Counter Culture Mama Podcast with Danielle Venables

107. Your Impact Doesn't Require a Transaction

• Danielle Venables • Episode 107

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Have you ever noticed how we entrepreneurs can become completely tunnel-visioned, believing our impact comes exclusively through our businesses? That revelation hit me hard this weekend, and it's completely transforming how I show up in the world.

For years, I operated under the assumption that my business was my legacy—that to make a meaningful impact, people needed to join my programs, download my resources, or become paying clients. While my heart has always been in the right place (as I know yours is too), I've realized this mindset creates what I now call "conditional leadership"—only offering value when expecting something in return.

This mindset shift feels incredibly liberating. Instead of measuring impact by business metrics, I'm focusing on how I show up in every interaction—from the person I pass in the grocery store to community members in Facebook groups. I'm creating spaces driven by genuine connection rather than conversion. I'm recognizing that my impact doesn't require a transaction, and my leadership doesn't need to be conditional.

This isn't about abandoning business goals or devaluing what we offer professionally. I still believe deeply in the transformation my programs provide. Rather, it's about expanding our definition of impact beyond business boundaries and removing the paywalls to purpose. It's about filling our days with activities that bring genuine joy and alignment, trusting that the good we put out returns to us in abundance.

How might your approach to business and life change if you focused less on strategic moves and more on this simple question: "How do I want to be remembered by everyone I encounter today?" Join me in making impact everywhere, not just with those who pay us. What would feel liberating to you in this season of your business journey?

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Speaker 1:

Hello, hello, hello. I hope you are having the most amazing Monday and if you are catching me live, please say hello. If you're catching the replay, comment replay. I was pondering something over the weekend and into this morning and it felt like something that was worth coming on and just sharing about and, first of all, even apologizing Now, I'm not one to apologize for my path, my journey, my process, my messy Um.

Speaker 1:

For those of you who've known me for a while, you know that all of the human experience, all of the shadows, all of the lessons and the beauty, everything is welcome in my spaces, and I think that's why I'm desiring to give voice to this is because it's something that is so easy to do unconsciously, and I think it's a trap that a lot of us, as entrepreneurs, as people who have these missions and these desires, not only for our own financial reality but also the bigger mission of impact in the world, right, it's so easy to get sort of sucked in and tunnel visioned into. That impact comes through my business and my business is the vehicle through which I make an impact and in some ways that's true, right, like I trust that, if you are here listening to this, if you're somebody who's in my world. You're not someone who doesn't have a heart of gold. You're not someone who doesn't want to make an impact and who just sells programs to sell programs, um, devoid of any transformation or impact. Right, like you're here because you care. You're here because your heart centered.

Speaker 1:

And I can say the same about myself, right, it's like we operate from a place of intention. We operate from a place of desire to see people win, to see people elevate, to see people live more abundant, successful, fulfilling lives. Right, whatever your mission is, it is rooted somewhere in there of, like, a desire to see people live better and, you know, win in whatever way that looks like for them. But where we can get tunnel vision and where, especially if you've received coaching and mentorship and things like that, it's like we decide to start a business. We then go and we seek out business coaching, mentorship how do I do this? We start looking for answers and within that process, we become so tunnel visioned on, like my business is how I make an impact in the world, my business is my legacy, my business is the mark that I'm here to make, and we become so focused on that that it's easy to lose sight of the bigger picture and that's exactly what I've been sitting with for the last few days is like what is the bigger picture of my life? Right, and I've come home to a lot of it, right, I've come home.

Speaker 1:

If you've been with me for like the last five years or so, or even the last few years, like, you've seen me go from, you know, ultra hustle, um, not even hustle, but like just very business focused, very like compartmentalized, and you've watched me come back to my roots, my role in the home, my role as a mother, um, the homemaking, the homesteading. You've watched that evolution and you've watched me go from being super outwardly, like spiritual and new age, and you've watched me come back sort of down to earth, down to a more grounded practice of spirituality and faith. Um, so you know there's there's evolution and stuff and and it's all like anchoring back into what feels true for me, um, but this most recent part of the evolution is coming back to a place where my impact does not rely on my business. Um, yes, my business, if you work with me in a coaching capacity, if you work with me, um, in a passive income capacity, like all of those things will absolutely, without a doubt change your life, and I stand behind that and I stand behind that.

Speaker 1:

But what I've really been sitting with on a personal level is like is that the only way that I have impact? And the answer is no, right. And so I've been sitting with like what is my legacy? And I'm no longer subscribed to the belief that my business is my legacy, and what I mean by that is that I am here to influence every person that I encounter. And it doesn't matter if you pay me, it doesn't matter if you ever coach with me, it doesn't matter if you download my freebies or you buy my Oracle deck. If you download my freebies or you buy my Oracle deck or you join my Facebook group or you step into sovereign wealth, like none of that is indicative of the impact that I'm here to make. You know, there's no, there's no barriers to entry, there's no paywall to have access to the impact that I'm here to make, and that's really like the mindset shift that I've been going through and it's kind of hard to put it into words, honestly. I'm like sitting here fumbling over my words, but it's really important for me to not place limitation and not place boundaries and boundaries is a word, but, um, you know to to not place like a degree of separation where it's like you only get access to what I contribute to the world If you pay me right.

Speaker 1:

I don't like that like reciprocal thing, and so some people, some entrepreneurs, will put up these boundaries of like you only get access to me if you only get to be in my inner circle, if and you know I'll give, but only if you're planning on investing, or only if you're an ideal client, or only if you meet a certain like standard of like what I'm looking for in my business. And I don't like that conditional leadership. I don't and like I felt that way for a long time but I couldn't quite like pinpoint exactly what my issue was. But that's what it is. It's conditional leadership, it's leading with a specific outcome. Right, it's joined my Facebook group so that I can teach you, so that I can be on a pedestal, so that I can show you how much I know, so that you can pay me. It's the email opt-ins of you know download my thing so that I can, you know, be in your inbox every single day, because that's my, that's my overnight ATM. Or you know, cash on demand or whatever. I haven't even been in that world for a while because that's how icky it felt, but I have seen marketing like that and it's gross, um, but you know it's like.

Speaker 1:

And so I will admit that I have been somebody who has been so hyper-focused on my impact coming through my business and desiring so badly to create that impact in the world that I have pushed, I have strived, I have, um, you know, done things strategically for the sole purpose of making an impact through my business. And I'm not saying that that's wrong, right, we already discussed this. It doesn't mean that your heart's in the wrong place. I know mine isn't, but it does sort of become a conditional leadership type of dynamic where it's like I can only make an impact if they join my world, they join my business, they pay me, they join my offer, right, and so I am what this is looking like. I'm going to try to like make this more like, grounded and tangible for you. What this is looking like for me is like focusing every single day, whether that's like sitting down with my morning coffee and like setting that intention for my day. Um, you know, I'm still I'm still grappling with exactly how I'm going to really let this come through into my full being. But you know, it's something as simple as like how do I want to be today? How do I want to be remembered by the person at the grocery store that walks past me, that you know holds the door for me, or that I hold the door for right? Um, how do I want to impact the people that I have conversations with in a day? What impact do I want my Facebook comments?

Speaker 1:

I spend a lot of time in Facebook, facebook groups, y'all. That's like that's my, that's my place, and it's not even like my Facebook groups. And that's what I've realized again. It's like I have tried to do Facebook groups because I've craved community, but every time I've done them, it's been a business group. It's been let me teach you about business, let me nurture you in a way and then sell my offers to you. Right, it's never been. It's been from a desire of connection, but it's always been through the lens of business, because, again, I was so like tunnel visioned on, like my impact is in my business, that the two would just get like tangled up and it would fall flat and I would start to resent it because it didn't feel like there was something incongruent about it. Right, and that was I was desiring community.

Speaker 1:

Other people were seeing that as like, oh, this is her Facebook group for her business and you know she's going to promote in there and whatever. Right, like, the energy just got a little bit distorted between, like, what my intention was and the way it was being practiced, because it was so closely related. It was a business move, right, starting that Facebook group was a business move. It became a business activity, as opposed to these other Facebook groups that I hang out in, where I give freely and I comment and I share and I support other women. And you know, to me that is the impact, that is the legacy. It's not about, if you ever buy from me. It's not about, you know, making a strategic Facebook group in order to get leads, right.

Speaker 1:

So I'm in this season where I'm like letting go even more of my business and of the strategy that I've learned and I'm just kind of playing with, like, what can this look like in practice? Right, like, how can I make an impact with every single action that I take, regardless of if it affects my bottom line or not, regardless of if it is technically a business activity or not? And you know there's been layers to this. I've been unpeeling this for a while, but it just feels like there's this new degree of like, certainty and groundedness around it, where it's like I am here to impact the world in a way that we have not really seen before, at least not in the business and the coaching world, and so I'm going to let myself follow that curiosity. I've already got a Facebook group mapped out that I'm like dying to launch, so if you want to hear about it, just hit group or type group below, um, and I'll I'll shoot you details when I finally have the nerve to hit go on it.

Speaker 1:

Um, but what I'm really craving is like connection. It's community, it is giving and receiving. Regardless of if it fits into the themes of my niche, right? It's just like where can we collect like-minded community and really just be there for one another and have dialogue and talk about anything that's going on, whether that is relationships or conscious parenting or, um, you know, at times it will be finances and money and business, but other times it'll be, um, theology I actually freaking love talking about like philosophy and theology. Um, you know, it can be medical and non-talks and you know all of those like hot topics, right. So it's going to be this group is going to be like a mom group, but I'm going to do it differently. So it's not just your average mom group Um, it's really going to be a place for it's like, if you feel a resonance with what I've been sharing right, with my stances on big pharma, with my stances on living just a holistically good life, attachment-based parenting um, you know, it's like just cultivating a life that you are like wildly in love with.

Speaker 1:

That is the type of people that I'm calling into this Facebook group and, again, it's not to sell to you, it's not to, um, you know, fulfill anything in my business. It's literally because I've been craving that community for so long and like I'm ready to like be in one that feels like I belong, and I know that I've had, um, there was a post a while back that I made asking people if they felt like sort of trapped between, like, new age and Christianity, and that's going to be. One of the things is going to be like walking your path, path right, your, your faith, your return to, maybe, christian roots or, um, you know, just whatever that's looking like right, where you're kind of like straddling a line where you're not ready to go like full religious churchy whatever, but, like you're, you're feeling that call back to some of the fundamental beliefs. It's going to be a safe space to explore that as well and to walk that path right. And so there is going to be talk of faith and biblical faith and there's also going to be a lot of room to just like explore and see and like wrestle with your faith and, you know, do all of those things that I've had to do on my journey to like fully come back there. So that's not going to be like the main focus, but that is going to be like another, like pillar or another topic of conversation that I hope to see in there, because those types of conversations are exactly what brought me to where I am today, has like shifted my mindset, shifted my heart, um, to a place where it's like it's not even about the money, it's not about the business and, you know, taking those kinds of blinders off that I had on and really just focusing on, like what do I want and need and what does, what do my people want and need? Right, because, like, if that's something that's missing in my life, it's probably missing in other people's lives too.

Speaker 1:

So, anyway, this is getting um, a little bit off topic here, but I just wanted to kind of share what was alive for me and what was shifting in, like the way that I view impact and that's really it. It's the, it's the perception of impact and where it needs to come from and how it needs to come through. And, you know, filling our days with business activities to move the needle in our business versus filling our days with things that bring us joy and trusting that God, the universe, whatever you believe in, is going to then reward you for the good that you're putting out in the world. Right? So to me, that's the bottom line. That's kind of the key takeaway. If this is like bringing something up for you, I'm going to invite you to just like share in the comments.

Speaker 1:

Um, you know what's what's coming up for you as I'm, as I'm talking through this, as I'm sharing my own experience, like, is this something that you have maybe felt like you're bumping up against too? Is it something that you're like, oh my gosh? Yes, I've been tunnel visioned as well. Are you like no, you're the only one in the world who has ever felt this way. I don't buy it. But okay, but you know, like I want to open dialogue around this because I really do feel like, as we're moving through these times, like things are shifting and the way that we are being called to like relate to one another is shifting, and I can't be the only one that's feeling that call, and so I'd be really curious to hear how that's showing up for you.

Speaker 1:

What's not feeling good anymore, what you're letting go of from the old way of doing business, and, even if you don't have clarity, just share like an intention for how you, how you want to move forward. Right, like I said, my intention is just impact everywhere. Impact everywhere, not just people who pay me, not just people who are interested in paying me, impact for every life that I touch. And so I'm curious, like, what is your intention? What would feel really liberating to you? Again, you don't need full clarity, but just naming it and, you know, maybe having a conversation about it in the comments, like I would just love to hear what comes up for you after you listen to this. So that's what I've got for you today. I hope you have a fantastic week ahead and I