Ten years ago I was working as a mental health nurse in the NHS, living month to month, payday to payday, and suffering perpetual exhaustion.
My job was challenging, rewarding, frustrating and demanding, all in one go. I knew there was more to life, I knew I had the potential and the drive to achieve more, but a little voice inside my head kept telling me to stay where I was, that this was ‘my lot’, that I would never have the confidence or ability to get out of this cycle of work-sleep-repeat.
Since I was a child, I had heard ‘don’t start your own business – the staff, the admin, the outlay, it’s all too much’, and the more I considered breaking out and making it on my own, the more that voice told me it wouldn’t work. That it was too much of a leap and I couldn’t succeed. That voice was my paradigm and guess what? It was wrong.
I shifted my paradigms, I focused on what I could do and what I knew I could achieve, and I took the plunge. I invested all of my savings into a flight to Canada to enrol in a course of self-development. I launched Dynamite Lifestyle and now my tech platform The Source is used by thousands of entrepreneurs and CEOs globally. I changed my mindset and drove the sales, and within three years I had made my first £million. Now I work with business leaders across the world to enable them to reach their full potential, to drive their business to the highest echelons of success, and I always start with addressing their paradigms. Here’s how…
What is a paradigm?
Before we look to change something, we need to acknowledge and understand what it really is. A paradigm impacts our results, income, thinking, productivity, the goes on and on. A paradigm is our subconscious programming and if we want to succeed, we must accept that we need to change it.
Understand your paradigm can be changed
As female business leaders we must accept we are all born equal, men do not have a stronger or weaker paradigm, it is society that can create this fallacy. We must assert ourselves, smash that glass ceiling, and create a foundation of support that ensures every woman has the belief that they can achieve their greatest potential.
Examine your beliefs and perceptions – and don’t be afraid to challenge them
We’re not born with beliefs, they develop over time. Women are no less capable than men of leading a business or running a company, but we have been conditioned to believe there are barriers facing us that men do not have. Babies are born with two fears – of falling and loud noises, all other fears develop as a result of things we see or do. Remove those fears – the self-doubt and the fear of failing. Replace them with positive beliefs. Ask yourself – could I do 1% better? If the answer is yes – and it always is – that means you are not yet working at your maximum potential. Push yourself, go that 1% further. Then do it again. Until you are working at your full potential you cannot achieve full success.
Update your mental software
Updating our PCs or phones is taken as a given, so why don’t we update our own inner programming? Think about it. Your paradigm is your inner voice, one that has learned and be shaped and manipulated by experiences over time. You don’t think twice about updating your software, so make updating your paradigms a habit too. Dispel negative thoughts with proactive and positive ones. Repeat a positive mantra to drown out the imposter syndrome. You are in charge of your future, make sure your aspirations for you and your business are the voice the subconscious hears, not the reflections of historical setbacks. By changing your inner dialogue you are regaining control of your future.
Learn how to goal set
Just saying ‘I want to be rich’ or ‘I want a better job’ will get you nowhere. Ask yourself what you want money for, what you want your business to achieve, and why. Is it to buy a bigger house, to give your parents a comfortable retirement, to provide for your children? By honing in on the why you give yourself a reason to strive for greater success. Examine your business, identify what you want it to achieve – X amount of sales, X net profit, market monopoly – then identify what it will take to reach that.
Strategy is important, a strong work model and firm plan is essential, mindset and self-belief is everything. But strategy is 5% of where results come from and mindset is 95% – hence why paradigms are so important. My clients come to me with a list of things they want to achieve but have no idea of how to get there. I work with them to set a clear plan and focus on what is really important to them. By focusing on mindset over marketing, you too can achieve maximum success for your business.
