You’ve made the decision to launch a company. Well done! To act on a desire you’ve been thinking about for months or even years requires bravery. Here are the mindset blocks keeping you stuck, however. We sometimes hold ourselves back before we even get started because we’re terrified of what our own success might demand from us.
No matter how accomplished you are or how many degrees you have on display, there’s something about launching a business that will make you face all of your fears and reveal to you how you’ve been stifling your own abilities.
It’s almost like your company becomes a mirror, reflecting back all of your fears and unresolved patterns. Problems with abandonment? Fear of not succeeding? Fear of presenting yourself completely? All of it, sometimes in one day, is what your company will force you to deal with. Occasionally, before ten in the morning.
Beware Of These Mindset Blocks
1. Looking for a Perfect Way
The belief that there is a perfect method to do a task is the first mindset block keeping you stuck. This may take the form of constantly searching Google for a solution or asking your coach a lot of questions in the hopes that they would read your mind and your clients’ brains and provide you with an answer.
Or perhaps you are deterring yourself from creating a YouTube channel or from regularly publishing on YouTube because you believe there is an ideal formula that you must adhere to.
Especially new business owners sometimes underestimate themselves and believe they must have a ton of content ready before publishing their very first post. They may also compare themselves to more experienced business owners and believe they must have all these moving parts in order to accomplish anything, which will only hinder their progress.
You will no longer be held back by fear or impostor syndrome; the sooner you realize that you already possess all the necessary resources to begin doing the darn thing. You’re going to trust yourself to accomplish what has to be done and stop searching for solutions elsewhere.
2. Being Unsure About Where to Begin
Making a decision might be intimidating. Someone may question whether they should even start if they believe they could change their mind later. For people who’ve already changed direction once or twice, this is a classic example of being multipassionate and highly creative.
It is crucial to keep in mind that most decisions are not final and that changing direction is always a possibility. You can never be sure where a choice will take you, and that uncertainty may be thrilling. Choosing a course and moving forward is preferable to overanalyzing every possibility and staying still, since there is always time to alter one’s mind later.
3. Anticipating Responses From Others
This is closely related to a common mindset block: believing that someone else has the ‘real’ answer and waiting for them to provide it. When, in fact, you should be forging your own route. You must cultivate and grow your own following; no one else can do it for you.
They can provide you with instructions and a solution, but it won’t be enough to fix all of your issues and have them do it for you. Instead of waiting for someone else to provide you guidance or specific action steps every single day, you still need to be in the middle of things and carry them out every single day.
Entrepreneurs must ultimately take full responsibility for their online businesses. This often entails learning how to continuously rewire their thinking over time, resolving problems, figuring out what isn’t working, and coaching themselves to the next level.
When a business is making money but seems to have hit an income ceiling, that’s the time to step back, examine what’s happening, and solve for what’s holding it back. Reasoning becomes crucial: What is preventing the company from progressing? How do the figures match the objectives? What needs to change, and what fresh ideas or approaches can help the next phase of development?
4. Specialist Schedules
You might still fall victim to overly rigid schedules that force you to focus on only one project at a time, even if you give yourself permission to work on many tasks at once. If you’re wired like this, those rigid schedules can make you feel just as stuck as before.
Of course, don’t travel down too many rabbit holes at once or for too long, and keep progress in mind. However, give yourself some leeway to be inquisitive and exploratory.
5. Internalized Beliefs
These internal beliefs can trap you and quietly keep you from moving forward. Everybody has self-limiting ideas that prevent them from growing or realizing their full potential. You may identify them as things like “no one will ever take me seriously,” “I’m not good enough,” and “I just get lucky with every project I work on.”
It’s crucial to recognize your self-limiting beliefs and swap them out with constructive self-talk. For instance, you can think that you’re not excellent at writing since your brother consistently had higher marks than you or that it would be difficult to get employment if this academic performance wasn’t so strong.
However, many people find it difficult to get hired, so it’s more useful to focus on how you present and promote yourself.
6. Anticipating Quick Outcomes
Impatience, or the need to see results right now, is the next mentality hurdle that is often encountered. This propensity may sometimes be problematic for even experienced business owners.
Planting the seed, comprehending the motivation behind a new endeavor, and having faith in the process are all lessons learned from entrepreneurship. For instance, the first three episodes of The Wanderlover Podcast were released on October 5, 2020. According to The Wanderlover Podcast website, episodes were published weekly.
Producing consistent content often requires hundreds of hours across recording, editing, coaching, advertising, and platform management, in addition to interacting with listeners and responding to their inquiries, which is what makes this consistency possible. This long-term dedication demonstrates how consistent work over time often yields significant outcomes.
Read More: 9 Characteristics of Successful Business Owners
7. Fears and Worries
Beyond limiting beliefs, fears and worries are usually the main reason we stay stuck and don’t move toward our goals. The things that prevent us from starting, venturing, or showcasing ourselves and our work are our fears. We fear making a mistake, failing, and receiving criticism for it.
It’s crucial to keep in mind that although worries are unavoidable, they can be overcome! You must always put a little bit of yourself out there and take little moves toward your goals. You will become more self-assured and brave just by doing this!
8. Impostor Syndrome and a Lack of Confidence
It can feel like you’ll never get over low self-esteem or the fear that people will ‘find you out,’ especially if you’re a creative generalist. This is particularly true for creative generalists. You may find yourself trying to be exceptional at everything, which is an exhausting and impossible standard.
The greatest way to overcome such emotions is to understand your abilities, how they may help you reach your goals, and—above all—to learn to fully trust yourself. Because the strongest feeling in the world is knowing that you have your back no matter what!
9. Unsure When to Give Up
Conversely, not knowing when to start may be just as bad as not knowing when to stop. Quitting may be difficult, particularly for creatives with several passions. Naturally, there is never a perfect moment to give up. However, knowing what you want and, more importantly, what makes you happy can help you determine when it’s time to move on.
Also remember that other people’s definition of ‘done’ may be very different from yours, and that’s okay. You’ll probably be prepared to move on after you’ve learned all there is to know about a topic, career, or even company.
Here Are Some Ways Entrepreneurs Hinder Their Success
Reluctance to seek assistance when necessary is one of the mindset blocks keeping you stuck. It might be tempting for entrepreneurs who are bootstrapping their companies to think they have to do everything alone. Although social media management and content creation may seem easy at first, these tasks are really difficult and time-consuming.
Experience has shown that a company’s ability to develop and survive might be hampered by difficulties in finding assistance or by a reluctance to employ and keep a competent staff. Working till you are exhausted is not a source of pride; the company will undoubtedly suffer as a consequence.
Alternative options, such as skill swaps or ‘energy exchanges’ (trading services instead of money), can help when hiring isn’t yet financially possible. Another common issue is disregarding the legal side of your business. This often reflects how you value yourself and your ideas. I implore you to consider the reasons behind your recurrent claims that investing in your company or your ideas is too costly.
There are several methods to legally safeguard your company without going over budget. Often the real problem isn’t money—it’s believing your ideas are truly worthy of legal protection. Learning to trust oneself, first in taking the risk to launch a firm and then in committing to the intense inner work necessary to thrive as an entrepreneur, is frequently the first step toward the greatest personal and professional progress.
The first step in creating a long-lasting company is subconsciously thinking that such achievement is well-earned. A permanent legacy can only emerge from that basis of self-worth and self-trust.
FAQ
Q: What impact does your thinking have on your company?
A: Your company won’t have clear objectives or a strategic direction if you don’t have a business mentality. Making informed decisions and determining which opportunities to pursue and which to pass up requires having a clear goal and a strategy for getting there. Without clear direction, the risk of making ineffective decisions increases.
Q: Mindset blocks: what are they?
A: Everyone has mindset blocks—patterns of thinking and attitudes that can hold them back from their full potential. However, certain mental blockages are especially detrimental to our ability to be productive.
Q: How does your mentality contribute to your success?
A: A growth mindset is the belief that your abilities can be developed through consistent effort, practice, and learning—even if some skills feel difficult at first. Individuals who have a growth mindset think that they will achieve if they put in enough effort and see obstacles and failures as chances to learn and develop.
