2 sources of energy for building business & making money
Channel: George Kao
Date: 01/09/2016

Energy Sources & Money-Making:

"Meet people where they're at."

"People don't care how much you know, until they know how much you care."

"Want to be interesting?  Get interested in others."

"Give them what they want, until they want what you want to give them."

(The first three sentences are age-old sayings, but still very true.  The fourth sentence is from the book Peaceful Warrior by Dan Millman.)

Think of the *sourcing* of energy when it comes to making money.

To simplify, there are 2 sources of energy here:

Yourself

Other people

Most spiritual / holistic service providers are sourcing their energy (for making money) from themselves.  They have had peak experiences.  Or a connection to a spiritual skill.  Or they have a passion to study a personal growth subject.  And they try to make a living with that passion or talent or peak experience.

That was all energy sourced from themselves (or you might say from the "divine").  I put that in quotes because divine *also* speaks through Other People, which brings me to the other energy source:

Other People. 

Most successful entrepreneurs source their energy from other people, i.e. market research, niche interviews, focus groups, or having repeatedly solved a highly charged (energized) problem for other people.

As spiritual/holistic service providers, we would do well to learn from that.  To be aware how we might be sourcing too much money-making energy from ourselves, and instead, turn outward and source it from other people's charged/energized problems.

For example, if you are willing to have more conversations (especially 1-1) with your audience about what they are really struggling with, you will naturally tap your source of compassion.

Compassion (other people) vs. Passion (your own experiences).

From interactions with other people, and thereby sparking your own compassion, you will formulate services & packages that are much more in alignment with the energy of other people. And that's where money comes from...

Compassion ... the root of the word is "suffering with" ... com-passion.

Increase your compassion by having conversations with others about their problems, frustrations, needs, wants, and especially their buying behavior, or what they want so much that they're willing to spend money on it.

From understanding & becoming energized (through compassion) for their problems, we look at what skills & talents we have that can solve problems they have -- we can't solve them all, but we can choose which problems to focus on. Then, we will make an aligned offer that makes the money flow.

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One other thought is that our energy source -- how we're motivated -- will determine our values & virtues in business. 

Fame & Money are lower motivations, but build a lot of businesses... which may be why there's so much narcissism, deception, and other bad values in business.

Passion & Compassion are higher motivations... may we build our businesses this way!

"Compassion" is energized when we get curious about our ideal audience, get to know them so well that we actually feel for their suffering... which then allows us to more naturally create services/products that really meet their wants. That's where money comes from.

Passion is the desire to express our soul... when we express our passion with courage and consistency, we eventually draw to us our ideal audience, but it can be a 5-10 year journey, or longer.

Compassion, here in our discussion, is about what others need *that they are willing to pay for*... so it's really about observing and discovering their buying behavior.  

To have compassion for what they're willing to spend money on is to say -- non-judgmentally -- that it's really what they believe they "need", and if we are to make money, we need to meet them where they're at.

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We can also bring our Passion to flavor & season our paid work, to make it more meaningful, unique, enjoyable.  

So, even as I coach people on business/marketing, I enjoy writing about spirituality & personal growth, and even though my clients won't pay me to talk about it, they enjoy it when I talk/write about it, and it makes me a truly unique business coach in their mind/heart.  But still, they are paying me for the business expertise, not my philosophizing.  I do that to make my work more meaningful for me, and more interesting for them.

If your passion isn't paying the bills yet, make it a hobby for now.  Make your paid (compassion) work even more interesting to you by bringing aspects of your hobby (passion) to it, e.g. how I bring spirituality into business coaching. 

It takes creativity to do this... but then again, anything worthwhile does!

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