Happy October update to the 2023 Goal Setting Challenge: How to Make 2023 Your Best Year Yet, October Edition! If you’re new here, throughout 2023, I have implemented a goal-setting challenge to hold myself accountable to my big dreams. Each month, I’m serving updates via the Blog and Podcast to keep you informed (and hold me accountable to making progress). We’re covering topics of success, where I’m facing blocks, falling short, and where I plan to improve over the next month. Each update is becoming a small piece of the 365-day puzzle where I’m actively tracking my progress over one year. My overall goal for this year has been to seek balance in every aspect of my life. This challenge has been an excellent source of motivation to show up each day as the best version of myself possible.

September has been a very exciting month. I began my month-long travel stint where I’ve been going to Charleston for some very exciting clients; and, in just a few days, I’ll be traveling to Cleveland, Ohio for the Forbes 30 Under 30 Summit! But in the meantime, I have some exciting updates for you about my goals. A few months back, I decided I was ready to start developing out the next phase of my business. In making that decision, a lot of my goals pivoted for the year. The online La.Rue community for women entrepreneurs building intentional lives and intentional business will be launching in early 2024. Building out this community requires great attention to detail, cultivating a network of support for purpose driven visionaries. This major shift has brought on a different perspective surrounding my goals, and I’m excited to share those realizations with you.

September Reflections & October Progress

Mindset

As an entrepreneur, I’ve learned over the years that launches in your business can feel as exciting as they are scary. You put so much time, energy, passion, and even money into something, and sometimes, it doesn’t go as planned. I felt that way about most of my launches up until the last year. When my team and I started building out this project (so many details to come!!), I realized something. As scary as it has felt—and still does feel—to put myself out there, I knew that if I wanted this community to be successful, I needed to start sharing it. I can’t launch something with no warning and expect it to be a success in one day. I have to share the excitement and show the value of investment. To do this, I needed to believe in the value I have to offer.

Self-worth and value is something I still struggle with today. Not to the level that I once did, but I think it’s one of those things we’ll face periodically in our lives. When I decided I wanted to launch the online community, I really thought about how much value I could offer to the masses. I mean this is my dream—my real, enormous dream. One day, I want to be running physical locations around the world that offer resources, coaching, workshops, and more to women entrepreneurs. If I dare say so, I want to change the face of the entrepreneurship industry for women. So it’s safe to say that over the last few months, my mindset has wavered. It’s contributed to my resistance in actually following through with this launch, but I’m still here.

Resistance

The resistance I’m feeling has been a wave of several emotions: fear, disbelief, lack of worthiness, etc. But at the end of each day, after I’ve accomplished something towards this goal of launching the community, I feel this sense of excitement and exhilaration that I never have before. The resistance isn’t based on a doubt that this might not be successful, I know it will be. The resistance feels like a manifested fear my past self. A girl that didn’t believe in herself or her value. Any resistance we face towards achieving our goals is rooted in a past belief that we cannot. They’re based on a moment or experience in our life that taught us not to believe in ourselves. I’ve worked really hard to heal those own experiences in my past life. But even still, they appear when the dreams grow with exceptional height.

Since beginning this project, I’ve felt unwavering confidence in the idea, but my confidence has wavered in myself. It’s funny to say this, but my way of addressing this has been to be incredibly honest with myself about realistic ways for this to be successful. I can’t do all the behind the scenes work without any real “promoting” and expect it to be a success. I have to find a solid balance between being behind the scenes and on the front lines of work. Resistance towards our goals doesn’t always mean we don’t believe in them. More often than not, any resistance we’re feeling is because we do believe in it, but we’re not sure others will.

How I’m growing in October

I feel incredibly optimistic moving into the next month of this challenge. Even after writing this blog and recording the podcast (October Update: Having Gratitude & Being Present), I feel a weight has been lifted. I’ve been receiving signs left and right that this is the right path and the correct next step. So over the next month, my plan for October is to lean into that belief. Lean into the confidence and excitement of this launch without putting blinders on to the work that’s required. As appropriate for our word of the year, I need to find a balance between the work I’m doing and my faith in myself.

UPDATES

Want to follow along even more on the journey to make 2023 your best year yet: October edition? I’m also updating you and going into far greater detail once a month on the podcast! You can follow along there and subscribe to the La.Rue Thrive Hive Newsletter as well to follow along for updates on my 2023 progress. I’ll update you on the podcast on how I plan to improve next month. I’ll continue talking about what resistance I’m facing and what solutions I plan to find! I encourage you to comment below on your progress so far in 2023 and how you plan to improve. Feel free to drop any questions in the comments, and I’ll see you next month!