In health coaching, and in wellness in general…it always feels like there is more to learn. When you’re training to become a health coach, you worry you’re not going to learn everything you need to know to complete your certification…and then when you do finish, you realize all the other things you don’t know. There are all kinds of continuing education opportunities, self-directed, formal, and everything in between, and you think you need to do it all and keep building your knowledge base until you’re READY.
When you’re ready, you’ll get started, right?
So how do you know when you’ve learned enough? How much is enough? How do you know when you’re ready?
Not to worry, we’re going to tackle all those questions and more below! Keep reading (or check out my video on this topic), because I’m here to help.
Tip #1: Accept
What I want you to accept is that you will never know it all … and you don’t need to. Know that you can be an effective health coach without knowing everything. Plus, it’s literally impossible to know everything.
On my very first day of medical school, many years ago, one of our profs said to us: the single most important thing for you to learn is how to say “I don’t know”. You need to be able to say “I don’t know. But I’m going to find out.”
That lesson has stuck with me, all these years. Because thinking you have to know everything—or, more to the point, that you somehow “should” know everything—is dangerous territory. Acknowledging your own limits—yet being committed to finding out the answers and learning more—is an absolutely key thing. There’s no shame in not knowing something. Health and medical knowledge changes all the time. It’s vital that you accept that you can’t know everything, that it’s perfectly okay that you don’t know everything, but that you have the ability to find something out when you need to.
So the quest to know it all before you can get started is a false quest. It can’t happen, and it’s only going to stop you from getting started building your business.
Get started anyway.
Tip #2: Specialize
When you specialize, this can help you feel more competent in your chosen field. Instead of trying to know it “all”, which, as I already said, is impossible, you seek to become an expert in one thing. In other words, choose a niche!
By narrowing your focus, it will give you an opportunity to truly sink your teeth into a certain subject area, wrap your hands around it, and give you that feeling of competence and confidence, so you can move forward.
Tip #3: Beware Impostor Syndrome
I want you to get honest with yourself, and your motivation for wanting to know more and more. Is this just impostor syndrome in disguise? What are you really wrestling with—is it a legitimate quest for more knowledge, or is it really that you’ve got an unrecognized impostor syndrome happening? Impostor syndrome is pervasive, and very common. I talk in much more detail about it in another video, which I’ll link below, because there are ways to deal with it, and conquer it, and mostly it has to do with working on your mindset.
Is this fear that you don’t know enough stopping you from getting out there and doing the things that will grow your business, like networking, marketing, or approaching other health professionals for referrals? That’s a shame, because you’re just distracting yourself with this quest for more knowledge, instead of stepping out of your comfort zone to grow your business. One of the most effective ways to start growing your client base IS to approach health professionals, like doctors, for referrals—and I see health coaches all the time avoid doing this because of self-limiting beliefs like impostor syndrome.
Free PDF guide for health coaches: How To Get MD Referrals
Tip #4: Embrace Lifelong Learning
Just because you don’t NEED to know it all, doesn’t mean you stop trying. Personally, I don’t ever intend to stop learning. There are always new skills to acquire, new things to learn. So adopt a growth mindset, embrace the concept of lifelong learning, and like I said don’t let yourself be stopped by worrying that you don’t know enough.
Recap:
Now, to recap…here are my tips for dealing with the worry that you don’t know enough yet to move ahead with your coaching business.
- Accept that you can’t learn everything…and you don’t need to anyway.
- Specialize, or niche down, to improve confidence.
- Be on the lookout for impostor syndrome.
- Embrace the concept of lifelong learning.
Now, I mentioned pushing yourself out of your comfort zone—maybe even before you feel ready—to start networking and growing your business with strategies like approaching doctors for referrals.
And if that’s something that sounds interesting to you—but you have no idea how to start down that road—I have created something to help you with that. It’s my free guide for health coaches called How To Get MD Referrals.
Click on the thumbnail below to grab that PDF for free.
