The winter season whispers promises of rest and joy, yet for most female entrepreneurs, it feels like anything but a peaceful pause. As the New Year approaches, the pressure to gear up, strategize, and launch intensifies.
But what if there was another way?
What if, instead of pushing harder, we learned to operationalize “wintering” as business owners?
Inspired by Katherine May’s book on embracing life’s slower seasons, “Wintering” in your life and business isn’t about stopping—it’s about a gentler, more intentional form of progress.
For the female business owner juggling caregiving, household responsibilities, and entrepreneurial dreams, wintering becomes not just a luxury, but a survival strategy. You know the drill: kids to manage, parents to care for, clients to serve, household to run, and somewhere in between, a business to grow. The constant demand for your energy can feel overwhelming, leaving little room for true restoration for yourself — the glue that keeps it all together.
But here’s the truth: Your business needs your rest as much as it needs your hustle.
Wintering in your business is about recognizing that not all moments require full-throttle energy. It’s about creating intentional spaces of reflection, regeneration, and quiet strategic thinking. This isn’t weakness—it’s a powerful form of leadership.
This is your invitation to a different way of entrepreneurship—one where rest is not the opposite of success, but its most powerful catalyst.
Practical Wintering for the Ambitious Entrepreneur
Redefine Productivity
Productivity isn’t about constant motion of doing and serving. It can also be quiet and still. Wintering productivity is about strategic pauses, deep reflection, and intentional restoration. Your most brilliant business ideas often emerge not from grinding, but from moments of quiet and silence. For me, when I finally step away from the doing and the hustle and just surrender to the now, my creative energy and my original passion thrives.
Choosing to winter down your productivity in your business doesn’t mean full stop on everything forever. That would be impossible.
It’s about creating a slower pace to reset and restore your energy for the busier times ahead.
Consider what it would mean to winter down your productivity — even just one day a week.
Embrace Micro-Wintering as a Female Business Owner
You likely can’t — or won’t — take a month-long sabbatical, but you can create 15-30 minute pockets of intentional rest throughout your week or month. Micro-wintering is the act of doing just this.
Micro-wintering — the act of pausing and going inward and hibernating — can become your secret weapon. These short periods of restoration can recharge your entrepreneurial spirit anytime of the year — and, honestly, in any season. (see companion worksheet below to help you create these micro-wintering pauses in your day!)
No matter how much hustle you have on your plate during the holiday season, gifting yourself 15 minutes to micro-winter is often enough to slow your nervous system, make clearer decisions and resume your hustle and grind for the prosperity you seek.
Strategic Planning and Reflection over Constant Action and Reacting
Your business doesn’t need you to be everywhere all the time. It needs your clearest, most intentional thinking. Use wintering energy go inward and take time to slow down and reflect and assess. This kind of inward energy for yourself and your business gives you time and space to …
Reflect on what’s been working well — and what has not
Assess your current business landscape
Uncover hidden patterns in your performance and visibility over the past year
Reset your business vision for the upcoming months ahead
Celebrate your wins and successes in an unexpected way
Wintering is a radical act of self-preservation in your entrepreneurial journey. It’s choosing depth over constant doing. It’s understanding that your business grows not just through external actions, but through internal nourishment. It’s understanding that you are a human being, not a human doing.
Tired of blending into the background?
Ready to turn your strategic pause into your most powerful business statement? Book a free Brave YES Coaching Exploratory Session to see how we can work together to transform your winter of reflection into your season of bold breakthroughs.
What sets my business coaching approach apart:
Radical honesty about entrepreneurial fears and how to move through them
Practical and creative strategies for stepping into the spotlight and making an impact
A methodology that honors both your intuition and your ambitions
Proven techniques for creating unexpected, attention-grabbing results through content and visibility strategies
So many entrepreneurs come to me feeling like there is more for them that they have more to give, but their capacity is maxed out and they can’t figure out what their next step is, what their Brave Yes is going to be or what that next bold move is going to be.
They want to shake up their business model or shake up their income or their sales, but often as part of the capacity building that we need to do in order to make big moves, or even to make decisions about big moves, we need to help them find their joy again.
Business can be a joy zapper.
Joy stealers are all abound in entrepreneurial life.
Some of the common complaints I hear from my clients who are in this place is they say,
I’m bored with my business
I’m burned out
I don’t get excited about anything anymore.
I don’t have time for joy in my life or my business.
I’m too busy slogging through the daily grind.
My business takes every ounce of my energy.
There is nothing is left for me creatively.
I’ve outgrown my business. And I don’t know what to do next. But I’m too trapped in the day to day to figure it out.
Even if what you’re doing is something you’re not passionate about — and this speaks to the passion paradigm right now, right because Everybody wants to start a business and thinks they will be happier.
Should you follow your passion, or should you do something more practical?
And maybe maybe you’re doing something that you’re passionate about maybe or not, doesn’t matter, doesn’t matter doesn’t matter.
Joy is still available to you to everyone.
And it must be included and baked in for people like us.
For people like us, it is very important to prioritize and operationalize joy.
everything I know about being a creative a creator, and an entrepreneur, which I’ve been doing for 15 years, is that when my passion is 100%, my joy follows. And when my joy leads, business thrives.
Tiny Changes to Make Your Business Feel 10 Times More Joyful
When when you’re trapped in the land of bitter and sour or when you are slogging through doing the boring things that you are not interested in doing. Expansion doesn’t happen in safe zones. And so yes, choosing joy in your business is a brave Yes.
Here’s three changes to make. So that you feel 10 times more joyful in your business …
ONE: the first way, first change that you can make in your business to feel more joyful, one, release the heavy stuff that isn’t working for you. And in this case, I would recommend doing a business cleanse, this is where you stop doing everything that doesn’t feel like joy, everything. And if you can’t let it go, and that is a sign that there is something that needs to change. If there’s still stuff that you have to slog through and do, it feels heavy and hard, and you’re very resistant to doing it, but you have to do it, there’s a sign, there is a red flag there that there needs to be a change in your business and your business model.
TWO: reassess your priorities and recommit to the projects and aligned clients that bring you the most joy or contentment. When you focus on impact and joy, everything that doesn’t meet that criteria has to go and so when you are adding back into your business and you’re deciding what projects you want to do, what clients you want to serve what’s offers you want to put out into the world.
THREE: Focus on your next brave Yes, as the founder of your business, focusing on your possibilities is a great way to boost your energy and your joy. And you know, truthfully, like, if you can prioritize your next brave, yes, either discovering it or following through on it. You’re gonna feel more joy. You’re gonna feel more joy. You just start. And again, brave. Yes, is about the Yes. There’s lots of things we need to do in business that are brave. But they’re not all brave, yeses. Some of them are just brave. Some of those are brave sucks, right? Like, you’ve got to suck it up and do it. But a lot of things can also be a brave Yes, where we’re just feeling good, joyful. Energy is stretching us in a good way. And we are excited about it.
Running a business is not just about money — it brings meaning and purpose to our lives.
To be #BusinessBrave means we pour our heart and soul into what we offer, how we offer it and who we serve — without apology.
And, while we must keep our business separate from our soul-selves, we must also recognize that the kind of energy WE bring to our business is the energy our clients and possible clients experience.
So, your business … it’s personal.
So invest in yourself, the CEO, the owner, the leader, the founder.
5 Prompts for a Soulful Mid-Year Review for Creative Entrepreneurs
How am I different right now compared to the beginning of the year? What is still the same? Is that OK with me?
On a scale of 1-10, how much risk-taking have I done? If I invested in being more courageous, what would change for my business?
Am I leading or being dragged?
What am I being called to create or make this year that hasn’t yet happened? What is stopping me from making this happen?
What goal can I let go of now because this isn’t the right season or timing?
This midway point in the year is a great time to make space to reflect and contemplate not just on the numbers of your business — which may be out of your control — and, instead, focus on who you want to be and how you want to lead.
Which question speaks to you the most? Share in comments.
In the weeks and months after I began a deep dive into my Personal Fear Story — and this was this was several years ago now — I was doing a lot of reading on how to be more courageous.
At the time, I had a really wonderful business that had six figures but then kind of plateaued and I wasn’t sure where to take things from there.
I knew that I needed to take some risks but I really was afraid to do what I knew I needed to do.
In fact, I laughed a lot because while I was so busy not changing a thing, my business mentor at the time — and somebody who has actually kind of opted out of the business world since — was literally pivoting every five minutes it felt like. Seriously, every year she was rebranding or changing up her business model here I was slogging along with the same old model.
In 2020, I reached a point where I was like OK I cannot keep doing this – in fact, I believe the words that came out of my mouth was “if I have to do this for another year I am literally going to lose my mind.”
So when I threw the backpack over the wall in 2020 and burned down my first business, I am not being fully transparent.
There was so much more to the story.
There was a spiritual component to that move and I was spiritually and emotionally ready. I had done the work.
I’ve been doing a lot of work to get to that point before I burned down the old business and started my new one.
This idea of “feel the fear and do it anyway” was the most common advice that kept popping up as I was researching courage and bravery.
It kept coming up … fear the fear and do it anyway
fear the fear do it anyway
But I immediately knew that that was never going to work for me or my work or my clients it is rooted too much in toxic masculinity which I reject 1000%. I reject toxic masculinity, which promotes being tough powerful and hard on yourself.
Scarcity mindset first showed up for me a few years into being a creator and business owner.
I am an accidental, self-taught entrepreneur — which means I didn’t go into business considering the many obstacles I might experience. Nor did I struggle to start up. My business began fast — and at scale, serving hundreds of women within a couple months.
But over the years, as the market shifted, the certainty bottomed out and there were times of ease and flow — and times of struggle and famine.
When in flow, life and business was so easy. Effortless.
When in famine, life was so hard, and my mental health was affected — more so by scarcity mentality than scarcity itself.
Since my Brave Yes Coaching framework is about saying YES to yourself — and feeling safe to do so — I work with my clients on healing their scarcity mindset and working on correcting any “scarcity holes” in their business and life.
Scarcity is a belief that we are all here to compete for limited or scarce resources and that there is not enough to go around for everyone.
Scarcity mindset or mentality is when you become overly obsessed on something feel you do not have enough of in your life. When in this state you struggle to enjoy life because you are so obsessed with what is lacking.
This creates a survival mode and desperate approach to being in this world. Just look at the more is more culture that the corporate world operates under to see the grips of scarcity and how it works.
All you have to do is see the lines outside a business offering limited availability of a product to see how scarcity creates hysteria.
TrueScarcity is when there isn’t enough to go around and we have to fight for what we need or want. It’s a feeling or state that means we do not have all that we need — or want. This is rooted in the present. If you aren’t sure how you will pay your rent, money truly is scarce.
Scarcity mindset is a perception that you won’t have enough and it’s often rooted in fear of losing it all or comparisons with others who appear to have more. It’s more based in the future.
Are we ever really doing enough?
Do we ever get to the end of our workload?
And since our livelihoods — especially if you have a business or do work in a company — depend on the outcomes of our output it’s really easy to get bogged down in what we haven’t yet acquired and our lack.
There are a few types of scarcity that I have noticed with my clients over the years:
Scarcity of money
Scarcity of resources
Scarcity of time
Scarcity of power
Scarcity of belonging/support
Scarcity of motivation
It’s normal to feel these areas of lack or not enough sometimes.
“Most people — the average human being — doesn’t realize the power of these types of scarcity driving their daily lives and their every action, thought and feeling.”
SHAWN FINK
There are a lot of people awakening to these daily drivers — but who are teaching methods to gloss over them rather than to heal them and work through them so they don’t take over.
The Spiritual bypassing of True Scarcity
With more and more people feeling determined to become millionaires and to work freely anywhere in the world, there has been a ton of spiritual bypassing happening around true scarcity and feelings of scarcity mentality.
Some spiritual and business mindset gurus tell you that if you want to get YOUR piece of all those scarce resources all you need to do is adopt an abundance mindset and manifest.
In fact, they will tell you that if you want more, more, more you just need to give yourself some mantras or affirmations and will your desires into fruition. along with not enoughness is so prevalent in our society.
Make a vision board!
Manifest!
I call BS.
I do believe in the Law of Attraction but I also believe that marginalized populations of our society can’t manifest their way through racism, sexism, oppression and being trapped in the broken systems of navigating poverty.
Scarcity is a very real thing for many perfectly wonderful people and it must be dealt with effectively — not glossed over.
“For many people the thrill of having more is intensified by the presence of those who have less. Waste is not the issue here. To many greedy individuals, power lies in withholding resources.”
bell hooks
There are many people in our communities who truly are unable to get their needs met because they are a person of color, LGBTQIA+, indigenous or a woman or because they are not educated enough, because they have mental health obstacles, and many other factors etc..
So if you are a privileged person does that mean you can’t experience scarcity?
Sometimes scarcity is real. Sometimes, though, it’s an illusion.
Regardless, the solutions are always, in my work, taking intentional, aligned actions.
My former longtime business was called Abundant Mama and my work was very much rooted in abundance work because I believe abundance work could change this world for the better. The work is not mindset work — it’s intentional and algined actions toward healing scarcity and feelings of scarcity.
Imagine if everyone felt safe, taken care of and as if we all have our needs met — always.
Since realizing from doing my own work on racial justice that “abundance mindset” is based in white privilege I do not promote it — but rather coach and mentor women through building their own abundance toolbox — actions YOU take that lead you toward feeling more safe, more trusting, more secure and more confident.
The Way Through is Through
Sometimes scarcity is real — even for the dominant culture.
To heal scarcity in my work with ALL women, we first get super present with the facts of your personal situation. My coaching offers safe space for you to share personal and confidential information that you might otherwise feel scared to share.
Sometimes scarcity is healed through real conversations where you get to be heard and seen — and valued. It’s amazing how much we bottle up inside.
You can suffer from scarcity if you are seriously are worried you are not able to pay yourself or your bills — or if you are legitimately worried about where the money will come from.
However, the work is always — whether rooted in fact or fiction — about taking aligned and intentional actions for mindful progress. I would never suggest a client “mindset” her way out of money problems and money fears.
There’s action and inaction. AND, since I work in soul alignment as well, there is some level of trust work that needs to always happen when we’re thinking about money and resources that we need.
So for me abundance begets abundance and so I practice taking actions that lead to more abundance.
When scarcity does show up for me — I dig deeper for the truth. In my case, there’s always been a legitimate fear at the root not just my mind playing tricks.
And then I take action to address the root issue.
In my GRIT coaching exercise that I offer to my clients in the zone of Scarcity, the aligned actions we work with around scarcity is based on the following themes:
Grow with a Growth Action List
Re-align with the Present
Implement Radical Self-Trust
Thrive and Flourish with Positivity Pauses
Gratitude falls under T — thrive with positivity pauses since it’s a cornerstone positive emotion — but there are many more ways to actively cultivate positive energy.
Gratitude is my favorite place to begin because it’s such an accessible practice that most people know how to use it quickly and easily.
Gratitude is a cornerstone positive emotion and antidote to scarcity mindset
It’s hard to feel lack when you are focused on all that you have and all that is going well.
It’s hard to feel angry when you are feeling grateful.
Cultivating true feelings of gratitude requires intentional actions — not just rote reciting of random things like we hear around the Thanksgiving dinner table.
When I tossed all faith to the universe and quit my 9 to 5, we had managed to have about 6 months of income saved up. We gave it that long to make the dream happen. If it didn’t work, I would go back to get a real job. Thankfully that never was needed as Abundant Mama did well instantly. But it wasn’t always easy.
That’s where my daily gratitude practice — going strong for 11 years and soon to be 12 — truly became a foundation for myself, my mental health and my work.
Why is Gratitude so powerful — what does the science say?
Putting a deep focus on what you value, what is good and what is working improves your wellbeing — giving you the capacity and clarity to focus on getting what else you need or want.
This is one of the many powers of gratitude.
When I started my gratitude journaling 11 years ago, I never dreamed I would stick with it this long.
But the truth is that I have found nothing but positive energy from. the practice. A big part of my success is in being consistently motivated and moving forward in my life and work. Gratitude is a key part of my self-care.
When we have positive feelings inside of us, have the energy and the capacity to do challenging things or to navigate through tough situations.
The practice for me is to write in my journal — sometimes 3 things. Sometimes two pages.
And while many have told me they find gratitude journaling rote — and they get tired of writing the same things over and over, I have a natural ability to find the gold in my day to write about so that it’s hardly the same.
I’ve been coaching women through this practice for a decade and offered a lot prompts over the years. However, today I am focused on the standpoint of scarcity.
Scarcity Mindset? 3 Gratitude Prompts to Heal Feelings of Not Enough and Cultivate Abundance
Gratitude journaling can get boring if you don’t know how to elicit the root of the gratitude itself — which is why I try and give my clients new prompts all the time.
These are designed just to help you work through feelings of scarcity.
What can I be grateful for right now that always keeps me safe and protected?
Who can I show gratitude to for always being there for me?
What strengths of mine am I grateful for right now that have gotten me this far?
What part of this post lands for you? Take time to notice and journal.
But like usual, I have a lot to say about these conflicting thoughts between doing and being, working and rest and striving and settling.
I’m a big fan of building in sustainable rest, renewal and revitalizing in mind, body and spirit SO THAT you can do all the amazing things you want to do in your life without forcing it.
I’ve been talking about all of this for years because I know for a fact that we thrive when we’re in flow DOING.
But WHAT YOU ARE DOING is what matters most and when you put your own #UnshakeableResilience at the forefront you are stronger in mind, body and spirit.
I am a doer. I take very good care of myself. My well-being is a 10 6/7 days of the week. I am not problem free or struggle free. I work very hard for my family and my life.
AND
I want desperately to make a bigger impact, to disrupt the status quo that so many others are happy to duck out of and away from and to serve deeply in this world.
My inner fire is hot and rest is not really needed when your soul is on fire with passion.
So, I want to remind you that, yes, you need to take care of yourself AND that isn’t always doing nothing and resting. More often than not it’s actually more essential in choosing the sacred, conscious action that is going to send you into a flow state of joy, contentment and service to others.
Sometimes the Brave Yes is rest.
Listen, my dear one, you absolutely, 1000% deserve to feel really, really good every single day of your life. Including TODAY.
And contrary to what you may see over and over on the Internet … doing nothing isn’t always what makes you feel good.
What?
It’s true.
I know because I doing nothing has about one minute of charm for me – a doer.
And, I also know because I am hired primarily to be my clients’ MIC – Motivator in Chief.
Our tendency as human beings is to rest. It’s actually quite hard to make ourselves work really hard.
And all that pushing that we do to keep up, striving and make things happen is what is utterly exhausting.
And that is what seems to be driving so many people’s desire to REST.
But like usual, I have a lot to say about these conflicting thoughts between doing and being, working and rest and striving and settling.
I’m a big fan of building in sustainable rest, renewal and revitalizing in mind, body and spirit SO THAT you can do all the amazing things you want to do in your life without forcing it.
I’ve been talking about all of this for years because I know for a fact that we thrive when we’re in flow DOING.
But WHAT YOU ARE DOING is what matters most and when you put your own #UnshakeableResilience at the forefront you are stronger in mind, body and spirit.
I am a doer. I take very good care of myself. My well-being is a 10 6/7 days of the week. I am not problem free or struggle free. I work very hard for my family and my life.
AND
I want desperately to make a bigger impact, to disrupt the status quo that so many others are happy to duck out of and away from and to serve deeply in this world.
My inner fire is hot and rest is not really needed when your soul is on fire with passion.
So, I want to remind you that, yes, you need to take care of yourself AND that isn’t always doing nothing and resting. More often than not it’s actually more essential in choosing the sacred, conscious action that is going to send you into a flow state of joy, contentment and service to others.
Sometimes the Brave Yes is rest.
Sometimes the Brave Yes is digging Sometimes the Brave Yes is digging deep and dusting off your inner fire for your life so you can start floating rather than swimming. and dusting off your inner fire for your life.
JOIN ME! — You are invited. Register now for the upcoming Brave Yes Visioning Workshop. We’ll be spending 90 delicious minutes helping you dust off your inner fire and SEE your life more clearly. You’ll want to block off your calendar for this one and bring a journal and plenty of ink for journaling. During this workshop, we will focus on your personal vision as a creative, changemaker or leader. And we are ALL creatives, changemakers and leaders.
