310: 4 Mindsets we Need to Be Visible for our Audience

Hello, hello! Welcome to our first Thursday training. Today is all about mindset. What are the mindsets that we need to help us move through whatever internal objections are coming up for us as we are working on showing up and being visible. Now, if you have not yet officially joined the challenge, I really want you to do that right here, and here's why. Because you will get some reminders via email about when we're going live. You will also get special message from me, a little pep talk, and there's some extra support that comes via this route. Okay, so if you haven't yet, please do go join. You being here is part of the challenge. Showing up, being engaged, adding your comments like you're doing— I see you over in my little comments box— all of this counts because it helps you prioritize this. It helps you move it to the top of your list. It helps you make this important. So I was just listening— I don't know if you guys are following me over on Instagram, but I was listening to this podcast between Brené Brown and James Clear. Have you read Atomic Habits by James Clear? Let me know in the comments if you have read it. I haven't read it yet. It's one of those books that I've been afraid to read because habits are a challenge for me. I'm a 7 on the Enneagram. Jen Whitmer is here. She's one of a handful of Enneagram coaches who I love and who are in my life. It just, it doesn't sound very much fun, right? Habits are the little details things. I just want to like do the big visioning, and I felt called out in this conversation in the best way. But one of the things that I thought was so powerful as I was listening to this conversation was the difference between what we want, right? Like what the goal is, and then what it really looks like in the everyday. So many of you here are here because you have this vision, you have this goal of yourself out front, really using your voice, sharing your story, showing up intentionally, moving our audience, impacting them. Like it's a beautiful vision, it's part of our why. And to get there, what that means in the very little everyday is that we need to show up and be visible. And it's part of the reason I'm doing this challenge. So I was listening to this conversation, I was like, oh my gosh, this is perfect, perfect for the conversations that I'm having with my speakers right now. Perfect because I think we all need that reminder. That when we want this vision and we are focused on what that end result is, what it means is that in the now, we have to show up, show our face, share our stories, really be seen, and that's part of the being visible piece. So it's really, it was a great conversation. You can go find it on Dare to Lead, which is Brené Brown's podcast. Okay, so in the comments I see, I wonder if that's similar to The Compound Effect, doing small things consistently leads to great results. Like I said, I haven't read the book, but I think that was exactly what he was talking about is that we, in the little things, we, it's this, we see long-term results, but it starts with the little everyday things. And so here we are in our Be Visible Challenge and we are focused on the little things, how we're showing up every day. We know that the compound effect of that moves us closer to that goal, but we're focusing on this right now. So how is it going? Let's check in. Are you doing your bingo sheet? Have you downloaded it yet? If not, go find it. It's in the feed. If you look over on the right side, there's topics and it's Be Visible Challenge is one of the topics. If you click on that, it'll pull up all the Be Visible posts. I will pin that post so that you can easily go and download the bingo sheet. It's, it's not a have-to, but it's kind of fun, and it gives you really simple, easy ways that you can show up every day and do something. Okay, super helpful for ideas, wonderful. Yes, it's got a lot of ideas. Now, if you're into prizes and you like prizes, awesome. If you get a bingo and you do all the things in a row in some ways, like up and down or crosswise, I don't really care, put your own rules on the bingo, post it in the group, and then you will be up for a prize. Who doesn't love prizes? Two ways to win prizes here in the challenge. One is to get a bingo, and you'll get in for a drawing once a week. There's a bingo winner, and then there is an engagement winner every week. People who are showing up, participating, cheering each other on, lots of comments. So for those of you who are here, bonus points, yay, yay. I know, who doesn't love prizes? Jen says, "I love it, I'm so close to a bingo." Woo-hoo-hoo! No surprise there, way to go, Jen, total rock star. All right, here's what I wanna know from all of you, and please put it in the comments, okay? Even if you're watching this on replay, Say hello, say #replay in the comments if you're watching this on replay, which is great. My question for you is, what is one internal objection that you have as you are working to be visible? What is a hurdle that you face? I want to know what's something that slows you down from doing this. What is, what are you thinking to yourself? What are the real hurdles, the challenges that you face as you are working to become more visible? In my experience, they tend to orient around a few different things. They tend to orient around perfection, wanting to do it right, wanting it to be perfect. Don't, I don't wanna show up. I don't wanna show the messy middle. I just wanna show it once I've got it. Really down. Once I've figured out all the tech, I just like, I don't want to show up and not show my very, very best, right? That can keep us sometimes from showing up. I hear a lot of fear, right? Jen just says, why does someone want to listen to me rather than all the others who also have the same knowledge? Like, what is it about me? So I would call that, that's another category That's kind of this category of that feeling of imposter syndrome, right? Which is, who am I? Like, do I really have what it takes? Can I belong in that club of people who must have something special about them versus what I have to offer? Okay, another comment: looking professional so that I've been taken seriously. Yes, I wanna be taken seriously because right now I'm an unknown, so my credibility feels like it's on the line. Is that what you're saying? Yes, that perfection, and it shows up as procrastination. Yes. Thinking and rethinking, redoing and redoing. Yes. Oh my gosh, totally. There is, I completely understand that, that feeling of like, I wanna get it just right, or I'm not sure, is this gonna work? All that questioning that it brings up. Yeah, a lot of fear around that. Has anybody ever had that fear of being judged or people thinking, oh, she thinks she's a big deal, look at her, especially as you're starting and maybe you're taking on something new and you're, you're really embodying a new identity in some ways and you're stepping out and it's like, and there's some tall poppy cutters, right? Those people who come along and they're just like, who do you think you are? Whew. I feel that I have been there. The tall Poppy Syndrome, absolutely. Thank you for sharing. I feel all that. I have all of that too, again and again. And what I want to talk about— there's these 4 buckets: perfection, fear, ego and judgment, and the imposter syndrome bucket. And I'm seeing all your comments, I love them. Thank you for sharing. I'm gonna share with you some thoughts around each one, and then hopefully a helpful mindset that may help you overcome this particular objection. So let's start with perfection because that has come up a lot, right? Even on Tuesday when I invited everybody to go live in the Be Live Tuesday. Did anybody here go live? I invited all of you to go live and just a handful of people did it. Now that's totally okay. I know there were some people who were like, I didn't, you know, I missed it, or I wanna do it next Tuesday, that's great. But I wanna give a special shout out to Nicole, if you're here, I just wanna give you some huge props because you were working on this exact thing, this fear of if I don't show up perfectly, will I still be seen as credible? Will people still see me as a professional? And I'm seeing a lot of that in the comments as well. And that's a completely understandable fear, but it's actually not true. I really appreciated how you took the risk to show up. Now, we don't want to show up as, you know, people who not prepared. That's not what I'm talking about. We need to prepare. We need to know what we're doing. We need to have taken the time to know our audience, right? Like those, when we are showing up externally for our our audience in those high-stake moments, they require more time and energy and preparation. But when we're talking about really just showing up and being seen and being visible, that perfection thing is really probably more about somebody seeing the things that we don't necessarily love about ourselves. One of my speaking truths is that speaking really reveals the truth for ourselves. We're really where we're at in our life's journey in a lot of ways because we have to show up and really be seen in a big way. And that's why it's so intimidating for people. And when we are talking about showing up in these small ways, it's still gonna tap into that. It's really gonna tap into it when we've got those higher stakes opportunities. But in the everyday, I'm gonna show up and they're gonna see, they're gonna see my real face. They're gonna see my crooked smile. For me, I've like, I didn't even know I had a crooked smile until I started being so visible and had to like watch myself on Zoom a million hours a day. And I was like, wow, I have a crooked smile. I had no idea because I've never spent so much time being visible. It's a journey of self-acceptance. You're like, "What, Sally? I thought we were here talking about speaking skills." And part of the journey of becoming a speaker, becoming an authority, is a journey of self-acceptance. And, and we're practicing it in the everyday. So first of all, give yourself a lot of grace. You're showing up. You pressed go even when you felt like, uh, I don't have, I don't have it all together. I'm not looking my best, perhaps. Remember that we are harder on ourselves than anybody else is. And the most important thing is that it is a lie that people want perfection. They don't. They don't. Think about for yourself those moments when you have really felt connected with somebody. It wasn't because they were doing it perfectly. You might admire them. You might say, wow, I'm impressed by them. But our goal is actually something deeper. If we want to move our audience, and that is our goal, because otherwise what are we doing? If we want to move our audience, the goal is actually connection. That's what we're trying to create, a connection. And connection is built on our authentic voice, our authentic story. And nothing kills connection faster than perfection. Because from an audience perspective, it feels like, good for you, but I can't do that. So you showing up as you is brave and it is the heart of connection. So the mindset I want you to think about if you are struggling with perfection, and we all are, we all are, let's just say it's not just a few people, it's everybody at different times for sure. The mindset I want you to think about is of course to hashtag, I'm gonna show up anyway. I'm gonna trust that my humanness, my humanness is worthy of connection. Who I am and like the real me, that is worthy of connection. Okay, so we're gonna show up anyway and my humanness is my superpower. Somebody write that down in the comments so everybody can see it. #ShowUpAnyway. My humanness is my superpower. Okay, in all your glory. The second bucket we're looking at is fear. Now fear can crop up in all kinds of different ways, right? There's like the fear of the technology of it. There's the fear of what will people think of me. There's a lot of, there's a lot of fear. Around all of this, okay? And I'm not saying that those don't have some real roots in there. They do. But I think one of the fallacies about speaking is that if I'm afraid, then it has some significance. It means something. But fear is truly just a part of the experience. And so for me, the most helpful thing that I can tell you about fear is that fear and excitement live in our bodies in really a similar way. The difference between fear and excitement is how we talk about it in our heads. And so instead of "I'm scared" or instead of "I'm afraid" and all the negative side of that, like, ooh, What I want you to think about is instead of I'm afraid, I want you to think I'm excited. I'm just so excited. I've just, whoo, I've got a lot going on. I'm just really excited. And now I'm not saying we're like ignoring, 'cause sometimes fear is trying to help us, right? Like fear is like going, ooh, not good, get out, get out, bad situation. Okay, and our bodies are reacting to an adrenaline moment or a new opportunity or a new thing. In a very similar way. It's going like, oh, I don't know, are you about to get eaten alive here? And we teach our bodies that we're actually okay. It's gonna be okay. I'm okay. It's gonna be okay situation, even if it doesn't go perfectly. And it's not, right? Feeling excited and ready. Nicole, I love that. Yes. Fear, if we can switch it in our heads to, you know, I must be really excited. I'm super excited about this, and it's okay for me to just take some baby steps along the way. I'm just gonna do one little thing, right? In this conversation with Brené and James Clear, he was talking about part of what gets in our way when we're doing something we haven't done before is there's no evidence that we really are capable of it. And so what we want to do in that moment to prove to ourselves, like, I can do this, besides just telling ourselves that, because behavior and action is what really proves it to ourselves, is bring it down to the lowest possible action you can take, like a tiny little thing. Be like, I am like, I can, I can do this. I'm gonna go live on Sally's platform where the bar is super low. It's a really loving place. Nobody's judging me. The expectation is that it's a little messy because you're showing us the middle. You don't have to show us the result. It's just You can be where you are. One little thing, I'm gonna go live for 30 seconds and just say, hi everybody, my name is Sally and here's what I do, right? Like lower the bar, keep lowering the bar, make it simple, make it easy, and you will start to prove to yourself that I can do it. And then as you're telling yourself, I'm excited, I'm actually, I'm super excited, you tell, you're gonna believe it. Yourself more and more and more because you will have been through it. You will have done it. You'll have had the evidence of, I can do this. Even when it doesn't work out that great, or even when I fall on my face, or even when I go live and nobody shows up, it's, I can do this. I can do this. Okay. So we're building the self-proof and the self-trust, and that helps kind of manage our fears. Was that helpful? Okay, so we've done perfection, we've done fear, and now I want to talk about the Poppy Cutters and the ego and that judgment of, "Who does she think she is? Look at her trying to be a big deal and taking up space and having an opinion about things and thinking that, you know, any of us care." Like Jen's saying, like, "Why? Why would people listen to me?" Okay, part of that I had— what I have to tell you is I have had some poppy cutters in my life, and they're not in my life anymore. And this is partly why, is that I had to— I have had to really cultivate friendships and people in my life who say, yes, go, go, you can do this, take up Base and be, be your biggest, baddest, like, yes, I believe in you, go, go, go. And what's happening for a lot of people is you are become— you're moving beyond their identity of you. That's fine. It's truly about, you know, being okay. We have to be okay with Not everybody loving us all the time. That's hard for me. Okay. My whole life I was told my superpower is that people like me, which is great and also terrible because of course not everybody likes me. I am not for everybody. And the more public I get, the more clear that becomes because There are people— oh, like, I post something, I'll get 3 new people on my Instagram page, and I'll lose 3 people. I was like, oh, okay, I'm not for everybody, and that is okay. So as you are working to be more visible, as you are working to step out front, know that you're not for everybody. I don't want you to be for everybody, because if you are really pleasin' everybody and everybody likes you, then, and you probably heard this phrase, then what do you stand for? What are you for? As you become for things, as you share your voice more, as you share your story more, you will become known around an idea and there's going to people, you're gonna repel people and attract people. That's what we want. You want to repel people and attract the right people. So that's what I want you to think about, is that, um, as, as you know, the poppy cutters come along and they're like, they're just taking off the people who are starting to rise up. That's about them, that's not about you, okay? And you're going to put to the center of your vision and your heart that you are there to serve your audience. People already don't like you. That's okay, because you are there to show up and serve. You're there to love up your audience, and that is a powerful way to keep moving forward. Okay, somebody just said, I've never heard of the Poppy Cutters. For those of us— for those of you who are watching and listening Have you ever experienced the poppy cutters in your life, or that fear of— especially, I'm from the Midwest, I'm a Minnesota gal, which you all probably know. I've been posting about how cold it is in the Midwest. There's a lot of resistance around anything that's about you, okay? So I absolutely want you to both know that it's okay. Like, we need enough ego as speakers to say, I have something to say and I'm ready. Like, I belong out front. I'm worthy of this moment. We need enough ego. So I don't want you to be egoless in this, but as we shift out front, it is directed towards our audience. Towards our why. Like, what, what is the purpose? You are all big-hearted entrepreneurs, so I know that's in there. And leveraging that, using that, keeping that front and center just helps you go, I am here for the right reasons. I'm here to love up my audience. I'm here to serve. And so poppy cutters, they're gonna— they're gonna be there. They're not your worry. Bye-bye, ignore them. Okay, our last bucket that we're talking about is the imposter syndrome bucket, that who am I, do I even, like, why would anybody listen to me, I don't know if I can, like, I think, I think I'm pretty good, but am I really, do I have what it takes, all of that, like, self- Doubt. Okay, I've been talking about this a lot with people, always, but especially lately, as I'm working with people whose dreams are ambitious and big. And as they are working towards it, it's like, whoo, it brings up all these internal questions, right? As you shift to the next level, it's going to bring up all the internal stuff. And that's okay. That's just really, truly part of the journey. What I want you to know is that the people who are up there at that next level that you're going, "I don't know if I have what it takes up there," they think the same thing about whatever that next level is that they are looking at as well. It's just, it's, it's part of it. It's part of the growth process. And so there's it doesn't exist that there's this— I, I sometimes— you might, you might have heard me say sometimes there are no special unicorns in speaking. It's like there's no people who are like, ah, I'm rocking this, I've got this, this is amazing, this is easy for me, I never make mistakes, I never question myself. It's just that doesn't exist. It doesn't exist. Imposter syndrome is a reflection of you looking at a goal and a vision that you're not sure— you haven't seen the evidence that you can do it yet. The truth is, the people who are stepping up there, they just did it anyway. They are the ones that said, you know what, I I don't know if I can do it, but I'm gonna give it a go. Okay, so as you are, as you are experiencing that sort of imposter syndrome, self-doubt, it's very, very natural. It's a part of the process of stepping into and becoming and being visible, being out front. So as you are doing that, I just want you to say to yourself, Say to yourself, I am worthy of this moment. It's okay for me to take up space. It— I belong here. I belong here. I have something to say. Nicole says it's so helpful to hear that these things don't go away and come up in different ways as you move up. Yes. Totally. Yeah, embrace these things. And truly, there are days when I feel a lot of these things all the time, when I'm just like, "Ugh, blah blah blah." And there are some days where I'm just like, "Yeah, I am rocking it," right? Confidence is not, um, it's not just this place that you get to and then that's it. It's truly a practice. And it's a state of being, just like authenticity is a practice. Brené Brown talks about that, but it's not like there are authentic people and inauthentic people or confident people and people lacking in confidence. It's something that we practice. And what we are working towards with all of this, with our focus on perfection, our fears with the ego and judgment with around imposter syndrome, what we are working towards is self-trust ultimately. And we get there by doing. We get there by trying. We get there by just taking little baby steps again and again. Baby step, baby step, baby step. We fall, we get back up. We fall, we get back up. We try it again and we learn We survived. We learn when we post a video that we're kind of like not sure if we should post and we get a great response from it. You're like, oh, turns out people don't care if I had my full makeup on. Awesome. Well, that helps. I mean, sometimes it helps me feel more confident, and you know, there's some days where we want that, but It's not essential for connection. Connection is the point. Connection is what you're going for. Oh my gosh, team, thank you so much for being here today, for coming. I saw a lot of you. I love the comments. I am really excited about what we are doing together this month.