25. The Key to Taking a Risk
This might come as a surprise to you, but many clients who want to sign up for coaching (and create the kinds of changes I talk about on the podcast) are afraid of taking the risk. And I get it. Signing up for coaching can feel scary when you’ve tried what feels like absolutely everything possible to get a particular result … and you still haven’t achieved it.
If you haven’t been able to create a new result in your life that you really want, despite all your best and most concerted efforts, you might wonder if coaching can actually help you or if this will be another disappointment like so many before. Again, I get it. It can feel so risky to keep showing up, keep trying things, and keep going after what you want. It can take a lot to keep believing in yourself and your capacity to create the life you want. It’s no small feat to keep trying things. But that ability to keep going - to not give up when things aren’t working yet - is key to creating anything you want that you don’t already have.
Because the real risk isn’t going after your dream and falling short. The real risk is giving up. If you try, you might fail again before you succeed. It’s possible. But even failure can move you towards your goal. Every time we try, we make progress, even if we don’t get what we want on that iteration. When we learn and keep going, we get closer to the result we’re trying to create. But if you don’t try, if you give up, you will FOR SURE not achieve your goal. And this is so important. The lie our brains tell is that there’s no point in trying, because we might not get to where we want to go. But again, if we don’t try, we definitely don’t get there. The brain will point to that and pretend like it’s proof we can’t make it. But it’s just proof we stopped trying. In order to get to your result, you have to keep trying. That’s all. That’s the whole trick. Try. Learn. Keep trying. And that is exactly what coaching teaches you how to do. That’s why coaching is so powerful, no matter what result you want to create with it. It teaches you the meta-skill of how to keep showing up until you get what you want. Is it a risk? Yes. But I happen to think it’s a much more worthwhile risk than doubling down on the status quo.
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WHAT YOU’LL LEARN FROM THIS EPISODE:
Why it’s important for you to know the kinds of results you can get with coaching.
The type of thoughts that keep you from taking risks.
Why you might be feeling risk-averse.
What a thought error is and how not having awareness around it keeps you stuck.
The number one thing that stands between you and your goals.
How you actually move closer to your goals by taking risks.
LISTEN TO THE FULL EPISODE:
FEATURED ON THE SHOW:
Leave me a rating and review on Apple Podcasts to receive an email from me with my deep-dive strategy session PDF document so you can walk yourself through it!
Feel free to ask me any questions over on Instagram!
FULL EPISODE TRANSCRIPT:
This week we’re talking about how to take risks and which thoughts get in the way of doing so.
You are listening to Love Your Job Before You Leave It, the podcast for ambitious, high-achieving womxn who are ready to stop feeling stressed about work and kiss burnout goodbye forever. Whether you’re starting a business or staying in your day job, this show will give you the coaching and guidance you need to start loving your work today. Here’s your host, Career Coach, Kori Linn.
Hey y'all, this week we are talking about risk taking, which is a topic that I am very passionate about. Especially because several years ago I quit my corporate job to take the risk of launching this business. And I remember very well how terrifying that was and how exhilarating it was. And a lot of times when people come to coaching, they want to take a risk of some kind. And coaching itself feels like a risk to them. They want to create something in their life that doesn't exist already.
They want to have a better experience of work, they want to get a different job, they want to get along better with their boss, they want to make more money. Whatever it is, they're trying to bring something new into being and they see that coaching is a way that they could do that or a tool that they could use to help them do that. And it feels risky. They're not sure if they want to believe that they can do this thing. They're not sure if they want to try it. It's like they want to believe they can do it, but they're scared to believe they can do it, right? I'm pretty sure we've all experienced that.
But before we get into it let's take a moment to read a review. This week's review is from B. from Ravenna and it's called “I love these podcasts.” The review says, “My business is that have a coach/trainer and I use Kori’s information and research in many of my sessions, (giving her credit of course). Kori is able to create pictures of the concepts she's describing. I learn something, if not many something's from each podcast. Thank you, Kori.”
B. from Ravenna, you are so welcome. I am delighted that the podcasts are useful for you. And I love that you're taking the information and using it to help even more people have a better experience at work and in their lives. I'm delighted by that.
Okay, so this week we're talking about risk taking and we're going to get into that in a minute. But first things first, I want to talk about the kind of results people get from coaching with me. Because that's what brings people to coaching often, is hearing what kind of results other people get. And that is one of the risks that I talk about with people most of the time is what feels risky to them is them trying to create these results with coaching and then being afraid that it's not going to happen.
So in the past several years in my business I have had a bunch of clients get really amazing results. I've had a client who stopped checking her email at night, stopped checking her email all throughout the day. So she started checking it only on a schedule instead of like constantly. And in the course of coaching together, she also got a new job that paid $20,000 more than her current job, which was, I think, like almost a 50% increase from the job she had had when we started working together.
And I love to think about that one because a $20,000 increase this year is $20,000. But over the course of her career, it's so much more, right? $20,000 a year over the next, let's say 20 years, that's like $400,000 if I'm doing my math right. Which I may or may not be but y'all got calculators, so it's fine. And I think that with what she learned in the six months we coached together she's going to have even bigger results in that because she's going to continue to get raises and promotions. And she's going to continue to make more and more money.
I had another client a couple years ago who took a lateral move in our coaching together. That was the first result for her, but then after that there was a reorg. And having taken that lateral move allowed her to step then further into another role that actually was an even better fit for her.
And I talked to her specifically about she probably would not have taken that lateral move before coaching because she had this idea that like every move had to be up. Even if she was in a job that wasn't a good fit for her, and she wanted to be in a different job the idea that she had to go up was kind of keeping her stuck in one way of thinking about her career trajectory. And deciding to take a lateral move instead allowed her to start working with a different team and get some different experiences. And those new experiences were ultimately what allowed her to get to that next job that came after that.
And of course not all the results that my clients get from coaching are about money or even getting new jobs. I have another client that I'm working with right now, her main results are just that she doesn't feel as stressed. She's able to actually enjoy her evenings and not spend them working, not check her email, but also not feel anxious the whole evening. She can enjoy her downtime and she can manage her work life when she's at work. And it's just like night and day for her, the experience of her job now, and the job didn't change at all.
What happened is she changed how she's thinking about her job, which changed her experience of it. She changed how she's showing up to that job and it's made a world of difference. So in that case it's not a difference like financially, she's not making more money. And she's not in a different role, she didn't necessarily get a promotion, but the entire feeling of her job is different. And it's allowing her to have such a more delightful life and such a more peaceful work life when she is at work.
For another one of my recent clients there's a big part of her job that she was really struggling with, and felt overwhelmed by, and had a lot of critical self-talk about. A lot of imposter syndrome and worrying that she wasn't good enough at that one part of her job or wasn't as good as the other people on her team. And for her the difference has been changing how she thinks about that one particular kind of work and really changing that self-talk, that narrative inside her head about it. And when we changed that she actually started producing a lot more of that work too.
So it's a beautiful result for her. She has a much different experience of that one kind of work. But there's also a really quantitative outcome, which is that she's producing tons more of it and able to deliver a lot more value in her role. Because she's able to do that work in a new way and in a more prolific way because of the way she's changed her thoughts about that part of her job. And because she stopped criticizing herself. Because when we criticize ourselves all day long, it's hard to do really good work, right?
Criticizing ourselves is tiring, it's taxing, it wears us out. So it's really interesting because a lot of us think that criticizing ourselves is going to help us show up more at work. It's like we've internalized our childhood thing where we “got in trouble” and we didn't do it right, and we're kind of trying to do that to ourselves all day long. But the irony of that is that it really slows us down and makes us create less good work, not more good work, and we feel a lot of anxiety and overwhelm. So that's been an amazing result for her. I think she actually did also get a promotion, which is also wonderful.
And of course, I think I've mentioned before, I'm a holistic coach. So even when my clients hire me for work stuff, we coach on anything they bring. So my clients often get along better with their spouses, they have better relationships with their kids, they often work on other habits in their lives. So a lot of my clients change the way they're eating, or like I had a client who changed the way she was drinking.
So I think when we started working together, she was like, out of habit, drinking a few glasses of wine every night. And through our work together, she cut that down and started drinking in a much more intentional way. So she didn't give up drinking altogether but deciding ahead of time how much she would want to drink, and then actually only drink that much. Whereas a lot of us decide ahead of time how much we want to drink and then drink the same amount we always do.
So I just wanted to give you these examples of what kinds of results people get from coaching, because I think it's helpful for the lesson I'm about to teach you about risk taking. Because like I was saying before, if you haven't created a result in your life before, especially if it's a result you really want and you've been really wanting, and you've tried a bunch of shit before and you haven't been able to do it, it can feel very risky to keep going after that result. It can feel very scary. For a lot of people it feels very emotionally loaded, very fraught.
So for instance, if you're feeling kind of like burned out and overwhelmed in your current job but you've already switched jobs like three times because every time you have a job you feel burned out and overwhelmed. So you switch and then you feel burned out and overwhelmed, and you switch and you feel burned out and overwhelmed. You may be in this place that I'm talking about where like you still want a solution, you still want a change, you still want to have a better experience.
But because you've tried stuff a bunch of times, you've tried changing the job a bunch of times, you might be feeling risk averse, right? You might be thinking like, “What's the fucking point? Every time I change something I just wind up right back here.” And in a way you're not wrong, right? Because that's been your experience.
As a coach though, what I know is, of course, you wind up back there because the way you're thinking about your work is the same. So even if you change the particular job you're in, our thoughts are nine tenths of reality y'all like because they're the lens through which we view everything. And that's why people come to me. And I can help them be in the same job and have a completely different experience of it by changing the way they think about that job, changing the way they show up to and interact with that job.
The reverse is also true, if you change jobs three times but are thinking about the work the same way and have the same habitual patterns that aren't working for you. And you're taking those habitual patterns with you to three jobs, then yeah, you're probably going to have the same or a similar experience. But I get how trying to change something, and trying to change something, and trying to change something, and actually making changes in your life but then your experience doesn't change can be really frustrating and can lead to you feeling risk averse.
So this happens a lot with people who want coaching because usually when someone wants coaching it's because they've tried a lot of shit already and they haven't figured it out on their own. So in a lot of ways, it's my job to help people figure out things that they have not been able to figure out before. But when people haven't been able to figure something out before they're suspicious, right? They're like, “Well, what if it can't be figured out?”
So all of that brings me to I was on a consult recently and I was talking to someone who wants to hire a coach, and she wants to have a different experience of her life. Like there were some tangibles that she wants to create but I'm not going to get into those here. And we were talking about why she wouldn't choose to do it. And the thing that came up for her was like, “What if it doesn't work? Like what if it doesn't work? What if it doesn't work for me? What if it goes wrong? What if it goes badly?” Right?
And what I was walking her through on that consult, what I was showing her is that the thought error here is actually this idea, what if it doesn't work. When I say thought error, what I mean is that there's a thought here that sounds true and sounds like let's say a “real concern” but it's a self-fulfilling prophecy. So when people think, “What if it doesn't work?” We tend to feel an emotion like dread or uncertainty. Then we don't take action, and then nothing in our life changes. And then we're like, “See, it didn't work.”
So what I'm saying here is that the thought, “What if it doesn't work? Or it might not work. Or what if it doesn't work for me?” That thought is an obstacle that prevents us from showing up and doing the things we need to do to create the result we want. But we don't realize that when it's happening.
So when this is happening in our lives, like there's something we want, let's say we want a new job. But we're having the thought like, “What if it doesn't work? Or like, what if it's not worth it to apply, to do all these applications? Or like what if it won't work for me?” Like obviously, other people are able to like apply for jobs and get them.
This is a thing the brain does a lot. It's like tricky, it'll be like, “Oh, other people can do that, but I can't.” Right? So the brain is like, “Obviously people can apply for jobs and get them, but I can't, something's wrong with me.” And then from that headspace we don't take any action, or we take like some half-assed action. We're like, “Oh, I looked at three jobs and applied to them, but like not in a way that was probably going to help me get the jobs.” Right?
Like I did this actually in my own past, I would like, “apply to jobs” but if I was having this, like this was before coaching, so I didn't know I was doing it. But if I was in the headspace of like, “This probably won't work, or it's not going to work for me.” I would like not, you know, zhuzh up my resume for this particular job, or like I wouldn't look on LinkedIn and see like do I know anyone there who could talk to me or connect me with somebody? I wouldn't use the full force of my resources to try to get the job, I would half-ass it, assume it wasn't going to work, then it wouldn't work. And then I could throw my hands up in the air and be like, “See, it's not working.”
And so this is what's so important, we think that taking risks is like dangerous. We’re like, “I don't want to take a risk because that's dangerous.” But as a coach, what I want to offer is taking risks isn't dangerous. What's dangerous is this thought, “What if it doesn't work for me?” And then we don't show up and try, and then we believe it doesn't work for us.
That's actually what's dangerous. If you want to know the number one thing that's going to get between you and your goals, between you and your dream life, between you and having the career you want to have that's full of meaning, and purpose, and joy, and delight, and, you know, wonderful challenges that are fun to work on. It's not you taking a risk. It's you not trying because you don't believe it's possible for you to get the thing you want.
I want to say this again because it's so important. When we think we can't have the thing we want, for any reason, whether it's like it won't work for me, or what if it doesn't work out, or whatever. When we think it's not possible, we don't try. Then we don't get the thing or we try and half-ass it and still don't get the thing. And then we think the logical outcome there is, see I can't have the thing. But all we've proven to ourselves is that when we believe we can't have it we don't get it.
So this brings me back to risk. What I want to offer to you is what if the bigger risk is not you trying to get the thing and then maybe you hit a rough patch or like it doesn't turn out the way you want it to? What if the bigger risk is you not trying or you doing that half-assed trying I was talking about before? I see so many people with big dreams and visions for what they want their lives to be like that I think you can have that thing. I believe in you, that's like part of my job as a coach is to believe in your unlimited potential. And to believe in your capacity to create the thing you want.
This is what coaching does. You actually have all the answers, you have all the power inside of you, you have the capacity. I mean, sometimes we have to like grow and learn new things, for sure. But what I'm saying is I believe that you have the capacity to bring about the things you dream of. And as a coach, what I help you do is remove the obstacles. And by obstacles most of the time I mean the thought patterns.
The thought patterns like the one I talked about before this idea of, “What if it doesn't work out for me?” Because that thought sounds useful, it sounds helpful but it's not. It's just like a cock block, okay? Because it just keeps us from trying, and it keeps us like stuck in this like, “Poor me, it just won't work out for me. And it's not my fault, it's just not meant to be. And I don't have to try so I won't try, and I can't try. Because if I do try it won't work out.” I really want to impress upon you that that's just a self-fulfilling prophecy, it's just a vicious cycle. And it will 100% seem like it's “just reality” when you're in it, but it's not just reality.
So at this point, I think I have to say that, yes, sometimes we will take a risk and try something, and it won't go the way we want it to. Maybe we don't actually get the outcome we want. That is possible, that's always possible. But what I want to offer is, what if that's still better than not taking the risk?
Here's how I want you to think about it instead, every time you take a risk in the direction of your dreams it moves you closer. Even if you literally didn't move any closer, right? So let me break that down for you. If you want a new job, and you're like, “Cool, I'm going to apply to new jobs until I get one. I'm not going to think it's not possible for me, I'm just going to apply to new jobs until I get one. I'm just going to take the risk, and take the risk, and take the risk.”
Maybe you apply to five, and you don't get any of them. So in a way, you're not any closer, right? You've applied to five jobs, but you still don't have a new job. So like sort of you're still in that same place like if you hadn't applied to any. But what I'm saying is even if you don't move closer, you're moving closer by applying to five. Even if you don't get any jobs, even if you don't get any interviews, any second glances, anything whatsoever you still move closer to that goal, because you tried something and you can learn from that.
At that point you've done like five cover letters, you've put your resume in five times. Like maybe you've even rewritten your resume for the different job postings. By taking those risks and moving towards the goal, you actually are learning and getting closer. It's kind of like you're doing iterations.
Like when we design a product, usually the first time we design the product that's not the final product, we don't even expect it to be, right? We're like, “Here is the first version.” And then we get feedback and then we design version two, version three, version four. So even a product that doesn't turn out to be a final product, can move you closer to the final product, can move you closer to the version of your dream that you're hoping for, that you want to bring into being.
And a lot of times when you take these risks and when you move in that direction, you're not going to be getting nowhere. You're going to be getting a little bit of somewhere and getting more information that can help you get even further there and get even further and get even further and go. And sometimes when we are just willing to take the risk, we get exactly to where we want to be, and it doesn't actually take as long as we thought it would.
To say all of this a different way, the only way we get what we want when we don't already have it is to take a risk. So if you don't try, if you don't take the risk, we know for sure what you're getting. You're doubling down on the status quo, you're going to get more of that unless something else comes in and acts upon your life. Which could happen, but why count on that right? Why wait for something else to change for you to get what you want? Whereas when you're willing to take a risk, then you get to bet on you. Then you get to know that you're showing up for you, you're showing up for your dreams, you're showing up for the career you want for the life you want to have.
I'm not saying that there won't be any bumps in the road, often there are bumps in the road. Often, we have to move a little closer to our goal and then like recalibrate and pick ourselves back up and dust ourselves off. And then keep going and keep going. But what I do know is that when we're willing to take risks, that's how we get there. And when we're not willing to take risks, we don't get there. We don't get anywhere, we get to be exactly where we are.
So the question really is, do you want to bet on yourself? Bet on your possibility, bet on the potential to create the thing you want to create? Or do you want to double down on that status quo? Do you want more of what you already have that you actually don't like at all? I think when we think about it this way, taking the risk is like an obvious hell yes. Right? Like why wouldn't we take the risk? If we already have something and we're like, “This is not that great.” Why would we want more of it? Why would we stay where we are and just double down on having more of that when we could have the opportunity to move closer to our goal and to have more of what we want?
That being said, I get that it's scary. So that's why we're going to go back to I think that thought that usually blocks people from taking the risk is like, “What if it doesn't work out? What if it's not possible? What if it's not possible for me?” Right? A lot of times, it's that personal thing? We're like, “Sure, sure, sure. It's possible for someone, but what if it's not possible for me?” And those thoughts, again, they cock block us, right?
So the first thing I want you to be able to do is just to notice that. To notice that there's part of your brain that's like, “I don't know about this risk, I'd rather you just like stay where you are because that seems safer.” And then when you realize that that's what your brain is doing, because, listen, that's how brains evolved. They evolved to keep you alive, they didn't evolve to keep you like overjoyed and feeling super fucking satisfied and having a delightful career. Your brain wants you to stay alive. And it sees risk as a threat to that. So you have to override that discomfort of your brain in order to take those risks.
But when you can see that for what it is and you're like, “Cool, I feel super uncomfortable. My brain doesn't want me to take risks, it doesn't know what's over there, it wants me to stay alive.” Then you can ask yourself like, “Okay, but do I want to double down on the status quo? Or do I want to bet on me? Do I want to bet on possibility?” Like, do I want to live the rest of my life thinking I decided it's not possible to have what I want. So I have to like live this other version of life where I don't have what I want. Or do you want to go find out if you can make it happen for yourself?
I don't see any downside to going and figuring out if you can make it happen for yourself. It's scary sometimes over there. Listen, I get that because like, again, I quit my cozy corporate job to launch a business. And there was some time in there when I did not 100% know what I was doing. Spoiler alert, I still don't 100% know what I'm doing but I have a lot of it figured out now, right? And I was very uncomfortable.
That was part of it, I took that risk, and then I had to keep taking the risk and keep taking the risk and keep showing up to that to get to where I was. But I'm so grateful that I did that. Because if I had stayed in corporate, like I would have, you know, that corporate coziness. Maybe, I mean, that company actually laid off a lot of people. You know, since I quit, they've laid off a lot of people, so I might not even have that job. But by betting on me and betting on my dreams, I got to go figure out how to make those happen.
So here's the thing, your brain for sure is not going to want to take the risk because, again, it wants to keep you alive. And that thought pattern that's going to fuck it up for you is probably some version of, “What if it doesn't work out?” But that thought pattern will just prove itself true. As long as you're staying in that headspace of, “What if it doesn't work out?” You will actually make it not work out because of how you show up in the world when you believe that. And then it'll just seem true. So don't do that.
If you want to stay where you are, just be honest with yourself. Just be like, “I'm going to stay here, I don't want to fucking go figure this out. I don't want to take the risk. I understand what I'm doing. I'm going to double down on the status quo.” There's nothing wrong with that, you can totally make that choice.
But if you want to take a risk, if you want to bet on yourself, if you want to bet on your dreams and your vision, you got to change the way you think about risk. You got to change that thought from, “What if it doesn't work out?” To like, “What if it does work out? What if I'm willing to make it work out? What if I'm willing to show up to this dream and vision again, and again, and again, and learn, and keep going and do that until I have what I want?” That's a really powerful question for you to consider.
Every client of mine who's gotten amazing results has had to go through this process. They've had to feel that sensation of fear in their body when they thought, “What if it doesn't work out?” And then they decided to think, “No, I'm going to do this. I'm going to do this. I'm afraid, I'm going to do it anyways. I'm going to bet on me, I'm going to bet on my dreams, I'm going to bet on my vision.”
None of them would have gotten to the place of creating the big changes in their lives that they created through coaching without choosing to bet on themselves first. So just think about that, what if anything is possible for you? And the only thing you have to do to get there is to be willing to bet on yourself and keep going until you get what you want.
All right, so just to review, we all have human brains here, and they have some things that they like to do. And one of the things they like to do is keep us safe. So when we have options in our lives that our brain perceives as risks, our brain is going to probably encourage us not to do them, because it wants us to stay alive. And it knows that in the status quo we stay alive, even if we don't stay happy. For instance even if we're not satisfied in our work.
And if you want to go after a big, beautiful goal or dream of yours, that's going to require feeling that sensation of risk, feeling that perceived danger, and betting on yourself and choosing that on purpose because that's not what the brain will offer you when left to its own devices. So you can take a risk, you can take whatever risk you want to and the key to doing that is the story you tell yourself about the risk and not falling for your brain when it says, “Okay, but what if it doesn't work out?”
And if you love what I teach, and you want some help taking things a little bit deeper and figuring out how this all applies to your own life I've got good news for you, I've got space for a few new one on one coaching clients starting this month. So let's hop on a call, I'll give you some coaching right away to help you get going. And if it seems like a good fit, I will share with you how we can work together. Just head on over to my website and click on the work with me button and get started there.
Also bonus, my coaching offering is totally virtual so as to better serve my global audience. And yes, I do work with people who are not native English speakers, and we've had great success doing that. There's even a testimonial on my website with someone in that category. So you can check that out on the testimonials page. All right y'all, have a lovely week and I will talk to you next time. Bye.
Thank you for listening to Love Your Job Before You Leave It. We'll have another episode for you next week. And in the meantime, if you're feeling super fired up, head on over to korilinn.com for more guidance and resources.
You are listening to Love Your Job Before You Leave It, the podcast for ambitious, high-achieving womxn who are ready to stop feeling stressed about work and kiss burnout goodbye forever. Whether you’re starting a business or staying in your day job, this show will give you the coaching and guidance you need to start loving your work today. Here’s your host, Career Coach, Kori Linn.
Hey y'all, this week we are talking about risk taking, which is a topic that I am very passionate about. Especially because several years ago I quit my corporate job to take the risk of launching this business. And I remember very well how terrifying that was and how exhilarating it was. And a lot of times when people come to coaching, they want to take a risk of some kind. And coaching itself feels like a risk to them. They want to create something in their life that doesn't exist already.
They want to have a better experience of work, they want to get a different job, they want to get along better with their boss, they want to make more money. Whatever it is, they're trying to bring something new into being and they see that coaching is a way that they could do that or a tool that they could use to help them do that. And it feels risky. They're not sure if they want to believe that they can do this thing. They're not sure if they want to try it. It's like they want to believe they can do it, but they're scared to believe they can do it, right? I'm pretty sure we've all experienced that.
But before we get into it let's take a moment to read a review. This week's review is from B. from Ravenna and it's called “I love these podcasts.” The review says, “My business is that have a coach/trainer and I use Kori’s information and research in many of my sessions, (giving her credit of course). Kori is able to create pictures of the concepts she's describing. I learn something, if not many something's from each podcast. Thank you, Kori.”
B. from Ravenna, you are so welcome. I am delighted that the podcasts are useful for you. And I love that you're taking the information and using it to help even more people have a better experience at work and in their lives. I'm delighted by that.
Okay, so this week we're talking about risk taking and we're going to get into that in a minute. But first things first, I want to talk about the kind of results people get from coaching with me. Because that's what brings people to coaching often, is hearing what kind of results other people get. And that is one of the risks that I talk about with people most of the time is what feels risky to them is them trying to create these results with coaching and then being afraid that it's not going to happen.
So in the past several years in my business I have had a bunch of clients get really amazing results. I've had a client who stopped checking her email at night, stopped checking her email all throughout the day. So she started checking it only on a schedule instead of like constantly. And in the course of coaching together, she also got a new job that paid $20,000 more than her current job, which was, I think, like almost a 50% increase from the job she had had when we started working together.
And I love to think about that one because a $20,000 increase this year is $20,000. But over the course of her career, it's so much more, right? $20,000 a year over the next, let's say 20 years, that's like $400,000 if I'm doing my math right. Which I may or may not be but y'all got calculators, so it's fine. And I think that with what she learned in the six months we coached together she's going to have even bigger results in that because she's going to continue to get raises and promotions. And she's going to continue to make more and more money.
I had another client a couple years ago who took a lateral move in our coaching together. That was the first result for her, but then after that there was a reorg. And having taken that lateral move allowed her to step then further into another role that actually was an even better fit for her.
And I talked to her specifically about she probably would not have taken that lateral move before coaching because she had this idea that like every move had to be up. Even if she was in a job that wasn't a good fit for her, and she wanted to be in a different job the idea that she had to go up was kind of keeping her stuck in one way of thinking about her career trajectory. And deciding to take a lateral move instead allowed her to start working with a different team and get some different experiences. And those new experiences were ultimately what allowed her to get to that next job that came after that.
And of course not all the results that my clients get from coaching are about money or even getting new jobs. I have another client that I'm working with right now, her main results are just that she doesn't feel as stressed. She's able to actually enjoy her evenings and not spend them working, not check her email, but also not feel anxious the whole evening. She can enjoy her downtime and she can manage her work life when she's at work. And it's just like night and day for her, the experience of her job now, and the job didn't change at all.
What happened is she changed how she's thinking about her job, which changed her experience of it. She changed how she's showing up to that job and it's made a world of difference. So in that case it's not a difference like financially, she's not making more money. And she's not in a different role, she didn't necessarily get a promotion, but the entire feeling of her job is different. And it's allowing her to have such a more delightful life and such a more peaceful work life when she is at work.
For another one of my recent clients there's a big part of her job that she was really struggling with, and felt overwhelmed by, and had a lot of critical self-talk about. A lot of imposter syndrome and worrying that she wasn't good enough at that one part of her job or wasn't as good as the other people on her team. And for her the difference has been changing how she thinks about that one particular kind of work and really changing that self-talk, that narrative inside her head about it. And when we changed that she actually started producing a lot more of that work too.
So it's a beautiful result for her. She has a much different experience of that one kind of work. But there's also a really quantitative outcome, which is that she's producing tons more of it and able to deliver a lot more value in her role. Because she's able to do that work in a new way and in a more prolific way because of the way she's changed her thoughts about that part of her job. And because she stopped criticizing herself. Because when we criticize ourselves all day long, it's hard to do really good work, right?
Criticizing ourselves is tiring, it's taxing, it wears us out. So it's really interesting because a lot of us think that criticizing ourselves is going to help us show up more at work. It's like we've internalized our childhood thing where we “got in trouble” and we didn't do it right, and we're kind of trying to do that to ourselves all day long. But the irony of that is that it really slows us down and makes us create less good work, not more good work, and we feel a lot of anxiety and overwhelm. So that's been an amazing result for her. I think she actually did also get a promotion, which is also wonderful.
And of course, I think I've mentioned before, I'm a holistic coach. So even when my clients hire me for work stuff, we coach on anything they bring. So my clients often get along better with their spouses, they have better relationships with their kids, they often work on other habits in their lives. So a lot of my clients change the way they're eating, or like I had a client who changed the way she was drinking.
So I think when we started working together, she was like, out of habit, drinking a few glasses of wine every night. And through our work together, she cut that down and started drinking in a much more intentional way. So she didn't give up drinking altogether but deciding ahead of time how much she would want to drink, and then actually only drink that much. Whereas a lot of us decide ahead of time how much we want to drink and then drink the same amount we always do.
So I just wanted to give you these examples of what kinds of results people get from coaching, because I think it's helpful for the lesson I'm about to teach you about risk taking. Because like I was saying before, if you haven't created a result in your life before, especially if it's a result you really want and you've been really wanting, and you've tried a bunch of shit before and you haven't been able to do it, it can feel very risky to keep going after that result. It can feel very scary. For a lot of people it feels very emotionally loaded, very fraught.
So for instance, if you're feeling kind of like burned out and overwhelmed in your current job but you've already switched jobs like three times because every time you have a job you feel burned out and overwhelmed. So you switch and then you feel burned out and overwhelmed, and you switch and you feel burned out and overwhelmed. You may be in this place that I'm talking about where like you still want a solution, you still want a change, you still want to have a better experience.
But because you've tried stuff a bunch of times, you've tried changing the job a bunch of times, you might be feeling risk averse, right? You might be thinking like, “What's the fucking point? Every time I change something I just wind up right back here.” And in a way you're not wrong, right? Because that's been your experience.
As a coach though, what I know is, of course, you wind up back there because the way you're thinking about your work is the same. So even if you change the particular job you're in, our thoughts are nine tenths of reality y'all like because they're the lens through which we view everything. And that's why people come to me. And I can help them be in the same job and have a completely different experience of it by changing the way they think about that job, changing the way they show up to and interact with that job.
The reverse is also true, if you change jobs three times but are thinking about the work the same way and have the same habitual patterns that aren't working for you. And you're taking those habitual patterns with you to three jobs, then yeah, you're probably going to have the same or a similar experience. But I get how trying to change something, and trying to change something, and trying to change something, and actually making changes in your life but then your experience doesn't change can be really frustrating and can lead to you feeling risk averse.
So this happens a lot with people who want coaching because usually when someone wants coaching it's because they've tried a lot of shit already and they haven't figured it out on their own. So in a lot of ways, it's my job to help people figure out things that they have not been able to figure out before. But when people haven't been able to figure something out before they're suspicious, right? They're like, “Well, what if it can't be figured out?”
So all of that brings me to I was on a consult recently and I was talking to someone who wants to hire a coach, and she wants to have a different experience of her life. Like there were some tangibles that she wants to create but I'm not going to get into those here. And we were talking about why she wouldn't choose to do it. And the thing that came up for her was like, “What if it doesn't work? Like what if it doesn't work? What if it doesn't work for me? What if it goes wrong? What if it goes badly?” Right?
And what I was walking her through on that consult, what I was showing her is that the thought error here is actually this idea, what if it doesn't work. When I say thought error, what I mean is that there's a thought here that sounds true and sounds like let's say a “real concern” but it's a self-fulfilling prophecy. So when people think, “What if it doesn't work?” We tend to feel an emotion like dread or uncertainty. Then we don't take action, and then nothing in our life changes. And then we're like, “See, it didn't work.”
So what I'm saying here is that the thought, “What if it doesn't work? Or it might not work. Or what if it doesn't work for me?” That thought is an obstacle that prevents us from showing up and doing the things we need to do to create the result we want. But we don't realize that when it's happening.
So when this is happening in our lives, like there's something we want, let's say we want a new job. But we're having the thought like, “What if it doesn't work? Or like, what if it's not worth it to apply, to do all these applications? Or like what if it won't work for me?” Like obviously, other people are able to like apply for jobs and get them.
This is a thing the brain does a lot. It's like tricky, it'll be like, “Oh, other people can do that, but I can't.” Right? So the brain is like, “Obviously people can apply for jobs and get them, but I can't, something's wrong with me.” And then from that headspace we don't take any action, or we take like some half-assed action. We're like, “Oh, I looked at three jobs and applied to them, but like not in a way that was probably going to help me get the jobs.” Right?
Like I did this actually in my own past, I would like, “apply to jobs” but if I was having this, like this was before coaching, so I didn't know I was doing it. But if I was in the headspace of like, “This probably won't work, or it's not going to work for me.” I would like not, you know, zhuzh up my resume for this particular job, or like I wouldn't look on LinkedIn and see like do I know anyone there who could talk to me or connect me with somebody? I wouldn't use the full force of my resources to try to get the job, I would half-ass it, assume it wasn't going to work, then it wouldn't work. And then I could throw my hands up in the air and be like, “See, it's not working.”
And so this is what's so important, we think that taking risks is like dangerous. We’re like, “I don't want to take a risk because that's dangerous.” But as a coach, what I want to offer is taking risks isn't dangerous. What's dangerous is this thought, “What if it doesn't work for me?” And then we don't show up and try, and then we believe it doesn't work for us.
That's actually what's dangerous. If you want to know the number one thing that's going to get between you and your goals, between you and your dream life, between you and having the career you want to have that's full of meaning, and purpose, and joy, and delight, and, you know, wonderful challenges that are fun to work on. It's not you taking a risk. It's you not trying because you don't believe it's possible for you to get the thing you want.
I want to say this again because it's so important. When we think we can't have the thing we want, for any reason, whether it's like it won't work for me, or what if it doesn't work out, or whatever. When we think it's not possible, we don't try. Then we don't get the thing or we try and half-ass it and still don't get the thing. And then we think the logical outcome there is, see I can't have the thing. But all we've proven to ourselves is that when we believe we can't have it we don't get it.
So this brings me back to risk. What I want to offer to you is what if the bigger risk is not you trying to get the thing and then maybe you hit a rough patch or like it doesn't turn out the way you want it to? What if the bigger risk is you not trying or you doing that half-assed trying I was talking about before? I see so many people with big dreams and visions for what they want their lives to be like that I think you can have that thing. I believe in you, that's like part of my job as a coach is to believe in your unlimited potential. And to believe in your capacity to create the thing you want.
This is what coaching does. You actually have all the answers, you have all the power inside of you, you have the capacity. I mean, sometimes we have to like grow and learn new things, for sure. But what I'm saying is I believe that you have the capacity to bring about the things you dream of. And as a coach, what I help you do is remove the obstacles. And by obstacles most of the time I mean the thought patterns.
The thought patterns like the one I talked about before this idea of, “What if it doesn't work out for me?” Because that thought sounds useful, it sounds helpful but it's not. It's just like a cock block, okay? Because it just keeps us from trying, and it keeps us like stuck in this like, “Poor me, it just won't work out for me. And it's not my fault, it's just not meant to be. And I don't have to try so I won't try, and I can't try. Because if I do try it won't work out.” I really want to impress upon you that that's just a self-fulfilling prophecy, it's just a vicious cycle. And it will 100% seem like it's “just reality” when you're in it, but it's not just reality.
So at this point, I think I have to say that, yes, sometimes we will take a risk and try something, and it won't go the way we want it to. Maybe we don't actually get the outcome we want. That is possible, that's always possible. But what I want to offer is, what if that's still better than not taking the risk?
Here's how I want you to think about it instead, every time you take a risk in the direction of your dreams it moves you closer. Even if you literally didn't move any closer, right? So let me break that down for you. If you want a new job, and you're like, “Cool, I'm going to apply to new jobs until I get one. I'm not going to think it's not possible for me, I'm just going to apply to new jobs until I get one. I'm just going to take the risk, and take the risk, and take the risk.”
Maybe you apply to five, and you don't get any of them. So in a way, you're not any closer, right? You've applied to five jobs, but you still don't have a new job. So like sort of you're still in that same place like if you hadn't applied to any. But what I'm saying is even if you don't move closer, you're moving closer by applying to five. Even if you don't get any jobs, even if you don't get any interviews, any second glances, anything whatsoever you still move closer to that goal, because you tried something and you can learn from that.
At that point you've done like five cover letters, you've put your resume in five times. Like maybe you've even rewritten your resume for the different job postings. By taking those risks and moving towards the goal, you actually are learning and getting closer. It's kind of like you're doing iterations.
Like when we design a product, usually the first time we design the product that's not the final product, we don't even expect it to be, right? We're like, “Here is the first version.” And then we get feedback and then we design version two, version three, version four. So even a product that doesn't turn out to be a final product, can move you closer to the final product, can move you closer to the version of your dream that you're hoping for, that you want to bring into being.
And a lot of times when you take these risks and when you move in that direction, you're not going to be getting nowhere. You're going to be getting a little bit of somewhere and getting more information that can help you get even further there and get even further and get even further and go. And sometimes when we are just willing to take the risk, we get exactly to where we want to be, and it doesn't actually take as long as we thought it would.
To say all of this a different way, the only way we get what we want when we don't already have it is to take a risk. So if you don't try, if you don't take the risk, we know for sure what you're getting. You're doubling down on the status quo, you're going to get more of that unless something else comes in and acts upon your life. Which could happen, but why count on that right? Why wait for something else to change for you to get what you want? Whereas when you're willing to take a risk, then you get to bet on you. Then you get to know that you're showing up for you, you're showing up for your dreams, you're showing up for the career you want for the life you want to have.
I'm not saying that there won't be any bumps in the road, often there are bumps in the road. Often, we have to move a little closer to our goal and then like recalibrate and pick ourselves back up and dust ourselves off. And then keep going and keep going. But what I do know is that when we're willing to take risks, that's how we get there. And when we're not willing to take risks, we don't get there. We don't get anywhere, we get to be exactly where we are.
So the question really is, do you want to bet on yourself? Bet on your possibility, bet on the potential to create the thing you want to create? Or do you want to double down on that status quo? Do you want more of what you already have that you actually don't like at all? I think when we think about it this way, taking the risk is like an obvious hell yes. Right? Like why wouldn't we take the risk? If we already have something and we're like, “This is not that great.” Why would we want more of it? Why would we stay where we are and just double down on having more of that when we could have the opportunity to move closer to our goal and to have more of what we want?
That being said, I get that it's scary. So that's why we're going to go back to I think that thought that usually blocks people from taking the risk is like, “What if it doesn't work out? What if it's not possible? What if it's not possible for me?” Right? A lot of times, it's that personal thing? We're like, “Sure, sure, sure. It's possible for someone, but what if it's not possible for me?” And those thoughts, again, they cock block us, right?
So the first thing I want you to be able to do is just to notice that. To notice that there's part of your brain that's like, “I don't know about this risk, I'd rather you just like stay where you are because that seems safer.” And then when you realize that that's what your brain is doing, because, listen, that's how brains evolved. They evolved to keep you alive, they didn't evolve to keep you like overjoyed and feeling super fucking satisfied and having a delightful career. Your brain wants you to stay alive. And it sees risk as a threat to that. So you have to override that discomfort of your brain in order to take those risks.
But when you can see that for what it is and you're like, “Cool, I feel super uncomfortable. My brain doesn't want me to take risks, it doesn't know what's over there, it wants me to stay alive.” Then you can ask yourself like, “Okay, but do I want to double down on the status quo? Or do I want to bet on me? Do I want to bet on possibility?” Like, do I want to live the rest of my life thinking I decided it's not possible to have what I want. So I have to like live this other version of life where I don't have what I want. Or do you want to go find out if you can make it happen for yourself?
I don't see any downside to going and figuring out if you can make it happen for yourself. It's scary sometimes over there. Listen, I get that because like, again, I quit my cozy corporate job to launch a business. And there was some time in there when I did not 100% know what I was doing. Spoiler alert, I still don't 100% know what I'm doing but I have a lot of it figured out now, right? And I was very uncomfortable.
That was part of it, I took that risk, and then I had to keep taking the risk and keep taking the risk and keep showing up to that to get to where I was. But I'm so grateful that I did that. Because if I had stayed in corporate, like I would have, you know, that corporate coziness. Maybe, I mean, that company actually laid off a lot of people. You know, since I quit, they've laid off a lot of people, so I might not even have that job. But by betting on me and betting on my dreams, I got to go figure out how to make those happen.
So here's the thing, your brain for sure is not going to want to take the risk because, again, it wants to keep you alive. And that thought pattern that's going to fuck it up for you is probably some version of, “What if it doesn't work out?” But that thought pattern will just prove itself true. As long as you're staying in that headspace of, “What if it doesn't work out?” You will actually make it not work out because of how you show up in the world when you believe that. And then it'll just seem true. So don't do that.
If you want to stay where you are, just be honest with yourself. Just be like, “I'm going to stay here, I don't want to fucking go figure this out. I don't want to take the risk. I understand what I'm doing. I'm going to double down on the status quo.” There's nothing wrong with that, you can totally make that choice.
But if you want to take a risk, if you want to bet on yourself, if you want to bet on your dreams and your vision, you got to change the way you think about risk. You got to change that thought from, “What if it doesn't work out?” To like, “What if it does work out? What if I'm willing to make it work out? What if I'm willing to show up to this dream and vision again, and again, and again, and learn, and keep going and do that until I have what I want?” That's a really powerful question for you to consider.
Every client of mine who's gotten amazing results has had to go through this process. They've had to feel that sensation of fear in their body when they thought, “What if it doesn't work out?” And then they decided to think, “No, I'm going to do this. I'm going to do this. I'm afraid, I'm going to do it anyways. I'm going to bet on me, I'm going to bet on my dreams, I'm going to bet on my vision.”
None of them would have gotten to the place of creating the big changes in their lives that they created through coaching without choosing to bet on themselves first. So just think about that, what if anything is possible for you? And the only thing you have to do to get there is to be willing to bet on yourself and keep going until you get what you want.
All right, so just to review, we all have human brains here, and they have some things that they like to do. And one of the things they like to do is keep us safe. So when we have options in our lives that our brain perceives as risks, our brain is going to probably encourage us not to do them, because it wants us to stay alive. And it knows that in the status quo we stay alive, even if we don't stay happy. For instance even if we're not satisfied in our work.
And if you want to go after a big, beautiful goal or dream of yours, that's going to require feeling that sensation of risk, feeling that perceived danger, and betting on yourself and choosing that on purpose because that's not what the brain will offer you when left to its own devices. So you can take a risk, you can take whatever risk you want to and the key to doing that is the story you tell yourself about the risk and not falling for your brain when it says, “Okay, but what if it doesn't work out?”
And if you love what I teach, and you want some help taking things a little bit deeper and figuring out how this all applies to your own life I've got good news for you, I've got space for a few new one on one coaching clients starting this month. So let's hop on a call, I'll give you some coaching right away to help you get going. And if it seems like a good fit, I will share with you how we can work together. Just head on over to my website and click on the work with me button and get started there.
Also bonus, my coaching offering is totally virtual so as to better serve my global audience. And yes, I do work with people who are not native English speakers, and we've had great success doing that. There's even a testimonial on my website with someone in that category. So you can check that out on the testimonials page. All right y'all, have a lovely week and I will talk to you next time. Bye.
Thank you for listening to Love Your Job Before You Leave It. We'll have another episode for you next week. And in the meantime, if you're feeling super fired up, head on over to korilinn.com for more guidance and resources.
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