to say yes to, and now that they’ve raised their hand that they’re interested in your topic, you can start building a relationship with them and raise your credibility factor by continuing to wow them with what you have to offer. Does this mean that you shouldn’t sell stuff on your website? Absolutely not! Of course you want to have your services and programs on your website with the ability to buy, because there are always exceptions and some people WILL come to your site and want to buy right away. The point here is that your primary call to action and the tone of your site should be geared toward starting the conversation rather than using every square pixel of space to make an offer or tell them about everything you do so that they can hire you this very moment. So let’s talk about when the selling part comes in. Your website sales will come from your follow up strategy.

And here’s where the second conundrum raises it’s head. Your website’s primary purpose is to start a conversation, not making a sale. Let’s say you’re marketing is going well and you’re driv-

Your follow up should build a relationship with prospects and establish your credibility. When you want to sell a particular program your best bet is to create an email campaign that captures the interest of those on your list that need your program right then. Your emails will direct them

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to a sales page where they can make a purchase. When you use this type of strategy to sell your programs online, your website becomes much more effective because your prospects are being directed to the right sales pages when they are ready to make a purchase. You’re also not losing the opportunity to build a relationship with prospects that might not be ready to buy from you when they first land on your website. So let’s recap what the 3 steps to selling your programs online looks like: • Step 1: You create awareness of your brand with your marketing. • Step 2: You start a conversation with your website visitors by collecting their email addresses in exchange for free information to help them with their problem. • Step 3: You make a targeted sales offers via your follow up system after your prospects have shown interest and you’ve built a relationship. Of course, there will always be exceptions and some people will buy from your website the first time they come to it. Those clients are few and too far between to make it worth wasting your marketing efforts and prime website real estate. If you have a marketing and sales system that is built with these steps in mind you will maximize the number of clients you have signing up for your programs.

3 step recap

If you’d like to get a free evaluation of your online presence and see where you’re super strong and where you may be missing opportunities go to www.brandpowerassessment.com and take my free assessment.

• Step 1: You create awareness of your brand with your marketing. • Step 2: You start a conversation with your website visitors by collecting their email addresses in exchange for free information to help them with their problem. • Step 3: You make a targeted sales offers via your follow up system after your prospects have shown interest and you’ve built a relationship. 92

Favorite book: Like many business owners, I’ve read a LOT of business books. I find that they present new ways of thinking about business and spark my creativity. The book I reference the most when talking with clients is probably Predicable Success be Les McKweon. In this book Les illustrates the stages of business and what is required to navigate them without your business imploding, and I find it fascinating. Growing your business in leaps and bounds is not always as simple as getting more clients. The key message I find is that when you make a change in your business you have to take into account the overall impact that change will have. For example, if you’re trying to scale your business by creating processes and repeatable systems; you have to be ready for those processes to slow things down until they are running smoothly.

bio

Holly is the Founder of The Land of Brand® a truly comprehensive and unique website design and branding company. She is also the creator of the revolutionary Branding Game™, which is a whole new way of looking at and experiencing brand creation. Having started her first successful business at just 19, combined with being a Book Yourself Solid® Certified Coach, Holly understands marketing and the struggle of trying to stand out from the crowd. Holly has taken the hard and laborious process that comes with creating a website and made it fun for her clients. The websites she creates aren’t just beautiful, but have a strategic backbone that her clients count on to bring in business.

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Get Your Complete, Turnkey, Online Business Building Solution from http://www.TheLandofBrand.com

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Click here for your Free Gift! Brand Power Assessment

Does your website stand out and engage your audience? Take this free assessment and find out where you’re kicking butt with your online presence and uncover areas that with a little bit of work could take you to the next level in your business.

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