Making It – Episode 159
The Power of Being at Choice in Life and Work (Lori Wayne)
Lori Wayne: Hey, I’m Lori Wayne and you’re listening to Making It. I run a small service based coaching company called Discere Consulting and help small service based business owners to grow profitable businesses in a fun way without running themselves ragged and crazy.
I was raised where my mom specifically said, you can do whatever you want to do, you’ll figure it out, I know you can. And we didn’t have much money at all, so there were a lot of things that I wanted to do that I had to figure out how to do. So for example, I really wanted to go to Girl Scout camp really bad and we didn’t have the money for that. So I’m just like, okay, I’m going to go win the cookie sales contest because the person who wins the cookie sales contest gets a scholarship to go to Girl Scout camp.
You know, when I got to high school, I really wanted to be on the swim team, but there were fees and I had to get to practice. And so like I got up at 5 in the morning, I rode my bike to a friend’s house, I paid her gas money to take me the rest of the way to swim practice. Then I rode my bike home to my job and worked. And I just feel so grateful for the experiences as a kid of knowing you could figure it out, you can get a plan, you can really pretty much do whatever you want to do and you’re really capable of taking care of yourself.
I was 17 years old, I had left home, I was supporting myself and putting myself through college and I have supported myself ever since then. And I was working for the Social Security Administration in Southern California. It was my college job and I was making like $12 an hour doing part time work. That was a lot of her part time work in 1980. And I had transferred down there from Reading where I went to high school. And in Reading, that job was fun, the people were nice, I got to do cool stuff. I mean, I worked hard, but it was some interesting work.
When I met Southern California job, I’m sitting there at my desk, I’m like, well, these people are okay, nice, but all they’re letting me do is file these fricking transmittal things. It was so awful, it was so boring. And it just hit me like a lead balloon. It’s like, oh my gosh, Lori, you are 17 freaking years old. You are way too young to do any kind of work just for the money. And that premise, that aha moment in that office has followed me through my career. And so this whole thing of being a choice I mean, I have to like it. And it’s how I live my life. I make decisions so that I can always be a choice.
From an early age, I always paid attention to my intuition. If it was pinging me, I was like, okay, no matter what anybody else says about it not being doable, if you want to do it, you can figure it out. And that is very much how this move to Colorado played out. I lived in Northern Virginia. I’m the sole provider for these three kids. I had gotten divorced and bought my ex husband out of everything so my kids wouldn’t have to move from their childhood home, which meant I was focusing on nothing but doing the right thing by my kids and recouping financially.
When I brought them on vacation to Colorado, to this ranch, which is now my neighbor. And I got back to Virginia and it kept pinging me, you should move there. You should move there. You know? And I had one little gremlin on one shoulder saying, you can’t do that. You don’t know anybody out there. You can’t make a move like that. You’d have to sell one business, relocate your other business. You can’t do that. And then I’d have the other one going, you can do it if you want. You’ve done things like this before. And here I am living my dream, right?
This whole really firmly rooted values, intuition, that foundation comes from my mom. It really does. You know, I was raised that way. And then also my dad, his influence was different. But I did boy things with my dad. I did hunting, I did fishing, I did camping. So I learned I could be really capable in all those different kind of roles. And when I think about, like, professionally, I had a coach, his name is Jerry, Jerry Wilkes. And he actually worked at Xerox when I worked at Xerox. And he was like a finance guy. And so he happened to be my boss there.
We were good friends. And he ended up leaving Xerox and went out and started his own coaching business. And so I hired him as a coach when I was getting ready to go out on my own. He helped me with a lot of things. You know, just the mix of being a hardcore, like, business guy, you know, you gotta know your numbers, you gotta do all that stuff. And then mixing in all that intuitive kind of stuff. He was a really big influence, really helped at a scary time beause that was around when I was getting divorced and doing all that stuff, too. So he was a super great coach that helped me through lots of that stuff. So I’m a big believer in the value of coaching.
I get up at 4:30. I’ve always been a morning person. I do some spiritual reading. Current on the docket is I have a little daily meditation thing for Immunity Church and I read a little bit out of Deepak Chopra’s book, Seven Spiritual Laws to Success. In the morning, I pick a page, read a page and a half or so out of that every morning. Look at my intentions that are written on a little card that are tucked in the back of that book. Kind of get those in my mind and then I just do quiet meditation for 15 minutes and then I go off on my walk for like an hour.
I can get like 6,000 steps in that walk in the morning and then I come back and by that time my husband is usually up. So I have coffee and breakfast with my husband and then I’m in my office working. So when I don’t have my good morning routine, weird stuff happens in the middle of the day. Stuff like I’m tired much earlier in the day. I don’t have my same amount of coping skills. I have multiple prongs in my work in my business. I’m usually very, very good at having each thing in its lane. I time block, I organize them in their space. And when I didn’t have my morning routine, I was like, my blocks are getting messed up. I can’t cope and was not nearly as good at my work.
A common mistakes people make on their way to making it. One of the biggest ones is they don’t have confidence in themselves to go for it. They don’t pay attention to their intuition and their internal barometer and their personal values. And they let themselves stay stuck in work situations, especially work situations that are not helping them get to where making it looks like for them. Get a plan and go for it. Don’t stay stuck in a spot that isn’t where you want to be.
Get yourself on your path to making it. And what making it looks like for my neighbor or one of my kids or you or me, each person’s making it may change. What making it looks like for me today, it might be different in five years. And then always, always put yourself in a spot where you can be a choice because if you do things like accumulating too much debt and you hate your job, it’s a little harder to be brave and say, I’m going to get a plan and go start my own business because you’re saddled with all this debt. Put yourself in a spot to always be able to choose.
But the biggest mistake, and I’ll talk about this in the context of my work is that I didn’t make the space earlier in my self employed career to focus on the coaching because I’m really passionate about working with small business owners, small service based business owners and women to let them know they can do like epic stuff, right? And they can build profitable businesses without working themselves to death.
I really did not start doing that as soon as I wanted to and it was only when I moved here to Colorado because I was like, okay, Lori, it is time to shit or get off the pot. You are either going to do coaching or you’re not. So like make a decision. If you’re going to do it, then do it. And so that’s only been like 10 years that I’ve been doing that part of my business and I wish I’d started it a little sooner.
I have this like middle aged hobby. I didn’t even start riding horses till I was 50. Now that’s kind of what I do all the time. I do cowboy mounted shooting. And it’s been very humbling because I wasn’t very good at it when I started. And I’m used to being good at athletic things like immediately. Another thing for me right now, it’s like my husband and I run this fun little side business where we run a little ranchette and we board horses and we buy and sell some horses. Sometimes I’ll give riding lessons, do a little training of horses for people.
And the fact that we can do that together and go do the fun things we like to do with our horses, we go camping in our trailer with our horses, that’s right up there at the top of making it. And then because I’m super practical and I am an ever so responsible eldest child type personality, you know, the fact that I was like, okay, Lori, you did really good. Like you have been so disciplined since the time that you were a 20 year old, saving money, doing things so that you know, when you were in your 60s you wouldn’t be going, oh my gosh, like I don’t have a financial plan, right?
Having the security of a financial plan around me. And that part was influenced from the time I got out of college and I was selling insurance and I’d go to people’s house and I would do like a financial needs assessment with them. And I remember I’d get back in my car, my little 1974 used Datsun B210 that barely got me down the road and I’d sit there and I’d be like, holy crap. When I am 50 years old, I do not want to be in that financial situation. I mean, it was scary. I was like, oh my gosh, one paycheck away from a really bad spot. And so that is not a choice.
Making it for me really means I’ve got the complete thing. I do work I love with people who I enjoy working with, and I have a really great balanced life. When I went to work for Xerox when I was 20 years old as a sales rep, and when this district manager interviewed me and was asking about my values and things, I explained my balance bubbles, which I think of as like Olympic rings. There’s a spiritual one, there’s a family one, there’s a work one, there’s a financial one.
And it’s okay if they’re sometimes out of whack for short periods of time where they’re not like their nice, neat, tidy little rings. They don’t look like Olympic rings. They’re kind of messed up. But you can’t be like that for long periods of time. For me, making it means my balance rings are in order and I am doing my hobbies and my fun things and I can spend time with my kids and I’m being financially responsible and my financial future is well planned for and then I’m doing only fun work. I have a mantra, it’s very technical. It’s called no yucky work. So making it means I’m a choice about all those things and I can keep my balance bubbles in order.
I’m Lori Wayne and you’ve been listening to Making It. You can find me lorirochellewayne.com. That’s L O R I R O C H E L L E W A Y N E dot com. You’ll find the link in the show notes. And thanks for sharing time with me today.
Danny Iny: Making it is part of the Mirasee FM Podcast Network, which also includes such shows as To Lead is Human and the Neuroscience of Coaching. To catch the great episodes that are coming up on Making it, please follow us on Mirasee FM’s YouTube channel or your favorite podcast player, and if you enjoyed the show, please leave us a comment or a starred review. It’s the best way to help us get these ideas to more people. Thank you and we’ll see you next time.