Scared to Speak Up During Meetings

[Orb]

It's to the point where saying good morning in the meeting is my limit. Anything more feels impossible. 

 

It's a combination of being afraid of not being listened to and also not feeling competent in my job.

[Serenity]

I also suffer from social anxiety from time to time. It shows up depending who is in front of me, and what is at stake. It's very debilitating, and I tend to try to avoid these situations because of the discomfort. Which leads into missing opportunities.

 

My guess is that this is our good ol' friend unworthiness/shame popping it's rather ugly head.

 

There are several possibilities:

 

- Working on it at the root 

- Overcoming it in this peculiar situation through a CBT type of work

- Medication (I found out that popping a small dose of propranolol before I've got to speak does wonders)

[Phil]

What about when feeling is heard / listened to, rather than the thoughts believed in spite of the discord? 

[Joseph Maynor]

I’m having a hard time meeting people who even have the confidence or mindset of an entrepreneur.  I don’t think most people have this.  It’s a combination of self-confidence, vision, independence, collaboration, hard work, and results focus.  So all these people find their life purpose and nothing comes out of it because they don’t want to build a business from scratch.  People undermine themselves let alone being undermined by others.  It disenheartens me.  You could give some people an opportunity for free and they’ll still quit.  Lack of self-confidence is no joke and I wish I could help people who suffer from this but somehow they must fix this in themselves.  Then there are people who want to dabble around and play around but who don’t have a head for making something practical and marketable that brings in actual money.  It’s like, dude, that ain’t gonna work either!  You can have all the life purpose in the world but without a business mentality it’s gonna stay a dream. Starting a business takes quite a bit of courage.  Courage is one of my strengths so I have this in spades.  I have other problems though — like I hate marketing and have little interest in doing visual art.  I’m a good CEO though.  I have that leadership thing going for me.  It’s hard to find people that can be as engaged as myself though.  I think most people just want to be comfortable followers not leaders.

Edited March 21, 2023 by Joseph Maynor

[Orb]

@Serenity I prefer working at it from the root, medication can help in the short term but it can only go so far. 

 

@Phil I just feel nervous during the meeting, I get a lump in my throat and when I speak up it comes from the throat and not the stomach. 

 

@Joseph Maynor I'm starting a business too, im actually working with my first "clients" , the momentum is slow but thats to be expected at first. And its perfectly fine to feel scared/insecure as an entrepreneur, entrepreneurs arent super heroes who are fearless. Any confidence they have is because of how much experience they have. I'm not sure how old you are but I'd guess you're in ur 40s, well I'm in my early 20s so on top of starting a business I'm learning how to be a functional adult in society.

[Phil]

@Orb

What if you take away the words applied to feeling like scared, my limits, impossible, afraid, not listened to, not competent and nervous… and instead the express the emotion (guidance) that’s felt?

 

How do you know confidence comes from experience if you (as you’re saying) have neither?

How are you so sure you know so much about what you are saying you don’t have?

Doesn’t really add up right?

[Orb]

@Phil I wouldn't be able to say it now, as I'm not in the meeting currently. So i dont feel whatever I feel during the meeting. But if I had to guess I'd say fear. But then if I use the scale I'm gonna angry during my meeting. 

 

Honestly, really honestly, I don't wanna feel the full range or emotions on the scale 😭. Just seems like a pain in the ass but idk if I can avoid it anymore. 

[Phil]

27 minutes ago, Orb said:

@Phil I wouldn't be able to say it now, as I'm not in the meeting currently. So i dont feel whatever I feel during the meeting. But if I had to guess I'd say fear. But then if I use the scale I'm gonna angry during my meeting. 

Saying what’s seen is what’s felt is like saying you can taste food by looking at it. 

Doesn’t work that way, isn’t it so?

 

Thoughts only arise now… and some thoughts are about being in a past or future… true as in, in accordance with direct experience, yes?

 

27 minutes ago, Orb said:

 

Honestly, really honestly, I don't wanna feel the full range or emotions on the scale 😭. Just seems like a pain in the ass but idk if I can avoid it anymore. 

You already are (experiencing emotions). 

Relief is the recognition of direct experience, of what already is actual. 

Suffering is avoidance, resistance, aversion.  

If you bring the same thoughts up right now will you not feel the same emotions?

 

[Orb]

6 minutes ago, Phil said:

Saying what’s seen is what’s felt is like saying you can taste food by looking at it. 

Doesn’t work that way, isn’t it so?

No it doesn't work that way.

 

6 minutes ago, Phil said:

Thoughts only arise now… and some thoughts are about being in a past or future… true as in, in accordance with direct experience, yes?

Yes it's true, very true.

 

8 minutes ago, Phil said:

You already are (experiencing emotions). 

Relief is the recognition of direct experience, of what already is actual. 

Suffering is avoidance, resistance, aversion.  

If you bring the same thoughts up right now will you not feel the same emotions?

 

Yes that's true. 

 

So if I use the emotional scale just once and go all the way up to love, will all the trauma and fears be gone? 

[Mandy]

@Orb You contribute and interact really well on the Zoom meetings, why are the work meetings so different? 

 

Do you believe that the actual job you're doing is useful and effective? 

[Orb]

27 minutes ago, Mandy said:

@Orb You contribute and interact really well on the Zoom meetings, why are the work meetings so different? 

In the zoom calls I feel safe being honest about the emotions I'm feeling. I can't talk like that at work. 

 

28 minutes ago, Mandy said:

@Orb Do you believe that the actual job you're doing is useful and effective? 

Not really, but I'm hard on myself. My mom said it's normal to feel like a fraud.

 

[Mandy]

1 minute ago, Orb said:

In the zoom calls I feel safe being honest about the emotions I'm feeling. I can't talk like that at work. 

Yes on some level I understand why you can't talk like that, but can you not also bring in emotion and honesty, even if it's not shared in the same way? 

 

3 minutes ago, Orb said:

Not really, 

Can you expound on that? I think there's something good here. Do you believe the tasks you're assigned to are useful and effective? 

 

[Orb]

6 minutes ago, Mandy said:

Can you expound on that? I think there's something good here. Do you believe the tasks you're assigned to are useful and effective? 

 

 

They're a little bit useful.

[Mandy]

@Orb Does it make sense that the judgement of I as the doer of the task, and the judgement of the task itself might get conflated? If you believe the tasks are a little bit useful, can you focus on those aspects, the utility of them, appreciating that, and see what happens, see how you feel about yourself after focusing there awhile, and working to expand and maximize that appreciation? Leaving yourself out of the equation. 

 

If I think I'm not spending enough time on my business, that lacking sentiment about myself carries over to "I'm not spending enough time with my kids or family either." But which is it? Do I need to work more or play more?  I'm doomed to conflict, because I started out in conflict with myself, so I do neither, and that's suffering. Or it's meditation, when I stop the activity of fighting myself. The thought pattern is of time shortageness, but the thoughts claim that specific things about me in regard to a specific thing are failing. Sentences are formed with subject, verb, object. The subject is never subject. 

[Orb]

@Mandy I think it just points to corporate culture lol. 

 

I think deep down everyone knows this work isn't really "alot". 

 

Like a guy working on a farm and someone sending out emails all day have a way different feeling at the end of the day after work. I'm sure the farmer feels more satisfied like he actually dedicated his heart and soul to something. 

 

I want to feel this with my new career. 

 

My new career is going so slow right now but I know it's only the beginning.

[Mandy]

3 minutes ago, Orb said:

@Mandy I think it just points to corporate culture lol. 

 

I think deep down everyone knows this work isn't really "alot". 

Yes, but if you write it off as that you steal your own attraction power away for this... 

3 minutes ago, Orb said:

I want to feel this with my new career. 

 

[Orb]

@Mandy I wanna feel alive! I wanna know what im doing for my new career! 

 

but unfortunately im in the early stages of building business so its so slow and everythings abstract.

[Mandy]

The current job and the one on it's way aren't two. The current house and the one on its way aren't two. Live what you're doing like it's the only one for you, and the world will be at your fingertips. 

[Mandy]

5 minutes ago, Orb said:

@Mandy I wanna feel alive! I wanna know what im doing for my new career! 

 

but unfortunately im in the early stages of building business so its so slow and everythings abstract.

Put on the gas! Put on the brake. Put on the gas, put on the brake. Why aren't we getting anywhere very fast? Why is this so slow? Because you're putting on the brake so much with your thinking, in noticing it's going slow, you brake. 

 

[Orb]

@Mandy last time I put on the gas I got in a car crash 🙃😅. I was going too fast.