The shameful secret behind my success.

I think we can all agree when I say entrepreneurship is NOT easy. Trust me, I’d be lying to you if I told you I never have moments where I battle with my inner critic. However, there is a specific exercise I do whenever I feel stuck, paralyzed or have to make a big decision and I’m sharing it with you today. I dare you to try it for yourself and report back to me in the comments below. It might just change your life, the way it did for me. I hope this piece of mindset advice lights a fire under you 🔥

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So I was having a conversation and I was speaking to a new entrepreneur. So this person really doesn’t have any proof right now that what they’re are doing is working that they’re on the right path, that they should even continue. And that’s so common at the beginning because you don’t know, entrepreneurship is like jumping… People say this all the time. It’s like jumping off a cliff and hoping that wings appear. And there is so much of a level of let’s hope this works, and that’s a really terrifying thing to do for anybody. So if you’re in that place right now, first of all, kudos to you, second of all, I’ve been in that position and I remember when I started my business, ignorance was bliss. I didn’t know. I didn’t know it was going to work. I really didn’t even know how to monetize my business at the time. This was 10 years ago, and now I’m 10 years in. And the reality I’ve created at this point is so far beyond what I ever could have comprehended.

And so when I was speaking to this person, they said, “how did you stay focused? How did you keep going when you had no proof?” And I don’t think anyone’s asked me that question like that before. And so what came out of my mouth kind of surprised me and was kind of hilarious to admit. And the words I said were “I got effing angry.” And I know that sounds weird, and I need to explain it. And I know this might work for you. So what I mean by that is when I first was getting started and even predating starting a business, I always had this little chip on my shoulder and need to be the best and to prove myself and to feel like I was worthy of being seen, heard, or even having any level of success. There was something in me that really felt like I wasn’t worthy of it. And for a long, long, long, long time, I actually still very much so have that as a part of me as much work as I have done.

And I’m very aware of it. And honestly, it’s not been the worst thing in the world because it’s helped me get to where I am and it’s part of me. And so struggling with that sort of lack of self worth led me to being the straight A student, the perfect kid, the perfect girlfriend, all of these things. I’ve shared this before on this channel in a lot more detail, but it was almost this level of shame of not being good enough that made me want to be the best and to be better. Am I saying this is healthy? No. But does it work for a short period of time? Absolutely. It’s not sustainable in the long run, but even to this day, when I feel like I’m stuck, I’m paralyzed, I don’t know where to go from here because it doesn’t matter where you’re at as an entrepreneur.

I’ve generated eight figures in my business. I still have moments. I’ve had moments this week where I’m like, I just don’t know what I’m doing. And I said to my husband yesterday, I said, “Shouldn’t even be doing this anymore.” And it’s such a moment of reactivity and I know it passes, but those moments never stop. They never go away. If you’re in the early stages, I hate to break that to you, but they never go away. So in those moments, I have to bring myself back to that place of I’m going to prove somebody wrong, even if it’s myself. And even if it’s that version of myself, that’s the most insecure feels the worst about herself version. And unfortunately with social media, and I think this is the really important part to know, social media compounds all of the insecurities we already have. Because especially if you have no audience on social media, you don’t have a lot of followers or subscribers or et cetera.

It basically is telling you, these platforms are telling you, you’re not worthy of being seen or heard. And it’s just not true. You just need to find the right people to see and hear you. And it’s not about the amount, it’s about the quality. And if you let the external, so the opinions of other people, social media, media in general dictate your worth and your value you’re never going to do anything because you have to keep in mind everybody starts from zero. So how do you have the audacity to start from zero and continue to succeed and to grow? And that’s what I was reflecting on for myself today. And the very basic answer is that I have to find a way to get angry. That is my fuel.

I call it revenge success and it does light a fire under you because I talk to so many people every day who say, “I want to start a business. I want to do this. I want to be an entrepreneur. I want to be in the next, this person. I want to be in the next that person.” But they’re not doing anything. And generally they’re usually just trying to grow an audience. And I ask, and I say, “Well, what are you doing every day to build a business?” Don’t know. When do you want to make X amount of money by? When do you want to have X amount of clients and create X amount of impact by? There’s no urgency in that where there is no urgency, there is no action. So you have to find a way to create a sense of urgency for yourself and understand that you need to get started on this yesterday because your time here is not guaranteed and your opportunity may run out. And if you don’t have a level of urgency in the beginning, find a way to get it.

And for me, the source of that urgency came through several different things in my life, but it definitely stemmed from, and I know this sounds so crazy, even though I’m saying it out loud, my level of urgency oftentimes came from thinking I wasn’t good enough. And that is all polar opposite to what you hear most of the time. And it’s the first time I’ve ever said that out loud. And it actually makes me sad to say it out loud because it is kind of sad. That I very much so struggled with self worth so badly for so long that the only way that I found my worth was through work and I kind of actually shamed myself for that. And that’s why I think I’ve had a hard time talking about it because you don’t hear that.

You hear be positive, be optimistic, envision your success. It’s going to happen. Just keep going, et cetera. It’s really hard to keep going when you don’t think you’re even worthy of getting where you want to go. So sometimes you have to lean into your insecurities. Sometimes you have to lean into the frustration you have, that you don’t feel like you’re worthy of it. And that is going to lay a fire under you to move forward and to prove all of those voices outside of you, whether they’re real or not, wrong. And it’s going to move you to do something now, instead of waiting and putting it off and doing what I call pretty procrastination. But trying to perfect things and trying to have the perfect brand and the perfect image and the perfect audience. That’s just a pretty way to procrastinate and procrastination at the end of the day is just a way to protect yourself from being told yet again, you’re not good enough. You’re not worthy of the success. You’re never going to get where you’re going to go.

You have to think about all the people who have done what you want to do. You’re not a special snowflake. You’re not the one person in the world this isn’t going to work for. It’s going to work if you continue to do the work. And the reality is I know enough very successful people at this point, wildly successful people that I look up to who have been able to achieve insane levels of success. And I will say that every single one of them, when I think about it, has an ounce of this in them. An ounce of what I call revenge success, trying to prove somebody wrong. Doesn’t matter who that person is. And also the exercise that I often do. And now it’s coming full circle for me, when I talk about your inner critic, that’s generally who I, at this point, I’m trying to prove wrong because like I said, I now have a successful business. I now know how to do what I need to do and how to get where I need to go.

But I still battle with those thoughts of you’re not good enough. This is never going to work, et cetera. And I still battle with that version of myself who’s deeply insecure, living in a shoebox apartment, in the fetal position, because she was so frustrated and stressed out and things weren’t working. That version of me is my inner critic. And my inner critic is constantly there saying, “Oh, don’t do that. Oh, don’t step out of your comfort zone. Oh, that sounds risky.” And trying to protect me. And so I love that version. I call her Ruth, you got to name inner critic.

I love Ruth, but I also have to quiet her down sometimes because I know that that’s not me. And so who I aim to be… And when you don’t have the proof of your success and when you don’t have the proof that things are working, you have to aim for a higher version of yourself. You have to create a version of yourself that is bigger than your current reality. So even if it’s just your current reality that you’re angry at, get angry. Find some sort of fuel within you to create urgency. And anger is a great way to do that. Being sad about it is not a great way to do it. It makes you wallow in. It makes you sort of create a story in your head that that’s reality and it’s always going to be reality. When you get angry, you want to make a change and entrepreneurs are change makers.

So imagine the 80 year old version of yourself. I do this with anything in my life that’s important to me, any big decision. What would that 80 year old version of myself be proud of myself for in this moment? Because if I do it only based on what’s happening in my current reality, I’m operating from a very small level. I’m operating from the level of myself who isn’t even able to fathom what I can create and what I’m capable of. And that is what keeps so many people stuck. If you operate just from this reality right here, that you’re in right now, the one that you’re not happy in, the one where you feel like a loser, the one where you feel like nothing is working, how are you ever going to create the thing that actually does work?

So what I’ve always done is I’ve always written let to myself, and I talked about this recently from that higher version of myself to my current self, based on a reality that doesn’t exist yet, a reality that’s far beyond my imagination and I just write it, stream of consciousness and in all of the things that I want to create for myself and manifest for myself and I believe it to be true and real because I want to anchor myself in that future. Because if I anchor myself into reality, nothing’s going to change. So my very bizarre mindset advice that stemmed from a completely out of the blue conversation today is to get angry.

This whole channel is dedicated to making entrepreneurship available to everyone. And I really do believe that anyone is capable of achieving entrepreneurial success and success on their own terms. But there’s so much reprogramming that has to go into that. And this is a very easy first step and you don’t need a freaking mindset coach when you don’t have a business.

What you need to do is you need to find the mindset coach within you, which is that higher version of you who’s created a reality far beyond your wildest dreams and you need to listen to that and you need to write it out and you need to visualize it in detail and know that that’s where you’re headed. And maybe your current reality doesn’t match up to that, but it will. Your reality now will meet that one day and you will go, holy crap. It worked. I hope it was helpful!

-S

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