Hey coaches. Welcome to such an important episode today. We're talking about self-trust, which is something that I'm kind of obsessed with. You've probably heard me talk about it before, but there's a good reason why I am. This is something that, believe it or not, is one of the most vital business skills you will have. [00:00:44] It's going to allow you to make decisions. It's going to allow you to create an authentic business that ultimately will succeed. Long-term. Self-trust is absolutely vital in terms of you being a truly masterful coach and offering your clients what they need. And self-trust is absolutely a foundational piece for creating an intentional life of peace and alignment where you truly feel. [00:01:13] You are living in your purpose. So I love this topic. I've talked about it specifically on a past episode, in relation to business mastery. You also, if you remember the interview with Andrea Giles, we talked about it and I've talked about this with our coaching collective mentors, because self-trust is a key component in our program, the coaching collective [00:01:36] And so I want to talk with you about it today and how it plays into each of these areas, business mastery, skill mastery, and your life. Before I do. I'm so excited to be at the fearless business workshop this week. It's in Dallas. And honestly it's only like 45 minutes from my house. [00:01:55] It's not really that far of a trek for me, but so much fun to be a part of it. And I'm just really grateful for the opportunity. So huge shout out to the Fearless Business Workshop and all the people who put it together. All right. Let's dive in. So self-trust, I want you to think for a minute about what this means to you. [00:02:17] What comes up for you when you think about this idea? When I think about self-trust, I think about this sort of whole settled feeling inside and something that actually we've heard a lot in the coaching collective is people say it feels like coming home in our community. And of course, we try to create an atmosphere where they do feel, seen, heard, loved, valued, and all of that. [00:02:45] However, the true reason they feel that way at a deep level is that we create an environment where we're helping our coaches to be able to reconnect with themselves. It's actually that self-connection and self-trust that creates that feeling for them. Self-trust is something that allows us to listen to an honor, our feelings, something that we often miss out on when we're a cognitive focus coach. [00:03:15] It also means giving yourself permission to ask for what you need in your life to get what you need to make choices that you are happy with. Self-trust is also part of confidence. It is a foundation that will guide you to make powerful choices in your life. Feeling empowered, feeling capable, and aligned with who you are. [00:03:40] Think again about what self-trust means to you and maybe just close your eyes for a minute and think about what areas of your life you feel the most sense of that self-trust. And it's important to think about that because it's also going to clue you in to the things that may be challenging your self-trust. [00:04:03] So let's talk about this. Why is self-trust challenged sometimes? Well, sometimes in life, when we may make a mistake or may make a choice that we perceive was a mistake. We blame ourselves. And chip away at that  self-trust rather than acknowledging that we're all human beings and humans make mistakes, or sometimes humans make choices that they later see another choice might've been better, right? [00:04:28] So that's the reality of it is that that's part of life. And yet, sometimes instead of having that view, we may tend to blame ourselves chipping away at the self-trust. Self-trust is also greatly challenged when our feelings are invalidated or ignored or challenged over the course of our life, either by others or by ourselves. [00:04:52] So maybe some of you listening are a very sensitive person. And have you ever thought you shouldn't feel that way or you shouldn't be so sensitive? I know that I've experienced that at times. Definitely thinking that I shouldn't be feeling the way that I am.  [00:05:06] One of the books that I've been really diving into and studying recently, written by Jonice Webb about overcoming childhood emotional neglect, is such a powerful example of how we chip away at our self-trust by invalidating feelings, by having feelings invalidated. And one of the things she says there is, our feelings are a more basic part of who we are than our thoughts. They are a physiological part of our bodies like fingernails and knees. Our emotions will not be erased and cannot be denied any more than we can erase or deny our hunger or thirst, our elbows or ear lobes. [00:05:45] And I think this is such a fascinating thing to think about because sensitive or not, even as a coach who has found the amazing gift of cognitive work, you may have mistakenly believed that thought awareness or intentional thinking can simply fix or get rid of emotions. And this actually will erode self-trust. [00:06:06] So we want to be aware of how cognitive work empowers us to be curious about our thinking, to be curious about our emotions. However, if we're using this to ignore or invalidate our feelings, it will actually have a negative impact eroding that self-trust. So there are so many ways self-trust can be challenged. [00:06:27] And I want you to just think about what it is for you. Is it outside voices? Is it an internal pattern you have? Or is it beliefs you've taken on about past mistakes or blame you've taken on about different circumstances in your life. Take a minute for you to identify where the self-trust is challenged. Okay. So let's go ahead and dive into what self-trust looks like in each of the three pillars, life mastery, business mastery, and skill mastery. [00:06:57] I'm going to speak to what self-trust means in each of these areas. And hopefully this will open your mind to how this may play out for you and make you aware of how you can lean more into self-trust. So let's talk about self-trust in life. Self-trust in life means you can honor your desires and your wants, rather than people pleasing or believing you have to justify them. [00:07:28] It means owning choices that you make without feeling the need to justify them. This includes things like money, how you spend your money, how you spend your time, how you utilize your energy. It's amazing how much time and energy we spend trying to justify what we'd want, excusing what we want, or even trying to fit into someone else's version of what our life should look like.   [00:07:58] When we can establish more self-trust it opens the door to honoring our desires and wants and owning choices and honoring our desires, wants, and owning choices also increases our self-trust. That's the amazing thing. We can go at this from both angles. [00:08:17] Self-trust in life also looks like honoring your feelings about what and who you want in your life. Think about if you spend time justifying keeping relationships in your life that don't serve you, maybe excusing things, maybe ignoring things. Do you do this and really think about why you're doing it? It's a fascinating experiment in what it is you are telling yourself about keeping a relationship in your life that is not helpful for you. [00:08:53] What else do you do this about in your life? Are there other circumstances, situations that you're in things you're participating in, that you are not honoring your feelings about honoring your desires. So notice where that comes up for you? Because again, the more we can honor the feelings we have and be clear about what we want in our life, it allows us to build that self-trust. [00:09:17] One more way that self-trust comes up in life or what it looks like is making decisions through filters you create, instead of those imposed on you. Do you make decisions about how you want to spend your time based on your personal priorities and values in life, or are you kind of making those decisions based on people pleasing or a lot of shoulds and supposed tos? [00:09:44] The more you can make decisions in your life through filters, you create and less on filters imposed on you, it will naturally build your self-trust, you will feel more in alignment and just feel kind of like you're on the same team as yourself. All right. Let's talk about self-trust in business. [00:10:07] Self-trust in business. Looks like, again, honoring your desires and wants in your business and owning choices. Now this can be very scary, right? Because part of the reason that we often look to outside advice or experts in our business is because obviously other people have more expertise, right? People that have already learned how to market, how to sell, how to run a business. We absolutely want to be learning all that we can. [00:10:37] And there's also often a part of us that is actually looking to others to make decisions for us, rather than owning them. This is kind of the sneaky way that we abdicate responsibility for our choices to avoid experiencing what we may create inside of us, which may be self-blame. [00:11:00] We have to risk failure. We have to risk being wrong and what we're afraid we may do to ourselves, if that happens. And so, as you can develop more self-trust in your business, this means that not only are you always learning and working to improve your business and grow things, but you're also asking yourself to make empowered choices and owning those 100%. [00:11:29] Self-trust in business also looks like paying attention to what you know instinctively your clients need and following that. I see it so often where coaches have a sense of what their clients need, but they question it simply because they're afraid that it's going to be a mistake or instead of following what they've felt coming up. [00:11:51] The sense that they've had, they go back and forth on it because sometimes staying in that place of indecision and confusion feels a little safer than moving forward. So self-trust means paying attention to what you know your client needs and following that. Giving it a shot, no matter what comes with it. [00:12:10] And finally self-trust in business, looks like making peace with who you are as a practitioner and leaning into that. Owning that you've heard me talk a lot about being your own authentic self, right? Bringing your own authentic coaching style. This creates an authentic business. So when you can have increased self-awareness of the gifts that you have, the abilities, whether innate or whether those things, those skills that you've built over time, make peace with who you are, connect with who you are, lean into it, own it and it is everything. [00:12:51] All right. Let's talk about what self-trust looks like in coaching skills. What this looks like is listening to your inner voice, telling you that your client needs something different in the moment or something different than you thought. This requires enough self-connection and trust in you. [00:13:10] That you can be tuned into the client's needs rather than operating from insecurity or from a rule book. It is very easy to get caught up in wanting to have your client validate you, wanting to have your thoughts about you in the session, overrun your thoughts about your client. So actually having more self-trust, having more self-connection allows you to be more present with your client and more client focused. [00:13:40] Finally, self-trust in coaching skills means trusting yourself enough and having that belief that you can have self-trust that you also make space for that to be true for your client, that your client is the expert in their life. When you can do this, when you can open up to relying on your client as the expert in their life, it will allow you to do a couple of things as a powerful coach. [00:14:11] Number one, it will definitely allow you to hold a neutral space where you do your job to show the client what is happening for them while trusting that they have the answers that is always going to be the most powerful place you can coach from. And on top of that, it also will allow you to show up consistently as a coach who helps your client to develop self-trust. [00:14:38] I strongly believe that the greatest gift I have given any of my clients over the course of working with them is helping them to establish self-trust, to be more connected with themselves and to feel more empowered. And that is what we do as coaches. It is not about the habits we help our clients change. It's not about the over-drinking or their relationship problems or increasing their income. [00:15:09] It's none of that. At the core of all of it is helping our clients to have self-trust, have confidence, help them grow their self-esteem, help them grow their self-worth. So they have such a powerful foundation that they can do anything. And I hope you will all give the same gift to yourself. That's what I've got for you.  [00:15:31]So much love to all of you, and I'll be with you again next week.  Thanks for listening to the masterful coach podcast. You can check out www.thecoachingcollective.com for info about the ultimate program for coaches. Building a business to find out more about Molly, you can visit www.mollyclaire.com.