How Momentum Came Before Mastery

By Sharon Burnett

When I started Remembering Who I Am, I was responding to work that was already happening. I didn’t have a plan or a clear idea of where I wanted it to go.

I had people asking to work with me, and I said yes before I knew how to package it or explain it properly. What existed at the beginning wasn’t a business in the formal sense. It was a practice. I worked with people one session at a time, without a defined structure and without pretending I had it figured out.

At the beginning, almost everything that usually signals “readiness” was missing. There was no offer ladder, no funnel, no marketing plan, and no explanation I could repeat consistently.

I hadn’t decided what the business would become. That uncertainty was uncomfortable, but it was still better than staying stuck in planning mode, polishing ideas that had never been tested.

For the first few months, Remembering Who I Am was simple. I booked sessions. I worked with clients. I paid attention. The website existed, but it changed constantly because my understanding of the work kept changing. I remember losing an entire week to rewriting copy — new headlines, new positioning, new promises — instead of doing the work itself. It didn’t help. It just delayed the moment where the business had to meet reality.

The first real momentum didn’t come from visibility or growth. It came from use. After about a dozen sessions, patterns started to appear. Some offers didn’t resonate at all. Others landed immediately. Certain phrases stuck because clients used them themselves. A few ideas I was attached to quietly fell away when no one needed them.

That’s where imperfect action mattered. It showed me that hesitation wasn’t really about fear or self-doubt. It was about treating early decisions as if they were permanent. Once I stopped assuming every choice locked the business into a final shape, it became easier to move. I didn’t need confidence. I needed information.

Instead of building structure around assumptions, I let the work show me what needed support and what didn’t. That meant staying flexible longer than most advice would recommend. Some offers existed briefly and then disappeared. Some weeks were messy. That wasn’t failure. It was feedback.

I noticed momentum in how quickly I could make decisions and move on. I stopped endlessly rewriting the website because the language had already been tested in real conversations. Things felt clearer, not because the business was finished, but because it was grounded in what was actually happening.

I also chose to remove anything that sounded impressive but wasn’t useful. No inflated promises. No aspirational gloss. Just clear descriptions of what the work addressed — and who it wasn’t for. The audience narrowed. Some people lost interest. Others didn’t need convincing at all.

If I were starting again, I would begin client work sooner and formalise later. I would stop trying to explain the business before it had earned its language. I would let it be rougher in the early stages instead of trying to tidy it up too quickly.

Remembering Who I Am didn’t arrive fully formed. It stabilised through contact, correction, and repetition. The structure followed the work.

Building before you’re ready doesn’t mean winging it. It means letting the business take shape in real time, in front of real people, before it’s neat or confidently explained.

Connect With Sharon

www.rememberingwhoiam.com