For the last eight years, I’ve been doing something most business consultants won’t do.
I’ve been helping extraordinary experts claim iconic positioning and sell at the luxury level. Million-dollar offers. $500K engagements. $100K transformations as foundation.
Yes, we’ve worked with hundreds of people who’ve been wildly successful. They’re building empires now. Creating generational wealth. Operating in rooms where legacy-level decisions are made.
But I’ve equally worked with people who haven’t succeeded. Brilliant experts. Masters of their craft. People with decades of proven results.
And I’ve learned some pretty harsh lessons about what’s likely going to lead to success at this price point and what’s going to stop you cold.
I can wrap my arms around you. I can see that you’re the master of your craft, brilliant at what you do. I can give you the strategy, the positioning, the exact roadmap.
But ultimately, if you can’t step into the identity required to sell at this level, no one is going to buy a million-dollar offer from you. Ever.
There’s only so much I can do. Only so much my community can do.
The rest? That’s on you.
So here are the lessons that have broken my heart over the last eight years of doing this very important work.
Mainstream strategies work for volume. And volume is growing. There’s nothing stopping you from doing that. There’s no judgment from me.
But our particular strategies work for a particular type of person.
And I need you to understand whether that’s you. Before you waste your time. Before you waste mine.
LESSON ONE: YOU DON'T KNOW ANY RICH PEOPLE (AND YOU THINK THAT'S PERMANENT)
I had a client, genuinely brilliant at what she did, who told me in our first conversation: “Kathryn, I don’t have any connections to wealthy people. I didn’t grow up with money. I don’t understand how rich people think. This just isn’t going to work for me.”
She never made it past that belief.
Same expertise as Colette, who grew up in a trailer park and now works with ultra-high-net-worth individuals who pay her premium rates for transformational work.
The difference? Colette didn’t use her background as an excuse. She used her expertise as her entry point.
Rich people aren’t a different species. They’re simply people with money who are actively looking for the best solutions to their problems.
Your job isn’t to know rich people. Your job is to become the person rich people seek out.
The experts who succeed at this level stop using their network as an excuse and start building their reputation as the solution premium clients can’t live without.
The ones who don’t stay trapped in victim thinking disguised as logic.
LESSON TWO: YOU DON'T THINK YOU BELONG WITH WEALTHY, SUCCESSFUL PEOPLE
I’ve written before about being a scholarship kid at Australia’s first full-fee paying university. About believing there was a fundamental gap between me and the wealthy kids around me. About spending decades trying to work my way into rooms through sheer effort.
The work built everything I have. But it didn’t get me into those rooms.
What finally did? Understanding that those rooms don’t operate on effort. They operate on certainty.
Unshakeable certainty about the value you create.
I watch this play out constantly with the experts I work with. The ones who succeed carry absolute certainty about their right to be in those rooms. Not because of where they came from or who they know. Because of the transformation they deliver.
The ones who don’t make it? They’re still trying to earn their place. Still waiting for someone to validate that they belong. Still hoping that one more credential, one more proof point, one more achievement will finally make them worthy.
Belonging isn’t earned through external validation. It’s claimed through internal conviction.
Premium clients don’t care where you grew up. They care about your absolute certainty in your ability to solve their most expensive problems.
If you walk into those rooms carrying the energy of “I hope they accept me,” they won’t.
If you walk in carrying the energy of “I belong here because I’m the best in the world at what I do,” everything shifts.
The experts who can’t claim that certainty never make it. Not because they lack capability. Because they lack belief in themselves at the level this work requires.
LESSON THREE: YOU CAN'T IMAGINE WHY ANYONE WOULD PAY BIG MONEY FOR WHAT YOU DO
“My industry doesn’t command these prices. People won’t pay six figures for this. What I do isn’t worth that much.”
You’re thinking about this completely backwards.
You’re thinking: “I need to find 100,000 people willing to pay me something.”
That’s the ascension model. Start small. Build an audience. Scale up gradually over years. Work your way from $97 to $997 to maybe, eventually, $10K.
We’re not doing that.
We’re using the descension model. The one luxury brands have used for centuries.
The math changes everything: You don’t need 100,000 people. You don’t even need 1,000 people.
You need a handful.
If you work with five clients this year at $500,000 each, that’s $2.5 million. From five engagements.
Not five hundred. Not five thousand. Five.
The question isn’t whether there are millions of people who will pay you six figures. The question is whether there are five people on this planet who have the problem you solve, who have the resources to invest at this level, and who recognize you as the ONLY person who can deliver the transformation they need.
Five people. Out of eight billion.
That’s not a market question. That’s a positioning question.
Do those five people exist? Absolutely. In every industry. For every genuine transformation.
Ultra-high-net-worth individuals. Fortune 500 companies. Visionary founders building billion-dollar businesses. Luxury brands seeking transformation at the highest level.
They’re actively looking for the person who can deliver what no one else can. And they will pay extraordinary sums for certainty.
You have to believe that market exists before you’ll ever position yourself to serve it.
If you can’t imagine why anyone would pay big money for what you do, you’ll never position yourself in a way that makes premium clients see you as the obvious choice.
Luxury brands don’t ask “Will enough people buy this?” They ask “Is this the absolute best solution for the person who needs this specific transformation?”
When the answer is yes, price becomes irrelevant. Because the transformation is worth exponentially more than the investment.
The experts who succeed have faith that their handful of ideal clients exist. And they position themselves to be found by those exact people.
The ones who don’t stay trapped trying to serve everyone at a price point everyone can afford. And they suffocate under the weight of volume.
LESSON FOUR: YOU FEEL GUILTY ABOUT CHARGING PREMIUM PRICES
“It’s not fair to charge that much. I should help people. I should do it affordably. Good people don’t charge high prices.”
I’ve worked with so many people in transformational industries who never get further than the first conversation because they can’t get past their money issues.
They genuinely want to serve. They want to help. They have decades of proven expertise and extraordinary results.
But they cannot reconcile premium pricing with their identity as a “good person.”
So they stay trapped. Serving too many clients for too little money. Exhausted. Resentful. Building nothing that lasts.
Let me ask you something: Do you want to create impact or do you want to create legacy?
Because they’re not the same thing.
Impact is what you create through your work. The transformations you deliver. The lives you change. The problems you solve.
Legacy is what outlasts you. The movements you start. The standards you set. The next generation you fund. The infrastructure you build that continues serving long after you’re gone.
Impact requires expertise. Legacy requires wealth.
Wealthy people can create impact at a scale that struggling experts never will.
When you’re barely sustaining your business, when you’re exhausted from serving too many clients for too little money, when you’re stretched so thin you can barely function, what legacy are you building?
None.
You’re surviving. Not thriving. Not building. Not creating anything that lasts.
But when you charge what your transformation is worth, when you’re compensated appropriately for the extraordinary value you create, everything changes.
You can invest in becoming even better. You can develop methodologies that will serve thousands through certification. You can fund the charitable work that matters to you. You can create opportunities for the next generation.
You can build something that outlasts you.
Feeling guilty about iconic positioning isn’t virtuous. It’s destructive.
You’re not being noble by undercharging. You’re being small.
And your smallness serves no one. Not your clients, who deserve your highest level work. Not your industry, which needs leaders setting new standards. Not the causes you care about, which need your resources to make real change.
The wealthy Icons who are changing the world aren’t doing it through affordable offers. They’re doing it through wealth that creates infrastructure, funds movements, and builds legacy.
Stop confusing poverty with virtue. Stop making your limitation look like selflessness.
Charging what your transformation is worth is the foundation of everything you’re meant to build.
The experts who succeed understand that sustainability at the highest level enables legacy at the broadest scale.
The ones who don’t stay trapped in martyrdom that serves no one.
LESSON FIVE: YOU THINK I'M LYING AND THIS IS ALL A FANTASY
I’ve written before about standing on stages and watching rooms split in half the moment I mention million-dollar deals.
One side dismisses it immediately. Impossible. Unrealistic. Fantasy.
The other side leans forward. Finally, someone saying out loud what they’ve been thinking in private.
I used to try to win over the skeptics. I’d spend enormous energy building cases, showing proof, explaining how this works.
They never believed me.
Because when someone needs you to convince them that million-dollar deals are possible, they’re not missing information. They’re missing belief.
And you can’t logic someone into a leap of faith.
The question “How can you charge that much?” isn’t actually a question. It’s someone telling you: “I can’t see myself doing that. And rather than sit with that discomfort, I’m going to make your pricing the problem instead of my limitations.”
I know this because I used to be that person.
When I was building my first business, I had very strong opinions about what things should cost. What was “reasonable.” What was “realistic.”
I’d hear about someone charging $50K for a project and think: “That’s absurd. No one needs to charge that much.”
Translation: “I can’t charge that much. And admitting that makes me feel powerless. So I’m going to reframe my limitation as moral superiority.”
The shift happened when I stopped needing people to validate premium positioning.
The people who succeed at this level already believe it’s possible before they have proof. They have faith in themselves at a level that doesn’t require external validation.
The ones who don’t are waiting for someone else to give them permission. To prove it’s real. To show them it’s possible.
But Icons don’t wait for permission. They claim their position and build the proof through action.
LESSON SIX: YOU REFUSE TO DROP YOUR HUMBLE AND ADMIT YOUR BRILLIANCE
“I don’t want to seem arrogant. I should stay humble. It’s not good to brag.”
Let me be very direct with you.
Real humility is acknowledging your gifts and using them in service of others.
False humility is hiding your brilliance so other people feel comfortable.
And false humility serves absolutely no one.
Your clients don’t need you to be humble. They need you to be certain. They need you to know, without question, that you can deliver the transformation they’re investing in.
Your industry doesn’t need you to downplay your expertise. It needs you to set the standard that everyone else measures against.
The world doesn’t need more experts hiding their light. It needs Icons who are brave enough to shine.
The refusal to claim your brilliance isn’t about not wanting to seem arrogant. It’s about not wanting to be responsible for what comes next.
Because when you admit your brilliance, when you claim your mastery, when you position yourself as the best in the world at what you do, everything changes.
You can’t hide anymore. You can’t play small. You can’t stay comfortable.
You have to grow up and step up.
You have to operate at the level your positioning claims. You have to deliver at the level you’re charging. You have to become the Icon you’re claiming to be.
And that’s terrifying.
So instead, you hide behind humility. You downplay your gifts. You make yourself smaller so you don’t have to be responsible for being bigger.
Your brilliance exists whether you acknowledge it or not.
The only question is whether you’ll use it to create massive value or hide it behind false modesty.
Stop feeling ashamed for being exceptional. Stop apologizing for your mastery. Stop making your gifts smaller so other people feel bigger.
Grow up. Step up. Claim what you’ve earned.
The experts who succeed acknowledge their brilliance and use it to create transformation at the highest level.
The ones who don’t stay the best-kept secret in their industry. Forever comfortable. Forever small. Forever wondering what could have been.
LESSON SEVEN: YOU REFUSE TO STEP INTO YOUR INNER ICON
“I’m comfortable being the expert, the consultant, the coach. But becoming an Icon? That feels too big, too bold, too much.”
Icons aren’t born. They’re made by deliberate choice.
The choice to stop hiding behind a small identity. The choice to claim the position you’ve earned. The choice to operate at the level you’re capable of.
And most people will never make that choice.
Not because they can’t. Because they won’t.
They won’t because it requires becoming someone different. Someone bigger. Someone who can’t hide anymore.
Your current identity is a choice, not a fact.
You’ve chosen to be “the expert” or “the consultant” or “the coach” because that identity feels safe. Manageable. Within your control.
But Icons operate differently. Icons set standards. Icons lead industries. Icons build legacies.
And that requires a fundamental identity shift that most people will never make.
Who is this for? People who are tired of being the best-kept secret. People who know they’re meant for more. People who have the inner knowing that they’re capable of iconic status and are finally ready to claim it.
People who are willing to become uncomfortable in service of their highest potential.
Who is this NOT for? People who want to stay comfortable. People who need external validation before they act. People who are waiting for permission or proof or the perfect moment.
People who want someone else to give them the identity they need to claim for themselves.
The experts who succeed make the deliberate choice to step into their iconic identity before they feel ready. Before it’s comfortable. Before anyone validates it.
The ones who don’t wait. They hope. They stay comfortable in the small identity that’s killing them slowly.
THERE'S A LEAP OF FAITH HERE
If you’ve read this far, you recognize these patterns. You see where you’ve been holding yourself back.
The gap between where you are and where you want to be isn’t strategy. It’s identity.
I cannot make you believe you’re worthy of iconic positioning. I cannot make you claim the certainty required. I cannot make you step into the identity that makes this work possible.
That’s on you.
But if you’re ready, if any of these lessons resonated and you know you can move past them, there’s an extraordinary opportunity in the market right now.
The middle market is collapsing. There are only two positions left: commodity or Icon.
And the iconic positions are still available.
This is the right place for you if you want to be in that 1% who gets to lead the market and truly dominate your niche and create a legacy.
But it’s not for everyone.
And if any of those lessons resonated with you and you don’t think you can get past them, that’s okay. It’s totally fine. Volume strategies work. Mainstream approaches work. There’s no shame in choosing a different path.
But if you’re ready to claim iconic positioning, if you’re done with the excuses and the false humility and the victim thinking, if you’re willing to do the identity work that makes this possible, then welcome home, Icon.
This is where we get to start our journey together.
