105. What It Really Means When Life & Business Feel Hard
One of the biggest lies moms tell themselves when they start a business is that it’s supposed to feel easy eventually. And when something feels hard for long enough, it’s natural to start questioning whether it’s meant for you. But what if feeling hard isn’t a sign that something has gone wrong, but actually worthwhile?
In this episode, I talk about what it really means when life and business feel hard and share a completely different way to think about hard, one that can change how you approach business, motherhood, and life in general. I also explore the ripple effect our thoughts create, why there’s no version of life free from challenge, and how to start choosing the kind of hard work that actually leads to a life you love.
If you’ve been feeling weighed down by the challenges of entrepreneurship, this conversation will help you see that hard doesn’t always mean bad. You’ll hear how embracing the right kind of hard can move you forward, unlock growth, and make the process feel more purposeful, energizing, and aligned with what matters most to you.
Ready for clarity and a simple action plan to get your business started? Schedule a free 1-hour consultation with me here!
What You’ll Learn from this Episode:
The difference between hard that energizes you versus hard that drains you.
Why feeling challenged doesn’t mean you’re failing.
Ways to shift your perspective when everything feels heavy.
Why hard experiences are often where growth and clarity are found.
How to choose the kind of hard that actually leads to a life you love.
Listen to the Full Episode:
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Full Episode Transcript:
A client said something to me recently that I think so many of us have thought before. Maybe this business just isn't meant for me because it feels so hard. I feel like we've all been there, myself included, for sure. Because when things feel hard for long enough, we start questioning everything.
I think one of the biggest lies moms believe when they start a business is that eventually, it's all supposed to feel easy. That once you find the right business idea, the right niche, the right strategy, the right balance, the hard will disappear. But I don't actually think that's true.
I think life is hard. Parenting is hard, business is hard, corporate is hard. And today I want to offer you a completely different way to think about hard. One that I know will change the way you approach business, motherhood, and honestly, your entire life.
Welcome to How to Quit Your Job, the podcast for moms ready to ditch the nine-to-five and build a life and business they love. I’m your host, Jenna Rykiel. Let’s go.
Hi mom friends. Earlier this week, I was coaching a mom who has had a business for a while, but it's not where she wants it to be. It's not meeting her revenue goals and there's a lot of other stuff going on personally that's getting in the way. She's really on an all-time low, it feels like, and I'm supporting her out of that, and she absolutely will get out of that. But one of the reoccurring questions that keeps coming up is whether she should be doing the things she's doing, whether this is the right business, whether she should just go back to corporate.
She's feeling like business has been really feeling hard recently, and she's trying to figure out if there's another route that would be easier, that would feel more in flow to her, where it just wouldn't feel so hard. And this led to such an important conversation earlier this week, one that I've been meaning to have on this podcast, but I'm realizing that it hasn't happened until now.
Today I want to unpack why we make hard mean something that has gone wrong. I want to unpack why that mindset actually destroys our dreams and how a simple mindset shift changes the way we show up in business, parenting, and life in general.
I'm going to talk about the ripple effect our thoughts create and why there's no version of life that's free from challenge. Spoiler alert. But I also want to talk about how to start choosing the kind of hard work that actually leads to a life you love. Because there's a really big difference between this is hard, so maybe I should quit, and this is hard, and maybe that's exactly what makes it worthwhile.
So if you've been feeling like you're in the trenches, if you feel like everything is hard and nothing is working, and maybe you should just go back to corporate where things are easier, I have a shift, an offering of a new way to look at things that will hopefully unlock a ton of relief for you. I know that it did for me. And honestly, if you're still in corporate and you're thinking that you want to just start your own business because being in corporate with a family is hard, this conversation is going to open up something for you too. I just know it.
So just like my client experienced, when our career feels hard, we question it. We look into other options and for some reason we decide that since it's hard, it means something is wrong. Maybe you're not meant to be doing this thing. If we were meant to be doing it, it would be easier. It would feel easier. It wouldn't come so hard to us. We wouldn't have to do so much work.
When the learning curve is tremendous and it feels like nothing is clicking and we're not getting it, it feels hard, and that feels like a problem. And when we tell ourselves that something is hard, it actually leads to feelings of insecurity, self-doubt, frustration, maybe anger, maybe disappointment, confusion. And honestly, maybe even depression and despair. I've absolutely seen moms get to a place where they feel a sense of despair because things feel so hard.
And it's not just business that feels hard. Life feels hard sometimes. Parenting feels especially hard most of the time. I can't tell you how many times I've turned to my husband in tears and said, what we're doing isn't working. And that's despair, and it's driven from the thought that this, whatever this is, is hard.
And when we're going through life feeling any flavor of those feelings I mentioned, our actions show it. I want you to think about the last time you were frustrated because something was hard. I want you to think about what you did when you were frustrated. I know for me, I probably would give up on it, whatever it is. I'd avoid it, I'd complain about it, I would judge myself, I would judge the thing, especially if I'm frustrated from parenting. I might judge my kids as if they are the problem. Spoiler alert, they are never the problem.
And what happens when we give up on things, when we avoid it, when we complain about it, when we spin in judgment, well, if it's our business that we're frustrated with because it's hard, we give up. We stop figuring things out. We waste a ton of energy complaining that could have been used finding solutions. We avoid working on the business, we lose momentum, and then it becomes harder and harder to regain it back. So things actually become harder.
If it's parenting that we're saying is hard and we're feeling frustrated about, we probably lash out at our kids or lash out at our partner. And I don't know if that behavior has ever worked for you, but I know for me, it's never made things better. When I get frustrated at how hard something is, maybe a tantrum or a kid not listening, when I feel frustrated and act on that, they get upset or act out even more.
The results that we create when we think that something is hard and feel unsatisfied with it, whatever that unsatisfying feeling is, it leads us to worse results. It makes our life harder. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy. Now, as an aside, how I just talked through that is basically how the model works, which is a tool that I provide all my clients in coaching. A process of stepping back and looking at how there's a ripple effect from our thoughts.
We have a thought, this is so hard. It produces a feeling. The feeling leads to action or inaction. And when we do things or avoid doing things, we create results. And sometimes those results are results we want, and that's great. And sometimes they are results that we want to change. This is life changing to understand and to help you see [the] world from different angles. Because most of us are not taking a step back and really analyzing what's happening when we're feeling frustrated and connecting our results to our thoughts.
So, just as an aside, thinking about it this way and a peek into some of the tools that I teach my moms that are so tangible, it's exactly this, a way for us to see how our thoughts are leading to our results, both results we want and results we don't want. And right now, I'm offering an opportunity for moms to test out my coaching program for a month, and with this tool alone in the first session, everything changes.
The empowering part of this tool and sort of knowing how thinking that something is hard actually creates a harder circumstance for ourselves is that when we think something is hard and we make that a problem, we create results we don't want. And just as we take ownership over creating results we don't want, we can also create results we do want with just a simple shift.
The kicker is, business is hard. Life is hard. Parenting is hard. So it's not about suddenly believing and thinking it's not hard. That wouldn't be easy for you to believe. That would be what we call a lie that you tell yourself, right? If you walk around saying that it's all easy, you're either lying or delusional. So we can't change the fact that there's going to be difficulty involved in all things in life.
A good example of this is if we look at any socioeconomic tier. The richest of the rich people still think that life is hard in a lot of ways. Money solves money problems, but money creates a lot of other money problems, right?
It becomes then hard that people are reaching out for money maybe and you have to say no to people. It becomes hard to make decisions on where to invest your money and where to keep your money safe. Suddenly losing money and losing everything that you've built becomes a substantial fear in your life, maybe not one that you've had before when you didn't have so many assets.
And if we look at the trajectory of our life, we can see that at no stage did we think that it was easy. I remember when I was little and life felt so hard because I couldn't make my own decisions. I was told what to do, I had to do homework, I had to go to bed at a certain time. Now, I'm sure everybody listening would agree. We're like, oh my god, what I wouldn't give to be a kid again when I had no worries. I had no bills. Life was easy. But when we were kids, it wasn't easy. It was actually arguably harder because we didn't have emotional regulation like we do now.
Every incident that happened felt like it was life or death, right? A small misunderstanding in high school felt like the end of the world. Other kids were mean, school felt hard, relationships were especially hard. And now many of you, I know this is true for myself, I'm pretty financially secure. My relationships are solid. There's not a lot of drama in my life. My kids are great. I have an amazing family, great friends, support systems, right? And life still feels effing hard.
So here's what we want to do. This is the most important piece of all of this. This is the shift, the change maker, the thing that I want you to remember and keep with you that will change everything. What if something being hard is not a problem? What if it's supposed to be hard? What if the fact that things are hard means that you are growing and evolving and leveling up as a human?
If we accept that business is hard and we know that it's supposed to be hard, what does that change for you in your day-to-day? How do you show up differently? How do you feel when you're working on the business? I know for me when I had this moment of surrender to things being hard in my business, when I just looked at it and said, you know what? It's not supposed to be easy. This isn't a problem. I stopped wasting so much time and energy judging myself, questioning my business, and hating the process.
Because yes, there are moments when things feel hard and when we make that a problem, that we start hating the process. And listen, if you're not having fun doing this, it's not worth doing. But suddenly I was able to see that this is part of the process. It's supposed to be hard. There is no escape from hard. And then I had a completely different mindset and energy towards solving what felt hard in my business.
Because everything feels hard before it feels easy. I remember my first post on social media felt so hard. Now they are super easy. It's just a matter of actually scheduling time to prioritize them. But that's not because they are hard anymore. I'm living this also so vividly in my personal life right now. I know I've shared that I recently started rock climbing, and it's a great example of where we want our minds to get to when we're thinking about hard.
Because when a climbing route is hard, that's not a bad thing. It means that I need to improve so that the route doesn't feel so hard anymore. And in climbing, there are very specific levels that are laid out. Routes are marked with a difficulty level, and as your skills develop and your fears diminish, you try a route at a difficulty level that you've never tried before. And it's hard. It's supposed to be hard.
I just did a 5.10c this morning for all my climbers out there. And it's the first time I've done that, and it was hard. I had to take a minute and rest and figure things out, which I don't have to do on 5.9’s or even 5.10a’s anymore. But there was a time when I looked at a 5.10a and thought to myself, there's no way I'll be able to do that. It's too hard.
But hard isn't a bad thing in something like climbing, right? Hard is an aspiration. Pretty much any climber in the gym, unless they are recovering from an injury, is going to be at some point in the day climbing a route that challenges them, a route that feels hard. Because hard is good. Hard means you're pushing yourself and you're improving and you're leveling up.
Something can be hard and we can accept it and work to get better at it with the understanding that it will get easier if we keep at it. And then there will be a new version of hard, of course. Or something can be hard and we can make that a problem and avoid it or quit it.
It's interesting because kids are so much better with this. I guess because everything is hard for them since they are learning everything for the first time, right? But imagine a kid learning to walk. Arguably, learning to walk is hard. We know that because they fall down a lot. They get hurt a lot. I'm sure it could be really frustrating for them, but they keep at it until walking is easy.
And then, of course, they level up to climbing and jumping and running. But initially, just walking is hard. Imagine if they made that a problem. Imagine if they got so frustrated or filled with self-doubt that they just avoided learning to walk. They just gave up on it. That would be a very different world, right? But they don't do that. At a young age, we are open to things being difficult, and we just stick with them. We just figure it out. We don't make it mean we just weren't meant to walk. We keep going until we figure it out.
And once we can walk, we never again think about walking being hard, unless, of course, we have an injury or some life-changing event that happens that impacts our walking, of course. But when walking becomes easy, something else becomes hard. The next thing, whether that's running or jumping or sprinting or swimming or climbing, we can't escape it.
So let's bring this back to business. Starting and building a business is hard. You've heard me say it many times on this podcast. Motherhood and entrepreneurship are the two greatest personal development journeys in disguise. Both are incredibly hard. You learn more about yourself when you start a business and when you become a mom than you ever thought possible.
All of those hidden insecurities rise to the surface, all of those weaknesses are amplified, all of those ticks are mirrored back to you in your little one. They start to mimic you and then you have this wild moment where you're like, is that what I sound like? Is that what I look like? Is that what I do? I didn't know I grunted every time I get off the couch.
And when those things come up, you have to face them head on in order to keep moving forward. Business is hard, but it's not a problem. Motherhood is hard, but it's not a problem. It's actually a good thing. It means you're the type of person who challenges yourself, the type of person who puts themselves in the arena to grow and level up. It means that you see a positive impact you can make on the world and in your own life, and you are brave enough to act on it.
If you built your career in a traditional nine-to-five, this is even more impressive because you likely haven't been given any reinforcement that starting a business is a good idea, except for me, of course, and I would trust me if I were you. But there weren't conversations and stories happening within your career that sent a message that you can do it too, or you should leave and start your own business. So you're special if you've been thinking about starting or building a business when you've never done it before.
And it's going to be hard. Business being hard means that it's worthwhile. Everything worthwhile is hard. Motherhood is worthwhile and it's really hard. The mental drama we have on a daily basis that come with being a mom and the leader of the family is hard. And it's absolutely worth it. I've never talked to a mom who didn't believe it was worth it. Hard is not a problem. Hard is a solution. When something is hard, we figure it out and then we find a new hard, which is an awesome feeling. If we keep finding new hards and if we keep challenging ourselves, we keep growing, and that feels really good.
Childbirth is really hard. And when you get to the end of that 40 week journey of growing a human or however many weeks for you, I know it's rarely 40 exactly, but whatever level of hard it was for you during that time, because I know it's difficult and different for everyone, you feel good once you're at the end of that journey. And also the journey is just beginning, right? But it's physically, mentally, emotionally hard. After you have given birth, you feel like you could conquer the world because you've brought life to the world.
Running a marathon, if you've ever done that, when you cross that finish line or any difficult athletic feat, I know what comes to mind for me is running a marathon, but when you cross that finish line, whatever that finish line is, you're exhausted, but you feel good. You feel like the months of training and all the injuries and the cramps and the sweat and the blood and the tears were worth it in the process because you feel on top of the world when you get to that point where you have overcome the hard. You have done it anyway.
Another example that comes to mind for me sitting for a 10-day silent meditation retreat. That's hard. That was harder for me than the marathon, honestly. When you're sitting, meditating for hours and hours on end, it is so hard on the body. It is so hard on the mind. And at the end of it, you're a completely different person, a better person, a better version of yourself. In the thick of all of these things, it's a slog, right? It's hard. You want to quit. You have thoughts eating at you that this sucks. And yet all of those things are worth it.
Those are just some examples that come to mind for me, but I know you have things in your life that have been so hard and were so worth it. And listen, I'm sure if I kept up training and running distances, then marathons would no longer feel hard to me. I'm sure I could ask anyone who does ultras and 50 milers and all the crazy things that people do. Marathons probably are easy to them. Anything can become easier after you stick with it, but only after it's hard first. You have to go through hard first.
Okay, here's the last thing I'll say about this topic, and this is also one of the most important things you'll hear all day. The grass is not greener on the other side. I know you've heard that before, but on the other side, keeping the grass green is just as hard. There's no way to escape hard.
If you go back to your corporate job, you will have a steady paycheck, but it will also be hard. You'll have maybe to go after goals and metrics that don't align with you sometimes. You'll have to do things or say things to your team that are hard. You'll have to request PTO from your boss anytime your kid is sick. There will be things that feel hard.
And for folks who are in corporate right now and who want to start a business because they want to escape the hard of corporate, I'll say the same thing to you. Leaving your corporate job does not free you of hard. There are some things that will become easier, but there will always be hard. That's why I always coach my moms to never run away from a role that feels hard for whatever reason. I want them to make an empowered choice to run to something with all the realistic expectations that need to come with it.
They aren't escaping hard when they quit their job to choose their business. They are choosing a different hard. And listen, I want you to choose the hard that energizes you and fills you up. Choose the hard that gives you life. Because hard can give you that.
For all the reasons I just talked about, hard can mean that you're feeling more alive because you're learning more about yourself and achieving things you never thought possible. Choose that hard. Don't choose the hard that feels hard because it's sucking the life out of you. Don't choose the existential hard, right? Choose the hard that has you becoming a better version of yourself. Choose the hard that has you feeling proud of yourself at the end of the day.
At the end of any choice is going to be some flavor of hard. Choose the one that leads to a life you love. That's what I said to this client. I said you have a choice. You can always find a job in a corporate role, but don't think for a second that it's not going to come with challenges and things that feel hard. I said you can't escape hard. And I encouraged her to think about her business and asked how her thoughts of it would change if it was okay that it was hard. It was supposed to be hard.
And in fact, if she just accepted that it was hard and didn't make it mean anything about her and whether she should or shouldn't be doing this thing. If we make decisions to avoid hard and move towards easy, we will find ourselves in a position where we're probably less fulfilled and are still dealing with some version of hard. For this person, if it's okay that it's hard, it means that the difficulty level is independent of whether or not she's meant to be doing this thing. And the beautiful thing about this is, is then I asked her what she liked about the business and the work she did.
If hard was accepted and if hard was part of the process, what did she like about it? And it was so clear that she's meant to be doing this work, right? She lit up about the impact, the beauty she creates, the environmental benefits, how she's so good at it. I think she worded it as, I'm actually good at it, how we women tend to do. Her whole energy changed. That's the energy we want to work from. The energy that says this is hard and it's worth it.
If there's one thing I want you to take away from today's episode, it's this. Hard is not a problem. Hard does not mean you're failing. Hard does not mean you picked the wrong path. Hard does not mean you aren't capable. Most of the things that shape us most deeply in life are hard. Motherhood is hard. Building a business is hard. Leading a family is hard. Changing your life is hard, but so is staying stuck. So is ignoring yourself. So is continuing to build a life that no longer fits who you're wanting to become. You do not get to avoid hard. None of us do. But you do get to choose your hard.
And I really want you to choose the hard that expands you, the hard that makes you proud of yourself, the hard that helps you become more alive, the hard that creates a life you actually want to wake up to. Because that version of hard, that version is worth it.
If you're catching this episode live, you are in luck because there's still time to take advantage of my May opportunity, which allows moms who are coaching curious, I'll say, to try out my program for a month. All the same benefits of my long-term clients, weekly one-on-one sessions, weekly group sessions, and support in between sessions, but no long-term commitments. Just a chance to experience what it feels like and then be able to decide from there if this type of support works for you, whether this type of support will help you get through the hard.
Honestly, it's not for everyone. So I've been loving this option so far this month. Go to the show notes, jenna.coach/105 and schedule a free consultation to learn more about how it works and to see if it's a good fit for you. If you're not catching this live, if May 2026 has come and gone, I encourage you to follow the podcast. Click the little plus button wherever you're listening so that you are notified of new episodes once they air. I'm always talking about new opportunities and resources to move you forward, so you'll want to get those little pings when episodes go live.
I also encourage you to join my email list. That's a great way to stay up to date. That's a great way to get resources. There's also the Mom Entrepreneur Circle that I talk about a lot. You are welcome to join. We meet every other week and that's a free community that you can join and get regular support, strategy, and connection on this journey.
All of these resources help you to redefine your relationship with hard. All of these resources make entrepreneurship less hard. We're not going to escape hard, but we can make entrepreneurship less hard. That's what this podcast does, right? This podcast gives you tools, perspective shifts, it helps to make it less hard. Is it going to be hard? Yeah. But tools and resources that we talk about on this podcast make it less hard.
All right, mom friends. Have an amazing week. I hope to talk to you soon. And I will see you next week.
Thanks for listening to this week’s episode of How to Quit Your Job: A Mom’s Guide to Creating a Life and Business You Love. If you want to learn more about how I can help you stop making excuses and start making moves, head on over to www.jenna.coach. I’ll see you next week.
I think one of the biggest lies moms believe when they start a business is that eventually, it's all supposed to feel easy. That once you find the right business idea, the right niche, the right strategy, the right balance, the hard will disappear. But I don't actually think that's true.
I think life is hard. Parenting is hard, business is hard, corporate is hard. And today I want to offer you a completely different way to think about hard. One that I know will change the way you approach business, motherhood, and honestly, your entire life.
Welcome to How to Quit Your Job, the podcast for moms ready to ditch the nine-to-five and build a life and business they love. I’m your host, Jenna Rykiel. Let’s go.
Hi mom friends. Earlier this week, I was coaching a mom who has had a business for a while, but it's not where she wants it to be. It's not meeting her revenue goals and there's a lot of other stuff going on personally that's getting in the way. She's really on an all-time low, it feels like, and I'm supporting her out of that, and she absolutely will get out of that. But one of the reoccurring questions that keeps coming up is whether she should be doing the things she's doing, whether this is the right business, whether she should just go back to corporate.
She's feeling like business has been really feeling hard recently, and she's trying to figure out if there's another route that would be easier, that would feel more in flow to her, where it just wouldn't feel so hard. And this led to such an important conversation earlier this week, one that I've been meaning to have on this podcast, but I'm realizing that it hasn't happened until now.
Today I want to unpack why we make hard mean something that has gone wrong. I want to unpack why that mindset actually destroys our dreams and how a simple mindset shift changes the way we show up in business, parenting, and life in general.
I'm going to talk about the ripple effect our thoughts create and why there's no version of life that's free from challenge. Spoiler alert. But I also want to talk about how to start choosing the kind of hard work that actually leads to a life you love. Because there's a really big difference between this is hard, so maybe I should quit, and this is hard, and maybe that's exactly what makes it worthwhile.
So if you've been feeling like you're in the trenches, if you feel like everything is hard and nothing is working, and maybe you should just go back to corporate where things are easier, I have a shift, an offering of a new way to look at things that will hopefully unlock a ton of relief for you. I know that it did for me. And honestly, if you're still in corporate and you're thinking that you want to just start your own business because being in corporate with a family is hard, this conversation is going to open up something for you too. I just know it.
So just like my client experienced, when our career feels hard, we question it. We look into other options and for some reason we decide that since it's hard, it means something is wrong. Maybe you're not meant to be doing this thing. If we were meant to be doing it, it would be easier. It would feel easier. It wouldn't come so hard to us. We wouldn't have to do so much work.
When the learning curve is tremendous and it feels like nothing is clicking and we're not getting it, it feels hard, and that feels like a problem. And when we tell ourselves that something is hard, it actually leads to feelings of insecurity, self-doubt, frustration, maybe anger, maybe disappointment, confusion. And honestly, maybe even depression and despair. I've absolutely seen moms get to a place where they feel a sense of despair because things feel so hard.
And it's not just business that feels hard. Life feels hard sometimes. Parenting feels especially hard most of the time. I can't tell you how many times I've turned to my husband in tears and said, what we're doing isn't working. And that's despair, and it's driven from the thought that this, whatever this is, is hard.
And when we're going through life feeling any flavor of those feelings I mentioned, our actions show it. I want you to think about the last time you were frustrated because something was hard. I want you to think about what you did when you were frustrated. I know for me, I probably would give up on it, whatever it is. I'd avoid it, I'd complain about it, I would judge myself, I would judge the thing, especially if I'm frustrated from parenting. I might judge my kids as if they are the problem. Spoiler alert, they are never the problem.
And what happens when we give up on things, when we avoid it, when we complain about it, when we spin in judgment, well, if it's our business that we're frustrated with because it's hard, we give up. We stop figuring things out. We waste a ton of energy complaining that could have been used finding solutions. We avoid working on the business, we lose momentum, and then it becomes harder and harder to regain it back. So things actually become harder.
If it's parenting that we're saying is hard and we're feeling frustrated about, we probably lash out at our kids or lash out at our partner. And I don't know if that behavior has ever worked for you, but I know for me, it's never made things better. When I get frustrated at how hard something is, maybe a tantrum or a kid not listening, when I feel frustrated and act on that, they get upset or act out even more.
The results that we create when we think that something is hard and feel unsatisfied with it, whatever that unsatisfying feeling is, it leads us to worse results. It makes our life harder. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy. Now, as an aside, how I just talked through that is basically how the model works, which is a tool that I provide all my clients in coaching. A process of stepping back and looking at how there's a ripple effect from our thoughts.
We have a thought, this is so hard. It produces a feeling. The feeling leads to action or inaction. And when we do things or avoid doing things, we create results. And sometimes those results are results we want, and that's great. And sometimes they are results that we want to change. This is life changing to understand and to help you see [the] world from different angles. Because most of us are not taking a step back and really analyzing what's happening when we're feeling frustrated and connecting our results to our thoughts.
So, just as an aside, thinking about it this way and a peek into some of the tools that I teach my moms that are so tangible, it's exactly this, a way for us to see how our thoughts are leading to our results, both results we want and results we don't want. And right now, I'm offering an opportunity for moms to test out my coaching program for a month, and with this tool alone in the first session, everything changes.
The empowering part of this tool and sort of knowing how thinking that something is hard actually creates a harder circumstance for ourselves is that when we think something is hard and we make that a problem, we create results we don't want. And just as we take ownership over creating results we don't want, we can also create results we do want with just a simple shift.
The kicker is, business is hard. Life is hard. Parenting is hard. So it's not about suddenly believing and thinking it's not hard. That wouldn't be easy for you to believe. That would be what we call a lie that you tell yourself, right? If you walk around saying that it's all easy, you're either lying or delusional. So we can't change the fact that there's going to be difficulty involved in all things in life.
A good example of this is if we look at any socioeconomic tier. The richest of the rich people still think that life is hard in a lot of ways. Money solves money problems, but money creates a lot of other money problems, right?
It becomes then hard that people are reaching out for money maybe and you have to say no to people. It becomes hard to make decisions on where to invest your money and where to keep your money safe. Suddenly losing money and losing everything that you've built becomes a substantial fear in your life, maybe not one that you've had before when you didn't have so many assets.
And if we look at the trajectory of our life, we can see that at no stage did we think that it was easy. I remember when I was little and life felt so hard because I couldn't make my own decisions. I was told what to do, I had to do homework, I had to go to bed at a certain time. Now, I'm sure everybody listening would agree. We're like, oh my god, what I wouldn't give to be a kid again when I had no worries. I had no bills. Life was easy. But when we were kids, it wasn't easy. It was actually arguably harder because we didn't have emotional regulation like we do now.
Every incident that happened felt like it was life or death, right? A small misunderstanding in high school felt like the end of the world. Other kids were mean, school felt hard, relationships were especially hard. And now many of you, I know this is true for myself, I'm pretty financially secure. My relationships are solid. There's not a lot of drama in my life. My kids are great. I have an amazing family, great friends, support systems, right? And life still feels effing hard.
So here's what we want to do. This is the most important piece of all of this. This is the shift, the change maker, the thing that I want you to remember and keep with you that will change everything. What if something being hard is not a problem? What if it's supposed to be hard? What if the fact that things are hard means that you are growing and evolving and leveling up as a human?
If we accept that business is hard and we know that it's supposed to be hard, what does that change for you in your day-to-day? How do you show up differently? How do you feel when you're working on the business? I know for me when I had this moment of surrender to things being hard in my business, when I just looked at it and said, you know what? It's not supposed to be easy. This isn't a problem. I stopped wasting so much time and energy judging myself, questioning my business, and hating the process.
Because yes, there are moments when things feel hard and when we make that a problem, that we start hating the process. And listen, if you're not having fun doing this, it's not worth doing. But suddenly I was able to see that this is part of the process. It's supposed to be hard. There is no escape from hard. And then I had a completely different mindset and energy towards solving what felt hard in my business.
Because everything feels hard before it feels easy. I remember my first post on social media felt so hard. Now they are super easy. It's just a matter of actually scheduling time to prioritize them. But that's not because they are hard anymore. I'm living this also so vividly in my personal life right now. I know I've shared that I recently started rock climbing, and it's a great example of where we want our minds to get to when we're thinking about hard.
Because when a climbing route is hard, that's not a bad thing. It means that I need to improve so that the route doesn't feel so hard anymore. And in climbing, there are very specific levels that are laid out. Routes are marked with a difficulty level, and as your skills develop and your fears diminish, you try a route at a difficulty level that you've never tried before. And it's hard. It's supposed to be hard.
I just did a 5.10c this morning for all my climbers out there. And it's the first time I've done that, and it was hard. I had to take a minute and rest and figure things out, which I don't have to do on 5.9’s or even 5.10a’s anymore. But there was a time when I looked at a 5.10a and thought to myself, there's no way I'll be able to do that. It's too hard.
But hard isn't a bad thing in something like climbing, right? Hard is an aspiration. Pretty much any climber in the gym, unless they are recovering from an injury, is going to be at some point in the day climbing a route that challenges them, a route that feels hard. Because hard is good. Hard means you're pushing yourself and you're improving and you're leveling up.
Something can be hard and we can accept it and work to get better at it with the understanding that it will get easier if we keep at it. And then there will be a new version of hard, of course. Or something can be hard and we can make that a problem and avoid it or quit it.
It's interesting because kids are so much better with this. I guess because everything is hard for them since they are learning everything for the first time, right? But imagine a kid learning to walk. Arguably, learning to walk is hard. We know that because they fall down a lot. They get hurt a lot. I'm sure it could be really frustrating for them, but they keep at it until walking is easy.
And then, of course, they level up to climbing and jumping and running. But initially, just walking is hard. Imagine if they made that a problem. Imagine if they got so frustrated or filled with self-doubt that they just avoided learning to walk. They just gave up on it. That would be a very different world, right? But they don't do that. At a young age, we are open to things being difficult, and we just stick with them. We just figure it out. We don't make it mean we just weren't meant to walk. We keep going until we figure it out.
And once we can walk, we never again think about walking being hard, unless, of course, we have an injury or some life-changing event that happens that impacts our walking, of course. But when walking becomes easy, something else becomes hard. The next thing, whether that's running or jumping or sprinting or swimming or climbing, we can't escape it.
So let's bring this back to business. Starting and building a business is hard. You've heard me say it many times on this podcast. Motherhood and entrepreneurship are the two greatest personal development journeys in disguise. Both are incredibly hard. You learn more about yourself when you start a business and when you become a mom than you ever thought possible.
All of those hidden insecurities rise to the surface, all of those weaknesses are amplified, all of those ticks are mirrored back to you in your little one. They start to mimic you and then you have this wild moment where you're like, is that what I sound like? Is that what I look like? Is that what I do? I didn't know I grunted every time I get off the couch.
And when those things come up, you have to face them head on in order to keep moving forward. Business is hard, but it's not a problem. Motherhood is hard, but it's not a problem. It's actually a good thing. It means you're the type of person who challenges yourself, the type of person who puts themselves in the arena to grow and level up. It means that you see a positive impact you can make on the world and in your own life, and you are brave enough to act on it.
If you built your career in a traditional nine-to-five, this is even more impressive because you likely haven't been given any reinforcement that starting a business is a good idea, except for me, of course, and I would trust me if I were you. But there weren't conversations and stories happening within your career that sent a message that you can do it too, or you should leave and start your own business. So you're special if you've been thinking about starting or building a business when you've never done it before.
And it's going to be hard. Business being hard means that it's worthwhile. Everything worthwhile is hard. Motherhood is worthwhile and it's really hard. The mental drama we have on a daily basis that come with being a mom and the leader of the family is hard. And it's absolutely worth it. I've never talked to a mom who didn't believe it was worth it. Hard is not a problem. Hard is a solution. When something is hard, we figure it out and then we find a new hard, which is an awesome feeling. If we keep finding new hards and if we keep challenging ourselves, we keep growing, and that feels really good.
Childbirth is really hard. And when you get to the end of that 40 week journey of growing a human or however many weeks for you, I know it's rarely 40 exactly, but whatever level of hard it was for you during that time, because I know it's difficult and different for everyone, you feel good once you're at the end of that journey. And also the journey is just beginning, right? But it's physically, mentally, emotionally hard. After you have given birth, you feel like you could conquer the world because you've brought life to the world.
Running a marathon, if you've ever done that, when you cross that finish line or any difficult athletic feat, I know what comes to mind for me is running a marathon, but when you cross that finish line, whatever that finish line is, you're exhausted, but you feel good. You feel like the months of training and all the injuries and the cramps and the sweat and the blood and the tears were worth it in the process because you feel on top of the world when you get to that point where you have overcome the hard. You have done it anyway.
Another example that comes to mind for me sitting for a 10-day silent meditation retreat. That's hard. That was harder for me than the marathon, honestly. When you're sitting, meditating for hours and hours on end, it is so hard on the body. It is so hard on the mind. And at the end of it, you're a completely different person, a better person, a better version of yourself. In the thick of all of these things, it's a slog, right? It's hard. You want to quit. You have thoughts eating at you that this sucks. And yet all of those things are worth it.
Those are just some examples that come to mind for me, but I know you have things in your life that have been so hard and were so worth it. And listen, I'm sure if I kept up training and running distances, then marathons would no longer feel hard to me. I'm sure I could ask anyone who does ultras and 50 milers and all the crazy things that people do. Marathons probably are easy to them. Anything can become easier after you stick with it, but only after it's hard first. You have to go through hard first.
Okay, here's the last thing I'll say about this topic, and this is also one of the most important things you'll hear all day. The grass is not greener on the other side. I know you've heard that before, but on the other side, keeping the grass green is just as hard. There's no way to escape hard.
If you go back to your corporate job, you will have a steady paycheck, but it will also be hard. You'll have maybe to go after goals and metrics that don't align with you sometimes. You'll have to do things or say things to your team that are hard. You'll have to request PTO from your boss anytime your kid is sick. There will be things that feel hard.
And for folks who are in corporate right now and who want to start a business because they want to escape the hard of corporate, I'll say the same thing to you. Leaving your corporate job does not free you of hard. There are some things that will become easier, but there will always be hard. That's why I always coach my moms to never run away from a role that feels hard for whatever reason. I want them to make an empowered choice to run to something with all the realistic expectations that need to come with it.
They aren't escaping hard when they quit their job to choose their business. They are choosing a different hard. And listen, I want you to choose the hard that energizes you and fills you up. Choose the hard that gives you life. Because hard can give you that.
For all the reasons I just talked about, hard can mean that you're feeling more alive because you're learning more about yourself and achieving things you never thought possible. Choose that hard. Don't choose the hard that feels hard because it's sucking the life out of you. Don't choose the existential hard, right? Choose the hard that has you becoming a better version of yourself. Choose the hard that has you feeling proud of yourself at the end of the day.
At the end of any choice is going to be some flavor of hard. Choose the one that leads to a life you love. That's what I said to this client. I said you have a choice. You can always find a job in a corporate role, but don't think for a second that it's not going to come with challenges and things that feel hard. I said you can't escape hard. And I encouraged her to think about her business and asked how her thoughts of it would change if it was okay that it was hard. It was supposed to be hard.
And in fact, if she just accepted that it was hard and didn't make it mean anything about her and whether she should or shouldn't be doing this thing. If we make decisions to avoid hard and move towards easy, we will find ourselves in a position where we're probably less fulfilled and are still dealing with some version of hard. For this person, if it's okay that it's hard, it means that the difficulty level is independent of whether or not she's meant to be doing this thing. And the beautiful thing about this is, is then I asked her what she liked about the business and the work she did.
If hard was accepted and if hard was part of the process, what did she like about it? And it was so clear that she's meant to be doing this work, right? She lit up about the impact, the beauty she creates, the environmental benefits, how she's so good at it. I think she worded it as, I'm actually good at it, how we women tend to do. Her whole energy changed. That's the energy we want to work from. The energy that says this is hard and it's worth it.
If there's one thing I want you to take away from today's episode, it's this. Hard is not a problem. Hard does not mean you're failing. Hard does not mean you picked the wrong path. Hard does not mean you aren't capable. Most of the things that shape us most deeply in life are hard. Motherhood is hard. Building a business is hard. Leading a family is hard. Changing your life is hard, but so is staying stuck. So is ignoring yourself. So is continuing to build a life that no longer fits who you're wanting to become. You do not get to avoid hard. None of us do. But you do get to choose your hard.
And I really want you to choose the hard that expands you, the hard that makes you proud of yourself, the hard that helps you become more alive, the hard that creates a life you actually want to wake up to. Because that version of hard, that version is worth it.
If you're catching this episode live, you are in luck because there's still time to take advantage of my May opportunity, which allows moms who are coaching curious, I'll say, to try out my program for a month. All the same benefits of my long-term clients, weekly one-on-one sessions, weekly group sessions, and support in between sessions, but no long-term commitments. Just a chance to experience what it feels like and then be able to decide from there if this type of support works for you, whether this type of support will help you get through the hard.
Honestly, it's not for everyone. So I've been loving this option so far this month. Go to the show notes, jenna.coach/105 and schedule a free consultation to learn more about how it works and to see if it's a good fit for you. If you're not catching this live, if May 2026 has come and gone, I encourage you to follow the podcast. Click the little plus button wherever you're listening so that you are notified of new episodes once they air. I'm always talking about new opportunities and resources to move you forward, so you'll want to get those little pings when episodes go live.
I also encourage you to join my email list. That's a great way to stay up to date. That's a great way to get resources. There's also the Mom Entrepreneur Circle that I talk about a lot. You are welcome to join. We meet every other week and that's a free community that you can join and get regular support, strategy, and connection on this journey.
All of these resources help you to redefine your relationship with hard. All of these resources make entrepreneurship less hard. We're not going to escape hard, but we can make entrepreneurship less hard. That's what this podcast does, right? This podcast gives you tools, perspective shifts, it helps to make it less hard. Is it going to be hard? Yeah. But tools and resources that we talk about on this podcast make it less hard.
All right, mom friends. Have an amazing week. I hope to talk to you soon. And I will see you next week.
Thanks for listening to this week’s episode of How to Quit Your Job: A Mom’s Guide to Creating a Life and Business You Love. If you want to learn more about how I can help you stop making excuses and start making moves, head on over to www.jenna.coach. I’ll see you next week.
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