Hey friend, it’s been a while! I got hit with covid and I had a nice time off with my family in the Norwegian mountains over the Christmas holidays. But, now we’re here, and I’m SO EXCITED to be back!

I was originally planning to talk about goals as we start off the new year. BUT, there is something that is so hot on my heart these days, and it is an amazing concept that have really changed me in a big way – and also my marketing and business.

The fastest and most (sustainable) energetic shift that I’ve experienced, is when I started implementing the concept I call “BE before you SEE”. You’re probably already familiar with the concept of “Fake it ‘till you make it”. But there’s a nuance to that, which really doesn’t sit right with me. So, instead, I think:  BE the result before we SEE the result or be before you see.  

Marketing Your Coaching Business

As coaches, to be successful, we have to be a product of our product. Nobody wants to hire a life coach that hates her life, nobody wants to hire a relationship coach that doesn’t really see the point in relationships. BEing what we offer to others is what attracts them to us. They want what we have. They want to work with you so that they can get to where you are. NOW, we don’t want your inner perfectionist and inner critic to gang up on you – we are humans and life happens. Yet, every day is a new, fresh start to reset and BE the version of yourself you most want to be and SEE the results that you most want to see in your life, marketing and business. We get to choose HOW we play the cards that we’re dealt. 

So, if we extend that train of thought, if you want to be a professional coach with a fully booked practice, you need to show up as the professional coach with a fully booked practice NOW. (Preface: I don’t mean professional in the corporate sense, but by its definition: to be engaged in a specified activity as one’s main paid occupation rather than as a hobby.)

Being a Fully Booked Coach

Just think about it, right: Your goal is to BE a professional coach with a fully booked practice. So, when you really embody that version of yourself; wearing her clothes, living in her environment, having her habits, thinking her thoughts, feeling her feelings, taking her actions – you inevitably get her results!

When I made the firm decision to step into BEing the version of myself that had the results I wanted, I went all in on all areas of my life. I got to a point where I pretty much screamed to myself inside of my head: “ I’m done just getting by. Fuck this shit, I’m not doing this anymore! I’m BEing my most ideal self, starting from TODAY!”

I asked myself, what is my style when I’m living as this version of myself? The answer was: Sophisticated, fun, edgy and powerful. For me that combination created a certain vibe. And if a garment in my closet didn’t give me that vibe, I either donated it or sold it. It was a confident and firm decision on each piece of clothing. Thinking back, this is what a decision-making process looks like for that version of myself too. I’m not going back and forth and leaving it to be decided at a later point. If it’s not a definite YES, it’s a NO.

To turn it back to you, what will your space look like when you’re a million dollar earner? If that version of you moved into your apartment or house today, how would she organize it? What would it feel like? What would be the atmosphere at home? You might think that you’d have designer interior and stuff that you can’t yet afford, but that’s not what I’m saying. You can create a vibe without having expensive stuff.

You might also be thinking “but, Martine, I don’t have money to buy a whole new wardrobe”. And this is not AT ALL what I’m saying! What I’m saying is that it’s better to have LESS clothing in your wardrobe, and being really strict when you do go shopping. If it’s not giving you the vibe you want, it’s not coming home with you. No more telling yourself “oh, this is nice” – and then it just becomes a wardrobe filler. Being a minimalist and having little stuff, paradoxically, is very much in alignment with abundance. Because you have less clutter in your home and instead more money in your bank account.

When I did this, I went into every drawer, cupboard and closet and emptied out everything that didn’t feel like the vibe that I wanted to become. This also extended to my phone and laptop. I cleared everything. For me, spaciousness, structure and calmness feels like abundance.  I’d be curious to hear the vibe you would create in YOUR home to feel a sense of abundance. 

Match Your Habits to Who You Want to BE

I also invite you to look at your calendar. Do you use it actively now? Would the fully booked version of yourself have a structured calendar that she honoured every week day? Starting out as an entrepreneur, all of a sudden having the sole responsibility to manage your time and get things done can seem hard. The part of you that just wants to sleep in, or take some time off in the middle of the day or do some house chores during work hours – could do that. You could let that part of you run the show! But within you, there is a version of you that gets shit done. You want HER to run the show. How can you create the habits that your fully booked self has? If you don’t have a fully booked practice of paying clients, start by filling up your spots with free coaching, self coaching and evaluation of your coaching sessions in stead. Put that in your calendar. Your fully booked self has a full calendar of speaking to people, so do the same. Help people now, then, offer your services.

In any situation you find yourself in, think “as my fully booked self, I do [fill in the blank] in this circumstance”. For example, if you are about to reach for your phone to get some instant gratification instead of completing a task, ask yourself: ““as my fully booked self, what do I do in this circumstance? The answer might be: “recognize that I’m distracting myself to avoid feeling comfortable, acknowledge that it’s okay to feel uncomfortable, set a timer to complete the task, and put the phone away”. The fully booked version of yourself likely has a higher tolerance for stretching beyond her comfort zone and therefore act accordingly. She’s also likely to prefer long term wins rather than instant gratification – and keeping her word to herself is something that she highly values.   

Also, don’t speak of that version of yourself in third person like “she does this or he does that”. Think, I do this. Because this version of you already lives within you, you just need to give her more air time!  

So, as you can see, to BE the result before you SEE the result, is a way of setting goals and moving towards them. To use the example we’ve been talking about here – you set the goal of being a fully booked coach. Then, you LIVE into it with your thoughts, feelings, actions and environment.   

The two first, thoughts and feelings, are the most important of all in order to create anything. As they dictate the actions that we take and habits that we establish. And although it might sound like, in this episode, that to BE before you SEE starts with changing how you look and how you live – what comes BEFORE that is your thoughts and feelings. The thought might be “I’m ready to go all in on being the fully booked version of myself” and you feel determined. The actions that you take is that you create space for the new to come through. You feel drawn to dress in a way that feels empowering and create a space where you can more easily focus on your business.

If you have children, I’m not saying that you should run around and clean up their mess all day – in high heels and a prom dress. Although, I would like to see that!  However, I do invite you to be in the circumstance that you are right now and think: “As a fully booked coach, what am I doing today? What gets to have my attention? How do I produce my best work today with what I have in this moment?”

I help my clients come back to what is the most important work EVERY SINGLE WEEK. They achieve AMAZING things as a result of it! And it’s not only the tangible things that they achieve, what’s actually MORE important is who they are BECOMING in the process. Nobody can ever take that away from them. They can come back to what they’ve learned, apply it and achieve results over and over again for the rest of their lives.

Marketing with Confidence

SO, you might be thinking that I’ve spoken a lot about BEing your way into your desired results. But how EXACTLY does that affect your marketing? In ALL the ways, my friend. In all the ways. When you are BEing your fully booked self, you speak and write with confidence. You know that you have what it takes RIGHT NOW to help someone. You don’t need anything from your followers, because you’re fully booked. You share because this is what you love to talk about. You come from a place of abundance. The whole vibe that you’re giving off shines though in every piece of content that you create. It draws people in, because they want what you have. And, if you can BE the result before you SEE the result, you can help your clients do the same. If you’re a health coach, you can help your clients be healthy before they see the results of being healthy. If you’re an empowerment or confidence coach, you can help people be confident before they see the result of being confident. If you’re a creative coach, you can help your people be dedicated to their art before they see the results of being dedicated to their art. It’s one of the highest forms of integrity to BE before you SEE when it comes to marketing, because you’re practicing what you’re preaching and you’re constantly creating transformation for yourself. When you’re sharing from that magnetic place, you’ll draw people in like magic.

An important thing to mention is that research shows that “negative emotions reduce the brain’s ability to learn, take in new knowledge and skills by impairing the function of the prefrontal cortex”. This also reduces the access to working memory, which is the raw material for creativity. This, again, hampers curiosity, cognitive agility and creative strategic thinking – all of which are super important as a coach. These functions are also crucial for your marketing. This is not to say that you should avoid feeling negative feelings. What means that we need to let them move through us and to process them, so that we can move back into alignment with BEing our most desired self. I’m not saying that you shouldn’t ever feel doubt, scared, sad, disappointed, self-criticize and so on. That is a part of the human condition, and accepting that is the most compassionate AND fastest way to get to the other side.

I once heard someone say “you can only access someone else’s highest self if you are in your highest self yourself”. When we are leaning into our highest potential, we see it more easily in others. WHO we are when we are doing something is more important than exactly HOW we do it? When we are BEing the strongest energy in the room, the person that sees the potential in our client, the person that knows in their BONES that coaching transforms peoples’ lives …the HOW comes easily and naturally. Embodying, living, thinking feeling and acting – in other words BEing the version of ourselves that has our desired results, is one of the fastest ways to get there.

Now, of course, we are human beings with human brains and emotions. So, you WILL experience resistance and doubt. That’s where coaching comes in. You know where you want to go, you know who you want to BE – and you live in alignment with that version of yourself every single day. Then, once resistance and limiting beliefs arise, you simply coach through them. If you haven’t already listened to my episode, Parts Work: All of Your Energy Going in the Same Direction, make sure to do that. It’ll help you understand how to move through your internal resistance a lot faster.

So, BE the result before you SEE the results. I’d be honored to be YOUR marketing and mindset coach and help you grow into the person who not only LOVES marketing her business, but also attracts clients as a result of it. Head on over to martinethomassen.com to get a full 1 hour free consultation with me to look at where you’re stuck and the exact steps to grow YOUR coaching business based on YOUR season in life, your strengths and uniqueness.

Talk to you soon, bye!