Battling the Voices of Self-Doubt

So, how did you deal with that. I mean, when the self-doubts crept in and you like, okay, I’m all alone, standing on this mountain job, who can I bring along with me? How did you deal with that?

I would say early in my career, I don’t know that I dealt with it well. I probably gave up on many things too early thinking, well, okay, let’s go along with the flow. Let’s see what others are doing and we’ll continue to sort of mold ourselves to the kind of behaviors and approaches my peers seem to be taking or people that I see at the time in leadership roles seem to be taking.
I would say it probably took getting a few mentors or managers who were a little bit different, who saw that I thought about some things a little bit differently, who encouraged me to not completely shut down that voice. But also gave me tips and tricks to say you need to read the room in terms of what kind of influence strategies can you use? How do you make sure that you’re framing some of your ideas or suggestions in a way that’s going to be well received by the audience?
So, I would say having sort of that core group of managers or mentors who saw that, encouraged that, but also gave practical tips on how to address that in a way that will sustain for the long term, versus just “Let me tell you what to do in this instance.”
That would have helped in the moment, but I think them seeing giving me ways in which to deal with that for the long term and really expand my skill set and improve the way in which I would approach things from then on, really helped in reshaping how I think about some of these things.
Slightly changing my approach, but still trying to focus on being as authentic as I can and ultimately getting to a place where it didn’t feel so alone, it didn’t feel so overwhelming to try and do something that felt like I was the only one carrying the torch for.
You learn to pick up some of those tactics to continue to make progress, even though it might feel like you’re pushing some things uphill.