Itโs a hot evening in July and Iโm perched at my desk, sweating and grimacing over an email.
Iโve just opened my latest course and at midnight the price doubles โ which seems like something people would want to know, right? Especially the people who attended the webinar?
Iโve emailed everyone who expressed interest twice already โ once on Wednesday and once on Thursday. Is a third time overkill? Am I going to annoy everyone? BECAUSE OH GOD WHAT IF I ANNOY EVERYONE.
It would be so much more comfortable to close my laptop and pour myself a drink.
Itโd be so much easier to say โif people want it, theyโll buy it! Theyโll figure it out.โ
But instead of drinking a tall vodka gimlet, I sucked it up, got uncomfortable, and sent that third sales email.
And would you like to know how much money than third email brought in? $2,134.73
Being slightly uncomfortable for 30 seconds brought in enough money to pay for a family vacation or two of those huge wheels of Parmesan cheese.
Since this happened, Iโve been thinking a lot about those Pinterest quotes about how โgreat things never come from comfort zonesโ and how we need to โget comfortable with being uncomfortable.โ
While I love an inspirational quote as much as the next white lady, Iโve always given these particular sayings a bit of side eye.
Like, how do I know the difference between Challenging Thing Thatโs Actually Good For Me and Thing I Genuinely Donโt Like, Never Will, And Makes Me Hate Life?
Whatโs the difference between knowing myself + my limitations and selling myself short?
Iโm not sure I can answer that probably-universal question, but I think Iโve found a workaround: be willing to make yourself slightly uncomfortable. Like, 25% more uncomfortable.
Making yourself 25% uncomfortable will probably yield 100% better results.
Push yourself to talk to one or two more people at that event or party
You hate networking and small talk? Me too. On the off chance I find myself in room full of strangers, I usually talk to two people and then wander off in search of the vending machine or pet.
What if โ instead of giving into my nearly immediate desire to leave โ I pushed myself to talk to one more person? Or two?
Iโm not forcing myself to stay for three hours or talk to 15 people. Iโm not making myself do something I hate. Iโm allowing myself to be slightly uncomfortable for a short amount of time. In the process, Iโm doubling how many people Iโve talked to.
Related: Networking for introverts
Approach three programs/people/jobs you think will say yes and one thatโs a long shot
Apply to three jobs that youโre obviously qualified for and one that would be a bit of a stretch. Apply to your โback upโ schools AND the fancy school. Email the painfully good-looking person on Okcupid youโre pretty sure everyone, ever is emailing.
Not to sound like your mom but you never know whatโs going to happen. Someoneโs going to get that job/scholarship/cutie; it might as well be you. Share on XYou might be amazed by what happens when you reach out to the Big Deal Long Shot. Kathleen and Emily landed some huge guests on the first season of Being Boss just by asking. I know someone who applied to Harvard as a long shot and got in!
Side note: did you know most women wonโt apply for a job unless they meet 100% of the qualifications while men will apply for jobs theyโre 60% qualified for? For the love of Pete, apply for that job you donโt think you can get.
Keeping working on that challenging project for five or ten more minutes
One of my favorite/worst habits is checking email or social media anytime a project gets hard.
Trying to connect Getdpd and Deadline Funnel? BETTER SEE IF ANYONEโS EMAILED ME. Struggling with a new sales page? Clearly, now is the time to see whatโs happening on Facebook! Canโt write an engaging intro to that blog post? Letโs watch Instagram Stories!
So when I see myself doing this, I note what Iโm doing (โI want to check Twitter because Iโm overwhelmed by all this codeโ) and then sitting in that discomfort. Iโll spend another five or ten minutes hashing it out and then โ if I still want to โ Iโll go check email.
Sometimes I really do need a break. A lot of times Iโm letting myself off the hook and distracting myself from work Iโm 100% capable of doing.
Send one followup email even though youโre worried itโll be annoying
Didnโt hear back from that job or academic program? Send a follow up email.
Contractor or client ignoring your invoice? Send a follow up email.
Meet with someone awesome and want to hang out with them again? You guessed it! Send a followup email.
I know followup emails can feel awkward or needy. It feels vulnerable to say โI really want to work at your company!โ or โI want to be friends!โ Itโs a lot more comfortable to devotedly hope that someone will remember you and what you want.
Hereโs the thing: weโre all busy and we all have full inboxes. Emails and text messages really do get lost in the shuffle! Make it easier for people to help you and give you want you want by (charmingly! non-demandingly!) reminding them.
When we see people who have things we want โ a cool job, a great relationship, a lovely home โ itโs easy to imagine theyโre somehow different than us. That they have a secret super power that made of all those things possible.
And maybe they do! Or maybe they just made themselves a little bit uncomfortable and sent a second email.
I want to hear from you! How often do you do thing that make you uncomfortable to get what you want? Tell us about it in the comments so we can be inspired!
P.S. It sounds strange, but getting outside of your comfort zone is a habit you can develop, just like brushing your teeth or making your bed. This will help โ and itโs free!
Oh my gosh, I am so guilty of switching browsers/apps when I get to a hard part in my work. Thank you for calling me out!
Iโm actually in a little bubble of comfort right now โ though I know myself that it wonโt do me good in the long run. Iโm so afraid of failure I rarely try anything new!
I need to up my networking game and my people skills in general. Iโve improved a LOT over the years already, but I could still be much better!
Charmaine Ng | Architecture & Lifestyle Blog
http://charmainenyw.com
Wait, the correct answer to your first problem about whether you should send that email is to have the drink, which gives you a little vodka-fueled confidence, and then send the email! Kiddingโฆmaybeโฆ
Seriously though, great advice. I have a bad habit of working on a task for a little while, getting to a โgood stopping pointโ and then checking FB. I do this way too many times in one day. Today I was doing client work, several 30-45 minute tasks, and I really wanted to call it quits for the day, but I forced myself to do just one more. Mostly I think I need to ban myself from FB during the day.
I work for myself now, but I do remember in my cubicle days being nervous about applying for jobs I wasnโt 100% qualified for. But one day I realized if I looked at job postings as a wishlist, it gave me a different perspective. They donโt necessarily expect to get someone who meets everything on the list, but you can usually figure out which things are reasonable to learn on the job and which ones you probably need to know going in.
To ban yourself from fb you can use cold turkey on laptop and offtime on mobile (android for sure). With CT there is NO WAY to undo it! And you can choose the same setting on offtime
So, hereโs what just happened:
1. Was working on some boring client work I didnโt really want to be looking at.
2. Decided to check email.
3. Clicked email from SVB, clicked this article.
4. This article told me to get back to work.
Damn, Sarah. Itโs like you know me!
Ha! Iโve certainly been in that situation, too! ๐
I landed my biggest client after sending a follow-up email that I was SURE was obnoxious. It wasnโt!
Huzzah!
Yes! Love that!
So inspiring! Just followed up on a bunch of jobs Iโve applied to. Thank you!!
<3 <3
I needed this today. Thank you.
I love it when I get a virtual kick in the pants.
I can confirm on the โapply for stuff youโre not sure if you qualify for itโ front from both sides. Iโve done it as a job seeker 3 times and changed my life for the better 3 times when I succeeded (college newspaper make me your copy editor just cuz I like words and people bring their essays to me, tech support guy make me a tech just cuz I can learn and understand Google results and help old people use their antivirus, current awesome job hire me to copy editorize spreadsheets and teach people to use software because editor/tech support). And as a former HR prescreener, no one is offended when you out kick your resume coverage โ the worst that happens is they donโt call and have forgotten you the next day. So yes, GO FOR IT. You may be just what theyโre looking for and they didnโt know it.
YES ALL OF THIS. My first internship-turned-job in college was basically a ton of practice in Many Long Shot Emails + Lots Of Rejection = Occasional Surprising Successes! (Specifically, I had to email fifty mom-bloggers a week (?!) and pitch them on letting me interview them about their favorite funny/embarrassing/heartwarming school memory.)
Thanks to people like you (and Captain Awkward, and Kelly โAdultingโ Brown), Iโve truly started to become the person who follows up with promising opportunities/potential friends, and sends (hopefully non-creepy!) love letters to people when they make something I genuinely connect with.
Some of this can be pretty fear-basedโi.e. โIf I donโt reach out to that cool girl from the party, I will continue to have No Friends in this new city.โ โIf I donโt follow up with these people who expressed interest in my copywriting, Iโm going to eat into my savings next month.โ But also, sometimes what you need to do something that makes you uncomfortable is to recognize that the alternative is Truly Much Worse.
And it does genuinely lead to some great stuff! Sometimes the awesome food historian you email for a long-shot blog interview asks you to be her intern 2 years later. Sometimes the girl youโve been trying to get coffee with for four months (!) really DOES just have a crazy busy schedule, and when you finally meet up, you become instant friends. (True stories!)
Here for Team Uncomfortable-In-Moderation!
Love letters = โHey, thanks for making this thingโ emails or IG messages, I should say. Iโm not out here with perfumed stationery.
Iโm so glad you linked to the cheese wheel. Made my day to know that exists! haha
I had cacio e pepe served out of a cheese wheel in NYC last year and it was one of the HIGHLIGHTS OF MY LIFE.
Iโm inspired over the applying for that โlong-shotโ opportunity. I have to admit that most/all of the time I apply for jobs I know I can do. Thereโs jobs that have come up that sound great, and I have a little experience, but doubt myself because I havenโt done some of the aspects of the job. Youโve inspired me to apply ๐ Thank you for this post!
My work is pretty different from yours and a lot of what you write about โ Iโm the entire software team for a 3 person startup. But this and a lot of similar posts still really speak to the people-interaction side of my work. This topic in particular is one that I really need to work on. Cheers!
Great read, thanks for the โpushโ. We all need to hear it some time.
25% I can do. Sometimes that means 100% but just for a minute. Thanks for the nudge.
Thank you so much for this , am always afraid of doing things that am not capable to do ,I feel uncomfortable but I donโt change.. Whatโs my problem?