I just got an email back from a client that would have thrown me into a tailspin a few years ago.
“We were not impressed… We’re going to stop here and source another solution.”
I’ve run a design studio for the past 25 years, and somehow I ended up in the odd niche of commercial real estate. I’ve worked with upwards of 15 separate CRE firms over the tenure of my career, and what I’ve learned is you never quite know what you’re going to get.
Sometimes it’s over-the-top admiration. They have never seen a better design. Where have we been all their lives?
Then there is the client who is used to PowerPoint presentations and crap designs created by the executive assistant who fancies herself a designer because, “she knows Photoshop.” They wouldn’t know good design if it hit them in the face. And that’s just the way it is. These clients can sometimes be coaxed away from using Calibri as a brand font, but oftentimes, they can’t be shown the light.
So today, when I got that feedback, instead of going into an imposter-syndrome spiral, I let out a deep breath and felt relief wash over me.
I’m an intuition girl. I have been working on learning to listen and trust my gut for a hot second now, and this moment was what I have come to recognize as a universal “brake check”. My friend MaryAnn coined the term, as far as I know. It’s when you’re working on some bit of personal development, and the universe gives you the chance to try out your newly minted skill. “You think you mastered letting your ego get the better of you? Hold my beer.” Then you’re hit with the client who didn’t like your work; the friend who is testing a boundary you’ve set; the daily meditation practice you thought you had set in stone, but you’re ready to throw the habit out the window because you missed a day. All these moments are meant to test you. Sometimes you don’t pass, and sometimes you impress yourself (like today for me) and realize you really have mastered something.
When you’re in school, and you’re learning something new, you’re always given the final exam to show that you’ve understood and can implement the information. It’s the same with life. When you’re trying to change something you don’t like about yourself, you can say you don’t want to react a certain way or feel a type of way any longer, but until you’re put to the test, you don’t know if it stuck. And every time you’re tested, you can see how much further you’ve come.
There is also the “what is true” technique I can put these moments up against. It goes a little something like this:
What is true? I am a great designer. My team is fabulous. My studio is thriving. I have clients who rave about my work and consider my expertise an important part of their business.
It’s easy to go all doom and gloom when you get a hit like this. But with the hindsight of 25 years as an entrepreneur, I know that these things always happen for the best and highest good. These clients are not my clients, and that’s ok. Did I waste 9 hours of my team’s time? Yes. But in the end, these are the hardest clients to work with and are better offloaded quickly.
I’ve been at this for 25 years and have never been more confident about my abilities. Releasing a misaligned relationship leaves space for the right opportunities. And things that I perceived as failures at the time were actually protecting me and redirecting me to the next best thing.
So when you find yourself in this moment, shift your perspective and see it as an opportunity for noticing growth. Did you react the same way as you used to? Or did you do something new and better?