Transcript
I taught myself my confidence is not just based on my achievements, on my strengths. I try to include into my confidence, not just my strengths and achievements, but also my weaknesses. But of course, when you go through tough situations, for instance, something doesn’t work out, a client refuses to work with you, whatever, or you don’t get new clients, you don’t have money. All of these bad situations. Sometimes you lose it. You totally lose it. I also think that’s part of the game. It’s a roller coaster. Now founding my own business is like a roller coaster and I try to keep myself stable in this. What I try to maintain my confidence, also to maintain my vision when it’s really bad? I sit for at least half an hour and I breathe deeply to connect back to myself, to the best part of myself. I feel what’s wrong. I feel nice sadness, my desperation, whatever I accepted it and I try to connect to the other parts of myself, to the hope, to my vision, to my joy, to my spirits. So that’s a very practical thing I do. I tune into my practice, of course, I practised breathing exercises or meditation, this is practice when I was in good shape and when I felt good. And now it’s my tool to sustain myself in difficult situations. And of course, there’s something else. Also, when you’re going this path of being self-employed to having your own project, you can’t really do it alone. You need friends, you need support, you need some people. You have an intimate relationship to who can clearly acknowledge you, who support you and encourage you when it’s going really bad. And I know this very well. They are there. You can call them in [at] night at three o’clock to talk to them and they will listen to you. They will support you. In tough situations that it’s really necessary to have a support system, friends, maybe even a mentor and a coach. Also in the beginning, when I founded the business, I had a business mentor that helped a lot. I wouldn’t have done it alone, not at all.
Surround yourself with good people, get a mentor, a coach. Establish a practice, it helps you to sustain yourself. In my case, it’s like breathing techniques that help you to balance your mind and your body in a relatively short time. And I established this practice at a time when I felt good, I do it continuously. So in times of hardship, I can use it. You know, it’s already a habit to help me to balance myself and also to connect to the best part of myself. So when I feel desperation, shame or hopelessness, that’s only part of myself, it’s just feelings and thoughts. It’s not myself. I acknowledge I feel it, I deeply connect to my roots and the best part of myself to my spirits and this way I can get over the hardest situations. But I think sometimes you don’t get through it. Sometimes it gets a grip on you. But this lack of confidence with desperation because things don’t work out very well. So that’s part of the game. That’s part of life and the better I accept it and acknowledge it, but I don’t lose my vision. That’s okay. I mean, what is important in those processes is not to blame yourself for what’s happened or to call it a failure. But to ask a question, how can I learn from this? What would I do differently next time in a similar situation? There’s a certain attitude, which here, for instance, in Germany we don’t have a failure or a bad thing. It crashes you. You’re not worth you. You did wrong. But to ask yourself, ‘So it’s a failure. Ah ha. Okay. I learned from it. What ran wrong? Next time I do it better. It’s a great opportunity to learn.’ So this is an attitude I try to establish now in my daily life and not just in business, also in my personal life.