For all those times when you bury yourself in research, in the hopes of feeling more confident. When you look to other people to make decisions for you. When you force yourself to do something you feel you ‘should’ and push aside the groan of your heart. When you sabotage your progress by second-guessing yourself.

For all those times when you think, “Who am I, to think I can do this?”

I have two words. They are as much for me as they are for you.

Trust yourself.

Here’s why:

1. Worrying won’t make it happen

Nadine was worrying. She had a ton of stuff to do, not enough time to do it in. She was speaking at a conference at the weekend, which she wasn’t fully prepared for, and with working hours limited to school hours, “unimportant boring admin” kept getting in the way of the creative, fun ideas she really wanted to spend her time on.

When we talked and dug a little deeper, we discovered that actually, despite feeing guilty that she had started that particular day working on her creative project rather than the “unimportant boring admin”, she was in fact on top of the things she needed to that day. She had the evening set aside to prepare for her speech, but what kept going round in her head was, “It’s not done yet. I’m running out of time.”

What she needed wasn’t more time. It was to trust herself. Trust that she did have the time set aside, and that was enough. Trust that she had planned for what needed to happen and put her mind to rest. Trust that when that time came, she had everything she needed to get her preparations done.

2. You know this stuff!

So often we wait until we feel confident, before we do something. And we wait for reasons – evidence, feedback, results – before we feel confident. The thing is, the evidence only forms after you do something. Action is what gets results. Feedback comes when you put something out there.

A while ago I was invited to speak at a training event at short notice, and in a teleclass that had a live Q&A format. Up until that point, I had run my own teleseminars, and I liked to be prepared, to know what I was saying. I liked to have it all worked out, sometimes to the point where I almost had a script written out.

This time there wasn’t much I could do to prepare. I had to go for it, and trust myself. Trust the knowledge in my head, that despite my baby brain, it was all in there somewhere! And if I was to go looking for evidence, I would find it – in the articles, blog posts and the book I’ve written, in clients I’ve coached, in my own personal journey. I had to trust myself – I know this stuff!

So come on you, you know your stuff. Yes there may be plenty to learn and you’ll have fun learning it. The way to do that is to take hold of what you do know, right now, and use it. Get it out there. That feeling of confidence, that assurance of knowing you absolutely can do it, comes after you’ve done it.

3. Trust your heart

My husband quit his job last year. It was well paid, but with a 270 mile round trip commute every day, it was literally sucking the life out of him. He didn’t have another job lined up – he didn’t have the time or the energy to look! His heart was screaming at him to get out. So he listened. He started a new job a month later, with a sizeable pay cut and a walkable commute. It means as a family we’ve been honing the art of living frugally, but reaping so much more richness in family time and quality of life.

What is your heart telling you? It may be nowhere near as drastic as my husband’s example.

Yes you can do research. Yes you can learn from others. But sometimes the decision you need to make is less about “How have others done this?” or “What’s the best way to…” and more about “What makes my heart sing?” and “How will I choose to use this to do more of what I love?”

4. Trust yourself on the move

My son asked me a brilliant question one day, as we watched my husband park his motorbike into the garage: “How do you stay balanced?” The answer I realised was: you keep moving. You can’t really balance on a bike standing still, and I’m told that the hardest manoevres are when you are going slow. I wonder, how often is that true for us in life? When do we put the brakes on with our doubts, and actually make it much harder on ourselves?

What about you?

Where do you need to stop worrying and start trusting yourself? In what area and on what level do you already know your stuff? Where do you most need to trust your heart? And where do you need to stop holding back and trust yourself to fly? I’d love to hear from you – drop me a line or leave a comment below. And if you found this article useful, please do share and like it!