Guest post by licensed Right-Brain Business Plan® Facilitator Kiala Givehand photo by Jennifer Lee
Do you have a list of ideas that you’re just waiting to implement? New plans for products or services that you think can change people’s lives? So what are you waiting for? Give yourself permission.
If you’re thinking that’s easier said than done, here are three tried and true strategies for empowering yourself and moving closer to living the life you want.
1. Inventory Your Expertise
In one of my many past jobs I was a 7th grade English teacher. It was one of the most rewarding jobs I’ve had — yes, I adored the kids, but mostly, I loved it because I learned something about myself everyday. Kids have a way of doing that — teaching us to know ourselves better. Every year I would get a new crop of fresh minds and I was charged with teaching them to write paragraphs and essays. On the first day of school they would tell me that they didn’t have anything to write about and every year my job was to prove them wrong. “You’re all experts as far as I’m concerned,” I would tell them. Then I’d have them make a list of everything they could talk about or teach me. They would come up with things like babysitting, making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, dribbling a basketball, riding a bike while carrying a large soda, French braiding their hair, and on and on and on. The point here is that even a child who has only been around for 12 or 13 years is an expert on many topics. And so are you. So give yourself permission to be an expert.
TAKE ACTION: Grab a sheet of paper and number it from 1 to 100, then begin to inventory your expertise. Simply write down all of the things (people, places, ideas, etc) that you could talk about or all of the things you could teach someone. These are the things you have already mastered and I bet many of them are related to your business. Go ahead, give yourself permission.
2. Enter the Conversation
Once you reconnect to the 100 things you already know, it’s time to enter the conversation. As a business coach, I find that many small business owners struggle with finding their voice or their place in a saturated marketplace. They fear being another face in the sea and not standing out. I suggest to them that instead of worrying about being lost in the crowd, that they should simply join in the conversations that are already taking place. Find the thing you are knowledgeable about, find others who are talking about that thing, then jump right in — insert yourself into the larger conversation. Trust me, you’ll not only find that you know a whole lot more than you realized, but that others want to hear what you have to say. Your voice matters, so go ahead and give yourself permission.
3. Begin Again
With words like relaunching, revamping, renovating, and re-branding in our vocabulary, why do we think we need to have it all figured out right out of the gate? Thank goodness that’s not actually true. As creatives, we are often hard on ourselves when it comes to success. On the one hand, we love to try new ideas, but when an idea doesn’t work or we find ourselves heading down a path we didn’t intend, we would rather stay the course than admit failure. Well what if we started to re-frame failure and give ourselves permission to begin again? What could that do to increase the forward movement in our businesses? Try monitoring your outcomes with the knowledge that if it isn’t working, you can adjust or tweak, or just begin again. Go ahead. Give yourself a do-over.
The wonderful thing about these strategies is that they can work for your life and your business. If you practice giving yourself permission, it can become a habit, which can eventually become second nature. You just might be surprised at how easy it can be to say yes to yourself, your new ideas, and your success. Try it today!
