Psychological blocks come in all shapes and sizes.

The brain is, after all, complex!

I’ve personally had to deal with a whole bunch of mental blocks over the years. Honestly though I think it’s part and parcel of being an entrepreneur. When you work for yourself you have to deal with yourself on a daily basis!

I’m in no way a qualified psychologist or therapist (that would be quite the twist eh?) but I can at least speak to my own experiences and offer some thoughts to assist anyone who recognises similar blocks.

Let’s get started:

Money is the root of all evil

First up, dealing with beliefs about money is a foundational layer.

Personally, I grew up in a middle-class single-mum home. Certainly not the poorest (thanks to mum being a superstar) but certainly not the wealthiest.

I went to state (ie. free) school in London - private education wasn’t on the table. But then I went on to Oxford University because one teacher at my school happened to have gone there and encouraged a few of us to apply.

At Oxford I was suddenly surrounded by rich people. Very rich people. In fact I married one - my ex-wife is a billionaire. That’s a story for another time though!

Basically though I’ve always had whiplash when it comes to money. Being dragged back and forth from not much to a lot and back again. It does a number on you let me tell you.

From this I know I have certain beliefs around money: tendencies towards resentment, ascetic tastes, rejection of materialism, inability to buy stuff for myself etc.

I’m not going to unpack them all because this isn’t my personal diary! But I’ve sat down and worked them out and actively worked (and work!) on them.

All of us have pre-conceived beliefs and bias around money. Even you saying “I don’t have any beliefs around money” is a belief I’m afraid!

I’m not here to judge. But it is important to at least know what your beliefs are and if there are any that you might want to modify.

A great place to start is the book Psychology of Money by Morgan Housel. It’s basically a set of stories outlining different beliefs and bias, presented in a way so that you can recognise yourself in the stories.

I’ve also built you a coaching prompt to help you kick off the exploration process:

Help me to uncover any potential psychological blocks I have around money. Ask me 10 questions, one at a time, awaiting my response for each before asking the next.

At the end give me an assessment of areas where I may be experiencing blocks. Name them if they are known phenomenon. Point me in the direction of resources, actions and exercises that could assist with breaking the blocks

Like all coaching prompts the more information you give the better the results you’ll receive. It’s a guided process to help make the unconscious conscious.

Confidence in business

Even if you have your personal money beliefs on lock, being an entrepreneur can be challenging.

We have the tendency to always be comparing ourselves with others in business. And lo and behold wouldn’t you know everyone else is doing so much better! Always the way isn’t?

Learning from people who are ahead of us is a super powerful method - this is why I love X/Twitter. I can see people building their businesses in real time, sharing what works and what did not. That’s hyper-valuable.

To guard against comparison (or even envy) it’s important to realise that a lot of these creators and builders have been doing this for a long time.

The “overnight successes” you see on social media have been years in the making.

A really useful exercise is to go and look at the first things these people posted. At the beginning of their grind. Don’t look at where they are now. Look at where they started.

Gary Vee is always great for this. He dominates social media in the marketing space. And his videos nowadays are high quality and high volume.

But go back and look at his first videos. They look like they were recorded on a potato. They are overlong and circuitous. If they popped up on your feed now you’d likely swipe away immediately. Sorry Gary!

But then Gary Vee spent the next decade plus plugging away. Always improving, always refining. That’s what you are seeing when you watch a video now - a decade plus of improvement.

This is a far healthier comparison point. Seeing early work and thinking “huh, I can do that". Not looking at the end result now and thinking “I’ll never catch up”.

Also, be sure to follow business owners who are honest! Ones who talk about failures and struggles as well as wins. Off the top of my head Marc Lou, Tibo and Nico are great examples here. Stop following hyped up “$10,000/month on autopilot” trash. Regulate your information diet!

Public/private mismatch

I’ve found that the quickest way to deal with confidence issues is to be yourself.

Confidence issues occur when there’s a disconnect between how you portray yourself externally and how you perceive yourself internally.

When these images mismatch we have a crisis of confidence.

So - if your public persona matches your private persona confidence becomes a lot easier. You don’t need to “pretend” anything.

For instance in these newsletters I’m not pretending for a moment I’m the expert of everything. God forbid. I’m not smart enough for that! That would be exhausting!

What I am is a good researcher, experimenter and documenter. I’m always learning, testing and applying new strategies.

And when one works I write about it. Not as a master but instead because it worked for me and because I’m able to break it down in a way that makes it more universal for others.

One great method to work on this is by building in public. Going onto social and documenting every step of your journey.

You don’t pretend to be what you’re not. You simply document each step of the journey as you grow.

Build in Public is a great community because you get i) mutual support from others whilst ii) not trying to be something you are not. You can gain supporters and fans for your work regardless of where you are in your journey.

Uncertainty about the value of your offer

The final level here is uncertainty about the value of your offer.

This is what we’re working on all week. But I want to give an additional micro-tactic here.

As the good reviews, testimonials and emails come in…print them out. You know, using that old defunct printer hiding under your desk.

Stick them on a wall or in a binder where you can quickly access them.

Failing that take photos and chuck them in a screenshot folder. Whatever works.

On a regular basis review them all. Read through them. See what people are saying about you positively.

Eventually the sheer volume will overwhelm you.

If you think your offer sucks but 1000 people have gone out of their way to tell you it rocks then…maybe they are right and you are wrong? Maybe…and this sounds wild…maybe it’s actually good?

Use overwhelming positive proof to overwhelm any hangups you have by sheer force.

It’s a process

Don’t expect to read this and immediately overcome your:

• money biases

• business confidence issues

• uncertainty about value of offer

This will be a process. Proper deep internal work.

But use what we’ve covered in this Part to at least recognise these tendencies in yourself so you can direct the work.