Episode 53 of the Business & Life Conversations Podcast is a juicy conversation with Denise Duffield – Thomas, a money mindset mentor for the new wave of entrepreneurs, about her new book Chillpreneur, the 3 types of fear that hold us back, improving your mindset and conserving your energy. We also talk about how she handles being a mom and business owner at the same time and she gives us a peek on how her book tours are managed.
Denise provides a safe place for women to talk about money, cash and abundance. She holds courses for entrepreneurs such as Money Bootcamp, Money Archetypes and Manifesting Course. Her best-selling books “Lucky Bitch” and “Get Rich, Lucky Bitch” give a fresh and funny road-map to create an outrageously successful life and business.
This episode is sponsored by my 4-day, 3-night Women in Business Retreat happening in Australia on October 24-27, 2019. Click here to learn more.
Important Links Mentioned in the Show:
Denise Duffield-Thomas Website
Denise Duffield-Thomas Courses
Denise Duffield-Thomas Facebook
Denise Duffield-Thomas Instagram
Denise Duffield-Thomas Twitter
Denise Duffield-Thomas YouTube
Australian Business Collaborative Facebook Group
Finding Balance in Business Women’s Retreat
Angela Henderson Active Business Facebook Group
Angela Henderson Facebook Business Page
Prefer to read Denise Duffield-Thomas: Embrace the Fear? Here’s the transcript:
ANGELA:
You’re listening to the Business and Life Conversations Podcast with Angela Henderson, Episode 53.
Hey there, you’re listening to the Business and Life Conversations Podcast. My name is Angela Henderson and on this show, we talk about improving your business, life or both. By having amazing and rich conversations with brilliant guests who will inspire you and who will give you tips and tricks to help you grow both in life and in business.
Hey there amazing humans, Angela here, and welcome back to another episode of the Business and Life Conversations Podcast. I’m your host Angela, from Angela Henderson Consulting, where I’m a Business Consultant helping women in business develop the foundational framework and strategy they need to grow sustainable and profitable businesses. I am really excited today because I get to have a juicy conversation with the most amazing person, Denise Duffield-Thomas. And we’re going to be talking about fear, conserving your energy, her new book Chillpreneur, and so much more. For those of you that don’t know about the amazing Denise Duffield-Thomas, she is a weapon in disguise and is the money mindset mentor for the new wave of entrepreneurs. And what Denise focuses on; she creates safe places for women to talk about money, cash, and abundance. She helps us to normalize wealth and to identify and then release all the sabotages holding us back. She is, as I’ve said, an absolute wealth of knowledge.
But, before we jump in today’s episode, I just want to let you know that this episode is sponsored by my 4-day, 3-night Women in Business All-Exclusive Retreat, where we will be focusing on having the chance to refocus, connect, learn, and grow, in order to grow both in life and in business. This amazing event will be held on October 24th through to October 27th at the Gold Coast in Queensland, Australia; and it’s an exclusive event with only 50 tickets being sold. From having 8 of Australia’s top female entrepreneurs speaking, to surrounding yourself with amazing people that will lift you up both at conference and after conference, to daily masterminds to get individual help on your businesses from both your peers and the speakers, to amazing food, being able to sleep in, and as I always say, eat an uninterrupted meal without your children; you’re not going to want to miss out. To learn more about this event and to purchase your ticket, head to angelahenderson.com.au. Again, this is an exclusive event with only 50 tickets being sold. We also do have payment plans for those of you that need help with cash flow, so you don’t want to miss this opportunity.
Now, let’s jump into this beautiful episode with the amazing Denise Duffield-Thomas. Welcome to the show Denise.
DENISE:
Hey, Angela. Thanks so much for having me.
ANGELA:
Gosh. Well, thank you. I know you’ve had a crazy schedule over the last few weeks on your book tour. So whereabouts are you today?
DENISE:
I’m actually at home. So this week, I was in Perth and Melbourne. Last week, I was all over Queensland. So I got in last night, and it’s always nice to be home. And then I go to New Zealand next week.
ANGELA:
Oh, goodness. And will the family join you in New Zealand? Or you’re heading off by yourself?
DENISE:
No, I find with the speaking tour; if I can go by myself, I can go much quicker. It’s in and out and I can come home. But yes, I’ve been away a lot. I go away for like two days at a time. My kids are starting to not love that so much.
ANGELA:
I just wanted to say; how’s the family coping? Because I know you’ve got three beautiful kids who are still quite young. Like, I think you’re oldest just started school this year. And of course, you got hubby. So, how do they cope when you’re not at home?
DENISE:
I think actually, they would cope better with me being away than Mark, my husband.
ANGELA:
Okay.
DENISE:
Yes. I think they really miss him. When he goes away; he’ll go out for the night and just miss bedtime and they’re so upset about it.
ANGELA:
“Where’s my father?”
DENISE:
And they go like, “I miss Daddy.” Like he’ll be gone for ten minutes, and they go, “I miss Daddy so much.” And they’re kind of okay with me being away for two days at a time.
ANGELA:
Yes. And do you ever get questions like, I do. I don’t know about you; but they all say like, “Oh, do you get the Mom’s guilt? Do you get this?” And my kind of response to people is, at the end of the day, I’m not just a Mom. Like a Mom is a part of who I am, but there’s other parts of me also. And for me, I also don’t want to get to when my kids are 18 and 19, and then, I don’t know what I’m like. I don’t really want to be fully dependent on the emptiness syndrome, either. And, I also; for Finlee, yes, my son; but also for Chloe, I also want her to know that when I go, I’m helping other women in business. What are your thoughts about when you get questions like that?
DENISE:
I don’t get a lot of questions around the Mom guilt so much. I haven’t had anyone like try and shame me for being away or anything. Not to my face, anyway. But I’m kind of the same, and I remember reading something ages ago about a Mom who would go away and she said, one of her big tips is never say, “Oh, I feel so bad about going,” and “I’m so sorry.” But she would say, “Mommy is going to do a conference or to do a book tour. And I’m really excited about it. And yes, I’m going to miss you. But I’m also doing this thing.” And so, I kind of do that philosophy; I’m like, “Hey, guys. I’m going away for a couple of days. I’m doing my book tour.” And I don’t make a big deal of it and I don’t apologize either.
ANGELA:
Yes. Fantastic. I don’t either. I’m just going like, “This is how we’re rolling. This is what it looks like. See you when we get home.” And I think, again, too, kids; they do have the kid brain, yes. But they are also humans. So I think the more we just communicate with them, I think they actually appreciate that sometimes.
DENISE:
I agree. And I love talking to them about my books and my programs and stuff like that. We were in an airport a couple of weeks ago going to dine all together as a family and I was like, “Oh, who’s book is that guys?” and in the shop, and they were like, “Your book, Mom.” And so, they’re not that impressed by stuff because I’ve got a lot of author friends, too. And they’ll be like, “Oh, that’s Mommy’s friend’s book. That’s Mommy’s friend’s book.” So they just think everyone’s Mom has a book, I think.
ANGELA:
Everyone’s Mom has a book; they’re like, they get to their school, “Where’s your Mom’s book.” “My Mom doesn’t have a book.” It’s so awesome, they do that. I mean, I don’t know. I think it’s also; what a privilege to also be able to share those experiences. Like, “Hey, we’re at the airport. There’s Mom’s book.” And they might not really think much about it now, but later on, I reckon be like, the penny may drop like, “Oh, that was really cool. Mom is an author. That’s really awesome.”
DENISE:
Well, I don’t know about you, but I think towards the future when they’re teenagers and I’m thinking; well, it’ll be great to have an assistant come sometimes and help me at an event. And I was like, “Oh, that would be so cool if they’re interested in stuff like that,” to be like, “Okay, cool. I’ll pay you to come in. You can sell books at the back of the room or you can greet people.” I think that stuff would be a really good experience, so I really hope they’re into that. “Well, look; you’ll get a free trip to New York. But you have to sell some books.”
ANGELA:
You’re going to have to work for it here. I do think about that often actually if I’m a 100% honest. I think about, like for example, there’s a couple of things; I’m in the middle of switching accounts and there’s just a few little loose ends unfortunately that I have to tie up that are driving me crazy. But, I was thinking, I’m just going to enter a couple of things into a spreadsheet real quick, and I was like, “Well, okay. I could just quickly outsource this and do whatever.” And my kids could type a little bit better, I’d be like, “Can you just enter this into a spreadsheet for me?” And it would be awesome, right? They’re working; they’re doing what I need them to do. So yes, I do think about that already.
DENISE:
My friend, Tammy, her and her husband both have a business. Their son, Elliot, is 10; he’s really good with computers. So he actually does all their social media graphics.
ANGELA:
Legend. Awesome.
DENISE:
And they pay him for it. So I got him to do about 50 of mine.
ANGELA:
Yes. You’re like, “Thank you. Take my money. I’m good.”
DENISE:
Yes. He’s great. What’s funny though, because he sent me an email; he’s like, “I hear you want to do some graphics. I charge a dollar an image.” Totally fine, and it was so cute. And I just thought, “Well, yes. They can do stuff like that.” And my husband had a paper wrap in England when he was a kid. I was like, “I actually wouldn’t want my kid to do that.”
ANGELA:
Yes, that would be a little in today’s society, unfortunately. Yes, I’m with you. I’d be like, “No, thanks. No.”
DENISE:
Yes. But like, there’s heaps of jobs that we can get them to do with so much finesse.
ANGELA:
Yes. Totally. And I like, you know, my kids, when I first start Finlee and Me, my first business; they would come to the market and set up the market. And they loved it. I think there’s an inclusion part of that, too; but also that learning. And they talk about; we’re going to be able to outsource a lot. Robots will take over a lot with AI. But, one of the things, that’s why I like when my kids would come to those events, is that it’s still working on their social; those human to human skills. And that’s why I don’t think robots will ever be able to replace that. So yes, I do like giving the kids; even when they’re little; start them to get included in that.
DENISE:
Oh, yes, absolutely. We had to do a big mail out last year of postcards and stuff. And you don’t really need a kid to be around a couple years older than probably Willow to stuff envelopes.
ANGELA:
Totally legit.
DENISE:
Yes. Just stick stamps on an envelope. And also for them to see, this is how we make money as a family.
ANGELA:
Yes.
DENISE:
It’s not magic; that we do something, especially if you’re entrepreneurs and they don’t see you getting dressed up in a suit and going to an office…
ANGELA:
Yes.
DENISE:
…to see, “Hey, this is what I do. I talk to people. I help people with their businesses. I write books. This is what we do.”
ANGELA:
Yes. And it’s so funny that you talked about it like we don’t get dressed up. My kids, whenever my hair is done and my makeup done; I heard Chloe say to Finlee, “It must be a big day. She’s dressed.” I was like, “Mom doesn’t know how to dress up.” She’s like, “Yes, not normally. You don’t know normally get those shoes out on. You don’t normally have your hair done. It’s in a bun, Mom.” I giggled when I heard her say that to Finlee a little while ago, “It must be a big day. It must be serious.” So, yes.
And now, for you, obviously, the book tour; how are you feeling with it? Because, I know, back in March when we were at a speaking event together. We were at the launch with a mutual friend of ours, Zach. And one of the things that you brought up, which I thought was really interesting, is how you are really honing in on protecting your energy. And that, with your book tour; you kind of talked about things like you decided to have it in the mornings when your energy level was at the greatest for you. And that you booked it at cinemas across Australia to keep it simple. I just want to take in, like, how are you feeling with the whole book tour? Has those particular strategies helped you in the book tour? To keep it simple? Have it in the mornings? And just ultimately, how are you feeling overall with the schedule?
DENISE:
Oh, you know what, I did really good things and I did really bad things. So, the good things were; last time I did a book tour, I did four cities and it was four different event spaces, different contracts, different layouts of room. Some, we needed to bring furniture in; it was a freaking nightmare. And I remember it just took months and months and months to organize. So I didn’t want a complication like that. A friend of mine told me she went to a Writer’s Q & A at a local cinema, and I went, “What?” You know, like, “Ding!” I went to go see them because I know the Marketing Manager there, and she was like, “Oh, yes. We could totally do your book tour in cinemas. Oh, and I happen to be the Event and Marketing Manager for all of New South Wales and ACT.” And so I was like, “Oh, okay.” So all we did is we told her all the dates, she organized all of them around the country within one company. It was one company to pay. It was super simple to do.
Most of the cinemas are around about the same configuration and roughly the same size. But I also knew that if suddenly one city went to like 500 people, most cinemas have got small cinemas and big cinemas that all free during the day. They’re really comfy. And I got to the point where I was just turning up like 10 minutes before, basically. And it was easy. I just walked in. And so that worked really well. The format for me worked really well. So I just said to people, “I’m not doing a keynote. I’m not doing slides. I’m just going to sit down.” I really wanted to sit down. That was a really important thing for me. “I’m going to sit in a comfy chair and I’m just going to talk about the book.” And every venue was slightly different because I had a piece of paper and I have 20 concepts from the book that I would talk about. And I would just look at the piece of paper and just be like, “I feel like talking about this one today.” So I tell people, “This is just going to be very chill and very easy,” and I did some Q & A.
The other thing that was really easy as you said during the day, during the week as well.
ANGELA:
Okay. Yes.
DENISE:
So it was easy to get event space because cinemas are empty during the week and during the day. And if I do it at night, I wouldn’t be able to sleep. I’ll be buzzing…
ANGELA:
Like on a high. Yes.
DENISE:
Yes. And also, I don’t want to be away from my kids on the weekend so that which means, “Oh, I can’t go because I’m working.” I’m like, “Well, I’m working, too. This is my job.”
ANGELA:
Yes.
DENISE:
“It’s not my hobby to go and do speaking. It’s my actual job.” So that worked really well. Some things that didn’t work well, I didn’t realize how much energy it takes to do a book tour. You’re going to laugh at this because of course, it freaking does.
ANGELA:
Yes.
DENISE:
Of course, it does. So I wasn’t just doing the book tour. I was also promoting the book through podcast interviews. So I was going and doing these big events, it’s like two and a half hours, three hours of talking to people; talking, signing books, hugging people, taking photo; a lot of energy. But then I was also doing podcast interviews at the same time. And not only that, I was also being a mentor on B school.
ANGELA:
Yes.
DENISE:
Which was again, that’s its own thing. Not only those three things, I was also; I’m still am teaching one of my courses.
ANGELA:
And a mom, still.
DENISE:
So that’s a lot of work. And then, I’m working on another book. And I’m doing that book with; I’m working with a ghostwriter. So it’s a lot of talking; we’re talking and having interviews. So actually, I committed to about five different things that really are their own projects.
ANGELA:
Yes, within themselves. And then, kind of like subcategories, probably even underneath of those.
DENISE:
Exactly. And so, I would go and do my event, and by all rights, I should have gone home, gone to the hotel, or go to the movies. I was already at the freaking cinema, I could have gone to see a movie or like meet up with a friend or whatever. And instead, people are like, “Hey, do you want to have coffee?” I’m like, “Oh, sorry. I’ve got to go back to my hotel because I’ve got a podcast interview,” or “I’ve got a mentor interview,” or “I’ve got another coaching session with someone with my course.” And so, I’ve lost my voice. I’ve got bronchitis. And people are like, “Oh, you must be so exhausted during the tour.” And I’m like, “No, I love the tour. And I love all of the other things.” But I shouldn’t have overlapped them all.
ANGELA:
Yes, that makes sense. So next time you just kind of clear the schedule a bit more.
DENISE:
Yes. The other thing that I did is I didn’t really talk to my team very much about what I needed from them. And so, in one of the cities I went to, I go into the hotel, and I was like, “What the freak is this hotel room, guys?” The walls were so thin; I could hear the lady next door scraping like she was in the room. And I was so pissed off. But then I realized that I hadn’t said; I just assumed that “Oh, cool. I’m going to go do this thing. You guys are going to take care of me.” And so I was booked in; like sometimes, I get on a plane and I’ll be like, “Guys, I’m in the last seat of the plane and a window seat.” But I didn’t really advocate for that as much like, “Guys, I need to be in the front row in an aisle seat, every time, if not business class. I need to be in a suite because I’ve got a makeup and hair person coming in and I don’t want us to be like sitting in this tiny hotel room. I need to sleep.” I felt like a bit of a diva doing that but then I realized, “No, I need to be able to do my job well.”
ANGELA:
Yes. And in order to do it and it’s not even; I don’t look at those things as luxuries. I look at those things as a necessity, right? Not only for your own energy but then, the energy that you’re going to be able to give at your book tour, right? And the energy that you can give; like it’s a knock-on effect. It’s a ripple effect, isn’t it? Really. I just look at it as it’s actually a necessity versus; I don’t know. That’s all I think it. Because if you don’t have good sleep, then what’s going to happen? You’re going to be cranky when you get to your event.
DENISE:
Absolutely. One thing I did do that was good, too, is we booked hair and makeup everywhere.
ANGELA:
Yes. You look super fun in all your Instagram stories and stuff. And you said that that was also part of; kind of embracing it, I guess. Like it was a fun element of it.
DENISE:
It was. But also, I don’t think I would have created the space for getting ready in the morning. I probably would have worked. I would have overbooked things; because it was tons were I had to do a podcast interview before the event because I just didn’t book it out on the calendar. But having that hair and makeup actually was a time to sit, read. And also, I looked good in the photos, which for me, I’m such an introvert; so going and doing a speaking thing takes a lot of energy; so I want to look good for those people who take a photo and then share it with someone else. And then, the impact of me actually getting up and doing something is multiplied. So the over the course of the tour, we sold 800 tickets; but thousands of people would have seen those pictures, so it was worth doing the hair and makeup stuff.
So, yes, lots of lessons. And before we hit record, you told me you had similar lessons this year as well where it’s like, “Okay, I have learned from that.” And I think I am good at going, “You know what, I won’t do that again.”
ANGELA:
100%. And like I think, sometimes we have to go through those. Whatever you would say, that they start as a mistake, and you’re like, “Oh, shit. Hold on, what was the lesson from that? Okay, the lesson is I need to actually protect my time even more; or how is this going to impact my family; or how is this going to impact my health?” And even though, sometimes I think that we are saying yes, we do consider those things. But it’s not ‘til we actually go through it or we tighten our schedule or we overlap. So we actually go, “Hold on. This isn’t working.” So I always say, there’s always a lesson that we can learn regardless of what we’re doing.
DENISE:
For sure. I thought of another good thing that I did. We knew that we were going to want to sell books. And I just thought, the idea of having a person I had to hire in each city; because I was thinking, I don’t really want to bring someone along with me because I like being by myself. So I was like, “Oh, I’m going to have to hire someone new in every city; explain to them how the square reader works and set up the books,” all those kind of things. So, we talked to Hay House, my publisher, and they contacted book stores locally, who; and some of them were just next door. Some of them was in a shopping mall centre or in the shopping mall. And they would bring the books, they would bring the reader, and they would bring two people. And they sold the books. So that probably cost me; if I did that myself, I probably could have made about $500 extra per event. But I would have had to do so much work to do that.
ANGELA:
And you’re just like, it’s already set up. And then you don’t have to pay for people’s airfare or hotels or everything on top, potentially on top of that.
DENISE:
Exactly. I don’t have to talk to someone and explain it. So that was worth it when I think it’s not a straight numbers game where it’s like, “Oh, I lost 500.” The opportunity cost was like, I gained peace of mind and energy and probably that would have cost me $500 of my time each venue to do that. So it was just great. And they made the money for it and so they were happy.
ANGELA:
And again, it’s a win-win. And that’s how again, sometimes, again, business; it’s a collaboration. And like you said, to me I do look at it, but you could go on, “Okay. Well, yes, they’re selling my book, and yes, I can make the money.” But at the end of the day, like you said, it’s a win-win. You’re energy level saved. Your audience is going to get better. Like more of you from a positive angle. You don’t have to worry about that element. You can just walk in, and leave, and they’ll do all the rest. Hello, total win-win.
DENISE:
Exactly. And imagine like, I’m trying to do my thing and some new person is like, “Oh, Denise, the square reader is not working. How do I do a receipt?” And I’d be like, “Oh, okay. Let me come over and do that.” I’m like, “Oh my god.” I just wanted to turn up and I did. I turned up and I’d be like, “Okay, cool. I’m ready to go. You can let them in now.” And then I did that and then I left.
ANGELA:
I think again, that sounds amazing. And I guess it’s also that, that I hope will help some of the listeners to look at that sometimes, again, you don’t have to keep doing everything yourself, right? Like, so many times, we put the pressure, “Oh, it will be easier if I just do it.” But as an end, you found an easier solution that was much better for you. And I always think that we can always; there’s always options out there. But sometimes, you’re just like, “Oh, I’ll just do it myself.” But you, you found an option. It was win-win. And now, you know what to do for the next time; same thing. Don’t bring the square reader and do everything yourself. Outsource.
Now, listen. One of the things though, now I should say because we could probably talk for ages. But one of the things I like to do at the beginning of the podcast; because not everyone will know you. In my intro, I’ll tell them a little bit about you. But I always like to ask a question. Because I think it’s important that people see the guest that they’re not just business owners, that there’s more to them than that. And my question to you, Denise, is I know you just bought this amazing rose farm, which looks absolutely amazing when I saw one of the pictures at conference. And, that on Valentine’s Day; it was really fun. You and hubby; if I’m telling the story correctly from reading it like, from how I perceived it when you’re telling it; is you decided to, with the roses from the rose farm; you decided to have a stand where you were selling roses. And you sold out. But my question isn’t about the selling part. My question is what is your favourite colour of rose on the rose farm?
DENISE:
Oh, that’s such a great question. Because yes, we bought a rose farm; we have no experience of selling, growing roses. We actually wanted to buy a holiday house, and we fell in love with this one; just happened to have a very small rose farm attached to it. I like all of them. Mark actually sells roses now locally around there. But he doesn’t sell them to the public. He sells them to florists and stuff makes a bit easier. And there’s beautiful pink ones and yellow ones; probably red are my least favourite. Once, I would say the pinky…
ANGELA:
And how many varieties of colours do you guys have on the farm? Just like, so many?
DENISE:
Oh, my God. I don’t know a fucking thing. I don’t even know what the varieties of colour; I’ve literally no clue about it.
ANGELA:
But they’re fun. You’re going to be surrounded by them now.
DENISE:
Oh, it’s so lovely having so many roses in the house. And my vision for that place is to turn into a retreat centre.
ANGELA:
Amazing.
DENISE:
Yes. But I think my personality wants everything to be done so quickly, and I realized, too, that I’m in a very busy season of my life right now. And it’s okay; we’ve got tenants in there who are just paying the mortgage. It’s okay to not take action on all of that right now and let that develop because I can see myself having grandkids there and stuff like that. Why do I need to do it all now?
ANGELA:
Yes. But I think again, that’s where; our brains are very similar, I think, Denise. We do have lots of ideas, which is good like it’s not a bad thing. But I always like sometimes, “Hey, we got to park that shit in the toy box, I’ll come back and play with that idea later on.”
DENISE:
Exactly. Well, the thing, too, that it’s a rich person problem to have. But now I have money, sometimes I do get myself into trouble. Because before, it would be like, “Well, I can’t afford that, so I’m not going to do it.” And now, “Well, I kind of can.” So…
ANGELA:
You can. Like, “I can. I can own it. Its’ a rose farm people. We are in. We’re good.”
DENISE:
Yes. We did. Because I actually thought that was a dream that was 5, 10 years away from. I wrote it on my goal list; I just didn’t put a date on it. And I was like, “Here it is.” And I just thought, things like this don’t come up very often, so I have to just jump on this. And we did. And I had to enrol a lot of people in that dream especially our financial advisors.
ANGELA:
Well, that’s what you’re saying at the conference; that you said, there’s like, “I don’t know. No, no, no. Just tell me, what are we going to do to make this happen?” And you and your hubby, you guys together worked and you guys made it happen.
DENISE:
Yes. And in the end, it didn’t even cost us that much money in the end. We thought we had to manifest all this extra money. Sometimes you just need to go see a broker and they go, “Oh, actually, you can refinance this.” And we actually put in way less money than I thought we were going to have to because we run the numbers.
ANGELA:
Yes. And numbers are like key. And we’re going to talk a little bit about this here around the fear. And I guess it’s a good entryway into your book, Chillpreneur. I will say, listen; I don’t say that because I like you and we’re friends, but I say it’s a great read. It’s an easy read. It is a funniest fact read. And I can always tell how much I like a book by how many times A; I snort out loud, and how many times I spit my diet coke. I don’t know. I can say, hand on heart, Denise, you nailed both of those. Especially with your liner that went something like, and I quote, “In the Smurfs cartoon, there was Brainy Smurf, Clumsy Smurf, Greedy Smurf, Hefty Smurf, Jokey Smurf and Vagina Smurf.” That’s where spitting, number one, and snorting happen. So, that was hilarious. But today, we’re going to hold off talking about vaginas, much to your surprise there. And instead, we’re going to focus on fear. Because fear, I think, is something that we don’t talk about as much as we should. And you’re book really touched upon that.
You’ve got 14 juicy chapters in your book, Denise. But the chapter I love the most was Chapter 1, which is called Playing the Game of Business. Now, I will say, people might go, “Oh, that’s great. You only got to Chapter 1.” No, I’m actually on Chapter 8 people, okay? It was just that Chapter 1 really resonated, well, necessarily with me, yes. But more so on where a lot of my current audiences sat. And where I see it, that that fear; I see it all the time in different groups; when I’m in conferences. And I just wish that if we spoke about it more; normalized it more; that maybe the fear wouldn’t be as intense for some people.
So I guess, I want to talk to you about; in the book, you really honed in, Denise, on three particular types of fear. You talked about the fear of failure, the fear of being found out as a fraud or an impostor, and the fear of being judged or criticized. And these are kind of the three fears that I’d like to just talk more about you and open up some dialogue and some conversations for the audience. And I guess, with fear, we know, like every one of us as business owners, we have it. It comes in stages, sometimes. We can freeze at times. We can be scared shit, sometimes. It’s a combination of all of those things.
But to start within Chillpreneur, you talked about a friend of yours who had sent you a text message I believe, it was something on the lines of, “I’m hosting a live event today, Denise. I’m super scared. Tell me the fear goes away.” And you were quite blunt in your respond to her, like, “Umm. Sorry. But no, it doesn’t. Not entirely. But, the good news is, what scares you today won’t scare you tomorrow.” And I guess I want you to talk with us a little bit more about, what do you mean by what scares you today won’t scare you tomorrow? And what does that look like for you, now?
DENISE:
Well, I think that’s just so true, right? Because when you think back at the start of your business, and every time you do something for the first time, it is terrifying. And I mean this is a perfect example of what we’re doing now. Five years ago, when I had an interview, I would think about it all night long and wake up at like 3 o’clock in the morning thinking about it. I would be really stressed and nervous. I’d have to do some EDT before getting on a call. But today, like these days, five minutes before my call, I’m like, “Alright. Who am I speaking to? Do I need hair and makeup?” And sometimes, if they’re like, “Yes, it’s a video.” I’m like, “Great. Let me smear on some makeup real quick.” A minute before I logged on, I’m winding my headphones. I do not think about it like it does not scare me in any sense because I’ve done it so many times. Same with events, like with my book tour, I was not a single bit nervous. I didn’t have to do tapping beforehand. I slept like a baby the night before. Five, six years ago, that would have terrified me.
And then, everything that happens in your business; the first time you get a refund request, it’s like a dagger in your heart. You’re like, “Oh my God, people don’t like me. This is the worst.” And then, after a couple of years, you go, “Oh, okay. So we’re about to do a launch. I know that we’ll get an X% of a refund request,” and it does not bother you. But there is always something new to be scared of and most of the time it’s the same stuff. And when I say that, I mean, I have guilt feeling, guilty feeling sometimes about things being too easy. Or that people will think that I’m a snob if I’m too successful. That’s a recurring fear of me. So that comes up at different stages of my business. And then, other things freak me out, like maybe going on a super famous podcast would scare me. No offence, Angela, but with you, so it doesn’t scare me. But if I was like, with Oprah, yes okay, fine, I would have been super nervous all over again. Anything like that, I just think, yes, it’s scary. And the reason why I was so blunt with my friend is because ten years ago, someone was really blunt with me about it. And that was Ali Brown.
ANGELA:
Yes.
DENISE:
I was at her event, it was 2009 in Dallas, or 2011; I can’t remember which one the Dallas one was. Yes, 2011 Dallas was. And I was going down to the party and I happened to get in a lift with her. And I was like, “Hi, Ali!” Like weirdo fangirl; I was like, “Hi, Ali,” and I was like, “Can I just ask you a question?” She said, “Yes, what?” And I said, “When does the fear go away?” And she was, “It doesn’t.” And I was like, “Truly, at a certain income level it does?” And she was like, “No. It never goes away.” And I was like, “Fuck. No.” So that’s why I just tell people now; actually, I thought six figures it would go away. I thought a million dollars it would go away. I thought three million dollars it would go away. It doesn’t.
But that doesn’t mean that I’m living in fear all the time because the first year or the first, like always first lessons when you’re doing everything for the first time, that is the scariest time. And that’s why you need to be so gentle with yourself. You need to army yourself against criticism and negativity and all of those things because you are so vulnerable. You’re like a little baby snail without a shell.
ANGELA:
It is. And I think that again, Denise, like that again, be gentle on yourself. I’m all about when I work with my VIP clients, and you probably do with your coaching clients also. It’s like, give yourself permission to either take it slow, or be kind to yourself, or be gentle. Like, it’s a huge, massive learning curve; kind of like when you have your first baby. Well, I can’t speak for everyone that’s had their first baby. But me, like, “What the fuck am I doing?” Like, I was a mess the first year. Because I was like, “This shit’s all new to me.” I was scared, too. But then, once you kind of get the rhythm, you’re like, “Okay.” But I had to learn to be gentle with myself as a Mom; I had to learn to be gentle with myself with certain elements of the business and know that it’s going to be okay. But, just to keep going. And I guess, a lot of people will stop or they let that fear creep in. I’m like, “Just keep going. Action steps. You got this.”
DENISE:
Exactly. But that first year, the thing you don’t know other people in business…
ANGELA:
The isolation.
DENISE:
Yes. And I remember saying to Mark, “Oh my God, I’m so nervous about this thing.” And it was like a webinar or something. And he goes, “Well, maybe you should just get a job. Whereas the next year, I had a lot more business friends and they were like, “I am, too. That’s good. And high fives. And I listen to yours. And you listen to mine. Text me after and let me know what it’s like.” And even after my events on my book tour, I’ve got girl friends that text me, “How was your event today?”
ANGELA:
Yes.
DENISE:
And you don’t have that in your first year that’s why everything is so scary.
ANGELA:
Yes. I totally agree. Why do you think though, with things being scary for those first times, right? So, the fear is different for everyone. But why do you think businesses struggle with that initial, like asking for the sale, or going live; or publishing a blog post? Those things, that really, when you’re first starting off in business. What are some of your theories behind why that fear or why that blockages there?
DENISE:
Well, I didn’t get any of that at first because I just thought, “Just do it. Just do the thing.”
ANGELA:
Yes.
DENISE:
And then, I read a book called Witch by Lisa Lister, as in you know, witchy witch. And she talks about this thing called the witch wound, which I’ve never heard of before. And then, a lot of other people have quoted them in my book. But it’s this fear that if you speak up or you do something different, you’re going to get persecuted in some way. And for some of us that, that is a really real feeling. Some of us are descended from families where that happened. It’s in our collective consciousness that women are being punished for speaking up; for being different. And not just women; other people are being persecuted for being different. And then, you might see it in today’s world as well, where someone might be outspoken in your industry, and they get, metaphorically, burned at the stake on Facebook. I’ve seen a friend of mine has pages and pages written about her on “Get off my internet forums.”
ANGELA:
Oh my goodness. Like serious people.
DENISE:
Ridiculous. So we fear that, and it feels real. So I didn’t get it and that’s why I was like, “Just do you’re freaking vlog post,” not realizing that behind the scenes that person was shaking with unexplained fear because they just thought, “It’s not safe for me to speak about this. It’s not safe for me to be visible. It’s not safe for me to put my head up. It’s not safe for me to be different or to make money.” All of those things. So you’ve got to work on that feeling of safety. It’s like, “It’s safe for me,” I actually literally use that as a mantra, “It’s safe for me to do this.”
ANGELA:
It’s safe for me.
DENISE:
And it actually just calms your body down a little bit. Actually even Liz Hayes, she just says, “All is well. All is well.”
ANGELA:
All is well. It’s simple. All is well. But I like the one; what do you say, “I feel safe?” or, “This is safe?”
DENISE:
“It’s safe for me to…”
ANGELA:
It’s safe for me to. Yes. And if people; so if they’ve got the fear, and again, like you said, we’re talking years in the collective conscience, right? For example, women have been in domestic violence situations in their own life, right? Or they had trauma growing up. I’m assuming some of those, if not all, will have an indirect consequence I guess around some of those fears about going live or a vlog post because again the not feeling safe.
DENISE:
Yes.
ANGELA:
And so if you look at kind of that, the historical side of things and then potentially the current side of things. But you also talked about, some of the; in your book, you talked about; you’re not a psychic but you also talked about some of the predictions for how much a business owner will fail. Can you talk a little bit about that and open up the conversation around what those predictions are?
DENISE:
Yes. So early in my business, I think I did the same as a lot of people do. I would do a launch or I would set up a blog post or I would do a thing. And I would be kind of feeling shitty if I didn’t get the results that I wanted and I would internalize that, “Nobody liked my thing. I suck.” All of these things; we all do. And then, I read a book, I think it was called Dotcom Secrets or something, I don’t know. It was like a brow marketer kind of thing. And he talks a lot about stats and AD testing and so is a new world. And I was like, “What?” And that’s when I started learning about the statistics of marketing. I should have learned it earlier because I actually have a marketing degree but I never went to class. I was the President of my business club on campus so I never went to class. But I found out about the stats of my industry and the fact that 1 to 2% is a really good sales conversion if you’re doing a launch. And I started actually then, looking at the stats that mattered in my business. So when I send a newsletter, what was my open-rate? It was around about 25%. What was my click-through rate? About 10%. What percentage of people unsubscribed? Like even knowing that can make you chill about all those things because then you’re like, “Oh, people don’t like me.” No, I know when I send out a newsletter, I’m going to have X% of people unsubscribe. And that’s just how it is. So I think even the stats can sometimes feel boring or restrictive or scary. They actually can be the thing that helps you be really mellow and chill because then you know it’s not personal.
ANGELA:
Exactly. And you’re able to go, “Hold on. This isn’t actually me. This is just like; this is how business works, collectively. These are the standard open rates. And so again, this isn’t about me.” They can externalize and go, “Actually, this is just an overall business. This is just a world of owning a business. It has nothing to do with me.”
DENISE:
No. Exactly. And you can forget though, every time. And sometimes Mark will do a launch, too. And he will go, “Oh, I don’t think we hit the results.” And I’m like, “Well, how many people visited the sales page?” He’s, “Oh, yes. Okay.” And then, he goes, “Oh, actually we doubled the results from last year.”
ANGELA:
And say, “Okay, I was freaking out for nothing.”
DENISE:
Yes, exactly. So those things are really important to know for your industry, or you track your own and then you’ve got a sense of your own ones. But you know what, I think a lot of women fear doing this because lots of women I know are being told from a young age that they’re not good at math.
ANGELA:
Yes.
DENISE:
Or they get confused by it. And I use a calculator for everything. I can’t do very simple math. But you can just plug it into a spreadsheet and just set it and forget it. But just don’t make up stories about your results. You’ve got to look at the numbers and then you can go, “Oh actually I’m right on track.”
ANGELA:
And I think it is. I know every legit, (hand on heart) like every VIP client I’ve ever had, probably about month three when we’re walking together, after we’ve done some of the other foundational element, I’ll say, “Okay, so now we need to look at more closely you’re Google Analytics. And what is this saying.” And they’re like, “Well, what do you mean?” I’m like, “Well, we need to check your numbers.” “But why? That will tell me what I’m doing?” I’m like, “That’s the purpose of it, right?” And every single client, I’ve had to set up, “This is what we need to check…” depending if they’re e-commerce or service-based, “…is the numbers we need to be looking at.” And they’re like, “Oh, I actually made more money than what I thought.” And I’m like, “Yes, that’s whole another kettle of fish in your account and we should be doing that part of it with you.” Right? But I’m looking more like how many people are reading your blogs? Where are they acting or where are they sitting at on your website? What contents are they consuming? What do we give the more of, etc. etc.
But yes, every single VIP client to date has not had the numbers. And I say to them, “Well, what is it?” Then they’re like, “If I had to actually have to look at my numbers,” all of them say the same thing, “But if I had to look at my numbers, that means that it’s like; it’s true or not true.” And I’m like, “Yes.” But it’s better than, like you said, Denise, the stories that you start making up. Whereas if you don’t track it, how do you know it is true or whether it isn’t true? So it is; it’s always an interesting exercise. It can be quite; you can see the fear caught in their face because I do my VIPS via video. And we’ll start looking at the Google Analytics. But you can also see the relief after that session. Because they’re like, “Okay. Now, I’ve got it.” And we do that every month, like on the first Monday of every month. Either they have their VA or their team collect that data and they review it from taking on the role of the CEO. They get the report, they look at it. Or, if they’re not at that stage yet, they go in every month; so the first Monday of every month and pull that data and start to be able to understand it. I think it’s so important.
DENISE:
Yes, I agree. But I’ve got a theory about why we resist it. Besides a lot of times, a girls are told they’re not good at math, there’s a cultural thing that we have around; it’s making wishes. And it’s drunk interest from such a young age. At birthday parties, “Make a wish, but don’t tell me what or it won’t come true.” So, collectively, we’ve got this thing of like, “I don’t want to look at it because it won’t come true. I don’t want to want it or won’t come true.” I think that’s something to do as well of, “If I look at it too closely, I’ll jinx it.”
ANGELA:
Jinx it. Yes. And I do like that, how you bring up the birthday wish. Because we are, we’re always told, “Don’t tell anyone because it won’t come true.” And I guess if we look at the wiring of our brains and if you look again, that collective conscious that you’re talking about. Then you look at even those things, what we’re already told about. And that will go totally into the mindset thing. But again, having to re-change those stories is going to be crucial to be able to look at your business from a successful and or be successful, really.
DENISE:
Yes. I think certain another personality type that resists this numbers thing are people who are all about relationships. They think like, “Oh, no. Denise, they’re not numbers to me.” And I’m saying, “It’s not about seeing people as numbers, it’s not. It’s just being realistic about the results that it takes.” And you might need to reach a whole bunch of people to get those numbers play out. It doesn’t mean that you don’t love each and every single one who joins. It’s just that, that’s just how stats work.
ANGELA:
Stats worked.
DENISE:
Yes. The only thing, though, that I did one time, I took my eye off the ball when I was on maternity leave. In the meantime, we kind of sexied out some stuff on my opt-ins. We made them really sexy-looking. And so for that six months, I wasn’t looking at my numbers and my opt-in rates. I came back from maternity leave and I was like, “What happened?” Our opt-in rates for all of my lead pages went down to like a quarter from what they were before.
ANGELA:
Wow. Yes.
DENISE:
Actually, because we made them too pretty.
ANGELA:
Yes.
DENISE:
And they had to be actually simple. So when you look at things like that; that went on for six months because I wasn’t looking at it. You can see where some major leaks happening in your business and just fix that. Like there were people coming to check that thing out and I lost people because they were like, “Do I click on this page? Do I click on this cute little design element? What do I do?” And it confused mindsets now. And so, just knowing those things, you can stop problems. I’m sure you’ve done that, too, where you’ve gone, “Oh, what’s happening with this page? Why are people bouncing off this page?”
ANGELA:
Sometimes, again, we can overwhelm people; overcomplicate things when things don’t necessarily need to be that way. If people; if we can solve a problem like, “Here, click here. You get it. It’s coming to you.” We don’t need to; whatever our stories are at that time, “Oh, I need to do this,” or “It needs to look this way.” But sometimes, if something’s not broken, right? I say, “Why do we have to touch it?” But sometimes, as entrepreneurs; because we were talking about before, is we’ve got a million ideas always going on. But I guess that goes on too, you’re also just testing. Just because something works and then you do try something out; again, if you are looking at those numbers on a regular basis, you’re going to be able to then decrease your fear with everything. But ultimately be going, “Okay. This didn’t work. What can we do next?” Like business is always about testing. It never stops. You’re always testing something.
DENISE:
Yes. And it’s empowering, I think. When you’re like, “Oh, actually, I can see that.” It’s not a story I’m making up, this is empowering information. But you’ll feel a bit scared about it, that’s natural.
ANGELA:
Yes. But I think again, the more that you get in the routine, again, it also builds, again, it’s empowering; you build your confidence, you know where you stand, you make better decisions collectively, like again. So, I know one of the predictors is just statistics basically as a business owner, but as Denise and I talked about, it is super important just to know your overall business statistics, right? Like we know there’s generic predictors like open rates and click-through rates and things like that. But your business has its own unique kind of identity and it’s important that regardless of the predictors or whether or not you’re reading those stats that you’re on top of those.
DENISE:
Oh, definitely. And I think, keep it simple. I think people can get too caught up in like, “Oh, I need a sexy funnel and I need to do all the things that’s like…” No, even just; make sure you’ve got Google Analytics on your site. Just know how many people are visiting.
ANGELA:
Yes, and some people, like, “What do you mean Google Analytics?” And I’m like, “Your web developer, did they install it? No. Okay.” But again, I guess rather, sometimes you don’t know what you don’t know, right? So it’s like, that’s why when you’re working with someone like you or someone like me, like they go; that’s what our role is, to let you know, and you too, Denise. But that’s part of my role is, to be able to look at those foundational elements; is that you need to have this; it’s a key part of your overall looking forward strategy.
Now with our second fear; so we’ve talked about the first fear. The second fear; the fear that you talked about in the book is the fear of being found out as a fraud or an impostor. And I’d love to know, why do you think women fear the fear of being found out a fraud? You think women kind of sabotaged themselves in this particular fear?
DENISE:
I don’t why necessarily but the thing that was comforting to me was realizing how many famous people have it and actually, most people have it. I think the only people who don’t have are like sociopaths.
ANGELA:
Yes.
DENISE:
Because they’re just like, “No, I’m fucking awesome all the time.”
ANGELA:
Yes.
DENISE:
I think it’s just really normal to be like, “Everyone’s got it figured out. And I’m the only one who doesn’t know what they’re doing.” So you can Google famous people with impulses syndrome and it’s crazy. And even just that for me was super comforting. I don’t why literally we have it, but it’s just natural and normal to feel like, “Oh my god. Everyone’s got it figured out and I’m just making up.” The thing that I’ve done to overcome that is I tell people I’m not perfect all the time. And even at the start of my book tour, I was like, “Hey guys. I’ve written this book called Chillpreneur but I’ve totally fucked up and put too many things in my life this year.
ANGELA:
Yes.
DENISE:
So why don’t you say that straight off the bat just in case someone says, “Well, you don’t seem very chill, Denise. And you’ve lost your voice.” I’m like, “Hey guys. Learn from me. I’m not perfect.”
ANGELA:
Yes. Not perfect. And I know, and also in the book, you said another beautiful way that when you overcome that this particular element of the impostor syndrome, is that you said, is the way, and I quote, “I’ve overcome the particular feels to forgive myself for not knowing everything but the same realizing that what I do know can really help people.” Can you talk to talk to me about how you were able to come with that realization? Is that, you might not know everything, but yet, there’s so many people out there that need to hear from you and for you to help them.
DENISE:
I think that started for me at the start of talking about money. Because I resisted it for a little bit because I thought that only financial advisors were like legally allowed to talk about money. And so I was thinking, “Oh my God. Do I need to go back to university? Do I need to become an accountant? Do I need to become a financial advisor?” Because in our world, that’s the only people who were allowed to talk about money in our minds.
ANGELA:
Yes.
DENISE:
And so I realized, I was like, as long as I’m not giving financial advice and I’m not pretending to be a financial advisor in any way, am I allowed to just talk about money from my mindset point of view. And I realized that I didn’t have to be Suze Orman to count for my voice to count because I thought there’s just some things that I’d like to talk about money. And I realized I was happy to contribute to the conversation. I didn’t have to be the Oprah of my industry. I didn’t have to be the expert of all experts. Because some people don’t resonate with my work but some people really do. And I think the way that I got out of it; because people tell me all the time, “I hated money. But I listen to you. And hey, I realized that money is actually not so scary.” So I just knew that I had a place in that conversation but I didn’t put pressure on myself to be the only…
ANGELA:
The only person.
DENISE:
No. And actually someone come up to me yesterday, she was, “Oh, Denise. I really want to talk about money mindset to millennials.” And I just went, “Great.” And she was, “But I really worry you’re going to think I’m copying you.” And I was like, “But, no. You’re going to say it in a way that’s; as long as you don’t copy me.”
ANGELA:
As long as you don’t you take my program and throw it online. We’re good.
DENISE:
Yes. Exactly. I was like, “Do it how you want to do it.” And I said, “I actually have seen in the last three years a lot more people talk about money mindset.” And occasionally, I get a little, “Oh no, in my program.” And I’m like, “Oh, actually, they’re talking about it in a completely different way,” and I’m talking about, “Go for it because the world needs more good people teaching cool stuff.”
ANGELA:
Yes.
DENISE:
We’re in the bubble, so we think, “Oh, everyone knows how to do this thing.” They don’t. They absolutely don’t. And they need to hear it in only the way that you can say it.
ANGELA:
And I agree with that because I know sometimes, I say to people, “When you hire me as a coach, A; you don’t want to hire me forever because that’s actually a bad coach. And two, I will help you with certain strengths but sometimes, you may need to hear it from someone else for the penny you drop.” Right? And so, sometimes, I think again, people learning styles, the way they perceive information, the way they consume information, personality, that I’m just like; and they still need to get the same knowledge, right? Still the foundational elements about growing a business. But I might just not be their cup of tea, and that’s okay. So again, I’m all about; I believe I go from an abundance. There’s more than enough people out there to learn from me as I’m treated for the same thing. One thing is just, don’t steal my stuff. Don’t steal my VIPs, where good to go. We’re good.
DENISE:
For sure. But also, even if you’re teaching the exact same thing as someone else, which most of us are, right? We’ve got different flavours around it. I’m not a very gentle, nurturing person; so I’m more of like a, ‘tell it like it is’ person. And so, someone needs to hear money mindset from someone who does it in a more gentle approach. They’re scared of me maybe. So yes, I’m all good with that. My thing for that was be a contributor, not a guru.
ANGELA:
Yes. Totally. And you go more in depth again about that in the book, again, why people should get it. But yes, I’ll talk more about that later. Now, I’ll summarize this fear though with a really cool quote and then we’ll move on to fear three. But just; you said, I personally would love to see more women be talking about this. I’ve said it a couple of times because I think again, we normalize it. But you said, was regardless of this fear, of this impostor syndrome; this fear of being found out as you said, and I quote, “Someone needs to hear your voice. If you show up with integrity and teach what you know with a lot of heart, you won’t feel like an impostor.” And I guess, that goes to, just embrace your uniqueness; what you have to offer will be different to someone else. But again, if you do it with integrity and you do it from heart, that impostor stuff will just go.
DENISE:
Exactly, because if someone goes, “Well, you don’t know XYZ.” I was like, “Yeah, I know. That’s okay. I’m just teaching as one part of it.”
ANGELA:
Yes. Totally. And even yes, sometimes I say with my clients, “If I don’t know something, I’ll tell you. And then, I’ll find that person who does know it.” Right? Like, there’s no way we can know everything. And there’s always people that are like, “Oh yes. I know how to do everything.” Those are the red flaggers. That I’m just like, “Actually, there’s no way on earth you can know everything.” And I’m like, “Run for the hills if someone says they know everything.” Because I’m like, “It’s like code for fraud.”
Now, the third form of fear is you talk in the book, Chillpreneur, about the fear of criticism. So my question to you, Denise, why do you think the fear of criticism continues to hold so many people back?
DENISE:
Yes. Well, I think it just touched on that witch wound thing again of; we’re scared of being ostracized. And I think that lives in us as well; I suppose in lots of places, lots of cultures where a tribal society or you lived in a small village. And if you were shunned, that’s a matter of life and death.
ANGELA:
Legit.
DENISE:
Yes. Right? Or, there could have been worse consequences. So we’re just really scared of being kicked out of our groups, of our tribes. It just lives in us as this fear of survival. I think that’s the first thing. And the second thing is it just doesn’t feel very nice to be criticized. Of course, it doesn’t. I think people are way more scared of it than it actually happens.
ANGELA:
Yes.
DENISE:
Yes. I think sometimes people are really surprised to hear that I don’t get a lot of haters.
ANGELA:
Yes. Yes.
DENISE:
Because they’re so terrified that they think that that’s just going to happen. And yes, oh my God; I’ve got heaps of 1-star reviews. I’ve got people who don’t like me. I’m sure people probably talk about me, but I really don’t seek it out. And some people Google themselves to find it.
ANGELA:
And I just go like, “Dude, why? You don’t need to do that.” Because of course, not everyone is going to like you. But there’s also the psychology about the five star and one-star reviews, too, right? That if you had just all five stars reviews, a lot of people, like literally, from a psychological standpoint, go, “Oh gosh. It was their friends and families who wrote those reviews.” Where it’s like, I actually say like, embrace the one stars because that to me the only contributes to the authentic you. Because people are going, “Okay. Yes. She’s not perfect.”
DENISE:
That’s such a great point.
ANGELA:
And then the world where people are always; Instagram worthiness and perfectionism, well if you just embrace the imperfect you, that’s what people will start to love. That’s what they want. That’s what they need to help them with.
DENISE:
And the other thing is, I’m sure you hate heaps of stuff. I’m sure you have a rational hate, there’s just some people you’re like, “I don’t like them.”
ANGELA:
Yes.
DENISE:
And I can be a real bitch. Like, you sit and watch reality TV. Like, Mark and I are the biggest bitches. We would never say to someone’s face, we are like, oh my God. We can be really mean and horrible. And so I think, I’ve got compassion for people who don’t like me. I totally get it. There’s heaps of things that I don’t like about some people. I mean, I would probably never tell them. So I think sometimes people who like to tell you that they don’t like you, I’m like, “That’s great. You didn’t need to tell me.”
ANGELA:
Yes. Really, like, “Thanks. No, thanks.”
DENISE:
Yes. And it’s also none of my business. Just like, “Okay.” So I am chill about criticisms because I just know that one, it’s inevitable. You can’t please everyone all the time, for sure. And two; I hate heaps of shit, too. So, whatever; like I’m not everyone’s cup of tea. But it’s not my job though to take that on. So I don’t read; like I’m not in our customer service inbox. My team probably see people go, “Well, I hate you.” They’re not forwarding that on to me.
ANGELA:
Like, “Denise, here’s some happy mail.” Not…
DENISE:
Actually, I probably mentioned this in the book, too, but when my assistant first started working with me, she would forward on love notes and people who are like fan girls; because she thought that would make my day. And words of affirmation for me are very low; like it’s my last. Gifts are my last, actually. So I thought, “Hang, on. I can’t believe that the fangirls are real and then the haters are like haters.” I have to see; I can’t be like, “She loves me. She loves me not.” And I can’t be like, “Well, at the end of the day, I’ve got three love mails and three hate mails and they can’t see each other.” I’m like, “I don’t care.” I like me, my friends like me, my family like me. And so, I’m going to sit with that. I’m going to have an equilibrium that has got no; like it doesn’t matter how many people like me or hate me so in that way if you think like that, then you can’t believe the rabid fangirl moments either. It’s just that; good and bad, it’s just someone’s opinion. I’m just going to be…
ANGELA:
Not mention, like how exhausting it is from an emotional roller coast. They’re like, “Yey. I’ve got five mails. I had one shitty one.” It’s like, one step forward, two steps back. I mean, that’s exhausting.
DENISE:
It is. So just do your thing. And yes, whatever. It’s not about dismissing them. It’s just like, it’s not your thing that it’s going to be a feel-feel.
ANGELA:
Yes. 100%. And so, for those listeners out there that are like, “Okay, you guys have dropped a few truth bombs. I probably need to look at a few little fear things. Need to take some action.” What’s one thing that the listeners can potentially do to start looking at or handling those three main points of fear that we talked about today?
DENISE:
Well, definitely; Google the impostor syndrome thing.
ANGELA:
Yes.
DENISE:
Because so many famous people talk about it, that will make you feel a million times better. If the witch wound stuff triggered something in you, I would go read a book about the witch wound because there’s a lot of people who talk specifically about the witch wound. And then, I would say, too, there’s a couple of specific things that you can do like for example take unsubscribe notifications off because you don’t need to see that.
ANGELA:
Yes.
DENISE:
Don’t read it. If you know that you’re going and read it sometimes to like take you there, lose the password for that for a while.
ANGELA:
Yes. Just lose it. Dump it.
DENISE:
Yes. Or maybe it’s on your dashboard when you log in to your email system, you can take that off. So I think sometime you should blink in yourself because you can’t stop the criticism coming but you can choose how you engage with that. It could be that you have a gatekeeper for your emails. There’s some practical stuff that you can do. You don’t have to get better at loving criticism; it’s just that it’s not your job to read it all.
ANGELA:
Yes. And it’s not you; you don’t have to hold it either.
DENISE:
No. I’ve got tons of one-star reviews as I’ve said. And I remember the first couple of times I got it, I would go and reply to them because someone would go, “Oh, Denise, you swear too much.” I’m like, “Well, first of all, you bought a book called Get Rich, Lucky Bitch; so like there was a bit of a spoiler in the title.” And I’d be like, “Well, thanks so much for your feedback. I’ve got here some other books that you might like better.” And now, I’m just like, “Cool. That’s your opinion.” I don’t feel good about it; I don’t feel bad about it. I’m so neutral on it now.
ANGELA:
And I guess, that though, that shift; because when you first started, you probably didn’t look at it from that point of view. And I guess, my question I have is, our discussion with that will kind of end and we’re almost going to wrap up, is around that mindset. So, a lot, if not everything around fear is mindset. And especially when we start off in business. That things are a bit wobbly and I see a lot of people, “I need to get the perfect logo. And I need to do this and I need to do this.” And I’m like, “If you spend just as much time as you are in your logo and your font and your colours, theme and all these; and read or didn’t exercise about mindset either collectively, or money mindset; whatever that is for you, I believe businesses would be in a quicker grow stage, potentially more successful, potentially. What are your thoughts about that mindset stuff in business owners?
DENISE:
Well, I think one of the best things you can do for yourself to improve your mindset is surround yourself with other people who have got a good mindset.
ANGELA:
Amen. Totally. Get rid of the toxicity.
DENISE:
Yes. Because even just being around people who are supportive, who are cheerleaders, who speak positively about money, all that stuff rubs off. Especially if you’ve got friends who challenge you a bit, too. I have a friend who would say, “Oh, I’m so stupid.” And I’d say to her, “Honey, I don’t think I can hang out with you if you talk about yourself like that because you’re not stupid.” And if you need friends like that who are just like, “No, you’re amazing. I love you. Hey, don’t worry. We both fucked up before.” That’s the bigger thing you can do for yourself.
ANGELA:
And not just your friends, I would say, too. I also say, family. A good friend of mine, Lisa Corduff, I had on the podcast a couple of weeks ago. Before we started recording, we were talking about also family, right? And that, as you grow as a person and as you grow in business, sometimes, you are stuck with shutting some of the family. And it’s a tough thing, too. But sometimes, we just bought a ticket last night, I’ll use as an example; we’re heading to Kuala Lumpur and Vietnam for a couple of weeks in June. And we’re leaving like 40 days; very last minute. But I was like, “Let’s rock and roll. Let’s do it.” And you know, one of the family members this morning was like, “Oh, must be nice to be able to travel.” Right? And I like go, “Hold on. That’s our choice.” Like, we’ve made a decision. We worked hard for it and that’s what we’re doing. We chose to take action to do this. But it’s like, there’s one particular family member, that it’s like, they’re doing it so much more often, right? And I kind of feel like, it’s like rocks in my pocket; like they’re kind of holding me down. And I’m just kind of like, well, it’s not that I want to get completely wipe them off, but I’ve got choices. Either, keep allowing these conversations to happen or we put in a boundary. Or kind of pull back a little bit, right? But I think, it’s not only surrounding yourself with good friends, but I think family also can play a big part of it.
DENISE:
Well, if you’re new in business, I would say the biggest mistake that people make is they try and get validation…
ANGELA:
Yes.
DENISE:
…from their family members. So they give them too much information whereas I think, change the subject. Honestly, if they want to be supportive, they don’t get to hear about your business. But that’s why you need friends; you need a mentor because you need somewhere to channel that.
ANGELA:
Yes. 100%. And that again, the more positivity around, like it’s a better place. It’s a much better place for everyone. And again, your mindset from there will grow. Now, Denise, I know like you said, you’ve been super busy. So I really appreciate you taking the time this week with my audience about these three main fears that you talked about in your book, Chillpreneur. And for those of you that want to get a piece of Chillpreneur, or chomp in at the bits to work with you, where can they find you? How can they connect with you?
DENISE:
Okay. Yes. So all my social handles and my website are all Denisedt.
ANGELA:
Okay.
DENISE:
Denisedt.com. I’m on Instagram @denisedt. What I actually really love when people do is that they tag me on Instagram, not with a word of affirmation because whatever. So don’t say, “Hey, I love…” Just say, “Here’s what I did from reading your book.” That for me, like acts of service, I’m like, “I was of service to you, and you change your past or you did this thing.” Like that for me gives me goosebumps. It’s so exciting. So take a picture; like a screenshot of how you’re listening to us right now. Tag myself. Tag Angela. Tell us what you did from listening to this podcast. That’s the thing that makes me so excited.
ANGELA:
That’s what makes you happy. Alright, then, well, listen. Denisedt is where they can find you at the socials. And tell us a little bit about Money Bootcamp if they want to get into some cool money mindset with you.
DENISE:
Yes. So my money bootcamp; it’s a six-week course but it’s like one of those; it’s like mafia and you’re in for life.
ANGELA:
A lot of good mafia.
DENISE:
You can’t get out. Once you’re in, you’re like in forever. And it is a set process to find out and discover your money blocks, where they came from, what beliefs you have around money, the tools to let some of those go, and recognize your money sabotages and all those things. And it comes with a beautiful community. And it’s a community just to talk about money. We’re not a business. We’re not a marketing forum. It’s a really rare place where you can talk about pricing and you’re fears around money and your money successes. And people share how much money they make about things, too, which is; it’s not even special. Like it’s not even a thing anymore; people are like, “Oh, I made this. I made this.” And we celebrate the, “I made a thousand dollars,” and we celebrate someone who are like, “Oh, I made ten million dollars last year.”
ANGELA:
Like, boom. Yes.
DENISE:
Yes, money is a normalized conversation and I sometimes forget how rare that is to have a place where we can talk honestly about money.
ANGELA:
And where can they learn more about Money Bootcamp?
DENISE:
At my website. So at denisedt.com and you can check out the Money Bootcamp. I also have a course called Money Archetypes, which is a really fun way to look at your money personality. But I would say for people, if you are just setting up, read my books. So I’ve got a book called Lucky Bitch about manifesting if you’re new to that. Even if you’re not, you’ll probably get some fun stuff. I’ve got a book called Get Rich, Lucky Bitch about money mindset. And then, the new one is about business. So go to Amazon. Pick which one you feel like you want to read first. And that’s a really good way to see if my flavour is your flavour.
ANGELA:
Is your flavour. Yes. Because again, everyone, we all got different flavours. But I’m kind of like you, Denise. I’m not here for fluff. I swear, probably; and I say to my podcast team actually click the explicit button for every episode because you never know what’s coming out in an episode. As today, we’ve got to see upon. But yes, man, a book’s a great way and you’ve got three really juicy books. Again, you’ve got a lot of content online. And again, follow Denise at her socials. She keeps it real. She doesn’t just talk about business. She talks about motherhood. She’s a strong advocate in a variety of different things. I can’t remember the gentleman who was Forbes; was it Forbes recently? Or when you use the word entrepreneur; that was a really great post you had. That’s a whole another podcast probably. All I’m saying is that it’s not just your standard, Denise, there’s a lot of value just on her socials so start there also, whatever for both.
And just also, for the rest of you, please remember that my team and I will also be putting together the whole transcription for this episode at angelahenderson.com.au. And of course, I cover all sorts of related business and life topics inside my active Facebook community, the Australian Business Collaborative. And for the rest of you, I hope you have a fabulous day. And I look forward to you joining me next week on another amazing episode of the Business and Life Conversations Podcast. Thanks, again, Denise, for being on today. I really, really appreciate it. Bye.
DENISE:
Bye.
ANGELA:
Thanks for listening to the Business and Life Conversations Podcast with Angela Henderson, www.angelahenderson.com.au
