Working backward from my imposter syndrome voice
“I can’t believe I just spent money on this!”
”What a waste!”
or worse….
*crickets chirping*
Yeah, those are the voices I heard in my head when I wrote the words “launch a course” on my sticky note mirror. I knew I wanted to do it because it would be the best way to reach more clients and scale my business, but the voices man. They definitely slowed my motivation to act.
Until…
I came out to LA and made goals for myself. Decided that there were things I wanted to explore and accomplish. I began to look at where I was in terms of accomplishing some of those goals, and where I had the largest gaps, I decided I might try to invest in the knowledge. So, I did. I found a course that seemed to have the answer to one of the gaps I had. Offered a short cut. So, I pulled out my card and I purchased it. Didn’t even tell my husband about it (which I would normally do for larger purchases), because I didn’t want to be talked out of it or told that I should investigate 3 other options before deciding. His approach is correct…but sometimes it just takes too long, and I get impatient. Especially when the answer seems to be staring me in the face.
Well…as soon as I opened the link, {insert Morgan Freeman voice} it was in that moment, I knew I had made a mistake. I just spent $600 on something that looked like someone spent 6 minutes on. Not that dramatic but you get what I’m saying. Immediately, the information in the course lost credibility before I even completed a module. I actually never even completed a single module of the course. Wasn’t even motivated to listen to the lessons. Shit! I just flushed $600 down the toilet!
BUT…
I will tell you something about that $600. It was probably the best $600 I spent since I moved out here. Why? It was the swift kick to the ass that my imposter syndrome needed. The kick that said, if this is what people are doing and making money from, what the hell are YOU waiting on when you know you could come 10x better. I also knew that whatever I produced, I would work extra hard to ensure that no person who purchased my course experienced the buyer’s remorse that I instantly felt.
Because of that investment, I was extra diligent with my research on effective course development. I engaged companies (this time, I involved my husband :)) that did this shit all the time to ensure that I was building the right content and avoiding the pitfalls that most people fell into when developing courses. All the while I still heard those voices (they never really go away), but I continuously worked backward from them. “So that’s what you don’t want people to think, feel, say. What can you do right now to prevent that outcome? What have you already done?”
Yes, the hours were more than I imagined, and yes, I had to sacrifice evenings and weekends with my family. But the result is something that I am so incredibly proud of. Putting it out the world now…well that’s a different blog post, but for now I’m celebrating the feeling of accomplishment.
Have I thought of 100 ways that I could have made it better? Absolutely. But I’m resisting the urge to let perfection hold me back from acting NOW. I think of all the books published on my shelf and remember that every author probably had a million more changes they wish they could have made right before it hit shelves. I think of the iPhone that gets released and then a few short months later there’s a new generation, or a new iOS upgrade. There is no perfect! There’s only what it is right now and the room to make changes later once I’ve learned more from my mistakes. The lessons I can only learn from DOING and not from HOLDING BACK.
Will this course be everything I want it to be? I have no idea! But if the plan I have for this chapter of my life doesn’t include the risk of failure, rejection, or embarrassment, it probably was never the right plan for me to begin with. I know what it feels like to play only in the arenas where I am sure to win. Don’t get me wrong, it’s great to win, but the longing for challenge haunts me. The feeling that I am robbing myself of something more that I could be or could bring is something that I’ve lived with for the last 10 years…I’m not going back.
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