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Business Blasphemy
Sarah Khan, Business Advisor and Leadership Consultant, is calling B.S. on the hustle-focused status quo of business and entrepreneurship, and getting real about what it takes to grow a business or career and NOT become a statistic. In each episode, Sarah helps navigate the rampant B.S. that permeates business strategy, marketing, operations, and mindset that has business owners hustling and pivoting themselves into burnout. She cuts through the noise and gives you guidance on how to view the status quo with a more discerning eye. If you're ready for success without the B.S., buckle up for hard truths, fun rants, terrible puns and (more than) the occasional curse word.
Business Blasphemy
EP107: You’re Not Indecisive – The REAL Reason You Hesitate is Not Your Fault
In this episode, I finally introduce myself properly (yeah, it’s overdue) and go deep on a topic that isn’t getting the respect it deserves: self-trust—not the cute, Pinterest version, but the kind that builds empires, not burnout.
I break down how self-trust is conditioned out of ambitious women from a young age, why most of us succeed in spite of ourselves, and how that leads to overthinking, hesitation, and outsourcing our decisions to people who don’t hold our vision.
More importantly, I show you why self-trust is not a mindset issue—it’s a leadership strategy. And if you're stuck in clarity limbo, there’s a reason for that. It’s not confusion. It’s disconnection from your own authority.
This isn’t soft coaching. It’s power reclamation. If that’s what you’re ready for, join me live for The Self-Trust Reset on May 6, 2025. Send me a message using the "Send Us a Text" link above with the word RESET and I'll send you details.
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The Business Blasphemy Podcast is sponsored by Corporate Rehab® Strategic Consulting.
Welcome to the Business Blasphemy Podcast, where we question the sacred truths of the online business space and the reverence with which they're held. I'm your host, sarah Khan speaker, strategic consultant and BS busting badass. Join me each week as we challenge the norms, trends and overall bullshit status quo of entrepreneurship to uncover what it really takes to build the business that you want to build in a way that honors you, your life and your vision for what's possible, and maybe piss off a few gurus along the way. So if you're ready to commit business blasphemy, let's do it. Hello, hello blasphemers. Welcome back to the Business Blasphemy Podcast, where we work hard to burn down every lie you've been sold about what it takes to lead, succeed and be seen in a world that wasn't built for women like us.
Speaker 1:Last week, I attended an event that was being hosted by a new friend that I made here locally. She is truly a kindred spirit, very excited to do more things with her, and the keynote was being delivered by an incredible woman. Her name is Marion Coomeumi. She's a veteran broadcaster here in Canada, she's a communications expert and she now teaches at a local university. She made me realize that, even though I've got over 100 episodes under my belt. Unless you're in my spaces, unless you've been listening since episode one, you very likely don't know who I am and, quite frankly, I've never introduced myself formally, which, in hindsight, was a huge overset on my part, so I'm very sorry about that. So welcome once again to the Business Blasphemy Podcast.
Speaker 1:My name is Sarah Kahn. I'm a leadership strategist and business growth advisor dragon tamer and your favorite blasphemer. I work with smart women who've outgrown the version of success and leadership that they have been taught to follow yes, taught. I help them get clear on what actually matters. I help them get out of hesitation hell. And I help them get out of hesitation hell and I help them start leading from who they are, not who they've been trained to be.
Speaker 1:And today I want to talk about something that does not get enough attention in conversations about success or ambition or leadership or visibility, and that is self-trust. Not the aesthetic Instagram version of self-trust. I don't even know what the fuck that looks like, but there you go. I'm talking about the real, practical, strategic, embodied kind of self-trust, like the kind that builds empires and kills burnout right. Like the kind that lets you lead from who you are like, from your identity, your core identity, not from fear or obligation or expectation or any other thing that we have been conditioned to believe is necessary, right? The kind that, in all honesty, most women are taught to surrender as early as possible. So you know what. Let's start with what I'm actually talking about, okay? So I've got my teacher hat on bear with me for a second.
Speaker 1:Trust, by definition, is a firm belief, like you truly are convicted in the belief of the reliability, of the truth, of the ability or the strength of someone or something. All right, that's trust. So when we talk about self-trust, we're talking about the ability to believe in yourself, in your own reliability, your own truth, your own strength. Self-trust is foundational, what you have and need at your very core. It's not something you earn when you've done enough. It's not something you're supposed to have from the moment you open your eyes.
Speaker 1:And here's the thing everyone skirts around when they talk about it. Most women don't lose self-trust because they're weak or whatever you want to put in there. They lose it because they're taught to. It gets conditioned out of us, right? That's the sneaky part, or I don't know, maybe it's not. You decide, but you learn very early on to doubt yourself. You know. You say, oh, I'm cold. Someone says no, you're not. You say I don't like that. Oh, don't be picky. Oh, this doesn't feel right. Oh, you're overreacting Every time someone gaslights your experience of something or challenges your gut instinct or punishes you for speaking up. Right, that is a slow erosion of trust. And by the time you are a high-achieving, multi-talented, successful, ambitious woman, well, you've learned how to succeed in spite of that disconnection, not because you trust yourself, but because you become really excellent and efficient at scanning the room and adapting right and outperforming expectations. Now, I'm not going to lie, that's an incredibly powerful skill. That is me, in a nutshell, and I've accomplished really great things because of that skill.
Speaker 1:But it costs you everything when you are the one who needs to make decisions at the end of the day, because now you are probably an overthinker. You probably second guess everything that you think, so it leads to more overthinking, right? You're somebody who asks everyone else first what their opinion is, what their impression is of something, what they think you should do. You're somebody who waits for clarity and that clarity never comes. You're probably somebody who's invested in a lot of clarity sessions, right, had a lot of conversations with biz besties and coaches. You're somebody who delays action because as hard as it's going to be to hear this you're terrified of getting it wrong. Every decision feels like it's so much bigger than it is and there's so much risk involved in it, and then, because there's more, just wait, there's more. And then you feel shame for not being more decisive when really you were just taught that your own knowing isn't enough.
Speaker 1:This is a true and all too common experience for women in pretty much every walk of life. It starts young and it continues, especially the more powerful you get or the higher up the ladder you go. And woe betide you as an entrepreneur, because you don't have the committee that we have in corporate or traditional roles to help you mitigate the risk of decisions. You're on your own with them, and so many people in the online business space are ready to pounce in and tell you oh, it's your mindset or it's your vibe, your vibe is wrong or you need to realign your aura. I don't know if that's a thing. I'm being facetious. I think it's aligning your chakras. Sorry, I'm just being an asshole, but this really pisses me off. Here's what I need you to know.
Speaker 1:Cultivating self-trust is absolutely essential, and I say cultivate very intentionally. Self-trust is not a vibe, it's a leadership strategy. Now, a lot of people think leadership is a title or it's a skill at best, but I'm here to tell you it's not. It's a strategy, right? Strategy is something that a lot of people in the online business space don't really understand. They deliver tactics, not strategy. Strategy is a deliberate, long-term plan of action and it is put together to achieve a specific outcome or advantage. If that doesn't apply to real leadership, I will eat my fucking hat and I don't wear a hat, but we can find one that looks appetizing, if I'm wrong.
Speaker 1:Leadership is not a to-do list. It's not about reaction or reactivity. It's about making intentional, high leverage decisions that align with your goals and your identity, and the identity is the key piece, right, and that's so that you're not just doing busy work, you're actually building something of consequence In leadership and business strategy answers questions like what are we going to achieve, what are we going to say yes to and what are we going to stop doing? What are we going to say no to? What resources or what positioning or what power do we need to get these things done or to get to where we want to go, and at the very core of it, strategy is clarity plus choice plus commitment, and self-trust is absolutely necessary for all three of those things clarity, choice and commitment Because when you learn to trust yourself and you have to learn it okay, it is something that you have to cultivate and learn and when you learn to trust yourself, you move faster because you're not constantly waiting for proof that it's going to work or guarantees right.
Speaker 1:You make sharper decisions because you're not operating from fear. There's a clarity and an alignment and a conviction that happens. You take more aligned risks, because the reality is you cannot avoid risk altogether. The thing that you want is to take risks that are aligned with your goals and your capacity and your identity, because you're not performing safety for other people. You also stop outsourcing your clarity and your decision making to people who don't hold or understand your vision. And when you trust yourself, that is when the magic kicks in. That is when your voice gets louder. That is when your confidence feels real, not practiced. You take up space without apologizing for it or feeling like you're sucking the air out of the room. You make moves and take action that feels bold but also feels true, because the moves are not performative. Imposter syndrome dies because you're not performing. You stop waiting for permission because you've already given it to yourself.
Speaker 1:I have watched women change their entire business model leave a job, raise their rates, take the stage I don't know pivot hard, not because they had a better plan or because someone told them, but because they trusted themselves to lead themselves and everybody else through it. You want to know the wild part. They always knew what they wanted. They just needed someone to help them trust their own answer. And that is why I created the Self-Trust Reset, because I see that there is a huge need, especially today, for something like this.
Speaker 1:The Self-Trust Reset is a 90-minute live, high-impact session designed for ambitious women just like you who are stuck in decision limbo, not because they're confused, not because they don't have clarity, but because they're disconnected from their own authority. You don't need another coaching program. You don't need another get-clear worksheet. You need a powerful environment where you can stop spiraling and start deciding. And so in this session, you're going to do exactly that. You're going to name your decision, the one that's been haunting you for a long time. You're going to identify the trust gaps that are keeping you stuck in all of those freaking options that you don't need, and you're going to reconnect to your internal guidance and we're going to help you make one really powerful decision to move from clarity and not from chaos. It's live. It's on May 6th. Spots are limited for a reason and I'm keeping it intimate and intentional and real. And if it's calling to you, go to the text link in the show notes or DM me the word reset on any of my social media platforms and I'll send you the details.
Speaker 1:Self-trust is not a reward for doing the right thing or for doing enough or for keeping up with the Joneses. Self-trust is a right and if it has been conditioned out of you, you have every right to reclaim it as loudly and as unapologetically as possible and with conviction, because, my love, you are not too much, you are not behind and you are not indecisive. You just haven't been in a room that reminded you of what you've always known. So come join me.
Speaker 1:We are resetting the standard for how powerful women lead themselves and, like I always say, you can have success without the BS. You just need to remind yourself that you're safe. I'll see you inside and I'll talk to you next week. That's it for this week. Thanks for listening to the Business Blasphemy Podcast. We'll be back next week with a new episode, but in the meantime, help a sister out by subscribing and, if you're feeling extra sassy, rating this podcast, and don't forget to share the podcast with others. Head over to businessblasphemypodcastcom to connect with us and learn more. Thanks for listening and remember you can have success without the BS.