What is a limiting belief? And how it could be holding you back in business.
Let’s talk limiting beliefs. What exactly is a limiting belief and why are they the buzzword of 2022. I’d like to rewind to 2020 for today’s blog post and tell you a little story about my own limiting belief system. In 2020, like most of us, I was a bit of a wreck. I had no income coming in, I can tell you factually I made less that £1000 that entire year. I lived with my parents, with no savings or means of getting out. I had a longish distance boyfriend who was thriving and I felt like the ultimate let down girlfriend. A girl at home with her parents, who couldn’t work and had no financial means to move out anytime soon. I realised, I attached a lot of my happiness and worth to work - which sadly because of the pandemic, I wasn’t getting ANY of. I was in a kind of deep depression, where I cried almost every night to him and everything just seemed really dark and bleak and crap! Whenever he would offer any kind of insight, motivation or suggestion, I would growl back at him “WELL YOU HAVE A JOB” or “EASY FOR YOU TO SAY” or any kind of excuse I could muster. I was limiting ME. Sure, the pandemic was a major roadblock and took its toll on everybody. But my attitude was my main limiter in life. My belief that woe is me, my life was hard and of course I couldn’t achieve anything right now, it’s a damn pandemic and I can’t work. I had so many limiting beliefs that stopped me from starting this business you see here. I believed it would fail, so what was the point of starting. I believed people would make fun of it like, “who the heck does she think she is, doing this during a pandemic!”. I had so many excuses for not starting By Kayleigh, that quite simply - I didn’t. What was the point? That was my limiting belief - that I would fail so there was no point starting.
Well fast forward to January 2021. I couldn’t live like that anymore, I had to do SOMETHING to get me out of the dark. So I started listening to some podcasts on manifestation and mindset. I needed to work on me, that was the main thing, because my negativity was all consuming. I started to recognise these thought patterns were exactly that, limiting beliefs that stem from fear, anxiety or generational trauma. I started small, teeny tiny changes, that allowed me to gain confidence and start to interrupt the limiting thought patterns that consumed my everyday. And here we are, a year and a half later - with a full thriving business that has changed my life. All because I stopped letting my limiting beliefs limit me. You’re probably sitting there thinking, “damn, I sure as heck ain’t that bad” but sometimes limiting beliefs can be small voices in your mind. Here’s an example:
Not starting something you have always dreamt of doing, because of fear of failure, or fear of what people might think or just fear of financial burden.
Not doing certain things or trying because someone else always does it better, someone always books more, or someone has more.
I can’t do that, I can’t say that, I can’t earn that, I can’t book that = coming to the conclusion there is no point.
Thinking your too old, that you have missed the boat, that you don’t look a certain way so therefore you can’t succeed.
Not believing in yourself and your ability.
Usually anything beginning with a … “but” is a limiting belief. It stems from fear, it is your brains defence mechanism keeping you cosy and safe and warm. Thank you defence mechanism, but we got this! I usually see limiting beliefs like the ones mentioned above are the number 1 thing that stops makeup artists achieving their dreams. They limit themselves, limit who they book, what work they book, how far they can possibly go, they put themselves into a box where it just seems impossible for any of those huge super amazing dreams, to ever reach you because “they just can’t”. I always make this example, if Mario told himself it seemed absolutely incomprehensible that he would book celebrity, he would never have found Kim. If Obama never dreamed he could become president, he wouldn't have. If Rihanna thought the market was too oversaturated and she shouldn’t bother, we would never have Fenty. You write your story, nobody else. Sometimes things happen (like a pandemic) that change up some of the chapters, but the end is yours to make, yours to write. If you are writing yourself into limits, you will find limits.
So how do we break free of limiting beliefs? For me, it started with journalling. I started to journal every limiting belief I had and would ask myself WHY. Why am I thinking this? Where does it stem from and ultimately is it true? Would By Kayleigh fail? Is that fact or some fiction my brain is trying to tell me to protect me? Once I got to the root of the problems, it became easier for me to believe ME and not my weird but wonderfully protective voice. And sometimes, I do still get these beliefs. I’m not just miraculously fixed from years of limits. But I’m better now at telling myself “hey, this product is awesome, it WON’T fail” I’m better at writing my own story ♥️