Transforming Your Business: The Breaking Before the Becoming
There's a season in every entrepreneur's journey that I don't think we talk about enough:
The season before everything clicks into place.
I'm talking about that period of time before your revenue grows, before your audience expands, and before your work finally lands in the way that you always knew it was meant to.
A client of mine is in the middle of this season right now.
She's built a thriving, well-respected, and fulfilling multiple six-figure coaching business. And she knows it's time for it to evolve and expand—not just financially, but in the nature of the work itself. She wants to be known in a bigger, deeper way. To write more. To speak more. To rebuild her business in alignment with who she's becoming.
To do that, she needs space.
And space requires letting go.
And letting go—before you know exactly what's next—can feel like jumping off a cliff.
This part of business growth is rarely acknowledged. But if you've ever gone through it, you know it's unavoidable.
It's when:
You know you can't keep doing what you've been doing, but you don't yet know what to do instead.
You feel pulled toward something bigger or different, but the path isn't clear—so you ping-pong between your vision for the future and the comfort of old habits.
You start saying no to work that's no longer aligned, but what is aligned isn't clear yet—so revenue dips and doubt creeps in.
This is the part where most people panic. They:
Go back to what's safe, locking themselves into another year (or three) of work they no longer want to do.
Try to force clarity too soon, rushing into action to escape the discomfort of uncertainty.
Confuse this essential period of transition for proof that they're failing—that they aren't smart enough, talented enough, or capable enough to create what they want.
But here's what most people don't understand:
This moment is not an indicator of failure. It is the cost of transformation.
You cannot create something new without dissolving parts of what got you here.
And that doesn't just mean your business model or strategy.
It means you, too.
Your identity.
Your way of thinking.
Your relationship to work, money, and success itself.
The moment you commit to a bigger vision, life will test you.
It will strip away what's no longer aligned.
It will challenge you to hold the discomfort of the in-between.
It will demand that you trust yourself more than you ever have before.
This is where most people quit—not because they aren't talented or because they don't have the right strategy.
But because they mistake this plateau—this space between who they were and who they're becoming—as a sign that something is wrong.
It's not.
This is where your next level is forged.
If you can sit in the fire—if you can resist the urge to run back to the old or force something new too soon—you will come out the other side transformed.
The Four Phases of Transformation
Sitting in the fire isn't passive. It's an active process—one that unfolds in four stages. If you know them, you can stop mistaking transition for failure and start navigating it with intention and power.
Stage 1: The Drop-Off
Everything that used to work just… stops. This is the first shock—the moment when the things that were once stable and predictable suddenly aren't.
The clients you used to work with disappear.
The things that once felt obvious suddenly don't.
You don't know where income will come from next.
All of this feels personal—like a commentary on your talent or value. But it's not. It's a reflection that can't use your old strategy to create your next level.
Stage 2: The Unraveling
This is the identity crisis:
Who am I if I don't know how to make this work?
Have I just gotten lucky this whole time?
What if I can't get “there” because I don't even know where “there” is?
This is where people tend to get the most freaked out and start reaching for old way of doing things instead of sitting in the discomfort and letting something new emerge.
Stage 3: The Clearing
Then—slowly—you start seeing the patterns of what's been holding you back.
The clients who were subtly misaligned.
The gaps and energy drains you ignored because you were too busy.
The aspects of your business model that were unsustainable but worked well enough at your last level.
And this is where the path forward starts to land—not before. When you're willing to let go of the past version of you instead of fighting to save her.
Stage 4: Takeoff
This is where things start clicking into place, and you build momentum towards your vision.
Most people never get here—not because they aren't capable, but because they turn around before they get to the clearing.
How to Navigate This Threshold
Create and hold space. When you're used to working at full capacity, space can feel unbearable. Don't fill it just to feel productive.
Don't mistake a revenue dip for failure. When you make big shifts in your positioning, pricing, or standards, a temporary dip isn't just likely—it's inevitable. This isn't a setback. It's a recalibration.
Shrink the gap between what you know and what you actually do. Most people know what needs to change long before they act on it. Where are you holding back because the familiar feels safer than the unknown?
Understand the real challenge. The hardest part of transformation is the undoing—the breaking down of the old before the new fully emerges.
You don't get to skip this part.
But you do get to choose how you walk through it.
The bigger the jump, the more significant the internal and external reconfiguration required.
If you're in this moment, don't mistake your plateau for failure.
Your business isn't failing. It is transforming.
The biggest risk isn't that you don't have clarity yet.
It's that you might force clarity by running back or rushing forward as a way to escape the discomfort of transition.
You are not lost. You are in the middle.
And if you can stay the course, you and your business will be forever transformed.
Love,
Levina