Be a Badass - Part 1

Do you want to be a badass, or do you just want the results that a badass creates?

There is a big distinction.

Many people want an extraordinary life without becoming the person who produces it. They want the success, but they do not want to develop the mental strength and work ethic required to create it.

I have spent years asking how I can help people create the success they want. I know you do not have to be the smartest person in the room. You do not need a perfect childhood.

But you do need to become someone who can handle resistance, overcome challenges, and produce results.

The two characteristics I see in badasses

When I look at people I admire who have achieved impossible goals, I see two characteristics.

The first is mental strength. They use their minds consciously and have developed the ability to be strong.

The second is an incredible work ethic that produces results.

These characteristics support each other. You need mental strength to get yourself to work hard, and you need to work on your mind to develop that strength.

Think about someone you admire who is tough, impressive, and uncompromising. Test this idea. Are they mentally strong? Do they work in a way that creates results?

Those are the two areas I want you to examine in yourself.

Work ethic is about what you produce

I see two misconceptions about hard work.

Some people do not understand how hard they need to work. They are not focused, productive, or challenging themselves, but they think they are doing enough and that it should be easier.

Others think a strong work ethic means working all the time, being overwhelmed, staying up all night, and abandoning the rest of their lives.

Neither approach is useful.

I do not believe you need to work every night and weekend or wake up at the crack of dawn. That is not what I teach.

I believe you need to develop the ability to produce significant results quickly.

When you put in the hours, you know how to focus and work hard. What you produce has an effect on your life and the world, and increasingly creates what you want.

Working all the time and producing results are different things.

Build the ability to handle challenges

Mental strength allows you to think that you can handle this, overcome the obstacle, and make something happen.

Reading the memoirs of Erin French and Ina Garten, I thought about what their journeys and mine had in common.

I see both women as mentally strong and hardworking. I also considered how challenging childhoods may have helped us develop those characteristics.

In my own life, overcoming pain required me to develop ways of managing my mind and moving forward.

That does not mean you need a terrible childhood to become a badass. Of course you do not.

It means you may need to deliberately choose challenges and develop strength when life has not already required it of you.

Choosing a challenge you could avoid can be difficult. You can back away. But that is also an opportunity to build the capacity you want.

Why I created Self Coaching Scholars

As I became more successful, I heard people say that I could make money only because I was teaching coaches a business opportunity.

They said someone could not make that kind of money simply offering life coaching.

I knew that was not true. I wanted to be an example of what was possible.

That was part of why I started Self Coaching Scholars: to demonstrate a business offering life coaching and courses that helped people in their lives.

I also invited women from different backgrounds, with different levels of education, experiences, niches, and offerings, into a mastermind to help them make a million dollars.

I wanted to show that I was not the only person who could do it.

We created those results. But the criticism did not disappear.

Keep going when other people doubt you

Proof does not necessarily stop people from judging or trying to discredit you.

You still need the mental strength to show up, stand up for yourself, and continue working.

It is one thing to fail alone while trying something. It is another to fail when people are watching, especially when they advised you not to try.

I have worked with clients who left a job to pursue something new while people around them seemed to be waiting for failure.

That requires strength. You cannot rely on everyone believing in you before you begin.

The criticism can come from strangers, family, customers, or people who have worked with you. Your commitment to yourself needs to be strong enough that you can keep going.

Believe in the person creating the result

I ask clients whether they believe they can create a business, a relationship, a nonprofit, or a million dollars.

Often they tell me they absolutely believe the result is possible.

Then I ask whether they believe they are a badass. That question can be much more difficult.

Believing a result is possible is different from identifying as the person who creates it.

Are you someone who gets things done, handles resistance, and makes things happen?

Are you willing to own that identity and let people have their opinions about it?

This can be confronting. It is easier to explain another person's success by saying they have something you do not have than to acknowledge your own capacity and your unwillingness to use it.

Not everyone wants extraordinary results. There is nothing wrong with that. I am speaking to those of you who want them and want me to challenge the excuses that get in your way.

Strength does not mean you never have doubt

I still have negative thoughts, self-doubt, insecurity, and things from my past that I am working through.

Being mentally strong does not mean weakness never appears.

It means having strength to overcome it, with an underlying commitment to believing in and loving yourself.

As you grow, the challenges can grow. You will need to keep reminding yourself who you are, especially when you feel tired or beaten down.

Support from people around you helps. So does learning to provide that reminder for yourself.

I want you to be able to put your head on the pillow and feel proud of who you are and what you created.

If you want to become a badass, begin by telling yourself the truth. Look at your mental strength. Look at your work ethic. Decide to develop both and use the capacity that is already within you.