Ep. 66 The Stern Truth: Year of the Horse and Your Business Success

2026 is the year of the horse, so, of course, I have to revisit my story about going to a horseback riding ranch. The story in this episode might sound familiar, but believe me, it’s important, so it bears repeating.

I was in a beautiful open field with around 25 other people. I wanted my horse to go faster, so I tried to smack the reins, ignoring the signs that told me this horse didn’t want to go fast. Well, one smack did it, and the horse went so fast that I narrowly missed a tree branch. 

The instructor came up after asking how I was, and I said okay. They said I could ride on the back of their horse the rest of that day. To that, I said, nope, I am getting back on that horse. And I did.

Looking back, I shouldn’t have ignored the signs that were right in front of me. He gave me the over-the-shoulder looks and was slowing down, but I was burying my head in the sand. I was dead-set on leading that horse.

Never overlook the signs that are there, no matter what part of life we’re talking about. Think about your finances. We have no idea what our numbers look like, yet we wonder why we don’t make payroll. We ignore those past due invoices, but that doesn’t get us any closer to our goals.

Take a few minutes to think about where you are in your entrepreneurial journey - financially, with your team, with your customers, with the economy. What feels wrong? Are there signs that you need to change something?

You might think you’re leading a horse, but sometimes, they lead you, and that's when you need to make a change.

If you’re a small business owner who’s running on the hamster wheel, feeling isolated, and watching great ideas collect dust, I invite you to the ONtrepreneur Inner Circle. Join other driven entrepreneurs and me and get mentorship, coaching, accountability, and encouragement to make growth happen: https://marshallstern.net/landing/innercircle

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Transcript

[00:00:00] Speaker: All right, my friends. So before we get into today's episode, I want to mention one thing about this episode. If you've been a listener of this podcast for a while now, this might actually sound familiar to you because I've talked about this story before. And the reason that I am bringing this to you again is because it's that important. You see, it's also the year of the horse.

[00:00:25] So I'm diving into a story that happened to me quite a while ago, and it's all about navigating our business. It's all about what to watch out for. So, as you listen to this episode, grab your pad of paper and pen and think about where you are in your entrepreneurial journey. Think about where you are financially.

[00:00:46] Think about where you are with your team, if you have a team, or think about where you are with your customers, what's going on in the economy, what is going on around you, and how you are showing up as the leader of your business. I think you'll get some great insights from this episode, whether you've heard it before or not.

[00:01:05] Again, this is a brand-new episode, but it's on a topic and a story that I have spoken about before on this podcast. So, like I said earlier, like I say every week, grab your pad of paper and pen and enjoy this episode because I think you are going to get some real deep insights. 

[00:01:21] And that is the whole point of the Stern Truth Business Unfiltered. Enjoy.

[00:01:31] Hi, I'm Marshall Stern and I've spent over 35 years leading and growing multiple small businesses. I know firsthand the struggles of entrepreneurship, feeling isolated, lonely, overwhelmed, and feeling like you have to do it all by yourself. I've been through multiple recessions, and I have felt the highs and the lows. 

[00:01:50] I've been there, and I get it. This podcast is here to change that. Every week I will bring you straight talking advice, real-world strategies, and honest conversations about what it takes to succeed in business without the fluff, the gimmicks, or the sugar-coated. If you're ready to stop spinning your wheels and start making real progress, then you are in the right place.

[00:02:14] This is the Stern Truth. 

[00:02:18] Alright, welcome back everyone to another episode of the Stern Truth Business Unfiltered. Alright, so we are at one year, one year anniversary, my friends, of this podcast, but there's a lot of things going on and we're going to talk about the one year anniversary and we'll get into all that.

[00:02:34] But also, it's also the year of the horse. So I'm dedicating this podcast episode to that being this year, being the year of the horse, or the year of the fire horse. And I want to talk about a story with you, a true story that happened to me, and I think I might have even talked about this earlier on in the evolution of the Stern Truth Business Unfiltered podcast.

[00:03:01] But I want to bring it up again in case you missed it. So, many, many years ago - we're talking back into the 1990s, my friends - I went with a group of friends to a riding ranch, a horseback riding ranch, and it was a three-day event. Three days of horseback riding out into the open fields and, and eating in a big cabin with all these strangers and living in log cabins on thin mattresses, on box springs, roughing it.

[00:03:36] That's my roughing it. And the first day we go out, we're all given these horses and there's about 25 of us now. I was with about, I think, five people, five or six people in our group, and in total there were about 25 of us, plus the leader, the group leader. And so he goes out to - the leader of whatever they call them, and he leads, right?

[00:03:56] He's got his horse and he leads, and we all go out one by one following in a row, some beside, but mainly in a row. And I had a really beautiful horse. I can't even remember the horse's name. You think I would know it because here’s the story. Don't turn those off because there's a story behind the story that I want you to hear and how it relates to business and life.

[00:04:18] So we're out there, we're going, we're galloping. They showed us how to do it and how to tighten the reins and, and if you want to slow down and slap the reins on the left side if you want, I think it was, if you want to go left or right, whatever. 

[00:04:32] And it was right there in the open field. Beautiful open field, 25 or 26 of us, we’re riding, we're just galloping, nicely and I’m like, I want to go faster. So I'm slapping the reins or whatever the term is to go faster. And every time I did this, kid you not - if you're, if you're listening to this, you won't get it, but I'll try to explain it. But if you're watching this on YouTube, you'll, you'll, you'll get it.

[00:04:58] So every time I would smack the reins onto the horse, the horse would, like, give this,look, turn its head. If you're not watching this, turn its head and give this, just this death stare, right? I ignored it. You know where this is going, don't you? I ignored the signs. This happened probably four or five times, and I ignored it.

[00:05:18] I said, oh, this horse is cranky today. This horse is this, whatever. My friends, maybe the sixth time I did it, turned around, gave me the death stare again out in this open field. Imagine, if you, if you're not driving, close your eyes, just imagine all of us in, in the open field. All of a sudden the horse - and we're all one behind another. I was sort of, you know, the front of it, maybe I was like, maybe the eighth or ninth goes -  straight to the right, takes off away from the crowd, away from the group of horses and starts going to the right. 

[00:05:51] And I didn't know what the hell was going on. It just took off. What I saw in the distance was a huge tree.

[00:05:59] Now, my friends, this is a massive open field with one big tree with two big thick branches sticking out and the horse took off straight towards the tree. As it gets closer and closer, I realize it's trying to knock me off of him and I ducked down as much as I could because he was going right towards the branch.

[00:06:25] It could have beheaded me if I didn't duck down and it clipped my shoulder pretty hard and knocked me off the horse. And I flew off the horse and I kid you not, I laugh about it now, I skidded - skid on my butt onto these rocks. The ground was pretty rocky in that area and I turned, looked behind me and all the other horses are coming towards me because they follow the horse that's in front and they thought we were going that way.

[00:06:54] So all the horses are coming at me. Thank god they all avoided me. And the, the leader, the group leader, because everyone saw what happened, came over to check on me. My horse took off. Luckily, I was okay. I was alive, but I ignored the signs and I didn't listen. And it took me in a different direction to knock me off.

[00:07:15] To make a long story short, the leader round, round - went to round up my horse, brought the horse back and said, you can ride back with me on the back of my horse. Or if you're okay to go on your horse. And I said, I'm, I'm okay. I'm going back on that horse. And I got back on that horse. He took me back.

[00:07:34] I then went and I rested up and I was done for the weekend because my back was completely messed up, yet I still had to drive back. And a standard car too. Seven hours or something like that back home. What's the story in this? It's the year of the horse, right? Well, I was horsing around. I was ignoring the signs.

[00:07:55] And when we do that, when we ignore those signs, bad things can happen. I’ve talked about my canoe story before, sorry, my kayak story before, ignoring the signs. Same thing. Luckily, in both situations, and in other business situations I've been in, things managed to be okay, but could have been worse. And in business it could be much worse. 

[00:08:22] Although in life it could have been much worse too because I could have not made it, but I'm here to talk about it. In business, my friends, we cannot ignore the signs. We just can't.

[00:08:32] Stop burying your head in the sand if that's what you might be doing. Think about it financially. I see this way too many times and I've been there myself.

[00:08:41] We bury our head in the sands. We stick our head in the sand. We ignore the numbers. We have no idea what the numbers mean, and we wonder why we don't make payroll. We wonder why this doesn't happen. We wonder why that doesn't happen,  yet we just keep going and we ignore the signs. The signs are there for a reason.

[00:09:01] The horse was telling me to change what I was doing. Slow down a bit, stop doing the same thing over and over again. He gave me signs. He gave me five of them until it was too late and I didn't get the message. I didn't get the memo. Although it was delivered, I wasn't listening. So there's lots of ways you, you can take this.

[00:09:24] There's lots of takeaways from this. One of them is if people in your life are telling you to slow down, if people in your life, your personal life, are telling you you're tired, you're anxious, you're not showing up at home the way you used to, you're being short with us, your focus isn't with us, if that is happening, if your sleep is disrupted, those are all possibly signs.

[00:09:50] Signs of a deeper problem. Signs that something needs to change. We need to change. If cheques are bouncing, if you're missing payroll, things aren't going to just get better automatically. Don't ignore the signs. What can you do to ensure it does not happen again? You might need to reach out, speak with your bookkeeper or your accountant, or if you have a coach or mentor, speak to them or get yourself one.

[00:10:21] Speak to other people in your circle that have a business. Get some feedback, get some support. Find out what is the missing piece and why this is happening. If you keep hiring the wrong people, although you might not know that - if people keep quitting on you or you keep having to let people go, or you're coming home constantly complaining about your employees because they're not listening to you, or they're doing this and they're doing that, stop ignoring the signs.

[00:10:49] We are the leaders, my friends, of our business. I got on a horse and I thought I was leading the horse. For any of you who have ever ridden a horse, that is not always the case. Sometimes they lead us and it led me. I ignored the signs. However, I was resilient. I got back on that horse, but it could have been too late, and my back actually has never been the same since.

[00:11:16] So what I want to take away from this episode - in fact, I'd like to know what you were taking away from this episode, but I want you to look at your business. I want you to take a hard look at your business and are there signs that you might be missing? Maybe you're going after the wrong type of client, the wrong type of customer.

[00:11:34] What are the signs? What could the signs be if people are ghosting you, prospects? If customers, clients aren't paying you, or they're complaining, they're hard to deal with. Are those signs that you should be paying attention to? Now, I'm not saying to abandon ship right away the first time that horse looks back at you.

[00:11:55] Take that as a sign. Be open to it. I know, in the moment, it’s difficult. Running a business is not easy. But in the moment when these things happen, we don't always see it for what it is. That's why I want you, that's why I'm putting out this episode, and I hope you share it with other people, because other people might be missing the signs right now and we need to look for them.

[00:12:18] So my accountability for you this week, let's call it that. I want you to step back, take a 30,000 view of your business in your life and how you are showing up, how things are going for you. Are there signs that you need to pivot, that you need to change?

[00:12:38] Are there signs that something is not working? You keep banging on a certain door and it's not opening, or you keep hiring the same people and having the same challenges? Is it a people problem or is it a you problem? Do you need to change the way you lead your people or are you even leading your people?

[00:13:00] It's the year of the horse. It's our opportunity to make this year happen for us. We're already, as I record this, as this podcast comes out, we are already finishing up Q1. Hard to believe that we're going to be going into quarter number two very shortly. Don't let the year go by with us ignoring the signs. Because the last thing you want is that horse to be taking you to what it did to me and knocking you off and almost decapitating you with a big branch.

[00:13:33] I quickly  navigated that and I reacted. I was lucky. I was lucky that time. I was lucky in the kayak a few years back that was leaking and filling up with water more and more, and eventually started to sink. I was lucky. I was fortunate. Have you ever been in that situation in your business? I'm very curious to hear what's going on in your business right now.

[00:14:00] If you're not sure, if you're ignoring the signs and you want to have a deeper conversation, reach out to me marshall@marshallstern.net. If you want to be around some other entrepreneurs come as my guest join us and the ONtrepreneur Inner Circle information is in the show notes. Don't ignore the signs because they're not going to go away.

[00:14:21] Signs are there for a reason. Signs are there. They are warning you. They're warning us. Sometimes it's to slow down. Sometimes, in order to speed up. Sometimes it's caution. Do something different. Change course. Don't be ignorant. I've been ignorant. Business and personal ignorance is bliss, right? No, it's not.

[00:14:43] It feels like in the moment, let's get our heads out of the sand. Let's do something proactive. Let's get ahead of this. Let's take control of those reigns, and then we can gallop and enjoy the open meadows without worrying about being knocked off the horse. But in business, we are going to get knocked down.

[00:15:02] You have to get back up. But sometimes, my friends, we can actually ignore the signs. What can you do to ignore the signs? I want you to post your comments. I want you to like this. I want you to share this. Give this a five star review. Tell everyone about it. Stop horsing around. The year is going to be flying by before you know it.

[00:15:25] Have a great week, everyone. We'll see you again next week in another episode of The Stern Truth Business Unfiltered.

[00:15:35] Thank you so much for tuning in to the Stern Truth. If you found today's episode helpful, we would love to hear from you. Please like, share, and leave us a review. Also, if you'd like to be a guest in an upcoming episode or join us in one of our Moment Accountability Group sessions, simply email me to marshall@marshallstern.net.

[00:15:54] That's marshall@marshallstern.net. And don't forget to hit the subscribe button so you never miss an episode. Until next time, keep pushing forward and leading with confidence.