Success is On the Other Side of the Unknown

I share my personal battles with mindset hurdles and the actionable strategies that have propelled my journey. 

Follow Dr. Sheena Howards' socials:
@drsheenahoward | Power Your Research

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

We want to do X, but we don't know if X is the right decision to make and we don't have a crystal ball. There's no way of knowing. You know, should I invest in this coaching program? I don't have the money now, but if I invest in this program I could make more money, but you don't know that for sure. I don't want my work to be stuck behind an academic paywall. I want to leave a legacy, I want to reach my potential and I want to change lives. This podcast, power your Research, is my attempt to help the smartest people in the world do that very thing. My hope is that you use the lessons I share to make more money than what your higher ed job can ever pay you. I've done it, my clients have done it, and so can you. My hope is that you'll apply what you learn here and one day join the Power your Research program where you can work with me one-on-one.

Speaker 1: 1:17

Mindset is actually step one of the Power Year Research Program, and the reason why mindset is so important to start with is because a lot of us academics, having been in academe, have a lot of beliefs that academe have taught us that are actually not helpful to us increasing our visibility, authority and income. They're not helpful in terms of what we charge and our self-worth. To be quite honest, we need a lot of external validation because that's what we have been taught. You take the test, you get a grade, we say yay, and a lot of those mindsets have to be adjusted or undone. You can hold two separate mindsets in your head at the same time, and so we start with mindset in the Power your Research program as you go through an entrepreneurial journey. Everybody's mindset issues are a little bit different. There are some consistent ones that I work with everybody on the psychology around money and why you're undercharging for speaking engagements and consulting and setting boundaries and saying no and that kind of thing. But outside of the ones that we work on that mostly every academic has, there are some that are going to come up as you build your brand, as you get out there, as you network, that are specific to you. So I'm going to share three of the mindset issues I had that I've either overcome or just a daily practice for me to remind myself to, quite frankly, get over it.

Speaker 1: 2:35

So you know a lot of us have these negative thoughts that we tell ourselves things about ourselves, we say things to ourselves that we probably wouldn't even say to our best friend. I always like to tell people like would you say it that way to your best friend? Okay, then don't say it to yourself that way. But I used to be mad at myself for things that I did behind closed doors and it was annoying because I would be thinking about things. For example, if I was walking and I don't know, a piece of paper fell out of my bag and I turned around, looked at it and I decided that I didn't feel like going back to pick it up and I kept walking down the street, I'd actually go home at night and think about that and be mad at myself. You could have just picked that piece of paper up. What type of person are you? You know littering is bad. What I had to do To pretty much eliminate that type of negative self-talk is just be in integrity with myself behind closed doors, be in integrity with myself when no one is looking.

Speaker 1: 3:35

And does it take a little more effort during the day? Yes, but does it eliminate the negative self-talk in my head Completely? Negative self-talk in my head completely? And that is super important, because that negative self-talk takes up energy that is holding you back from the things that you want to accomplish. So, yes, if I drop even something as small as a gum wrapper on the ground that just accidentally fell out of my purse, I will turn around and make sure I go pick it up. It's one less thing I have to think about and feel bad about when I go to lay my head down at night, and there's multiple examples of this, and I don't know if anybody else out there does this, but that is something that helped for me tremendously. Hey everyone, real quick. I don't run any ads on this podcast, so I have to rely on word of mouth. If this podcast has helped you in any way, please share it with a friend and follow me, dr Sheena Howard, on LinkedIn, where I give more free content on building your brand as an academic. If you tell me you came to my LinkedIn from the podcast, I'll make sure I accept your request.

Speaker 1: 4:38

Second mindset issue that I had was being scared of the unknown. You know, when we're trying to grow and do big things, we come to a crossroads. We want to do X, but we don't know if X is the right decision to make and we don't have a crystal ball. There's no way of knowing. Should I invest in this coaching program? I don't have the money now, but if I invest in this program I could make more money. But you don't know that for sure. All those types of decisions that we have to make that are super hard, I found, is successes on the other side of the unknown. There are some things right now that you know that you should do and you're scared to do them for whatever reason. But deep down inside you know that you actually should do them. Just do them. Just do them Because on the other side of doing them, either you're going to get the thing that you want or you're going to learn a significant lesson that's going to help you the next time. So it's a win-win. But not doing them is actually causing you more negative self-talk, in your head at least, at least for me, because now you're not making a decision. Right, you're not making a decision, and that's energy wasted.

Speaker 1: 5:42

The third mindset thing that I had was being caring too much about what other people would say or think and if you're trying to build a brand, if you're trying to get international national media coverage, caring too much about what strangers think is not good because it's going to subconsciously hold you back, and I don't. I wasn't admitting it to myself, but I did have that problem. One of my really first big interviews I did, I got some really mean comments, which is normal, right, if you're going to be out in the world. There's lots of mean people Internally. That made me feel bad, but now I am at a place where I don't care about what people think, because what I'm trying to do is bigger and more important than that.

Speaker 1: 6:28

I wanna help people, I wanna inspire people, I wanna change people's lives. I want millions of people to read my books and have their lives change for the better because I inspire them to do the tough things. I help them get out of a tough situation. I help them remove a cloud from over the top of their head, and that is more important to me than any uncomfortability I might feel because someone, a stranger, said something mean to me, and so, in terms of building a brand and being visible and being on social media and being out there, I had to get over myself.

Speaker 1: 7:03

These things are a practice every day. For the most part, I have to be self-aware enough to remind myself that these are some of the things that I tell myself, so that I don't let them hold me back Again. I hope this helps someone out there. We all have our individual mindset. Things, and even the things that we're unconscious of, can hold us back from reaching our goals, and so I hope someone out there hears this needs this, uses this and, of course, if you want to jump on a 30 minute call with me, we can talk about building your brand. It's free to chat with me. I'll take you through the power of your research process and answer any questions you have.