Issue 024 | Stop Trying On Businesses That Don’t Fit

November: What Actually Fits?

For those who have never met me in person, there is something you should probably know about me.

I am tall.

Not just kind of tall.

I am six-foot-two.

Which puts me somewhere around the tallest one percent of women in this country.

And while there are some things I absolutely love about being tall, buying clothes has not always been one of them.

I can scroll through social media and see an influencer put together the most beautiful outfit.

The pants fall exactly where they are supposed to fall.

The sleeves hit perfectly.

The proportions work.

Everything looks effortless.

Then I look at the woman wearing it and realize she is five-foot-six.

Maybe five-foot-seven.

Even five-foot-nine.

And I already know.

Those pants are not going to look like that on me.

There is simply not enough fabric.

My arms are longer.

My torso is longer.

My legs are longer.

The same piece on the same size body can become an entirely different outfit once you add several inches of height.

So I can admire it.

I can get inspiration from it.

I may even love it.

But I have learned not to automatically assume:

That will work for me too.

For years, that meant walking through department stores and specialty stores seeing things I liked and knowing they were not really designed with my proportions in mind.

The mannequin could wear it.

I probably could not.

Or at least not the way it was intended to be worn.

And recently I decided I was tired of approaching my wardrobe that way.

I am entering a different season of my life.

I want to rebuild parts of my wardrobe around how I actually live now.

So instead of continuing to admire clothing on women whose bodies were nothing like mine, I started searching specifically for women who were.

Tall women.

Women my height.

Women who understood the reality of looking for longer inseams, longer sleeves, different proportions, and clothing actually cut for our bodies.

And suddenly, my world opened up.

I found page after page created specifically for tall women.

I started following about nine of them.

And through those women, I discovered somewhere around a dozen clothing companies—some I had never even heard of—that actually make clothes with women like me in mind.

That fascinated me.

Because the problem wasn't that there weren't clothes for me.

The problem was that I had been looking for them through the wrong reference point.

I Didn't Need Less Inspiration. I Needed Better Alignment.

I did not have to unfollow every woman who wasn't six-foot-two.

They can still inspire me.

I can still like their style.

I can still notice a color combination.

A silhouette.

A jacket.

A way they put something together.

But I no longer need to expect their exact recommendation to fit my body exactly the way it fits theirs.

That's different.

And I think we do the same thing in business all the time.

We follow someone online.

Their business looks incredible.

Their content is everywhere.

They have brand partnerships.

Or a course.

Or a membership.

Or an Amazon business.

Or an agency.

Or a speaking career.

Or a consulting practice.

And we think:

I could do that.

And maybe you could.

That's not really the question.

The better question is:

Would that actually fit you?

Your personality.

Your expertise.

Your capacity.

Your responsibilities.

Your desired lifestyle.

The way you want to spend your days.

What you actually carry.

Where you're ultimately trying to go.

Because there are a lot of businesses that will look beautiful on somebody else's life.

That does not automatically mean they belong on yours.

October Was About Slowing Down Before We Build

Last month, we spent time looking at what happens before the business.

Who is carrying the vision?

What do they actually carry?

How much of them should the business be allowed to require?

What does the money need to make possible?

Now I want us to move into another conversation.

What actually fits?

Because once you begin understanding the visionary, you can stop treating every successful business you see as a recommendation.

Sometimes it is simply inspiration.

Sometimes it shows you something is possible.

Sometimes it gives you language for something you had not considered.

Sometimes it helps you discover an option you did not know existed.

But inspiration and instruction are not the same thing.

And possibility is not prescription.

Possibility Is Not Prescription

Just because someone else built it successfully does not mean you should duplicate it.

Just because you have the ability to do something does not mean you should build around it.

Just because an opportunity exists does not mean it belongs in your architecture.

That is one of the reasons I keep coming back to this principle:

Possibility is not prescription.

I could spend years trying to make standard-length pants work for a six-foot-two body.

Or I could acknowledge something simple:

They were never designed around my proportions.

The pants aren't bad.

My body isn't the problem.

It's a fit issue.

Business can work the same way.

Sometimes the problem isn't that you aren't disciplined enough.

Or focused enough.

Or working hard enough.

Sometimes you are trying to force yourself into an architecture that was never designed around the person you actually are.

And that is where we have to start paying attention.

We See Something Working and Assume We Should Wear It Too

Someone launches a course.

Someone else starts consulting.

Another person builds a membership.

Someone creates a certification.

Someone starts an agency.

Someone runs a cohort.

Someone sells templates.

Someone gets paid to speak.

Someone builds a community.

Someone licenses a methodology.

And because we can see that it is working, we start wondering:

Should I be doing that too?

Sometimes the answer is yes.

But sometimes the answer is simply:

That is a beautiful business. It just is not yours.

And I think experts need permission to recognize that without feeling like they are leaving money on the table.

Because every opportunity does not belong to you.

Every business model does not belong to you.

Every expression of your expertise does not belong in your architecture.

I Have Built From Capability Before

When I look back over the things I have done throughout my life and business, I can see how often capability opened the door.

I knew how to organize.

I knew how to create.

I knew how to develop programs.

I knew how to solve problems.

I knew how to design.

I knew how to lead.

I knew how to strategize.

I knew how to help people take scattered pieces and turn them into something coherent.

And every one of those things could become an opportunity.

Some did.

But being able to build around something did not automatically mean that thing belonged in the business I ultimately wanted.

That took me a long time to understand.

Because when you are multi-gifted, almost everything can look like possibility.

And when you are resourceful, almost everything can be made workable.

Those are strengths.

But without discernment, they can also become traps.

Good Opportunities Can Still Be Wrong Opportunities

This is one of the things I want us to explore this month.

Because we often assume that if an opportunity is good, profitable, aligned with our skill set, or available to us, we should take it.

But a good opportunity can still be the wrong opportunity for the visionary.

It may require more access than you want to give.

More travel than fits your life.

More visibility than you actually desire.

More live delivery than your body can sustain.

More people management than you want responsibility for.

More evenings.

More weekends.

More availability.

More emotional labor.

More dependence on you personally.

And none of those things automatically make the opportunity bad.

They simply tell us something about fit.

That is why I have become less impressed by the question:

Can this work?

A lot of things can work.

I am more interested in:

What will this require in order to work?

And:

Do I actually want to build a life around those requirements?

A Business Can Work and Still Be Wrong for You

I think this is where a lot of experts get stuck.

Because once something begins producing results, it becomes harder to question it.

The business has clients.

The offer sells.

People know you for it.

There is demand.

Money is coming in.

So logically, you should keep going.

Right?

Maybe.

But a business can be viable and still be personally unsustainable.

A business can generate revenue and still consume the visionary.

A business can be respected and still require a life you no longer want.

A business can look successful from the outside while the person inside it is quietly trying to escape the very thing they built.

That matters.

Because success is not simply:

Did it work?

We also have to ask:

Did it fit?

Fit Is Not the Same as Comfort

I want to be careful here.

When I talk about fit, I am not saying the business should never stretch you.

Or that everything should feel easy.

Or that you should only do the things you naturally enjoy.

There are disciplines that come with building anything meaningful.

There are skills you may need to develop.

There are seasons that require more from you.

There are uncomfortable decisions.

There is responsibility.

Fit is not an excuse to avoid growth.

Fit is about whether the structure is fundamentally compatible with the vision and the visionary.

Can this model realistically produce what needs to be produced?

Does it align with the way the expert actually creates value?

Can it work with the capacity that truly exists?

Does it support or consistently fight the life the visionary says matters?

Can it mature?

Can it become more sustainable over time?

Can parts of it eventually function without the visionary personally carrying every piece?

Those are fit questions.

The Business Model Is Not the Vision

This is another reason I do not want people becoming too attached to a particular model.

A course is not the vision.

Consulting is not the vision.

A membership is not the vision.

Speaking is not the vision.

A nonprofit is not the vision.

An agency is not the vision.

A product is not the vision.

Those are vehicles.

Ways that value can move.

Ways people can access what you carry.

Ways money may flow.

But the vehicle is not the thing you are ultimately trying to accomplish.

That means you can change the vehicle without abandoning the vision.

You can stop doing something one way and find another expression for the same expertise.

You can outgrow a model.

You can redesign an offer.

You can decide that something that made sense three years ago no longer belongs.

The vision does not have to die because the vehicle no longer fits.

Your Expertise Has More Than One Expression

This becomes especially important for experts.

Because expertise is often much larger than the first way we learned to deliver it.

Maybe people know you for speaking.

But your expertise is not limited to a microphone.

Maybe they know you for consulting.

But your value is not limited to an hour on Zoom.

Maybe they know you for personally doing the work.

But there may be methods, processes, frameworks, judgment, tools, or intellectual property underneath that work.

The visible expression may only be one expression.

And if we confuse the expression with the expertise itself, we can accidentally believe we have fewer options than we really do.

That is part of what I mean when I say we need to look for fit.

Maybe what you carry is right.

But the way you have been expressing it is no longer right.

That is a very different problem.

And it creates very different possibilities.

Multi-Gifted Does Not Mean Multi-Business

This is another place where fit matters.

When you carry a lot, it is easy to assume every gift needs its own container.

One gift becomes a brand.

Another becomes a business.

Another gets its own page.

Another becomes an offer.

Another turns into a project.

And before long, you are managing five different expressions of yourself.

All legitimate.

All connected to something you know how to do.

And all requiring attention.

But maybe the answer is not another container.

Maybe the answer is better architecture.

Sometimes several abilities belong inside one body of work.

Sometimes one gift supports another.

Sometimes one area remains ministry.

Sometimes one becomes intellectual property.

Sometimes one is simply part of the way you think.

Not everything you carry needs its own storefront.

I think that is one of the biggest traps for multi-gifted people.

We see all the pieces.

But we do not always stop long enough to ask what the pieces belong to.

You May Need Fewer Things, Not More

That thought has become more important to me.

Not less value.

Not less impact.

Not less possibility.

Just fewer disconnected things.

Because complexity creates its own cost.

Every offer needs attention.

Every audience needs communication.

Every platform needs maintenance.

Every brand needs clarity.

Every commitment takes up space somewhere.

And eventually, a visionary can spend more time maintaining all the containers than actually moving the vision forward.

That is not the goal.

Sometimes growth looks like addition.

Sometimes growth looks like integration.

Sometimes it looks like deciding:

This belongs inside that.

Or:

This no longer needs to stand alone.

Or:

This is something I can do, but it is not something I need to build around.

Those are architectural decisions too.

The Right Reference Point Changes What You Can See

This is what surprised me most about changing the way I looked for clothes.

Once I intentionally started following tall women, I did not become more limited.

I actually discovered more.

More vendors.

More styles.

More options.

More things I had not known were available to me.

That is important.

Because choosing fit is not always about narrowing your world.

Sometimes the right fit expands your world.

You stop spending so much energy trying to make the wrong things work.

And suddenly you can see options that were invisible before.

That may happen in business too.

You may have spent years trying to make yourself fit into the business models that were most visible to you.

Maybe the problem is not that you do not have enough options.

Maybe you have not yet been exposed to enough architectures that make sense for someone who carries what you carry and wants the life you want.

That is why I believe we can learn from people without automatically copying them.

Look broadly for inspiration.

But choose narrowly for fit.

What Fits Now May Not Fit Forever

And I think we need permission for this.

Fit is not always permanent.

Something may fit beautifully in one season.

Then your life changes.

Your capacity changes.

Your priorities change.

Your expertise matures.

Your financial needs shift.

Your family changes.

Your body changes.

Your vision becomes clearer.

And suddenly, something that once worked begins creating tension.

That does not always mean you made the wrong decision before.

It may simply mean the architecture needs to evolve.

You do not keep wearing something that no longer fits simply because it used to.

You adjust.

Business can work the same way.

Maybe client work is exactly right while you are learning the market and refining your thinking.

Later, some of what you have developed becomes education.

Maybe live teaching helps you find the language.

Later, the teaching becomes intellectual property.

Maybe you lead every part of the work personally at first.

Later, someone else can carry certain pieces.

The structure can mature as the visionary matures.

That is not inconsistency.

That is intentional evolution.

I Keep Coming Back to the End in View

One of the ways I am learning to think differently about fit is by looking further ahead.

Not because I can predict everything.

I cannot.

But I can ask:

If this works exactly as designed, where does it take me?

That question can reveal a lot.

If this offer grows, what does my calendar become?

If I double the number of clients, what does that require from me?

If this community grows, what level of ongoing access will people expect?

If this becomes successful, will I like the job I just created for myself?

If I keep building this way for three years, what kind of life will exist around it?

Those questions do not kill opportunity.

They help us evaluate it.

Because sometimes we are so focused on whether something can succeed that we never ask whether we actually want the life attached to that success.

Build What Fits

This is where I want us to go in November.

Not toward smaller thinking.

Toward more intentional thinking.

There may be many things available to you.

Many things you could build.

Many ways your expertise could generate income.

Many opportunities that would technically work.

But Business Architecture asks us to go beyond technical possibility.

It asks:

Does this belong?

Does this support the vision?

Does it honor the visionary?

Does it work with the life that already exists?

Does it move us toward the future we actually want?

Does the opportunity fit the architecture?

That is the conversation.

Not whether something is good or bad.

Not whether someone else has made it successful.

Not whether you have enough skill to make it work.

Whether it belongs.

Because you do not need to build every business you are capable of building.

You do not need to monetize every part of what you carry.

You do not need to say yes to every opportunity that validates your expertise.

You need to become clear enough to recognize the difference between:

I could do this.

and

This belongs in what I am building.

Those two sentences can lead to very different lives.

The Architect's Question

What are you currently trying to make fit simply because you know you could make it work?

Do not rush to change it.

Just look at it.

Maybe it is an offer.

A client type.

A responsibility.

A business model.

A partnership.

A way of delivering your expertise.

Something that worked once.

Something you have always assumed you should keep doing.

Something everybody else seems to think you should want.

Look at it again.

Not through the lens of capability.

Through the lens of fit.

Because there are a lot of things you can make work.

The goal is not to prove that you can.

The goal is to build what actually belongs.

Grace and peace,

— Angela