You’ll probably be shocked by what I’m about to tell you today.
That’s because I almost never say what I’m going to tell you today. In fact, I teach the exact opposite! (You may even wonder what’s gotten into me.)
As you know, one of the principles I stand for is “success without sacrifice.”
I believe you can build the business you want without feeling constantly stressed out or working yourself to the bone to make it happen.
But today, I’m encouraging you to do the exact opposite: to push yourself too far and to overdo it … and do so fearlessly.
Sound counterintuitive or impossible? It’s not, and I’m going to explain why (and how) right now.
Remember the Pendulum Effect
In a previous post, you learned about a theory I call The Pendulum Effect, an approach where you test your limits by overdoing (and under-doing) things in order to find your sweet spot in business (or in life).
When people try to overdo something, it often brings up a lot of fear. And unfortunately, too many women let fear stop them from taking that next big step in their business.
Before I get into the exact fears that come up and how to overcome them, let’s review some examples of overdoing things:
- Putting together a premium offer and charging more than you’ve ever done before
- Sending more sales emails than you’re comfortable with
- Taking on more clients than you’ve ever done before
- Agreeing to more guest blogs or interviews than you think you can manage
- Spending more time or money on a coach than logically makes sense
When done deliberately, intentionally, and planned in advance, overdoing things in business helps you see what you’re really capable of and what your true limits are—two pieces of essential information for your personal and business growth!
The big challenge with overdoing, of course, is fear.
Fear Gets in the Way
Even though I recommend stretching yourself as a positive way to grow your business, deliberately overdoing something can bring up a lot of fears.
Fear of overwhelm. Nobody wants to feel the stress or anxiety of taking on too many clients, for example. You may worry about missing out on time with your family or missing deadlines and letting your clients down.
Fear of negative reactions. In the example I shared here, I mentioned a sprinkling of negative comments regarding the number of sales emails I sent on the last day of my most recent Make It Work Online launch. The fear of judgment can play a huge factor in how willing you are to put yourself out there.
Fear of working too hard for little to no payoff. You might be thinking, “What if I push myself and it doesn’t pay off?” You may worry that if you bite off more than you can chew, there’s a chance you’ll look back and decide it wasn’t worth the risk and trouble.
These fears and more will come up, but you can’t let them run the show, bringing us to…
How to Not Let Fear Stop You from Pushing Your Limits
As you well know, just because something is uncomfortable doesn’t mean you should avoid doing it. Pushing yourself beyond your perceived limits is essential to finding your sweet spot and helping you create an even more successful business (and more awesome life!).
So, how do you push the limits and overdo something without freaking the eff out?
It’s easier than you think, and yes, of course I have tips to help you keep at it and not care what other people think!
Steal This! My Step-by-Step Approach to Fearlessly Pushing Past Your Own Limits
Click to TweetDeliberately choosing to push the limits to learn and grow is one of the smartest things you can do for your business … and one of the scariest.Here’s my personal step-by-step approach to pushing past your limits even when you’re terrified.
1. Figure out the limit you want to push, and make sure you’re pushing far enough.
First, you have to know what limit you’re deliberately pushing. For my MIWO launch, it was sending a lot of emails.
Notice, though, that I had to push “sending a lot of emails” far enough to really see what the impact was. In my case, that was four emails in the span of about 6 hours.
You can’t just move the needle a tiny bit. You have to really go for it.
2. Make a plan.
Second, you have to decide what the plan of action is—so you can stick to it!
I mapped out my email schedule way in advance and knew that I was going to do it no matter what.
Click to Download21 Winning Ways to Book Yourself Fast!3. Know why you’re doing it, and hang onto that.
You must know why you’re taking the overdoing actions and stand firm in why you’re doing them.
In my case, I had observed many multi-millionaire marketers sending me ridiculous quantities of emails—more than I had ever sent to my list. They make way more money than I do, so I thought I probably had something to learn from them about fearlessly emailing!
I was curious: Would more emails increase the number of applications I received? How much would this increase unsubscribes? How would it feel to do this?
I had so many questions I wanted answers to and the only way I could get those answers was to take this action. I knew if fear showed up, I could tell it, “Yeah, but I really need to know these things, so I’m doing it anyway!”
4. Mentally prepare for the potential “downside” and make peace with it in advance.
Proper advanced planning doesn’t ignore the fact that things may not go perfectly. Instead, it addresses it head on.
I was clear when I sent too many emails that I could get a massive number of unsubscribes.
In the case of the second example I mentioned previously, I knew that taking on too many clients could result in me having no time to work on my business, build my list, or create my next program.
I knew what I was deliberately doing and why, and I was willing to accept the potential downsides.
5. As you take action, focus on YOU, not them.
With all of this preparation done in advance, the final step is to follow through. And as you do, stay focused on YOU and why you’re doing this in the first place.
Make sure you have friends, accountability partners, or a mastermind group who know what you’re doing and why so they can support you when it’s go time. If you’ve done all of the prep work, you may not need them, but they make a great backup plan.
Click to TweetDeliberately pushing your limits is one of the smartest (and scariest) things you can do in your biz.Are You Ready to Push Further?
Now that you know why you must overdo it in your business and that it’s possible to do so without fear, it’s time to put the five steps into action and prepare for your next overdoing action in business.
Tell me…
Have you ever deliberately pushed your limits? What did you learn?
Have you wanted to try this in the past but were held back by fear?
Do you see one area in your business where you would learn a lot by overdoing it? Where and how?
I can’t wait to hear your stories, experiences, and tips in the comments. Fill me in!
My Personal Recommendation for YouPeek Behind the Curtain: The Two Times I Screwed Up on Purpose & How It Helped My Business Succeed Even Faster
Jenny,
Once again I understand why you’re the only person I will trust my business growth to for the rest of my days!!! Yes, this is something that I struggle with and understanding where to push and where to lean back and allow ease to take over.
However, last year when we launched Sales School, it was the biggest launch we’ve ever done. I pushed every limit I had, financially I invested more than I was comfortable with on the launch, time wise, I invested more than I had, and giving to the program and students I invested more than I had.
It created a major success, but just as you taught me the Pendulum Effect allowed me to approach the results with ease and by not pushing so hard.
I remember day one of sales feeling as if they were lack luster and not impressed and you told me that I had given all I had to this launch, and that the sales would follow but I had to lean back rather than push.
So I guess what I’m saying is I see this so much in my business and you’ve taught me all of it. How to push when needed and get uncomfortable, and how to lean back and approach some areas with more ease.
The Pendulum does swing both ways in my business and I’m FINALLY after five years learning to get comfortable being uncomfortable.
Thank you for your amazing contribution to my business each week with your content.
You are the queen of knowing how to push past your own limits and really go for it! There’s no one I know who does this as well as you — you’re a model for all of us!
And I’m excited to see you learn to let things go the other way, to pull back and work less hard…. and see what comes of that, too.
Yes yes yes!!!
This is my main focus for the month. Seeing how far I can push my comfort zone when it comes to putting myself out there.
I created this marketing calendar yesterday for the month of March and had so much fun doing it. But then fear came up once I realized I would absolutely have to promote it if other people were going to get any value out of it.
The safe thing for me is to send it to my newsletter list and be done with it. So I really pushed myself to go on Periscope and talk about it, shared it in a Facebook group and did social media mentions.
I know I could’ve actually done even more and at the same time I acknowledge that I did take actions outside of my comfort zone. As soon as I remind myself that what I create is not for my eyes only and it’s possible that it could really, really help someone, the fear grip lessens and I feel more inspired to share/market/promote.
When I’m doing scary things, I know I’m on the right track.
Thanks Jenny!
Carla xoxo
I love how you are a witness to what you’re doing — that kind of awareness will serve you well for your business and your life! Noticing where you did and didn’t follow through; where you took scary steps and where you didn’t; and what you want to do differently next time.
It is scary to push hard past what we think we can do, and it’s also essential.
Keep it up, Carla!!
I pushed my last new opt-in much more than I was comfortable with by promoting it hard on Facebook. I really went for it and ended up with quite a few takers.
Now I need to be more consistent on my follow ups. I feel uncomfortable looking at my tracking info and seeing the folks I’ve sent emails to repeatedly with no response, but I’m going to do it anyway.
Thanks Jenny!
xo
Way to go pushing your opt-in and seeing the payoff!
When it comes to those follow-ups, reframe it from “selling” to “helping.” Remember that you care about them as humans (because I know you do) and check in like you would check in with an old friend. That reframe in your mind will make the emails better, too. You’ve got this!
I was really looking forward to reading this post today, Jenny. Especially after reading your post last week.
You’ve really inspired me to push the boundaries for March. It’s going to be my personal March Madness, and I can’t wait. Ha.
For the last few months, I’ve been saying that I was going to hold monthly webinars! And, I have not yet done so. So, this month, I’m going to push the limits and hold 3 webinars!! I’m doing this to see how it affects my list building efforts. I’ve already felt the fear yesterday, as I was preparing my leadpages for my first webinar. But, this morning, I woke up refreshed and with more clarity. I really need to push myself in order to achieve more in my business. Thanks so much for the reminder.
I’m literally going to print these 2 posts out and read them monthly. Ha. Thanks, Jenny, you rock. 🙂
Cheers,
Jennifer
It makes my day to hear these posts are inspiring you to go for it — and pleases me even more to hear you’re following through.
I love that you’re going to really push something (webinars) in a big way to see what the reaction is. That’s EXACTLY how to do it and see what happens.
Good luck, have fun, and let me know how it goes!