232 - Becoming a Chillpreneur with Denise Duffield-Thomas

On today's episode of the podcast I speak with Denise Duffield-Thomas about becoming a chillpreneur. 

To hear Denise's previous episode of my podcast, click here for episode 65 "Money Blocks."

Being a chillpreneur does not mean working beachside from a hammock. It's about creating a business that works for your and your personality. When you start a business, a lot of learning who you like to work with or what your boundaries are comes from trial and error. A chillpreneur business is one that is in line with your strengths, fits your lifestyle goals, fits your income goals and is personal to you. Creating an optimism that there is space for you is a tenet of the chillpreneur philosophy. Know thyself and prosper. 

Denise's third book titled Chill and Prosper comes out on July 19, 2022. It gives a fresh and funny roadmap to living a life of abundance without burnout. To pre-order the book and get access to Denise's free affirmations for business owners, click here. The book is a post-pandemic look at creating a business that works for you. 

Often Denise receives objections like, "this won't work for my industry," or "I can't do my business online," or "I can't create a passive income around this or write a book." An example is a pelvic floor therapist who said she couldn't do it online. She learned that when you charge win-win prices and don't feel the need to be affordable for every person and have time for every person, you have more time to create passive income in a way that works for you. 

Too often business owners are trying to build a critic-proof business with a critic-proof price and that's impossible. If you have no critics it probably means you're bending over backwards to please everyone, and that's not sustainable. When we go into an industry, we go in with a mindset that there's a certain way things are done and that's the way we need to do it too, but that's not the case 

For example, as an attorney that looks like carving out a specific niche and serving that audience through specific online services and products, as opposed to just 1:1 services in an office. When people niche down, so many people go through fear of "am I enough?" or "am I allowed to?" We focus on the bad thing that's going to happen if we set a boundary or if we have to live forever with the decisions we choose. 

A lot of times we over-deliver from a place of wanting to be generous. In a coaching space, Denise finds coaches frequently go over time when working 1:1 with clients or give more freebies along with their material. She found that her refund rate was going up on her own course and the feedback she was getting was people did not have enough time to complete it because there was too much material. Denise's generosity was causing other people overwhelm. 

"A confused mind says no," Denise shares. When things are not available at the time you're ready, for example calling someone to schedule an appointment versus doing it online, you will lose people when adding complications. Do your best to automate tasks so customers can act at the time they're ready.

Denise discovered that having a chill business and automating parts of her business has helped her with her ADHD diagnosis. Automate, delegate or batch the parts of your business that are your highest pain points. Denise acknowledges she can go down the rabbit hole of shiny objects, and talks about the importance of focusing on the products you do have and how, in her case, they all lead to the bootcamp program that she offers. For many entrepreneurs, it's easy to get excited about so many projects at once, which Denise finds is common, but not always helpful, especially when you want to be the best at everything you try and have an itch that needs to be scratched. 

It's important to be consistent in your business. Even if you're the person who comes up with ideas all the time, you can find where that fits into consistency. For example, some people may hire someone to help them brainstorm or create space to do it themselves. The value of your service does not equal the value of you as a person.

Chill is different for everyone. For Denise, something that helps her chill is that she likes to batch her podcast recordings in advance. She also recognizes she has to keep it in check, because she has a tendency to go overboard and you can get too into that intensity if you aren't careful. 

Get in Touch with Our Guest

Denise Duffield-Thomas
Preorder Denise's book Chill & Prosper here.
Get a copy of Get Rich, Lucky Bitch here. 
Listen to Denise's podcast here. 
Check out Denise's website here. 
Follow Denise on Instagram and TikTok.