Bryan McAnulty [00:00:00]:

Have you ever felt like you're stuck in a job that drains your soul but you have no idea what else you're meant to do? What if I told you that there is a proven process to figure out your life purpose and turn it into a thriving six or seven figure business? That's exactly what Erika Carico helps people do. Erika is an award winning sole business coach who went from corporate burnout to building a multimillion dollar business doing what she loves.

Erika Carrico [00:00:22]:

I mean, I came from corporate myself, complete burnout and I was miserable in my career and I was miserable in my marriage.

Bryan McAnulty [00:00:28]:

But what makes her story even more incredible, she built her business. A single mom and cancer survivor, proving that when you align with your purpose, anything is possible. Today, Erica is here to share her 28 day process that has helped thousands of entrepreneurs get crystal clear on their calling and build successful businesses around it. If you're ready to stop wondering what your purpose is and start living it, stay tuned because this episode is going to change the way that you think about work, business and success.

Erika Carrico [00:00:55]:

I was diagnosed with kidney cancer and it was like, wake up. You know, it really took me hitting this you might die to make the switch. And so it's a balance for me. No matter what level I've been at. I've always had to work with my mindset and my limiting beliefs and my fear to make decisions really from a place of where I want to be as opposed to a place of where I've been in the past.

Bryan McAnulty [00:01:17]:

Welcome to the Creator's Adventure where we interview creators from around the world, hearing their stories about growing a business. Hey everyone. I'm Brian McAnulty, the founder of Heights platform. Let's get into it. Hey Erica, welcome to the show.

Erika Carrico [00:01:36]:

Thank you so much for having me. I'm super excited to be here.

Bryan McAnulty [00:01:40]:

My first question for you is, what would you say is the biggest thing either that you did or are doing that has helped you to achieve the freedom to do what you enjoy?

Erika Carrico [00:01:51]:

Wow. I would say honestly, I mean my business has grown from like everybody's zero to, you know, I started at zero and I guess now I have a multimillion dollar company and I think probably the biggest for me I could go strategy for sure. But honestly, the biggest thing for me has learned has been learning how to get out of my own way and work through my own fear and my own mind telling me what's possible and what's not.

Bryan McAnulty [00:02:22]:

I'm curious. I think that's a great answer. But I wonder if you could give like, is There any relatively recent example you can think of where you realize to yourself, oh, I'm. I'm kind of in my own way here.

Erika Carrico [00:02:33]:

Yeah, absolutely. So, yeah, this is, yeah, full transparency. I haven't actually even talked about this publicly. So we, I had a. I have been doing a marketing strategy that has really worked. I put it in place in 2020. It worked great. Created, I don't know, close to $5 million, I'd say in my business.

Erika Carrico [00:02:50]:

And we were just kind of flying right. I was, I had my team in place. It was working. My program was getting epic results. There wasn't much that I really needed to do. And so personally I was going through a pretty chall high conflict, divorce, custody battles, you know, all kinds of things. So I almost put my business on autopilot. And what happened in September was our ads essentially broke.

Erika Carrico [00:03:15]:

We got a shadow ban on our social media, which was not anything that we had done but like bots had, whatever, just kind of detected the wrong thing and everything kind of everything just stopped working. So the strategy that we were putting in place wasn't working. My ads manager didn't know what to do because our ads had worked for four years. We didn't have to really change much. And all of a sudd. Google hated our landing page. So Google wasn't showing our ads to people either. And I think I got in this space of okay, well we're just gonna fix this.

Erika Carrico [00:03:45]:

And you know, I kind of was like in Hope Addict for a couple of months. And meanwhile I was watching revenue go down, go down, go down. And we were earning 150,000amonth, probably started slowly dropping down to more 120,000amonth and then, you know, down to 100,000amonth. And when we hit the hundred thousand a month mark, I went into straight fear and straigh panic and I think my mindset and sort of my underlying scarcity patterns and coming from a place of growing up without money and with a single mom and never having enough and money always being a struggle my whole life I went into this place of like complete meltdown and despair. You know, back in November, December, whenever it was. And it was like I was like, this is, we're going under. The whole thing is it's going to be done, we're going under. Nothing's working anymore.

Erika Carrico [00:04:34]:

I need to fire my team. I have to break, you know, pull everything back to the start. I'm going to end up like downtown Denver in a cardboard box. I'm gonna lose my kids. I mean, I Went down the rabbit hole of, like, I'm going to. Yeah, be homeless in a box in downtown Denver with no business and no kids and no home. And I had. And I have to really work through my own mind and.

Erika Carrico [00:04:57]:

And my spiraling thoughts on a regular basis to, like, reprogram. Reprogram. Reprogram them into a place of being able to make decisions from reality. Being able to make decisions from, a place of, like, divine right. Being able to make decisions not from a place of fear or scarcity or lack, but truly of what is possible. What am I meant for? What is this lesson trying to teach me? What is this divine course correction trying to show me? And so it's a balance for me, no matter what level I've been at. I've always had to work with my mindset and my limiting beliefs and my fear to make decisions really, from a place of where I want to be as opposed to a place of where I've been in the past. Does that make sense?

Bryan McAnulty [00:05:41]:

Yeah, definitely. So would you mind to share, like, what was the decision that you feel has helped to shift that and, like, get you out of how you felt?

Erika Carrico [00:05:49]:

Back in November, I had to come back to spirituality. I had to come back, honestly, to a place of my. Why. Why did I actually start this business in the first place? And I started this business on the back end of being diagnosed with cancer and literally thinking I was going to die and almost making a promise that no matter how much time I had left on this earth, I was going to use that to be of service and to use my gifts in my original medicine and to make impact in the world and the way that my soul is meant to make impact. And so I had to come back to the fact that I think as creatives, all of us feel in some way that we're a vessel, right? We're a channel. Like, it's like we're here for whatever is meant to come through us is meant to come through us. And I had to come back to that knowing of, I am here to make a difference. I am here to make an impact.

Erika Carrico [00:06:39]:

I am here to be a vessel of the work that is meant to come through through me. And there were a couple things in my business that I wasn't excited about and I wasn't loving anymore. And the interesting thing about all this is all of that has to shift in order for me to actually get to where I want to be. And that breaking in September was like, divine guidance of this is happening for you, not to you. Because we're going to move you out of where you're not actually meant to be and back smack into the place where you are.

Bryan McAnulty [00:07:10]:

Yeah. Yeah, that's great. And I can relate to that myself, of thinking about, like, times that were difficult and suddenly you go down the rabbit hole with everything. But it's been similar for me where I realized that going back to the why is what gives me the solution and helps me move forward with it. And I think as entrepreneurs and creators, like, we're put in situations like that that really cause us to, like, have to really think about everything of, like, why are we doing this? What do we really want from this? And, like, think about that on such a deep level that you wouldn't otherwise have to. And for me, whenever it's been tough with something, it always has been, okay, well, if I, like, didn't have to do anything, like, right now, what. What would I want to be doing? And a lot of times when I realized that some of those things, it's the same things that I am doing, and I kind of realized, like, it doesn't. The problems don't matter because I'm doing the thing that I enjoy.

Bryan McAnulty [00:08:10]:

And I think if you can get to that point and find that thing for yourself, that it can not only make it possible to get through those moments, but also a lot easier.

Erika Carrico [00:08:22]:

Yeah, absolutely. I think we have to. I've seen so many entrepreneurs build businesses, and I truly. The ones that, well, the ones that I've really seen make it and thrive and continue to go is because that person had a higher calling or they felt like it was part of their purpose in some way, shape or form, and exactly what you said, they love doing it. And when you think about doing anything other, other than that, it's like, no, why would I. Why would I? There's nothing else I'd really rather be doing.

Bryan McAnulty [00:08:50]:

Yeah. Yeah. So I feel like myself maybe unfortunate that I was kind of so obsessed of having to figure out, like, well, what do I actually want to do and what do I care about doing and wanting to, like, reject anything that I didn't want to do. And I think some people are. Are more likely to work on the thing and only come to that realization later. Whereas for me, for whatever reason, I felt like I'd, like, really had to figure that out. But I think it's been such a powerful thing for me because if I didn't, I don't think I'd be doing the same things that I am today, in a way. So I want to talk about more about this because I know that you have this 28 day process on helping people get clear on all that.

Bryan McAnulty [00:09:40]:

And I guess, yeah, so like let's, let's get into that now. I guess you've built a multi million dollar business and while being a single mom and overcoming cancer, as you mentioned. And so what would you say like those experiences help teach you about the purpose and like how do you now pass that on to clients?

Erika Carrico [00:10:01]:

Yeah, I think, well, what I learned over the years and I actually started my business as a life purpose coach and then kind of just, it morphed over the years. But our purpose is I think a combination of a couple of things. So one, what are you naturally good at? What are your divine gifts? Right. What are skill sets that you can really build upon and expand upon that are, that are going to move you forward? And the second piece is what do you really love to do? Most people I think as adults that I've spoken to, they don't actually know. It's amazing how many people you ask to create a list of five things you love doing and they get stuck after one or two or they don't even know. They can't even put anything down. Cause they're like, I don't do anything that I love. It's like my whole list is, or my whole life is a to do list.

Erika Carrico [00:10:51]:

So really getting people to connect back to what do you love to do? And sometimes we even have to go back into childhood, right? How did you spend your time as a child? What did you love to do as a child? How did you spend your time playing? What, what activities were you involved in? What, what brought you joy? And, and once we know what those, those two things are, we have a good idea of what our natural skill sets are and what we love to do. How can we then combine those two things to create something that is going to give back to the world or add value to the world? And I truly think that that's really what our purpose is in a, in a, you know, simplified way, I suppose.

Bryan McAnulty [00:11:33]:

Yeah, yeah. I think for me that's been helpful too to make sure to frame it of like how can we give value to the world? And one of the people that impacted me on that, and I should really talk to him again because I think he still lives in the same city as I do now. But was John Colko and he wrote this book actually called Problems Worth Solving. And he talked to me about how when you're, you're gonna pursue some kind of problem, it should be a problem that's actually worth solving and that you should think about the business that you're trying to start or what you're trying to do through that lens. Because there's a lot of, like, you can do almost anything to make money. There's so. There's so many ways that you can make money with all these different kinds of businesses. And I think when you're a new entrepreneur, you hear about one of those ways and you're like, oh, well, this is it.

Bryan McAnulty [00:12:29]:

This is the way. And the reality is there is a way to do it with the things that you enjoy and with a way that's going to positively impact people. And that's one of the reasons that I love the coaching and course and community space, because it's usually so built on that that you're providing a service or offering a product that's going to actually make a positive impact on people's lives. And once you get past a certain level to actually feel motivated in your business, it's kind of got to be about something where you feel you're making a positive impact.

Erika Carrico [00:13:01]:

For sure. Absolutely. Well, and it's like, I think. I mean, for me, there's no other. There would be no other way I could do this. Because it's like when. When you hit challenges, not if. Right.

Erika Carrico [00:13:12]:

When you hit challenges. Truly, just like last September, the only thing that got me go, like, got me through that really was remembering that this is why I'm here, this is why I'm here is to have this impact. And I think also at a certain level in our business, right, like when you're earning a hundred thousand a month or 150,000amonth, you're less profitable than you were in the very beginning. You have a team, you have overhead, you have a lot more stress and a lot more responsibilities. Like, I have 80 to $100,000 a month going out. That's a whole load on my shoulders that I didn't have in the beginning. And so you have to really look at. Well, at this point, it's not about the money.

Erika Carrico [00:13:51]:

What is it about? Right. I think at this point, it is about impact. And if it were about the money, I mean, I wouldn't want to grow past where I'm at. But to me, that's not. It's the impact. It's the wanting to help people around the world to live their purpose, to help them get their work out there so that they can have the impact they're meant to have. Right? So that's what it's about. For me.

Erika Carrico [00:14:09]:

And I think every entrepreneur is gonna face times in their business where you have to remember why you're doing this. And if it's not for impact, I guess in my. In my world, like, what is. What are we. What are we doing?

Bryan McAnulty [00:14:23]:

Yeah. So going back here, if you could go back to the moment that you decided to quit your corporate job, what advice would you give yourself then?

Erika Carrico [00:14:33]:

I would have given myself the advice to do it 10 years earlier and start my business 10 years before I actually did. But everybody talked me out of it and told me that I needed to, you know, be responsible and have a real job. And I was getting married and having kids, and everybody was like, yeah, you can't. You can't be a coach. Are you crazy? Like, yeah, do that in your free time and don't use any family money to do that, but go get a real job. And, you know, I would have. I would have definitely told myself to do it when I had initially thought I wanted to start my business, which was 10 years before I actually did.

Bryan McAnulty [00:15:08]:

Yeah. Yeah. I think it's. It's often that you. You may, as an entrepreneur, hear other people kind of say, oh, that doesn't sound like the right idea to go and do that. What do you think are the biggest misconceptions people have about, like, finding their purpose? And how does your approach kind of help break through those myths?

Erika Carrico [00:15:27]:

Yeah, well, I think. I think. Well, actually, the. I think the two biggest myths are, one, I don't have time to find my purpose. I don't have time to do that. Right. Like, life is busy. I've got kids.

Erika Carrico [00:15:41]:

I've got a family. I've got a job. So I don't have time is the first one. And I think the second one is that they just don't think they're special for some reason. Like, they don't. They see their gifts as so normal that they don't even actually see them as gifts. I think that's what I see the most is that people don't actually look at themselves as having a gift to bring to the world. And they think, well, everybody else is already doing that, or, this could be my.

Erika Carrico [00:16:07]:

But there's so many people out there doing it, I'll never be able to do it as well as them, or. Or there's no room for me in that space. And, yeah, that's honestly just a B.S.

Bryan McAnulty [00:16:18]:

Yeah. Yeah. I think that's great. I had a thought recently, which it might seem not extreme, but the way I position it, I guess, like, there's no intention to ever offend anybody. But the idea that sometimes I've noticed, like, somebody has a product or something they get really successful with, and people are kind of like, angry or making excuses to that person of why they're successful with that product. Say, like, oh, well, you just happen to have a following and that's why, or you just did this. And sometimes I think what it actually is is that especially if they see somebody like that, it appears to them as if it was easy for the person to share that and be putting that out. It's a combination of the feeling from seeing that person just feeling so comfortable to just put something out there and just do something.

Bryan McAnulty [00:17:11]:

And at the same time, like, it appears almost as if the person doesn't even, like, want the success in a way, because they're just. They're just doing it. Like, there's no. Like, there's. Doesn't seem like there's a hidden motive behind it, but they're just doing it, and then suddenly they're successful with it. And so it's the feeling that when you see somebody else like that, and it's almost that not only are, like, they just doing it, but it seems like they don't want it, but they still want it more than you. And that's a very, like, difficult thing to kind of deal with as somebody who's not at the point that you're at where you feel like, well, how can this person be succeeding when I want to have this? But they have it because the reality is actually they do want it more than you because they are doing it. And I think it's a way to describe that.

Bryan McAnulty [00:18:03]:

Like, you can just go and try things. There is time that you can find. For example, like you said, that you can go and work on the things that you want to do.

Erika Carrico [00:18:12]:

Yeah, for sure. Well, two things come up to me. One, usually when someone's feeling that way, they're comparing their beginning to somebody else's middle, right? Like, if someone is just starting and they're comparing themselves to me and my business, it's like, well, you haven't seen the eight years that I've put into this. Or you haven't seen the beginning, two or three years, or the beginning first year where I earned 22,000 in a whole year, right? Like, people don't see. They. They compare themselves at the beginning to your middle. And I did that too. When I was starting.

Erika Carrico [00:18:44]:

I compared myself to people who were 10 years ahead of me. And it's like, that's ridiculous. That doesn't, you can't, you can't do that to yourself. And then two, I have watched a lot of my colleagues who I started businesses alongside drop off and most of them are not in business anymore. I think out of the initial program that I went in for coaching, there was 75 of us and there might be five or six of us that are actually coaching still. And I think the only difference is they eventually quit and I didn't. Every time I fell down or failed at something, and there have been so many times where I failed at things, I did get back up and I keep going and I figure it out and I move through it and I course correct and I shift and literally I just don't quit. And I think somebody told me that very early on, you know, the difference between those who make it and those who don't are they just quit.

Erika Carrico [00:19:31]:

And if you don't quit, you'll make it.

Bryan McAnulty [00:19:34]:

Yeah, yeah. I would say like the extension almost of find something that you enjoy doing, find something that is going to make a positive impact on people and then keep doing it, just keep doing it. So like if, for, for so many cases, if you can find something that there's just a way that you can continue doing it, eventually you'll reach that success because from like whether even trying to consciously learn or not, you'll go through the process so long that you will become an expert and you will get better. And I think often for a lot of people, like that's, that's kind of the challenge. Like how can you find a way to at least make this sustainable for yourself, that you can just continue doing it and you'll grow from there?

Erika Carrico [00:20:18]:

Yeah, yeah. Well, and it's like from spiritual law, if you look at it from that perspective too, if this is what you're meant to do and you have that desire, then you take those inspired steps and that inspired action and it just, it's going to work. It has to work, you know.

Bryan McAnulty [00:20:35]:

Yeah, yeah. So with your 28 day process, can you kind of walk us through some of the main steps in that process and how it works?

Erika Carrico [00:20:43]:

Yeah, of course. Yeah, for sure. So it's really around getting clear on how do you want to express your purpose in the world. Right. I think we all, I always say our purpose is kind of like an onion. There's so many different layers to it and we only really know our purpose to the extent that we know ourselves. And we're constantly growing, evolving, and we're constantly peeling off our own layers. And the deeper that we get to know ourselves, the deeper we get to understand our purpose.

Erika Carrico [00:21:09]:

But the very, the first main steps I take people through. And actually I have a course right now that I. Well, I've always had a course since 2018, but my whole. I have a book that's coming out this spring just about this 28 day process. So I'm super excited about that. But essentially it's what I, what I talked a little bit about before is getting clear on, you know, what you're, what you really love to do, what your divine gifts are, and then how can you combine those two to create value in the world? And I think from there it's making a decision to choose. Right? Like, I think so many people are like, well, I could do this or I could do this or which is wrong or which is right? And they sit in the space of trying to figure it out or think their way through it or what could this be? Or how could this look? And they don't actually start, they don't do anything. So it's like you have to then make a choice of, here's where I'm gonna start because this is where I am today and I'm gonna take action towards that.

Erika Carrico [00:22:03]:

Right? I'm gonna get moving. I'm gon, I'm going to start the business, I'm going to do the thing and allow that to evolve. Know that in a year or two years, or three years or five years, your business will look very different. And what you're doing then probably won't be what you're doing now, but you have to start somewhere. And most people don't actually take the step to get started. You know, most people will, maybe they'll make a decision, but, and, but they'll, they'll build their website and they'll, you know, they'll, they'll take the course or they'll get the certification. And then when it comes time to put themselves out there and try and go get clients, they freeze and they're like, nope, can't do it. I need to go get certified in this first.

Erika Carrico [00:22:37]:

Or actually, wait a minute, my website needs a total overhaul because that, you know, it's, they, they stay in that space of wanting to create instead of making that leap to go from consumer to, you know, mentor to teacher to guide to coach to creator. And yeah, my, the 28 day process then is about taking those initial steps and making it go.

Bryan McAnulty [00:23:00]:

Yeah, yeah, that sounds great because that's. As you started introducing it. The first thing I was going to say, like how do you get people who are kind of just stuck thinking about it and oh well, I am going to change or I maybe I should do it this way and they don't really take that action. And if it helps to share, like for me, when I started my business, the way that it looks now is completely different than when I first started it. I started as like a graphic designer, then kind of web design and did all kinds of like work like that for clients. I tried out like all kinds of different things of E commerce and digital products and other things. Then like realized I like building software and like web applications specifically and like through all these things for like 15 years now, that's what has led to me building heights, platform and what I have today. And if I just waited said I'm going to think about this for a really long time, I don't, I wouldn't have ended up with the thing that I built today.

Bryan McAnulty [00:23:53]:

I built this today because I was able to keep doing those different things and learn like, oh actually I don't like this part of this or I do like this thing. And that's, that's what let me go forward. So you, you do constantly evolve and I think you evolve quicker and you can make all those realizations faster actually by taking the action.

Erika Carrico [00:24:13]:

Yeah. Because then you learn what you love and what you don't love. You learn what you're good at and what you're not good at, you know, and, and yeah, you're constantly figuring it out. Just get messy is what I say. Just get messy with it. Be uncomfortable, being uncomfortable and yeah, progress over perfection. And I used to just have this visualization of like my hands were just in the mud. You know, my hands were just in the mud.

Erika Carrico [00:24:35]:

This is messy. This is gonna be hard. This might suck a little bit, but eventually I'm gonna figure it out. And you do. You fumble your way through the first couple of years, but I think by year three, if you're consistent, you start to see some traction and you start to figure it out a little bit. And a lot of people have a lot of success. I think I had a six figure a year my second year and it just flew from there. So.

Bryan McAnulty [00:24:59]:

Yeah, that's great. Yeah. So you've helped thousands of entrepreneurs now transition from like these unfulfilling careers to their dream businesses. I'm curious if there's like any popular choices of like businesses. People tend to start after working with you or if there's any like businesses that have like surprised you after somebody's worked with you?

Erika Carrico [00:25:18]:

Yeah. Well, a lot of people, I mean most of the people, they, they come out and they want to do something. Well, so it's interesting. Most of them want to do something that is obviously going to have an impact. Right. So they usually go into the service based space because my approach is kind of a spiritual approach and then turning like your purpose into profit. So most come out wanting to have some kind of an impact and usually it's because of their story or where they've been or because of different traumatic events that have happened in their lives. Right.

Erika Carrico [00:25:47]:

And I think a lot of times that gives meaning to what we've been through as humans is to be able to now go and help other people through whatever that experience might be. So I think the majority of people end up doing that kind of thing in some way. Shape or form. Looks different coaching to. We've had people go and get, you know, become naturopathic doctors, we've had them become NLP practitioners, therapists. I mean just whatever. It's, it's always a, it's different and really fun to see what people come out with. Um, I think what has surprised me the most is that a lot of people have actually come out of the process and they realize that some of them even realize that they want to stay in their job.

Erika Carrico [00:26:29]:

And it was like a perception of how they were perceiving their, their work and their corporate career. And a lot of people decide that they can align their career with a new mindset and a shift of perspective more with their purpose. And they come out wanting to stay in their career, but they choose to do like volunteer work or they choose to start something like a not for profit. So they don't actually want to monetize their purpose. They stay in their job, but they use their purpose as a way to have impact, but in a more voluntary aspect, which always kind of surprised me.

Bryan McAnulty [00:27:00]:

Yeah. Yeah, that's really interesting. And yeah, I can totally see like that being the right choice for some people.

Erika Carrico [00:27:06]:

Yeah.

Bryan McAnulty [00:27:08]:

For people who are then considering to leave that stable job and have the fear around it. What, like how would you help them address that fear? And especially if they have like what you're saying, if like friends and relatives saying, oh, maybe you just do that on the side. No, you shouldn't really like put time into that or.

Erika Carrico [00:27:27]:

Yeah, well, we all feel it. I don't. Did you have corporate job before you moved into your business?

Bryan McAnulty [00:27:32]:

I did not. For me it was, I didn't even go to college. And so for me it was everyone Telling me, brian, why aren't you going to college? What are you doing with your life?

Erika Carrico [00:27:45]:

Yeah. Yeah. Well, I think, I mean, I came from corporate myself. Complete burnout. I honestly think that a lot of me knowing that I was here for so much more, me knowing that I had this work that I was meant to share with the world, I was holding it in and stuffing it in. And I was miserable in my career and I was miserable in my marriage. I hated where I lived. Like, it was this whole thing.

Erika Carrico [00:28:07]:

And I was diagnosed with kidney cancer. And it was like, wake up. You know, it really took me hitting this, you might die to make the switch. And I think we all face fear. And the biggest thing that I hear is, well, what I need the certainty of a paycheck. I need to have. Have the benefits. I need the 401k.

Erika Carrico [00:28:27]:

I have a family to support. I have a mortgage to pay. I have to pay my bills. I have to be responsible. And I get that. There's no one saying that you. I there. There's no one saying that you have to just up and leave and start your business and, and have no money coming in.

Erika Carrico [00:28:40]:

Right. Do it wisely. Like so many people, I couldn't afford to just quit my job and move into my business full time and not earn money for a year. So I did it on the side. And you know, every night after my kids went to bed, I had a baby that I was nursing. I had a toddler at the time. I was recovering from cancer. I did not have a supportive husband.

Erika Carrico [00:28:58]:

And so, and I. And I was working full time. And so when my kids went to bed, you know, from 8:30 to 10:30pm on Tuesdays and Thursdays, that was when I started building my business. And on weekends, you know, from. On Sundays, from like, I don't know, it might have been like 8am to 1pm that was when I built my business. And so I was able to start bringing in clients, start bringing in some cash flow. And by the year mark, I had replaced my income in my career. And so I was able to let go of that career and not even have a lapse.

Erika Carrico [00:29:29]:

And some people, you know, like, if you're a higher earner and you're earning like 250,000 a year, whatever, in your corporate career, it's going to be a little different for you. But I always say, great, get your savings to a point where you have some. You have a comfortable savings. Get your business to where you're at least earning half of what your corporate salary is. And Most people can take the jump then. Most people feel confident because then once they quit their job, they have all that extra time to then pour into their business. It's already working at that point. It's just a little bit of a scale strategy.

Bryan McAnulty [00:29:55]:

Yeah, yeah. I think that's really great advice. And definitely like having a family and a kid and a job already, like that is so much to deal with both in terms of time that's taken up from that and responsibilities and things that you have to provide for. But I think it's a great point that you made and how you explain that you did it through like those times on the weekend or at night. And what I think people maybe miss, like or underestimate is that how much you can actually get done in a short time. And like most likely at the corporate job, like there's meetings and there's all these like silly little things where you're not actually like being productive towards a specific thing. But when you're building your own business, you don't have to have any meetings with anybody or anything. You can just say, okay, I need to get these things done.

Bryan McAnulty [00:30:47]:

And like what you can accomplish in like, if you're able to give yourself just a couple hours of focused work, it's I think like most people would be surprised what they can actually accomplish in that time.

Erika Carrico [00:30:57]:

I totally agree. My whole strategy is built around build your business to six figures in less than 10 hours a week. Because if you're like, if you're focused on the needle moving, revenue generating activities and you're letting go of all of the other stuff, like you will start earning money. And I say that 10 hours a week because yeah, you can absolutely build a six figure business in ten hours a week. Like it's just, it doesn't take a lot of time. And I think so many people, and I did this in the beginning too, I was like, wow, I need to be sitting at once. I finally quit my job. I turned into an employee almost.

Erika Carrico [00:31:29]:

I was like so used to sitting at a desk for eight hours a day that I came into my own business and I was sitting at a desk for eight hours a day, Monday through Friday. And half that time I was not doing anything that was going to matter. I would have been better off out hiking and doing something fun for myself. Right. And then just really focused on those small hours of needle moving, revenue generating activities. And once I sort of realized that and made that shift, yeah, my business, I think I hit the 750,000 a year mark and I was Working so much less than I ever would have worked in corporate because I was so focused on what was going to work.

Bryan McAnulty [00:32:00]:

Yeah, yeah, that's a great point too. And I think I would encourage anybody as well. If you are, you feel like you've been maybe working on your website for too long or like your logo or things like this, try to find a way to become comfortable with being uncomfortable about it not being perfect to you yet and realize that like most likely like there are so many other things that you don't even realize that are definitely not perfect in your business business that you're probably not delivering on well through like the client experience or your marketing or something else and become okay with all of that and then just work on like you're saying the things that are going to actually make an impact and make you money. And then you may even realize later on still that the website actually wasn't as important as you thought it was or the logo or whatever it was. And I have loved to see like through our platform course creators who had that realization and like had it early enough or just were able to not care about certain things like that that have been really successful. Because what, what I say is like you need one of the three things like your marketing, like your branding or your product and like if you have a great product but like maybe your like website looks bad or whatever, like you can still be really successful or if you've got great marketing but your product's still need some work, you can still probably get customers. And one of my favorite examples is this customer that was using our platform and like their first year they built a six figure business and inside heights platform. Like you can change the logo at the top left to whatever logo you want or your business name or whatever.

Bryan McAnulty [00:33:42]:

He never changed it, it just, it says height still it's like the default like platform branding. But like he's able to change it. And I remember our support team and like we even reached out to him and he said hey, you know like you can, you can change something, you can upload a logo or something. Like he didn't even have a logo but he was delivering this excellent product to people and he built a six figure business in a year because of that. And so like it's not that he was like trying to like scam people or something like this. It was like a health type course I believe as well. And so like being able to become comfortable with not worrying about certain things like that can definitely help you focus on what's important to grow the business.

Erika Carrico [00:34:20]:

Yeah, absolutely. I think that's hilarious. And also so true. People. I've seen people come into my courses and they have been. They're so stuck. They'll spend six weeks, you know, behind the scenes and not reach out to us. And they're like, I've been struggling with my logo, same kind of thing.

Erika Carrico [00:34:33]:

And they'll ask me, you know, how did you ever create one? And I'm like, I don't. I've never had a logo. I don't have a logo today. I don't have one. It's just never been important to me. So, yeah, I don't. I don't have a logo.

Bryan McAnulty [00:34:45]:

Yeah, yeah. And if it helps anyone watching or listening to this, for some background on myself, because I did really care about this, like a designer. That's where my background is from. And the way I learned to get myself out of that was through a bunch of experiences over my career, like working with clients and things like that. But one story, very short story in particular that stood out was when I was building my first web application as my own product, there was. It was like this kind of like goal tracking app. And it had the input where you add your goal at the top. And I spent so long trying to make the shadows and everything, like, perfect on that input.

Bryan McAnulty [00:35:23]:

And then I finally show this to a designer on my team and I have him try it out. And he says, brian, I can't find where to add the goal. I can't find where to add that. He couldn't even see it. Like, he didn't realize where it was in the interface. And so I realized all the time I spent on the shadows and all the gradients and everything, it had to be completely moved anyway.

Erika Carrico [00:35:45]:

Yeah.

Bryan McAnulty [00:35:46]:

And so I think that's a good example of like giving yourself the flexibility to be able to just move forward and try different things. Because sometimes the thing that you're perfecting is actually like, not the right direction at all.

Erika Carrico [00:35:59]:

One million percent. Yes. Welcome to being an entrepreneur.

Bryan McAnulty [00:36:06]:

So I think many of our listeners are like creative entrepreneurs. They're looking to, like, find the next step in building a business that feels fulfilling. What's one challenge that you would kind of give to them or suggest that they can take on this week to kind of give them a taste of like your 28 day process?

Erika Carrico [00:36:23]:

Oh, that's a really good question. I would say create a list of five to 10 people that you can reach out to. Who can you reach out to that maybe they're not even. Not even in A place, not even from a place of, oh, I'm going to sell this person into my service or whatever, not from that kind of a place, but literally making five to ten reach outs of, hey, here's what I'm doing, here's this new business direction I'm taking, or here's this business that I'm starting, here's what I'm doing, here's who it's for. Do you know anybody that might be interested in this? And just saying, like, who do you know? Do you know someone? And even getting in that space of energy and momentum and doing private reach outs and invitations creates, Creates so much. I don't know, I think it just creates so much forward movement that other things then start to fall into place. You know, you're starting to plant those seeds that maybe if they don't pay off right now in those initial reach outs, they'll pay off later and other things will start to flow as well.

Bryan McAnulty [00:37:20]:

Yeah, yeah, I like that. That's a good exercise. And so one of the things we like to do on the show is also have each of our guests ask a question to the audience. So if you could ask our audience anything, whether it's something you're curious about or just kind of want to get everybody thinking about, what would that be?

Erika Carrico [00:37:36]:

Well, I know we talked about this before and I think it's changed. He said that it probably would. I think I would like to know what you know. What is your purpose? Why are you here? What are your divine gifts and how are you going to utilize those to one, create value in the world and have impact, but also give you the vehicle to create true financial freedom for yourself. So what is your purpose and why are you here? What's your mission?

Bryan McAnulty [00:38:06]:

And Erica, thanks so much for coming on the show. Before we get going, where else can people find you? Online.

Erika Carrico [00:38:11]:

Amazing. Thank you. Yeah. So my website is just Erica Carico.com and there's a free video training on there where you can hear the strategy that I take people through to build their business to six figures. You can find me on Instagram, lots of free trainings on YouTube. Yeah, just Google me and I'm pretty much. Yeah, it'll all pop up.

Bryan McAnulty [00:38:32]:

Awesome. Erica, thanks so much.

Erika Carrico [00:38:34]:

Thank you for having me. It's been so great.