What does it really look like to build a business around the life you want, instead of building your life around your business?
That's the question at the heart of this week's episode with Natalie Ellis, founder of BossBabe. Natalie has built one of the most recognizable communities for women entrepreneurs, and she's been incredibly open about what that growth cost her along the way. We talk about her journey, the burnout that forced her to rethink everything, becoming a mom, and learning to step back without feeling like it would all fall apart.
As a business owner and a mom myself, this conversation hit home. If you've ever felt like your business is running you, instead of the other way around, this episode is for you.
Meet Natalie Ellis
Natalie Ellis is a mom, CEO, and serial entrepreneur best known as the founder of BossBabe, an online community and education platform for women entrepreneurs with more than 4 million followers and over 100,000 students. She hosts the BossBabe podcast, writes a weekly newsletter read by more than 400,000 women, and invests in women-founded companies.
She also founded CEO Mama, a private network for entrepreneurial moms. After experiencing burnout firsthand, she created the Freedom-Based Business Method, a framework for building a business that supports your life instead of consuming it, and wrote a bestselling book of the same name.
What We Talk About in This Episode
- Natalie's journey building BossBabe: Natalie takes us behind the scenes of growing BossBabe into one of the biggest communities for women entrepreneurs. We talk about what fueled that growth in the early days and what it actually took to keep it going.
- Entrepreneur burnout and the wake-up call: From the outside, success can look effortless. Natalie gets honest about the burnout that came with building a fast-growing company, the warning signs she missed, and the moment she realized something had to change.
- Motherhood and running a business: Becoming a mom changed how Natalie thinks about time, priorities, and what success really means. We talk about the pull between showing up for your family and showing up for your business, and how she's learned to make room for both.
- Learning to step back without everything falling apart: For so many founders, stepping back feels terrifying. Natalie shares how she let go of being involved in every decision, and why the business didn't collapse when she did.
- Creating systems and delegating: Systems are what make freedom possible. We dig into how Natalie built processes and a team that let the business run without her doing everything, and how to start delegating even if you're used to holding it all.
- Using AI in your business: We talk about how Natalie is using AI to save time and work smarter, and how small business owners can start using these tools without feeling overwhelmed.
- Letting go of the pressure to always grow: Bigger isn't always better. Natalie opens up about letting go of the pressure to keep scaling at all costs, and redefining success around profit, freedom, and the life you actually want to live.
- Finding balance and freedom in business and life: Ultimately, this conversation is about designing a business that supports your health, your family, and your peace. We talk about what balance looks like in real life, not on Instagram.
Whether you're building a business, growing a career, or just trying to find more balance, I think you'll walk away from this conversation feeling lighter and more empowered to design a life that works for you.
