Often, some of the unasked questions my clients’ have on their minds are “What’s wrong with me?” or “How is it that I can’t do this?” or “Why do I feel this way?”. They just don’t know that these questions lurk inside their brains. Yet. Instead, the question actually posed to me is a million variations of the following:
Can you help me with improving my confidence/body language/image/business/chances of finding love/happiness? OR Can you help me quit a habit, stop procrastinating and overthinking (insert variation of other real-life struggles most of us have)?
I’m always curious in my initial conversation to find out what the reason behind the outer ask is. And if there’s one thing I can say with certainty – there always is. Let’s start with a story.
Meet *Sandy. On the outside, he looks great. He’s got a successful business that is doing ok but could do so much better. He knows it. I know it. He admits there are days when he has a great attitude to life and high energy levels. Everything goes right and everybody appreciates his efforts. Meet *Sheetal. She’s dreaming of embarking on her solopreneur venture. She starts everything in her life like it’s the next best thing. Ever. There are lists. And checklists. And to-do lists. And she’s just invested in a brand new skill-building course which is going to be a game-changer for her. Then she will be happy, she tells me.
Then my conversation with them deepens. And through the skillful probing of a good coach (that’s me, btw) and a safe space (confidentiality is binding for any accredited and trained coach) Sandy and Sheetal open up. Sandy reveals how he often gets triggered by comments others make, which he takes very personally. There are days he can’t sleep because of this. Sheetal says she tells her friends proudly that she’s a perfectionist, but deep inside she feels like she’s the biggest imposter ever.
That’s when I open the door for my clients – to their dark sides. But I’m supposed to be a coach who introduces my clients’ best selves to their most audacious big goals right? So what the heck am I doing bringing them down and making them poke around in the dark? You see, the reason why the Instagram platitudes that we all love to ‘like’ furiously don’t help us really move ahead; remember #ineededthistoday?. It’s because no bright and sparkly self-help page is ever going to tell you the hard truth about your personal success.
Hard truth #1 – You meet your best self on your darkest day – Often people will defer working with a coach when they’re going through a rough time – think divorce, just got laid off, no money, can’t sleep. The most common feedback I get is “I really want to work on my business/weight/confidence as soon as this blows over”. COVID has a special one “I will deal with this after lockdown” For a life coach, it’s the moment when I want to lie down on the ground and scream “that’s the biggest mistake ever”. But I also realize that everyone is at different readiness levels, so it’s always the choice of the person. One thing which is a universal truth though – Adversity is THE time when you cannot do this yourself and you need competent hands to hold your own without judgment and with experience. It’s when you get to learn how adversity is your biggest ally and a skilled coach helps you understand what hidden gems you could potentially find resourceful to bring out even better outcomes. Hence my sobbing (please don’t judge if you see me crying at my desk. Now you know).
Hard truth #2 – Your BEST self is hidden in your darkest beliefs about yourself. Let’s go back to Sandy and Sheetal. After a few sessions, we arrive at some basic assumptions that each one of them is making about themselves which is not only outdated but it is also harming their progress. They are both blind to these belief patterns as these are often subtly and so finely ingrained in their psyche that they don’t show up in their eyes, maybe not in their close circle of family and friends but sadly it’s what’s preventing Sandy from signing up more clients and taking his business next level and Sheetal from ever having the satisfaction of a project fully completed, taking a risk and thereby the happiness associated with checking something off her box or what lies on the other side of her fear. Furthermore, both of them have multiple limiting beliefs about themselves, the world, the “way” things are right now and each of these feeds into one another, joining hands to hold them back from their rightful progress. It’s only when both of them finally acknowledge the presence of these and then slowly work on effective habits, with accountability and structure which a coaching relationship brings, that magic starts to happen. Getting to this stage is a huge victory for many. Sandy and Sheetal have been walking around for years asking themselves “What’s wrong with me?” and “why can’t I just do this?” And it’s important for me to assure them that nothing wrong with them AT ALL. And, they totally and completely CAN hit their goals. But there’s a caveat – Once they’ve addressed their beliefs about themselves. So, this brings us to ….
What’s a limiting belief?
Simply put, a belief is an assumption that you hold true for yourself under any circumstances. Google says it’s an acceptance that something exists or is true, especially one without proof. And it’s that ‘without proof’ part that I have the real beef with. It can be an amazing belief e.g. Everyone is a good person or I am capable. It can also be devastating.
“Success comes with a price”
“I am responsible for making everyone happy”
“I’m an imposter. People are going to find me out”
“I am just not good enough”
“Happiness is out of my reach”
These are some of the limiting beliefs that Sandy and Sheetal are walking around with every day. Telling themselves this every day. Going to work with every day. Demonstrating their behavior every day. And all this, without even asking themselves for proof of veracity. So you are probably going “Oh well, I’m not Sandy (the loser) or Sheetal (the loser) because I never say those things to myself” Sure, you and I don’t. But there are subtle giveaways in several aspects of our lives that scream our limiting beliefs.
- You find yourself trying to overachieve. If I kill myself working, then I will be rewarded right?
- Where’s my next big adrenaline fix?
- You find yourself always reaching out first in an uncomfortable situation just because you cannot stand feeling the discomfort and not necessarily because you think it’s warranted.
- You tell yourself that it’s ok if you are cruising along, even when you know you are capable of more. (Insert 1000 post covid remarks here).
- You make statements like ‘I will be happy if….’
- You make statements like ‘What choice do I have?’
Yup, you got it. All of these are limiting beliefs are fear-based and they’re performing a symphony of self-defeat in your brain. And these grow a little cocktail of habits transmitted deftly through very competent neurotransmitters throughout your body storing them in memory pockets to be retrieved conveniently when your fear encounters anything remotely challenging. Often, the skill sets required by us to move forward are the same ones that present themselves to our fears in the form of negative thoughts. “what if I fail?” “What if people find out I am really no good at this?” and “What if I find that I’m really happy now?” And without giving you a chemistry tutorial here, these negative thoughts go to the kitchen in your brain and cook up some really awful emotions. That’s what you feel. That’s where you go “stop, I don’t even want to try something different or move ahead cos this is too painful” And in our world (the big happy universe of coaching) we call these clusters of negative Saboteurs (cue music). You can find a saboteur lurking in your last drama, your last private binge, your last argument, your last refusal to do something you were dying to try, and your last justification.
In conclusion, after this dark unveiling, it’s important for me, again, to tell you (as I assured Sandy and Sheetal) that you are fine. This is normal. EVERYONE (that includes your coach) has at least a couple of limiting beliefs. They’re there for a reason. They didn’t appear yesterday. They’ve probably had a space inside you since you were a little child. They were most likely handed to you by people whom you trusted and loved. And that’s fine. What’s not fine is being ok with them once you become aware of them. That’s where we really have some work to do together. It’s where we accept and then say ‘ok, what’s next?”
And that’s how the process can begin to introduce your best self to your BIGGEST AUDACIOUS goals.
*Names are fictitious. The struggles are real.
