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Hello, everybody happy Thursday. I hope you guys are having an amazing week. When this episode comes out, I will be in San Diego, actually coming home from San Diego. I’m speaking at the social media marketing world event this week, which is exciting. It’s exciting to see events back in full swing. It seems like maybe not full swing before COVID, but pretty much happening at least to being hosted. And this conference has been on my list to speak at for a while. It’s definitely one of the, the bigger, well established conferences in events in the digital marketing online space. And I absolutely love Michael Stelzner who puts it on he’s put it, I don’t know how many years, but a lot of years, it’s, it’s an OG for sure. And I’ve actually never been to it and attended it. Because I have a rule that I only go to events that I’m actually speaking at, unless it was a mastermind, which I’m not currently a part of any.

I made that rule like three or four years ago and it was the best thing I did because you can really, before COVID like travel a lot and go to a lot of events and sometimes you get something out of it. Sometimes you don’t. I always get something out of it when I speak. And I love being on stage and pushing myself out of my comfort zone, which is what today’s podcast is actually about, which doesn’t have to do with me speaking. I’m pretty comfortable speaking now, but it used to be something that I was really nervous and I feel like it is something I wanna continue practicing and getting at. But today on the podcast, what I’m diving into is embracing discomfort. And I was inspired to do this podcast because I am currently and I’ll share as much as I can, but I am currently building a software.

As many of you guys know, I’ve talked about it on the podcast for a while. I have been building it since probably July of last year. And it’s delayed in launching, which I can share those details. Once we do launch, it is still coming. It will be a tracking and attribution software. It’s gonna change the game in terms of how you track, how long people are on your list before they buy, where they came from, your funnels, accurate Facebook ad data and data all the way through the funnel from the Facebook a to them buying, even if that’s like three months down the line. So it’s incredible. It’s coming together. There’s been a lot of hurdles, a lot of hurdles and getting it done. And I am currently having to work directly with a team of developers. And so I am a non, you know, what’s referred to as a non-technical founder.

Like I do not understand at all code how things work in the backend, like how to talk their language, how to explain things and in is extremely challenging. And the thing is you can’t just hire somebody to manage the developers because right now, especially I’m the only one who has the vision. I know what I want the experience to be like for the users. I’m the marketer, I’m the ideal customer. I know what I’m trying to create. So I’m the only one who can really communicate it. And so I have support with like the, the UIUX design and I have the developers, but I’m having to be the communicator in a lot of times. And so I’ve been noticing like, especially in the last month that some big changes have happened, how uncomfortable I am and how I’ve had those thoughts of like, I can’t do this.

Like, what am I even trying to do? I am totally gonna mess this up and I’m totally gonna fail. And those moments where I feel like I am so outside of my comfort zone, I am so like out of the norm of what I know, and I feel like almost stupid, like talking to them because they’ll laugh at me. Like, they’ll ask me a question and I’ll be like, I don’t know. I have no idea the answer to that, but I will find that out for you or I will learn,  , even using like, there’s just, it’s just a whole different world, like using the project management tools that developers wanna use or so one software called JIRA. And that’s what most used to track sprints, which I didn’t even know what a sprint was, which is like, you do a sprint, which is, could be a week or two weeks and you try to get done all these tasks and all this stuff in your software within that sprint.

Like I’ve had to learn. My, my mind has expanded so much since I started making the software, but especially in the last couple of months, because I’m taking over managing the developers. So I was reflecting those moments that I’ve had. And, and really this is the biggest risk I have ever taken as an entrepreneur because when I started my business before all I was doing was just taking clients, I was trading my time. There was no investment. I was, you know, profitable for day from day one because I had no expenses. And I was just getting paid as a contractor to work as a virtual assistant and then to manage people’s ads, you know? And then I’ve gone to grow my team and yes, there’s been risks and there’s been decisions I’ve had to make that are hard 100%, but I’ve never been so far outside my comfort zone where I felt like, oh my gosh, like I could totally fail.

This could not work. And, and then I’m in it for much investment. And I’ve had to have moments with myself, especially in the last couple months where I’m like, I’m not just hanging onto this because I’ve invested money and I don’t wanna let it go. I’m I’m hanging onto this because I believe it is gonna be the biggest thing I ever do. Like I, I have goosebumps saying that because I know that if I can get through this phase that I’m at right now and, and launch it and have this solution that everybody needs, it is going to be huge. But I’ve had moments where I’m like, can I do it? Like if I can’t do it, what if it doesn’t work? What if I invest all this money and I make these decisions and then I have to walk away, like all of these moments.

And a lot of it is coming from being uncomfortable, being outside of my comfort zone, being on these calls with developers, where I feel like the d b person in the room. And I feel like, what am I even trying to do? Like laughing at myself, almost in a fun, you know, in a fun way. I’m not making fun of myself, but I’m like, oh my gosh, I, I am the, I am the person who’s like equivalent to someone coming to me and saying like, what’s Facebook. Like, that’s how I literally feel. And it has been so challenging, but a good to force myself to get to a place where I have to communicate what I’m trying to do as if I’m talking to like a three year old, because these developers, they don’t know like funnels, right? So I’m trying to explain what I’m, what, what we’re building, but I have to first, before they can fully build it, had to get them up to speed with like the why, otherwise you’re not gonna have a good product if someone’s just doing like a task I’m, I’m working with people who wanna understand the goal so that they can make recommendations for me on how we can achieve it better.

But explaining that to somebody who doesn’t live in your world and like trying to merge those two things is extremely challenging. And so what I wanna talk about today is embracing discomfort. And also this is so relevant in your personal life in business with marketing, with everything I’m focusing specifically on being a CEO and doing this and how this can create growth in your company. But I do wanna note, I just read this book. I actually talked about it on a previous episode, maybe like a month ago called the comfort crisis. And I wanna summarize that for you just to get you thinking. Cause I think it was an incredible book. I, I rated it five stars. It was really good. I highly recommend it by Michael Easter. And essentially what I was talking about is that we have today created a life where we’re so incredibly comfortable that we don’t even know what discomfort is.

And we don’t even have to ever go outside of our comfort zone if we don’t choose to, if we don’t actively choose to, like, if you think about people who had to hunt and gather in our ancestors, like they were so far out of what we say is discomfort. Like the discomfort for them was like a hundred times what it even is for us. Like we have food available to us nonstop. We don’t even have to move our bodies. If we don’t want to, we have warm houses, we have all these things. And also every day we kind of typically up level what our comfort level is. And so something that was maybe like comfortable to you a year ago is now uncomfortable for you. So for example, like I used to live in a really small house, right? I to live in like a 700 square foot studio when I started my business and that wasn’t like when I was living in it, I knew it small.

And I knew it was tight with a kid and a baby and all those things. But I was comfortable now as I’ve grown and I’ve increased my success, I have a 3,500 square foot house. If you were to put me back into a 700 square foot studio, I wouldn’t do very well. Right. I’d be really uncomfortable. So our, our tolerance, it is also changing as we grow. And we’re not able to like, unless you force it upon yourself, get to a place where you’re uncomfortable, but most of the time growth happens when you are uncomfortable. And so if you don’t actively make yourself uncomfortable and push for that, you won’t grow. And our brains are not wired for growth. They’re wired for survival. So your brain is going to try to constantly convince you to not step outside of your comfort zone. And so that’s what my brain has been doing.

Like what, for example, with building the software, it’s been saying like, what are you doing? Like you’re doing something so risky and you don’t know what you’re doing. You’re completely outside of your comfort zone. Like go back into your comfort zone, go back and do what’s easy and stop doing this. Like, you can’t do this. You’re gonna fail. And my brain is doing that because it’s wired for survival. It’s wired for saying, no, you need to survive. Which means staying comfortable. But obviously humans have evolved and now we don’t need to do that. And our brains aren’t wired to keep up with growing. And so I also think as an entrepreneur, like, I don’t know if you guys have experienced this, but I’ve experienced this a lot where the average person, like let’s say people that you were friends with before you became an entrepreneur in high school, whatever past friends, people in your hometown.

Let’s just say a lot of people, the, the overwhelmingly majority of people don’t grow. They don’t change. They’re the same person. They were 10 years ago today. They don’t wanna change. They don’t have the drive to do that. Like they’re the same person for the most part. And then as entrepreneurs, for the most part, we have to every single day, basically sign up for being a doom person, stepping outside of our comfort zone and saying like forcing ourselves to grow. Because if we don’t grow our business, isn’t gonna grow. We’re not gonna survive as an entrepreneur. And so I’ve had many experiences where I’ve gone back to, for example, at my hometown, or I have friends that I was friends with in high school. And I’m like, I’m not the same person. I was like, I, I relate 0% to you because you’re the same exact person that you were five years ago, but I’m a completely different person.

And so it’s hard to have relationships when you are that person because you’re constantly changing and growing. And I think that sometimes happens with family, friends. And, and you know, if you’re not that person, it’s hard to have people in your life who aren’t growing and are willing to like become the new person like you are. So on that note, I want to encourage all of you to just first ask yourself, do I embrace discomfort? Like, do I push myself personally, professionally in my business to be uncomfortable. And I force to myself to do this all the time. I take a five minute cold shower every day. For this reason, every day I get up, I work out and I do a 45 minute hard workout. And then I take a cold shower and sometimes I will go out and it’s 30 degrees outside and I’m in the freezing cold.

And then I’ll come in and I’ll do a cold shower. And I gotten it to the point where it’s like, it’s not an option every day. My brain is telling me like, what are you doing? Do not turn the warm water cold. Your face is so cold and n b from being outside. Don’t turn it cold. And I just ignore that and I do it anyways. And what that does is it builds up this mental toughness. This is why I do 75 hard. This is why I four worse myself. When I’m working out, I feel like I can’t do another set. Do one more, like go until you can’t go anymore. And then do a little bit more. And I force myself outta that comfort zone. I do it in business too. I will do things like speak on a stage, could be an example in the past where I was completely not comfortable with it.

And at that point, you have the option to choose what your brain is telling you to do. Don’t embarrass yourself, don’t go up there and expose yourself to that type of like critical eyes or people judging you. You might mess up like, just sit there. Just don’t do it. It’s easier to just not do it. But you have to actively say like, no, I’m gonna do this for some of you. This is probably creating reels. This is doing a live webinar in front of people. You’re uncomfortable. You don’t wanna mess up. You’re afraid, but you do it anyways. So those moments where you are like, I’m worried what people will think, or I’m worried I’m gonna mess up or I’m worried I’m gonna fail all of those things. Everybody has those. Now the differences. Are you somebody who gives into those or are you somebody who chooses to do it anyways, who chooses to show up and do the thing that your brain is screaming at you not to do because you’re afraid of failure.

And so for one second, if you think anybody never has the fear of failure, you’re wrong, everybody is afraid of failing. It’s just a matter of, do you choose to let that stop you or not? And it’s so powerful. If you can continue to build that mental toughness to overcome those feelings. And the other piece that I always ask myself is who is the CEO? I need to be to achieve the goals I wanna achieve. So if I want to become a $10 million business in the next year, what would the decisions be? And what would the actions be that that CEO needs to make? Because I know I’m not that CEO yet. I haven’t gone through the experiences, the challenges, the times where I’m, I’m really,  , challenged and, and have to make a decision to keep going. Like last year, that was that year for me, as you guys know, if you’ve listened to my podcast and I could quit, I could have quit.

And I wanted to, everything in me sometimes said to do that, but I kept going. And so that is, is there. And you have to go through those things to become the CEO of the company that you want. And so if you are not changing, if you’re not changing all, you’re showing up. If you’re not changing how you lead, if you’re not showing, if you’re not changing the fact that you do new things, you try new things. You push yourself outside of your comfort zone, which is going to be different for everybody. There’s sometimes things that one person might feel really comfortable with. And another might not whatever those things are that make you uncomfortable, lean into that, because that is where the growth is happening. And so I want you guys to stop and think every day in your business and really in your life, are you doing things that make you uncomfortable?

Are you doing things that are new that make you learn that challenge your current skill set, and then grow your skillset? Because if you’re not, you are not growing at the pace you could be, which is 100% slowing down your business growth. And so as a CEO, if you are waking up and doing the same thing every day and attending to the same fires and your numbers are staying in the same in place or going backwards, and there’s things that, you know, you should do, you know, you should get on video, you know, you should show up in new reels. You know, you should do a live webinar. You know, that you should write that email that is vulnerable, but really opens up to your audience, but you’re afraid to do it. You know, that you should build that offer that you’re not if anybody’s gonna like it, but you know, it could be a hit, you know, that you should make that decision in your business, that it has risk attached to it.

But what if you fail? What if you don’t, you know, you should spend the money on the ads that you’re afraid of losing all of those things. If those are coming up and then you’re choosing to let those stop you, you, you are the reason that your business isn’t growing and in order to grow, I’m telling you, you have to do things that make you uncomfortable every day. And if you can bring this into your personal life that’s bonus points. And so this book really inspired me, but then also I have been just really reflect, like for me, I’m in a massive season where I’m uncomfortable, I’m uncomfortable every day with building a software. I don’t know what I’m doing. I I’m afraid of failing. I am taking a huge risk. I could completely mess a it up. And I will. I’ve already made mistakes.

I’ve already made like several mistakes that I could. If someone came up and I, you know, I will share all of this. But if someone came up and asked me like, Hey, I’m starting a software. What would you not do? I already have the list for you guys? Like I already have it. And I have to go through that to improve. I’ve already wasted money, a good amount that I’ve weigh, that I’ve learned, but I don’t look at it as a failure. I look at it as I needed to go through those things, to get to where I am today, which is even closer to launching this software, which is even closer to having my a hundred million dollar company. And there’s so much about business. And there’s so much about marketing that often feels scary and unknown until you understand it. Anything new, our brain is like, don’t do that.

It’s new. You could fail. This is not safe. And so spending money on Facebook ads, adding a team member to your team and having a payroll expense, adding a skill, showing up and doing a webinar. If you’ve never done any of those things before, of course they feel, of course they feel uncomfortable. They’re unknown. Anything unknown feels uncomfortable. So push yourself and lean into those things in order to grow. And I want you guys to reflect today and just ask yourself, where am I stopping my growth? Because I’m resisting being uncomfortable or I’m the unknown. And wherever those things are, I want you tomorrow just start taking steps to do those things. Anyways, what’s the worst that’s gonna happen? Like really? What’s the worst that’s gonna happen. You might lose a little bit of money. You can always make money back. You might make yourself look silly.

Nobody’s gonna remember in a week, I saw a post the other day that was like, and Betty White died a month ago. And, and hardly anybody’s talking about it and that’s Betty White. Do you think anyone’s gonna remember when you die? And I was like, dang, that’s good. Like, why do we care so much? Why do we care so much about what people are gonna think or failing or wasting money, whatever it is. It’s like, what’s the worst that’s gonna happen. It’s probably not that bad. And it’s definitely not worth you stopping your growth. Your brain is gonna convince you, it’s the end of the world. That’s its job. And your job is to overcome that. So you can experience the growth. All right, everybody, this is a little bit of a rant, a little bit of lighting, fire into you. And Hey, if you guys try the cold shower, you’ve gotta message me.

Okay. I have people who sign up to work with market like a pro or, or clients. And they tell Andre on my team, like I love Emily, but I’m not doing a cold shower. I think those of you who say that should lean into that and do your five minute cold shower. I am almost on day 400 without missing a day of a five minute cold shower. And I am still not used to it. Like I still am like fighting. I turn it hot. And then I turn it down cold at the end of my shower. And every day I’m like, oh, I just wanna stay in this hot water. And sometimes I delay it like two more minutes and I have to force my, to get uncomfortable, to turn that water ice cold. And I’m telling you a Colorado cold shower, like compared to Texas was a little crazy, but I love it.

I love making myself uncomfortable and constantly pushing myself to grow. Somebody recently asked me, what is your definition of success? And I said, my definition of success is that I’m better tomorrow than I was today. If I’m better tomorrow in all areas of my life. And I won’t always hit this, but if I am doing that, I’m successful. All right, you guys, thanks so much for tuning in today. Send me a message on Instagram at Emily Hirsh. If you love this episode, if you extra loved it, share it for me. Tag me can thank you. And I’ll talk to you next week.

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