AF274 - I'm Scared

Let’s just admit it! We are scared. Scared to launch new bundles, scared to get it wrong, scared to lose money. Worry and fear come disguised as overthinking. We are going to talk about practical ways to help you make better decisions in business based on data, facts, and risk rather than fear, worry, or failure.

We tend to overthink every little thing. Maybe we need an Overthinker's Checklist. 

Today’s episode is all about overthinking and moving past our analysis paralysis to make decisions. We need to make decisions in our business. We can not take forever all of the time. Otherwise, we will slowly kill ourselves and our business will not grow in the right direction. 

The feeling of indecisiveness, especially if you are new and second-guessing everything because of inexperience or because you have made bad decisions in the past and you do not want to continue repeating those mistakes are the reasons for fear, worry, and overthinking. 

I want to let you know that the workshops are back for 2023. I would love for you guys to check it out. I can not wait to meet you in person because I get to know you. I love to get with people and talk business to help you grow, learn about you, your business, and your struggles, and see if there is anything I can do to support and help. Building bundles together in a group setting is so much fun. I hope I can meet you in January when we come to the Dallas marketplace. It is basically three days of shopping, meeting each other, going through the trade show together, and solidifying your business for 2023. If this is something that excites you and you want to do it, if you want to crush your goals for this coming year, or whatever your reason is, why you started this business, we can make it happen. Go to mommy income.com/workshop and check out the workshop that we have. We will be in Las Vegas at the end of February and there is going to be a retreat later on next year. 

Overthinking makes it hard to take positive action in the right direction because our emotions can cloud our judgment. Overcoming one’s fear and curing overthinking and analysis paralysis is not going to happen overnight. Stop thinking about the past and stop worrying about the future. Get rid of all the things that you can not control. Do not dwell on the bad and scary. The opposite of overthinking is problem-solving. Overthinking is identifying and looking at all of the options and looking into them. Problem-solving consists of things, thinking about and working through, whether on paper or out loud or anything, working through a difficult situation by purposefully looking for ways to solve the problem. It is about reorienting our focus on the actual solutions.

And did you know that what you focus on is actually what grows? There is what we call a mental workout, a mental strength exercise that we can do to retrain our brain from overthinking into a healthier mindset. And this takes time and practice. You can help yourself adjust the way you think by taking a few steps to overcome and be more productive with your brain power. It is a good thing if you have someone opposite your personality so there is a balance of the things that you tend to overthink. If you are thinking positively about certain things, then someone has a negative thought about it, and you can meet in the middle or able to see various possibilities or ideas that will lead you to a good decision. When there is a great balance, you can see both sides and then make an effective decision that is going to help solve the problem.

Take your thoughts and write them down. No judgments. You get a piece of paper. You can even throw it away. Or you can use your phone or an app. As you dig through the details, ask yourself why this situation is causing you negative thoughts. Just ask the question really quickly. You can literally set a timer for 15 minutes or for five minutes. 15 minutes is too long to sit and worry. Five minutes is just right. You can get out of your head those negative thoughts and reread them. Sometimes, you can find those negative thoughts laughable. Some, you find easy to solve. You can actually rationalize with yourself and sometimes it is still just as real as when you wrote it down and that is okay. 

You are just taking a step to do something with it. You are not just letting it circle and circle around. You can also break down the emotions of why you are experiencing that and try to identify it, not judging it, not calling it or labeling it. You can know yourself better afterwards. There will always be judgment coming from other people, but that is perfectly normal and we need to be aware of it and recognize that not all people are going to support us and would make us feel a certain way. You get to decide who can affect your actions. 

You do not know me as you know me in the two minutes that I interacted with you, but you do not actually know me, know my life. So their opinion does not have value as opposed to say, for example, your mother-in-law or something like that who does know you and does pass judgment and her opinion might have a little more value, but does it, it is just food for thought. 

Another way to kind of curb your overthinking and get it under control is to acknowledge previous successes. By regularly taking down all your negative thoughts, you are able to take a look at previous notes and determine which thought you have overcome. You can use your successes as inspiration and motivation to move on to the next step. Overcoming hardship is proof that you can do hard things. You can make decisions and make good ones.

Another way is to stay present. Staying in the current moment helps you focus on what you can control instead of worrying about what might happen. You are focusing on what you can control right now at this moment, let's just be real. We are not in control of Amazon or their algorithm or their check-in process, but you are, you are in fact in control of proper research, writing listings, taking good photos, setting prices, and focusing on growing your business. What we need to focus on most is just taking simple actions. 

Action is the antidote to fear. So whatever it is that you fear, taking an action in some sort of direction helps the fear subside. There are plenty of ways to help stay in the moment so that you are not constantly thinking about the past or future.

And disciplining yourself. Setting a definite date and time for doing things will eventually prevent you from worrying about things. Making a 15-minute hustle appointment and putting it on your calendar will organize your daily activities.

Also, you can talk to yourself, in front of the camera or in a mirror. Talk out loud about things you have in mind, even though it sounds silly. If that could eradicate overthinking, that is fine. And it is so freeing because no one is listening. No one cares, and no one is judging. You can just talk to yourself so you can say whatever you want. There is no filter and no one is judging you for how you feel or how you think or how silly it might be. It is just you versus yourself. 

Unplugging and shutting off your computer or your phone for a designated amount of time every day and doing an activity that brings you joy will help with worry. It will help with overthinking. Do what you love and turn off extra stimuli. Sometimes when we turn off all the extra stimuli, we actually have time to think for real. 

Another tactic here that we can do is write a list of things that you are in control of and choose one to take action on. Do your best and be excellent.

Something very simple as getting outside, taking a walk, walking away from your desk, from the things that are frustrating for 15 minutes, and just taking a deep breath and walking outside, even if it is just a quick lap around your house or you go out in the yard and walk around for a second and instead of focusing on your problem. Take note of your environment. Note the way things smell, what you see, and what you hear. That is what makes us feel fully alive. When we are aware of what is going on around us, what is going on in our heads, and what brings us joy. This is all a lot about awareness as well. Getting outside, a simple change in environment for 15 minutes at a time can just change the perspective.  

I hate wasting time. By overthinking, you are wasting a lot of time. You can prevent this by getting a different perspective from a person who has no idea and no clue. An outside perspective is helpful to keep us balanced. It can either validate that we are on the right track or it can bring in a perspective we had not thought of and help us to see the problem more clearly.

One of the ways you can do this is in the Amazon Files Hub. You can go and ask your fellow wholesale bundlers how they get through this step or how they get through this or how they defeat overthinking.

If you are in the Hub, you have the Overthinkers training and checklists that I made along with this episode. So make sure you log into your student portal and you download the overthinkers guide and checklist for the framework because I went ahead and created that for you so that you actually have a checklist when you're going through the framework and you are checking off the different things when it is time to move to the next step. 

An additional way that you can get some perspective is by coming to the Facebook group. Asking someone similar to you can help you validate your thoughts. Asking someone with a different perspective or personality can give you insights that you might not have thought of or that missing piece before you make a decision.

If you have not read my book, Dream Big, Step Small, why get yourself this gift for Christmas? It is on my website. I will send you a signed copy or you can get it on Audible and listen to it all on Audible or on Amazon. You can do the ebook and have it right away. You can print it out or order from Amazon.

Dream Big, Step Small Chapter Four - “Trust the Facts, Not the Feelings”. You all have heard me say this a million times probably on the show and other places, but this has really been the single-handed most important thing that I have gone through to help me really get away from overthinking and analysis paralysis and decision-making issues. Trusting facts and not feelings. An unbiased approach leads to better decision-making. Being a good decision-maker is a skill you need to have.

Write down how you feel about a situation. I know some of you do not want to write stuff down. Listen, there are motor skills and brain activity that are connected with hand and pen, and paper and brain. There are studies on this. It is important to use pen and paper even though everything is digital nowadays. We can type everything, we can talk and text, and we can FaceTime and everything else. There is something that happens physiologically when you write things. 

If you want something done right, teach someone how to do it your way. That is better. And then hire them to do it over and over again.

WATCH:

LISTEN:

QUOTE:

“When you do something you love, you're activating your dopamine and your endorphins in your brain that gives off those happy feelings. And doing something you love then helps you clear the space, clear the clouds, the worries and the fears are natural and they're the clouds, but the clouds can be moved away.”

                                                                                                                                           -Kristin Ostrander

RESOURCES:

• 2023 Mommy Income LIVE Events
• Why You Should Sell Wholesale Bundles on Amazon
• Everything You Need to Know - Dallas Total Home & Gift Market
• 3 Reasons to Attend a Tradeshow Walkthrough
• Wholesale Bundle System 3.0
• Dream Big Step Small
• Mommy Income Hub Group
• HUB

I am doing this with love, compassion, and understanding knowing that this is hard stuff. No sugar coating it. You are in business. It is not going to be easy, but it is worth it. The results are worth it. So I am challenging you to keep your overthinking and your analysis paralysis in check. Are you going to die? No. Anything that you knew in the business, especially on Amazon e-commerce, you are not going to die. This is not a dangerous job. Your pride might get hurt a little. Your ego might get hurt a little if you try to sell something that does not sell. But that is actually not the end of the problem. You can actually tweak things to make them sell better and more efficiently. There are solutions to all the problems. So if you do not have a supportive group, I encourage you to join the Amazon Files Hub. 

That is where we can talk and group coaching sessions every month. We can get questions answered, additional training, and support from a community that understands what you are going through while creating and building a business of wholesale bundles. For those that are not in the Hub, it is open for enrollment. You are welcome to come and join the Hub and you can get the full Overthinker's Guide to the Wholesale Bundle Framework, including little check boxes. 

So let me know when it is time to move forward in the framework. It is a printable download. You can log into your student portal and get that right away. If you are not part of the Hub, go to mommy income.com/hub and join the hub. We'd love to see you there. And you guys just take a collective breath. Again, this is tough stuff you are doing and I am so proud of you for being willing to work on it. Your future self will thank you for relieving a little bit of that fear and stress and for taking those actions. So remember, get your pens and papers, and write some of that stuff down. Trust the facts, not the feelings, and take some action. We'll see you guys same time, and same place next week on the Amazon files. 

Share your AHA moments with me on my free private Facebook group  - the Amazon Files (use the code word SCARED) and tag me so I can celebrate with you! 

Have questions? Email me directly at [email protected] with all your questions, concerns, or doubts. I would love to answer them all for you.

Keep on bundling…

-KO