Look at My Hopes, Look at My Dreams
What Capsule Toys Taught Me About Breadwinner Energy
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This week, I reflected on a quiet conversation that happens with every client as they achieve their financial goals. It’s a chat I had in my own head as I waited (and waited, and waited) in a capsule toy shop in Kyoto.
I’ll be direct: my kid loves crap. He is into “limited edition merch” as is a moth to the flame. On the first day of our Japan trip, we stumbled into a capsule toy shop, a storefront filled with oversized bubble gum machines that hold opaque plastic eggs filled with collectible, often plastic, trinkets. Each egg costs $2-$3 and each themed trinket comes in four or five variations.
Each day, we spent time browsing rows of machines out of FOMO. There could be anything in there! The experience and resulting bounty brought my child so much joy. For me, these were unrecoverable hours of my life on an expensive international trip, spent supervising an activity I strongly discourage at home.
As I stood in that store, my unvarnished thoughts were:
- Do you even appreciate what it took to organize excursions and accommodations while I ran my company, kept you housed and fed, and took care of everything for our entire household?
- Do you understand that this is also my first visit to this fascinating place with thousands of years of culture, and I am wasting it watching you look for anime robots?
- Does anyone appreciate the blood, sweat, and literal tears that went into earning this money, which you are now wasting on plastic crap?
In that moment, I experienced Big Breadwinner Energy.
When the Money Gets Real
About 60% of small business founders say they are motivated by the opportunity to earn more money. Guess what? When you actually do it, it’s a whole mindset shift.
Earning money as a single person has the energy of Destiny’s Child “Independent Woman Pt. 1.” The shoes on my feet, the car I’m driving, the rock I’m rockin’ — I bought ‘em. Sure did.
But what happens when you gotta buy all that and what everybody else wants and needs, too?
This is a real mindset shift, especially for women. You may have been raised to expect that you should have some of your own money in your own name, but as mad money so you don’t have to justify what you want, or as a backup in case things go bad. You understand the expected duty to others in the form of unpaid labor, of course. But perhaps you expected a financial peer to cover some of the costs of day-to-day life, especially the boring stuff like the car insurance and property taxes.
Big Breadwinner Energy takes some adjusting. As the source of financial stability, you may give up the shoes, the car, and the rocks so everyone can thrive. And those thriving might be your partner, kids, parents, friends, siblings, employees, or consultants. You pay for housing, school fees, and healthcare while they’re gleefully buying capsule toys.
Leading with Abundance, Not Resentment
As self-funded CEOs, you may experience Big Breadwinner Energy around employee compensation. As you hire more experienced or skilled people, they might make more than you do, or what you made at that level. You will be paying some portion of their benefits. They may take vacations while you have to work.
When you’re self-funded, it’s hard to not think zero-sum about that money. You’re paying someone instead of paying yourself. You may think, I didn’t get paid this much when I was at this level. I’m paying this person more than I pay myself, and I’m taking all the risk. I could take a month off every year at a resort in Mexico.
It’s hard to not ask, what am I getting from this?
One of the evolutions of Big Breadwinner Energy is to not get all ‘80s Dad Energy about it. You might remember the special breadwinner privileges of the last 20th century, like surrendering the biggest pork chop or being sent outside for an hour because “Dad works hard for us and needs some time to himself.” Nope, you’re gonna be doing school pickup and shuttling the kids to baseball practice while filling the Instacart order and buying a bunch of fruit besides bananas.
When you get the financial growth you wanted from owning a business, it will test your centering principles. It’s okay to be honest about these feelings. I guarantee your other entrepreneur friends have their own stories. You will be tested when you’re writing that monthly insurance check. When you offer a market salary. When you pay the whole mortgage.
A Reminder to Celebrate the Win
It’s time to step up to being the boss and leader you said you wanted to be, which is a milestone of your success. And it’s not a switch you can flip. I have yet to work with a business owner who didn’t have some mindset work to do around becoming the definitive financial source for their team and family.
Here’s what I reminded myself:
- Pressure is a privilege.
- In my family, I am the keeper of our abundance mindset, and I take that leadership seriously.
- It is a blessing to own a company that’s doing well enough that we can have more than our basic needs.
- I am grateful for the skills, capabilities, and luck that have created this bounty.
- My 9-year-old child is respecting a budget, acknowledging each dollar spent, and taking joy from this experience. I bought an armful of jelly bracelets at Maurice’s, $2 of allowance at a time.
- I am definitely buying myself that overhyped face cream that I have to pay tariffs on at home. (I did. It’s glorious.)
On our last morning in Toyko, the kiddo dashed among the Akihabara shops, emptying his pockets of the last few hundred yen. And I helped him hunt for the final limited edition robot toy, which we finally found in the fourth shop. I hope he will treasure what he took home as much as I have.
