My Entrepreneurial Rollercoaster of Confidence
How starting a business broke down my self esteem and built it back stronger than ever before
Heart palpitations, sweaty armpits, stomach twisting… these were the physical sensations I’d experience in that split second I heard the key turn at my front door each evening.
I’d close down all the windows I had open on Google Chrome, open up some random document and make it look like I was typing something important. As the door would open, I deeply dreaded — feared even, the question I was about to get asked:
“How was your day, babe?”
There stood my husband who was financially and emotionally supporting me to get my business off the ground. He was the one who believed in me when I didn’t believe in myself. He had faith in me to turn my talents into something prolific.
Have you ever overthought a question this much?
I hated this question with all my heart. Because my day was never great. I wasn’t making it rain. Surely my husband knew I hadn’t made any sales that day.
In fact, why was he being so nosey? What made him think he could question me like that? Instead of actually meaning “How was your day?” I thought what he really wanted to know was, “Have you made back any of our lost finances yet?”
My answer to this daily question would be one of the following:
“Alright. How was yours?”
“I didn’t sell anything, so…”
“I posted on Instagram and LinkedIn — no one’s bought anything yet though.”
“Well I remembered to get the chicken out of the freezer so I achieved something.”
I started pushing away the people who loved me most
I got more and more defensive. I’d even go on the attack some days. Until my dear husband didn’t want to ask me how work went anymore. Of course then I’d accuse him of not having any interest or respect for what I did.
Day in, day out, my self worth was depleting. Which is kind of counterproductive for someone trying to make it as a coach for women to gain confidence.
Starting a business seemed exciting at first
So what happened? The sole reason I wanted to make this a business was because I’d done this confidence work already. As a former engineer, my self-esteem had hit rock bottom. I figured out a way to build it back up really quickly. Not only that, I helped a whole bunch of my team members to grow their confidence too. I felt on top of the world when I quit engineering to become a coach.
I remember in my final weeks of employed work, I’d come home and sit in the dining room working on my website and social media channels till late at night. I was literally building a business while all my friends were watching Love Island. I felt really smug about that. This super positive drive to make it as an entrepreneur felt fun and exciting.
Fast forward a couple of months: Here I was sitting at the same dining table fearing my friends and family would ask me how business was going. I didn’t want them to know I was a complete failure, so I talked to no one about it.
It was a dark and lonely place to be, especially as most of my friends had never started a business before. And the friends who did own businesses seemed to be doing so well. I didn’t think they’d relate to me at all.
Realising I couldn’t do it alone
Driven by fear and shame, I kept trudging along. I at least had the mental clarity to realise I needed help so I invested in a business coach despite having zero income to “justify” it. I met some other new business owners who were going through similar rough patches and found out I wasn’t the only one.
It was through these connections that I found the strength to keep going, even when it felt like I was sweeping water uphill. I followed “the formula” for starting a business. Slowly but surely I built the confidence to charge a respectable fee for the coaching I was giving out.
The emotional rollercoaster of making sales
When I made my first sale I was completely ecstatic. I called my husband straight away and did a little victory lap around my lounge room (with my two beagles joining in despite having no idea how huge this moment was). But only days later, I felt like a failure again. Where was my next sale? Am I going to have to go through all this heartache, emotional hurt and impostor syndrome every time I wanted to sell my services?
I made another sale and the same thing happened. I thought I had nailed this whole business thing but days later, I felt like I was back at square one.
The problem was this
I had put my self worth in the hands of other people. If someone was willing to pay me to coach them, I was a good coach. If I wasn’t making a sale, I was a bad coach. While making sales was always an achievement to be celebrated, it was always going to feel like a total chore until I could detach my ego from my work.
My husband, friends and business coach all believed in me even when I didn’t. This helped me make my first few sales. But the thing that got me to keep going was developing a new kind of confidence in myself.
Detaching my ego from my work
I had to rewire my beliefs to know that I was good at my job even in times I wasn’t making money. And I guess this got easier the more proof I had under my belt.
I could always think back to the clients I made a real difference to. I’d recall the woman I helped to get out of a toxic workplace and inadvertently save her marriage. The once quiet and timid data scientist who found her voice and got a £10k pay bump the month we finished our coaching program. The countless female leaders who had zero confidence when they first came to me, and left 3 months later with their heads held high, absolutely killing it at their jobs.
I also developed proof that if I kept sharing my message through my podcast, social media or blog, that some people would contact me if they ever wanted to work together.
Confidence made me listen to my intuition
Finally there was a day I heard this little voice in my head questioning the way things were usually done in business. Business coaches were always talking about how to get to 6 figure months or whatever. And it was usually the same tactics: Email funnels, a series of templated cold-call messages on LinkedIn, starting a Facebook group…
I grew the guts to question whether I could do it differently. If I hated sending cold-call messages, was there an alternative way to get the same success or more? And why did my goal have to be 6 figure months or financial at all?
Don’t get me wrong, all these tips and tactics are incredibly helpful to learn about. But after a while, you realise that every business coach is peddling something they tell you is absolutely ESSENTIAL. If you don’t jump on the TikTok, Instagram lives or email funnels bandwagon, then you’re missing out on a huge opportunity.
I learned that amongst the noise, I had to figure out what was best for me and my business. And I only came to that realisation because I’d grown enough confidence to trust my own intuition.
More sales didn’t equal higher self esteem: It was the other way around
The more my self esteem grew, the more sales I made. It was as simple as that. At the time I finished work to take maternity leave I felt unstoppable. I knew deep in my core that I could achieve anything I wanted to. I really believed that.
Returning from mat leave felt like I was starting all over again. My confidence was low, I wasn’t making the sales I was before, the market seemed different. That’s probably a story for another time but spoiler alert, I bounced back from that too.
The point I’m trying to make is, being an entrepreneur can be full of highs and lows. Big income months, huge self esteem and incredible sense of contribution. Or zero sales, broken confidence and lack of value.
The one thing I owe my business success to
The one thing that has consistently helped me create business success is working on a positive mindset. Without fail, the more I work on my inner confidence, the more business I attract. The more I can separate my ego from my sales, the easier it is for me to take action. More simply, the quicker my mindset bounces back from failure, the faster my business grows.
Maybe reading this article is your sign to finally start working on your confidence and business mindset. If you’re curious to know how much more you could achieve if you removed the negative noise from your head, let’s chat. You can schedule a call here.
