11: Ash Ambirge & Trashing Your Imposter Syndrome

Oh boy, this was a wild ride and I loved it. I talked to Ash Ambirge, who is a foul mouth, amazing, loud, crazy, creative internet entrepreneur, creative writer, speaker. She’s an advocate for women being brave and doing disobedient things with their careers and their lives. 

Today we’re talking about her book “The Middle Finger Project” and named after her own business. Her book is absolutely amazing and we go into a deep conversation here about imposter syndrome, sharing your stories and finding how do you balance the stuff that you need to do to make you money and the stuff that gets you excited. 

Perfectionism is an occupational hazard when you start a business for yourself. What’s even worse, you’re excited about it. You’re starting this business because you’re really excited about doing the work that you want to be doing and that is really where the tricky part comes into play. Most people are not that excited about going to work, so they’re happy to leave it. But when you’re doing it right, this becomes a very real challenge that all of us are going to face. It’s like a form of intellectual gambling when you realize that the rewards are whatever you want them to be and the harder you work, the more you get. It’s like this high, that you can almost become addicted to.

According to Ash, we need to learn how to become a mother to ourselves. We are our own worst enemies in this regard.  We work ourselves to the bone, and eventually, you’re going to have to take a kinder approach to the way you’re showing up in the world and the way you want to bring these gifts to the world by thinking about what your mother would say to you and what she would tell you – is it time for rest, can you do that in the morning instead, and all those things that we grew up hearing from our mothers.

Ash is a firm believer that you can have it all, but only one thing at a time and you have to also know what are the things that you don’t actually want. You have to learn how to take the focus off of what other people will want from you and really try to focus more on what you want to be giving to the world. And of course, doing so intelligently, there’s got to be a little strategy behind it, someone has to buy what you want to be giving to the world. But thinking about that more will help you narrow down your options. And then when you do that it allows naturally for a little bit more time and relaxation.

Being grateful for what you’ve got is the worst thing you can do. Ever. When you’re grateful for what you’ve got, it keeps you stuck in this pattern of thinking that maybe things will get better eventually, but they’re not because they’re going to be the same until you get ungrateful and unsatisfied and decide to change it. You can appreciate gratitude. But sometimes it’s a trap. Because, when does gratitude become a euphemism for surrender, what’s the line between just accepting what is versus surrendering when really you could have made something better for yourself had you taken the risk?

We as entrepreneurs believe that we want to do all things right now and perfectly and quitting equals failure, which equals to, you know, end of our lives.

Ash’s advice is that no matter what, even if you make something that is perfect and you slay for that thing whatever it is that you’re making and you finally feel ready to release it to the world, and it’s perfect in all its glory, you- because of the nature of being an entrepreneur, and the nature of change and technology, you’re still going to iterate this thing, as long as you live.

Therefore, start looking at iteration being the goal, instead of doing it because you’re just never going to be done. It’s never really going to be done, even if you think it’s perfect now, you’re still going to change it later. So, there’s no point in trying, I think that the goal should be launching and iterating, as opposed to waiting until something is perfect to launch it.

Start with more bare bones version of anything that you’re putting out there, whether it’s a service or a product, and see what the responses are and then get feedback on it, and then iterate and slowly but surely just change one element at a time, and measure the response and measure if there’s been a change, keeping everything else constant, until you are satisfied with the final product.

Also, as entrepreneurs, we are leaving so much money on the table and it has nothing to do with the reflection of our actual talents or skills, it is always a reflection of how much confidence we have at any given point in time.

Here’s the thing that we always forget

• we forget that our clients really want us to tell them what to do.
• They want us to lead them, they want us to say “okay so here’s what it costs, but here’s why it’s a really good investment, here’s why I recommend that you should do it.” 
• If you stand as an advisor, versus thinking of yourself as just a lowly freelancer who’s grateful to get any pennies they throw your way, it changes the way you show up in the world, it changes the dynamic of a conversation.

Most of us who are just starting off, approach any kind of transaction where there’s money involved, like a freelancer would, like we’re just very grateful to have the business (there’s that word again, grateful) and we will do anything to make that client happy, and that’s what starts leading to all of the scramblings around.

When you think about it from the perspective of an advisor, the big shift that happens there is that a freelancer takes orders from their clients but an advisor gives orders. When you adopt that disposition, everything else goes smoothly including, of course, the money piece. The more your clients pay you, the better clients you get.

When we are first starting out, a lot of us fall into this trap, where we want to provide as many services as possible to kind of cast our net as wide as we can. But it’s far better to pick something that you are just great at and just own it. That’s how you get to that advisor status.

When deciding what your one thing should be, look at the motivation behind why you want to do it. Go with the thing you really like. Not because it aligns with your background or because it’s the best chance to make some money. The second clue that tells you that you are on the right track is – do you want to teach this to somebody else. When you are really enthusiastic about something, you want to explain it to someone else and talk about it.

Instead of making your decisions the way you usually do, try looking at something you’ve been wanting to do from the perspective of “despite”– I am going to launch this thing despite not having the time; I’m going to launch this thing despite not having the money; despite not having the confidence; despite not knowing if it’s going to work out.

Love + magic,

Maggie