November 21, 2025 • 31 mins
Fear of rejection can run your day without saying a word. I’ve felt it in rehab bunkhouses, in church pews that taught guilt over growth, and across kitchen tables where a homeowner just wanted their AC to work and their evening back. That same fear fuels the masks we wear, the discounts we offer too soon, and the way we beat ourselves up on the drive home. So I pulled the thread from the beginning: where does imposter syndrome start, how does it hijack sales, and what daily choices make that voice lose its power?
We start with the messy parts: performing to be safe, confusing approval with belonging, and how organized religion shaped and then shattered some of my early beliefs. From there, the focus turns practical. I walk through how to read body language, ask sharper questions, and slow down enough to uncover the real blocker behind a hesitant buyer. We get honest about tonality and ego—why being the expert doesn’t give you license to steamroll, and how letting someone finish can save a deal. You’ll hear why “I don’t know; I’ll get back to you” is a trust builder, not a weakness, especially when talking with engineers or highly technical clients.
Then we tackle value, pricing, and boundaries. Not everyone is your customer, and chasing chronic discounters will hollow out your calendar and your confidence. I unpack the true cost of a “free” van roll, how to teach value without apology, and why clean presentation—uniform, breath, clarity—sells before words do. Finally, we zoom in on the inner work: cutting self‑talk that spirals, making quick amends, and stacking esteemable actions that make you the same person when eyes are on you and when they’re not. Simple routines like breathing, prayer or meditation, the gym, and a few intentional calls become the spine that steadies your day.
If this hits home, press play, take what serves you, and try one habit for a week. Subscribe for new drops every Friday at 4 a.m., share this with a teammate who needs it, and leave a review to help more people find the show. What’s the one mask you’re ready to set down today?
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
CoreyBerrier (01:01):
Welcome to the Successful Life Podcast.
I'm your host, Corey Berrier,and today I'm going to do a
little follow-up on last week'sdiscussion on fear of rejection
and imposter syndrome.
So I realized after I did theepisode last week that I didn't
(01:23):
give you really any way ofovercoming that thing or or how
I've overcome a lot of thosethings.
And I think there's always a Ithink there's always a piece of
those things that are alwaysgoing to live in each and every
one of us.
At least for me, I think thereis.
And I think, you know, as I'vereflected back over this past
(01:50):
week after doing last week'sepisode, I got to thinking about
there's different differentlevels of imposter syndrome,
different levels of fear ofrejection.
And they show up differently.
So as an example, you know, ifI look back on some of the
(02:15):
things that I've overcome in mylife, and some of the things
that I've been through arechallenges that, and by no means
am I saying this like I've, youknow, arrived or anything like
that, but a lot of the thingsthat I've put myself through in
(02:37):
my life, a lot of people don'tcome out of those things, drugs,
alcohol, relationships, puttingmyself in really terrible
positions, like I mentioned lastweek in in Las Vegas and in the
other Corey's nasty house.
(02:58):
And so I think about you know,I think about what it took to
get through those things, goingaway to rehab for six months and
being away from you know thewoman I was seeing and being in
a a camp of men for six months,which I couldn't leave the
(03:21):
property, you know, and it was aPentecostal holiness uh
recovery center, if you will.
There was no um, they didn'tlook at things, they didn't look
at recovery the way I look atrecovery now.
There was no 12 steps, therewas no framework, it was
Pentecostal holiness show up andGod, you know, it was God
(03:47):
fearing.
I mean, I remember Jesus.
I remember the preacher wouldjust look at you and make you
feel so guilty for not going upto the altar.
(04:08):
I mean, he would look directlyat you and just say, like, you
know, what what you know, whatare you not repenting for or
whatever?
It's been a long time ago, so Ican't remember specifically how
he said, but it was thisguilt-ridden fearful way of
(04:31):
preaching.
And quite frankly, it it kindof ruined my organized religion
thoughts.
I don't, you know, I don't, Idon't, I don't buy into
organized religion.
I don't like it, it doesn'talign with me.
I don't go to church becauseit's just not my cup of tea.
(04:55):
If it's your cup of tea, morepower to you.
I'm not saying anything's wrongwith it.
I'm just saying it doesn't workfor me.
And uh my brother is uh, youknow, he is an ordained
minister, and uh he he doesn'tpreach that way.
And uh and he's not in it forthe wrong reasons.
And there's not too many peopleI know, not that I know a bunch
(05:17):
of preachers, but it does seemlike there's a uh there's a
financial aspect to that.
And my little brother didn'thave that for sure.
But back to the fear ofrejection and and the things
that imposter syndrome, youknow, I think about you know,
the things that I was mostfearful for or most fearful of
(05:39):
were those situations that I putmyself in because I was
intoxicated.
The DUIs, the getting introuble with drugs, the you
know, putting myself inpositions where I could
ultimately been killed atminimum.
(06:02):
And I think about you know, thetimes that I got through where
I was terrified, I was scared todeath.
And one of those times was forsure in that six-month you know
work camp that I was in, and Iwas court-ordered because I'd
got in trouble with drugs, andmy alternative was I could go to
(06:25):
prison for 34, 35 to 42 months,and that just wasn't an option
for me.
I mean, it was an option, butit wasn't one I was gonna uh
exercise, I can tell you that.
And so I decided to go for thelesser of the two evils and go
to this six-month camp.
The problem uh, or the thingwas is they knew I needed they
(06:47):
knew I was court-ordered there,so the folks that were
court-ordered got treated alittle bit differently.
And ultimately, because theyknew I needed to be there or
that I was court-ordered to bethere, I didn't uh the again was
(07:13):
treated with a very differentum treated very differently.
And so I had to people please,and I had to make sure I was
liked by everyone.
And I've talked about masks onhere, and boy, in that place I
had to have four 40 differentmasks, you know.
(07:34):
I had a you know uh aGod-fearing, you know, uh
repentant mask on in church.
I had to be cool in front ofthe guys that were cool.
I had to be, you know, uh toughin front of the guys that were
tough.
I had to be able to communicatewith the guys that were, you
(07:58):
know, I mean, this place waslike the last stop for a lot of
folks, including me in thatsituation.
But there were some hardcoredudes in there, um, people that
had countless felony chargessitting on there, you know,
waiting for the cop or the yeah,the cops to come and serve them
(08:21):
their charges or warrants orwhatever.
And so they came to this placebecause it was an attempt to
mitigate those charges.
And so you were, I was around abunch of wild ass dudes.
I mean, you're talking aboutpeople that are coming in off
the street that have beensmoking methamphetamines and
(08:43):
crack cocaine, and I mean, likethe the second before they got
in was when they hit the crackpipe.
So you're dealing with peoplewith untreated bipolar disorder,
untreated schizophrenia, likethese are not people you really
want to be around.
And so I had to, you know, Ihad the people please, and I had
(09:05):
to, because I didn't want toget rejected out of that place.
And I felt like if I ever spokeup, I would be rejected.
I felt like if I or andejected, uh, so I just kind of
played good, you know, I playedthe part with whoever I was in
front of.
And that's been a lot of storya lot of my life as I just play
(09:28):
the part of who the person I'min front of.
And whether that's you know, ina relationship, or whether
that's with a you know, uh apast boss, or whether that's
been with even friends or peopleat the bar, or you know, the
list goes on and on.
This is something I'vestruggled with a long a lot of
(09:50):
my life, and it's because Iwanted people's approval, I
wanted them to like me.
And the truth of the matter is,I just didn't feel like I was
good enough to be a part of.
(10:12):
And so I've been doing a lot ofwork over these past few months
to figure out what's the rootof those things, and and it's
really just stories that we tellourselves, and a lot of that
stems from fear of rejection,and and the reason you know,
that imposter syndrome, Ibelieve, you know, manifests is
(10:36):
because we've I've you know hadto play the part of different
people all my life because ofthat fear of rejection.
And so let's take this in adifferent direction.
You know, I mentioned I cantell fear of rejection in
(10:58):
salespeople, and I mean I cansee it a mile away.
And the way because I've beenthat guy, and the way I've
overcome that is I have torealize when a customer or
client or uh you know my boss orwhoever doesn't do the thing I
(11:21):
want them to do, it's not theoutcome that I want.
The truth is they're just notdoing it my way.
And the other hard truth is,people are not going to do it my
way.
You know, while my way seemslike it may be the right way, I
(11:42):
have to be open-minded to it notbeing the right way.
And so that fear, you know,that fear of rejection in a
sales situation, uh very rarelyam I affected by the fear of
rejection in a sales situationbecause I don't know what's
(12:03):
going on with that person unlessI ask enough questions.
I don't know what's going on intheir personal life.
And sometimes you can't askthose questions, but you can
pick up and you can sense whenpeople have something more going
on than they're telling you.
If you watch their bodylanguage or their facial
expressions, or how theyinteract with you, you know, if
(12:28):
they're open and kind, thatmight just mean they're using
that as a people-pleasingmethod, so you go away.
And so sometimes you have toask the hard questions in those
situations.
It doesn't mean you need to bea jerk by any stretch because
that's never appropriate.
But what is appropriate isfiguring out, you know, if
(12:51):
you're in plumbing or HVAC andyou're at a customer's house,
they have a problem.
They didn't wake up that dayand call you because they had
nothing better to do.
They didn't call you becausethey like seeing your company
van in their driveway.
In fact, you're the last personthey wanted to call.
And so you got to figure outwhy you're there, what the
(13:13):
problem is.
And you can only do thatthrough being, you know, being
kind and listening to what theysay, reading those facial
expressions and the bodylanguage, then understanding how
you can solve their problem.
And it's much like that inlife, you know, when when you've
(13:37):
had a disagreement withsomeone, or the people are not
acting the way you think theyshould act, there's a reason for
that.
Maybe your expectations areunreasonable.
Or maybe they have somethinggoing on that they're not
telling you, and it's your jobto figure that out.
And I've also found that Isometimes, lots of times, put
(13:58):
unreasonable expectations onmyself.
You know, I don't know if youhave ever said to yourself, hey,
that was really a stupid move.
You could have done thisbetter, you could have done this
different.
Why did you do that?
Why did you say that?
And it's this constant barrageof you know, beating the shit
(14:21):
out of yourself.
You're the only one doing it.
You know, most of the time wewould not talk to another friend
the way we talk to ourselves,and that self-talk can be
damaging.
It can be detrimental to thatfear of rejection and that's
(14:42):
that imposter syndrome.
It can, you know, that's aself-fulfilling prophecy when
you start talking shit toyourself and you beat yourself
up over things that are just notin your control, and they're
not your fault most of the time.
(15:02):
I'm not saying that you don'thave a part, and I'm not saying
that you don't you shouldn'ttake accountability because you
100% should.
You have a part in everything,but you're not the whole part,
you're not the whole piece ofthe puzzle, you're just a part
of it.
And it doesn't do you any goodto berate yourself after you've
(15:26):
lost a cell or after you've saidsomething stupid to your
girlfriend or your wife.
But it does pay off, you know,to make amends and to say, hey,
I was wrong in this situation.
Not I was wrong and you werewrong, but I was wrong in this
situation.
It could be how I handled it,it could be how I reacted, it
(15:49):
could be how I interpreted theconversation, which could have
been wrong.
And so sometimes you have toask clarifying questions.
Did you mean to say it thisway?
Well, no, I didn't mean to sayit this way.
Is that how you took it?
That's how I took it.
Well, no, not I didn't meanthat at all, right?
So just a simple conversationsometimes can solve so many
(16:14):
problems.
And the problem is people don'tcommunicate today.
You know, we communicatethrough text message, we
communicate through, you know,we see people on social media,
and we think that's the facts,right?
We think that uh when we seepeople acting crazy online, that
(16:34):
that's the real person, andreally they may have just had a
really crappy day that day, andmaybe they just decided to say
something crazy on social media,and now you think they're
crazy.
On the other hand, you got tothink about before you say
stupid stuff because people canperceive you in that same light,
(16:56):
and so I think all of thesethings contribute to how we see
ourselves and how we look at usas people, and a lot of times we
don't look our look atourselves in a very positive
light, and that's damaging, andit doesn't build your
(17:20):
self-confidence, it doesn'tbuild your character, um, or if
it does, sometimes it builds anegative character, and that's
not really what you want, Idon't believe.
It's not what I want.
I don't want people to look orhear anything that I say and
think that guy's a real jerk, orthat guy's an egomaniac, and so
(17:49):
I go back and I listen to thispodcast, you know, after it
comes out, because I like tohear how do I come across to the
crowd?
If I were listening to this,how would I come across?
How would I sound?
And sometimes I don't like whatI hear.
Sometimes I think to myself,dude, what are you doing?
(18:12):
And that's you know, thatkicking my own ass.
Like, why did you say it thatway?
Why did your voice inflect inthat particular manner when you
were talking about this thisthing?
And it could just be that I'mpassionate about it, it could be
that I feel very strongly aboutit, and sometimes that may come
(18:34):
across as being preachy or orcondescending.
(19:20):
And so as it pertains to salesand your customers, you got to
think about how your tonalityis, you got to think about how
you're coming across.
And listen, it's you know, whenyou know you're right because
you're the professional, it'sreal easy to slip into I'm the
(19:43):
professional, you're an idiot,and what you're saying makes no
sense, and you need to hear mebecause I'm the professional.
And unfortunately, that doesn'twork very well.
Even if someone's wrong,sometimes you just gotta let
them keep talking, and sometimesthey'll figure out on their own
(20:05):
they're not making any sense,and sometimes you just have to
be empathetic towards theirtowards their um I'm trying to
think of the word here towardstheir lack of information, their
(20:28):
lack of ability to know whatthey're talking about, because
most people don't, you know, butthey can go on Chat GPT or
Perplexity or whatever, orGoogle, and they can Google what
they think is wrong with theirair conditioner, and then
they're the expert.
They think they can speak yourlanguage, and you know they
(20:50):
can't speak your language.
You're there, you're theexpert.
You're the you're the guy thatactually knows.
So that in itself, if you dealwith that that um that imposter
syndrome because this engineeris talking about all the
mechanics of an HVAC system, andmaybe you don't know the
(21:14):
specifics of what he's talkingabout, you got to recognize
like, okay, this guy's anengineer.
He probably does know moreabout the inner workings of this
box than I do.
He probably does ask verypointed questions because he
wants to seem smart.
And so let him ask thosequestions.
(21:36):
And if you don't know theanswer, the the answer is I
don't know, I'll have to getback with you.
Or let me check into that.
But don't ever try to, myadvice would be don't ever try
to, you know, out talk someonewho might know more than you.
And you know, I use thatengineer example because this
(21:59):
has happened countless times inour industry.
You know, you you run acrossthat one out of ten guy that's
you know, he wants to know everysingle thing about how that
machine works.
And it's not, you know, as asales guy, it's not our job to
know everything about the innerworkings of that system.
You know, you need to knowenough to have a conversation,
(22:21):
but you're not an engineer,you're a HVAC salesperson or
plumbing salesperson or whateverkind of salesperson you are,
and you're there to sell the joband be able to communicate that
effectively so that person canmake a decision on their own to
move forward with you as soon aspossible.
(22:42):
And I think uh, you know, backto the the fear of rejection,
you know, at the end of the day,not everybody, not everybody is
your customer.
Not everybody should dobusiness with you.
And the truth of the matter isnot everybody, you don't want
everybody to do business withyou because some people are not
(23:04):
fun to do business with, nomatter how kind and nice you
are, how many no matter how manydiscounts you give them.
In fact, those people that arerequesting discount after
discount after discount aregoing to continue being a pain
in the neck.
You can guarantee it, ithappens all the time.
And so when you have that fearof rejection crop up when it's
(23:34):
time to ask for the money, justremember like not everybody's
your customer, and it isultimately their decision
whether they move forward withyou or not.
You can't do anything tocontrol that situation as long
as you show up and give it 110%.
And I don't mean you try tosell your butt off, I mean like
(23:58):
you educate that customer on whyit makes the most sense to go
with you, even at a higherprice, and you'd be shocked how
many times people will pay ahigher price to go with a better
company.
You know, I hear peoplecomplain online about how
(24:21):
companies are price gouging andhow equipment's very expensive
and how they're making so muchmoney.
And the truth is you don't knowhow much money it costs to run
a business.
It's astronomical.
You know, just looking at theyou know, the van itself is
(24:43):
gonna cost you um the van itselfjust to get in the driveway
costs three to five hundreddollars.
So if you go out on a you knowon a zero call and walk away
with a goose egg, that costs thecompany money.
(25:04):
And I don't want to scare youto have that fear of rejection
because sometimes you're gonnahave to walk away with a zero.
It shouldn't be often, but itis gonna have to happen at some
point.
And then you have to reflectback, what could I have done
differently?
Where what did I say that maybecould have changed the
direction of this?
(25:24):
And it could be how you'redressed, it could be your breath
stinks, it could be that youare filthy, and sometimes you
still have to show up filthy,but you should probably explain
to the customer what you weredoing before you got there so
they don't think that you showup to work filthy.
Now, if it's eight o'clock inthe morning, you should never be
filthy going into work.
(25:45):
You should never look like thegarbage man does that comes by
your house every week.
You know, um, and these things,these small things build
confidence in your salesprocess.
They build confidence in you.
When you do the things thatyou're supposed to do, when you
(26:07):
brush your teeth in the morning,when you put your your uniform
on and it's pressed and it looksnice and it's clean and your
hair's fixed, you feel better.
And so therefore, you're gonnasell better.
It's the same thing.
If you're going on a date, youwouldn't show up on a date,
surely, to God, lookingdisgusting, looking disheveled,
(26:31):
looking like you just rolled outof bed because you don't want
that person to think that you'rea slack ass.
Well, work's no different.
And I mean every day at work.
I don't mean your first day atwork, I mean your hundred and uh
your thousandth day at work.
It's that stuff should neverchange.
(26:52):
And if you do the same thingthe right way every day for a
thousand days, then thatthousand and one is just gonna
be a normal day.
You're just gonna get up andyou're gonna brush your teeth
and you're gonna shower andyou're gonna be clean.
And that's gonna be become it'sgonna become your new normal
opposed to the new, opposed toyour normal now being the other
(27:14):
guy.
You know, we get used to we getused to things, right?
In other words, there's um youknow, if your if your goal is X
number of dollars per day,you're probably gonna get right
to that goal and you're gonnaquit.
(27:35):
Now some people push past thatgoal.
And then that then they pushpast that goal.
It's a game.
And so that's how you that'show I've beat having that fear
of rejection and impostersyndrome when it comes to you
know being in a sales role.
(27:57):
It's gonna be hard to besuccessful in sales if you have
that.
It's gonna be hard to besuccessful in life if you have
that.
Because there's always gonna bethat little voice in the back
of your head that says you'renot good enough, you don't
belong here, and you're gonnadeal with that for probably the
rest of your life, but it thatvoice gets smaller and smaller
(28:22):
and smaller.
At least that's been myexperience.
Because repetition buildsmuscle, just like if you went to
the gym.
You know, repeating thosepositive habits creates a
positive person.
If you want to be esteemable,you have to do esteemable
things.
You can't get self-esteem bybeing a turd when you're not in
(28:50):
front of people.
You gotta be the same guy,whether people are looking or
not.
And that's one of the thingsthat you know, I'm the same guy.
Doesn't matter if you're infront of me, if the boss is in
front of me, if you're not infront of me.
I'm the same dude.
Doesn't matter.
Because it's just easier beingthe same guy, and it's still
(29:12):
taking a lot of work to getthere.
And I can contribute a lot ofthat to being in recovery and
having to go through some veryhard and painful lessons in
recovery.
But those things have made methe person that I am today, and
I am proud of those things.
You know, uh not everybody getsit, and I don't know why that
(29:36):
is, and I don't know why I getit, I don't know why I got it.
And it doesn't mean I'll get ittomorrow, but it means today I
have it.
Because I've prayed, I'vemeditated, I've done my
breathing exercises, I've goneto the gym, I've made my phone
calls.
It's the consistent things inyour life that really bring
(30:00):
peace to you.
And if you're looking for thator you're interested in that,
and you are struggling, just goback and re-listen to this
because these are all myexperience.
I'm not telling you anythingfrom a book, I'm not telling you
anything that I haven't alreadydone.
Uh, and again, I haven'tarrived.
I'm not, you know, this like byno means am I a perfect example
(30:28):
of how you should want to act.
But I do try to set a goodexample as best I can.
And I don't always do a greatjob, but I try to correct it if
I don't.
And so I think that's going tobe about it for today.
I appreciate you guyslistening.
The podcast drops every Fridayat 4 a.m.
(30:49):
And I plea, and please, if youwould subscribe to the podcast.
We've got about 50 some percentpeople that have subscribed.
If you're not one of them,please do leave us a review.
That'd be great.
I'd appreciate that.
And we'll see you next Friday.
Welcome to the Successful Life Podcast.
I'm your host, Corey Berrier,and today I'm going to do a
little follow-up on last week'sdiscussion on fear of rejection
and imposter syndrome.
So I realized after I did theepisode last week that I didn't
(01:23):
give you really any way ofovercoming that thing or or how
I've overcome a lot of thosethings.
And I think there's always a Ithink there's always a piece of
those things that are alwaysgoing to live in each and every
one of us.
At least for me, I think thereis.
And I think, you know, as I'vereflected back over this past
(01:50):
week after doing last week'sepisode, I got to thinking about
there's different differentlevels of imposter syndrome,
different levels of fear ofrejection.
And they show up differently.
So as an example, you know, ifI look back on some of the
(02:15):
things that I've overcome in mylife, and some of the things
that I've been through arechallenges that, and by no means
am I saying this like I've, youknow, arrived or anything like
that, but a lot of the thingsthat I've put myself through in
(02:37):
my life, a lot of people don'tcome out of those things, drugs,
alcohol, relationships, puttingmyself in really terrible
positions, like I mentioned lastweek in in Las Vegas and in the
other Corey's nasty house.
(02:58):
And so I think about you know,I think about what it took to
get through those things, goingaway to rehab for six months and
being away from you know thewoman I was seeing and being in
a a camp of men for six months,which I couldn't leave the
(03:21):
property, you know, and it was aPentecostal holiness uh
recovery center, if you will.
There was no um, they didn'tlook at things, they didn't look
at recovery the way I look atrecovery now.
There was no 12 steps, therewas no framework, it was
Pentecostal holiness show up andGod, you know, it was God
(03:47):
fearing.
I mean, I remember Jesus.
I remember the preacher wouldjust look at you and make you
feel so guilty for not going upto the altar.
(04:08):
I mean, he would look directlyat you and just say, like, you
know, what what you know, whatare you not repenting for or
whatever?
It's been a long time ago, so Ican't remember specifically how
he said, but it was thisguilt-ridden fearful way of
(04:31):
preaching.
And quite frankly, it it kindof ruined my organized religion
thoughts.
I don't, you know, I don't, Idon't, I don't buy into
organized religion.
I don't like it, it doesn'talign with me.
I don't go to church becauseit's just not my cup of tea.
(04:55):
If it's your cup of tea, morepower to you.
I'm not saying anything's wrongwith it.
I'm just saying it doesn't workfor me.
And uh my brother is uh, youknow, he is an ordained
minister, and uh he he doesn'tpreach that way.
And uh and he's not in it forthe wrong reasons.
And there's not too many peopleI know, not that I know a bunch
(05:17):
of preachers, but it does seemlike there's a uh there's a
financial aspect to that.
And my little brother didn'thave that for sure.
But back to the fear ofrejection and and the things
that imposter syndrome, youknow, I think about you know,
the things that I was mostfearful for or most fearful of
(05:39):
were those situations that I putmyself in because I was
intoxicated.
The DUIs, the getting introuble with drugs, the you
know, putting myself inpositions where I could
ultimately been killed atminimum.
(06:02):
And I think about you know, thetimes that I got through where
I was terrified, I was scared todeath.
And one of those times was forsure in that six-month you know
work camp that I was in, and Iwas court-ordered because I'd
got in trouble with drugs, andmy alternative was I could go to
(06:25):
prison for 34, 35 to 42 months,and that just wasn't an option
for me.
I mean, it was an option, butit wasn't one I was gonna uh
exercise, I can tell you that.
And so I decided to go for thelesser of the two evils and go
to this six-month camp.
The problem uh, or the thingwas is they knew I needed they
(06:47):
knew I was court-ordered there,so the folks that were
court-ordered got treated alittle bit differently.
And ultimately, because theyknew I needed to be there or
that I was court-ordered to bethere, I didn't uh the again was
(07:13):
treated with a very differentum treated very differently.
And so I had to people please,and I had to make sure I was
liked by everyone.
And I've talked about masks onhere, and boy, in that place I
had to have four 40 differentmasks, you know.
(07:34):
I had a you know uh aGod-fearing, you know, uh
repentant mask on in church.
I had to be cool in front ofthe guys that were cool.
I had to be, you know, uh toughin front of the guys that were
tough.
I had to be able to communicatewith the guys that were, you
(07:58):
know, I mean, this place waslike the last stop for a lot of
folks, including me in thatsituation.
But there were some hardcoredudes in there, um, people that
had countless felony chargessitting on there, you know,
waiting for the cop or the yeah,the cops to come and serve them
(08:21):
their charges or warrants orwhatever.
And so they came to this placebecause it was an attempt to
mitigate those charges.
And so you were, I was around abunch of wild ass dudes.
I mean, you're talking aboutpeople that are coming in off
the street that have beensmoking methamphetamines and
(08:43):
crack cocaine, and I mean, likethe the second before they got
in was when they hit the crackpipe.
So you're dealing with peoplewith untreated bipolar disorder,
untreated schizophrenia, likethese are not people you really
want to be around.
And so I had to, you know, Ihad the people please, and I had
(09:05):
to, because I didn't want toget rejected out of that place.
And I felt like if I ever spokeup, I would be rejected.
I felt like if I or andejected, uh, so I just kind of
played good, you know, I playedthe part with whoever I was in
front of.
And that's been a lot of storya lot of my life as I just play
(09:28):
the part of who the person I'min front of.
And whether that's you know, ina relationship, or whether
that's with a you know, uh apast boss, or whether that's
been with even friends or peopleat the bar, or you know, the
list goes on and on.
This is something I'vestruggled with a long a lot of
(09:50):
my life, and it's because Iwanted people's approval, I
wanted them to like me.
And the truth of the matter is,I just didn't feel like I was
good enough to be a part of.
(10:12):
And so I've been doing a lot ofwork over these past few months
to figure out what's the rootof those things, and and it's
really just stories that we tellourselves, and a lot of that
stems from fear of rejection,and and the reason you know,
that imposter syndrome, Ibelieve, you know, manifests is
(10:36):
because we've I've you know hadto play the part of different
people all my life because ofthat fear of rejection.
And so let's take this in adifferent direction.
You know, I mentioned I cantell fear of rejection in
(10:58):
salespeople, and I mean I cansee it a mile away.
And the way because I've beenthat guy, and the way I've
overcome that is I have torealize when a customer or
client or uh you know my boss orwhoever doesn't do the thing I
(11:21):
want them to do, it's not theoutcome that I want.
The truth is they're just notdoing it my way.
And the other hard truth is,people are not going to do it my
way.
You know, while my way seemslike it may be the right way, I
(11:42):
have to be open-minded to it notbeing the right way.
And so that fear, you know,that fear of rejection in a
sales situation, uh very rarelyam I affected by the fear of
rejection in a sales situationbecause I don't know what's
(12:03):
going on with that person unlessI ask enough questions.
I don't know what's going on intheir personal life.
And sometimes you can't askthose questions, but you can
pick up and you can sense whenpeople have something more going
on than they're telling you.
If you watch their bodylanguage or their facial
expressions, or how theyinteract with you, you know, if
(12:28):
they're open and kind, thatmight just mean they're using
that as a people-pleasingmethod, so you go away.
And so sometimes you have toask the hard questions in those
situations.
It doesn't mean you need to bea jerk by any stretch because
that's never appropriate.
But what is appropriate isfiguring out, you know, if
(12:51):
you're in plumbing or HVAC andyou're at a customer's house,
they have a problem.
They didn't wake up that dayand call you because they had
nothing better to do.
They didn't call you becausethey like seeing your company
van in their driveway.
In fact, you're the last personthey wanted to call.
And so you got to figure outwhy you're there, what the
(13:13):
problem is.
And you can only do thatthrough being, you know, being
kind and listening to what theysay, reading those facial
expressions and the bodylanguage, then understanding how
you can solve their problem.
And it's much like that inlife, you know, when when you've
(13:37):
had a disagreement withsomeone, or the people are not
acting the way you think theyshould act, there's a reason for
that.
Maybe your expectations areunreasonable.
Or maybe they have somethinggoing on that they're not
telling you, and it's your jobto figure that out.
And I've also found that Isometimes, lots of times, put
(13:58):
unreasonable expectations onmyself.
You know, I don't know if youhave ever said to yourself, hey,
that was really a stupid move.
You could have done thisbetter, you could have done this
different.
Why did you do that?
Why did you say that?
And it's this constant barrageof you know, beating the shit
(14:21):
out of yourself.
You're the only one doing it.
You know, most of the time wewould not talk to another friend
the way we talk to ourselves,and that self-talk can be
damaging.
It can be detrimental to thatfear of rejection and that's
(14:42):
that imposter syndrome.
It can, you know, that's aself-fulfilling prophecy when
you start talking shit toyourself and you beat yourself
up over things that are just notin your control, and they're
not your fault most of the time.
(15:02):
I'm not saying that you don'thave a part, and I'm not saying
that you don't you shouldn'ttake accountability because you
100% should.
You have a part in everything,but you're not the whole part,
you're not the whole piece ofthe puzzle, you're just a part
of it.
And it doesn't do you any goodto berate yourself after you've
(15:26):
lost a cell or after you've saidsomething stupid to your
girlfriend or your wife.
But it does pay off, you know,to make amends and to say, hey,
I was wrong in this situation.
Not I was wrong and you werewrong, but I was wrong in this
situation.
It could be how I handled it,it could be how I reacted, it
(15:49):
could be how I interpreted theconversation, which could have
been wrong.
And so sometimes you have toask clarifying questions.
Did you mean to say it thisway?
Well, no, I didn't mean to sayit this way.
Is that how you took it?
That's how I took it.
Well, no, not I didn't meanthat at all, right?
So just a simple conversationsometimes can solve so many
(16:14):
problems.
And the problem is people don'tcommunicate today.
You know, we communicatethrough text message, we
communicate through, you know,we see people on social media,
and we think that's the facts,right?
We think that uh when we seepeople acting crazy online, that
(16:34):
that's the real person, andreally they may have just had a
really crappy day that day, andmaybe they just decided to say
something crazy on social media,and now you think they're
crazy.
On the other hand, you got tothink about before you say
stupid stuff because people canperceive you in that same light,
(16:56):
and so I think all of thesethings contribute to how we see
ourselves and how we look at usas people, and a lot of times we
don't look our look atourselves in a very positive
light, and that's damaging, andit doesn't build your
(17:20):
self-confidence, it doesn'tbuild your character, um, or if
it does, sometimes it builds anegative character, and that's
not really what you want, Idon't believe.
It's not what I want.
I don't want people to look orhear anything that I say and
think that guy's a real jerk, orthat guy's an egomaniac, and so
(17:49):
I go back and I listen to thispodcast, you know, after it
comes out, because I like tohear how do I come across to the
crowd?
If I were listening to this,how would I come across?
How would I sound?
And sometimes I don't like whatI hear.
Sometimes I think to myself,dude, what are you doing?
(18:12):
And that's you know, thatkicking my own ass.
Like, why did you say it thatway?
Why did your voice inflect inthat particular manner when you
were talking about this thisthing?
And it could just be that I'mpassionate about it, it could be
that I feel very strongly aboutit, and sometimes that may come
(18:34):
across as being preachy or orcondescending.
(19:20):
And so as it pertains to salesand your customers, you got to
think about how your tonalityis, you got to think about how
you're coming across.
And listen, it's you know, whenyou know you're right because
you're the professional, it'sreal easy to slip into I'm the
(19:43):
professional, you're an idiot,and what you're saying makes no
sense, and you need to hear mebecause I'm the professional.
And unfortunately, that doesn'twork very well.
Even if someone's wrong,sometimes you just gotta let
them keep talking, and sometimesthey'll figure out on their own
(20:05):
they're not making any sense,and sometimes you just have to
be empathetic towards theirtowards their um I'm trying to
think of the word here towardstheir lack of information, their
(20:28):
lack of ability to know whatthey're talking about, because
most people don't, you know, butthey can go on Chat GPT or
Perplexity or whatever, orGoogle, and they can Google what
they think is wrong with theirair conditioner, and then
they're the expert.
They think they can speak yourlanguage, and you know they
(20:50):
can't speak your language.
You're there, you're theexpert.
You're the you're the guy thatactually knows.
So that in itself, if you dealwith that that um that imposter
syndrome because this engineeris talking about all the
mechanics of an HVAC system, andmaybe you don't know the
(21:14):
specifics of what he's talkingabout, you got to recognize
like, okay, this guy's anengineer.
He probably does know moreabout the inner workings of this
box than I do.
He probably does ask verypointed questions because he
wants to seem smart.
And so let him ask thosequestions.
(21:36):
And if you don't know theanswer, the the answer is I
don't know, I'll have to getback with you.
Or let me check into that.
But don't ever try to, myadvice would be don't ever try
to, you know, out talk someonewho might know more than you.
And you know, I use thatengineer example because this
(21:59):
has happened countless times inour industry.
You know, you you run acrossthat one out of ten guy that's
you know, he wants to know everysingle thing about how that
machine works.
And it's not, you know, as asales guy, it's not our job to
know everything about the innerworkings of that system.
You know, you need to knowenough to have a conversation,
(22:21):
but you're not an engineer,you're a HVAC salesperson or
plumbing salesperson or whateverkind of salesperson you are,
and you're there to sell the joband be able to communicate that
effectively so that person canmake a decision on their own to
move forward with you as soon aspossible.
(22:42):
And I think uh, you know, backto the the fear of rejection,
you know, at the end of the day,not everybody, not everybody is
your customer.
Not everybody should dobusiness with you.
And the truth of the matter isnot everybody, you don't want
everybody to do business withyou because some people are not
(23:04):
fun to do business with, nomatter how kind and nice you
are, how many no matter how manydiscounts you give them.
In fact, those people that arerequesting discount after
discount after discount aregoing to continue being a pain
in the neck.
You can guarantee it, ithappens all the time.
And so when you have that fearof rejection crop up when it's
(23:34):
time to ask for the money, justremember like not everybody's
your customer, and it isultimately their decision
whether they move forward withyou or not.
You can't do anything tocontrol that situation as long
as you show up and give it 110%.
And I don't mean you try tosell your butt off, I mean like
(23:58):
you educate that customer on whyit makes the most sense to go
with you, even at a higherprice, and you'd be shocked how
many times people will pay ahigher price to go with a better
company.
You know, I hear peoplecomplain online about how
(24:21):
companies are price gouging andhow equipment's very expensive
and how they're making so muchmoney.
And the truth is you don't knowhow much money it costs to run
a business.
It's astronomical.
You know, just looking at theyou know, the van itself is
(24:43):
gonna cost you um the van itselfjust to get in the driveway
costs three to five hundreddollars.
So if you go out on a you knowon a zero call and walk away
with a goose egg, that costs thecompany money.
(25:04):
And I don't want to scare youto have that fear of rejection
because sometimes you're gonnahave to walk away with a zero.
It shouldn't be often, but itis gonna have to happen at some
point.
And then you have to reflectback, what could I have done
differently?
Where what did I say that maybecould have changed the
direction of this?
(25:24):
And it could be how you'redressed, it could be your breath
stinks, it could be that youare filthy, and sometimes you
still have to show up filthy,but you should probably explain
to the customer what you weredoing before you got there so
they don't think that you showup to work filthy.
Now, if it's eight o'clock inthe morning, you should never be
filthy going into work.
(25:45):
You should never look like thegarbage man does that comes by
your house every week.
You know, um, and these things,these small things build
confidence in your salesprocess.
They build confidence in you.
When you do the things thatyou're supposed to do, when you
(26:07):
brush your teeth in the morning,when you put your your uniform
on and it's pressed and it looksnice and it's clean and your
hair's fixed, you feel better.
And so therefore, you're gonnasell better.
It's the same thing.
If you're going on a date, youwouldn't show up on a date,
surely, to God, lookingdisgusting, looking disheveled,
(26:31):
looking like you just rolled outof bed because you don't want
that person to think that you'rea slack ass.
Well, work's no different.
And I mean every day at work.
I don't mean your first day atwork, I mean your hundred and uh
your thousandth day at work.
It's that stuff should neverchange.
(26:52):
And if you do the same thingthe right way every day for a
thousand days, then thatthousand and one is just gonna
be a normal day.
You're just gonna get up andyou're gonna brush your teeth
and you're gonna shower andyou're gonna be clean.
And that's gonna be become it'sgonna become your new normal
opposed to the new, opposed toyour normal now being the other
(27:14):
guy.
You know, we get used to we getused to things, right?
In other words, there's um youknow, if your if your goal is X
number of dollars per day,you're probably gonna get right
to that goal and you're gonnaquit.
(27:35):
Now some people push past thatgoal.
And then that then they pushpast that goal.
It's a game.
And so that's how you that'show I've beat having that fear
of rejection and impostersyndrome when it comes to you
know being in a sales role.
(27:57):
It's gonna be hard to besuccessful in sales if you have
that.
It's gonna be hard to besuccessful in life if you have
that.
Because there's always gonna bethat little voice in the back
of your head that says you'renot good enough, you don't
belong here, and you're gonnadeal with that for probably the
rest of your life, but it thatvoice gets smaller and smaller
(28:22):
and smaller.
At least that's been myexperience.
Because repetition buildsmuscle, just like if you went to
the gym.
You know, repeating thosepositive habits creates a
positive person.
If you want to be esteemable,you have to do esteemable
things.
You can't get self-esteem bybeing a turd when you're not in
(28:50):
front of people.
You gotta be the same guy,whether people are looking or
not.
And that's one of the thingsthat you know, I'm the same guy.
Doesn't matter if you're infront of me, if the boss is in
front of me, if you're not infront of me.
I'm the same dude.
Doesn't matter.
Because it's just easier beingthe same guy, and it's still
(29:12):
taking a lot of work to getthere.
And I can contribute a lot ofthat to being in recovery and
having to go through some veryhard and painful lessons in
recovery.
But those things have made methe person that I am today, and
I am proud of those things.
You know, uh not everybody getsit, and I don't know why that
(29:36):
is, and I don't know why I getit, I don't know why I got it.
And it doesn't mean I'll get ittomorrow, but it means today I
have it.
Because I've prayed, I'vemeditated, I've done my
breathing exercises, I've goneto the gym, I've made my phone
calls.
It's the consistent things inyour life that really bring
(30:00):
peace to you.
And if you're looking for thator you're interested in that,
and you are struggling, just goback and re-listen to this
because these are all myexperience.
I'm not telling you anythingfrom a book, I'm not telling you
anything that I haven't alreadydone.
Uh, and again, I haven'tarrived.
I'm not, you know, this like byno means am I a perfect example
(30:28):
of how you should want to act.
But I do try to set a goodexample as best I can.
And I don't always do a greatjob, but I try to correct it if
I don't.
And so I think that's going tobe about it for today.
I appreciate you guyslistening.
The podcast drops every Fridayat 4 a.m.
(30:49):
And I plea, and please, if youwould subscribe to the podcast.
We've got about 50 some percentpeople that have subscribed.
If you're not one of them,please do leave us a review.
That'd be great.
I'd appreciate that.
And we'll see you next Friday.
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