Michael Knapp says amazing stuff

Being an entrepreneur is no easy task. The road to success requires dedication, risk, self-reliance, and time. One misstep and it feels like everything you’re working towards will disappear.  Every step forward is personal. So how do you find your dream job and how do you balance it all? Meg Orion is an entrepreneur who has discovered just how to do it all. How? She’s a health coach.

Orion offers personalized one-on-one health coaching services. It’s her dream job. “My mission was almost selfish at first,” she says. “I place a lot of value in honoring passion and following dreams, so personally I wanted to create a job and lifestyle that I loved, one that I was excited about and eager to engage in everyday.”

After more than a decade as a massage therapist and professional dancer, an interest developed to help people both holistically and physically. Orion found a path that combined both. “Knowing that I could reduce someone’s pain and stress by getting them to change their diet and start exercising, that was great! That by promoting and teaching self-care I could make a client’s days easier and happier, and that they in turn would spread their good feelings to others? It was clearly a path that delighted me.”IMG_5859

When you’re on the path to entrepreneurship, or already there, finding balance helps lead you to continued success. Her philosophy is that the body, mind, and soul are all interconnected— that you cannot work with one without shifting the other two. Guidance in nutrition, physical activity and self-care was a path she wanted to share as one entrepreneur to another. Sometimes self-improvement needs a guiding hand, and who better to help then someone who has already been on the same journey? Orion shares her story on how to achieve personal success and self-fulfillment:

Be Your Authentic Self

“I attribute my success to walking my talk, showing up as my true self and not giving up. Taking great care of myself and following many of the same suggestions I give my clients is integral to my being in a position to help others. My career path provides me a wonderful symbiosis; not only do I offer expert guidance in the areas of nutrition, physical activity and self-care, but it’s vital to my profession that I take my own advice, and so I benefit, and the cycle is positively reinforced.

People hire me for my skills and education – but also from the way I present myself. Showing up as one’s authentic self, believing unshakably in the process one promotes is an unmistakable position and is correlated with success in many areas of life.

Ask For Help

As my business grows I strive to know when to ask for help and when to hire out. There are many aspects to running a business that are auxiliary to the actual services I provide, and I understand that while I am slowly improving at all of those, it’s more important to have them done very, very well than it is for me to know I completed every business task myself. Ultimately, delegation has been a wonderful necessity.

IMG_0619Look At Your Fear

A year-and-a-half into starting my business I almost gave up and went to nursing school. I’d found myself temporarily paralyzed with the self-doubt and fear of creating something new, and my mind rebelled. Thankfully, I defaulted to a run in the woods, and there I either found or lucked-upon the clarity that allowed me to look at the fear objectively, and I was able to return to the idea of following my heart and going for the thing that excited me. That run was over a weekend, and on Monday I made a plan of attack and began again.

Balance The Personal and Professional

I do my best to stay present and non-rushed as my husband and I feed the kids a good breakfast, make smoothies for us and get everyone out the door. After drop-off I put on my professional hat. Arriving at my office, I have a second cup of tea, answer emails and get ready for my first client. I typically see three clients; take a break to then go exercise at a kettle-bell gym for an hour. Then I return for lunch and computer work. That work might be updating my social media, writing a blog or planning a community class. I leave my office by 2:15p.m. everyday to pick kids up from school. I love this part of my day and feel blessed and fortunate that I have the flexibility to arrange my day in this way. From 2:30p.m on it’s mom mode; we’re playing, going to Tae Kwon Do, tidying the house and preparing dinner.

Follow Your Own Advice

It’s vital to my profession that I take my own advice, and so I benefit, and the cycle is positively reinforced. What I believe in intimately and wholeheartedly – is how wonderful it feels for you to realize that you’re the successful instrument of your own positive change. That realization – that you have what it takes to clear the hurdles between you and your own health and happiness – can be fabulously addictive, and the entire world can use more of that addiction.

As an entrepreneur what you put in is what you get out. At the end of the day your motivation comes from within. Whether you’re looking for a new career path or a dietary change, Orion helps people find balance and introduces sustainable and healthy behaviors. 

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Find out more about Meg, and try a free coaching session, at megorion.com