Join Kristi Mirambell as she discusses the importance of stepping out of your comfort zone and always embracing the unknown for successful growth for your company as a business owner.
The biggest fear that I have as a business owner is what “I don’t know that I don’t know.” Everyone of us lives in this moment of ignorance. Unfortunately, it is part of us being human, so what do we do with this?
As an engineer, I live life making sense of everything. When I use the word everything, I literally mean analysis paralysis of every life moment. It is a practice that over time created a pressure inside of me that impacted my relationships with others. I became more controlling and less open minded and in some relationships, it was a vulnerability that others used for manipulation. But at the time, it was what I needed to make sense of the fluidity of life. Then life unfolded in a way that was not able to make sense for me. That is when I had no choice other than to embrace that there are things, I dont know that I don’t know and that it was fine.
This time of my life produced a sense of ease in accepting that I know that there are things I am unaware that I don’t know. With the acceptance came the shift of seeing life in a perspective of awe with a childlike excitement of what I will learn next. The journey is a continuous journey that unfortunately for my logic driven brain does not fit into an excel sheet or have an equation, but what it does offer is freedom and with freedom comes opportunities.
I use this basic life lesson and translate it into K-Belle every day. I consciously recognize where I may have unknowns and look to others that I admire that have a better understanding than I do about that aspect. I learn what I feel is necessary to learn about the unknown then decide if it fits what I do best. As a small business owner, I measure if my time is best spent doing a task or if outsourcing would be a better option. The most common decision maker is the amount of money that it takes to outsource it versus “just doing it myself.” Currently, I struggle with this internal debate. However, something to consider is what is the value that you as the owner bring to the table and what could you pay someone to compliment what you do best?
Your company is your vision, but that doesn’t mean that you have to know everything that you don’t know. It means that you have the courage to take a chance and with courage comes believing that you have the self-awareness to identify anything that you may not know and find a way to overcome it. On the other side, to the people that are living in arrogance. Meaning that they are rigid in the belief that all they need to know is what they know, then I encourage you to shine a light on your blind spot. Allow an aspect of life that is different than your common daily thought process to be considered. Challenge yourself to understand (not necessarily agree) a different way of observing.
Regardless of the way that we choose to live our lives, it all starts with trusting that no matter what we don’t know, whether intentional or unintentional, that we have the tools and abilities needed to overcome it. Acknowledging the faith, we must have in ourselves to start a business is the first step to moving into a perspective of living life and business in awe. We are not meant to know everything, but we are meant to figure it out. And that starts with believing in ourselves.
- Kristi Mirambell
President / Founder
K-Belle Consultants, LLC