If you’re battling with that persistent voice that keeps telling you how things could go wrong, how you may not have worked it outright, then you’re dealing with self-doubt.
As one of the greatest obstacles that hinder humans from fulfilling their dreams, self-doubt is what almost all the entrepreneurs struggle with at some point in life.
However, numerous experts have written widely on how to overcome this scourge, and philosophers have thousands of quotes on self-doubt attributed to their names. This shows the extent to which self-doubt has become a pervasive issue for entrepreneurs.
Self-doubt can be dangerous to your overall wellness; it is not only harmful to entrepreneurs physiologically but also harmful in terms of living productively and with emotional and spiritual wellness.
The following are some of the dangers of self-doubt you should know about.
I believe if you discover how self-doubt contributes to most of the productivity-related issues we face at work, finding the voice to say no won’t be as hard.
Self-doubt weakens self will
Self-will is still one of the strongest gifts we inherited as an individual from God. The self-will to become an entrepreneur.
Being able to determine that we want or do not want something and being able to go ahead with our decision is not an ability all creatures enjoy.
Where self-doubt becomes really dangerous to your self-will is when it makes you seek encouragement or an excuse for why you can’t still move your business forward or for why you’re not able to accomplish a goal.
The problem with seeking encouragement is that it makes you lose your self-esteem. Most of the bravest and most successful entrepreneurs today needed no one to encourage them, in fact, most had no one to do so.
Giving excuses, on the other hand, makes you embrace failure, which untimely will crush your self-will. If you’re looking for a reason to kill that self-doubt, think of how it could damage your self will.
Self -doubt breeds procrastination
Could self-doubt really be the reason the why the majority of entrepreneurs procrastinate?
Procrastination may seem harmless at first, but when self-doubt begins to creep in and you’re consistently considering starting that first paragraph later, then you’ll start a long cycle of procrastination that will prevent you from getting anything done.
Hesitation is one of the grandchildren of self-doubt. When people are hesitant about doing something, they procrastinate until they miss out on that opportunity and find an excuse to justify themselves.
Self-doubt kills personal growth
Self-doubt prevents entrepreneurs from experiencing personal growth.
We often experience our greatest moment of personal growth and fulfillment when we give ourselves the freedom to pursue that which we desire without the fear of failure or worries over what other people might think about us.
When you begin to doubt your ability to achieve all your dreams and fulfill the whole of your desires, you’re consciously preventing yourself from experiencing growth.
Hinders creativity
Creativity is one of the greatest natural resource tools entrepreneurs can always tap into. It’s what helps entrepreneurs to create the most precious things they admire and work hard to achieve those dreams. It’s what helps to design a way out of unfavourable situations.
But self-doubt will effectively shut down this ability to think creatively.
Self-doubt makes you question the rationality behind your ideas and prevents you from being bold enough to show your most creative ideas. At its worst, it makes you totally unable to see a way forward in tricky situations.
Doubt is a part of being an entrepreneur, majorly as human. This is a normal experience that we’ll face as we navigate through the several stages of our lives, but it should not be given the power to determine our success. By recognising the dangers of self-doubt, you can fight its ill-effects more easily.
Source: e27
