Change and impact: Not just for other people

The first time I spoke at a conference, it was not because I thought I had something useful to contribute. In fact, my first thought was: “Me? I’m not an expert. I’m not a speaker.* I can’t possibly be the right person to do this.”

Someone requested help (the conference had a two-speaker per session requirement). Someone else believed I could do it. And because I often doubt myself, I also doubted whether I was correct about not being the right person to join this conference talk. (Turns out self-doubt can occasionally be useful. Also, thank you Ash Shepherd for letting me borrow your confidence in me!) 

So I talked to the person leading the session. And then my excitement in coming up with ideas and delving into the topic overrode my fear of public speaking and doubts about my ability to do a good job (until like, the day before the conference, of course). I was nervous during the presentation. But I did it. And people got useful things from it. (Thank you, Marci Soifer, for being a great co-presenter/session leader!)

More importantly, I got something extremely useful out of it: Speaking at my first conference changed how I saw myself, and the experience challenged the things I thought myself capable of doing. 

“So today, you’re writing 1000 words. And you will write many more words after that. Those words will matter. They may not change the world, but they will change you.” — Roxane Gay

It can be transformative to do things we’re not sure we can do–or we’re not sure we can do them well (calling all perfectionists). Not everything is going to be a hit out of the park, but we carry forth what we learn from the experience and what we learn about ourselves. 

Why does that matter?

Not everything we do needs to change the world. Most of the things we do won’t. But in the aggregate, they add up. There are enough people in the world who are confident without basis. We don’t need more confident people. In the face of complex challenges, what the world needs is more people who can handle doing things while being uncertain, who have an accurate understanding of what they’re capable of and can contribute, and who are willing to share those. 

It’s not about public speaking or raising your hand for that role or publishing that story publicly so much as it is about what gets unlocked within you once you do it. Because without shifting things inside of ourselves, we won’t be able to do the things that shift things outside of ourselves.

Do I love public speaking? No. I still get nervous and self-conscious. I just don’t let it stop me any more when I have something valuable to share. Because now, mixed in with that nervousness, is hope for what sharing that might unlock for someone.

If I hadn’t said yes (or really, “Um, okay, sure I guess?”) eight years ago, I likely would not have ended up giving a talk last year in which I referenced my upbringing and then had an audience member come up to me afterwards to say that she’d felt seen in a way that she hadn’t in a professional space before. Was that world changing? No. But it mattered to her. And that matters to me.

So that thing that you’ve been nervous about doing, about putting out into the world?

Maybe it won’t get any responses or it gets rejected or it never leads to anything external. But doing it will make you a person who didn’t let fear get in the way of doing that thing. Isn’t that worth it?

I would love to cheer you on, if you’d like to share. Or, if you are interested in having a thinking partner as you work on these things, let’s find a time to talk.

*Yes, even though I had taught courses and my job at the time involved leading classroom-based staff training, those were still new things for me AND it’s different to facilitate an interactive training than to present to people for 30-60 minutes. Or at least it is in my head.

P.S. I’m still a scaredy cat and lots of things still scare me or make me nervous! But there are people who benefit from us playing smaller than we are, and there are people who would benefit if we were to live at our actual size. Think about who those two groups of people are.