If you experience fear as a business owner and are having side effects such as, procrastination, not getting your goals accomplished, not following up with prospects as promised or simply never getting started on marketing your business – you’re not by yourself!
Considered as the #1 reason why most women don’t accomplish their business goals, fear can be a huge obstacle to your success. However, it can also fuel your success when you know how to handle it and get past it.
For businesswomen, fear is often present when you’re needing to ask for the business, saying exactly how much you charge, speaking in front of the crowd, writing a new book, new ventures or projects.
The solution to fear is not about fighting it or thinking you can ignore it. It’s all about taking swift and immediate action, which will almost always eliminate it.
Below is my 3-Step System for Eliminating Fear:
1) Identify your fear(s). Of course, It’s easy to know when you’re hesitant on taking action on your goals. But, have you actually identified when it’s fear and when it’s not fear? Not all reasons for putting things off is about fear.
Sometimes, it could be that you don’t really desire to take on a new idea, project or move forward with a particular business goal. So, keeping it real with yourself is a must. If you’re the type of person that really goes after something with swift action then your inaction could mean that it’s not for you. But, you’re the only one that can determine this. So, it’s time to discover what your fear issues really are!
2) Know why you have fear(s)! It’s time to schedule some “Me Time”, so get out your planner, select a date and block off 2-3 hours of time where you can focus just on you! Also, make sure you select a quite and peaceful environment where you will not be disturbed.
Determine if there is any validity or evidence supporting the fear(s) you have. Oftentimes, fear really is just “False Evidence Appearing Real.” Finding out and understanding your whys will help you to discover solutions to overcoming and eliminating your fear(s).
Now, you may have to dig deep to discover your “whys”, but it’s worth it. For some, it could have been something from childhood, for some, it could have stemmed from a negative or emotional experience as an adult and for others, it’s the lack of know-how.
Another possibility of fear has to do with your Belief System! You might have a belief that you can accomplish your dreams and goals, but do you have the level of belief required to make it happen? A good test for this is that if there is procrastination involved then the level of required belief is not there.
The type of belief needed to move past fear I refer to as “Unshakable Faith”. It’s a level of belief within you so deeply rooted that it compels you to take swift and immediate action. It’s like an internal energy that drives you to take action like never before. The desire to take action and accomplish has become an ingrained habit that naturally compels you to move forward with your ideas, thoughts, dreams and goals. Note: procrastination is not present with this type of belief.
3) Take Swift Action Anyway! Action is truly the cure to this type of fear. But in order to take action, you must be willing to commit, push forward and use your fear to fuel your desire to accomplish your goal! Now this isn’t always easy to do at first, so having an accountability partner or working with a coach can be extremely helpful!
Another way to take swift action is to make sure you have whatever it is that you want to accomplished written out and outlined on paper. Simply bullet point each item and then set goals and tasks to each item you list. This helps you to have clarity and move forward with whatever you want to do.
You might also have to go through short business or personal development trainings to enhance and develop your skills on a particular topic.
Fear Example:
Meet Sherry. She has a fear of showing others or gift basket designs.
Sherry designs and owns a gift basket service, but every since she visited a competitor’s website, she realized that her gift baskets were not up to standard. So, she developed a fear of really marketing her business and passing out her brochures, which had pictures of baskets she had designed. She had developed a fear that was holding her back.
To overcome the fear Sherry use the 3-Step System (shared above) and discovered that her fear stemmed from her feeling like she was not capable of creating more beautiful baskets like that of her competitor.
So to overcome the fear, she decided to take a Gift Basket Design Class and get up-to-date on new supplies and ideas for presenting her baskets. She also realized that perhaps she needed to also discuss marketing her business online and offline with a marketing consultant and make sure that her website was appealing and user friendly for individuals to order gift baskets from.
Taking the action to find solutions, instead of allow the fear to overwhelm her allowed Sherry to gain more confidence and feel good about sharing her basket designs with others.