The question that started my school-hours only work-week.
Before you ask yourself ‘what if I don’t have what it takes?’ ask ‘what if I don’t want what it takes?’
If you’re a woman and you’ve ever felt like there’s some inherent, invisible magnetic force compelling you to people-please, peacemake and proactively procrastinate on your own goals in favour of someone else’s vision-
Samesies.
Exactly where we’ve felt compelled or rather roughly pushed into people pleasing has evolved over the last few decades from the home, our relationships, within friendships, with in-laws, and within our careers as we navigate the swirling mists of transparent yet (not always but often) toxic testosterone. (In fact, you can probably slap that testosterone blanket across most (if not all) of the above).
And one of the pathways for many women out of people-pleasing prison has been to give a right old middle finger to the corporate world and create our own version of success in the form of our own business.
And it’s a vision that we’ve made work for us. Society failed to support us as we became mothers and were saddled with the brunt of life admin, unpaid manual household labour and holding the collective of our emotional household together. So we decided to take matters into our own hands.
Nowadays, it seems like every woman knows another woman with a business. Or has one herself.
I am one of those women. And my business, that thing I started for ME, to support me through the early years of my children’s lives, to buy me the ticket I craved to Freedom-Town with stops at Uncapped-Income and Flexibility Stations-
Well, it nearly broke me. And I’d say if you’re reading this article, your business has nearly broken you too.
Frolicking, Long Lunches and Stripe Notifications
I LOVE a good business. I love watching women succeed with something they and ONLY they have brought to life, creating their own version of success without feeling chained to someone else’s ambitions, 5-year plan or misaligned key objectives.
Working for yourself as a woman in 2025, especially if you have or you’re planning to start a family, gives you the power to completely shape the way you want to work, how you want to earn an income and how much you work.
So why do so many of us end up feeling like we’ve created ourselves a carbon copy of the corporate roles we left behind?
And instead of working less, we’re working more - and instead of earning more, we’re working less.
Of course - there are LOADS of women who appear to be living the solopreneur dream - spending hours frolicking in the pool with their kids, trotting out for long lunches and seemingly spending about 10 minutes a day at their laptops all while watching Stripe notifications roll in on repeat.
And I get it. This is the vision that sells. This is what inspires other women to want to create their own version of pool-frolicking, Stripe-pinging, lunch-eating success.
You DO have what it takes - but you might not want it
But when we compare our own laptop-tapping, 3-day messy bun and Cotton On leggings, ‘just give Mummy 5 more minutes’ hard-slog style day - it doesn’t quite match up. And we start to question why.
And because we’re inherently driven to people please, to accept the status quo, to go with the flow - we assume that it must be something we’re doing. It must be us. WE must be the reason that our success doesn’t look like the girl in the magazine.
We ask ourselves: “what if I don’t have what it takes?”
If you only take one thing from this haphazard collection of words I’ve fervently squeezed out of my ever-distracted, deeply tired, five years into toddlerhood brain make it this:
You DO have what it takes.
BUT you might not actually want the thing that you’re working so hard to get.
Let me break it down. Consider each of these questions in the season of life you’re currently in. You don’t have to answer for your forever self. Just the self you are right now.
Do you really want to earn multiple six-figures? Or do you want to earn enough to support your living expenses, go on a beach holiday or two with your kids and fund a modest habit for new books and nice candles?
Is that thing you’re working so feverishly toward really your version of success? Or are you chasing it because all the business coaches said so?
Do you really need to sit at a desk for 8 hours a day to get you where you want to go? Or is this a productivity pattern recycled from your corporate days?
Answering these questions was the start of breaking down the overload, overwhelm and constant burnout cycle I’d been living through the first two years of my business. And it was the start of moving beyond the ‘I don’t have what it takes’ mindset mangle into ‘maybe I actually want something different’ possibility platform.
Out Of The Overwhelm and Into A 5-Hour Day
Answering these questions - like, really answering them - opened up magical alternative pathways and possibilities for me - like:
Reimagining an income goal for myself that felt healthy, abundant and aligned to the season of life I was in - because it was matched with the goals, aspirations and feelings I wanted for myself and my family (versus an arbitrary number of on-paper zeros)
Verifying whether the journey I was currently on was even the right one for me - because there’s nothing that’ll get in the way of you achieving your goals more than chasing the wrong one
Validating that alternative ways of working that felt light, fluid and freedom-filled could actually help me be more productive (and feel more fulfilled doing it) than chaining myself to a desk for hours ever could
Now, I’m rebuilding my working style to completely align with a school-hours only framework (to support our current season of life with my oldest daughter in school and my youngest set to start in 2027). I’m prioritising my creativity, connecting with my family and giving myself plenty of space to breathe, think and honestly, just exist (because honestly, existing is pretty damn amazing).
This is what happened when I stopped asking myself if I had what it takes - and instead, asked myself what I actually wanted.
I hope this article inspires you to do the same.
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