Recently I shared some thoughts about how a disabled entrepreneur can plan for success, and I mentioned that some of us on the Bliss Your Money team have struggled with disability, too.

Writing that post about disability and success led me to reflect and share what’s been going on with me and my company this year.

Disability has never been the heart of how I talk about my life as an entrepreneur — I’m all about pleasure activism and helping you build the business you desire so that you can have the abundance you dream of! I want this for all of us.

It feels vulnerable to expose this stuff, to admit that we’re human and our bodies don’t always function perfectly even when we’re attending to all of our needs. We’re often told that in the professional world, we’re supposed to put our “best” foot forward. Will anyone look to Bliss Your Money for our profitability consulting, payroll setup, bookkeeping, mindset coaching, and other services if they know it hasn’t always been easy for us? I believe that it’s important to risk openness in order to model working with and through adversity.

As you may know, I’ve been having some health stuff since a car accident a few years ago. During this time, I had to slow down and put more responsibility on my staff. My business would have crumbled if I had never leveled it up so that it could run without me. Thank goodness the Bliss Team came through!

This January, I thought I was really going to get back into the game, but in the spring some new health stuff happened, and after a couple of months of trying to struggle through it, I realized I had to take a step back again. I’m still physically healing, in a “two steps forward one step back” way — which is no picnic at all! Two people on the Bliss Team are taking care of almost everything that I normally do.

It feels really strange to hand over so much to other people. When you first hire employees, it changes the way you think about what the company does, because you either get really good at not sweating the small stuff (which includes knowing the difference between small stuff and big stuff!), or you turn into a micromanager. But going on sabbatical is a level beyond that.

And it’s such a relief. It is such a relief to have the time I need to heal. I hope you can get that, too. It’s often really stressful to run a company. Often I feel like everything’s on me, even things I have no control over and couldn’t have foreseen. I’m human, which means I need a break sometimes, and now happens to be one of those times.

Friends, I always hope that you can let go of any self-blame for your misfortunes. Be as kind to yourself as you would be to others. You did the best you could with the information and resources you had at the time. We make the best plans we can, and we try to be really effective at carrying them out. That doesn’t mean the path is going to look the way we expect it to. I’ve found that mindset work really helps me get past self-blame and disappointment in order to focus on what I can change.

That’s why we have our communities to help us with our individual needs. It’s also why solopreneurs become employers, so that our staff can help with our productive needs.

Many of the entrepreneurs and organizations that Bliss works with, and Bliss Your Money itself, have missions or visions to make the world better. That means we’re always trying to figure out how we can have a bigger impact. And that can feel really difficult when life is making us aware of our individual disabilities or the areas of the work that we find the most challenging.

That’s why we get help. Hire a contractor or employee so that you can have the support you need to give yourself a break.

Or if you don’t have the cash flow to hire right now, could asking a close friend to help out at your business for a few hours make a difference?

If asking for a little free help seems too hard, do you have a few hours to help someone else?

One way to give help is through mutual support, for example by asking someone to co-work or body double on Zoom, or by trading services with a professional colleague. Another way is to help out without mutual support, because you know this person will be there for you when you need them. Sometimes going to the giving end of that sacred circuit of giving-receiving can really get you in touch with possibility.

I’ve received a lot of help over the years. After I lost my job in the tech bust, I ended up a single mom on welfare. Building my business was part of climbing my way up from poverty. Since then, I have been so grateful to have opportunities to help others. There’s no end to this story. I’m still receiving help every day from Team Me, and still trying my best to be part of Team You. The Bliss Team is part of keeping that help coming and going each day.

We all help others, we all receive help. We all struggle together, we all have disappointments, we try again. Many of us are familiar with how this can work in our personal lives, and it can be surprisingly effective in our professional lives as well. If you aren’t already in my private Facebook group, will you join? We’d love to get to know you better.

Struggling to get on top of your money stuff? Do it with Bliss!