The biggest thing holding you back from being successful is not an algorithm.

It’s not AI. It’s not competition. It’s not the economy. And it’s not the fact that you don’t have the perfect demo, website, or agent yet.

Yes, that shit matters. But that’s not it.

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What actually makes the difference, over and over again, is something right under your nose. It’s the set of patterns you repeat every day without realizing it. The choices that feel reasonable in the moment. The habits that once kept you safe, but now keep you stuck.

If you want to fulfill even a part of your potential, you have to stop treating the obstacles as external and start looking inside at where you’re getting in your own way. Where you’re driving with one foot on the gas, yet still the other stomping on the brake.

It’s not because you’re lazy or uncommitted. It’s because you’re human, and nobody hands you a clear playbook for building a business.

So let’s talk about the patterns I see over and over again, the ones that sabotage progress, and what it actually looks like to step out of your own way.

The Real Problem Isn’t External. It’s What You Keep Repeating.

Most people blame something external for holding them back.

But when you zoom out and look honestly at your calendar, your weeks, your habits, it’s rarely one big failure. It’s repetition of the same delays, the same avoidance, the same bullshit stories you tell yourself in your head about timing, readiness, or confidence.

None of these mean you’re some sort of failure. You’re just predictable. And predictable patterns are fixable.

1. You Don’t See Yourself as a Pro Yet

Long before rates, marketing, or auditions, there’s a story running in the background in your head. Something like:

“I’m not really a voice actor yet.”
“Once I hit X, then I’ll take this seriously.”
“When I get an agent, then I’ll act like a professional.”

That story sounds harmless and humble, but it comes at a cost. When you don’t see yourself as legit, you play small, undercharge, hesitate. and wait around to be picked instead of building momentum.

The shift happens when you realize this is ass backward.

Being a pro isn’t something you earn after success. It’s something you practice in order to achieve it. Successful business owners don’t wait to be validated.

They take action.

2. You’RE Waiting for Confidence to Show Up First

A lot of voice actors tell themselves they’ll do the uncomfortable things once they feel more confident.

Raise rates later.
Reach out later.
Put themselves out there later.

The problem is confidence doesn’t work that way. Confidence isn’t the starting line. It’s the byproduct. It shows up after action, not before it.

If you keep waiting to feel ready, you’ll stay stuck forever. The people who move forward aren’t braver or more certain. They’re just willing to act in uncertainty.

3. You’re Still Waiting to Be Picked

This one runs deep, especially for performers.

So much of acting culture is built around being cast. Being selected. Being approved. But the business side of voiceover doesn’t work that way.

When you stay stuck in waiting mode, you hand over control. You delay progress until someone else decides you’re worthy of it.

Business owners don’t wait to be chosen. They create opportunities. They start a shitload of conversations. They measure actions, not moods or feelings.

The moment you stop waiting and start reaching out, the power dynamic shifts.

4. Perfectionism COSPLAYING as High Standards

This is one of the most common traps, especially among capable, intelligent people.

You tell yourself you’re just being thorough. That you want to do things right. That quality matters.

And it does.

But there’s a line where preparation stops being responsible and starts being protective. Endlessly rewriting emails. Tweaking demos for months. Reworking websites instead of shipping them.

It feels productive and justified. But nothing gets fucking DONE.

Author, Brené Brown says this:

Perfectionism is a self destructive and addictive belief system that fuels this primary thought: If I look perfect, and do everything perfectly, I can avoid or minimize the painful feelings of shame, judgment, and blame. Perfectionism is a defensive move.

Progress doesn’t reward perfection. It rewards consistency. Done, repeated, and refined beats perfect and incomplete every single time.

5. You’re Always Busy, But Rarely Strategic

Ask most people how they’re doing and you’ll hear the same answer: “Oh! So busy!”

Busy editing.
Busy organizing.
Busy responding.
Busy reacting.

But busy ain’t the same as effective.

If you don’t control your time, attention, and energy, something else will. Usually your inbox. Without structure, your best energy gets spent on low-impact tasks, and the work that actually grows your business gets pushed to “later.”

Structure doesn’t limit creativity. It protects it. As my business coach, James Wedmore, says…

The more structure you have in your business, the more freedom you have in your life.

Time blocking, priorities, and planning aren’t corporate horseshit. They’re how you align your time, attention, and energy to what you say you want.

6. Procrastination Isn’t Laziness. It’s Avoidance.

Most procrastination has nothing to do with discipline. It’s emotional.

You avoid the tasks that come with risk. Rejection. Uncertainty. Visibility. So you clean. You organize. You tweak. You “prepare.”

All of it feels reasonable. None of it moves the needle.

The breakthrough happens when you notice the moment you want to run and choose to move toward the task instead.

You don’t need to finish it. You just need to start. Atomic Habits author James Clear calls it optimizing for the starting line.

Ten focused minutes beats another week of avoidance.

7. You Know Marketing Matters, But You Avoid It Anyway

Almost everyone agrees marketing is essential. A precious few actually do it consistently.

Outreach feels pushy. Follow-ups feel annoying. Visibility feels vulnerable.

So marketing happens in bursts. A week of effort, then nothing. A push when work is slow, then silence when it picks up. The result is so damned predictable:

Inconsistent effort means inconsistent results.

Marketing is about repetition and consistency (not perfection) that keeps you visible even when you’d rather hide in the shadows.

Silence is not rejection. It’s not a No. It’s a Not Just Now.

Consistently providing value to people who may one day need your help isn’t desperation. It’s what pros do.

8. You Keep Second-Guessing YourSELF

Decision paralysis shows up as intelligence. Research. Comparison. Optimization.

But at a certain point, it becomes a way to avoid commitment. You switch strategies too quickly. You revisit decisions you already made. You keep options open instead of taking action.

Progress compounds when you give things time to work.

There is no perfect choice. There is only a choice you stick with long enough to learn from.

9. You Don’t Have a Structure for Accountability

This is where everything ties together.

Most of these patterns persist for one simple reason: there’s no system catching them.

No weekly review.
No tracking.
No feedback loop.

When nothing is measured, everything is optional. When you can see your actions, your patterns change.

When you track your effort, progress becomes real. A sales manager I one worked with said “What gets measured, grows.” You don’t need a complicated system. You need one simple way to stay honest with yourself.

The Common Thread

If you recognized yourself in several of these, it’s not a permission slip to beat yourself up. It’s just information. These issues aren’t about talent, intelligence, motivation, or willpower.

They’re about structure. Without structure, even the clearest of visions and the best of intentions fade. With structure, even average effort compounds over time.

This is why so many capable people stay stuck way longer than they should. Not because they aren’t good enough, but because they’re trying to build a business without a framework to support it.

The Way Out Isn’t Trying Harder

Getting out of your own way doesn’t require a personality transplant. It requires fewer, better decisions, clearer priorities, and repeatable systems.

Every pattern you noticed here is something you can change. Not overnight. Not perfectly. But steadily. You don’t need to fix everything. You need to pick one pattern and interrupt it. Start there.

Build structure around it. Repeat the process. You’re not waiting for your break. You’re building it.

And the moment you stop getting in your own way, you’ll be surprised how much room there was to grow all along.

9 Ways You Get in Your Own Way & How To Fix it