3 From 3: 3 Lessons From 3 Years In Business That You Can Use To Help You Live Lit!

Leaving the secure confines of Big Law to carve my own path was no small leap, but it was necessary.

March 30th  2024, marked 3 years in business, and in this week's episode, I mark that milestone by sharing 3 lessons learned from my time in business, lessons that you can translate into your own life, whether you are in business or not.  

Join me,  as I distil 3 years of trials, triumphs, and transformations into a series of candid reflections and actionable lessons, all so you can move from a life of lethargy to living life Lit!

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Chapters

• 0:00 Lessons Learned From Three Years
• 5:36 Lessons Learned in Business Journey
• 19:10 Lessons in Self-Trust and Focus

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

If somebody gives you the exact steps that they have followed and you follow and walk in those exact steps, those exact footprints, you're not actually walking your path, you're walking theirs, and what worked for them may not work for you, and also, what worked for them, it may work for you in some way, but you're going to miss all of the other things that could have happened along the way Because you're going to abdicate your autonomy to somebody else's formula, somebody else's blueprint, somebody else's path. You're listening to the Triple C Project. Welcome to the Triple C Project, the podcast that helps you gain clarity. Welcome to the Triple C Project, the podcast that helps you gain clarity, boost confidence, build courage so you can live life lit. I'm your host, ryan Spence, the Big Law Dropout, life coach author, speaker, lover of hoodies, hip-hop and big hairy, audacious goals. If you're tired of living the life you think you should want and ready to start living the life you do want, this podcast will help you get from where you are to where you really want to be. So now we're friends. I invite you to grab a drink, take a seat and allow me to guide you towards living a life that's lit. Hey, hey, welcome to episode 97 of the Triple C Project and it's April. How the hell is it April already?

Speaker 1: 1:29

For me, in 30th of March of this year 2024, marks three years in business, and I thought that I would mark that milestone by sharing some lessons that I have learned from my time in business, lessons that you can translate into your own life, whether you are in business or not. So just a brief recap I left Big Law in 2020, february 28th 2020 to be exact. Still remember the day I walked out of that building for the last time and I did my yoga teacher training in July 2020. It was supposed to be April, but COVID right. And then I started teaching pretty much straight after I finished my teacher training, I started teaching private classes out in Singapore in August 2020, which was great and I loved it. I was teaching two classes a week in my condo to a great group of people, and I had some regulars who stuck with me until my very last day in Singapore, which I really appreciated and I took on my first formal coaching client. So where I actually called myself a coach and was actually doing what I believed to be coaching in December 2020, starting with two clients who I offered to coach for free. Both insisted that they pay me and they did a nominal amount, but it was the first time I'd made money from coaching, so and it was then that I realized that this is kind of what I wanted to do, having resisted it for so long. So I actually incorporated the business after moving back to the UK. So I moved back to the UK January 2021 and incorporated the business.

Speaker 1: 3:10

I Am Ryan Spence Limited. Yeah, look, I didn't want to waste time thinking of fancy names, because I find that's just another form of procrastination. I knew I could always change the name later or use a trading name later, so I just made it easy on myself. So I am Ryan Spence Limited is the registered name of the company, and that was incorporated on the 30th of March 2021.

Speaker 1: 3:33

So three years in business, and I want to preface this by saying that, look, if you want to go deep with your personal development, if you really want to exponentially grow and find out about yourself, start a business. This is not my reason for starting a business, but start a business and that will happen, whether you like it or not. It's been a wild ride. It or not, it's been a wild ride. You know, starting a business is a wild ride and it focuses you to confront and deal with all of your shit. You know there's nowhere to hide, but you don't have to start a business to learn and confront, deal with your shit. It's just that I found that starting a business forces you to do that a hell of a lot quicker. And again, whether you want to or not, you kind of have to do it. And I've had this conversation with other business owners, entrepreneurs as well, and we yeah, we all say the same thing it's a hell of a ride. So in this episode I'm going to share three lessons that I've learned in three years of business and how you can use them to transform your life from lethargy to lit, to transform your life from survival mode to thrival mode.

Speaker 1: 4:55

But before I do that, a question have you read my book yet? The Triple C Method? The Triple C Method gain clarity, boost confidence and build courage so you can live life lit. It's been described as a transformational toolkit and the book I wish I'd had when I left corporate, and also a spring clean for your mind. I love that the idea of sprinkling your mind and it's a book that I wish I'd had when I was in my big law wilderness years and it's a book that I wish I'd had. When I was in my big law wilderness years and I didn't know whether I could change my life, I didn't believe I could change my life, even though I knew that where I was wasn't where I wanted to be. This is the book that I wish I'd had.

Speaker 1: 5:36

The book's available as an e-book, paper book and also an audio book, read by moi, yours truly, and this book, the book, will have you thinking differently about what you do, why you do it, and it'll get you thinking about and getting after exactly what it is that you want, instead of settling for what you think you should want. It's filled with insightful stories and packed with actionable tools and the triple C method. It's going to leave you with a renewed sense of energy about what's possible for you, what you are capable of. So go grab yourself a copy. Head to iamryanspencecom slash book to grab the book directly from me, or go to or hire a book from your favorite independent bookstore and grab it, read it and tag me on social media when you grab hold of your copy so I can shout you out and show my appreciation for supporting my work, but also for transforming your own life, taking that step to make the changes you need to make to move from a life of lethargy to a life that's lit. Okay, that's the plug.

Speaker 1: 6:49

Now let's get to the episode. So three lessons from three years in business and there were a lot more than three lessons. So trying to decide which three to pull out here was quite difficult and I didn't want to go through all lessons because that would have been a very, very long podcast and I'm sure that those lessons will come up at some point in a different guise and different episode. But for today, here's three. And the first lesson I want to share is there are no shortcuts.

Speaker 1: 7:24

So the blueprints, hacks, formulas everyone seems to have them and want to give them to you for a price. That's what I found in business and that's what you will find when you are looking to change your path, to do something different, to go in a different direction. But the thing about these blueprints, these hacks, these formulas is they're not a substitute for just getting down and just doing the work you need to do to figure things out, Because whatever you're wanting to do or whatever you're wanting to change, getting your mindset to accept that it's going to be hard, that there's going to be things you have to learn, that you're going to have to go through some shit. It's going to save you a hell of a lot of energy Because you can't avoid the mess. A lot of these blueprints and formulas and hacks kind of pride themselves on helping you to avoid a million pitfalls and there can be some value in that. I mean it's If you can circumvent some of the more obvious things that could happen, more of the most obvious mistakes that you could make. That can be helpful.

Speaker 1: 8:35

I remember when I went backpacking around Southeast Asia and it was helpful to me to have little bits of information about what to do and what not to do. But I remember being quite frustrated that my friends who had been a couple of years prior wasn't giving me everything, and I realized once I went traveling myself that that was a good thing, because if somebody gives you the exact steps that they have followed and you follow and walk in those exact steps, those exact footprints, you're not actually walking your path, you're walking theirs, and what worked for them may not work for you, and also what worked for them it may work for you in some way, but you're going to miss all of the other things that could have happened along the way because you're going to abdicate your autonomy to somebody else's formula, somebody else's blueprint, somebody else's path, else's formula, somebody else's blueprint, somebody else's path, and you're not going to use your own critical thinking, you're not going to follow your own curiosity, which could take you somewhere completely different to where you imagine going. So look, you can't avoid the mess, the embarrassment and the failure by following someone else's path and, as I just said, you shouldn't want to either by following someone else's path, and, as I just said, you shouldn't want to either.

Speaker 1: 9:59

The journey, the process it's far more valuable and I've said this before, it's all far more valuable than the destination. It's in the journey, it's in the process that you really learn about yourself, that you really figure out who you are and what you want and why you want it. It's what really helps you to get that clarity. So this doesn't mean that you don't seek out help. I mean, I have an episode called build your squads. You need to have people around you who are going to give you that support. But that's different to abdicating your wants, your needs and your desires. It's different to giving up your critical thinking to follow some magic formula or to buy some magic wand that promises to take you from zero to a hundred real, quick, great reference there. Cause you're going to end up disappointed and you're going to end up out of pocket. Trust me, I know this. So, number one for getting from lethargy to lead, or survival mode to survival mode, or simply just changing the way that you live to create the life that you want. Remember, there are no shortcuts. So if anyone's promising you a shortcut or a hack or formula, be very suspicious. Turn on that spidey sense and figure out if there's any value in what they're offering you. Okay, lesson number two trust your gut.

Speaker 1: 11:23

Now, when I first discovered the world of online business and then coaching, I I kind of soaked up everything that I could find, because I'm like that, and once I'm into something, I'm into something and I wanted to take up all the information I could. I listened to every podcast I could find, I mean, watched every YouTube video, read whatever book or blog, followed whoever on Instagram, I bought courses, you know, and all in pursuit of knowledge about how to turn what I loved so yoga and then coaching into a business that I love to create a life that I wanted to live, completely different to the life I was living before. But much of the early stuff I consumed, it felt off to me, some of the people I was following, some of the things that they were saying, and it just didn't feel aligned and I didn't know why. Now part of me thought, well, maybe I'm just being so conditioned to this corporate way of thinking, what I call this corporate state of mind, that seeing this and hearing this new stuff was just a little bit jarring and it was going to take a bit of time for me to start to decondition myself and step into this new person I was becoming and step into this new world that I was entering. But that just didn't seem to be it. You know, I thought I needed to go deeper and commit more, but this nagging feeling wouldn't go away and, despite paying for certain courses, I couldn't bring myself to implement much of what I was learning, even though I wasn't growing as fast as they. The people selling the courses said that I could, um, or said that I should, and it just didn't feel right and I just couldn't do it and I didn't really know why. And it's only really in the last few months, having been down many a coaching rabbit hole on the likes of Reddit and various other podcasts and people on Instagram that I've been following, now that I felt validated, that I trusted my instincts, because I've discovered some of the tactics used by some of the people that I felt knew more than me, and I found that a lot of what they were saying was, to put it kindly, suspect, and many people had been burned by following the way that they were doing things, the way that they said that things should be done.

Speaker 1: 14:03

So it can be difficult to trust yourself to go against the status quo. When everyone else is saying to do this, when everyone else is going right, it can be difficult to trust yourself to go left. But what I found is that once you've got that clarity, once you're clear on your values, on what's important to you, on your why, on what you stand for and what you will and won't do, your gut is a damn good indicator of when you're in or out of alignment and so and so I'm really pleased that I did follow my gut. So I encourage you to trust yours and look self-trust is a big thing that I work with on my clients. So if you need help with that, you know where to find me. Self-trust is tied to confidence, I believe. So if you've got that confidence that leads to that self-trust, trust your gut. That's lesson two.

Speaker 1: 15:07

Okay, third lesson, lesson number three, and this is one that's probably was the one of the hardest ones for me to not to learn because I knew it was necessary, but to kind of bring myself around to, and that is be patient. So there's a greeting card I've seen before somewhere and it says something along the lines of when you meet the person you want to spend the rest of your life with, you want the rest of your life to start right now. And that's kind of how I felt once I found my business, once I found yoga and coaching and knew that I could make this into a business. I could make this my life. You see, I had a mission, and my mission was to help people in the position that I'd been in I mean that unhappy, unfulfilled, lethargic big law lawyer and to transform their lives from that lethargy to living a life that's lit, to show them that you can do things differently if you want to. You just need to know what it is you want to do and then take the steps to get after it. You want to. You just need to know what it is you want to do and then take the steps to get after it. And I wanted to devote all of my time to it right then and there.

Speaker 1: 16:22

And I was very impatient, you know, and I would get very frustrated by my impatience, because the longer it took me to get to where I wanted to be, to where I envisioned being, to the life that I saw for myself, the more frustrated I would get at times. Why is this not happening faster? What am I doing wrong? I'm doing everything that I feel I'm supposed to be doing. What's going on here? Everyone's saying I've changed their life, my work is great. Why is this not growing faster than I want it to grow? But after months of coaching myself, meditating and kind of really taking that deeper step inwards, I've now flipped that phrase that I saw on a greeting card. And now what I say is when you know what you want to do with your life, you accept the journey will take as long as it needs to take to get there.

Speaker 1: 17:27

No-transcript. You see, look, the thought of change can be daunting. The time it will take to learn something new or become someone new can just be frustrating and lead you to trying hacks and blueprints and formulas and shortcuts. Shout out to the first lesson in an attempt to get there quicker, because you know exactly what it is that you want and you want to be there now. But, as I said in lesson one, those hacks, those shortcuts, those blueprints, they won't work.

Speaker 1: 18:07

So you have to learn to be patient and to trust and enjoy the process. You can't skip the good and you can't skip the bad parts of the journey, because they all contribute to building the habits and the skills you need to step into and become the next version of yourself, to embrace and live that next version of the life you envisioned for yourself. And trust me, I know this is not easy. This patience, malarkey it's not easy at all. I'm impatient by nature about so many things, and so this is something that I still have to work on. But, like much of this, once you're aware, and once you're aware of what isn't serving you, you can then start to recognise when it shows up in your life and do what you need to do to deal with that shows up in your life and do what you need to do to deal with that and being patient and then just accepting that it will take as long as it takes. It will save you so much energy and it just makes the load that you're carrying so much lighter.

Speaker 1: 19:10

Okay, that was lesson three. Um, now I had three lessons because it was three years, but I actually have a bonus lesson now. Yes, I could have just said four lessons in three years, but three and three sounded better, and it was only after I'd sort of started to prepare this episode that I thought I really want to get this one in um, because something happened as I was preparing and I thought, actually, this is a really good lesson to to share. So this bonus lesson that I'm giving you is kill the noise, and what I mean by that is everyone has an opinion, do this, don't do that.

Speaker 1: 19:46

I mean as a coach, I've heard you know you don't sell single sessions. You only meet clients in person or you got to have a niche. You know you've got to have a niche. You can only focus on one thing. All sorts of things. As a yoga teacher, I've heard you don't use notes in class, you don't change your sequence, you don't demo, you only give cues, you don't play music, and I've heard the opposite of every one of those as well. So the thing is, it's not to say that any of those things are right or wrong, but they all contradict each other and, as I said, in the beginning, I was very hungry for information, and so it can be helpful to cast your net wide when you're looking to change things, to do something different.

Speaker 1: 20:36

It can be helpful to cast your net wide and to listen to a whole range of people and take in a whole load of information, but there's a point where that can become overwhelming and you've got to ask yourself okay, I've heard all of this stuff, but what do I want to do? What aligns with who I am? How do I want to be? And you've got to trust yourself to just roll with that. And that's something which I'm doing on a regular basis, and I will unfollow people and I'll stop listening to certain podcasts and I will stop reading certain posts on social media, not always because I don't like the people involved or I don't like what they're saying, but because they're drowning out my own thoughts and they risk influencing my voice in a way that isn't really helpful to what it is that I'm trying to create, to who it is that I'm trying to be. So sometimes you've just got to kill that noise, and that can look different at different times.

Speaker 1: 21:46

Sometimes it can literally be just staying away from social media completely, or it could be unfollowing certain people or muting certain people. It could be just not listening to certain podcasts, to completely rearranging your podcast listing, to changing the books that you are reading, and this isn't necessarily about just confirming your own bias, but it's about creating the space for you to create, for you to create from yourself, from your soul, and not to be influenced too heavily by all of the noise around you, especially when you have lots of contradictory opinions about the same thing, because that's only going to confuse and overwhelm you. I know because I've been there and I still see it coming up. I saw it come up this week and I was like, well, stop reading that post, it's not helpful. Um, I can see how that could work for somebody, but that isn't where I'm going with this and I don't want to follow that and take that in, because that's going to affect how I show up in this particular way. This was about yoga and I don't want that to affect how I show up and teach my classes, because I have a vision of how I want to be as a teacher and there are people who I follow who are helping me to become that. So I need to leave that other thing to the side. So there we go Three lessons and one bonus lesson and a quick recap.

Speaker 1: 23:20

Lesson number one was there are no shortcuts. So you want to change. That's great. You've made that decision. Now go out, do the work to change. Accept the mess, the embarrassments, the failures. As I've said in previous episode, you're going to go through that messy middle and you can't avoid that if you want to get to where you want to get to.

Speaker 1: 23:41

Lesson number two trust your gut, self-trust. Listen to your intuition. What is it telling you? If something doesn't feel right? Explore why Be curious. Don't just dismiss it because you feel that other people know better, because no one knows you better than you.

Speaker 1: 24:00

Three be patient. Resist the urge to try and move things along too quickly. It doesn't mean don't do the work. It doesn't mean don't exhibit any urgency, but it means that accept that it will take as long as it needs to take and you can't rush that. You know if you're baking a cake, put the cake in the oven. It takes as long as it takes. You can't rush it. Even if you want to eat that cake right now, it's got to stay in as long as it needs to stay in or it just won't be ready. So apply that to your own change, to your own transformation. Be patient, and when you feel yourself getting impatient, come back to this episode and listen to this lesson again. And the bonus kill the noise.

Speaker 1: 24:47

Don't allow yourself to be overwhelmed by overconsumption. Listen to what you need to listen to, listen to what serves you and if something comes up that you think, hmm, that's interesting and you want to explore it, that's good, that's fine. But don't allow the overconsumption to keep you stuck, to allow you to procrastinate. Figure out where you want to go, what you want to do, follow your curiosity and shut out what you need to shut out to keep you focused on the path that you have put yourself on. Okay, that's us for this week.

Speaker 1: 25:26

I hope this has been helpful. These four lessons have been helpful for you. I'd love you to drop me a line and let me know which lesson stands out most for you, or which one of these do you struggle with most? Hit me up on email, hey, at IamRyanSpencecom. Or on social media, instagram at Iam underscore Ryan Spence or just Ryan Spence, over on LinkedIn. All of the links to those places are in the description of the show on whatever pod player you are listening to this episode on and leave a review.

Speaker 1: 26:04

If you want to actually leave your insight from this episode or your favorite lesson from this episode and just drop it in a review, that would be awesome too. I'd love that and that will also help other people find the show and see what the show is about and how it can help them, how it can relate to them. So again, the link to leave a review is in the description to the show, or just head to the review section on your favorite pod player and show some love. Show some love to the CCC Project and yours truly. And don't forget, if you grab a copy of the book, tag me on social media and just say hey, got the book, hey, reading this book. Let your friends know and let me know and I will be sure to reply and give you a shout out and support you on your journey from survival mode to thrival mode. Support you on your journey from survival mode to thrival mode. Until next week, um, have a great day week, whatever time of day it is. Um, wherever you are, thank you, as always, for being here and until next time, stop living a life of lethargy, start living life.

Speaker 1: 27:11

Thanks for tuning in to the triple c project. In the spirit of the triple c, there's three things that you can do to support the show. Head to rate this podcastcom. Slash triple c or over to your favorite podcast app and leave a review. Reviews really help people checking out shows to see what they can expect and how this show can help them. Second thing you can do share. Share this episode. Share a previous episode with a friend, someone who you feel could benefit from what I'm throwing down on this here show. And number three, head to IamRyanSpencecom. Get on the mailing list. I'll be sharing news about the show, news about what I'm up to my new book, start writing soon. So to be the first to be in the know, you need to get yourself on the list. Really appreciate you being here. And until next week, stop living a life of lethargy, start living life lit.