Erica Wernick, Personal Coach, Author and Speaker: Procrastination really has nothing
to do with laziness and everything to do with resistance and a lot of times when people
procrastinate it’s really truly because they don’t feel worthy of the thing that
they’re trying to make happen.
Film Courage: Erica what’s the biggest obstacle you’ve had to overcome in your life?
Erica: That’s a good one.
My biggest obstacle for sure that I have had to overcome that I’m still working on is
my self-worth and my struggle with self-worth.
I’ve done a lot of work to try to work, to try to heal that and work on that.
I think that being an artist in Hollywood requires you to put yourself out there in
a way that most people won’t really have to do in their lifetime if they weren’t
pursuing a big dream, if they weren’t trying to do something challenging.
It requires a lot of you and through with through rejection and and also through depending
on what your job is in the industry what your craft is it can feel so personal like what
you are putting out your work that you are putting out it is like you right it's attached
to you so I think that I tend to attract a lot of clients who are like myself and I think
a lot of artists in general struggle with self-worth more so because it's on display
so much more often than maybe other people who aren't working in an industry like Hollywood
would have to face essentially which I guess it's a good thing it's a good thing that we
need to that I should say I that I need to work on this and that I need to get better
but it's really been my biggest obstacle because I think that it impacts everything I do it
impacts how I put myself out there how I ask for things that I want if I come across as
someone who believes they're worthy of what they want or I talk to my clients a lot about
how a lot of artists come across as desperate in the please choose me please choose me am
I good enough tell meI'm good enough and I think a lot of us struggle with that so I
myself have struggled with that as well and I think especially shifting into my coaching
business where I have to build a business on me whereI'm the brand and it's it's been
a whole extra layer of me working through some self-worth stuff I guess you could say
but that's definitely been my biggest obstacleI'm wondering if struggles with self-worth actually
propel someone to go pretty far because whenI've done like little bits of research on a lot
of people whether it's acting music whatever I find a lot of them have a missing parent
and I think that that causes people to do interesting things and soI'm wondering if
that almost propels people to to go further where someone who doesn't it's more safe and
so okay I didn't get this well that's all right but somebody who really is like obsessed
with it it actually that that self-worth sort of wound actually makes them rise up more
I hopeI'm i'm making sense now you're making perfect I mean Tony Robbins talks a lot about
the idea of if you grew up without a lot of trauma or obstacles or issues you're almost
in a worse spot trying to achieve big goals he's because because of exactly what you're
talking about this like safe comfortable kind of bubble and and a lot of people look at
people like Oprah who had an incredibly challenging childhood right so a lot of the times that
people who grew up with a lot of obstacles or potentially a lot of trauma it does propel
them it does ignite a fire perhaps or or helps them succeed I think with self-worth particularly
it could totally go in that direction but I find at least with the clients that I work
with is that more often than not it actually does hold people back from taking bigger risks
or putting themselves out there in a bigger way and so they do it kind of in a safe way
of and I myself struggle with this and I know that I can catch myself when I do this sometimes
I'll make a post for my business or something and I'll do it to an audience that I know
already loves and accepts me and so I think that if you if you doubt yourself and you
don't feel worthy of what you want it usually ends up holding you back so like if people
procrastinate procrastination is really has nothing to do with laziness and and everything
to do with resistance and a lot of times when people procrastinate it's really truly because
they don't feel worthy of the thing that they're trying to make happen so I do feel like I
think it can definitely go in the direction that you're talking about and I think other
obstacles and trauma absolutely does propel somebody forward but a lot of times with self-worth
it it holds us back from going after the big things that we want rightI'm thinking of like
Marilyn Monroe and the lack of self-worth probably took her very far but it also could
have taken her down unfortunately I mean I guess too if you don't have a strong sense
of self or strong self-worth you're going to let a lot of people tell you how to live
your life tell you back to these like Hollywood boxes like like for example if you don't have
a strong self-worth maybe you do end up booking projects booking shows booking features but
none of them feel aligned like you don't actually feel happy you feel miserable right because
you let somebody else tell you what you should feel or what you should go after because you
didn't feel that you were worthy of the things that you really want so tony raw I i guess
I maybe I have heard that from him before but so you've heard him say that it's actually
not an impediment to have had if having had like sort of this safe upbringing but or maybe
it is I don't know I don't want to I don't want to butcher his words and say it incorrectlyI'm
justI'm just recalling my memory of what he said but that was that was like I have remembered
that because I it's interesting like I am someone who is incredibly determined and ambitious
but I i did have somewhat of a comfortable life and sometimes I wonder if that propelled
me actually this is like a totally different topic but if that propelled me in a way where
like I feel less scared to go after certain things or to take some risks because I feel
like I i still have a safety net of my family like I have a good family life so I feel like
I still have this safety net so maybe it's less scary for me than other people but I
don't know from what I remember of what he said I'm pretty sure he did say that people
that that struggled more in their childhood or in their lives kind of have that one-up
on I don't know maybe being ambitious or pursuing your goals what's the biggest challenge you've
helped one of your clients through one of the biggest challenges that I have helped
my clients with and this probably doesn't sound very sexy but I feel like I i feel very
fortunate to connect with people who are struggling in their careers and are really down about
it and the fortunate part comes with how I get to help them not thatI'm so glad that
people are struggling that maybe it came out wrong but I've been very fortunate to connect
with these people who feel really down about their careers because maybe it has been some
time and they're not where they want to be yet and so sometimes people come to me where
they're depressed and they're really feeling down and by the end of the time we're working
together they they feel happy again they feel excited again in their career they feel hopeful
and that energy switch is so crucial to what comes next in terms of their strategic moves
and what opportunities come their way like it really does help them bring in a new level
up opportunity and so I think likeI've had clients who are on the verge of quitting andI'm
like one of their last resorts and so I think for me that's one of the most challenging
things thatI've helped clients with but I think that is so rewarding because it's so
it's so awesome to see people who've started feeling really down and really depressed about
their career who now like one of my new clients I mean we're only like a month in and she's
already feeling so excited and hopeful and that is just so awesome I mean I just feel
so fortunate to be able to help people like I feel like one of my superpowers is helping
people believe in themselves and and really seeing what's possible and so I feel honored
to kind of relight that spark for people and help them get back to what's possible and
and get back to their dream well it's like dating like when you're in a relationship
all of a sudden now all these people are attracted to when you weren't no one would call no nothing
happened but then all of a sudden you give off this energy of like I don't really need
it that much or whatever and I think that that the desperation goes something happens
and whether it's dating or business or whatever but I don't know if the same for some of what
you've talked about I mean a little bit it's it's a to for me it's about the energy and
so and it's about getting in alignment with the energy of the thing that you desire so
if you're feeling really down and really low which is normal and happens all the time you're
not likely to attract exciting new opportunities right it's like if if you're feeling like
really low and you're right here and these opportunities that you want are up here you're
not in alignment with them and and so when you start to feel good again and inspired
and excited it brings you up here and now suddenly you are in alignment with these new
opportunities and I think from like a slightly more tangible way to explain this is that
when you are feeling really down and really low you are problem oriented right and so
and I i know thatI've been this way when I went through my really challenging year 2009
and I was really depressed my mom would suggest solutions to me and she would think of ideas
to help me and I would say no to everything I would shoot down everything I was just not
in the energy of accepting help or accepting a solution because I was feeling so low and
so when you're feeling hopeful and excited again suddenly it's like oh there's opportunity
everywhere I see solutions everywhere so you're my the your belief system and your energy
is all controlling the opera like opportunities might have existed around you the whole time
but you just didn't see them I always talk about the example of the Fedex logo do the
Fedex logo so I mean I would know the colors it's like the purple and the rng do that there's
like the hidden arrow in between the e and the acts of Fedex in the white space maybe
I don't no so I say this because a lot of people tend to know about the arrow and and
so if you don't know about the arrow go look at the Fedex logo and so it's in the negative
space the white space between the e and the x and that was intentionally done because
Fedex is about movement and so there's also a little hidden baking spoon in the lowercase
e that most people don't know really okay and the idea is that even if you didn't know
about that arrow and that baking spoon they were always there you might have looked at
that logo a hundred times and you didn't see that because you didn't know it was there
you didn't know to look but it doesn't mean that they didn't exist they were always there
so it's like when you are feeling hopeful and excited and you're feeling good to look
for opportunities that are always around you but if you're feeling depressed and low you're
probably not even going to see them even though they might be right in front of you what do
you do for people that they can't necessarily do for themselves two things I think one is
like I talked about I think that I help people believe in themselves and believe in what's
possible in a way they never have before I feel very proud I feel like it is my superpower
to really help people expand their view of what is truly possible and the other thing
that I do that people might not be able to do for themselves is to see their blind spots
right so I can usually have a conversation with them and fairly quickly determine where
their blind spots are in terms of like what's holding them back if they talk to me about
their strategy I can pick out what's really holding them back in that strategy what the
limiting belief is just the other day I was on a podcast interview and I was coaching
the the one of the hosts and he talked about how him and his producing partner they they
live somewhere else in the united states and they're working on moving to Las Vegas and
and they had this whole plan about why that was a good decision and I said tell me why
you're moving to Las Vegas instead of la tell me why you're not moving to la right and so
they told me all these reasons that we're really fear-based they didn't believe that
they could afford to live here they didn't believe they'd find any work they didn't they
had all these stories that they decided on that created their decision and then that
decision leads to dream adjacent right and so I think that we can't always see our blind
spots that's why I work with coaches too I have people help me with my blind spots and
so we can't we can't see them on our own because our mind is really good at justifying our
decisions our mind is really good at coming up with reasons or excuses about why what
we're doing is the right thing to do or the best thing for us but a lot of times we're
holding ourselves back and so I help people with that and and really helping them recognize
where their blind spots may be.
Question For The Viewers:
What is the biggest obstacle you have had to overcome in your life?