This One Thing Is Holding You Back From Reaching Your Potential

The best you can possibly hope to achieve in your career is to maximize your potential, which means getting the most out of your talent and abilities. The most exceptional performers in the world have successfully done that. Having worked for years with many of the world’s most elite athletes, musicians, and ultra-high performers in other disciplines, I have learned that there is one thing that tends to separate the good from the great. And while you may not be an elite athlete, the same thing that holds them back from maximizing their potential is likely holding you back from achieving yours.

Most people know that to become the best in the world at anything requires innate talent, a supportive environment, attention to detail, and the ability to work harder than everyone around you. But what is just as important and not discussed as much is the belief you have in your abilities. Your self-belief alters how your body performs. Your body responds most positively when you believe you can achieve a task and less positively when you think you cannot. And this is a virtuous cycle because the more you believe in your abilities, the better your performance will be, and the better you perform, your belief in yourself improves.

This lack of self-belief prevents most individuals from reaching their potential. If you have a big presentation and stew in self-doubt, your performance will suffer. If you are thinking of starting a company but don’t fully believe in yourself, your enterprise is less likely to take off. The same is true at every level and in every discipline. Through my research, I have learned that many Olympic races are won or lost even before the starting gun goes off, simply because some athletes do not believe they belong on that grand stage. The imposter syndrome they face at the starting line affects their physical abilities, and years of hard work are ruined because of a moment of self-doubt. On the other hand, athletes with high self-confidence, who believe they are made to shine in these moments, are the ones that come out on top.

Self-Belief Affects Performance:

One of the landmark studies that demonstrated how belief in our abilities impacts our performance involved researchers assigning people invited to participate in a study randomly to one of two groups. The first group was led to believe that they were stronger than the second group. And the second group was led to believe they were weaker than the first group. Both groups were then asked to participate in strength exercises to determine which group had stronger legs.

The researchers informed the first group that their opponents were injured and had done poorly on their leg strength exercises, leading them to believe they were likely to win. The researchers told the second group that their opponents were university athletes who had done well on their exercises, encouraging them to think they would lose. In taking these steps, the researchers artificially manipulated what each group believed. One group was confident that they would win, while the other thought they were likely to lose.

All participants were then asked to perform the same exercises while the researchers measured the leg strength of each participant. As you might guess, the results were staggering. The high-belief group performed considerably better than the low-belief group. The difference between the two groups was not in the power of their legs but only in what they believed. And what they believed made one group physically stronger and the other weaker, proving that what you think matters in how well you perform.

Improving Your Self-Belief:

By some estimates, approximately 85% of the population grapples with low self-belief, imposter syndrome, or low self-esteem, all of which impact their performance. If you are like most people, this lack of self-belief and confidence in your abilities is holding you back, and you must learn how to trust your abilities.

The most effective way to gain self-belief is to experience success at tasks. Psychologists refer to this as mastery. Your confidence in your abilities grows when you do well or gain mastery at something. And as we saw in the research above, when your confidence grows, your performance gets better. Skills and self-belief are inextricably linked, each one feeding the other. This is known as reciprocal causation, where both your skills and confidence help each other grow and keep you in a state of continual improvement until you maximize your potential.

Excellence is a series of small improvements that add to extraordinary outcomes. If you have trouble attaining it, start by giving yourself a task slightly out of your comfort zone, something you can only achieve with a little extra effort. Achieve success in it, and you will notice a boost of confidence and self-belief. Then give yourself the next task, again slightly out of your comfort zone, and stretch to achieve it. As you keep reaching new milestones, you learn that you are better than you thought you were, and the power of what you believe and what you can achieve becomes unstoppable.