I’ve had these thoughts SO many times in my life! I haven’t gone for jobs because I didn’t fit the criteria exactly, I’ve felt low because a career path was seemingly out of my reach, and I’ve felt pissed off at myself because I didn’t do enough work to get where I wanted to be.
Any of these sound familiar?
Any of these sound familiar?
This whole thing is called the ‘Imposter Syndrome’. If you actually got that job you would start feeling like a fraud because you didn’t feel you knew enough to keep that job. I definitely went through that at the beginning of my coaching journey!
This is why I’ve come up with 3 tips to help disrupt and break those “I don’t know enough” thoughts and worries.
1: Look at what you already know and what you can already do
You know when you decide to go for a job or start a business, it’s usually because you have experience, knowledge and you know you can do it. This is something very important to remember! The problem is when the doubts start to sneak in like Mr Sneaky Ninja from Sneaksville.
This is where it’s good to take stock of what you know and what you can do. Let’s use me as an example, when I started my coaching journey I went through SO many waves of doubt. I used to think “But I don’t know enough to help others”, and I even thought that when I graduated as a Certified Health Coach! Eventually I took stock, did a life audit, and realised that I’d just graduated, I’d already been helping others while I spent the year studying, and I’ve always been someone who is very good at helping others and knowing what to say to them.
I had the knowledge and I had enough experience to perform my role very well.
There are SO many times when we allow our worries and fears to put a blanket over our existing knowledge and experience, but it’s not just any ordinary blanket, it’s the blanket of invisibility so we forget about how good we already are! It’s time to remove the blanket and see the treasure that is YOU underneath it!
2: Talk about it
When you surround yourself with supportive people you have the opportunity to discuss your worries with them. But you MUST have that support network in place!
You normal friends usually aren’t the people you speak to about this, it’s people who have gone through the same thing, your peers, people who have knowledge and experience.
Talk about your worries and fears with your support network. You will usually find they tell you that you’re talking crap because you already know enough and you’re already good enough. Listen to them, they know what they’re talking about.
If your network feels that there may be a little bit of truth in the “I don’t know enough” thoughts, they will suggest solutions to help you.
3: Study…. only if we need to!
Nobody knows everything so we will ALWAYS be able to learn new things. The questions is whether we are studying to genuinely fill in the knowledge gaps or if we’re studying as an excuse why we aren’t going for our goals.
Listen, this is the reality, I know, I’ve been there. We want to go for our goals but then a nice shiny new course comes along as we convince ourselves that we absolutely MUST do that course because if we don’t, there’s no way we can achieve this goals. This is the ‘Shiny Object Syndrome’ and in regards to achieving what we need, it’s a killer!
I used to collect courses like people collect stamps. I reached a point though where I had to say enough is enough, I know enough right now to reach for my goals and dreams. This is where tip #1 applies, we need to look at ourselves and decide is we truly need to study a little more or whether we are good enough right now. You HAVE to be brutally honest with yourself at this stage because if you’re not then you are only doing yourself a disservice.
So, on to the study itself. If you TRULY need to study then you have SO many options now.
You have:
The Internet
Google
YouTube
Online courses
Home study courses
Local night classes
Workshops
The list is endless for where you can get that additional knowledge from! But be sure that you really need it, many times we actually know enough already.
So how about you? Have you fallen foul to the shiny object syndrome? Do you still have the worries about not knowing enough? Let me know in the comments.