The other day it was absolutely pissin’ it down (as my UK friends would say).

It was the very type of day that makes you want to cuddle up on the couch, under your coziest blanket, with a warm cup of tea and a good book, maybe of the Jennifer Weiner variety.

Not me – I had a doctor appointment to get to. It had been on the calendar for several weeks, so rescheduling wasn’t really an option without a fair amount of hassle.

So I got in my car and headed out.

The drive was 45 minutes, on the highway no less, with visibility down to about 4 cars in front of me. The spray coming off of other cars are insane.

Oh, and did I tell you really don’t like driving on highways?

I kept my car at a good speed, in one lane, and just went about my drive.

Other cars and trucks kept whizzing by, weaving in and out of lanes – they just seemed to be going infinitely faster than me. I was going about 8 mph over the speed limit.

I was so tempted to tell myself a fun but incredibly unhelpful story about how terrible of a driver I am, how I was inconveniencing the other drivers with my safe pace, how staying in my lane meant I was a loser and heck, if I couldn’t feel confident on the road doing something I’ve been doing for over 20 years, how in the hell am I supposed to succeed in business.

Then a magical thing happened, I caught myself.

I heard the start of story-spinning, the meaning-making, the feelings of lack and “less than”.

I reassured myself that for these conditions, I was going at the comfortable pace for me to get where I needed to go.

This scenario is something I see this all the time with other business owners.

We see someone else doing something out in the public eye and immediately want to jump on that ship.

We watch another coach pitch not one but three offers during a webinar.

Sometimes we think, “WOW! That was awesome and I can see how she did it. I’m going to look into that tactic and see if I can try it on my next online training.”

But too many times, we see that someone crush it on the online events and immediately tell ourselves that their success means we’re a failure at our businesses because we’re not doing THAT.

There’s a big difference between seeing that other person try a new tactic and using that as fuel step just outside our comfort zone and try something new in your own business versus using what you see to tell yourself you are “less than” or a loser or that you won’t make it.

Remember to stay in your lane and keep on your own, unique path in order to get to where you need to go.

You will get there.

It happens in exactly the time it needs to happen in.

Photo by Sergio R. on Unsplash