How to Show Up, when you don't feel good enough

In a world of so much beauty, yet so much uncertainty, so much opportunity, yet so much volatility...

Never has the demand for us all to Show Up as the best version of ourselves been greater

Together we have the talent, we have the knowledge and we have the potential. We can discover new ways of doing things, we can develop new businesses and design new products, we can create positive change. And yet...

Why do so very many of us, at some point in our lives, suffer from the fear of not being good enough?  Which means, we don’t start, we don’t try, we don’t finish, we give up. We don’t Show Up

For some of us, this so-called normal feeling of not being good enough only hits us on certain days, when nothing we do feels good enough. We kind of hate ourselves for a bit, pour ourselves a glass of wine or take it out on our loved ones, go to bed angry and wake up kind of ready for a new start the next day 

For those people this feeling of  ‘not good enough-ness’ seems to pass and doesn’t visibly impact their daily lives. Here’s the thing though - honestly, most of us struggle with this feeling, for a bit longer than a moment.  This feeling of 'not good enough-ness' does seriously impact how we Show Up and what we achieve in our lives

For some of us we fight the feeling of not being good enough by going into workaholic, overachieve mode. Others of us numb our pain by plunging into the insta-perfect dreams of other people’s false realities, comparing our ‘normal-ness’ with these highly crafted slices of not real-ness, we find even more evidence that we fall short. And so we become even more paralysed by insecurity, by indecisiveness, by procrastination

Think of all those things that don’t get created, don’t get developed, don’t get done because we fear we are not good enough

If we are not good enough, our work won’t be good enough, especially not if we are challenging ourselves to create something new, achieve something better than we have done before, or even simply complete something we have already started.  Think of all the un-applied for jobs and promotions, the unwritten books, the unfinished research projects, the unbaked cakes, the start-ups which never get started, the transformational fitness programmes we embark on, yet stop after day 4, the paintings and poems we screw up and throw in the bin when our first attempts don’t meet with our exciting and inspiring internal visions?

Some of us are crushingly aware of our own stagnation and sense of unworthiness, others of us are simply not aware that this may well be the biggest thing holding us back and stopping us from Showing Up in our own lives

In fact, for some of us, this feeling of not good enough-ness is so serious, it even has an official name - Atelophobia. Atelophobia is defined as a fear of not doing something right or the fear of not being good enough. In other words, it is a fear of imperfection. It is comprised of two Greek words - the prefix - Atelo(s) means imperfect and the post fix - phobia means an extreme or irrational fear 

People who suffer from Atelophobia worry that whatever they are doing is in some way not good enough, unacceptable or completely wrong.  It can be so debilitating that even small tasks, such as messaging someone, or eating or speaking in front of others can be difficult, because they are so afraid of making some kind of mistake and falling short of their task. They are consumed with feelings of deep self-consciousness and being constantly judged and measured. People with Atelophobia are often unconsciously making perfection their goal. A  goal which cannot, of course, ever be reached. What happens? They are left feeling miserable and that they are a failure. Losing more and more confidence and self esteem with every unachieved and unachievable goal of perfectionism 

Even though the people suffering from Atelophobia are just as intelligent and talented as the rest of us, this talent and ability is hidden by the fear of failure and not being good enough. How heartbreaking is that? 

What a shocking waste of talent, capability, misplaced energy and misunderstanding

If this is us, where do we start? First, if we have not already done so, we must acknowledge that this feeling of not being good enough may well be the biggest single thing which is stopping us from Showing Up in our own lives and achieving our unique potential

The second thing is to realise that the simple yet incredibly powerful way we can all move forwards to fulfil our potential - is to swap perfection for progress 

Swapping perfection for progress means we aim for progress, not perfection

Small steps of progress move us forwards, rewarding us with a feeling of momentum, because we have achieved the small step. These small steps all gradually add up, giving us sparks of confidence, making it possible for us to achieve our goals and potential. This is what we call being progressfull - it means by swapping perfection for progress - we can let go of the feeling of not being good enough.  Instead, we make the most of our talents by focussing our time and energy in the best small steps forwards to achieve our potential

Being progressfull helps us step by step, Show Up...

...allowing ourselves to be seen, living our own, unique best lives, making our best contributions at home, at work in our whole life

Because we saw that so many people can benefit from living a life of progress, not perfection, we set up a company called Progressfull™

We combine my experience of over 20 years of working with some of the most brilliant minds in innovation and communication, winning awards, growing businesses and inspiring teams, with my co-founder Jo's skills as a highly experienced CEO level executive coach, learning architect and facilitator

Over the last 25 years Jo has worked closely with global high performers and their teams, sharing tools and concepts to help them gain a truly competitive edge and has developed a wealth and breadth of experience designing and delivering truly effective, bespoke training tools and programmes to help them grow themselves, their teams and their businesses

We understand you want to continually learn and progress in life, that you don't want psychobabble or unrealistic 'positive thinking', so we focus on outcomes and results

In reality all the answers to the questions of how to progress and live a better life already exist out there in some way, from the wisdom of the Ancient Greeks to the latest findings from the world of Neuroscience. But even if we are aware of these ideas and concepts, very few of us have the toolkit to actually apply them in our everyday lives, from home, to work, to our whole life.

So we decided to create it! 

We share sparky deep insights, simple practical frameworks and handy transforming tools, including tools for purposeful self -reflection, usually only accessible for high performance executives. Making these available for everybody to use in the real world. So you can quite literally, Show Up and take your personal progress into your own hands 

An experience with us takes you from feeling overwhelmed and unfulfilled to inspired, energised and on track. Our passion is to help you unlock your personal progress and professional potential - helping life work for you not against you – from home, to work, to your whole life

Progressfull™ helps you access the ability to live a life full of progress and an important principle of living a life of progress is Showing Up 

We have an Upskill, which is what we at Progressfull call an online course, which can help you Show Up. Showing Up includes video and exercises designed to help you unlock your ability to Show Up, even when you don’t feel good enough - you can learn more about it here

Showing Up is not easy, but it is worth it. We all have just one life, so we might as well make sure we swap perfection for progress and Show Up to live our own life and most importantly, live it well

As Nelson Mandela so wisely said,

“There is no passion to be found playing small – in settling for a life that is less than the one you are capable of living”