Not going all in with your personal brand is the single biggest mistake you’re making. No wonder you’re not getting a lot of sales. “Oh, but I’m camera shy” “I have strong opinions… I would repel people.” “I know what to say but my head goes blank whenever I open the camera” “I’m making scripted videos..but I wanna make raw content, but I CAN’T” You’re letting that little piece of meat inside of your head (your brain) hold you back from making money. And you expect to get clients? I was so camera-shy that I didn’t even upload my own face as my personal Insta profile pic for years… 😨 I thought I was being “too out there”. But guess what? I had to change, even if it meant doing something I was scared to do my whole life. I knew that to get to where I wanna go, I needed to level up in a few areas. One of those included facing the camera. Because how could people expect to know about my expertise… If I can’t even portray my own self? Just when I made that change, in only 2 months, my camera shyness dissolved. People started bombarding me with positive comments. And leads started to flow in. And the best part about it is…that I don’t even have to fake it. Or pretend to be an extrovert who’s always brimming with energy… I can be as authentic as I can be, and my audience will accept me for who I am. If you’re camera-shy, it’s time you start taking action. Even if that means making 3 videos in closed doors. Even if that means keeping those 20-minute-long videos in your gallery forever. Because if you keep listening to your brain’s excuses… It will LITERALLY hold you back from getting clients. Which, in turn, will hold your income back in the long run. Now the choice is yours. Do you wanna remain camera shy, or do you want an increased bank account? If you’re serious, comment your situation and I’ll solve it for ya.

Most of my social interactions became better once I stopped obsessing over having the perfect body language. The internet is filled with advice that is supposed to “help you.” But it did the opposite for me. Heck, it made me even worse when it comes to social interactions. “Sit up straight!” “Don’t cross your arms!” “Smile or it’s rude otherwise!” “Nod often, but not too often that you seem like a bobble head.” “Use gestures, but don’t show your palms too often, that’s a sign of weakness!” “Make sure you’re making strong eye contact, but not more than 5 sec, that’s creepy!” All of this advice became counterintuitive because I used to spend most of my time overthinking my moves instead of the conversations themselves. It was no different than being sandwiched by two walls that are moving towards your body to crush you. Because one side of your mind is trying to help you with the information. While the other is trying to correct you so “you don’t give off the wrong signals.” “My smile isn’t proper yet…I should smile more or it’ll come across as dismissive!” “Oh should I place my hands this way…NO that’s a weak body language position.” “Shit, I’m tired of sitting up straight, I wanna lean back. NO WAIT, I CAN’T, that’ll give people the wrong signal.” And this is where I found myself becoming socially worse. I found myself constantly battling inside my mind, trying to balance these two voices. And to other people…I was this shy, awkward guy who didn’t have much say in a conversation. No wonder that happened because all the conversations were happening inside my head. And I zoned out half of the time, and couldn’t pace myself with the flow of the conversation. In groups, everybody reacted & responded, but I found myself to be too ‘slow’ to even catch up. “What was that?” I often asked after missing an obviously clear & loud joke. This made me even more self-conscious, and that little voice became a huge monster. A monster that started to haunt me by hurling bitter things at me whenever I was behind in a conversation.

It’s hard to describe the kind of freedom you feel where every person feels approachable. When you can talk to anyone without your chest tightening. That feeling alone changed how I experience the entire world. But I wasn’t always like this. For the longest time, I had severe social anxiety. My father urged me to go and talk to the cashiers & shop clerks… But that was equivalent to swallowing poison to me. Whenever I was greeted with the thought of speaking to a stranger. I got that suffocating feeling in my chest. Even in a spacious room, I felt constricted. I felt physically sick, and my body even warmed up. Even with a room full of people, I couldn’t enjoy myself. My thoughts consumed me, and my fight-or-flight mode activated each time I found myself in such scenarios. “Gosh, I wanna get back home.” And each time I was out with people, I wanted to rush back home. Thinking that I’d crush it the next time, since it’ll be a fresh start. But that was a lie. Because the cycle only repeated. And it repeated for years… The worst part about it was that I saw every interaction as a “performance.” “Oh, I didn’t perform good yesterday.” I said to myself often after meeting people. Since I thought of it in a performance frame, I felt so much pressure to perform well. And I had “performance anxiety” the entire time. Watching YouTube videos on improving my social interactions made the situation even worse. I often found my thoughts going against me, depending on the videos I’d watched. “Sit up straight!” “Your body language isn’t correct!” “You’re smiling too much, that’ll come across as weak!” “You’re losing eye contact, it should be 3-4 sec long!” “You’re nodding too much!” It was a disaster… It almost felt like it would continue for the rest of my life. And I couldn’t even think what that life would be like if I continued living underneath this burden. Apart from that, there was this regret that I had each night going to sleep after a “failed” interaction.

Do you want to achieve freedom in life? 🏄 Do you want to be the richest person in your bloodline? If that’s too much, then do you at least want to add an extra 2k-5k/month to your name as an entrepreneur? What if I tell you that you can achieve all of that…but you have to do only ONE thing. You need to look weird in front of others. 😜😝 You need to be able to accept criticism, mockery, and judgment from others. In other words, you just need to look like the only black sheep in a crowd of white sheep. Would you make that trade? ✉️ If you can achieve all of your dreams just by looking a bit weird, that’s more of a bargain, isn’t it? With this perspective, it doesn’t feel that bad to look weird, does it? Yet most people still get that heavy feeling in their chest when pursuing their dreams. People still don’t feel like doing cold outreach because it makes them feel weird. People still hate the feeling of being rejected on a sales call. So they avoid or delay doing the “cringe work” altogether. But this “cringe work” is what moves the needle. It is what gives you the freedom you want. I have learnt this the hard way… 😞 I used to worship my self-image, thinking I was a “tough dude” Thinking I needed to talk in a certain way, smile all the time, be slow with my movements… And it got me nowhere, and my growth plateaued for such a long time… But now I’ve started to accept feeling stupid while doing the “cringe work”. I’m now ok with appearing like a complete idiot in front of others. And I came to this realisation after I observed children. When you see kids… You see that they’re so free-flowing that they don’t care about anyone else. They’ll ask you dumb questions like: “Why is the sky blue?” ☁️ And once you answer them, they still have 100 more dumb questions to ask. They’re guided by their curiosity, which in turn helps them GROW their knowledge. They’re unstoppable when it comes to growth because they don’t hold themselves back. However, as we grow up, we tend to become our own biggest enemy.

You want all the glamour in this world. 💸 The dream body, financial freedom, the ability to talk to people without overthinking, love & respect from others. What if I tell you that you can get all of these things, but there’s a catch… You’ll only get these things if you DON’T LOOK at them at all. What? 😵‍💫 What the heck is this weird concept, you might think to yourself. Well, this is none other than the weird law of Core & Peripherals. See, whatever you want comes in the category of peripherals. These are the eventual by-products. That you get once you focus on the Core. The core is what you WORK ON to achieve the peripherals. It is the secret button that you press, which causes the peripherals to chase you. But how does that work exactly? Let me explain it with an example of a cat. 🐈 See, when you like a cat, and you want it to come to you… You kneel down, rub your fingers in front of it, and call it by saying: “psst psst psst.” But the thing is, most cats don’t come to you (especially the shy ones) And then you become frustrated and you start to get back and walk towards it. And the cat walks away from you. 🐈 🏃 As you increase your speed to chase it. The cat increases its speed to run away from you. 🐈 🏃 But now imagine the opposite scenario… This time, go to the cat with delicious cat treats… Now...the cat rushes towards you and even wants to lie on your lap after having the treats. Heck, ten more cats will join you, and all of a sudden, you’re the “cat whisperer” The same is with our materialistic goals. For instance: Peripheral: You wanna get better at social interactions Core: talk to strangers, share your opinion with your loved ones, have child-like curiosity. Peripheral: You want 3 clients this month Core: 10 cold outreach/day, make 2-3 YT vid/week Peripheral: You want to level up in work (generally) Core: Strong work ethic, punctuality, innovate with new ideas, take feedback from past mistakes Whatever you want to achieve lies in the Core.