Recently, I’ve had a few career coaching clients ask me some variation of, "How can I trust myself? I've taken steps in my career that I thought were the right thing and now things aren’t working out. So, how can I trust my judgment in deciding what I do next?”

My answer is we can trust ourselves and our judgment to the extent that we’re willing to be really honest with ourselves.

The thing is, you can never know for sure how something is going to go, we’re just working with the information we have in the moment. However - and this is where we can run into trouble - often we don’t really use all the information available to us. In particular, we don't look at or we downplay how we’re actually feeling deep down about things. What’s going on inside of us is a wealth of information we can have the tendency to ignore, sometimes knowingly.

So how do you trust yourself in deciding on your next career step? You make sure you’re looking at that stuff going on inside. I’m talking about getting really honest about the potential thing you’re considering doing and whether you genuinely feel it’s what you want. Just how in a relationship with another person, you can trust them to the extent they are honest with you, you can only really trust yourself to the extent you are honest with yourself.

For me in the past, just like my clients, I also made decisions I thought were the “right” move, but they didn’t work out as I’d hoped. What I was doing was actively convincing myself - telling myself a story about how it was the right thing and hiding what I knew deep down to be true. I was pretending that there wasn’t a small voice inside me whispering, “Actually no, you don’t really want to do this.” I didn’t want to acknowledge it and was scared to admit it was there. Because then I would have to deal with it.

Our truth can often seem pretty inconvenient and troublesome; so we’d rather pretend it’s not there.  For me, facing my truth would mean I’d have to then do the work of finding what I actually do want to do. At the time I felt lost and like I hadn’t a clue what that was. But I did know it was likely something that didn’t fit the script of what myself and others had created for my future. I was afraid to be honest about and confront that. So I pushed that inner voice aside and tried my best to convince myself the path I was about to walk was the “right” one and that I actually wanted it.

I think you know how that worked out. We can’t hide from ourselves. There’s no getting around your truth. In this moment, your truth could be that despite all the arguments for it, you don’t actually want to do what you’re considering doing next. Your truth could be that you don’t really know what you want to do, but instead of doing the inner work to find out, you’re trying to convince yourself you want to do X - you’re not being honest with yourself. Whatever your honest truth is, it’s what you can trust. And it’s perhaps the most valuable piece of information to guide your next step. Any step that honors that truth will put you on solid ground.

So, how do you know if you’re being honest with yourself? Well, if what you’re considering doing is right for you, you likely won't need to convince yourself. You’ll know. You’ll feel it. And while you may have fear, you’ll also feel excited to take this next step because there’s some real desire there. It’s not coming from shoulds or a convincing mind with arguments. Notice the difference between something sounding good - maybe looking really good on paper, feeding your ego, ticking all the boxes, having arguments for being a “safe” choice - vs. something that actually in your bones feels good, gets you excited and has some real energy behind it.  Get clear and honest with yourself on your motivations - are you motivated by a genuine desire to do what you’re considering doing? Or is it coming from a place of shoulds and a need for external validation?

Think about other areas of life, like relationships. Have you ever started a relationship with someone and early on had some red flags that you chose to ignore? Perhaps you did a bunch of convincing yourself that they weren’t a big deal. Maybe because you were afraid of being alone, facing the judgment of others, bearing the pain of ending the relationship, or any number of other reasons. In the end, these relationships usually don’t work out and you’re left wondering why when deep down you kinda already know why. You knew all along it wasn't really the right fit. What I’m talking about here for your career navigation is a very similar thing.

Pay attention to how you’re really feeling. If you do that, you can take your next career step knowing you’re doing the best you can and it’s likely your future self will thank you. There are still no guarantees things will go exactly as you hope, but you will have done your part.