Stop Faking It, Start Owning It. Consistency Beats "Fake It Till You Make It" Hands down
The power of consistency and mastery (and why it’s better than “Fake It Till You Make It”)
In today’s fast-paced, results-oriented world, two common approaches to success often come up: "Fake it till you make it" and "Work on it till you own it." The first encourages acting as though you’ve already achieved something, hoping that the confidence you project will carry you through until you actually arrive. The second—"Work on it till you own it"—focuses on persistent effort, mastery, and personal growth through consistent action.
While the "fake it till you make it" approach can give you temporary boosts of confidence, it often falls short when it comes to building long-term, authentic mastery. The deeper, more lasting growth comes from embracing consistent effort, especially when paired with methods like Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) and hypnotherapy. These tools can empower you to reshape your mindset, dismantle limiting beliefs, and help you sustain the perseverance necessary to truly "own" your goals and skills.
Understanding "Work on It Till You Own It"
To "work on it till you own it" means committing to the process of mastering a skill or achieving a goal until you reach a level of fluency and confidence that’s completely authentic. Whether it’s in your career, personal development, or health goals, ownership is the point where you’ve put in enough consistent work that your performance feels natural and effortless. It’s not just competence—it’s mastery.
This approach is rooted in persistence, resilience, and the belief that consistent, focused effort will yield deep, lasting change. In the context of NLP and hypnotherapy, this phrase becomes even more powerful. These methodologies help align your unconscious mind with your conscious goals, creating a more harmonious and effective path toward real growth and success.
The limitations of "Fake It Till You Make It"
"Fake it till you make it" is a phrase that encourages people to project confidence, even when they don’t feel it internally, hoping that this will eventually lead to genuine success. While this approach can work in the short term by helping people push through fear and self-doubt, it often leaves gaps that are difficult to bridge.
Superficial Confidence: Faking confidence doesn’t build real, lasting self-esteem or skill. It creates a surface-level appearance of competence that can easily crumble under pressure.
Impostor Syndrome: The more you fake it, the more you may feel like a fraud, as you’re continuously pretending to be someone you’re not. This can actually worsen feelings of inadequacy over time.
Lack of Substance: Pretending to have mastered something may get you through a meeting or an event, but it doesn’t create the deep knowledge, ability, or resilience required to sustain long-term success.
In contrast, "Work on it till you own it" encourages you to actively develop real skills and emotional resilience, eliminating the need to fake anything.
The role of NLP in "Working on It Till You Own It"
Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) offers powerful tools to help you shift your mindset and stay motivated on the journey to mastery. It focuses on the relationship between neurological processes (how we think), language (how we communicate), and behavioural patterns (how we act). With NLP, you can break through limiting beliefs, transform unhelpful mental habits, and reprogram your mind for success.
Here’s how NLP can enhance the "work on it till you own it" mindset:
1. Breaking Limiting Beliefs
NLP is effective at identifying and dismantling limiting beliefs that might stop you from putting in the effort necessary to achieve mastery. For example, if you believe, "I’ll never be good enough" or "I’m not smart enough to succeed," NLP can help reframe these thoughts into empowering beliefs like, "I have the ability to learn and grow" or "I’m constantly improving with every step."
By shifting your belief system, you’re better equipped to commit to the long-term effort required to truly own your goals.
2. Anchoring Success States
NLP includes a technique called anchoring, where you link a physical gesture or trigger to a positive emotional state. This can help reinforce feelings of confidence, motivation, or focus whenever you need them most. By anchoring positive emotions, you create a reliable resource to draw on during moments of challenge or frustration.
Anchoring becomes a useful tool when you’re working toward mastery because it provides instant access to empowering mental states. Instead of relying on fake confidence, you can tap into genuine feelings of success that keep you motivated and resilient.
3. Visualisation for Success
In NLP, visualisation is often used to help individuals mentally rehearse their success. By visualising the steps toward mastery, you condition your mind to anticipate and embrace the path to ownership. You’re training your brain to expect success, and this visualisation aligns your conscious goals with your subconscious mind, which accelerates the process of learning and mastery.
The use of NLP techniques like visualisation helps cement the idea that progress is being made, which increases the likelihood that you’ll stay consistent in your efforts and achieve long-term results.
Hypnotherapy: reprogramming the mind for mastery
Along with NLP, hypnotherapy is another powerful tool for ensuring that the path to "owning" a skill or goal is smooth and aligned with your inner resources. Hypnotherapy works by accessing the subconscious mind—where many of our habits, beliefs, and automatic responses are stored—and reshaping those mental patterns in a positive direction.
1. Rewriting Unhelpful Patterns
Through hypnotherapy, you can address the unconscious mental blocks that prevent you from sticking with a goal long enough to achieve mastery. If procrastination, fear of failure, or self-doubt has held you back in the past, hypnotherapy can help rewrite those patterns. Instead of battling against these obstacles consciously, hypnotherapy allows you to work on them at a deeper level, making it easier to stay focused on consistent effort.
2. Accessing States of Flow
Hypnotherapy can help you tap into states of flow—a mental state where you’re fully absorbed in an activity, losing track of time and performing at your best. Athletes, artists, and high performers often talk about being in a "flow state" when they’re fully immersed in their work. By using hypnotherapy to practice entering these states, you can increase your productivity, focus, and motivation, which are essential for putting in the work necessary to truly own a skill.
3. Building Resilience
Hypnotherapy can also be used to build resilience by reinforcing positive beliefs and reducing the fear of failure. Often, the fear of not being good enough or of making mistakes can keep people from sticking with a goal long enough to achieve mastery. By addressing these fears on a subconscious level, hypnotherapy helps you cultivate a mindset of persistence and adaptability.
Why "Work on It Till You Own It" is better than "Fake It Till You Make It"
With the combined tools of NLP and hypnotherapy, the "Work on it till you own it" approach far surpasses the temporary benefits of "Fake it till you make it" for several reasons:
1. True Confidence Through Mastery
Unlike "Fake it till you make it," where confidence is built on a fragile facade, working toward true ownership provides real confidence. With each step forward, your skills improve, and your belief in your abilities solidifies. Hypnotherapy helps reprogram limiting beliefs, and NLP techniques keep you grounded in authentic, empowered thinking, making your confidence unshakeable.
2. Deeper Learning and Growth
By embracing consistent effort, you’re more likely to achieve deeper learning and genuine growth. NLP’s visualisation and belief-reframing techniques accelerate this process by aligning your subconscious mind with your conscious goals, ensuring that you stay motivated and focused. This approach leads to sustained success, whereas faking it often results in superficial growth that crumbles under pressure.
3. Aligned with Authenticity
NLP and hypnotherapy both prioritise authenticity—helping you become the best version of yourself, rather than pretending to be something you’re not. "Work on it till you own it" is built on this authenticity. Instead of relying on an external image, you’re developing real skills and emotional resilience, which fosters long-term growth and self-empowerment.
4. Resilience and Adaptability
In moments of challenge, the "fake it" approach often collapses, leaving you unsure of how to proceed. But when you work on something until you own it, you’re building resilience along the way. NLP techniques like anchoring and hypnotherapy’s ability to reduce fear and doubt help you push through obstacles with confidence, ensuring that setbacks don’t derail your progress.
So the bottom Line really is authentic success comes from consistency, Not pretending
While "Fake it till you make it" might offer short-term benefits like a temporary boost in confidence, it doesn’t create long-lasting success. In contrast, "Work on it till you own it," especially when combined with powerful tools like NLP and hypnotherapy, builds authentic confidence, resilience, and true mastery.
By consistently putting in the work and reprogramming your mind for success, you can overcome limiting beliefs, develop unshakable confidence, and truly own your craft. The rewards of this approach go far beyond the temporary boost of faking it—they offer deep personal growth, fulfilment, and the satisfaction of knowing that your success is built on a solid foundation of effort, authenticity, and mastery.
So, if you're ready to move beyond pretending and start truly achieving, why not shift your mindset? Begin now by booking a hypnotherapy & NLP session to reshape your thinking. The results will be life-changing.