Influential Introvert: Communication Coaching for Professionals with Performance Anxiety
The Influential Introvert: A podcast for professionals with performance anxiety. If you’re a business owner or leader who wants to speak confidently in front of a room, online, and in social situations without becoming a sweaty, stressed out mess, follow this show.
Learn the essential verbal and non-verbal skills necessary to elevate your presence and charisma and capture people’s attention. Equally important, you’ll learn to manage your mind and body so you feel less anxious and more confident speaking up, being decisive, and connecting with others.
Influential Introvert: Communication Coaching for Professionals with Performance Anxiety
It’s Supposed to Suck Right Now
Struggling to start something new because you're afraid of looking foolish? This episode is your permission slip to begin. You’ll learn how Stoic philosophy and growth mindset can help you move through discomfort, let go of perfectionism, and build real confidence – one imperfect step at a time. If you’ve been overthinking or biting your tongue, this conversation will help you shift into action.
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I’m your host, Sarah Mikutel, a communication and mindset coach. My work is about helping people like you share your voice, strengthen your relationships, and have more fun.
As an American expat living in the U.K., I value curiosity, courage, and joy. A few things I love: wandering European streets in search of the best vegetarian meal, practicing Italian, and helping my clients design lives that feel rich and meaningful.
If you're ready to have conversations that open doors – in your career, your relationships, and your life – let’s talk.
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Calm Your Nerves in 90 Seconds: Public Speaking Anxiety Reset
Does the phrase “public speaking” make you feel a little sick…even if it’s just a team meeting or a group conversation?
I made something to help you.
Calm Your Nerves in 90 Seconds is a free anxiety-reduction toolkit with a guided meditation and journal to help you communicate with confidence.
Use it anytime your brain goes into overdrive and you need a reset.
https://sarahmikutel.com/reset
My friend's little boy is crying. For the past 20 minutes he has been following a YouTube tutorial, carefully drawing each line, but when he looks at his finished picture, it does not match what's on the screen. I didn't do it right and the tears flow harder. He's treating this gap between his first attempt and a polished adult drawing as a personal failure, and most of us can relate to this, even when we know the difference between a fixed and a growth mindset. We want to be amazing at everything on our very first attempt, because then we don't have to be embarrassed. No one has to see us struggle. We try to control how people perceive us by attempting to look perfect, and this often means hiding or not trying anything new. A fixed mindset, as you may know, is the belief that we are born with certain natural abilities and that's it. You are good at something or you're not. A growth mindset is the belief that we can all grow and improve. A growth mindset is the belief that we can all grow and improve and learning. This changed my life because until then, I had been afraid of looking stupid and I let that fear impact how I showed up in this world. If we haven't met yet hello, I'm Sarah Mikatel and I'm a coach who especially loves helping people feel more confident in how they express themselves and relate to others. I'm also an American in England who loves talking about stoicism, connection, global exploration and the emotional freedom that comes with a growth mindset.
Speaker 1:In her TED Talk and her book Mindset, stanford professor Carol Dweck likes to talk about the power of the word yet meaning. We can use this word as a helpful tool to remind ourselves that we are learning something new. So of course, we're not going to be good at it Yet. To quote from her book Self-Theories in contrast to the helpless pattern, some students seek out difficult tasks and pour effort into them. These mastery-oriented individuals thrive on challenge. Their sense of worth is not tied to immediate success but to the process of learning and improvement. End quote.
Speaker 1:It's unreasonable to think that we should be masterful at something we've never done before, but many of us fall into this trap. We want to leap over what is referred to as the messy middle, because that stage of growth feels really uncomfortable. The other day, one of my clients was telling me about a few business ideas that she had, and when she spoke about one of them in particular, her whole body lit up, she smiled, her body became more animated, she spoke faster, with excitement. She's been thinking about this idea for a long time. It's an idea that I think is very brilliant. She's been thinking about this for years, but she hasn't moved forward on it.
Speaker 1:And as we talked it became clear that, one, she's stuck in analysis, paralysis, that muddy, stuck feeling of drowning in too much research. And two, she's afraid of judgment and rejection. And this feeling, this messy middle, this being stuck in the mud, it feels kind of chaotic, both stuck and chaotic at the same time, because you're going around and around in your head trying to think of the perfect solution before moving forward, because then no one can see you mess up, no one can say anything about you. So we think, but that doesn't work, because the only way to move forward is to move forward, to take action, to test things, to try, and that will feel uncomfortable too. But this kind of discomfort feels a whole lot better than just spinning your wheels, because you're actually moving forward to become the person you want to be. You are taking brave action, making progress on your goals.
Speaker 1:Becoming great that is, the highest version of yourself is not designed to feel great, it's designed to challenge you and to change you. Appreciate the struggle. This is learning. Accept that pain is part of the process. Literally say to yourself this is the part where it's hard. Appreciate the struggle. Accept the pain. This is the part where it's hard. It won't always be like this, and simply accepting the reality will bring some ease.
Speaker 1:If you want to do something fun, exciting, different, like sell tacos from a truck, move to Istanbul, sell everything you own and live out of a van, you are going to have naysayers, people who judge, people who reject your dreams. This will happen no matter what path you pursue in life. So take the path that you want to be on. Usually, people's judgments are not about you. They are about their own preferences and often their opinions are about their concern for you. When I quit a great job in Manhattan so I could go live in Rome for a while, all but a handful of people told me I was insane. A recession was kicking off, and they were really concerned for me, and their worry had me second guessing myself. So I had a decision to make Listen to people who rejected the kind of life I was interested in or try something new, and for me, that was living la dolce vita in Rome for a while and I chose the latter, and this set me up for a promotion when I returned to New York and later Italian citizenship.
Speaker 1:I'm not saying you should ignore advice or charge ahead with no concern for others. I am saying your belief in yourself needs to be stronger than other people's doubts, and if you do something like start a business or a podcast or anything where you increase your visibility or it goes against the norm, you will have people who give you hate online. Unfortunately, this is the price of admission these days. You have to dust yourself off and keep showing up for the people who believe in you and that includes yourself and you have to be willing to make mistakes. As Epictetus said, if you want to improve, you have to be okay with looking dumb in areas that don't matter. He's saying that sacrificing short-term comfort is worth it if it helps you stay focused on what really matters Wisdom, integrity, inner progress, living by your values. That means letting go of your preoccupation with how you appear to other people and choosing virtue over validation. And Carol Dweck agrees with him that we should sacrifice our egos for a more enriching life. To quote her from Self Theories again. If your intelligence can be increased, why not do that? Why waste time worrying about looking smart or dumb when you could be becoming smarter? And in fact, students with this view will readily sacrifice opportunities to look smart in favor of opportunities to learn something new. End quote. Both Epictetus and Carol Dweck would likely agree that if you want to improve, you have to be open to appearing imperfect. If you want to achieve your potential, stop prioritizing external praise. If you want to explore something new, you have to risk being misunderstood.
Speaker 1:In my early 20s, I spent a summer in Siena. I was working on my thesis and wandering around medieval streets, and I met my friend Rana in a beginner Italian class. In Arabic, her name means eye-catching or glittering object. In Italian Rana means frog, and she found this hilarious. We did not have much in common aside from being American. She was loud and adventurous. I was observational and I will give myself some credit. I was adventurous too, as long as the adventure didn't involve me looking stupid. Rana got me to do things like ride a motorino through the Tuscan countryside, which was as charming and dangerous as it sounds. She lived boldly and I admired that.
Speaker 1:One evening we are sitting in Piazza del Campo, siena's medieval main square where everyone gathers at night, rana, beer bottle in hand, strikes up a conversation with the guys next to us. In Italian. I don't say a word, not because I don't know how well I don't really, but even if the conversation had been in English, I probably would have been too shy to open my mouth. In fact I know I would have been. One of the guys actually asked why I wasn't talking and Ronna explained that I worried that I couldn't express myself the way I wanted to. Or maybe she said that I worried that I couldn't express myself the way I wanted to, or maybe she said that I was too embarrassed by my Italian language skills. But I remember watching her and thinking how does she do this so easily? Some people are so lucky to be born that extroverted and I still think that some people are wired to be more outgoing. But I also now know that we can all become more easygoing and experimental and bold. We can all tap into our Rana energy, otherwise known as a stoic or growth mindset.
Speaker 1:You might be afraid to try something new. Accept that this is normal and do the scary thing anyway. Learn from your mistakes. See them as growth opportunities, to quote Carol Dweck again from her book Mindset many growth-minded people didn't even plan to go to the top. They got there as a result of doing what they love. It's ironic the top is where the fixed mindset people hunger to be, but it's where many growth-minded people arrive as a byproduct of their enthusiasm for what they do. This point is also crucial. In the fixed mindset, everything is about the outcome. If you fail or if you're not the best, it's all been wasted. The growth mindset allows people to value what they're doing regardless of the outcome. End quote. It feels hard until it doesn't. And the beauty is in the toughness, that messy middle, that muck that we're struggling with. That is your brain rewiring itself as it acquires new knowledge. What do you want to learn this year? What's holding you back from starting? What's one imperfect step you're willing to take today?