‘Just Believe In Yourself’ is Terrible Advice.

Gary Vee

The internet is awash with talk of ‘self-belief.’

I didn’t think it was a thing. I put it up there with ‘manifesting,’

I didn’t think that believing in yourself would suddenly make magic things happen.

I didn’t realise that things only change when you go all in.

When you are totally and utterly convinced that you will make it, no matter what.

And this is what most people get hung up on. It’s why the words ‘just believe in yourself’, are not enough.

Over 100 years ago, Franz Kafka said; “By believing passionately in something that still does not exist, we create it. The non-existent is whatever we have not sufficiently desired”

I believe that 97% of success in any project, comes from your commitment to it.

You might think that you believe in yourself but the limit of your perceived success, is the limit of your actual success.

Read that again.

‘If you hear a voice within you say you cannot paint, then by all means paint and that voice will be silenced’ - Vincent Van Gogh

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It’s been a long journey to figuring this out.

Something bizarre happened when I launched my podcast.

I sat down with my co-host, and we decided that it was going to be big. I don’t know what delusion came over us, we were completely unknown at the time.

We had no audience and yet, on the day the show launched, it went to #1 on iTunes.

We regularly interview some of the most famous creatives in the world and I’ve made some work that I’m incredibly proud of.

We all have different ideas of success, for some, making a podcast may be enough. For us, we wanted lots of people to listen to it, we wanted to help as many people as we could.

‘Confidence is 10 percent hard work and 90 percent delusion — just thinking foolishly that you will be able to do what you want to do’ - Tina Fey

If having an impact is what matters to you, it’s crucial to recognise that no matter how much faith you have in your work, it won’t ‘succeed’ unless a credible audience also perceives it as strong.

We didn’t magically will our pod to the #1 spot. We decided it would happen and then spent months learning how.

We committed to our ridiculous belief. We studied the iTunes algorithm. We made practice episodes. We made sure it looked and sounded like a #1 podcast and we made sure that we had A-List guests.

We heard ‘NO’ often but the belief kept us going. We learnt how to write great pitch emails and once we landed a few big names, we leveraged those names to get more. It sounds simple and it is.

I’ve read about the theory of a financial thermostat. The idea is that without financial education, most people will always stay at the same ‘temperature’. No matter how much money they make. If they’re not aware of their thermostat, they always end up back at the same place.

I think we also have a success thermostat. I’ve seen a lot of people reach a certain level of success and top out. Something, somewhere, stops them climbing any higher.

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The human brain is such a powerful truth-maker. If you decide that you’re going to become successful, your brain will start looking for ways to make it true.

In 2020 I started writing down ridiculous goals. I wrote ‘10k Instagram followers by the end of 2020’. I started with 500 followers on an old account I barely used. 10k seemed impossible but I kept reminding myself, launching a #1 podcast seemed impossible too. This gave me some confidence.

I learnt about social media, I practiced, I got out of my comfort zone. Every day I put one foot in front of the other and ended 2020 with 40k followers. 10k had seemed impossible, I 4X-ed that.

Spurred on by this, I have continued to write down crazy goals, but they don’t seem so crazy anymore. Actually, it’s starting to become a bit ridiculous…

Last year I wrote ‘Paint at the MTV VMA’s’. I’ve now been asked to paint at this year’s EMAs. This is insane to me.

MTV EMA Award - David Speed

I don’t tell you this to brag. I’m telling you because I want you to know that at the beginning of 2020, no one knew who I was.

I decided to become well known. Decided to become a successful full-time artist. Decided to make an impact. You can decide, too.

If you write things down, they’re not just going to magically happen but you will access a part of your brain that shows you an alternate reality. It will seem impossible, it will seem scary, it will seem fine for some people, but not for you.

And that makes it pretty hard to ‘just believe in yourself’.

What you must do, is believe that you are the type of person who can make it happen.

You must be brave enough to dream and to first say ‘maybe me’, then say ‘yes, me’

As I write this, I’m sure you’re picturing someone super confident. I’m not. I question everything. I tear my work to pieces. I paint over myself.

I just don’t get lost in it. I lose some battles but I know I’ll always win the war and nothing will make me quit.

I look at my goals regularly, and I make sure everything lines up.

If you have a dream client – is your work the sort of thing they’d be interested in?

The work you make should be the type of work you want to make more of!

I have a friend who gets loads of brand work. She engineered a clothing range with Nike, the bloody genius. I asked her how she did it and she said that she just started making art about sport. She said that she made so much work about sport that it would just be ‘obvious’ for them to collaborate with her. And collaborate they have, many times.

Oh, Kanye..

Artists like Kanye West and Salvadore Dali were seemingly born with huge, indestructible egos. Their success was almost inevitable.

Most creatives don’t have this confidence, in fact it feels tacky to be this delusional. But you can develop Kanye confidence and still be a good person.

My tactic is to use ‘success stacking.’ This means celebrating the wins, which, if you’re like me, you’re probably quite bad at.

Take positive things that have happened and ride their momentum. Remember a time when you achieved something that was out of your comfort zone – you did it before you can do it again. Your brain will make it normal, remember it was remarkable.

Commit, all-in, to making your project a success.

Don’t say ‘I hope’, ‘maybe’ or ‘someday’. This is so, so important. Remember the truth-maker between your ears. I hear this non-committal language from creatives all the time. You have to be certain.

Don’t make excuses. Write it down, work out how it’s done, do it. Reframe the failures as lessons and realise it’s only failure if you stop.

Watch ‘The Matrix’ and see Neo go through the journey of self-belief. I’m serious, actually watch it. You’ll get goosebumps when Trinity turns to Morpheus and says; “what is he doing?” the reply comes;

“He’s beginning to believe”