But, how??? I've been asking that same question about successful entrepreneurs for years.
I'd watch someone build an empire, something that actually worked, and my brain would go straight past admiration into mechanics. Not what they did. How. It's the question that eventually drove nearly every story we’ve produced over the past 10+ years across multiple platforms. I've built a whole career on finding the how for other people…and of course, for my younger self.
I used to take that simple question as evidence of my curiosity and background in stage performance. I’ve been behind the scenes of countless productions watching how the lights, sounds, movement, and lines come together to make magic happen.
So imagine my surprise when I realized that question was driven by a deeper limiting belief that’s been calling the shots all along.
The Belief I Didn't Know Was Driving Everything
My mother was a serial side-hustler. Strike that. My mother has always had heart and hustle in general, full stop.
My whole childhood, I watched her try a range of direct sales businesses like Avon and Mary Kay while she held down a full-time high stakes corporate career. From hosting product parties at our home to vending at flea markets, it seemed like she tried one thing after another, but none of it ever quite took off. She's also been my hero, so much so, that when I envision what's possible for someone like me, she's usually the reference point I check against. So somewhere in there, without ever deciding to, I started telling myself this story:
If she couldn't make entrepreneurship work (and she's the standard), it must not be possible for people like us.
Somehow her experience became evidence I started to own. That's what makes an unconscious belief dangerous, especially one you’ve inherited. It doesn't feel like a belief. It feels like a fact you happened to witness.
It wasn’t until a business buddy introduced me to an episode of “A Really Good Cry with Radhi Devlukia” that I was able to catch this not-so-dormant belief calling a bunch of shots and secretly driving all kinds of behaviors. She helped me dig deep until we uncovered the root of my “But hows?” and then she gave me a listening list. (This is why everyone needs a business buddy.)
In this episode about manifestation, money, and spiritual laws, spiritual coach David Ghiyam talks about the fifteen years he spent broke because of a belief he'd never examined either. "I had a limited belief that having money means you're going to lose your family. As soon as I changed it, that's when the gates opened," he shared.
When I heard that, I knew I was on to something, and I’ve since thought, this is probably happening to lots of ambitious, purpose-driven folks like us. For David, he inherited his family’s money story where "everything has to be saved and nothing is to be enjoyed." For me, it was, “my mom couldn’t figure it out, so I probably won’t be able to either.” Both beliefs were absorbed early, from people we love and trust, and at some point, they capped what we thought was available to us.
But all that is over now.
Not only have I caught and reframed that limiting belief, I also see what my mother has been able to accomplish since then. She’s spent the last couple of decades building a tax and real estate business, and now she’s into real estate investments, too. She continues to invest in learning more and growing her networks, and as a result, she’s sustained business success for years. So looking back, that belief wasn't even accurate. It was just unexamined.
Catching Your Limiting Beliefs
I'm not writing this because I have all the answers. I still see entrepreneurs buying multi-million dollar homes on some of my favorite real estate reality shows and ask, “But how?”
But what's different is now I actually have a way to answer that. It's called the Five Whys, something my business buddy and I both learned in an entrepreneurship program, though I didn't expect to be the one on the receiving end of it.
It’s simple. I told her something vague: that sometimes business building felt elusive to me. Then she asked why, and I answered. She asked why again, straight into that answer, and kept going. I didn't need all five. I was already tearing up by the second response because that's how fast it gets real when you're ready to face the truth. By the third or fourth time she asked, I was standing face-to-face with that simple belief that had been running things the whole time.
So now, I’m able to pause and address that old belief head on. Then I reframe it with the truth, which for me is, “I have everything I need to build a thriving, multi-million dollar business.”
And it’s time to tell yourself a new story, too.
Because this part of building something on your own terms has nothing to do with your funnel, offer, or your pricing. It's noticing that a belief you've been treating as evidence might just be an inheritance you never opened up to check.
It’s time to catch those beliefs and tell yourself the truth: that anything is possible, and you can build the career and life of your dreams.
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Move in purpose, on purpose. The Purpose Post tells the stories of creatives and founders who stopped waiting for permission and made their move. If you're already in motion, or getting ready to be, you belong here. Join us. 👇🏾
