Have you ever felt like you were a fake or an imposter as a beauty business owner? Have you ever thought that your business success is just sheer luck? Are you ever worried that people would find out you didn’t deserve your accomplishments?
If you have experienced any of those thoughts and feelings, you’re not alone. It’s called the imposter syndrome and about 70% of people experience at least one episode in their lives.
Imposter syndrome is different from fleeting moments of self-doubt. I have coached people with MBA’s and extensive education credentials through these episodes. It doesn’t matter how well-educated or smart you are.
Anyone can develop these short-term beliefs of being a phony.
Recently, I had imposter syndrome scenarios come up in a couple of coaching sessions so I want to share a few insights about this common challenge.
The Impact of Imposter Syndrome on Your Beauty Business
The impact of imposter syndrome can stifle your courage to pursue new opportunities for your beauty business. It can keep you from creating content and sharing your expertise through videos or blogging. Or even prevent you from launching new services. You get the idea.
In particular, the imposter syndrome can exacerbate the fear of failure and hold you back from taking action. In my client’s case, she was branching out in her beauty business and she felt scared to put herself out there.
There are different types of imposter syndrome and understanding the root cause can help you overcome these feelings more easily:
- Perfectionism can make you feel like a failure with the smallest mistake. That fear could hold you back from taking any action.
- The superwoman mindset causes you to think that you have to succeed in every aspect of life, causing you to put in long hours which leads to burning out.
- If you’re a “natural genius,” you may feel like a failure if you don’t succeed at first try — this can hinder you from experimenting and innovating in your business.
- Solo beauty business owners may think that they’re a failure if they ask for help but we all know, building a successful business needs support!
- The expert mentality can cause you to continuously seek out additional certifications because you feel that you never know enough to be “qualified.” You may hide behind yet another training program instead of implementing what you already know.
Does this sound familiar to you?
How To Overcome the Imposter Syndrome as a Beauty Business Owner
We don’t know exactly what causes the imposter syndrome but we do know that it’s difficult to stop the internal chatter once it starts. The sooner we recognize the negative self-talk, the sooner we can overcome it.
Talk To a Trusted Friend or Coach
Verbalize your fears that cause the imposter syndrome immediately. This helps you examine your thought pattern from an observer’s standpoint instead of being attached to it.
A trusted friend or coach can further facilitate this process by challenging your assumptions. A good coach will ask the right questions to give you different perspectives. This will help uncover the source of your distress.
I had my client try the simple exercise of talking about her fears. I asked her to take a 30,000’ view of the situation so she could become detached from the negative emotions. She discovered the exact time these feelings started and the feelings lost their power over her. She acknowledged the learnings and let go of the limiting beliefs.
Take Baby Steps, No Matter How Small
After my client recognized the limiting beliefs that were holding her back, we came up with causative action steps. This reinforced the idea that she’s fully qualified to pursue new opportunities. As a result, she was excited to implement and get moving!
Taking action is one of the best ways to challenge your negative thoughts and self-sabotaging assumptions. When you take baby steps and start achieving results, it builds momentum. You create evidence that will help you overcome your thoughts that caused the imposter syndrome to begin with.
Write down your accomplishments regularly. Celebrating success allows you to see how your skills and capabilities create positive outcomes and acknowledge the efforts you have invested to achieve results.
Like the client in the example above, most of us need support to overcome hurdles as we build our business. Imposter syndrome or not! The Elite VIP Coaching program is for beauty business owners ready to take massive actions to improve their business model while upping their inner game.
It’s time to expand your current level of success. Learn more.