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Have you ever thought about quitting your job… but the fear of what comes after not only for your professional life, but also your personal life, is keeping you stuck? Let me and my friend Amy Porterfield peel back the curtain on what happened to our personal relationships and our marriages when we finally gave our two weeks notice.
We’re talking about how our relationships have been affected through our entrepreneurial journeys and what you could expect if this is the year that YOU put in your two weeks notice and leave what you’ve known to embark on something new. Ready for a chat with Amy like you’ve never heard her? Let’s dive in.
Before Her Business
Amy Porterfield has been on the Goal Digger Podcast more than any other guest, but we’ve never really dug deep into her personal life. That side of the story, though, is the foundation of this conversation because sometimes when making a big life change – like quitting your job to become an entrepreneur for example – it can really impact your personal relationships.
Before Amy started her online education business, she was working for Tony Robbins and she really loved the stability of it. She told me, “I called myself a ‘corporate yes girl’. I liked to have a boss. I liked to have someone tell me what to do and then I go do it even better, so I can get the promotions, the rewards, the atta-girls. I liked to have a paycheck every two weeks. I liked paid vacation. I liked health insurance. All of that was great.”
She continued, “I was a security kind of girl, so I thrived in a corporate environment, but I had been there for almost seven years. And Tony teaches entrepreneurship. He teaches how to design a life by your own dreams, and I just got the bug. When I was in that company for a while, it got to the point that I started to get itchy.”
How Quitting Changed Her
Amy was newly married when she decided she was ready to quit her job and go the entrepreneurial route. She said the first year after quitting changed her… And not in a good way. Not in a way that her husband recognized.
“I was uncertain. I didn’t know what I was doing. I think I was a hot mess for a good year, and he didn’t know that woman. And so I think I freaked him out in the beginning.”
Amy continued, “In my corporate job, I was the director of content development. I work for Tony Robbins. I made great money. There was a lot of ego tied to that. And so then I go out on my own and there’s also ego tied to I own my own business. I’m an entrepreneur. I was not making money. I had zero social media following. I did not have an email list. I was a low woman on the totem pole in terms of success as an entrepreneur. I lost a little bit of that identity. I didn’t know who I was and who’s telling me I’m doing a good job? No one.”
Relationship Shifts
Amy and her husband’s marriage shifted and evolved alongside her business, because Amy herself was shifting and evolving as she gained her confidence and footing in entrepreneurship. She shared how the early years of her business were also the toughest years of her marriage. They were in debt, didn’t have any money, and Amy was navigating an identity crisis and fearing what would happen if her business dreams failed.
Amy recalled a memory when she and her husband let themselves sink into their new reality with Amy’s entrepreneurial success after several years of rough times. They’d moved into a big house in California, leaving condo life behind, and sitting in their spa in the backyard that she said felt like a tropical oasis.
“I looked at him and I said, can you believe this is our reality? And that was the moment he said, absolutely not. I would’ve never, ever guessed we would’ve made it here with this beautiful home and this beautiful life because holy cow, that was a rough, rough go for sure,” she continued, “But it was that moment that we realized, no, this actually did work out. We are here in the moment, and that was the time that we we’re going to start reminding ourselves how good it is, because I think for so long we were just scared to let out a breath, like, is it all gonna go away? And we kind of took a big breath and exhaled and said, okay, this is it. This is what we wanted.”
So Much More to Hear
You have to press play on the full conversation with Amy Porterfield because she’s revealing more about her personal journey that was playing out behind the scenes as she built her wildly successful business, including the conversations she had with her husband when he realized that she made more than 15 times what he did in a year.
Amy also shares about her brand new book, Two Weeks Notice. Two Weeks Notice will take you from “stuck” to making strides in the direction of your dreams — even if you have no idea where to start or just how liberating where you’re headed really is. If you pre-order, you’ll get access to Amy’s bonus called Off the Record featuring off the record conversations with some of Amy’s closest entrepreneur friends about their journey (including me!)
