Who are you to say you're not as impressive as you sound?
This week, I was really honoured to be invited to give a speech at a graduation ceremony at UCL, the university I attended around two decades ago. (If you’re interested, you can read what I said here.)
Among previous alumni to have given speeches in graduations are - I was informed - a world-famous lawyers and an Olympic gold medallist.
And me.
Now I’ve done a lot of work on myself over the years, but it was pretty much only when I sat on the stage at the Royal Festival Hall, hundreds of soon-to-be graduates and their families in front of us, that I caught just how much I had played down this moment inside myself.
You see, I have some very old practices which I am incredibly skilful at.
For example, I can look at my achievements and discount them very rationally.
Now, I don’t do this outwardly. When I’m selling myself, introducing myself, I’ve done enough work on myself that I give people the picture that I believe will be of greatest service to me and to them. I tell them about the podcast (or indeed podcasts!), the business coaching amazing leaders, the series of books, the previous clients I’ve worked with and more.
But inside, I know the exact reality of all those things. I know just how many people DON’T listen to my podcast (around 8.2 billion) and pretty much exactly (also about 8.2 billion) haven’t bought my books. I know the struggles of my business, my energy, my mental health and more. I see the inside of me every day. And it isn’t always pretty.
But sitting there, with the stage lighting on, and the Dean of the Faculty giving me a beautiful introduction (that I had written), I heard it and felt it. And I stepped up - as I always do - and gave the best speech I could, honouring the moment and trying to give it a significance that I, 20 years or so ago, hadn’t found in a different graduation ceremony in a different large hall in London.
And I remembered the words of one of my former coaches, Rich Litvin. He used to say, all the time: we compare what’s going on for us on the inside with what’s going on for everyone else on the outside.
That isn’t a fair comparison.
I suddenly had the flash: who am I to know what it’s like to be inside any of the people I’ve seen speak over the years, who I heard the biography of and gave the credit I thought they deserved?
And who am I to say that I’m not as impressive as I sound?
And, when someone reads out a biography of your greatest hits in front of hundreds of people in the biggest hall in one of the biggest arts centres in the world… even I have to admit that if I heard this afresh I would probably think that the guy they’re talking about sounds pretty impressive.
Someone I respect recently said to me: one of the things I like about you, Robbie, is that you make yourself look bigger than you are. She explained that she had done that, too, as she started her (very succesful) business.
I relayed this story to my sister, Rowan, in the afternoon after the graduation ceremony and she said something like: well, what else are you supposed to do? Pretend to be smaller than you are?
And of course most of us do that all the time.
And most of us feel far less successful than we are.
So if we were to appear as successful as we feel, we would pretty much always be underselling ourselves. And as Rowan pointed out, that doesn’t seem to be a good idea.
There are times, when, if you’re like me, used to playing down your achievements as a way to protect yourself, it’s useful to be reminded of what you’ve achieved.
And how, on the outside, it looks amazing.
And it might be equally amazing - or equally unamazing - as all the other people out there you’ve admired over so many years.
But let’s err on the more likely side:
What you’ve done is amazing.
Well done.
Keep doing it.
The world needs it.
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This is the latest in a series of articles written using the 12-Minute Method: write for twelve minutes, proof read once with tiny edits and then post online.
Buy the 12-Minute Method series of books, written 12 minutes a week over three years, here.