The Fear of looking stupid

Hello, I'm Katie McManus, business strategist and money mindset coach, coming to you today as a massive weenie. Because we are talking about the fear of looking stupid. And one cannot go on lives on the Internet to tell other people not to be afraid of looking stupid without being willing to look stupid themselves. Okay? So I want to own a stupid thing that I did when I was starting this live. Hi, Asher. Welcome. So I actually already did, like, five minutes of this live. I came into Streamyard and I, like, started the music, and I thought I hit the live button and the music ended, and I was, like, doing my show. I was talking through all the points that I had laid out, and then I was like, why. Why can't I see any eyeballs? Like, why isn't anyone commenting? I'm wearing a hot dog costume, guys. Like, this is. And so I started, like, looking to see if my post went through and hi, Chris. And guys, I forgot to hit the live go live button. I did, like, the whole shebang, and it didn't go live. So I just want to own that. Doing stupid shit happens, okay? Looking stupid happens, all right? And yet, just because it happens doesn't mean we can't fix it. It doesn't mean that things can't go well after the fact. All right? So just some housekeeping. Hi, Lauren. Welcome. Hi. Okay, so I am going to the Facebooks, to LinkedIn, to YouTube, and. Hi, Chastity. Hi. And again, hi. Oh, man, I love it when people are. Are hanging out with each other in the chat. Great to have you all. And also to Twitter. I don't really have any followers on Twitter, and with what's going on in Twitter right now, like, I mean, it really wouldn't send any kind of message for me to cancel my Twitter account because I don't have any followers. But, you know, I show up there. Hi. If you're watching from Twitter, let me know. But anyway, we're not talking about all the social media platforms tonight. We are talking about looking stupid. All right? And actually, can I just tell you, just side note, like, it's cold here in Philadelphia right now, and this hot dog suit is, like, warm. I think I need to wear it a little more often. It really has good insulation. And I'm actually. Because the. The hot dog head tends to, like, crumble. I'm wearing a hoodie underneath. Like, this is the right. This is the right outfit for me for the winter and for, you know, my thermostat. Anyway, we're talking about the fear of Looking stupid. Now, I can't remember where I started off when I did this live, when it wasn't actually live. But let's talk about fear first. Let's talk about what people are generally afraid of, Lauren. I mean, that just seems less exciting. Just blankets. Like, come on, I have plenty of blankets. But I mean, the hot dog costume, it keeps the upper half just really toasty. Asher agrees with me. Thank you. But let's talk about fears. Okay, so they. They've done numerous, numerous studies on, like, what people's top fears are. And in all the studies, I seem to come across the top two fears really aren't death. One is public speaking, and the other one is spiders. Now, spiders don't really help me with my point here, but let's talk about this fear of public speaking, because I can speak honestly about this. I used to be massively afraid of public speaking and. Hi, Frank. Welcome. Didn't even know you could do this on LinkedIn. Didn't know you could go live on LinkedIn or didn't know you could wear a hot dog costume on LinkedIn. Please offer some clarity there. Anyway, so I used to be massively afraid of speaking publicly. And what would happen ultimately is I would get up in front of people, I would have what I was going to say either written down or, like, I'd be repeating it in my brain over and over and over, and then I just go blank. And even if I had written it down, I would be so nervous up there that I would look down at my notes and it didn't matter how big I had made them. It didn't matter how much space. It didn't matter. None of it mattered. I would start sweating profusely, and I would stop, stutter and stammer through whatever remarks I had prepared. And I was so concerned with looking stupid that it was a guarantee that I look stupid. Okay, the only time this was not true was when I would stand up to speak at a funeral where people, you know, someone mattered to me. And at that point, you just don't care if you look stupid. And so looking stupid, this fear that you're going to get up and look ridiculous or you're going to be rejected or people are going to laugh and ridicule you. It is so ingrained in our chemistry and our biology because if that happens, you know, our. Our Neanderthal brains would worry that we'd be kicked out of the tribe, that, oh, my God, people think I am ridiculous. They don't respect me, they don't honor me. Like, why should they keep me in this group? Like, I'm going to have to go fend for myself so it can feel like it's life or death. Okay? I want to own that I've been there. Okay? And just like a moment like I used to be that. And here I am wearing a hot dog suit. I also wear this hot dog suit when I'm speaking publicly. I've done that in front of like massive rooms of people. All right, so it's a big jump. If I can do it, you can do it. All right. Both. Oh, thank you, Frank. Yes, you can go live on LinkedIn and you can wear a hot dog suit while you go live on LinkedIn. All the things. So let's talk about the fear of looking stupid and why it's not a good strategy for you to get what you want. Okay. Anytime you do something new, you're gonna look stupid at it. Okay. I don't know if anyone who's watching doesn't know how to ride a bike. Okay? If you were to try to ride a bike, I guarantee you the first few times you tried to ride that bike, you, you'd look absolutely stupid. Okay? It's just a given. The first time you try to use a new piece of technology, you're going to look stupid. The first few times you're on a new social media platform if you don't understand it. If it's just like, oh, Wendy Wiseman, I guess she needs to get in here. Yes, please come in, Wendy. And hi, Trevor. Oh my gosh, like people are getting called into this. This is so funny. I need to wear my hot dog costume more often. You're gonna look stupid the first few times you do anything. Actually, you're gonna look stupid probably the first few dozen times you do that thing. There's no way to get good at something unless you're willing to be. Be bad at it to begin with. Okay. When I was learning how to coach, when I was, you know, in coach training, I did my worst coaching ever. I had the worst impact with my practice clients who were also in my class. Thankfully, they were also learning. So. Oh my God, I'll never forget this awful, awful session where some. I was coaching this man and he brought up his fear of his mortality and being, you know, 28 year old woman. I was just like, I don't know what to do with that. Like, how do I, how do I guide you through mortality when I'm so much younger and I have, like, I have less mortality than you? I don't know more. I don't know. You're going to be bad at stuff. You're. You're going to be bad at stuff. There's no way to bypass that. There's also no way to bypass being bad at stuff in front of other people, okay? Especially if you want to start a business, okay? That is essentially what you have to do. You have to be bad in front of other people until you get good in front of other people, all right? So if you're letting the fear of looking stupid. Stupid hold you back from starting a business, from meeting the love of your life, from doing anything that's exciting and worthwhile doing, you're never going to get that thing. And that makes me really sad for you because I want you to have that thing. And I want you to realize that it doesn't matter if you look stupid or not, okay? Because you either have that thing or you don't have that thing. And on your deathbed, you're not going to worry about you looking stupid too many times. You're going to worry that, like, you met the love of your life or you started that business and you showed yourself you could do it. You're not going to or you're going to regret not having those things. Neymar One of my biggest fears, being successful enough, but not making a comfortable enough. A comfortable amount. Yeah. Yeah. We come up with really interesting benchmarks for success for ourselves, don't we? It's the biggest mind out there. A few queries. Are you on commission for these costumes? Can I buy one in England? Can we make a LinkedIn costume party? And then can we all look stupid together? No, I don't get commission. I should, obviously, because I look so cool in this that people obviously want to buy hot dog costumes after seeing me. Yes. I think you can buy the one in England. I got this one from Amazon. It was like $23. I highly recommend it. It's very warm. The only. The only criticism I have of this costume is that it does not have pockets. Okay. My next hot dog costume, I want to invest in one that has pockets. Yeah. That's my only criticism. And we can absolutely do a LinkedIn costume party. Yes. And we can all look gloriously stupid together. Yes. I love these ideas. I just don't know who you are because your privacy settings show you up as LinkedIn user. So please let me know who you are so I can follow up and send you links to stuff. So I'm getting a little warm, actually. This is. I'm wearing a hoodie under here to prop up the, the, the hot dog head. Anyway, okay? So you're gonna be a beginner at stuff, and you have to be willing to look stupid if you want this thing to happen, okay? Especially starting a business. Because for my folks who want to start a business, remember this key piece of information. People cannot hire you and give you their money if they don't know that you exist. All right? So at some point, you're going to have to pop out at them and say, hey, I exist and here's what I do and here's who I am. And you're probably going to look stupid doing that. And that's okay because at least you told them that you exist. You have a higher chance of getting them to sign up for your stuff and buy your things if they know that you're. You exist, even if you look stupid doing it. Let me see. Trevor, Katie, you are hereby invited to be guest on the Hotness Unleashed show, season two. I'm there. Yes. Thank you, Trevor. I will be there. Oh, my God. Leah. Yes. I will send you a hot dog costume. Oh, my gosh. You. Absolutely. We're doing. We're doing a hot dog costume party. Absolutely. Yeah. I don't know why, why LinkedIn isn't showing you either. That's so weird. Anyway, okay, so beginner, we have that kind of cinched up. Like, you're willing now after watching this inspirational weenie talk, you're willing to go out and be a beginner and potentially, like, start stupid. Right? Cool. Awesome. So let's shift now to the next way you're potentially going to look stupid, and that's by making mistakes. Here's the beautiful thing about being human is that making mistakes is a guarantee. Making mistakes is just a given of being human. Like I, like I just said, I keep saying that's technically a mistake. If you're public speaking, you don't want to say when I. And I'm going to start saying it more now because I'm being conscious of it, I'm starting to get nervous about saying that is a normal thing for people. One of the things I like to tell my clients when they're worried about showing up on social media or they want to go live. And Chris Hennessey, who teaches people how to go live, can speak to this far better than I can. When you go live and you make mistakes, you actually become far more human and approachable by your clients. Like, people in the world who see you as perfect, they're never going to come to you and tell you their problems, they're never going to come to you and say, oh, my God, I really screwed this up. I need your help because you seem too perfect. If you saw the most beautiful, perfect woman in the world walking down the street and you have, like, you know, acne issues, you maybe have some scarring on your face, whatever. Are you going to walk up to her and ask her what her makeup routine is and ask her how she put her look together? Probably not. You're going to want to go to someone who is imperfect, just like you. So when you show up out there in the world and you make mistakes and you show that you're human, you actually make it easier for people to be in business with you. Hi, Wendy. Welcome, Kimberly. I never made. Make any mistakes that everyone right before they make one. Yes, exactly. Famous last words. Come on. So we're gonna make mistakes. It's just a given, all right? And in those mistakes, you may look stupid, you may say the wrong word. Oh, my God. Can I just share the stupidest thing that I did? So when I was in the process of building my business and, like, really for the first time getting on social media, I was in this group program, and I also happened to be in Italy at this Airbnb. It was gorgeous. I had this, like, whole penthouse flat. It was absolutely beautiful. And my coach at the time challenged me. He saw there was a painting behind me in this. In this cute little kitchen that I had in this penthouse. And he's like, I want you to write a Facebook post about that. Because I really wasn't comfortable writing yet. I was like, well, what do I have to say that anyone would be interested in? And so I. I started, you know, writing about this. This painting, and I just had a really dumb moment. I didn't recognize that, like, the symbols in it were the Greek Alphabet. And so I wrote this whole thing. I made so much meaning out of the symbols of the characters out of the whole thing. And one of my old professors from college, I was a philosophy major, of all things. One of my old professors from college came into the comments and corrected me on this very basic, stupid mistake that I made. And I was just mortified. And other friends in the program reached out to me. They're like, how did you do that? Like, how did you handle the mortification of someone coming in and, like. Like correcting you on this basic thing? And it really did take me a couple of weeks to get past it. But here is the deal that I made with myself is that those things were guaranteed to happen again. And having my former professor, who I really look up. I really look up to this woman. She's absolutely incredible. Maureen Eckert. She changed my life in so many ways. Having her call me out and correct me, I just saw that as something that was like building my thick skin to be able to do it more often. Because you can't get clients if they don't know you. If. If people don't know that you exist, they cannot give you their money. That's just how it works. Okay, let me see. A new dating for all tastes and ages. Oh, gosh, I don't know. All right, we're gonna. I'm gonna block you. You seem 69xxx. Oof. Never had one of those in my comments before. I think it's the hot dog costume guys. Anyway, so you're gonna make mistakes. It's guaranteed to happen. But again, like, that doesn't stop me from building a really successful business. All right, that's just it. That's just it. Like, looking stupid doesn't stop you from getting what you want. Now, finally, you can be the most perfect person ever. You can speak in the most polished, correct, like, grammatically and vocabulary. Correct way. That wasn't even grammatically or. You know what I mean? Like, that was not correct. You could be perfect. You could be so smart. You could say all the right things, and there will still be people out there who will look at you and say, wow, that's really stupid. Because sometimes stupid is in the eye of the. Of. I can't say that. Sometimes stupid is in the eye of the beholder. Okay? So if your goal is to just not look stupid, you're never going to do anything exciting in your life. You're never going to get anything that you want. You're never going to have one of those, you know, wonderful brave moments where you put yourself out there and like, oh, my God, did I just do that? You're never going to have that. And you're never going to have, like, the next couple minutes where you realize, oh, my God, it worked out like that delight. We've all had that moment, right? Maybe you. You were brave and you walked across the bar and you asked someone out and they said yes, or maybe they said no, but you were, like, really proud of yourself for putting yourself out there. Or that moment where you applied for a job that you didn't think that you qualify for, but you put yourself out there. You kind of believed in yourself just for a moment, and they gave it to you like if you don't put yourself in those positions, if you don't, if you aren't willing to look stupid, you're never going to find out what it feels like to be that person who puts themselves out there. Who is that person who put themselves out there and had it work out okay. It is the most magical experience that I want everyone to have in their life. And, Eric, stupid is as stupid does. Yep, exactly. So in summary, can we all just commit to being a little more stupid and a little more outgoing and a little more brave in how we show up in the world? Can we just be willing to make mistakes and, you know, be judged a little bit? Because it's gonna happen. Because on the other side of that, on the other side of those moments is everything that you want. Everything that you want, that successful business that you want is on the other side of potentially looking stupid. The life you want is on the other side of potentially looking stupid. You know, it's amazing when someone is really passionate about a big, juicy goal and they talk about it and they just believe in themselves so hard, even just talking about it and believing in yourself. Some people will judge that as you looking stupid. And I think that says more about them than it does about you. Like your dreams are sacred to you. Go after them. The people who will throw shade and discourage you and cast doubt. How sad are they? Because if they're doing it to you, imagine to the degree that they're doing it to themselves. Right? Because you know that saying, like, we would never speak to our best friends the way we talk to ourselves. Well, here they are talking to a perfectly nice other person in the world in this awful way, discouraging them from what they want. Imagine what's happening inside their own head. Okay, so compassion for others, conviction and willingness to look stupid. Can we all commit to this, please? And we have to get names and addresses to send hot dog costumes for Leah's and my party with that. I'm getting a little hot because this is a lot of layers. And you can't tell. My face is like slowly turning as red as the hot dog. I want to thank everyone for tuning in for this this evening. Asher, Chris, Hennessy, Lauren, Chastity. Chastity, I can't read right now. Frank, Trevor, Neymar, Leah, Wendy, Kimberly, Eric and Stephen. I hope you had a nice Christmas and New Year as well, all the way in Ireland. Anyway, thank you all for joining. I hope you found this helpful. I hope you are inspired to go out and do something that's brave after after watching this. Thank you, Asher. And I cannot wait to go live with you. I'm going to be going live Monday through Friday for the rest of this month. I have some exciting shit coming, guys. I'm so excited to tell you about it. Expect some details over the next couple days and next week. So much more to come. Eric. Good stuff. Happy 23 to you as well, Naima. Thank you. And with that, have an amazing night, everyone. I'm Katie McManus, business strategist, Money mindset coach, and temporary hot dog. Have an amazing Tuesday and I will talk to you all soon.