going downstream with an upstream business - the value of being ourselves part II


It wasn't that long ago, of course I think in evolutions and age myself in dog years now, that I sold things from mall carts because there was no place of commerce called the internet.

(there was an internet of course, but people didn't trust it so much for shopping in those days)

I had to build my business to appeal to the local customer. This is what business makers had been doing for generations.

If I wanted to focus my business on what I wanted to do I had to plant my business in a place the thing I wanted to do was needed.

Or I could try to figure out what was needed in the place I wanted to plant my business (ie the local mall) and focus my business on that.

I couldn't just decide what I wanted to do and do it wherever I wanted to do it - I had to work upstream with an upstream business.

We live in a very different world now.

(although it looks like the internet created this change, what really happened is we changed and the internet was created by us to support our new way of being - this is why we really need to defend what we have created here - if you haven't educated yourself on net neutrality, please do so and take some action to support it)

The stuff I sold from my mall carts had a very broad appeal. It had to. I had to appeal to as many people who came into that mall as possible or I wouldn't stay in business.

This mindset is the reason so many people in business before the internet have so much trouble translating their success to an online business. With 60% of U.S. sales anticipated to involve the internet by 2017 we all need to figure this thing out.

I have a friend who owns a local music store selling musical instruments and supplies. He has been in business for decades and was smart enough to see the internet as a great opportunity. He got in early and set up a website.

It pretty much looked like a one dimensional version of his music store.

This seemed like a good idea at the time (the aisles in his store became sections in his website - he even had pictures of his retail store on his front page) because we really couldn't see how this was all going to work yet.

Of course what happened is his website never took off. Yes, millions of people were buying online, but they weren't buying from him (most of the money made from local stores going online without a doubt went to web designers).

His physical store sales plummeted. Yes, customers still came in to pick the brains of his seasoned staff, but then they went online (and to the big box stores), with its price comparison and Amazon free shipping.

The very internet that was supposed to open up his little business to the world destroyed his retail sales platform because he was selling the same thing everyone else was.

Now he is a very savvy and smart business man and switched his retail sales business model to a service model - he now makes most of his money on music lessons and has become the go-to local place for this. He was able to go downstream and do what we loves in an upstream business.

This works for him because he is a musician and loves music - if he had been just a guy who opened a music store because he saw his town needed a music store he would have been in a whole lot of trouble. Those guys are dead in the water now.

There is not a Happily Ever After ending to this tale however

(and if he really thought it through he wouldn't really want there to be, we came to this planet for contrast and growth after all - the end is never really the end).

His service business model is exhausting. His sales staff do not easily transition to teachers. Some are excellent, some not so much. He is now trading hours for dollars. Even in his little upscale community parents will only pay so much per hour for lessons. Other music stores are making similar transitions. There is more competition all the time. He still has a store filled with musical merchandise and a website that looks like his store. He is swimming in brand new waters.

(and so are we)

Next part III - loosening our grip

why we have to know we're awesome to sell online - the value of being ourselves part I


The challenge with integrating our spiritual life and our business is that in order to be fully ourselves we have to stop catering ourselves to an audience, and of course, our customers are kind of an audience.

They don't eat popcorn and we don't tell them to silence their cell phones

(well, maybe they do eat popcorn - I hope not with any of that fake butter though)

but we are in business to trade value with them - the stuff we make for that stuff in their wallet; the stuff that got into their wallet when they traded their value for the stuff in somebody's else's wallet. We are all in this together after all.

Since Business 101 taught us to figure out our customer, get inside her head - who is she? what does she look like? what does she want?, then cater to that - this is all good solid advice, until it isn't anymore and the truth is - this way of thinking has always made artists a little itchy.

Maybe we quit our day job to fire our boss and now we have dozens of bosses (we call them customers or clients these days) and instead of working for a paycheck we are working for the possibility of a paycheck. We really need to know what the hell we are doing here.

I have had a couple businesses before this one and before that I was in banking. I have made many mistakes over the years, but the one thing I have done right (and this is totally because of the Course in Miracles and my spiritual practice) is this:

I have always seen myself as the primary value in my business or my job. Not the stuff I make, not the stuff I do - because I know these forms can and will change - I know the value is really me.

I know from past experience that when one business winds down I can make another one because I have done it before. Seeing ourselves as the primary value we have to offer the world rather than our makings being the primary value is an important distinction. This works the same way when we have a job.

I have many friends who sell online who are selling less and less because the marketplace is more and more crowded (and other reasons, but this is one of them). They are a little panicky. Many people have turned to teaching and coaching and this in itself is OK and a good thing really - we all teach what we need to learn after all, that's how life works - but the coaching business online is starting to look like a giant pyramid scheme (which is not in any way sustainable) with coaches just coaching people to be coaches! 

(I have to do a post on the proliferation of online coaching and the asteroid/minor planet Chiron - the wounded healer- soon)

So what is the answer here?

We always have to know our ability to make money is in our own hands.

It isn't in our customers' hands or our boss's hands - the money looks like it comes through our customer or through our paycheck. It comes from the Universe (God/Higher Self - we should pick our most comfortable word here because we really need to get this and hold it in a place we vibrate with) - the money comes from Source.

It is like air. We breathe it in. We breathe it out.

The more we try to hold on to money the more it runs through our fingers - and in fact if money is running through your fingers right now, loosen your grip! Spend a little more. Trust that life has got your back!

Some experts advise us to play out worst case scenarios with our fears - they tell us to think of the worst possible thing that could happen if we lose our job or our business and this is supposed to make us see how preposterous our fears are so we can release them -

the problem is that all of us have past life experiences where the worst possible things that could happen to us really did happen to us (and if you don't resonate with past lives, think of your familial ancestry here) and part of us knows this.

How freeing would it be to really absorb into the very DNA of our business that we just have to be who we truly are and trust that the universe will deliver to us exactly the people who will benefit from us and our work and that is exactly what will happen.

(this does not mean we will make a lot of money - it does however guarantee to make us rich)

Part II next week - going downstream with an upstream business

Have a nice weekend everyone - I had a stressful week and it is now 70 degrees and sunny so I plan to be meditating (ie gardening) in the sun as much as possible for the next two days. I had a terrible Vitamin D reading of 16 (!) recently and have decided sun (and supplements) are my friend right now. I will try to do another auto-immune thyroid/hormone post next week. Would love to hear what anyone else is doing.

Also Venus is moving into Aries May 2nd - so this is a great time for us to take any action that brings beauty and love into our world. Will write about that next time!