On this episode of the Online Marketing Made Easy Podcast, I share with you some insight I’ve recently discovered about myself. It’s something that I’ve always known on some level, but I’ve just recently really owned it and started to be actively aware of it. I decided to share it with you, because maybe you can relate.

Here’s the deal. Sometimes my mind is a pretty scary place to live as a result of the stories that I create  about my experiences. When I’m in my head, these stories are completely true and real, but in reality, they are just perceptions.

As an example, in the early years of my business if I promoted something and it didn’t go as well as I thought it should, the story that would play in my mind was that I’m just not as good as my peers, that I didn’t have what it takes to be a success, that I’m in over my head, and that I should have never left Tony Robbins. These stories crushed my confidence!

Now that I’m more aware of these stories, I try to spend as much time as possible in the present moment, where life is actually happening, rather than focusing on these stories that I’ve made up. This approach has helped me quiet fears, doubts, and worries as they pop up as I’m building my business.

I’m sharing this with you because these stories are something we all have to deal with from time to time. Because of that, I invited my good friend and mentor, Marie Forleo, founder of B-School, best selling author and the creator of the award-winning web show MarieTV.com, back to the show as my first repeat guest.

I specifically asked Marie to come on the show to explore these mindset pitfalls, because Marie is not only a marketing pro, she also has a great way of pulling you out of your head and into the present moment where things tend to look very different than they do in our minds.

Marie and I discuss the following three mindset pitfalls that entrepreneur’s tend to face as they’re building their business:

#1: How Do I Deal with the Competition?

#2: How Do I Deal with Criticism in My Business?

#3: How Do I Deal with a Lack of Follow Through?

If you’re struggling with perfectionism, focus more on the actual content, rather than the bells and whistles that are nice to have, but not 100% necessary.

It also helps to get things started, knowing that everything is going to be an iteration. For example, when you initially release a course, it may not be just the way you want it to be, but you can keep making improvements.

This is what Marie did when she first launched B-School, her online school for modern entrepreneurs. B-School has now been out for five years, and has grown into a comprehensive soup to nuts program that changes people’s lives.