The Planner You're Becoming

Starting over doesn't mean starting from scratch — but it can feel that way. A new price point, a new market, a new certification level, a new season of life. Each one has a way of making experienced planners feel like beginners again. The question isn't whether those moments will come. It's whether you'll treat them as growth or crisis.

In this episode, I'm joined by Venisha Walker, Master Certified Wedding Planner and Owner/CEO of Cloud 9 Events based in Tennessee. Venisha shares how she found her way into the wedding industry, why she took professional development seriously from the beginning, and what it actually looks like when education shows up where it matters — in your client workflow, your timelines, and the way you lead a vendor team on a wedding day.

We also get honest about imposter syndrome, time management, and the quiet distortion that happens when you spend too much time measuring yourself against someone else's highlight reel.

And we talk about something that doesn't get named often enough: the emotional labor of this work. Weddings have no redo. The heart behind the logistics is often what clients remember — and what drives the referrals and vendor relationships that build a reputation over time.

If you've been navigating a transition, questioning your standards, or just need a reset on your why, this conversation is for you.

www.cwpsociety.com | info@cwpsociety.com | IG: @cwpsociety | FB: @cwpsociety

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

You're listening to the Wedding Planner Society podcast, brought to you by the CWP Society.

SPEAKER_02 0:15

Welcome to the Wedding Planner Society podcast, brought to you by the CWP Society, the world's premier wedding planner certification program and membership. I'm Chrissy Thomas, senior educator here with the CWP Society, and I'm glad that you are tuning in. I want to talk today about beginnings, but not in the way that you might expect. Because when we say just starting out, most people picture a brand new planner, someone who just built their website and is on the hunt for their very first client and is trying to figure out what to charge. And yes, this episode is absolutely for that person. But I've been thinking lately about how starting out is not actually a phase that you leave behind. It's something that shows up again and again throughout a career. You're starting out every time you raise your prices for the first time, every time that you maybe change your focus with your business. Every time you step into a new certification level, a new market, a new chapter of your business. Every experienced planner listening right now has been a beginner more than one time. They just kind of stop calling themselves that. There's so much that goes into building a real business. The contracts, the pricing, the packages, the brands, the systems. And yes, all of it absolutely matters. And building that foundation is real work and it does deserve to be taken seriously. Now, the planners I've watched build something truly durable over years and years weren't only thinking about what to do, they were equally intentional about who they wanted to be in this industry, what kind of professional they wanted to be known as, how they wanted vendors to describe them after a long wedding day. And what did they want clients to say when someone asked, hey, would you recommend your wedding planner? The question, who I am becoming, is one I don't think we ask ourselves enough at any stage of her career. And the reason it matters so much at the beginning is that the habits, the standards, and the reputation that you establish in your first few years are incredibly hard to undo later. It's not impossible, but it is hard. The planner who shows up late once doesn't think of herself as someone who runs behind. But the venue coordinator who she kept waiting, that coordinator's perception is set. First impressions in this industry are not always forgiving. So if you're at the beginning or if you're at any kind of beginning, let's start there. Start with who you want to be, not just what you want to book. Second, the version of you that's willing to be a student is the most powerful version of you this industry will ever see. I think there's a misconception that confidence in this business comes from having all the answers all the time. But some of the most confident planners I know are the ones who are the most eager to learn. Not because they don't know things. In fact, they know a great deal. But it's because they understand that this work is deep enough and complex enough that there's always more to understand. New planners sometimes hold back questions because they're afraid that question will make them look inexperienced. And on the flip side, experienced planners sometimes stop asking questions because they feel like, gosh, I've been in this industry long enough. And that asking feels like it's an admission of something. And both of these instincts cost people. The questions you're afraid to ask are almost always the most important ones. The thing you don't want to admit you don't know is usually the thing that will matter the most when you're standing in the middle of a wedding weekend. A willingness to learn, real learning, not just collecting information, but actually sitting with something until you understand it, is what separates the planner or coordinator who grows from one to one who plateaus. And the willingness doesn't have an expiration date. It's available to you at year one and also at year 20. And third, and I want to say this clearly let's slow down on comparison. I know, I know it's hard, especially now, because you can see everyone's highlight reel in real time. The planner or coordinator who seems to be booking everything, who just got featured somewhere, who just announced something new. And when you're at the beginning of anything, it's easy to use someone else's middle or someone else's end as the standard for your start. But here's what you're not seeing behind any of those posts. The years it took, the clients they had lost along the way, the events that didn't go perfectly, the relationships they had to build, and the moments that they weren't sure if this was even going to work out. Nobody starts at someone else's chapter 10. And trying to skip ahead doesn't fast forward your career. It just means that you may miss the work that makes those chapters solid. The most grounded and confident planners I know are the ones who stop measuring their career against someone else's timeline and started measuring it against their own values and their own standards. That shift from comparison to conviction changes everything. It changes how you price, how you pursue clients, how you respond to rejection, and how you recover from hard days. It also changes what you're willing to invest in. Because when you're running your own race, you start to see education, professional development, and community not just as optional extras, but as essential parts of the foundation that you're building. And this is going to bring me to the guests that I have with me today. This is a woman who made a decision early in her career to take professional development seriously. And she's built a business and a reputation over time that reflects exactly what we're talking about. Now, Venetia Walker is the owner of Cloud9 Events, a master certified wedding planner with the CWP Society. She is also certified wedding design consultant, certified style shoot coordinator, certified timeline genius, and also serves as an industry advancement director. And she also holds her associate's degree in business management. Venetia, welcome to the podcast. I am extremely excited to have you here. I think you are the perfect person to have this conversation with. Well, thank you for having me. I appreciate it. Absolutely. So I want to start our conversation off with a little something unexpected. You know, when you first were starting out, maybe not necessarily your first booking, but maybe your very first sense of yourself as a professional. What story were you telling yourself about what kind of planner you were going to be? And how much of that story turned out to be true?

SPEAKER_01 7:20

Oh gosh. It's a really weird thing because I am, I guess I would say, I would, I am, I'm very in tune with God. And so for me, it was a Godsend. Like I was riding in the car with my husband, and this was after my wedding in 2022. And God just literally deposited something in my spirit and said, This is what I want you to do. So for me, it wasn't something that I had dreamt about that I was since I was a little girl. It literally was something that was dropped in my spirit. And I looked at my husband and I said, Oh my goodness, God is pulling us in a different direction. And he was like, What? And I explained, and he was like, What in the world? Where do we start? And so I think my first my first thought about being a planner, one was where do I start?

SPEAKER_03 8:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:12

And I knew from previously getting married, I had one into the wedding industry, right? Which was my former wedding planner. And so I called her up and I said, Hey, listen, I know this is gonna be odd, but this is what I feel like I'm being led to do. Where do I start? And typically I wouldn't always say that that's a smart thing, but it's not a it's not not a smart thing because you want to ask someone who maybe is in the industry what their thoughts are just to gauge, kind of get some information. Um, and she literally pointed me to the CWP society. Like literally, she she I am blessed and grateful that she did that. Um, but what I thought about myself as a planner is that I just wanted the most knowledge I could. Yeah, because I know the experience that I experienced on my wedding day, just me walking outside and trying to get a client, I couldn't have never done that without experience. I mean, without knowledge. Yes, the experience does help, but the knowledge is everything because you don't know what you don't know until you know it. Yep. So that's kind of what I thought about myself as a planner that I really needed to like get some type of education. Um, and I think it all turned out to be true. Like for me. Yeah, I was like, it all turned out to be true because I laugh at myself. I just had a wedding this weekend and I was like, had I tried to wing this on my own without the knowledge and education that I uh I've gained from the CWP society, man, it would have been bad news bears, is I like to say it. It's bad news bears.

SPEAKER_02 9:55

It's you know, with your I love that you mentioned that because you uh you had talked about the power of knowledge. And what I love about your journey as a certified wedding planner, now a master certified wedding planner, is you didn't just stop at the certification. And I think that goes to exactly what you said. You you wanted more, you wanted to just fill your brain with even more knowledge so that way you could operate at a standard and the at that at a level that you knew you wanted to be at. So every certification that we've possibly offered that makes sense and it's relevant for a life center, you're like, sign me up, I'll be there. There's fun, give me more. And even I know just this past weekend you attended a conference. It wasn't CWP, but you attended a conference, I think it was a foral workshop. Again, you just wanting more and more knowledge and just knowing how that's gonna impact you in your career in the long run, it's it's gonna be it's gonna be amazing to see for sure.

SPEAKER_01 10:47

Yeah, yeah, I think it's gonna be amazing. Um, I can't say enough about knowledge, you know.

SPEAKER_02 10:53

Yeah, it just yeah. Now speak on that same note, you came into this industry with a business background. You know, you had your degree, you've got that operational thinking. I'm curious, was that foundation something that you leaned into from the start of your business, or did you have to learn how to let it work for you in the creative industry rather than maybe against it?

SPEAKER_01 11:15

I leaned into, I definitely leaned into education. I've always thought education was important. And so I think that's my go-to. Like, if I don't know, I'm gonna find out through education. Um, and some education looks different for everyone. You know, some people will actually go and take a four-year degree and think that that's great. Um, some people will go to a state school and get a certificate. Um, the CWP society to me is more like I guess a four-year degree. You know, you don't just stop at one class when you get a four-year degree. There are multiple levels, and I I heavily leaned into that thought process of looking at it like you don't stop at the smallest thing, you know, you don't expect a doctor, a heart surgeon to go, okay, you know what, I'm gonna learn about the heart and then stop and think he's gonna be able to do, you know, open heart surgery just by knowing the that there's a couple valves. I would never never allow them to be why would we wanna, you know, why would a client just want to get someone who just learned about you know how to set a table? Yeah, or you know, or or is a great, you know, budgeter doesn't mean you know how to plan. Yeah, there's more that goes. There's levels, there's like an onion, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 12:42

Exactly. Oh, I love I love that analogy so much, and I hope that resonates with people. And because I do think when you know comparing it to a heart surgeon, like that's just a matter of you know, life or death, but comparing it to a wedding day, that's an investment of someone spending thousands and thousands of dollars on a day that they can't do over and a day where we're we're merging families, a day where you're surrounded by family members and friends, and how important it is. Why would you want to put that at risk when you think about hiring someone to lead and to guide and to make sure that you're you and your family are actually able to enjoy this wedding day? That's how important it is, and that's how important planners should take it, and that's how important how serious we should take, how precious this career is, and and what a beautiful blessing it is that we get to be part of it. Let's let's show up to the table, the best version of ourselves we could possibly be.

SPEAKER_01 13:39

Yeah, and we're the professionals, so like in a profession, like if you call yourself a professional, you have to know all the ins and outs. We are there to guide our clients, you know. Again, I said it earlier, they don't know what they don't know. And it's up to us to make sure that this one day is memorable in a good way because there's two ways to memory remember things, you know, you can remember it in a bad way, and I'll never book that planner coordinator again, or remember it in a good way. And I'm telling all my friends and family about it because you know, every I look at a wedding like this, there's another client in the room. Yep, there's always another client in the room, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 14:22

So it's important how you show up. Just gave me chills because that's that's a thousand percent true, and that too, that's a reflection of me and my career. I've been doing this for 13, 14 years. I've never had to pay for advertising because of the referrals I get, not just from the venues and the vendors, but for the people in the room. Bridesmates, the best friend. I had one who uh she had just I was it was in a country club and I was there working, and she had just swung by. She was at the club playing tennis and she was getting married there, and just she didn't even come talk to me. She just saw me in the room. She said she said, I saw the way that you were talking to the vendors, and I thought, I gotta have her as my wedding planner. Yeah, people are always watching, and when you're showing up as a professional, you're gonna book those clients. Oh, Venetia, I love that you just said that.

SPEAKER_01 15:07

It's the same. Like this past weekend, I had a wedding, and the bride, the maid of honor had is getting married in October, who happens to be the bride's sister that I was, you know, uh coordinating her wedding for. And she her her fiance, not even the maid of honor, the fiance was like, I don't care what we have to do to get you as our coordinator, we want you. And she's she wasn't even my client. Yeah, so like you're always there's always eyes on you, and it's important um how you show up.

SPEAKER_02 15:43

Exactly. I do want to ask you a question about especially knowing how much you value education, and when you received your education, was there something that you actively had to unlearn in order to grow? Maybe not necessarily something that you didn't know, but something you thought you knew that you eventually realized was actually holding you back.

SPEAKER_01 16:04

Yeah, so a couple of things. I think the biggest one is time management. So I come from a background, obviously a business background, but more um recently in banking management. And so that's a little different beast in the retail world. It's like the number fifth most stressful job in the world, and I went from number five to number three, but I digress. It's okay, it's fine. That's what it was like really. We're we're bumping up to number three for stress, okay? Yeah, you know, the last shall be first, the first will be last. It's fine. So um, I think what I had to unlearn was time how I did time management in the past was not necessarily what I could, I couldn't rely on that same method in the future. Um, future meaning now. Um, I definitely had to craft a whole different way because the workflow is totally different in wedding planning uh than it is bank manager or retail managing in a retail store. The workflow is completely different while you are dealing with one client at a time that comes in, you're dealing with multiple clients at the same time. Yeah. Um, and how you know the process of workflow that you put in, you're only as good as that. Yeah. You're only as good as that workflow. And so, yes, it's a trial and error, depending on how you like it. But I did have to unlearn my previous time management. And the other thing I had to that I'm still currently working with, and because I don't want people to think that once you unlearn something, that's it. Like you find you, you tend as you grow, you tend to find other things that you need to unlearn. And my biggest thing is that I'm not good enough. My biggest thing is I'm not, you know, that that I'm not the imposter syndrome. And I think I have the education, I have the knowledge, I have to lean in on that. So definitely using words of affirmation all the time. So it's just one of those confidence.

SPEAKER_02 18:11

Yeah. And again, it kind of goes back to what I mentioned earlier about that comparison. And I think that's why it's so hard now, is because it's right in our faces, it's in our phones, we see it all day long. And I I even struggle with it to the point where, you know, Venetia, you know, that I'm taking less weddings as my role grows here at CWP. And as my two young boys, I want to be there for them on the weekends for ball games and things like that. So I'm taking on less. But what I'm doing to myself, and I'm like, would you stop doing this? Is I'm seeing the weddings that my peers, my girls, you know, my fellow CWPs are booking. And I'm like, oh, they reached out to me too. But man, that could have been a very great wedding. And like doing that comparison of like, should I have taken that wedding? And then I'm like, no, you you turned them down because your son had a ball game and you would have been, you would have regretted not being at that ball game. So it's that figuring that balance out of that comparison game, it is a struggle, and just reminding yourself that you are on the path that you're supposed to be on, right? I said earlier, we cannot compare our chapter five to someone else's chapter 10. And I know it's easier said than done, but to piggyback off what you said, the words of affirmation, if those are those things that you have to constantly work on in order to not get buried in that comparison trap. Because what happens when you're so buried into comparing yourself to others is you can't get yourself out and you can't even figure out who the heck you even are because you're too busy comparing yourself to other people. So you're getting in your own way by doing that. So you have to be really intentional, like you are, Vanisha, with the words of affirmation, reminding yourself, I know what I'm doing, I'm educated, I can do this. If that's what it takes for you to get out of that path, then make sure that you do so.

SPEAKER_01 19:54

But I'm glad I did not I only mention that because I want people to understand that whether you are a novice or newer planner or an older planner, comparison creeps in. It's like we call scope creep, it's a comparison creep, it creeps in when you least expect it. And especially when you're newer, obviously, you see all these great weddings and you have wishes. And I think I think what would be good um is to create like a wish board of weddings that you want to do, you know, and just check those little puppies off and as and put words of affirmation around it and you know post your credentials, like make sure that you are seeing it, that you know, I took this class, and this is what I learned from this class. You know, go through the notebooks, don't just take the notes and throw them off to the wayside, you know. Go back over your notes and and I can't even tell you. I have a notebook right now that's so shabby because I done I think I done burnt the pages kind of going back through it, you know, because at the end of the day, I learned some good nuggets. Yeah. And I use them, you know, so that's why education is important. Exactly.

SPEAKER_02 21:08

It's I love that you said that. Use use don't just write the notes, use them, we'll back at them, reference them when you need to when you're in a situation. What I love about why you said that is because I've for some people, they think of education as just a one-stop thing, like you said earlier. You get it and you're done. And unfortunately, that's just not the case. It's just not. In order for you to continue to grow, you have to go back and reference it. Or it's on the flip side of that, we have people who love education, they want all the credentials, they want all the degrees, they want everything, but then they're not applying it. So it's like you're getting this education just to have the badge. That's not doing you any justice at all. Like if you're not taking the information, absorbing it, and applying it to your business, you just have a badge on your website. That's it. That's not going to make you improve your business. So I'm so glad that you mentioned use, get your notebook, use the notebook.

SPEAKER_01 21:58

Well, the the thing. Too about it is like you put you put all these credentials out there, like you have all your badges on there, and you're not applying it. You're not only making yourself look bad, you're making the CWP society look bad, and all of its fellow members, and the CEO Lori Hartwell, and then you, Chrissy. Like we are the brand. We are the brand, and we are the example of what we would love for the wedding industry to look like. So we need to show up. We we paid for these things. Show up. It's like you like I have kids in sports, and I tell them all the time, you know, we start something, we're gonna finish it. I know you're a sports mama, and I know you know that sports ain't cheap. No, so listen, if I'm paying all this money into sports, oh you you gonna finish it. Yeah, like we're gonna use what we pay for. Like, that's like not being a good steward of your money, and that's a whole nother lesson. But um, yeah, that's valuable that can apply. Don't let me take you out in church for real, because I will. But you know, it's it's just one of those things, it's like you have these credentials, use them, use them, use them to your advantage, like mention them, talk about them. Um, and then you know, I don't know, it'll show up, it'll show up in your work.

SPEAKER_02 23:15

Yeah, it will a thousand percent. And I love that you mentioned that when you don't put that knowledge how it is a reflection of not just CABP, not just the founders CEO, but it's a reflection of its members, and it's because the CABP society is so member driven. Like Lori Humble has not paid a dime for advertising. The reason that we are now the world's you know biggest certification program and membership is because of our fellow planners, because of the CWPs who did exactly what your wedding planner did. Someone interested in wedding planning, you need to get certified. We drive this business and it be because what you said earlier, we want this industry to change. We want the wedding planning industry to be taken seriously, and we know the only way that it can be is if we value what it is that we bring to the table. And if we if we are pricing ourselves correctly, if we are valuing education, if we're doing the job that we're supposed to be doing, that's gonna elevate and rise up the industry. And the only way that you can do that is if you get the education, and because we value our reputation as wedding planners in the wedding industry as a whole, we want everyone around us to have that base knowledge and that base foundation. So I'm so glad that you mentioned that. I appreciate that. Of course. Now I want to ask you about the emotional weight of this job. And I think this is very interesting because you come from the banking world. I too came from banking as well. So I totally understand. I think that's this is something that the industry doesn't talk about enough, not just the logistics, the long hours, the checklist, the things like that, but the but the emotional ask of it. When did you really feel the weight of what it means to hold space for someone's most personal day? And how have you learned to carry that emotional weight and that load?

SPEAKER_01 25:04

Listen, wedding one, wedding one, because I'm just being, you know, most of us, a lot of us, I can't say most of us, a lot of us have been married before, and we knew how important that day was for us. And I feel like this is something that should not be taken lightly, um, because there's no redo's, you can't press pause. Let me go back and say that differently. Pause, let me go back and do that differently. There's no redoes, doovers, none of that. And I think from wedding one, because I am so serious about, like, I have a heart for my clients. You know, Lori talked not too long ago about scope creek. That, yep, that's me. That's me. Because I love my clients, like I love them like they were mine. I always said in banking that I would treat my clients like I treat my grandmother. That was my motto. If I wouldn't recommend it to my grandmother, I'm never gonna recommend it to my clients. And so, for in the wedding industry, I'm treating those as if they were my daughters, you know, and so they're family to me, and and the emotional toll is like I'm the mother of the bride, even and doing all the planning, I'm the mother of the bride. You know, those are my those are my babies. I get little, I get a little, you know, protective. I'm a mama bear, you know, and and the emotions that are attached to it, you know, when they're hurt, I'm hurt. Yeah, when they're happy, I'm happy. So we gotta stay happy all the time. Because I mean to be happy, you know. When they're sad, I'm sad. You know, if a DJ messes something up, I'm gonna say this in the most nicest way, he gotta see me. Yeah, yeah, we gotta talk about. Yeah, I'm a little mama bear, but but I will say this, I do stress that in in the front end with all the with all the vendors. I stress that in the front end. I said, hey, you know, I know you're a professional just like me, and you hold your your profession just as important as I do. So with that said, we're gonna surround this couple as you're the the uncle, and you're the you know, we're all family at the end of the night, and so it's important that that we stress the um the value of care with all the vendors, and so how I carry that is like close to my heart, yeah. And it started with wedding one, and it hasn't actually probably has gotten worse. I was gonna say it's probably worse.

SPEAKER_02 27:50

Each wedding I do, it gets a little worse because you're probably like you said, you're getting those kind of repeat clients where it's like she's a product, she's the sister, so you're just getting closer and closer with their family and their friends, and it does get worse.

SPEAKER_01 28:02

Yeah, I mean, to the point where you you end up starting to get invited to things, yes, and then you go, Oh, should I go?

SPEAKER_02 28:11

Baby showers, like all the things, you know, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 28:15

Closer to lunch. Oh, they love to invite me to lunch. Hey, we're having lunch at so and so. You want to come? And I was like, Well, can I? And they're like, Absolutely, we're family now. You know, for a client to say that we're family, that's everything.

SPEAKER_03 28:28

That means a lot. That's everything's a lot.

SPEAKER_02 28:30

That means job well done because I think what happens, Venetia, in this industry, and it's unfortunate. We forget that we are in the industry of love. We just look at a wedding as another day, it's the same. Well, they're doing they're getting the ceremony, the cock to hour, the first dance, all of it's the same. It's not because of who's getting married, because of who again is in the room. I am the exact same way, Venisha. When you mentioned mama bear, I laugh a little because that's I literally say that in my initial consultations. When I get to the section about talking about my approved vendor list and why I require my couples to have vendors on my approved vendor list, I tell them it's because I get very mama bear. I and I realize in my first year of business that not everyone who claims to be a wedding professional is a professional, but me should be working with my amazing clients. I get very mama bear and protective of you and this wedding. And I realize the only way I can protect this wedding day is by making sure we're only hiring and working with people who are going to take care of you. And that's why I have this approved vendor list. And when I word it to them that way, I never get pushback because they see my heart. They see how important I take it as if they're trusting me with this day. That is the biggest honor. And because it's the biggest honor, I get very mama bear with my companies. I get so close with them, I get so close to this wedding, and I that's the heart of what it is that we do that I think people forget about. And I'm hoping if you're listening, that this serves as a reminder of there is heart at what we do. It's not just timelines, it's not just checklists. There is emotion to the weight of being in the wedding industry. And that's important to hear because I feel like whether you're new into the wedding industry or you're new to weddings, because I've had a lot of people who do events in corporate and making that transition. And they're they're able to do their job, but they're why why am I not getting bookings? Why am I why isn't the client relating to me? It's because you're going about this is just task and checklists, you're forgetting the emotion, the people behind it. So I'm so glad that you shared that. Thank you for that.

SPEAKER_01 30:34

Yeah, you're welcome. And I just want to say the emotion doesn't start when the wedding starts, the emotion starts at the consultation. Yes, like it starts from the beginning. Like I feel like people book based on emotions, people, the I buys, that's the whole thing. The I buys, but also the heart feels, and there's a connection that happens at consultation. And once you and it's not about the dollars either, you know, you shouldn't be doing it because oh, I'm getting paid. Well, yeah, that's a byproduct. That's a byproduct. It starts at the very beginning.

SPEAKER_02 31:11

I'm so glad that you said that exactly. So, for every planner or coordinator listening to this who maybe is somewhere in the middle of their career, maybe not brand new, but not where they want to be quite yet. What's the thing you think they need to hear that they're probably not letting themselves hear? I think they need to go back to remember their why.

SPEAKER_01 31:33

Why are they actually doing like what is the purpose of becoming a wedding planner? What is the purpose of um this career in a whole? And what's the end game? What are you going for? I think when you know your why and what the goal is, every you can track everything in the middle. Yeah, you can pinpoint what I need to get there. I guess I hate to say it like this, but Jesus said it best, you know. Write it down and make it plain so it can be read on the run. You want to make sure that you are writing it down because sometimes we get in the middle of stuff, in the middle of things, and we forget what we're doing or the why. Or I'm at an age, you know, I can walk out of a room and forget what I was doing, you know, and I gotta go back to the other room and remember what it was I went to go get. So if you write it down, you might forget in the middle of it, but you can go back and remember and pick up. If you get lost, you can see where you where you are, you know, and go back. And I think sometimes when we're in the middle of like our career, and we're like, what's next? Or why am I doing this? We can go back to that why. And I think those whys need to be, they change, they do, they're never the same from year to year. They're never the same. My my family and I, we do a um, we do a a chart at the beginning of the year that has four cry quadrants uh of goals and snapshots of what the future would look like, and I can pull them out. And for the last three years, my goals have changed. There's a few on there that are still the same, but my goals have changed, and I have to know my why. Yeah, I think planners that are in the middle or the thick of things, sometimes they forget their why. Yeah, and so if if they've wrote it written it down, they can figure out where to go when they get lost.

SPEAKER_02 33:26

And I love that. Write it down, have it somewhere where you can constantly reference it. I have beautiful framed quote that was my my why at the beginning. And it's it's a quote from a song, and it says, decide what to be and go be it. And that was my beginning motto in life because for me it was that that comparison game, that fear, and I didn't want to be held back. I knew what I wanted to be. I just need to go be it. So I kept that at my desk. It's still here where I'm it's constantly a reminder of this was your goal. Do it, go it, do what you need to do to get there. So I I love that so much.

SPEAKER_01 34:06

Well, and not only that, it's like once you get there though, what happens? Yeah, you make a new goal, yes, you make a new end game, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 34:15

You know, so exactly. Well, Venisha, God, this was so good. I don't want to get off. Like, we could be on here for hours. I'm really tickled because we are so much alike between the bank industry and what you said about walking into a room and having to walk back to the room that you were just in to remember why you came in that room happens to me all the time. So we are on that same level. But my baby shout out to be a boss. My last question for you if you could go back and have one honest conversation with yourself on the very first day you decided this was going to be your work. So in that car with your husband, not to change anything, but just to say something, what would you say to yourself? Don't quit.

SPEAKER_01 34:59

Don't quit. If if this was something that was given, like this is specifically for me, if God gave it to me, then he's gonna sustain it. Keep walking, keep moving forward. That is, I should be my word for the year moving forward. Keep moving forward, one foot in front of the other, because the only time that you um fail is when you quit.

SPEAKER_02 35:22

Yeah, exactly. Venisha, thank you so so incredibly much. Thank you for your honesty here. That that meant a lot to me. And I really do think that your words of wisdom here, there were so many nuggets that you dropped, I think is going to really impact our listeners. So, for everyone listening, whether you planned your first wedding last month or your hundredth last weekend, I hope something in this conversation landed because what we talked about today, again, it's not just for beginners, but it's for anyone who's building something and wants to build it well. The willingness to keep growing, to stay curious, to measure yourself against your own standards instead of someone else's highlight reel. That's what this work actually requires. Not just at the start, but all the way through. So if you're at a place in your career where you're ready to invest in that growth in a serious and structured way, I want you to take a look into certification with the CWP Society. Not because it's a box to check, not because what it says on the paper, not because you get a badge, but because the process of earning it will push you in ways that will make you genuinely better at this work. And the community you step into on the other side of it is one that you'll want to be a part of for the rest of your career. Venisha is clearly evidence of that. And there's a seat for you at the table here. Visit CWPSociety.com to explore where you'd like to begin. Again, I'm Chrissy Thomas. Thank you for listening, and we'll see you next time. Thanks again, Venetia.

SPEAKER_00 36:50

And before you go, we have a little something just for our podcast listeners. If you are ready to elevate your career as a wedding planner or coordinator, you can use code podcast to receive$50 off the executive or master certification program. This code is valid until the next episode releases. So be sure to take advantage while it's available. This offer can't be combined with any other discounts. Visit CWP Society.com to learn more.