1484: Doubt by Elana Miller of Zen Psychiatry on Career Success & Entrepreneurship

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[00:00:56] Doubt – bei Ilana Miller – of ZenPsychiatry.com

[00:01:01] I've talked before about how I'm working diligently on my 4-Hour Workweek Muse. More on that later.

[00:01:07] What I didn't emphasize before was the doubt that has come along with this project.

[00:01:12] Since I've started affiliate marketing and building websites, I've been reading a lot of online business blogs.

[00:01:17] I came across a post on the blog Freedom Ideas with an image that describes the author's progress making money online.

[00:01:24] I want to point out a couple things about the graph.

[00:01:27] First of all, this guy makes over 8 grand a month now, most of it passive income, meaning he doesn't need to keep actively putting in work to get the paycheck.

[00:01:35] Not too shabby.

[00:01:37] Second, he made almost no progress in his income for the first 15 months.

[00:01:41] What do you imagine he was thinking for those first 15 months, putting in so much effort with so little return?

[00:01:47] Do you think he wondered if he was on the wrong path?

[00:01:49] Do you think he ever wanted to give up?

[00:01:51] Do you think he ever felt doubt that success was coming?

[00:01:54] I'm sure the answer is yes.

[00:01:56] It's easy to see, in retrospect, that the effort was worth it.

[00:02:00] But obviously when you're in the thick of it, you don't know what's coming.

[00:02:02] What separates someone who keeps trying long enough to succeed from someone who gives up far too early?

[00:02:09] The person who succeeds is the one with the unwavering ability to continue on a path in the face of doubt.

[00:02:15] In the Buddhist philosophy, doubt is considered one of the five hindrances along the path to enlightenment,

[00:02:21] along with desire, anger, boredom, and restlessness.

[00:02:24] It is said that before the Buddha became enlightened, each hindrance visited him, tempting him to give up on his path.

[00:02:30] Each hindrance was challenging, but doubt was the most insidious.

[00:02:34] This is because doubt works underneath your skin, integrating itself into your thoughts

[00:02:39] to the point where you don't realize it's the enemy and instead start to believe it.

[00:02:44] This concept applies to goals where the path is uncertain.

[00:02:47] Do you want to quit your job? Find a relationship? Make a drastic move? Take on a new challenge?

[00:02:52] You're going to feel doubt any time you take action and don't know the outcome.

[00:02:56] You'll wonder if you're doing things right, if you should just give up,

[00:03:00] if it will be too hard, etc.

[00:03:02] Let's take the example of finding a relationship.

[00:03:04] I know a lot of people, and myself, might I add, when I was single,

[00:03:09] who struggle with doubt that they will ever meet someone.

[00:03:11] They look in their past and see a bunch of missteps and painful breakups

[00:03:15] and imagine that that's what their future looks like too.

[00:03:18] But actually, the path looks similar to the first image of this post.

[00:03:22] Every relationship ends until you find one that doesn't.

[00:03:25] The doubt you feel in the meantime is not a sign that things won't work out in the end.

[00:03:30] Sure, you don't know how it will happen or when,

[00:03:32] but if you put your energy and effort in the right place and fight through the doubt,

[00:03:36] you will get what you want.

[00:03:38] This is true for almost everything.

[00:03:40] So this brings me to my new business project.

[00:03:43] I really haven't made too much progress since my last update.

[00:03:46] No more sales and a minuscule amount of traffic to my site,

[00:03:49] although I do have three pages ranking on the first page of Google for their respective keywords.

[00:03:54] But I'm going to keep going.

[00:03:55] Some friends of mine recently quit their jobs,

[00:03:58] one as a lawyer in a big firm,

[00:04:00] to move across the world to Kathmandu.

[00:04:02] They are kicking ass right now living a life I wish I could live.

[00:04:06] My version takes place in Nicaragua.

[00:04:08] I'll get there someday.

[00:04:09] But don't you think they doubted taking such a big step off of a traditional path?

[00:04:13] Wouldn't it have been a mistake to have let doubt stop them

[00:04:16] from taking such a potentially life-changing step?

[00:04:18] Don't mistake doubt for a sign that you will fail

[00:04:21] because you will feel doubt any time you're going along an uncertain path.

[00:04:25] Doubt is an obstacle you need to pass before you can find success.

[00:04:29] It is a hindrance on your own path to enlightenment.

[00:04:32] If you are doing something hard, you will doubt everything,

[00:04:35] your abilities, your knowledge, your luck,

[00:04:38] the specific path you've chosen, even your final goal.

[00:04:41] You will be afraid of making mistakes,

[00:04:43] and that fear may make you move so cautiously

[00:04:45] that you don't make any real progress.

[00:04:47] You may forget that mistakes are inevitable,

[00:04:50] and not really mistakes if you do the best you can

[00:04:52] with the knowledge you have at the time.

[00:04:54] Imagine a plane that makes constant small course corrections

[00:04:57] on the way to its destination.

[00:04:59] Like the plane, you can be going in the wrong direction

[00:05:02] 90% of the time and still end up at the right place.

[00:05:05] So anyway, do I doubt I'll be successful at this project

[00:05:08] and with my eventual goal of freeing myself

[00:05:10] from the necessity of work for work's sake?

[00:05:13] Constantly.

[00:05:14] But I try not to believe the narrative of my doubt.

[00:05:16] And really, if a person wants something with every fiber of their being,

[00:05:21] they usually find a way to get it.

[00:05:26] You just listened to the post titled

[00:05:28] Doubt by Ilana Miller of zenpsychiatry.com.

[00:05:32] This show is sponsored by BetterHelp.

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[00:06:34] And thank you to Ilana.

[00:06:36] She's a psychiatrist based out of Los Angeles

[00:06:39] who has been through quite a lot.

[00:06:41] She graduated from Harvard in 2004,

[00:06:44] took two years to travel and study in Mexico,

[00:06:47] did clinical research at Stanford,

[00:06:49] studied medicine at USC,

[00:06:51] and did her residency in psychiatry at UCLA.

[00:06:54] Unfortunately, in 2013,

[00:06:56] she was diagnosed with cancer, stage four lymphoma,

[00:07:00] and her treatment would be three years of chemotherapy.

[00:07:02] She completed that in 2016,

[00:07:04] and she returned to residency

[00:07:06] and started her own private practice in psychiatry.

[00:07:09] Then in August of 2019,

[00:07:12] her cancer unexpectedly relapsed

[00:07:14] with a worse prognosis,

[00:07:15] and she'd have to have a stem cell transplant.

[00:07:18] She went through with it,

[00:07:19] and we're so happy to hear

[00:07:20] that she has gone back into remission.

[00:07:22] So all of us here at The Optimal Family

[00:07:24] are wishing her all the best

[00:07:25] and thanking her for letting us share her wonderful work

[00:07:28] across all of our podcasts.

[00:07:30] And she frequently writes about personal development

[00:07:32] so you can hear more stories

[00:07:34] on the podcast Optimal Living Daily,

[00:07:36] and hopefully her story

[00:07:37] can bring some gratitude into your life.

[00:07:39] So with that, have a great rest of your day.

[00:07:42] I thank you so much for being here,

[00:07:43] and I'll see you tomorrow as usual,

[00:07:45] where your optimal life awaits.

[00:07:47] Let's see you tomorrow.