I started my first online business for one reason only … money. I wanted to make enough money to afford to live in the same country as my children.

My husband and I emigrated from South Africa to the US to give our two then teenagers a better future. However, we soon realized there was no way our funds would be enough to retire in the US. Our hearts were breaking because we could see ourselves eventually returning to South Africa while our children stayed behind, living almost 10,000 miles from us.

I started selling online courses. But it wasn’t as easy as I had hoped. Like many solopreneurs, I soon worked 60 hours a week and made very little money. I always felt a heaviness in my stomach and was too stressed to sleep well.

“I’m not cut out for this,” I told myself.

I was ready to give up, and I could see myself never hugging my children on their birthdays or hardly ever spending Christmas together.

But then, one day, I listened to a podcast interview with a life coach, who explained that she was making millions while working only three days a week.

I started following her and applying what she was teaching, one by one discarding the tasks in my business that led nowhere.

After a few months, I went from working 60 hours to working only 6 hours a week in my business while doubling my income.

My mind was blown once I discovered that the way to make a business successful was to manage my mind and emotions, in other words, to tame, train and fly my innter dragon more than anything else.

After I taught myself to work more effectively, I had a new vision. I wanted to be a life coach, showing other struggling solopreneurs how to do what I’ve done.

That’s when I got certified as a life coach. And that first online business of mine? It paid for the expensive coach training.

In 2022, I coached entrepreneurs in the mastermind of the owner of a vast software and business coaching company. As a result, I honed my coaching skills.

In the more than 500 sessions I did there, I could see these entrepreneurs’ faces light up as they realized they had it in them to calm their brains down, pick themselves up, and keep going.

And yes, I’m making my dream of living in the same country as my children come true.