A well-known climbing coach said that the biggest obstacle in the way of people’s growth as climbers is, basically, fear of embarrassment.
When people want to get better at climbing, they try to do it privately, so that no one can see them doing things badly. They’ll go to the climbing gym when no one is watching, or hang out in a corner hoping no one is looking. But they’re missing out on the biggest opportunity — feedback from people who can see things they can’t see.
And the thing getting in the way is fear of embarrassment.
I’ve found that this is true no matter what you’re trying to learn. No matter what you’re trying to grow in. Fear of embarrassment will stop you from getting real growth and transformation.
My belief is not that we should just get over that fear. It’s that we could learn to see embarrassment as an integral part of the growth process.
I’ll talk about why in a moment. But first, let’s look at a few more examples where the fear of embarrassment stops people from growing:
- Writing a book or blog: This one might be a bit obvious — you want to write, you might start writing, but the fear of embarrassment (or being judged) stops you from writing or making the writing public. But even further, we resist getting feedback from people that might improve our writing, because we’re worried that the writing sucks. Imagine getting feedback from readers and more experienced writers who might help you get to the next level — most people cringe at the idea of showing their “embarrassing” writing to people who might judge them.
- Getting coaching or support from others: Most people avoid getting a coach, or getting real support from other people, because they are embarrassed to admit how their growth process looks. I haven’t been doing the things I said I would, I’m struggling, I don’t like things about myself. We have judgement for all of that, and we are embarrassed to show that to others. This stops us from getting support through all of this struggle.
- Taking your business to the next level: Whether you’re launching a new business or wanting your existing business to get to the next level … it can be hard to see where you’re getting stuck. Leadership is lonely, and we can only see what we’ve already learned to see. To get to the next level, it requires getting feedback from someone who can see what we can’t see. But this can feel embarrassing. We avoid getting that kind of support, and that means we struggle to do anything other than what we already know to do.
Hopefully you can see that this can be applied anywhere we want to grow — personal development, taking care of ourselves, deepening in a relationship, dealing with the overwhelming chaos of life. We struggle to get beyond where we are, because we are too embarrassed to get support, feedback, coaching that might take us to the next level.
