When Self-Doubt Meets Reality Checks
Corporate Exit Diaries - Week 4
September 19, 2025
This week I wrote about second-guessing my expertise the moment things felt unfamiliar, only to have a client refuse to let me charge less money. I also finished a chapter about resilience that took me right back to getting fired two days before my double mastectomy.
Sometimes writing forces you to process shit you thought you'd already dealt with.
The Excellence Trap That Won't Let Go
Monday's post was supposed to be about Chapter 17 progress, but I ended up reflecting on how vulnerability on paper feels like jumping off a cliff. The response was intense - people sharing their own smoking guilt, parenting fears, and workaholic badge-wearing stories.
Wednesday I tackled the zone of excellence trap again. The concept that being really good at work that doesn't fulfill you is more dangerous than outright failure. The engagement was lower than usual, maybe because the tiger photo was too dark, or maybe because people don't want to hear that their "good enough" life isn't actually good enough.
But Friday's post about catching myself trying to undervalue my expertise hit different. Over 2,300 impressions in six hours. People connected with the admission that even four years out of corporate, I still default to self-doubt when situations look unfamiliar.
The message is clearly resonating: competence doesn't disappear just because the packaging changes.
The Client Reality Check I Needed
Here's what I didn't share publicly - this week a client wanted to pivot from our original plan. My brain immediately went to "maybe I should charge less since this approach is new to me." Same skills, same value, but different scenery made me question everything.
When I suggested the lower rate, they looked at me like I'd lost my mind. "Under no circumstances will we pay you less. Just because we're doing this differently doesn't change what you bring to the table."
They saw my value when I couldn't see it myself. Classic entrepreneur self-sabotage disguised as humility.
The Resilience Chapter That Broke Me Open
Chapter 20 forced me to relive two very different rejection experiences: losing a million-dollar RFP as an employee versus getting fired as a business owner two days before major surgery.
As an employee, that RFP loss stung for exactly 24 hours. Then I shifted into "thank you, next" mode and started hunting smaller clients.
As a business owner? Getting fired before my mastectomy felt personal in a way employee rejection never had. I cried, ate Ben & Jerry's, and had a full pity party. The resilience muscle I'd built in sales was there, but the stakes were completely different.
When it's your name on everything, rejection doesn't just hit your paycheck - it hits your identity.
Writing about this while my daughter is struggling with her own self-worth issues added another layer of complexity. How do you teach resilience to someone when you're still learning it yourself?
What's Actually Shifting
Four weeks into documenting this transition in real time, I'm noticing something: the content that performs best is the stuff I'm most hesitant to share. The smoking guilt. The parenting fears. The admission that I still second-guess myself despite years of proven expertise.
People don't need more polished business advice. They need permission to be human while building something meaningful. The mess is the message.
My manuscript progress this week was substantial - Chapter 18 about zones of excellence versus genius, Chapter 19 about client pivots and mental gymnastics, Chapter 20 about resilience evolution. Over 4,000 words that forced me to process patterns I'm still living through.
The writing isn't just documenting the transition anymore. It's accelerating it. Every chapter that hurts to write is teaching me something I didn't know I needed to learn.
The Infrastructure Continues
Website copy is written and ready for my literal husband to implement. Newsletter strategy is mapped out. LinkedIn performance is building steady engagement without needing to chase viral content.
The boring foundation work nobody wants to hear about continues. But I'm learning that showing the infrastructure building in real time is exactly what people need to see. Not the highlight reel of "I quit my job and moved to Bali," but the actual messy process of building one thing while you're still dependent on another.
Most days this feels worth it. Some days I want to clock in and clock out and call it done. But the resilience muscle memory from years of sales rejection keeps me moving forward.
Next Week's Reality
More chapters to write. More content to create. More honest documentation of what it actually looks like to transition from profitable work to purposeful work without blowing up your life in the process.
No roadmaps. No guarantees. Just the messy middle of becoming whatever comes after where I am now.
The foundation work continues. Always the transformer boxes before the 19-foot ceilings.
This is part of my Corporate Exit Diaries - real-time documentation of finishing my book and transitioning from profitable work to passionate work. No roadmaps, no guarantees, just honest progress.