Most people think that in order to make more, you need to DO more – and there is some truth to that. After all, that’s how we get better at doing something – more practice means more mistakes, more failures, more lessons learned, and more wisdom earned.
But, making more mistakes and having more failures (sometimes publicly) isn’t exactly a walk in the park. It’s awkward, embarrassing, and if we’re not carefully letting go of beliefs, expectations, fears, and desires along the way – we end up making things much harder than they need to be.
So, today I’m talking about 3 things I’ve had to let go, in order to grow my online course business past the million dollar mark. I hope these stories will help you feel like you’re not alone and inspire you to start investigating what YOU want to let go of next.
My name is Caitlin Bacher, CEO of Scale With Success®, and I’m on a mission to help course creators all over the world grow their business in a way that is profitable and scalable. I’m sharing revealing insights about what it really takes to scale an online course business to millions of dollars per year. Join me here to discover the tough decisions I’ve had to make, the biggest failures I’ve had to bounce back from, and the learnings that emerged every step of the way. I’m so grateful that I have the chance to tell you everything right here on Scale With Success®: The Podcast. Let’s get started.
Today I’m sharing 3 things I’ve had to let go of in order to make over $11m in online course sales since I started this business.
So, let’s get started with the very first thing I had to let go of in order to reach my goals.
1. My Expectation That I Would Fail
There was a moment in time, in the early days of my business journey, when I had every reason to believe that my new business would never work. I’ll never forget one afternoon in my first year of business when I mistakenly triggered an automated email that went out to ALL my customers saying they were about to be rebilled.
Now, NOBODY was actually going to be rebilled and it wasn’t even possible for me to rebill them, but somehow I did something that caused the email to go out.
At the time, I was doing all my own customer service and let me just say that people were very upset. It felt like the straw that broke the camel’s back. I remember sitting on my bedroom floor in tears, trying to answer every email to reassure everyone that the email was a mistake and it was actually impossible for me to rebill them. In the midst of frantically sending out my replies, the power went out.
I couldn’t reply to anyone because the internet was out for everyone in my neighborhood and my head was swimming with worst case scenarios.
In the weeks leading up to that fateful afternoon, it seemed like every time something didn’t go my way, I’d use it as proof that I wasn’t cut out for this. So, when the “accidental email” happened – at that moment I was certain everything was over.
For all the seasoned course creators listening now, I’m sure you can relate to that feeling.
What I didn’t realize was that my expectation that I would fail, was really clouding my perspective. I wasn’t focused on the new sales that were coming in that day. I wasn’t focused on the kind-hearted emails from people who said they’ve had tech issues before in their business and told me to just hang in there.
I wasn’t focused on all the things that were going right – I was only focused on what was going wrong.
Something had to give – and that something was ME.
I realized that if I was going to move forward I HAD to take personal accountability for the way I was choosing to view things. Seeing everything as “proof” that I wasn’t good enough to make my business goals happen was taking a toll and it wasn’t sustainable at all.
The reality was that there WERE good things happening – I just hadn’t been paying close attention to them. One thing to know about the human condition is that we LOVE to be right even if it’s something destructive. So, the subconscious belief that you are doomed to fail is causing you to take actions that are aligned with that belief and your attention is constantly focused on gathering evidence to prove that you’re right.
That year, I made an intentional choice to let go of the belief that I was doomed to fail and instead shift my perspective to something new: My success was inevitable.
Embracing this belief gave me a huge sense of relief. I felt lighter, more focused, and as a result made better decisions. Don’t get me wrong, I still faced a bunch of challenges and made loads of mistakes – but now I saw them as temporary setbacks that I could learn from to get better.
My resilience increased, which helped me stay out of The Drama Triangle (listen to Episode 112 to learn all about that) so I could solve problems faster and with more ease.
So, try something right now, even if it’s only for a few seconds, and let yourself believe that your success is inevitable. There will be some part of your brain that says, “that’s not true” so just thank that little voice for their concern, but for the next 10 seconds – you are going to immerse yourself in the knowing that your success is inevitable.
Choosing to believe your success is inevitable (and is already happening all around you) isn’t always easy, but with practice it becomes easier.
2. My Desire to Control Everything
I used to think that conditions had to be perfect in order for me to succeed. As a result of holding that belief, I felt it was my duty to try to control everything and everyone around me.
I told myself that success was ONLY possible for me if everything was going perfectly around me – which is kinda hilarious to admit because conditions are never perfect.
Tech will break, power will go out, algorithms will change, one of your team members will quit – life will always be life-ing and you have zero control over any of it. No amount of worrying or planning will give you control.
I remember the first VA I ever hired was a lovely person who was very good at what she did, but I was a terrible manager. Anytime she had a question, I would just swoop in and solve the problem for her. I wouldn’t coach her through the process of figuring out where to find the information herself, I was just doing it for her. As a result, she had to keep asking the same questions – not because she was incapable, but because I was treating her as incapable and doing everything for her.
The truth was, I felt like doing it myself would give me more control – and because I believed success was only possible if my circumstances were perfect – I worked very hard to keep that illusion of control going. Even when doing it was doubling my workload and leading to massive overwhelm.
But, instead of letting go I dug my heels in further – and eventually I really began to resent that I had hired a VA who kept asking me questions and wasn’t figuring things out on her own.
In hindsight, I can clearly see that this was because I wasn’t giving her freedom to figure things out on her own – my desperate attempts at control led me to continue to swoop in and rescue her day after day. I’m sure she realized my complete lack of trust and it’s no surprise that just 3 months into our working relationship – she quit.
Instead of using that as proof that I’d never be a good enough boss and vowing never to hire anyone again – I used it as an opportunity to learn.
I looked at my own actions (and the beliefs that were driving them) and took inventory of what I had done to contribute to my current situation. I realized my fear of making mistakes was on par with my fear of others around me making mistakes and that “me doing the work for her” wasn’t solving anything. It was making things worse and I was essentially robbing her of the opportunity to learn.
Letting go of my need to control everything around me was a TRUE TEST of my commitment to believing my success was inevitable. It wasn’t easy for me to do, but ready or not – I was all in.
The reality was that I never actually HAD control – so what I was REALLY doing was letting go of the belief that it was even possible for me to control everything around me.
All that worrying, rescuing, and blaming gave me the illusion of control – but, that’s all it was – an illusion.
3. My Fear of Not Being Liked
You’d think that if I really believed my success was inevitable and control was an illusion – then my fear of not being liked would just instantly disappear.
But, that wasn’t the case. Letting go of beliefs that no longer served me felt like peeling back the layers of an onion. The more limiting beliefs I uncovered, the more beliefs I realized I had to let go of – and I must admit I was tempted to feel stressed about that.
Afterall, didn’t I have to perfectly let go of all my limiting beliefs in order to achieve success? NO. Perfect is an illusion, just like control and I didn’t need either to get where I wanted to go.
As your audience grows, your client base grows, and your team grows – there are going to be lots of opportunities to realize that not everybody is going to like you at any given moment in time.
And what does being liked by everyone really even mean? Afterall, someone could like you one minute, not like you the next minute – and that might be something you have ZERO control over.
You can’t force someone to assume good intent whenever you say or do something.
Here’s an example.
When team deadlines are near and unexpected obstacles occur, it’s normal for tension to rise and it’s easy to make assumptions about WHY someone is making a request or asking a question.
Case in point, the simple request of: “Did you finish uploading that video,” could mean many different things to many different people.
Depending on what beliefs you are holding and how you see the world, you could interpret that request to mean that the asker is insinuating that you aren’t moving fast enough, or that you can’t be trusted to remember the task, or any number of things – even if NONE of those meanings are true.
People are going to believe what they’re going to believe, do what they’re going to do, and like what they’re going to like – and you have no control over that.
The good news is, you don’t NEED everyone to like you in order to achieve your goals. Think about any successful coach or course creator. Some people will like them and some won’t – and that’s ok!
Letting go of your need to be liked doesn’t mean that you don’t care what others think about you – it means understanding that your success is not dependent on 100% of people liking you 100% of the time.
To recap, here are 3 things I had to let go of in order to grow my business:
1. My expectation that I’d fail.
2. My desire to control everything.
3. My fear of not being liked.
Letting go of long standing beliefs isn’t always easy, but it’s doable – and like an onion there will always be more layers to uncover. I appreciate you being here and make sure to tune in next week for another episode of Scale With Success® The Podcast.
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