The deconstruction of Alexis began in late 2009. After a profound shamanic journey I fell into the gap of awareness that starkly showed me I was not how I wanted to be in the world.

I was ego, money and power-driven.

I was more concerned about who liked me and who didn’t than I was about living my own truth. And while I was financially very successful, I was not really enjoying my life.

My team was fraught with conflict. I felt like I could not let go or it would all fall apart. And I couldn’t see a light at the end of the tunnel.

So I began the process of burning it all down.

I began to work with Tim Kelley to find a re-connection to my reason for being here on the planet.

I let go of my entire team in one business.

I broke up with my long-time boyfriend, who was also my business partner in another business.

And I deconstructed.

Within months, a new Alexis began to emerge. Much more eccentric (yes, I moved to Colorado on a whim, got married at Burning Man and bought a farm!) And much more real.

I went to Eden, a sacred land where I am hosting an event for evolutionary entrepreneurs this May, the Bahamas and Peru. I took my kids out of school a lot to travel with me. And, I got nailed by the truancy police.

During this time, I nearly killed off the program I created that trains lawyers to be a new kind of lawyer. I cut away everything that didn’t serve, lost a lot of members in the process and discovered who I really wanted to do business with as I went forward.

I got really clear that I would never be in business with someone again just because they were paying me or because I thought I needed them. I would only do business with people I enjoy being around, who I know, like and trust.

I learned a lot about people during this whole process. I saw some truths that were hard to see – about myself and others.

I almost sold the business, then I almost merged it with another business. But each time, I couldn’t do it because I did not have confidence that the work would survive if I let it go that much.

The work we do with lawyers who serve families and lawyers who serve small business owners is transformational.

I’ve invested the last 8 years of my life in creating this work, developing the systems, and streamlining them so lawyers would not have to reinvent the wheel to make a difference for their clients.  I couldn’t let them go completely.

I had to find a way to deliver the systems and materials to lawyers in a way that was both sustainable and profitable.

Sustainable in this case means that I am still involved in the business (because there is no one who coaches lawyers to build their businesses like I do), but I have a team and systems in place that can handle the marketing, fulfillment and operations without me.

It took me a year, but I finally feel as if that team and those systems are now in place and today we re-opened our Personal Family Lawyer and Creative Business Lawyer programs for the first time in over a year.

The response has been phenomenal. Lawyers are joining us, I am passionate about the business again, and this time I know how to do it without losing myself to it.

I can be who I really am and still serve lawyers, it’s a glorious day!

This is integration.

I made a video about that and the new Goddess circle that welcomed me in today. Watch it:

I was honored to give two presentations while I was there.

The first, an ignite-style presentation in which I had 6 minutes with 20 slides advancing 18s at a time.

I spoke about Love, Sweet Love for lawyers.

Here’s a bootleg copy of that presentation.

What you can’t see is that my knees were literally knocking beneath my skirt.

I’m not sure if I’ve ever been that nervous doing a presentation before.

I can do a 90-minute talk with almost no preparation and without a shred of nerves, but 6-minutes scared the heck out of me.

On Saturday, I did a full 90-minutes on the revolutionary new law business model that allowed me to build my business from scratch into a million dollar a year law firm my clients loved within just three years.

Here’s the write up about that talk.

Despite the nasty comments on the write up from curmudgeonly lawyers who give the rest a bad name and the incorrect facts in the article, a few lawyers approached me after the presentation and said it was the best they had ever heard at an ABA meeting.

What I talked about applies to all service-based business owners – business success begins with loving yourself (self-care) and then setting up your business systems so your clients know you really love them.

To do that, you need to stop trying to serve the world and instead focus on serving your just right, most perfect people you were meant to serve.

It means you need to have a team to support you – you cannot do it all alone.

And you need to stop charging for what you should be giving away and instead build what I call a stand tall and go deep business model that allows you to create true make a difference, lifelong relationships with your clients.

Self care and love – no matter what business you are in, it’ll make all the difference in the world.

Whenever you embark on a transition of your company from one stage to the next, it’s important to reconfirm your why. Transition is hard. Far harder than you expect it will be.

It will bring up everything you’ve been working your whole life to avoid. Like your fear of being alone. Your fear of running out of money.  Your fear that there is something fundamentally wrong with you.  Your fear of … name it – transitioning your company from one stage to the next will bring it up. Big time.

As I take my company through a major transition from Stage 2 to Stage 3, I’ve had to ask myself why.

Why am I making this transition? Why not simply let it be?  Or why not move on to something else and give this intense, massive, taking everything I’ve got to make it happen energy to the two other businesses I’m growing?

It takes a HUGE amount of energy to jump from one stage to the next.

In this case, it has required me to replace nearly my entire team.

And through all of this transition, the same question kept coming up – why? Why make the transition?  And why continue to serve lawyers?

This second question  – why serve lawyers – has been asked of me by

… fellow marketers who insist they would never serve lawyers because they are too difficult to deal with,

… my own lawyer who advised me to get out of the lawyer market because lawyers are too difficult to deal with,

… my coach who has also worked with lawyers and says they are too difficult,

… and my banker who gently suggested it might be easier for me to focus on serving the general entrepreneurial market.

And so in honor of National “Be Kind To Lawyers” Day (which was actually yesterday, but I ran out of time to write this post yesterday), this is why I serve lawyers:

First of all, let me say this – there are a lot of lawyers I don’t like.  They are negative, unhelpful, mean, pessimistic, curmudgeonly, out to get as much as they can for themselves and pretty much the ones who give all the rest of us a bad name.  Those are not the lawyers I serve.

In fact, those lawyers, wish I would go away.

The lawyers I serve went to law school to help people.  They want to make a positive difference in their client’s lives.  They are lovers, not fighters.  They are grateful.  And giving.

They deserve to have a sustainable business model.

When I left the big law firm in 2003, I felt scared, lost and alone.  I rented office space from lawyers who had been doing it for 10-25 years and their lives seemed almost worse than the newest associates at biglaw.

They worked constantly and never seemed to get ahead.  Scrambling.

I prayed for a day when I wouldn’t have to worry where new clients would come from.  A day when I could quote my fees without feeling sick.  And that when I did, my prospects would get it.  Say yes.

Most importantly, I prayed for a day when I would feel really great about what I did.

Because for a long time, I didn’t.

I knew that the work I was doing was most likely going to be a waste.  I knew that the expensive stacks of paper my clients signed were just that – stacks of paper.

I knew that at the end of their lives or when they faced a lawsuit or in the midst of some other crisis, those documents wouldn’t work.

Why?  Because they were pieces of paper that oftentimes were out of date within weeks of my clients walking out of my office.

I wouldn’t hear from those clients again until something happened. Something bad.  And then, it was oftentimes too late.  My hands were tied.

I felt helpless.

I knew I could really help me clients if only I could be proactive.  A real counselor. I mean that’s why I had gone to law school, right?

But, how could I do that?  The business model had me constantly focused on bringing in the next new client.

I wanted to get to know my clients and help them make meaningful decisions throughout their lifetime.  But I wasn’t getting paid for that.

I was getting paid to draft documents.

I began to question my own value.  Which of course made it impossible for clients to value me.

So I told the clients my documents were better.  More customized.  At the time, I didn’t realize that’s something lawyers say, but is actually total B.S.  The more “custom” the documents, the more chance for error.

Then I began to talk about lifetime relationship.  Because it’s what I really wanted.

But when I looked around at the reality of my practice, there was no lifetime relationship.  I was a solo lawyer with one part-time team member and constantly trying to bring in my next new client.  Where was their room for lifetime relationship?

So, I began to give away my time for free.  When clients who had paid me for legal documents would call, I’d talk to them on the phone, hear their problems, make recommendations and not charge them.  Because it was only for a few minutes here and a few minutes there.

Those minutes began to eat up my life.

Then, I got resentful.  I was giving away so much for free.  So much value.  And yet I still had trouble helping clients understand why they should pay me double what they’d pay the guy down the street just providing a set of documents they could have gotten online or on QVC.

I knew something was broken, but I didn’t know what.  I just knew that I wanted more.  More for my clients.  More for my family.  More for myself.

I wanted to feel great about what I did.  I wanted to have time to spend with my family.  I wanted to make a deep and lasting impact in my client’s lives and for them to feel grateful to write me a check.

To make that a reality, I realized I’d have to change everything.  I’d have to build a business model that worked.  I’d have to buck the norms.  Go against the traditional advice.

I’d have to risk it all.

So, I did.  And as I was doing it and I was scared and I didn’t want to do it anymore and I wanted to turn back, I perservered because I wasn’t just doing it for myself.

What kept me going was thinking of the other lawyers out there, suffering as I was.

I thought of them and I kept moving forward.  I thought of them when I wasted money on things that didn’t work.  I thought of them when I cobbled together the systems and had to do it all manually and without anyone to show me the way for years. I thought of them when I invested huge money to learn from consultants, coaches, and other business owners outside of the legal industry.

And I thought of them when I figured it out.

The year I hit 7 figures of revenue in my law firm, had thrilled clients and I did it working only 2 days a week in my office, I thought of those lawyers, and their families and their clients.

It really was possible to have a law firm that really did make a difference for clients, that didn’t require me to work 6 days a week and that supported my family.

I couldn’t keep that to myself.   It’s too important.  For all of you who are currently working with lawyers who aren’t really serving you.  And for the lawyers who care.

So, that’s why I serve lawyers.

For the 2nd time, I am three years into a million dollar business venture of my own creation and I am beginning to see a pattern.  I am committed to living beyond patterns and conditioning, so now that the pattern has been noticed, I am committed to doing something different.

What did Einstein say?  “Insanity is doing the same thing again and again and expecting different results.”

So here I am.

Exactly where I was just a couple of years ago in so many respects.

And yet so far away.

The difference this time is that I seem to be willing to let go in the right places, even though it’s really hard.

I kept my law firm operating too long because I couldn’t let go.  I told myself it was because I had to take care of all the people who worked for me.  I was doing it for them.

A part of me was.  But, another part of me simply couldn’t let go.  Of them.  Of the clients.  Of the reputation.  Of the identity.

By the time I did, it was too late.

And I’m still dealing with the fall out from it.

I won’t do the same thing again.  And, yet, here I am.  Making the conscious decision to break free of conditioning and patterned responses is difficult.

I’ve done what I do and built something that’s making a huge difference.  But, it’s time for its next evolution.

And I’m committed to allowing that evolution to happen in a way that’s best for the organization as a whole.  The work is too important.

I won’t make the same mistake.  Maybe a different one, but not the same one.

So, I’m letting go.  But instead of letting go into the hands of someone who has never run a million dollar company before and doesn’t have a proven track record (which is what I did last time), I’ve decided to create a whole new paradigm of business operation.

This will either be the greatest experiment in letting go ever and I’ll go on to write a 4-Hour Work Week-like book about it and make it to the NYT bestseller list or I’ll be just be another schmo who runs businesses into the ground.

That’s my fear of course.

One failure is acceptable and even seen as a positive in some circles.

But, two?  That begins to look like a pattern.

That’s what my mind tells me at least.

Of course, lots of people tell me that my law firm was a huge success, not a failure.  And then I tell myself that too as reinforcement.  Because it was – if I had wanted to be a lawyer.  I’d be rolling in the dough now.  A pillar of my community.  Living the American Dream.

It sounds great and I know I SHOULD have wanted it.  It just wasn’t my path.

So I sold it and had what I have now discovered is an all too common post-sale experience.  Within 6 months, the guy I sold it to stopped paying me, stopped paying the bills and was not servicing the clients as I would have.

Since I’ve started talking about this, I’ve begun to hear from other business owners that this is a quite common situation.  A company is sold to the wrong person or people and in anywhere from 6 months to 2 years, the company is out of business.  Each one left with a varying degree of debt and/or liability.

I don’t want that to happen again.

The work I have created is transformational.  I know how much it’s impacting lawyers and the clients they serve on a deep level.

I can’t make the same mistake again.

So, I’m doing something different.  Very different.

Yesterday, I announced to my Personal Family Lawyers that now that the company is three years old and has a solid foundation – solid recurring revenue, systems that are proven to work not just by me, but now by additional law firms implementing the systems as well, documented financials and projections – it’s time to evolve to the next level.

I consider all different possibilities and ultimately thanks to the purpose work I’m doing with Tim Kelley, I have determined that the most purposeful thing I can do is let go with purpose.

Letting go with purpose for me means looking at what would be most purposeful for me individually, the company as a whole and ultimately the world.  Discovering that option, becoming aware of it, then trusting and letting go.

It’s scary as shit.

So yesterday, I sent the PFLs a letter letting them know that I am going to model the new paradigm of collaborative operations within the PFL program.

Over the next few weeks, I will be inviting Personal Family Lawyers who meet certain criteria to be on the Senior Counsel of the organization. They will pay a membership fee to participate (so they have skin in the game) and receive my personal coaching on their business (people pay $3,000/mo. for this) in exchange for their membership on the Counsel.

Those are the last decisions I will make alone and the group can choose to change them as part of the collaborative process, which takes into account the perspectives of all stakeholders.

This group will be trained in the Collaborative Operating System model and we will document that as best as possible to share with other organizations in the future in case this works.

Within some period of time (once the training is complete), I intend that the Senior Counsel (of which I will be a member) redesign every aspect of the program so that the work thrives if the community wants it to thrive.

That means, the Counsel will make all decisions, including the extent of my continued involvement, how  much I’ll be paid if I do continue to be involved, how much I’ll be paid if I don’t continue to be involved, what I do on behalf of the organization, etc.

This is a grand experiment. I will chronicle it here, even when it’s scary.  Especially when it’s scary.

A model of the new paradigm.

How can I talk to you about how it should be, if I’m not blazing the trail?

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Please let me know that this is impactful for you.  Hearing that will give me the fuel I need to keep going down this path (as if I could stop it now?!?) – I’m really scared and the fact that it inspires you, inspires me to keep going.

I haven’t been writing because I’ve been in a dark space and I haven’t wanted to share that because there’s so much amazing stuff happening in my life that I’m in gratitude for and I want to keep my attention on that.

And yet, the darkness is there too.  I’ve been keeping it hidden.

I told myself I was keeping it hidden because I didn’t want to focus on it, didn’t want to make it real, didn’t want to grow it.

But, by keeping it hidden I inadvertently lead you to believe that your life has to be perfect for you to step into the greatness of who you really are.

When, in truth, it’s just the opposite.  You can only step into your greatness if you don’t wait for the darkness to dispel.  You’ve heard the saying tha the light is most visible as it shines through the darkness.

It applies to your light too.

No matter what’s going on in your life, you CAN be thinking big.  There’s nothing to hold you back now except your own BS (belief systems).

It’s never the right time.  Just like it’s never the right time to have a baby.  It’s never the right time to think bigger about who you are.

In fact, there’s no better time than now.  Because what I can tell you is if you wait until all the challenges are gone, you’ll be at the end of your life before you realize you’re out of time.

Ok, so I know you are dying to know about this darkness.

What darkness am I experiencing in my life?

Closing down my law firm has brought me face to face with the darkness of people who feel abandoned by me.  People who feel left behind.

I promised a lifetime relationship and now I’m no longer going to be their lawyer.

And while I have trained Personal Family Lawyers throughout the Southern California area who will step in and provide the ongoing service I promised, there are people who are not happy with that.

Rather than expressing their disappointment and sadness as that, they’ve turned their pain into anger and threats.

Susan, my Client Services Director, who has borne the brunt of these attacks, is a saint.  She’s trying to shield me while at the same time conveying the messages.  And with each new report, I have a choice.

I can react in kind with my own indignance (made that word up!) or I can recognize another opportunity to be more of who I am, feel compassion for the person who is unhappy and remember the Truth.

I have done everything I possibly can to ease this transition.  The truth is, I’m no longer the best lawyer for my clients.

It’s hard to acknowledge that, but it’s true.

They deserve to have a lawyer who is in her office, focused on their needs, at least 4 days per week, not traveling around the country constantly, teaching and doing tv appearances.  They deserve a lawyer who has an office they can go to, who will be available to talk with them when needed.  They deserve a lawyer who has a team to answer quick questions and will be able to sit with them and go over their planning decisions on a regular basis and keep things up to date.

My clients deserve a Personal Family Lawyer and there is just no way I can be that lawyer and fulfill my life’s purpose at the same time.

I tried everything I could to bring a lawyer into my office who would be able to keep things going for my clients, but my standards are high and ultimately I could not find someone in Redondo Beach who was ready to step up in a big way build upon what I had created.

So now, my clients need to choose a lawyer in San Pedro or Santa Monica or Sherman Oaks to find the same kind of service and ongoing relationship.

And that’s painful.  I hear ya.  I loved the office in Redondo Beach, also.  I loved working with you, also.  I’ll miss you, also.

What’s so suprising to me is that a few of my clients are expressing their pain with threats and anger.

I haven’t written about it because I was trying to pretend that darkness didn’t exist.  But, it does.  And, I have to acknowledge that and bring compassion to it and not hide it away.

By hiding it away, I don’t allow you to see that you too can shine your light through the darkness.  It leads you to believe that everything has to be perfect for you to go big.  And, that’s the exact opposite of the truth.

Fortunately, I have seen rays of light through this darkness that have given me huge hope.

Here’s an example:

I was working with a woman named Helen on a book project.  I promised to write a book as part of a series of books she is creating.  She’s been asking me for the first two chapters for two months now and I just have not had time to get to it.

Between closing down the firm, working on the TV show treatment, training lawyers, raising kids, being a girlfriend, appearing on TV and trying to spend a little time every now and then taking care of myself, I just couldn’t get to it.

So, finally, I wrote to Helen and I told her I was just not going to be able to participate and I was so sorry.

I held my breath waiting for her reaction.  Given the feedback I’ve been getting from a few of my clients as I’ve honestly told them I just can’t do it all, I expected anger on her part.  I expected to get an email saying “Alexis, you promised you’d do this.  Now, I’m going to hold you to it.  And, if you don’t do it, I’m calling my lawyer.”

I braced myself for that response, in fact.

To my great joy, that’s not what I heard at all.  Just the opposite.

Helen responded “Alexis, congratulations!  We are so excited for everything that is happening in your life!”  She went on to let me know that she wanted to support me in what I have going on in my life and if we could find  a way to work together, great.

We’ve got a call scheduled for Feb. 25 to talk about how we can work together anyway.

This is the type of woman I want to do business with, I will make time for and cannot wait to build amazing things with.

What’s so exciting is that I am finding more and more people like that in my life.    And so I recognize that the mean people are slowly but surely disappearing and this experience has given me the opportunity to uplevel the people I do business with and share my life with.

Yes, its scary.  But, I’m being afraid and doing it anyway.

By the way, if you are ready to step into something bigger and just need a little hand-holding, encouragement, motivation and guidance to make it through the rought spots, I’m launching a monthly program that will help you do just that.  The first month’s free.  Check it out here.

While I’m down to being there only 2 days or so a month, I find myself getting very tense as I approach those two days.

I want to spend my time writing, coaching, creating and parenting my kids – doing the things that allow me to feel the vast freedom of who I am.

While it’s true that my law business has elements of writing, coaching and creating, which satisfied me for a few years, I’ve moved on to the next stage of that evolution and yet the law business still needs me, for now.

But yesterday, despite all my dread leading up to it, turned out to be one of those days that actually provided fuel for me to stay on my path of changing the way lawyers think and changing the way the public thinks about lawyers. It’s a day that will help me through what Seth Godin calls “The Dip”, as I build the new business.

First, I was in Court (in front of Commissioner Reva Goetz who has been overseeing the Britney Spears conservatorship and just ordered $400,000 be paid to the various lawyers involved in Britney’s case).

I was there on a case that is a stark reminder of exactly why every parent needs to read my book and why you should take the simple legal actions to protect your kids’ well-being and care.

The long and the short of it is that three years ago 4 kids were sent to live with their aunt after their mom and dad died and three years later we are still in Court racking up legal bills trying to make sure that the aunt didn’t squander the teeny bit of money mom and dad left behind for the kids. Ugly. Never needed to happen this way.

Then, I came back from Court and went to do a home visit with one of the warmest, kindest families I’ve had the pleasure of spending time with. Five kids, mom and dad. I went to their home because dad is dying and he wants to know that everything has been taken care of for his kids before he goes.

They’ve spent the past couple of years working with another lawyer on dad’s complex estate plan and about 6 months ago realized that lawyer was not doing what he promised.

This lawyer was the traditional type lawyer billing them flat fee at first and then later by the hour – at $400/hour. The family made several decisions within the past year without consulting this lawyer because they didn’t want to pay the hourly rates he charged. So, they took actions without really knowing why and found that many of the things this lawyer had recommended they do were never followed up on because there was no one making sure everything got done. Typical.

Now we are scrambling to get everything in place the right way so Dad can have the peace of mind he needs to let go in peace. Another reminder of why the traditional lawyer’s business model must change. Hourly fees must go.

Last, I met with a client I haven’t seen for three years. Three years ago, my law firm was just like the rest – I prepared legal documents and talked about relationship, but didn’t have any real way to provide that relationship. Today we do.

This client came in for the three year review of her plan, which we provide as part of our service to all of our clients because sticking form documents on a shelf and never looking at them again means your plan is going to fail when your family needs it.

It turns out that in the three years since I last saw this client, lots of things have happened in her life that she really should have talked with me about ahead of time because I could have saved her a lot of grief, taxes and potentially liability by making sure she set things up in the right way.

She invested in property with someone else without an agreement and is now at risk of losing a lot of money, she made a loan to a business partner that is not well documented and could end up not good, she started a real estate development company that doesn’t own the assets it’s supposed to own and her husband sold his business, which could have been structured for maximum estate tax and asset protection, but wasn’t.

After meeting with me yesterday, she’ll be joining our Business Plan membership program and will consult us before doing any of those things ever again, but as she said – she just didn’t know. She thought we just prepared Trusts. My bad for not getting my message across and out there earlier. But, reconfirmation that the radical change in the business model is so needed and valuable.

So, while I was dreading the day and it took time away from what I really want to be focusing my time and energy, it was an important and necessary reminder of why lawyers must change the way they think and why I must change the way you think about your relationship with your lawyer.