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Strategy

How to Discover TRUE Success by Identifying the Right Business Model for You

There comes a point in the journey of every successful entrepreneur where they ask themselves, “Is this it? Is this all?” 

They’ve had the success. They’ve made the money. But they’re still not satisfied.

Beyond that, they’re burnt out. Exhausted. Tired of working day and night for something that’s no longer bringing them happiness.

The question is, what do you do when you hit this point?

How do you rebuild your business from the ground up in a way that will support you over the long-term?

Best-selling author and million-dollar business builder Alexis Neely had to go through divorce and bankruptcy to figure it out and now she wants to help other entrepreneurs discover their own path to financial liberation and personal sovereignty during our upcoming Online Business Superhero Summit.

Here’s Alexis’s story. I know it’s long but I definitely recommend that you tune-in.

The feedback we got from our tribe on this was amazing:

“Oh my God! We came for online business facts and we are getting life wisdoms, so moving and valuable.” – Anja

OK, here goes from Alexis Neely:

2009. I was super successful in a traditional sense, appearing on TV and all the top television networks, you know Today’s Show, Good Morning America.

My business was doing 2 million a year and I built this real brand, this real image, this real persona around Alexis Neely. That’s the name that I was born with and then married into.

And yet there was this voice in the back of my head that was saying, “There’s something else, this success feel’s empty, this is not what you came here to do, you didn’t come here to this world now to go on TV and gossip about Tiger Wood’s divorce, just to coach lawyers to make more money, this is not who you are Alexis, what are you doing? You’re wasting your life on this external form of success, when are you going to step into the real you?”

Now I didn’t have any idea what this voice was talking about. Who is this real me? What do you mean? I am being successful, I wrote a bestselling book, come on, what else is there?

And yet I knew that there was more.

It turns out that I had to let go of everything that I had built in order to find out what that was so from the period of about 2010 to 2012 I did that. I shut all of it, I brought my companies down to the littlest that they could possibly be because I kept hearing people in my businesses saying, “Alexis you can’t do that, Alexis you can’t wear that, Alexis you can’t say that, Alexis you can’t write that. You’ll hurt the business.” And that isn’t why I went into business.

I didn’t go into business to be trapped by the trappings of success. I went into business to be able to be fully expressed, to be able to be all of who I really am and I didn’t even know who I was so that was very confusing for me.

So in order to find out who I was and what I really stood for, I decided that the answer was to let go of everything I thought was important and get myself to a place where money was off the table.

I was no longer making any decisions based on money whatsoever, which meant that I needed to shrink my expenses back to the littlest they could be because when you’re running 2 million dollars’ worth of businesses, what that means is that your writing checks of at least a million dollars a year, at least.

I mean that’s really what makes a difference between a hundred thousand dollar business owner and a million dollar business owner — it’s the size of the checks that your writing or the amount of credit that you’re running, because your profit margins are generally going to be around a third to fifty percent. That means you’re spending the rest of what’s coming in.

Nobody ever taught me that but I found out very quickly, that in order to maintain a business of that size, you have to spend that kind of money so in order to take money off the table, what I had to do was shrink my expenses back to as little as they could possibly be and I went and I lived on a farm for a year. I stopped paying all of my bills other than what was necessary.

I connected with my community very deeply. I didn’t really have any community before that. I didn’t really have any friends before that. Everybody that I was friendly with was friends from a business perspective, it was like, what can I give you, what can I get from you, what can you get for me, what can I get from you, etc. It was all transactional.

Even though I thought I was a relationship oriented person, what I had built in my life was based on transaction.

And Marisa, you and I knew each other back then but I don’t think we got close in any means because I didn’t get close with anybody. It was all about the business and that was painful. It didn’t feel good at all, but I really didn’t know another way. That is what I had understood success was.

So I went and I lived on a farm for a year and started to really connect with the community here in Colorado. I moved out of LA. I came to Colorado. I start to really reconnect deeply with my kids. I started to really reconnect deeply with myself.

I found a whole other version of myself, her name is “Ali Shanti”, and most of the time today I go by Ali.

I use Alexis Neely still for business because people in business know Alexis Neely and what’s funny is that today, as I am Alexis Neely, Ali Shanti is here all the time.

Awhile back that wasn’t the case, there was kind of this separation. There was Alexis Neely and there was Ali Shanti and I didn’t really understand how the two interacted. So, when I was Alexis Neely, I’d blow my hair out straight and put on my make-up and, you know, I would put on my Alexis Neely super hero costume, right?

But over the past couple of years, the journey for me as I’ve come back into the world, I left the farm. I filed bankruptcy while I was there and I came back out into the world and I learned how to integrate Alexis Neely and Ali Shanti. So today I am both, Alexis Neely and Ali Shanti.

I’ve rebuilt those businesses, different businesses. I reconstructed them with different models because the models I had built did not work, they were based on the old paradigm that, if that’s what we try to build our businesses on, they will crumble. You will not be able to maintain it unless you are truly some kind of a superhero with a heart of steel. It’s simply not sustainable, as we really truly move into this we economy, into the new paradigm.

What we’ll find, what I believe that you’ll find, is that, it has to be built on relationship but not just the kind of relationship that Michael Drew is talking about, although that is the foundation. The kind of relationship that is with yourself, where you truly can be all of who you are without shame, without doubt, without fear, without worry that people are not going to like you, people are not going to understand you. In fact, that is what people want from you and you can’t do it alone.

So it’s not just about being in relationship with your clients and your prospects and your referral sources, it’s about being in a relationship with your team and your community.

So today, the 2 businesses that exist aren’t even my businesses, they do similar things to what the other businesses did and I still have those old other businesses as well but what the businesses today do, they‘re run by entire teams of people that care about these businesses as much as I do — maybe even more, honesty, than I do.

One business still serves lawyers and teaches lawyers a new law business model. The other one still serves entrepreneurs and teaches new paradigm business models and legal insurance and financial and tax systems, I am not the CEO of either of those businesses, I am just on the team.

I might be the face because that’s my particular role but I am operating in my – and I know exactly how much money I need to be bringing in. Not so that I can go out there and sell as much as I possibly can and take as much as I can for myself, but so that the entire company, the entire ecosystem that we have created, can be supported in a sustainable way.

So today, these businesses are back to making more than 2 million dollars a year in revenue but I don’t feel trapped by it anymore because I am able to be fully myself.

They are not even my businesses. I have access to them. They’re able to serve the work that I am here to do in the world, but not just the work that I am here to do in the world, the work that the entire team is here to do in the world.

I am just part of it and I am operating in my own entrepreneurial archetype and as well as every member of the team is as well.

Each person is receiving from the business what they need so they can live a life of true financial liberation as well, knowing that they can earn what they need, when they need it on demand, none of us feeling as if we have to hoard the resources of the company for our own personal gain but sharing them as much as we can, as much as possible so that everyone benefits and we are able to create more as a result.

=====

Alexis Neely / Ali Shanti will be kicking off the Online Business Superhero Summit on Monday, July 7th @ 12pm PST with a talk about financial liberation and how you can discover your own path to sovereignty in the new economy.

If you are coming online, there are so many different models: there are programs, products, courses, tele-summits, tele-seminars, licensing, certification, you name it.

But what’s right for you? Should you be a virtual assistant, an online business manager, working behind the scenes, in front of the scenes?

Alexis will help you discover your true definition of success, so you can build a business that allows you to make a huge difference without sacrificing yourself along the way.

==> Click here to pre-register for the Summit and Alexis’ training: Financial Liberation: Discover Your Path to Sovereignty in the New Economy.

 

 

Love it? Hate it? Let me know...

  1. spencer Avatar
    spencer

    How do I join in webinars … especially ones with Q&A. Jupiter Jim recommends you and your program.
    Thannks,
    Spencer

    1. Marisa Murgatroyd Avatar
      Marisa Murgatroyd

      Hi Spencer – Is there a specific program that you’re interested in? I’m in the South of France and not doing any webinars live until July, but I could point you to a replay for now.

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