Next Level University

#1504 - Insecurities Get Worse When We Hide Them

• Kevin Palmieri and Alan Lazaros

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The fear of revealing our insecurities, of being 'found out,' can often lead to anxiety and, in severe cases, panic attacks. In this episode, hosts Kevin Palmieri and Alan Lazaros talk about how opening up about these insecurities to someone we trust can be incredibly liberating and helps us conquer these fears. It involves acknowledging our fears, opening up about them, and, ultimately, using them as a springboard toward personal growth and success.

Links mentioned:
Next Level Social Media - reach out to Kevin for more information at Kevin@nextleveluniverse.com
Next Level U Book Club - https://www.nextleveluniverse.com/next-level-book-club/  

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Show notes:
[3:43] Sharing your insecurity with those you trust
[8:42] Realize that you are insecure
[13:15] Janine talks about how valuable Group Coaching is, what her takeaway is, and why she thinks you should take the leap
[17:01] What are you hiding? 
[21:30] Triggering insecurity in someone else
[25:40] Outro

Send a text to Kevin and Alan!

Speaker 1:

Next level nation. Welcome back to another episode of next level university, where we help you level up your life, your love, your health and your wealth. We hope you enjoyed our latest episode, episode number 1503. Your deepest fear also creates your biggest strength. Today, for episode number 1504, happy Sunday.

Speaker 1:

Insecurities get worse when we hide them. So, as you have heard me talk about many times, during the early phases of being a full-time entrepreneur a very broke full-time entrepreneur, a full-time entrepreneur with Less than part-time results, with negative results at this point I went through a lot of anxiety and panic attacks and I was dealing with a lot of that stuff. Alan and I were traveling. This is when we were living in Florida for the month and we were getting ready to drive From northern Florida to southern Florida and I remember we podcasted during the day. We went back to this, the house we were staying at, we packed our stuff and I remember I Was just starting to understand what anxiety felt like and for me, maybe trigger warning.

Speaker 1:

For those of you who deal with anxiety, I don't want it to make you anxious, but for me it's tightness in the chest, tightness in the throat. It feels like I can't breathe. That's just the way. That's the way it shows up for me. And we're packing and I remember I got super anxious and I remember telling Alan, when we were putting our suitcases in the car, I said, hey, man, just a heads up. I am super anxious and I said I think it's because and again, at this point I didn't really understand any of this I think it's because Before, in my old job, when I would Pack a suitcase and get in a vehicle, I'd be headed off to do something I didn't enjoy doing and I'd be miserable and I'd be homesick and it just wasn't good for my mental health. So I just want you to know I'm feeling anxious if I come across as any type of way, if I am Impatient, if I'm, if I'm different. That's why I I Was very insecure about the fact that I was anxious, because I thought it meant that I was weak or I thought it meant that there was something wrong with me or I didn't understand it.

Speaker 1:

I was so new to me I didn't understand what any of that meant. And the beautiful thing about Sharing that with Alan was number one I trust Alan and I feel safe with Alan. Number two is there was no part of me that was afraid he was gonna find out that I was anxious, excuse me. And yeah, there was no part of me that was afraid that I was gonna get found out. So there's kind of two, two scenarios here. One I don't tell Alan, then I have to pretend everything is okay for the entire five-hour ride, with the giant fear that Alan's gonna think something's wrong with me. What if he asked me and I say no, dude, I'm great, everything's awesome, everything's good. Meanwhile, I can't breathe and my chest is tight and I don't know what the hell is going on. That's part one.

Speaker 1:

Part two is I just communicate vulnerability with Alan. Hey, man, you know how I talked about that anxiety thing before. I know you don't necessarily understand it, but I'm dealing with it right now. This is how it shows up for me. If I come across is not interested in what you're saying or not as conversational as usual, it's nothing against you. I'm just going through something internally here. Just wanted to share that with you. When you don't share your insecurities with those that you trust, it's almost the main focus of the rest of the time you have together You're worried about. Can they tell there's a, there's a running joke. When you get high. You think everybody can tell you go in public when you're high, you're like oh my god, everybody knows I'm high, interesting.

Speaker 2:

Right, so bad, so bad. Oh, I hate it so much.

Speaker 1:

I think it's. I don't have.

Speaker 2:

I don't have social anxiety. I do have social when I'm high. Yeah, that's very common.

Speaker 1:

I Don't get that. I don't. I don't get that. I don't know why, and I very rarely go out Anywhere when I am under the influence of drugs, but that's probably why. But I think it's very similar In your mind. You're thinking everybody knows my secret. You have flashbacks.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I think we should briefly tell the story. Oh man, you, yeah, yeah, I'm comfortable, okay. So, speaking of insecurities, that you're that get bigger if you hide them. I'm gonna not hide this one.

Speaker 2:

Kevin and I are early in our podcast journey and I partake in marijuana and I hit this bong which was not a good idea, terrible idea for you and I hit it way too hard. And I don't smoke often. I like very rarely. I think I've smoked weed, I don't know my entire lifetime, maybe 50 times, something like that, but it wasn't.

Speaker 2:

I'm not like an avid smoker by any means. I would occasionally do it in college and then I did it a little bit in high school, but I was never a big fan. Really, I liken it to spicy food. I hate spicy food. I always have, but I still eat it. We get this guac dip, that's. I love the guac, but I hate spicy guac and it's just eventually, alan, can you just not buy this Because you just hate it every time? That's what weed is to me. So again, nothing against the weed smokers, I just personally don't like it. So I hit this bong and I hit it way too hard and I'm coughing my brains out and I am so insecure because I know that I just made a huge mistake and I turned to Kev and I say Kev, so vulnerable, how long is this gonna last, man? And you're like you're trying to be nice because you know it's like four hours and you're like I don't know like an hour, just nap it off, man.

Speaker 1:

Go lay down.

Speaker 2:

Go lay down. So I do, I go lay down and you put on Joe Rogan for me. I don't know, man, I didn't know. Nope, can't think deep thoughts during that. I just need to nap it out and get back to my true self. But yeah, that I'm wicked, wicked. I don't like that adjective.

Speaker 2:

I'm extremely, extremely, extremely insecure when I'm high, extremely. I don't know why I've always been like that. I remember one time I got I smoked and I couldn't function. I went into my room and I tried to nap it out and I swear you ever been at a party. This is a weird conversation.

Speaker 1:

Right on.

Speaker 2:

NLU, who knew, yeah, NLU, who knew you ever be at a party where everyone you're the host and you know everyone's there to see you and I, one by one, I swear to you, every single person came into my room to try to talk me off the ledge and by off the ledge I don't mean anything negative, I mean I just wanted to sleep, like you got to come out, like it's okay, we know you're high, who cares? Everybody is, it's not a big deal. And every single person came in. They like sat on the bed, you know, tried to talk me to get me up. I was like no, and then eventually I did it. I want to eat the food. When the food came out, I went and ate and, honestly, this is just my truth. The only good thing about THC, from my experience personally, is the food. Oh my God, oh my God.

Speaker 1:

What a weird episode this has become.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, this has become a weird episode, but anyways, here's my point. This is about insecurities. I get super, super, super insecure when I'm high and I don't experience a ton of insecurities otherwise, although I have gotten in touch with my insecurities lately and I want to share one of those after I let Kevin talk.

Speaker 1:

No, he can share it.

Speaker 2:

A different insecurity. Yeah, sure, sure, the point of this episode. I asked Kevin beforehand. He said when you share your insecurities, they actually become smaller, assuming you do it with someone safe. When you hide them, they get worse.

Speaker 2:

I agree, and the thing that I think is important for everyone who's listening. Step one is to realize you are insecure no matter who you are. To some extent, emilia is the least insecure person I've ever personally met, but she still has insecurities A couple. They're just very different than other peoples. Okay, I know some people who are really insecure about how intimidating they are. I know some people who are really insecure about their memory. We were on book club and one of the book club members broke down in tears because we're reading a book called Limitless and chapter 13 is on memory, and she broke down in tears about how much she struggles with her memory and I said thank you so much for sharing, because book club is a place where you're safe to be successful and great, but you're also safe to be struggle bus. And so layer one is you are insecure, whether you think you are or not. It just might not be a normal insecurity or a common quote, unquote insecurity. Layer two is identify it. What is it that's that I'm insecure about?

Speaker 2:

So I told Kevin a long time ago that I'm insecure about my lack of symmetry in my nose. So if you've ever studied the science of modeling and the science of attraction, symmetry is really important. It's the distance from you know how big the gap in your nose is, not the gap, but the length of the width of your nose, the distance between your eyes and your nose, the distance between your hairline and your chin, the jaw line. There's a lot of science to masculine attraction and feminine attraction. That's what it's like. It's called the golden ratio. I won't go down the rabbit hole, but every logo Apple's logo, mcdonald's, all the logos out there have the golden ratio built into it because we're also attracted to it. So the golden ratio is essentially your hips, the hips ratio to your waist, to your breasts. There's a ratio there that we really and that's why people who get plastic surgery, they amplify those ratios and that's what triggers sexual attraction. Quote unquote. And again, I'm not going to go down the rabbit hole. But the point is, is symmetry is really important for attraction?

Speaker 2:

So I lost my symmetry in my nose when I broke my nose and I was a model. So I was insecure about it and I used to hide it underneath the hat, because you can't really tell that it's unsymmetrical unless there's above lighting. Above lighting makes it worse. I should say Okay, and so I would wear hats all the time. And I remember in college I would have like really long hair on purpose, because I didn't want to show it.

Speaker 2:

And so at the end of the day, we all have insecurities. The problem is, when we hide them, they actually get worse, and then we have to continue hiding them, and continue hiding them and continue hiding them and we can't really shine. I have one client who it's so fascinating too, because this client is beautiful, everyone thinks she's beautiful and she's insecure about how big her butt is. And again, I'm coaching this person, dear friend of mine, and it's like listen, most women would kill for that. And so here we are, we have, we have thick hair and we wish we had thin hair. We have thin hair, we wish we had thick hair. We're tall, we wish we were shorter. We're short, we wish we were taller. Right, it's.

Speaker 2:

It's this weird thing of everything has an upside and a downside, and I think that I Think that it's human nature to be overly critical of yourself.

Speaker 2:

I Know that it is and if you can just realize that and realize that even the most beautiful among us are deeply insecure and that was what really did it for me is when I became a model and I and I modeled with other women and and I Don't think, really any other men I modeled with other women and these women were beautiful and they were so deeply insecure and it was like, okay, that's when it really started to click for me. And then I did coaching and 4700 hours in with all different clients all over the world. Every single one of them has a deep insecurity. Even the ones that aren't insecure are insecure. That they're not insecure Because they don't fit in, they don't feel like they're relatable. Emilia is a good example of that, but she is insecure about how intimidating she can be. So at the end of the day, just own it and try to stop hiding it, because when you stop hiding it, you really start to shine and it's a level of courage that I think a lot of people will appreciate.

Speaker 1:

Do you believe we're only 14 minutes into this episode? We've been talking for two hours, my goodness and we did not smoke. No, I don't smoke anymore, but I think that's what we're sounding a lot like we did.

Speaker 2:

I know I know I'm insecure about.

Speaker 1:

I connect insecurities to fear, where, when you have a fear, you convince yourself you can't face it and then it gets worse, yeah, but when you face your fear and you realize, oh, that's not the end of the world, it actually gets better. It has to be with the right person, though. Maybe, I don't know maybe that's why more of us don't share our insecurities is because we don't have somebody in our life we feel comfortable doing it with. Maybe that's a thesis, because if you have someone you feel comfortable sharing with, it would be hugely beneficial if you have that type of relationship where you can say, hey, can I share something with you?

Speaker 1:

Kind of an insecurity, something I've been going through, something I am afraid to share, but I feel safe with you. It's putting the light on something that you've never put the light on before and seeing what happens. And if it's with somebody, is it this cut and dry? Probably not, but if you share it with somebody who loves you, who cares about you, who you have a good relationship with, who isn't toxic, understands vulnerability, understand psychological safety, it's probably gonna go better than you think.

Speaker 2:

Okay, you listed a lot of things right there. Yeah, that's a very small percentage.

Speaker 1:

That's fair, of the population. Maybe take one of those. If you, if you have someone in your life who understands and appreciates you, feeling psychologically, psychologically safe with them, that's probably a good person.

Speaker 2:

But again, this is one, one of the best side interrupt. You know this is one of the benefits. I'm insecure about that, no, so this is one of the benefits of therapy. It's it's you know with your clinician that you are protected, that your privacy is protected, and that's something that I'll bring everyone behind the scenes. You'll notice some stories I share anonymously, some I, some I talk about specifically. The reason why is because the ones that I say the name, I have permission in advance to share it. I Protect. I'm very much walking that line at all times. I don't want any of my clients to ever feel unsafe to share things with me, you know. So I always ask permission in advance prior to saying things and I've had certain people say say my name every time. We're good, I, if it's gonna help someone, say my name and then other people who I know don't want me to share it and that's okay.

Speaker 1:

What is your next level? Nugget, good sir.

Speaker 2:

It's the same. It's the same as what this the point of this episode is, which is, okay, I Never identified as someone who was insecure and that was holding me back. For those of you who are out there, I think a large percentage of our listeners do identify as insecure and I appreciate your honesty and your humility, but there's some of you, like me, who didn't identify that way because you weren't insecure about similar things. What I want to help and I've been this has been kind of a theme over the last like 30 to 50 episodes. For anyone who is on my end of drive to five. You are insecure, you just don't know it because you're not insecure about the same things, and I think that that's the important piece of this is ask yourself what am I hiding? What am I hiding From myself, from other people? What am I avoiding? Because underneath that is fear, it's insecurity, it's okay.

Speaker 2:

Every human being is insecure at times. There's no such thing as someone who has nothing ailing them. You know Some of the most successful people on planet Earth, some of the most impactful people on planet Earth, have some of the deepest insecurities. You just don't necessarily know that and it's just. It's so, not something to be ashamed of. If you live there and you never overcome it and you have a fixed mindset and you make excuses and you're constantly a victim who never takes empowerment, then yeah, of course there's going to be shame there. But that's not the road you're taking. That's not who you are, that's not who you have to be.

Speaker 2:

And I think that there's some people who are insecure that own that. They're insecure and then they, because of that, they really shine and flourish versus people who pretend they're not because they don't know that they are. And if you're in that second boat, I was in that second boat in my teens and my early 20s and I just didn't realize that I wasn't insecure about the things other people are insecure about. But that does not mean you're not insecure. And there's a superpower built in just owning whatever you're insecure about. There's so much growth on the other side of owning it in the proper setting.

Speaker 1:

And that goes back to our previous episode your deepest fear also creates your biggest strength very similar online with that, my next LLNugget. I think I said it earlier this week. I don't know. This week's been a very long week, not just in terms of the actual week, but the episodes have just felt like we spaced them out weirdly this week. It feels like we haven't recorded an episode in a month and I don't remember what we talked about.

Speaker 1:

But you either get over it or you live under it With an insecurity, with a fear. Either you get to the point where you feel like you're over it quote unquote enough to explore it or you live under it. That becomes the ceiling where you live your life. And is it that simple? No, logically, is it that simple when you look at it? Yeah, kind of.

Speaker 1:

If you're insecure about the way you look in a bathing suit, you most likely won't go anywhere where there's an opportunity for you to be in a bathing suit, or you'll facilitate some sort of situation to make sure you're covered up and that's going to end up being it, and then it'll probably, unfortunately, get worse in time. Maybe you share with someone yeah, I'm insecure about the way I look, and they say oh yeah, I understand. I definitely have experienced that as well. This is what I did, that helped me, and now you're on, hopefully, a path of progression. But it can't happen unless you admit it first. Unfortunately, again, the world is set up in a weird way. It just is. When it comes to stuff like this, yeah, believe it, or?

Speaker 2:

not. The people who are less insecure are typically the ones who are saying I'm insecure.

Speaker 2:

It's so interesting how that works. And the very last thing I'll say I didn't mean to jump in, but I do have to share this. One last piece I feel called One of my biggest insecurities is being around insecure people. I was a prepubescent I talk about that like I was a little kid and everyone hit puberty and I didn't. Now I'm 6'2", I'm bigger, I'm 190 pounds. I'm not jacked by any means, but I'm built and it depends on you talking to, but I can tell people get really insecure around me. That's definitely something that's happened more in my 30s than it used to happen, which is very weird for me because I used to be the overlooked literally and figuratively overlooked guy. But I am definitely insecure with how much I intimidate other people and owning that has helped me and for some of our listeners I do believe that that will help you too. So, even if you don't feel like you're super insecure, that's making other people insecure and that probably is triggering your insecurity Cause.

Speaker 2:

For me, when I'm around people who are deeply emotionally intelligent and emotionally mature and who are well rounded and vulnerable and physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually developed, I'm not super insecure. I'm not insecure around you. I'm really not. I just feel good, it's all good, I know I'm not going to get, I know I'm safe, it's all good, you're not going to freak out on me or whatever, and if you get triggered, you'll just tell me, instead of lash out. When I'm around other people, I am, I'm insecure and I get all weird and I want to overcome that. And the only way to overcome that is to realize oh, I'm not insecure, I'm insecure about being around other people who I make insecure. So again, just a little bit of a deeper layer for some people Cause you. What you're doing is you're triggering each other, you're triggering insecurity in someone else and then that's making you insecure because you can feel their insecurity. And I think that there's a way to create a safer energy in that very hyper conscious thought to end the episode Next level nation very excited.

Speaker 1:

We have something called next level social media. So at this point we are producing 55, something like that. Many, many podcasts Awesome Next level podcast solutions. Nlps has grown. Teams amazing, everything's awesome. We have next level social media. That is growing very quickly as well Much quicker, in fact, than next level podcast solutions. At the beginning, we literally do people social media, so we come up with the content, we come up with the caption, we do the posting on multiple platforms.

Speaker 1:

If you're someone who is struggling with social media but you know you need it for your small business or for whatever it is your side hustle, for your dream chasing, but you cannot seem to get yourself to do it, please reach out. I am happy to discuss pricing and all that I promise you because this is the feedback I've gotten. It is way more affordable than you think and, I would argue, more affordable than anybody else. I'll just put it out there because I've gotten a lot of feedback. So just reach out if you're interested. It's something that we're growing very quickly and I'm very excited and the team is growing and we'd love to help you if that is something you're struggling with.

Speaker 2:

Imagine someone who can talk to you about what you want to put out into the world in terms of social media, and then they can align what they write and what they do with your photos, your videos and put it out there for you in an aligned way, for a monthly fee where you don't have to fall down the rabbit hole often and you can just trust that it'll be done consistently and sustainably over the long term. That's as a business owner, it's tremendous to be able to do that with someone that you trust. So again, next level social media. If you appreciate next level university and the standards that we set for this podcast and for how we deliver and over deliver for our clients coaching, you name it next level social media will be no different. We don't want to put our name on anything that isn't something we're really going to work hard to over deliver on. So, speaking of that over delivering, I do believe that I over delivered earlier on Book Club. I showed up and I said listen. I listened to the chapter. I've also read this book in the past, but I didn't prep the three points and I was just owning it. I said I'm going to rely on the audience a little bit here. I said I do have a little bit of something that I want to do, but I'm going to ask the audience questions and we're going to do polls and we're going to discuss. We're going to discuss the chapter openly. So even when I don't over deliver, I still think I over delivered in the vulnerability of listen.

Speaker 2:

This week has been brutal and I'm here. I'm here for all of you. There was like 18 people, I think. So really good book club and it was just a safe space for us to all talk about. In this case, it ended up talking about memory. I talked about that person who was in tears, but everyone was applauding her in tears, because that's the safe space we're all here to learn from each other. So book club, jim Quick, we're actually ending this in three more chapters. We have three more chapters and then there will be a poll in Next Level Nation for the next book. You do not have to have read the chapter. You do not have to prepare in advance. Some people are in their car with just their audio listening in, not video or anything. Some people are fully engaged, participating. You can do anything in between that spectrum. We hope that you're there. The link will be in the show notes. It's every Saturday 12 30 PM Eastern Standard Time and I hope you give it a shot.

Speaker 1:

Tomorrow for episode number 1,505 Monday a new week, new opportunities. One word to stop using in your relationship. We have several clients who are in therapy, counseling, psychology. One of our clients is a psychologist and I've noticed when I talk to her she's really good about this. She's really good about choosing her words. She's very intentional with her words. So that inspired me to do this episode. So we'll do that tomorrow. As always, we love you, we appreciate you, grateful for each and every one of you, and at NLU we don't have fans, we have family. We will talk to you all tomorrow.

Speaker 2:

Keep owning your insecurities. Next, sublimation.

People on this episode

Head Shot

Alan Lazaros

Host
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Kevin Palmieri

Host