For years I learned strategies and tactics for growing my list, building my community, and promoting my work.

And guess what I did with those strategies?

Not much!

Sometimes I felt completely overwhelmed by all the information and so, did nothing. Other times I tried a few different things in a half-hearted manner, but in truth, I wasn’t completely committed to making it work.

As a consequence I was busy. And I thought that meant I must be on the right track.

I was carrying around a lot of stories too. Stories about marketing and list building. I felt the strategies I was learning were too pushy, I didn’t want to hustle, and I saw no real alternative for growing my business.

I knew that if I ‘had to’ market to a larger audience, I needed to find a way to connect with people that felt natural to me. I just wasn’t sure how to get there.

So I focused almost exclusively on nurturing the community I had and on building out the best products and services I could.

That worked well and was definitely rewarding for everyone involved.

Until it became obvious that it wasn’t actually a sustainable approach to building a business.

You see, to keep the business afloat, I’d been developing new products and services for my small but loyal community.

That was time consuming, exhausting, and ensured I could never scale anything because I was so busy building things from scratch.

All. The. Time.

When I realised what I was doing, I knew I couldn’t keep it going much longer.

I really wanted to change my business model so I could reach and serve more people. Little did I realise that everything I was doing was keeping me stuck in an old model that was much harder work than it needed to be. I had also unconsciously created a clear limit on the amount of revenue I could generate.

So rather than learn another list building strategy, I took some time to look closely at what was going on within me.

Here’s what I found; inner fears and stories designed to keep me small and invisible. Blocks around being seen by too many people. Blocks around getting it wrong, not being able to manage a big community, being judged or criticised by strangers.

I used the personal development tools I was trained in, and I developed others, to overcome these blocks. To free me of the fear. To heal old wounds. To release limiting beliefs.

And with that, lots of my stories about marketing dropped away. Marketing started to feel like a neutral thing; neither good nor bad. Just a tool for business growth which I could make as wonderful or as manipulative as I wished.

In other words, I discovered that marketing isn’t something that exists independently of me. It really is just a reflection of me and the values and integrity I bring to the business.

And when I’m happy to be seen for those things, I’m happy to market my business to more people.

There’s not a day that goes by when my business and lifestyle don’t benefit from having taken the time to clear my visibility blocks. Because I’ve dropped all those stories about what marketing is or isn’t, I can now make it what I want it to be. Better yet, I make decisions that are much more sustainable for me and my lifestyle.