Leap Academy with Ilana Golan - How I Built a 7-Figure Business While Working a Corporate Job | Kelly Roach

Episode Date: September 3, 2024

Kelly Roach built a seven-figure side hustle before leaving her corporate role. How did she do it despite an intense workload and failed product launches? Strategic planning, smart time management, and an unyielding drive fueled by a childhood embarrassment on the free lunch line. In this episode, Kelly shares her inspiring journey, emphasizing the importance of patience, persistence, and the willingness to take imperfect action. Kelly Roach is a business coach, CEO, podcast host, and bestselling author. Before launching her multimillion-dollar business, she worked at a Fortune 500 company, rising to become its youngest VP.  In this episode, Ilana and Kelly will discuss: - The defining moment that fueled her ambition - Juggling multiple jobs in college - Her transition from NFL cheerleader to corporate leader - Why entrepreneurs must embrace imperfect action - The importance of mental toughness   - Her transition from corporate to entrepreneurship - Staying motivated through failures - The importance of investing in coaching - Effective time management for side hustlers  - Financial strategies for entrepreneurs - And other topics…   Kelly Roach is a business coach, CEO, podcast host, and bestselling author of Conviction Marketing and The Live Launch Method. She rose from an entry-level sales position at a Fortune 500 company to become its youngest VP. While working full-time, she started her multimillion-dollar company, Kelly Roach Coaching. Kelly is also the creator of the Live Launch Method, a simple launch strategy that leverages timeless business principles to help entrepreneurs consistently generate six-figure results. She is regularly sought after as a coaching expert by several news outlets. Connect with Kelly: Kelly’s Website: https://kellyroachcoaching.com/  Kelly’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/kellyroachinternational/  Resources Mentioned: Kelly’s Podcast, The Kelly Roach Show: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-kelly-roach-show/id  

I built my business to over seven figures while I was still working full-time. A lot of times it takes longer than you think to get profitable. Entrepreneurship is not necessarily the right thing for everyone. How do you see that? Many people that pursue entrepreneurship work longer hours and make less money than they did in a job. If you're trying to escape a bad boss, don't do it. If you think you're going to quickly make more money than your job, don't do it.

If you think you're going to work less hours than your job, don't do it. If you think you're going to quickly make more money than your job, don't do it. If you think you're going to work less hours than your job, don't do it. Your business is not going to outperform you. Take the time with yourself to get clear on what you actually really, really want out of life, and then just make decisions that align with that. Kelly Roach, you've been helping six, seven figure CEOs break through revenue plateaus. You grew so fast. You have endless media, but you actually started as an NFL cheerleader or even before that. So tell us a little bit of how you got to where you are, Kelly. My story is this. I was on the free lunch line. One day I was going up through the lunch line and there was a volunteer cafeteria leader in that day. And she didn't know that I turned in an empty envelope every day.

And the usual lunch lady would just toss it in the back and wouldn't rip it open because she knew there was nothing in it. So there was a volunteer one day and she didn't know I was on the free lunch program and she ripped my envelope open. There was nothing in it. And I stared at her and she stared at me and there was my friends and my classmates all around me. And I just remember this moment of like my entire world freezing and it flipped a switch in me that just said never again. Right. And I didn't want to ever be in that position of being vulnerable and compromise because of situations and circumstances that I didn't choose. And so as early as I was able to work, I was a young hustler. I always had so many different jobs. And when I went to college,

I ended up having a whole different variety of jobs. I was a server and I was a cocktail waitress. I was teaching aerobics. I was on the NFL cheerleading team. I was doing all these different things. And my career really started when I graduated school and I got a job in a Fortune 500 in the most entry-level job that they had. And I chose that job because I knew it was this huge global international company. And I saw the opportunity. I said to myself, if I work hard, I can really make something of myself and achieve financial freedom. So I was the first person in and the last person out every day for almost a decade. I was promoted seven times in eight years.

I ended up building a team of 100 people and went from being a solo producer to managing 17 locations. And that's where I just fell in love with business and coaching and teaching people and helping people to unlock their talent. And it's really where I learned everything that I do and teach in business today. And then got to the top of the corporate ladder and really started thinking about, well, what do I want in life? What

do I want my every day to be like? And it didn't look like that. And so that's when I started my entrepreneurial journey. And I went from a side hustle to a seven-figure company to an eight-figure company to now six companies. And here we are. That is incredible. That is so, so, so inspiring. So you grow up in this corporate environment, you're clearly moving up the ladder. But entrepreneurship is really, really hard. And it's a really scary move, especially when things work out. What caused you to say, that's it, line in the sand? What was the thing and how? Yeah. Well, I have a really interesting story because I did it the opposite of how most people do. I actually went to my boss one day and said, I'm starting my business.

And I understand if you need to fire me. I'd like to stay. But if this needs to be goodbye, I'm okay with that. And I was the highest performing person at my level in the company. I was a senior vice president. I was running about a $50 million portfolio. And I said, I got to do this, right? So I started my business on the side as a side hustle. I would work before work, on my lunch

break and after work. And I built my business to over seven figures while I was still working full time before I transitioned out to full-time entrepreneurship. And it was really because I had worked so hard to create financial freedom, to start building wealth, to put myself in that stable financial position. And I knew that starting a business, as you mentioned already, it's really hard. A lot of times it takes longer than you think to get profitable.

And I did not wanna put myself in a position of financial strain or scarcity when I was starting my business. I wanted to be able to put myself in a position of financial strain or scarcity when I was starting my business. I wanted to be able to reinvest in it. I wanted to be able to be strategic in the decisions that I was making. And so that's the path that I chose. And I recommend that for a lot more people.

I'm not saying it's right for everyone, but I think a lot of people quit their job to pursue building a business and they don't realize that oftentimes it takes two to three years to get a business to the point where you can take money out of it consistently and still have enough money to reinvest in it to grow, right? And a lot of people don't understand everything that goes into getting a business off the ground, both time, energy, financially, and mentally, right? And so that's how I did it.

I do recommend something along these lines to a lot more people than I think people want to admit because the burning the boats is a beautiful story, but it's not the right thing for everyone. And I think overall entrepreneurship is not necessarily the right thing for everyone. How do you see that? I think entrepreneurship has been really glamorized over the last 10 years.

And it's absolutely not right for most people. What I always say is you'll have the hardest boss in the world. Many people that pursue entrepreneurship work longer hours and make less money than they did in a job. So I always tell people this. If you're trying to escape a bad boss, don't do it. work longer hours and make less money than they did in a job. So I always tell people this, if you're trying to escape a bad boss, don't do it. If you think you're going to quickly make more money than your job, don't do it. If you think you're going to work less hours than your job, don't do it. And the thing is, is there is an other side. I don't want it to sound like

entrepreneurship is awful. I love it. I have built multiple million and multi-million dollar businesses and I've built a lot of wealth and I've had a lot of success and I have a lot of freedom. However, it took many, many, many years of sacrifice to cross that bridge and most entrepreneurs never do cross that bridge because it takes a long time to get there. And a lot of people give up patience before they reach that destination. So I think if you're thinking about pursuing entrepreneurship, or if you're already in the world of entrepreneurship to be successful, you have to truly have a burning desire to make an impact, to do something really unique with your talent. And you have to be committed to really playing the long game while running your own race. Because if you don't have any one of

those things, you're probably not going to last for the long haul and you'll probably not stay in it for long enough to ever get the benefit of it. And that's what I see from a lot of people. They think that it's going to be in those first three to five years that they start to see the benefits. And in reality, it's not until long after that, usually. Everybody's chasing some kind of an overnight success that takes a decade to get there or more. And I think in this era of instant gratification, like, let me post something and see how many likes I get. You know, they think that the clients will follow in the same manners. And yes, you found an incredible method.

We'll talk about that. But it takes a lot of consistent work and a lot of continuing when most others stop. So I totally agree. What is a really hard moment that you remember throughout this journey that you think would make sense for our audience to hear? I remember, so I invested in a lot of coaching, a lot of courses, a lot of resources to support me on the entrepreneurial journey as any good new entrepreneur does. And I remember, this is while I was working full-time still, I invested in a program. It was about $10,000.

And it was to run a webinar that then led people into consultations. And I remember being so certain and so confident about this. I rehearsed it. I practiced it. I worked for weeks and weeks to get ready for it. And I was so confident that I was going to be booked solid after it that I actually took days off of my day job after this webinar because I thought I was going to be booked solid with consultations and enrolling new clients. Well, I remember I did my webinar. I did my big presentation, I did the pitch, and I wasn't even selling anything. I was inviting people to book a free consultation.

And I did not even get one single free consultation, not a single one. And I remember just curling up in a ball on the floor and just being like, I cannot even believe this. Like I was in so much shock and disappointment and frustration. And it was definitely a moment where I wanted to give up. And so I had to really ask myself, am I really in this for the long haul? And am I really willing to double down and push through failure and keep trying and keep trying until I get to success. And of course I did. But I think as entrepreneurs,

we have moments like that literally over and over and over again. It doesn't matter what level or stage that you're at. And that's the kind of thing that you have to be able to develop that emotional mental toughness to push through those moments because they're gonna happen and they're gonna happen more to happen and they're going

to happen more than once and they're going to happen all along the way. So how do you build this toughness? How do you get back up when you're falling or when you feel like, you know, we sometimes call it almost your near-death experiences, like you literally feel like it's suffocating. How do you get back up, Kelly? Well, I think the first thing to remember just about anything that you want to learn how to do is that imperfect action and execution are the only way to learn something new. And when you attempt something,

chances are you're gonna have to do it many times before you become successful at it. And that's where the biggest disconnect is in the entrepreneur world, because we assume that because we took a course or because we listened to a coach or because we listened to a book or a podcast or put this hard work into executing something, that that means that it's going to be successful the first time out of the gate or the second time out of the gate. When in reality, whether you're looking at an athlete or you're looking at a performer, you're looking at a high level leader in a business, anything that's worth anything,

it takes time to build. It takes a lot of repetition. It takes a ton of action, many, many failures. That's typically where you get the most information and experience from. And so you have to give yourself that reality check of what does it actually take? If you could go listen to a course and then plug into a cash machine, then everyone in the world would be a successful entrepreneur, obviously, you know, but this is how we think because we get so emotionally invested in the outcome that we want. So I think it's remembering that it is an iterative process and you have to actually run the drills and then iterate and build on what you learn each time to create success. It's not a flip of a switch. It is a multifaceted process

that happens through repetition. I think that repetition is incredibly important, and it's actually the muscle that you need to build in order to become the leader that you want to become, in order to build big things. But I think there's also another element, and I wonder, you probably see it a lot. There's people that come from a certain passion. They really want to solve a great problem. What they don't realize is that a lot of the times they're not going to work on this big problem. What they actually going to do is the marketing, is the sales, is the logistics, is the operations,

is the tech. How do you see that with your clients? And how do you navigate that? I actually want to solve this thing. This is my passion. But what I'm actually doing is all the minutia. How do you see that? I actually want to solve this thing. This is my passion, but what I'm actually doing is all the minutiae. How do you see that? I think there's a couple different elements of that. First of all, what I always tell people is if you want to do that one thing, you should go

do that thing working for someone else. Because when you run a company, 98% of your time and energy is going to be spent leading, casting vision, building brand, working on systems, processes, people. A very small portion of your time and energy is actually being directly allocated to the problem that you want to solve. So if you want to just focus on, you love to do accounting work, you should be an accountant. You should not build an accounting firm, right? An accounting firm means you are running an organization. An accountant means you are actually executing people's taxes. Those are two completely different people. So if you don't want to lead, if you don't want to lead, if you don't want to manage,

if you don't want to be working on big picture infrastructure related things, then building a business doing that is probably not going to be fulfilling for you. That's number one. Number two is if you are really passionate about impacting a problem or solving a problem, and that's why you're pursuing entrepreneurship, that's great and you can absolutely do that. All of my businesses are because of a problem that I'm really passionate about solving that I think that we can do better

than every other solution on the market for. However, I understand that in order to make an impact at solving that problem, I have to be focused on the system, the engine that I'm building to solve that problem, not one by one, solving that problem one time at a time, which is what you can do individually. And I think the third one is you can't duplicate and multiply solution unless you learn to get results through people. And a lot of entrepreneurs never flip the switch to go from being the business to

running and building a company. When you are the business and you are the entrepreneur, you're the doer. When you are building a company, you are leading and you are coaching, teaching, training, and mentoring to get the results through other people. So again, it's two completely different skill sets. It's two completely different mindsets. It's a completely different operating system. And it's just getting clear on where you want to be and how you want to operate. And I think I didn't even realize that when I started my business, because even as a VP, I was already kind of moving up the ladder in corporate. Then the difference between number one and number two, three, four, whatever that is,

is light years away, right? And I think it's very, very true that in today's world, if you're running a business, you're running a machine, you're running a process. So you're running this thing and it involves a lot of things and leadership is part of it, but it's part of it. And I think as an entrepreneur, when this is your baby, it's very different than leading a team, even as a vice president. And I think that was really hard for me to understand.

So how do you navigate between, on one hand, trusting yourself, you already climb up the ladder in Fortune 500, et cetera. But then on the other hand, not coming with so much ego that you know everything. Because a decade ago, I knew everything, but I knew nothing. So how do you navigate that, Kelly? It is a very humbling experience, no doubt about it. I mean, I was the same way. I came from corporate and I was accustomed to being the best, knowing my craft inside and out, hitting my budget every single quarter, making my full bonus, getting constant promotions. You go from hero to zero overnight. And I think that being humble and realizing that it doesn't matter how much knowledge or experience you have in someone

else's container, you're operating within a machine that's already built. Now you're moving over here and you're attempting to build a brand new machine. And again, when we talk about the change of mindset and skillset, again, these are two completely different things. You have to build process. You have to build systems. You have to hire and train people. Every single thing that you do is new and you're creating it from the ground up, which means that the pace at which you're going to do it, when you're used to snapping your fingers and getting results in moments over here in your job, now it might take you months to do something because you're going from an idea to needing to build the process and needing to hire the people to needing to figure out the success path and then iterate on it. And so just being humble, I think is really, really important. And being okay with the fact that you're going to have to pay your dues and go through that failure and that learning process and all of those iterations, just like anyone else would. And being okay with that is the thing

that's going to speed you up because the more that you hold on to trying to look perfect or be perfect or perform the way that you did in another world, it's just going to slow you down from being able to dive in headfirst and really start getting traction with what you're creating. So what helped you decide not only that you're going to do this, but you're also going to take help by your side to do it? Because I think for me, it took me time to realize that I need help. And that time, again, the biggest cost in our life is always the money we're not making, right?

That time costs money. But I felt like I knew it. And everything shifted when I started leaning on help because there's people who've walked the walk. They've been where you are. They know how to take you forward. It's always the best investment you can make. But what helped you decide that I'm going to invest to get there faster?

Exactly that, right? Because when I was transitioning and I was in corporate and now I wanted to build a business online because I was working during the day. So I couldn't be building my business during business hours. I had to be able to build my business on off hours, which meant online was the way to go. And I was coming from a world where we didn't operate online at all. We made phone calls. We went into businesses. I was going business to business and sitting down and having physical business meetings at our clients and at our prospects. And so I was like, I know business,

but I don't know the online world. And so I think one of the smartest things that I did was I hired my first business coach before I even had my first client specifically to learn online marketing. Because the thing I learned is there is a solution to every problem. So find the person that's already figured out the thing that you want to do and pay to skip the line and replicate their success. Pay to skip the line. Ooh, I am totally stealing that one, Kelly. This is brilliant. So then you come up with, and I would love to know how you came up with the live launch method, which is, that's what I know you're known for. And I know a lot

of clients that went through your methods. How did that come about? How did you figure this out? How did you experiment with it? Tell us a little more. Yes. One of my most amazing success stories. No, I'm just kidding. So I was just failing after failing after failing on launching. So I had actually invested in the best launch training that was out there at the time from the biggest name in the online world that has been teaching launches for over a decade. And I took the program and I executed the launch

and I kept executing the launch and kept failing and losing money. And I finally was just like, I was so frustrated and angry and upset and burnout. And it was weird because I had built my whole career in sales and leadership. So here I was launching and I wasn't making a single sale. And I was like, this isn't working for me. And I know it's not that I don't know how to sell.

And I know it's not that I don't have a product that people would buy. It was the vehicle. And the vehicle was broken because the vehicle was very antiquated. At that time, this was when the only launch game in town was you get all these video cameras and you do these slide decks and you do all these prerecorded videos

and it's like dozens of emails and it's tons of tech and it's the timers and it's this and it's this. And for me, I'm a natural born leader. I'm a natural born speaker, like from the standpoint of I want to connect with people. That's what comes naturally for me. And what was happening was my energy was so depleted in managing the tech, in creating the slide decks, in putting together all these 85 steps, that by the time I got to the part where I was recording the launch videos, I had no energy, I had no charisma, I had no passion for what I was doing anymore. And it was just falling flat.

And so I just remember I got on the call with my team one morning and I was like, we're trashing everything. We're starting from scratch. We're not using any tech. We're not using any landing pages. We're not using any pre-recorded anything. We're not using any slide decks. We literally trashed everything that we had learned. And this was right at the time also that live streaming became available on Facebook. So I was like, I'm going to go live and teach, and then I'm going to sell things. That's it. And I put together this sequence where I was like, I'm going to teach in a multi-part series. And then, you know, as I move through the series, eventually I'm going to make the invitation for people to buy. And really quickly, it went from 10,000 to 100,000 to multiple

hundreds of thousands to a million to over a million. I never had a plan or objective of teaching launching at all. That was not a goal of mine. I was not interested in getting into that space. But the space that I was interested in was helping people to build family first businesses, helping people to achieve freedom, helping people to put sales and marketing systems in place. I was in the business of rapid growth strategy. And when I realized that this was the simplest, fastest, easiest way that people could grow their businesses online, I wrote the book. I started teaching it. We've taught it to over 100,000 people now. Obviously, live launch is now common vernacular in the online space. Anyone you talk to says,

oh yeah, I live launch. That's a methodology that I invented that I wrote a book about years ago that I taught to a hundred thousand people. And now so many people are teaching it to other people that it's become commonplace, right? But it's just an incredible methodology and what I love about it. And by the way, just for everyone listening, there's a lot of bad actors that are copycats that teach live launch that don't actually, they haven't actually scaled launches. So check your source. But what I will say, what I love about the live launch is it gives you the power of being present, of being authentic, of listening to your intuition, of really teaching and sharing from the heart. You don't have to do any of those

slick marketing tricks, which I absolutely despise, where you're like, teach the what, but don't teach the how. Give them this, but don't give them that. Don't teach them too much because then, you know, it's like you don't have to do any of that. You can just be full heart, full authenticity, full value add. People get results working for free going through your live launches, and you build this amazing brand reputation, which really truly is what you said. That's what I'm known for. I'm known for that because not only are people having ridiculous levels of success building seven and eight figure businesses with it, but people come through my live launches all the time and they get results for free. So they're like, oh, that Kelly Roach girl. Go to that Kelly Roach girl's launch because even if you're never going to buy anything, your business is going to be better because of it. You'll learn something that's going to

transform you. So yeah, your biggest failure is usually placed in front of you to lead you to your biggest success. And it's really important to remember that when you're having that big moment of failure, it's being placed there because that when you're having that big moment of failure, it's being placed there because that's your fork in the road moment. You're either going to give up or you're going to double down and you're going to build from that point. And for me, that was the catalyst for my career. Literally, that exploded my business and I would not be where I am today without that.

And that was from me having launches after launches where I was failing and losing money. That's the only reason why the live launch exists is because of my failure. That's such an inspiring story, Kelly. This is so beautiful. And I think you also alluded to something very, very important.

And this is for all of you. You want to learn from somebody who's walked the walk. So check it. Check that they've been roughly where you are. Check your sources. Check that they're right roughly where they want to learn from somebody who's walked the walk. So check it. Check that they've been roughly where you are. Check that they're right roughly where they want to go. Otherwise they can't help you. I love that, Kelly. And tell us when you see entrepreneurs,

and again, you'll see people with victim mentality. It never works, da, da, da. Like it's just normal, right? There's people that always look at the negative and there's people that will always, let me try again, I'm going to try again, I'm going to trust myself. How do you know which entrepreneur can make it, which entrepreneur can't, or what do you see as distinctions? Because you see so many. I pretty much can tell within five minutes of interacting with someone whether or not they're going to make it. And there's two things, imperfect action and mental toughness. The mindset of a person that's going to make it is

they have a willingness to take action. They have a drive. They have a willingness and they have a drive. And there's only two kinds of people in life. There's people that there is a problem for every solution. And there's people that there's a solution to every problem. And you have to decide which of those people that you're going to be. And your business is not going to outperform you. That's what I tell people all the time. Like your business isn't going to outperform you.

So if you have a bad mindset or if you have an unwillingness to run the reps and look at your own behavior and look at your own results and look with a critical eye in a non-emotional way where the kinks and the hoes are that you have to fix in order to get the results that you want, you're never going to get anywhere. And sometimes it's not even like, oh, I don't know how to sell or my product isn't good. For me, it was all the tech. It was all the

moving pieces. It was all the distractions and all of the barriers between me and the audience that was preventing me from being able to connect in a meaningful way with people. So there's all different reasons why maybe your business isn't where you want it to be. But that's what I mean when I say you have to be able to put all the cards on the table and say, what's missing here? What is not working? And what are different ways that I can approach this to break through and to actually get a result? And what I love hearing from you is that extreme ownership that every single successful

entrepreneur will have, or even successful leader will have to have, because you have to be willing to look in the mirror and ask yourself very tough questions. If I'm not taking action, why is it? If I'm procrastinating, why is it? If I'm failing, what is it? And you were able to ask those questions. What do you think, maybe something that you went through in your childhood or before in your career that built you to be able to look in the mirror and say, okay, I see a problem, but I'm going to continue anyway. What do you think brought this?

I think that, and maybe every person realizes this at a different stage in life. For me, I was very young when I realized if it's going to be, it's up to me. There's no benefit to you making excuses for yourself because the only person that can change your situation is you. So the moment that you give your power away and you make excuses for yourself is the moment that you no longer have a pathway to getting what you want out of life. And for me, whether it was I cleaned my dance studio after

school for seven years to pay for my dance lessons. I could go through story after story after story of every situation in my life where it was like, I could either say, I can't do this because, or here's what I need to do in order to make this a possible because. That's a decision that all of us can make in any situation or circumstance. Right. So it's basically, am I choosing to be a victim or a victor? And I'm choosing to be a victor every single time, but it's a choice and it's your choice. And do you think it's something you were born with or is something that you learned to do throughout life? I don't know because I don't know how much of that is just, it's situational, right? It's your response to circumstances that you're prevented with. But what I can say is I think anyone can

develop it. Anyone can develop it. It's not a skill, it's a mindset. And so those are two different things. Skill is like something where there's a barrier to you being able to do something. Whereas mindset is a belief, a belief that you can take action and create change in your life. And so I think anyone can put themselves in the driver's seat and just say, no more, no more. Starting today, this is how this is going to be. And that's interesting because I think we tend to give ourselves discounts, right? From today, but you know what? I ate this pizza, so I'll just start it tomorrow. So we tend to give ourselves some discounts. And I think there's something about putting that line in the sand that you're describing and saying, yes, but I will do this anyway. And I'm going to be all in.

So what made you go all in? Is that you as a kid? Is that that you're just driven? What do you think it is? I think for me, I just knew I wanted out of life. And so it was just making decisions that were in alignment with that. It's just asking yourself, what do you want? And if you know what you want, if you have clarity around what you really want. Because I think that people, they set a lot of goals and they put things on paper that they want to achieve or do or be or have. But a lot of times those things are not even their own goals. They're things that maybe society

has put forth or that they see their coach doing or that someone in their family expected of them. So the reason why you don't have the motivation to pursue them and to achieve them and to have the discipline to go after them for years is that they were never really your goals to begin with. And so I think it's like that quote, to thine own self be true. Take the time with yourself to get clear on what you actually really, really want out of life, and then just make decisions that align with that. It's really not complicated, but it's being honest with yourself. And it's allowing yourself to be quiet for long enough to gain that clarity that most people really truly don't have. They can tell you their goals, but it doesn't necessarily match their true desires.

What you just said hit such a strong chord for me. So one of my hardest moments in my life was when I had no clue what I wanna do next. And for somebody driven, that drives them bonkers, right? Because I'm like, I always knew what I want to do next. So how can I not know? Like I'm so driven, but I'm right now have no clue. And I think 70% of the people in Leap Academy really have no clue where they really want to go. Finding that clarity is the very first piece that we want to help them resolve, just like you said, because then you

start making decisions based on your own goal. But being that honest is sometimes really, really hard, right? Because we want what society expects from us. We want what our parents want from us. We want to be liked. And suddenly we're choosing, like you said, goals that are not necessarily aligned. And it's just such a beautiful distinction that you just said. Just to add on that, I think that many times when people feel like they don't know what they want, it's because what they want, they don't actually feel is worthy. Like it's not a big enough desire that meets society's expectations. Like maybe what you want is you want to take a couple years away from your career to spend with your children or your grandchildren. And the thing that actually brings you the most joy is getting to spend quality time and build legacy with your

family. But maybe you don't feel like that's a match for the societal expectations because you're a high achieving, very driven person that's always had a very successful career. This is why people stay in limbo and go in circles for so long because there's this internal conflict between what are the expectations that I think that I have to meet on the outside versus what are the desires of being in alignment and authentic on the inside. And I think it's really, really important to recognize that you're the only person whose opinion matters in that situation, in that particular circumstance. And to not be making those decisions based on anything other than what is true for you,

because then you will be unhappy and then you will keep circling in indecision or procrastination. And I see procrastination a lot. And that's manifested because you're not actually committed to that thing. It's not actually what you want. And it's incredible because the clarity actually comes from action, not just thinking about it, procrastinating, dreaming about it, praying about it. Like you actually need to take action and the momentum will fulfill itself, right? Or at least it will give you some clarity.

Do I even want to pursue it? Yeah. Listen, any action, even the wrong action will bring you massive amounts of clarity because sometimes it's by taking one step that you realize, oh my gosh, this is definitely not what I want. And now you have way more clarity than you did five minutes ago.

And I think people stay in that theoretical space for so long when even taking an action that isn't ending up being the right action will give you far more clarity than sitting in indecision will. I so agree with that. It's incredible. So Kelly, if you look back to yourself in that maybe cafeteria or whatever, because it's such a beautiful story, what would you say to your younger self, even then, or, you know, when you wanted to hop to entrepreneurship, what would you say to yourself that you can see now that you were no way for you to have seen before? I would just say you can do it. I think I knew I could, but I think you always feel like

things are going too slow. You always feel like, am I ever going to get there? I think I would just be like, breathe. You got this. And I think there's something really beautiful about almost being, you know, and I think you said something similar to that somewhere on being on two sides of the charity side, right? You've been given, but you're also now you have enough wealth to help and give back more. And I assume that's a big part of who you are, Kelly. Am I right? Oh, for sure.

Yeah, I mean, that was one of the biggest things for me. And, you know, obviously the people that helped us out and even I cleaned my dance studio to pay for lessons. That experience of having that opportunity shaped me so much. And that's the thing I think a lot of people maybe feel guilt about wanting to build wealth or feel guilt about achieving high levels of success. But the thing is, you can't pour from an empty cup. When I think about my parents, my parents were amazing,

good people, like really good people. But there wasn't anything to give because they were barely able to just get by. That's the thing is, if you want to be able to do things like what we do, which is build a well in Nepal, we just installed a water project with Charity Water there. Malawi, we built a well in Malawi. We're getting ready to initiate kicking off another water project. That takes money. That takes money. So you have to have resources to be able to do these things. And I think a lot of people forget that. And I think we can all help more with a few millions in the bank. So it's not, you don't need to be shy about it. It's more about what are you actually trying to create and what is that big

impact for you? Yeah. So I love that you said that. So where can people reach out to you? We're obviously going to have all the sites and the notes, but just in case they're listening. Yeah, definitely. I mean, I think the Kelly Road Show is a great place to come. Anywhere you listen to podcasts, I teach about sales, marketing, business building, scale leadership, building a family first and faith-driven business. And I pour my heart into the show every single week. So I would love anyone that wants to come over and check it out and take a listen. I love that. And if you guys do have a business that you want to launch, definitely check her out and check the podcast. And seriously, Kelly, I heard your name a lot. And it's just been such an honor to speak to you to hear your insights. I'm sure a lot of people got a lot of inspiration and just

a lot of great takeaways. Thank you, Kelly. Thank you so much. Thanks for having me.