E217: 3 Strategies to Creating Your Dream Life and Business with Hannah Schwartz

Hannah Schwartz, Your Business Strategist. She works with entrepreneurs who are ready to level up in biz or want to pivot, and offers 1:1 and group programs! Hannah wants to know, what's your business plan?

[00:50] Valerie LaVigne: Welcome back to The Women's Empowerment Podcast, Hannah, thank you so much for being a guest on today's show, I am very excited to see your face today.

Hannah Schwartz: I'm most excited. I can check off all the boxes after this call.

VL: I love that so much. Yeah, after this call this podcast.

Potato Potato right you know what's so funny is that like, I feel like it gets so much energy after calls with you and you probably hear that all the time. You're just such a vibrant ray of sunshine. And actually, when I first sat down at my desk, it was super gloomy outside and the sun was shining as we're talking. So this is very lovely. And I'm just so happy that the sun is shining here. So my dear I could talk to you all day about anything and everything. However, I want us to stay on topic because I'm super excited to chat with you about all of the amazing things that you do and all the amazingness that you are. When we first met Doing this which is very exciting you were not a business strategist yet.

So, I would love to kind of break down. Really, just like the, you know the elevator version of how you went from where you were to that business strategist self.

[02:13] HS: Okay, I actually love this story and I find that a lot of entrepreneurs and a lot of people just in general do change careers and always feel really sticky about their previous careers. I feel the opposite. And I think that my previous career gave me this one. Anyways, I was in real estate and I decided instead of having a geographic location, which most Realtors do, they choose like an area that there will be to be the realtor for I was like, I want to work with a demographic of people. And I want to work with entrepreneurs. I want to teach younger newer entrepreneurs all about homeownership and entrepreneurs that have been in the industry for years and years. They're going to want to invest in property. I'm going to be here. And so I ended up connecting with entrepreneur after entrepreneur after entrepreneur and it was the coolest group of people you could ever imagine. And then something really incredible happened. Entrepreneurs started calling me for business advice, out of the blue, out of nowhere, and on many calls, they would say why don't you offer this charging? And I always said this is my dream. I love giving this call to me anytime. One day I'll charge thinking that I'd be like 50 or 60 years old when that time comes around. And I thought I would like to grow a business in real estate or multiple businesses in real estate. And then I'd sell them or hire people to manage them and then I go off into business strategy. And one day I was sipping coffee on my patio, and I literally had this epiphany, why? Why are we waiting for 50 or 60 years old? Why don't I just do it? And then something else occurred to me if I'm 50 or 60 and dropping my real estate career, however I do it, I'm still going to have to start business strategy and people are still going to have the same thoughts like why are you doing this? but if I start now in 10 years I'll have 10 years experience in business.

I'd rather just start now. So within two weeks, I dropped my realtor license, how to a lot of very awkward conversations and launch my new business launched my beta program which sold out in the first day and assigned to my first long term clients like them onto something. And now, your business strategist.

[04:16] VL: Oh my goodness, what an empowering story. Absolutely. And I think it's really brave of you to take that leap. And a lot of the times people think like I don't know what to do, like, I have some ideas of what I want and then they're like, but what are people asking you for? What are people coming to you for? What do people know you for? And you did that? That? That call? So how amazing and I've got to say like, since knowing you and seeing this transition for you and seeing your journey. It's pretty incredible to see how smooth it is. I mean, again, it's from the outside. I'm sure there were lots of difficult and awkward conversations. But I'm sure that part of being a business strategist is part of that.

That this new chapter of your life requires a lot of skills, a lot of really important skills that are transferable into all different areas of our life. And the one that really comes to mind for me is organization and the other one is being proactive right as a strategist, you need to be thinking ahead and planning for tomorrow, but it's like what can you do today? So are there any strategies or tips you can share with the listener of what we can do today to organize ourselves to have a better future than that dream?

Strategy #1: Create Zones in Your Home

[05:40] HS: Absolutely. I love offering tangible things that you could do literally today or tomorrow. you could take from this podcast and go on your way and start. One of the first things that I did was actually take this from the Netflix show the whole minute.

The Home Edit Show Netflix

The show talks about creating zones in your space to allow yourself to, you know, make the space better and more aesthetically pleasing and also to allow whatever it may be regarding home decor aren't too different. I know also, on the flip side of that, our brains create patterns. And our brains really need us to show them new patterns so that they can work their best in specific arenas. And so I took those two ideas, the idea of creating zones for statically pleasing spaces, and zones for grading work and I put them together and what I mean by that is I created in my space, the zones in which I did different things. So when I'm at my desk, that is my work done. If I'm not feeling like working, I leave my desk. My desk is where I do work related to my computer work. I don't even actually brainstorm often at my guess, because I find that brainstorming takes me to a dream world. And I people often say that like procrastination, I don't think that's procrastination, but it might not feel as so I needed a space now for brainstorming. So there's actually a match on my floor in my office. And that's my sense space. It's my dream space. I pull tarot cards, I have crystals and then sometimes people with tons of blank pieces of paper and that brainstorming I also the morning coffee zone. When I sit in this morning coffee shop, It's like I know my day is going to start where I have like this couch, a little table and some plants. I journal from there and it allows me to dive into my writing.

And so I highly recommend creating so you can have a tiny apartment, you can have a tiny, tiny, tiny apartment and get yourself like a little tiny nap and put it on the floor and that could be your dream space. It doesn't really matter if it's aesthetically pleasing or not. It's about allowing your brain to know what you're doing in each particular space and the magic is once the pattern starts to create in your brain. The moment you sit on that mountain, your brain will start going nuts in dreamland for you. Once you sit at your desk, you're going to start thinking. Once you sit in that coffee area your mind is going to know I can rest here So creating so it's for your brain to find patterns I think is an incredible way to get started.

[08:42] VL: I enjoy this very much.

And this is something that I practice on a bigger scale but I really love the specificity of how you're sharing it because there are times when I sit at my desk and I want to do three different kinds of things. And in my brain it's three very different kinds of if you want to compartmentalize that if you will, but I usually practice it as okay, this is my workspace. This is the bedroom. The TV doesn't go in the bedroom but the laptop doesn't go in the bedroom and my phone I try to keep out of the bedroom. It's usually there with me.

However, I have noticed that since doing that this was years and years ago, I sleep so much better because the bed is for sleeping. However, I really like the specificity of it because having those routines and rituals and systems and patterns is really gonna get you into that space quicker like you said, and already I have so many ideas for myself.

I'm gonna step outside for like a couple of minutes every day even though it's winter now. I'm going to step outside every day and just get some sunlight on my face as I drink my morning beverage because yeah, I just can see the spot in my mind that I want to do that And I love that so much.

HS: I love that idea. I'm going to take a step further and I'm going to do it too. Every time I go to a cottage, my friends cottage, the first thing I do with my cup of coffee or I take a sip is I go out onto the patio and i Cheers the lake and I say good morning like and then I Aki and it's before I make sure that that's my first sip. Usually it's a little bit too hot, which means I have to stay outside a little bit longer. And so I don't have a great view. I don't have a patio which is great. I decorated it myself very proudly. but the view is mediocre but I do have some trees. And so I think in the morning instead of just sitting with members of the coffee. I'm going to go outside and here's the trees.

VL: Yes, we're gonna I'm going to tag you tomorrow morning and my *Cheers*

Oh my gosh, I love that so much. Yeah, and it really is this tangible practice that people can do today. I like you to like can we break down a little bit like if you have a smaller room. So let's say your office is where you do all of the different things like your morning coffee is in your office.

Do you change the difference between like you and I right now we're having a conversation via zoom. Is that different from like your work or is conversing and having those interactions with your clients is that different from like, you know what I mean? What's the word…

I know you write on blogs. So are you writing a blog post in the same place that you're having a conversation with someone if that's a better question?

HS: Okay, we're going into specifics here and I'm just like, lighting up inside. Okay, we're gonna take this like 17 steps further. Okay.

I'm so excited. I don't even know where to start. So yes, you are going to have overlapping things that happen in each particular space. So yes, I do write blogs, my dream spaces where I actually hand wrote them and when I take that, obviously I need my computer and I'm not going to move my whole computer in order to take off this thing.

Here are two points that I want to make that will change the way you think about it. The first one is it's not so much about getting to the space to do the thing, but it's leaving the space when you're not getting.

So you come to your work desk and you find that you're leaving your desks.

And that's the hard part because a lot of people are like, I need to sit here for five hours and get whatever it is done. But your brain isn't in it. And in order to allow your brain to really understand what's happening in that space. You need to take that you need to remove yourself when you're not doing that thing. So that's point number one. Point number two zones also can be the way you do a thing. Okay, I'm just going to go after this and hope it makes sense. I have two different types of pens. I have ballpoint pens, and felt pens.

Okay, I gotta say I'm nuts, but it's real. My felt pens are used for journaling. My ballpoint pens are used for work. They feel different. They feel different in my hand and they write differently. One of them doesn't write well when I write quickly. felt pen suck when you write really fast. ballpoint pens write really well in the past. So when I'm using a felt pen, I can't write quickly. I use it for myself. It's when I get to write slow.

Ballpoint pens run really fast. I can use it for work and I could job and millions of notes down. It's not so old. So when you are in a very small space, for example, and your desk is your everything, allow different things to change. your space itself doesn't have to do So yes, we just talked about zones but created the zone.

So for me, my journaling zone is a specific journal, and I'm very particular weekend I actually spent way too much money on my journal. And they felt pens and a cup of coffee or something.

My office space when I'm sitting at my desk is my like, even if I'm in like a slower pace my life goes on because when I'm at my desk I'm working but when I'm on my map I like it.

To work about creating things within each zone that are specific to the way you want your brain to read. And the more things that you can kind of put together in this pattern, the more easily your brain will look into it. Now I'm no scientist, I don't really understand all of the things about the brain. but for science sake, Allow your brain to have a lot of reason to connect the thing you're doing with this space.

[14:48] VL: It's amazing I talk - I'm not a scientist either - but I talk a lot about neural pathways. On the show. And when you have a habit like this one you've created you can think of it like a row. You've created this road or this pathway from where you are to where you want to be. So where you are is a cup of coffee, where you want to be is in your dream space. So to get you there quicker, you have some sort of habit against you there. So it's stepping onto your Mac, seeing your crystal, seeing your tarot cards and doing the thing. Then you have another pathway to get you somewhere else. Now, as you're creating these pathways, it takes time to build a bridge, it takes repetition. So not only does it take time, but it takes the consistency of repeating the same motion or the same action or creating the same environment every time. And then you can have tons of neural circuits in your brain like that hundreds of 1000s I was gonna say. So if you can create those neural pathways that you're talking about, like quick routes as quick paths to where you want to go. It's easier than to just reroute. It's kind of like your brain knows the Google Map. easiest, fastest way to get there because it's built it and it's done it before and it'll just keep repeating. So I really love that and whether people realize it or not that pen example is perfect because you might not know this but you brush your teeth the exact same way every single time you brush your teeth. You pick up the toothbrush with the same hand you put the toothpaste on your toothbrush with the same hand that you go into your mouth the exact same way every single time. So another kind of quick way to change that neural circuit or neural pathway is to switch hands when you brush your teeth. Just that and then you can see how your body just naturally wants to pull towards the original way that additional path. So it's really cool.

I mean, I get real nerdy about it because I love that stuff. Yeah, I love it. And I have favorite pens too. So I actually have I have like someone gave me a packet of the same pen but they're different colors. So I actually have the white pen that I have goals with my white achieved planner. and then the pink pen that I have goes with my Five Minute Journal. It's the same pen. it's a different color, but I use them for my different books.

HS: Yeah, yeah. I can also give an example because on my mat in the office, I do two very different things. One of them is business, strategizing, and business brainstorming. And the other is like la la land meditation. And so in order to find separation within that, so that I'm not thinking about business when I'm trying to meditate. I switch the environment by the only things I really change is I bring blank pieces of paper and my business pens to the mat with me and then my business If I don't have those papers, and the pen and meditation And it's it's that simple bringing a business part of my desk to the floor with me, allows me to go back into business.

[18:01] VL: So cool. I love that. Okay, so we know exactly where we need to be to do the things. But what things are we doing in that space like how do we create that dream life that we want? Or how do we achieve those goals in those spaces that we're in?

HS: I think it's all about going after the things that you really want and need. I think you can make two lists and the things that you really need and the things that you really want, the things that you really need. You're going to need space for those and the things that you really want to see if there's a connection between them and once so I love doing art and crafty things. And that's a big hobby of mine so I actually created a space for it in my house. I haven't used it much. I wrote a piece actually called Move your Cookbook. And the idea of moving your cookbook is to make things easier for you to do and if you're not doing them new, very similar to the toothbrush. So I wasn't using my cookbook that I wanted to be using and so instead of having it in my kitchen, I put it in my office, And then I ended up using it. And so this idea of creating the goals that you really want in your life, but every person is different for that In terms of creating, if we're switching topics for a moment, if we're talking about creating some sort of schedule, in which you want to make a dream life and I highly recommend doing it, and it is so much fun!

Strategy #2: Dream Life Calendar

Open your Google Calendar and you're gonna call it the Green calendar. You're gonna think of yourself. Three years later.

Three years later, three years later, Hannah, what does her life look like? What is she doing? Use colors. Google calm has all the colors you can want and create some sort of calendar for yourself, be it I'm going to work Monday, Wednesday, Friday. I'm going to be off every Tuesday on Sundays. I'm going to go to Saskatoon on Wednesday. And whatever it is you're doing, you can be as specific as you want. It could be as detailed as you want. You can be as broad and here's the fun part. Now you're going to overlap your current calendar with your future calendar, which you can do on Google and slowly start to adapt your current calendar to look like your future. And it's easy because there are colors there. So for example, I love networking. I love it. It's like one of my favorite things to do. So what I did on my dream calendars every day, Sorry, every monday, wednesday and friday from three until six I had I overlapped it with my current calendar and every time I had a networking option, During those times I was like oh my gosh, and moviemaking.

Oh my gosh, I'm doing it the same color is overlapping each other. I'm doing the things every single time And the cool part is you get to actually create this calendar for yourself over time that is your

[21:00] VL: I just yes to all the things Absolutely So, I love this and I do something similar. Similar with my clients when I'm working with them.

But I love the idea of seeing it in your Google Calendar and overlapping it that way because yeah, it just brings you into that really in the present and it gives you that evidence. and when you have that evidence of this is possible for me. You start to see how other things are possible for you, too.

Yeah, that's really incredible. So would you recommend it? What's your dream in 1 to 3 years from now?

HS: it really depends where you're at in your life. Sometimes it's beneficial to do a year round and sometimes it's beneficial to do three. For my business. I got one year out because I wanted to see what my life could be like in one year. There's another really interesting aspect to this that I actually do want to touch on. And it's sometimes what we think we're gonna want. We actually don't find joy in and to figure that out sooner allows us to re-dream something new. And so if for example, I wanted to network three times a week and I started to do it and I didn't find doing it, then I get to actually adapt my training calendar. but I wouldn't have known that otherwise, I wouldn't have realized that my future self was actually not going to enjoy going to a party every single Saturday night. because in theory, that's cool. In theory, I'm going to be this: a cool person is going to be invited to everything and then you start getting invited to everything and you notice that that's part of your brain realizing, I don't like this. And so it also allows you to actually navigate what your dreams are actually bringing you joy.

[22:22] VL: Oh my goodness that is such a great, such a great point. Because that happens with a lot of people a lot of the times they strive for so long or they push so hard and they quote unquote, finally achieved their goals and then they're left feeling with this dissatisfaction. And it's like Oh, if only we knew what this was really like and something that I teach a lot of is connecting to a feeling word, it's not necessarily the habit, or the goal, it's how do I want to feel, and this could also be like, whatever, a year from now, three years from now, whatever it is for that person.

And then how can we reach that feeling today and then just keep cultivating that or look, what are the things where are the activities? What are the conversations who are the people I'm around? What are the events I'm going to that bring me closer to that feeling? And then you're saying yes or no to the invitation based off of Will this make me feel And for you it could be fill in the blank could be connected to my dream calendar connected to my dream life, or it could be deeper than that into an actual emotion or feeling so yeah, I think they tie in really well together. So in that case, let's say I've built my dream calendar. I'm starting to see that a couple of the things I'm doing every week or every day are lining up. Some of the things are working some of the things aren't. Are you encouraging like weekly check ins to kind of clarify where we're at, how often are we, you know, reviewing this, this system.

HS: Yes. I love this conversation so much. I love it so much.

Okay, wait, wait, wait, before I go there, your what you just said about the feeling behind it is giant Can we just like dive into that for briefly.

VL: Yeah, let's do it.

HS: Okay. What you just said matters more than the dream calendar does because if you don't know the feelings behind it, you're not going to enjoy it. What I share with people, my clients and friends and I am going to take what you said and turn it business for a moment. If you made a million dollars in your business tomorrow.

Would you feel successful? I guarantee you the answer is no. And the reason why is because you don't know the feeling that you were after, or the feeling that it brings to your body. And it's exactly it, I think is exactly what you were referring to. And so when I speak to my clients and my colleagues and my friends, when it comes to the feeling of success, or the feeling that you're trying to receive every moment of every day that you think you have reached success, stop and think about what that feeling is that you start to actually feel what success is about. if you do make a million dollars Tomorrow, you will actually feel.

VL: I love it. Perfect. Yeah, like that. I think it goes back to like when you're saying part of your practice is meditating and sitting into that space. And it's like, I feel like a lot of the and this might be going off topic but I feel like a lot of the information out there on social media and just in books and all kinds of things is like, these are all the things you have to be doing and chasing and going after to have a successful business and it's like but a lot of the work is done. internally a lot of the work is done with our mindset and connecting to like what it means for me and it's not following someone else's checklists all the time and I think people get really tripped up because they're like, but I did all the things I did a through that just like so and so told me so And then again they reached this like, what now why didn't like a hangover like a success. hangover or something.

Or they're like, this isn't what I wanted. And, you know, this is a great conversation for people who are whether you're just starting your business or you've been in your business for years. Am I doing the things that I myself want that I myself dreamed of? Because I wanted it not someone else told me that this is what I want. Someone else said you need a million dollars in your business. Right? and I mean, if that's your goal, that's fine, but if it's not yours, then what are you chasing? so getting to your feelings. I love it.

I also am, we've talked about colors you're talking about organization and I cannot help but notice your colorful cue cards behind you, I'm very attracted to rainbows, like I just keep my eyes keep starting there. Can you tell us a little bit about what is going on behind you?

Strategy #3: Business Pillars Program

[28:06] HS: And actually, this was the perfect segue because we were just talking about goal setting and reaching big. And so actually what's behind me is what I offer is a system that I teach, which is called the pillar system. I created it when I was in real estate and I had no idea what I was doing in business. I had no market I had no business idea. I had no rhyme or reason what I was saying yes or no to, above all else I was to idea and project to project and then one day I decided I don't like this way of business. I don't like having an age business. On a Word document that I have printed. That's like catching ducks on my desk. How do I go after it? What am I even going after? These goals seem really big are they my goals? I'd be their goals. So one day I sat down, I like color. I like visualization and I need to be able to see physically my success. I need to be able to see progress. I need to see it be motivated. And so one day, honestly, I have no idea how I came up with it. But this is now the system I use in business all the time. And it's what I teach, I come up with or we come up with together the foundations of your business. So instead of working on one part of your business at a time, what if much work on both parts of your business together. Have you ever noticed, and this is in life too? Have you ever noticed that you'll deal with a task and then ultimately realize that the task could have worked for multiple things, but you didn't know it at the time? And so you do the task of like, oh my gosh, I need to do this task again for this other idea. Well, with the pillar system, you have your core foundations, your base, your foundation of business, the legs on which your business dad, and then we create goals beneath each pillar. So each color is a different foundation, and the goals the bottom cards leading to the top are the little goals.

And I think the tangible piece that I can offer right now for anybody who is goal setting in general, is the idea of a small goal and a big goal to us. I believe it's completely wrong. And here's why. We get very, very overwhelmed with the idea of a big goal. And then just as you said before, and just as we were talking about about success, the closer we are to a goal, the less the goal matters somehow. And then we completed the goal and we're like what's next?

We don't really feel like we've done and so I urge you instead of saying small goal and say the goal that is closer to me and the goal that is harder for me.

Because the only difference is how able we are to achieve it in the moment. That's the only difference and the work towards the big goals. It's just a lot of the little it's a lot of smaller tasks, but there's more.

And so it doesn't mean that they're harder, it just means that they're farther away.

And once you can allow your brain to realize, whoa, even my giant goals so my wall right now is an entire year. This is everything I'll be doing.

So my top goals are months, months from now so if I were to just be that goal, I would be free.

[31:38] VL: Where can we find you? Where can we follow you, how can we support your business?

insta :https://www.instagram.com/startwithhannah/

website: https://www.startwithhannah.com/

Tik tok: https://www.tiktok.com/@startwithhannah

Medium: https://medium.com/@startwithhannah

VL: Is there anything that you’d like to share before the rapid fire round?

[33:30] HS: Is there anything that I'd like to share.. maybe… is that okay, I do have something I'd like to share, here's what I'd like to share, you know that we're worth reading this in January and January is a big makeover. I don't have any reason to have any resolution.

VL: No, I don't do that

HS: That's the best answer. Great. So we don't have any resolution. But what I do want to bring into account is that I call Mondays and this is the perfect time to talk about it. So in January we don't like huge love like the year has the most incredible year in the world, and then we literally wake up feeling exactly the same.

Because literally, nothing has changed. And the concept of Monday is very similar to January. Mondays, we usually make up and we're like this week is going to be the best week of the entire world. I'm going to do x y and Zed or on Thursday, you're going to you're going to say to yourself, I'm going to start the next big Mondays are January it is our regular January. And Tuesday is our February when everything comes crashing down and we're like wait a second. I can't do all this is not possible. So every time we were starting on Monday and your Monday is like the coolest thing in the world. Remember that it is EJ and Tuesday's you're paying weary and each week will come and go. Allow yourself to enjoy it. more than you planned it

VL: This is perfect. But don't hit on February that's my birthday

HS: I just almost spit out on my copy onto my screen! everywhere use our slow down and fall into ourselves, in my opinion, because yeah go go go in February like we do you live on in February?

RAPID FIRE ROUND:

What are you currently reading? OR Favourite book?

Becoming by Michelle Obama

What does “empowerment” mean to you?

Empowerment is thriving, and supporting women in the drive. I actually wrote a piece about this called thriving women. And I think that we have for every woman who sinks down into her God, and decides where and how she wants to thrive. Then we also get to see that that is empowering.

What is your longest standing habit?

Journaling. Almost every day and do like your crops for those three right? I have free range but when I first started journaling that variable right off the top of the page there are no And then I will then I would start that with my new thing that I've been doing because I'm finding that because the heart of the habit has become a little bit too routine for me. Now the new thing that I'm doing is adding extra.

What are you currently working toward?

So many things that can't be wrapped by your question. I'm working toward the business I'm working towards. I have okay three words for the business word of the year. It is scary and exciting. Its authenticity and my personal word of the year is host because I want to host a lot of events they used to host free k0V!D And my soul word of the year is def. I want to find more depth within myself.

VL: Those are great words And I love how they are tied together and yet. Thank you so much for this delightful conversation. I have really enjoyed our time together and they really want to acknowledge you for the journey that you're on. how far you've come since we first met several years ago now I think it's like three years ago now!

I want to acknowledge you for just the light brain to any place that you are at whether that's virtual or in person or in the dance. You really like you really make my day. I didn't. I wasn't lying when I said you. You brought the sunshine with you. So thank you again so much for being here so much for being a part of my life. And I'm very excited for the listener to connect with you. So like I said, I'll link all of your information to all of the key things!

HS: When this opportunity is the coolest I'm going to I'm going to party on my couch. Thank you so much, I'm so, so, I miss you so much!

Podcast Host

Valerie LaVigne

Valerie is the creator and founder of Valerie LaVigne Life and the Women's Empowerment Show. She helps busy and empowered women create healthy habits so that they can become the best version of themselves and transform their lives. Learn more about Valerie here!