We recently connected with Anna Nichols and have shared our conversation below.

Anna, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. What’s the backstory behind how you came up with the idea for your business?

As an entrepreneur, personal and professional evolution is a fundamental part of creating a successful business. I had to do a lot of deep inner work to find my confidence as well as take messy action in my business to keep making progress – and both felt wildly uncomfortable for a long time. I remember it was January 2021, right after new years and feeling completely unaligned with the direction my business was going at that time. I remember laying in my empty bathtub, ugly crying on a daily basis for what seemed like months because I thought I would never have a successful business. I had a deep desire to help people as a business coach, but felt completely lost on what was the right direction for me and my business. This led me on a journey of self-discovery which is when I found Human Design and that is when everything changed in my life and business.

For the whole first year of my business I was searching for the best way to do things. I kept hearing people say “this is the best way” or “that is the best strategy” and I was trying to implement a million different business models and marketing strategies to get clients. But you know what really happened? I felt slimy selling my coaching services and felt like a complete failure because I didn’t have the business I desired yet.

As I was diving deeper into my own Human Design, I started to realize why certain strategies were not working for me. Then finally one day it dawned on me – I have a Master’s Degree in Business Administration and logically know that all of the business strategies do work — but I wasn’t applying the right strategies for my unique Human Design. It was the biggest AH HA moment because this made complete sense from a logical perspective. Once I started creating offers and marketing myself from a Human Design perspective, my business became way more fun and I was attracting new clients with ease.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

My journey in entrepreneurship started when I was a kid. My parents were immigrants from Poland and ran several businesses in Chicago then in Colorado. I remember working at my parents’ motel when I was 10 years old and learning so much from the experience, then watching the freedom they created for themselves. Years later after I graduated college with a Masters in Business Administration, I ended up working at a university for 10 years, and my love for education and business flourished. I always knew I would run a business of my own, and wanted something that gave me the freedom of time and space which is when I started growing an online coaching business. With two kids, I always dreamed we would travel all summer long and have really amazing adventures with them, which was not something we got to do a ton of with my parents’ brick-and-mortar business. I first learned about Human Design when I was early in my coaching career and fell in LOVE with it! My college degree in business and my experience coaching local businesses showed me that many different strategies work, but all strategies don’t work for all people. I was applying Human Design to my personal life, my parenting, and my relationships, so I decided to start applying it to my own business and the entrepreneurs I was coaching. WOW! What a game changer! Human Design has helped me coach so many entrepreneurs into creating aligned businesses that they loved.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

There are two huge lessons I had to unlearn. The first is is that there is a “right” way to do business. The second is that business has to be “hard.” When I was younger, I imagined owning a brick-and-mortar business just like I watched my parents own because this was all I knew. Then, when I went to college and started studying business, I learned many strategies, but still the types of businesses they teach about were more traditional businesses which is what lead me to getting a job in higher education and being an “intra-preneur” in that setting. Even when I first learned about the online business industry, I thought there was a “right” way to start and grow and online business. I was working tremendously hard in all of these different business experiences I had, so I thought this was just the life of a working professional. But when I started applying my Human Design to my life and business, it helped me let go of thinking things should be a certain way and allowed me to see how easy business could be when it was aligned.

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

When I was going through my entrepreneurial journey, I had to redefine “failure” because like most entrepreneurs, I tried a lot of things that didn’t work in the beginning. I tried tons of different niches, offer designs, marketing strategies, and sales approaches and fell flat on my face more often than I wanted to admit for a long time. I wanted to help people and knew I could do it, but the business side felt so hard for a long time. Eventually I realized that what I once thought was failure, was actually just testing what worked and what didn’t, but I wouldn’t have figured that out if I didn’t keep going. There were so many times I wanted to give up (which usually meant I was tired or hungry) and let my emotions drive my decisions. This is another place my Human Design was so helpful because it showed me how to understand my energy, my decision-making, my gifts, my purpose, and so much more. Once I started leaning into my unique Human Design, things started to feel easier and my business started to thrive. Now, when things feel tough, I check to see what is out of alignment and I am able to course correct much faster.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/iamannanichols/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/iamannanichols/
• Other: https://linktr.ee/iamannanichols