In this episode of the Wealth Witches Podcast, host Katelyn Magnuson explores the transformative power of “leaning into discomfort” to drive personal and professional growth. She shares her own experiences, such as the journey of rebranding the podcast and embracing her true identity, emphasizing the importance of distinguishing between discomfort that leads to growth and discomfort that indicates a misalignment with one’s values.

Katelyn discusses practical strategies for managing discomfort, including aligning her work with her energy levels and outsourcing tasks that drain her energy, like email management. By hiring an executive assistant, she has been able to enhance both her efficiency and client experience.

The episode also delves into the value of asking for constructive feedback, even when it’s uncomfortable, as a tool for improving services and fostering stronger client relationships. Katelyn encourages listeners to embrace their authentic selves and make choices aligned with their own values, rather than following the crowd. This episode is a motivational guide for anyone ready to push past their comfort zones and make meaningful, aligned changes in their life.

Key Takeaways

• Leaning into discomfort is essential for growth and self-discovery.
• Embrace your authentic self to create a more fulfilling life and business.
• Outsource energy-draining tasks to improve efficiency and reduce overwhelm.
• Seek and value constructive feedback for continuous improvement.
• Ensure your actions align with your personal values and goals.

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Music credit: Neon Fairies by Wolves 

Hello, and welcome magical creatures to the Wealth Witches podcast.

This is a place where we brew financial empowerment and mix in a little sprinkle

of magic. I'm Katelyn Magnuson, your guide on this enchanted

journey to financial enlightenment. Here, we honor all identities and

invoke our inner witches to create holistic wealth and prosperity. So

grab your crystals, open your minds, and let's get ready to conjure some

financial clarity clarity.

To steal or borrow, we'll say, some

famous words from Sheryl Sandberg. We are gonna be talking about leaning

in, but we're talking about leaning into discomfort on this episode

in business, in life, and, also, I think

trying briefly about sort of understanding

discomfort and what I mean by it because

there's discomfort meaning anxiety, nervousness,

something that maybe you aren't good at, and there's discomfort

meaning a lack of safety or,

you know, something that is irresponsible

or risky. And,

again, definition of risky can kind of vary. So

I want to talk about a couple of real life examples that I have, and

one of them is this podcast. So as I had chatted about

in episode 37 when we were kicking off this new season, this

new version of the podcast as Wealth Witches,

For me, a time when I know that I need

to lean into something, into something that's uncomfortable, but

uncomfortable exciting is when it's something that I can't stop

thinking about. And I'm thinking about it, and I'm excited. I I call

it, like, nerve cited. Right? Because you're nervous, you're excited, you're anxious.

For me, especially in the industry that I'm in, it's like, how am I gonna

be perceived? Like, am I still gonna be taken seriously in the industry?

You know, what about my clients that are, like, not okay with

this? What does this mean? What does it look like for the team if the

team feels like it's weird? And, frankly, it

doesn't matter. A lot of it doesn't matter. I'm

not out here to hurt anyone. I'm not out here to do anything

except show up and provide value and

relatable stories and

be my truest realest self online. And that is what I kept coming back

to. I kept having this push or this nudge

that I was feeling things were

boring. Things were

no. Boring is not necessarily the right word. Monotonous.

Things were monotonous. Things felt routine. And I

kept just getting these little nudges or, you know,

embracing things in my personal life, like having a solstice party,

celebrating the full and new moons, getting to understand, like, my

menstrual cycle and what that meant for my energy levels and how to

work with my schedule, because I kept noticing it started a

few years ago. It's like, you know, I'm really creative 1 week out of the

month. Like, what is this? And then figuring out, like,

oh, that's because it's I still don't even know what the name of the phase

is. I just know that I have about a week out of the month where

I am so much more creative. All of the ideas flow. And without fail, it

seemed to happen that I would have all of my commitments,

time commitments, social commitments, client calls that week. And

so I wanted to be doing these creative things, and I didn't have the time

or the energy by the time I was through my commitments

to do the creative things. And so instead, now I can figure out

and take time for, hey. These are I I have a creative

week. I have a dead energy week, and then I have 2,

I think, term or, like, all normal weeks, like,

medium weeks. Right? And so for me,

becoming aware of that, let me understand that, like, when

I get the these creative nudges on the create like, I can go

take action on them. And so for me, one of the most uncomfortable things

I've done in the last year is rebrand this podcast,

get a tattoo that has crystals in it and

mushrooms and, you know, it was deemed like my witchy corner on the

inside of my forearm. Like, it it's again, it's it's a full sleeve. We

really went bigger, went home on that one, and I couldn't love it more. But

for me, wealth which is and this concept, like, kept popping

up of, like, marrying the holistic

side of things because I'm here to take actionable tangible steps.

Like, what tax strategy do we have? Like, what tax savings are

there? And at the same time, like, we're manifesting.

We're practicing gratitude. We're, like, celebrating the seasonal change.

We're embracing our energy levels. And that felt so much

more genuine to me than just showing up on the

tactical, like, strategic left brain side of business and life

because that's not who I am. I am that and

magic and sparkles and glitter and

astrology. And so for me,

that was probably one of the hardest ones, but I kept I kept having that

nudge. Now there are a few other areas that I have leaned

in to the discomfort, and I encourage you to lean into the

discomfort as well. And there's a couple of different ways that I've gone about it

for these. The one of them is that I will get

really, really overwhelmed by emails.

Not personally, but professionally. We have 2 joint email inbox

3 joint email inboxes or shared email inboxes, and then I have my own

private email. And there can

be times where I can feel so

overwhelmed or maybe I I had all the best intentions. Right? But things were

really busy. And a week goes by, and I was going

to respond to that email. And now it's been a week, and now it's just

awkward. And I keep pushing it off because it's just, like, uncomfortable

thing that's gonna take me probably take me 10 or 15 minutes to do. Right?

But if I wasn't in a quiet place, if I wasn't in a spot where

I could give it the attention that it needed, because that's when it tends to

happen, or if it required additional thought, additional capacity

from me, then I'd put it off for a quiet time or a less stressful

time when I could actually, like, really give it what it needed. And

without fail, that ends up becoming 2 weeks, And

then the person follows up, and then I feel really awkward. And it's just

this whole weird shame spiral. And I've talked

to clients. I've talked to some of my work besties.

Except clients do the same thing to me. You know, where I send an email

and they mean to reply and they don't reply, and then it gets really awkward.

And I've literally called it out to them that, like, hey.

No harm to a fell. I understand what's going on. I can see you opening

my emails. Can we just connect on this? Like, really, truly,

I know how you're feeling. I get the exact same way. But it is. It's

this gross shame imposter spiral that happens.

And so understanding that I can only force myself so

much to reply to them. So I keep inbox 0. So anything in my inbox

are things that need to be replied to or actively being worked on.

And seeing that every day, seeing the email sitting at the

bottom that I need to reply to that it's gonna take more capacity than I

have right now, or maybe I have to get information from someone else. And

it's just that extra effort. So I

short circuited the whole process and hired

an executive assistant to help with emails.

And this is a shameless she didn't even know I'm talking about this.

But Success Beyond is the agency that I

hired, and Jen Bayes is one of my really, really

great friends. She runs it. I was talking to her because I

have a chat with her and Shannon, who does our email marketing for the freelance

CFO. And we're, you know, talking about this and just how frustrating it is. And

Jen's like, you know, I I literally have a team that can help with that.

And I was like, yeah. But it's taxes and, like, accounting and says, there's a

lot of technical knowledge. And she's like, just just think about

it. And I thought about it because I didn't

want to train like, the the thought of taking the time to train someone

else felt can't think of the right word for

it, but it felt like it wasn't going to fix the problem

because they're not me. And that's so like, how many times do we

fall into that line of thinking? Right? They're not me. They're not me. They're not

gonna do it the way that I do it. That's fine.

So what happened is I was connected with Jules

and because I decided to give them a try. And Jules came on,

and Jules is one of the

thirstiest people I have ever met when it comes to knowledge.

He wants to know everything. He wants to understand the why. He's a big picture

thinker. And we spent he came on in May

right after tax season wrapped up. There's always these weird odds and ends and things

that come through. It's been amazing, because I can

tell him, you know, a lot of times if we have too much work for

him, like, I am actively working on emails. But if I get an email that,

like, maybe someone has a complaint or a frustration, I have a

tendency to avoid looking at those. And so he can look at

it. He can help compose a response. I can approve. It can get sent

off. It takes a lot of the executive function or the legwork out

of that entire process and then ends up with

us having a better client experience or a better email experience

because I'm not doing the weird, awkward, shame, spiral avoidance

in looking at an email. You know, there are still times where I have to

go do something or he needs information from me, but he can

communicate that to me. He can ask the questions. And in the meantime, he's learned

so much. There are a lot fewer questions he has to ask. And so for

me, something that is still uncomfortable

has become much more manageable because I brought in help.

And that sort of segues into my next topic here

of feedback, soliciting,

asking for feedback.

This one is tough, but has

been so fruitful. So don't get me

wrong. I want good feedback. Right? I want you guys are awesome. We

couldn't do this without you. This is so amazing. Like, rainbows,

kitten, puppy, sunshine, all of that.

That's great. But that also doesn't tell us how the experience could be better.

And so I have come as uncomfortable

as it is, I have come to really value constructive

or I don't like negative feedback. We don't get

very much negative feedback, but constructive feedback. Because we honestly

truly want our clients to have

a valuable, meaningful experience with us in whatever capacity

they're working with us in. We work with a lot of different people across a

lot of different industries that have a lot of different needs. We cannot accommodate

everything that everyone asks for, but we're always truly

open to feedback. And so for me, getting really comfortable

with asking for reading, replying to feedback.

We ask for all of our bookkeeping clients to provide feedback, or we give them

the opportunity, I should say, to provide formal feedback once a

quarter. And that feedback is, what are we doing well? You know, what would you

rank us? Would you recommend us to a friend? What would you like to see

more of offered? What can we improve upon? You know, like, are there any spots

that have been frustrating for you this quarter? And

a lot of times, again, we get the rainbow fluffy kitten surprise

back, but sometimes we get feedback that, you know, hey,

I'd really like to understand x y z when you're sending reports out,

or I feel like I don't know what's going on with this,

or I'd love to see you offer, more information on retirement

or, you know, things of that nature. And it can be

so helpful. And what's been really kind of lovely to

see is it's uncomfortable. Right? You read this feedback. We go over it with the

team. Like, the team has access to all of this, and

we use it to we review it. Is this

feedback realistic for us to implement? Is it a one off? Are they maybe on

the wrong tier? Because sometimes we'll have a client that provides feedback, and the

solution is, hey. Like, that's what's included in your package. And so

it's clarifying, right, what their services are versus if you

want next day turnaround or you want

calls or you want these sorts of things, like, this is in this package, you're

in this package. Do we need to look at changing offerings? And so a

lot of times, it's clarification. A lot of times, it

is having the conversation of, like, hey. Yeah. We can totally do that. Like, you

know, client wants to see something emailed over, and they want

an email instead of a video. Done. We

can do that. And we had a client that had been really

fantastic about giving feedback, like, constructive feedback.

And within 6 months, her feedback

was, I feel so heard and listened

to because you asked for feedback, I gave

feedback, and changes from that feedback have been implemented.

And I see them, and it's appreciated. And so not only does it

make our services better and more valuable, but our clients feel

like we're not just asking for feedback for fluff. We're not just asking

for kudos. We're not just asking for testimonials. We're not just asking to

feel good. We genuinely care. And so despite it

being something uncomfortable, it is something that is really

valuable. Now, again, that doesn't

mean it's not the customer is always right. It's not everything they

say is gospel. It's

what works within our business model. Where can we accommodate these things? Or

if it's feedback we're seeing across the board, maybe we've changed something, and that thing

that we've changed isn't working. And so I'll give you an

example, not as soon as it's not working yet, but something that we did

is we overhauled our tax system for this year. And

Jill and Jules spent all of this time researching, having sales

calls, and they found a system that they think would be far superior based on

feedback that we had received from clients about the way that we were

doing things. There were some frustrations with, you know, they couldn't

see the documents once they'd uploaded them, which led to a lot of questions, which

led to a lot of follow ups, which led to some last minute things. And

that's not how we wanna be operating. And so we took that

feedback, and we wanted to make something that was better both on our end on

the admin side behind the scenes and for clients while also keeping

security at the top of our our minds because we're working with sensitive documents.

And so we rolled that out to clients, and there has

been a learning curve for some of them. But the whole point is that we're

asking for feedback during this process, and we're saying, hey. We made this

change because this is the feedback we've received from a lot of our clients.

This is what we've done. Please let us know what your experience

is, what things that you could see, you know, that you liked, what things that

you could see that need to be done differently this next year or things you'd

like done differently for 2024. And we'll do sort of

a a post mortem survey for all of our tax clients and

all of our bookkeeping clients, specifically about this new system that we've rolled

out. And that will let us decide or, you know,

make team changes for this upcoming tax

year to, again, always make the process more

enjoyable or for a lot of people less painful. Taxes are painful.

Right? So where can we make it less painful? Where can we make it easier,

again, both for us and for our clients? And so that to me is one

of the reasons why leaning into

discomfort can be so incredibly

important and valuable. And, like, I covered, you

know, there are multiple different ways of leaning into that discomfort and

it may be hiring someone. It may be it may honestly

even be saying, like, I need help. I'll give you a great

example. This podcast has been ready, not this

particular episode, but the revamp, the

new cover, the branding, a bunch of the guest

episodes. We got recorded in Q3 late Q3 and early Q4 of

2023. And then I hit a pausing

point because we changed podcast editors. We had an agency

that did it in 2022, which is the last time I think we'd recorded or

edited an episode. And what happened with that is they made

it really easy to I just dropped the recording in.

The way that this editor does things, there's a little bit of a learning curve.

We don't have a system set up. And so I finally reached out to the

team member that could help with that to help project manage. And I just

said, hey. This is what I have. This is where I'm getting stuck.

This feels really silly. I need help.

And from the time that this is recorded and the time that I asked for

help, it will have been less than a month to the time that this podcast

goes live. So

and by this podcast, I mean, the revamp podcast, not necessarily this episode specifically.

So understanding, like, when you need to do something that's uncomfortable,

when you're not getting something done that's uncomfortable or confusing or that you

just keep hitting this wall, but it's something you want to do and asking

for help. So there's all of these different ways. Outsourcing,

getting help, doing the damn thing, understanding it's something you

want to do because it's something that keeps popping back up. It's something that, you

know, feels really important. I think all of those are

worth paying attention to. I think

where we can fall into some trouble is feeling that we

should do something and doing something, leaning

in to use the term, leaning into discomfort for something

that we don't actually want to do that isn't actually aligned, that just feels like

something we should be doing or something that everyone else is

doing. That's where I think we get into trouble. That's

where, you know, hiring someone that's not a good fit,

not paying attention to your gut or your intuition or

anything else that we wanna, like, pay attention to there and doing something

simply because, well, so and so did it, and they have a multimillion

dollar business or so and so did it, and they work 10 hours a week.

Does it align with your values? Does it align with what you wanna be doing,

how you wanna be doing business, or operating? Right? This doesn't have to be

just business. Like, maybe your neighbor or your best friend

does Pilates, and that is their, like, go to thing, and they're

happy and healthy. Maybe Pilates makes you just want to, like, fall

over and curl up in a ball. Maybe it's not your jam. Maybe it's boring,

but maybe you love lifting weights. That doesn't mean you need to go do a

Pilates class because that's the right way to work out or that's the right way

to move your body. The right way is whatever works

for you and your goals and who you are as a human being. So

making sure that you're getting quiet, you're paying

attention to yourself, and you're acknowledging what

you actually want and sort of divesting that

or separating that from what you feel like

you're being bombarded with or being told that you need to do, you have to

do, you must do this. This is the only way because that is

one of the most bullshit things that I think we are bombarded with both

as business owners and as human beings. There's no one size

fits all. There's no like, your goals aren't the same as

the next person that I talk to. And that means that, like, the journey, the

circumstances, like, all of that can look different. And your values may

be different. So all of that in influences the decisions that you're

making. I just want to encourage you to

identify the areas that you may be avoiding things

that might be making your life more difficult and look at

what can you do. Can you do those first thing in the days, but you're

done with them? Like, I try to answer emails first thing in the

day. The ones that I've been putting off are the ones from the last couple

of days or the ones that, like, need my input on them for Jules in

this case because then it's done. It's not looming the rest of the

day. Because if I let it loom, there's a very good chance that

at the end of the day, I'm gonna be too tired, too stressed out to

whatever, and I'll look at it. Oh, I'll do it tomorrow. I'll do it tomorrow.

So where can you communicate? Where can you hire? Where can you

outsource? Where can you modify how

you operate or eliminate something? You know, maybe

you've been providing a Facebook group that you don't want

to be doing anymore or, you know, some some level of support,

some level of offering, some level of service that you dreads

you dread doing, you dread supporting. Like, you don't have to keep all of the

same things. You don't have to be the same person that you were 3, 4,

5 years ago or even 5 months ago. You know, make sure you're

honoring your contracts, of course, but you can make

changes. You can make adjustments. You can hire support. You can, you know,

bring someone in to run that Facebook group or to help with it if you

really wanna be, you know, continuing it. So getting really

clear about what your values are, how your time is best

spent, and, again, what areas you can be leaning

into to make your

personal life, your business life

easier, simpler, more fruitful,

I think is really invaluable. That's a wrap

for this episode of the Wealth Witches podcast. I hope our magical

money talks have left you feeling empowered and inspired.

Remember, wealth isn't just about dollars in the bank. It's about abundance and

financial freedom in all aspects of your life. I'm Katelyn

Magnuson encouraging you to keep challenging the status quo and embrace your inner witch

on this financial journey. Until next time, stay magical.

Hey there, magical listener. Are you ready to take your financial journey to the

next level? This is Katelyn Magnuson inviting you to join us at the wealth,

which is monthly program where we dive even deeper into the cauldron of

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business support to an inclusive community that's here to support your growth,

we've got everything you need to embrace your inner wealth witch. Visit

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Your wealthier self is waiting.