Relationships: Practicing Inclusivity Rather Than Exclusion in Relationships by Making the Invitation

In Episode 9 of The Business Mamas Podcast, I introduced a Framework for Enhanced Well-Being - Focus on Beliefs, Relationships & Making Heart-Guided Decisions.

It's by using this framework that I have found the greatest improvement in my ability to be present in my life, to be present in the joy of my work when I'm working, to be present in the joy of my relationships when I'm spending time with myself and with the others.

Today, I want to talk with you further about relationships, and in particular, I want to talk with you about inclusivity versus exclusion, and being the person who makes the invitation.

Practicing exclusion is easy. You stay in your own lane. You don't expose who you really are to others. You hide and by hiding you protect yourself to a certain degree. You protect yourself from being hurt by never really being seen. If people don't know who you really are, then they can't hurt you because they don't know your vulnerabilities. They don't know what matters to you or what you care about.

When you do this, you are really excluding everyone from getting to know the true you. You are depriving others of the value they would gain from knowing you and you are depriving yourself of the value you would gain from being in meaningful relationships with others.

I’ll share a story with you about how I learned to practice inclusion and make the invitation. I met Linda Easton at a luncheon for the Central Coast’s Chapter of the National Association of Women Business Owners (NAWBO) in San Luis Obispo.

This was pre-Covid times. We sat together at a table and took turns, each sharing about a book that had been meaningful in our lives. Linda shared enthusiastically about a book she was reading that was guiding her on how to take her business to the next level. She told me that she was going to create a book group where we could work through the book together chapter by chapter, supporting one another to implement the steps the author suggested in our own businesses.

Reading that book and being in a supportive environment while working through the book changed me as a business owner in so many wonderful ways. I spent many lunch breaks in the company of Carol, Marianna, Lindsey, and Linda until suddenly an aggressive form of cancer took Linda's life without warning. At her memorial, I can't even tell you the number of people who said “Linda invited me to coffee” or “Linda invited me to lunch”. Linda always made the invitation when she enjoyed another person's presence.

Linda always offered to take the relationship to the next level and everyone who was lucky enough to be invited by her won because of that. I honor my friend Linda by now extending the invitation to others.

Extending an invitation is an act of generosity. It is a gift just to be invited regardless of whether or not the invitation is accepted.

When Linda invited me to be in her book group, I was honored. As a mother of two little ones, I am very selective with what invitations I accept because I know that time is precious. When my oldest son was only a few months old and we had just moved back to San Luis Obispo, I was invited to join a networking group that met once a week from 7 a.m. to about 8 a.m. I was tempted to join because it seemed like a good move for my business development. My son usually woke up at about 7 a.m. The thought of leaving the house before he was even awake, being at work all day, and then only getting a little bit of time with him at night was not something I was willing to accept even if it was just one day a week. I followed my heart on that one and I declined the invitation. I know it was the right decision.

Linda's invitation was that we find a time that worked well for all of the women in the book group. I proposed a lunch during the work week because I needed to eat lunch anyway and this would be a great opportunity to maximize the chance to learn and connect with other women business owners, while simultaneously minimizing how much extra time I would need to add to my workday and be away from my kids. If lunch didn't work out as the time for our meetings, I may have not joined the book group, but luckily the other women thought a lunch meeting was a great time for the meeting too and our book group was born.

Even if I had ultimately declined being in the book group, I took just being asked as such a compliment.

When you come across someone that you would like to get to know more, just extend the invitation. By extending the invitation, we get to rise together. There is nothing sweeter than getting to rise together. Reaching new heights in business and in life can still be satisfying when you're not sharing it with anyone, but when you're sharing your journey and getting to see others rise along with you, it's so much sweeter!

My call to action for you is this:

1) Take time to consider if there someone you met that when you share time with them, you find yourself feeling better just having shared that time with them?

2) That's a sign. This is a person that you have the potential of having a special connection with.

3) Get yourself ready to extend an invitation to this person by doing this:

• Decide that you will put yourself out there rather than hiding.

• Remind yourself that you and your invitation have value.

• Remind yourself that it's a gift to get to be in your presence.

4) Know this in your heart and confidently extend the invitation to others.

• The right people will accept your invitation.

• If your invitation is declined, then it wasn't the right person or it wasn't the right time for that person and that's okay.

• Don't take getting declined as a sign that your invitation doesn't have value because it does. Keep making it. The person or people who are meant to accept it will accept it.

5) Can you identify a group that you've been interested in but you haven't yet joined?

• Sign up to attend their next gathering.

I want to leave you with an example of why you shouldn’t take having your invitation declined personally or as a sign that your invitation doesn’t have value. If Linda's book group was going to be in the early morning hours where I'd have to miss time with my kids, it wouldn't have been the right invitation for me. That wouldn't have said anything about the value of her invitation.

We never know how much precious time each of us gets on this earth, but we do know that life is precious and it's short.

I encourage you to bravely extend the invitation and build the relationships that you truly want in your life.

If you enjoyed Episode 17 and this blog post, I would love it if you shared the blog or the podcast with someone you think could benefit from them. I would also be incredibly grateful if you could leave an honest rating and review of The Business Mamas Podcast on Apple Podcasts as that helps more people find the show and it helps me in sharing this message of practicing self-love and self-care with more people whose lives I know could be enriched by hearing it. Sign up to download my Morning Routine Guide and receive my twice-monthly newsletter at The Business Mamas Podcast.

Until next time and with gratitude, Kara Stein-Conaway, @karasteinconaway on Instagram.