I made something new! Something new AND REALLY PRETTY.

SOMETHING NEW AND PRETTY AND SO-MUCH-MORE ME.

Please join me there. It would mean so much.

xoxoxo,
Rachael ;)

I recorded a video for you, and wrote it all out below the video too. Enjoy, darlings. This is all for you.

Once upon a time, I was alone.

Yes, I had my children and my husband with me, but I was alone in the great work that I was beginning.

I started my web design business sometime in January 2008. I don’t remember exactly when, because the decision was not one that I had the luxury of spending a lot of time thinking about. It was sink or swim, and the only swimming I knew how to do was designing websites, so that is what I started to do.

And I was alone. There was no one I knew who could support me, who could understand me, who could offer advice or guidance.

I began to build a small community on my blog and on Twitter, and that helped. I learned valuable things from the teachers and gurus that I came across, and that helped too. But still I had nowhere I felt that I belonged.

And because it had been that way for so long, I stopped caring about it, or at least I thought I did. I filed away the loneliness into the parts of my heart that didn’t have to be out in the light all the time, so that I could carry on building my business and getting work and swimming instead of sinking.

Then, early last year, someone invited me to be part of a group of people who were going to do some intense business-building work. The person who invited me was someone I trusted, although it was still difficult to take them up on it because of the cost involved. But the universe provided, and my husband agreed to handle things without me while I was gone, and so I went.

It’s difficult for me to express what happened while I was there, but I did try after I got back home. Here’s a bit of what I wrote then:

“When I finally arrived, I immediately reverted to my shy, outsider, I’m-not-that-cool self. The self that doesn’t think she’s awesome at all, that believes she’s ridiculously awkward, and feels like an uneducated hick who doesn’t know how to use silverware. (Yes, I’m aware that none of that is true – but it doesn’t change feeling like it is.)

But then – I don’t know exactly when it happened, but it was probably partway through some shared laughter, or in the middle of one of the many hugs we all shared during the weekend – I suddenly felt loved.

I felt understood. I felt cared about, surrounded, and supported. I felt lifted up.

All my life, I’ve been the weird one. I read books and climbed trees as a child, and grew up on a farm while being homeschooled. We didn’t have a TV, and I played the piano for fun. My friends were few and far between, and most of them couldn’t relate to my way of being.

As an adult, I put aside wanting to do what my heart wanted, and did the things that were expected of me: I married early, started having kids, tried to learn housekeeping and billpaying and other wife-y stuff. When my first husband took off like the bastard he turned out to be, my world shifted in a huge way.

I learned how to be strong (like I already was). I learned how to find ways to make things happen (like I already knew how to do).

Years have passed since that first shift, and I’ve experienced many more. The most recent shift in my world was my entrance into that special club of entrepreneurs, those people who have their own businesses, who spend more time loving their work than they used to spend hating their jobs.

And then, I met a whole bunch of other people just like me. Fourteen others, in fact… And I was home.

What I learned from the weekend cannot be summed up here, it cannot be bullet-pointed, and it sure as hell cannot be expressed in any coherent way except by my life and my actions and the way my world makes sense again. I met people who, by their love and their creativity and their innate them-ness, reminded me and retaught me that we were meant to live in community.

We need each other, and not just because we get lonely. We need each other because you can’t always see how amazing you are, but I can see it. We need each other because I can help you, but I can’t help myself – I need you for that.”

The reason that I have opened this new community – the Caffeinated Business Community – is that I want to provide that for you.

I want to give you a place that you belong. A place to experience love, acceptance, and the life-changing feeling of being understood.

My business has grown so much more since I experienced what true community feels like. My income has increased, my ideas have more clarity, and my ability to do my best work has been honed and polished.

Just like someone did for me, I am now doing this for you: I invite you to be part of this. I want you here. I want you to grow, laugh, learn, connect, and be supported all the while.

I can’t wait to see what we can do together.

I’m not sure how to begin this post, because my heart is so full.

Did you see the comments on last weekend’s post, Are You A Mother And An Entrepreneur? Did you see how many women (and the ones who love them) showed up and poured out their marvelous stories?

I realize that I don’t usually focus on women in business specifically, because obviously we are a happy mixture of men, women, single, married, child-free, unschooling, traveling, stay-at-home entrepreneurs. I do know that a lot more women are starting businesses lately (according to the statistics cited in this Forbes article, women are starting businesses at 1.5 the national average).

I also know that as women, we hold so many talents inside that we often don’t even see.

We don’t value our time, our energy, our wisdom.

We don’t place a premium on our internal resources because we multitask them.

We don’t realize that the very act of starting a business is a bravery so awe-inspiring that most people will never try it.

But look at us. Just for today, look at us. Look at yourself.

Look how amazing you are. Look what you do every day.

Look how you love the ones you nurture. Look how you learn and question and grow. Look how you take criticism as an opportunity for positive change.

Look at your kindness, your strength, your utterly breathtaking ability to get up when life pushes you down.

Some of us went to the best schools and hold hard-earned diplomas. Some of us learned the ropes early, from the school of hard knocks, without finishing high school.

Some of us saved up money to break our fall gently when we escaped the cubicle. Some of us started with less than nothing, because it was either this or live in a cardboard box.

All of us have what it takes to succeed at what we aim to do. Even if not all of us believe this, it’s still true.

I believe in you.

And I always will.

Stay tuned for the project I’m going to do with all these marvelous stories, and some of these marvelous mothers. And thank you again for participating.

Yesterday, the ineffable Michael Martine posted my first guest blog over at his place.

Here’s a teaser:

“Hey! Yeah, I’m talking to you, over there, reading blogs instead of working on your business.

I need to tell you something important, and I need you to pay attention.

Ready?

STOP PRETENDING YOU DON’T HAVE A BRAND.

And while you’re at it, stop pretending that your Thing isn’t a Business. Because it is.”

Go ahead, read the rest. I know you want to. ;)