Hey, welcome back to ADHD Owned, an ADHD Entrepreneurs podcast. I have a very different episode for you guys today. And I don't know if you can tell what different is going to be like for this podcast because there's not enough episodes, I feel like to make that judgment. But I say it's a different episode because your girl made a colossal mistake in her business last week, aka me. And I want to talk about it. Because as I was going through it, of course, like the little voice in my head, that's the reasoning voice is going, Oh, this is going to be really good. This is going to be really good to share with your clients and your friends and the people around you. Because I feel like so many people go through some of the things that I'm about to share with you. And I feel like I made all of the mistakes so that you guys don't have to make them. In a way I feel like I made them all so you guys don't have to do it. So I really want you to really listen, pay attention to this episode. Because I do not do this. Often I do not share all of the things that go wrong. In the middle of it, I still feel like I'm in the middle of it. But I don't know, it just feels like this is the right thing to do. And I haven't seen people talk about today's topic. And that's why this feels very pressing for me to get out to you guys. So without further ado, today we're talking about launching flops, putting out offers that ended up not being aligned and not being something I should have put out in the first place, at least not during this time. And just the pressure of always one upping yourself. I feel like in the business world, there's just this pressure that we all sometimes feel that we just have to one up ourselves, right? If you're like a product based business, and you sell products, and maybe you do like a Saturday market, and you sell, I don't know how much money. And like, after that you feel like the next market you do has to be better than the last one, right? We just feel like we have to one up ourselves. Or if you're a coach or service provider, you feel like you know, your last group program or whatever program that you launched, it has to be better than next time you have to make more money from it. You have to get more clients and all of this like stupid stuff that that we feel. And it's so sad that we feel that pressure of doing that. And I asked myself, where does that pressure come from? Like I really asked myself these questions last week, why do I feel like I have to work on myself? Is it because of me? Is it because I have such a high expectation of myself? Part of the answer is yes. That is why because I am my greatest competition. And because I strive to be the best. And that's in my core. That's who I am. But I cannot just genuinely tell you that that's the only reason because I'd be lying to you. The other reason I feel is because I'm being watched, right? When we have a business we're being watched, we're being watched by possible clients. We're being watched by clients that have already bought, we're being watched by the people, the audience, our friends and family are watching. There's just this pressure that like we have to be successful in order for people to want to buy from us. And that's a really heavy feeling. Can we talk about it? It's a heavy feeling. And this is where I feel like it almost causes us to put the wrong pressure on ourselves. And I found that this wasn't the main reason why this happened for me. But this was a little bit of the reason why I pursued an offer even after I felt like maybe this isn't the right offer. So the story goes that my mastermind I had dreamed it up in my head and came up with a curriculum for it like the structure of what I would teach and I came up with how I would present the offer. How many times would we meet? All of those details in the fall of last year, and I was still actually trying to decide if that's what I wanted. And I remember even at the time, I had a coach and I remember even my coach was helping me like, really figure out if this is what I wanted. And then I was like, You know what, it just feels right. I think it would be fun. I've never run a mastermind. It was gonna be my first time doing it. But I'm like, I know that I can do it. So that was that. But then I launched my bundle. And that was really fun. And I actually really enjoyed doing that. But I guess it just see, it was more again, again, ADH do it was more work, then I, of course thought and planned for because we almost never plan correctly. We think something's just gonna be like, oh, yeah, I mean, it's gonna be a little bit hard. But like, it'll be fine. No, it always takes like 20 hours longer than we thought. Yeah, so I think kind of towards the end of December. And at the beginning of January of 2022, I realized that I just wasn't sure if I was still aligned with this offer. I wasn't sure if the mastermind was truly what I wanted. And I was a little scared by that thought, because I thought I had already decided this is what I want. This is what feels right. And then all of a sudden, I found myself doubting that. And so that was a kind of a little bit of a red flag for me. Like I was like, oh, no, why do I feel that way? So then I kind of had to figure out why I felt that way. And of course, this is all happening subconsciously throughout my day, right? It's not like I'm sitting at my desk, and I go, Oh, my gosh, I don't want to do this mastermind anymore. Why do I not want to do a mastermind? Let's write out a whole thing as to why I don't want to do a mastermind. I wish I could tell you that. That's how I went. But let's be honest, that's not how it went. It's like as I'm washing the dishes as I'm walking, to go take my dog out. Or as I'm walking to do the laundry is of course when I'm thinking about all these things about my business. And I'm realizing that there's a little bit of a question mark around this mastermind I've launched. Here's the pressure. I've already told everyone that I'm watching a mastermind. I've been talking about it on social media. I've been telling my clients, I had people that were telling me I'm waiting for you to drop that, like, I'm keen to listen to it. Like I'm interested. So I was like, okay, cool. Awesome. Yes, this is good. So I just felt like the pressure of I said I was going to do something. And now I'm not going to do it. Well, that was heavy. That was heavy, because it just felt like I was letting everyone down, first of all. Secondly, it made me feel like a loser made me feel like what I say I don't stick to even because we've all been lectured about that that what you do you don't stick to you? How many goals have we created? How many dreams, how many new year's resolutions have we created for ourselves, and never actually do them? Right. And I feel like that kind of was still hanging over my head. I didn't realize it subconsciously. And that's what I was feeling. Anyways, that happened, then I'm going to be completely honest with you guys. My husband tells me we've been thinking about buying a house because he's getting promoted for work and it kind of requires him to have a house and for some reasons that I won't share. So basically, it was kind of left field like that. He was like, hey, everything's just kind of lining up. And like, we should start looking at houses. And I was like, a bit taken aback. Because I was like, wait right now, like, Are you sure? Are you? Are you serious? I'm not ready to start looking at houses like I'm trying to launch my mastermind, then I need to create it then I need to show up like a badass for my clients. Like, I kind of have a lot going on right now. And like I don't want to add on looking for houses. So I was a bit intimidated by that. But it was something we needed to do and wanted to do. We've been desiring to own a house for the longest time. So there is where I thought okay, well, if we're going to start looking for houses, I most definitely need to like get into my gear. I need to do this mastermind because Wait, pause parentheses. A part of me was still questioning whether my hesitancy with my mastermind. Like my little question mark was because of my fear. And I was still trying to decipher this. I hadn't figured it out. I was trying to decipher if my hesitancy was because of my fear of what if no one buys because my mastermind was going to be a higher ticket program. And I've never launched something for that. Hi, hello. I know a lot of you can relate on this part. Because so many of you guys are telling me I don't know. I'm just so scared to raise my prices. I've never charged that much. And I was trying to figure out if that's where my fear was coming from. I'm like, oh, no, am I kind of scared of this? Because that's a normal human experience. Okay, let's not shame people for feeling that way. It's normal. Even I go through it. Okay, so I was still trying to figure out, is it fear or is it something else in this current moment when my husband said We're gonna start looking for houses. I was like, okay, then this is my sign that I need to go for it. Like, I need to not be afraid of what could happen with this mastermind. I need to not be afraid that people are like imposter syndrome, right. And that's why I kind of talked myself into doing it. Yeah. And it was going to be a five month mastermind and I was a little bit intimidated by that too, because I've only ever worked with people consecutively for 10 weeks. And my group program was 12 weeks. So I was a little bit intimidated by having such a long offer, like a long time working with someone and like a long commitment. So I was a bit intimidated because I'm like, I don't know how that's gonna work for my brain. Because let's be honest, my brain gets tired and bored. And I kind of just want the next thing. So that's where I was a little bit hesitant about it. Anyways, I think a masterclass, boom, that's what I need to do because I've actually always wanted to do a live workshop, a training. I love teaching, teaching is my thing. It is what I love. And I feel I'm so good at. Especially creating curriculums and courses and programs for ADHD brains, like I am such a nerd for this crap. And I work meticulously on those slides to make it so easy for people to learn. And if you don't believe me, go into my Facebook group. Look up the hashtag masterclass. And read what people are saying about this masterclass. They loved the way I taught it, because this is what I'm good at. I just say that I was so excited to do this masterclass. I'm like, Yes, this would be so fun. Well, what happened was that your ADHD squirrel friend here chased the fun thing, which was a masterclass. But what I did not realize by chasing that fun thing was that that also meant that I had to set up an email sequence, I had to set up a thing in Kajabi, to like, get people's email so that I can send them the replay link and the link, I didn't realize that I had to create somewhat of a small landing page. I had to keep promoting it so I could keep getting people to come in. So we have a good group of people. I had to finish creating the slides for the masterclass. And that took a really long time. And also not even just finishing the slides, but creating the transitions, the order of how I want to present things. There's a lot of strategy that goes into this. And I know probably you guys are being like, Well, duh, of course, Jesse. It's gonna be a lot of work. Yeah, no, we don't realize these things in the moment. Once everything is done, and we look at it, we're like, what was I thinking? Yeah, that was me. I was like, What the heck was I thinking? Why did I think I could do this? Like easy peasy lemon squeezy? No, I don't know what I was thinking. But it's okay. That's just my ADHD brain. Trust me. I already shamed myself. And then I'm like, okay, that's not it, either. That's not my style. So that's what happened. And I was so overwhelmed by all of the work, incredibly overwhelmed. I did not give myself enough time to do this. Like, this is the part where I want to lie to you guys and tell you guys that I gave myself a much longer time. But I can't do that. I gave myself maybe like six days to put this together. I said, I'm going to do a masterclass. That's what I'm doing. Yep, I'm doing it. I'm gonna post my Facebook group. I'm gonna tell people I'm doing a masterclass and boom, done. And then I was like, Alright, now let's start creating it. Six days, six days? No, I can't believe I can't believe I gave myself only six days. So anyways, that happens. And it's a colossal flop on my end, not on the part where I teach really well, and people get a lot of things from it, because that was secure. Okay, I'm a good teacher, I made my slides very well. And it was good. The part that I screwed up that I did not spend enough time on, because Can I give you the whole list of what I had to do? I didn't spend enough time on the actual selling portion talking about my offer, talking about my mastermind talking about that part. That's what I didn't spend enough time on. So it didn't end up being what I wanted. And I can 100% say, that's what happened. That's what went wrong. It was not people didn't want what you had. It was not that it's not that it wasn't a good offer. It was just that I didn't present it in a way that they needed it presented. Because there's a lot of psychology that goes behind selling and marketing yourself. And if you haven't realized that there's a lot of psychology behind it, then I'm so glad you're listening to this because 90% of people's decision of buying anything has In the subconscious brain, that is a fact. So knowing that I know this, I love the brain. I love psychology. I love subconscious psychology. And I love sales psychology. So I'm not like someone who didn't know how to get people to see the value in what I have to bring. I know how to do that. I teach my clients how to do this in a way that feels aligned and natural and not sleazy, or weird or manipulative. No, not like that. But in a way that helps people see the value that you bring. It's all about how you present it to them, how you talk about it, right? So that's what I was really kicking myself for. Because I didn't get to do what I knew I needed and was supposed to do. And why didn't I get to do that? Because I ran out of time, because I ran out of time. Because remember, when I said I gave myself six days, I gave myself six days, that's not quite enough time to do everything they needed to do. That was a problem. And so I was literally working on it until the last second. And it was bad. And then and then okay, here's where it really screwed me up a little bit was that as soon as the masterclass was about to start, I got a delivery. And it threw me off so much, because that was just not supposed to happen. And so I showed up to the master class, like a minute late. I was supposed to show up, like right on time. But I didn't do that. And to my surprise when I logged into the master class, because I had to go pick up this delivery that was there. And it was like a big delivery because we're house hunting. So I already bought some things. Yeah, it was just bad. And when I come to the master class, and I log into the Zoom, there's already 50 people waiting for me. 50 people are already there. Put yourself in my shoes. Please understand that when I hop on and I see that 50 People are waiting, and that I'm technically like a minute late, immediately. I'm like, so embarrassed and so pressured, and I'm like, crap, what the heck, I was already really frazzled. And that's never good. Because of this. I felt like, you know, we need to get the show on the road. Like, we need to not waste any time. Because of course, in my mind, even though technically it was only a minute or two late in my mind, it's as if I were 20 minutes late. And so I was like, No, we gotta go. And so in all of this, like Rush, I forget to go live in my Facebook group. And I was supposed to go live in my Facebook group. And for the people on the actual zoom call. I completely forgot to do that. Because I just was not prepared, to be honest. So yeah, that's the story. And I didn't of course, I didn't realize this until like, literally at the last four minutes of the masterclass is when I realized, oops, I was supposed to be live and I'm not live right now. And then the other problem we encountered was that too many people signed up for this masterclass, and that's why I was feeling so pressured to get everything on time. Because I thought I was just going to have a cute little masterclass. I'm just going to put this little masterclass together. I'm just going to run this little masterclass. It'll be awesome. It's gonna be great. Nope, 700 people signed up for this masterclass 700. And I'll remind you, this was my first time doing a free live workshop training of this type where I have like an email thing, and I'm really promoting it. Like this was the first time I have something like this official capacity. That's why I made all the rookie mistakes. And I made all of them. So I do not do them again. And so you don't have to do them. Yeah, it was bad. The big, overwhelming thing that I was feeling after everything was done, and I realized how many mistakes were made that led me to the result. It was the feeling of a messed up. I'm almost like I'm in trouble. It was so weird to feel that to recognize it, to observe myself and be like, Oh, my gosh, it's like, I feel like I'm in trouble. I feel like I messed up and I let someone down. And it was almost like my inner child was scared that the adult was going to be like, No, that's not how you do a Jessie. You were supposed to do it this way. You're supposed to put the hand over here first, and then do that and it's almost like I went back to my school years where maybe I didn't understand the instructions correctly and I completely Did the project all wrong? And then the teacher comes and looks at and goes, What is this? No, that's not right, you forgot to do this. And it was almost like that feeling that I was experiencing at that moment. And of course, when you feel that as an ADHD person who is so used to failing, who is so used to making mistakes, who is so used to getting corrected by adults, you start to fear that feeling, it feels terrible, you feel like the ultimate idiot, you feel like you let someone down, you feel useless, like you couldn't do anything like you're powerless. And that, my friends, is what I felt in that moment. And after realizing that, I understood that there are many moments in my business, that this still comes up for me that if I feel like I was meant to do something for my one on one client, and then I ended up not doing it, like, maybe I meant to send them a message, and then I completely forget, and then I'm like, dang it, I didn't send them that message. And then I feel like I let them down. And it comes from that feeling of growing up in a world that doesn't understand you, that doesn't know how to communicate with you well, so that you can understand them well. And it was really crazy. So now that you've heard this, I want you to see if this comes up for you as well, if this comes up for your business. I screwed up, and it's just this overwhelming feeling when you fail at something. And I think for me, I was able to trace it back to my childhood. And like those were the first times I felt that way. And that's what I'm reliving every time I feel this way. So yeah, I hope that that helps you in any way. So to add another plot twist to everything that happened to me last week, as I was creating this free masterclass presentation, I had the genius like crazy inspiration idea that US ADHD ears get in the middle of the night, I had this like download of the structure and the curriculum of what my ADHD business course could be. This is something I've been wanting to create. It's something I've been saying I'm going to create. And before even last year, I put a date on like, this is the year I'm creating it, I had a date set, but because of the whole house situation and everything that was kind of like blurred, and I'm like, Okay, this might change a little bit. But I got this download randomly. And I was like, Oh my gosh, what if I create the squirrel printers Academy. And it's like, the business course that every ADHD entrepreneur would have wanted to go through, and it's not going to be like all of the other neurotypical courses, it's going to be super badass for HD brains. And it's gonna be super visual and short videos. And I'm gonna include scripts and templates, and yada yada, yada. And I just got this, like, genius idea. And I was like, oh my god, oh my god, this is exciting. Oh, my God, this feels like, Oh, my God, I have to do this. So I was like, but I have this masterclass. So, what do I do? Then I was like, what if I pre sell this course that I'm talking about this new idea? What if I pre sell it to the people that are going to be in the masterclass? Because it's a great opportunity. And by doing that, what if I do a payment plan to make it super accessible for people so that they can get in on it, and they don't have to pay the full price? If they don't, because once I come out with it, I'm not going to do a payment plan. It's just going to be full price. I mean, I may do just one payment plan. I don't know I haven't decided anyways, then I have the idiotic idea of okay, I'm going to carve this out. I think I can have it in time for the master class. And that, my friends, is where I really screwed up. Because, again, I underestimated how much time it was going to take me to do all of that, and the fact that I had so much left to do. So that's where everything went wrong. Of course, I didn't give myself enough time. I did everything rushing. And when I looked back at everything, and I looked back and I said what the hell happened? Where did I go wrong? And I assessed the situation as if I were looking at it through somebody else's eyes. As if I were looking at somebody else's royal screw up. I realized that I was motivated by desperation by need. I just need to get this out. Because at this point, it was mainly the fact that I had already said I was doing a mastermind I had already told people I'm not taking one on one clients. My only one on one clients will be in my mastermind and I had already structured all of my business plans to the mastermind so this was a problem and the problem is that I just was not aligned with the mastermind and I counted on me doing the mastermind and had too many things going for that to have to happen in my business plans and like what I was going to offer and I even like turned people down for one on ones because I was like, my one on ones aren't open until August. So that's where I was like, wow, I really screwed up and now what do I do? But I just knew in that moment after the masterclass, it dawned on me that this whole thing is not working out. Because I should have never done this mastermind, I should have never put out this offer because I was not aligned to it. And I think I let the fact that I just need to get it done. The fact that I had already said I was going to get it done, the fact that I already had things set up in the curriculum built out that I just felt like I couldn't go back now. And it just pushed through. And that's why I want to talk to you about the fact that some moments in our business, we have to push through. Because you know, maybe it's our fear holding us back or insecurities holding us back. It's something external that should not hold us back from doing something. And other times there are times where we need to let go. And we need to be brave enough to make that decision. No, don't say this, like you need to be brave. I say this to myself, because when I realized that all this was going on, immediately, I knew in my heart and in my mind, it's off, this mastermind is off, I cannot run it. It is not aligned to me. i If I go through with this, I'm going to have the worst five months of my life and in my business. And I'm not willing to do that. And then the scroll printers academy that I came up with this genius last minute idea. I was like, okay, yes, this is still going. I still want to create this. But now that I look at it, I was also wanting to put that out there. Because I just wanted to get it out. I just want to take hold of the opportunity of having people on the masterclass. And that was a wrong reason I should not have done that. I should have only sold one thing on that masterclass. And that's it. I exhausted my buyer. I gave them three offers. And that was so stupid of me to do. But it just felt like that's what I needed to do. Like I felt like I needed to take over the opportunity. But then the problem was I didn't quite sell it on my masterclass. I didn't weave it there. Because working on my presentation was like the last thing on the list when I had all of these other super important things that needed to happen. So that is basically what went wrong. And if you're sad and stressed after hearing that, thank you. Thank you because it was really bad. As soon as the masterclass ended, as soon as it ended, I busted out into tears, I busted out into tears, because everything that could go wrong went wrong. So many people signed up, I didn't know that my Zoom account had a limitation of only 100 LIVE viewers. And I didn't realize that until I was in the middle of the masterclass that people weren't able to get in because it had reached the max. And it reached the max pretty quickly. And my VA couldn't even get in. I don't know how it happened. But she couldn't get in. And so I was supposed to have her there helping me responding to comments, responding with the links to my offers. She couldn't do that. She wasn’t there. So can you see why I was frazzled? It was a mess. It was a huge mess. I was there, unsupported and alone. So do not recommend. But what I realized from this is winging it. There's some things that we can wing and these types of things are things that we cannot wing. I can not wing this next time is what I learned. Like no. It feels like that is like a no duh thing. But I don't know, I needed to be told that or not even told that I needed to go through that to realize, because you could tell me all day long, I'm still going to make no mistake, and I'm not going to learn until I go through it. I really feel like that's our ADHD nature, in a sense. So that's kind of what happened. And it sucks because now I have to tell people, Hey, by the way, I'm not running the mastermind. Hey, by the way, this Academy course, I'm still doing it just not in the timeline, I thought, and I'm still trying to figure out what I'm doing for that. To be honest, I haven't even sent the email. Because I've been avoiding it so hard because I can not figure out what I'm doing with it. And I hope you realize that this is a very vulnerable podcast episode for me to get out there. Because in a way I'm admitting to all of my failures. And in a world where it feels like we have to look like we have our shit together. And I feel like people look up to me, and they expect more of me. Maybe I don't know if that's just my perception, but I feel like people expect more of me. And I feel like I really let them down and I let myself down and I let my clients down because I feel like I didn't show them and showcase what I would have wanted them to do. I didn't listen to my own preachings. There's so many things I didn't do. But that's okay. I'm not focusing on that. But what I want you to walk away from hearing this is one, if you're launching an offer, you must make sure that it is super effing aligned to what you want. And what you want to think about is, does it work for my timeline? Do I have lots of things going around at that time? Does it work for my current situation? Does it work for the current things that my heart is into, like my mind is focused on, you got to think about those things. And then you need to make sure that you go into really big things like this with a huge plan. I almost feel like I shouldn't even include this point, because it seems so obvious, but apparently wasn't obvious to me. Apparently, I thought I could just do it, I got this. It's no biggie. It was a biggie, it was a biggie. And I needed to have really, really just focused, had better communication with my VA, and even like delegating more things to her. But I didn't do that. So yeah, in retrospect, I feel like a lot of you guys, a lot of ADHD entrepreneurs, kind of have made some of these mistakes in your own ways, right? Obviously, not my exact story. But in your own ways, you've probably felt like you quote unquote, dropped the ball on certain things. And it's important for us to learn from those lessons and see them as lessons, not failures, not mistakes, and not proof that you should close up shop, but just lessons and things that help you get through it. And the reason why I can make this podcast episode now, and why I can come up to you guys, and I'm even doing an in depth training and like, study on what I went wrong, and how I could do it better and how I can sell better and a masterclass, I'm doing this for my membership people. So the reason why I do this is because I can learn from my failures. And I truly believe that in order for us to grow, you have to fail, you have to make mistakes in order to grow. So when all of this is happening, in the middle of it, I'm crying. But the back of my mind, my higher self is saying, This is good, because we can only go up from here, the next time I offer something or do something like huge, like a masterclass and all of this, the next time I do that, it's going to go so much better than this time. And I'm going to be able to have victory. So that's what I have for you today. I hope that this was helpful, I hope you learned, I hope you cried or laughed with me a little bit. It was a bit of a storytelling experience of me telling you where I went wrong. But I just really wanted to be vulnerable and show you what happens in an everyday business. So many people talk about their successes, and all their like really awesome launches and really awesome business things. We don't talk about the things we fail enough. And I don't want to be that person that only talks about the successes, but the failures are even more important to talk about because those are the ones that we really learn from. And that's what you're going to get from me when you listen to this podcast. So I hope you like that if not, sorry. Okay, so I hope that was helpful. You can DM me, please actually, please DM me If you got anything out of this, because I'm not gonna lie to you a part of me is like, I don't even know if people are gonna like this or not, I don't even know if this is gonna be useful or was I just ranting the whole time, I hope I didn't sound like I was ranting. I was really trying to share some value with you and some knowledge of what I learned from this experience. So if you've got anything, please DM me? And let me know, what was the nugget that you got from this? What was the thing that really stuck out to you? And by doing that, it's also helping you soak it into your brain even more. So you can DM me on Instagram at ADHD female entrepreneurs. Or you could send me a message on Facebook, if you find me through there, too. By the way, if you're wondering, the masterclass is now up for sale, that is what I told them that it would only be open for the replay for a few hours. And yeah, but it was so valuable that that's why making it a paid product. Because I'm telling you, I poured my guts out into this and so many people got so much from it. So I turned it into a mini little training there. So that is up for sale in the show notes if you are looking forward to it. Okay, that is what I have for you today. I hope this was helpful for you and I will catch you on the next one.
