Ep. 114 – Sometimes You Just Have to Embrace the Suck

Tips on How to Handle Imposter Syndrome…and January

It’s the doldrums of January. Christmas has passed. Deer season is over and I didn’t get a deer.

Although I love the snow. I can’t do anything when it’s zero degrees outside and 25 mph wind like it is today.

Like many of you, I’m starting to get the seed catalogs and I’m starting to plan my garden, even though I really need to stay in the moment and embrace this season.

We live in a world where we want permanence, but we buy stuff that breaks – and we do it on purpose.

So this episode is about how to Embrace the Suck:

(military slang) To consciously accept or appreciate something that is extremely unpleasant but unavoidable.

Listen on your fave Podcast app:

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Tips on How to Handle Imposter Syndrome

In addition to the cold, I have been fighting Imposter Syndrome. Way back in Episode 11, we talked about Imposter Syndrome. Even though I’ve been at this for two years, I still struggle with Imposter Syndrome once in a while. So what is Imposter Syndrome? It’s especially affects entrepreneurs. It’s that self-doubt. It’s that thinking: “you’re not good enough”.

It’s thinking that “I’m not an expert and I feel like I’m going to get called out on it.”

I’ve been doing this for two years, but I interviewed Nicole Sauce back in December and halfway through the interview I suddenly had a little bit of an anxiety attack. I thought, “I’m interviewing Nicole Sauce!” and I let it get in my head and it affected the rest of the interview, even though the interview turned out great and it wasn’t a problem.

Embrace the Season, Embrace the Suck

As an entrepreneur or anything else in life, there’s a season. It’s like the moon. It waxes and it wanes. And sometimes the waning is a time for reflection and change. So leave time for the change and expect it. Have the mindset of Change and then you won’t be surprised when it happens.

Last year I was just starting Grow Nut Trees and I was confounded why people really weren’t buying elderberry, comfrey, and elderberry cuttings in the Spring. (Because hey, I plant stuff in February and March). But if you look on Google Trends for Comfrey – that search term doesn’t even really peak until May when the Normies are doing the garden planning and doing their planting. To expect anything else is to expect things that just aren’t going to be.

As a side note, elderberry cuttings are now available on GrowNutTrees.com. Go check it out.

If you’re an entrepreneur and you are feeling this, it means that you are getting ready to grow. It’s normal, so embrace it.

Tips on how you can Embrace the Suck

Here are some tips on how you can Embrace the Suck, whether you’re an entrepreneur or whether you’re not:

Look back and on your wins and celebrate them.
Embrace the suck and learn from your losses. A lot of the times the losses are just bad timing, like I said with my elderberry cuttings. Or it means that you need to tweak something, you need to adjust, you need to change.
Ask yourself what can I learn from this?
If you’re an entrepreneur, diversify. We are all stuck in a one-income mindset and that’s not how it works. In a side hustle, that’s not how it works. In entrepreneurship, you need to have multiple income streams.
And the best tip is to Rest. And at this time, where it’s the downtime, the doldrums of January: Plan. Everybody thinks that the nursery guy or the farmer are sitting around doing nothing at this time of year. But if you talk to anyone, like Akiva Silver from Twisted Tree Farms, they’re doing planning and they might use this time to also do marketing and write a book. They’re doing something, they’re not just sitting around. Sure it’s not as busy as summertime, but it has a season, it has a place.

If you’re an entrepreneur, sure you are not an expert, but you’re still going to Get Stuff Done (#GSD). This is how you do it. (I saw this from Justin Welsh):

You know more than you did a year ago or two years ago. Aim your marketing, your message, and your product at who you were two years ago and talk to that person. Aim at that person. It shouldn’t be too hard to do because that person is, or was, you. It may be hard to get back into that mindset, but you were there. Speak to that person, aim at that person, market to that person.

Free Your Mindset

And finally, just turn Off the BS. 2024 is going to be a tough year. It’s the election year. There’s a whole lot of stuff going on that is made to get you to click, that is made to get you to Like, that is made to get you riled up, especially if you spend time on Twitter. That’s their whole business model is. So turn the BS off and you’ll be surprised how you feel.

Take this downtime opportunity to reset, and you will be ready for the next phase of your journey.

Will Horvath of Permaculture Apprentice has opened up his Permaculture Farm Design Course and it is HALF price for the next week. Click here to get it for $197 now through Jan-26.

Check out the NEW 2024 Homesteading Bundle from Permies, which has 35 e-books, courses, videos.

What I really liked:

The Backyard Forest Garden e-book
Agroforestry
Restoration Agriculture: Designing Your Perennial Farm presentation from Permaculture Voices by Mark Shepard
Permaculture Thorns, A Book About Trying to Build Permaculture Community, by Paul Wheaton.
Plus 2 books by Nicole Sauce.

homesteading-and-permaculture-bundle — Homesteading and permaculture bundle

Check out Thriving News – Thriving Community News, Without the Noise.

GrowNutTrees.com

I elderberry plants, elderberry cuttings, comfrey crowns and root cuttings available. Adapted to the Midwest.

Seeds and trees have “memory”. They thrived and reproduced in a certain climate.

Often when you buy chestnut trees or seeds online, you have to buy from nurseries in the Northeast or Southeast US, or the Pacific Northwest.

Take it from us, trees grown in those climates do not do well in Kansas.

Buying from our Kansas homestead, with nut trees grown and adapted to the Midwest, will make them much more likely to be successful on your homestead or in your yard.

Order now at GrowNutTrees.com