Stop Buying What You Are Selling Yourself

You are the very best salesperson in the world. As long as you are also the prospect to whom you are selling.

Right now, your win ratio is 100 percent. You’ve never lost. Everything you have sold yourself, no matter how crazy, no matter how poorly it served you, no matter how great the cost, you bought lock, stock, and barrel.

There was that time when you sold yourself the idea that nothing was your fault. You loved the idea that you were really a victim, and none of the poor results were of your own making. You sold yourself absolution, and you bought it—even though you paid for it with years of poor results.

And then there was that time that you sold yourself the story that the circumstance of your birth were the reason you couldn’t do what you really wanted to do. You weren’t born to the right parents. Nor were you born on the right side of the tracks. No one has even heard of the place you grew up or the tiny school you went to, the one where it was impossible to make the right connections. This sale was so easy. You didn’t object once, even though you paid dearly.

What about that whole list of identities you sold yourself? Remember when you sold yourself the idea that you aren’t a morning person, that it is impossible for you to get up in time to set your day up for success? You sold yourself the idea that you “can’t show up on time,” even though your habitual lateness has hurt your relationships.

Then there are the sales you make each day. How many times have you sold yourself that tomorrow is the day you will start in earnest? How many times have you sold yourself the idea that there will be time for you to do what you need to do tomorrow, so that you didn’t have to do what most needs done today? Isn’t this the easiest sale to make? You buy it like you’ve never been burned by buying this before—and like you aren’t still being burned by it now.

The better part of you knows that everything you are selling is bunk. That part of you knows that all these things that you have sold yourself are built on a foundation of lies and deception, self-deception.

Stop selling yourself beliefs, ideas, stories, and excuses that don’t serve you. And when you do try to sell yourself these things, don’t buy them.