The latest episode of Emerge + Expand is a recording from a live I recently did in the Introvert Friendly Business Facebook group, answering a question around resistance to booking in a photoshoot. I thought I’d share it with you because not only is this a great example of a business activity that can often bring up our visibility stuff, I think what we talked about can also be applied to anywhere resistance is showing up for you.

In this episode, I also chat about:

• How business activities like professional photos can bring up some of our visibility stuff as we step into the world.
  
• Why professional photos are a great early investment in your business when deciding where to start in your business and a few tips to feel more comfortable.
  
• Questions to ask yourself when identifying and moving through resistance in your business.
  
• The way that we’re invited to go deeper with ourselves, our own healing and transformation, when we decide to start and launch a business.
  
• A really simple trick to soothe your nervous system
  
• My best tips to move through resistance in your business with ease.

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Also mentioned in this episode:

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FULL TRANSCRIPT:

speaker 0

00:00:00

This is episode 12 of the Emerge and Expand podcast. Hi, welcome to the new episode of the Emerge and Expand podcast. I’m your host, Katherine Mackenzie Smith, and today I am sharing with you a video that I did in my free Facebook community introvert friendly business. So if you’re an introvert and you’re not in that group and you’re not aware of it, please come on over. If you had to emerge and expand.com/fb group, you’ll be able to join straight away there and I hope that you’ll enjoy this episode. It was a question from the group, if you have any resistance around visibility, being seen, getting professional photos taken in your business, anything like that, you’re gonna enjoy this episode. And if you have any questions about being an introvert in business about visibility, about creating content, anything you’d like me to talk about on the podcast, please head into the group and let me know. I love answering these questions in the Facebook group, but also being able to create other content around it as well and make sure that it’s super relevant and helpful for you. So let’s dive in.

speaker 1

00:01:03

The question was, I recognize that I need photos of myself in my marketing, but I’m feeling really resistant. How do I get over myself? And that’s such a great question from a visibility perspective, but I think also this idea of resistance in our business. So I wanted to talk a little bit on that today. Share some thoughts. Photos I know are one of those things, especially early in your business. But to be fair, I’ve been doing this for years and I’ve booked in a couple of photo shoots in the last couple of years and ended up canceling them. If it feels like it is a stretch for you or it is something that’s uncomfortable, that can just be part of your visibility stuff. Sometimes these things happen in our business to make us be with some of the stuff that we are still working through in our own personal journey, healing journey and photos, visibility, being seen, putting ourselves out there.

speaker 1

00:01:59

All of those things are completely valid and things are just naturally come up, not just when we’re starting out. Think there’s this like thought in our minds that like, oh, just it’ll be weird and it’ll be scary at first and then it’s gonna get easier. But every time we grow and we expand, we hit a new level where we are asked to evolve and be with the next level of that journey as well. So it’s kind of not about getting to a destination and more just really being okay with the fact that there are some things that we do in our businesses or need to do in order for it to exist and run that maybe are a little bit uncomfortable sometimes. And how can we reframe that to make it more in alignment? How can we question it and decide, is this actually a path that I wanna go down?

speaker 1

00:02:52

Do I actually need to do things these this way, the way that everyone says it needs to be done in order to get my work out into the world? World to get my business out into the world when it comes to photo shoots in particular and getting professional photos. I know this is something that even I say, if you’re gonna invest in anything very early in your business, professional photos is something that is going to really be a worthwhile investment these days. You can get templates or Canva, you can do drop and drag build websites. You know, you can kind of manage a lot of that stuff very affordably and kind of DIY until you’re ready to up level. But having said that, that’s from my perspective. So you know, maybe it’s a case of actually getting a little bit comfortable playing around with things in the safety and privacy of your own space.

speaker 1

00:03:43

You can buy a tripod or you can buy like a ring light or something, or you can just prop your phone up on something and just get comfortable or start practicing moving your body and and trying some things out. And getting used to seeing yourself on camera I think is a really great way, not just to start to feel comfortable about getting photos taken and and that visibility, but also to just get used to seeing your face. Because I think that a lot of what many of us are sitting with is like the self-judgment, the self-criticism stuff that we have just been conditioned that we are also dealing with. Like there’s so many layers as to why resistance comes up around visibility, around being seen around even just getting photos taken, but also in, in every area of our business. I always wanna start with what’s really going on here in the the pop up group.

speaker 1

00:04:35

We were having a conversation where people are talking about they hate the word launch in their business, they hate the thought of doing the launch, they hate the idea of launching something. It feels too big, too scary, too overwhelming. It just makes them wanna run away. And so the question that I will always ask when it comes to resistance, when it comes to those fears and those things that we’re maybe worrying about what is really going on here? What is really at the heart of this? And so coming back to the, the question that’s been posed, what is the resistance? What is the fear there? Is it that you just don’t wanna do it? It is a lot of energy and it takes an awareness of your body to sit in certain ways and and actually have to think about your body, which for some of us is a really uncomfortable thing.

speaker 1

00:05:23

Sometimes it is about the visibility of these exist now and now I have to put them out into the world. And what that feels like sometimes it is actually, oh this is serious. Now I’m investing potentially hundreds or events thousands of dollars into basically saying this is really happening. This isn’t something that I’m talking about or thinking about in terms of like creating a business and starting a business. This is something that’s actually happening and now it’s real. And the fear around that. They’re just a few examples. I can’t tell you what is under the surface, but time and time again in our businesses, we are going to be invited into being with parts of ourselves that we maybe haven’t before, that maybe other areas or other things in our lives haven’t activated in a way that they do. When we decide I’m gonna embark on this journey, I’m gonna create something that previously didn’t exist, I’m gonna put all of my heart and soul into it, I’m going to put it out into the world for the potential to be judged or to get comments or whatever that might be.

speaker 1

00:06:36

Whatever that fear is. And the thought of investing and taking that step into, okay, now I’ve invested this money, I have done the uncomfortable thing, I’ve gotten the photos taken. Now it’s real. Can sometimes be the thing of like, oh, once I step off that ledge, there’s no going back. It’s real. It’s out there. And what that means for you and what that feels like for you. So they’re just like a few things of like, okay, well what’s really going on? Because we can’t, I wanna use the correct words like get over ourselves until we actually have sat with the truth. That may not be truth at all, but what’s, what’s really going on under the surface? So often we had this in Emerge and Expand yesterday on our monthly group called that sometimes you just actually need to say out loud the thing that is really going on in order for your nervous system to acknowledge, Okay, so you’re aware of that potential danger.

speaker 1

00:07:39

I’m good now because that is kind of how I’ve definitely noticed in my own self how my nervous system works, that while everything builds up and all of the nervous system responses and all of the, you know, mind overthinking and all of that, that if it’s like our, our nervous system is trying to tell us that we’re maybe not aware of this. So there’s a potential danger that we might not be aware of and it will just keep building and building and building and building. And what I have found to be one of the absolute best ways to move through that is to actually speak to that, talk to someone, confide in someone that you trust, whether it’s a friend, a family member, a coach, whoever that might be saying it out loud actually just lets the nervous system know. So what’s really going on for you?

speaker 1

00:08:24

Acknowledging that, be with that journal about it. Talk to someone that you trust with that level of vulnerability. And then it’s just a case of now that I know that, how can I make this really easy for myself? How can I take what feels like a huge big rock in the path of resistance and how can I just simplify it? So like I said right at the start, is it getting a friend to take some photos of it? Is it playing around with your iPhone camera or whatever phone and just starting to get used to the idea of having to work out poses and do things like that. Is it just diving in and booking the photo shoot? Or how can you make that really easy for yourself? What is the first step? Is it just creating a list and contacting some people and having a conversation with them?

speaker 1

00:09:15

Is it playing around taking some photos for yourself? What is it that’s gonna make it super easy to take the next step? And sometimes is this something that I actually need right now or am I focusing on this thing that I can’t move forward, I can’t work on the website, I can’t launch my services, I can’t do anything until this photo shoot is booked and has happened and if those photos exist and then I’ll be able to move forward. Sometimes we will put something that is a bit scary for us, right in the way of moving forward at all. And so maybe it’s actually, okay, what can I do instead? That has absolutely nothing to do with this. Maybe it’s, I’m thinking about getting photos cuz everyone says that I have to have photos or everyone I did my coaching certification with has already got their photos.

speaker 1

01:10:02

Like, are we comparing, are we making decisions and thinking that’s the next step we absolutely have to do based on external factors? And is it the thing that’s actually stopping us from taking any forward motion? And is there something simpler that we can do in the meantime? So there’s a whole bunch of things to think about there. Obviously this is in relation to the question about getting a photo shoot, but I kind of think that this could be applied to absolutely anything. Whether it is building a website, whether it is putting something out into the world, whether it is starting to share content on social media, whatever it is that is creating resistance for you or that you are maybe putting, rolling that rock into the road, being really aware of that, sitting with the feelings that are coming up because they’re all totally valid.

speaker 1

01:10:54

Asking yourself what’s really going on here and reflecting and maybe sharing it with someone who you trust and then putting something into place to simplify and either breaking it down into smaller steps or going, You know what, I’m gonna actually move around this and I’ll come back to it. I’m stopping from doing anything because of this fun thing. I’m not ready for that yet. So instead I’m going to work on this piece instead. There is no linear path in your business. There is no one rule for, you cannot do this, this, this, this, this. Until you get professional photos taken. You can’t launch your business, you can’t start posting, you can’t put services out there and start working with clients until you have professional photos. There is no linear progression for the order that those things need to happen. And so if that is the thing that is getting in your way right now, what does taking that out of the equation free up for you energetically so that you can focus on something else and come back to that later.

speaker 1

01:11:57

So I’d love to know if this was helpful for you, if you have also had issues with or found that resistance to doing things like booking in professional photos in your business, how did you work through it? I would love to know because I think that the more that we talk about this stuff and we realize that is actually pretty common, it really helps to go, Okay, cool. So everyone feels like a massive doc when they go and get photos taken and awesome. I am not alone. And maybe that is the thing that shifts something for you. So let’s chat about it in the groupies, let us know. Has this given you some steps to start thinking about how you can move through some resistance in your own business? Is there something that you could just actually take out of your list that is stopping you from making forward motion right now? And have you found a way to feel more comfortable doing scary visibility? Things like getting photos taken, speaking online video, whatever that might be.

speaker 0

01:12:54

If you wanna join in on the conversation, share your own experiences and just get involved with other introverts in business doing their thing, Make sure you come and join us in the Facebook group if you haven’t already. It is the introvert friendly business group. You can find that by searching on Facebook or just go to emerge and expand.com/fb group and you’ll be able to join there. If you’re interested in more podcast episodes about visibility, make sure you check out episode nine. It was a due business Differently interview where I had an amazing chat with the wonderful May Kay saying about visibility. And if you want the show notes or the full transcript, any of the links from today’s episode, you can just head to emerge and expand.com/podcast oh one two. If you are an introvert in business, I have some really exciting stuff coming up and I can’t wait to share it with you.

speaker 0

01:13:44

Just to be able to manage your energy, your systems, and getting seen and heard in your business. If that sounds like something you might be interested in, make sure you head to the show notes where there’ll be a link for you to sign up to a wait list to find out all about it. Can’t wait to share it with you. So this was just a short episode this week, but I hope that if you have found yourself having any resistance around being seen around getting your professional photos done or anything else in your business, that this has just given you something to sit with, a few questions to ask yourself. And also just the reminder that everyone is going through different things at every moment and every stage of their business and that if you are at the moment, you’re absolutely not alone. So if you want more, please come and join us in the group. Otherwise, I will catch you in the next episode.