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Maybe, as a gym owner, exercise is your release valve. But more and more gym owners admit that working out in their gyms adds to their stress instead of relieves it. I want to tell you: It's OK to work out somewhere else.

“Who am I to lead them?” As a business grows, it adds staff. Ironically, this can leave the Founder feeling even more isolated. By the time she reaches Tinker Phase, an entrepreneur can feel very alone even with a big team supporting her.Promoted beyond the point of her own expertise, the Tinker tries to wrap her head around larger challenges than she’s ever faced. Each decision takes on great importance because it affects a larger team. And she’s dealing with sums of money she’s never seen let alone controlled. It’s very common for a Tinker to feel as if she’s woken up in someone else’s job. “How did I get here?” she asks. “Why me? I’m no more qualified than they are.” That’s the impostor syndrome. (Not sure if you’re a Founder, Farmer, Tinker or Thief? Take the test here.) Beating Impostor Syndrome  Nearly every Tinker I’ve ever mentored has reported having impostor syndrome—even the alpha folks who own gyms.At some point, even the most self-confident owner has wondered, “How did this all fall into my hands?”Here’s how to beat it.  1. Realize You Don’t Have to Be Perfect You only have to be slightly ahead of those you lead—and not always on a technical level. Your job as Founder is to be well rounded. But good hiring means that you replace yourself with “pointy” people: those folks with a deep (but narrow) field of expertise. They’re specialists. You’re a generalist. If you know more than your tech-support team, they need more instruction. Your job isn’t to be the best shoemaker anymore. It’s to motivate and calm the team, tell them inspirational stories, and provide a vision for the future.  2. Fake It Till You Make It One of the benefits of joining higher-level mentoring groups is that you have to do the stuff they do. When everyone else in the room is a millionaire, you spend the weekend doing ...

Consultants solve problems in a vacuum. Mentors see the whole picture. I’ve hired consultants before. Whenever I have a small problem that exists in a vacuum, I’ll call in a consultant to help me with a quick fix. Consultants are good at coming up with ideas; some consultants do team exercises. Those are fun. But I call myself a mentor—and not a consultant—for a reason.   Saved by a Mentor   If you know my story, then you know that a mentor saved my business. A consultant wouldn’t have. See, I thought I needed marketing help. But Denis, my first mentor, knew that I actually needed to build the systems that would build the team that would sell my service before I even thought about marketing. That’s what a mentor does. A consultant would have said: “Spend your last $500 on newspaper ads.” And I’d have been out of business back in 2009 if I had. I’ve had three mentors since: Dan Martell, Marcy Swenson, and now Todd Herman. None of these people gave me silver bullets. But they all gave me clarity: Instead of piling new ideas on top of my overwhelm, they stripped everything away to find the one thing that would really move my business forward. And I’ve scaled 28 times since Two-Brain’s first year, largely due to the mentorship I receive. Consultants should cost up to $5,000, and your relationship with them will typically last a day or two. But I pay over $80,000 per year for mentorship, and our conversations last for years.   The Best Path   We are a mentorship practice for one reason: we care enough to give gym owners the best. And mentorship is the best: All the seminars, videos and masterminds are helpful, but only when built into a bigger plan. Our Incubator program is a 12-week sprint through the systems that will build and grow your business. Our Growth ...