Hey, it's Samantha Hartley of the Profitable Joyful Consulting podcast. This is Season five, we've been talking about consulting advice and actually today is the final episode of that season. It's episode 60. For 60 episodes I've been coming to you and talking to you about all things profitable, joyful and consulting. And today my advice is about confidence. It is important for you to build your confidence in yourself and your business and in what you do. And the compelling thing to me about this is that confidence comes from within you and it can feel like it's impossible for you to do anything about, but you can do something about it.

Very often clients will come to me and when I capture case studies or testimonials from them, the thing that they will say was the biggest thing that they got for me was confidence. Confidence in their pricing, confidence and asking full value for their services in knowing who they were working with and who was the right fit for them and when they should not compromise, when they should really trust themselves.

So how did we develop that and what role did I play in them developing it? So I want you to think about areas where you feel like you need more confidence. I think it's important to build your own confidence by building a track record of success for you to grow in trust in yourself; when you make a promise to yourself or your clients, and then you fulfill that promise, it's like your trust equity increases and you believe in yourself more.

The more you do something and it works, the more confidence you have about it. So that's really the first part of this is just you doing the work and getting better at it, which you naturally will do. I think the important thing for you to do is make sure that you reflect on your wins, your successes, the places where you've made a contribution. And it was good, like look where you are confident already because then you can build on that.

The other thing I think it's important to do is for you to have a person who can mirror back to you when you are at your best. Because then you have another source of information about you and what's great about you. So be sure that you have a coach or colleagues and even your clients may say to you, hey, that was so helpful, that thing you did, or, you know, you're really brilliant at solving this problem and we're so glad you bring that to us.

I have clients who will help other help their own clients with phrasing. This is one of my favorite things, is when you just give them the words to say and they practice saying it and then they feel great about themselves because they said the thing that was hard. It's such a small example, but it's one that I really love.

So having that mirror of people telling you, you know, you're really good at is a way for you to build confidence because you affirm, I think secretly we suspect this about ourselves, but you really confirm and affirm that for yourself.

And the last thing that I wanted to mention as a way to build your confidence is affirmations. If you're a person who feels like that's never worked for me, I don't want to hear it, then OK, you can tune this part out. But I think most people have had a kind of a positive experience with affirmations, at least somewhere, and we can't always get them to work. And I want to share with you what has worked for me. I'm going to share with you three different affirmations and kind of the way I chose them and why I chose them.

When you are in transition, which almost everyone is all the time, you know, the things that used to work for you no longer work and the things that are going to work for you eventually don't yet work. And so you're in this place that no longer and not yet. And it's really uncomfortable. And that's a place for a lot of business owners when they're trying to grow their business. So as a consultant, your clients will be in transition when they come to you. And that's a painful place. And when you are growing your business, it's a painful place.

And I wanted to share with you an affirmation that I use when I'm in transition that helps me to feel more peaceful. As experts, very often we want to be on top of everything. And when you're in transition, what you really need to be in is surrender, because there's a bunch of stuff that's out of your control that you can't do much about. And so when I'm in transition, the thing that I will affirm to myself is I am doing something new. And what I'm telling my subconscious mind and all of myself by saying I am doing something new is I'm not an expert at this yet. This isn't my comfort zone. I shouldn't be perfect at this yet. No one should expect me to be perfect at it yet. I am doing something new and so it sends the message “it's going to be bumpy and rocky until we get better at it.” So that's one of my favorite affirmations. To acknowledge the truth of the present time, I am doing something new.

The second one that I want to share with you that I think is key for experts. So I know a lot of people who are perpetual students, like they want to get all of the certifications and MBA, LCSW, PMP, like all of the letters after their name, which is great, until or unless you can never have enough of them. Yeah. You can never feel confident. You've always got to know something else. And for people like that, sometimes it's hard to get started. They can't have confidence in where they are. And so for them, I love this affirmation. I already know everything I need to know to get started. I already know it. I already know everything I need to know to get started. Another version of this, which I love to affirm because I don't have trouble getting started, I don't have any letters after my name, I don’t have any trouble getting started, finishing is a very often key for people like me. So we have a lot of energy at the start. So an affirmation that I love is I already know everything I need to know to be massively wealthy and successful. That's it. I already know everything I need to know in order to do that.

So if you are someone who has trouble getting started or if you sometimes feel like everybody has more than I have or I don't measure up or anything like that, you already know everything you need to know to help your clients, to be a successful consultant, to be really wealthy at what you're doing.

And the last one I'm going to share and I want to share this because I'm going to show you the way you can do it as a progression. So the affirmation itself is I am wealthy and financially free and you can choose to state any goal of yours in the present tense. I am wealthy and financially free. So choose your goal here. In this case, I'm using this one. A lot of people will say I can't affirm that because when I say I am wealthy and financially free, part of me knows I'm not. And so I'm just really validating a thing that isn't true. So if you struggle with that, I want to offer you a phrase in this case, which is I am on my way to being wealthy and financially free, every day I am wealthier and more financially free. So you give yourself the steps to it in the phrasing, I'm getting started being wealthy and financially free. I am more wealthy and financially free than I have ever been before. I offer that phrasing if you are in progress, you're a work in progress and you're on your way to something. There will come a point for you in affirming this when you can just fall on, say it. You'll have a day when you're like, you know what I am? I am wealthy and financially free and I'm affirming that today.

Until you're there, use the building up language. And as I said, I'm confident in my marketing. If you feel like I can even say that, you can say I'm growing more confident in my marketing every day. I am more confident in my marketing. I am an amazing, successful consultant who gets incredible results from my clients. I am growing into being an amazing consultant who gets great results from my clients. So allow yourself to progress into the reality that you want to be true for you.

As we conclude the consulting advice episode, what I want to advise you is follow your heart, believe in yourself, work hard to get results for your clients and you will see success in your business. And with that, I will see you in season six for management consulting. Thanks.