In this episode of The Abundant Coach, Jennifer Jimenez reveals how perfectionism is actually fear in disguise—and why letting go of perfectionism is the secret to success, fulfillment, and true impact in your coaching business. If you’ve ever delayed a launch, re-recorded videos to exhaustion, or felt “not ready,” this episode is your permission slip to be real, take action, and start changing lives now.

Key Takeaways That Will Inspire Action

• You don’t need to be perfect to be powerful—you need to be real.
• Perfectionism is rooted in fear and blocks momentum.
• Taking messy, aligned action leads to impact and income.
• Your clients aren’t looking for polish—they’re looking for heart.
• Momentum builds confidence—and confidence builds business.

🚀 Your Authentic Message Can Change Lives– No Perfection Needed

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✅ Clarify what you do and who you help

✅ Turn your story into a powerful client attraction tool

✅ Show up confidently and authentically stand out online

✅ Stop spinning your wheels and start getting results

Whether you’re just getting started or want to grow your coaching business with even more ease and authenticity, this challenge is your next best step.

👉 Reserve your spot here

This is your time. Let go of “perfect.” Step into your power.

00;00;01;12 - 00;00;27;02

Mat Boggs

Welcome to the Abundant Coach. This is a weekly podcast about creating full spectrum success with a thriving coaching business, while making a profound difference in the world. Each week, you'll discover insights, strategies, and inspiration to help you attract your ideal clients. Create real transformation and grow your coaching business while living your purpose with true freedom and fulfillment.

00;00;27;04 - 00;01;08;11

Jennifer Jimenez

Welcome. Welcome to your abundant Coach podcast. This is episode 89 letting go of perfectionism. Why perfect is actually a trap. Now, if we're meeting for the first time, my name is Jennifer Joy Jiménez. I am a co-founder here at Brave Thinking Institute, where we are the premier center for transformational training and coaching, and today we are giving ourselves permission to release the illusion of perfection, because perfection can actually be a success trap that actually keeps you stuck.

00;01;08;13 - 00;01;33;26

Jennifer Jimenez

Now, in this episode today, you're actually also going to learn how perfectionism might be showing up in your life and in your business, why it's rooted in fear. And then I'm going to help you walk away with some empowering shifts and practical tools. Now let's go ahead and receive a beautiful deep breath. Focus our minds in this moment and release any tension or stress that you might be feeling today.

00;01;33;26 - 00;02;11;02

Jennifer Jimenez

Receiving a beautiful, deep breath in. And exhale. Release. Nicely done. So I think when you say the word perfectionism, most people really do know just automatically what that means. But let's define what perfectionism is in a coaching context. Now, it's not about excellence. It's really about fear masquerading as a part of us that is just simply trying to protect us.

00;02;11;04 - 00;02;33;07

Jennifer Jimenez

The common disguises of perfectionism is the feeling of I just wanted to. I want to get it right. I want it to be perfect right before I put it out into the world. Or the feeling that you need to be perfect in order to be accepted or liked or successful. If you've ever thought it's not ready yet, or I'm not ready yet, I need to work on X.

00;02;33;07 - 00;02;56;15

Jennifer Jimenez

00;02;56;17 - 00;03;24;06

Jennifer Jimenez

I am a transformational coach myself and one of our faculty members. I'm the founder of our Health and Wellbeing division and I've been coaching for a few decades now. So here are some of the things that we see show up that can really cause sabotage to your success. That is masqueraded by perfectionism, right? So spending weeks perfecting a website before launching, I'm sure you've never done that before.

00;03;24;08 - 00;03;52;14

Jennifer Jimenez

Rerecording videos endlessly instead of just publishing it right? Or not making an offer. An invitation to coach with you or to your new program until every piece is filmed, recorded, created, polished to perfection, then you invite somebody into your program. So here's the hidden route to this perfectionism. And that is that fear is just simply a response, right?

00;03;52;14 - 00;04;16;05

Jennifer Jimenez

So the hidden root is that it's rooted in fear. And we're afraid of being judged. We're afraid of rejection. We're afraid of not measuring up. And this goes way back to tribal times because when we were in tribal times, right when we were really reliant on each other for survival, if we were rejected from the tribe, we would literally die.

00;04;16;08 - 00;04;41;20

Jennifer Jimenez

So our survival mechanism is triggered when we feel like we might be rejected. Now here's some of the other things that it can look like. It looks shiny on the outside, but it blocks your light from getting out on the outside. It might look really good to have the perfect website or to polish your program to perfection, but it really is a wall between you and massive imperfect action.

00;04;41;20 - 00;05;21;21

Jennifer Jimenez

One of the things we have studied and found is that the coaches who are the most successful meaning they have the greatest level of impact. Typically, they're generating an expansive amount of income because they're impacting more people, but the ones that are the happiest are the ones where their business really is an authentic expression of their heart, where they get to wake up in the morning and put their life force energy, their vocal, their creative expression out into the world in a way that is super authentic to their heart, to their soul, where they really do feel like they're living their purpose, passion and mission.

00;05;21;23 - 00;05;55;29

Jennifer Jimenez

And the ones that are the happiest making the most impact and income are the ones who regularly practice and exercise massive, imperfect action. Now, the other reframe on perfectionism is to recognize and know that perfection isn't protection, it's paralysis. So we want you to know that ultimately that when you're stuck in perfection ism, it really does drain your soul's battery.

00;05;56;02 - 00;06;28;13

Jennifer Jimenez

You can lose confidence. You can lose energy when you feel like you just can't even move forward unless you are perfect or everything around you is perfect. It's just unrealistic. Now, I'd love to share with you a beautiful story, a personal story, actually, of a very beginning time when I was launching my coaching business and this was back in the day when you had the funnels obviously still exist today, where you've got the freebie and then you've got the low price product, and then you got the this and that, and you have to build out this whole funnel.

00;06;28;13 - 00;06;50;15

Jennifer Jimenez

And I had this, this fallacy really that I thought I needed to have all of that built before I could even do anything in the public eye. And I got invited to be a guest speaker on this large global summit. And I had nothing of my backend built yet. And my brother, actually, he's my younger brother, Matt Boggs, is also a co-founder.

00;06;50;15 - 00;07;16;00

Jennifer Jimenez

He was one of the original co-founders of Art Institute with our mother. Her name is Mary Morrissey. She's the founder of the Brave Thinking Institute. And Matt, one of his areas of expertise is marketing. He's actually our marketing faculty inside of our coach certification division. He's brilliant, so amazing. He has millions of followers on his YouTube channel, and he just really has a way with understanding marketing.

00;07;16;07 - 00;07;33;22

Jennifer Jimenez

And I remember calling him in a panic saying, Matt, I'm going to turn down this interview opportunity because I don't have anywhere to send clients if they're interested in, you know, looking at what I might do or finding me, and I feel like I need to have that. You know, I got have my website and I got to build the thing and all this stuff.

00;07;33;22 - 00;08;06;08

Jennifer Jimenez

And he was like, Jennifer, stop. Pause. You don't need any of that. Actually, nobody even cares if you have a website. What would be the next indicated step? And I said, well, would be enrolling in a coaching program. He said, how are they going to do that? And I said, well, from and I have a background in sales, one of the easiest things is just literally to hop on a discovery call, find out what their pain is, find out what their results and vision are, what they would love, and fill the gap if they're a perfect fit for the program, outline the program and invite them in, he said.

00;08;06;08 - 00;08;27;13

Jennifer Jimenez

Well, do you need a website for any of that? And I said, well, how are they going to contact me? He said in the interview at the end of the interview, you can literally just simply have people email you. You can put your email out there and say, if you're interested in learning more. I have a handful of opportunities for a complimentary discovery session.

00;08;27;16 - 00;08;57;09

Jennifer Jimenez

I only have room for five, but the first five of you who email me, it's on a first come, first serve basis. My email is Jennifer at Fill in the blank. And it was like this moment where I realized, oh my gosh, first of all, he's totally true. And secondly, I almost missed out and declined a global opportunity to share my gifts because I felt like I needed to have it all figured out and all bright and shiny and beautiful on the back end.

00;08;57;11 - 00;09;16;13

Jennifer Jimenez

And one of my clients, who's actually now one of our certified coaches, her name is Lewis, and she works with me now in the Health and Wellbeing division. I remember when I was invited to the Los Angeles Unified School District to give a talk on health and wellbeing and mindset, and I did that exact same thing. It was an in-person venue.

00;09;16;16 - 00;09;35;11

Jennifer Jimenez

I gave my talk at the end. I said, for a handful of you who are interested in learning more about coaching, come talk to me. I'm giving away a few discovery sessions. She ran to the back table, she signed up, and I didn't even still at that point have a fully working optin sequence and funnels and all of those things.

00;09;35;11 - 00;09;51;16

Jennifer Jimenez

Now, of course I have all of that now, but it's just a great example that she enrolled. She didn't ask me if I had a website. She didn't even care, you know. And so when she launched her coaching business and a few times I asked her, what are you doing? Have you done your workshop or are you giving talks?

00;09;51;16 - 00;10;33;03

Jennifer Jimenez

And she said, no, I'm tinkering with my website. I reminded her that actually when she enrolled with me, I didn't even have a website. So it's a perfect example of really not allowing the idea that we have to have all of the business components perfectly beautiful and built. You will over time build those things. But one of the things we teach here at the Brave Thinking Institute really, is that these small hinges can swing a very big door, and that you absolutely want to make massive, imperfect action really does lead you so much further down the road into your coaching business of your dreams.

00;10;33;06 - 00;11;06;12

Jennifer Jimenez

Now, here's the other important piece of this, right? Sometimes we feel like, oh gosh, if I just let go and go do that talk. And I don't have all of my business pieces in place, are they going to judge me? Are they going to just think that I'm lazy and I'm unprofessional? And no, actually the reframe on that is that letting go and really just moving into massive, imperfect action represents you stepping into your authenticity and into aligned action.

00;11;06;12 - 00;11;28;26

Jennifer Jimenez

And the more action you take, it's a feedback loop. The more confident you're going to feel, the more confident you feel, the more action you're going to take. So on and so forth. So this is really about trusting your message way more than the book, right? The way we decorate the door or the cover of the book or the design, it's nice to have all of those things.

00;11;28;26 - 00;11;51;23

Jennifer Jimenez

I'm not going to lie. You know, like, I really love having pretty things and having things look really good. Yes, we all do. And yet trusting that the message that I have, the massive, expansive heart that I'm bringing is really my best business card. You know, I am a walking for me personally, particularly in the work that I do.

00;11;51;25 - 00;12;15;11

Jennifer Jimenez

I am my walking billboard. So I will say that one of the things that you want to feel isn't that you have your life perfectly put together, but that you are living what you teach. So every day I think am I work coming from a vision in our institute, we do vision driven coaching. So we're coming from a three year vision.

00;12;15;13 - 00;12;44;12

Jennifer Jimenez

Now are all of those aspects in my life today. First of all, I am living my dream life that I vision over ten years ago, 15 years ago. Did I get there overnight? No. Do I have bigger visions that I'm working towards? Absolutely. But if I'm taking good care of myself, if I have my health and wellbeing actions and my relationship tools, and I'm doing something each day to really make a difference in the lives of others, and I feel that I am in integrity.

00;12;44;14 - 00;13;25;18

Jennifer Jimenez

And one of the things I love, actually, about our brave Thinking Institute certification is that we are standing on the shoulders of giants. We have coaching curriculum that's done for you. It's the dream builder tested and proven program and other programs that Mary Morrissey, my mother, you know, she has invested over over 50 years studying and applying these success tools, transformational spiritual success tools that work that are codified, that is a repeatable, proven system for living a life you love for basically manifesting your dreams.

00;13;25;21 - 00;13;56;24

Jennifer Jimenez

And so you don't have to have the perfect life or know how it all works. But you can trust that it does work. And we've basically put tens of thousands of people through this program so that our coaches that come in, as long as they're just living what they teach and in integrity, they don't have to have built massive, incredible dreams or $1 million or be the best relationship coach or any of those things to be able to see amazing results with their clients straight out of the gate.

00;13;56;24 - 00;14;23;10

Jennifer Jimenez

And it is. So that's really what builds in and at least in our circle, amazing confidence. Now, imperfect action is soulful leadership. It really is true leadership. So the question I ask you right now is, what would it look like for you to let go of perfectionism? What would it look like in regards to what are you waiting for?

00;14;23;10 - 00;14;44;28

Jennifer Jimenez

You know, we're all waiting for something, right? We all have this maybe goal in our mind. And we think, well, when my kids get to a certain age or when I pay off my student loans, or when I, you know, lose some weight, then I'll do more social media, whatever the then I'll do it, then. And here's why I'm waiting.

00;14;44;28 - 00;15;07;27

Jennifer Jimenez

What would it look like to just let go of that inner critic, that part of us that is wanting that perfectionism? And what would massive imperfect action look like? Right. What would you do if you knew you couldn't fail? What would you do if you knew you would just be accepted? What would you do if you knew massive, really, truly massive, imperfect action was going to lead you to all the results that you would love?

00;15;08;00 - 00;15;31;01

Jennifer Jimenez

And I would tell you, for a lot of our coaches, it really is just going online with messy hair and just giving a piece of advice, speaking a quote, you know, making somebody's day. It is saying yes to that opportunity to speak before you feel ready. You know it is deciding you're going to go for that certification. And before you feel ready, before you have all the money, all of those things.

00;15;31;01 - 00;15;55;00

Jennifer Jimenez

Right. So I'm curious what it would look like for you. So here are some practical tools and takeaways. So as you're looking at taking action or pausing because you don't feel ready for some reason, you want to ask yourself, is this alignment right? Or is this avoidance? Is this feeling of I need it to be perfect, right? I'm not quite ready.

00;15;55;07 - 00;16;20;16

Jennifer Jimenez

Alignment or avoidance? I love that question. Now you want to also shift the narrative you can shift from it must be perfect to it just must be real. Like authenticity really. If you if you look at some of the social media channels that have the most followers, the people on those channels really honestly don't look perfect. They're often unmade up.

00;16;20;16 - 00;16;45;24

Jennifer Jimenez

You know, they're in casual clothes, they don't have a ton of makeup on. Like, what would it look like for you just to give yourself permission to be raw and to be real? I love this mantra. I choose progress over perfection. I lead from presence, not polish. So good. So a soulful practice for you. And one of the takeaways that I'm going to recommend is this journal prompt.

00;16;45;26 - 00;17;20;29

Jennifer Jimenez

What would I do today if I didn't need it to be perfect? I'll say that one more time. What would I do today if I didn't need it to be perfect? And another tip coming from a mind body spirit expert. It's one of my areas of greatest expertise, but also one of the things that's really been transformative for me is when that inner critic shows up, or that part of me, that's that perfectionistic person that just wants to put the brakes on because it needs to be this or that.

00;17;21;07 - 00;17;43;02

Jennifer Jimenez

One of our institute, agreements is that if it's a seven out of ten, you know, if it's a seven out of ten, just go for it. Let's just go. And you can always do a beta test with things. You know, you can test it out, you can put it out there again if it's a seven out of ten, massive imperfect action is going to really take you so much further down the field.

00;17;43;05 - 00;18;06;01

Jennifer Jimenez

The other thing is that we encourage aligned micro action. So here's how I'm going to recommend you do that. Number one is I'm going to encourage you to take some action. So if this gave you even one breath of freedom or inspiration, you aren't already subscribed to the channel. I'm an invite you to subscribe to the Abundant Coach podcast right here.

00;18;06;04 - 00;18;34;04

Jennifer Jimenez

Also, leave a review. We would love a positive review and share it. Share this episode with somebody. Be that change agent, pay it forward. I'm also going to invite you to make a note for yourself to visit us for our next episode. In the next episode, we're diving into the truth about visibility, how to stop hiding, and finally show up confidently online and in your business.

00;18;34;06 - 00;18;59;01

Jennifer Jimenez

So in closing, I just want to remind you you are not here to be perfect. You are here to be powerful, present, and deeply you. So with that, it has been an absolute pleasure to share these tools with you today. Just dust off, shake off that perfectionistic part of you. Align with the most raw, real and authentic version of you.

00;18;59;01 - 00;19;10;24

Jennifer Jimenez

And that really is the version that is the most loved and appreciated and that your clients are looking for. Until next time, have a great one!

00;19;10;27 - 00;19;30;11

Mat Boggs

Thanks for joining me this week on the Abundance Coach. To dive even deeper. Visit our website at bti.com/coach certification. If you love today's episode, be sure to subscribe on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your favorite podcast. And while you're at it, please rate and review. I'll see you in the next episode.