I hear this statement often. It seems sensible. Once we have a range of qualifications under our belt, we will be ready to help people – Right?

Now I love learning and have a number of qualifications to my name. I used to joke that if I put all the letters of my qualifications after my name, it would be longer than my name. But it is not the letters after my name that make me a good coach. Most of my skill has come from putting the book learning into practice.

At some point you will need to start doing.

It is scary to promote yourself and become visible. There will be people who can do what you do, much better than you. There will be people who don’t like you, or don’t think what you’re doing is the right thing to do. There are some who seem to delight in criticizing.

Does all this make you want to hightail it back to the couch and watch some Netflix?

As one of my mentors said, ‘business is the best self-development course you will ever do’. It will test your desires, your patience, your perseverance and consistency. Nothing else is quite like it for bringing you to a realization of your strengths and your weaknesses.

You keep doing courses, you keep getting qualifications and hope that one day you will feel ready to start that dream business. You feel that just this one more piece of paper and you will round out all your knowledge and then people will see how much you know and be willing to listen to you and buy from you.

But people buy from those who they feel can help them, and they have developed a relationship with. It is called the ‘know, like and trust factor.’ This is not achieved through more study. This is only achieved through visibility. Through turning up, being seen, talking about what you do, and showing what you do.

The fear you feel is part of what your brain is doing to keep you safe.

We have a very sensible mechanism called the fight, flight or freeze response when we are placed in a situation where we are afraid. Most of us know the feeling when we are near the edge of a cliff or climbing some wonky stairs. We feel the heart beating faster, our palms become sweaty, our breathing increases. Blood flows to our limbs and away from the frontal cortex – the thinking and reasoning part of the brain. (when a tiger is chasing you, there is no need for complex calculations, you just need to run)

But what does this have to do with doing a Facebook live?

Your body responds with the same fear response. You have the same physical responses and the same loss of cognitive thinking. You freeze and stammer and it feels like you are making a real hash of the video. You never want to do that again, if you even get as far as doing the first one.

What is the solution?

Reduce the fear response, calm down the stress centre of the brain and assure it that this is not like a tiger chasing you.

One of the best and easiest ways to calm down stress is using the tool of EFT – tapping. This enables us to reprogram the stress response and calm down the stress reaction. Once your body is no longer reacting, the thinking part of the brain stays active and you will be able to deliver your message with clarity and ease.