How to Overcome Perfectionism, Procrastination and Imposter Syndrome
Perfectionism, procrastination and imposter syndrome are three struggles that go hand in hand. When perfectionism is discussed in our industry, or in the context of work and running a small business, it often gets paired with negative behavior like procrastination. This causes indecision and feeling like you don’t actually have any idea what you’re doing, otherwise known as imposter syndrome.
Luckily, there are ways to not overcome these feelings– there isn’t some mindset exercise you can do to make them completely disappear, but you can make shifts to prevent them from inhibiting growth in your business and perhaps actually serve you. Keep reading to find out how!
Adopting an Experimental Mindset
If you’re waiting for things to be perfect before you move forward, then you’re never going to grow. While there may be valid reasons to delay something, we’ve often seen people do it simply because they’re afraid of messy action. If you adopt a spirit of experimentation, then you allow yourself more room to grow as you develop and take on new clients.
BY EXPERIMENTING, YOU’RE ALWAYS LEARNING
What if you viewed every decision as an opportunity to learn, rather than succeed or fail? When you own a business, the only way you’ll learn is by doing. Even if you make mistakes along the way, they allow for the opportunity to learn, grow, and make better choices next time. While you can’t always be certain that you’re making the right decision, the art of choosing to have an experimental mindset can be extremely beneficial since it allows you the flexibility to make “mistakes” and find solutions (because when you foster an experimental mindset, nothing is a mistake since everything is experimentation.)
Separating Your Self Worth from Your Business
This is relevant to all three feelings: perfectionism, procrastination, and imposter syndrome. It’s so important that you separate the wins and losses of your business from your self-worth. While it may feel great when your business is doing well, it can be detrimental to your mental health when your company is not in a season of growth. This allows those ugly feelings to creep in during those periods of plateau.
It also serves as an important reminder that it’s unrealistic for a business to be profitable every single month and to make the same amount of money every single month. Don’t be swayed by what you may see from other bigger names in your industry. Having fluctuating income is to be expected, so don’t let it make you feel as though you’re putting on this facade every time you talk about or work on your business as if you have no idea what you’re doing.
Communicating with Clients Who Won’t Listen to You
If there’s ever a worse time for those imposter syndrome-y feelings to come up, it’s definitely when dealing with clients who won’t listen to you. More than likely you’re a people pleaser at heart, which means you’ve also mostly been liked by the people around you. This makes it even more uncomfortable when a client gets irritated or angry, bringing up a whole can of worms in terms of negative feelings but at the forefront, imposter syndrome.
When someone says something, it generally has more to do with them than it has to do with you, so it’s your job to practice being less reactive and more inquisitive. Coming from a place of understanding diffuses the situation. “I” messages are another great strategy. Talk about how you feel, not how the other person is making you feel. Our emotions are not a result of other people’s actions, and we have control over what we feel in any given situation.
Another poignant tip: don't write emails when you're frustrated! And if your client is projecting frustration onto you, you can diffuse the situation by acknowledging their feelings and setting clear boundaries. We can’t always bend over backwards for clients, take on their emotions, and turn things into unnecessary emergencies. Not only do we need to separate our self-worth from our work, but from our clients’ responses, too!
Is Planning More Fun than Doing?
This is the phenomenon that occurs when procrastination is at its peak. It’s a really big piece of why so many business owners are having trouble moving forward in their business. There are these intense feelings of anxiousness that come with looking at all you have to do, so you avoid it with all your might. But then that level of overwhelm comes with a whole lot of planning but very little doing. Perhaps you just like to get organized as a way of covering up the fact that you aren’t actually getting any work done.
YOUR BUSINESS WON’T FALL APART
For a lot of people, this kind of avoidance isn’t necessarily because they don’t like doing the work, rather they’re so afraid of missing a piece or making a mistake at one of the steps. Your business is not going to fall apart if you missed a step, or screwed up on a piece. Do what you can to correct it, make a note of it, and take action to fix it.
DEALING WITH HUGE TASKS
Oftentimes those big, pesky tasks that show up on your to-do list can cause a major spin. When it comes to bigger tasks, the key is to break them down into smaller milestones that you can aim for each day. Not focusing on the task as a whole radically reduces your anxiety and gives you a better chance to take everything one day at a time. Each task that you complete will add to the overall progress towards the bigger task at hand, and by slowly getting through the list one step at a time you’ll be much less likely to end up completely overwhelmed or just not doing the task at all.
Bust the Perfectionism Once and for All
As women who identify as perfectionists, we are constantly challenging ourselves to meet impossibly high standards in an effort to serve a greater purpose and arrive at the most ambitious solutions possible. This is a big part of why we decided to put together the Bust the Perfectionism Toolkit. Not because we see perfectionism as a shortcoming, but because we view it as a unique skill set that you can learn to master, instead of allowing it to master you.
If you’ve been dealing with those pesky feelings of perfection, procrastination and imposter syndrome, we suggest you take a big deep breath and try our toolkit first! We want you to get unstuck and experience the amazing results that come from perseverance and problem-solving.
