Entrepreneurs: Take this simple step to unshakeable self-belief and guaranteed success

Your Self-belief is the Key to Your Success

Nobody at all, with an ounce of common sense, is going to believe, trust or invest time, money, and effort in a loser. Make no mistake.

If you have little or no self-belief then – rightly or wrongly – you will be perceived, and treated, as a loser. No-one, unless they’re stupid, bets on a known loser. Ask any venture capitalist.

Successful investors always look for passionate, hardworking people who have enough self-belief to set out, and forge ahead on their own. Brave people, who risk their time and money in providing a new product or service for the benefit of others. It’s a ‘no-brainer’ – self-belief is an essential quality of spirit for entrepreneurs.

It’s also a quality, in fact, that we all need. A quality that’s truly needed, always and in everything: business, relationships, life, love, the lot. Without self-belief, we’ll sabotage our ability to work successfully with others. But that’s not all: we will also self-sabotage.

Your Self-belief is the Key to Your Success

“Anyone can do it”

If you lack self-belief, all your ambitions, aspirations and dreams will collapse. They’ll dissolve, and vanish . . . in a sea of doubt. Self-belief is absolutely crucial. Why?

Without essential self-belief, you won’t follow through. On anything.  A business mentor’s hardest job is to convince clients they can be successful. “Anyone can do it,” they suggest.

Yet we rebel at the thought. We build walls to defend our mediocrity. We cling relentlessly to the lie:

“I can’t do it; I’m a nobody.”

Often our negative conditioning in life has convinced us of this debilitating illusion.

You know you have the power – yet you just don’t believe it. Everything happens in strict accordance with how much we believe. Believe you can, and you can. Believe you can’t, and you can’t.

Your Self-belief is the Key to Your Success

Your special talents

The first step in achieving greater self-belief?

Recognize your own personal value and dignity. Deep down you know you have the unique gifts and talents you need.

You find that hard to believe?

You just need to think, for a moment, of all the many successful entrepreneurs, who perhaps have far fewer talents and gifts, in their niche, than you have in yours. Tell yourself the good news,

“If they can do it, then so could I. What’s stopping me?”

The reason they’re successful is that they went for it, they believed they could.

So? Forget the lies you’ve heard all your life, telling you

“Who do you think you are?”

” What do you know about running a business”?

“You’ll never make it!”

The power of self-belief is within us all, and at our command. We just need to discover it, believe it, and then use it.

Just remember that self-belief is not all or nothing: something we either have or don’t have, like a physical object. Self-belief and self-doubt are qualities of mind and spirit, rather than anything material. Therefore it’s a question of the degree, or level – how much or how little – we have of that quality.

A down-to-earth quality of mind

So, how much self-belief do you have? As with most things in life, the ideal outcome is a balance between the extremes. Neither “I can achieve absolutely anything” nor “I am quite useless, and can’t do anything worthwhile.”

We seek the golden middle way. Neither unrealistic optimism, nor a pathetic learned helplessness. A balanced middle view is the ideal; that would actually be more optimistic than most of us imagine.

So, what’s needed?

Realistic, down-to-earth, solidly grounded optimism! That’s a crucial factor that separates the high achievers from those who settle for mediocrity.

High achievers are so optimistic because they believe that with hard work, determination, perseverance, and creativity, huge success is possible. They’ve proved it, over and over again.

Even when things don’t work out, they remain optimistic. We all know stories of world-famous entrepreneurs who’ve failed more times than they’ve succeeded. But they persevered. They never gave up. They just learned another lesson, dug their heels in, and dived right in again.

Your Self-belief is the Key to Your Success

Most successful entrepreneurs really are ordinary people, much the same as you and me. They only difference is they had the belief, optimism and courage to simply go for it; and then persevere.

They know, better than most, that we all have massive abilities, which often go unrecognized. Such abilities can even be improved. We can all learn a wide range of skills, and so create a greatly enhanced and enriching life-style.

You need to find that belief and courage. You can then fashion a much better life for yourself and your loved-ones.

So . . . how? How do you find this self-belief and courage?

Success notebook

The first place to look is your past triumphs, your own track record. Trust your own experience. It gives you solid, concrete evidence that you can succeed in many things.

I am convinced it’s a brilliant idea to make a list of your greatest achievements up to date. So motivational! Buy a huge notebook, and use it just for this purpose. That list will be your very own self-belief manual.

Even better, add photos and gather physical evidence of past glories. For example dig out certificates, medals, prizes, rewards you’ve earned in the past – a veritable golden treasure chest of memories.

That was YOU, not anyone else.

Think too about the countless ordinary, everyday things you’ve learned and now take for granted. Everything you needed to learn and achieve to grow up into a well-rounded, and competent adult.

Again, that was YOU, not anyone else.

What an inspiring exercise, because that winner you’re looking at is a younger you. You’re still the same person, with even more experience. Why doubt now when you’ve already proved you can do it?

The next step is to add to this list regularly, as you recall other past successes. Look at these successes frequently. This will help continue building your confidence and self-belief.

Another powerful step: begin to jot down new and up-to-date successes. Increasingly, you will be looking forward to future successes and further entries in your self-belief manual, your “success journal,” as some call it.

Whenever you doubt, latch on to those powerful memories. Clear proof that you already succeeded in so many challenges. When you’re afraid and doubt yourself, remember the great things you’ve already achieved.

Maybe you disagree. You may be thinking,

“I’ve never really done anything great. It couldn’t work for me!”

I’m not talking about extraordinary things, like winning Olympic gold. You’ve a ton of experience and learning in everyday things we take for granted.

A toddler programmed to be a winner

Learn from yourself as a toddler. Let’s focus on one simple example. You learned to walk. Remember how?

It was a relentless, in-built drive. You never gave up. Day in, day out, you tried. Day in, day out, you made imperceptible progress. Day in, day out, you kept falling over. However, you just kept on getting back up again. It never entered you’re little mind to think,

“That’s it! I’ve had it! I’ve tried over and over. It’s not working. I’ll never be able to walk. Might as well settle for crawling!”

Think of what you did then, how you simply refused to surrender. I’m still talking about YOU, not some famous person. You too have succeeded in so many things. Use your imagination.

See yourself again in that situation. Feel again how you felt then. Picture it in detail in your own mind. Bring that power and feeling back into the now. It felt so good, didn’t it?

You were able to summon up your self-belief, and you succeeded. You proved you could do it, and you can do it again and again. Always focus on your successes.

What about all my failures?

Don’t worry about the past failures. They don’t mean you yourself are a failure, as a person. Keep it simple.

So-called “failure” is nothing more than a result of some action. You tried something, and it didn’t work out. No big deal. Just learn a better way. Rejoice in this positive “learning from your mistakes.”

Let me repeat: focus on your successes. You’re building your self-belief, not putting yourself down; no point in filling your mind with the times when things didn’t quite work out.

Use your success diary to note and remember all your successes. Keep adding to it, you’ll soon see that you have a lot more to inspire you.

Your Self-belief is the Key to Your Success

Lastly, one final and extremely important point: create a little team of positive people around you. As a group, you will supercharge the self-belief of each other. You will feed off each other’s energy, belief and wisdom.

Self-belief will go through the roof.

Your success is there for the taking. You deserve it. You know you deserve it. Take it. It’s yours.

Gerry McCann

@themerry_monk