Overcoming Perfectionism: How to Move Forward When You Don’t Feel Ready [Ep 27]

Welcome to the Thriving therapyneur podcast. The show for ambitious therapists who are ready to unapologetically make more money, scale their impact and build their dream coaching business. I'm Carly Hill, therapist turned coach turned CEO of a seven figure online business. I created the Thriving Therapeutic Podcast because I'm obsessed with helping big hearted therapists outgrow the office and build successful and sustainable online businesses. So if you are wondering how you can continue to make an impact without sacrificing the life you love, welcome Therapreneur.

This is exactly the place for you.

Think of it like the business school we never had. I am so excited to dive in with you. Let's get started.

Hello therapreneurs. Carly Hill here. Happy to be here with you today. This episode is for all of my Therapreneur friends, maybe my type A perfectionistic friends, who feel like they're just not quite ready or they need to have it all figured out first before they can start. This is so common, so much so that I had to come on here and quickly record an episode because I'm hearing this over and over and over again. You feel like you need to have every little detail, especially even your niche perfectly defined before you start. And the truth is this belief that you're telling yourself that you have to have it all quote unquote figured out, this is one of the biggest obstacles holding you back, standing in your way, holding back so many talented therapists from stepping into coaching, holding them back from making a larger impact, holding them back from unapologetically making more money. And it doesn't have to be perfect. Nobody likes a perfect person. Perfection is not the goal. Progress is the goal. These small wins, this is what's going to create momentum. Each step, each step that you take, the path is going to become more clear. There's empowerment that comes from taking action without it needing to be perfect. Like give yourself a permission slip to do C work. It doesn't have to be A plus plus work. You can get a B minus, you can get a C. That is okay because guess what, you, your C work is probably actually A work, but you're probably just being too hard on yourself, right? So take the leap. I call it the 8020 rule. We're 80% sure and we move the F on 80%. It does not have to be a hundred percent. And I'm really curious, how long have you been telling yourself that you're not ready yet? How long have you been pondering this idea? My clients tell me all the Time. Like, I was thinking about doing this for a year. I was thinking about doing this for two years. I was like, wow, imagine you would have acted on it two years ago. Do you know how much further along you could be? And we can't go back. But take that as inspiration and a lesson for yourself. You get the idea that you want to outgrow the office. What action step can you take today? Small action towards your goal. Even if you don't feel a hundred percent confident, like I dare you to put yourself out there. I dare you to take one small action. I dare you to just try on this identity and tell somebody what you're doing. Somehow, some way move into and shift into the next level. You. How would she show up? What action steps would she take? What is future you do every single day? You are ready. You are more ready than you think you are. And do you know why you're ready? Because you don't have to figure it out all by yourself. This is exactly why mentors like myself exist to walk you through the process of adding coaching, protecting your license, creating marketing, selling, delivering your signature coaching program, making yourself known in the online space, helping you build funnels and websites and do paid advertising and organic marketing. Like, you do not have to throw spaghetti at the wall. You do not have to worry about a blueprint. It's already been designed for you. All you have to do is simply make a decision that you're ready and get out of this readiness trap. Get out of waiting for, for the perfect moment to pass you by. Waiting for you to have this epiphany that it's just all figured out. Like, we gotta get out of that and you have to step into. I'm doing the damn thing. That's the feeling that you need to feel into. Readiness is a moving target. Each level you reach, it's gonna bring new challenges. So waiting to start until you feel fully ready, this is only going to keep you stuff. It kind of comes down to excuses versus action. I don't have a niche yet. I need more experience before I start coaching. I don't know enough yet. I think I need to go take a coaching certification. I don't know if I'm going to be good at it. I don't know if people are going to pay for this. These are all excuses, lies, stories that we're telling ourselves. Well, why don't you prove it to yourself? Why don't you get some help figuring out your niche? 90% of my clients, they do not know their niche when they come into the Therapist to coach accelerator program. And even if they think they know their niche, a lot of them end up changing it. This is something that can come to fruition together through workshopping, through wordsmithing, through conversation, not just another niche worksheet. This is something that can be collaboratively through figured out together. Just this week alone, I had three clients ending up changing their niche. And they would have never come to this conclusion of this new niche that they wanted to do had they not put themselves out there in the first place. Had they not gone through the market research phase in a very strategic way, they wouldn't have just come out of the gates and said, this is what I want to do. But they were led to this aha epiphany moment of wow, this is really what I meant to do. Because they started before they were ready, because we workshopped it together and figured it out. So knowing your niche is not a prerequisite to deciding that you're going to move into the online coaching space. You think you need more experience before you start coaching. Yet you're a licensed clinician, you have a ton of certifications. You do not have to take another coaching certification that's going to teach you how to build rapport and ask powerful questions. I've taken a coaching certification. I didn't learn anything. I didn't learn in grad school. You don't know if you'll be good at coaching. Well, do you think you're a good therapist? I would imagine so. You've probably been doing it for a long time. So the best way to learn if you are feeling a bit of imposter syndrome is by actually taking action, by putting yourself out there, not just by planning endlessly and maybe catastrophizing about the future. No one will ever feel a hundred percent ready. You have to decide that you are ready. Successful people start before they're ready. Because if we based it just on our feelings, we could always very easily come up with an excuse of why now is not the right time, why we are not ready, procrastinate, put it off. And we are really, truly just getting in our own way. So deciding now is the best way to actually move the needle forward in your business. Change the narrative that you're a lot more ready than you think you are. So you decide today you decide, are you ready? Not do you feel ready? It's are you deciding to be ready and when the answer is yes, not if. When. When the answer is yes, feel into your body. Yes, you're ready. Because this is a decision that you're making. Successful people decide to be ready. What is an action step that a ready person takes? And then I want you to go take that action step. This journey is never going to feel easy, but every single step that you take, it's going to build confidence. It's going to bring about clarity. Momentum breeds momentum. It's going to fuel you forward. So start now. Reach out for help. You do not have to do this alone. In fact, we are not meant to do it alone. We are here to help you every single step of the way. From filing your business entity to protecting your license, giving you all of the paperwork that you need to marketing yourself as both a therapist and a coach, ethically and legally, to figuring out your niche, to designing your offer suite, setting up your social media, putting yourself out there, writing social media posts, creating websites and doing emails and taking payments and taking contracts and signing up clients. Creating a signature coaching program. Marketing it, selling it. All of it. You have somebody in your corner who can help you, who can support you, who is cheering you on. So take a look at your life, what you want it to be like in the next six months, in the next year, and have a conversation with yourself about excuses, about being ready, about the stories you've been telling yourself and knowing that it doesn't have to be perfect and you don't have to have it all figured out ahead of time. You got this. My love is with you. I'm cheering you on. We all are. And I'll see you in the next episode.

Thank you so much for listening to the Thriving Therapy podcast. I hope that this episode has inspired you to reduce burnout, work smarter, and see the freedom potential you have as a therapist. We would love to have you inside the Therapist to Coach Accelerator Facebook Group where we have live trainings and cheat sheets on all things marketing, sales and adding coaching ethically and legally. I am here cheering you on and I'll see you around.