Your Ego is Your Business
- Author: Emily Syring
- Published:
- Updated: April 12, 2024
Do you have an inner saboteur causing chaos and mayhem in your business? If you have feeling like you are starting and stopping, spinning wheels or not making traction – you are not the problem, your ego is.
Emily Syring, author of, “Stop it. Your Ego is Showing.” explains how we allow our ego to damage our business and how to regain back that control.
What comes to mind when the word ego pops up in conversation or is seen on the back of a book, or even in your own mind?
Maybe it’s a definition, or a certain stereotype or even a particular person that you see.
Regardless of what comes up initially, the fact of the matter is, your ego is your business. Figuratively and literally.
Your ego is your sense of self. Your sense of self-worth, your sense of who you are. Which trickles down into what you think and believe, the actions you take and eventually seeps into the world around you.
Whether we like it or not, ego plays a role in our daily lives and business.
Especially when it comes to owning and operating a business online or otherwise.
Let’s break down the ego into bite sized pieces to get a better understanding of how it affects your business and why it is in fact, your business.
The fear of the unknown will eat you up. And it will spit you back out over and over and over again if you let it.
Your brain is playing tricks on you
Fear is the language of the ego mind.
The ego’s sole purpose for every human being is to keep them alive.
Your brain is wired to search for and eliminate threats. By running away, fighting them off or freezing in your tracks.
The thing is, threats come in all different boxes and also depends on a multitude of factors. When talking about running a business specifically, these threats can look like the fear of failure, the fear of rejection, even the fear of success.
This fear can keep you and your business stuck and also stagnant.
For weeks, months or even years.
Fear isn’t always this big blatant thing either. It can be small initially. It can appear different than you thought it would.
Fear can also force you to stay in your comfort zone. Where it’s warm. Safe. It’ll have you thinking the same thoughts, believing the same stories over and over again, giving you the same results over and over again.
Fear is where the ego lives.
In the familiar.
In the same.
Fear will make up stories to keep you stuck.
- Avoiding opportunities that could propel your business forward.
- Spending too much time and energy on what everyone else is doing.
- Chasing after answers in course after course instead of finding solutions.
- Never taking action.
- Under selling yourself for fear of rejection.
The first step to overcoming that fear in business is to become aware. Simply become aware of the thoughts and also stories that play out any time a decision has to be made. Become aware of the beliefs that those thoughts create, the “I am” statements that follow and shift them.
Shifting the focus from “what if this is the wrong decision…” to “what if it’s the right decision…” can simply force your mind to look at what could go right instead of what could go wrong.
Problems are here to help, not hurt you
And when you work from that place, everything changes.
Problems are inevitable in business.
That’s why you got into business, to solve people’s problems. Right?
But sometimes those problems grow too big and too heavy. And when you look at them through the eye of your ego mind, they become solid, immobile. And it’s hard to find a solution.
The truth is that if you put your focus only on your problems, like your ego wants you to, you’ll never move past them.
Simply because your focus will be on the problem itself instead of the solution.
Which is just another game of your ego mind to keep you stuck.
The solution?
Similar to fear it’s about recognizing the stories. And choosing a different place to focus and moving from there.
Even a simple reframe of the word problem can go a long way. And it can demolish your ego’s stories with logic.
Shift the word problem to challenge.
Already it feels better. Less invasive. Less solid. Maybe even more exciting.
Now shift the word challenge to opportunity.
Opportunity to grow and learn. Opportunity to expand.
Doing this consistently will allow you to look at whatever comes your way in a different light, create solutions and continue to move. And when it comes to business, it is imperative to keep moving forward.
If you find yourself pricing your offers on the basis of survival mode, pause and ask yourself about the stories that are coming up around the prices you are choosing.
Remember, your ego is built on survival.
And that survival mode is so engrained in us that it comes out in our business too.
When you’re focusing on survival mode, you want and need every single customer you can get just to keep the business running.
This can show up as undervaluing and underpricing your products.
Simply because you’re trying to sell to everyone and everything within reach.
The focus is on surviving instead of on the value and transformation you can provide for your clients.
Once again, survival is coming from fear. Fear of failure and oftentimes, fear of rejection that comes in the form of people not buying from you, refunds or customers not showing up.
These are all normal parts of business but the ego turns them into something much larger and makes them all about your personal survival.
Are you pleasing yourself or just fearful of being poor?
If you find yourself pricing your offers on the basis of survival mode, pause and ask yourself about the stories that are coming up around the prices you are choosing.
Are they based on what everyone else is doing?
Are they catering to everyone and everything?
Do they appropriately reflect the value and transformation you offer your clients?
These are just some questions to get you thinking about your prices and recognizing where they are coming from so that you can shift them from a place of fear and your ego, to a place that feels good and reflects your business in a better light.
What if you were stuck in a box and you tried everything you could possibly think of to get out the box but nothing was working. What would you do?
Here’s another hint, the directions to get out of the box are printed on the outside of it.
You probably already know where I’m going with this. And it’s something our egos don’t always take too kindly to.
Getting help.
Hiring a coach.
A mentor.
You see, that person can see the directions on the outside of the box we are struggling so hard to get out of.
Naturally, the ego pops up when seeking help too. Maybe there’s a story about getting help that needs to be let go of. Maybe all that’s needed is a perspective shift.
Awareness is the key to move from survival to thriving
This is when awareness comes in again.
Checking your thoughts and stories and questioning them. Asking them if they’re true, if they’re helpful and even if they’re your own. Chances are, they’re not. And a coach or mentor can help you see the things you can’t yet see on your own.
If fear is holding you back from asking for help, shift your focus.
Ego will demolish your business if you let it seep in and take over, but you don’t have to allow that to happen.
Check the stories that are coming up around your business, what’s possible for you, what needs to be or not be done, how it needs to look and if these stories are coming from fear, which most of the time they are, shift them.
Shift them into something that’s more helpful.
That will propel your business forward instead of keeping it stuck.
And ask for help.
Hire a coach or mentor like Denise Lee and simply keep moving forward. And don’t miss out her podcast for more motivational tips and ideas.
Emily Syring
Emily Syring is a renown Life Coach and author of, "Is your ego showing?" She is dedicated to help women step out of their heads and into their power through personal development and life coaching.
