Monetize Your Strengths
Happy Monday, Tribe! (Seriously, can we all agree that Mondays are beautiful?!) Mondays get such a bad rap, but I’m so grateful that you’re here kicking off this week with me. The sun is shining, it’s the start of a new week, and I’m excited, guys.
If you are one of those amazing people who listens to every episode, then you know that I will always start by asking a question that will directly impact you, your life, your business, your future business, everything. I like challenging your brain to start thinking bigger. Today, my question for you is this: How well do you know your strengths?
Work in Your Zone of Genius
Do you know your strengths like the back of your hand?
Don’t worry, this isn’t a job interview! The reason why I’m asking is because when you know your strengths as a human being, an entrepreneur, a coach, whatever it is that you do, you actually have the ability to incorporate them every single day. Bringing your strengths to the table in your business allows you to monetize your strengths, find success, and legitimately work in what I call your zone of genius.
That’s what we’re going to talk about today: identifying your strengths and then building them into your business model. Because, when you know your strengths, you can incorporate them in ways that allow you to operate on a higher level. Your zone of genius is that flow, that energy where work no longer feels like work. It’s that state where your success isn’t defined by your income but instead by your passion.
Real talk — work should feel like joy. It should feel like fulfillment. It should feel like happiness. It should feel like you own your business and live your life based on your own design. I promise, if you start examining your strengths (and your weaknesses — more on that in a minute), it’s 110% possible for you to find that zone of genius.
What Are Your Weaknesses?
One of the biggest issues that I see when people start their business is that they don’t align with their strengths. So often in my Impact to Income Academy and through my coaching practice, I see people who start a business because someone gave them a checklist of what to do. A mentor or a coach did things a certain way, and that mentor passed those practices on to someone else.
That’s great in some ways. If a coach trains you to use your strengths, then you’re golden! Often, a coach or mentor will teach you how to replicate their success. They’ll give you a blueprint of what they did to get to where they are today. But, unfortunately, their strengths might not be your strengths. That’s where I see people getting their wires crossed.
When we do things in our business and our life that don’t feel right to us — we might actually be building a business on our weakness, rather than our strength. So many people forget to pay attention to their weaknesses while they think they’re utilizing their strengths.
That leads me to my next question for you: what are your weaknesses? There’s no shame in that game — we all have weaknesses. I want you to take a moment and literally write them down.
For me, I'm the most non-creative human that you will ever meet. If you want me to put together something that looks cute, dream on. But here’s the thing: I've had mentors and friends who are amazingly creative people. When I first started out, I thought I had to be creative and design things for my business if I wanted to be successful. That's what my mentor and my friends were doing. But, I realized that creativity is actually a weakness for me. Trying to be a creative person was not adding value to my life or income.
That realization really left me with two options: either outsource creative work for my business to someone else, or just not give a crap about what the creative elements of my business looked like. That realization was so freeing!
The worst thing in the world is if you bring your weakness into your business and you have to work in that mindset every day. When you live in a weakness, you're never going to want to come to work. You're never going to want to coach. You’re never going to achieve the impact you want to have in this world.
Working in your weakness is what stops you from working in your zone of genius. Again, I want you to consider: how often in your life and in your business are you actually working on things that don’t utilize your strengths? What is it that you do from day to day that leaves you feeling empty, or stressed, or bored or burned out? That feeling can tell you when something you’re doing is actually a weakness.
Monetize Your Strengths
As you’re thinking about your strengths, don’t forget about your weaknesses. If you’re just following in the steps of your friend or mentor because they do it one way, that way might not work for you. And, if you’re utilizing your weaknesses, you’re not actually monetizing your strengths.
It’s SO important to consider your strengths because without making them the core of your business, you’re not building a business that’s aligned with your values. That may sound like a harsh reality check, but I want you to ask yourself if you’re really building a business that’s based on the impact that you want it to have. Or, are you just copying a checklist of something that someone else told you that you needed to have a business?
I want you to really let this soak in. This is something that I taught in the accelerator, a six-week program for men and women who want to start a business. Our goal is to know and understand our passion and our purpose. We need to all get crystal clear on what impact we want to have in this world. Only then can we use our God-given gifts, our strengths, and those things that are so good and innate within us. Only then can we create a business and a life that’s based on our values. That’s what entrepreneurship means to me: finding alignment with the life that we’ve always dreamed of having.
And here’s the thing, tribe. We’ve talked about this before, but I just want to reiterate. Financial success will come when you start to define your success on a whole new level — on a level that’s larger than money. Working in that zone of genius and playing to your strengths will allow you to build a business that you love, that you’ll feel passionate about, and that you’ll want to keep growing year after year. Redefine your success, because if your life is just about grinding through your weaknesses to make more money, then you're going to be disappointed.
How to Find Your Strengths
If you don’t feel like you know your own strengths and weaknesses, that’s ok! Some of us don’t have that level of self-awareness yet to know what energy we want to tap into (and what habit we want to stop doing). My advice to you is to ask people. Ask your partner, your mother, your friends, and clients. Ask people who are close to you to tell you what they think your strengths are.
Then, write them down. Start to notice patterns. Take a good hard look at your business and your life and ask yourself, “Am I living this life and running this business from a place of strength and from a place of values?”
If this exercise has helped you, I'm going to hold you accountable — because that's why I'm here!
What I want you to do is screenshot your lists of strengths — and weaknesses, if you feel comfortable sharing them — and put that list up on your Instagram stories. You can tell your followers, “Hey, Jenn challenged me to call out my strengths, here they are.” You can tag me (@thejennkennedy). Tribe, aI really want you to start to own these gifts. Embrace your talent and start to monetize the things that you do best in this world.
The moment you start to identify and appreciate your strengths is the moment when your life becomes really wild and crazy (in a good way). You’ll start living in your passion and your purpose and your zone of genius. It’s an incredible feeling — it explains why I’ve started loving Mondays so much!
I can’t wait to see all of your strengths on Instagram stories. If you don’t feel comfortable sharing your strengths with others, you can always DM me — I’d love to hear what you’re passionate about and what impact you have on the world.
Tribe, I hope you have an amazing week. I’m so grateful to you for reading and sharing this episode with others. I hope that this message completely propels you forward to achieve big things in your life and in your business.
See you on Friday, Tribe!
