Ep #254 How to Manage Fear + Setting New Standards

Are you feeling some fear (or heightened anxiety, worry or overwhelm) - being an entrepreneur is not easy stuff, but I share with you my experience of coming back to the US and what tools I used to work through my fears. I also share with you an amazing practice to implement this fall to become who you want to be to succeed at the next level of your business. What three new standards will you set for yourself to become the entrepreneur you want to become?!

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Transcript

Sari  0:00  
Welcome to your Food Business Success. This podcast is for early stage entrepreneurs in the packaged food industry ready to finally turn that delicious idea into reality. I'm your host Sari Kimbel, I have guided hundreds of food brand founders to success as an industry expert and business coach, and it's got to be fun. In this podcast, I share with you mindset tools to become a true entrepreneur and run your business like a boss, interviews with industry experts to help you understand the business you are actually in, and food founder journeys so you can learn what worked and didn't work and not feel so alone in your own journey. Now, let's jump in. 

Sari  0:48  
Hello and welcome back to the podcast. I am so excited to be with you guys today. I've been like giddy thinking about recording an episode, because it's been a while. The last episode I did was back in August with Jane Hamil, which was really fun, and that was impromptu. I was not planning on recording a podcast in August. You guys know, I was taking the whole summer off, and I am back in the US. I'm back in Denver, actually, just quick update. I'm on my last week of house sitting. I actually moved back into my place that I rented out for over a year. I have not had a home like a place I can return to on this year of adventure, I have had a tenant in my place, and so I've been bouncing around, doing house sits, staying with my stepmom, staying at friends, Airbnbs. It's been an interesting journey, for sure. So I'm feeling really good. It does feel really great to be back in my home area, to connect with friends and family, and frankly, to be able to read all the packages, especially grocery shopping. Grocery shopping was really hard in France for me, because I am particular. I do, you know, want clean labels, and even though the EU does have stricter rules around some of the things that I care about. It was still hard, you know, I was like, what? Is this even the thing that I want, and then what's in it? And, you know, and then the pricing, and they didn't really have, like, a local thing, other than when you go to the farmers markets, of course, which I tried to do often, but yeah, grocery shopping was actually one of the harder things. And I didn't have a car in when I was in Europe for the most part. And so I was I would walk to the grocery store, or I'd walk to the farmers market, which was great, but it was still a 10 to 15 minute walk. And so every time I went into town, I was always like, thinking about, okay, what do I need? And, you know, the way that the French and Europe in general eat is like eating fresh and, you know, maybe only shop for a day or two. But it was really hard, because I think my brain was always thinking about food and shopping. And, you know, I would go into town, walk into the centralville, and then I always had to go at the grocery store and, like, get a couple waters, or, you know, pick up this thing, or, and, you know, and then you have to carry everything back. So it was really nice to be able to get into my car, which I missed so much, having that freedom of movement and drive to the grocery store, get as much as I wanted. I could get the six pack of sparkling water and be able to read all the labels and converse with my cashier. I told her I was like, this is amazing. I feel like so grateful to be able to understand everything that's going on around me and then to be able to drive home. So lots of amazing experiences, of course. And as all adventures go, there was some things that were really challenging, living in another country and time zones and culture clash and all sorts of interesting things along the way. But I have to say, I am feeling so refreshed, so energized. I am so excited to come back with more energy, with more you know, wisdom and AHA and focus for you, for all of you who are starting, launching, growing and scaling your packaged food business. And as I mentioned, I am house sitting and hopefully a the chair squeaks a little bit, so hopefully I won't squeak too much, and I have a dog up behind me that you can't see, but Gwen is behind me, and hopefully she just had, like, a major shaking moment. And I was like, okay, pausing the podcast for a minute, so hopefully we can get through this without too many breaks from chair squeaking and from dog noise, general dog noise. So today I wanted to talk with you about a couple things that are on my mind as I re enter reality. I definitely was intentionally, to some extent, putting my head in the sand around everything going on in the US and frankly, just in the world. I needed a little break and a reset, and I noticed some things coming up for me, both good and bad as I was coming back into reality. 

Sari  6:04  
So the first thing I want to address is I noticed myself starting to get pretty anxious, and there was, like, a lot of fear coming up and even coming back, being back for a week now, I've noticed myself in just that feeling that a little bit more in my body and noticing some of the anxiety and the fear that's coming up and whatever your political bent is, there's just no question that you know, there's a lot of change, a lot of upheaval, a lot of things that people are disagreeing about, let alone the economy, and it can be really scary as an entrepreneur, right? Because you have the power. I mean, the good side of an entrepreneur is that you have the ability and the power to affect your income. And we also are, you know, at the mercy to some extent of circumstances, right? And when people are feeling afraid, when there's a general feeling of fear, they tend to clamp down on their budgets. And so I was feeling some fear about like, is anybody going to be starting a food business? Does anybody actually want to grow it? And you might be having a lot of fear when it comes to things like supply chain price increases, or maybe you're starting to see a decline in sales, right? Or your margins are shrinking, or it's harder to find the support that you need, or it could be that ripple effect of other businesses struggling as well, and I just want to acknowledge that that is the reality that we are in. I want to say I let myself feel all the fear. I had one day where I was just like, I'm just going to feel this, right? I'm going to not try to get myself out of it. I'm just going to let myself be a little crazy in the fear, because this is what's going on for me. And so without trying to, like, exacerbate it, I just was, like, in it, and I was trying to recognize, like, what am I really afraid of, right? So if you are feeling some of that fear, and you might not even recognize it as fear, but you might notice that your anxiety has gone up, or your worry, right? Worry can be kind of a byproduct of fear that goes on attended to. So if you find yourself worrying a lot or not sleeping well, or you're making rush decisions based on scarcity, and you're having like, really big reactions to things. That's oftentimes coming from fear, and so if that's you, if you like, yeah, I've been feeling that. Then I want to encourage you to, instead of trying to push it down and run away from it, I want you to turn towards it. Give yourself a little space to say, okay, I see you. Is it fear? Let's dance, right? Let's have the conversation. Let's actually identify what it is I'm actually really afraid of, like, I talk about as a coach going to the worst case scenario, like, take your brain there. What are you really afraid of? Because on the surface level, you might say, well, I'm afraid of my prices going up, or I'm afraid of losing margin, or I'm afraid of losing customers. But like, dig in a little bit deeper, because the there's a bigger fear that's probably underneath there. So name it. Write down what you're actually really afraid of. Get deeper. Don't be afraid to say, okay, and why am I afraid of that? Why that, right? Like go in a little bit deeper, and then I think, really leaning into self compassion, and that is that you're actually letting yourself feel the fear. You're letting yourself feel the worry, the anxiety, whatever is coming up for you without judgment, without trying to make it go away, they'll be like, yeah, but you shouldn't be feeling that,  right? You can't be feeling that right now. We don't have time for that. Like, that's not helpful, because when we are sitting with fear, and even if it's a low grade fear, even if you're, like, shoving it down or, you know, it's just like that low grade worry, that just kind of under the surface, the reality is that is going to be affecting your decisions, and not in a good way. And so we need to turn towards it. We need to see it and allow ourselves to have some compassion. 

Sari  10:55  
I like to talk to myself like I am a two year old, and it's that I see you, I believe you, I hear you, I know that's really hard. It's hard to feel so afraid. That's really scary, like that's how I talk to myself when I'm having those moments. When I'm feeling the fear, because I know that if I make decisions from that place of fear, if I take action from there, that is not my highest and best actions, that is actions and decisions that are coming out of scarcity. They're coming out of fear. They're coming out of a lower brain power and a lower energy, right? It's not going to be what is in my client's best interest and in my best interest. And so really, the first step of like getting through the fear is actually turning towards it, right? What's that saying that the way out is through? There's no getting around it. It's like, let's go in a little deeper. See it, feel it, offer yourself compassion, so that on the other side, we can lower our fight or flight and fear responses so we're in a better state of mind, right? Our energy, our mental capacity, like physically, we need to bring more calm, more safety on board. And as a life coach, and a coach that uses a lot of different tools and a lot of different, I pull from a lot of different teachings and dogmas and different things, I really lean into stoicism when I start to feel the fears coming up, right? And it could just be even that daily, like you check the news and you notice, you know, that anxiety start to come up. And so I highly recommend the daily stoic leaning into some Orion holiday stuff. He's got a great podcast. I literally read the Daily Stoic every day. There's a chapter every day, and that's really helpful. The idea that like, what is in my control is where I want to spend my energy, right? And looking at the fears and what's going on around me, and not getting swept up in all of it, but saying what is in my power to change, to manage, and the rest is letting go of it, because that is, it's kind of, what's that saying? Like, there's my business, there's your business, and there's God's business, and there's a lot of things that are out of my control. We start to feel out of control, right? And more worried, more afraid, when we are trying to control everything around us, and so much of it is not within your power. 

Sari  14:04  
So what I did when I was feeling it, after I went through the emotions, is I got really concrete with, okay, here's the fear I'm having, here are the fears I'm having. And I started to, like, dig in and say, is that true? Like, even just putting numbers on a page, right? You know, because my fears are always like, I'm going to, you know, lose everything and end up in a van down by the river. I somehow, that's always my go to. I haven't had that in a while, so it was interesting. It was coming up for me, but that feeling of like, I'm going to lose it all right, and then I'm going to be seen as a failure, and somehow I'm like, completely abandoned by all my friends and family. And looking at it and saying, is that true? Is that really going to happen? Putting some numbers around it was actually really helpful, because ultimately our two year old toddler brain, we have a part of our brain, that primitive brain, that is, all it's looking for is safety and security. And so by getting concrete with it and saying, well, here's my bills, here's the money I have, and as an entrepreneur, here's the potential, right? And kind of getting excited about, well, what's possible? Because as an entrepreneur, I have endless potential and possibility to bring in more revenue. So where can I affect that, right? So I got kind of into the weeds of it, so it was a great way to show that toddler self, that, you know, two year old self, that was throwing a fear tantrum that, like, I got us, right? You're safe. And if you need to post that on the wall, if you need to say, like, here's how I would deal with the worst case scenario, and here's some milestones, at least, like, I want to give myself some runway to go create, not out of fear, but out of excitement, out of possibility, out of being in, you know, my zone of genius and offering my contribution to the world. That's where I want to create from. And so I need to, like, appease and calm down that two year old fear brain of mine. And so that was really helpful to say, that's things I can control, right? I can look at my finances and say, oh. And you know what's so funny is, like, when I did that, I was like, oh, it's fine. I'm good. I got this, right? But there was a whole story there about, like, oh my gosh, you just wasted all this time. You waste all this money in Europe, right? And you weren't being responsible, and you're going to lose everything. And that was the story that was going on. But the reality was, when I looked at it, I'm like, that's not the reality, that's not true. And are my friends and family going to abandon me? No, absolutely not, right? Maybe some of them will, I don't know, but the majority of them won't. And I could come back from anything. That's that resiliency that we have to cultivate as entrepreneurs, and so I lean into stoicism, especially when I feel like the everyday fear, the worry about things I hear in the news and whatnot. And I'll be honest, I still like, now that I'm back in the States, I still like, really monitor, and I am very careful about how much I let in, because my energy can really take a nosedive if I allow too much in and certain times of the day, which is actually going to lead me to the second half of those podcasts. So let me wrap up with fear, because I just wanted to address that. I wanted to offer some really simple tools around turning towards the fear, speaking to it with kindness, and practicing self compassion, and then getting really concrete and like, what's in my control and what's not in my control, and not even that. Like you have full control, but you have the ability to affect change. Where is that in this situation? And getting really concrete with that, and then that's where you put your energy. Because think about all the energy that is wasted. Imagine you have a battery for the day, like, here's how much energy I can put into work and family and friends and, you know, just living if you are spending so much of it worrying and in anxiety or overwhelm, that's a lot of juice that could be going to positive things. That could be going to things that are actually in your control. I had a coach that used to say, worry pretends to be necessary. And I love that, because I often, I don't spend a lot of time worrying, although I have to say, on the year of adventure, there was maybe a little bit more. But I kept coming back to that, okay, what can I control? Where's the holes here, right? What do I What can I plug up in this boat of mine, this year of adventure, right? That, like, where can I make sure there's clarity? Who do I need to reach out to? What list do I need to make? And anytime I did that, I always felt more grounded, more safe, and then I was able to proceed, right? And so I'm just doing the same thing now with my business, I want to help you do the same thing as well. So after doing that work and getting into first, maybe more of a neutral place where I wasn't afraid, but then recognizing when I had some energy that was feeling really excited. I was like, I can't wait to come back, to be really present with our members and with people in our programs and on the podcast and all the ways that I get to show up. And we're actually doing a sales channel challenge. We're doing another one, a live version, in October. And so I noticed when I had moments where I was feeling excited, I would like, okay, let's get into this. Let's get excited about what's coming up. What's the potential here, what's the possibility. What am I excited about? And so I think fall is such a beautiful time to have that renewal energy, that reset, coming back and creating new routines for yourself. And it was just perfect timing to be coming back from this year of adventure, to be coming back and getting back into work. And so as I thought about what was possible and what I was excited about, I started thinking about who did I need to become? What identity is this person, right? And there were a couple of things that I recognized that I'd maybe let slip a little bit, or I was just giving myself permission to indulge in living in Europe. But I recognize that for me to create what I really want this year and to go big in this fall, the last four months of the year, that I needed to step into a new identity. So I got clear on my vision, and then I started to say, what's the identity that I need to change, or who do I need to become? 

Sari  21:44  
And I've talked about this before. This isn't new, but I think it's such a great time with fall and that fall reset energy to say, okay, what is my goal for the end of the year? We did a full worksheet and a class with this in our Master Your Business course. And it was so fun, because it's like setting that, what are my 10x goals? Like, if I could 10x my year, let's go for something big, right? Let's not just go for like, well, that'd be cool. I can, for sure, hit it, but like, Let's go bigger, right? Let's, let's amp it up a little. Let's get some excitement in there. And then, who do you need to become? So, as I thought about my vision and this person I wanted to become, and who was this, you know, this 10x sari that was like on fire in food business success and in my other coaching programs, and, you know, in my other businesses. Because, you know, I can't just have one business. So, so I was thinking about like, who do I want to be? So I recognize that the identity of the woman who I needed to become woke up every day and was lit up, was excited, felt amazing, was in her best physical body, and like, physically felt good, and emotionally felt good, and was like showing up in service. And I also recognize, and this is a little hard to explain, because it's like, I know it's all the same person, but there's a part of me that wanted to fall back on the grind of it all, and like, push, push, push, and the hustle of entrepreneurship and my identity and my for my vision of who I want to become at the end of the year that I recognize that I am a woman who creates more value, creates more wealth, creates more revenue, but doesn't hustle that doesn't burn out, because I've been on that road and I don't want to do it again.

Sari  23:52  
So I was thinking about, how does she behave? How is she acting in the world? Like, what kinds of things am I doing if I am a woman who is showing up, who's on fire, who's feeling amazing, healthy, you know, emotionally, spiritually, mentally, physically, all of that, not perfect. I want to say no perfection here, but feeling all of that and is also not hustling. So you can't get there all at once. You can't eat the elephant all at one time, right? It's a process. But what you can do, and this is what I am doing, is choosing three standards to live by, to shift, to change. So using fall energy to say, what are some new habits, some new ways of being, some routines that I want to implement, that raise the standard and get me closer to becoming that identity. So for me, I will share mine, my three standards that get me so much closer to her is that, first of all, I am not drinking. I gave up drinking. I am becoming a woman who does not drink, who prefers not to drink, which, if any of you know me, that's kind of a big deal, even though my drinking has become a non issue in the last few years, but coming a lot off of my 50th birthday, I knew that this identity shift was coming, and it was actually really scary, because I'm like, who am I if I don't have, you know, enjoy wine or, you know, enjoy a nice cocktail or something, but I'm coming at it from a place of more just curiosity and like, well, who am I if I don't? Who am I if I sleep amazing, because I don't ever consume alcohol, right? Like, and it's not the thing. But there is the experience of going through becoming the woman who does not drink. And it's not forever, either. I said I'm going to do this for a year, and so it's been an interesting experience. Or, you know, I've been not drinking for a little while now, and I even went on a date in France, which was really weird to not drink, and I had to tell him ahead of time, because, you know the French. What are you talking about? So but I'm adjusting right, and I'm really proud of myself for choosing that, because it was the hardest thing for me to choose. It was the one that I've been dragging my feet on for a very long time, but I knew that it was coming, so I'm embracing it, and I'm being super curious about it, and enjoying feeling really good. So the alcohol was part of it, and then I am just raising my standards around my diet, no more gluten, no more like just cleaning everything up. I'm off of coffee for a little while. I just want to see how it affects me and kind of reset my energy. And you know, now it's in Europe, I ate a lot of almond croissants and had a lot of coffee, so that's okay. That was amazing, and now I'm back, and these are things I can control, and these are things that are making a huge difference in my energy and my sleep. And then I'm like working out and really enjoying that, and that's feeling really good. So there's kind of that, you know, ripple effect into all areas of my life. And then the third one is to have more time in the morning. So I talked about wanting to be a woman who is not burnt out and is not hustling. And so I'm an entrepreneur. I get to choose my schedule. And one of the things I really enjoyed in France is that there was an eight hour time difference, or depending on your time zone, but there was anywhere from a guess, a six to nine hour time difference for my clients who are mainly in the US, or at least in North America, I should say, because I do have some in Canada, but I was really enjoying the mornings and not having any interruptions. Nobody was texting me. Nobody was emailing me. I mean, there might have been emails from the day before, but I just I got into some good habits about not checking my phone right away, of like, having some physical movement of reading, meditating and just really enjoying some of that, like there was a luxury of time. 

Sari  28:54  
Now I won't be able to have, you know, I mean, I would get up maybe at, like, somewhere between seven and then eight, sometimes 9am because I was up later working sometimes, but, you know, I wouldn't even start working until like, three o'clock. So I know I won't have that amount of time, but I can take a part of that and I can continue it. And so I am giving myself the space in the morning, knowing that that is so important to set me up for success. That's that emotional wellness, right? That meditation, the reading, the writing, and I'm really making that a priority. I even got a regular alarm clock, like one that's really beautiful, and it turns off like the so I don't even see it at night, and it's just like a normal, regular, old fashioned alarm clock, instead of having my phone next to me, because I'm really committed to protecting my energy in the morning so that the phone is going like in the last week. It's been this way, it's been really great. I've noticed a big difference. So I put the phone, like, charging it away from myself, and I'm not checking it in the mornings, and I'm giving myself, like, a good 90 minutes to two hours where I'm not jumping into emails or phone or any of that. And I think that is going to make a huge difference. That is part of I see that as part of my identity in the future. So with this fall energy, I want to recommend that you identify three things that three standards that you can raise, and new habits or routines that you want to commit to, knowing that how you do one thing is how you do everything, right? So it's not about the thing that you choose. It's about you becoming someone different, right? And so what is it that you need to do, that you want to do, or that, you know, maybe don't want to do it, like the drinking thing for me, I didn't want to do it, but I knew, like in my gut, in my soul, that that was the thing, the next thing for me. That was the next frontier, and that was for me what I needed to do. So it was scary, but I said, yes, right? I turned towards it. Think about for yourself. I would love for you guys to tell me to set your standards, and if you're in Fuel, I'll put a little post in there, and you can tell me what you are doing for the fall a reset, and how you are raising your standards. Or I'll put a post up on social media, and you can share with me there where you are raising your standards, because this is everything. It's not about making some giant leap to becoming that person. It's about doing these small like raising your standards in small ways and becoming a new identity in small increments, right? It's not an overnight leap, all right? That's what I have for you today. It was so fun to be with you today and to record this, and I hope whenever you listen to this, it excites you and you feel some new energy to work through your fears and to raise your standards. Until next time, have an amazing week!