201. Time Freedom with Retha Nichole | The Moment You Knew Pt. 5

Speaker A: Can we ask you something? When did you know you'd made it?

Speaker B: Not the version with the revenue screenshots, not the one people clap for on Instagram, but the real one.

Speaker A: This summer, on the business reboot podcast, we're asking entrepreneurs one question and letting their answers redefine what success actually looks like.

Speaker B: Because more often than not, it's not what you think.

Speaker A: This is the moment you knew, and we have a feeling it might have you looking at success a little differently. Hello, my friends, and welcome back to another episode of the business reboot podcast that sounded like I was a news anchor brought to you by Bloom Sparkling energy drinks. Um, it's fine. Okay. Today, we're really excited. We're continuing our the moment you knew series this summer where we're talking to entrepreneurs about the moment that they knew they made it. And, um, we hope that it's been as interesting to you as it has been to us, because we've loved all of the different answers that people have given. It's just. Just so funny that it doesn't always vacillate around, uh, revenue. Sometimes it's time, freedom. Sometimes it's being able to be a provider to your entire community. Sometimes it's being able to, you know, go to the gym at 2 o' clock in the afternoon and, um, eat protein cookies at your desk while you, uh, you know, have a dog at your feet. That's really. That's my success story, guys. But we are really excited because we have one of our dearest friends here today, somebody that is an oldie but a goodie on the podcast. Ms. Aretha Nicole is here. Oldie, but a good. I'm the youthful one here. I am. Um, let. Let me remind you.

Speaker C: Always wants us to know that she is.

Speaker A: I do. I am in perimenopause while these two ladies are in the full thing. And so. But Reetha is a. Look, here's the deal. I would say life and business coach, but that's not even it. It takes six seconds being in her present while she's working with people to realize that she is a wrangler, a handler, a. And I don't even know the things that. That you do with your clothes.

Speaker B: Pop you on the hander. Uh, let me dry your tears with this tissue. You may bring you a sweetie.

Speaker A: I mean, I'm pretty sure you have. I'm pretty sure you have access to everybody's ATM card and their Social Security numbers, house keys. I don't know. I don't know. It's a lot um, but we love her and we're really excited. Rita, thanks for joining us today on the podcast.

Speaker C: I love y' all so much.

Speaker A: I know you do. You do. Like I said, I sent Rita and Corey this week a video of this little girl, and she was singing Weak by swv. And she was just tearing, tearing it up. And her little two friends were in the back as her backup dancers. And I was like, this would be the three of us if we go to karaoke. Guys, did you see my message?

Speaker B: I'm gonna be the side stepping one in the back. Yes.

Speaker C: I was just getting ready to say. And Corey sent a message back saying she would be the one side stepping in the back and I'd be the one in the front. And you're right, Corey, because Melissa would be the microphone hog. And that little girl in the front, did you see her? She was singing without a M mic. She was like, maybe she'll let me sing this part.

Speaker B: That little girl had a death grip on that mic.

Speaker A: Like Melissa. She wasn't going nowhere. I'm supposed to stand sip in the back.

Speaker B: It's fine. Close enough to the mic. Whispers a little louder with the song. She might get hurt.

Speaker A: You might, you might. I love it. I love it. Okay, Rita, tell us. Tell us, like, what you're doing right now in entrepreneurship and how life is as an entrepreneur. And then really, like. Let's dig into the. The main questions here.

Speaker C: Do you curse on this show? No, I'm just kidding.

Speaker A: Get after it, big dog.

Speaker B: Corey.

Speaker A: Corey does.

Speaker B: Corey does F word sometimes. It's my favorite. I'm just saying.

Speaker C: No. Okay, so what am I doing? I, um, I have clients that I see Monday through Thursday, and I coach them in their business, in their life. Because I believe if your business is a mess, it affects your personal life. If your personal life is a mess, it affects your business. And so I do that for business owners. Um, they have to be in business for a minimum of five years. And, um, C suite executives, who's held that position for a minimum of five years. And then, um, I am a fractional coo, uh, for two companies. And that's just. That's just for me to do something creative. That's my version of creative.

Speaker A: She's like, you know what I should do? I should be the head of something that makes me feel pretty good with my free time.

Speaker C: I don't know how to design stuff. And, like, I'm not trying to sew. Like, everybody's like, what about needlepoint? I'm like, that's not how I'm creative. I'm creative at digging into your business and figuring out what's going on here. Um, that's what I do. I own, um, SP Circle, which is a paper company, is what I call it. We design journals and, uh, notebooks and things like that. Because I believe that writing out the things that are swirling in your head help you to become more clear about where you are going, where you should be going. And it gets your emotions out so you don't operate in such an emotional state. So that's what I do. And then the question for today is funny to me because I would have two answers. One would be, you know, kind of funny. And then the other, uh, would be my true, true answer. Like what I thought of when you guys first asked me months ago to do this. So the real true answer, what immediately came to my mind when it said, when did you know you made it? Is, um, when I could take the month of July off. I take the month of July off. And I love it. I've done it for the past. This is 2026, so probably, uh, the past seven years. And. And so that's when I knew. And it. Yeah, that's when I knew that, uh, well.

Speaker A: And you also. You also take a couple weeks in December off, because that was a couple of years ago. Yes. And I was like, girl, why are you not taking the time off? And you're like, I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna do it. I mean, Corey and I take three weeks, and it is. But we don't.

Speaker C: We.

Speaker A: We take. We have our own individual vacations during the year. But then those three weeks in December are reserved for us to be quiet and still and with our families. And it is like, you have to have it. But I remember when you started instituting July and how much of a game change that was. Okay, so what's the funny one?

Speaker C: And the funny one is, um, that I no longer drive a car with over 300,000 miles on it. That the ceiling fell down while I was on the phone with Melissa. And I was just like, I'm just gonna thumbtack it. It just need a few thumbtacks. Just need a few hundred thumbtacks. I did it. And I showed my progress and my beautiful ceiling to Melissa. Um, and so that's the funny one. Because if you had asked me then up until the ceiling fell, like, I didn't even care about that car. You know what I mean? Like, it was. It got me to point A, to point B. And so it was fine. And when people would get in it and be like, does this have 300,000 miles on it? And you just driving it, I'm like, well, it works. It still works. So that's the funny one because, you know, over time when things change for you, then you change that. Like, you know, buying the car that I have now is like so exciting for me because I don't have to drive kids around. So I was like, I could get something that I really, really like. And the beginning, uh, of business Reita wouldn't have even dreamed of that. And there are some ways that I still don't do those things. Like the other night we were at dinner for my husband's birthday and he was, they were talking about new iPhones and they were like, well, mom still has a 13, so she's not gonna. And I'm just like, no, it works fine. Like, why do I need a new one? It works just fine. And so there are still some things that are, I'm, um, still like that. But the biggest one is the freedom. Figuring out how to take your time. Entrepreneurs can really screw themselves and their business and their family by quitting a 9 to 5 and working 24, 7. Like, that's my favorite.

Speaker B: Yes, yes.

Speaker C: Doing so, not figuring out how to truly take a vacation. When you are a practitioner type entrepreneur, which means if I don't practice, I don't make any money.

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker C: It's really hard to juggle how do I get time off. And so that was huge for me figuring that out.

Speaker B: Well, let's, let's tap dance on this just a second because I want to know, because you, you work with, um, you have a great client roster and um, you work with some very, you know, high, high performing, high performance people because like you said, you don't take clients if they haven't been in their role or their business for more than five years. So they are typically, you know, high, high level, like high octane people. So what have you noticed with working with clients, with friends like us, that we're also, you know, taking time off. And yourself, what value does that bring back to not only your business, but also your life by taking that time? And no, uh, matter what it looks like for you, it could be like for us, three weeks at Christmas and then we both have individual family vacations throughout the year. For you, it's a week, I mean, uh, a couple weeks at the holidays and then a month of, of July. It can look different for everybody. Do you see as the value that it brings back to Your business and your personal life when you do that?

Speaker C: Well, the first thing that I think about is how they all do it now. Right? You know, more, when I first started this, of course, they were highly offended that, you know, I was going to be gone for a month. Like, what am I? You know? Um, but over time. So this will be the seventh time I've done it, right? So the seventh year I've done it. And the way that I do it is I give them choices. And so choice A is skip with me the month of July. Choice B is to see me four times in June, and then choice C is to see me once. And spaces are limited for that. Everybody can't do that. So first come, first serve, see me once in July for two hours. And when I first started that, everybody was, I'm gonna see you four times in June. And I thought, well, that was a mistake. Who put that option in there? And that was the first two years. I was like, wow, this was a mistake. But God was like, no, it's not. Stick with it, right? So fast forward to now, year seven and three people. Three. Well, y' all don't know my whole roster, but three people are the only ones who want to see me for two hours in July. Everybody else skipped. And, you know, it took seven years to get to that. And so the value is them seeing it and going, oh, you know, she has shown me how I. I, too, can do this. And everything doesn't fall apart. Whether you have a service business or the practitioner or something else, everything doesn't fall apart. So I was really happy with that this year. So that's why that is the first thing that comes to mind. Because, um, asking my assistant, I asked her June 15. So this week I said, okay, what are we looking like for July? Because the other thing was, if you chose July, you wait until the 30th, because that's when I was leaving. I used to see him on the front end, and now I don't. I see him on the back. Um, and so she said, three people. No one. You know, she would have told me ahead of time, but no one chose to see me in June. And only three people. And these three people, they need that. Um, so one of them I chose, and I said, hey, just put her. I don't care what she say. That's what we getting. That's what we doing.

Speaker B: She needs me in July.

Speaker C: She needs me. Well, she's gonna need that, you know, And. And it was interesting because she wrote back to my assistant, was like, she's going to choose for me. I bet she was like, yes, she has.

Speaker A: She has.

Speaker C: Will not be skippy. So, yeah, that's the value, I think, is, uh, sometimes in your business, you have to live things out for people to see that it can be good for them. And so everybody's pumped to take July off.

Speaker A: I think a lot of times, too, when. When entrepreneurs are trying to figure out their schedule so that they do have more time, freedom in it, the scarcity mindset will creep in, and they start thinking people will walk away. And I'm like, dude, if you were that replaceable in your business, ain't nothing stable. And I say that as somebody who thought those things too. And now, I mean, Corey and I've been doing three weeks in December, I guess, three years now. And I, um, remember the first year, people were still popping in Boxer, because we were like, we'll check in on Boxer once a week. But, like, you know, and so we'd have a bunch of messages. Corey and I would be texting, going, did you hear this year? This last year? Or, uh, the. The next year, it was less. This year I was like, you heard from anybody? It's crickets. It is literal crickets. Where is everybody? And then, yeah, but. But I also think that even. Even taking off time during the year and my previous life as a wedding photographer, I remember it took me a solid, like, nine months to wake up on a Saturday and, um, wet. Like I was gonna miss a wedding if I slept late. Um, because you just feel this, um, almost like, way far beyond hustle culture. It's probably a mental illness, but where you just want to, uh. Or you feel guilty if you're. If you're off. And so being able to move past that and. And really, like, reclaim your time is huge. And something I wish more entrepreneurs were unafraid to do. I think we get so caught up in. In being afraid the money will just completely evaporate, and that's that, um, uh, you might not be as hungry as us, because we get hungry, and we will find a way to make the money.

Speaker C: Right? Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker A: We talked to. We talked to Rita when we were in Charleston. She came up with us, and we talked about how she was a little kid and she was selling waters and snacks on the bus, and she told

Speaker B: favorite stories I now have in my wrist bag.

Speaker A: And I'm like, yes. I'm like, who didn't sell seashell necklaces to their neighbors on the cul de sac? Or, you know, um, candy apples for a trip? To Six Flags with your school. That didn't exactly exist. Me and she did a Patterson.

Speaker C: We probably still take.

Speaker A: We should have went to jail.

Speaker C: We had to take tests. Uh, you know, with the Scantron, they probably even know what that means anymore, but we had to take. So I sell pencils for a quarter because you forgot yours. And so you going to need one because she told me to bring that number two pencil. So I sell pencils for 25 cents.

Speaker B: I love you so much.

Speaker A: I'm like, it's the, uh. It is that, but that is. That's like the hunger. And I remember Aretha talking about her seal and fallen. And we used to. 100 years ago, we both. We would voxer every morning and I would sit in the parking lot of my gym for much longer than I was actually inside the gym every morning. And I've changed my ways now. I'm at the gym all the time, but then I just like to park in front of it and use their WI fi, apparently. And, um, Rita would have her smoothie and her coffee and her water in her car, and the. The push pins would be draping on the. And, um, it was. It was chaos. And I remember when you got a loan for your next car and it was like, so huge. And now. And this is. This is the other thing about things and about money is that humans, we're fickle, like, right? So it's never going to be enough. Like. And I would love to have the Lord test me in that if. If you could please just go and see what I would do with it. But, um. But it's like the. Which is why I love the time freedom part of this is because the money's. The more money you make, the more money you're going to spend. And I love how everybody thinks they won't until you do. And then you're like, ah, poop. I did. But, um. But it's. It's the time that you can't get back, and that's huge.

Speaker C: Time is more. Money is great. Listen, I love a good bag, okay? And Louis Vuitton don't go on sale, so. I know.

Speaker A: Listen, listen.

Speaker C: Right? I already know. But what happens is the reason that time is so much better is because as you make more money, your appetite grows and your. You get fancier. And when. As you get fancier, then the fancy things cost more money. And so then you think that you're not spending more money because you're buying the same things, but you're buying the same things at a much higher price tag than you were. And then don't let something like inflation come in. That's money you didn't even expect to spend. Right? You know, so that's why time means more and memories mean more. And so I love an experience. I love a, uh, memory. And so I'm gonna. That's what I'm. That's what I'm always shooting for. I'm always shooting for that. I ask every client when they start with me, uh, what is. Define success for you? Because industries, each industry has their own definition of success, and that is not mine. I mean, I'm a coach. But to define success in the coaching industry is you're gonna make a bunch of classes and people take them online, or you gonna develop your own certification program. Neither. I want neither of those.

Speaker B: Like that.

Speaker C: That I don't want anything like that. So if you don't define success for yourself, then the industry, slash, the world will. And then you'll always be shooting for something. And usually it's attached to money. So it's time for me. I can't. I mean, I see clients on the first and third or the second and fourth, right? So this third week, that's my last time seeing them. So all day today, they've been like, oh, it'll be July. I said, and we're skipping.

Speaker A: Remember?

Speaker B: We skipped.

Speaker A: I will not see your face. Thank you. Have a good day. Now, listen, Rita does love an experience. And I talked to her last month because I booked a cruise for my family and our kids for spring break. And it's a cruise that Rita and her family did last year. And she started telling me. She's like, look, this is the price of the cruise. It's gonna be expensive. But all that. She said, but don't they gonna get you because you can't eat at this place. You got to do this. And it's gonna be this. Compounding all this stuff. And I. I sat my kids down. Auntie Aretha has told me the ins and outs of this cruise, and y' all ain't getting that version. Y' all basically gonna be four people shoved in a dorm room. And you're gonna bring your own towel. You gotta bring it. Bring a dark bottle, because you're gonna put sodas in it. And we're not telling nobody. I want you to sit down. You're gonna eat at the place they said. And we're not going nowhere. You hear me?

Speaker C: And you're gonna enjoy it.

Speaker B: Damn it.

Speaker A: I was like. I was like. Rita told me, and we don't have that. Okay. We gonna sit still? We're gonna sit still on the boat? Um, no, but I think, I think it's great. And, and it is fun because, uh, being able to have that time off and, and life just passes really fast. I think the older we get, the more we see that, the more we notice the shifts and it's like, you know, what do they say the, the years are, or the days are long, the seasons are, years are short or something. Whatever saying is, that's what it.

Speaker B: Eventually you got it.

Speaker A: And things are, things are short and long.

Speaker B: Well, you know what I find interesting and we, I, Melissa, I was literally having this conversation yesterday is that we've been like, we've been around for a long time. Like we are not spring chickens. And it's fine. I don't want to be a spring chicken. I'm not trying to be 30. I enjoy being 50. Like, I really, really do. But, um, what we've noticed is a shift. And you said if you don't define success for yourself and talking about that with clients and we do the same thing, like, what do you want? What do you want this business to be? What do you want this life to be? Like, let's build towards that. Not how somebody else defines, like you said, your industry or the online Internet liars. Don't let somebody else define what success and happiness and freedom looks like for you. But what we are noticing is, because we've again been in it for decades, is that people are scaling back in their lifestyle, in their businesses, because we were told that we were fed the narrative and some people bought into it, some people didn't. But it was like more and more and more and more and more. Like, well, when you cross the six figure mark in business, well, okay, and the next is seven. Like, let's go, come on, let's hustle. Like, what courses are you creating? What funnels have you done? Like, all the things that we see in the online space and you, you have this house, but now you've made it. Quote, unquote, you've made it. And so now you're getting the next house and you're going to get the, the mountain house or the beach house. And you're gonna do this, you're gonna do that. And what we're noticing is so many people got those things because they, they thought that's what that was, what success would bring them or was supposed to bring them. But what they're realizing is that you just have to continue working harder and harder and Harder to keep that up because like you said, uh, inflation, it's going to cost you more and more and more. And what they're doing is they're buying back time freedom because they're selling those houses, they're downsizing, they're moving out of the state that they were in, that was hella expensive. Or they're selling off the, you know, investment properties that they had and they're scaling back, they're, they're letting go of because they couldn't take a month off because they had to feed the machine that they had built. And I think that we're watching it and I'm just kind of listening, I are sitting on the sidelines going, oh, isn't that interesting? Because we knew it not to do it that way because we've also been around the block a time or two and the faster you build, sometimes the faster it has to scale back or it can crumble. So we've been noticing that lately.

Speaker A: Mhm. I love that.

Speaker C: Yeah. The pendulum is always going to swing back, right? You're only going to be able to go so far. And so I think, you know, for you, you know, for us, I think you say, well, we didn't go that way. Well, I think it's because we knew from other businesses or watching other people in their careers that we knew we didn't want that. So you may not always know exactly what you want, but you probably know I don't want that. And that's where people get stuck, right? And then that's how they end up needing us because they go, I know what I don't want. I just don't know how to get what I do want or I can't see what I want. It's not truly defined. And that's okay. Just don't keep going after what you know you don't want, because the world says you should.

Speaker B: Amen.

Speaker A: Yeah, I love that. That is the perfect bow to tie on this episode. I love it. Frida, thanks for being here. We love you so much.

Speaker B: You can follow all the adventures of Melissa, Corey and Rita, um, online at an Instagram, at the. Really this reboot. Um, also, Rita, tell everybody where they can find you, please, before we close.

Speaker C: I'm on Instagram. Listen, I have my name on everything. But don't, I mean, don't even. I just do it so you won't get it. But I'm on Instagram. Um, that's where I live. That's where I live. I'm in the dms. No one else is in there but me. And if you come in there and you say some stuff that's not appropriate, then you're gonna really know it's me because you're gonna hear my voice. And I'm m gonna leave you a voice note that says I'm not Don't play with me. Uh, my website, but everything is on the Instagram bio and you can find me there.

Speaker B: Perfect. We will link all of that in the show notes. And thank you guys so much for, uh, joining us on today's podcast episode. You can find us@thebusinessreboot.com you can find us on Instagram at Business Reboot. We too are in the DMs and do not be coming in there being treacherous because we will click clock you right back out with a voice a m Voice memo. Also, Rita, um, but we hope you guys have enjoyed this episode. We hope you are loving the summer series that we are doing about when you knew you made it. Um, and until next time, thanks again for joining us.