The Profits Genie

With the Tooth Fairy and Some Leprechauns

It’s honestly ridiculous… downright embarrassing, even, that it took me so long. Math is my thing. I spent almost two decades in finance. Professionally. I had started my first business at around 8 or 9 years old, making jewelry and selling it to my classmates. I also had a thriving carwash business for a weekend when I was about 10, paying my employees in cupcakes. I am a serial entrepreneur, for crying out loud! I look back now and realize that I hadn’t been nearly as skilled as I’d thought, and a whole lot more just plain lucky than I’d realized. 

Profit. Financial freedom. Generational wealth. All those things that we say to each other with a shine in our eyes as we meet in group coaching, summits, seminars, and networking events. I see it all so clearly now.

My first year in my first “big time” business, I nervously submitted everything I thought I was supposed to for my CPA to review. Great news! I’d made a profit! Excellent; how do I get that, please? Where is it? Oh, I’ve already spent it? Hmmm… I don’t feel like I’ve spent that amount of money this year. Okay, I’ll pay closer attention next year.

Wow! I’ve doubled my profit year over year! That’s amazing; I must be really good at this! But…ummm… where is that money? I don’t understand why I am not seeing and feeling the impacts in my life and my household. You know what? I probably need more staff so I can sell more and be more focused to work on the business instead of in the business. That’s what they tell us, right? I bet that will do the trick. That’s what I’ve been missing.

Wait… what happened? I actually sold less this year with more people… My people don’t seem to have the passion and skills that I have for this business. Ugh! Silly me! I didn’t train them properly. I’ll just train them right up! I’m a really good teacher and trainer; people have told me so for years. No problem; I can fix this.

Is this sounding familiar to anyone else? I remember the moment it finally clicked for me. I had made a really big sale and a nice fat juicy check was coming. I wanted to do many more just like that, so I finally upgraded to that software I’d been eyeing, and I hired that marketing consultant who had all the answers, and I got those super cool tech tools that were going to make me sonic-boom fast and efficient! I was going to make so many more of those checks, with even more zeros in front of the decimal point!

That big fat juicy check came and I deposited it into the bank. Then, as I was paying bills, I slowly and horrifyingly realized that in my zeal to grow and be better and smarter, I’d already spent that tantalizing check twice over, if not three times. It was gone before I ever even had it in my eager hands. I had cool tools and a brilliant marketing consultant who was telling me all the things I should be doing, even when I disagreed about whether the commands aligned with my vision or goals. And I had no money. Again.

I had worked so hard to get to that point, and I had done well in numerous businesses before. I had no doubt that I could do this business; nay, should do this business. It finally hit me like the proverbial ton of bricks: my only saving grace had been my ability to out-earn my foolishness. It was far less skill and more just stumbling backwards into good fortune.

Don’t misunderstand me. I describe myself as a “relentless optimist.” I absolutely still believed that I could and would continue to outearn my prior foolishness. But I didn’t want to have to. Not anymore. I didn’t want to just keep throwing spaghetti at the wall to see what would stick. I wanted to be smarter and more strategic about my businesses, my growth, my finances, and my profit. 

It was amazing to me every year that my CPA told me how much profit I’d earned! From businesses that I just made up! I came up with ideas and I poured blood, sweat, tears, and a ton of joy into my endeavors. And people actually paid me for my skills! The time had arrived for me to stop wondering where that alleged “profit” was, other than at the bottom of an annual report. I could see the line item there, and I understood the math to arrive at such a number. But I could not identify it in my life! Yep… mmhmm… the accountant praised me for making money. And the IRS sure let me know that I was paying them for the privilege of having earned it. Yet, where was it? Why couldn’t I put my hands on it?

I even got super desperate many times, actually considering “real jobs,” and even going so far as to put in a few applications and resumes. Yet, as I hit the “submit” buttons on those applications, I knew that it would only be a bandage over something that required surgery. I was only going to work for someone else long enough to increase my comfort level to start again with my own business. In actual fact, I knew that I wasn’t even going to close my already operating businesses; I was going to keep them going as side hustles until I could leap headlong into them again. I decided to hold off as long as possible on the bandage phase, and maybe skip it completely if my good luck held out. I was going to figure out the surgery and just get it done. 

When people ask me now what I do, I explain as succinctly as I can (because I really really really like words) that I am a serial entrepreneur, certified small business coach, and an entrepreneur consultant. I help business owners see and use their profit. The vast majority of entrepreneurs and small business owners that I encounter are happy, but not prosperous, or they are prosperous but not happy. I help them to be both at the same time. I do occasionally encounter a few who are simultaneously happy and prosperous; enough of them to keep the faith alive that it is real and not a myth. The rest of us, though, are working 8 days a week to continuously feed the business monster we’ve built and which has now enslaved us, or we are working a mere 60 hours a week and still trying to get to a revenue goal that we think will make us comfortable. We hear about the “four hour work week,” and we smile and dream, while inwardly thinking that it sounds about as likely as stumbling across a magic lamp with a wish-granting genie. Maybe the tooth fairy and a couple leprechauns are hanging out with the genie, too.

If you, like me and so many others, are seeking personal fulfillment and prosperity at the same time, then we should talk. If you want to be better at making a profit and also knowing where it actually is, if this resonates with you, contact me. I’m here to help. No magic; just good sense.