Childhood causes of negative self-talk in your clients (Where does negative self-talk come from?)

Listen to the podcast version here:

Today we will explore where negative self talk in your coaching clients comes from.

We can define negative self talk as thoughts which stop your clients from taking action towards what they want.

As a result, they do not achieve their goals, they do not blossom to their fullest potential and they fail to create the life that they want. They may end up feeling unfulfilled and unhappy with life.

It is good to know where our self talk comes from. So that when we catch our minds having a negative dialogue, we know that it comes from something our parents said to us when we were growing up, for example.

When your clients can filter out thoughts which originate from other people, they may not be so affected by these negative thoughts. They will still have the drive to move towards their goals.

On the other hand, if we do not care where our self talk comes from, our thoughts will control us. We will be ‘slaves’ to our thoughts essentially. And this is harmful because our thoughts are not 100% correct. Negative self talk can be harmful because it brings up feelings like fear, shame, anxiety, doubt.

If we let these negative thoughts and feelings run our lives, we will not grow as a person. So it’s helpful to filter out which of our negative thoughts are planted in our minds by other people.

There are many things which cause negative self talk. But today we will focus on how our upbringing can produce negative self talk in us.

When your clients have parents or caregivers who expect perfection or who only show love when they achieve success, this can really ‘screw’ them up as adults.

Let’s explore the 3 childhood causes of negative self talk.

Childhood cause of negative self-talk #1: “You (or your work) are never good enough. There is ALWAYS room for improvement.”

The first childhood cause of negative self-talk is hearing this message often: “You are never good enough, there is always room for improvement.” This message can be said indirectly by parents, family members, teachers or even friends.

If your coaching client heard this message too many times when they were young, they may grow up to be perfectionists. They may not take action towards their big goals because they never think that they are good enough. Or, they may overwork to be as close to excellence as possible. 

This trend is common amongst clients who come from families who value high achievements or if they were enrolled in top, high-performing schools when they were young.

Now, if you are a coach who wants to help your clients overcome negative self-talk, then you can check out my done-for-you Overcome Negative Self-Talk workshop.

The workshop is already done for you, so you can conduct your own workshop by tomorrow and sell it to your audience. Now with that out of the way, let’s move on to the second cause of negative self-talk.

Childhood cause of negative self-talk #2: Only receiving love and attention when they did something ‘good’.

The second cause of negative self-talk is experiencing conditional love when we were young. Some parents only give love and attention to their kids when their kids did something ‘good’.

These parents may even reject or punish their kids when they do not meet the parents’ expectations. But when these children obey their parents, get straight As in exams or achieve some kind of success, their parents will shower them with praises and affection.

These kids may grow up into adults who think that they have to be successful or achieve big things in order to get love and approval. It’s actually quite sad when you think about it. 

Childhood cause of negative self-talk #3: Endless comparison

The third childhood cause of negative self-talk is constant comparison. If your clients’ parents compared them endlessly to their siblings when they were young, they will feel that they are not worthy as individuals.

They will feel as though they are living in their siblings’ shadows. They may even think that they have no identity of their own. They may grow up believing that they have no unique talent or nothing valuable to offer the world. They may not even be able to pinpoint what their strengths are. 

They may have low self-esteem, no sense of identity and may blindly follow what other people are doing instead of honouring their own interests and talents.

Now, at this point of the video, you may be looking for tools to help your clients overcome negative self-talk.

That’s why your next step is to check out my done-for-you Overcome Negative Self Talk workshop where you will get the slides, the script and workbook all done for you so you can launch it fast.

That’s all for now - I’ll see you when I see you.

Shikah

PS: If you want to create a negative self-talk workshop but feel overwhelmed with the many things you have to do everyday, I have a done-for-you workshop which has the 1) slides 2) workbook 3) script all done for you.

Four tell-tale signs of imposter syndrome in your coaching clients

Do you have coaching clients who are perfectionists, who struggle accepting help from others or who procrastinate for a long time before starting a project or side hustle?

Well, they are showing some signs of imposter syndrome :) In this short and sweet power-packed video and podcast episode, we will succinctly lay out the 4 signs and symptoms of imposter syndrome.

Transcript

Today, we will be discussing 4 clear cut signs of imposter syndrome. If you are an experienced coach, this can serve as a reminder for you. This is helpful because refreshing our memory is part of learning and gaining knowledge :)

If you are a new coach, this video will help you identify if someone has imposter syndrome. And create strategies  to help them reduce it.

How can we define imposter syndrome?

We can define imposter syndrome as someone who has a belief that they lack skills, knowledge or experience to do something. They have this belief even though they have many pieces of evidence which prove that they are capable.

It’s more of an ‘irrational’ belief because it is based on their emotions, and not facts. If someone also has an unconscious belief that they don’t deserve success, that is also a sign of imposter syndrome.

Why do they - or we - have imposter syndrome? It likely stems from the thought that they have nothing special or valuable to offer the world. It originates from their experiences during their childhood to teen years.

Why do we have to help our clients reduce imposter syndrome?

Reducing imposter syndrome is beneficial. It allows our clients to live with courage, be brave enough to try new things, face failures head-on, and essentially, live a rich and vibrant life.

On the other hand, living with imposter syndrome means they have many unfulfilled dreams.

Our clients don’t start the projects that they want because they are scared of failing. They take too long to execute their plans.

They procrastinate because they want everything to be ‘perfect’ before they launch or start something. I dare say that we will have with many regrets if we let imposter syndrome stick around. 

Let’s dive in to the 4 clear cut signs and symptoms of imposter syndrome

#1 Perfectionism

The first sign is perfectionism. This is a no-brainer. Perfectionists will overwork themselves to burnout or take way too long to start a project. They want everything to be flawless before launching something.

They don’t like mistakes, they view mistakes as shameful, so they will go to all lengths to prevent mistakes and failures. Perfectionists will focus on even the smallest, irrelevant details of their project before making it public.

They overwork because they have such a low opinion of their own skills and talents. So they work themselves to death to feel secure. The flipside can happen too.

Many perfectionists have bucket lists which are unfulfilled because they procrastinate to start something. They place such a high standard on themselves, that they feel overwhelmed just at the thought of starting their project. So what happens? Nothing happens!

They also want things to be perfect from the get-go. When they are starting a blog for the first time for example, they expect everything to go smoothly even at the first try.

They are like this, because they have high standards on themselves. And when things do not go smoothly - which is normal if you are doing something for the first time- they get discouraged and feel down. So perfectionism as you can see, is a sign of imposter syndrome.

By the way, you can download my free perfectionism test which you can use as a lead magnet. This will help your clients gauge how severe or how mild their perfectionism is. The link to download this below so click the link if you want a free perfectionism lead magnet.

With that out of the way, let’s go to the next sign of imposter syndrome.

#2: Collecting knowledge and not implementing them

The next sign of imposter syndrome is someone who likes to ‘collect knowledge’. These are the people who buy courses after courses and do not implement them. They may also chase qualifications after qualifications. Maybe they have multiple certificates : degrees, diplomas and everything in between. They collect knowledge because they don’t feel confident of the knowledge they already have.

Learning and upgrading ourselves is crucial, but if they buy courses because they feel insecure in their own skills, that’s an issue. Sometimes they do this because they believe that they need to have a ‘certain level’ of knowledge before starting a business, for example.

And that imaginary level is of course a very high standard they put on themselves. At this rate, they will never start their project or launch their business. Or they will sit on an idea for years before actually taking action. This is another sign of imposter syndrome. They never feel that they are ready, skills-wise. 

#3: Does not like accepting or asking for help

Another sign of imposter syndrome is not accepting help from other people. These lovely people like to do things themselves. They believe that if someone is ‘competent’, they have to be able to do everything themselves.

To them, accepting help is a sign of weakness. And they think that their success is not counted unless they do it themselves. If they get help, they will credit their success to the people who help them, and not to their own talent. Again, they have such a low opinion of their own abilities that they follow this high, impossible standard so that they can feel ‘worthy’. 

#4: Wants to play ALL roles ‘perfectly’

The next sign of imposter syndrome is wanting to be the perfect wife, the perfect mum, the perfect daughter, the perfect employee - all at one go. It sounds tiring just saying it. They don’t trust their own abilities, so they will work really hard to be ‘perfect’ in all areas. What happens? Burnout happens.

They may find it hard to let go and relax. They don’t like making mistakes in any life area because that is a sign of incompetence in their eyes. In reality, nobody is expecting them to perform at 100% all the time. And people are actually more forgiving than we think.

These lovely people are intent on playing perfect roles so that people do not have the ammunition to ‘attack’ or criticise them. They are sensitive to criticism because they feel that they are such ‘low value’ human beings that every criticism is a blow to their confidence.

If you want to accelerate your coaching results, be sure to check out the Overcome Perfectionism Workbook I have in my online shop. You can use the coaching tools in the workbook to coach clients with perfectionism, which is one of the causes of imposter syndrome.

I’ll see you in my next video. Bye!

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Procrastinating to start a coaching business? This will motivate you.

If you’ve always thought that you are not ‘ready’ to start your coaching business, I get it. I used to think that I need to know EVERYTHING about business before starting.

I am running my own business now, creating done-for-you courses which coaches can sell to their clients. Coaches like you can then focus on coaching clients whilst I take care of the content creation for you!

Tip #1: A growth mindset is necessary!

The first thing I did was to start my business with a growth mindset. When we are running a business, we have to put our ego aside. Because it’s a constantly learning experience.

I was aware that my blog design was unsophisticated, my blog posts were not perfectly structured and I did not even know what on earth is SEO. I joined some Facebook Groups, watched some free videos and implemented what other entrepreneurs suggested.

There was a lot of trial and error. I created videos which were basic, long-winded and very raw.

But the experience is priceless. So my motivation for you if you want to start a business but you think you are not ‘ready’, is to just start.

Start with a YouTube channel, start with a blog, start with a podcast or anything. And trust me, you will learn a lot more when you do things and experiment as opposed to just watching video tutorials or learning from courses - but not implementing anything.

We learn the fastest from experience. If we don’t make mistakes, we don’t learn.

Tip #2: Look at our business as a lifelong commitment

Another thing I did was to have a mindset shift. I looked at my business as a lifelong commitment.

Maybe you will be running your business for 30, 40 years or more. When we look at our business that way, we will realise that making mistakes and trying new things is an everyday ‘thing’.

Failing, flopping, creating products that no one wants to buy, launching programs that nobody registers for, getting nasty comments or clients are just part of the journey. (Can you relate?)

You can run a business for 10 years, and you will still fail, get bad reviews or get scammed at some point.

So we don’t need to be obsessed with learning everything before starting. Because your business is going to be a lifelong journey.

You learn along the way.

Tip 3: Treat your business as a fun project!

The next tip I’ll share for you to start your coaching business is to treat it as a fun project.

This sounds like fluffy advice, but having fun keeps you committed. If you have fun, your enthusiasm will show in your videos and in your writing.

Your self-worth should not be tied to your business, ideally.

Your business is a separate project in your life where you are allowed to have fun, help your clients, get paid at the same time. It’s a beautiful thing.

If you are starting a coaching business but not making money yet, you can always work a part-time job, do freelance work or even a full time job to pay your bills whilst you get your business running.

Do what it takes to make you feel secure about having fun and experimenting in your business, if security is important to you.

While most people can follow these steps and start a YouTube channel or a blog, I find that people get even faster results when they have a high-value lead magnet to get email subscribers.

If you’re someone who wants to level up, you can sign up for the Self Exploration Tool below which you can use as a lead magnet to get subscribers.

Thanks for reading this and I’ll see you in my next blog post!

Sincerely,

Shikah

How to create consistent content (and have fun doing so!)

"Stop creating free content!" I recently heard this sentence from a course creator.

I’ve noticed that some business gurus claim that creating free content is akin to a waste of time.

"It's better to create low-cost items, run ads, get people to buy and then nurture them in your emails," they say.

This method makes sense as a business owner because they are focusing their efforts mostly in activities which bring in the cold hard cash.

However I have a gut feeling that if you want to create a ‘legacy’ - in other words, a business which lasts decades - your life-changing content needs to exist somewhere : in your blog, your podcast or in your YouTube channel.

I still think content is king right now because before your clients bought your courses and programs, they likely

• have listened to your podcast eps before

• have been watching you on your IG stories

• watched your YouTube vids

That’s why I created ready-to-post high-engagement IG captions like these to help you stay consistent on IG whilst you focus on creating your signature course or program. At least you can tick one thing off your to-do list this month!

But we have to admit that creating consistent content is hard.

Hence, I'm sharing 5 strategies which have helped me stay consistent (on some platforms!) and have some fun whilst doing so.

Strategy 1: To create consistent content, honour your in-born talents and inclinations

What mode of content creation feels the easiest for you? Are you a natural-born writer, love talking into a mic or love being in front of the camera?

It's time we own our innate gifts and honour them.

If you are a natural writer, focus on writing emails, blog posts, IG captions. If you are a natural in front of the camera (I envy you!), focus on YouTube, IG stories and IG 'live'.

Video marketing is all the rage. But if you are a talented writer and have to force yourself to create videos every single time, chances are, you will not be consistent with your YouTube channel.

Or, you will start hating content creation!

Thus, it’s best to honour your inborn talents and then look out for courses which teach you how to make sales and get traffic with your talent.

For example, if you are a camera-loving person, you can purchase courses which teach you how to get sales with YouTube videos or IG stories.

Strategy 2: Don't tie too much expectations to every piece of content

We all know that in the business sense, every free content has to lead to a freebie, which leads to a funnel, which should lead to a sale.

I would also suggest that we create our content with joy and with the purpose of serving our audience.

Not every email we write has to have an intention to sell. Not every IG caption needs to promote something.

We can create content simply because it gives us some kind of satisfaction or joy.

To be practical, we do need to balance our 'fun' content with strategic content to get our business running.

But not every content has to be strategic because we may burn out if we only publish perfectly curated, perfectly strategised content! And where's the fun in that?

Strategy 3: Try a new tweak or two

To keep content creation fresh (and fun), try a new tactic or two.

If you see a celebrity coach you admire addressing you by your first name in her newsletters, you can try the same method if you have not done so.

Keep following other entrepreneurs you admire and observe how they create their videos, podcasts and emails. And try a new tactic or two to your content to keep the excitement going.

Note that these tweaks are supposed to be small tweaks.

I won't suggest that you do a complete overhaul of your sales funnel if it has been working well for you, unless you don't mind the risks ;)

Strategy 4: Keep reading, watching and consuming content to get ideas and inspiration

I've seen some coaches tell us not to consume other people's content so that we don't unintentionally 'copy' them.

I beg to differ because we do need to broaden our knowledge. I feel that we need to be reading books, taking courses, watching videos and listening to podcasts related to our coaching topic.

When we consume fresh, new content often, we will get 'aha' moments which we can share with our audience.

As an example: I notice that when I make time to read, I have a stream of ideas and topics to write about. I will write about them from my perspective, which makes my content 'me'.

Strategy 5: Outsource some of your content creation

Perhaps you simply don't have the time or energy to create free content.

If you have the means to hire someone to write blog posts, captions, video scripts for you, why not do so? You don’t have to feel guilty or embarrassed because every big-name coach or entrepreneur out there works with a team.

Or you can get my ready-to-post challenges like this one to get your Facebook group content done for you in a snap.

Creating consistent content can be fun if we bear these 5 strategies in mind.

I’m curious: what's your strategy to create consistent content?

Let me know in Comments or send me an email at shikah@shikahanuar.com

As always, wishing you much blessings and abundance in your business.

Shikah

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Click here to see the FULL details of these done-for-you Instagram captions.

Ready-to-use Instagram captions to save you countless hours and have more time to grow your business.

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3 Mindset Shifts for Coaches and Entrepreneurs with Imposter Syndrome

I was urged to create this podcast episode after a new coach sent me an email saying that she had ‘imposter syndrome’ after reading my blog posts.

I had to stop her negative train of thought and quickly wrote an email reply to her.

I’ve always felt a strong drive to remind my audience of the unique value and the one-of-a-kind contributions they can make to their world.

Also, comparing our beginning to someone else’s middle is harsh on ourselves. The successful entrepreneurs we admire have failed, flopped and embarrassed themselves countless times before getting to where they are.

If you need a confidence boost and wish to feel good in your own skin, you will find this episode helpful.

If you prefer reading, you will find the episode’s transcript below for your convenience.

Take care,

Shikah

Full Transcript

Hi, I'm Shikah. Thank you for being here with me today. Today we're going to talk about Imposter Syndrome. And this is motivated by an email I received from one of my subscribers recently. So she was a new coach that time.

And what she did or what she emailed me was that she said, “I feel Imposter Syndrome whenever I compare my work with yours” She was telling me that she felt Imposter Syndrome when she compared her work with mine. So that was quite unfair on her because, well, at that time, I've had close to five years of counseling experience. I've been working with companies in public relations for a long time. I've been doing copywriting for a long time as well.

So she was comparing the beginning of her coaching journey with me - who has been counseling and doing copywriting and all those things for years. So that was quite, I would say, that was a little bit unkind on her. So I had to stop her and tell her that comparing her beginning to someone else's middle, is not going to be very helpful on her at all. It's going to just make her feel even less confident and make her feel even worse about herself. So that's what motivated me to create this podcast episode today.

The wonderful thing, or rather the tricky thing about Imposter Syndrome is that it can strike anyone. Whether you're a beginner or even though you've been doing business or doing something for ten years, Imposter Syndrome can still strike us, especially if you are offering something for the first time. So let's say you are rather experienced in your business and you're offering something for the first time. Let's say you're offering a mastermind for the first time, or you're creating a signature course for the first time, or offering a group coaching call for the first time. Sometimes you will face imposter syndrome.

You'll be wondering, Can I offer them the results that they want? Is my work valuable? Will they see the value in my work? And all those questions will start flooding our minds because we are doing something for the first time. And that's understandable.

So I'll give you about three tips for us to reduce our Imposter Syndrome and focus on our business. Okay? So the first tip I'm going to share is to be aware of our unique worth. So every one of us has a little spot in this world. So you are born with your own set of circumstances, your own viewpoints, your own way of seeing things, your own perspective, your own brand of authenticity and all that.

And nobody else in the world has the same energy or the same circumstances, or the same unique blend of circumstances and talents that you have. So it's good for us to focus on our unique strengths and our unique worth. So there is no one else like you or me in this world, right? So that's why many people or many coaches out there encourage us to be authentic. But I know that being authentic is not always easy.

Being vulnerable is not something that is very comfortable to do. So if you want to start being authentic, what we can do is - maybe - do it one step at a time. Start showing a bit of vulnerability to your audience, just a little bit at a time. And then once you get comfortable with yourself, who knows, maybe you'll be able to be 100% authentic with your audience. That will be quite nice, although they will require a lot of coverage, I would say.

And yes, I digress a little bit. So yes, point number one is to be focusing on your unique world and to realize that you have your own unique spot in this world and you have your own unique sets of talents and all that which you can offer and contribute to this world. And it's good for us to focus on serving our audience and serving our community instead of putting all our focus on ourselves.

So whenever you create a piece of content, maybe a blog post or a podcast episode or a video or anything like that, focus on serving your audience first and foremost. Think about how you can make this helpful for them.

Think about how you can change their lives with the little information that you're going to share. And always have your audience in your mind firsthand when you're creating content. So that will help you to reduce imposter syndrome a little bit because you're taking the spotlight away from you and you're focusing on your audience. That is one way I create content, and I think that allows me to be a bit more vulnerable in my email sometimes, in my blog post sometimes. All right, so if you have not subscribed to my email list yet, and if you want to get motivational emails from me, you can go to the show notes and subscribe if you want to.

So tip number two is to have a growth mindset. So having a growth mindset means being aware that if we are offering something for the first time, chances are we are going to flop, right? Our first video is going to suck. Our first podcast episode is not going to be perfect.

What else? Our first blog post is probably not going to be very structured, not going to be very SEO-friendly either. So it's not going to be perfect. The first piece of what we are putting out there is not going to be perfect. So we are going to have a growth mindset about this and realize that every mistake is an opportunity for us to learn.

So when you try something new and it flops, well, okay, that's all right. That means you can approach it in a different way or maybe you offer something else. And I know seven-figure coaches actually, who revealed that sometimes when they launched something for the first time - nobody bought it. And I know someone else who is also a digital marketing coach who told us that when he was holding in-person seminars for the first time before Covid, only seven people came and they were all his family members.

But he's a seven-figure coach right now. So you can see that everybody starts from zero. And having a growth mindset is really important. So it's not about giving up immediately when you don't see results, when you don't see the results that you want.

That means our business needs some tweaking. Maybe we need to have a different approach, a different way of doing things. And one way to get ideas about this is to focus, or rather to study the people that you admire in your industry. So if you are a coach I'm talking mostly to coaches, I believe. So if you are a coach or an entrepreneur, study the work of those other coaches or entrepreneurs that you admire.

Look at how they write their emails, look at how they structure their podcast episodes and things like that. So those will give you some ideas about how you can do your work and minimize imposter syndrome. Tip number three is to stop comparing yourself with other people. I know this is incredibly hard with Instagram and TikTok and all those social media platforms, but yes, we have to stop comparing ourselves with other people. As I mentioned earlier, we all have our own unique talents and unique perspectives and unique gifts that we can offer to the world.

So it's not fair to compare ourselves with other people. Sometimes when we purchase a course or when we follow a coach’s blueprint, you might realize that what works for her may not work for you. Right? Even though you may have paid, I don't know, $3,000 for a course or something like that, you might realize that after implementing some of the strategies, what works for her or him may not work for you. So that's the thing about staying true to your own voice.

Okay, in short, stop comparing yourself with other people. So, yes, there is no one perfect way to create a business or to run a business. People are running in many different combinations, if you realize.

For me, personally, I love writing emails, I love writing blog posts. And I'm just starting to get consistent - ‘starting’ is the keyword here - on my podcast. So this works for me. But not everybody loves writing. There are some people, some of you out there who hate writing, who hate doing emails, who hate writing blog posts, and who hate speaking into a mic.

Then you might have to approach your content differently. You might have to market your content differently. So that's why I say that sometimes what works for another person may not work for you. So you have to do a bit of trial and error sometimes. And yes, stop comparing yourself with other people out there.

Comparing your beginning with someone else's middle or comparing your middle with someone else's even further middle is not very fair on you.

Okay, so I think that's all I'm going to share today. I'm heading out right now and I hope that this show’s episode has been helpful to you in some way and I will see you in my next episode.

Bye!