Design Your Vision: Why vision is the starting point for aligning your business-of-one and scaling beyond money
The most important question is, "What am I building toward?"
Welcome to How Solos Scale. Each week, we share a new framework, concept, or example of how solopreneurs are scaling from $25,000 to $50,000+ per month.
Hey there,
Six months before we co-founded Duo Consulting, Erica considered going back to a full-time job.
For two years, she’d been creating courses, running cohorts, and constantly writing content. She was doing well by most metrics. She had clients, revenue, and a business that worked.
But she was exhausted in a way that had nothing to do with working too many hours.
She’d crash hard after each launch and would sleep for days.
In other words, she’d gotten really good at a business model that drained her energy. She’d optimized for results without considering whether she wanted to live the life required to sustain them. It got so bad that she almost gave up running her business.
The root cause? She’d been asking the wrong question.
What’s your vision for the business?
When scaling a business, most solos tackle the questions that show up in every “how to grow” article and discussion:
What revenue targets should I hit?
How many clients do I need?
What’s my growth trajectory?
As solopreneurs, we had asked ourselves those questions for years. They drove our launch schedules, content calendars, and business strategy. They also drove us toward burnout.
Because underneath those questions is a conventional path we all follow:
Begin with the problems we’re good at solving.
Package our solution into a clear and compelling offer.
Set revenue goals and build systems to hit them.
Scale, scale, scale.
As a solo, your biggest risk isn’t picking the “wrong” business model. It’s getting really good at one that secretly drains your energy.
That approach led us to be conventionally successful but misaligned over time. Nick built a coaching practice that generated good income but left him feeling disconnected from the life he wanted. Erica built a content business that met revenue targets but drained her energy and ultimately led to burnout.
So when we built Duo, we started with a different question:
“What’s our vision for this business?”
Erica had never been asked about her vision before. Not by a business partner, a coach, or even herself. Honestly? She didn’t have an answer ready.
She felt like she should know, like “vision” was something successful entrepreneurs inherently understood. But she’d been so focused on just getting through each week that she’d never given herself permission to think about what she was actually building toward. It was uncomfortable. She felt like a non-expert on something that seemed fundamental to running a business.
Starting with vision changes how you think about your life, goals, and business.
The conversation shifts to what you’re working toward, and intentionally away from tactics and targets to get there. It makes you think deeply about: “How does this business fit into the life I want to live?”
Before we go further, let’s explain what we mean by “vision.”
What is Vision?
Vision is clarity on what you’re building toward in your life.
It’s the answer to questions like:
What does success mean to me?
What do I want my days to feel like?
How do I want to spend my time and energy?
Who do I want to become?
Most people think of vision as something grand and aspirational, like “changing the world” or “building a legacy.” Sure, that is part of it. But more often, vision is deeply personal and practical.
It’s Nick wanting dinner with his family every night.
It’s Erica wanting work that melds with the season of life she’s in.
It’s knowing you want time sovereignty more than location freedom. Or that you’d rather work intensely for three weeks and completely disconnect for one, than maintain a steady baseline all month long.
Vision is not a lightning bolt moment that strikes you one day. It’s not something you figure out once and never revisit, like a detailed 10-year plan with specific milestones. And it’s definitely not what you think you “should” want based on what others are building.
Once you have a vision, you have:
A filter for making decisions about your life and business
Something that evolves as you grow and learn what you actually want
The foundation that everything else (your offer, pricing, and boundaries) builds on
Vision is giving yourself permission to think about the bigger question: What am I building this for?
When you have that answer—even a rough, imperfect version of it—your decision and path forward become clear. You realize that your life has one vision, and your business exists to help you get there.
Real quick, let’s clarify the difference between goals and vision.
Goals are important because they tell you what you want to achieve.
You can set goals to scale to $50K, $70K, or even $100K months. You can set goals to work with a specific type of client or in a certain industry. Goals give you direction and help you hit milestones.
But if your goals don’t help you achieve your vision, you’ll eventually hit a “What’s the point of this?!” moment.
You’ll stare at the ceiling between meetings, wondering why you ever started your business.
On the other hand, having a vision tells you who you want to become and how you want to live. It’s what you want your life to look like day-to-day. What meaningful work feels like to you. What abundance means beyond just the number in your bank account.
Goals are how you achieve your vision.
Why Most Solopreneurs Never Have A Vision
The majority of solopreneurs we work with don’t have a clear vision because it feels indulgent, impractical, and a bit “woo-woo.”
But the biggest friction point is time.
You’ve got clients to serve, content to create, and revenue to generate. You don’t have time to sit around pondering your ideal life when there are deadlines to hit. Plus, the conventional business wisdom is to focus on metrics. Revenue, growth, and scale matter most.
Vision is something you figure out later, once you’ve “made it.”
Except that’s exactly backwards.
Vision work is really, really hard to do alone.
Visioning requires reflection, conversation, and space to think. These things that feel impossible when you’re running a business alone. You have to step back from the everyday grind and ask uncomfortable questions about what you want, not what you think you should want.
When you’re solo, who do you have those conversations with?
(While we love a good AI brainstorming session, it’s not the same as talking to a human.)
And where do you find space when you’re the only one keeping everything running?
For years, Erica couldn’t create a vision on her own. She was doing what she could to get through each week. Then she’d “rest” over the weekend (parenting toddlers ≠ rest), then get back to it on Monday.
There was no time to think about anything beyond the next launch, the next client deliverable, and the next revenue goal. But now that she has Nick, they talk pretty much every week about what they want, what they’re feeling, and where they’re going. That dialogue and thinking partnership makes a major difference.
Ironically, being solo is why so many solopreneurs never develop a vision.
Creating a vision forces you to sit with hard questions:
Am I building what I actually want, or what I think I should want?
Is this business taking me where I ultimately want to go?
What if I’ve been optimizing for the wrong things?
These aren’t easy questions. They reveal the gap between where you are and where you want to be. They surface the misalignment you’ve been feeling but haven’t named. They make you wonder if you’ve been working really hard in the wrong direction.
It’s easier to just keep pushing forward. To focus on what’s in front of you. To tell yourself you’ll figure out the vision piece “once things settle down.”
Except for one very big problem: Success doesn’t cure your lack of vision.
It exposes it.
It also doesn’t cure your limiting beliefs. It doesn’t automatically make you feel fulfilled or answer the underlying question: “Is this what I want?” Success just gives you more of what you already have. If what you have is misaligned, more of it makes the problem worse.
The practical barrier to visioning is operating in survival mode.
The solopreneurs we work with come to us doing well financially but struggling energetically and mentally.
You’re running so fast on the treadmill that stopping to think about direction feels dangerous. It’s like everything will fall apart if you take your foot off the gas. The idea of adding vision work to an already overflowing plate feels impossible.
Instead of asking “What am I building toward?” you ask:
“How do I get more clients?”
“How do I make more money?”
“How do I scale beyond my time?”
These are necessary tactical questions. But when they’re the only questions you’re asking, you end up building a business that’s optimized for growth without any clarity on what you’re growing toward. You hit $20K months and immediately want $40K months. You hit $40K and want $70K. The number keeps changing, but the feeling of “not enough” never goes away.
Because you never defined what “enough” means to you.
Without vision, every opportunity feels like you should take it.
Many of our clients say things like:
“I want to replace my corporate salary.” They do. But now they’re working more hours than they did in corporate.
“I want to make $40K/month.” They hit it. But now they want $70K/month, and the original achievement feels hollow.
“I want location freedom.” They get it. But they’re working from their laptop on vacation, and it doesn’t feel like freedom.
If this sounds like you, know you aren’t failing. You’re succeeding at the wrong thing because you don’t have a clear vision. So you’re unsure if your business is taking you where you ultimately want to wind up.
Take one of our clients (we’ll call her Sarah), a solopreneur with an events business.
She came to us with a successful company bringing in $40K/month and a strong point of view. But her business was burning her out. On a coaching call, she said she wanted to start writing a newsletter. We encouraged her: “Cool, start a Substack. But the premise needs to be the premise of your business. Think through your point of view, vision, and beliefs about your industry.”
Articulating all that in writing was harder than Sarah expected.
She sent Erica a message:
“You should make everyone write long form about their vision and POV because it pressure tests if they actually believe it.”
Writing out your vision forces you to articulate what you’re building toward in concrete terms. It reveals your definition of success. You’re confronted with whether your vision is truly yours or something you borrowed from someone else.
That’s why every single solopreneur we’ve hand-delivered a vision to has failed. (And it’s precisely why we don’t anymore.)
You can’t be handed a vision. You have to develop it yourself.
If you build a business around someone else’s vision or definition of success, hitting your goals makes the misalignment more obvious. If you optimize for revenue without considering what gives you energy, growth accelerates your burnout. If you say yes to every opportunity because you don’t have a clear filter for what you’re building toward, more success creates more confusion about what to focus on.
Success magnifies misalignment.
Misalignment magnifies burnout.
But if you have a vision, strong opinions, and you believe in them? You’re going to do great things. The reason is simple: you created it.
A clear vision aligns your business with your life.
You make decisions with confidence. You know which opportunities to say yes to and which to pass on. You design your offer around your vision, not just market demand. You price from abundance, not scarcity.
You build for the long term. Vision gives you direction to invest in leverage because you know where you’re going. You create systems that serve your vision of freedom. And you think in years and decades, not weeks and months.
You attract the right people. You connect with clients who share your values and vision. You find partners who want to build the same kind of business. You bring on team members or contractors who understand what you’re creating.
You operate from abundance. You’re not hoarding opportunities or clients “just in case.” You’re creating from inspiration, not obligation. You build a business that expands your life, rather than consuming it.
Vision is both philosophical and practical. It’s the filter for every decision and the foundation that makes everything else (your offer, your content, your operations) purposeful and productive. It’s also a process and skill you can develop by asking the right questions and giving yourself permission to answer them honestly.
Every business decision flows from understanding your vision.
It’s the difference between $30K months that feel like a prison and $60K+ months that feel like freedom.
At Duo, for example, we discovered our visions were different, yet similar.
Nick’s vision: Autonomy, self-determination, and building something meaningful that provides for his family while giving him control over his time. His version of success looks like high-impact work with fewer clients, dinner with his family every night, being present for his kids’ childhood, working intensely when he’s working and fully disconnecting when he’s not, and building generational wealth.
Erica’s vision: Creative autonomy, financial security, and operating from abundance instead of scarcity. Her version of success looks like meaningful work that challenges her intellectually and creatively, the financial foundation to invest in her kids’ future without debt, the ability to say no to work that drains her, collaboration with people who push her thinking, and space for reflection and strategy.
Katrina’s vision: Creative freedom, embodied clarity, and building a business that creates transformation for others while funding meaningful adventures. Her version of success looks like focused days shaped by creativity and writing, premium compensation for work that lights her up, clients who push her intellectually, a calendar with generous space for travel, and the financial foundation to invest in what matters—all while creating measurable impact.
Having clear individual visions is exactly what makes our business work.
We built Duo from a vision-first approach instead of a revenue-first one. Here’s what that looks like in practice:
One standardized offer – no more custom scoping anything, ever
One ICP – clarity on exactly who we serve and who we don’t
One sales conversation – no more discovery calls to retrofit services
One pricing structure – no more pricing from scarcity or second-guessing our value
One “perfect week” – a schedule that works for both our lives, not just the business
Now, to be clear, we’d already simplified many of these things before articulating our visions. We knew we needed one offer, one ICP, and clear boundaries.
Having a vision gives you the conviction to stick to your decisions.
Without vision, it’s easy to let boundaries slip.
A prospect comes in slightly outside your ICP, but they’re willing to pay. A client asks for custom work, and the revenue is tempting. You start second-guessing your pricing. You say yes to a call that doesn’t fit your perfect week.
Vision is what keeps you from letting any of that get f*cked up.
It’s the filter that makes you say: “This doesn’t serve where I’m going” instead of “Maybe just this once.” It’s the anchor that reminds you why you made those decisions in the first place.
Most importantly, our mindsets have changed.
Erica’s scarcity mindset is gone, and she’s in abundance mode. She loves the work she’s doing and is leaning into her strengths (writing for solos where the outcomes are instant and impactful) instead of forcing herself into a business model that drained her.
Nick is building exactly what he envisioned: a business that supports his family, gives him time with his kids, and proves you don’t have to sacrifice your life to scale.
This is the power of vision.
Here’s how to start creating yours:
How To Design Your Vision
Vision isn’t one thing, one sentence, or one approach.
It’s a combination of three things that help you chart a course to the life and future you want. What most people get wrong is trying to have separate visions for their life and their business. The reality is that your life has one vision, and your business is the vehicle to help you achieve that ideal life.
Your vision is made up of three main components:
Who you choose to be. You must decide who you are and what your identity is. Do you want to be a present parent? Do you want to be a high-powered businessperson? Do you want to be an athlete? Who do you want to be? You have to decide, and you don’t have to pick just one. But you must pick.
What you choose to believe. These are how we intentionally reframe and reprogram the limiting beliefs we have about ourselves, our business, and the way the world works. You can choose what you believe.
What you know is coming. These are the things you are certain about and the things you are working towards in your future. That could be anything.
When you get clear on these three components, decision fatigue starts to disappear.
You’re not overthinking every choice because you know where you’re trying to go. Should you take this opportunity? Does it serve who you choose to be, what you believe, and what you know is coming? If not, it’s easy to say no.
You also don’t have to be close to these things today for them to be part of your vision.
Maybe you’re single with 19 cats, and you know you want to have kids one day. That certainty doesn’t require a partner or a timeline. It’s just something you know is coming.
Maybe you’re working in-house right now, and you know you’re going to run a business one day that generates a million dollars in revenue. You don’t have to have the business yet.
Maybe you know you’re going to buy a big plot of land and start a farm. It could be 10 years away. Doesn’t matter.
Your vision can be far into the future. The point is knowing what’s coming so you can make decisions that move you in that direction.
This is where your business becomes the vehicle.
Your business serves your vision. It creates the conditions for what you know is coming to actually happen.
In the kids example, the business bankrolls your life so having kids doesn’t feel like a financial prison sentence.
In the business example, your current work might be what puts you in rooms where you meet future co-founders or develop the skills you’ll need.
In the farm example, the business provides the financial backing to buy the land.
Whether your vision is purely personal, purely business, or anything in between, the whole point is because you know what’s coming, you no longer overthink. You can act with significantly more confidence that you’re doing the right things for yourself, your life, and your family.
The actions you take are moving you in the right direction.
Many people’s definition of vision includes some version of “freedom.”
And everyone’s idea of “freedom” is different.
For some, freedom is time sovereignty and never being on anyone else’s schedule. For others, it’s financial security and always having the resources to do what they desire. Or it’s creative expression and being able to create without judgment or limitation.
Freedom isn’t one thing.
It’s a collection of different dimensions, and each person weighs them differently.
Understanding which freedoms resonate with you can help you create your vision:
Time Freedom: You’re never on anyone else’s schedule. You move through your day with full sovereignty, doing what you want, when you want, without urgency or pressure from others.
Financial Freedom: You always have the money, resources, and capacity to do whatever you desire. You’re never operating from lack. You’re always supported and abundant.
Social Freedom: You only share time, space, and energy with people who amplify you. Your relationships are nourishing, aligned, and energetically clean.
Creative Freedom: You freely express your creativity in any form, without judgment, pressure, or limitation. You create from joy, truth, and flow.
Location Freedom: You can be wherever you want, whenever you want, for as long as you choose. Your environment is an extension of your energy and purpose.
Purpose/Mission Freedom: You have total clarity on why you’re here and what you’re meant to offer. You live, lead, and create from your core mission.
Relationship Freedom: All of your relationships are rooted in truth, love, and energetic resonance. You release anything that no longer serves, without guilt or obligation.
Health Freedom: Your body supports your mission. You’re strong, vital, and unrestricted. You honor your body as a vessel for the work you’re here to do.
Spiritual Freedom: You’re deeply connected to yourself, source, and the field. You trust your intuition fully and live in alignment with your values.
Mental Freedom: Your thoughts are clear, empowering, and expansive. You’re free from limiting beliefs, old programs, and mental noise. You see truth clearly and create from inner knowing.
These freedoms aren’t a formula. There’s no step-by-step process. But reflecting on which ones matter most to you—and which ones you’re willing to trade off—can help you understand what you’re aiming for.
When you first start thinking about vision, the concept can seem overwhelming and abstract.
Vision” feels too big, too vague. But when you look at a list of specific freedoms like this, it becomes clear. Oh, I want those things. And in order to build a business that makes me happy to go to every day, I have to have those things inside my business. Or else I hate my business.
That’s what vision comes down to.
We’ve partnered with Chris Walker and ENCODED to help our clients assess their freedom, reflect on their current life, and map their ideal life so they can cast a vision for themselves. The goal is to raise your frequency and bring your vision to life.
Here’s how to begin:
Start with honest reflection. Look at the ten freedoms above. Which ones make you feel something? Which ones, when you read them, make you think “yes, that’s what I want”? You don’t need to rank all ten or analyze them perfectly. Just notice which ones resonate most right now.
Write 2-4 pages about your ideal life. Not your ideal business—your ideal life. What does your perfect week look like? What are you doing? Who are you with? What gives you energy? What drains it? How do you want to feel day to day? Don’t edit yourself. Just write.
Talk it through with someone. This is the most important step. Find a thinking partner, like a business partner, a coach, or a trusted friend who can help you process what you’re discovering. Vision work requires dialogue. The conversation is where clarity emerges.
Now, if you’re reading all of this and thinking, “This sounds like a complete overhaul of my entire life and business,” take a breath.
Vision is a glide path, not a U-turn.
Having a vision doesn’t mean you have to execute it immediately.
Once our client Sarah started doing vision work, she realized she hated everything she’d been doing. Her big life vision, the thing she was truly passionate about, had nothing to do with her current business. It was an “oh shit” moment.
But her current business is her moneymaker for now.
It allows her to build toward her new vision.
She doesn’t have to blow up her business today. Her big vision doesn’t have to happen in the next year. She can get her current business organized and profitable, then use that foundation to move toward what she ultimately wants to build.
This is what we call “the glide path.”
Vision gives you direction, but you don’t have to get there tomorrow. You take one step, then another, then another. You make one aligned decision. Then another. Over time, those decisions compound.
Your business starts to reflect your priorities instead of someone else’s template.
A realistic vision glide path might look like:
Keeping your current offer for the next six months while you’re profitable
Gradually shifting your positioning to attract more aligned clients
Saying no to the next misaligned opportunity that comes your way
Building systems that give you more freedoms that you’ve identified as important
Testing what your ideal week actually looks like, one week at a time
Vision creates clarity. Clarity creates confidence. Confidence creates better decisions. Better decisions create momentum. Momentum creates the freedom you’ve been building toward all along (with a lot less overthinking).
It starts with giving yourself permission to ask:
What am I building for?
Cheers,
Nick, Erica, & Katrina
P.S. – Ready to standardize your custom consulting services? Book a call with Nick and Erica.
P.P.S – Want to share your unique POV with mini-books like this one? Book a call with Katrina.
Have questions? Ask us in a comment below.