I’ve come to believe that the biggest killer of businesses is not poor marketing, lack of sales or wrong product fit. It’s financial sabotage, nothing will destroy a business faster. Not doing whatever it takes to grow your business and beating yourself up for that is a sure sign your inner game of money is out of whack.
When I invest in businesses now, I look for people who have already run a business with the same revenue I want to achieve, usually if you put someone with a $1 million dollar a year psychology into a business doing $10 million a year after a year you’ll have a 1 million dollar a year business.
Conversely put someone with a $10 million a year psych into a biz doing $1 million and the next year you’ll have a $10 million a year business.
Your psychology is EVERYthing in business
Here’s some of the most common ways I see entrepreneurs sabotage their businesses:
Not knowing when to quit
It’s easy to fall in love with your business…. heck it’s a pre requisite for success.
Yet falling in love leads to an old adage that love is blind… and nothing is more likely to kill your business than not knowing when to change it.
Often times when I see a business it’s pretty easy to spot the problems, just like spotting someone else’s toxic relationship.
It’s easy to see from the outside yet when you’re on the inside and actively in love with your business or idea it’s hard to be pragmatic and know when to quit.
If your business is not working now it’s most likely flawed in some way. The model, the product or worse still no one wants it, when this happens you have to cut that baby lose and start the next one ASAP time is precious.
Helping everyone but themselves
When I built New Insights Life Coaching from a room in my house to a business doing $8 million in sales I got to see a LOT of people who LOVED to help others… they’d have all the answers on how to self actualize their lives and grow their businesses.
Yet 99.9% of the coaches I worked with couldn’t (wouldn’t) help themselves.
They say those that can do, and those that can’t teach others…. in my experience this is true.
So if you find yourself giving other people great advice then write it down, usually the very same advice you need too!
Scared of success
Have you ever found yourself on the verge of a big success, and noticed things starting to go wrong? It begins with a feeling of agitation. The tiniest details irritate you. Reliable people start making alarming mistakes.“What’s up with them? Can’t they see how important this is? Why are they being so careless?”
“What’s wrong with me today?”
You get into arguments with your partner and friends, who wonder why you’re being so “touchy.”
All of these are classic symptoms of fear of success – a condition that is all the more dangerous because it’s so unexpected. You want to be successful, right? You’ve sweated blood to get to this point, so why would you sabotage yourself?
This is the big one I think. Most people when you ask them will tell you they want to be a success, they would LOVE more cash, more time and more freedom.
Yet so few people will ever do what it takes to achieve those things, why?
In my experience many people are scared of success and the things they perceive it will bring them, lets take a look at the big fears around what success will bring.
Big Fear No 1: It Will Change Me
“If I achieve that goal, I won’t be who I am, I’ll change somehow … I will lose my personality.”
Reach Your Goals Very often people are afraid that if they reach their goal, they will have to stop being who they are and start playing someone else’s role.
Underline that. Remember it. Read it again.
It’s big.
You must realize that you will have to change. But it doesn’t mean that it will be some freaky change. Life is a constant motion, a constant change. It throws down a challenge
“Change or get left behind.”
That’s what keeps us growing, moving forward, getting rid of the obstacles that slow us down.
Is someone asking you to turn into an evil, bloodthirsty monster?
You can be a wonderful person, both spiritually and materially wealthy and still be tolerated by the majority of the people out there.
🙂
Success is often tied to all kinds of weird beliefs that have been squished into our minds. But the fact is, that achievement is something that is very good indeed and in all candor … do you want your kids to be successes … or failures?
Then, why not yourself?
Big Fear No 2: I Don’t Deserve It
“I’m not worth it. I don’t deserve to be successful.”
This problem is the biggie.
First of all, you have to be honest enough with yourself to admit that you do have a challenge with your self-worth, yes?
… and can you admit that you think you don’t deserve to be successful. Most of the time, people aren’t that honest with themselves. Self-deception is the easiest form of deception there is!
People hide the true reason behind many little, unimportant reasons, and the feeling that “I am not worthy!” is hiding behind closed doors.
You can’t treat the cause if you can’t find it. But I want you to realize that being straight with yourself is one of the most important factors of achieving anything important in life.
There are many other reasons for Fear of Success caused by a shitty self-image.
One of them is a lack of belief in your own ability to sustain progress, and maintain the accomplishments you have achieved in your life.
Sometimes you think, “…. I think I just got totally lucky …”
Another: The belief that there are others out there who are better and smarter than you, who will replace or displace you (and let me tell you that you are RIGHT!) There ARE people better and smarter than you and there always will be, but there are also millions of people who don’t hold a candle to you!
Listen,
Building a business is hard work, it’s exhausting mentally, physically and emotionally.
The ups and downs are not for everyone.
But learning some new “traffic getting” strategy or buying the latest widget will not help you one iota if your psychology is working against you.
This week I watched first hand as a very talented friend threw away a great opportunity because her Psychology was out of whack, rather than getting to work on her psychology she sabotaged her chance of success, a pattern she’s run over and over again….
It IS easier to simply run away I know, but ultimately the more you run the bigger the fears seem.
Let this be the week you get to work on you!!
To your success
Neil
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