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January hits and suddenly everyone is shouting their goals, signing up for everything, and sprinting straight into burnout. But loud doesn’t equal strategic and busy doesn’t equal growth. If you want this year to feel different, it has to be different, starting with how you move before the chaos kicks in.

In this episode of The Real Truth About Business, Michelle shares three grounded CEO decisions to make at the start of the year that protect your energy, expand your capacity, and keep you focused on what actually matters. From building quietly instead of performing online, to doing the internal work required to receive bigger goals, to setting real calendar boundaries, this episode is your permission slip to slow down, get intentional, and lead your business instead of reacting to it.

Whether you’re a coach, consultant, OBM, VA, designer, copywriter, or ADHD entrepreneur, this episode will help you start the year with clarity, restraint, and CEO-level decision making instead of overwhelm.

You’ll learn:

1. Why you don’t need to build your business out loud to be successful
2. How capacity and safety to receive impact your ability to hit bigger goals
3. What subconscious and somatic work has to do with business growth
4. Why saying yes to everything kills momentum and clarity
5. How to protect your calendar so there’s room for clients, creativity, and life

This is the real truth about business growth, especially for neurodivergent service providers who crave clarity, structure, and results without falling for every trend online.

Links referenced in this episode:

1. Join the Sunday Morning Brew!
2. Check out the Focused Visionary Accelerator!

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Here's your Next Steps:

1. Take the "Where's the Gap in Your Business Strategy" Quiz
2. Connect with Michelle on LinkedIn, Instagram, Threads or Facebook
3. Visit my website to learn more and apply for the Focused Visionary Accelerator
4. Sign up for my newsletter - Sunday Morning Brew - delivered every Sunday at 6 am

About the Host:

Michelle DeNio is a business strategist and growth advisor for service-based entrepreneurs, especially neurodivergent and ADHD business owners. Creator of the Focused Visionary Accelerator and host of The Real Truth About Business podcast, she helps clients simplify, focus, and grow sustainably. With 15+ years in business operations, she’s known for turning big ideas into simple, profitable action plans.

Hey.

Hey.

Welcome back to the real truth about Business.

Happy New Year.

I am so excited to be here with you guys.

And back, I believe we are entering year five of the podcast.

I can't remember.

So, yeah.

Holy crap.

Year five of podcasting.

I appreciate you.

I'm so grateful that you are here.

And today I want to chat with you quickly about January.

Right?

We're just gonna have a really quick conversation about the new year and how we're entering the new year and the things that we are going to do and not do before life freaking gets crazy and we are just reacting to every single thing.

Okay, so this one's just a little bit of a, like, hey, we're not doing that this year.

Okay.

All right, so if you're ready, we're diving in.

But real quick, before we dive in, if you are not on the Sunday Morning Brew email list, the newsletter, jump into the show notes, get on the list, because I am now sending out every single week.

You are going to get a CEO power move of the week.

All right?

And so this is your dedicated CEO time.

It's one action, one thing that you can do in your business that is going to move the needle, that is going to help you to step into and own the role of CEO in your business.

Make some moves, take quick action, and start to see the results that you're desiring.

This is all about being proactive, not reactive.

So if you are not on the Sunday Morning Brew newsletter list, jump into those show notes, hit pause, sign up, and make sure you're on the list.

Okay, now that we've got that out of the way, let's talk about January.

Okay, so everybody, I mean, there's a lot of excitement always, always, always going into a new year.

Always.

There's, like, I'm seeing posts all over threads all over Instagram, whatever Facebook, whatever social media platform you're hanging out on.

Okay?

And I'm here for it.

It feels a little bit more intentional.

I'm just in this mode of, like, I just want to take action and show everybody what's happening.

I don't want to talk about it, right?

And so there's that.

There's.

There's that.

I.

That was actually number three on my list.

But let's talk about that first, is that you get to build quietly, okay?

So, like, if you are kind of like scrolling social or not, and you're seeing and feeling like this imposter syndrome or you're feeling like this comparisonitis is, you know, starting to kick up or any of that.

Like, I just want you to know that, like, you don't have to share all your freaking goals in your every waking move in order to be seen as an expert and an authority in your business, right?

Like, I'm not sharing any of my goals.

Inside of the Focus Visionary Accelerator, we created bingo cards, which was so freaking fun.

And I have it sitting here right next to me.

And I looked at it again, like, and it is helping me to stay so laser focused on the things that I want to achieve, and it's so freaking exciting.

But, like, not sharing that, okay?

Like, those are my goals, my intentions, the things that I want to achieve, and I'm going to do them and I'm going to take action on them.

But I also don't need to tell everybody about them, okay?

I don't need to tell everybody my revenue goal.

I don't need to tell everybody when I hit my revenue goals.

I don't need to share any of that, okay?

Like, I'm just kind of over it.

Like, to me, I'm kind of like, can we grow up?

Like, can we grow up a little bit?

Do we really need to keep sharing this?

Because this is just not.

Like, this isn't what business owners do outside of the online space.

If you, like, are you going to your local, like, coffee shop?

I think about all the little local.

There's, like, a little downtown area here in Venice and in Sarasota.

They're not sharing that.

You know what our goal is this year, right?

Like, it's just, like, it's.

It's not really an accepted practice in any Other business.

And so I don't know.

I'm just at this point where, like, I'm just not playing it.

I'm just not playing into it this year.

And I have my goals, I have my things.

And so I just want to, like, give you that permission to.

Not that any of us need the permission, but sometimes I feel like we need somebody else to say, like, yeah, you don't have to freaking shout your goals from the damn rooftops in order to, like, actually hit them.

Like, you can celebrate them.

You can have them and not have.

And not feel like you need to share them.

Or maybe you share them with like, the people privately.

Like, again, inside of the Focus Visionary Accelerator, all of us, we were on a group call and we were sharing all of our goals together and we were encouraging and helping other people, like, think of other goals.

A lot of it was centered around, like, just personal things too, right?

Like, not just business about.

We inspired each other.

I think I shared this in the Sunday morning Brew about how one of my goals is to make two new friends just because, like, I have all of you Internet besties, but, like, where I don't have a lot of besties here in the local Florida area.

And so, like, you can share those things in the communities and in the spaces that feel safe, right?

In the communities, in the spaces that feel in alignment for you.

Shouting them into the void of social media is not necessary.

Okay.

So find the spaces that feel safe, that feel supportive, that feel comfortable for you to really share those goals if you want to.

But also know that you can keep them kind of sacred and that's okay too.

And I posted about that on Social.

I'll drop the link in the show notes to that post just because I think it's.

I really do think that there's more of that that needs to happen this year.

Okay.

Just a little bit more of that.

Like, let's just keep things to ourselves a little bit.

Okay, so that's number one.

But number two.

Number two is before you work on all your goals is I want you to really look at.

And again, I am not an expert in this area.

I'm sharing from my own personal journey and I'm sharing from the things that I have learned and the experts that I am surrounded by and the things that I have seen make.

The biggest difference is that if you are not working on the subconscious and the somatics inside of your own body to actually receive and increase your capacity for those goals, it is going to be very hard for you to achieve Them all right?

And so that's the thing I really want you to think about in January is like, what are you doing to feel safe to receive them?

What are you doing to increase your capacity?

What are you doing to move beyond maybe your fear of success?

What are you doing to move beyond those that feeling sometimes of unworthiness or those stuck feelings?

Right?

Like, what is it like, are.

How are you creating the safety for the capacity to increase?

I have really large goals that I want to hit and things that are going to require me to be in rooms that I am uncomfortable in.

We've talked about this.

Going to require me to raise prices in certain areas that again.

But again, I can raise my price on paper, I can talk about it in, on this podcast, I can talk about it.

But if my body doesn't feel safe to hold that, then it's not going to sell.

Right?

And so working on the capacity and the safety to receive, like that is something that I feel is a non negotiable.

Right.

Is like, what is your capacity to receive?

Are you the person that's always saying, no, no, no, I'm all good.

No, you don't have to do this.

Like, that was me.

I could not receive to save my life, no matter what it was.

If anybody asked me, do you need help?

No, I'm good.

Do you want me to pay you back for this?

No, like if I bought something and people wanted to pay me back, I'm like, no, no, no, I got it right.

Like again, there's, there's a level of generosity there, but there's also this ability to just receive for somebody to say, hey, I got this for you, or hey, I'm going to send you this, or hey, I'm going to do this for you.

And for me to just say, okay, okay, right?

Like I worked so hard on being capable and opening up my capacity to receive.

And if you don't work on that, then there's only so much that your body can handle, right?

And so I want you to think about that as you set these big goals, as you have these big plans, as you create this, this vision for your new year, is like, are you set up to truly receive it?

Is your body set up to receive that?

And if not, what do you need to do?

And what type of support do you need in order to do that.

Okay?

And then number three is stop freaking saying yes to everything.

Stop saying yes to everything.

Stop signing up for fucking everything.

Like, seriously, like I already have seen it.

Like, I'm seeing it all the, like again on socials, I've been scrolling threads way more than I probably should have during my downtime, but I was, I really do enjoy that platform, so I do spend a lot of time there.

But I'm seeing people that are signing up for this and saying yes to this and joining this group and joining this community and joining this and setting up this collaboration and set and like they're freaking busy all the way till March already.

And it's like, holy freaking crap.

Like, wait a freaking minute, right?

Like hold up.

Like take a pause before you say yes before you get yourself so over committed.

Okay?

Protect your calendar a little bit, right?

Like go in and make sure that your coffee chat link has some boundaries in it.

One of the things that I did is instead of only having a half hour in between, I have an hour in between all my calls now.

Because you want to know why?

Because 90% of the time I call, run over 30 minutes.

Even though my coffee chat link is set up for 30 minutes, a lot of times it runs 45 minutes or more.

And then I have another call right at the top of the hour and that gives me 15 minutes to get up, get a drink, go to the bathroom, do whatever.

And so now by having an hour in between.

Yes.

Is it going to limit how many coffee chats I have?

Yes.

But is it also going to give me more time to get up and move?

Because also one of the things I'm really focused on this year is making sure my body doesn't freaking hurt so bad.

And part of it not hurting is getting up out of this damn chair, right?

And so when I'm on back to back calls all the time, I can't do that.

I can't get up out of this chair and go walk and get on my walking pad or whatever.

I, I tried the whole walking pad raised desk thing.

I can't do it.

Like my ADHD brain cannot do all of those things.

And so, and quite honestly, I don't want to when I'm on my walking pad.

I just want to walk.

I love it.

Like, I don't listen to a podcast, nothing.

And so I scheduled that in.

I also set it up to where my link, I think it's set up to where I can only book like eight or ten coffee chats in a Month, which I know for some of you that sounds like a lot, but it's actually.

I mean, this is coming from somebody that used to do like eight a week, right?

So I set the boundary in there.

Like, what are you doing to protect your calendar?

Because again, saying yes to all these communities, saying yes to all this networking, saying yes to all of these things, and committing to all of these programs and communities and groups and all of these things.

Like, what happens when you have freaking clients, right?

Like, if you're busy and you're taking on clients, you don't have time to attend all of these things.

You don't have time to be doing all of these collaborations, right?

Like, yes, you need to be have things in place to bring in leads and to do some lead generation and relationship building, but you don't need to do all of them, right?

And like, you need to track the leads.

You need to track what is working.

This is like step four in the Focus Visionary framework is all about understanding what is working.

Where are your people going, where are they coming, how are they coming into your pipeline, really tracking your leads, tracking your conversion rates, right?

Like, this is something that I focus heavily on inside the Focus Visionary framework.

Like, we touch on it, I think, in all eight steps, almost, because it's one of those things of like, what is actually working before you just say yes to everything.

And also, do you even have the capacity to say yes to all of these things?

Like, when is the last time you actually sat down and looked at, like, how many hours you have available, how many hours you already committed, and then really then only then filling in with what you have available?

All right, if you're already in groups that you can't, like, actively engage in, adding more groups isn't going to necessarily bring you better or more leads or more collaborations or more referrals.

What brings in the referrals, the leads, the collaborations, is being engaged, being a community member that shares their expertise, that builds those relationships.

Spreading yourself thin doesn't allow allow you to do that.

So where do you need to maybe go deeper instead of wider and really work with what you already have?

That was something that I really, really worked on because I had quite a few things that I've been looking at and joining and wanting to get into a couple more communities and like, where do I want to put my time and effort?

But the reality is, is like, I'm already in a couple communities that I truly have not been that engaged in.

So I'm like, how can I sit here and honestly tell myself that they aren't working or that they're not worth it when I personally have not put them the time and energy into them.

And so adding more to my plate doesn't help that situation.

It doesn't help it at all.

And so I actually just said no to everything and told like most people, like, I'm not making any commitments right now because I need to really work on at least for Q1, seeing where I have the capacity to even fill in all of these other things.

I just launched out that two day intensive offer which I will link that in the show notes too, as well.

Like it's a fast action, two days.

And I'm trying to like I've opened up my calendar to do two of those a month, which is amazing because I know people want to take fast action.

I know that they're wanting like let's get in, let's dive deep, let's get the strategy, let's find the gaps, fill the gaps, all of those things.

I'm super excited about it.

But I'm also going to need some downtime, right?

Because two days intensive, it is that.

It is what it is.

It's intensive, right.

So I don't want to over commit myself.

So really, I want to really encourage you, like before you start to say yes to all these things, like take into consideration, go back and review, like where did your clients come from, what worked, what communities have you not maybe put a ton of time and energy into that maybe you need to put more energy into, right?

So that just protect your calendar.

Because if you fill your calendar with all these other things, where does that leave room for the revenue generating clients, the revenue generating actions, right?

Like lead generation is great, marketing is great, visibility is great, but it's only as good as the roi.

And again, ROI means something different for everybody.

That's a completely different topic.

But we also have to have the space on our calendar to be able to measure roi.

Right.

So anyway, those are my quick thoughts before as we enter the year again.

I just wanted to share that because I think it's important to just kind of take that minute to pause and really look at these three things.

One, you don't have to build out loud.

You can build quietly.

You don't have to scream your fricking goals from the rooftops.

You don't have to share them with anybody.

And if you do want to share them, find the spaces that feel safest and most comfortable to share them in.

Number two, what are you doing to actually work on the internal ability to receive and expand your capacity.

All right?

What subconscious beliefs, what somatic work needs to be done to.

So that you can actually receive and work towards all of these goals?

Because remember this saying, nothing changes if nothing changes, right?

If you're.

If you came up a little bit short last year, like, look at that.

But also really look at what's internal, right?

Because I had a mindset coach several years ago, and her.

Her statement was always, you can't out hustle your beliefs, right?

So you can't out hustle the beliefs that are holding you back.

So what are you doing and what support do you need to increase your capacity?

And one of the easiest things that, again, that I did that.

That was really a big game changer, was just allowing receiving, right?

That could just literally be receiving from my husband, saying, like, I'll clean up.

Okay, thank you.

Or I'll get the laundry going or I'll run to the store.

Okay, thank you.

Right?

Instead of saying, no, no, it's no big deal.

I'll do it.

I'll get it.

I'll go.

I'll do it, right?

Just saying, okay, when somebody offers to bring something for dinner, when my mom says, do you want to come for dinner?

Yep, sure.

Thank you.

Right?

Like, just being open to the receiving.

All right?

And then number three, stop saying freaking yes to everything.

Protect your damn calendar.

Protect your calendar.

Leave space in it.

Leave room in it.

Leave room for you to breathe.

Leave room for you to think.

Leave room for you to be creative, for you to enjoy hobbies that you gave up.

Okay, I was talking about my bingo board.

One of the hobbies.

I'm really.

So.

Two things.

One, make new friends.

But two, I've been wanting to take a pottery class, but, like, I can't take a pottery class because my freaking schedule was so booked.

So it's like, where can I leave some room for that?

I've been wanting to go to this, like, cardio dance thing, and I've.

They have classes in the morning that I'd much prefer to attend, but I was always booked up.

I was always, like, overbooking my calendar.

I couldn't.

I wasn't.

I didn't leave enough time for travel.

And so it's like, I put those things in my calendar first and foremost, and everything else worked around, right?

Like, build these things in.

First life, then business.

All right?

This is the year we kind of take our life back.

We get back to ourselves.

We do the things that bring us back to ourselves while also getting us the results we want in our business.

Okay?

So those are my.

My little tips.

All right?

I'm.

Not gonna shout it from the rooftops.

I'm just gonna take action, and you guys are gonna watch and see, and I'm gonna share, and I'm gonna bring you along for the journey.

And there's so many things I want to talk about, so get ready.

And by the way, don't forget, if you're not on the newsletter list, go do that now.

Get on the Sunday morning brew list.

The CEO power move of the week is good.

I promise you that.

All right, I'll talk to you soon.