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It can be frustrating to ask these questions because you might feel like you're asking them out into the ether. What do I do? And it just echoes, and there's no answer. As business owners, for some reason, we have this misconception that we are supposed to have all the answers. We are supposed to know what to do next. And we start to feel pretty down on ourselves when we're not sure what to do to get. Get the business to finally get off the ground or to take it to that next level. All that being said, running a business is not easy. That's why the words in Isaiah 40 give me such comfort. Hello, everyone, and welcome to episode 304 of the Kate Show. Today I have something that has been really weighing on me for a couple days, and I actually rearranged my recording schedule so that I could get this one out first because I think that it's. It's timely. Now, I have heard from a few people in my life who are really struggling in business in several different ways. Some of them are wondering if they should shut down their business entirely because despite their best efforts, things aren't working. And there are other people who are trying to figure out where to. To grow next. Like they've reached a certain level of success and they're wondering what is so significant about my next move that makes me hesitate to take it. They can sense there's something more. They can sense that they're called to do something with the successful business they've been given that they've worked hard to build over years. And these two people, while they might have totally different problems related to their businesses, they can actually get those answers from the same source. So this episode today is for those of you who are struggling with what's next. And I'll be honest, I keep coming back to this place because I am always wondering, what's next. I don't like to stay in one place for too long. I mean, if God called me to sell the business, I would. Now, I don't think that's what he's calling me to do. But there is a question of in which direction to grow a business. A business can grow in a lot of different ways. A business can shut down for a lot of different reasons. And when I hear from some people in my life, you know, my clients or past clients, who are just like, I don't know what to do anymore, it seems like all I'm doing is wasting my time and my effort because things aren't growing. I. I've been there, too. I have been there, especially in the earlier years of business. And like I said, for those of you who've been in business a bit longer, you're. Your question might be similar to what mine often is, and that is, which direction do I grow it now? Am I supposed to keep growing it in just one direction? Or is something about it supposed to fundamentally change? Because, let's face it, I've changed as a person since I started this business. You've changed as a person since you started your business. It's a valid question to be asking. It can be frustrating to ask these questions because you might feel like you're asking them out into the ether. What do I do? And it just echoes and there's no answer. And you go to the business coaches, many of which are lovely and helpful and wise, and you get help with your own personal issues, you get help with the inner workings of your business, but you still don't feel clear on what is the goal, what is my purpose here? Maybe you're just burned out. Maybe you don't need to change anything in your business. You just need a nap. That's very possible. But maybe that stirring, that friction that you're feeling is a sign that change is coming. Doesn't have to be a bad change, but it's something that you have to be ready for. So today I'm sharing my secret resource for getting these questions answered and settling the angst that can come with changes when they're big changes when they're good, changes when they're completely out of left field, unexpected changes. Whatever it is that you are headed for, today's episode is going to help you a lot. All right? So let's just get into it. I'm going to share with you the message that kind of set my brain on fire a few days ago. It set my brain on fire as a marketing consultant and as a business owner. It. It's just something that I've been constantly meditating on and mulling over. And this is the message. It's from 1 Corinthians 3, 7. So neither he who plants nor he who waters anything, but only God who gives the growth. As a business owner, this makes me feel a lot of different ways all at the same time. I've been planting and watering my business just as you have, and it's been hard. Those buckets of water are heavy. And pulling out the weeds, like, what Tedious monotony. And yet. And yet I can see in my own business that all of my hard work would have been in vain if God had not decided to give it growth. And that's very humbling because in the girl boss era, which, like I said, is kind of dying off, and for lots of good reasons. In the girl boss era, we were told to proclaim the fact that we were self made millionaires if we achieved that. We were told to brag about how much we worked and about how in control we were and all of that. That's, that's a lie. We were never really in control. But also, this verse does beg the question. So if neither he who plants or he who waters is anything but only God gives the growth, well then why bother working so hard? Or is God just micromanaging everything about our businesses? Does it really matter whether we are good managers of our business if God's the one who ultimately makes it grow anyway? Also, why did God let that woman's business fail? And is a business that didn't do well actually a failure? Or is it just a stepping stone? And on that vein of thought, is a successful business just a stepping stone as well? And if so, to what? These more esoteric high IQ questions are things that I didn't start thinking about until recently. Because I'm starting to think that maybe life is about a lot more than just having a business, just having a successful business, just having a business that keeps getting more and more successful every single year, only increasing the grind and the stress and the pressure that we put on ourselves. But then, of course, it's good to work, right? Well, we're just going to get into all of this. God is creative and we are his kids and we inherited his creativity. His penchant for making things work is part of our humanity. And without meaningful work, we fall apart. I mean, ask any Montessori teacher. Kids and adults must have meaningful work. They must have purpose. They must find their significance in that. Because someone who is left to his or her own devices and has no responsibilities, no work to attend to, always defaults to being obnoxious because it's not how we were meant to live. So we are supposed to work, and our work does matter. And in fact, in Ephesians 4, 28, it says, Let the thief no longer steal, but rather let him labor doing honest work with his own hands so that he may have something to share with anyone in need. So maybe the purpose of running a business is not just to watch the revenue grow year over year over year, but it is to be able to employ our team because they're trying to work honestly with their own hands and provide for their families and to share with anyone who needs it. When that is our purpose for being in business, it does significantly impact the decisions we make and whether we make certain decisions at all, because doing our due diligence is a requirement. It's not just a good idea, however, thinking that we are the catalyst for our own success and that without us, our business would never be successful, or without us working tons of hours, our business would never be successful. Or without us getting all sorts of venture capitalists involved, our business will never be successful. I think that we may have severely mischaracterized both God and success and vastly overestimated our own abilities. But I'll get into that. In Proverbs 22, it says, do you see a man, or I would assume a woman, skillful in his work? He will stand before kings, he will not stand before obscure men. We are supposed to have a skill set. In fact, we are each given one by our Creator, and it is our job to work it out from there. You may have been gifted with the ability to be an interior designer or a professional organizer, but you still had to work out that gift. And then you have to work out managing a business around that gift. And it's difficult. It is difficult because the world will say, well, this is the epitome of your success. This is it. So if this fails, you fail. And, you know, the problem with hitching our wagon to something that we cannot control, like a business, is that when that business goes over the edge of a cliff, we go with it. Not great. Not great. And that's why we can't hitch our value as a person to the business. But we also then can't use it as an excuse to, well, I don't have to work that hard because if God wants it to be successful, it will. No, due diligence is a requirement, not just a good idea. In First Thessalonians, Paul, who's writing to the church in Thessalonica, says this, which really just sums up life in general. Aspire to live quietly and to mind your own affairs, and to work with your hands as we instructed you, so that you may walk properly before outsiders and be dependent on no one. So the picture that's being painted here is, work with your hands. Live quietly and mind your own business. Help others, but don't be dependent on them. Help them. In Proverbs it says that a slack hand causes poverty, but the hand of the diligent makes rich. He who gathers in summer is a prudent son, but he who sleeps in harvest is A son who brings shame. Now, a couple different ideas are being presented here at once. So being lazy will lead to poverty. Could be poverty of character, poverty of your bank account, poverty of success. Like it could lead to a lot of different things. But the hand of the diligent makes rich. Now, rich doesn't necessarily mean just money. Being diligent makes you rich of character, rich of connections, rich of friends, rich in life. Because you can't be diligent and be hidden. But it's very easy to slack off and be hidden and to be apart from the culture that you are supposed to be in, but not of. The verse also says that he who gathers in the summer is a prudent son, but he who sleeps in the harvest is a son who brings shame. So this means that let's just say this guy is supposed to be aware of what to do in each season. And it's a reference to agriculture. But we all have seasons in our business as well. What if we tried to harvest during planting season and then we got frustrated when there was nothing to harvest? But it silly for us to expect there to be something to harvest when it's actually planting season and we are supposed to be planting. But that's just not as exciting as harvesting because we want instant gratification. We want to see the fruits of our labor right away. And we forget that there's the labor that comes before the fruits. Due diligence is a requirement. In Proverbs 21 goes on to say, the plans of the diligent lead surely to abundance. But everyone who is hasty comes only to poverty. Again, not necessarily just financial poverty. The plans of the diligent surely lead to abundance. In other words, you have to thoughtfully strategize about what you're going to do before you do it. Because randomly pulling things out of your hat and trying them will make you poor. It will make you poor of discernment, poor of character, and probably poor financially too. Being diligent requires strategy. It means making wise financial choices in your business, managing your business with thought and intention, marketing with a strategy. Strategy. Not just throwing money at an ad and hoping that works. That would be a lack of planning which you know clearly leads to poverty. You need to be able to simplify your business because that's part of stewarding it well. You need to monitor what you're doing, analyze results and adapt accordingly, and serve clients well and with integrity. Some of these things should go without saying, but they they do need to be said. I have seen so many interior design businesses in particular, fail or just struggle, and that designer will be like, I just. I just need my next project. I don't know if I should work on my SEO. Maybe I have to make my website even better. Um, I guess I need to do more marketing. I'll take out some ads. I don't know. And they're just like, all over the place because they don't have a plan. They also struggle with managing their finances, so when they do get a plan, they can't fund it. It's a struggle. And because they also have a scarcity mindset that is governed by paranoia rather than purpose, even if they do have the money for some sort of implementation of a marketing strategy or paying a coach to help them become a better financial manager, they hold that money with double fists and they do not give it up for anything. And instead they go down with the ship that they only built halfway versus having someone come on board, help them finish building, help them steer. That's the struggle. We business owners tend to be control freaks. And that control freak nature shows up in a variety of ways, including paranoia, including being afraid to invest in the right ways. Now, this is not a diatribe on me saying this is why you should hire a marketing agency. No, not at all. Because honestly, any of you could listen to a podcast, this one or a different one. There's a lot of marketing podcasts out there. And come up with your own plan and implement it, and you'd be just fine. Okay, you. You don't need people like me. It's just nice to outsource things. Sometimes your focus should be on what am I going to do that is significant and why do I care about making money? Obviously, a business needs to make money. Unless you're a 501C3, you need to make money. In my recent episode with Kelly Jackel of Eleanor, I love that she said the sticky note by her desk is something that says along the lines of, did you do the things that make the money? Because it's important to stay focused on what matters. But I know Kelly, and she's not like, quote unquote, all about making money. She needs the money to fuel her purpose. And she knows what her purpose is. And that's why she's able to move forward with confidence and do things that would scare a lot of other business owners. Because for her, it's about more than just running a successful business. And I am the same way. It is about more than just being successful. It is about being impactful. It is about being significant. And you cannot be those things by accident. The plans of the diligent lead surely to abundance. And I would wager to say that could be an abundance of significance and impact, not just money, because it is not just about money. And when your business is struggling, you can feel like it is about money because you kind of need the money to fund the things to do the thing. I get it. But that is where you have to step back and realize that as long as you're doing your due diligence and you are walking in the way that God has for you, all of this will come, all of it, because God is a good father. And I will get into that a little bit deeper. So hold tight with me. As business owners, for some reason, we have this misconception that we are supposed to have all the answers. We are supposed to know what to do next. And we start to feel pretty down on ourselves when. When we're not sure what to do to get the business to finally get off the ground or to take it to that next level. But here's what the Bible says about that. Trust in the Lord with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding, okay? So don't rely just on you to come up with some great idea, because who needs that kind of pressure? Here's what you should do instead. It goes on to say, in all your ways, acknowledge him and he will make straight your paths. Now, what does that mean? In all your ways, acknowledge him. It means that in everything you're doing, make sure that it lines up with the way he wants you to live. And that can be hard. I know that. You know, if you don't believe in God, you're probably not still listening to this episode. You're probably like, okay, this is another sermon. But the thing is, God cares about your business. He deeply cares about it because he deeply cares about you. Another thing that I wanted to touch on. So for those of you who have read the Bible, you're probably familiar with King Solomon, the. The son of David. David is the one who fought and killed Goliath. Solomon has been known throughout ancient history, not just biblical history, as being incredibly wise, incredibly wealthy, just a standout superhero of a guy. God asked him early in his life to make a request, and God would grant it. It's kind of cool. Not really something that comes along every day, I would say. And instead of asking for riches or power, Solomon said, God, I just need. I need to be wise. Please give me wisdom. God was so proud of him for asking for wisdom instead of all those other things that he said, you know what? I'm going to give you wisdom in abundance, and I'm also going to give you the wealth and the power and the influence. It. It was extremely generous of God to do that. Solomon went on to contribute significantly to the book of Proverbs because God had given him so much wisdom that he had to start writing it all down. So here's what he says in Proverbs. Be not wise in your own eyes. Fear the Lord and turn away from evil. It will be healing to your flesh and refreshment to your bones. Honor the Lord with your wealth and with the first fruits of all your produce. Then your barns will be filled with plenty and your vats will be bursting with wine. Being wise in our own eyes means we think we have nothing left to learn. And it really limits the capacity to grow anything because a plant cannot water itself. It doesn't work that way. God actually wants to come alongside us and in some ways make this a lot easier for us. So in Psalm 32, God says, I will instruct you and teach you, and the way you should go, I will counsel you with my eye upon you. In other words, he's not just going to give you random advice that applies to everyone. He is going to look at you, keep his eyes on you, and give you the counsel that you need for your particular moment, for your particular situation. However, God is a gentleman, and he is not just going to burst into your life. Well, sometimes maybe, but not usually. You need to ask him for that wisdom the same way Solomon did. And now at this point, you might be like, okay, this all sounds great. However, that doesn't put money in my bank account. That doesn't bring me new clients instantly, and I don't necessarily feel all that better. So what was the point of that? Well, there's a few more things I have to say on this. You have to do your part. You know, doing your due diligence is very important, but just as important is not stressing about the rest because you can't control it. So in 2 Corinthians 12, it says, but he Jesus said to me, my grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. Therefore, Paul says, I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses so that Christ's power may rest on me. What this means, and if I were to put it in my own words, is I don't always know how to make the best decisions in my business. Like me, personally. Me, Kate the socialite. I don't always know. But what I do know is that even when I screw up after trying my darndest, God's grace is sufficient. Which means that the big hole that I put in my business or in my life by making a wrong choice, he can cover that my grace is sufficient for you. He can cover that. He can make it better. He can turn it into something Incredible. In Philippians 4 it says, and my God will meet all your needs according to the riches of his glory in Christ Jesus. God makes significant effort in the Bible to tell us, I've got you. It's okay. If you need help, ask me for it. Because you know he works plenty of miracles every single day. But he's not necessarily just going to barge into your life or barge into your business unless you invite him into it. In Matthew 6 it says, so do not worry, saying, what shall we eat? What shall we drink? What should we wear for the pagans run after these things and your Heavenly Father knows you need them, but seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. So it's a matter of priorities. Are you running your business for the purpose of you have to have that certain dollar amount? There's nothing wrong with having financial goals. It's not what I'm saying here. But if you run a business from the perspective of it has to be successful or else, or if it's not successful, then I personally am a failure or I can't stop worrying about my business because I don't want to do next. This is important for you to remember. Do not worry, but seek versus kingdom. The Father knows you need these things. Now. There are some things in life that we don't need. We just want. We just want to become social media influencers. We just want to make millions of dollars. Do we need that? No. Anyone who is a parent knows that as much as we adore our children, we can't give them and shouldn't give them everything they want. Because what they want may not actually be what's best for them. And God makes it clear that he knows what's best for us. He has plans to prosper us and give us a good future. And that future doesn't just mean a future here on this earth, but that means our eternal future. And if he knows what's best, it doesn't mean, oh God, I really wish I had a million dollars. Can you give it to me? You can ask for that, but I would first question, why do you need a million dollars? Because it has to do with your. Your heart position. Like why, why do you need your business to be at a certain level? Are you where God wants you to be? Or where. Or are you just running from him? I mean, it's possible even if you don't have a relationship with God right now. There are plenty of people who are trying to deny the existence of God and in doing so are recognizing his authority and wanting nothing to do with it. And because of that, they will always be running. And any success they have in this life is the epitome of any success they will ever have. This is that are heaven. And that's sad. It's sad that that's as good as it will ever be for them. And their significance is so tied to their own success that if that were to ever go away and they're constantly worried in the back of their mind that it might, then that's the end. That's the end of everything they've accomplished, everything they have built. There's no peace in that. There's no hope or significance in that. All of that being said, running a business is not easy. And that's why the words in Isaiah 40 give me such comfort. And it says, he, God, he gives strength to the weary. I'm tired. I don't know about you, I'm tired. He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. Even youths grow tired and weary and young men stumble and fall. But those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. Why do they need to renew it? Because it's hard. They will soar on wings like eagles. They will run and not grow weary. They will walk and not be faint. God is with us for the long haul. That is the best relationship you could ever have. You and your Creator together, in business, together even. But the problem is, so many of us don't understand who God actually is. The Bible says in Psalm 103:13 that as a father shows compassion to his children, so the Lord shows compassion to those who fear him. So God is compassionate. God is a father. But there are plenty of us out there who are like, the word father brings up some rough, bad things for me because my father wasn't good. Hey, I'm in that camp right there with you, okay? I had lots of baggage to go through. I had ptsd. It was not a great situation growing up in my household. So the idea of a father to me meant he's just looking for me to do the next thing wrong. And then he's going to rip the rug out from under my feet. And he is going to look down on me and say, I told you so. You deserve every bad thing that's about to happen to you. And that was the enemy. That was the devil, because that's not who God is at all. Let me tell you a story about the first time I really started to realize who God was, because I had a general idea, but I was still kind of like, I follow you, God. I. I worship you. I. I do. I'm committed to you. But there's still part of me that's like, I don't know about this whole good father thing. I don't know if you actually want to be my father or if I'm just like one of your illegitimate kids that just popped up and here I am. You know, maybe some of you have ever felt that way. I don't know. The story I want to tell you is when I was pregnant with my second child, I was sitting in my office, much like I am now, and I was about seven months pregnant, and I was just thinking about how excited I was to have another baby. And then I was like, is it silly that I should be this excited? I mean, I was just elated over the moon, because I was like, well, I mean, I already have one baby, and it just seems kind of silly that I'm just like, oh, my gosh, like, so excited about the second one. Like, it just. I was just questioning myself. And then I heard God's voice, and he said, that's exactly how I feel about you. And I was like, what? But it's true. With all the. The millions and billions and trillions of people who have ever lived, God is still just as excited about you. That's weird, guys. That's weird. And it changes everything. But when you have that in your mind and then you read what I'm about to read to you, it will all make sense. This is from Matthew, chapter seven. Ask and it will be given to you. Seek and you will find. Knock, and the door will be open to you. For everyone who asks, receives. And the one who seeks, finds. And the one who knocks, it will be opened. Or which one of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent. If you, then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father, who is in heaven, give good things to those who ask him? God only gives good things. Anything bad is not from God. Okay? And the fact that he is using their parent Child relationship to explain how he interacts with us is the whole point. That's why he created families, so that we could start to understand how much he cares about us. And for those of us who grew up in bad families and, and have experienced that complete twisting and distortion of what love was supposed to be, well, that's why we end up thinking, this is all up to me. I've got to do it all myself. I can't let anybody help me. I shouldn't let anyone help me. I deserve the bad things that happen to me. And if things go wrong, it's probably my fault, whether it's the business or something else. And those are, those are lies. That's. That's not how God operates. It doesn't just say that God is loving in the Bible, but God is love. Every time we love another person, our friend or child or spouse, whomever, even if we don't believe in God, we are displaying one of his, like his entire characteristic. Because there is no love apart from God, okay? Love to. To accept someone unconditionally, not in spite of their issues, but because they are who they are and God is who he is. Many of us don't understand who God actually is and how involved he wants to be in our lives. In Psalm 68, it says, Father to the fatherless defender of widows. This is God. Wow, that's pretty personal. What does this mean for you? It means that you need to rest. Rest mentally rest. Knowing the success, success of your business has always been in the hands of God. And a failed business isn't really a failure. It could be more of a stepping stone. Because maybe you just weren't meant to stay there. Maybe you were never meant to be there in the first place. One of the many things that you can know for certain about God is that even if his will is not always done on this earth, and it isn't, that's why the Lord's Prayer says God's will be done like we're asking for it. Because his will is often not done. Because he gives us free will and our will rarely lines up with His. But we're asking for his will to be done. But even when it is not done, he has a way to take the mess that we've created or the mess that's been put on us by others or by the economy or whatever, and redeem that, turn that into something incredible, which is something that only he can do. There's one more story I want to tell you, but this one is from the book of Genesis. It's about a woman named Hagar. Hagar was a concubine. She didn't have a high place at all in her tribe. She did what she was told, whether that meant, you know, household chores or bearing children. And she ended up bearing a child. Again, that was just part of her. Her serving. That's what concubines do. I'm not gonna go into the backstory about why she got kicked out of the tribe, but she got kicked out of the tribe along with her son, her young son. And they were in the desert, so there was no place for her to go. They were dying of exposure, of starvation, of dehydration. And it got so bad that she put her young son down and she walked a distance away because, as the Bible says, she couldn't bear to watch him die because she knew it was imminent. And as a mother, I'm just like. Oh, like the weight of that grief, that helpless feeling that's just absolutely crushing. And then something happened. God himself showed up. God himself showed up and saved her. And it says in Genesis. So she called the name of the Lord who spoke to her. You are a God of seeing. For she said, truly here I have seen him who looks after me. She was a nobody. She didn't have anything to her name. She was about to lose her child. Most precious thing she had. She was kicked out of the tribe not because she did anything wrong, but because someone else wanted her out. Okay? The most marginalized human being ever, right here. And God showed up for her because he loves her just as much as he loves the big names in the Bible, you know, Abraham, Solomon, David, whomever. And that's why she said, you are a God of seeing. I have seen him who looks after me, and God looks after you. God looks after your business. I encourage you to ask him what you should do next and be ready for his answer, because he does answer. He made it clear. Knock, and the door will be opened. Seek, and you will find. He's not trying to make this hard. He's just saying, humble yourself enough to ask for help, and you'll get it. Whether it's wisdom, guidance, peace, whatever it is that you need, he will give you what you need. All right, guys, thanks for attending this sermon. I hope that it encouraged you to hear these words from God, as it definitely has encouraged me. You guys know that, like, my faith and my business are so intertwined, I. I cannot separate them. And the reason I named this podcast the Kate show instead of something that had the word marketing in it is because I knew this time would come a time where I would start to add more and more faith based episodes in because business is about as about serving God and our higher purpose and our higher calling and marketing is just a relationship that helps that get done. Okay, I don't think marketing is the most important part of a business. I think managing it well is the most important part of a business and also understanding why you're in business and what your significance is and are you in the right place because God's not going to bless you if you're not in the right place and if you're not sure you're in the right place just ask him because he'll tell you and then everyone's business problems will be solved just like that. Not to mention personal problems. All right guys, thank you so much for watching and listening and remember to keep your marketing simple, keep your message clear and I will talk to you soon.