The Johnson Crew!

Hi friends thank you for joining me today for this big announcement it's taken me a hot minute to make this video but I think I'm finally ready to really put it all out there if you've been following me for even just like the last five or so months probably saw that I started a new business last year it was a subscription box business and it was really fun but I have decided to close it man it took me a long time to get it going I started working on it two winters ago really put a lot of heart

And soul into it and loved it and enjoyed it but it became overwhelming it became a burden and it started to pull me away from my own family which is sort of the opposite of the whole goal of the business which was to give families more special time together so when that started happening I realized there's something wrong here I don't think this is a great idea anymore I wanted to share that news with you but I also wanted to dive into that a little bit further

And talking about balancing working and having kids and homeschooling and all of those things how to juggle all of that and if you are in a similar situation if you have a lot of things that you're juggling I'm just hoping that this video can be an encouragement to you to hear from my experience how things went what my thought process was there at the end and hopefully act as a support for you as well if you are needing to make some kind of change and what you've got juggling or if you've maybe been yearning for starting your own thing

But maybe this just isn't the best season of life for it just to have somebody in your corner so let's chat a little bit about that like I said I started working on this business in the winter of and it was an idea then and I was kind of testing things out on some of my friends everyone really loved it and it was very supportive and thought it was a great idea and so I decided to go for it and really make it a thing make it a real thing of course my husband was totally along for the ride the whole time you know talking with him

And trying to figure things out and he was so supportive and also thought it was a great idea gave me lots of time to work on it we had a babysitter who was coming once like every other week sometimes more and I was trying to juggle all the things if you are new here I do homeschool our four children they range from ten down to three and I also help my husband manage his photography business which that is our bread and butter that's what pays the bills

So this idea was really fun and exciting and it was something that was going to bring me a lot of joy there were a lot of years there where I was so proud of my husband and his business and I love helping with that and doing that together with him I think it's been a wonderful thing for us to do together but I had this desire to have something that I did on my own that I could be really proud of and saying all these things out loud I don't love how it sounds saying it all out loud

But maybe you've been there or you are there and you get it and and so that was a thing for me and and so I went for it and it was really exciting at first and just like a few months in really really small into like actually launching the business I realized how little I actually did know about starting your own product based business and subscription box business and it wasn't like I had all this capital to like go ahead and hire people to be on my team or anything

And so I was doing it all my husband was helping as much as he could and I'm super appreciative for all his help that he did do but it takes a lot if you've started a business before or done marketing for another company you know it takes a lot to get a new business off the ground so I found myself spending a lot of time marketing this thing and then didn't have enough time to even like develop it and make the actual monthly kits it just started to become way too much I was spending

So much time on it and it was pulling me from other things that I needed to do and wanted to do and I am not a good multitasker but I had started trying to do work during homeschooling hours like while my kids were like busy doing independent work I would be trying to get stuff done and I am not a good multitasker if you interrupt my train of thought what I'm trying to work on I usually get pretty flustered and frustrated and so I was not being a very good homeschooling teacher

And mom and the more that that went on I was becoming more dissatisfied with the business now if you have started a business or want to start a business I hope that I am not discouraging you everybody's different your circumstances are different types of businesses are different support systems are different responsibilities are different so uh what has been my experience is going to be different for you so about this springtime I was really feeling burnt out with it and realizing just how much I had been dropping the ball in all other areas of my life in order to do this business

And I was not happy with that I wasn't happy with myself and so I really put it to prayer you know is this what I should be doing in this season of life maybe this is something I can do when my kids are grown so I talked to god a lot about it talked to my husband a lot about it and I was actually really surprised how painless it was to come to the decision to put it down really like I'm so thankful to god he gave me a lot of peace

And contentment around putting this business down I thought that I would feel really embarrassed telling people that I'm quitting basically this brand new thing that I've sunk a lot of time and some money into I thought that I would feel like a failure that I couldn't make this thing successful and I thought that I would be really heartbroken to quit this business that I had created and honestly I actually was met with a lot of relief in deciding to put it down there were still you know mild feelings of all of those things

But very very mild and really just mostly felt relief and contentment and for that I thank god for and my husband for being such a great support to me and I'm thankful that I had the opportunity to try and give it my best and be able to look at myself in the mirror and say it's okay to put it down so if you are in a similar situation and have been feeling like that I wanted to encourage you that it's okay to put it down

And you can tell yourself I'm just putting it down for this season and I'll pick it back up down the road and hopefully that'll give you some comfort as well that it doesn't have to be a no forever it's just a no for right now if your reason for quitting something is better than your reason for continuing something then you can feel justified and feel good and feel like you are making a wise decision my reason for putting it down is that I know that I wasn't being a very good homeschool mom mom in general um

And that I was putting a lot of other important stuff down or just not doing those things very well in order to do this and this business yeah desired to do it but it is not worth the sacrifice of all these other important things so once I could kind of bring myself to that headspace and see the pros and cons it was a fairly easy decision to to put it down our kids are only little for a little amount of time and I know while our kids are young it feels like forever

But older wiser women tell me this all the time that it goes by really fast and you don't want to miss it so I still have plenty of other things that I do that bring me joy that I'm interested in but this is just a season where I'm not trying to do things that are going gonna pull me away from being a good mom being a good wife and showing god to my kids and being there for them I want to build wonderful relationships with them

And I know the limit I have on my plate and starting that business was pushing me over that limit that doesn't have to be the same for everybody but I know myself and how I handle things and handle stress levels and so for me this was the best decision to say we're going to put it down go put it down for now maybe I'll pick it up down the road so hopefully that's encouraging to you to hear my experience and how we're trying to figure out how to juggle all the things one other exciting thing that has come out of putting that down is that over this last year

And some change while I've been trying to build that business I really pulled back from youtube so now I do have the capacity to put videos out once a week and so I'm really excited to do that and build this community up over here I really appreciate you guys and this is just such a fun community if you are new here I do mostly talk about homeschooling on this channel and life as a family of six so if that interests you definitely hit that subscribe button below

And join this amazing community here and I look forward to sharing with you guys if you have this kind of experience in your past you're currently going through it and you want to share that with this community please feel free to share that in the comments below and I'm sure that will be an encouragement to other people reading those comments if you want to chat one-on-one about this kind of stuff feel free to send me a message over on instagram I'll put my handle up here

And we can chat over there I appreciate you guys hanging out with me tonight and I hope you have a wonderful night for the rest of your day whatever time of day it is that you're watching and I'll see you next week thanks you