I was recently asked to speak to a group of entrepreneurs who recently left their careers of many years and in some cases decades to pursue their dreams of owning their own business. The goal for me was to help them through a difficult career change and give them tips and advice on how to make the transition smooth and successful.
They all wanted to know about how to run a better business, how to market, how to get clients, how to manage or make enough money etc... But what they needed was some reassurance, for their concerns to be heard, and for some direction. When people feel cared for and heard out they tend to relax, come back to the moment and regain their footing a bit. They get back to being their "self".
Even helpers need help. We're all just people no matter how you slice it.
We all need help and we all struggle with our identity from time to time. This looks like struggling with insecurities, fear of taking risks, losing confidence in abilities you normally excel in and many other ways in which we often struggle.
Why does this matter for entrepreneurs or anyone, you might ask?
Because we attach our identity to so many things. We become our job positions, our favorite sports teams, our favorite music groups, our culture, our addictions and many other things we accumulate over the course of our lifetime.
We take that stuff with us everywhere.
Some call it baggage, but it's really just our past data re-ran on a moment to moment basis depending on what the situation calls for. It's automatic. It's reactionary. It's our subconscious operation system.
All of our labels and ideas about who we think that we are, make up our identity. This doesn't always mean it's true, but it is certainly what we believe to be so.
As a result, we tend to stay stuck in roles we don't like or outgrow positions and are then unsure about what to do or how to correct course. And anytime we start something new like a career, a marriage or even just a new game on our phone, we can easily beat ourselves up or curl up into a ball.
New things are hard, but only at first because we apply old stories to new settings. Of course, there will be friction in new environments but that can also be the perfect stimulus for sparking the growth process you are actually looking for.
When we start getting clearer on our identity and understanding who we really are, things begin to shift within us and in our reality. An identity crisis isn't just for mid-life married couples either. They happen to everyone at some point and usually more than once. Not all of them are highly dramatic or intense but they do occur at different life stages and events like career changes. They are the times that really change our course and stand out as important to us when we look back on our lives.
I ended up recording a video with some great info that will help anyone looking to grow and gain more confidence!
So I thought of sharing the video with all of you beautiful people because not understanding your identity or at least not beginning to look, is a recipe for a lot of unnecessary struggle and conflict. Especially when we are trying to grow and pursue the next desire whatever it happens to be.
Of course, identity is an endless and ever-evolving topic. I'm mean we're always changing somehow, right?
Questions about who we are have sparked the curiosity of man since we became aware of our own consciousness. In the video above, my aim is not to answer any questions but rather to open up the op