Why You Keep Getting The Same Feedback

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“This price is WAY too low.”

“You need to raise the price.”

“You’re offering way too much for that price.”

“Either narrow the scope by 75% or at the very least 4x your price.”

“Isa, you keep seriously underpricing.”

This is what I heard every time I got in the hot seat for business coaching for at least my first year in business.

And it was hard to hear.

Because I was trying.

But my belief system hadn’t caught up with an appropriate price for the value of my work.

Every time my coach told me to raise my price, I had to confront a long history of being overworked and underpaid, undervalued, and gaslit into undervaluing myself. Before I could get to the confidence and optimism of charging thousands of dollars for my labor, attention, and energy, I had to wade through grief, anger, resentment, suspicion, mistrust, disappointment, disillusionment, and depression. It was deeply uncomfortable. After all, this was emotional labor I’d been avoiding my whole life up to that point.

Thank goodness my coach was there to hold me accountable and keep nudging my prices upward. I wonder if I would have burnt out and given the whole thing up without her.

It is true that no one else could “fix” this problem for me.

The fix required my participation and effort.

And I DID have to go through the hard part. I had to underprice and overwork and feel how badly that felt. I had to watch clients who paid like $300 work off my marketing strategies for YEARS to come. I had to literally see with empirical evidence the results my work was getting for them before I started to dare to believe I should be charging more… By, like, a lot. (Eventually, I 10xed the price and tripled sales. I share that story here.)

But I bet that journey would have taken me much, much longer if it hadn’t been for my coach (shout out to Cera Byer!) who kept giving me the same feedback over and over again- and introducing me to new thoughts to replace the “no one will pay for this” self doubt nonsense that had been playing on loop in my subconscious.

So I had to hear the same feedback. Over and over again. Over many months.

I spent thousands of dollars to be told the same thing again, and again, and again, and again.

And let me tell you, it was worth every penny.

Here’s why.

It doesn’t become muscle memory until you’ve practiced it. A lot.

Like, thousands of times.

This is true for building a new physical skill.

For example, the most common feedback I have to give when teaching people how to ride horses is “heels down!”

(This is important for safety and proper riding posture, as it helps keep the rider rooted in the saddle, better able to balance with the horse’s movements- even when unexpected, in the event of a spook, bolt, buck, etc. It also helps stabilize the rider’s leg so they are able to use the leg to communicate with the horse effectively and intentionally.)

One of my adult students told me the other day that she was feeling discouraged because she had been really working on keeping her heels down and thought they were down.

Here’s what I told her: “Your heels were down a minute ago, when you were thinking about it. But then you were thinking about posting on the correct diagonal and bending through the corner and your heels crept back up. You just haven’t practiced heels down enough for them to stay down on autopilot. We’re still in the phase of having to think about it and make a conscious effort for it to happen. But the more you practice, the sooner it will become muscle memory! And that’s why you’re paying me your hard earned money so I can remind you when you forget, so you become a stronger, safer, more effective and more relaxed rider more quickly.”

In other words, she was in the Cognitive Phase of building muscle memory, a completely normal initial stage of the process.

But here she was expecting herself to skip right to the final Autonomous Phase.

An unfair and unkind expectation to hold for herself. But how many of us can relate? We keep expecting ourselves to begin something new at Mastery Level.

Keep that up and you’re right on track for a major crashout.

That’s why it really helps to have a good teacher or coach, there to encourage you through the learning stages, introduce new concepts and perspectives that you haven’t yet thought of, and hold you accountable to your own goals. 

Also to check you when you’re beating yourself up rather than putting in your reps. Because these are not the same thing and you can’t punish yourself into improvement. You just have to be willing to show up as an imperfect beginner willing to learn new things and practice new ways of moving.

True for riding horses, true for entrepreneurship.

That’s why we wind up talking about pricing, handling scope creep, protecting your peace, not expecting yourself to be an immediate Black Belt/Subject Matter Expert/PhD in each new skill/endeavor you attempt, being kind to yourself through the learning process, and prioritizing what feeds your creative well so freaking much in the Squad 🎉, my club for big-hearted, black sheep, rebel entrepreneurs shattering glass cielings, breaking cycles, and refusing to fight for a seat at the table when we can build our own, better tables, were we all get to eat.

Because for most of us, we have not yet practiced these things enough for them to be second nature.

Repetition is needed to incorporate new beliefs about yourself, your work, your clients, value etc. And you definitely have to practice new social/emotional skills like communicating boundaries, healthily handling conflict, and asking for what you want.

Before going into business or ourselves, a lot of us were totally unaware of the dashboard with which we were navigating the world. By “dashboard” I mean our default beliefs, narratives, and outlook on whether certain things, relationships, situations, etc. tend to work out for us or not. Also, our sense of time, how our creativity works, how we plan ahead, what we need in order to be at our optimum capacity.

Totally unaware that other people navigate the world using completely different dashboards.

Totally unaware of when our operating system needs an update.

Totally unaware that upgrading our dashboard is possible.

Awareness is the first step.

You have to see it to change it.

For example, you can absolutely change a default belief like: “everyone undervalues me and would never be willing to pay me in a way that leaves me feeling resourced rather than scrambling.” But first you’d have to be aware that this is the default story you’ve been telling yourself. Then you’d have to come up with a better story like: “my aligned clients value how they’ll benefit from my work so highly that they’ll happily pay top dollar for access.” Sometimes you can’t even conceive of a better story until someone you respect suggests a new one for you. But however you come across that better story, you’re going to have to practice it. A lot. Repeat it over and over until it becomes your new default.

That’s why my coach had to tell me to raise my prices month after month. That’s why every single lesson I’m telling my riding students to keep their heels down. That’s why I’m always telling Squad members to tell that needy client that that latest request was out of scope, so unfortunately they will not be providing that extra deliverable. OR that they’d be happy to for an additional fee of X and a timeline extension of Y.

Nothing has gone wrong. You’re not “behind” in your entrepreneurial journey. This is just a normal part of learning.

You just need to practice.

And perspective to know WHAT to practice.

That’s what I’m here for. I serve as on-demand marketing director and on-call cheerleader for The Squad 🎉, THE club for first-gen entrepreneurs breaking all the rules to be wildly successful, wildly resourced, and wildly of service. From marketing masterclasses to hot-seat business coaching to neurodiverse-friendly coworking to using creativity to process the emotional challenges of entrepreneurship to a private community of cheerleaders & coconspirators, Squad is THE place to smash through business goals you’ve been stuck at when going it alone. Tomorrow, Dec 1, 2025, is the last day of my once-a-year discount on memberships. Price goes up Dec. 2. And if you join in December 2025, you get December 2025 for free and all of 2026 included in your annual membership.

We have events you’re not going to want to miss like 2026 business planning, marketing block busting, and an arts for emotional regulation experience starting right away- so the earlier you get in, the better.

If you miss the discount date, don’t worry. Even at full price, this is the most affordable membership of this caliber on the market. Seriously, this is less than you probably spend a month on car insurance if you live in California right now. You GOTTA know that building a profitable marketing system for your business while protecting and enhancing your peace of mind is DEFINITELY worth that. And meeting your new business besties? Priceless. Get in here.