Episode 222: My Word of the Year: “Owning It” (Why It Matters for Confidence, Visibility, and Business)

In this episode, I share: • How I choose my word of the year • What “Owning It” really means (and what it doesn’t) • How this mindset shift affects confidence and visibility • Why so many small business owners want freedom but struggle with self-trust • How choosing a word of the year can guide your business and personal growth

This episode is especially for small business owners, female founders, Etsy sellers, and Shopify store owners who want to be more visible without burning out or pretending to be someone they’re not. As a #1 small business PR expert and coach, I see every day how fear of being seen holds founders back — and why owning your story matters just as much as getting featured. If you’ve been feeling ready to show up more boldly — in your messaging, your pricing, or your story — this episode will help you reflect on what you want to own this year.

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Connect with Gloria Chou on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/gloriaychou 

Join Gloria Chou’s PR Community https://www.facebook.com/groups/42863325495194

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TRANsCRIPT

[00:00:00] So every year, I have a word for that year, and it always comes to me. It’s not like I sit down and boom in one session. The word comes, it comes to me as I’m flowing through the year before. So this year my word was freedom and my word the year before this one was spaciousness. And I think having the spaciousness.

For myself really allowed me on my healing journey to find the freedom and to feel good, to lean into that freedom that I ultimately cultivated this year. So looking back on my word, which is freedom, a lot of people think, it’s traveling or making a bunch of money, or spending it on things, and maybe that’s part of it.

I mean, I do travel a lot. But for me it was something much deeper. For me, it was freedom from breaking the mold of what I thought my business would look like. And it’s not just me experiencing this. It’s so much has happened in the online world, whether it’s economically, whether it’s the age of ai, and a lot of people just fundamentally realize that, oh my gosh.

We have collectively been through so much and the things that used to work, all those marketing gimmicks, those fake urgency timers just

[00:01:00] don’t work the way it used to. And so because of that, this year of freedom has given me this blank canvas of what is it that I really wanna build in terms of my business?

How can I do things without following the frameworks of everybody else? Because again, they’re not working like they used to. What I did, one of the things that I did that I’m really proud of is create a sacred New York business experience and so it’s not a retreat and it wasn’t a conference. I knew I wanted to go deeper.

I knew I wanted to do something in person as a group over the course of two or three days where we got to go really deep. And so that’s why I created something that was completely original. And it included a cacao ceremony. We wrote letters to our old selves. I brought in facilitators and musicians that I know in New York who are deeply devoted to this work to do this.

And I called, my best videographers, photographers. To do a photo shoot that wasn’t about pretending to be the best version of yourself, but to be more about being confident in stepping into

[00:02:00] how you wanna feel for the next year. And so, holding that sacred space for a small container, a small group of people in the way that I wanted to, very different from the other playbooks of what the event should be.

Usually it includes an upsell. Mine didn’t, made me feel so good and it, it nourished me in so many ways because when I first thought about it. I had so many ideas and people telling me, this is how you should structure it and, you need to do the day one like this and day two like this.

And even though I did get some comments or feedback so that I can ideate. I completely created a brand new framework called my Unapologetic Messaging Framework, which I presented on day two, and it was brand new, and it was all about the evolution of my own messaging journey. And if you followed me for a while, you would know that before I played by the old marketing playbooks of what everyone else did.

And now it’s really about. Just me as a person, showing up and, telling you exactly where I am on my journey. And in doing so, inviting you to be the same. And a lot of it has nothing to do with pr. I still do a lot of

[00:03:00] pr, ai visibility stuff, but a lot of it’s much deeper. It’s about my own relationship with my mother.

The healing that has happened, my relationship with plant medicine and psychedelics and, somatic therapy, how the journey of scarcity, which, you know, for me from birth, the, the scarcity mindset was so deeply ingrained. You know, my mother was sewing shoes in a shoe factory growing up, and she didn’t have electricity or running water in her house.

How that shaped me and my business decisions and how I evolved as a leader, all of those things. And so that was really amazing to be able to put in and distill how my messaging framework shifted in a way that has actually welcomed a lot of people to actually wanna work with me. That’s really far away from the usual marketing gimmicks.

So instead of using timers and discounts and this bonus and that bonus and buy before X, Y, z, I just started talking like a real human and Not be afraid to call out the BS online and talking about the stuff that no one talks about. Those are the main shifts that happen, and I realized that having the freedom to

[00:04:00]be able to create a playbook like that not only allowed other people to be unapologetic as well, but it allowed them to tap into the deeper core truth of who they are.

And I think a lot of times we’ve. We’ve just been so inundated with the marketing shoulds. I call it the prison of shoulds, that it dilutes our very message, which is the core message, which is our magic spark, which is what the world needs. It dilutes it to a point where we don’t even know what that is anymore, and so being able to hold.

Space for those entrepreneurs. It was so deeply nourishing because I was able to create from a space of freedom that then allowed me to be my true self and not have this end goal in mind of, oh, there needs to be an upsell to this other thing. Because a lot of events often do entail that, and I didn’t have that.

So the presence, it allowed me to just. Be there completely for them. It really translated into transformational results for them, and so many of them felt so confident, so empowered in a real way when space is held, and so that was just really beautiful to witness. Another thing that I did, which stayed true to my word

[00:05:00] freedom for the year, is freedom from launching the way that normally online business owners launch.

there’s so many. Gimmicks and tricks and calendars and the ebbs and flows of what season you should launch and are you gonna do a webinar launch or are you gonna do, a private podcast series or, what that is? And I just didn’t want to do any of it. I did my business as usual.

I showed up, I created space to be able to have actual conversations, and I didn’t follow the normal calendar of what a launch would look. Because honestly, I did all that and yeah, it worked, but I think fundamentally we’re just in a different place right now, and I think people don’t buy because they know it works, because there’s so many other things that they could buy.

They buy when they feel ready, when they feel empowered, and you can only do that energetically through holding space and really channeling that intention of the fact that you really care. Because everything is so impersonal now. and there’s a lot of manufactured empathy out there. So I didn’t have the usual launch calendar, but what I did do is that I noticed that things were changing in the online world.

Shopify announced that it integrated with chat CBT, which forever

[00:06:00]changed the future of AI and online shopping. And so if you have a product, if you now can be visible in the AI layer, your customers are asking chat GBT right now, what to buy from. And because that happened, I just

Scraped together a webinar using slides that were mismatched and font and not the most branded thing. And I just turned on Zoom and I just. Let it rip. I, I showed up. I talked about what I knew from actual evidence from chat, GBT helping small businesses adapt and get found in this new AI shopping era, which is happening right now and much quicker than we think.

We now know that chat GBT has integrated with so many different things, including Shopify, Amazon, Walmart, and all the things, and I just wanted to give people the latest and greatest information. Now, I’m not a psychic. I don’t know. Exactly what’s gonna happen with ai. But I knew that this information needed to get out there.

And so freedom to me also meant that even though I wasn’t ready, even though I didn’t have the most perfect pitch deck that was branded and beautiful, I just got this information out. I

[00:07:00] sent a few emails. I said, Hey, this has happened. If you want to learn more, let me know. And even the, the opt-in page I remember for the actual registration didn’t look so great.

It wasn’t, again, the most beautifully designed because I didn’t have time to prepare, but I really had the intention of. How can I get this new relevant information into the hands of more people as possible so that small businesses could really seize the moment, this window of opportunity and compete with the big brands.

Another way I incorporated my word for the year of freedom into my business and life is that I just stopped using yearly metrics and yearly goals as a way to orient my team. Now I know this is a no-no in business. I’ve been in all the masterminds where we literally devote entire sessions to mapping out our entire year.

But I didn’t, I did not map out my year and I’m not the most a type person. I even when traveling, I like to land in a place and explore and get lost in one pocket instead of planning all the things I need to do, checking them boxes. And I’m starting to approach my business like art, where, I

Know what I want to get out of it.

[00:08:00] It’s more about feelings and not so much these rigid bookended goals. I started the year with this number and I end the year with this number. Now obviously I wanna see a good trend and from all the years of having these really strict numbers and all these spreadsheets and what we wanna hit, and this year not doing it and having more business come our way and, see our community flourish and get amazing results and people resonating with our content more and more.

Has really taught me a thing or two about, how there is a place for rigid numbers and goals, but in the day and age where we are all so. We’re also sensitized, or should I say, desensitized to all the marketing gimmicks, that being a human and really channeling your inner light and, showing that you’re devoted to this, that’s what’s gonna drive the numbers and, being present for that person and just.

Being that extra ounce of, generous, that’s what’s gonna, change. That’s, honoring someone and, not tricking them into buying and, helping them make a decision and staying on the phone with them. And yes, offering free calls, which a lot of people say, you shouldn’t offer any free

[00:09:00] calls.

Well, I actually wanna know if you’re a good fit for my get featured accelerator, and I want to cultivate a community. And that means vetting every person that comes because your vibe attracts your tribe, and it’s this co-creation. So freedom from having these really rigid goals, freedom from having a, number for the year, which I, I don’t have.

but then exceeding that number has really taught me so much about the flow of, business, and, how I want to do business from here on out. which is not so much about always about the destination, but really enjoying the process and the journey and people can feel that. So that’s another way Freedom has, really dictated my ear.

Now on a personal front, freedom for me means being able to live and work anywhere. obviously I have a husband, I have a dog in New York, but I traveled three months outta the year and this year I took my mom on an extended five country tour. So if you read about my blogs and how we healed our relationship and you know, we.

Only lived eight years of our lives together. My father died when I was three. There has been a lot of change

[00:10:00] and we never could see eye to eye because she’s comes from a very different culture from me. Different generations, different culture, different viewpoints, language, everything. I can never feel like I connected with her and through a lot of healing with psychedelics and, somatics finally was able to find the compassion to not get so triggered and create a space where the love can come in.

And, she didn’t change. She’s still the same. She still says things that triggers me to no end. But I changed and I softened. And because of that, she also softened. And it’s, it’s funny, it’s when you heal yourself, you heal the world. And I’ve, I’ve done a lot of podcast episodes about this and it’s very much a journey in the making.

But this year we took an extra long time to be with each other. I only see her once a year. but instead of seeing her for maybe two or three weeks, I spent nearly. I wanna say almost two months with her, which is a long time, and I’m actually recording this right now in Barcelona while I’m on, the fourth country out of our five country tour.

It’s hard, right? but freedom also means freedom from feeling guilty of how I need to

[00:11:00] be hunkering down and in my office every day and being able to, to close the books for the year. I actually told all of my clients Hey, I’m going on this journey. I’m going on this trip with my mom, one that she’s always wanted to, to be on.

So I’m closing my books for the year. I’m no longer working with clients on a one-on-one basis. Now, obviously you can still get in, might get featured accelerator, right? But in terms of one-on-one work, my books are closed until the next year. And usually I don’t say no to business, but. I gave myself the freedom to be I wanna honor this time.

And it just means that even though it’s not the most lucrative thing to do, I’m gonna give myself freedom to actually make an announcement and turn away clients until next year, because those clients will always be there. The ones that, that know what I’m about and, believe in my and aligns with my values and mission are gonna be there.

So that’s another way that I cultivated freedom. Now, I, I still have days where I’m maybe I’m traveling too much or I need to really hustle harder. But then I just realize Being able to have spaciousness and, to relax a little bit and get creative ideas flowing. And you can’t do that when you’re constantly in this fight or flight mode.

[00:12:00]

It has breathe new energy and life into what I wanna create for next year. And we actually hosted a team retreat in Thailand with my team. And instead of it being so formal before and all. Upskilling and communication and expectations. It was really about co-creating and we had so many amazing ideas when people can just relax, including myself.

And so I’m so excited for the next year of what’s ahead, we’re building so many new things with custom GBTs and AI and really being the best in class. I’m already. The number one small business PR expert, And I don’t really do a lot of SEO at all, hardly any, but it’s because of the trust that I built.

That AI now has recognized me as that I really wanna step into it and own it and deliver the best in class for small businesses. We are disrupting the PR space every single day for small businesses who are told that you’re too small to get PR or you need to hire an agency for thousands of dollars.

And we have been able to say, actually no, that’s not true. Using our. Copy and paste prompts and free AI tools like Perplexity do. AI people have gotten into 10 15 gift guides and quadrupled their AI

[00:13:00] searchability, and they are small businesses selling on Etsy. They’re, a female founder wearing all the hats.

So this is absolutely possible and freedom is the through line, through all of it. Freedom to create freedom to, to define myself differently because I don’t come from a traditional PR background. So I encourage you after you listen to this, to reflect on thematically what has this year meant for you.

Maybe it was letting go of a lot of things. Maybe it was bringing in a lot of things, but, I, I wanna know. So let me know. You can DM me on Instagram at Gloria Chow pr. That’s Gloria, C-H-O-U-P-R. And I will let you know when I do think of my word for next year, it hasn’t percolated yet. It’s, coming to me.

It always comes to me at the right time. And I’ll let you know when that does happen. But I wanted to just give you a recap of my word for this year, freedom so that hopefully you can also free yourself. From the prison of shoulds and stop measuring yourself and your self worth by what you should be doing.

And maybe the gap between where you are and where you think you should be and just coming as you are because you are worthy, you are powerful. And with that happy New Year, happy holidays

[00:14:00] and I cannot wait to have you tune in for next week’s episode.

Yay. Thank you.