The confidence store

Good evening, everyone. I'm Katie McManus, business strategist and leadership coach, coming to you this Thursday evening to talk about confidence. Now I'm just going to dive right into this. If you are joining me this evening, welcome. I'm streaming this on Streamyard to the Facebooks, to LinkedIn and to YouTube. I do like this to be interactive, so if you have any questions or something to add to the conversation, please do. But just know that sometimes Streamyard is imperfect and not all the comments make it to me all the time. So if you comment and I don't call you out, it is not you. I'm not mad at you and you did nothing wrong. It's just that the technology isn't working. So anyway, with that said, because we're talking about confidence, when we talk about confidence, when we talk about anything that hits home like this, it's really easy for your self consciousness to pop up. So just want to name that. You know, we can start questioning people like us, we can start wondering, you know, how we're coming across. I may even get weird at some point during this, this stream, which, you know, happens fairly often, so it won't be anything new, but just want to call that out whenever you. I know Luke Manton talks about this. He has Tourette's and he makes these beautiful videos and he shares about his experience with Tourette's. When he's talking about Tourette's, he tics more. It's the same thing when we're talking about confidence saboteurs. What's the term? Imposter syndrome? All that stuff just kicks up and it just becomes way more present. So as I'm talking, if you find yourself thinking of all the reasons why you have no right to be confident, just pay attention to that, okay? Put a little fly on the wall inside your brain and pay attention to what, what conversation is happening internally. Okay, so I want to talk about the absolute bare basics when it comes to confidence. And I'm going to say this and you're going to think, oh my, it's super simple. Why? Like I kind of already knew that or why is she saying this? It sounds super dumb. I have to say it because it is so basic, we jump over it. We forget this all the time when we are thinking, I need to be confident about something. We don't do these basic things. Rest. It is really hard to be confident when you are sleep deprived, okay? When your brain isn't functioning at its full capacity, the rest of your body. So your whole system, your body Has, I think it's the limbic system. If there's any science people in the audience. Hello, everyone. Please correct me, but the rest of your body, besides your brain, has a system for waste removal. Meaning that if any dead, if any cells die and they need to be sloughed off, or if parts, you know, come apart or whatever, I don't know. I don't know a lot about science. I just know this fact. Your body can get rid of it throughout the day. Like you have a whole system. You have organs designed for this. The one part of your brain that can't do this while it's awake is your brain. Your brain doesn't have that cleanup system. The only time your brain can clean itself up is while you're sleeping. Okay? This is why sleep is so imperative. Well, I mean that and a bunch of other reasons why when you don't sleep, when you sleep, you're better able to manage your hormones. Your hormones self regulate better. When you're well rested. Cortisol, which is the stress hormone, is one of those guys that gets regulated when you're well rested. If you're not well rested, cortisol, adrenaline, especially if you're drinking a lot of coffee, all that spikes. And guess what? You have stress hormones coursing through your body. It's really hard to be confident when you have stress hormones coursing through your body. So if I, I just want to like, get on a mountaintop and shout this with a loud horn. If you want to be confident, sleep eight to nine hours a night. Sleep eight to nine hours night. You will be 50% of the way there, I swear to God. Rest and also eat. Just going to go down this little list I have here. Eat, eat. If you're not well nourished, if you are having a sugar crash, for instance, or if you're getting hangry, those things all kill your confidence. So does hydration. Your brain needs that lubricant to make it work. If it doesn't, you're going to get slow, you're going to forget things, you're going to stumble over your words. And as I'm saying this, I'm getting thirsty, so I'm going to have a little sip of my soda water. Mmm, delicious. And lastly, another super basic thing. If you want to be confident in whatever you're doing, I don't care what you're doing, you need to make sure that the clothing you are putting on your body fits you and is comfortable. Okay? The easiest way to make you feel not confident in a moment is to have to adjust to make your body fit in the clothes or have to, like, hike things up or, like, you know, pull straps back up. If you've ever been on a date where you dress in something like, super hot but super uncomfortable, and then halfway through the date, you're, like, dying for air, you know what I'm talking about? Okay, so. But I don't even care if you're doing a zoom call and you don't, like, wear pants that fit. It is just the most basic thing you can do. So now I want to go into. Those are, like, the human needs things that you're required to do if you want to be more confident. Let's talk about the things that actually build confidence. Now, my hugest, biggest, most ginormous pet peeve is when I see a guru or a teacher or a really bad coach. I'm not even going to call them a straight up coach. A bad coach who goes out there and says, just have confidence. Just have confidence. Oh, you don't know how to do that. Well, just have confidence. Just have confidence. Yeah, it's like, where the fuck do I get confidence? Is there a confidence store? Is there a cream I put on my face and it just like, you know, gets soaked in through my pores? No. No. Just having confidence is not an answer for someone who's struggling with not having confidence. Okay? If you're saying this to people, please stop. It is bad. It just makes it gaslights people that there's something wrong with them. They can't just be confident, which, by the way, compounds the problem and makes them less and less confident, okay? You're making it worse, not making it better. And if you're a person who's listening to someone who says this, stop listening to that person, okay? They are not a credible source for you to build your confidence from building confidence. So this is something that I work on with my clients. Many of my clients come to me. They've never had a paying client for their business before. And so they're tasked with building a business and onboarding and enrolling new clients when they've never gone through the process before, okay? The number one thing is do your homework, do your homework, prepare, prepare. But not too much. I know I have a lot of perfectionists in my world, okay? So when I say prepare, I mean prepare well enough, okay? So say you are going to run a sales call to enroll a new client, okay? You're going to prepare. You're going to learn how to do it from a coach, a business strategist, whoever it is that you're working with, who's showing you the way. And then here is the prime step, that if you jump over, you're just going to struggle a lot. You're just going to be on the struggle bus for a long time. You need to practice, okay? Practice. Practice is key. Dental hygienists don't just learn the theory of cleaning teeth and then go and start working on patients. No, there would be a lawsuit, I imagine, or there would be a lot of bleeding gums. I hate that. Anyway, they practice. They practice on each other. They practice on dummies. They practice on a lot of stuff. You have to practice. So if you're starting a business and there's a part of the business that you have to do that you're not confident in, practice it, okay? I make my clients do this. I teach them the sales call. I teach holistic selling because I don't believe selling ever has to be pushy or manipulative. It can be all about their relationship and all about showing up authentically to serve someone that you're talking to, you talking to. And I make them go practice it. Go. I make them go practice it with their spouse, with their best friend, with their cousin, anyone that they can get on the phone who will do some role play with them. It sounds silly and it sounds like not that much fun, but honestly, if you don't do this, then you're going to be in a real world situation where you're trying to sell and it's not going well and you're going to start to panic and then you're going to forget everything, okay? Confidence is built through practice, okay? Speak to any athlete, speak to any musician, speak to any actor, speak to anyone, lawyers, doctors. Confidence is built through practice, okay? So if you want confidence in what you're about to do, you need to practice, okay? Another way to do this is just to get comfortable talking to people on the phone and asking them for something. And this is specifically sales, something that I always advise for my clients and people who are building their business, is that if you're not confident in asking people to pay you for money, go and get involved in a political campaign, go and knock on doors, go and hold a sign somewhere, go and ask people to sign petitions. Because if you can ask people to show up to a place on a certain date and fill in their name and fill in that tiny little box next to the candidate that you support, the jump to asking people to buy your service from you is actually not that big, because it's just asking them for something that is usually the biggest hurdle. Another one here is to go and collect no's. Literally go and stand on a street corner and collect no's. Ask people and you'll look ridiculous doing this. Just own that, okay? You'll look crazy. Ask. Ask a hundred people if they will let you give them like a 30 minute consultation and get as many no's as possible. Okay? You'll be surprised. You'll probably get a few yeses as well. They won't count. You have to get no's. Here's. So that's, that's the first bit is you have to practice. You have to put yourself out there. Number two is that you have to deal with any limiting beliefs that you have. If you have. So say you have a limiting belief around. And I talked to someone today who is this incredible woman. She wants to start this business that is going to have incredible impact in the field that she works in. And yet she doesn't see herself as. As like, oh, I shouldn't do that. There's also this belief system there that if she wants to help people, she has to not make a lot of money doing it. Okay, That's a limiting belief, okay? Because there's no. Nowhere is it written. I mean, maybe it is written, but like, it's a bullshit rule that if you're helping people, if you're a healer, if you're serving people, if you're changing the world, that you also have to make no money, okay? That is a limiting belief that gets planted in our brains very early on. So. And that's obviously not going to serve someone who's starting their business. And this is a limiting belief. I bring it up because it's a limiting belief that most of my clients have. Okay? Most of my clients want to change the world in some way, shape or form. And it feels icky to them to be making a lot of money doing it. Because when we think of someone who makes a lot of money, we think of Scrooge McDuck. Okay? We think of 45. We think of a bunch of other people who are evil with money. So we have this whole belief system that if you have a lot of money, then you're evil and you're bad. But if you are good in the world and you should just be squeaking by, barely making it, barely making the bills. No, no, no, no. So areas to look at for limiting beliefs are what are your beliefs around money and who has it and who doesn't have it and what makes you deserving of it? Another limiting belief. It's gonna sound really like touchy feely and woo woo is love. You know, who's deserving of love, who's not deserving of love. You know what makes you deserving of love? I can tell you money. And love and acceptance are generally very closely tied together. They're both energy fields out there in the world. We misconstrue them as. As things that are tokens of power. Let's just say that we misconstrue them as tokens of power rather than just pure energy sources. And by the way, if you're questioning all this, you're like, oh, well, there are some people who absolutely don't deserve money and this and that and the other thing, when you just take a deep breath, you can absolutely believe that if you want to. But if you're trying to start a business, that belief system is probably not going to serve you that well. Everyone is deserving and worthy of love, acceptance, and money. Everyone. Okay? That's not to say there aren't bad people out there who do bad things. And yes, there should be repercussions for those people for whatever that is, but that doesn't make them any less deserving because we are all naturally deserving and worthy of love and money, including you. So. And it doesn't make you a bad person to want more money. Okay? It absolutely doesn't make you a bad person. This is something that I personally had to clean up with myself when I started out and some resources that I'm gonna give you. So I have it somewhere. Thinking. Thinking, Grow Rich. Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill. This. I hold up this book all the time, guys. If you haven't bought this yet, you need to. I don't get it. Like I haven't. I should have an affiliate link on my website or something. I don't. But it's specifically this edition. It's by with Joel Fatinos and August Gold. And the reason I like it is because it's slightly abridged and there are really great journal questions at the end of each chapter that help you really pinpoint into where. Where this is true or not true for you. Okay. Another one is the Soul of Money by Lynn Twist. I would hold it up, but it's at the other end of the house and I don't want to make you guys wait while I get it. Okay? So deal with limiting beliefs. This is also a great topic for you to bring to your coach if you work With a coach. Okay. If you are working with a coach, they will be able to tease it apart with you. It's hard to do a lot of the stuff on your own. I can speak to that. I'm a trained coach. I'm certified, and I still have a coach that I dive into this stuff on. So, yeah, don't. Don't feel bad if you feel like, well, I think all this stuff is true. That's totally normal. Okay? So that's number two. You have to deal with limiting beliefs, okay. Because if you believe it, it's going to be true in your life. Okay. Lastly, this is my last piece of advice for this. Just to go do it. Just go do it. Literally, just go do it. Because the truth of the matter is that if you need confidence for it, if you need to muster up some bravery and courage for it, it's obviously outside your comfort zone. Okay? We are not like, once we step outside our comfort zone once, it doesn't mean that that's now our comfort zone. We usually step across the line, we hang out for a couple minutes, then we jump back. Oh, okay, all right. I did it. I did it one time. Okay. And then we have to do it again. And we're able to hang out a couple more minutes there. And then we jump back and we're like, okay, all right. Easier. Getting easier. I could. Yeah, all right. I can do this again. And that's where, like, second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth time, like, finally, like the seventh time, you're like, oh, cool. I'm just outside my comfort zone. This isn't that bad, actually. I think I'm comfortable here. It takes a few jabs outside of your comfort zone for your comfort zone to grow. The only way for you to have that confidence, though, to grow that comfort zone, is you have to step outside of it. You have to just go and do it. You have to do it before you're ready. This is. This is. If you take. If you take away one thing from this live, and you can tell I'm tired because I'm kind of stuttering. If you take away one thing from this live, I want you to take away that you are never going to be ready for the thing that scares the crap out of you. And the thing that scares the crap out of you, I guarantee is the thing that is going to make the most impact in your success in your life. You're never gonna feel ready until you've done it about half a dozen times. If you don't do it, if you chicken out, if You're a weenie. If you don't muster up some bravery and some courage and just go do it, guess what? That impact, that change, that change in course, direction, whatever, for your life is never gonna happen. You're going to stay with the status quo, which you know may be fine. You know, you created this life for yourself. You were the author of everything up until now. So obviously there are some things in this life that you have right now that work for you. Wonderful. But if you want something different, and the thing that will get you there is the thing that's outside of your comfort zone that requires you to gain some confidence and all that stuff, you just have to go do it. And I know if you're watching this and you're listening to this, you know exactly what this thing is for you, and I want you to DM it to me as soon as this ends. I want you to write it down right now and you're going to send me that dm. The thing that you feel you need the confidence to go out. And do you know what it is? Because it's been sitting in the back of your mind. It's like, oh, shit, I should be doing that. Oh, I really should be doing that. Oh, so. And so is doing that. Oh, this lady on Instagram is doing this. Oh, and that guy over there. Oh, my God, they're all doing it so well, I'm never gonna be able to do it. You know what this is? You have to just go and do it if you're not ready. If you're ready or not ready, I don't care. I want you to DM me. Whatever this is for you, I want to hear it. And actually, if you're brave enough, you can pop it in the chat. But anyway, I don't. I don't normally do my lives this early in the evening, but I'm exhausted because I just got a puppy and we've been getting up between 2:00am and 4:00am because, you know, puppies have small bladders and not a lot of control, so they need to get out. So, anyway, so I'm wrapping up my day a little earlier today. And so anyway, most people, when they watch, they watch in the evening. My point, anyway, a little rambly at the end. Anyway, I hope this was useful to you. If you're feeling like you need some confidence in an area, one place to show up is the being brave call that I host every single Friday. It's at 11:00am Eastern. It's over. Zoom. It's a group call. It's completely free. It is part like optional participation. See, I'm tired. So if you want to show up and ask questions, it is a free form Q and A. Sometimes I will do stuff like you know, guide people through a visualization or we'll do breakout rooms so you can get to know some people or I will dive into something like limiting beliefs around money. But mostly it's a free form Q and A. You're welcome to show up and ask questions. You're also welcome to show up and listen and learn to learn from whatever questions other people ask and the answers that they get. Both are welcome. You also can show up late, you can leave early. You know, it's very free form. It's just, it's a way for me to give back to my community and get to know people and support people doing brave ass shit. Anyway, I'm going to pop that link in the chat of this and if you have any questions, if you are struggling with confidence in some way, reach out. You know, there's a million things that you can do to build your confidence and I just, I can't stress this enough. Just go and do it. I hate that. Oh I love hate the term fake it till you make it because some people think, oh, fake it till you make it, you're faking that you're credible in something. No, no. Fake it till you make it is generally like fake the confidence that it takes to get to until you do the thing. There's an element of that, but I know it doesn't resonate with a lot of people. You just have to go and do it. Just go and do it. And if you're too afraid, I want you to think of this one thing. If you don't do it, what's your life going to look like in 5, 10, 15, 20 years? What path are you on right now if you don't change anything? And do you want to be on that path? Because some people do and I don't want to shame that. But if you don't want to be on that path, I want you to really think about what you're opting into right now by not doing this change. I know, I know. When I started thinking about this four or five years ago, I was not happy with where that path was headed. I was not happy. I had to change things. And I invite you to as well. Anyway, I'm Katie McManus, Business Strategist, Leadership coach. I will be going live tomorrow afternoon and then I'll be enjoying my nice weekend. I hope you will as well. And, yeah, don't. And last final words. Last final words. Stay away from people who tell you to just be confident. It's bullshit. Anyway, have a great night. Thanks for watching.