DO YOU FEEL LIKE YOU ARE NOT BUILDING YOUR BUSINESS AS FAST AS YOU WANT TO?
ARE YOU STRUGGLING TO FIND HARMONY BETWEEN YOUR WORK LIFE AND YOUR PERSONAL LIFE?
Women sometimes feel like they can’t build their #business as fast as men, or that they don’t have the same “drive.” But the truth is, the way we do business in the world is evolving right now. The old patriarchal model of “business first” is fading away. Women create differently, we think and see life more holistically. Our roles as #entrepreneurs and caregivers are equally important. Karen and Michelle talk about how women can find harmony between their family life and running their business, and how to know their own strength and power in the process.
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Full Transcript
Intro
Welcome to The Matrix World, your go to resource for applicable real world tips and insights to help you create a successful sustainable, mission based business. Hosted by Karen Curry Parker and Michelle Vandepas, you can subscribe to our podcast on iTunes, YouTube, or any other podcast platform and learn more about our virtual co working community at thematrix.world.
Michelle
Hi, everyone, I’m Michelle Vandepas. And Karen Parker is here on the podcast with me this morning, the matrix Scott world and this particular podcast we’re talking especially to women. And so even though the matrix is open to everyone, we have a message for women today, especially women who are, well, everyone. Because women have come with a unique set of circumstances. And we’ve been talking about cycles, or we’re not talking about monthly cycles. So that may be part of it. We’re talking about cycles, like bringing up your children taking care of aging parents, which typically falls to the women members of the family. Not always, but typically, we’re talking about natural cycles that women go through, and what effect this has on being an entrepreneur. Karen, you and I are in the same boat. We both have young, young ish children, children at home. And we both have parents who need extra attention right now, what effect has this had on your business?
Karen
Well, I would have to back up and go even further back than where I am right now. Because right now, I think I’ve learned how to navigate it as well as I could, you know, when I first built my business, I was a single mom, I had full time custody of my kids, I had responsibility, full time for the financial support of my kids, and I was an entrepreneur and actually having a job outside of the home. Because my home based office wasn’t an option, I could not make as much money as a J. OB I was a nurse by training, I had four kids, you know, working as a nurse would have taken me out of the home would have created an enormous amount of childcare expenses, and I wouldn’t have been there. And building a business from home was imperative to me and structuring it around my children’s lives. And which I still do today. So where and you do this too, I know that, you know, I’m off at three because I have to go lay and stand in car line or drive, you know, and pick up my kid and spend the afternoon doing homework or violin or math tutoring or whatever. And in your case, you mean you have a teenager, she’s doing music and theater and God knows where I mean, every time I talk to you in the afternoon, you’re always checking somewhere with a kid in a car. Right. And I you know that the complaint, maybe it sounds like a complaint sometimes that I have is that it feels like it’s not fair. Because the speed at which I have grown my business and the speed at which I sometimes watch people that don’t have the same workload or may I you know, without trying to sound like binary around this. But when I watch men who have a wife at home, who’s doing all of this traditional role of raising the family or running a household, even if you know, she’s also doing stuff, it seems like the trajectory of men in business sometimes feels a lot faster than the rate at which I have been able to grow my business. And
Michelle
I want to ask your question around this because it’s so interesting. As you know, like, we’ve both we’ve had to go pick up sick kids from school, right? And if you’ve got clients, then what happens, right, you have a schedule, and it just like, the energy goes like this. So we have that whole piece. But then let me ask you, it has been presented, that sometimes men because of testosterone or the way they’re brought up or the success model might be more driven or more willing to push through things. And I think why want to go for go go.
Karen
I think that’s so unfair, right? Because it’s certainly in my experience, there was nothing that drove me more than the need to feed my family. And that was my only option as a single mom and even now I’m the breadwinner in my family. So my drive to take care of my family is unparalleled as far as I’m concerned testosterone or not. It’s the way in which we create as well. is very different because we are listing. So when I plan my week, for example, I’m not sitting there going, I’m gonna market this and launch this digit. That’s part of it. But I also know that I’m only doing it within these hours. And, you know, my backup plan is I mean, I’ve had a sick kid home Friday, and today, we’ve been up all weekend throwing up and whatever, right, and I’m not, you know, being shady, bright, as usual. And yet, I know how within that cycle of having a sick kid, how to continue to work my week and build my business. And that’s because I think as women and this actually goes into the physiology of the way a woman’s brain is wired, we have a larger corpus callosum, which is that part that connects both hemispheres of the brain, which means we’re able to think more holistically by nature. And so when we are creating a business, we’re not in that single minded, masculine perspective of I’m going to do this and do this, which I think we misinterpret as Dr. But in fact, we are looking at the entirety of what’s going on in our reality, and how can we be present to all of this in a harmonious way. And note that I said harmonious and not balanced. Because balance is a myth, you will never as a woman, especially be balanced in your business, you will always be what I call the each according to need model, which means somedays, it’s going to be in your case, you have an aging parents that are here with you for the holidays, you’re like your focus for the next couple of weeks is going to be I gotta block out my schedule. And you told me this morning, you blocked out your schedule, because you need to be present to what’s going on at home. Right,
Michelle
right. Absolutely. And, and it’s changed than it was a year ago, right? Or it might be different in six months. The other piece of this that I think is so interesting, is at what point do our feelings for our clients get in the way, this empathy, this holistic view? Because we’re so like, oh, my gosh, I have to cancel my client, and then we make ourselves bad, and we feel bad. And then what is my client? gonna think of me, right? So we have this empathetic gene, that sometimes I think can be self sabotaging, because we are so worried about what that looks like.
Karen
So can I want to throw something in here? And again, I think that and I really want to be clear that I don’t want to have this conversation of men versus women. I think we’re, we’re really talking about an evolving model of doing business in the world, because women are becoming more empowered. And because roles are changing. And even men, I think, are beginning to build businesses in the different way. So I’m not saying it’s men versus women. And I will say that in the old patriarchal mindset around business and success, and I think about my dad, who’s you know, the embodiment of the masculine man in business, right? You know, you didn’t renege on a client ever, right? You didn’t cancel on a client. That was shameful. Your clients come first your business first we say it right business first, right Business before pleasure. And then we associate children and stuff like that. So the pleasure piece, right? I have young, it’s not always pleasure. And that’s that mindset, though, of the material world and gain in the material world is more valuable than the quality of life. And that I think, has been actually a very destructive model in the world. And when we come from the I don’t think it’s a place of empathy, I think it’s an old mindset. If I’m empathetic towards my clients, I’m going to say, hey, I want to show up in my best way possible for them so that I can serve at my highest level. And if I’m like, okay, come on, I got a kid puking in the next room, or I got a babysitter come in. And yeah, and I’m not I’m not present. I’m not being compassionate, which means being with my clients with passion, then I’m not serving. And so maybe the model itself of I’m canceling my client, I feel guilty or shame isn’t about empathy. But it’s that old model of business first, right?
Michelle
We’ve talked a lot about the sorts of challenges that women have, you know, over the years that you and I’ve been talking, and what I’ve also noticed is that the whole model that you’re talking about has changed with more people co working more people working from home and this goes for men and women, more more men being stay at home dads or being caregivers to dad and so forth. And I think people want this whole model too. Change. And we can see the vision of where we’re going as a more holistic business model. And the reality is that sometimes it’s just really frustrating and difficult, especially for women if you are the marriage main caregiver. And so I love having these conversations, because we can see where we’re going. Right? And it’s how can we hold each other up? To get there without being in that shame?
Karen
Totally, totally. Absolutely. And I think that that’s the other piece that when we created the matrix, that was a big part of what we wanted to see in the matrix, co working space that you could show up in your pajamas if you needed to, because you were up all night with a puking kid and say, you know, I’m struggling to balance peace right now. And I’m feeling like a failure, because part of me is still in this old model of you show up for your business no matter what. And the other part of me is in this new model that says, you know, it needs to be holistic, and it needs to take into account all the elements of my beautiful life in my heart, and how do I reconcile between those two help, and we all get together and we say, you’ve got this, it’s okay, we’re all in the same boat, and you’re not screwing up and go take care of your kid and come back tomorrow. And you get that extra support around those places where we tend to question ourselves because we are stepping into a new paradigm and we don’t have sometimes the evidence or the proof that, oh, it’s gonna be okay if we do it in this way instead.
Michelle
As always, your message my message is lead from your heart, lead from yourself. And that’s what it comes back to. Thanks for being on the show again today. Karen,
Karen
thank you all for joining us. Thank you, Michelle, and be yourself and do it your way.
Outro
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