Hey, my friend. Welcome back to Do Life Big. I am so glad to have you here. Listen, before we dive in today's episode, I am asking a huge favor of you. I'd be so appreciative. If you could share this episode with one friend when you're done listening, or even right now, you can just go to the bottom you can, click share, and send it over there to your friend that comes to your mind. I'm trying so hard to just get this podcast out there to more and more people to spread the word. So we can spread this message so that I can have more of an impact and help you create your best business and life possible. So thank you so much for doing that. I really, really appreciate you.
Alright, let's dive into today's episode. What we're going to be talking about today is using the pain of our failures to create greatness in our business and in life in general. And this is going to be a really good one because I'm going to be sharing with you some things that have happened to me personally in my business and in my life. And you're going to be able to apply this and use what you're going to learn today and apply it to your business in life too.
So as you know, I'm a mindset coach, and I am the creator of the Mindset Accelerator program. And I've also built a very successful network marketing business. And with that, in the journey of entrepreneurship, there are ups, and there are downs, and there are great times, and there are times that are tough. And there are times where you feel like you're on cloud nine and you're unstoppable. And then there are other times where you're knocked down, and you're wondering, “Oh My Gosh,” What is going on? Why does it just seem like one thing after the next keeps happening? And everything in life that you want, in terms of your business and your life. It comes down to your mindset.
And the way that you talk to yourself and the meaning that you give to things that happen in your life outside of your control. It's all based on how you look at it and how you interpret it, and the stories that you're creating in your mind about whatever it is that has happened. And so many times when we are confronted with failures or roadblocks, instead of just looking at the situation as neutral, which is what we need to do, we tend to look at it and make this negative situation that happened mean something negative about ourselves, right? We make it make us seem less than that we're not as capable as we thought we were.
And I remember when I started my network marketing business nine years ago, and we were on fire. And I was remembering back to how I was talking to myself, the thoughts in my mind. You know, I was confident, I had so much belief, I felt like nothing was going to stop me, and we grew so fast. And we built a huge team. And we were changing so many lives, and was able to go on and build a six-figure business in my first 11 months. And I mean, we were literally unstoppable. And I approached my business with so much energy and enthusiasm, and confidence, and showing up to my business felt easy and effortless. And I just felt like in so much alignment. And right where I was supposed to be it never felt like work to me. And I remember people telling me that, “Hey, you know, you're going to hit roadblocks, there's gonna be times where you have failures, but you just have to keep going and blah, blah, blah.” And I just was like, well, that's not going to be me.
Little naive, Kathi. Right? Brand new entrepreneur with no entrepreneur background or experience at all, right? So what happened was, is when things did start to happen, and so what happened was is when I did start hitting roadblock after roadblock in my business, which is totally normal, but I didn't know this at the time, I was not really aware of it that this is normal. When you own your own business to be like ups and downs like a total roller coaster, I created this whole BS story in my mind, which I didn't realize at the time was BS, but it was where I was telling myself that I wasn't good enough to be able to achieve the things that I want to achieve. That I would never be able to create the business that I had, in my mind, that I had envisioned. I would never be able to go, as far as I had hoped, that I wasn't that great of a leader because if I was, then I would be able to help these people get through their roadblocks. And so I was internalizing all of that and making it mean that something must clearly be wrong with me. Right?
And how many times have you done that where you look at an external circumstance or something that's happened to you? And it really had nothing to do with you. And we take the responsibility and blame for it and make it mean something negative about us. It's so common to do this. But here's the thing, that whole story that I was making up in my mind was total BS. And the thing is, is that these are my thoughts. And these were my beliefs. And I believed it all. I thought that it was true. But those were just all honestly, just my limiting beliefs at the time, getting in my head keeping me stuck for years, for absolute years.
And it's exactly why I created my mindset accelerator program. Because I never want another online entrepreneur to have to go through the long period of pain and stress, and anxiety, feeling like they weren't enough or cut out to achieve their goals and be stuck for as long as I did. I never wanted to see anybody else have to go through that once I was able to crack the code to this, which you'll I'll dive into as I get further into this episode. But as I was going through this stuck time in my life, with the business where I was feeling like one roadblock after the next, I was constantly also looking externally for the answers outside of my control to try to change the situation when really, I should have been looking inside. This is why I spend my time now, and for many, many, many years, I work harder on my mindset than any other area in my life because it is everything.
And so when I had all these limiting beliefs in my mind, they were there. They filled my mind. And this is what happens with most people. Because the thing with limiting beliefs is you can't see them. So most people don't even know that they're there. But for me, I had that self-doubt. I had fear keeping me stuck. That feeling like I wasn't as good as I thought I was. And I didn't really have what it took to go as far as I had envisioned. And I was telling myself all of these lies and was sabotaging my future.
I was sabotaging my future success because, at the end of the day, and take note of this; your thoughts are what create your results. So I was stuck with no growth and had even started to go backward. And I had lost that belief in me. But here's the thing. As soon as you start to lose belief in yourself, you're never going to show up to your business and to life the way that you need to to be able to achieve the things that you want to achieve. How will you ever really create success if you don't believe you're capable? You won't.
And so like I said, most times, people don't even know what their limiting beliefs are that are holding them back. But they're talking to themselves internally with this dialogue that you would never say out loud to other people. You would never talk this way to your best friend or to somebody in your family. But yes, sometimes we talk the worst to ourselves. And we believe it. And the more that we stay stuck in this mentality of this negative self-talk, the more we believe it. But you can change it because you can change the way that you think. And remember, it's your thinking that creates your results.
If you look around you right now at everything that you have, the job you have, the relationships you have, the amount of money that you have in your bank account, where you live, everything is all a direct reflection of past thoughts that you've had. So if we're not happy with a current situation that we have going on right now, then that's a really good time to stop and look inside, and work on this and change the thoughts that you have now to go on to create the future that you want. So the only limitations that we face are the ones that we place upon ourselves.
And so here's what happened to me as I started to go on this downward spiral. I just figured at the time that, “Hey, if I just keep working hard, if I'm doing all the things, if I keep showing up, just keep being teachable, that I'll be able to push through and succeed. I'll work myself out of this problem that I was in, stay consistent, go through the motions, stay up late at night, do all the things, get on all the calls, listen to all the personal development, do all the income-producing activities,” right? And I was doing all of that. And I remember looking at other people, and they were succeeding. And I was like, “What the hell, like, why is my business not growing to the level that I want it to right now?”
I should be so much further along, but I'm not. And at this time, I remember feeling so burnt out. I was so burnt out, I was exhausted, I was stressed, I was overwhelmed. And I just felt like the weight of the world was on my shoulders with this business. And showing up to my business was no longer fun and exciting. And something that fulfilled me, it felt more of a chore, it felt forced. And I hated feeling like this.
But the moment that I chose to tell myself a different story, and actually uncover what my limiting beliefs were, and then changed my thoughts and focused on my self-belief and self-worth as a daily habit, that's the moment that my business started to change. Because truly, being able to catch your specific limiting beliefs on the spot, and then silence them is the fastest way to the success that you want in your business and in your life, hands down. It's what my program teaches you to do.
So if I think of one word to describe how I was feeling in my business and in my life back then, it would have been “stuck”. And I remember the day that I finally had my epiphany when I was going through this phase of being stuck. It was the day I had my major breakthrough, that changed everything for me, and not just me personally, but would then go on to help thousands of other online entrepreneurs as well. And I remember being up in Massachusetts, and I was walking around this big field, and I was walking laps, and I had my earbuds in. And I was listening to a podcast because every time I do any kind of walking or biking, I always listen to a podcast for personal development.
And I remember, I was listening to this podcast, and there was a guest speaker on his name was Jim Fortin. And he said one line that changed my life forever. So remember this line, and write it down, put it on a post-it note, put it on your mirror, and say this to yourself every day. But he said, “You are the thinker of your thoughts.” And literally, just write them in there was when the light bulb went on, and it clicked immediately. All of a sudden, I was like, “Oh my god, Kathi, you have literally been telling yourself this BS lies. Nobody else told you the story. Nobody else told you these lies. Nobody else ever said any of these things to you. You literally put these thoughts in your head, you thought them for yourself.” See.
So for the longest time, my mind was programmed to view failure as a negative thing. And I stopped and I flashed back to my life. And I thought of all these times where I didn't succeed at certain things that I wanted to succeed at. And I remember how I handled it. And the reason why I was so upset all those times was because I was making those situations mean that I wasn't good enough. That I wasn't cut out to do it. And so my mind was programmed to look at those failures as a bad thing.
But here's the deal, we have to go through the failures, and embrace them and use them as tools to learn, it's as a matter of fact, the only way that you will grow and get to the level that you want to get to in your business or life is to confront the failures, and work your way through them and learn from them so you can come up stronger, and grow more on the other side. Right? And every single time a situation out of my hands would happen that I had no control over, I was giving my power and control away to these external circumstances, instead of putting the power and control back in my own hands, which is what we want to do.
And the thing is, is that if we interpret failures and roadblocks, and things not going our way as negative, meaning something is wrong with me, it's just not possible to ever have long-term success when your mind is wired that way. It's just not possible to ever go on to build a six or seven-figure business and maintain it and continue to grow it and actually enjoy it and be fulfilled. When your mind isn't wired for success. Change the way you think. Change your life. It is a fact.
So think about some of the areas in your life right now where maybe things didn't work out the way that you had planned. Maybe you hit a roadblock, maybe things are not moving as fast as you had hoped. Maybe something happened to your hands. And yeah, you can say it sucks. It stings, it hurts. But what can I learn from that? Right? What can I learn from what I just went through? And learn to find the blessings in our past. Thank our past instead of looking back, blaming our past, and making it mean something negative about us, right?
You know, you have these big dreams that you want to achieve either in your business or in your life. But maybe you feel like you're playing it safe, right? You feel like there's a chain that's holding you back or maybe you even came into this new year with all these goals and dreams and you were so ambitious and excited and fired up. And now, you can already start to feel like that fire start to fizzle out. Because your inner thoughts, that inner dialogue, that “inner bitch voice” is what I call it is trying to stop you. It's trying to prevent you from changing and growing.
And I want you to remember this, whatever your past is, whatever has happened, it doesn't dictate the future success of your life. It doesn't matter what you've gone through; it doesn't matter how many times you failed. It doesn't matter if you've been through a divorce and you've hit roadblock after roadblock, whatever it is for you. It doesn't dictate what you're capable of doing going forward.
But here's the mistake that most people make. Most people look to their past as an indicator of what they're capable of. And it's not true. And if you're doing that, then we have limited thinking here that needs to be broken. And we need to reprogram the way that you're thinking. So that way, your mind is wired to have a successful entrepreneur mindset. The only way to change the way that we think is to change the meaning that we have given to our past events.
So, you can make a conscious choice to look for the blessing and give what you went through a new meaning. You can't control what has happened. But you can control what it means to. Things are not happening to you. And what if you just adopted this belief right now that life is always happening for you and not to you? That it's all rigged in your favor? How about that?
What if we stopped making these situations so wrong and we started making them right? Of course, they're painful. Of course, they were. But, my life changed the second that I realized that I am the one responsible for every thought that comes into my mind. And when I started looking at those failures as life lessons and blessings that were there to serve and grow me, that's when things started to become awesome.
Every part of your past is a message or a lesson. And you can use those lessons to change your future. But if you don't look at it this way, you will continue to have this pain and be stuck. And you'll continue to keep getting the same result until you've learned the lesson that you needed to learn to live the life that you're meant to live. And the longer that we keep saying, “This shouldn't be happening, or I should be this, or should, should, should, should, should,” The longer that we keep pushing away the success that we want, are the life that we want. And these lessons in our life will continue to get louder and louder and louder until you listen.
So we have got to let go of whatever it is, that we've been holding on to that's been holding us back. And we need to learn to let go of it. Because in order to let in, we need to let go of what's holding us back. So stop making where you are right now wrong. You are exactly where you need to be. It's normal to hit failures. It's normal to have roadblocks. It's normal for you to try something and have it not work. And then, you have to tweak it and see if it works again. This is all part of the process.
But we need to stop using past experiences to determine what goals to set. So many times, we get caught up in well, I couldn't do it before or look what happened in my past. Why bother now. And we need to stop looking at those past failures as bad things and stop making them mean something negative about ourselves. It's just simply not true. So, set goals based on who you want to become. Stop playing it safe and setting goals out of fear. Because whatever you focus on, you will get. Realism is the fastest-traveled road to mediocrity. And so many of us get caught up in the mistake of just setting goals that are just; they're pretty attainable. Their safe goals is what I like to call it; there's no big, hairy, scary goal. Because deep down, you don't really believe it. And you don't want to go through the pain of failure of not achi eving it again. So you don't even bother putting it out there on your vision board for the year. We need to stop doing that.
And from here on out, we're going to use failures to create our best life. It's when you go through these failures and come out stronger, with so much more knowledge, learning the lesson that you needed to learn so you could continue to grow, where you can then go on to become this beacon of hope for so many other people who are going through that same thing that you already went through. So I want you to try to become aware each time that you have some kind of limiting belief that pops into your mind when you're going for a goal, or you're going for something that you want to achieve or something new that you want to try, something that's out of your comfort zone. Catch yourself and stop anytime that you see yourself reverting back to the past with those thoughts in your mind.
Choose to focus on, “Okay, what was the lesson in that? What did I learn? But what good came out of it?” No matter how bad it was. There was always some little blessing or some small good thing that came out of it that you can be thankful for.
So your success in business and in life is honestly 90% your mindset. It's the stories that you tell yourself. And these stories come from the meaning that we assign to these circumstances or failures that happened in our life. And so I really am challenging you that the next time that you hit a roadblock, or something goes wrong, instead of immediately being like, “oh, man, I suck. I knew I shouldn't have tried this; why? Why did I bother doing this? God, I just can't do it. This is ridiculous.” I am really, really encouraging you to look at that situation as totally neutral. And keep yourself out of it. And don't let it mean anything negative about yourself. Don't make it mean anything negative about you because that's not true.
And if you can choose to create a made-up BS story, like I did for all those years before I had my epiphany of you are the thinker of your own thoughts, then you can take the time and energy to create an awesome story. And choose that when things don't go right to say, okay, it didn't work out the way I thought it was. What's the lesson here for me to learn? What can I learn from this? This is happening for a reason. And you will remain stuck for as long as you choose to ignore the lesson that you need to learn. It will continue to pop up like this until you learn the lesson that you need to learn.
And so sit there and truly ask yourself, What good is coming out of this right now? How is this helping me? How is this benefiting me? Search for it, search for it, search for it. Think about it, get it in your mind, and then say all right, now we're gonna keep going; we're gonna keep moving forward. And just know that it is totally normal for things sometimes to be hard. It is totally normal for things not to work out the way that you want them to.
It's all part of the journey. But the more that you fight it, the harder it's going to be. And the more that you make it mean something negative about you, the longer you're going to stay stuck and feel bad about yourself. And so it's all about this focus of where am I going to focus? Where's my mind going to go when something doesn't work out? Am I going to be negative about it? And make it mean something bad about me? Or am I going to look at it as an opportunity and hope for lessons to be learned?
So I hope that you enjoyed this episode. Please go share it with a friend if you liked it and you got a lot out of it. But I really, really appreciate you, and I'm so thankful that you're here. I hope that you have an awesome rest of the week. And I believe in you. I think that you're awesome. I love ya. And I will see you the next time. See you later.
