180. Stop Hiding in Your Business

Erin Aquin:

Welcome to the Love and Success Podcast. You are listening to Episode 180, Stop Hiding in Your Business.

Hello there lovers. I’m Erin Aquin and I want to talk about why we all need to stop hiding in our business. For some people, it's hiding in the business, sometimes it's hiding behind the business. But this is gonna be a super short and sweet episode. Maybe not so sweet.

But I really, really feel very passionate about this because I'm right in the middle of it. And here's the deal. So I'm going to share with you my personal story and why this is important, probably for you with the hopes that it inspires you but also how I'm navigating this personally in my business and in my life. So some of you have heard this before on the podcast, but when I was very young, when I was probably a fresh teenager, I started studying the magical arts. I was very involved in earth religions.

I was actually part of a coven, where I studied to be a Wiccan priestess for a number of years. And, you know, back then, there was no Instagram, there were no Witches of Instagram. This was not something you could do professionally, there were definitely people out there like psychics and mediums and readers and things like that. But being a spiritual entrepreneur was not a legitimate profession. 

And I know there are people out there that think it's still not, but those people probably don't listen to this podcast. Because if you don't know by now, I'm very deep into the mystical. I went on from there to work in the music industry for a number of years. I taught yoga for almost two decades, professionally full time. And I was also an acupuncturist. I loved being an acupuncturist and herbalist too, because it kind of felt like going to Hogwarts. 

So I really loved that infusion of the mystical, of the beautiful energetics of Chinese medicine. It is the basis of the yoga that I developed, the style of yoga that I developed. And I've even written books about elemental yin yang yoga. So I've been kind of mystical for many years. My husband, and I met in a spiritual community, where we both meditated for hours a day. And yet, when it comes to my business, even though I'm a life coach, there are probably a lot of people who think that that is very Woo.

I have not always been outwardly opinionated or outwardly forthcoming about my own spiritual values and beliefs. And you know, I don't think that that's a problem. I'm not scolding myself for that at this point, because I think one of the amazing things about being a coach is that it doesn't actually matter what your spiritual or religious beliefs are, you can really help people at the level of the mind and emotions. 

But recently, what I have noticed is that so many of my own clients are telling me that they don't know if there's a place for themselves spiritually in their business, they feel like they have this one part of their life, that is the business that they are trying to scale and grow and develop. Most of my clients are pretty successful, and they're becoming more successful as we deepen our work together. But there's that bucket or pocket and then there's this personal life. There's the family, there's the relationships, there's maybe the spiritual aspect, that they too, don't necessarily feel like sharing or feel like there's a place for it in the business. And, you know, I think that's fair.

If you're selling Personal Training, you may not need to bring tarot cards into your sessions, although that could be a really cool way to do it. I don't think you necessarily need to be discussing your spiritual beliefs with every single person or your customers like really, at the end of the day. We don't get into business to talk about ourselves. We are here to serve people who need to be served. But what I started to notice is that my people felt very shy and reserved about bringing some of their most powerful practices forward. And up until even recently, when I went on my retreat to Italy and came home and spent some time with six and seven figure coaches, it's always amazing to me that even the ones that don't have an explicitly spiritual coaching practice, they're doing manifestation techniques. 

One of my friends, Jamie Berman, who was on the podcast talking about money and manifestation, has seen huge success working with coaches who want to learn how to manifest money. And I love that because it means that there is a place for our spiritual selves, there is a place in our industry, and probably in yours, whatever that may be, for being our full self. So what has been happening for me recently is I started a side Instagram account where I was like, I'm going to put all my magic witchy woo stuff on this other Instagram account, keep my personal one for like, business things. 

And my social media manager, Laura, shout out to Laura, got on a call with Steve and I, and basically coached me on why that was such a bad use of my time and my energy, when everyone who works with me pretty much knows my spiritual side. It's not a secret, anyone who's been around me for any amount of time knows that I'm into the magical and the mystical, like, I'm not doing a great job of hiding it.

But there has been this part of me, and maybe this is true for you, that feels like we can't bring that part forward, because it's not “legitimate” or it might not have anything to do with your niche or your product or something like that.

However, if we are really part of a bigger shift, which I believe we are, I think those of us who have become entrepreneurs in the last 5, 10, 20 years, we have an opportunity to run our businesses differently. We don't have to use the old playbook of having a business where everything needs to be short, simple, dumbed down. Very, to the point, we only ever talk about our product, I think there are more people out there who want to have relationships, especially those of us who are like coaches or spiritual wellness professionals, people want to know a little bit more that creates the opportunity to really have a relationship. 

So my social media manager, Laura, she was like, “Listen, you got to just come out of the broom closet, you think that people don't know, but they do. And you're not talking about it is the only thing that is making it weird.” So this really prompted me to do a couple of things. 

I'm teaching my first magical class on creating your own personal rituals this week, which is, you know, not a coaching class. It's something totally outside of what I normally do. But it's taken 25 years of my experience in putting that in a class. If you want to check out the class, by the time this episode comes out, I think I will have already taught that particular class, but you can head over to revitalizeyourrelationship.com and there will be a link to access the replay of that class, if that's something that interests you. 

But it's so much fun because now I don't have to do this work of having literally a double life. There are going to be people who hate the fact that I'm talking about spiritual, mystical woo things. And that's okay. But there are also going to be people who will find this to be a relief to know that they are not alone like this was a few months ago, I coached five of my clients on the same exact topic. They were not talking to each other. They didn't know that there were other people who felt the way that they did. And it was all about sharing more of themselves spiritually. And I think that if that's not a sign that things are changing, I don't know what it is. 

So here's what I want to propose, maybe for you. It's not hiding out spiritually maybe for you. It is maybe your marketing, you don't post your own original content. Maybe you just like repost other people's stuff, and hope for the best. Or maybe you haven't taken on the role as the face of your business. Maybe you're not comfortable being on screen or having pictures of yourself, but I'm willing to bet they're somewhere in your business that you have been hiding out there.

You've been trying to stuff yourself into someone else's idea of what the right way is. And follow an expert who, who knows nothing about you, personally knows nothing about your business, who probably has the best intention with the tools that they're teaching. But maybe those tools do not resonate with you. And I am here as living proof that you don't have to try and succumb to things that don't feel like intuitively, the right move. You know, when I even say this on calls with people, when I work with a one on one client, it's a six month commitment, I would never want someone to go against their intuitive sense, if it doesn't feel like a good fit. I don't think that that's helpful. And I think more of us need to stop overriding things that just don't feel like a fit, especially in our businesses.

You know, maybe there are other places in your life where you need to push yourself to do something that you're not totally sure about. I can't say I can't speak to all of that. But I can say that if you have decided to be an entrepreneur, this is literally building a business around your dream, and around you as the owner and the visionary. So why, why do so many of us put barricades and blockages up against the things that really feel true. If there's one thing I hope to leave this world knowing, that I helped more people listen to their business intuition, and create and craft their entrepreneurial dream, I don't think we can really do that if we're not constantly tapping into what feels good to us. And if we're not willing to stretch ourselves, at least to the point where we stop hiding out in our business, I am done hiding. I'm done. circling around the spiritual, mystical part of who I am, I'm just going to show up completely as me. And this is something that I've always been working on to some degree, but it feels like a relief, it feels like a relief to let myself be exactly who I am. 

Some people are going to hate it, some people are going to love it. And I don't control that at all. But what I can do, now that I have this free energy is I can co collaborate with the intuitive messages that I get with the things that my clients are really asking for. This will free you up when you stop hiding, you will have an abundance of energy and time, which I do. I've said that before. But I will say it again, I do think those are our most precious resources, we cannot create more of that. So find out where you're hiding. 

Challenge yourself today,maybe take out your journal and sit with it. Or, you know, if you process better on the move, go for a nice walk in nature. And really ask yourself the question, drop it down into your body. ‘

Where might I be hiding right now, in my business? 

Where am I not accepting who I am? And bringing that forward in a way that could be helpful. 

Because maybe for you, you don't have to talk about your spiritual beliefs. If you're selling file folders, 100 notes, anybody selling file folders, email me if that's your job, kudos to you. But maybe you don't have to bring that forward. But are you allowing those parts of you to inform how you do business, how you schedule your day, how you work with your employees, who you work with, like, like I will say on that meeting with my team, it became so apparent that we had attracted exactly the right people for the right role. They were willing to coach me on it, they were willing to challenge me on something. And that is the kind of culture I want to work in the kind of place I want to be in. So I want to thank my team. And I want to invite you to let me know Where are you hiding? Where are you hiding right now in your business? And are you ready to free up a lot of energy by showing up completely as who you really are without having to segment because when we hide out, it's like trying to work with one arm behind your back.

And if you follow why you're doing that, it's usually about being worried about other people's opinion. So this is your invitation. Let them have their opinions.

You be you and let's see what you can create.

I promise you it'll be closer to what you've been dreaming of than if you try to do it someone else's way.

Let me know how this goes. You can find me over on Instagram at instagram.com/erinaquin or head over to revitalizeyourrelationship.com find me there and I will talk to you again next week.