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I see with brand new eyes no, I've never been so sure Take my head let's run into the unknown this is the beginning. You are listening to the Kristen Boss Podcast. I'm your host, Kristen Boss. As a best selling author and performance coach, I'm on a mission to share about sustainable and purposeful approaches to both business and life. Each week I bring relevant topics that I believe are necessary to create a life of purpose, significance and meaning. Entrepreneurship is about so much more than growing your bottom line. It's about who you are becoming in the process and building a life that is truly extraordinary. Entrepreneurship is really just the beginning. Hey friends, welcome to another episode, an episode where I am wrapping up a chapter, a chapter of a story I've been writing for quite some time. So by now, if you haven't listened to the prior two episodes called the Pivot Part one and Part two, I would encourage you to go back and listen to give you a little bit of context to what this episode is about. But I'm going to be doing a little bit of retro retrospective, kind of looking back on the episodes we've created here, what the journey has been, and kind of talk a little bit about the next. It's not super clear yet, but here's a couple things I want to cover. So one, you've probably heard by now that we are doing our final enrollment of the Social Selling Academy that ends January 2, 2025. So this is your opportunity to get access to all the content I have created for you over the last five years where you can learn the sales, the marketing, the Instagram, the Facebook, the email marketing, the recruiting. All of those things packaged nicely for you in an online course that comes with the Facebook community. And literally over 300 videos where I have coached students. And you can look it up to the minute based on the topic, you can write any question and it'll take you literally to the minute. And the second of a coaching call that I have done where you can get my response, my answers, over 72 training videos. It is a very, very robust library. And when you purchase that, the SSA and our final enrollment, you will have access through December of 2025. So you have about a year to get through all of that material and implement and get the training. So be sure to check that out in the show notes and then let's just get into the meat and potatoes of the show. So people, I said this to a friend the other day. I was like, am I crazy for closing? Not closing, but essentially like we call it Sunsetting a program, you know, this multi million dollar company. Am I absolutely crazy? And they're like, no, not if it's not in alignment with where you're going. And that's really what it has come down to, is coming into an alignment of what I feel where I'm feeling led. And one of the things that has, I've noticed is just one of my gifts that I'm very good at is noticing patterns. And I have noticed a lot of patterns. I've had a very large sample size of over 8,000 students in all my programs, collectively maybe nine and, you know, a hundred thousand social sellers. I've trained in live events and keynotes and conventions. I have a pretty large sample size of the ability of having the opportunity to notice trends and patterns and behaviors and maybe like group psychology and group think along this with this sample size audience of social sellers. And so I was noticing a couple things. One, I was noticing this collective, like, if, if there could be a sigh. I feel like I'm hearing the industry sigh, like, almost like this. I'm tired. I'm tired. I sense a lot of people who are tired. In fact, I just coached somebody on my. One of my last SSA calls and she said, what if I just don't set goals for 2025, can I just not have goals? And she was just so exhausted, emotionally spent. I said, well, usually when we, when we set goals, we often set our goals from experience, historical experience. And I said, there, there must be some experience you've had with a goal that has you deciding, I will no longer set goals, I don't want to set goals. I was like, was there an emotional experience with a goal you had in 2024? And she just burst into tears. She's like, yeah, I set these huge goals and I didn't meet a single one of them. And what I was gathering from her was just that she was dealing with this intense feeling of disappointment, the emotion of disappointment. And nobody likes that emotion. Nobody's like, sign me up for, for, you know, an hour of wallowing on my couch, feeling severe disappointment and feeling let down. But I find disappointment in business as often because we have our expectations and reality far falls far below our expectations. And it's that gap that creates levels of disappointment. And I would say unmet expectations. And I think it was Brene Brown that said expectations are just future resentments waiting to happen. And I will also say, like, not just future resentments, but future disappointments, future heartache. And so what I see people do is in Order to protect themselves from feeling the intense emotion of disappointment. They're just like, cool. Then I, what I'm going to do is talk myself out of wanting anything because then if I don't want it, I have to. I won't have to feel with the disappointment of not attaining it. And so this is how I see people talk themselves out of their dreams and their goals. They're like, I don't want it anyways. But that's not the truth. What they're saying is like, what I don't want is to deal with the heartache of things not happening in the timeline I thought they would or things taking longer or being harder or more frustration that frustrating than I thought it would, or I can't deal with the heartache of unmet desires being prolonged. I said this at my live event earlier this year. Is hope deferred makes the heartache. I think dreams deferred make the heartache. And so what I see people do is people will experience a delay in their goals and in their dreams and the disappointment makes them heartsick. And so what they do is they make an agreement with themselves and they're like, well, I'm just going to stop dreaming, I'm going to stop reaching. I'm going to stop accomplishing goals or even setting goals because all I'm doing is just setting myself up for hurt. And I don't think that's the answer, friends. But as I'm kind of like. And I'm realizing, I think a lot of people feel the way she does. They don't even know how to go into 2025. They're like, yeah, I'm kind of tired of the big goal talk because I'm tired of the disappointment I feel when I don't meet my big goals. And so I see people distancing themselves. And so I'm, I'm noticing that pattern. And I've also noticed the pattern of a multitude and a plethora of tools and courses and options to give you everything you need to have success as an entrepreneur, as a social seller. You could just type in recruitment tool and you can't scroll for less than five seconds. And somebody's teaching you, hey, here's how to recruit. Someone's teaching you how to go viral on social media. Someone's giving you a content calendar. And you know, we have these tools and inside the social selling academy and we've seen literally thousands of students have amazing and extraordinary results. But I realized I'm like, okay, the tools are great. I've been Spending years refining these tools to help people get the results they want. But I'm like, is time being spent in the wrong place? Is it really tools that people need? Well, yes, yes, people do need tools. But if somebody isn't feeling empowered, if somebody thinks that they are unworthy or they fear experiencing the emotion of disappointment, or they don't know how to hold themselves through emotional disappointment and defeat and failure and handle all the heartache that comes with business, the tools don't matter. In fact, I was just talking with some of my six and seven figure earners on our last call, and they were all like, I just can't. My team just feels despondent, discouraged. I can't get them to show up. And I was like. And as I was hearing this, I'm like, you know, I could march in there and hand all these people tools on how to like income trackers and give them step by step prompts of where to go on Instagram, how to talk to people, how to sell without selling, how to attract people, how to build a funnel. We can give them all the ChatGPT prompts, we can give them the captions, the content calendar, the sales scripts, the mini chat funnels, we can give them all of these things. And by the way, almost all that is inside the social selling academy, but we can give them all of these things. But somebody who feels disempowered and has no belief in themselves, they're not going to do a darn thing with a content calendar. The tools are completely useless when a person does not feel empowered to use them, if the person doesn't know how to have the mental grit and stamina to go through the hard parts of entrepreneurship. And so that's why I'm like, okay, there's more here. There's. There's more here. And I want to empower the person. There's so many tools out there, guys, and I'm really proud of the tools we've created, but I'm ready to actually serve at a bigger level, the whole of the person, empowering the person behind the tools. And also, I was just listening to this song and there is a lyric in the song that says, you know, your sales could go up, but what's the point if your health declines? And I'm like, dang, isn't that so true? Like, we can perform in business, but if we're not performing in our personal life, if our personal life is falling apart, is that success? Is that winning? Not in my book. So I'm in this, you know, really Retrospective reflective place where I'm thinking about all these things. And so you might be like, well, Kristen, the title of this was called A Good Funeral. Why did you call it that? Because I think the close of every chapter deserves A good funeral. Deserves where we, you know, it's like the celebration of life. Well, what about the celebration of a journey, the celebration of the process, the celebration of this. These chapters that you embarked on before you go on to the next. What does it look like to slow down, to pause, to give a good goodbye? So what this came from was I was with my therapist and I. There was some projects I had to do, and I told her I was like, I'm feeling extreme resistance to doing any part of it. And, you know, as we kind of picked it apart, realized I was grieving the closing of a chapter. I was. It was heavy and emotional, and for me to finish the things, it meant that it was actually going to end. So it was like I was delaying the end. And I just felt so exhausted. I was like, I'm not motivated to do this. I don't want to do this. This is so hard. And my therapist, God bless her, just looked across from me. After a long moment of silence, she's like, then plan a good funeral. What does a good funeral look like for this part of your business, for this chapter? And that mental switch was everything. Because I'm like, well, how do I honor this? How do I finish well, how do I end this in a way that honors the process and the journey? And it doesn't have to look like this abrupt, dramatic, sad, doesn't have to be that. Like, it could be a celebration. It could be this beautiful close of a chapter. And it's so interesting. I was also telling her, I'm a Harry Potter nerd. I'm a Potterhead. And in the last book, Dumbledore gives Harry a snitch from his game, winning snitch that he caught his first Quidditch game. And there's this font on it that says, I open at the close. And the whole movie, Harry's trying to, like, open this snitch, figure out what's on the inside. And I feel like that's what was happening with me. I was holding on to this business while also feeling like, I know something new is coming. I know something new is around the corner. I know I'm. I'm going to be expanding my impact, expanding the people we talk to, talking about this on a different level, because I've told people, I'm like, I'm not done coaching. I'm not done helping people. I'm not done serving people. I'm not done helping people reach their goals. It's just going to look different in a way that I think that truly matters. And so here I was, holding on to this thing and I realized, oh, my goodness, what if I'm not going to get clarity on the next until I close this thing? And so I was like, could it be? And it was when Harry finally realized, like, he was about to go to his death to meet he who Must Not Be Named. I don't know if I could say Voldemort on my podcast. I don't know. He's about to go meet he who Must Not Be Named, and he know he's going to die. It's when he accepts the closing of a chapter that the snitch finally opens and gives him what he needs. And so I realized I'm like, oh, my goodness, could it be that my next will be revealed to me? Well, I will get the clarity I need when I have the courage to face the close. When I have the courage. And so I was just like, oh, my goodness, is it I open at the close? Is this clarity, this new vision for where I'm going next? Is it what? What happens? Do I have to close this? Come to peace, come to terms in order to be to get the next And a hundred percent that as soon as I made the decision, it was like clarity started coming. And it comes in layers. I sometimes think, like, you know, some people are like, what's next? I'm like, guys, I'm not in a huge rush to throw something together half heartedly and put it out there. I plan on doing it with a lot of intention and purpose and peace. And we just don't see enough people pivot and then pause. We see a lot of people pivot and run to the very next thing or the next launch. And I'm taking a cue from Ms. Taylor Swift. And I was just thinking this. I was thinking, because I'm going to be real vulnerable with you for a minute. Nothing scares me more than disappearing for a time. Because the story I tell myself is that if I'm not visible, then I am invisible. I am not thought of. I don't exist. If I am not top of mind, if I'm not on someone's feed, if I'm not in someone's inbox, then I am forgotten. And if I am forgotten, I'm irrelevant. And if I'm irrelevant, I'm making no impact in the world. And if I'm making no impact, then I have no worth. Welcome to my brain, and welcome to why I go to therapy. And also, I just think it's important that you guys know there's no paycheck or amount of success that takes that away. You're still. You. You still have stories to contend with. And so my fear is, you know, stepping away, because my. My fear is, like, everything's gonna be terrible. I'm gonna be forgotten. And then I. I started to look for examples of, like, well, are there other people who, like, disappeared for a while, went off grid for a while before they came out and did the next thing? And I'm not saying. Listen, I'm not saying I'm gonna come out with an ERAS tour or anything as grandiose with that. And, hey, I may not come out with something bigger and better. Maybe the answer isn't always going from bigger and, like, from, like, to. From big to bigger, from more to even more. Maybe it's just different. Maybe it's just softer. Maybe it's just more peaceful. Maybe it's more purposeful. I don't really know. But I don't think we always have to pivot to bigger, grander. I think we can just pivot to more fulfilling, however that picture looks. And so I know what comes first is peace and fulfillment and alignment and profit follows those things, because I find if I'm just. If we're just chasing money, fulfillment oftentimes is the thing that gets sacrificed. So as I was thinking of, like, okay, who are people that, like, have disappeared? And I take a cue from Taylor Swift. I think she disappeared for two years, and she went kind of quiet for a while. She had, like, her. Her Reputation album, which I love that album. And then, like, and that was, like, fierce Taylor, unapologetic Taylor. And, you know, we were like, whoa, Taylor, what's going on? And then, like, she took some time and softer albums came out. And then, you know, now we're in the era of, like, Taylor's version where she's, like, reclaiming pieces of herself. And listen, you. You don't have to like Taylor Swift, but here's. Here's what I took from it. I was just like, you know, she disappeared into this, like, Covid. She went really internal, really quiet for a while. And then she, like, came out from this season of quiet and just, like, literally created a tour that actually changed the local economies in the cities that she toured. They call it. They call it the Swift Effect, like, that the occupancy of hotels in the cities that she toured went up exponentially. And not just that, but the prices, like what it does for local economy. So I'm like, wait, hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on. Is it possible that taking some time to go internal, to be introspective, to not be in a hurry, to go into a season of quiet and not producing and not doing the thing, is it possible that the impact of who you are when you come out of your time of quiet and resilience, and I'm going to call it your winter, like the winter time, where it's not. There's nothing active happening. In fact, it's quite dormant. Anything that's happening is happening beneath the. The soil. And even then, it's. It's sleeping, it's hibernating. There ain't movement until spring, which I think is a really perfect time to say, hey, after my last year end training, I'm taking a beat. I'm taking a beat until spring. I will be back in the spring, which means I'm not going to be creating content on Instagram. Lord help me. I can't believe I just said this. I, like, hadn't even written that down, but then I just decided, all right, I'm just gonna announce it. So I actually stick to it. Because I believe when we face the thing we're most afraid of, which for me is disappearing and fearing irrelevance, we truly become unstoppable because we're like, it's okay. I have put myself in the position where I can face the things I'm afraid of, and I'm willing to be with myself in that. And I don't know what's going to be on the other side. But here's the thing. If you've been following for a while and you're like, I want to know the next thing you can. There's a link in the podcast and you will be notified. That's like, our special email list so that when the next thing comes out, you will be first to know. But I know that I am looking forward to this soft era, the introspective era, the era of healing, of closing a chapter, you know, and, you know, I feel like this is a good funeral. And so I'm going to end this with some closing words for you guys. If we're all here to say goodbye to this chapter, I just want to say, if you have been a faithful listener these years, every share, every download, every review, every comment, I have read them all, and I am so thankful. I'M so honored. I know there's so many voices you can listen to, you can hear that you've shared my insights with your team, that you've had me come speak to your companies. I am not lost on the weight of that, the privilege of that. And I'm so thankful. I would not be here if it weren't for your listenership. I wouldn't have gotten the book deal if it wasn't for your weekly tune ins and your feedback and sharing. Thank you. Thank you for letting me serve you. Thank you for being a part of this chapter. I don't know if you're going to be a part of the next. I hope you are. But I always tell people like you don't own your audience, you don't own your followers, you don't own anybody. I think the best posture we can have is have an open palm and we serve whoever comes to us at the time and we don't try to hold onto them, latch them and say, this is mine, my person. The same with like your downlines, your clients, your team, all these things, you don't own any of them. But you have the privilege and the responsibility and the honor to serve them for so long as they choose to be in your presence. And I am thankful for that. And so with that, I want to say thank you. And what a good chapter this has been. What a really beautiful chapter. And the fact that you have sent me sweet messages and that you have shared how this podcast has impacted your business and your personal life, I am so thankful. I know my work isn't done and I have no idea what that's gonna look like. But I do know that I'm not done serving people. I'm not done impacting people. Just going to look different. So I think I'm just going to say goodbye for now and we'll see you next time. That's a wrap for today's episode. Listen, if you love what you heard here today, I would love for you to leave a real quick rating and a review. This helps the show get discovered by new people. Be sure to take a screenshot of today's episode and shout us out on Instagram. We'll shout you right back out. If you'd like to find additional resources or discover how to work with me, head to www.kristenboss.com. it starts right here.