Ep 411: The Truth About My Gap Year: The Real Reason I Pressed Paused on My Multi 7-Figure Company
This episode is powered by The Ascension Archetype Quiz.
If you have been grinding, building, and scaling your way to and beyond seven figures only to realize that something inside of you is shifting, that success no longer feels like it fits the way it used to, and that the next level of your leadership is demanding something radically different from you, then this episode is about to disrupt everything you thought you knew about growth. Dr. Darnyelle Jervey Harmon is pulling back the curtain on her own business in a way no seven-figure CEO is talking about right now. She is sharing why she made the bold, Spirit-led decision to press pause on a thriving multi-seven-figure business and eight-figure portfolio, not because it stopped working, but because God called her into a season of becoming that required space, surrender, and a complete recalibration of her identity as a leader. If you think scaling is always about acceleration, this episode will challenge everything.
Here’s the truth: the strategy that built your current level of success is not always the structure that can carry the next level of your calling. And if you are honest with yourself, you already know it. You have been feeling the shift. You have been hearing the whisper. You have been asking questions that no one around you seems to be asking. The truth is that seven figures requires more being than doing, and most entrepreneurs will never slow down long enough to confront that reality. Dr. Darnyelle did. And the freedom she found on the other side of that obedience is the very thing you have been journaling and praying about.
You’ll walk away with a completely reframed understanding of what it means to be a strategic CEO in a season of transition. You will learn the critical difference between a seven-figure business and a seven-figure company and why choosing the right one for your season could be the most liberating decision you ever make. You will hear the three unmistakable clues that signal it is time for you to consider an intentional pause, and you will understand why movements require a completely different architecture than moments. This is the game-changing perspective that no one in the business coaching space is willing to say out loud, and it is the episode you did not know you needed until right now.
Grab your Move to Millions Podcast Notebook, a pen and your favorite beverage and listen in to discover:
✔ How to recognize when your business is successful but your leadership identity is evolving and requires space to catch up to your next assignment
✔ How to discern the difference between a seven-figure business and a seven-figure company so you can intentionally choose the structure that honors the season you are stepping into
✔ How to position yourself financially and operationally to take a strategic pause from revenue-generating activities without your business collapsing or your legacy being compromised
✔And so much more
This episode is a call to every legacy-led CEO who has been feeling a stirring that they cannot quite name. A call to the leader whose business looks successful from the outside but whose spirit is whispering that the next chapter requires a fundamentally different version of who they are. Dr. Darnyelle is not theorizing here. She is sharing the raw, real, and deeply spiritual journey of choosing obedience over performance, choosing alignment over momentum, and choosing a gap year over another sold-out launch. This is a call to stop performing your success and start stewarding your calling.
This is your invitation to pull over, put the headphones in, close the office door, and give yourself permission to really hear this one. Because if you have been secretly wondering whether you are allowed to slow down, whether your next level might actually require less doing and more becoming, whether the thing you built is the thing you are supposed to carry into the next decade, this conversation will give you the permission you did not even know you were waiting for. Stop what you are doing and listen in, because this is the episode that could change the entire trajectory of your business and your life.
- “Sometimes the most strategic move a leader can make is to pause long enough to become who the next level requires.”
- "Seven figures requires more being than doing. Let's just let that breathe for a moment."
- "There is a difference between leading from performance and leading from alignment."
- "I am giving up good to make way for greatness."
- "Sometimes growth requires acceleration, and sometimes growth requires space. The wisdom of leadership is knowing the difference."
- "The strategies that built one level of success are not always the structures that can carry the next level of your calling."
- “Effectiveness and alignment are not always the same thing.”
- “Movements require a level of leadership that goes far beyond performance.”
- If nothing about my business changed in the next ten years, would I be truly fulfilled, or would I simply be comfortable?
- Am I building a business that reflects the life I actually want to live, or am I maintaining a structure that requires more of me than I desire to give?
- Is there a deeper level of calling that I have not yet made space to hear because I am too busy performing my current level of success?
- Have I been measuring my value through motion and momentum, and what would it look like to measure it through alignment and obedience instead?
- Am I leading from performance or am I leading from alignment, and do I know the difference?
- Take the Move to Millions Ascension Archetype Quiz
- Join the Waitlist for Sanctuary
- Apply for a Soul + Strategy Conversation
- Move to Millions: The Proven Framework To Become a Million Dollar CEO With Grace & Ease Instead of Hustle & Grind by Dr. Darnyelle Jervey Harmon – Get Your Copy
- Join the Move to Millions Facebook Group for ongoing support and community engagement – Join Now
- Move to Millions 90-Day Business Growth Planner – Get Your Planner
Personal brand website: https://drdarnyelle.com/
Company website: https://incredibleoneenterprises.com/
Move to Millions website: https://movetomillions.com/
SEASON 7 EP 411
Darnyelle: [00:00:00] If you have been secretly wishing you could take a step back without having to worry about what others might think so that you can recalibrate, breathe, or shift your business. This episode is for you. If this is your first time here, welcome. I already know that it will not be your last. And welcome back to our OG listeners and now watchers who are catching the video version of this episode on YouTube.
I am so grateful that you are here. I get so many people DMing me on Instagram. Telling me how much they love the show, and I just wanna take a moment and just say thank you.
From the bottom of my heart, it gives me so much joy because this is my love letter to business. My podcast is absolutely one of the most favorite things I do each and every week, and so it gets me so excited to come into your eardrums or into your eye view now that [00:01:00] we've added YouTube to share with you.
Every single week. Now, all season long, I have been committed to having a different conversation with you. Yes, this is technically a business podcast, but let me tell you what you don't need in this season. You don't need more insights or strategy. You have no shortage of strategy and the strategies that you already have, guess what?
They work. If they weren't working for you, that means that there's something deeper that might be at play, which is why season seven is all about what happens when it is no longer the strategy that is preventing your move to millions. Can we be honest for a second? You keep praying for and journaling about seven figures.
You're doing all the things that you have been told to do. Wait, what a minute. Therein lies the problem. Seven figures requires more being than doing. Let's just let that breathe for a moment. So this episode is gonna be a little bit different because [00:02:00] today I'm putting my own business in the in the streets.
There is a moment that every real leader will eventually face. That is the moment where what built the success that you are actually standing in is no longer what you are called. To be doing. And when that moment comes, you like me, will have a decision that you must make. Now you can be defiant and you can keep performing what you believe is success at the expense of your next level.
Or you can be obedient and do the unthinkable, the thing that no one prepares you for and no one talks about out loud. You can pause long enough to create space so that you can properly build the foundation of the life and business you are meant to lead next. So today I want to talk to you about the decision that I made to press pause on a successful multi seven figure business in eight figure portfolio, not [00:03:00] because the business stopped working, not because my revenue disappeared, and not because the work was no longer desired, but because God called me into a.
Season that requires something very different from me as a leader. And if I'm being honest, it has been one of the most uncomfortable, but also strategic and spiritual decisions that I've made in my entire career. You know how they say, if you wanna make God laugh, tell 'em your plans. Yeah, exactly. And you know how they say sometimes you have to laugh to keep from crying.
Well, both of those things are ringing so true in my life and business right now. Here's what I mean. I literally wrote the book on building a seven figure company with grace and ease instead of hustling ground, like literally. My book Move to Millions, lays out my proven framework, the move to millions method for building and sustaining a seven figure business or company with grace and ease instead of hustle and [00:04:00] grind and that method.
Has helped me to help 85 entrepreneurs and small business owners just like you experience their first or next seven figure year. The strategy works, the structure works, the methodology, it works. And what I love the most about the method is that it is not theory, not one ounce. It's all factual. Which is why we have had the results that we have had.
And throughout my forties, I was committed to shouting the method from the rooftops. And it's why I wrote the book that it sold tens of thousands of copies around the world. It's actually still in the top 100 and several categories, and that book came out more than two years ago. In fact, if you do not have a copy, do yourself a favor and go grab one.
There is a link to access the book in the show notes. You can even get it on Audible. Now I stand by one of the components that I teach in the book, deciding if you desire a seven figure business or a seven figure company for years, 15 years. In fact, I was Team [00:05:00] seven figure Company. What I began to realize during that particular season in my life that I now believe every entrepreneur eventually encounters something is going to change.
The strategies that built one level of success are not always the structures that can carry the next level of your calling. And if you are building towards seven figures or beyond, there will come a moment when your leadership has to evolve maybe even faster than your business does. That moment can be confusing because from the outside, everything looks like progress.
Revenue is growing, clients are getting results, the brand is expanding. But internally, something deeper starts asking questions. Questions like, is this structure aligned with the life I want to live? Is this business architecture designed for the next decade of my calling?
Am I building something that requires more of me than I [00:06:00] actually desire to give in this season? Here's the thing, those questions are not a sign that something is wrong. They are usually a signal that your leadership identity is evolving, and that realization is exactly what began happening in my own life experience.
Something happened in my life and my leadership. As I approached my 50th birthday, I realized that the next chapter of my life was not about building a bigger company. It was about building a business and a life that actually reflected the level of freedom and alignment that I desire. So after 15 years.
I'm switching to Team seven Figure Business. Now let me break down the difference between the two for you and for those of you who will be watching the video episode, you will be able to actually see this online. All right, so first up, let's talk seven figure business. So when you have a seven figure business.
You've got 50 clients or [00:07:00] less that you're serving over the course of the year. You are typically working in one signature or select offer. Especially for those of you who have read the book, you will know exactly what I mean, and that offer is somewhere priced between 25 and $50,000. You've got a clear and automated business success formula, and just to make sure we're on the same page, whether you've read the book or not, a business success formula is the journey from contact to contract and everything that needs to happen in between to attract a lead, to qualify, a lead, to nurture a lead, to convert a lead, and to an onboard a lead into your program, right?
You've got tight operations, you've got systems and automation. You probably have one part-time service provider in addition to yourself, you've got an executive assistant that is dual capacity, both administration and operations, and you are marketing and sales for the business. Basically, you've got a really good paying job [00:08:00] with an extreme amount of flexibility, and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that versus a seven figure company where you are serving hundreds or several hundred clients.
You are typically operating with two offers. You will have a signature offer and a select or substantial or significant offer. You have one service provider for every 30 to 40 clients that you serve. So now your service delivery team is growing, which means you have time to work on the business, not just in the business.
You have an executive assistant that helps you with the business and your personal. They could be the same person, could be two different people. You've got a marketing and sales team, so you've got leadership team, so there's a director of growth.
Right. There is someone who's overseeing operations. There's someone who's overseeing programs, I believe in three teams, right? You have your operations team, you have your talent [00:09:00] team, and you have your customer service team, right? So those are your teams in addition to your marketing and sales. So you've got.
Unlock. You've got an operations manager or a director of operations, or a VP of operations dependent upon your infrastructure. You are working yourself out of a job as the CEO of the company. You do not have to be present for the company to do anything, which means you are free to start other projects.
You're free to thoughtly, start your own podcast, write your own book. All of those things are happening when you run a seven figure company. So for the last. 15 years I've been running a seven figure company. While I've recently made the decision that my goal is to focus on moving back to having a seven figure business.
And let me tell you why this is so important because my fifties are for freedom. Freedom this season is called nothing to prove in my life. Now, I have to be honest. I want you to think about when you buy a home and maybe you buy a home [00:10:00] that's slightly larger than you're used to so that you can grow into it.
And then later on, after being in that home for several years, you decide you wanna downsize and move into a condo so that you don't have to worry about sprinklers or grass or any of that kind of stuff. And as you start packing, you realize that you've accumulated. So much over the years, that is kind of what has happened to me.
I realized that I created a company with an infrastructure that was more complex than my next evolution actually needs. And the only way for me to move out of that old house and into the evolution without chasing the ghosts of what used to be was to take a break to literally give myself the time and the space to downsize while also evolving the work.
That is the most important thing I want you to understand. And here's the thing, like the move to millions method is still the body of our work. But what is happening now is we are layering the sanctuary standard on [00:11:00] top of the move to millions method, which I'm so excited about and brings up a nother.
Body of work, an evolved body of work, a body of work that I know that I have been uniquely designed and created to do In realizing that I created a company with this complex infrastructure, the only way for me to allow myself to get out of it was to give myself time and space to downsize every single part of it.
And what I love about what I'm already seeing in the new iteration of the work is that I'm giving myself the time that is required to do just that. Plus, because I turned 50 and my fifties are for freedom, I want more time to travel focused on treating my vessel like a temple instead of a trash can, and giving myself the space to just be without fear that if I don't do it will [00:12:00] all fall apart.
And that realization began the process of what I am now calling my gap year. A gap year for me is a strategic intentional pause. It's a season of dismantling and rebuilding, not because something was broken, but because I could feel that the next level of the assignment required a different architecture.
And can I be honest? I have never felt more free in this season. And yes, it has taken some getting used to when your identity has been tied to performance and you are known for output and results. Slowing down to the point where you aren't chasing results can feel. Has felt foreign, but I know that I am better for it, and I know that if you decide that this is what you wanna do, you will be too.
And I cannot wait to introduce you to my next evolution. This realization opened the door to a conversation with God that is ultimately changing the direction of my business and my leadership [00:13:00] Now.
I did not decide this overnight. It actually unfolded over a period of time through very specific moments with God. The first moment came in June of 2024 when I felt a very clear instruction that it was time for me to take a sabbatical. Now, if you know me, I haven't taken a sabbatical. Now do I vacation?
Do I? I take four to six vacations a year, but a sabbatical, like a long time away from my business. Yeah, my first reaction. To that instruction was not excitement. I love what I do. It's not work, right? Why in the world would I need to take a break from what it is that I love? Now, let me sidebar here real quick.
This in and of itself is part of the problem. My next level isn't. A DO season, it's a BE season, but in the state of doing that I've been accustomed to, I would never get there. There's too much happening and depending on me in the name of loving what I do, I literally, despite what I [00:14:00] told myself, created a job.
I wanted to put in my letter of resignation for, so yeah, my first reaction, it wasn't excitement. My first reaction was confusion because from the outside looking in, everything was working. The business was successful, our clients were getting amazing results. Revenue was consistent and growing, but the instruction was also clear, slow down, step back, create space.
And if you are a high performer like me, space can feel uncomfortable because when you are used to measuring your value through motion and momentum like I have been, but the more that I sat with the instruction, the more I realized that God was preparing me for something bigger, the more excited I became.
Now, in full transparency, I did not know when I took my sabbatical in November that I was going to come home and make the decision to take a gap year. I didn't know that.
Now, while I was away from my day to day in beautiful Bali, another conversation happened that began to frame everything. [00:15:00] Now, did you catch that? Sometimes in order to hear God, especially about your next season, you have to go somewhere out of your normal, and that is exactly what Asia has been for me.
All year from Thailand to Bali in Singapore, God could speak so clearly to me. Now, if you recall, in June when I was in Thailand, God hit me with a your moment. But I called you to be a movement and I can't lie, that messed me up for weeks. And even my first thought on what God meant it was wrong. I thought he was saying, go bigger.
When what he was actually was saying was go deeper. That single sentence changed how I saw everything. Because movements require different structures than moments. Moments can run on adrenaline. Movements require architecture. Movements require stability. Movements require a level of leadership that goes far beyond performance.
And here's the thing. The moment that I become accustomed to was getting someone to seven figures. I mean, to an extent I can do [00:16:00] that in my sleep. 85 businesses deep in. Four years, five years. 85 businesses in five years. Yeah. Who's doing that? Right? That's a moment though. That is literally a blip in time.
Getting them to seven figures. If I do not shift and evolve the work to be a movement, once they get to seven figures, they could fall by the wayside. Do you know that statistics say that 78% of the businesses that do seven figures only do it once? They're literally one hit wonders. And because movements require a level of leadership that goes far beyond performance, I had to do some work on myself.
So I, I laid out at the beach in Bali and God said three times in a row, take a gap year. I knew that the only way to become the movement would be to pause, to reset and recalibrate. And that didn't mean to take a break for a break's sake. It absolutely [00:17:00] did not mean retreat. It meant to give myself permission to take a strategic season to unbe become and become again at the level of my evolution.
Did you just catch that? A strategic break 2026 for me is a strategic break. I made the decision. I decided to go with the decision that I made. I decided to lean in. I decided to trust God. I decided to be a frog, fully relying on God and to take him at his word. That if he before me, it matters. Not who be against me, but can we be honest for a moment?
Who is talking about taking a whole seven figure business with working launches and systems and sold out live events and sending them on the side so that they can hear God shift direction and [00:18:00] become the next iteration of their work. Nobody is. That's why I had to do this episode on the show. Like I've been going back and forth like, am I going to tell people or am I not gonna tell people?
Am I just gonna be on the periphery and then I pop back up again, or am I gonna let people in? And I was having a conversation with one of my mentors, and they were very adamant that I needed to tell people because to get your business to the point where you can afford to take a year off strategically without your business collapsing or shutting down.
Yeah, that's goals for a lot of people. And perhaps I'll do another episode where I'll get into some of the things that I did to put myself in position where I could take a year away without it costing me everything. Now, here's the thing. I could have absolutely kept doing what I was doing, but then I would never become who I am supposed to be in this next season.
So as uncomfortable as it was to start laying off teams, shutting down [00:19:00] programs. I decided that obedience is better than sacrifice. Now, I won't lie, my nervous system was an overdrive at the thought of slowing down, let alone strategically deciding not to hold my live event to sunset. Programs that have changed countless lives, it's why I, I know now that.
Two years ago when I started doing tapping every single day emotional freedom technique, it was designed to help me to not only regulate, but to increase my capacity so that I could actually hold this transition in a way that would allow me to grow and evolve instead of shrink and retreat. I feel like somebody needs to take a deep breath in, so take a deep breath in.
When I tell you, making the decision to have a gap year. It has been the most terrifying, but also the most liberating experience of my life. Now, there are some other things that are going on in my life that I won't really get into in this episode, but I will tell you that the timing [00:20:00] of this has been perfect, and I believe that God loves me so much that coming into my next season, my next decade, turning 50 years old, that still trips me out by the way.
There are so many things that I had to be willing to relinquish in order to get everything that God has promised me to experience inside of my life. And I'm like, Lorenz Tate and love Joan, y'all. I want all of mine right now. You don't have to save mine for later. So here is where the story gets really honest, because the realization that I had while I was on vacation for my birthday was not really about my business.
It was about me. For years, I've taught leaders what it takes to build a seven figure company strategy, sales infrastructure, systems, support, all those things they matter. They absolutely matter. But during this season, I realized that there's another layer of leadership that I had not fully honored in my own life.
Sole [00:21:00] leadership. Right after my book came out, I expanded the pillars to include soul leadership and self-care inside of the move to millions method. Now, from the outside looking in, everything about my business looks successful. And don't get me wrong, it was successful. The revenue was strong, the clients were getting results.
Our EBITDA was good, the brand was growing, and when things are working, it becomes very easy to assume that everything underneath that's success is aligned. But alignment and success are not always the same thing, because what I had to confront. During this season as I began this break was that I had built something really powerful while still operating from a version of myself that had been shaped by years of pushing, proving, and performing at the highest of levels.
And that version of me had been incredibly effective. But effectiveness and alignment are not always the same thing. And the more time I spent in prayer and reflection during this break and making the decision to [00:22:00] start the gap year, the more I realized that the next chapter of my life was not asking me to build more.
It was asking me to become different, to release identities that had served me well. But were not designed to carry the movement. I now feel called to steward. There is a difference between leading from performance and leading from alignment. There is a difference between success that is built for momentum and success that is stewarded through obedience, and what I began to understand is that the next level of my leadership was not going to be built by doing more of what had already worked.
It requires me to slow down long enough to examine the internal architecture of my life, my identity, my relationship with success, my relationship with the rest, my relationship with obedience. And that realization [00:23:00] is what is literally changing everything. Because here's the thing, y'all like this gap year is new.
At the time of this recording, it's March. I've been in a gap year since January. I intend to be in this gap year for all of 2026. Now, how that will play out and what I will do and those things will change, but right now I have a very clear assignment of what it is that I'm working on, and it is so liberating to take time and space for myself.
I wake up without an alarm. And once I wake up, then I ease into my day. I get up, I move my body, I make myself some breakfast. I take my dog for a walk, then I shower and dress. And if it is a day when I am to be working on building out my sanctuary program, then I go and I start working on that. If it is a day when I'm sitting at God's feet and hearing him, then I get comfy on my prayer couch, and that's what I do.[00:24:00]
Because what I know is that the next chapter is not simply about scaling a business, it's about becoming the kind of leader who can steward a movement. And movements require a different level of alignment, a different level of surrender, a different level of self-leadership, and that is when I realized the most strategic thing that I could do.
Was not pushed forward. The most strategic thing that I could do was pause and lean into the gap. Now you might be sitting there and you might be like, okay, what in the world is doing, y'all talking about what in the world is a gap year? A lot of people hear that phrase and immediately get confused. Now they know what it means for a high school or college seniors that decide to take a year and see the world.
For a 50-year-old CEO of an award-winning multi seven figure business, what does a gap year mean? Then, [00:25:00] trust me when I tell you, I ask myself the same question. So here's what I came up with. This is a season of intentional recalibration, a season to examine the architecture of my life and my business a season to release identities that no longer.
Serve the next chapter and a season to rebuild infrastructures that can support the movement. I am feeling called a steward because movements require something deeper than momentum. They require sustainability, they require alignment. They require leadership that is rooted in obedience rather than urgency.
I'm operating from my success brain, not my survival brain specifically. It means that I have paused revenue generating activities. I am fulfilling on programs that had clients actively enrolled in them. But at the end of the current cycle, all of my existing programs are being sunset. I am giving up good to make way for greatness.
I am moving fully into the work of my life. The move to Millions Method remains the strategic framework for building [00:26:00] millions, but the Sanctuary standard deepens that framework by addressing the internal leadership capacity that is required to sustain them. From that deeper foundation, two sacred journeys will emerge.
I cannot wait to share them with you. That's an episode for another day.
It has been truly refreshing to sit at God's feet and create this next evolution and giving myself the space to pack up the old and unpack the new it is different. I have never done anything like this.
I am the girl who's been efforting since she was 13 years old when she got her very first job at McDonald's. Now I haven't really been publicly talking about my gap year. But when I have mentioned it, it has certainly piqued people's interest. It's disruptive, and as you know, I fancy myself a pioneer. So who knows, this might catch on and there might be others who are getting themselves involved in holding a gap year.
Now, in case that might be you, let me help you to understand. By giving you some clues [00:27:00] that taking a gap year might be your next best move. Okay. Now I wanna say something to those of you who are listening who may feel a similar nudge in your own leadership, because pressing pause on a successful business is not a decision that most entrepreneurs even consider.
They just keep working right. We are conditioned to believe that if something is working, you keep pushing, you keep scaling, you keep building. But sometimes the most strategic move a leader can make is to create space, not because something is wrong, but because something deeper is trying to emerge. And I promise you, it will not emerge if I did not intentionally pause my life and my business to take this year to.
Reimagine what I want my business to be over the next decade to the next 15 years. I don't know if I will retire, but I know that by the time I get to 65, I definitely , won't be moving at the same pace as I'm even working to build out now. [00:28:00] But if I didn't give myself this year, I, it will never happen because I'm on this stage or that stage and I'm doing this VIP day and I'm bringing on this client and I'm.
Doing all the things and then it's time for my live event , and it would just never happen. So I had to give myself permission to take a break and to tell myself it was okay. You know, it's funny, you know what I used as my example? I thought about artists like Adele or Maxwell, like they're not pumping out albums every single year they do an album, they go on tour.
They do whatever they do for two to three years, four years, five years, seven years, and then they come back and we welcome them back. Like nothing is wrong. So why do we think that? We just have to keep pushing when we are being asked to evolve? So that was my decision. I said, you know what? Enough already, I trust God.
I am a FROG. Either I trust him or I don't. I'm going to do this because I know that it is a setup for something bigger now. Let me [00:29:00] share three clues that a gap year or some form of intentional pause might actually be your next best move. All right, number one. Your business is successful, but your spirit is asking deeper questions.
Everything on the outside looks like progress. Revenue is strong. Clients are getting results. The brand is growing, but internally, you feel a shift and you are no longer excited about what you have been offering the world. It feels monotonous. You find yourself asking questions like, is this the structure I want for the next decade of my life?
Is the way I am operating aligned with the leader I am becoming? Is there another level of calling? I have not yet made space to hear from yet. When those questions start getting louder, it's often not a strategy problem. It's a signal that your leadership identity is evolving.
About a month before my 50th birthday, I started my annual wheel of life review, and as I look at every [00:30:00] area of my life, I quietly asked if nothing changed in the next 10 years, would I be fulfilled? And when the resounding nose smacked me in the face, that was the clue that I was going to have to be honest, that it was time for me to evolve.
Clue. Number two, the next level of growth requires a different version of you. There comes a point in every leader's journey where the habits and identities that built the current level of success are not the ones that will sustain the next level. You realize the next chapter is not just about scaling the business, it's about expanding your capacity, your identity, and your leadership posture, and sometimes that expansion, guess what?
It requires space. Space to release would no longer fit space to rebuild. What will carry the future include? Number three. You feel a clear invitation to slow down and you keep ignoring it. That was probably the biggest signal for me. When you are a high performer, slowing down feels [00:31:00] uncomfortable.
We are wired to move, to produce, to build, but sometimes the most important instruction we receive, it does not sound like acceleration. It sounds like pause now. Not forever, but just long enough to listen. Just long enough to realign.
Just long enough to make sure that the next chapter is built with intention and not more of the same, because the same has been working. Listen to me when I tell you this. This was the game changer for me, recognizing that there was nothing wrong with what I built, but also recognizing that I have been called to something greater.
I think we do ourselves and we do God a disservice to not lean into the greater that we are being called into. Now, you probably won't hear this many other places. People are not taking a whole year off from generating revenue in their business. Most people can't even afford to do that. Because they don't have cash reserves and they haven't [00:32:00] been a good steward.
But in our years when we did , multiple seven figures, I invested, I still invest. I will never stop believing that my money is supposed to make me money. So instead of using my money just to live in my business , and take care of the expenses of my business, I use my money to make me more money.
And so I get involved in investing in the right things. I actually purchased a couple of businesses that don't require me at all, so I've got money coming in whether I move or not. And even still inside of this business, I've made decisions. I've cut expenses, I've reduced overhead because it would be foolish.
To take a year off from generating revenue and still operate at the same level we had been operating. Right? That would not be wise, but I made the decision because I know that what is coming [00:33:00] next, the work that I am called to build in the earth, it demands the space to be created and birthed in a way that honors my greatness, and it honors the people that I am called to serve in this next iteration.
I never thought I would take a gap year. Y'all never, this isn't what I thought I would be doing. I am so glad that I am doing it and I just wanna encourage you, if you are feeling a sense, I said this on one of my coaching calls, 'cause you know, we're fulfilling programs through June the 30th. And I said something about taking a gap year on one of the coaching calls and the clients were like, I'm sorry, what is a gap year?
And so I broke it down for them, which is actually what led me to say, let me record an episode for the podcast. I broke it down for them and they were intrigued. And what became a goal for them was to get to the point where they would be able to take a gap year from their business, [00:34:00] that they would not have to worry about money and driving revenue so intently that if they were being asked to change direction, they wouldn't have to pull double duty.
Can I just tell you how freeing it is to know that I have the space to do. Absolutely nothing if that is what I'm being commanded to do in my spirit, yo, it's a game changer, and I pray that many of you will listen to this episode and you will make a decision. Maybe not in the moment that you listen to the episode, but in the future you will make a decision.
Now, even when God said in June of 2024, take a sabbatical. I didn't actually take the month off until a year and some change later. Because I needed to prepare my team and my business for me to be gone for a month and the business still run. I needed to do that. And I [00:35:00] also, as I was doing all of these things to lead up to taking that sabbatical, I also had to be honest with myself and to ask myself if I really wanted to continue to have a business and infrastructure that required the level of overhead that my business required.
The answer, y'all wasn't over resounding. No. It was actually a hell no. Like I just realized that my fifties this season is called nothing to Prove. You will probably hear me say that often when I'm talking about my own journey and what's going on with me. And because this season is called nothing to prove, I'm not chasing anything or anyone or any title or any place.
I'm not chasing anything. But if I were chasing anything, the only thing I would be chasing. Would be God's favor and living up to the evolution that he has placed me on to do the work, to say yes to the work. I've been detached from any and all outcomes for a [00:36:00] while. The only outcome I've been attached to in the last three to five years is the one where God gets the glory.
So this pause is not forever, it's just long enough. Long enough to figure out the next iteration long enough to build out sanctuary and what I've got coming for sanctuary. Whew. It's so good y'all. This gap year represents an opportunity for me to recalibrate and for me again , to pack up the old house that was in credible on enterprises.
And then after I pack it all out. To unpack the new house that is the next iteration of the work. So this is not about me stepping away from my calling, but instead it's about creating the space that is required to steward the next evolution of my calling very, very well. [00:37:00] I'm really excited. That I'm doing this, and at the end of the day, there is a reason why I decided to share this with you because if you are a leader that is building towards seven figures and beyond, you will eventually encounter this moment.
The moment where the next level of growth is not about another strategy. It's about a deeper level of leadership, a deeper level of truth, a deeper level of alignment between who you are becoming and what you are building. And sometimes the most strategic thing a leader can do is pause long enough to make sure that the next chapter is built on the right foundation.
That is what this has been about for me. This gap year is not the end of anything. It is the beginning of the next evolution of the move to millions movement. And if you are in a season where you feel something shifting inside of you, where the old ways of building no longer feel aligned, I want you to know that you are not alone.
Sometimes growth requires acceleration, and sometimes growth requires space. The wisdom of leadership is knowing the difference. Thank [00:38:00] you for allowing me the space to share why I said pause on my very successful multiple seven figure business and eight figure portfolio, and know that I think about Ephesians three and 20 that exceeding, abundant above all I could ever ask of, think or imagine.
is what is gonna come flooding into my life because I was willing to stop what I was doing, to take the space and create the gap for God to do everything that he said he would, and so much more. I believe the same is possible for you. If this episode inspires you, , tag me in a post in your stories, shoot me a DM and just let me know that you heard me and you are evaluating for your own business
the time in which you might take a gap year so that you can evolve into the next version of yourself, and I'll see you guys next time. Take care.
