self-doubt: here's the fix

Summary

self-doubt is the most expensive emotion you’ll ever carry. it costs you opportunities, relationships, money, years. and the fix isn’t a mindset trick. it’s a sequence.

four steps to short-circuit it:

1. do. action proves capability. you cannot think your way out of self-doubt. you have to act your way out. the rep is the cure.
2. know. nobody has it figured out. every person you respect is faking some of it. that’s the level playing field. once you internalize that, your “I don’t know enough” excuse evaporates.
3. adjust. amateurs quit when something doesn’t work. pros adjust and try again. the difference is one or two iterations of refusing to give up.
4. learn. stop consuming free content as your primary education. get a mentor, hire a coach, buy the course. paid learning forces commitment. free learning rarely does.

your self-doubt isn’t a problem with your psyche. it’s a problem with your inputs and your reps.

Transcript

why you can’t afford self doubt

I know there are a lot of you out there who struggle with self-doubt. You’re not sure if you can do this. You’re not sure if you have what it takes. And maybe you do and maybe you don’t, but here’s what I know. You do not have time for self-doubt. You really don’t. You have to get moving. We can’t sit here and three years later continue the same conversation about whether or not you can do this and continue to have this self-doubt about what you can build and what you’re capable of. So let’s go over the four ways to eliminate self-doubt. The first one is do. You have to do something. That is it. You have to prove to yourself that you’re capable of doing something. So you just need to do it once and then you need to do it many times. We can take a very small example. Say you wanted to start posting videos on social media. Do it one time. Create a video. I don’t care how crappy it is. I don’t care if you’re trying to create a podcast and it’s recorded with your phone. It does not matter. Get it up. Get it uploaded. Just do it. Prove to yourself that you can do it once. After you do it once, you’re going to prove to yourself that you can do it three times. After you prove to yourself you did it three times, you’re going to do it a hundred times, two hundred times. Once you start to prove to yourself that you are capable, you no longer have the self-doubt around action. You are capable. You can do this. You just need to prove to yourself. Do it once. Do it twice. Do it 300 times and you will start to eliminate self-doubt through action one implementation at a time. The second way to eliminate self-doubt is to know and what you need to know is that nobody has this shit figured out. No one. Okay. One thing that I learned and one of my biggest lessons in being an entrepreneur in this space. I’ve interviewed hundreds of people on my podcast over the years and one thing having met mentors and billionaires and everything in between, nobody has this shit figured out. Nobody is really all that smart and nobody has every single thing dialed in. I have not met that person and I’ve met so many successful people. Yes, there are some people who really squared away and some people who are complete mess but the majority of all the successful people I know out there do not have any of this figured out. Not by a long shot. We’re all just doing stuff. We’re all just trying to figure it out. We’re all just throwing stuff out there and seeing what works and then we find what works. We do more of that thing but you have to realize there’s not an us and a them. There’s only everyone and everyone is capable. So once you know that, you know that it’s very possible for you to do this and no one else is really better than you or more capable especially today. It’s never been easier to start a business, be successful and do all of these things. You absolutely can do it. So you have to know nobody has it figured out and that you can do this. Again, that was my biggest lesson learned and going to all these conferences, meeting all these people, I’m like, oh wow, they’re not as smart as I thought or they don’t have everything figured out or they’re not as squared away. They’re not as organized. That’s what you learn when you meet your heroes and that’s why people say never meet your heroes but I think meeting my heroes was the best thing I could have ever done because I realized they don’t have it any more figured out than I do.

#1: action proves capability

The third thing that you have to do is adjust. This is what separates the amateur from the pro. Okay, so you’re going to be out there doing things. You know that you are capable just like everyone else but then you have to start to adjust your actions based off of feedback. So your feedback can be data, your feedback can be from customers, clients, your feedback can be from anywhere, anyone but you have to make adjustments based off of the data and feedback loop that you’re getting and you have to establish that. So if you wanted to do videos or short form or whatever it is, make 10 posts. After those 10, you look at the data, what went well, what didn’t. When you’re just checking a box and not trying to get any better at what you do, the self doubt will remain because you’re like, well, I’m doing it but it’s not working. It’s not getting any better. I don’t see any improvement and the reason is because you’re not making any freaking adjustments. You have to adjust and that is what the amateur does. They sit there and they just keep doing it because some people have that drive, that determination. They can just do things.

#2: nobody has this figured out

Some people can do things but they don’t make adjustments to improve them. You have to get better. Okay, you have to improve. If you’re actually trying to improve a process, improve your videos, improve your scripts, improve your writing, improve your newsletter. If you’re actually out there trying to improve those based off of metrics, based off of data, based off of feedback, you will start to eliminate self-doubt because now you know that you’re capable of making progress through some sort of feedback loop. So establish whatever it is. Whether you’re letting the algorithm do that or if you’re looking at newsletter open rates or if you’re looking at your income, whatever it is, whatever scorecard you want to keep, whatever you’re trying to get better at, go do that thing. Make the adjustments so you don’t have to worry about whether or not you are capable of getting better. You are 100%. You just need to adjust based off of a feedback loop that you establish and you create. And the fourth thing that you need to do to eliminate self-doubt is to learn. You can start on YouTube and podcasts and do all the free crap but eventually you’re going to have to go pro in the learning category as well. Sometimes you don’t have the cash so you have to start with all the free resources out there and there are a ton of free resources that can really help. But what you’re missing is a coach, a mentor, and a community. Okay, those are the things that you need if you really want to get to the next level. You need someone who’s going to hold you accountable, that isn’t your brother or your friend, who’s not actually going to hold you that raw level of accountability that you need. The person who shows up and say, hey, you didn’t do a good job. You need to try harder. You need to do better. You need that person. And you will learn so much faster when you’re not focused on the 19 different things you could do that you saw on YouTube yesterday and you focus on the one thing your mentor or coach told you to do. That is the difference in superpower people have who are successful versus those who are not. We can all learn stuff. We could all use AI.

#3: adjust & improve, amateur vs. pro

We could ask questions. But ultimately you’re too scattered and so the self doubt is always there because you spent 14 days on this, then you changed your course, and you spent 11 days on that. You change your course again because you don’t actually know how to go from step 1 to step 2 to step 3. You could figure that out over the course of 20 years by just doing it all and learning the lessons the hard way. Or you could hire a coach and mentor who has that 20 years of experience ahead of you and they can shortcut your journey from 20 years to one year or six months or hell. Just make you avoid all of those things all together. You need to be learning from people, from coaches, from mentors, and get away from all the free stuff. Again, there are a lot of great free resources out there but they aren’t what will get you to the next level if you really want to eliminate self-doubt. So if you follow those four things you will be eliminating self-doubt one at a time and you absolutely need to do this. Like I said, you don’t have time to have self-doubt.

#4: get mentors & stop consuming for free

You just don’t. You need to get moving and start chasing your goals today. Whatever it is, start today. But I want to close this out by reading a passage from my book Killing Comfort because I wrote this passage specifically for people I knew who were struggling with getting things done and struggling with self-doubt. So here goes. First, you have to know. You have to know. It is 100% possible to achieve your goals. Yes, what and how you do things matters but if you don’t think you can make it, everything else is useless. You can do this. It doesn’t matter what you say or why you think you can’t. Say it to me and my response will always be the same. You can do this. Jared, you don’t know how many times I’ve tried. You can do this. Jared, I can’t stay motivated. It works for a little while but then everything falls apart. You can do this. Jared, you don’t know my schedule, my life, or what I face on a daily basis. You can do this. You can change little by little, just one thing at a time. It will feel forced and awkward and you may even hate it but it will start to work. Making a change won’t be fun. You may not enjoy pushing yourself or trying to find the time to fit new things into your schedule but the results will start to show. What you cannot do is sit around and twiddle your thumbs. You have to do something. Don’t feel sorry for yourself or think about how you will never achieve your goals.

a reading from Killing Comfort

You have to do something. Believe in yourself. Believe in your ability to achieve your goal. It’s that simple. Try harder.