The Causey Consulting Podcast

Recently I was talking to my friend, Will, and he said something that inspired me to record this episode. He works in the healing space and expressed frustration with people who want to eat junk food, smoke cigarettes, and get drunk but then come to him to be "healed" so that they can begin the cycle of trashing out their bodies all over again. 

Key topics:

✔️ Sometimes in life: you are your own worst enemy. No cavalry is coming to save you and you need to build your own ladder out of the pit you put yourself into. 
✔️ Trying to make someone else God Almighty and looking to them to save you from your own mess is not a great idea. It's too much pressure on both you and them. 
✔️ There are times when you need to be able to give yourself  the closure or apologies that someone else will not. Some people are jerks-- they will wound you deeply and never apologize for it. You have to be willing to give yourself that nurturing that you need.
✔️ If you're in the pit right now, it probably didn't happen overnight. Likewise, as you are building your own ladder out, it will probably not happen overnight either.

Special intro music: "Jacob's Ladder" by Huey Lewis & The News.  

Need more? Email me: https://causeyconsultingllc.com/contact-causey/

"Whenever feasible, he preferred to eat the rude." -Barney on Hannibal Lecter's philosophy

My client "John" told me that he's had a lot of trouble with rudeness and he's fed up with it. But what does that mean?

Key topics:

✔️ Rudeness means different things to different people and it has different degrees of severity. What is your boundary line of acceptable versus non-acceptable behavior?
✔️ In John's situation, he felt disrespected and marginalized... by everyone. Clients, prospects, and candidates alike. So what was he doing to put himself in that position?
✔️ If you allow people to treat you like a doormat, they will. Clients and prospects will follow YOUR LEAD on how you view yourself. This doesn't mean no one will ever occasionally test your boundaries (and your patience) but it helps to screen out the obvious problem children.
✔️ Dr. House always said, "People lie. Everyone lies." This may not be true in every single situation, but you ultimately want to protect yourself and your business. Don't allow yourself to go off on wild goose chases hoping maybe one day you'll get paid for it. 
✔️ If most of the projects or jobs you're working on disappear and blow away, it becomes frustrating not only for your pocketbook but also for your mental health and well-being.

Need more? Email me: https://causeyconsultingllc.com/contact-causey/

What happens when you're not stuck with nothing... you're just getting that which is unwanted? Sometimes getting 💩 feels worse than getting nothing at all. 

Key topics:

✔️ Sadsacks and wounded birds tend to attract more of the same. If you're saying, "I don't want a wounded bird in my life" yet you yourself are a wounded bird, you're putting out a contradiction. 
✔️ You don't need to give everything away to strangers from the jump. If you go into a job interview and say, "Every job I've ever had sucked butt" or you go on a first date and say, "Dating sucks. All I attract are lousy liars and catfishers," a happy, high caliber person will run.
✔️ Are you desperate? Narcissists and manipulators can spot a sad, desperate person from 10 miles away. Don't play into their hands! Heal your traumas and practice good self-care.
✔️ Get your mind right. I once published an ebook called Get Out of Your Own Way because so often in life, the person standing in the way of a goal is the self. Not the other. 

Need more? Email me: https://causeyconsultingllc.com/contact-causey/

I received some Viewer Mail from "Eddie" who is struggling with ads. The types of ad strategies that work for others in his space aren't working for him. So now what?

Key topics:

✔️ Eddie has hired a few "experts" who promised to help him and blow up his social media... yet nothing happened and they really weren't accountable for that.
✔️ If your business is tanking and you want someone else to bail you out, everyone in that situation is in trouble.
✔️ A coach can't fight in the arena for you. The image that comes to mind for me is Proximo in the movie Gladiator. He's a gruff mentor but he doesn't fight Maximus' battles for him.
✔️ Just because your competitors are dropping hellafied money on social media ads DOES NOT MEAN you must do the same thing! If you don't know what you are doing, you can throw massive amounts of cash away.

Need more? Email me: https://causeyconsultingllc.com/contact-causey/

We've all had times when we wanted something to show up in our lives but... where is it? How do we handle the impatience and frustration? 

Key topics:

✔️ I think of Charlotte in SATC saying, "I'm exhausted! Where is he?!?" 
✔️ We intuitively know that when we try to put a stranglehold on something, we're not doing ourselves any favors. When we chase after someone or something, what typically happens? It runs away. 
✔️ Don't admonish yourself for having emotions. We will ALL have times when we experience frustration, impatience, anger, etc. Welcome to the human condition. 
✔️ Challenge your own thoughts and fears. You are not your thoughts! You do not have to buy into every fear that pops into your head. "What if I never find a job? What if I never find love? What if I never find a nice house?" Zip that crap up. You do not have to believe it just because it came into your head. 

Need more? Email me: https://causeyconsultingllc.com/contact-causey/

Is ghosting always a negative thing? In times past, we tended to think that there was never an acceptable time or circumstance to simply vanish. Yet technology has changed the culture so much and, like it or not, a lot of our interactions and more fleeting and transactional than ever.

✔️ How much do we owe other people? If you had one date with a person, do you need to write them a doctoral dissertation on why you'd rather not see them again?
✔️ Some situations will be painful and awkward no matter what, whether you rip the band-aid off quickly or you write a treatise about it.
✔️ We live in an era of hook-up apps and transactional everything-- partners, jobs, friends, purchases, etc., etc.  We can either lament that and cry in our beer or we can accept reality.
✔️ Ask yourself this: will this change anything? You don't necessarily need to walk away without saying anything at all, but in my experience, people are who they are. If you try to sit someone down and say, "I feel neglected by you" or "I feel like you ask a lot of me as a friend but don't do much in return," they may shape up for a little while, but they often revert to their previous behavior because... people are who they are!


Link to the article I mention in this episode: https://medium.com/the-dot-non-fiction/in-defense-of-ghosting-when-no-response-is-the-right-response-f426e8114972


Need more? Email me: https://causeyconsultingllc.com/contact-causey/

In this episode, I'm discussing some viewer mail I received from "Cindy." She is looking to attract clients who treat her with dignity and respect rather than being pains in the neck, micromanagers, unpleasable 💩s, etc. 

Key topics:

✔️ In her email to me, "Cindy" uses the term dignity, which I think is perfect. Your clients SHOULD BE treating you in that way and if they are not, something's gone awry.
✔️ When you freelance or own your own business, you get to set the rules. If you do not want to be treated like an employee by someone, then don't put up with it. It's like the old saying: no one rules if no one obeys. 
✔️ The way that some people are treated in Corporate America stinks. It's not a reflection of being treated with dignity; it's all about surveillance and existing in an office version of a  police state. No thanks.
✔️ Focus on that which is wanted not that which is unwanted. Set your satellite signal to attract the people you want. Dwelling on people who grind on your nerves will not help to repel them.

Need more? Email me: https://causeyconsultingllc.com/contact-causey/

An hour worked should be an hour paid. Yet so many small business owners, solopreneurs, and freelancers feel like they need to give entirely too much away. In this episode, I discuss my client "Jeff" and his desire to work with better prospects and improve the cash flow in his business.

Key topics:

✔️ If someone says all the right things during the intake call and then turns into a bugaboo, stalker, weirdo, etc., what do you do?
✔️ Working for free or putting everything on the line in a contingency-based business model will break you. You're not gonna have solid, dependable cash flow if you keep operating that way. 
✔️ Don't get happy ears on a sales call. Detach yourself from the outcome and develop safeguards that rule more people out than in. Not everyone on the planet is an ideal client for your business and that's OK.
✔️ Your rules of engagement are utterly meaningless if you do not require compliance to them. You may as well save your breath if you let people treat you like a doormat. 

Need more? Email me: https://causeyconsultingllc.com/contact-causey/

Back in March, I recorded an episode about Making the Price Leap, which is when your business is surviving and you want to kick it up to thriving. I received some requests to discuss the first big leap, i.e., leaving your corporate job in order to step fully into your business or freelancing career. 

Key topics:

✔️ Full disclosure: there is no one way to make the leap. Everyone's situation is different. This is simply my experience with what has worked for me and what has not.
✔️ Testing and beta testing are crucial. If you can suss out ahead of time that your business idea or business model is not gonna work, it is so much better than going into debt or blowing up your corporate career.
✔️ Know thyself. Some people respond well to financial pressure. Others fold. Some people like a hard-driving environment and others loathe it. Which are you?
✔️ Even if you hate your day job, once it's time to resign and move on, you will be nervous. There will some part of you that is anxious and scared half to death. It's normal and it has happened to all of us. 

Need more? Email me: https://causeyconsultingllc.com/contact-causey/

It's April Fool's Day, but this is no joke. *insert wah wah horn here*

Recently, I had a conversation with one of my clients about "almost" clients. What do we do with people who got 4th & Goal but never made the touchdown?

Key topics:

✔️ Avoid the "close all deals by any means necessary" mentality. Not everyone you talk to is meant to be your client.
✔️ You cannot crawl inside someone else's brain and change who they are. Likewise, if your sales techniques are predicated on you having to always light a fire under someone's butt to close them, you're playing a dangerous game.
✔️ Ideally, people need to be ready to roll before they ever get on the phone with you. I understand that won't always happen, but you should aim for ideal prospects who consume your content regularly and pre-close themselves.
✔️ Your prospects also need to have a coherent "why." They need to have their own motivation. Do you want to drag them across the threshold of change kicking and screaming? Do you want to constantly have to re-close them and convince them to continue with your product or service? Hell no.

Need more? Email me: https://causeyconsultingllc.com/contact-causey/