Your business success isn’t luck—it’s a conscious decision that starts with a success mindset for a brand new year. Juliet Clark welcomes Lin Yuan-Su, the founder of Enlightened Success Institute and a coach who famously built a multi-seven-figure business after making a powerful, spirit-led decision to leave her stable career as a registered dietitian. Lin dives into her “Success Trifecta,” highlighting that Mindset is 80% of the game, followed by Aligned Strategy and then Action. She shares her personal journey from an employee-mindset to becoming a powerful business owner, underscoring why authors and entrepreneurs must stop treating their book as a costly hobby and start seeing it as a lucrative business. Lin also emphasizes the necessity of creating a solid plan, putting ongoing business activities onto your calendar, and setting a clear, detailed vision that includes both personal health and relationships for full-spectrum success.
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Success Mindset For A Brand New Year
I’m so excited. We’ve got some beginning of the year inspo from Lin Yuan-Su. Before we get going, I want to tell you guys, in March, we have a new book, new program, everything coming out. Gary McDermott and I, my AI partner, have been working really hard on a new AI program that will run basically a two-year marketing plan for you.
We have a course set up that goes with it that explains all of the scientific data and how you’re actually supposed to do your marketing in a way that works. We’re going to be sharing all that with you, and there’s lots of workbooks inside the new course. You should have your avatar nailed by the time we’re done.
My guest is Lin Yuan-Su. She left behind a successful healthcare career to follow her true calling and went on to build a multi-seven-figure coaching business from the ground up. As the Founder of Enlightened Success Institute, she’s helped thousands of high-achieving women and entrepreneurs shift from burnout to purpose with clarity, confidence, and soul alignment strategy.
Known for her blending mindset, spirituality, and business wisdom, Lin empowers leaders to overcome fear, trust their voice, and take bold action towards their vision. Her teachings are rooted in lived experience and her mission is simple, to help others succeed by becoming more of who they truly are. Welcome, Lin.
The Mindset Secrets You Already Know
Thank you so much for having me, Juliet. That was a fantastic introduction. I wonder who wrote that.
I don’t know.
Amazing. Thank you. I’m very honored and I always say as a coach, it is always an honor and privilege for me to have the opportunity to share what I have to share, whatever it is. My intention is always, even if you walk away with one golden nugget, with one inspiration, with one new idea, my work is done. That’s always my intention. Thank you, Juliet, for this opportunity. I do have some slides I’m going to share.
Mindset secrets. They are so-called secrets and then many of you, I know, you’re an author, you wrote a book, you know you have a message you want to share with the world. You will realize those secrets when you hear them, they are actually not so much of a secret. My intention is for you to really understand the power behind all of those practice, those understanding and knowledge.
This is your year, my friend. 2026 is your year and it is going to be a wonderful year for you. Why? It’s because you lead yourself, your business, into that incredible success that you know you will love. Who the heck am I? For those of you who don’t know me, just like Juliet was sharing, I was a registered dietician.
I was the nutrition expert on a healthcare team and for the longest time, that was what I thought I would love to be. I did an undergrad degree in Nutrition as well as a Master’s degree in Nutrition, chasing this dream of being a registered dietician. I loved what I studied and two weeks into working as a registered dietician, I literally realized, I’m not happy. I’m not fulfilled. This is not what I want to do for the rest of my life.
Of course, at the time when I first heard this voice, immediately, I said, “You’ve got to stay in here for the rest of your life because that’s what all the other dieticians do,” so I did. I stayed on that particular career path for eight years. Yet this voice keeps coming back and this feeling of I was not fulfilled. I was not making the impact that I wanted to make on the planet Earth. I have patients coming in, I have clients coming in and I want to really help them, yet very often, because of all the other things they are dealing with on their in their life, they are not really doing much change in their health.
Nothing right or wrong. It was just such a such a challenge that I felt myself feeling challenged and I didn’t feel rewarded because the person hasn’t changed much. I’m not blaming on them because I understand their circumstance. Also, because I understand their other circumstances like addiction, family issues, trauma, past trauma, mental health stuff.
As a registered dietician, as a licensed healthcare professional, I was bound by a lot of regulation. I couldn’t talk anything outside of food. All of that frustration, eight years later, I found myself crying in a parking lot. Everybody was telling me how successful I was. I was in a steady job with pension and benefit, but this hole inside of me was growing bigger and bigger. It was very hollow. I was not happy, I was stressed out, I felt like I had to do something, but I didn’t really care for it. Nothing wrong with the job, it’s an important job, it was just not designed for me.
The Spirit-Led Decision: Trading A Stable Career For A Multi-Million-Dollar Business
In that moment, when I was crying in my car, I made a decision because I feel like this is ridiculous. I’m in crying in a freaking parking lot and something is not right, something’s got to change. Later on, I made what I call very spiritual decision. I didn’t have a plan, I didn’t know what was my action, I have no idea was what was my next step. I just made a decision to say something got to change. From that decision, I started to see different opportunities. I started to hear different conversations. That allowed me to open up just enough to personal development. Just enough to step into an opportunity to be an entrepreneur.
As they say, the rest was history. It was January 16th, 2018 that I handed the CEO of my previous workplace my letter of resignation. I left. I started building my own business as a coach, as an entrepreneur. Years later, I can tell you, it’s not always easy and I learned so much. I had incredible success, as Juliet shared. I incorporated my business in 2021 and ever since then, my corporation has generated over $3 million. Let me tell you also this, I’ve made incredible mistakes and had wonderful failures as well.
I’m not saying it in a sarcastic way. I’m just saying it as I always look at this journey as a powerful journey to grow myself. I was not an entrepreneur. I was a trained hardcore employee. My own mindset shifts is this shift from being an employee into being an entrepreneur into being my own business owner. That is something I will I would love to share with you as well. It’s running the show. I didn’t even know it. I was waiting for other people to give me direction, I didn’t even know it. The power of our understanding and the power of how we show up for ourselves.
I want to start with this. I want to celebrate you. Very often, we’re looking at a year to say, feeling like, “2025 was not that great,” or, “2025 was okay. It was good but I need more, it’s not enough.” Whatever it is your thinking, my invitation for you, let’s celebrate the heck out of it. Let’s really hone into, “2025 was great. I did great, my business did great, I did all the work that is required and now is a brand-new chapter.”
From that mindset, I promise you, you are going to attract more and more things that is really allowing you to celebrate. Celebration attracts celebration. I want to celebrate you for all the work you have done. You’ve an author, you published a book, you have a message you want to share with the rest of the world and you are making this world a better place.
That’s what you do. You you’re sharing the message that matters to you. I promise you, other people on the planet Earth are very much resonating with you. They really resonate with your message, they really resonate with your teachings. Whatever you have shared in your book or books, they are making this world a better place.
The 80% Game: Unpacking The Mindset-First Success Trifecta
For that, let’s really just connect with that reason for why you do what you do, for why you wrote a book, why you want to share it with the world because that matters. My personal philosophy in anything, in creating any success transformation is this is mindset first, strategies and actions follow. I create this particular format. I didn’t invent the process, I just formulated it in this way. It’s called a Success Trifecta. It starts with mindset, with your thinking, with here. This is 80% of the game. Whatever transformation we’re talking about, whether it is your impact, if you want to be a speaker, paid speaker, if you’re a coach, you want to through your book you want to make this impact. Whatever it is, it’s all starting here.
From there, we create aligned strategy. You got to have a business plan. If you’re building a business, you got to have a business plan. It doesn’t have to be a fancy binder with 153 pages of detail. No, it might just be a piece of paper you write down your vision and you write down what you’re going to do, what you’re committed to do for next month, for next quarter, for this year. As much as detail that is your strategy. From there, you take action. This trifecta is like a boomerang. You start with mindset, that’s the beginning point of this energetic transformation and it brings in the result that you’re calling in.
This is the flow, if we look at this. The powerful thing is whether it is about business, whether it is about your health, it is all the same formula. Success is not just business. It’s not just money, it is not just impact to other people. It’s all areas of our life. My business name is Enlightened Success Institute. Years before, when I was doing my business, I was a success coach, that was the title I gave myself. I always felt there was something missing. The word enlightened means is coming from your heart, coming from your soul, coming from this calling you have from a much deeper place than just your brain and your logical mind.
Enlightened success is a full spectrum. It’s your business, yes absolutely, is the impact. Yes, that’s wonderful and it is also about your personal health, about your mental, physical, spiritual strength. It is about all the relationship that matters for you. I was supporting another coach and she just started working with me. We were having some conversation, a one-on-one, and she just kept going back to her own personal relationship. Right now, she’s feeling challenged in her life. Even though we are working together to create a business plan, her entire 2026 business plan, this is her calling as a coach, as an impactful person, yet it’s this personal relationship within her family that is creating a lot of energetic blocks for her.
That is something her and I we’re working on to dissolve. I cannot dissolve it for her, yet knowing that if she’s willing to strengthen her mindset, that is going to be part of the weight that would be dissolved from her entire energetic field and from there, her business is going to explore. It is going to grow so much bigger.
Even though we think family and business has nothing to do with each other, it has everything to do with each other. Mindset is this overall thing that is all connected together. How you do one thing is how you do everything. I’m giving you another example. Juliet and I were talking about skincare before we started. I have always been somebody I had a decent skincare routine. For years, I have heard how great Korean skincare products are. I never entertained to that. I never wanted to do anything about it until part of my vision is about my own health, about my own vitality.
How you do one thing is how you do everything. Share on XIt’s not coming from a place of I’m not pretty enough or I’m so afraid of wrinkles or anything. It’s coming from the place of love. My overall vision is built on love. Not just for my business, for my impact. It is also for my own health. From that place, as I am growing, suddenly, this past holiday season, on a daily basis because I took two weeks off so every single day I would do a full-on Korean skincare routine.
Did you know actually, it can be up to 10 steps for 1 routine? It’s like over one hour with all the steps. I was having so much fun. It was not a chore. It was not a burden. This is what happens when you are feeding your mind with the love. You’re feeding your strategy and action with love. It comes out easily. Your book. You’re promoting your book, you’re doing marketing, I get it. Here, I will be the first person to tell you, marketing, yes. I love what I do. I love to make this impact. I love sparkling other people’s potential and so they have this spark in their eyes for what’s possible for them. That’s what I love and marketing is a part of it.
I keep feeding into that love, so guess what? Now I do enjoy marketing, I do love marketing. I do love talking about it and working with my support team to create a fantastic marketing plan so other people know what the heck am I doing. That is a power of love. That is a power of this particular trifecta. Again, 80% of your result is going to be coming from your thinking. As an author, as a coach, very likely you already know this. This is a reminder. Whatever you’re doing on a daily basis, have something that feeds into your mind, feeds into your passion for what you do and feed into love.
I’m going to share with you three things for you to lead your very best year in 2026. The first is what does it look like? A vision, a specific designed blueprint. What does it mean to train your mind for success? I’m going to give you I am very practical person as so I’m going to give you some very practical tips and things you can work on right now so you can start seeing this transformation.
What can you do to grow into the best business owner you can be? What does it even mean to be a business owner? I don’t care where you are, whether you have sold a book, whether you have been paid for any of your speaking engagement or you have paid client, that is the past and it’s up to you to declare if you’re a business owner or not.
Nobody else can do that and it has nothing to do with whether you have made money or not. That is all what’s following. The first is your own thinking. If you don’t treat your business as a business, it’s not going to bring you revenue. Nothing wrong with that, it’s just matter of do you want to would you love to have a business or not? We’re going to talk more detail about that.
Blueprinting Your Best Year: Creating A Detailed, Full-Spectrum Vision
First, what is your vision for your best year in 2026? Some of you you’re working with a vision statement, whether it’s a year from now, three years from now, some of you, this might be brand new. Wherever you are, my invitation for you is come in with a beginner’s eyes, meaning this is a new beginning because it is.
This moment you’re taking a breath is the beginning of the rest of your life. This is your opportunity by divine reason you’re watching this, you’re reading this. What if this is your opportunity to solidify your best 2026, your best year ever? What if that is possible? If you’re brand new or even if you have a vision statement, my invitation for you to like go back to it to see if you have those key elements in it.
The details of your vision. The universe loves details. The more specific you can be, the faster you’re going to see the result. If you just say six figure, the universe doesn’t know what you’re talking about. Maybe you’re talking about $250,000 but $100,000 is also a six figure, so be very specific. It might be in revenue, it might be not one or the other, and all of those details, the how many hours would you love to work in every single week? Be very specific. If you love ease and flow, then don’t put there, “I want to work 60 hours a week,” unless that’s absolutely what you want and you would love. How many clients you would love to serve?
The universe loves details. The more specific you can be, the faster you will see results. Share on XIf you’re speaker how many audiences you would love to get in front of? You don’t need to know how. How will follow. We’re talking about a year from now, the result you would love. We start with the end in mind. You’ve got to know where you want to be. If you don’t have that, if you don’t have that solidified, the life is going to happen by default.
Sometimes it’s good, sometimes it’s not. We want to be very specific with those details. If you say, “I don’t know how much money I want to make in a year,” make it up. The first number popping into your mind. The first number that has this, “I would love that.” Write that down and then, as you’re engaged with this vision, very often, you’re going to be more and more clear of exactly what you would love and the amount of impact is in reflection of clients, in reflection of audiences. Maybe for you, the impact is how many people have read your book, have got your book. You know what is the number. You know what matters for you, nobody else does. Don’t listen to anybody else tell you, you should do this.
Thank you very much for sharing the idea. Always bring it back to your own heart to say, “Do I resonate with it? Do I agree with that?” A key element in being an entrepreneur, being a business owner, in building your success. One of the things I often see and I went through that as well and for supporting other coaches, other impactful people, especially people who are went through what I went through, transition from being an employee into an entrepreneur.
You don’t know what you’re doing, so like an expert talking about something, you’re like, “I’ve got to do that. Social media is powerful? Okay I’ve got to do that. That person did that and they have success? I’ve got to do that.” Nothing wrong with that and after all the years, one of my intentions is always share what I’ve learned with others, for people who wants to be where I am now.
I did that. I love that as a registered dietician, I always mentor students and here as well. My intention is for you to shorten your journey and reduce the amount of mistakes and failures. That is my intention. Nothing wrong with them. If I can support you to reduce that, that would be great. All the suggestions, ideas that you hear, bring it back to your heart. What would I love? What do I really want? Do I resonate with this idea? Sometimes it might be a good idea, but not right now. It might be for later. Keep track of it and then you will implement later.
How do you feel when it’s all done? A year from now, you’re living this life. How do you feel? Some key elements in this, do not be excited. The feeling of excitement is coming from fear, coming from, “I do not have this.” Come from this place of calm and relaxed energy. You’re happy, you’re grateful, you feel just so proud of yourself, humbly proud of yourself. Those are the great feelings. How do you feel as this is actually your result? We’re not going to leave anything else out of this vision because life is not just business. Life is not just numbers and money. Those are all great by all means and that is important and we always bring our own health into our vision.
Always bring the relationships into your vision. It might be as simple as one sentence, “I am dynamically healthy.” Great, but include that in your vision. As you’re building this this incredible impact, we’re not sacrificing anything else. We’re not sacrificing time, we’re not sacrificing health or relationship that really matters for you.
It’s an overall full spectrum success. That’s it. Just like you get into your car, you want to drive from where you are to a new another destination, you want to know where you’re going. I live in a place where I’m about 2 hours away from Toronto and 2 hours away from Detroit so I’m right in the middle. Let’s say I want to go to Detroit. I cannot just put Detroit, Michigan in my GPS. I don’t know where it’s going to take me or what neighborhood it’s going to take me. I don’t want that. I want to give my GPS a very specific address, a specific location of where I want to end up. This is where you want to end up. That’s why it is so very important.
Stop The Self-Sabotage: How To Make A “No Matter What” Decision
Once you have this, calibrate it. I’m more than happy to support you to calibrate it if you you’re wondering how to do that. Either reach out to me or if you already have a coach, ask them to help you to calibrate your vision to make it very solid, very strong and very clear. Make a decision, my friend. Nothing is going to shift unless you make a decision. Just like when I was crying in that car, that pain pushed me into making a decision. You don’t have to wait until you’re in such a painful place for you to make that decision. You look at this result, you say, “This is really what I want for 2026.” Make a decision, make a no matter what decision, move forward.
Here’s the thing. Literally, the second you make a decision, this is going to happen. You’re going to feel something is trying to pull you back. You’re like, “Yes, this is a great year. I’m going to move forward,” and something is pulling you back. Some people are aware of this and most people don’t. Fun fact about me. I used to teach Zumba Fitness at a gym. For those of you who don’t know, it’s like dance fitness. It’s a lot of fun. I loved it. I taught it for ten years. I noticed something. Every single January, my classes would be packed, so many people they’re and then by the middle of February, it would go back to the usual 4 to 6 people who always come to my class.
This is human nature, nothing wrong with that and we want to be aware. You set a new goal, you set a new vision, you move forward. There’s going to be an invisible weight that’s trying to hold you back and that is actually not coming from anywhere else but your own mindset blocks. This is not to say, “I have mindset blocks?” Yeah, we all do. As long as we’re living, as long as we’re breathing, we all have some mindset blocks. The key is not to look for it. I know this sounds counter logical. The key is not to look for it but to train your mind to focus on that vision, on your success. How do we do that? Understand it. Understand how your mindset works. How mindset works in general. How the energy and universal laws work to mold and shift with your mindset, your actual results. Understand that.
Nothing is going to shift unless you make a decision. Share on XHave a daily practice for mindset studying and training. Whatever you’re already doing, again make sure it’s coming from your heart. Just because everybody is doing gratitude doesn’t mean you have to do it. Maybe for you is about a practice of self-love. It’s an affirmation of I got this, I am enough. Whatever is coming from your heart, have a daily practice. From your vision, create a solid business plan for this year. Solid doesn’t mean a fancy binder has to be printed out. A solid can be just you sitting down with yourself or with other people a support in a group to work it all out. That is coming from your heart.
You look at the activities, you feel like, “I’m looking forward to do all of those things.” Use your calendar as the number one tool for success. What does that mean? If it’s not on your calendar, most likely it’s not going to happen. If you would love to source out more speaking engagement, are you putting that into your calendar?
Maybe it’s just two hours every single week. On Monday and Wednesday you’re going to search for speaking engagement and reach out to them. Do that. Mark that onto your calendar. You’re not waiting, “I’ll do that when I have a moment.” Most likely that moment is never going to happen. Our mindset is brilliant. It’s going to find those distractions. “Look at that. The dog wants to go out again. Look at that. The laundry hasn’t been folded yet.”
The Money = Impact Principle: Why Your Business Can’t Be A Costly Hobby
Whatever it is, nothing wrong with that but if you solidify it in your calendar, more likely, you will look at that as a reminder to say, “It is my time. My half an hour or an hour to prospect, to look for speaking engagement, to connect with my past clients,” whatever is the activity that is a strategy that has your heart in it for it. Treat your business like a business. If you treat your business like a hobby, it is going to be very costly.
I was going through my storage area and I saw two of those plastic drawer things. It’s a little storage container. It has three drawers and I look into what’s inside. It was beads, like small beads. When I was working as a registered dietician, I worked with first nations population and from there, I learned how to do bead work. I got fascinated about it, I got obsessed so I bought a whole bunch of beads.
It was a hobby. I know other people who do bead work to make earrings, to make whatever and they sell it as their business. For me, it’s a hobby. I look at those two containers of beads, I did a rough calculation, it’s probably well over $1,000 just to get those beads. It was a hobby. Hobby costs money and business generates income. There’s a whole other area of money mindset. I’m not going to dive into that. My invitation for you is if you already have a mindset practice and studying right now, make sure it has abundance and mindset training in it. If it doesn’t, expand into that.
You’ve got to understand, as a business owner, you must understand, understand is not just, “I know.” When you say I know, that’s exactly the moment you don’t understand. Understand means, “Yes, this is the truth. Money equals impact.” If you’re coach, put your hand up if you have coach for free. I’m going to put both of my hand up. We all know when we give something for free from our heart, we believe in the material we want to give it to this person, we really want to help them. We also have comparison to say somebody is willing to invest in themselves.
If you say, “I’m a coach. I don’t have a paid client yet.” Look at yourself. You invested money in yourself and you know what is the outcome when you receive something for free versus when you made an investment in money. How you are showing up. As a business owner, please take this not just to your head but to your heart. When people are waiting to say, “Terry, I would love to work with you. Here is my credit card. I would love to sign up with you for whatever you’re offering. I would love to buy your book.” When they buy it, they’re most likely going to read it.
When they read it, that is when the impact is done. When they pay, most likely, they’re going to show up to their coaching sessions and that is when they receive the transformation. It is not about us, my friend. It’s not about us. It is about the soul that’s in front of you that is ready to be transformed. We’ve got to give them the opportunity, the best structure, the most solid channel for them to have a transformational experience. Treat your business like a business. My friend, you’re the boss.
The Boss Mindset: Moving Past The Employee Mentality
When I first started building my business, I was like, “I got all the time on the planet Earth. What do I do?” Days after, I would do nothing. Later on, I realized that was my employee mentality. I was waiting for somebody else to give me a direction. I was waiting for somebody to tell me what to do or a job description of what do I need to do. You’re the boss. You’re the leader. You’re the core of your business.
You’re the center and the core of your business. Do not let anybody step into that place. Not coming from a fighting or defensive. Claim this is your spot. You’re making an impact that nobody else can make. My mentor, her name is Mary Morrissey, she always says in the world of coaching, whether you’re a coaching, speaking, teaching, we’re sharing a message. There is there is no competition. Why? It’s because your unique energetic signature is going to serve your unique audience. There are people resonating with you and they don’t resonate with anybody else. There is a way that you teach certain content that makes an impact that nobody else can make that impact.
Believe into that. That is a truth. Eight billion people on the planet Earth. There’s truly no competition and you are the core of your business. You’re the leader. You’re the leader of your business, of your impact. Start leading yourselves. Start leading you. You got this. If anybody cheers for your business, for yourself, it’s got to start with you and then other people. If you’re a coach, guess what? The first client of yourself is you. Mind your own mind. Doesn’t mean we don’t have other mentors and supports. It’s just we practice what we talk about.
Read your own book and really study your own book. You’ll be amazed what you can learn from yourself. It is an incredible thing. Start leading yourself. I keep saying this. I’m going to say it again. You’re the owner of your business. You know the best of your business. You know the best of your business. That’s why you can have people with such a incredible success. They still do not know your business as good as you are.
You can welcome feedback, you can welcome support. There are strategists out there. They just say, “This is what you do. You should do this. You should be going that direction.” Again, been there done that, I go and just like, “This is such a struggle, this journey, but I’ve got to do this because this person said this.” If you can start practicing this, just to understand, again, take a breath, relax your body, relax your mind to know that you you’re solid.
You know your business the best. All the ideas coming into you, take a moment and really just to say, “Do I resonate with this? What is my business structure?” If you’re newer, if you have a mentor, have a coach, work with them. Know that they’re working with you. Sometimes, as a coach, I’ve done that too. We’re so passionate to help other people, we’re just like, “Yeah, this is going to be great.” We may forget to ask, “Do you resonate with this? How do you feel about it?”
You’ve got to voice that out. Sometimes it’s just matter of can you slow down? Can we take a pause for me to really marinate in it? That could be a great strategy to implement to make sure that whatever you’re creating, whether it’s program, business plan, marketing plan, whatever, it’s from your heart. Why does it matter? When it’s coming from here, it flows.
It attracts your ideal clients. It produce results. When it’s coming from here, you are looking forward to do it. It won’t feel like, “I have to do a social media post, really?” If you don’t like social media for now, forget about it. Just put it on the side, not say ever, but like just follow your heart. There are so many different strategies out there.
The 6-Step Practical Process For Inevitable Success
Now we’re going to get practical. Success process, what do you do? Six steps. First step, have a clear vision. Simple, straightforward, write it down, calibrate it. Whether you calibrate it with yourself or have somebody calibrate with you, do that. Make a no matter what decision. What do I mean by that? Maybe you say, “I’m decided. Ever since I wrote a book two years ago, I’m decided to do this.” Make a decision again. It’s like a renewing of your vow towards your business towards this impact you’re about to make. This journey can get very challenging.
I acknowledge that. It is not about dwell into oh for sure it’s going to be hard. It is about to realize yeah there are things where it’s required for you to do is not easy. It requires for ourselves to say no matter what, I am making this impact. No matter what, I am building this business. This is a no matter what decision. Have your own daily mindset practice and training, whatever you do. Create a solid business plan with the support or whatever way that you do this. It can be as simple as on a piece of paper.
Put your ongoing business activities onto your calendar. If you say, “I am going to do my own webinar every single month,” put that on your calendar. That’s the best way. Don’t just go, “I did one for January and now let me decide when is going to be my February one.” Nothing wrong with that, been there done that, but I want to shorten your journey, remember? Put it all in throughout the entire year. This is the day I do webinar. Schedule monthly and quarterly meetings to reevaluate your business plan. Don’t just do it and then shuffle into a drawer and you don’t even know it exists. Engage with it. Let it work.
Make it work. How do you know it’s working? You check in. Check in with it. Reassess, reevaluate. There are times when you implement strategy thinking is a great idea, maybe it did not work as well. That’s okay. We change it up. You’ve got to reevaluate. As long as you love your vision, as long as you keep going, your success is inevitable. This is according to the universal laws. Just like the Law of Gravity. If you stand on a chair you jump, guess what? You’re going to land on the ground. You’re not going to float into the air. Same thing here. If your heart resonates, it’s okay if you’re just like, “I don’t know if that’s the truth.”
As long as you love your vision, as long as you keep going, your success is inevitable. Share on XIt is the truth. Your success is inevitable as long as you love it, as long as you keep going. It’s okay your journey looks a zigzag. It’s okay if you if you experience failures or make a mistake. It is all good. Just to know that your result is inevitable. Let’s be it. Not just do it. Before you do it, be passionate, be impactful, be kind, be grateful, be happy, be you, be authentic. From that place, you do whatever you do. That is when the world is going to receive the gift of you. All right. Now that is it. Sorry I just flew past by that because I want to really make sure I include everything. Any questions?
The #1 Mistake Authors Make (Your Book Is A Business)
I don’t have questions, but I do want to mention here because this is probably one of the biggest mistakes people make. Your book is a business. Whether you have a coaching business around it, whether you have things you’re selling as accessories or affiliates, your book is a business. I would say probably 75% of the people out there will write a book and they don’t understand that.
You have to get out there and treat it like, “How am I going to sell these books? What are the stages I’m going to get onto to sell it? Do I have my digital marketing in place?” That’s another biggie. I know Terry does this really well but do you have your funnels in place? Do you have your pitches? Are you doing ads? What are you doing to attract people to that book and get yourself out there more and more? It’s really important to remember that and lay out a business plan for the book just like you would for your own business.
Absolutely. Start with your mindset. You decide this is a business or this is part of my business activity. It is. It’s not wrong for people to just want to write a book and that’s what they want and that’s okay too but you’ve got to make that decision intentionally rather than maybe you think this is part of your business but you haven’t treated as a business.
Yeah, that is so true. We had a client who didn’t build a platform first, so of course, that first book didn’t do very well. This is the mindset writers get into when they do these books. She is now working on her second book but she hasn’t gone back and built that platform. Still, she’s avoiding it. She’s going to get that same result from the second book that she got from the first book because she didn’t build those assets.
She didn’t have that LinkedIn newsletter, she didn’t have a funnel where she can go, she didn’t collect email addresses, she didn’t do all of the things that are going to build her audience. There are over 100,000 books a month now that are published. How are you going to make yours stand out if you don’t bring your own audience? There’s no platform out there that will bring your audience to you other than you on there.
Sometimes, people think, “There are people who are out there who sell millions of books.” Yes, that’s true. This moment, what came to my mind is Rachel. What’s her last name? The lady who said, “Girl, stop apologizing.” Do you know who I’m talking about, Juliet?
I think I do. She’s written a lot of books.
Yes, and I she was one of the keynote speakers at one of the event I attended and she talked about this. She says, “People think I just became successful overnight and my book suddenly started to sell millions. That is my ninth book.” It’s not her first book that suddenly she became famous. We forget to look at other people if we consider them successful the journey they went through. We all started really relatively at the same place. If you’re coach, we all started having this desire but had no idea what to do. If you’re building a business, we all started day one. It doesn’t matter who you are.
If you're building a business, we all started on day one. It doesn't matter who you are. Share on XYeah, that’s very true. You’ll see as you start building too and I know Terry has a ton of books out there. She probably knows this too. That first one is not going to sell very well if you haven’t built that platform. I experienced the same thing, then I started building the platform. My second one sold better. My third one sold over 25,000 copies. My other ones after because I’ve built a substantial audience. Now I have built in people to sell those to.
You do have to remember that when you start writing, you have to start the audience building journey as well. That’s part of a business. You wouldn’t start a business and not market to bring people in and so many people do that. That’s what that platform building is doing for you, is getting that audience built so that you do have success. I think that’s the biggest thing. You wouldn’t start a business and not market.
It goes hand-in-hand. One thing I learned through my journey, as an entrepreneur, start a business. I just didn’t know what to do. That’s why the support out there, it can be so important and valuable for people to really understand yes you have a dream you have a vision, then let’s build that plan. That plan is crucial. Business plan includes marketing plan as well. It’s not just like, “This is what you do,” and just go ahead do it. To whom? That’s all part of it.
The Four Pillars Of Marketing: Don’t Jump To Product Awareness First
Yeah, it is definitely part of it. One thing people don’t understand about marketing is they jump in the middle. It’s actually scientifically based and there is a layering process. That’s why we always tell people start this back way before that first book comes out. First of all, you’ve got to establish your critique, your creds.
Your first audience is going to be unaware that you’re even there and then go into what is the problem you solve. That’s going to take a little bit. What is the solution? That’s going to take a little bit. You get to product aware and start selling things. You can see most authors jump into the fourth pillar of that layering without doing those first three and they don’t understand, “Why doesn’t anybody know who I am? Why doesn’t anybody know that I solve a problem and what problem it is?” You really have to get in there and work it like a business and do it right. You have a free gift for us, don’t you?
I do. Even if you do have a current daily mindset training or practice, this is really an addition. It is something I created called Success Oath. It is something where I want to take daily affirmation to a whole other level. There are four different parts of this oath and you can start to just follow what is the instruction provided or you can start wherever calls your heart. It is simple, it is easy. I believe it is very powerful. It’s coming from my heart and soul. I would love to share that with you.
Next month, we’re going to be talking about contracts and copyrights and this is becoming more and more important. I really implore you guys to show up. We’re seeing some really funky things in contracts that you don’t understand what you’re signing. You could be signing away your intellectual property. I’ll give you a great example. I saw a contract where it actually said that you own the rights to your book, but if you create a course from your book, you’re going to give the publisher 30% of the proceeds.
I talked to the woman before she signed the contract. She said she made about $250,000 a year and I was like, “Do you want to give $80,000 to your publisher because that that doesn’t sound kosher?” Really looking at that. With AI, there are a lot of things. The copyright office will know, longer copyright. We’re getting a lot of children books, with illustrations that are created through AI. No bueno. They’re not yours. I hope you guys will show up. It’ll be on February 5th at the same time. Lin, thank you so much.
I mentioned at the beginning that we have a whole new program and a book coming out in March 2026. If you want to go take that three-unit course that is free, you can go to FindYourIdealAvatar.com and start working through that. It is the first three lessons in in the big program. You can get a flavor for what that program looks like too. For Lin, go over to Prgm.LinYuanSu.com/oaths-home. Thank you guys and I will see you next month.
Yes, absolutely. Thank you so much. Very nice to meet you. All the best.
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About Lin Yuan-Su
Mindset Trainer & Strategist | Founder of Enlightened Success Institute
Lin Yuan-Su left behind a successful healthcare career to follow her true calling—and went on to build a multi–7-figure coaching business from the ground up. As the founder of Enlightened Success Institute, she’s helped thousands of high-achieving women and entrepreneurs shift from burnout to purpose with clarity, confidence, and soul-aligned strategy.
Known for blending mindset, spirituality, and business wisdom, Lin empowers leaders to overcome fear, trust their voice, and take bold action toward their vision. Her teachings are rooted in lived experience, and her mission is simple: to help others succeed by becoming more of who they truly are.
