Starting out as a self-employed person: Tips to get your confidence high

Starting out as a self-employed person means that you are going to begin as an entrepreneur, and that is the most exciting and fun journey you can take in your work life. Instead of listening to others and doing what they say, you are going to listen to yourself and do what you want.

A first fun insight of starting out as a self-employed person is that you are now going to become more action-oriented instead of being reactive. So first, let's talk about what to expect, what you need and what to do.

Stages you go through as an entrepreneur

When you start as an entrepreneur, there are three stages you go through. If you Googled "starting as a self-employed person," you're probably just getting to phase two.

In fact, the first stage is one where you notice that there is a certain need among people; in the market, as it were. And you can fill that need. You see an opportunity for yourself, so to speak.

In the second phase, you actually start your business. You consider what resources you need to get started. Like maybe a good laptop if you want to be a virtual assistant, a company car if you want to be a landscaper or start-up capital if you need to develop something for your business.

At this stage, you can also register with the Chamber of Commerce and the Tax Authority as an entrepreneur, even if you don’t have any clients yet. That way, you can at least claim a VAT refund on the investments you make.

In the third stage, your business is really there, and that is the stage where you get clients and where you can grow your business or keep it stable, so you know you can make a living from it for a long time[1].

What do I need?

The great thing about being self-employed is that you can do it from home. So if you have a kitchen table, you have somewhere enough.

Then you need another skill that you are going to use for your business. Are you going to provide services, such as tile laying or be a virtual assistant, or are you going to sell things?

Depending on what you are going to do, you already know what you need.

As a business owner, though, it is helpful to register with the Chamber of Commerce so that you can reclaim VAT on the investments you make for your business.

Then it is also helpful to have at least something for your records, so you can keep track of what investments you have made and so you can send invoices to your clients. Keeping your records is then useful for your VAT return and final income tax.

A computer on which you can keep this kind of records would be handy, as would a phone for your accessibility. You can also use the phone you already have for this purpose. You can then ask your phone provider if they also have a business plan for you when your current plan expires, and you can deduct the cost of your phone from your profit.

In addition, you need a few mental things, namely:

1. Perseverance
2. Discipline
3. Self Confidence
4. Need to achieve something
5. Ideas
6. Goals (source 1)

What to do.

So what you need to do is register as self-employed with the Chamber of Commerce and then figure out how to make your business known to your potential clients.

For this, online marketing is helpful and you can check in your area for networking meetings for entrepreneurs. There you can showcase yourself and learn from other entrepreneurs how they are shaping their businesses.

This can also help you overcome insecurities and fears about entrepreneurship, more on that later in this blog.

It is also important to keep up with your records, especially if you do not yet have the resources to outsource.

Online marketing

If you are just starting out in business, it is very nice that social media exists. In fact, this is free to use and that can be very helpful to start promoting your business.

In addition, it is helpful to have a website that tells more about what your business can do for people and why you are the most scaffolded person for this.

Overcoming fears as you become self-employed

So when you become self-employed, there are actually four things that are very important, namely:

1. Have confidence in the quality you deliver.
2. Dare to show yourself.
3. Don't fear the IRS.
4. Have an entrepreneurial mindset.

In all these cases, talking to other entrepreneurs and hypnosis can help you.

For example, in terms of the quality you deliver. By talking to other entrepreneurs about how they view their services, you can find out that you are doing quite well.

In addition, a hypnotherapist can help you with your self-confidence, allowing you to stand behind your product or service more fully. This can also enhance your intention to exhibit entrepreneurial behavior, and improving that intention helps you actually demonstrate entrepreneurial behavior[2].

For example, you can improve intention by having some kind of plan. One hypnosis technique that fits this is progression. Progression is very similar to regression, with the difference being that you can actually visualize your ideal future as a self-employed person.

You then visualize, for example, how successful your business will be a year from now. Then you take a step back in your mind each time, until you get to the point where you are sitting in the chair with the hypnotherapist.

This in fact gives you a plan and a clear goal to achieve and that can do a lot to actually achieve that image.

Then there are often real fears, such as the fear of showing yourself. Whether this is in social circumstances such as while networking with other entrepreneurs or whether it is online, it can still be quite scary.

Changing Beliefs

Where do these fears come from? That's also something you can explore with hypnosis. After all, many people who start out as self-employed don't really see themselves as entrepreneurs, and that can be prohibitive. I have noticed this myself. In the years when I thought I was not a good entrepreneur, I also earned very little relative to what I did.

But then I used regression to find out why I thought that. That’s when I discovered that an entrepreneur in my family had once told me I would never be a good entrepreneur. I had accepted that suggestion. But during the regression, I realized I could let go of it.

Instantly, my sales went up three times. So just changing beliefs related to, for example, being a self-employed person and what that does to your income can do a lot to still become a successful entrepreneur.

This helped me develop an entrepreneurial mindset.

Regression is also a technique that a hypnotherapist can help you with.

Daring to express yourself as a self-employed person

This can also help you if, for example, you find it scary to work on your online visibility. For example, if you think you need to invest in professional photos first. After all, even if you're just starting out in business, you don't have to.

Showing yourself is also something you do when networking to get clients, especially in the beginning this can be useful if you don't have many followers on your social media yet or if you don't have many website visitors yet.

If you find it exciting to talk to other entrepreneurs, visualization can be very helpful. For example, you can visualize how to stay relaxed and how to listen to other entrepreneurs, so you can learn from them how to relax and tell more about yourself and your business.

A visualization like this helps you imagine that you can do this and that boosts your confidence. In the process, you can practice staying calm right away. This is ideal if you suffer a bit from social anxiety.

This technique is often used in conjunction with other techniques, such as regression or progression.

Overcoming fear of the IRS

Given all the scandals at the IRS, it's not very surprising if you get these fears. For example, I know a businesswoman who also had a fear of the IRS, which very much inhibited her from picking a payment system for her online products, for example.

After all, you should all have invoices following one another. After talking with other entrepreneurs, she found out that many entrepreneurs also have different lists. For example, a list of incremental invoices for services and a separate list of incremental invoices for their online products.

Another exercise she did was to ridicule her beliefs by saying the phrase "I'm afraid of the IRS" out loud as crazy as possible during a weird dance. Because if you can laugh at your fear, it's no longer a problem.

So hypnosis can definitely help you make a success of your business if you are going to start as a self-employed person. It can help you with your business plan. It can help you remove obstacles and overcome fears so that you can start your business in a relaxed way.

Would you like to learn more about hypnosis? Then join our free online masterclass.

Or sign up for one of our seminars and training courses.

Also pin this handy infographic as a reminder:

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