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The business that nearly broke me…

I remember the day vividly. It had been another long week, so long that the days all seemed to merge into one.

My body was done, so exhausted that I couldn’t pull myself onto the bed to get some much needed rest. I fell to the floor, I cried until there were no more tears. In every possible way, I was broken. The life and business that I had built, all of those dreams, had brought me to this.

I was angry, frustrated and exhausted. How could the life I’ve been dreaming about lead to this?

I felt backed into a corner (literally) and I had two options, as far as I could see…

Admit failure and defeat and walk away. Resign myself to the fact that my dreams were only ever meant to be that, just dreams and go and get a job.

Or keep digging deeper and deeper, ignoring how ill it was making me and just keep pushing through.

In my heart of hearts, I knew that neither were an option.

What was once a roaring fire, may have turned into a flicker of a flame, but that inner yearning, the longing to make a difference, the desire for more, was still there. And no matter how bad it got, I couldn’t deny it. I couldn’t walk away from the essence of my soul. I had battled too much and fought too hard to keep it.

But neither could I just keep going. I’d been in this cycle for nearly two years, slowly getting worse, the meltdowns becoming more regular. I was so tired in every way. But I also couldn’t see a way out.

So I gave in. I literally surrendered myself to whatever is out there. After all, I didn’t have enough energy to think anymore. 

It was in that moment, when my body was weary and my mind empty, that a single thought entered my head…

“It’s your business, do with it what you want.”

And then, like a thousand lightbulbs going off in a single moment; every decision, every thought, every moment that led me to this place became breathtakingly clear.

One of those lightbulbs took me back to school. 

I always loved learning. I was a curious child, eager to know everything about everything. I would spend hours in conversations with my mum, our heads in books researching my latest round of questions. For that reason, I excelled at school. Academia came easily to me, I could hold my own in sports and could turn a few heads too. It was during my time at secondary school, I took on a belief that would lead me to that crushing moment years later;

‘I am too much. I need to dull it down a bit. I need to be less than..’

I learnt kids can be pretty cruel, that the jealousy of others feels like daggers in your back. That the price of ‘having it all’ just wasn’t worth the loneliness.

So I didn’t get the predicted straight A’s in my GCSE’s. I got what I needed, but not what I was fully capable of. I toned down my hair, make-up and clothes. I distanced myself from so many things. I made my world so much smaller.

But here’s the thing when it comes to our soul-filled longings…they don’t just disappear. We can try to bury them, hide them, lock them away, and yet they still remain.

I would spend hours researching entrepreneurs and setting up businesses. I dreamed of one day having the freedom of my own business.

And whilst I did eventually make that leap into the unknown and start my own business, little did I know that the embedded belief above would keep me struggling for so much longer than I needed to.

I know it’s part of human nature to want to fit in, and it’s natural that when we are starting something new to look to those who have done it before, and make use of their advice and guidance. But after my total meltdown on the floor that night, I realised that I had been so focused on ‘fitting in’ of doing it the way everyone else does, of trying to grow whilst keeping myself small- that I had almost totally distinguished my own light. I was so utterly exhausted because I was living out everyone’s else’s vision, not mine.

The thoughts in our own head always fascinate me. Throughout those years, to the outside world, I was the smiling, happy Debbie everyone knew. And yet I felt like more of a fraud than ever. Looking back now it’s no surprise really, I wasn’t being the real me.

Another of the lightbulbs took me to the heart of the sheer intensity of the emotions I was going through that fateful night.

I’d been in this place once before….

This is the first part of my book I’m currently writing, but I wanted to share it with you because it’s the unspoken part of business.

Too often we struggle and don’t reach out because we believe we’re the only ones feeling this way. That’s one of the many lies we tell our-self. It just isn’t true.

If this story resonates for you, and you want your own breakthrough, I’d love to help you achieve this.

Book a free consultation below.

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