My Dear and Wonderful Friends,
This coming Wednesday night we are doing a special FREE webinar about creating a Soul Based Business and life – and one of the things that I wanted to share with everyone this week is my personal story about how a part of that program – the concept of value – has touched my life –especially recently! Margaret and I talk all about this concept in the first class of the program, going into how to determine what are the things that you truly value; what do other’s value in you; do you see yourself as being value-able; and how would you like to be remembered – what values will people remember about you. But the most important component is teaching you how to best value yourself – and in so doing – how to not only be of service in your value of others – but how to value your own life and happiness with equal importance! This is often a difficult concept for us to grasp as we are so used to our role as a “human-doing” – trying to do whatever we can to be of service and love to others – that we forget how to be a “human-being” – that place where we honor ourselves for who we are and not just what we do!
For most of us this isn’t something we set out to do. It is something that kind of grows around us – like a snowball rolling down a mountain. That’s what happened to me as I began to expand my work with Margaret, after the Hay House books and the radio program began reaching people throughout the world. Margaret and I wanted to be able to touch as many individual lives as possible. So, we began to offer substantially discounted rates on services that would allow us to do so. At the same time, I was moving from working full-time as a Newspaper Publisher to making this my full time vocation. So my being of service in working with Margaret not only became my passion – it became the sole support for my family – and I needed to grow it quickly! I began to notice a couple of things that happened as a result of the reduced rates. We became very busy with booking half hour readings, at 50% off and even sometimes 66% off the original rate, and Margaret always went over the half hour! Margaret often says of herself that she loves to talk! Almost every reading ran between 35 to 45 minutes. It became clear that in order to support my family, and keep the discounted rates, I would have to do two to three times the number of readings – and would need to increase my available time to do so.
Let me be clear that I was, and still am, so very grateful for those readings and all the wonderful people who schedule them! But the increased schedule gave me little time for being with my family – let alone creating new books or programs – or follow up with clients. Many of you even kindly commented on how we were doing all this, since we were starting most days at 6am and ending at 11pm. And the more I listened to Margaret, speaking to others in readings, about creating balance in their lives – the more I realized that I needed to look more closely at how to better define my soul based life – and to avoid the burnout that has happened to me in the past when I put in too many hours and didn’t do things to care for myself. I am sure that so many, if not most of you, can relate to that burnout as well!
When I looked at how we were being of value to others, I could see that some valued the discounts because it gave them the affordability do Soul Reclamation or to ask Margaret their most burning questions. Other’s loved the extra time that Margaret would spend with them. My challenge then was how to find a way where I could still keep offering outstanding value and additional time to all of you – while creating more available time so that Margaret and I could create even more things to help expand her messages and “walk the talk” of all that we were teaching others – while also leaving me some more time for family and self! Stephen Covey, who’s work I so respect, would call this creating the “win, win, win” scenario – in which all parties would be able to receive value!
I sought out advice both from Margaret and colleagues that I greatly respect, and I think we came up with a way to do this! We found a way to keep the most affordable reading rate possible (a $50 reading), increase the amount of time for regular readings (from 30 to 45 minutes) – while even reducing the cost – and we established Easy Payment Plans for services like Soul Reclamation and Private Coaching (available now in three monthly payments)! And to make this transition easier for you, we offered substantially discounted rates for the full month of May (which ends tomorrow) as part of our Month of Expansion. We wanted to allow you the ability to expand your access to our services, through some final discounted specials, while we were designing a method to create permanent value!
While making these changes was a little scary – as I mentioned in last week’s newsletter – it was crucial to be able to find a way to offer stable ongoing services, that could offer as much value as we possibly could to all of you – while not always having to do pricing specials. The idea of something special is that it should be new and different and not part of the consistent menu of services. Most times, when you go to a restaurant and the server tells you about the specials – they aren’t regular menu items that are just lower in price! They are a creative new dishes that expand upon the regular menu and that is what we need the time to prepare for all of you. We want to create new helpful content to give you tools to make your life more joy filled! We want to offer more direct social media connection with all of you – with channeled Messages from Margaret that are both timely and inspiring! We would like to offer more Facebook LIVE events and Living Room Tour Events! And most of all we want to help to lead by example and to offer you ways to see that you can create “win,win,win” situations in your lives and that creating value in all you do – especially in how you view yourself is truly possible! I hope that all of you will love this new direction and will support us in our desire to expand how we can support you! You will find all of the details posted on the website later this week under its own slide show header.
Why I am sharing all this with you, is that I know that this situation is not something that I alone have grappled with. So many of you struggle with how to best offer your services – especially when they are “spiritual” in nature! Even those of you with more traditional businesses, or those of you who work for others, seek to find ways where your customers or employers could better understand your value. I think that part of that begins with looking first at what your clients, or your employer currently needs and values the most in you and your services and then expanding from there. Look first at their desires and then offer services that can answer those desires– while respecting your desires as well!
It might seem odd to be closing this message with words from none other than the “King of Rock and Roll,” Elvis Presley, but I saw a quote, credited to him, saying, “Values are like fingerprints. Nobody’s are the same, but you leave them all over everything you do.” I hope that in all we do that we have left fingerprints that assist you to value who you are – and who you are evolving into…a wonderful, incredible, limitless soul who is valued not just by what you perform as a “human-doing” but in whom you are as a “human-being!”
With great love and value for all you are,
Gerry
