What if the biggest thing holding your business back isn't your strategy, marketing, pricing or product?

What if your business has simply reached the point where it needs a different version of you?

In the final episode of The Sacred Shitshow® – Season 6: Plot Twist, Jess Gelling brings the entire season together with two founders at very different stages of business, but both discovering the same thing:

Every stage of business asks something new from the person building it.

Our first founder has spent months building their first product as a solo developer, only to discover that building it was actually the easy part.

Now come the human bits.

Pricing. Marketing. Selling. Finding customers. Communicating value.

And the uncomfortable realisation that another feature might feel productive, but it isn't necessarily what the business needs anymore.

Our second founder is much further along.

Their business is generating revenue while they're somewhere else entirely. Their team is working, leads are being followed up and the systems they've created mean the business no longer stops when they do.

And they've realised something surprising:

Maybe this is what success was supposed to feel like all along.

Through the RUNE lens, Jess explores the evolution from creator to business owner, from doer to leader, and from measuring success by how hard you work to measuring it by what you've built.

✨ Why building a product and building a business are two different things
✨ How perfectionism can become protection from visibility
✨ Why your first customers should become your greatest teachers
✨ Reframing marketing as communication rather than self-promotion
✨ Why another conversation can be more valuable than another feature
✨ The shift from doing everything yourself to building systems and trust
✨ Why systems are acts of leadership
✨ Building assets instead of constantly recreating effort
✨ Reducing founder dependency
✨ Why your definition of success is allowed to change
✨ Building a business that serves your life rather than a life that serves your business
✨ Becoming the founder your business needs next

Your business has never needed a perfect founder.

It needs a founder who's willing to keep evolving.

The person who starts the business isn't always the person who grows it.

The person who grows it isn't always the person who leads it.

Every new stage asks you to learn something, release something and become someone you haven't been before.

And the business only grows when you do.

As we close Season 6, Jess leaves us with one final question:

What version of me got me here… and what version of me will take me further?

Think about who you were when you started.

What have you learnt?

What have you let go of?

Who have you become?

And most importantly:

Who does your business need you to become next?

Because if Season 6 has taught us anything, it's that the next breakthrough probably isn't hiding inside another strategy.

It might be waiting inside the person you're becoming.

Thank you for joining Jess for The Sacred Shitshow® – Season 6: Plot Twist.

Eight episodes. Sixteen business stories. And hopefully, a completely different way of looking at your business and yourself.

If an episode changed the way you think, send it to another business owner who needs to hear it.

This has been Season 6: Plot Twist. 🎙️

RUNE Membership

What if something you believe about your business with absolute certainty… isn’t actually true?

Maybe you’re convinced you’re behind.

Maybe you believe everyone else has figured something out that you haven’t.

Maybe you’re terrified of losing a client because you’ve labelled them one of your “biggest”.

Or maybe you’ve repeated the same story for so long that you’ve stopped checking whether the evidence actually supports it.

In Episode 7 of The Sacred Shitshow® – Season 6: Plot Twist, Jess Gelling explores two founders whose businesses look completely different, but who are both being influenced by the same thing:

The story they believe to be true.

Our first founder is just 17. They started experimenting with business at 14, have launched businesses, made sales and experienced failure, yet social media has convinced them they’re falling behind.

While they’re still figuring things out, their feed appears full of teenagers driving Lamborghinis and becoming millionaires overnight.

So they’re asking:

“What am I doing wrong?”

But what if they’re measuring their real life against somebody else’s highlight reel?

Our second founder believes they’re about to lose three of their biggest clients.

That should feel terrifying.

Instead… it feels like relief.

When they look beyond the size of the invoices, they realise those clients aren’t particularly profitable, take significant capacity and only really make financial sense when the founder personally delivers the work.

Perhaps losing them isn’t the disaster they thought it would be.

Perhaps the business has simply outgrown them.

Through the RUNE lens, Jess explores what happens when we stop treating our assumptions as facts and ask:

What if I’m wrong?

✨ Why comparison distorts our perception of progress
✨ The danger of using social media as your measure of success
✨ Visible success vs invisible learning
✨ Why a failed business doesn’t mean you have failed
✨ Why your biggest client isn’t necessarily your best client
✨ Revenue vs actual profitability
✨ Why relief can tell us something important
✨ When old client relationships and pricing become unsustainable
✨ Why losing revenue can create space for better revenue
✨ How fear, familiarity and comparison shape business decisions

The hardest thing to let go of isn't always the client, business or opportunity.

Sometimes…

It’s the story you’ve been telling yourself about it.

“I’m behind.”

“I should be further along.”

“I can’t afford to lose them.”

“Everyone else knows what they’re doing.”

What changes when you stop assuming those things are true and look at the evidence?

If I looked at my business with fresh eyes today… what would I see differently?

Where are you assuming something is true without checking?

What story have you been repeating?

And if you stripped away the fear, comparison and familiarity…

Would you still believe it?

Sometimes the biggest shift in business doesn’t begin with a new strategy.

It begins with a new perspective.

Follow The Sacred Shitshow® so you don’t miss next week’s final episode of Season 6: Plot Twist.

Have you ever said yes to something in business while a little voice in your head was quietly saying…

“I really don’t think I should.”

A client. A discount. A project. A favour. Another revenue stream.

Sometimes we say yes because the opportunity genuinely fits.

Other times? We say yes because saying no feels terrifying.

In Episode 6 of The Sacred Shitshow® – Season 6: Plot Twist, Jess Gelling explores two business owners facing very different decisions, but both are learning the same lesson:

Just because an opportunity exists doesn’t mean it deserves a place in your business.

Our first founder believed saying yes to every opportunity was the fastest route to growth. Every client meant more revenue. Every custom request was good customer service. Every discount might secure another sale.

Until all those yeses started creating a business they didn't particularly enjoy running.

Our second founder has created a free online platform that's already attracted around 50 users, and they're coming back.

Now they're wondering how to monetise it. Advertising? Affiliate links? Something else entirely?

But perhaps the question isn't simply “How can I make money from this?”

Perhaps it's “Which way of making money actually belongs in the thing I'm trying to build?”

Through the RUNE lens, Jess explores the nervous-system patterns beneath opportunity, scarcity, boundaries, validation and our tendency to grab what's available before asking whether we actually want it.

✨ Why every yes has a hidden cost

✨ How fear and scarcity can influence the opportunities we accept

✨ Why saying yes can become a confidence strategy rather than a business strategy

✨ How we unintentionally teach clients how to work with us

✨ Why boundaries are decisions we make for ourselves, not punishments for difficult clients

✨ The difference between being customer-focused and customer-led

✨ Why not all revenue is good revenue

✨ How to identify the clients and projects that genuinely fit your business

✨ Why returning users are powerful evidence that you've created something valuable

✨ Different ways to monetise an online platform without immediately relying on advertising

✨ Why your existing audience may be your greatest source of market research

✨ The value of building assets and offers you actually own

✨ And why growth can come from becoming more selective, not less.

Freedom doesn't come from having more opportunities.

It comes from choosing which opportunities deserve a place in the business you're building.

More clients aren't automatically better clients.

More revenue streams don't automatically create a better business.

More opportunities don't automatically equal growth.

Sometimes the most commercially intelligent thing you can do is say:

No. That doesn't belong here.

What opportunity am I saying yes to simply because it's available, not because it's aligned?

Is there a client you've been reluctant to let go?

A project that no longer feels right?

An idea you're pursuing because you think you should?

Or perhaps there's an opportunity you've been avoiding because saying yes to yourself feels far scarier than saying yes to somebody else.

Don't judge what comes up.

Just notice it.

Because every yes shapes your business.

And every no shapes it too.

Throughout Season 6, we're taking real entrepreneurial stories and looking beneath the surface through RUNE, the Regulated Understanding of the Nervous System for Entrepreneurs.

Because business decisions aren't made in a vacuum.

Fear, scarcity, safety, validation and our need for certainty can all influence what we say yes to, even when logically we know something isn't right.

Follow The Sacred Shitshow® so you don't miss the rest of Season 6: Plot Twist.

And if you know a business owner who needs permission to stop saying yes to every bloody thing that lands in their inbox, send this episode their way.

RUNE: https://strangeapothecary.co.uk/main-shop/personal-development/nervous-system-leadership/