How to Stop Self-Doubt From Crippling You

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So go get your audiobook now. Www.entremd.com 7Figurebook and let's rewrite the narrative for physicians starting today. Hi docs. Welcome to the Entre MD podcast where it's all about helping amazing physicians just like you. Embrace entrepreneurship so you can have the freedom to live life and practice medicine on your terms. I'm your host, Dr. Una. Now today we are going to be looking at how to stop self doubt from crippling you. The reason why I bring this up is because even as somebody who has started multiple businesses, taken multiple businesses to seven figures, to multiple seven figures and all of that self doubt is still a thing that creeps up. And so sometimes people think there's a big problem because they have doubt. But the truth of the matter is nothing could be further from the truth. This is something that's going to show up multiple times. Especially if you're going to be somebody who keeps striving to be more, keeps striving to do more, every time you take on a new project, it's going to show up. So the question is not whether self doubt shows up, it is going to show up. The question is how do you respond to it? How do you move forward in spite of it? How do you have endless momentum even though, even though self doubt has shown up. So the real inspiration for me doing this episode is I was talking to a mentee of mine and she is doing so great. She just, she's in the middle of her second launch. It's already a five figure launch and it's not something she's done before. She's new to the world of entrepreneurship. And. And then doubt was showing up, and so we started having this whole conversation about it. And when I was done, I was like, you know what? I think I'm going to go share this. This is really, really, really good. Okay, so. So let's talk about that. So I gave her three things that I do that I have done in the last 14 years as an entrepreneur to keep moving and keep crushing, like, big milestones on all of those things in my businesses, even self doubt. So the first thing. The first thing is really surrounding myself with big, big dreamers, people who are big dreamers, people who are doing great things, people who are getting great results. And this is, like, much bigger than I am right now. I will say that this does require that you have the mindset of, like, when you're around people who are doing so much better than you, that your reaction to that is, huh, I wonder how they did it. I wonder what that's like. It's an attitude of curiosity and maybe inspiration rather than depression. Like, how come they're doing that? Well, I'm not. And I'm not. That is such. That's not helpful at all. Right? That's not helpful at all. And so it does require that attitude. But really, it's keeping big dreamers around me. And I'll give you an example. I was in a meeting, and in this meeting, it was a bunch of founders, female founders. You had to have done at least seven figures in revenue in the last 12 months to be a member of that meeting. And while we were sitting there, I remember one of the ladies there saying, talking about her business and talking about how somebody had offered to buy it, and she didn't think she needed to sell because she was doing so great. And so she made a statement. She said, at this point, we're doing an easy million a month, okay? Now, at that point in time with Entre md, I had just crossed multiple six figures, and nobody could tell me nothing, right? And so when she said, easy million a month, I thought about it. I was like, easy million a month. What kind of person do you have to become and what do you do to get to a point where not only are you making a million a month, but like, an easy million a month right now. What that. So when I think about that, I think about the kind of team that that person will need, the kind of challenges that come with that and all of that. And it's just a reminder for me that Whatever challenge I'm having in my business or whatever problem in my business is making me think like I can't do this. And it's making the self doubt creep up that the truth of the matter is it's not that serious. You know what I mean? Like it's, it's, it's not that serious. Like this person is all the way doing these big things. So the problem, this is a conclusion that this makes me come to. The problem is not the problem. The problem is who is facing the problem, right? And so that's just my inspiration to grow. So even so when I see challenges which would normal so say for instance, maybe somebody's like they weren't happy with the service I provided and, and I make that mean something. All this self doubt creeps up or the mind, the chatter is just going, you're not good enough. You're not the kind of person who can do this. This doesn't work for you. Look at that other person there. Look at what they're doing. You're a doctor, what do you even think you're doing? You don't have an mba. Who are you to teach other people how to run businesses? Like all of these kind of things, right? But when all of these things come up, I'm looking at the other person. I'm like, well, they don't have all that stuff either. I look at what they've done and so looking at people who are big dreamers just shows me that the things that I think are the reasons why I can't do what I've set out to do are not really valid. Like they're not, they're not valid at all. They're not valid at all. And so I on purpose keep myself in front of people who are big dreamers, people who are doing much better than I am in business. People who have crushed, have crushed milestones I haven't even thought about. Like, I have a friend, right? And we were talking and she was like, I am so excited. I'm like, what happened? She's like, oh, like I just went through this process and I'm actually in the works for the biggest contract of my life. And I'm like, what is the contract worth? She's like, 133 million. I'm like, what? And again, it's not from this place of oh, I saw. They'll never get there. Not bad. But like curiosity, like wait, what? And inspiration. And so it makes me go like, okay, the goal that I have, like, come on, like you can do that. I can do this, right? And so I just keep myself in front of big people. Now when I say big people, big dreamers. Now there are a number of ways you can do this. Some of that is books that you read, some of that is actual people that you know. Some of those are communities that you join. They may be communities that you pay to be a part of. They may become communities. A lot of them will be communities you pay to be in because those people are usually behind paywalls. Okay, if, if you're talking about communities, right? And so that's one thing that I do and it helps me keep this self doubt in check. The second thing that I do and I do this on a regular basis is that I trick my brain with my vision, right? So think about it. You may have, maybe there's a goal you set in your business. You didn't hit it. And because of that, you've made it mean something. It means I'm not good at this. It means I won't crush my goals. It means that I suck, whatever, right? Or you tried something, maybe you tried to, you did a launch and all this stuff and you're like, I heard about this launch thing, I'm going to try it. And you did it and it didn't work, right? And you're like, oh man, I suck at this. This will never work. Or those kind of things. Sometimes nothing, nothing really needs to happen. Your brain will just offer you all kinds of thoughts, all kinds of thoughts. So I'm like, well, that's what is happening. It's coming my way. And I'm reacting to that, right? Like it's coming my way and I'm deciding all of these things. Well, what if I played offense, right? What if I played offense instead of defense? So for instance, I run a business school for physicians. It's called the entrepreneur Business School to your long program. And I have been working, we just started the beginning of our fourth year right. Last month. So I have been working consistently on this product beyond trendy business school for four years. And I have choices. I can allow my mind randomly tell me all the things it wants to tell me about the school or I can decide what my vision is and keep that vision in front of me. And so one day I was like, you know, this mindset chatter, it's a lot. And the reason why I'm telling you this and I'm using myself as an example is because I want you to be clear that there's nothing wrong with you if these self doubt, these thoughts keep showing Up. It doesn't mean, oh, I should have like sometimes people tell me I should have outgrown this. I'm like, that's not, that's not how this works. That's not, any of this works. This is not something I'll grow. This is something you figure out how to thrive in spite of. And so I was like, well, since my mind is going to do this, let me play offense. I literally took a notebook and I wrote out my vision for the school, right? So the altar, indeed business school is the number one business school for physicians producing more six, seven and eight figure entrepreneurs than any other business school. I talked about the hundred thousand physicians that we would have helped. So I went on and on and on in detail, right? Because the mind charter is in detail. So I did this in detail is four pages long, okay? And when I was done with it then, now what I do in the morning is I take that and I start off my day with my, my work day with it, right? I have a whole morning routine for my life, but my work day. And so I pull this and I look at it and I imagine it and I'm like, okay, Entrepreneur business school is number one business goal for physicians, producing more 6, 7, 8 figure entrepreneur than any other business school. We have a hit yet. We're really close, but we haven't hit it yet. But, but still that's my vision. I keep it in front of me and I talk about how I'm perceived in the marketplace. I talk about how many students are in the school and I talk about the kinds of results they're getting. I'm talking about what their lives look like because of the results that they got. And all of these things, I go on and on until I'm done with the four pages. And what I've done is I've created like big faith, right? As opposed to self doubt. So that's me playing offense. I start my day that way intentionally so that, that way when the self doubt, the more I do that, the less the self doubt has the opportunity to stop, right? And so that's what I do. I trick, I trick my, my, my, my, my brain with that. I do want to stop here and say this because if you're here, chances are you're an entrepreneur, right? When we say I want to say this because a lot of times the self doubt comes from words, right? I remember the first, my very first one started view after I started my first business, which was my private practice, I was out of it for like two or three days. I was so sad. I was like, what does this mean? Do we really suck? Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And if you're an entrepreneur, you're going to go through that. And you know, the sooner you go through that and you build your thick skin, the better. And that doesn't. Thick skin doesn't mean you don't respond to the review and look for the validity of it and make changes in your business. It just means you don't let it, you don't let it make you fall apart. Right. And so, so that's what, like, so that's what happened to me with that. So I wanted to stop to say this here. That words, your words are not like air. They're not without consequence. They're not. Your words have power. Your, your words really have power. And so you, you want to be careful because you can either empower people with your words or you can destroy people with your words. And are people going to come at you and say negative things about you and say negative things about your business and are they going to do all of that? Yes. But you can choose not to be the person who does that. You can choose to be that person. You can choose to be the person who empowers entrepreneurs, especially if you're a physician entrepreneur. Because entrepreneurship is one of the ways we take care of the craziness that's going on in the healthcare space. Right. If you look at loss of autonomy, you look at burnout, you look at the fact that 70% of private practices are owned by private equity or corporate entities like insurance companies and stuff like that are hospitals. So only 30% are owned by physicians. Right. Learning about entrepreneurship is the way we reverse that trend and things like that. So when you see a physician entrepreneur. Yes. If there's something wrong, let them know, like, you can do that. But use your words to empower them. Because the physician community needs them to set the example of what is possible to. So we can change the way the physician community is. Right. So be the person. You use your words to make people overcome their self doubt rather than expand their self doubt. It's not your responsibility, like it's nobody's responsibility to take care of my self doubt. But I also recognize that I can help rather than hurt. Right. Okay. So I just want you to throw that out. That's extra. Okay. Number three. Number three is the next principle. So this is what this is. At every point in time as an entrepreneur, the things that you don't know will be more than what always. This is never going Away. The things that you don't know will be more than the things that you do know. Okay. The things that you don't know how to do will always be more than the things that you do know how to do. Always. And so when you start, when you're working as an entrepreneur, there is this tendency to go like, oh, I don't know how to do this. And there's this new thing in the market. I don't know how to do that either. And I brought on, I need to bring on this team member. I've never hired. I've never hired a CEO before. Like, I don't know how I'm going to lead a CEO. I've never hired another doctor in my private practice. I don't know how I'm going to lead them. I don't even know I'm going to make the payroll when I hire somebody and pay them multiple six figures. Like there's always going to be things that like, right, you then have. And at that time, like your self doubt is an all time high. It's like there are all these things that I don't know and all of that. But you have choices, right? Even if you knew everything to do, you wouldn't do everything. At the same time, you just take the next step, right? And so what I do, one of the things I do to stop self doubt from crippling me is when it shows up. And it's showing up because all these things are overwhelming and I don't know what to do. I'm like, okay, I don't know everything to do, but I always know the next step to take. I always know what I can do right now. And so in the midst of all of that, I just pick the thing that is the next thing and I just do that. I just pick the thing that's the next thing and I just do that. Because if I don't do that, then what happens is the overwhelm stops me. I can have all those feelings and I can feel like I don't know everything, but I can move forward. So that's what I do, right? And so what that means is as I figure it out and I'm like, oh, this is what I need to do. Or this is how that plays out. I've been moving the whole time instead of being stuck. Okay, So I told her this and her words was like, yes, I got this, I'm out. Right? Like she actually hurried and got me off the phone, which is, okay, I'll address it later. I'm Kidding. But, but she was like, let's go. As I want to think, I want you to think about yourself. You may, you may run a private practice, you may be a coach, maybe a speaker, you may host event, you may be an intrapreneur and you're building or you, so you work a job, but you're building your personal brand and you're monetizing that. One of the things that you must learn to master is self doubt. So it's not going to go away. You are just going to learn to stop it from stopping you. So if you feel self doubt, don't make it mean, it doesn't mean anything. It doesn't mean you're not growing as an entrepreneur. It doesn't mean you're not improving. There's nothing you do that will make it go away, right? What you're going to do is stop it from stopping you. So it can stay there, but it gets to be in the passenger seat and can just sit there and do its thing. But I'm still driving this car, I'm still going where I need to go, right? So I really want you to embrace surrounding yourself with people who have done so much more than you've done. They will inspire you, they'll keep you in motion. If it is a vulnerable environment like the way the Entre MD business school is, they will even share their self doubt. To hear somebody who is, who is running a business that is valued at 200 million talk about their self doubt really puts it in perspective. It's like, oh, apparently this is, this is not going anywhere, right? So being in that environment like do everything you can legally to be in environments where there are people who, what they do, what they've accomplished is so much that it can almost intimidate you. That's how much it is you want to be in those kind of environments because it stretches you, it causes you to grow and it really gets you to get out of your own way. Especially if it's a vulnerable sharing environment. I want to really challenge you to take the time, document your vision and start telling yourself that, right? So self doubt is talking to you. You let your vision talk to you. All you have to do is put your vision on paper and give your voice and your vision can talk to you. And may the best man win. And I want you to start practicing the next principle. Overwhelm is such a useless emotion. It's a useless feeling. It will stop you every time when you feel that and it makes you feel like you start doubting yourself and all of that. Just think in the middle of all of this, what is the next step? What is the thing that I can do? What is a revenue generating activity I can do right now while I figure all of this stuff out. If you do that, even on your bad days, there will be great days because you still move forward, your business still move forward. Maybe you still got new clients, you serve them at the highest level, you got new referral sources. So your business still moved forward even though you felt some kind of way, right? So that's what I want you to do because we can get to this point. I got to this point two years ago at this point, right? I used to like the self doubt, the fear, all those things really used to stop me. I really used to believe a lot of this stuff. And I was working really hard to make the fear and the self doubt go away. And I had this moment where I realized the fear is not going to go away. The self doubt is not going to go away. And so I remember I was taking a walk in my neighborhood, I remember exactly where I was. I was like, you know what? Since the fear is not going to go away, I'm just going to push you to the side. You get to be in the passenger side in this car and I'm taking the wheel and I'm gonna go where I'm going in spite of all the stuff that you're doing. So feel free, say what you gotta say, do what you have to do. But I'm going forward, right? You don't get to stop me anymore. You don't get to drive, you don't get to be in charge at all. Okay? And I want you to get to that place where you're comfortable even though there's fear, you're comfortable even though there's self doubt, you've mastered this, that it doesn't really matter. I can still go forward. I can still build very successful businesses, I can help a lot of people, I can create financial freedom for me and my. Even though I feel self doubt, even though I feel fear like it's an emotion, I feel it, I'm not letting it stop me. Okay? That's my dream for you. And that can become your reality. You can start by, by executing these three strategies that I gave you. And I cannot wait to celebrate what you go on to create because of that. So if this, if, if you got a lot of value from this, I want you to comment in the comment section, let me know that it was super high value for you and then grab the link of this, share it with another physician ENTREPR in your life. They would thank you forever. Go be the boss of Self Doubt. Hey, if you love listening to the Entre MD podcast, I want to invite you to join Entre MD On Demand. It is my signature subscription program that gives you access to a library of business courses designed to help you do one thing as a physician entrepreneur, and that is to thrive. Just head out to Entre M forward slash on Demand and I'd love to have you join us. See you on the inside.