124. 3 Ways to Get Back on Track by Reconnecting with Your Why

 
 

With back to school in the air and Q4 around the corner, now is the perfect time to make sure you’re using the rest of 2021 in a mindful, intentional and ethical way.

It’s time to get back on track by reconnecting with your Why.

In this article, I’ll share:

  • Three questions to answer to create authentic, cohesive messaging

  • How to avoid pandering

  • How to create the foundation you need to support expanding your business

If you’re feeling that back-to-school energetic shift, you may already be doing some reevaluation, figuring out where you want to put your efforts and what you want to focus on.

As you think about your services, your audience, how you want to be visible, your marketing, and every other aspect of your business, you’re really trying to hone in on your beliefs, values, and ethics and making sure everything is in alignment. That things make sense, that they’re cohesive.

To help with that, let’s get back to the basics.

You need to know your why.

You cannot align your values to your services, your audience, your marketing, your business if you don’t have a clear understanding of what your why is.

There are three simple questions you can use as journaling prompts, jumping-off points for social media posts, blog posts, or even take into your next staff meeting. You can use these questions to support you as you create a cohesive vision and company culture, even if you’re a company of one.

Take this opportunity to pause for a second and allow these three questions to guide you to more clarity about your current why so you can begin looking ahead to your goals for the end of the year and beyond.

This article is based on a Pause On The Play podcast episode called 3 Ways To Get Back On Track By Reconnecting With Your Why.

Who are you supporting?

Who are you addressing? Who is in your audience now and who do you want to add to your audience?

Understanding who you support, who you’re talking to, and who your audience is makes a difference in how you’re going to approach your goals.

If you’re committing to diversity, equity, and inclusion, are you really working toward pay equality? Are you really working toward LGBTQIA+ awareness? What is it about what you’re saying and who you’re saying it to that connects with that goal?

Not knowing means you’re talking into the ether. You don’t know why you’re doing it. You don’t know why it matters.

Why does it matter to you?

Why does it matter that pay equality isn’t widespread? Why does it matter to you to support access to resources for marginalized groups or voices?

Knowing why it matters to you is important when you’re deciding to make shifts in your marketing, your imaging, your verbal or visual content. If you don’t know why it matters, you run the risk of it coming off as inauthentic pandering or simply centering yourself to make money.

Knowing why it matters to you and letting that be a part of that basis, right behind who you are supporting, is going to help with clarifying your why, that directs everything else.

Why is this work important to you?

With the shifts that you’re making, you want it to show up, you want it to be seen, you want it to be obvious. But why is it important to you? Why is this position important? Why is this message important? Why is it important to you to show up in the world and operate through your business and brand in this way?

If you don’t know why it’s important to you if you don’t know why it matters to you if you don’t know who you’re supporting, it’s a tree without roots, there is no basis, no cohesion.

You can’t say, “I want to provide support to this group, but I don't know why.” Or, “I want to widen my audience to include these types of people, but I don’t have a reason.”

None of the things that you could do to expand your business are going to happen if you don't know your why, and you don't have those roots:

Who are you supporting? Why does it matter to you?

Why is this work important to you?

If you know who and why, these shifts in your business will help because you are now tying together why it’s important to you with the group or people you’re doing it for, and why it matters.

But if you don’t know why it’s important to you, then it doesn’t matter who you’re supporting. If you don’t know who you’re supporting, you’re not going to be able to explain why it’s important to you.

The answers to these three questions need to come together in order to make sense.

Who are you supporting? Why does it matter to you? And why is this work important to you?

Take some time to sit with these questions. Journal, talk it out, find those roots, and plant that tree.

Keep The Dialogue Going

Concepts are better explored in community. Actions are more lasting when taken alongside other imperfect allies. Connect with a cohort of entrepreneurs and changemakers at the intersection of values and visibility. 

Join us at pauseontheplay.com/community


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125. How to Hire in an Intentional, Ethical, and Considerate Way

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123. Diversify Your Network Without Tokenizing the Folks You Wish to Attract