All small business owners have stretches of panic. As you get further into owning your business you tend to have stretches of mild panic instead of major panic. We call this winning. Throw some hormones on top of a busy, busy week and you are likely to find yourself in one of those stretches. But that also happens to be a particularly good time for some clear and focused thinking. So while I was panicking yesterday thinking my business model is never going to work and I need to quit my job and run away to join the circus… I also thought of a lovely way to encapsulate my business model that reminded me of just why I know it to be a powerful one. There just isn’t much competition built into it. And that’s a beautiful thing.
I’m boutique. I have two treatment rooms. My small group offerings max out at 16 for sit down and 8 for movement. I am no threat to what anyone else is doing. I’m not trying to be a yoga studio, or an art studio, or an herbology institute, or a Pilates studio, or a body rolling studio, or a personal training studio or even, really, a massage studio. My goal is to expose people to wellness. My goal is to give people opportunities to EXPERIENCE these things. As such, instead of competition I become a collaborator with a bunch of really cool people and studios who may not even know I am collaborating with them. I’ve always enjoyed my role as a conduit. A conduit takes things from one place and transfers them to another. I’ve always been a person who finds things and then finds the person who needs them.
And Peace and Good Things’ expansion feels that way. I am finding neat and knowledgeable people and connecting them with the people who will benefit from them. The Yoga Series this summer, for example. It’s a great way to EXPERIENCE yoga. Taking it will allow you to form a strong and nuanced foundation. It will introduce you to or deepen your relationship with your breath. It will make you stronger. And I suspect there will be some amazing shared experience that will create bonds between the classmates. The class will act as a conduit that will bring Yoga with a capital Y into your life.
Maybe you will fall in love with Yoga. You will use this to develop a daily practice. You will take privates with Kelly and deepen your base. You will explore yoga studios until you find a home class that you love. And I will love knowing I was a part of that. Or maybe you will discover THE STRETCH. That stretch that seems to calm the thing in your body that likes to nag at you. And I will love knowing I was a part of that. Or maybe you will learn how to breathe, really breathe, for the first time in your life. And for the rest of it you will be able to access that in times of need, as part of exercise, as a simple daily practice upon rising or going to bed. And I will love knowing I was a part of that. Or maybe…oh, the possibilities are endless.
So I ended my internal dialogue with…Peace and good things is here to provide transformative experiences. Without taking the word transformative very seriously at all.
And with that thought I passed back out of mild panic and back into hopeful confidence. I’ve got this.