Grace Beverley

Why didn't I just double down on that and just concentrate on that?

Because it's embarrassing that I haven't been able to really perform in public.

And realistically, the company that exists now, nearly seven years on, that is a much bigger company and that has all of these formulas behind what works and what doesn't work and all of that, that would never exist if I hadn't had that first launch.

It just wouldn't have been able to.

And done and imperfect, as we know, is so much better than perfect because realistically, nothing anyone does ever is perfect.

They're all on different scales.

And yes, you should have high standards for yourself, but you need to be able to actually just get things done and get things out there.

So this brings us on to step three, which is to practice public rejection.

And if there's one thing I've learned from all the guests I've now had on this podcast, it is that confidence doesn't come from waiting until you feel ready.

It very much comes from building evidence that you can survive discomfort.

And if you're not going to take it from me, hear it from Emma Greed.

The only way you can progress is to let yourself be slightly exposed.

This builds a tolerance to hard things, to discomfort and to embarrassment, which ultimately creates a baseline confidence that will carry you through your plans.

There's research around exposure therapy, which I think we've all seen a lot of on TikTok, like rejection exposure therapy, for example, that shows that repeated exposure to feared stimuli reduces anxiety over time because your nervous system recalibrates.

So basically, the first time you feel cringe, it will spike.

The 10th time, it feels manageable.

The 50th time, it's barely going to register.

You can build a tolerance to embarrassment the same way you build a muscle or the same way you build tolerance to rejection.

You should put yourself in the path of things that you are scared of over and over and over again so they feel less scary.

So when you're next thinking of, for example, deleting something that you posted or not sharing something that you've done well at work because you think it's cringe, give yourself a 24-hour rule.