Today we are speaking with an award winning business strategist who believes entrepreneurs can grow their dream business while living their dream lives. Racheal Cook is the founder at Rachealcook.com, FiredupandFocused.com, and Your Business Sweet Spot.
Racheal has been able to work 25 hours a week and has built her own dream business while still enjoying her life. She has retired her husband, spends time with her family and loved ones and helps to teach other entrepreneurs do the same. Racheal believes in having clarity in what your life and business need to look like so your dream business doesn’t turn into your dream nightmare.
A Corporate Burnout
Racheal was in the corporate world as a newlywed working and traveling nonstop. Her 75 hour weeks left her only Sundays to spend with her husband which didn’t end up happening as all she wanted to do was sleep. With burnout on the horizon and surrounded by people whose personal lives constantly suffered, Racheal forged off from her cushy consulting career onto her own path. She identified a few things that she initially wanted: freedom, travel, flexibility, and children. Knowing she did not want to make money at the expense of her life, Racheal got clear on her direction before she set off on her future path.
Building her own dream life:
Racheal suggests moving from the fancy stuff on the vision board to figuring out what those items actually allow you to feel. For example, instead of waiting to spend time in her million dollar dream home on the beach, she can spend more time at the beach right now. Finding ways to allow yourself to feel pieces of your dreams while you upgrade your life in the meantime creates more balance and helps you find clarity. When things seem so far ahead of where you are, it’s hard to picture the path to get you there whether it is in life or in business.
When she first got started, Racheal kept looking for opportunities that opened up right in front of her. She had always worked with larger businesses but when a yoga teacher asked for her help, she agreed and wound up working with more and more small business owners and ultimately, female entrepreneurs. Listening to what the audience she has built along the way has wanted has allowed her to serve her community while also finding success. Rachael states that cocreating her services with those that she serves has really been beneficial in her business.
Racheal credits her success in part two main things:
- Creating Consistency. We live in a stop and start entrepreneurial world. Showing up to your community only when you sell something is not serving your people. Pick an avenue to show up for them and make sure you do it on a consistent basis
- Reach out and Build connections with people. Pick one outreach strategy and focus on it. This leads to connections, community and ultimately opportunities down the line.
Dreaming through the Resistance:
Surprises came along the way including finding out she was pregnant with twins 6 months after starting her new business. From this moment forward Racheal focused on building online through the health challenges her new pregnancy brought forth.
When Racheal was able to retire her husband and he joined her in the business, after a quick excitement period they hit some initial struggles in their transition. Not just in just learning how to work together but in navigating their personality types and needs in this new set up. There is always a trade off to the big decisions they have made but Rachael credits this move as allowing herself and her husband flexibility and to spend more time with their children.
What makes her unstoppable
Stopping is what Racheal feels makes her “unstoppable”. Rachael builds breaks into her business. Knowing the importance of rest, she schedules unplug days to disconnect and comes back refreshed. If you are running at a fast pace all of the time, you will burn out before the marathon is over. All of the items that stress you out as entrepreneurs are self imposed things. All expectations can be moved to allow perspective to adjust and adapt.
Sometimes we forget that there are ways to take the stress off. We set the bar extremely high and sometimes we need to find and enforce those ways to make things easier on ourselves.
For a chance to win one of Racheals books, Fired Up and Focused or Your Business Sweet Spot, leave a comment below with your biggest takeaway from this weeks episode.
outlineof this episode
- [1:13] Intro to this episode with Rachel Cook, award-winning business strategist.
- [2:19] Rachel’s story – Why and how she left the corporate consulting world and became an entrepreneur.
- [5:45] How a vision board and a desire map can help you reach your dreams sooner.
- [11:34] Engaging with people in every part of the process is key to turning your business into a successful reality.
- [14:24] What is the best way to build up your audience?
- [17:44] How Rachel dealt with the unexpected challenges in her entrepreneurial journey.
- [22:47] Why being stoppable can make you unstoppable!
- [28:30] Lightning round.Golden nuggets of business advice and resources from Rachel Cook.
- [30:59] How to enter the competition to win one of Rachel’s books.
Resources& people mentioned
- Racheal Cook’s Website
- Racheal’s Fired Up and Focused Challenge
- Book: Your Business Sweet Spot, by Racheal Cook
- Book: Fired Up and Focused, by Racheal Cook
- Book Profit First by Mike Michalowicz
- Book: She Means Business, by Carrie Green
- http://www.groove.co/
- Animoto.com/business
