Welcome to the Stop Sabotaging Your Success podcast, episode twenty-two. I’m your host, Cindy Esliger. This is the podcast focusing on what we can do today to take control of our careers and overcome the inevitable barriers to success that we encounter along the way.

You may be surprised to learn that it’s your thoughts that are getting in the way of you achieving your goals, not your circumstances, or what anyone else is doing. We all have a large number of repetitive thoughts that have become beliefs, that we’ve made our own over the years. These make up our belief system. 

It’s hard to know how many beliefs we have that we’ve accepted as truth, or where they came from exactly. But it’s time to question what you are thinking of as fact and indisputable truth. My bet is that you’ve never thought to question them. 

In this episode, we’ll explore a new way to think about your beliefs. And instead of trying to tackle everything at once, we’ll look at ways to make it much more manageable, by taking one at a time. We need to stop buying into what society has been feeding us for years and let go of the victim mentality completely. 

What you tell yourself is powerful. A belief is just a thought you keep on thinking. But a lot of what we’re thinking is about what we can’t do, and those limiting beliefs can be harmful. If you’re like me, you’re probably thinking that there’s some deep rooted issue you have to unravel in order to figure out how to change that “I can’t” to an “I can”. Thinking about what you can’t do is not making you feel very good and maybe the results you’re getting aren’t what you want either. 

It’s time to think about your beliefs in a new way. It’s time to question them, take them apart, and see what’s working for you, and what’s working against you. Focus for a moment on where you are choosing to adopt a victim mentality and why. This is something we need to stop completely. It’s just a habit, but it’s not an easy habit to break. 

The way forward is waiting for you to uncover it. The way you think about things may be sabotaging your efforts to achieve what you want in life. By simply changing your thoughts, you can release yourself from their grip and experience a whole new level of growth and success. 

But don’t make it seem like a huge deal. You’re not trying to tackle the whole entire belief system at once. We want to start small. Look at where your limiting beliefs may be hampering your efforts to achieve your goals. There’s a reason you’re holding onto your limiting beliefs. And for many of us, the reason is rooted in fear. 

Our limiting beliefs do more to hold us back than anything other people could do to us. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not that the barriers we encounter in advancing our careers aren’t real, but there is power in the way you think about those barriers, and how that makes you feel. Because how you feel impacts how you show up, and the actions that you take create the results that you get when you believe them. 

We tend to hold fast to stereotypes and biases, and we treat them as if they are one giant group of beliefs, which makes it sound scary and insurmountable. But we don’t need to tackle all those beliefs at once. I’d like to offer you an alternative. Take it slowly. Decide from this moment forward, you’re only going to focus on one belief or barrier at a time. 

Now I want you to refer to that one belief as a thought, because a thought is a simple sentence that you have in your brain. There’s nothing scary about it. Now is the time to question it. Is it really true? Did you know that you shouldn’t believe everything you think? You get to decide whether you want to believe it or not. 

Instead of trying to tackle everything that is holding you back, let’s make it much more manageable. One thought at a time is much easier to work on. We tend to think that we need to get to the root of it all, uncover all the stuff. But that feels daunting, exhausting, and defeating. It feels like a battle we’ll never win. 

Working on one at a time seems doable and not quite so daunting. And it won’t send you spinning in overwhelm or freak you out because you’re not sure where to start. Start by focusing on one limiting belief that is currently holding you back. Even small changes can make a big difference in your perception of growth and what’s possible for you. A completely different life will be waiting for you a year from now. 

Be specific. Because being more specific allows you to be more intentional, deliberate, and feel more in control and less like a victim of what’s happening around you. So don’t be vague by generalizing. It’s important to get specific about the real problem, the real challenge for you, in this moment. Narrow it down to what in particular is holding you back. That way, you know what to work on. And then ask yourself, “How is this true for me? And how is this not true for me?”. 

Break it down for yourself. Explore all sides of the issue. Look at it from every angle and detach yourself from it. How would you approach it if a friend was asking for advice on how best to deal with this? When it’s big, there’s no clear direction and no action can be taken. 

Dealing with one thought at a time will also incrementally change your identity, how you see yourself. Instead of seeing barriers that are holding you back, you’ll be able to see that nothing is standing in the way of creating the results you want, and ultimately creating the life you desire. Instead of seeing yourself as limited, blocked, or unable to progress, ask yourself, “What in particular is restricting my ability to succeed? What would need to happen in order for me to do what I need to do?”. 

When we adopt a victim mentality, we feel powerless, unable to problem-solve, because we can’t see possible alternatives. And as a victim, we tend to identify with having a permanent problem that we can’t do anything about because that’s just the way things are. They will always be holding you back. But is that really true? What would need to happen in order for that not to be true?

Think about each of your limiting beliefs, very specifically, objectively, and systematically. One at a time. The only reason we’ve had them for many years is because we’ve never questioned them. We’ve never undertaken the task of working on them. Instead, we’ve actually reinforced them by seeking evidence that they are true. And now we’re committed to them, fully entrenched. They feel like our deep truth, just the way the world works. It’s the way things are, have always been, and will always be. 

We’ve never questioned them because we saw them as facts. They feel like they are heavy and daunting, and yet we’re unwilling to let them go. You can just look at one limiting belief and today you can decide that it doesn’t apply to you and let it go. Free yourself from just one. That’s your job for today. 

Having limiting beliefs is part of being human. Notice each of these little “I can’ts”. Keep track of them. Write them down. As you uncover them, you’ll notice how you feel about them by the way you describe them. They commonly cause us to feel overwhelmed, like we don’t know where to start. 

With this new awareness, catch yourself whenever you are explaining or making an excuse for why something can’t be done. You’re just limiting your own potential because you aren’t seeing possibilities. You’re diminishing yourself and everything you’re capable of. You’re discounting yourself based on what you’ve accepted as true, that isn’t. 

Think about how life-changing it is to meet someone who truly believes you are meant for more, and sees you already as more than you see yourself. You’re not broken or in need of fixing. It’s time to believe that you can have a life far greater than what you are currently living, if you want to. You get to decide. 

It doesn’t matter if other people have made a judgment about your ability or your potential. Let them be wrong about you. What’s important is what you believe about yourself, and what’s possible for you. You are limitless, if you decide you are. 

Free yourself from the person you were and what you thought you were capable of. It’s time to start becoming a new version of yourself. It starts with what you believe is true for you. Whether your beliefs have been put upon you, you have now adopted them and made them your own. There’s power in that because you are in control.

The most important thing you can ever do in working against these barriers, is to believe in yourself and what is possible for you. Start with your own belief and the identity that creates for you. We tend to be afraid that we can’t make the change. We don’t yet believe that a different life is available for us. 

We see ourselves as a little broken and unfixable. It seems like too much effort, so we don’t bother to even try. We’ve been convinced that that’s just the way things are, so we count ourselves out before anyone else has the chance to. 

It’s time to stand up for yourself. It’s time to push back against what we’ve been taught, regardless whether others believe it or not. It’s only important whether you believe it. And this can be transformational. 

Strengthen your own understanding of what’s possible in the world. If it’s possible for others, then why not you? Anyone can make changes and have the life they truly desire. Stop missing opportunities because you’re counting yourself out. 

Sometimes we don’t even have to worry about someone not considering us, because we don’t even see ourselves in contention. We get to decide for ourselves what it is we want. Then it’s up to us to figure out a way to make it happen. It’s not going to be easy, but it’s not impossible either. 

We need to know what’s on the line. It will require us to become someone different through the process. So we need to be all in, and not let other people’s opinions stop us. You might not have the life you want yet, but it is possible. 

It can be life-changing to break free of your limiting beliefs. They are what’s holding you back and they aren’t based on truth. At some point, you need to just go for what you want. You’ll always find a million reasons why you can’t or you shouldn’t, so you need to find all the reasons why you can, and you should. 

Find all the things that make you feel self-conscious about going after your desires, and then create all the reasons why you’re doing it anyway. Have patience with yourself as you go through this process. If you’re doing something you’ve never done before, it’s going to take some time for you to get the hang of it. 

Hold belief for yourself in those moments, when things get tough. It’s not a sign that this is not what you’re meant to be doing. That’s just what society, and your boss, and your coworkers are going to tell you. They will tell you that you’re not meant to be a powerful woman, who’s earning a great living, creating the life of her dreams. Maybe not in those words, but by their reactions and their responses. 

Cultivate a supportive group of people who believe in you, even when you don’t believe in yourself. The dreams you have for yourself are yours. You don’t have to tell other people what you’re building for yourself. Don’t wait for external validation or permission. You don’t need it. 

Your belief in yourself will have to be enough to get you through, and it will be enough. Eventually everything that you’ve been working for will show for itself. Keep coming back to your why in order to keep the momentum going. 

It’s going to be uncomfortable doing the hard things, the things people don’t expect, or perhaps don’t want to have happen. They may see it as a zero sum game, where when you succeed, it then limits their potential. Let them see it their way, but hold onto your dreams. 

It’s about awareness, persistence, determination, grit, and perseverance. Keep showing up for you. Your work is important. You just might end up showing them what is possible. And then everything that you have gone through, will then have been worth it. 

What do you want to believe? And how do you start believing it?

Here are the three steps: Step one, you have to find out what you believe now. What do you believe about yourself, about your past? And what do you believe is possible for your future? Step two, decide what you want to believe. Is what you’re currently thinking working for you? If not, what do you want to believe instead? And step three, practice believing. If you can’t quite get there in one step, build a ladder to it. Each time, rather than defaulting to your original negative thought, practice repeating your new thought, over and over again, until it becomes second nature. 

And that’s it for this episode of Stop Sabotaging Your Success. Remember to download your Guide to Changing Your Beliefs at cindyesliger.com/podcast, episode twenty-two.

Thank you to our producer, Alex Hochhausen and everyone at Astronomic Audio. Get in touch. I’m on Instagram @cindyesliger and my email address is info@cindyesliger.com. And if you liked the show, please tell a friend, subscribe, rate, and review. 

Until next week, I’m Cindy Esliger. Thanks for joining me.