INSIDE THE

When You Need to Laugh Roll the Blooper Reel

Whenever venturing into something new be it a job search, learning a new technology or taking on a new project, there are going to be mistakes, mishaps, and bloopers!

Over the last several months, while dealing with the new norm brought on by the pandemic, I have had to adapt to new technology and lead several webinars. I speak at several conferences a year and everyone always thinks that this comes naturally to me because I make it look easy. The honest truth: I am terrified every single time.

And now to make it worse, I had to learn a new technology that was ever changing, while also interacting with several people I had never worked with before. My anxiety went through the roof.

I frequently hear that people are dealing with “imposter syndrome” and I am one of those people. No matter how hard I work, I don’t think I have done enough or it’s not good enough.

Launching into webinars and doing podcasts was something I had to do, as the pandemic was cancelling in-person events. And to add to the challenge of learning something new, the technology kept changing on a weekly basis. Add working with new people for the first time and wanting everything to be perfect for them—no pressure!

But guess what? I made a lot of bloopers and when you are doing these on a webinar, you are watching yourself do them. Mortifying. But instead of crawling under the nearest rock, I made sure we saved them all to make this blooper reel. Why? Because we all need a laugh right now and I saw this as a way to ease my anxiety.

So how do you overcome a blooper? First, understand that we all make them. Laughter or smile is always a good way to move on from making a blooper and then acknowledging the bloop. Next, take a deep breath, focus and carry on.

This may not sound easy as you may be mortified, embarrassed or some combination of the two. You will not be able to make the ground swallow you whole, but you will move on. Acknowledging that we make mistakes and can learn from them makes us human and helps us grow.