No matter where you are in your design career, chances are you’ve asked yourself what you need to do to be successful in design a few times. And if you’re working independently, self-doubt and feelings of insecurity often creep in.

As creatives, we’re always looking for ways to improve, build up our businesses, and establish credibility in the industry. Having a success mindset is important to accomplish all of these, but adopting one and feeling confident in ourselves can be difficult.

If you want to know what you need to do to be successful in design and develop a success mindset, we break down the main takeaways from the video above right here:

Practice Being Present

In the video above, Chris gives a group of design students coaching and guidance on adopting a success mindset. One of the first exercises he encourages the students to do is a “mental floss.”

If you can take a few minutes now, close your eyes, take three deep breaths, and practice on being receptive to what’s happening in the moment; to be present throughout the lecture.

Forget everything that happened before you opened this article, and be receptive to everything you’re about to read, and hopefully watch in the video above.

You’re Getting in Your Own Way

Your biggest blocker, biggest critic, and biggest contributor of doubt is you.

Each and every one of us is guilty of this—and it’s all just part of being creative humans. We will always question ourselves, but what we can’t continue to do is get in our way. We have to remind ourselves that we are growing, progressing, and are better than we were yesterday.

Stephen Covey, author of 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, says this: “If we keep doing what we are doing, we’re going to keep getting what we’re getting.”

If we keep getting in our own way, we will never break through those barriers we put up.

When You Love Yourself, You Believe in Yourself

If you don’t love who you are, how do you expect somebody else to do the same? This question often comes up in the dating scene, but it’s applicable to your professional life as well.

There’s a pretty good chance you will have a few failures throughout your career. We all go through rough patches, but we always come out on the other side wiser and with a new perspective. If you doubt everything you do, it becomes harder to keep progressing.

Regardless of the type of failure you encounter, remember to be kind to yourself. Be confident in what you can do and where you are in the moment.

Don’t Be Humble

While many of us were raised to be humble and are reminded to keep our heads down, humility actually doesn’t pair well with a success mindset.

Don’t take the gifts you have for granted. Celebrate your accomplishments and acknowledge your capabilities on a regular basis. Do this as a daily ritual to reprogram your brain.

Confidence is infectious; and when you believe in yourself, others will, too.