How to Think About Business Support in 2026 (Because “Invest in Yourself” is BS)

The online business industry completely broke people’s brains when it comes to paying for support.

And honestly? I get why.

For years, the message has been that if you really believed in yourself, you’d invest. Your hesitation was supposedly a scarcity mindset. You needed to “get in the room.” You had to spend money to make money. Your “next level” required a next-level investment.

(Cue the eyerolls.) 

Somewhere along the way, we stopped having normal conversations about discernment, timing, business fit, actual problems, cash flow, or whether the support itself was even any good.

Because a lot of people got burned. (Myself included!) 

So many of us spent money on giant programs where nobody actually knew our business. Or joined groups where we were just another number. Or bought into emotionally compelling promises that sounded amazing in the moment but didn’t deliver anything. 

Thanks to all of that, now too many experienced service providers are overcorrecting in the opposite direction. They’re skeptical. Hyper-vigilant. Cautious about every decision.

Which, to be clear, is valid.

But that skepticism can so easily turn into isolation. While it may look like discernment, you end up trying to solve everything on your own.

The Cost of Pretending This Still Works

Today’s episode is ripped from the headlines, so to speak, as I’m seeing a lot of experienced service providers settling for businesses that technically work, but aren’t really working for them anymore.

When this is happening, you know something is off and that the market has shifted in a big way. You’re grappling with the fact that you’ve outgrown parts of your business…but you’re unsure what to do next. 

Part of that is because you’re exhausted.

I mean, all of us are overloaded in some way right now thanks to macro-level events, and that impacts our ability to do deep, strategic thinking about our businesses. As a result, decisions feel harder, every move feels risky and potential changes can be overly emotional.

Add in the unpredictability of the current market, and we can easily default into preservation mode. When that happens, so much of our energy is expended trying to maintain the current version of our business.

While we’re doing that, everything is changing. I know I sound like a broken record at this point. But it’s a long ass list of what’s changed in the last 18 to 24 months, thanks to the commitment to oligarchic capitalism by big tech leaders and the current US administration.

Nothing is functioning quite the same way. Since the pandemic, trust in everything has been in a free fall, and that impacts everything from buyer behavior to your client’s expectations. 

At the risk of sounding alarmist…we’re NOT going back to 2019, 2021, or whatever year you’d like to repeat in your business. 

Yet, too many people are sitting in this weird middle ground where they know something needs to change, but they don’t trust anyone enough to help them figure out what that change should actually look like.

Talk about a catch-22! Ignoring everything isn’t a plan, but neither is trying to figure it out on your own by consuming free content or relying on an AI tool.

Going it alone or ignoring it may feel safer than making the wrong investment, but it’s not safer at all.  Sometimes there’s no substitute for getting the support you need when you need it. 

The Real Problem With Online Business Advice

One of the most damaging things the online business world did was turn support into a morality play.

If you invested, you were “serious”.

If you hesitated, you had mindset problems.

If something didn’t work, you “weren’t available for the transformation” or, my personal favorite, “playing small.” 

This bullshit leaves very little room for nuance, let alone for timing, discernment, cash-flow realities, business-model fit, capacity, or actual strategic needs.

These thought-terminating cliches encourage people to override their instincts. Ignore red flags, trust the process or spend based on vibes.

Thanks to all of that bullshit, I see smart business owners don’t just trust their own judgment anymore.

They’re afraid to make thoughtful, strategic decisions about support, so they swing all the way to the opposite extreme and decide they’re just going to do everything themselves forever. (Or keep putting it off for as long as humanly possible.) 

And I really want to challenge that. Because the answer to manipulative investment culture isn’t trying to do it all alone. 

The real answer is becoming more strategic and more discerning. (Which I talk about constantly on the podcast I co-host called Duped.) 

It’s asking: 

• What problem am I actually trying to solve? 
• What kind of support would genuinely help? 
• Do I need perspective, implementation, accountability, strategy, or emotional steadiness? 
• Am I trying to buy certainty? 
• Am I getting the right help for the right problem?

That’s a very different conversation from “just invest in yourself.”

Getting Support Without the Culty Vibes

If you’re considering getting support for your business, it’s worth noting that there’s long been a false binary: either spend recklessly on every shiny promise online, or be so skeptical that you stop getting support entirely.

Neither option is good for you or your business (or bank account) in the long run.

Personally, I’m incredibly selective about where I spend money in my business. I don’t care about proximity to internet-famous people. I’m not interested in aspirational identity marketing.

And I have zero desire to sit in giant “containers” where nobody actually understands my business. (I mean, none of that culty bullshit is helping anyone.) 

However, I continue to invest strategically in support. In both 2025 and 2026, I invested in highly targeted 1:1 consulting while making major changes to my business.

Why? Because I’m too close to my own business.

I’m a business consultant and still value perspective, outside expertise, and strategic support. I think more people need to normalize that for themselves, too.

Trust me, I don’t say that in a “but every great coach has a coach” scammy MLM kind of way, but rather to say that even the most seasoned, experienced service business owner needs support. 

Sometimes you need someone to help you untangle a problem faster. Sometimes you need experienced eyes on your thinking. Sometimes you need help seeing sticky spots you literally cannot see from inside your own business.

As I write in my book Staying Solo, solo doesn’t mean alone. There are so many ways to get support, and you aren’t going to get a gold star from doing it alone. 

It’s Not Always About the Money (But the Math Matters) 

I want to normalize having more honest conversations about the financial side of support without the fantasy math or fearmongering about what happens if you do (or do not) spend that money.

When I make an investment in my business, I’m not sitting there telling myself “money is energy” or convincing myself I’ll magically make it back. I’m looking at it from multiple angles. 

I’m asking: 

• What problem is this solving? 
• What is staying stuck already costing me? 
• How quickly could this help me move forward? 
• What happens if I avoid dealing with this for another year? 
• What’s the realistic upside if this works well?
• What’s my motivation for investing? Is this a vanity project, or can I expect tangible ROI? 

Yes, part of that math is about the dollars and cents of a potential Return on Investment (ROI), because for service business owners in particular, the impact on revenue can be real. 

For example, if I invest $2500 in something and it helps me with something tangible like improving my positioning, raising my prices confidently, packaging my services better, improving conversions, retaining clients longer, simplifying delivery, or attracting better-fit leads, that investment can compound financially for years.

If that $2500 I invested helps me sell even one of my packages, it’s paid itself off immediately, so the odds are stacked in my favor, and not because of some bullshit income claim about how much money I can make with their system or “10x your income overnight” fantasy.

Small strategic shifts inside a service business often create outsized financial impact over time.

Think of it this way: what could even one pricing change, a better-fit client, a stronger referral relationship, or an update to your package or sales page do for your revenue?

Every single sale you make helps you recoup that investment, and it adds up faster as you’re not selling $17 dollar PDFs. 

The online business world has created this all-or-nothing environment where an investment either needs to produce overnight life-changing money or you’re supposed to pretend ROI doesn’t matter because “growth can’t be measured financially”…because of vibes.

Again with the bullshit, as that’s not how any of this works. There’s a middle ground where we can (and should) consider how any investment affects our bottom line while also recognizing that the impact isn’t always linear.

Support can’t only be evaluated solely by immediate cash returns while completely ignoring the costs of delay, burnout, indecision, avoidance, and staying frozen. 

Sometimes I’ve paid to speed up my decision-making, get out of my own way, or simply shorten the path between “I know something needs to change” and actually doing something about it.

I’m not encouraging you (or anyone, for that matter) to spend money you don’t have. I’m never, ever going to do that.

For some people, the funds genuinely are not there right now, and that’s real. We need to be honest about that instead of pretending everyone has unlimited money to throw at support, coaching, consultants, masterminds, or another “life-changing” offer.

But if you do have the funds and you keep putting it off, it’s worth asking yourself why. Because a lot of the hesitation right now isn’t just financial. It’s emotional. It’s uncertainty, skepticism, fear of wasting money, fear of making the wrong decision, or fear of getting burned.

And honestly? Your clients are probably navigating that exact same tension, too.

The Kind of Support People Actually Need Right Now

What most service providers need right now is perspective. Strategic thinking. Help with making decisions. Accountability. Support adapting to a changing market. 

Running a business and just being a human right now is flipping exhausting. Trying to navigate all of that completely alone because the celebrity entrepreneurs made you distrust support isn’t helping you.

The real conversation we need to start having isn’t “Should I invest in myself?”

Honestly, I loathe the language of “investing in yourself” at this point because it’s bullshit designed to shut down your critical thinking. 

The better question is: what kind of support do I need, and when do I need it?

Part of that may mean accepting that, even as an experienced service provider, you can’t navigate the current business environment entirely alone.

I’m over 20 years into this work, and I still know when I need perspective, strategy, or support, as everything has shifted over the last few years. 

So I want to encourage you to get more comfortable with asking for perspective, getting experienced eyes on things, adapting faster, getting support for specific problems, and making strategic decisions before things become urgent.

The answer isn’t recklessly throwing money at every shiny promise online.

But it’s also not becoming so skeptical and shut down that you refuse support entirely while your business slowly drains the life out of you.

There’s a middle ground, and it’s about discerning when, where and why you need support.