What Happens when High School Follows you to Business

We all had a moment in high school, or perhaps junior high, when the meanest of the Mean Girls turned our way and sniped, “Why don’t you just shut up, no one asked you.”  The problem is not with high school and teenagers with low self esteem, wacky hormones, and the social pecking order – no, the problem is that the bully, she followed you into your business.

When you started out as an entrepreneur you really thought you were a solo, but hanging around and poisoning the metaphorical water cooler was the bully. Even more disturbing, the Mean Girl now lives inside you, whispering messages of self doubt and hate. Let’s be honest, sometimes she’s screaming.

It happens when only 2 people sign up to buy your new offer on the first day, “you’re a loser” she laughs.

You open up Facebook in the morning and see what all these fantastic talented friends of yours are doing and you hear, “you’re boring.”

In the moment when you’re poised to reach out to a potential client, apply for TEDx or contact a mentor she says, “who wants to be around you?”

These bullying moments may be a carryover from the days when community and social standing were the most important things in our mind (sorry teachers), but they will continue to impact our businesses today and tomorrow. After all, is a network of colleagues not unlike a campus? We may be virtually connected but that makes it all the more simple to pass virtual notes and amplify the feelings of loneliness.

I don’t believe the answer is unconditional positive regard. We don’t have to share blog posts that suck or click “like” on every post we read. We don’t even need to respond when posts don’t meet our needs or interest us in some way. All of that? That’s inauthentic and the only way we’re going to learn if our messages are making a difference is if we react to them with honesty.

Instead there needs to be a profound increase in compassion and gentleness. With ourselves.

There’s not a preponderance of ugly comments on social media (at least in my world. If there is in yours then use the ‘unfriend’ and ‘block’ buttons as needed). Instead the rude comments, hurtful judgments and negativity is coming from our Inner Mean Girl (IMG). It’s a voice that sounds suspiciously like the girl that bullied us in school and then followed us into business.

Here are 3 great reasons to evict your IMG today and ban her forever:

1. You wouldn’t work with horrible clients, why work with horrible influences?  Even if they’re only in your head and in the past, now is the time to stand up for your ideal working environment and tell that mean girl to go back to high school, the last place she had relevance and power.

2. Self-doubt and inner fear are the greatest of self-sabotaging behaviors. They hold us back from sharing our gifts, our love and helping others in need. In your own business there may be a lack of clients, weak content and no follow through. By letting the IMG run the show, you’re allowing a poison to fester, grow and destroy everything it touches. Think zombies, but worse.

3. You don’t have time for this bullshit. I know something that you’ve been trying to keep secret: you’re amazing. Your gifts outshine the stars, your compassion is felt so deep, your knowledge and experience and creativity is so, so needed in this world. And, I hate to break it to you but: you’re dying. We all are. Our time is limited and you just don’t have time to sit behind your computer, hiding from the world, worrying what the IMG says about your blog post.

She didn’t like that you wrote “shit”… well, tough shit! Stop feeding your gremlins and begin feeding the source of your dreams.