How to Feel Ready When You Don’t Feel Ready

There is no such thing as perfect. If you are progressing, moving forward in spite of the fear in your business and life, that's all that matters.

I remember the day like it was yesterday…

Full-body sweats. My sales copy was attached. I sat there, staring at the blue send button. Maybe I’ll wait until tomorrow. I should review it again.

What if it’s not good? What if he reads it and thinks I’m an idiot? Ah, why am I so scared? What’s wrong with me? I’m a grown adult with two children.

I wrote my first sales page in September/October 2012 and submitted it to my business coach. Now if you feel that I’m a bit intimidating, straightforward, and have a no-BS attitude, you should meet my former business coach.

[SIDENOTE: I wouldn’t be where I am today without him. Funny how that works, Right?!]

So I submitted my first-ever draft of my sales page and then I sat there and had a full-on anxiety attack. All of the what IF’s that could ever run through a person’s head ran through mine. Seriously.

Why? Aren’t I this crazy confident business badass?

Yes… now. But I’m also NOT immune to the mindset monsters that could have the power to stop you dead in your tracks and hold you there for 3 years.

So what’s my secret to success?

I’ve learned how to move forward and take action, even when I don’t feel ready.

What you may not know about me is that from grade 2 until my last year of high school I was bullied in one form or another. The worst of the bullying happened towards the end of grade 8 as I was entering high school.

It started with calls to my house to warn me to stay away on my first day of high school, then as the year went on it turned into being spat on and afraid to walk down certain halls, then being told off in front of all of the ‘cool kids’.

To this day I have no idea what I ever did to that girl.

And the crazy thing is, even after all this time and all of my ‘growth and success’ if she walked into a restaurant where I was eating my first instinct would be to hide. Now, I wouldn’t actually do that. I’d probably walk over, smile, say hello, nice to see you, and walk away.

We all have these stories that have shaped our way of thinking and behaving, and some stories are worse than others if you chose to view them that way. For years I was so afraid to BE my big, bold self for fear that I would be judged as a ‘know-it-all or a bossy bitch’.

The internal monologue that being a leader = being a bossy bitch was imprinted on my psyche from a very young age and stopped me from playing full out, some days it still does.

So how did I go from being just a girl sitting in a Starbucks with full body sweats afraid to send sales copy to be reviewed, to the person I am and mindset I have today?

I PUSHED MYSELF TO START BEFORE I FELT READY.

If I had waited until I actually felt ready I’d still be sitting in that Starbucks with my finger hovering over the send button, sweating. Actually, if I had waited until I felt ready I would have ended up working IN that Starbucks.

Here’s the thing that’s rarely talked about… creating something from nothing is likely the scariest and most fear-provoking thing you’ll ever do.

There is no way around feeling vulnerable, scared, not ready, incapable, not smart enough, not good enough, overwhelmed, and exposed.

In fact, if you didn’t feel those things as you start to grow your business I’d be worried you were a bit of a sociopath.

Accept that you will never feel ready enough. And start anyways.

Take one single action at a time. Then take another. Then another.

Taking action alleviates anxiety. Brian Tracy has a great quote, “failure is a pre-requisite for success. If you want success, double your rate of failure.”

I believe everything is all about progress. There is no such thing as perfect. If you are progressing, moving forward in spite of the fear in your business and life, that’s all that matters.