Christine Hansen: Christine Means Business

Christine Hansen Business Expert  Joins Us On Join Up Dots Podcast

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Introducing Christine Hansen

Christine Hansen has risen to the top in her profession for sure.

If you google “How To Sleep Better” you will see so many search results it is astonishing.

People are literally tapping away for solutions to their sleeping problems every second of the day.

Now you won’t need to struggle or google anymore as today’s guest is an expert at teaching you how to sleep better.

She first joined me on the show back in 2016 where we discussed her personal journey to building literally her “dream” business.

Starting her journey as an English teacher in Luxembourg, she had a pretty standard career for a few years until she got to the point when her interest in corporate coaching and sleep patterns became too much to ignore.

And she took the leap of faith, leaving her career in education in 2015 to start something new and inspiring.

And she did that building the Sleep Like A Boss business, for those people out there who want to sleep but cant.

How The Dots Joined Up For Christine

And then came the pivot that most business go through.

Some pivot as the business isn’t working, whilst others are simply looking for a greater challenge in their lives.

With her new business Christine Means Business, as she says “Hustling in desperation: SUCKS! Being your own boss should be the best experience and not the worst. If you are constantly working overtime without getting paid, without appreciation and you’d basically fire yourself then you’ve come to the right place to change ALL of that.”

So what side of the pivot fence did she find herself on, and did she really need to do something else with her time?

And does she truly know where is she heading with her new business

Well lets find out as we bring onto the show to start joining up dots with the one and only Christine Hansen

Show Highlights

During the show we discussed such weighty subjects with Christine Hansen such as:

Christine shares the reasons why she pivoted in her business and the steps to franchising 

We discuss why an avatar is not the ideal way to build a business instead of 

Christine talks about her “spikey” approach to launching a product or starting a new platform.

and lastly……..

Why it is so important to focus on giving you and your business space to develop on its own every now and then.

Return To The Top Of  Christine Hansen

Full Transcription Of Christine Hansen Interview

Intro [0:00]
Life shouldn’t be hard life should be a fun filled adventure every day. So now start joining up dots, tap into your talents, your skills, your God given gifts and tell your boss, you don’t deserve me. I’m out of here. It’s time for you to smash that alarm clock. And start getting the dream business and life you will, of course, are dreaming of. Let’s join your host, David Ralph from the back of his garden in the UK, or wherever he might be today with another JAM PACKED episode of the number one hit podcast. Join Up Dots.

David Ralph [0:38]
Yeah, good morning to you. Good morning to you good morning to Yes, I’m in the United Kingdom is a better place to be I don’t think so the sun is shining, people are walking around, and the clothes are starting to drop off little by little will await a summer and that’s makes you feel good. Well, I couldn’t feel any better if I try because today’s guest is somebody that well, she’s been on the show twice. And I would say she’s my maid, she might dispute that. But I’m going to say she is. Now if you google how to sleep better, you’ll see so many search results. It’s astonishing. People are literally tapping away for solutions to their sleeping problems every second that a day. Now, you won’t need to struggle or Google anymore as today’s guest is an expert at teaching you how to sleep better. Now. She first joined me on the show back in 2016, where we discussed her personal journey to building literally her dream business. Starting a journey as an English teacher in Luxembourg. She had a pretty standard career for a few years until she got to the point when her interest in corporate coaching and sleep patterns became too much to ignore. And she took the leap of faith, leaving her career in education in 2015, to start something new and inspiring. And she did that by building the sleep like a boss business for those people out there who want to sleep but can’t. But just recently came the pivot that most businesses go through. And that’s why she’s on the show again. Now some pivots occur as the business isn’t working, while others are simply kind of looking for a greater challenge in their life. They’ve got a bit bored with their success. Well, with our new business, Christine means business. She says hustling is desperation, it sucks. being your own boss should be the best experience and not the worst if you’re constantly working overtime without getting paid without appreciation. And you’d basically fire yourself when you’ve come to the right place to change all of that. So what side of the pivot? Did she find herself on? Did she was she bored of it? Or? We’re gonna find out? And did she really need to do something else with our time? And of course does she truly know where she’s heading with a new business? Now what let’s find out as we bring onto the show, to start joining up dots with the one and only Christine Hansen morning.

Christine Hansen [2:56]
Introduction you know, I’m excited to see what comes out of this. You know, I want to know what during the episode actually, there’s some brilliant questions.

David Ralph [3:04]
Well, we’re gonna start with some really brilliant questions, because that’s what I do, Christine, and the first brilliant question is, am I your friend Christine? Am I gonna make

Christine Hansen [3:15]
you our dear friend? I can honestly say we’ve, I mean it’s not like we have a chat every day or so. But we’ve been in touch fairly regularly over the years.

David Ralph [3:26]
We haven’t we have and so I’m just going to tick it off and say you’re my lady mate. You’re my lady mate. And that’s the first question that’s gone. So why the paper because sleep like a boss seemed to be to me something that was established it had a reputation it’s the kind of thing but you could cream off the profits and then just sit in your pyjamas and not really do much. Why? Why? Why have you done this other one Christine

Christine Hansen [3:53]
fell asleep like a bear still is it is still an amazing business and it’s still alive. But it is I’m just the founder now I’m not the CEO anymore. So basically happened was that I really I had an inkling but kind of didn’t quite follow it that I enjoyed buildings keep like a boss a lot. I loved first of all, figuring everything out to build the sleep like a boss method. I love the marketing, you know, making it become an authority. But the clients were a little bit client work and the whole health industry was not necessarily what made me go all Tingley all over. So what I the first step that I figured out, was that okay, and I was actually in Tuscany with a British group of entrepreneurial ladies and we were discussing things and I was like, you know, I think I want to get a team and see you know, just have some teams, team members who work with clients and I just look after the business side of things. And the lady next to me was like, so why don’t you franchise Sit out, wouldn’t that make a lot more sense, and I never taken myself seriously enough, I guess to even just have that idea that that might be a thing. You know, I never considered myself as a startup or anything, or even as a founder that for me was just the tech world or so I that never occurred to me.

David Ralph [5:21]
But I’m gonna ask you a question on that. Because interesting, just that that bit there. It was obvious it was a great business. Why didn’t us sort of see it that way? Is it was it just because you’d built it up? And most things, although they look sexy from everybody else, they’re never as good as you kind of wanted it to be you listed on that journey?

Christine Hansen [5:42]
I think it is. Because to me, and maybe that’s also again, where I’m coming from like here in Luxembourg. Particular startups is really a special kind of breed. It’s very, it’s either FinTech so finances, or technology in terms of, you know, anything that has to do with it. So Superga boss being a service based business coaching and consulting and in the health space. I didn’t, I saw it as a completely different animal. And I think it’s also because I grew it from being such a small project with so much passion, I thought more of it as a legacy business. And maybe subconsciously, I think I really didn’t want to be like a sellout, you know, being compared with people who start a business to grow it in a way that they can sell it for the most profitable amount that kind of didn’t sit right with me, which is

David Ralph [6:36]
why didn’t the day businesses have a journey, don’t they? And it’s not a never ending journey?

Christine Hansen [6:43]
Absolutely. And it’s totally judgmental on my end, like, absolutely. And I didn’t realise that until I actually played with the idea. And so why not, as you just said, why the bloody hell not because otherwise, it would just have died, I literally would have stopped. And it’s interesting, because I have when I have this conversation with coaches in particular, or other people who have a similar service that is very personal. It is very often they don’t even consider just like I didn’t, to hand it off, you know, to let it live without you. It was very, it’s a mindset thing, for sure. So once I took that decision, though, it was so liberating. And I’m really happy to say that I managed to get beautiful team members from all over the world. And after a year, I decided, okay, I really, really enjoy only building the business. And I don’t focus enough on personal development or health development for sleep like a boss, but my team members were still doing that. And whereas I was starting to focus on helping other people building businesses, which is ultimately what I really figured out is what I love doing. So that’s when we took the next step.

David Ralph [7:59]
Now, so it was a pivot more to feel you, Ben, a desperation, because I have guests that come on Join Up Dots. And quite often they will email me saying, Oh, can I change the link that you posted on that podcast that we did? And I always think, yeah, go and I will do. And I look at it. And I think, where’s your clear history based on what you’re showing me there, it just seems to be like a complete leap. And when I delve into it, it’s because they’ve got desperate. And so they’ve gone off in a different direction. But as we were saying, Before we pote arms started recording, a lot of Join Up Dots. Makes sense, because you keep going, and you don’t keep on leaping from best to bat.

Christine Hansen [8:43]
I agree. And I think for this particularly taking the decision to not, quote unquote, let it die, you know, to just say, I don’t want to do this anymore. So let’s delete the website and do something completely new. I’m really grateful for that. Because the pluggable says fantastic. It’s an awesome service. Like he just yesterday was a networking event. And I told people about what I was doing. So C++ is a part of that. It’s one of the dots. That’s very important also for me to make people understand that I know what I’m doing. And now as a business consultant, and coach, and people’s eyes still light up and it’s it would have been such a shame to just have let it wait go two ways, really. So for me, I’m still very proud of it. I’m still very proud to be the founder of it. It’s just that I didn’t want to deal with a daily of it anymore. And I’m really happy to have found the perfect person to take over as the CEO. She’s actually German but lives in Canada. So the perfect mix. I feel a little different quality if we go into stereotyping, but yeah, and so to me slip like a boss is still valid. It’s still there. It’s going to change obviously a little bit. The branding was very much centred on me as a persona now it’s going to be more centred on a team and a hub that it has As the potential you know, it will still grow. And I think it was just the fact that I use just a simple thing like sleep like a boss.com. And not Christine Hanson calm is now really paying off because it can change again. So I’m really, really proud of it, I’m really happy about it.

David Ralph [10:18]
What I find fascinating and not just review, but with so many people because it’s totally a juxtaposition to where I am. But people are always talking about teams, teams teams, and I always think I can’t bear the thought of having teams, I like to find strategies and simplicity, where you don’t need to have teams, because a lot of it is just kind of doing stuff that you kind of feel needs to be done, but doesn’t really and is just expense. And it’s a rubbish expense.

Christine Hansen [10:52]
That is where franchising is brilliant, because I don’t pay my team members, like they use like a boss as a portal, and I actually get a cut. So what I did, interestingly, you know, is I trained them in the sleep like a boss method, and I was paid for that. And then as they learn that skill, they can use some of it on their own to their own business, they all have their own business as well. But if they want to use sleep, like a boss method, which includes lab testing, etc, etc, they would go through sleep like apostle calm. And in that case, we would get a percentage. So in a way, it was not my responsibility necessarily for them to get clients, I gave them everything they needed, but it was really up to them as to how much they would be doing with it.

David Ralph [11:41]
Now, what’s genius about back then, is the fact that everyone goes on about actually, they don’t go on about it as much as I did, maybe three or four years ago, it was all personal brand. Oh, you got to have a personal brand. That’s the key thing. And I’ve often pondered with the personal brand. If you’re the person, it’s very difficult to dip away from it. That sleeve like a boss could easily have somebody else’s face on it, and it will still be as powerful. What do you think about sort of that personal brand? Where it’s, it’s your name, it’s your face? It’s your voice on the podcast, it’s your hair, you’re there? Do you think it’s a it’s a win? Or do you think what you did was right?

Christine Hansen [12:23]
I think it really depends on the business that you’re selling in a way. And I think I changed my opinion a

David Ralph [12:32]
lot about it over the years to be a woman, you’re a woman, you’re allowed to Christie exactly, it’s

Christine Hansen [12:36]
a wise, you know, we evolved. In the meantime, I think it really doesn’t matter if it’s your name, or if it’s a company, the only thing that I find is really important is that you don’t assume. And I think that is something where I go a little bit against the grain in terms of that I don’t believe in a client avatar at all. I don’t believe in assuming, and building a complete business on an idea that you think is the perfect client for you. And I’ve learned through experience because that’s how I built the packet loss and partly as well gearing it to women only in the end 60% of our clients were actually men, very different from who I thought I’d be attracting. So in the end, what I teach now is to the only thing that you really know for certain is what you like who you are, what your values are, and also what you don’t like, and that’s the only thing you need to know. And it doesn’t matter whether you’re selling a product, whether you’re an artist, whether you sell a service, as long as you communicate very selfishly and egocentric Lee about who you are and what you want, and what you don’t want the right people will resonate with it. And it’s a much stronger position than assuming and thinking okay, so we have imaginary Kathy, who is in this age gap and who is earning this much and who has 5000 kids, you know, that exercise is ridiculous to me because we’re so different even if we have all the same job, the same amount of children live in the same house even we are so different. So I think it’s just building businesses from assumptions which branding unfortunately often does. I just think that it can get very costly because you’re you build and communicate in certain way that you then have to change. And it can also be a it’s a big effort to then pivot again, which takes courage as well. And I’m all about laziness all about the least amount of effort possible. So and that is really just being yourself really,

David Ralph [14:54]
but that’s not how easy is it is being strategic that’s being smart. You know, I am Totally up and with people that basically I retired, I, you know, I podcast three times a month. That’s it. Everything comes through to the hub of Join Up Dots. I speak to people. And then I run courses every now and again. And that’s it really. And if I don’t want to run a course, I don’t like in the pandemic, I’ve shut down for a year. And I just sort of sat there reading weird books in the garden with the sunshine. But that’s not lazy, is it? That’s being strategic and totally what we said at the beginning with the hustle and all, you know, that guy, Gary, Vaynerchuk years ago, he was everywhere. I haven’t seen a glimmer of him for years. Now, I don’t know if he still is imagined he is. But he was all hustle, hustle, grind, grind. And I bought into that. I bought into that totally. And now I think maybe I missed the point of what he was trying to say. Ultimately, I was one step in the grave. And so I think being lazy is actually your way of saying Hang on, there must be a better way of doing this.

Christine Hansen [16:08]
Yes. And I think that’s also I love. Let’s be very honest, being lazy. And prophets, like a pro is really a good headline. Ultimately, what it is, though, is people on helping people understand that embracing the calm that you need is actually super smart. Because you can then burn when you really have a passion project when you want to not when you need to. But when you want to. So I’m as well all about keeping it super simple. And I have one offer right now what to what one regular offer. And that’s it, I’ll take it or leave it. That’s that’s really it. And then I agree as well, you know, if we’re looking at Join Up Dots when I started, which was in 2015. That was the culture as you said, you know, you had Tim Ferriss, you had John Lee Dumas, you had Gary Vee, it was very masculine energy, very hustle, Click Funnels 5000, you know, all of that kind of jazz. And also the women out there was similar, you know, it was very similar vibe. And I feel that it’s changing quite a bit recently, like maybe too much sometimes, you know, it’s not enough to just manifest and hoping that things work, you still need to do something. But the yin and the yang has become a little bit more balanced, I feel. And it’s also the way that I work and the way that I communicate and how I live my life, really. So that has become really, really important to me to really understand. It’s also my character, that to allow myself not to do anything when I don’t want you. Because if I do something, it will not work anyway, like, projects that I do when I really feel I get when I’m burning, do very well. But if I force something that I’m not even with sometimes maybe even believing 100% Forget it, it will never work. And it’s been years of finding that out thinking but if I have the right strategy, or if I work with the right experts, it will still work. And I’m not doing that. And then instead having I don’t know just a burst of excitement and sharing that and converting really, really well. That has really taught me to not put myself down as well when I decide not to do something. I just did a story on that two days ago, because I had a day where I started to blame myself of not being productive. And then I looked back and I was like, well actually, I coached voluntarily a group of students for two hours in the morning, in person. So I drove to Luxembourg City, I saw them we did two hours of coaching, and then get back home. And then I had a podcast interview that lasted an hour. And I was like, well actually, you have been doing things stop, stop, stop blaming yourself or stop putting yourself down. And that’s an exercise that I’ve become better at at you know, becoming aware when I do that. But it’s years years of indoctrination that, you know, I’m still struggling against. And I’m not the only one. There’s so many of us, you know. So I think the first step is obviously to be self aware of that self talk and then to it’s practice, really to catch it more quickly. And to to set yourself straight.

David Ralph [19:29]
Let’s hear from Oprah. And we’ll be back with Christie. The way

Oprah Winfrey [19:32]
through the challenge is to get still and ask yourself what is the next right move? not think about oh, I got all of this stuff. But what is the next right move? And then from that space, make the next right move. And then next right move and not to be overwhelmed by it because you know your life is bigger than that one moment. You know, you’re not defined by what somebody says is a failure for you. because failure is just there to point you in a different direction.

David Ralph [20:03]
Now, one of the things that I struggled with was, if you, you could take Join Up Dots into free quarters, our free course doesn’t make sense into free. Math was not my best. And so the first bird was ambitious and grind and hustle and drive, drive, drive and work harder than anybody else I know. And then the next part was, Oh, my God, I’m falling to pieces, I need to do something I need to slow down, I need to get my health back, blah, blah, blah. And then the last bit, you would have kind of gone, okay, I’ve got it all worked out now. But I found the last bit was me kind of going, not sure if I can be bothered anymore. I quite like doing nothing. I quite like just sort of like sitting around reading a book and then watching a film in the afternoon. And me and my wife were having afternoon naps on the sofa. And I found it a bit of a struggle to to get back. And so when Oprah says that, she’s totally riot, but I found that I got to quiet. But actually, I couldn’t get going again.

Christine Hansen [21:07]
I think that you’re not the only one with that. I think it’s tricky. But I also think you have to trust that quiet for a while because the moment the sparks will come again. And this year, for example. I’m not planning anything, there’s once one thing that’s in my calendar. And I think it’s partly also because I had big projects planned in 2019 for 2020. And obviously, due to global mayhem, that didn’t happen didn’t happen again in 2021. And, you know, that kind of burned me out emotionally, really, because I was expecting those things I had, you know, bet on those things, income wise. And so this year, I’m all about really not planning and really like a butterfly, just going from where it pulls me and I think it’s, I think that’s actually okay. Obviously, caveat here is that you need to still have financial income. If you’re completely broke. Obviously, that will not work. I think you always need a baseline of movement.

David Ralph [22:19]
But you can always find money somewhere, can’t you that’s the key. You can

Christine Hansen [22:22]
and I think I’m a big believer in having a consistent baseline of content dripping out to schmooze Google all the time. So whether it is a podcast or blog video, ideally, it’s all three but merged into one flow system. And then maybe even having people you know, doing the heavy lifting in terms of you just produce one piece, and they then take it and convert it. That way, you have constant content going out, but you batch it, maybe in the beginning of a quarter, and then you’re done for the rest. That I think is the most important bit. And then you keep your energy for when you really burn for something when you really have a project that you want and be more spontaneous. For me. It’s personal as well. My character, my personality type, I’m a human generate. I’m a generator in human design. But for me, I like Sparky things. Yeah, I like to have a launch that just three days spontaneously without thinking and keeping it very simple, no huge teaching platform or anything, like just keeping it super simple. And that’s why I said the only thing that I have planned and again, I went from what I like and I think that’s what you need to keep in mind, instead of looking at blueprints, instead of looking at what are others doing that’s converting for them. First, really have a check in with what you want and what you enjoy. So as an example, for me, I love travel. And we had this little we chatted before that recording and I was saying, you know I travelled quite a lot during the pandemic. And it was awesome. Because we could see things the way we’ll never see them again, like an empty Venice with an empty Piazza San Marco, which is unheard of in hundreds of years, really. And so I love travel. I also like to travel in groups, if that’s the right people because you have these amazing conversations. I like to chat with other entrepreneurs because they get me and so I combined all three, which is now the business trip or community which is basically a community where we travel the world high end so I’m not someone who goes glamping I do want the full flight to this place. And we travel the world but amongst entrepreneurs, which I think if I may say so is genius because you get away from it all. You literally have to take that plunge leave if you have a big team leave your team, if your family to say I’m not available for a week because I’m in an exotic country and Which is amazing for yourself, but also for everyone around you, because you can literally test it’s a lead emitted me audit for your business, is it actually holding up without me because if it’s not, you have a problem, it’s not a great business model. Otherwise it should be able to run smoothly without your personal input every day, your family will also get more creative, which in home afterwards is going to still be amazing, because you can say you managed without me, so let’s just have some days off, which they will be able to do. And then at the same time, whenever you travel, it’s it’s so healthy for your mind. Because you wherever you go, you have expectations, just how we are wired. When you go to certain country, you expect a certain something of the landscape of the people of the culture. And those expectations will be shattered, because it’s always different, which opens up a mindset that’s a lot more open, which opens up creativity. And it definitely helps you to also step back and look at your own business and your life and evaluate. Who am I actually because you don’t have another team member yapping into your ear. This is a great idea. But or even a family member who’s like, Are you sure it’s just you and a few other entrepreneurs who will be non judgmental, and who will be supportive as much as they can, which I think is just golden. It’s just awesome. It’s amazing.

David Ralph [26:26]
And I pay for your travel effectively. They of course, yeah. Which is brilliant. I want to emphasise that because a lot of people will not think of that as a business idea. But as you were saying it to me, I thought this is this is bloody good. This is but you get some people, they pay for you to go off on a little jaunt. You then have to sort of talk to them every now and again. That would be a drawback for me to be honest. But then they fill your bank account up.

Christine Hansen [26:55]
Exactly. And it’s it’s really, I want to encourage that in people go from what design from what you want. So obviously, there is going to be some structure in there, right? Like there’s some discussion pillars, there’s some activities, but most of it is cultural and relaxed. And I really want to emphasise it’s not Hi pie pipe. It’s not what you hear on a retreat. Yeah. Let’s walk over fire. Let’s have five hours of yoga, let’s not eat, you know, it’s like no, no, no, it’s really about lush, it’s about luxury. It’s about relaxing. It’s Yes, about thinking but all without pressure, you know. So, and yes, it is obviously, stemming from my core desires. But interestingly, for me, stepping back, and just travelling and switching everything off is easy. But I know that for a lot of people it’s not, and they wish it was. So I’m basically taking my skill and facilitating that for others. And that, you know, understanding a talent or a skill or a gift that you have and monetizing it and that not being a bad thing. That is a mindset journey really, that you have to come to own. And I’m really happy to say that over the years, I’ve done so much personal development that now I do. I really do. But yeah, so that is what a perfect business should look like. You know, really,

David Ralph [28:28]
I love this, Christine, I really do. Because it speaks to me because it goes against the norm. It’s a business where effectively you don’t have to be the expert, you’ve just got to be the conduit, you just have to be the person that joins the app together, you join up the dots. And that’s one of the stumbling blocks that new business owners have. But they think they’ve got to know the answers to everything. But they don’t, they just need to think how to make it easy for other people to get a good result. And there’s not much more to business for NAT. Find out what people want, and find out what they need to get what they want. And then find out where those people are, you know, it’s as much as that really,

Christine Hansen [29:12]
exactly. I really see myself as a curator to find the right people, and a facilitator to guide them through the process. And it’s a business that is ultimately you know, in my vision for future dots is a very much a word of mouth business. So it’s not going to be huge marketing or anything like that. Because every experience every trip is just eight people maximum. So it’s really going to be a weightless bears business of community that sees each other over and over, but in different situations in different countries. So that’s what I want to achieve. That’s where I see the dots going really.

David Ralph [29:53]
Now a lot of people had similar businesses before the pandemic hit, and totally had to sort of pivot them. I used to have people on the show, but used to, you know, do conferences all the time and any had to go online? Do you have a kind of fallback because of what’s been going on over the last few years? Do you look at it and think, Okay, if it ever happened again, to be honest, highly likely it is going to happen again. But I could take this concept and not suddenly be financially a financial desert, but I could still sort of operate it in a different way.

Christine Hansen [30:26]
Yeah, because it’s what it what happened, like the first two retreats were planned for 2020. And now the first one is happening in July, in Bali, and we had to postpone it three times, you know, so I’m very much aware of it. And also the first quarter this year was supposed to be financed through a business trip to to Namibia. And we, we were supposed to communicate about it in December, which has been Omicron head and Namibia was suddenly on the blacklist and I had to cancel it. That was my first quarter gone. So I’m very much aware of it, which is why I still have my baseline business, which is my coaching and consulting. So I do at the moment, do both, you know, have my regular bread and butter, so to speak, which is my regular coaching, and consulting with one on one clients. And then ultimately, the business, the business tripper is a much higher conversion in terms of finances, the profit margin is just much, much higher. And so ultimately, I think if I schedule a few of them, I will easily be able to live off the profits, even for a year when things aren’t great, or when there’s even no travel. And I think that’s also where people need to understand what their living costs actually are. I’m always confused when people say seven figures. So what are you actually going to do with him? Why do you need all that money? Because if you’re smart with investments as well, you don’t need that much to really live comfortably in in luxury, really,

David Ralph [32:00]
I was speaking to a woman recently. And I said to her, you know, what, what’s your, your benchmark figure per month? And she said 12 million? I said I can what what is, you know, what’s your keep the lights on figure? What do you need to actually just survive, you know? And she said, No, that’s what I’m aiming for 12 million? I said, No, you haven’t got the concept. You haven’t got the concept. Sure, aim for that. Brilliant, but what’s your first sort of financial dots? And people can answer that beta is no, and they’ve got no idea what the actual bolts are, that kind of now down their financial situation, you know, I know, to the penny, what Join Up Dots costs and what running my business costs. And, you know, I know everything. And I was reading, um, Elton John’s biography recently. And it was a good read, as you can imagine, he’s got a few stories. He’s, he’s been a bad boy over the years. And in the sort of early 2000s, he found himself bankrupt, you know, he was broke. And he basically said, you know, this is ridiculous. I’m Elton John, I’ve been touring and setting since the early 70s. How the hell did this happen? And I thought, because you’re an idiot, mate. You’re an idiot. But didn’t Elise say, Can I have a look at the bank statement? Every now?

Christine Hansen [33:15]
Yes. Yeah, I agree. And it’s one of the first exercises that I’d actually do with my clients is to do a financial intake because financial literacy is not taught. It’s just not and very often it’s even frowned upon to really look at your money or it’s scary because you know, that actually your financial situation is much worse than you think it is. Or you know, wanted to be so actually knowing how much do you need to make to survive like to keep the lights on, as you said, privately, as well as for your business. That’s a bench line, then you go into how you want to live. I’m someone unapologetically I love the luxuries I do. I do not go into a three star hotel, it’s never going to happen. I will never fly Fly economy. If the flight is over four hours long, you won’t see me get there, that’s not going to happen. So I know that I have a certain amount that I will need on top of keeping the lights on money, let’s put it that way. But I know that amount, you know, and it’s not out of this world. If I have more than that, which I’m aiming for of course, it’s mainly because I want to reinvest it to make sure that if you know once I hit it for me it would be 50 Once I hit that I can choose whether I want to work or not. Whenever I feel like it and really making sure that I can that do that comfortably calculating that I’ll be 100 you know?

David Ralph [34:42]
Yeah, it’s I love dirty travel. I really do. You know, I like things that is an adventure when things break down and you’ve got to get a bus and you’ve got to you know, public transit. I love that the thought of going into first class on an aeroplane. Oh, I couldn’t, could bear it. It’s just not me. I like I like the thought of losing all my luggage and getting somewhere and you know, and really sort of having to use my means to sort of to get through. David means business. That’s what I’m, I’m gonna start a new business. I’m gonna, I’m going to do. So I’m

Christine Hansen [35:19]
going to teach you how to travel on this Caribbean riskiest, way possible?

David Ralph [35:23]
Yeah, yes, Ganga key travel, that’s what we want, and it will be perfect. So how excited are you compared to the 2015 version? I’m always interested on this now. Because when you first start, you kind of almost feel like you can’t fail and everything’s brilliant. And yet, you just want to work at it all the time. And you definitely do lose your mojo somewhere along the line. I don’t know, anyone has remained as excited as those first few months.

Christine Hansen [35:53]
You know, I think, I think I’m still as excited but in a calmer way, which is weird, right? It’s not as a forensic excitement anymore. I still love what I do. I could never, I think otherwise, I would have stopped, you know, at some point, because you have your ups and downs. And you know, like, the pandemic was a hit in the gut, like it was just brutal. I think I would have stopped if I wasn’t select sighted. But it’s a it’s a much karma excitement, like it’s I’m still passionate. That’s the fire is still there. I love it with all my core in my heart. It’s just an I’m not on all the time anymore. You know, I’m just, I don’t know, I’m organising my energy differently. In a way, I think I’ve learned to really calm down in between, and then really ramp it up. Yeah, when I need it.

David Ralph [36:54]
It’s the yin and the yang again, isn’t it? You know, I’ve become very interested in Taoism and Chinese principle over the years. And just over the last six or seven months i It’s kind of like mindfulness on a daily basis, where I used to be mindful when I was pulling to pieces. But now I think to myself, it’s better to do it a long time before that, David so that you don’t get to that point. But is it if you do the yin and the yang, and you’ve had a few really hard days in your business, and your life deserves you to be away from it. And if you haven’t got the strategies in place to be out to walk away from it, then that’s a red flag. That’s the first things you should be looking at.

Christine Hansen [37:37]
I agree. I agree. And I think I’m really grateful that I never came to complete burnout. I was exhausted, yes, it I don’t, I wouldn’t call it a burnout necessarily. But it was still this is not fun. You know, if you have to worry all the time. It’s just not fun. And as soon as it’s not fun, you have to stop and reevaluate, I guess. But it’s also about appreciating that just as I said before, just because you’re not sitting in front of the computer doesn’t mean that you’re not productive. So for example, yesterday, I had my first networking event in person in years, like even before the pandemic, I had dropped networking, because I didn’t really need it. But now I was like I was craving it. So I had that yesterday came home at 11pm, which is outrageously late for me. And today, the only appointment I have today is this one. And one more with a founder who’s who’s developing an app for investment for women, which I found is really interesting. But that’s it. So for the rest, the only thing on my schedule is going into the woods with my dog. And I know that I have ideas there. And sometimes I love to talk to myself, I love having imaginary interviews with Oprah, about when I hit all my goals and done looking back, you know, so even that is weird, but it’s productive. You know, like other people would say it’s conscious manifesting, I just call it having fun in the woods by myself, you know, but

David Ralph [39:08]
I agree, I spend more time doing something like mowing the lawn, suddenly going, Oh, epiphany and rushing up to my office and then doing something. And then I sort of go back and I carry on mowing the lawn or I’m doing anything. And then I go, Ah, another idea. Now I could be sitting in front of the computer for three hours. I don’t have a single idea. Exactly. So you do have to get away. You do need to walk in nature, you do need to connect. And I think I think that’s one of the things that really is a claim the real leap of faith. I think it’s the leap of faith isn’t quitting your corporate gig and going for it. I think that real leap of faith is the next one when you are going for it but then you do walk away from it and allow it to sort of operate without you. You know, I’ve been Yes. Which none of us do in the beginning. We just keep on making our way through ploughing through.

Christine Hansen [40:01]
Agreed, and that’s why I think podcasts like these are so important, you know, because if you’re a beginner and you’re listening to episodes and you hear people talking about it, at least you think about it, whether you follow the advice or not. So obviously, you know, your own choice. But I wish I had heard it more often. And finally, a few more people are actually sharing this. And oh, hustle culture is kind of like, yeah, you know. And so I’m really grateful for that, because I wish I had heard it a little bit more when I was starting out,

David Ralph [40:34]
but you wouldn’t have listened. That’s the problem, isn’t it? Maybe,

Christine Hansen [40:37]
maybe, I hate to say, you know, when people say you have to go through it, it’s a rite of passage. And why? Just because we went through it, others have to, you know, I think I’m hoping that some people are smart enough to really take a step back and listen, and maybe be a little bit smarter than we were.

David Ralph [40:56]
If you ever tried to tell your kids or your partner something, and they actually listened to you, you know, people don’t, you know, people don’t you sit down in front of them, and they still they still want follow through. So I do think they do have to do it until they go, Oh, hang on, this isn’t working. This isn’t working. I need help. Ben, they start looking around, you know, because I remember when I quit my job, originally, there was no way I was going to fail it literally within three days, I was going to be making 100 grand a month, you know, if it was easy. It didn’t work out that way.

Christine Hansen [41:33]
Now, that’s a huge pride and ego thing. You know, and I think communicating that that which I love doing that calling people out on their egos can accelerate that process, though.

David Ralph [41:46]
I don’t think I’ve got an ego anymore. I ponder that sometimes. Because I think there I used to have a huge ego in the early days, you know, global domination was what I was after, I was like some demented James Bond villain sitting behind my microphone. But now I think, as I say, I think oh, I can’t be bothered, let somebody else do it. You know, I was on LinkedIn just for a second before we recorded. And I saw somebody post an iTunes review of them selves, their show, going another classic iTunes review, I love getting these things. And who cares? Who cares? Focus in on the people that need your help, not just picking yourself up. But I think I would have done that in the in the early days. I think I was all about, you know, look at me, look at me.

Christine Hansen [42:35]
It’s about that. And it’s also what everyone tells it to do. I mean, I don’t want to say don’t do it. Like it’s also great to be proud of things and to showcase them. But it’s a different get a different vibe. I feel and I people are not attracted by the desperation of pointing yourself out if it’s, if it’s natural, it’s something that I do regularly here I share it. It’s just much karma. People enjoy it. It’s genuine. That’s what we like. And I recently had a guest on a podcast and they have this giant new thing. They are releasing a podcast every day, Monday and saturday and sunday included for this year. And he was like I work every day also like Sunday and still young, like under 30 I think I was just like smiling to myself, you know, because I was like, Yeah, you might think this is happy because he also go to the gym every day. But that’s not what it’s about. And, you know, speaking full of wisdom, you know, I had my burn Howard in it had this successful career. It was like in nearly you’re not even 30 yet. I’m pretty sure. No, you haven’t seen it yet. But so you’re probably right, I think but if we can impart some wisdom on people who are open to receive it, then I’m very happy if we do make a difference.

David Ralph [43:48]
Yeah, my wisdom is if it’s sunny by yourself and ice cream and sit on a bench. I agree. I wish we had a beat the kink. Just just do that and then you’ll be fine. You’ll be fine. Well, this is the part of the show that we’ve been building up to. This is the part called the Sermon on the mic that you’ve done twice before. But this time, Christine, you don’t get a chance to choose. You get told who you’re going to speak to and what we’d like to do is send you back to the Christine who last appeared on the show and if you could share some advice with her to get them to where you are. What would it be? Well, we’re going to play the music and when it fades, it’s your turn to talk this is a sermon on the mic

Unknown Speaker [44:36]
here we go with the best bit of the show us sir man on the mind. The sermon on

Christine Hansen [44:55]
my dear 2016 Christine one thing that I want you to understand and to be aware of is that you are doing a lot. So stay still sometimes. And look back at what you’ve been doing already. And you will see that it’s been a lot more than you give yourself credit for. Do it everyday.

David Ralph [45:20]
I mean, that was your that was short and sweet. I remember the last time you did a sermon on the mic, you went, your your younger self became older by Dave had three birthdays by that time.

Christine Hansen [45:32]
I don’t remember what I said. Honestly, I’m like, I was just like thinking he’s I don’t want to say the same thing.

David Ralph [45:38]
Perfect advice. Anyway. So Christine, for the people that have been listening to Christine means business, what’s the number one best way that they can connect with you?

Christine Hansen [45:48]
Well, I have everything you need on Christine means business.com, you will find social media links to steer clear you find anything that’s relevant. Just hop over there.

David Ralph [45:58]
We will have the link on the show notes to make it as easy as possible. Christine, thank you so much for spending time with us today, joining up those dots. And yeah, come back again, when you’ve got even more dots to join up. Because I do believe that joining up those dots and connecting our paths is the best way to build our futures. Christine, thank you so much.

Christine Hansen [46:17]
Thank you for having me again. It was an absolute joy.

David Ralph [46:22]
Yes, Christine Hanson Yeah, she’s been on the show three times now. And I love that idea. But she loves travel. So let’s build a business around that and get people to pay for her doing the travel. And she’s just got to do the arranging. She’s got to get the venue. She’s got to get the the content sort of sorted out the structure, but everything else is very fluid. And that’s how a business can be. It doesn’t have to be so structured. You can look at it and think, Do other people need this? How do I bring it to them and you don’t need all the answers. You don’t need to be an expert at all. You can go out and do it. I’ll tell you Okay, so um, next time I will be bringing I think it’s an interview show, but if not, it would just be me but as long as you’re there, it’ll be fine. Anyway, until next time, see again, Cheers. Bye bye.

Outro [47:13]
That’s the end of China. You’ve heard the conversation. Now it’s time for you to start taking massive action. Create your future create your life is the only life you’ve got. We’ll be back again real soon. Join Up Dots Join Up Dots Join Up Dots. God’s Jolene, Jolene up up dots.