As promised, this is the first email in my series to support you to get beyond scarcity and survival, and make your next level choices from a new place.

If you missed the first message, in my email newsletter this week, you can read it here on my blog.

And do be sure to read it, if you didn’t because in it, I introduce you to my secret weapons, and you’ll definitely want to meet them, if you are a visionary who has a sense that maybe you aren’t playing quite big enough to have the true fulfillment you desire.

Success is a funny thing. 

First of all, it’s 100% relative, and often defined by surface realities that once achieved don’t actually lead to deep fulfillment. 

How often have you “gotten there” only to find out that it was simply a milestone on a journey, and not “it”?

For me, it’s been a regular thing. 

Now, I’m used to it, and learning that each turn of the wheel on my journey to liberation is simply that, a turn of the wheel.

At the “liberation” stage (meaning you’ve either made it or life has taken everything from you and you’re no longer ruled by the some of the money beliefs you once held or inherited), there is an opportunity to celebrate, gather your resources, and depending on what you do next, either expand your capacity significantly. 

Or, shrink, contract, and go back to a comfort zone that doesn’t really push you, and could cost you years of life that you’ll never get back.

Personally, I’m choosing to expand.

If you are too, watch this next video clip with me and my secret weapons on the path to fulfillment, Jana and Molly, about why they were so critically important to my coming into the deepest fulfillment and inspired action that I’ve ever experienced in my life.

Hint: they were the first people I ever came across who could help me articulate my vision in a way that was so inspiring to me that I was able to reorient my entire life to align with that vision. 

Had I not been able to articulate the vision I’ve been holding in full, and get it documented with their support … well, I’m not sure what I’d be working on or doing right now, but it’s really quite possible I would have lost my Company (again) and had to repeat mistakes I had already made 10 years ago. 

Sigh, that would have been unfortunate.

And, if you’re on a precipice of your next level, this email series is for you.

I’ll be back tomorrow with the next part, taking you way back to the beginning of my journey toward bootstrapping my success. If you’re in any type of financial fear, or scarcity, or uncertainty regarding money … tomorrow’s message is for you.

To your eyes (and heart) wide open life,
Ali

I’ve bootstrapped every step of my journey.

That means that I’ve never taken outside capital from investors. 

All of it was funded by me, and the SBA (via loans), and banks (via credit cards). I did also receive a $50k inheritance from my dad when he died in 2004, and used that to fund the growth of my business.

When I walked out the door of the big law firm, and away from the $180k/year paycheck, just after giving birth to my second child in 2003, I did not know where the resources would come from. 

My husband was a stay at home dad. I was the breadwinner. Looking back now, I’m shocked at my chutzpah.

And, I had something that I only now realize with hindsight is what created the guarantee that I’d always have what I needed …

No matter how much or how little you have right now, you have this available to you too.

Watch this clip from the call I hosted with Molly and Jana, to see what it is.

When I review the history of my life, what I can see is that I lived much of my life on this razor’s edge of terror and excitement. I now see it as the signpost that I am headed in the right direction. 

For many years, the fear part kept me stuck, and swirling in confusion.

But then I learned how to understand it for what it was, and see that I could actually turn toward the fear, safely.

I encourage you to consider this terror/excitement razor’s edge as a signpost for yourself as well. Turn toward your fear, and learn to let it live in your being as excitement so you can keep moving toward it, rather than freezing or fleeing from it.

In the early years, the terror screamed at me that I was going to run out of money and end up homeless. 

The excitement would say “No way that can happen. You’ve got valuable gifts to provide. Just keep going, Alexis.”

What resourced me to keep going was what I talk about in this video. 

When I learned to turn toward it, all of the resources I needed showed up every time. 

Even when I moved to a farm and filed bankruptcy.

Everything I needed, right when I needed it.

Surprisingly, it was the bankruptcy (and the year leading up to it) that showed me the truth about money, and exactly how resourced I really was. 

That was a shocker.

And, I sure wish I didn’t need to go through a bankruptcy to figure it out.

But, as a result of all of it …

• I learned how to use the resources available to me in a way that I believe is unusual.
• I learned that the most valuable resources I have are my time, energy and attention. 
• I learned that money is infinite, when I know how to access it and use it wisely.

My biggest prayer now is that I can pass on the extremely time-intensive and financially costly lessons I learned in a way that shortcuts the process for you.

To help me make sure I’m doing the best I can in that regard, I’d really love it if you hit reply and let me know what you are receiving from what I’ve shared in this email series so far.

If you need a refresher, here’s where you can read the email I sent last week at the beginning of the series.

And, if you’d like the full video of the call with my “secret weapons” on the path, hit reply and let me know and I’ll send it.

To your eyes (and heart) wide open life,
Ali Katz

Every time I got really “successful” I hit up against something that may be impacting you too.

The first time was 2009, and I had “made it” … 

Best-selling author, family financial and legal expert on TV, 2 million dollar businesses, kids in private school, living on a walk street in Hermosa Beach …

And, yet, I didn’t feel as if I had made it at all. 

I felt stagnant, flat and confused.

I went on a wild 10-year ride seeking fulfillment — letting go of everything, living with two names, fully expressed, not hiding, being all of myself — and learning to do business in a new way, and again what I found was “success”, but once again it wasn’t quite it.

By 2021, I had rebuilt everything, money was flowing in to the tune of $7M/yr and I had a full team running my business for me.

Once again, though, I noticed I wasn’t that excited by my business (or my life). 

I had made it, right? 

But, why wasn’t I lit up and turned on and all sorts of excited by what I had made?

It was right about then that I decided to dive in and get support from two women I now call my secret weapons.

What they helped me figure out is that there is something far greater than “success”, and what was missing. 

I’ll be sharing an email series this week that looks at what’s more important than success, and will create the ultimate fulfillment that you’ll desire once you are no longer in scarcity and survival, or if you’re beyond scarcity and survival now and wonder … what else?

For now, meet my secret weapons here. 

And watch for the email series the rest of this week with more, including how I found the money to build my businesses, what I discovered beyond scarcity and survival, and how you can “skip the line” to the true success you really desire instead of having to loop incessantly around old patterns that don’t ultimately create what you want.

I’m here in service to your eyes wide open growth and evolution.

To your Guided path ahead, with eyes (and heart) wide open.  

Ali Katz

Business owners: can your business be a conduit for true freedom, not just for yourself, but for all of the people you employ as well? Yes, if you choose to change the paradigm and welcome true freedom for all those who work “with you” instead of holding on to the false belief that “they” work “for” you. Teamwork makes the dream work, but only if you realize (as a business owner) that you are part of the team, not there to be served by the team.

The dark shadow of freedom… 12 years ago, I made the decision to step into my own personal sovereignty by creating my first business—a law practice. I knew nothing about business or how to run one other than what had been modeled for me by the restaurant general managers and law firm partners I had worked under in my prior jobs as a waitress in high school and college and then a law firm associate after law school.

What I learned from those jobs and the bosses I worked for was that freedom was available to those at the top, but for everyone else, freedom was a mere illusion. I swore I would do it differently when I built my own business. But for the most part, I failed for many years. Someone always ended up trapped—either me or the people who worked for me.

As I’ve gotten to go behind the scenes as a trusted advisor to high-level business executives, lawyers, and company founders, I’ve seen this trap replicated. In most cases, the business owner doesn’t even know (or maybe doesn’t care) that the people supporting them in their business are trapped. In most cases, the people who are trapped may not even acknowledge to themselves that they are working in jobs they don’t really want because, well, it’s a paycheck, right?

Over the years, as I have coached and guided thousands of people to start their own businesses, to find their own personal sovereignty, and get on the path to their own financial liberation, I have seen a pattern repeated over and over that is simply another trap. There is an inherent belief that if you are not the owner of the company, at the top of the hierarchy, that you aren’t really free. That you aren’t really successful. That you can’t have full sovereignty. And far too often, those who are building the businesses are more trapped than ever, but they’ll never show it because to do so would hurt the business.

As a result, even those who have no business building businesses dive in, sacrifice their lives, their happiness, and yes, their own personal freedom to do it. Mostly, they struggle and never quite get there, thinking there is something wrong because they can’t figure out how to make it work. Sometimes, they succeed, but at what price?

As we move into a new paradigm, we have to find another way—a way in which the business supporters, the business connectors, and the business guides are able to create and enjoy as much freedom as the business creators, and vice versa—a way in which we all get to share in the fruits of the labor and take on the full personal responsibility that comes with a life of personal sovereignty—a way in which we can all be truly free, to be all of who we are, to live the lives we really, really, really, REALLY want, and to work together in harmony beyond competition to experience it.

On this day of celebrating independence in the US, I urge you to consider whether you have truly created a life of freedom. And if so, is it at someone else’s expense? Or are you perhaps trapped by your own definition of success?

Where do you see this shadow side of freedom in your own life? And what ideas do you have about how we can shift it?

I got pulled into a conversation on Facebook today between several long-time online coaches/business owners … about refunds. And it inspired me to write some of my thoughts about how to structure your refund policy, how to handle refund requests, and how to turn your next refund request into your greatest life and business growth opportunity ever.

You can read what I wrote about refunds and how to handle them here.

On another note, I’m in the midst of a lawsuit around my IP that has me feeling more powerful in my business than I’ve ever felt before because I have the right protections in place to stand for what I created.

I used to shy away from protecting my IP. I felt conflicted between my values of “share the wealth” and “protect my IP” — through an evolutionary spiral dynamics lens, this is an “orange” and “green” conflict that I didn’t know how to resolve. Turns out that integral leadership development (my lifelong growth path), I’ve been able to learn to hold the paradox and find the higher purpose of IP protection, and now I’m finally standing for my IP in a way that feels 100% values-aligned.

I can’t say for sure that I’m going to win this litigation, but I’m committed to standing for what I created. My former client signed an agreement not to sell what we taught her to other lawyers, and once she began to do so, I created a possibility of collaboration, which she declined without even talking to me and instead having her lawyer file a lawsuit against me.

The part that sucks the most is that I believe she’s being led astray by her lawyer and getting very expensive, and ultimately bad advice. I can’t say for sure as I have not gotten to talk with my former client directly, and I’m not sure I will ever get to do so outside of a deposition context … but what I can say is I have been involved with enough lawyers throughout my life (both as a lawyer, a user of legal services, and a trainer and coach to thousands of lawyers) to know that many lawyers are motivated to increase conflict because that’s how they get paid. And, very few lawyers have actual conflict resolution skills.

It’s the reason I’ve doubled, tripled and quadrupled down on serving the legal community. I truly believe that with the right business models in place, lawyers can shift culture simply by how they help their clients to deal with life’s most important matters — death, conflict, and money.

And what I can best advise you on here regarding your own intellectual property is that Trademarks are not enough. You must have contracts that protect your IP. If I win this case, it’ll be because of my contract, not just my Trademark. 

If you want support on any of this, the best way I can support you with all of this is through my LIFT Foundation program, which is on sale for a few more days this week before it’s taken off the market for a big brand renovation materials — and likely big price increases when we come back out. Use code alijunespecial to get a $3,333 discount on the whole program + my support in your business for the rest of the year. You can even make 3 payments, if that’s helpful. 

If you want to join, and need a more stretched payment plan to be able to do it, hit reply and let us know so we can figure out how to make it work for you.

If the LIFT program and getting my direct support isn’t right for you right now, there’s lots of free places you can learn from me: listed below.

I’m here in service to your eyes wide open growth and evolution.

To your Guided path ahead, with eyes (and heart) wide open.  

Ali Katz

It’s shocking to me what can be accomplished when I’m aligned, and how Life shows up with literally everything I need so that I can take the biggest risks, and see them pay off in spades.

And, when I’m not aligned, it’s equally shocking to see how bad it can get.

It’s the same for you — alignment is the single most important life and business growth hack I know, and if you don’t know what “alignment” is, it can be quite difficult to know if you are out of alignment, and how it’s impacting you.

Back in October of 2021, I was way out of alignment, and I almost lost my Company (again) as a result.

Fortunately, this time, I was able to see it, and once I did, I knew what to do to turn things around. It wasn’t easy, by any means, but it was far easier than losing my Company would have been.

Sure, I could have rebuilt from scratch. I’ve done it before. But gratefully, I found the way back to alignment faster this time, and didn’t need to go all the way to rock bottom to get there. Phew.

On June 21, at 1pPT, I’m going to introduce you to my secret weapons in the alignment game. 

Molly Strong and Jana Wilder built Simon Sinek’s company with him (Molly as his EA and then head of product and Jana as CEO), and then left to go on their own wild journey of alignment, and now I’m intro’ing them to you so you can hear how they helped me see where I wasn’t in alignment, and the growth strategy we created together once I was back on track. 

If you want to join us, use this link to register.