Practicing Gratitude In Your Small Business
26:13 Share

It helps me, you know, change my mood. Maybe I was a little moody that day. Can you believe it? Sometimes that happens. That's like every day.

Hey everyone, welcome to the SOB Marketing Podcast where we celebrate the SOB that you are and if you haven't figured it out yet, we mean small owned business. We don't mean SOB. Listen, we know that as a small business owner, you are working hard on the daily to keep your business fully operational while trying to promote it. And while some days it may feel like the business is owning you,

If we're being honest with each other, I bet you would admit that you wouldn't give up the insanity for anything. Our commitment here at the SOB Marketing Podcast is to give you the real talk.

what works when it comes to advertising, marketing, promoting your business, and then what doesn't really work. And Chelsea and I promise to always keep the conversation real. Welcome back to another episode of the SOB Small Owned Business Marketing Podcast. I'm here with my lovely, beautiful, little, itty-bitty baby sister, Chelsea.

I'm 26, y'all. I know. I don't know why I always... You're always going to be an itty bitty baby to me. A little housekeeping before we jump into today's topic. Please leave us a review. If you are listening to this, we want to strongly encourage you guys to leave us a review on Apple Podcasts, any platform that you're listening to us. If you're on YouTube,

go ahead and hit that subscribe button as well. We want to be sure that this episode reaches as many small business owners as possible. And the only way for us to do that is by getting reviews. So you guys please help us with that initiative. Also, if you are short on time, we have a chapter that you can scroll down to TLDL, Too Long, Didn't Listen. We highly encourage you to come back and listen at some point. But

That section is going to be where Chelsea is going to wrap up the meat and potatoes of this conversation. So if you are on a time crunch, go there and come back and listen to the entire episode. Chelsea, what are we talking about today? Okay. So y'all, this episode is a little different. First off, happy Thanksgiving because we're releasing it on Thanksgiving, uh,

A little strange because we are not recording on Thanksgiving. It's called podcast magic. Absolutely. So a little different. We practiced gratitude for a couple months and we want to talk about what we discovered, why we believe you should reflect and practice gratitude as a small business owner and just practice

Have this conversation about why being grateful can actually help your small business. So first, let's start off by talking about what the physical practice of this was, Chelsea. We made a point to go ahead and actually bring ideas. And for every

Every meeting, we have a meeting once a week. Every meeting, we had to at least discuss for some portion of that time what we were grateful for. And it wasn't like a, you know, just like a one sentence like, hey, I'm grateful for X, Y, and Z. We actually...

told ourselves we were going to talk about it in depth, right? So the way this kind of looked was every day or every week when we'd have our weekly discussion, Chelsea would say, okay, or should we do our gratitude practice? We'd say yes. She'd say, do you want to go first? Do you want me to go first? And then we'd

We'd kick it off. We'd say, okay, this is what I'm grateful for and here are the reasons why. What I found was it was a really nice opportunity to be able to talk about the stuff that sometimes you don't find super important, right? Yeah, absolutely. I do also want to say we made sure every time that we came up with something different, we actually took the time to think and reflect instead of just saying, okay,

One sentence, like you said, every time I told Vivian, oh, you go first, it's because I hadn't prepared anything. But telling on myself, this experience has really meant a lot to me. It's so wonderful to be able to

work with a family member, to work with my sister, who is like a second mother to me. We have such a special bond. And then also to be able to, you know, this is my full-time job. So I get to do everything with Vivian, which seems like a lot, but to me, it's fine. People are like, that sounds miserable. I know. No, to me, I love it. But to then also take the time to think about everything that

we have going on and everything that we have to be grateful for. It was very moving. It was very eye-opening. And I'm going to be honest, it helped me be more productive. I don't know about you. Yeah. Well, and I think too, for all of you out there that are listening that are the owners of your small business, it's

It can be tough some weeks, okay? And the thing is, whether that be because, let's say you missed out on an opportunity for a contract, right? Or let's say you had an expense that you weren't planning for, or, you know, life just happens at times. And so I think, and sometimes it, well, not sometimes, it never happens on our timeline, okay? Like, I don't know, the powers that be, the universe, God, whatever it is out there is...

We are not in control of the way sometimes the dominoes stack up. And so it is nice to have a practice like this in place because I will tell you that from the perspective of someone who's owning a business, when Chelsea and I are talking about this, I love hearing her feedback and her perspective on it because she's in it day to day.

right? She has access to me. She knows she can ping me, she can call me, she can text me, whatever it is. And she does a fabulous job of emailing me saying, this is what I need from you this week, like, you know, X, Y, and Z. But it's nice to also know that she's

What she is looking at is the positive of it, right? Because then that helps me understand where... Kind of keep a pulse on things. Like where things are. And I think it would help and it does help to gain perspective and then also be able to pivot if you need to in some areas, right? But for me as the owner too, I think it just...

It's nice to focus on the good instead of always focus on like, I always feel like there's a timeline attached to something. It's not always about the timeline, right? Y'all, how often do you talk with your employees or if they're not employees,

than your volunteers, your significant others got roped into this. How often are you saying? That's a very good point, Chelsea, because we know some of y'all out there be roping your significant others into markets and whatnot. Yeah. Which good for you. Good for you. But how often are you guys talking about

This is how far we've come. Look at all the good that we've done. Look at where we are. And how often are you just talking about, oh my God, this went wrong. Oh my God, my table display fell. And there's nothing wrong with having that conversation. I mean, obviously you're going to have to talk about it, but remembering to actually bring up the good is so important. Yeah. And another thing that I really liked about this is I felt like it forced me

me in particular to think outside the box. Okay. So what I mean is sometimes when you're having a rough week and you feel like it's slim pickings, you're like, it's not that you're grasping for straws, but you're thinking you're having to shift your mindset and you're like, okay, what,

There's good in everything, right? Like to some extent. So what is it that I'm overlooking, right? What is the good in this? And I know even before we hit record on this episode, Chelsea and I ran through our weekly gratitude practice. And it was nice because while it was along the same string, right? Like we had a very similar thing to be grateful for. It was nice to see that our perspective was not the same.

Right. And and so I do think that it's forced me in particular to say that.

to reach, right? And to say, instead of just reaching for the stuff that you're typically always grateful for, like, you know, owning a business, getting to work with my sister, what else is there? Like it's, it's making you dig deeper. Yes. Yes. And I think that's really important. I also want to bring up the fact that when we started doing this, Vivian and I had stated, oh, we're going to try this out for a month.

So we're going to do this four times and see how it goes. And now it's just clockwork. Now it's something that we do and we're going to continue doing because it is so helpful. I also feel personally it helps me

I don't want to say I have imposter syndrome, but sometimes you're like, am I really good at this? Do I actually know what I'm doing? It is very helpful to look back and to think about all the opportunities that you've been given because it helps, at least for me, it helps me be more aware of

this is what I'm capable of. This is what I am able to do. I was given these opportunities and this is what I did with those opportunities. Yeah. And I also think it's, we sometimes equate growth to,

with it being linear. And it is not, I think that's the one thing that I've learned the most over the last couple of years is that it's always, it's always this nice little, um, graph of like peaks and valleys. Okay. And so like some, sometimes like Chelsea saying we'll have throughout the year, we'll have times when we're like at

the peak, right? Last week, we had a conversation about an upcoming opportunity for 2025, which I hope does pan out. Peak day for us, okay? We're like, yeah, super excited. And then the funny part is immediately afterwards, Chelsea said something was like, whoa, but now I'm a little nervous about X, Y, and Z, okay? Yeah, because she was looking ahead to when that experience hopefully comes to fruition. And so even in the same...

conversation we could go from peak to valley really quick. But I think it just reminds me that what we see or deem in our head as linear growth for a small business, for your marketing, for whatever it is, it's not like that. And so

Exactly what you just said, where sometimes when you're doing this gratitude practice, it forces you to have a higher view or perspective. And so then you're looking back across the board and saying, well, wait a second, let's look at the growth instead of looking the growth.

from month to month, right? Instead of comparing September to October, let's look at the growth from January to October. What does that look like? Right. And so, um, and then we're like, oh, wow. Like it's, you know, it's definitely catching steam. It's doing really, really well. And so I think that's where sometimes, um, it helps when you have, when you keep going back to this, cause like you said, for me, it's not so much, um,

imposter syndrome because I feel like everybody's an imposter. Okay. Every single one of you, you're all imposters. Okay. Vivian just shouted you out. Yes. All of you, all of us, we're all, but, but so for me, it's not from that perspective, but it is from the perspective of like, Hey, when, when I feel like we're, um, we're not in the peak. Oh no way. Let's look at that timeline. And actually we have grown. It's just not been super linear. Like sometimes it'll dip. Are

Are you a small business owner feeling overwhelmed by marketing? We understand. That's why we created the SOB community just for you. Imagine having access to expert marketing advice every week through our interactive Zoom calls. Network with fellow small business owners in our community, share valuable insights, and grow together. Dive into our comprehensive training videos covering everything from social media to SEO. And all this for just $50 a month.

Empower your small business without breaking the bank. Join the SOB community today. For small business owners who are thinking about practicing gratitude, you obviously don't have to do this and you can absolutely do it on your own. I will say for me, it is very helpful and I think it's much more meaningful that I have Vivian with me and that we're sharing what we're grateful for together because it is

It helps to hear Vivian's perspective, one, because again, we are not the same. We think of things differently. And it helps me, you know, change my mood. Maybe I was a little moody that day. Can you believe it? Sometimes that happens. That's like every day. What is that?

I was like, wait, what? Can you believe it? Sometimes I'm moody. But I think the only time you're not moody is when My Chemical Romance announces they're going on tour again. And then you're not moody. If y'all are wondering when this episode was recorded, if you're a My Chemical Romance fan, you know exactly when this was recorded because they just announced their tour and I am living for it. I'm so excited. But my point was,

It helps give me perspective. It helps hearing things from Vivian's perspective.

It also helps us figure out if we're on the same page when it comes to the seasoned marketer and SOB marketing. And it really helps strengthen our relationship. My point was if you have maybe a business partner, if you have a significant other that you may go to all of your markets, maybe you want to practice gratitude with them.

Because I promise you, if you ask your significant other, like, hey, what are you grateful for in terms of, you know, what we're doing together? They're going to say something that you hadn't thought of. And it's going to be very meaningful. Yeah. And I want to touch on that point that you brought up, which is it does create that line of communication to ensure that we have a commonality and that we have, you

I don't want to say that we're thinking it because like you said, we have two very different perspectives because we're two very different humans. But it does allow us to check in and to keep this top of mind. And I think more importantly, what it does too is it gives us an avenue to where if there is an issue. So like we practice gratitude and I think it also...

to say like it helps us from keeping each other, from taking each other for granted. Not that we ever do. I think you and I have a healthy balance of that, right? Yeah. But if you're doing this type of practice, it prevents you from only going to that person when you're complaining about something or when something didn't work out, right? It's like you need to have more to talk. It's kind of like having that BFF that you talk to all the time, right? Like you call him up and you're like,

you know, can you believe so-and-so did blah, blah, blah. Okay. Well, if, if your only commonality with your BFF is that you guys talk about other people, then you probably need a new BFF. Like you need more things, right. Than that. And you want,

some of that to include the really good stuff, right? Like you want to share your good experiences, your good thoughts with that person. And so I love that it was an open door to having a further discussion. And that's going to lead me to my next reason for really loving this practice. And that was because I think it sparked creativity.

100%. I can't tell you guys how many times when Chelsea and I were going through our gratitude thing, it literally turned into a conversation about like an upcoming idea or something. It's like we got so excited about saying what we were grateful for that then it sparked other ideas and we're like,

oh, hey, like, you know, that means maybe down the road we could do X, Y, and Z or down the road. And so then that would lead to another discussion. And I think it just kind of interjected this excitement. Yeah.

right? Into our daily, um, or into our weekly check-ins. Whereas before maybe our weekly check-ins were more of, um, well, it was more of that is the whip. That is Chelsea whipping me in shape because like she said, she does this full time. I still have a full time job that I'm doing. And so, uh,

on a weekly basis, we're able to check in, but that's usually the time where she's going to lay down the law and she's going to say, this is what I need from you. And so it becomes this dynamic of like, you know, she's saying, I need to tell Vivian, you know, the six items that I need from her and she needs to get it done by this date. And then for me, it's like, okay, I'm going to hear my to-do list, right? I got to,

interject the stuff in my weekly life. But the discussion changed a little bit whenever we were able to have those funner discussions of like interjecting the daydream, which I think we also do pretty well, but I'm a daydreamer. I love daydreaming. All right. Give me a good vision. I'm all about it. That is a hundred percent Vivian. But no, I a hundred percent agree with that sentiment that

For me, I felt more comfortable coming in and laying down the law because I know at least we're going to have that conversation first. Lies. Listen, you guys, she has no problem. Don't let her fool you. Don't let her say she's uncomfortable doing any of that. She's not. That's true. I'm not uncomfortable. I'll do it. But it was nice to have that back and forth, be able to have...

that conversation so that we every week can sit down and say, this is what we're grateful for. This is the past. This is where we're going. I think it also, again, was really helpful for saying, this is where we're going. Yeah. I don't think we give a lot of credence to, you know, you guys, I, um, I was thinking about this the other day, um,

Someone had in a conversation mentioned having lofty goals, ridiculous, insane, lofty goals that you'll never be able to reach. And I think for some people, for the typical A personality, type A personality where you want to set a goal, you want to reach it, you want to feel like you can check that off the list, and then you can move on and set another bigger goal. I think

I think we don't often enough set ridiculous goals that we know we're not going to meet. And the reason...

is because it kind of takes the fun out of like that attainable. I feel like Vivian is specifically calling me out right now. No, no, no. It's not you. I mean, it's also partially me. Like I do this to some extent, but not, I think I've allowed myself a little more wiggle room to where now I'm like, I see the value in. So let me give you a perfect example. The unattainable goal for the SOB community or for our seasoned marketer business would be

to help move the needle and keep more small businesses in business, right? Because there's a lot of small businesses that will start, and then I forget the exact percentage, but how do they fail every year? And so the unattainable goal that I want us to set, and I think that this practice of gratitude has allowed me to feel more comfortable, hint, hint, Chelsea, to approaching my little baby sister about setting this unattainable goal. Yeah.

is that we set a big lofty goal that we're never gonna reach, okay? But if we even just do our part to create resources to keep small businesses in business as opposed to having them fail, then I'm gonna feel good about it, right? Like I feel like I'm contributing to some end to helping at least one small business be able to keep going as opposed to them having to call it quits prematurely, right? Love.

Is that not a mission? I feel like that's our mission statement. If it's not, then it should be.

Well, and I think this is where another thing that this brings up is I do feel like it brings up those important conversations like that just now where, you know, you guys, businesses, when I started this seven years ago, which I didn't think I was going to start as a business. It was just creating some YouTube channel or some YouTube videos. It's turned into a full-blown business that now Chelsea is dedicating her full-time time

job to growing and putting stuff out there and all this, which means that the business changes too. Okay. And it's not for, because of her directly, or it's not because we brought on a staff member and it's not, but it's because the, I think the,

Let's all be realistic. Our target audience changes, the landscapes change. And for us, we service small business owners. It would be ridiculous for us not to address the fact or acknowledge the fact that the small business community has changed the last seven years.

We talk about this all the time with regards to just marketing, the marketing changes, right? From year to year, small business owners and their needs are going to change as well. And so if I just say that to encourage you that if you're a small business owner, what Chelsea just brought up is,

Every once in a while, we need to be revisiting our mission and our vision because we are improving and getting better. Or maybe we're realizing, hey, you know what? Instead of doing all this other stuff, I just want to focus on X, Y, and Z, right? Maybe we're rebranding. Maybe we're whatever it is. It's a good...

opener to say, hey, let's have some of these larger conversations that we may need to address. It doesn't mean you have to do it every year. And it does it may not. If you start this gratitude practice, I'm not saying that's where you're going to end up. But I'm just saying like it could spark some really good conversation that leads to improving your small business. So, y'all, this is this entire conversation is to say if you're

you are not practicing gratitude, if you're not being introspective, maybe consider doing that because it can be very helpful. It's definitely something that Vivian and I feel like has helped the seasoned marketer in SOB marketing. Like it's, trust me, Vivian and I are not going to continue doing something that we feel like is a waste of time.

So that's why we're bringing it up. We feel like it was very useful for the business. And what better time than now to begin to name and consider all the things that you're grateful for. So let's do the TLDL. So if you're here because you skipped to this chapter for the TLDL, too long, didn't listen.

great, I understand you're busy. Once you have the chance, go back and listen to this entire conversation. But the short of it is Vivian and I practiced gratitude by starting our weekly meetings with one thing that each of us are grateful for. And it was something that we actually had to think about and consider. It wasn't just, I'm grateful for working with my sister. Like it was an actual thing.

deep dive into things that we are really grateful for. We did this because sometimes we can get caught up in our day-to-day struggles and we forget where we started, why we started. Expressing gratitude can help you significantly. It can help you improve your mood and

It can help you be more productive. It helps us get more creative, think more creatively, and it overall improves your quality of life. It can also help you better understand your small business journey, where you are in that journey, and help you practice patience. We tend to believe that we should be further in our journeys than we actually are.

while forgetting where we started. So consider practicing gratitude. Consider taking the time once a week. That's what Vivian and I are doing once a week. We sit down and we say, this is what we're grateful for. And we are super grateful for all of you that are in our SOB, small owned business community. Thank you for a

allowing us to share our expertise and our marketing knowledge with you. And we want, if anything else, to just really build an engaging community. So please, please, please, if you guys ever have any feedback, you know where to find us. We're on all social media platforms under The Season Marketer, or you can email Chelsea directly at Chelsea at theseasonmarketer.com.

Y'all go out there and be the best SOB you can be. And happy Thanksgiving.