688 - Why Perfectionism is Killing your growth & how to move past it

We are eight weeks away from Unstoppable women. So if you haven't heard about this event and this is the first time you're hearing of it, oh my gosh, where have you been? It is time to check out the details. It is a full day transformational event happening in Brisbane on 29 August at the Brisbane Entertainment and Convention Center. This is about shaking up the events industry and giving you a transformational event that's going to change the way that you think about business, the way you think about yourself, and the way that you show up online and in business. Every single speaker has been curated to create an incredible experience for you. So I want you to think the mix between Tony Robbins and business cheeks, it's not just about motivation. It's not just about taking notes. It's about shifting something within you. From incredible speakers like Erica Kramer, the queen of confidence, Tina Tower, who's the founder of her empire builder, and Annika Odendahl from Pink Sparrow Social, I cannot wait to help you change the game this year for you and your business. So if you have not got your tickets yet, it is time to secure your spot. There are bring a bestie tickets so if you want to bring a friend along so you're not alone and you won't be alone afterwards because you'll be making a whole bunch of new business besties. But grab your business bestie ticket now before they run out and VIPs. I think there's only like five left, so you better grab your ticket ASAP. Check out the link in the show notes to grab your ticket now. Welcome to the Next Level Life podcast with Christine Corcoran. This podcast is made for the powerhouse business women who are ready to ignite their fullest potential. This is where we will dive deep into the mindset breakthroughs and sprinkle in some kick up the butt motivation so you can scale your business with confidence and clarity. Whether you're craving more income, impact or inspiration, this podcast will be your ultimate resource for all things next level. Listen in as we have authentic conversations with game changing fitness female entrepreneurs as we reveal the secrets of what it takes to rise and thrive. So go ahead, ignite your inner fire and let's get you taking massive aligned action. Are you ready to elevate? Let's go. Hey. Hey. Welcome back to the podcast. Thank you so much for hitting download. So today I want to talk to you all about perfectionism and before I do that, I want to let you know that the tickets to Unstopper Women are increasing so if you haven't got your ticket yet, grab yours now because you are going to miss out. And honestly, this is shaping up to be so incredible. I cannot wait to be in the room with you. I cannot wait to shift and change the way that you think about yourself and your business and help you really step up and go to that next level in your business. And every single one of the speakers that I have on the stage for you are helping support that shift. And it is an identity shift, honestly, because this is what happens in rooms like this. You hear certain things that change the way that you think about the actions that you take in your business, change the way that you think about what you're available for, what you deserve. And it creates an opportunity for you to be like, wow, that could be possible for me and that's what I want for you. It's also going to be such an incredible connection exercise. So the way that I'm curating this event is allowing you to learn how to expand your circle of influence and also how to network effectively. It's one of the things that I've learned. We're spending a lot of time in America, they do it very differently to what we do here in Australia. And every other networking event that I go to is so boring. It is so like, pitch me your little 30 second elevator pitch. And at the end of the day, I don't really know why I should pay attention to what it is that you do. And it's so interesting because the exercise that I'm going to get everyone to do in the room and we're going to be doing masterminding sessions on as well. Like, it's going to be so valuable for you to be there on the day. And it's not even just going to be what's going to be learned on the day. It's going to be what you take away and what you implement. And it's also going to be the shifts and changes that happen in your mindset over the six months after the event. Right. Because this is what happens when you're in rooms like that. You create these incredible connections, you learn certain things and you see what's possible for yourself and then you start taking action, action from that newfound perspective. And that's where things start to shift massively in your business. And the way that I think about your circle of influence and your network and the way that we think about our growth is that we need certain people around us to support that next level of evolution. Otherwise you go back into your own home. Office, you go back into your own environment, surrounded by your own friends and family, and you go back to the old mindset. But if you don't, because if you stay connected with those people and you surround yourself with really incredible people doing great things and it will cause you by osmosis, it'll cause you to elevate and lift yourself up and evolve. So that's what I want for you. So make sure that you get in the room. There is after pay available if you want to pay it off over time. Otherwise there is absolutely. This is so worthwhile. Like when I think about like the investment of this, I've spent so much more. I've spent 40 grand last year literally going to America three times to be in the room with incredible people. And this is why I wanted to create this event for you. But it is so much more affordable than that. And even if you were to have one one hour session with even just one of the speakers, you would eas spend over $350. That's how incredible these speakers are. That's why I've spent so much time developing my network and developing the connections that makes this, that makes this event possible. So if you want to know also how to do that, come to the event. All right, let's talk about perfectionism. Over the last couple of weeks, I haven't had a lot of my plate. I've been launching Unstoppable Sales, which I have the brand new group coming through now, which is amazing and they're so beautiful. And I have been working with a lot of my one on one clients. I have one spot left for one on one. So if you've been wanting to work with me one on one, make sure that you reach out to me. Because I've only one spot left for August. And what I'm noticing is I've been having conversations around perfectionism and I have found that I'm not a perfectionist. And yet it is definitely elements of perfectionism that still show up in my business. But one of the things that I've acknowledged that within myself, but also I help support my clients, is actually the underlying wounds that cause perfectionism. So that's what I want to talk about today. Because perfectionism absolutely kills your growth. It kills how fast you can move. And in this day and age in business, you have to move fast. You cannot sit on decisions, you cannot sit wait and try to perfect things before you put it out to the world. And even just like the news cycle, but also the content cycle moves so fast that if you waste days and days and days trying to perfect a post, you know, all of those types of things, you prevent yourself from getting in front of the right people. That could be incredible clients for you or could be new opportunities for you. And so perfectionism is also the other thing I want to talk to too, as well, is like, I was talking to a friend about this the other day and how, like, we're obviously using more AI in our businesses, right? And AI is great. It helps support us and helps to have us brainstorming all the things. But what I'm noticing is that I'm starting to really notice when people are using ChatGPT in their captions and when they're using it across the board in their business. And it is creating a little bit of skepticism and distrust. Because I'm like, even though they're saying this, how do I know for sure that this is what they're going to deliver? And how do I know that this is not just chatgpt pumping out something that sounds good, but really that's not truly who they are? And so it's creating a level of distrust, and we're craving more authenticity. And so even when I was writing an email the other day that I had sent out, I think it was last Thursday, it went out. When it went out, I got the. I normally email it to myself. And so I literally woke up Thursday morning and read the email to myself. And sometimes I do that. I don't always do that, but sometimes I do that. And I read it through and I'd made a couple of spelling mistakes, and I'd made a couple of grammar errors, and I was like, oh, well, at least people know that I actually wrote this, right? Like, it's so interesting how I was like, oh, well, hopefully that makes me more relatable. And one of the things that I want to speak to is like, yes, we can use it. Absolutely use it, but just be discerning in how you use it. But when it comes to the perfectionism piece, I feel like AI is making it worse, right? Because everyone's being real perfect now, and it's creating this barrier for connection with your ideal clients. Because people don't want to buy from perfect. They want to buy from people they feel connected to. And you need to show your authenticity in your realness. And if you're always perfect, it creates this level of, like, untouchableness, right? And so the perfectionism, we want to acknowledge that that's actually not serving the growth of your business as much as you possibly Think it could be because you might be seeing other people and comparing yourself to other people and being like, oh, I wish I was more perfect. I wish I was closer or better or enough or as good as those people. When really you want to come back to your ideal client and be like, what do they need to know from you in order to trust you? And it's often not the case, being perfect. So I want you to think about that. What does your ideal client need to see from you in order to trust you, in order to feel connected to you, in order to want to work with you? That's what they need to hear, right? It doesn't have to be perfect. Secondly, perfectionism really is a level of protection. We don't want to get it wrong. We don't want to be seen that we're getting it wrong. We don't want to be seen. We don't know what we're talking about. We want to get it perfect for a reason. Like, what is your ultimate deep down reason if you can uncover some of those underneath wounds that are causing you to be like, oh, I have to be perfect a lot of the time. A perfectionism trait started from a young age, sometimes even in high school, where if there was a really high expectation placed on us and love was either given or taken away based on our level of perfection, that can then create a behavior, a strategy in order for us to get our needs met, in order for us to get the attention of the love that we really crave, because we all crave it, that we often play out the same scenarios again and again and again. Because it's all we know, it's what our brain has learned. And so if we're not acknowledging, like, oh, this was an old strategy that used to play out, and I can understand where it comes from, then you can start to move beyond it, right? So we need to know and understand where the pattern has come from in order for us to make peace with it and heal. And so we can move beyond it. Because if we're always craving that approval, that recognition, that love, that attention, whatever it is, and we find that we only really get it when we're perfect or seemingly perfect. I want to talk to you. Maybe I'll give you an example. Like, let's say that you grew up and during high school, you either had a teacher, someone or a parent, someone who had a form of authority in your life, form of influence in your life, and that person you really craved attention or love from. And that person had really high standards, really high Expectations that there were certain things that they wanted you to do a certain way, and only then would they then show you attention or love. And really, if there's no love, there's always attention. So sometimes we get that attention and it's a still a form of love. And so we will crave that. And so if that is the case, then we will usually learn, our subconscious mind learns that when we get things perfect, then we get attention and love. And if it's the only way that we're getting our needs met there, then we will try to do it as much as possible. And so then we learn that for us to get that need met, we must be perfect. And then it creates an expectation and a standard for ourselves that causes us to always strive for that. And so sometimes it's driven like that, or other times it's actually driven by a not enoughness story. So if we don't feel like we're enough to get that love and attention, if we're treated like we're not enough, and then there's only like small little amounts of attention or love that we get, only when we do certain things that are in alignment with that person's expectation, then we are trained that way. Like our subconscious mind is literally trained that we must do these things in order to get our needs met. And so then we go and live our adult lives doing the exact same thing again and again and again, and we start our businesses and then we try to get that approval from either industry leaders or other people that we know, or even our clients. And if we're always striving that approval, you will always be trying to prove your worth, always. And you will always be trying to get your needs met through other people, which is only going to serve you so long before you burn out, you get exhausted, or you just actually don't get your needs met. And so working through the perfectionism wound is so powerful in order for you to take your power back, in order for you to not crave that from other people and learn to actually give it your give it to yourself. Secondly, we need to move beyond it because we know in the business world that things move fast. And if you are wasting time trying to get things perfect when it really doesn't always matter, like, yes, there's going to be certain parts of your business that it's important that you spend the time to get things right. But, but I will be like, huge caveat here. But majority of the time, things get perfected in the action. They get perfected in the action. So you cannot just overthink something. You cannot try to just perfect it on your own in its own little system, in its own little space, that there's no other form of influence or input. And so we must remember that we are serving other people. And so we need to have the input from the other people in order to perfect things. And we also need to look at, like, what should we be spending our time and energy on in order to really utilize that skill set in a really good place. Because if you are wasting time on a caption or on a reel or on a piece of content or on that button on your website that, you know, only a few people see every week, like, is it really necessary for you to perfect those things or waste your perfection energy in those areas? Right? Is that going to move the needle forward in your business? And so you need to actually take time to be like, hang on a minute. Where am I going to exert that energy? And where am I not going to. Where am I going to let things slide a little bit? Where am I going to let things go a little bit and just ease off the expectation? Because often is the case is that we do one the way that we do one thing is we do all things, right? So we try to be perfect in all areas, which is just physically impossible, possible. I sound exhausted just even talking about it, right? And then that brings me to the things that really do matter, right? So there's definitely going to be areas of your business where you need to obviously spend some time and energy perfecting something to a certain extent, but then also remembering that for it to be really perfect, you do need to get it out into the world in order to get feedback, in order for. To see if it actually works, to put it into action, to see the result that it creates in order to see if it actually works. And so we must recognize that otherwise we can waste a lot of time sitting in perfectionism and not. And expecting. Or blaming ourselves and expecting ourselves to try and work out the problem when really we need to actually put it out into the world. So it's okay to do that to a certain extent, but just acknowledging, like, where are you sabotaging your own growth and preventing yourself from moving forward because of that expectation that you're placing on yourself. And so this shows up for so many women that I work with from the place of, like, trying to expand their visibility and they're trying to get everything perfect. They want to get that speaker pitch, right? They want to get their topics on their podcasts, right? They Want to get their every caption, every real, like, everything perfect. When really it doesn't need to be. It doesn't need to be. It's actually more quantity than it is quality right now. Right. And I say that loosely, like, so I just want a little caveat there. It just does still have to be good content. Like, I have to say that. But what I'm trying to say is that if you are spending hours and hours. Like, I remember going to an event and someone stood up and said, I spent 17 hours creating a reel. And I was like, whoa. I would have given up on that way earlier. It should not take that long because really, like, what's the lifespan of the real. Like, it's probably going to go out there and maybe be popular for three days and hopefully, I mean, stays longer, but not a lot, not majority of the time. So we want to acknowledge, like, where are we. Where are we wasting our time and energy? And also acknowledging too, that when we do spend time and energy on something that really matters, it's actually because we really care. And so you want to let yourself off the hook a little bit and just be kind to yourself in the process. To be like, it's okay because I do care, but just know where your line is. Know where is the line that I'm stuck in? Perfectionism versus just caring. Yeah, where is your line? You should know your line so then you can get the support that you need to either overcome it and to move beyond it. That's why I love, like, in my containers, that other than that doesn't last very long. Because if they're sharing it with the community, if they're sharing it with me for feedback and I can give them the feedback and like, cool, now get it out there. There's less sitting and stewing on it and kind of sitting in your own energy around, like the perfectionism, peace and expected to be having to be perfect in order to get it out there. And then you put it out there, you get a positive response and not for the need for validation. So I just want to highlight this. So there's two pieces here. So one, we get the outcome that we're wanting from a perspective, from a perspective of a result or an outcome, but not validation. Right. If we're looking for the recognition, the validation, like the likes, the follower count, the positive feedback, if we are only getting that from that one place, that's where we're still looking for validation and we're still looking externally for that. Whereas I always like to encourage my clients to Find something that they like about what they've created and acknowledge themselves first before they put it out to open the space for other people's opinions. So taking a moment to be like, whatever you've created, ask yourself, do you like it? Are you happy with it? What are you proud of yourself for? What do you like about it? Like, take the time to do that, because you should be proud of yourself and give yourself the validation, give yourself the approval, the love and attention before you go looking externally for it. So we want to shift away from just having that expectation that those needs are only going to be met externally if you learn to give it to yourself once you heal that wound. And there's a lot of processes that I take my clients through to heal that wound. But once we go through healing that wound, then we can come back to learning to give ourselves the approval, learning to love what we create, learning to acknowledge ourselves and celebrate ourselves. And then the opinions of other people don't matter as much because the end of the day, they're very fleeting anyway. And so you're no longer craving it when you heal that wound and you learn to be able to give it to yourself. And that's much more fulfilling, much more rewarding. And then you're no longer setting yourself up to have such incredibly high standards. Yes, you still want to have standards, but if they're so high that you're preventing yourself from growing and expanding and learning and growing and connecting, it's a problem. Yeah. So I want you just to define what is your line. And there's going to be certain things as well that you're like, okay, what can I start to relinquish a little bit of that perfectionism on? So you might even need to put yourself on a timeframe. You're like, I'm going to spend 30 minutes on that piece of content, and once it's done, I'm putting it out. Whatever it is, at that point. At that point, it's going to be done. It's going to be put out. And not spend so long wasting so much time and energy on things that are only going to matter for a short period of time. Okay, last little thing I want to talk about is the connection between perfectionism and the fear of judgment and the fear of failure. It often shows up with these cases because we're fearing that judgment and we're fearing that failure. But we want to look at the underlying wound of that. Right. So we want to look at why do we fear the judgment and why do we fear the failure Are we fearing the failure because we've had the feeling before, we've experienced failure before and we don't want to relive it? Is that connected to the original wound that we spoke about earlier of like looking for perfection because we're wanting to get our needs met? And so again, it could, it could come from a parent or an authority figure in your life as a kid where it wasn't okay to make mistakes, right? So there was either judgment that was passed on and so you obviously don't want to relive that experience because it's like deeply wounded, or secondly, that if that person didn't allow you to make mistakes. So it's a just different parenting style, right? And that's, you know, we're not passing judgment on the parent. We're just acknowledging that that's just what they knew was a parent. That's how they parented. And now we're reparen as adults, so we're looking back and being like, okay, that didn't serve me as a kid and what can I make peace with and then learn to rewire my brain now and adapt and heal those wounds, right? And so we look back at that and go, okay, if we had a parent that it wasn't okay to make mistakes, that everything was such a high expectation you had to be perfect, or that even when you were learning, it wasn't okay to make mistakes, which really, that's actually how we learn. And so we know better now. And so parents parent very differently now because of what we learned as kids. And so parenting, like even education has come so far. So we want to acknowledge like, yes, things have shifted, but maybe we weren't parented in a way that served us in the long run. And we want to look back and go, okay, is this the, the pattern has come from? Was it not okay for me to make mistakes? And so then I've built in a self narrative that again, it's not okay for me to make mistakes. So then I judge myself or I fear the judgment of other people and that failure is like literally not an option. This is where we've got to reframe failure and judgment. Failure doesn't exist unless you allow it to exist. Honestly, this is what I honestly 100% thousand percent believe. Failure does not exist unless, because a failure is nothing, it's actually not an ending. It's often the beginning of something. It's often a learning a lesson. It's actually a breakthrough. So we need to learn from our mistakes and we need to learn and grow and evolve beyond any failures. Cause it's never actually the end. And so I just want to acknowledge that and just help you reframe that. Because if you even have the word failure in your vocabulary, that's usually where we're placing that self judgment and such high expectations on ourselves. And so we want to acknowledge like, hey, do I use the word failure much? Do I listen to it in my own thoughts? And can I reframe the way that I talk to myself about this? Because it's impacting the way that I show up and take action in my business. I honestly feel like this is an evolution. Because at first, if that feeling of worrying about failure feels so big, it can feel almost like so foreign for me to say, like, oh, it doesn't exist unless we allow it to exist. But honestly, this is the way that I do in business. Like I have shit fail all the fucking time. Like all the time. But I don't dwell on it. I look at it and I learn from it and be like, okay, what can I take away from this? And rather than judge myself, I go, okay, I could have done things differently. And I'm going to learn from this and I'm going to do better next time. But I'm also not going to dwell on it. Because if when we dwell on it, it makes it even more, it makes it so much worse. So stop dwelling, move forward, keep focusing on the future rather than the past. Stop blaming yourself, stop placing judgment. Because this is also the next piece of the judgment piece. It's like, it's often the way that you're talking to yourself. The self talk that goes along with learning and growing and evolving has to be kinder. It has to be kinder and more generous. You are a human being, you are evolving, you are going to learn. And business is the absolute perfect learning ground. Because it's where we evolve so much and where causes us to grow so much. And it's also changing so much. And so we must be okay with being able to be adaptable. Which means your narrative, your internal narrative, the way that you talk to yourself must be kind and generous and supportive. You must be your own cheerleader. Otherwise you will always judge yourself and you will always feel bad when you don't make the best decisions or when you don't follow through on the things that you said you were going to do. Or you fail at something or you suck at something, right? And I'll say this to a client. The other day, she was trying to perfect her speech and I said to her, you're going to have to suck at it for a bit. You're going to have to practice it again and again and again until it becomes clearer, until it's easier for it to roll off the tongue. Because it's in the action, it's in the practice that you get better. It's not in the overthinking and trying to chat GPT at 50,000 times. Because it's got to come from you, right? You've got to practice it and you've got to get the muscle memory of your mouth speaking the words of your body holding the energy of your spirit coming through you when you speak. So this is why I want you to start to just adjust the way that you're speaking to yourself about it. Because you are a work in progress. Always. Always. And I say that with so much love. We're all a work in progress. And the kinder you can be to yourself, the more likely it is that you will not judge yourself when you fail. You will not judge yourself when you're not as perfect. Because you are lovable no matter what. You are absolutely, incredibly lovable. Without any of those expectations, you exist on this planet. You are a kind, generous, loving, caring human being. Nothing else matters. You are still lovable no matter what. No matter how that caption looks, no matter how that post looks, no matter how perfect your program is, whatever else, it doesn't matter. You are still lovable and your love is not contingent on the perfection that you put out into the world. All right, lovely. I hope this really deeply resonated with you and I hope that you take the time to really acknowledge what those patterns are. If you need support with uncovering what those patterns are, we can absolutely talk and so feel free to send me a message and we can chat about it. And always here for coaching as well. So if you need support with that you can reach out and we could talk about some one on one coaching options. Otherwise, I hope that I'll see you at Unstoppable Women. Book your ticket now. I'll see you soon. Thank you for listening. And if you found any value you out of this episode, make sure you hit the follow button so you get access to the episodes as soon as they are live. And make sure you come hang out with me on Instagram. You can find me at christinecorcorancoach. Have an incredible week.