My Epiphany

Does hard work = more success?

To be more + have more, do we have to do more? Hustle more? And grind until we’re exhausted?

For a really long time I had a HUGE goal on my vision board. I'm talking a BHAG (big, hairy, audacious goal) and the type of goal that would make me cry when I visualised it whilst scaring the pants off me at the same time.

But I had this inner most dominant thought take over every single time I would think about it, or work towards it or plan for it…

“I just cant do it, its too much hard work”.

You see, I had this belief that you have to work harder in order to reach the success you’ve desired to reach + holy moley I was already working SO HARD I just didn’t know how I was meant to put any more effort in.

%FIRSTNAME%, what if I told you thats a glass ceiling belief holding us back from creating wild abundance in our lives?

You see, I was coming from a mega scarcity mindset with thoughts like:

“I don’t have enough time to fit this all in”
"There aren't enough hours in the day”
“If I slept less I could fit in more”
"I’m working back to back and I’m exhausted”
“I’ll skip todays work out and get straight into it to get more done today”
"She's successful, but look how hard she works, do I really want that?"

And so on, and so on… perhaps you’ve been hustlin HARD and you’re reading this thinking… “YEP this is me & I’m tired now!!”.

That was me.

It wasn’t sexy, or fun… it was exhausting and I was getting nowhere near my BHAG goal, in fact I was going backwards, getting further and further away from it.

I found myself thinking IS THIS REALLY IT? Is this the path for me grinding my days away just constantly feeling like I’m climbing a big AF mountain with its own weather system, all day every day? Blood, sweat, tears, ugly cry faces, never-ending 24/7 go-go-go HARD WORK? 😩

- 15+ hour days,
- Back to back meetings,
- 100 tabs open (on my computer screen and in my mind),
- 4573485643 projects at one time,
- Brain working faster than my computer so chopping and changing between tasks ,
- Always running late, feeling guilty, feeling stressed, burnt out,
- Crying of frustration &
- Feeling like a goddamn slave…

I'm embarrassed to say but for nearly 30 years, I had always believed that hard work was the ONLY key to success.

But after I started to get a grasp the concept of flow, moon tracking, and setting intentions (the right way)...

I realised that:

HARD WORK = SUCCESS = BIG FAT B.S .

You’ve been lied to all along. And you know what… it stops today!

Here’s the truth…

It's true that it took me about 2 years of hard grind to get to a very comfortable point in my business, in the beginning, it looked something like 12+ hours a day to earn a $20K pay cheque at the end of the month by the second year.

I hustled hard.

When I hit that income goal after two years, I thought to myself... "If I have to do that all over again to double my business then I want out, I simply can't do that again".

In hindsight, I was doing it all wrong back then and I could have possibly gotten the same result, with way more grace, ease & flow if I had:

JUST. LET. GO.

I’m proud to say we eventually reached that BHAG goal once I figured this out. My husband and I frekin smashed it out of the park 2.5 years into business & we did it while on our 12 month honeymoon traveling the world. In flow.

What I’ve learnt from this?

Working harder is NOT the magic sauce of success.

And NO, money isn’t the ONLY reflection of success or happiness… I know many people extremely abundant financially and they are by no means happy or “successful”. It's about impact. Emotional revenue. It's about fulfilment. Joy. Giving back. Living life aligned with your highest values. Who you can help. Your favourite causes you can tithe or donate your time to. How happy you are doing the things that light you up daily. That's true wealth.

However I do believe abundance is a reflection of your self worth, of how dedicated you are to growing and evolving, of how aligned you are with what you’re doing, and your commitment to your vision, your mission, your purpose and your “why”.

The TRUTH about success is actually this:

Hustle is NOT SEXY, it's exhausting & you can drop the facade that you enjoy it right now.

Success is meant to be FUN. If you’re not having fun, reconsider what you’re doing and why. Doing something you hate will not bring more abundance to you.

Success is meant to FLOW, it's meant to feel like you are in the right place, at the right time and the universe will do a really fab job of dropping nice hints to remind you of that.

Success comes from aligning yourself with energies that make you FEEL good, giving back, creating impact + doing good things.

Success comes from INSPIRED ACTION, not from action you force yourself to do because you feel you need to.

Success comes from balancing that yin and yang energy in your life, if you’re taking massive action and it feels misaligned, it will never bring you fulfilment.

Success, money & goals getting ticked off are meaningless when you are not truly happy or aligned. Being unhappy with all your goals being met = not successful.

So here's what happened to me…

When we decided to let go of the hustle, my hubby + I sold up our things, stored what was left in storage, packed a bag, flew to Europe with a one way ticket, bought a car + we drove through each country living each day without a plan for tomorrow.

THIS IS SO UNLIKE ME.

BUT… it's the best thing that ever happened, I was forced to find that beautiful balance between hustle + flow, for the first time ever.

I had to practice dipping in and out of both yin and yang energies within my business …

** enter MORE SUCCESS **.

I was forced to stop and smell the roses when the internet stopped working (hello, a daily occurrence when you’re on the move hopping from one air bnb to another), I was forced to sit in nature more, laugh more, relax more, take it easy more, look outside my window more, use my sign language skills in countries I couldn't speak the language, learn to read maps more, learn to surrender and stop trying to control everything.

When I let go and surrendered, the abundance began to flow in.

Whattt?

For someone who always thought to be more, earn more + grow rapidly you had to “work harder”, this was hard to grasp. I’ve learnt that hustle is not hot and I’ve decided that’s NOT what success looks like to me in my eyes…

I guess our trip around the world forced me to cut down on the grind, get back in touch with nature, explore more, play more & deal with not-so-great wifi so I can jump offline more :)

“So… let me get this right does this mean that I should just sit around and do nothin?”

NO! 🙈

In order for the Universe to keep up the flow of all of our dreams + desires, we must keep taking action on them.

You just need to find the difference between hustling & allowing, which is simply this:

Directionless, painful, forced action = hard work. Ew.

Inspired, focused, fulfilling action = Allowing. Receiving. Abundance. Success. YUM!

So if you’ve been tirelessly hustling your butt off and you’re over it. I challenge you to stop.

Breathe.

Meditate.

Ask for guidance.

Ask yourself what is the lesson you need to learn here?

Who do you need to become?

What needs to change?

How are you feeling about what you’ve been doing?

Take a weekend getaway.

Heck, get yourself a one way ticket outta here. It worked for me!

Relax.

Pat more animals.

Hang out with puppies.

Ground yourself in Mother Nature cos she’s pretty frekin beautiful.

Bask in the sunshine naked.

Press snooze.

Read a book.

Take a bath.

Smile.

Pray.

Whatever you do, just detach yourself from the hustle and tune into what YOU actually need to do. Which is to take a step back… in order to take two steps forward.

Know you are worthy of all the success in the world. 

You deserve all the success and accolades in the world, but be a receiver of that success, not a forcer.

And as Abraham Hicks says:

"Once you figure out what it is you want, your work is not to set sights on it and think about it all day long. Your work is to CHILL. Your work is not to figure out what the path is because the path is being revealed to you. You just have to figure out how to be receptive to the information about the path”

I hope this has served you.

Chani x