Overcoming Scarcity Mindset by breaking free of the Paradigm of FearIn today’s podcast episode we’re talking with business coach Jessica Fearnley about scarcity mindset issues and how they have an effect on everything from your health to your business, and how accepting your differences and choosing to walk your own path can help you break out of our society’s dominant paradigm of fear and comparison.

In part two of our interview, which airs next Friday, we’re talking about the critical importance of getting clear on your personal definition of success and Jessica shares her most powerful tip for getting un-stuck in life and business!

This Expert Series Guest Interview Has Two Parts:
1714 Overcoming Scarcity Mindset and Fear
1715 The Danger of Comparison

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 Show Notes – Overcoming Scarcity Mindset and Fear

 Nathalie: Welcome back to the Vibe Shifting Show everybody. I have a special guest today.  We’re talking with Jessica Fearnley! Jessica is a business coach who specializes in promoting work-life balance alongside business growth.

She helps entrepreneurs and business owners who want to win back more of their time, effortlessly make more money, and work with better clients, all while reducing their stress levels and increasing their quality of life. Welcome Jessica, I’m so excited to have you here today!

Jessica: Yeah. Thank you so much for having me, Nathalie.

Mindset and Entrepreneurs

Nathalie: When we first talked about setting up this interview together you mentioned that one of the topics that you really love to talk about is this concept of abundance versus scarcity mentality. And you work with business owners.

Jessica: Yeah.

Nathalie: And is that is that one of the sort of main things that you deal with when you try to help them? Is that one of the main problems that you find that they have is their mindset surrounding their business?

Break out of your fear-based, scarcity #mindset by realizing that your differences are your #strengths! Click To Tweet

Jessica: Yeah. Well, it’s been really interesting actually. It’s been a real journey for me through setting up my own business. But I’m not actually a mindset coach but I often find that it’s mindset work that we have to do before we can actually get to work on people’s business problems.

Often it’s a problem that is originated actually with their mindset, but it’s as we deal with the mindset that they then become in a place where they’re equipped to be able to make the right decisions in their business. Which then deals with the way that the problem has been manifesting in that physical way in their business.

The Impact of Mental Blocks

Nathalie: Interesting. So is it usually that… Are people usually even aware that there is a sort of mental block there? Or are they completely focused on the “doing” aspect of things, thinking that there’s something wrong with what they’re doing their business? Do they seem to have that insight that tells them that it’s the way they’re thinking about it that needs to be dealt with first?

Jessica: Well, it really depends on the person. I mean sometimes there’s a grain of thought about the fact that it could be a mindset block. But often it… they’re coming to me with an actual problem with their business that they might be saying “I’m just working with clients who, they’re just awful” or “I’m I’m working really hard and I never have enough money coming into my business”. And as we start to talk when we do our work together or even kind of in the discovery call phase, it just becomes really obvious to me that actually it’s the things that they’re telling themselves about their business.

What a Scarcity Mindset Does

Jessica: And this is where scarcity mindset, I think, can be so helpful. Because it’s when you start to tell yourself “oh, there’ll never be enough”, “I can never do this”, “I’m powerless in my situation”, and you kind of put it all on your external circumstances, but really that’s something that comes from within. And it’s a story that you’re telling yourself.

So really it is often to do with changing that story that people are telling themselves and then that really is so powerful in equipping them to make changes in their business and in their life beyond their business as well.

Nathalie: Interesting. I’m actually working on my newest book right now and it is all about that concept of the stories that we tell ourselves and how it impacts on our daily lives.

Nathalie: So this concept of changing the story that we have in our minds and the effect that it can have in our physical reality is one that absolutely fascinates me.

You Make Decisions According to Your Beliefs

Jessica: Yeah. No, I totally agree and it’s been something for me, I think. I hadn’t really even thought about my own mindset, and it was as I got into looking into scarcity and abundance and what that looks like in both cases, I just found myself situated almost entirely kind of on the scarcity side. And I was telling myself all these things you know like “oh it’s really hard to do a business” and “money is very hard to get”. And then you just, you start to make decisions according to those beliefs that you have.

Be mindful of your mindset – the #biz decisions you make are rooted in your beliefs. Click To Tweet

And it does take time to be able to shift those beliefs that we have. And we have to always be grounded in reality, don’t we? You can’t just imagine something and make it happen. At the same time, it’s very powerful if you tell yourself a story about opportunity as opposed to hardship.

Beliefs Are Absorbed From the Outside

Nathalie: So can you give me an example of sort of a mindset shift in particular or a group of mindset shifts that you made in your own life and your own business and how that affected your reality?

Jessica: Sure. Sure so, really, I think my whole life is almost a story about scarcity and abundance. Because, I think just… and I think this is true for a lot of people, actually, that I was brought up you know almost to having these scarcity beliefs ingrained into me. And it was it was kind of from my family, from my background. But also it was just what I saw in the world around me.

The News is Grounded in Scarcity

And I think, often if… I mean, it sounds bad in a way but I think if you watch the news a lot that’s often completely grounded in scarcity. Because people buy into the news and… I was actually reading something today saying that it’s really hard to have positive news stories because they’re just not convincing to people. And the media kind of gives people what they want, essentially. But so often we want to read about the bad things. We want..

Nathalie: There is a whole lot of psychology behind that.

Don’t Buy Into the Fear Paradigm

Jessica: It’s so interesting, isn’t it? And I think, for me, one of the things that I’ve really changed in my life, when I’ve become more aware of how easily I succumbed to the scarcity mindset is actually switching off the news more often. And not just buying into this whole kind of fear paradigm that they’re really selling.

But really for me setting up a business, it’s been such a journey. I think when I started I was just terrified all the time and I was constantly finding myself in these situations where I just thought “oh my goodness I call possibly, I can’t possibly have a successful outcome to this situation”.

The Vibe Shifting Show Interviews Jessica Fearnley - Part 1

How Fear Can Hold You Back

Jessica: Which could be anything from going networking and meeting someone who was also a coach or did something similar to me and feeling completely threatened, completely terrified, and just like “oh no this is exactly what I knew would happen, it’s a very small marketplace, it’s already completely flooded with coaches”.

I think for me getting to a point where I feel comfortable talking to people who do similar services to the services I provide, feeling comfortable in a big marketplace where there are there are lots of other coaches out there, it’s true, we can’t get away from that. But that doesn’t mean that there’s no opportunities to work with people. And I have clients we have chosen to work with me and not other coaches, and it’s true for all of us.

Your Uniqueness is Your Selling Point

Jessica: I think when you’re an entrepreneur, your USP is so often your own uniqueness, your own personality, and that’s a really… that’s been a really powerful shift for me to be able to see that as opposed to just feeling threatened and small and like there’s nothing that I can do.

Nathalie: So, the “USP” is the Unique Selling Point, for people who aren’t familiar with that.

[crosstalk]

Do You Feel Threatened By Competitors?

Nathalie: So that’s interesting because I was reading some of your articles on your Web site and one of the things, one of the articles, you were talking about this concept of comparison. Which is… you were saying that one of the things you dealt with was this feeling of being threatened by other coaches in the similar niches to yours. Can you talk about that a little bit?

What to do when you feel threatened rather than empowered by competitors in your niche. #BizTips Click To Tweet

Understanding How Social Media Targeting Works

Jessica: Yeah sure. So I think this is massive. And this comes up for my clients often, as well, is just that we can spend so much time in the online space. So I spend a lot of my time on Facebook and because of the way that Facebook ads work and the way that the Facebook algorithm works we can quite often get posts curated for us by Facebook…

Nathalie: Yes.

Jessica: …from other coaches which can lead to this sense of “oh my goodness, there’s a million people who do what I do, and they’re already doing Facebook ad and I’m not doing Facebook ads…” And it can just be this sense of real overwhelm and just feeling like the world is such a small place and actually there’s already so many people who offer a similar service to what we provide.

Jessica: But actually I think the strength is just realizing that, firstly, Facebook is set up to do that. It’s showing you things that it thinks you’re going to like. And if you like Amy Porterfield, if you like Marie Forleo, well we’re all going to see the same ads. That’s just how it works.

Nathalie: Yeah.

Being Different Can Help Your Business

Jessica: But I think it’s really getting away from the fact that there is no one standard of how you should do your business. And what I found, particularly in the last year, I’ve started to just be a bit more confident in my own opinions, in my own beliefs, and just being able to kind of step away from the big coaching pyramid that there can be out there where people say there’s a set formula of how you sell things, there’s a set formula of what you have to say you offer.

And I’ve started to move away from that myself and just say well actually I am my own person, and the set formula doesn’t work for me in the way that it might work for other people and that’s okay. So I can speak to the issues that I’m really passionate about.

And I’ve actually found that has been so much more effective for my business. I’m actually at a point where everyone who I work with I feel like they are my ideal client which I definitely couldn’t have said two years ago.

So I think when you get really clear about what it is that you offer in real terms and when you start letting your own personality shine through, you don’t need to compare yourself to other people because you couldn’t be like them and they couldn’t be like you.

Quote - two roads diverged in a wood

The Fear of Comparison

Nathalie: That is so powerful. I love that because that is something… And even beyond entrepreneurs, but anybody who’s trying to build something that really matters to them, to make any kind of life change or start some new venture, whether it’s in the business field or anywhere else.

I think everybody struggles with that fear of comparison. That scary “Oh my gosh there are so many other people there who are already doing it and they’re all so much better than me” and “I could never be that good” and “How did they even get there?” I think so many times we get caught up into this concept of we could never be what those other people are.

Jessica: Yeah.

Do Your Own Thing

Nathalie: And we lose sight of the fact that it was never about that to begin with. You’re not supposed to be what those other people are. You’re supposed to be you, doing the thing that you love to do, in the way that works best for you. Because your best way to help your clients or to sell your art, or to become the professional that you want to be, is to be yourself because nobody else can do that.

Jessica: Yeah, and actually when you start digging into that… And this is why for me it is about my business but it’s also just so much bigger it’s about my life as a whole.

The more you dig into that the more you realize that actually, if there are things you want to be doing in your life but you’re not doing them, all you have to do is choose to start doing them. And when you become open to that as a possibility, you really can start to create a life that you’re happy with and that you feel content with.

‘If there are things you want to do in life, all you have to do is choose to start doing them.’ #mindset Click To Tweet

Beware Doing What You “Should” Do

Jessica: And I think for me so much of the time I was just living this existence of I have to have a 9 to 5 job because my parents think I do and that’s what people do and I have to work in this kind of environment and I have to do this and I have to be this.

And then when I could break away from that, just stop comparing myself to other people. It is so refreshing because you can just start to choose things that you actually want for yourself rather than what you feel everyone is kind of wanting you to have, whether that’s a good fit for you or not, really.

So, you know for me, a prime example is career. I mean, I really didn’t enjoy 9 to 5 employment. I hated being in the same place Monday to Friday. I didn’t like working at a desk all the time. I didn’t like working in a big open plan office with 500 other people where everyone just had to be quiet all the time and just sit there doing not very much. You know, I’ve done jobs where you have two hours work a week and you have to make it last for 40 hours. And I was just so bored all the time.

Your Life, Your Way

Jessica: But what I love about the current business that I’ve set up and just the way that I do life now is that actually I have the freedom to be able to choose: well actually this morning I might work, or I might not. Or you know there’s fixed days of the week where I have clients that I see, but actually the rest the time, there’s a lot of flexibility.

And my life isn’t about a 9 to 5 existence or proving myself or trying to be as good as the people I went to school with or anything like that. I’ve got my own standards and I can sort of… I can dig into that and really give it 100 percent and do a lot of learning and development in certain seasons.

Jessica: But equally, this year for example, I actually had my second baby at Easter and I’ve been working six hours a month pretty much since then. And I’ve been doing more work than that kind of in the evenings or around nap times when I’ve wanted to. But there is no kind of set contract with myself about “I must sit at my desk for x, y, z hours. You know, I really can just have that freedom.

“Money is Renewable”

Jessica: So for me I think that’s when developing this abundant mindset and believing that actually… money is renewable and there’s always more available if I choose to go and get it. That has been really powerful for me coming from a background where money is always scarce and you’ve got to hoard it and you’ve got to be careful with it.

And you know it can really affect you, I think, at a deep level because it really does impact the decisions that you make about everything. It all originates in your mindset doesn’t it?

You’re Allowed to Be Different

Nathalie: It does. And again that’s just so powerful, that idea that we can choose to do or be something different. And I think that is probably the most powerful thing that we can do for ourselves. But at the same time for so many people, I think it’s also one of the hardest things to do. Is to be able to give ourselves permission to be different, to do something different.

You don’t need anyone else’s permission to be yourself. #MarchToYourOwnBeat Click To Tweet

Jessica: Absolutely.

Nathalie: Because it is so ingrained into us that you go to school, you get the job, you do your 40 hours a week for, you know, 40, 50, 60 years. And that’s just the way it is. And whether you like it or not, you just have to do it because everybody does.

Jessica’s Crisis Point

Jessica: Yeah. And I think getting to that point where you don’t need other people’s permission. And I think, really, in my life I almost had that decision made for me. I went through burnout eight years ago. And I had really struggled with my health for two to three years before I hit crisis point really. And in a way I didn’t really have bad health problems.

I got very depressed and I had irritable bowel syndrome which really affected my life in a big way. But the biggest thing was lack of energy. And I just got to the point where I was so tired I could not get out of bed. And it was during that period, and it was a very hard time of my life. It was probably one of the lowest periods I’ve had, where I just felt no hope at all.

I felt like my whole existence was deconstructed because I had seven months, I think, where I didn’t work and I couldn’t get out of bed or really do anything. But during that time, just this new foundation of a new life really did get formed.

You Don’t Need Permission

Jessica: And I can look back on that now and just realize how much I was learning these lessons about, okay so I am ill with something which doesn’t really have a name, it’s only been subsequently that I’ve been able to call it burnout. But at the time I didn’t really have a word for it at all.

People would say to me, so what do you do? And I’d just kind of be thinking, well I don’t really do anything because I’m not really well enough to do anything.

But actually getting to a point where I can see the impact that that had on my life… that really paved the way for me to become an entrepreneur, I think. Because it just started to show me that I didn’t need people’s permission to be ill, and I didn’t need people’s permission to put the things into practice in my life that I needed to get well.

A Different Way of Doing Life

Jessica: So, I’ve just been really privileged, I think, to have gone through that because it really did show me that different way of doing life.

And I think it’s been from there, and kind of saying to myself well actually maybe I’ll work part time for a bit if that’s what I need to do, I have to go back to full time work. And just be able to do that and having a loving husband who has really supported me through that whole process… that has just been such a powerful thing for me.

Nathalie: That’s wonderful. What would you suggest to people who know they need to make some kind of change, so that they don’t have to go through that burnout before they get there?

Jessica: Yeah, don’t do what I did. My goodness. Don’t do what I did.

Nathalie: Yeah. So many of us go through that process, but there’s got to be a way to not do that first.

Learning to Listen to Yourself

Jessica: Definitely and, you know, I’m glad that I went through it. But I also wish that I could have seen it coming and realized what I was doing to myself by constantly kind of ignoring my body’s signals. So it’s almost like I look back on that time, I just feel like for a long time my body had been saying “I am tired. I’m not well. Please can you do something differently and look after me?”

And I had just repeatedly been like “I don’t have a category for that. I don’t know what it looks like to take time off work. And I don’t know what it looks like to quit my job. So I just have to keep going. And I wish that I had listened to myself and just had known more what would have been helpful for me at that time.

And I think because I was frightened and the people in my life weren’t able to kind of help me — their solution for things was just like “well, just keep going”. And it was it was really unfortunate just the way that it all went with that, really, because it did have to get crisis point before I was able to really acknowledge to myself that it was happening.

Why it’s important to live within your ‘energetic means’. #SelfCareMatters Click To Tweet

Living Within Your Energetic Means

Jessica: So I think just be really aware… like when you’re… If you’re constantly thinking to yourself “Do you know what? I’m really tired and I just can’t cope.” That’s not nothing. That is your body trying to get you to take things in a different direction. And self-care, I know it can sound very airy-fairy, but self-care is just so important. And making sure that you are living within your means when it comes to your energy reserves and your emotional well-being.

Nathalie: Now that’s interesting because most people don’t focus on that. They talk about living within your means from a financial standpoint.

Jessica: Yeah.

Nathalie: But I have never heard anybody say to live within your means when it comes to your energy and emotional standpoint.

Jessica: Yeah. And it’s funny. I think the more you dig into it, there are actually a lot of parallels. One of the one of the things I remember thinking at the time, and one of the benchmarks that I use for myself now, because I’ve been really fortunate that I have, I’ve got well again.

And I don’t know if I would be well if I was still doing a 9 to 5 career because I’ve chosen to take life in a completely different direction. But I remember one thing that I would often think is, you know, at the moment I think I’m writing checks with my energy that I cannot cash…

This has been part one of my interview with business coach Jessica Fearnley. Be sure to tune in next week for part two of this interview in which we discuss self-acceptance, definitions of success, the dangers of comparison and social media, and Jessica shares her most powerful tip for getting un-stuck in life and business!

About Today’s Guest Expert:

Jessica Fearnley is a business coach who specializes in promoting work-life balance alongside business growth. She helps entrepreneurs and business owners who want to win back more of their time, effortlessly make more money, and work with better clients, all while reducing their stress levels and increasing their quality of life. Pick up Jessica’s free scarcity and abundance checklist, and connect with her on Facebook!

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