Hi Juicy Woman,
In the previous post, I shared with you the essential importance of changing your negative self talk. I can’t stress enough how critical this is to your happiness and success, not only in being able to help you end the war on food, but also empowering you to reach for all your dreams in life. If you don’t learn how to tame your inner critic, you’ll get stepped on and end up hating your life.
If that rings true for you, I suggest that you continue to follow this blog religiously and soak up all the wisdom that I have to share on how to create curvy confidence in any situation and how to love your body even if you can’t stand it, because I do it. I do it everyday. And because I am continuing in my own quest to make peace with food and friends with my body, my information is cutting edge, real and powerfully practical. I won’t share it with you, unless I know for certain it works.
In this last installment of this 4 part series on boundaries, I want to give you an expanded perspective and a richer understanding of the consequences of operating with a low self worth; having no boundaries.
Here is a broadcast that I recently sent to my list of women, being completely transparent and sharing my personal reasons for not charging for my coaching services ‘til now.
If you are in a similar boat, I urge you to do an about face and recognize the value that you bring to the table and start charging today. Here’s the email:
Dear Juicy Woman,
I just wanted to let you know what’s doing lately. I’m at a place in my life where I’m bustin’ at the seams, overflowing with passion eager to tell you about all the wonderful things I have in store for you. As you probably know, you’ve been in my heart and on my mind for many years. Service and helping others has been engrained in me by my Nana since I was a young girl.
Sunday School teacher, Girl Scout Leader, volunteer parenting seminars facilitator, 9 years teaching kids business and developing self esteem programs for women and children, that’s me. That’s who I am. I’m a giver. It’s second nature to me from the top of my head to the tips of my toes. As a longtime member of my list, you’ve probably been receiving my inspirational emails periodically, gaining the benefit from my goofs and Ahas for over 5 years. If you’ve been a client or participated in any of my programs, you know that I always underpromise and overdeliver.
Depending upon when you joined my list, you may or not know me as a coach. Yet, that is what I do. You may have thought of me as a buddy, a colleague, a friend, a consultant, a trusted advisor, never seeking payment. Let me be totally transparent and tell you why I haven’t charged for my services for many years.
When a colleague first introduced me to the magic of Emotional Freedom Technique, I felt compelled to share it with others. After I experienced a miraculous healing myself, I was finally able to be free from years of living under a dark cloud of fear that came from a childhood and adulthood riddled with sexual and verbal abuse.
Because I was so passionate and wanted to serve other women who lived under similar circumstances of fear and shame, I resolved to spread the word of healing to all women, making it available to everyone I could. Because so much money was invested in my own healing, by the generous gifts of my Nana, I wanted to pay her kindness forward and save other women the heartache and expense by sharing this spectacular gift of hope and healing with others. I never wanted any woman to be denied wholeness because she didn’t have the money to pay for it.
That’s when I jumped headfirst into learning about and teaching everything I could to help women overcome painful memories and rebuild a negative self image. You may have been with me for years participating in my Juicy Woman Fabulous, Fit and Free Calls or gained the benefit of being on my free forum or the EFT forum.
All of these services were offered at a time when I was able to devote myself completely and entirely to serving others without expecting anything in return. I had no need for money whatsoever, because thanks to my beloved Nana, I had a nestegg upon which I could depend.
During those years, I created many products and programs, that I didn’t feel entirely comfortable promoting because I had this wonky belief that because I was in the service business, demanding to be paid would be wrong.
Also at the same time that I was doing this, I had ended an 18 year run of managing the family real estate business in order to help my father out of a jam. I felt that because I was doing this under family obligation, I didn’t really deserve to be paid for what I was doing, so I blindly conceded to accepting $150/week salary to basically become a slave to my father and his money machine business.
I hated what I did with a passion, because in my position as the new “boss” everything came down to dollars and cents. For me, there was no heart, no love and no humanity in it, so I did my best to put there what was missing. With my father temporary out of the picture, as the landlord, I had the power to do anything I wanted, so I often let tenants go without paying rent, gave them new equipment at no charge, and gave them services that far exceeded the bounds of reasonable expectations. I was a sugar momma with no sense of boundaries.
That behavior and that mentality followed me and crept into every aspect of my life. Spending excessive amounts of money along with eating was my way of having a temper tantrum and demonstrating that I hated my life. I didn’t feel safe actually saying it, because I feared losing whatever security I had. I was afraid all the time of everyone, my father, my employees, my accountant, lawyers, suppliers, tenants, contractors, you name it and I feared them.
You see before I became The Juicy Woman, I allowed people to walk all over me and crush me like a bug, because I just didn’t feel worthy of anything better. All those years of being sexually abused by so many men and being verbally assaulted by my father with his scathing character assassinations, during the 18 years I stepped in to run his business, had left an indelible mark on my heart, creating a rock hard belief in me that I had absolutely no value to anyone, including myself.
Then one day a couple of years ago when I finally woke up and realized that my father wasn’t the wonderful and honorable guy who I always thought he was, I was devastated when he betrayed me by reneging on a promise, choosing money over me. I couldn’t believe that the one man who I had always counted on, had abandoned me so that he could ride on my coat tails and benefit from the 18 years of work I did to beautify his buildings. I sold those buildings for $10.5M and I got nothing out of it. Nothing was a bigger wake up call than that.
That’s when I realized that my lack of self worth was threatening to destroy me. In debt up to my eyeballs, I realized that if I didn’t break free of my fears and limiting beliefs that prevented me from recognizing my value and start charging for my services I would face the possibility of losing my home.
If you’ve read a portion of my book, you know that I’ve since recognized that as a seriously limiting belief and now I acknowledge the value that I have to bring to the table. So I’m doing my part my sharing my value and my very hard earned lessons with you so that you never have to face the pain and shame that I have. Now I’m challenging you to do yours. If like me, you hate your life and want to change it, then I’m here to help you every step of the way. I haven’t got it all figured out, but where I am is a damn site better than I’ve ever been. Now I have enough confidence for 100 women. I’ve become fearless for being tossed under the bus so many times.
Now here’s the plan. I want to let you know that over the next couple of weeks, you’re going to receive many invitations to join a multitiude of products and programs of mine that have been in abeyance for far too long.
It’s up to you to decide what you want to do. I’m only making the offer, not pushing anything on you. If you want to change and learn from someone who really knows what it’s like to hate their body and hate their life, how to bounceback from shame and betrayal, have the courage and the skills to shamelessly start over, with their head held high, emerging more loving and compassionate than ever, then I’m the only gal for you.
Much love,
Andrea