How would you feel if someone sent you an email entitled, “You Are Going to Suck?”

Or “The Thing You’re Doing Is Going To Fail?”

Or “Your Life Is Horribly Boring.”

If none of these ring true for you, then you might be able to roll your eyes and brush it off, but for many of us, titles like this can speak to our deepest fears and insecurities.

And you know what?

Nobody should have to put up with that kind of bullshit.

Guilt, Shame, and Fear… And Other Awful Things We Don’t Want to Talk About

(It’s really okay to read this section. I promise it’s not that scary!)

Brene Brown has a new talk up on TED in the past few weeks about listening to shame, which she defines shame as our deepest fear that we are inadequate.

At one point (13:35, if you’re watching the video) she talks about the voice in the back of our heads that tells us we are not good enough and that tries to stop us from doing the things we want to do. She calls this voice “the critic”, and she says,

“…If we can quiet it down and walk in and say, ‘I’m going to do this,’ we look up and the critic that we see pointing and laughing, 99 percent of the time is who? Us.”

That critic doesn’t need any more external support. For most of us, much of our time is spent finding ways and means of quieting him down long enough that we can do what we need to do. Because it is only when he is quiet that we can access our greatest strength: vulnerability. (Yep, that’s a total tease… we’re not going to talk about vulnerability quite yet. But think on that for a while….)

So those fear-mongering blog post titles? They’re like taking a stick and poking a tiger in the eye, right after you just managed to get it to fall asleep.(No, I don’t know why you’re putting tigers to sleep… just roll with it here, okay? It’s a metaphor.)

Sure, some might say that if those titles activate your stuff, it is your stuff, and I agree. But we don’t need to have to work through our deepest fears every time we open our inbox or our Google reader.

Nobody wants to check their email in the morning and have someone throwing the possibility of their own inadequacy in their face.

Well, okay, maybe some people actually do. There is one blogger in particular who I know has professed to being motivated by beating himself up. But I can’t find the post and his site now has an obnoxiously huge and impossible-to-close opt-in pop-up, so I’m not going to link to him anyway.

You don’t need to read that stuff.

The Problem with “Good” Marketing

There’s this concept in marketing and copywriting that the best way to sell something is to figure out what keeps people up at night. That the best way to pitch your product is by appealing to their deepest darkest fears.

Just turn our your TV (if you, unlike me, actually have cable) and you’ll see exactly what I’m talking about.

In three minutes or less!, you’ll be told that you don’t have the right clothes, aren’t thin enough, don’t go to the gym enough, hang out with the wrong people and eat the wrong food. Of course, those are only the surface level fears, but they all play to the same fear of inadequacy.

And the worst part of this negative tripe invading the interwebs? Well, besides the scare tactic titles, some of the writing is actually worthwhile.

The “You’re Going to Suck” post was a great post about how it’s okay if your work isn’t good right away. From a blogger I like. But I’ve now revoked his access to my inbox due to lack of trust.

The saddest part is that he probably got a lot of positive reaction to that post. The marketers who recommend these tactics aren’t stupid. For some masochistic reason, a lot of consumers dig that kind of thing. It’s confirmation, in some twisted way, that they’re right. That they’re not enough. It’s validating the monsters that live inside all of our heads.

Yes, making people feel like shit sells… but is that how you want to make your living?

To Epic or Not To Epic?

Tonight, I’m teaching a teleclass with Shanna Mann called “Permission Slips for Epic Goals.” Which probably doesn’t tell you a lot, actually, but it’s about how to be more compassionate with yourself.

You see, there’s an “epic epidemic” sweeping the interwebs… everyone trying to out epic and out bucket-list the next person.

You’ve probably heard the stories:

“I was nobody. I was dirt on the bottom of somebody’s shoe. Even the postal service wouldn’t hire me. And then I ran a marathon.”

“I was just a corporate hack who wasn’t worth talking about until I quit my job and moved to Bali/Thailand/other Asian country.”

“I lived in my parents’ basement and had no friends until I learned how to build niche sites and now I’m a baller. Whatever that means.”

The bottom line is that the epic epidemic relies on the belief that our value as individuals comes from what we do rather than who we are.

It’s the same nonsense that fuels the self-help industry, with people running out to buy the latest book in the hopes that it will help them “fix” themselves. Yes, we all want to be better people, make an impact, etc. etc. but there’s a difference between making a conscious commitment to showing up and working on your stuff versus devaluing yourself as you are.

Hoping that running a triathalon or climbing Mt. Everest will somehow cover up the gaping hole where your self worth should be is not an effective tactic. In the same way that having kids or getting married is not the answer to lack-of-purpose on the other end of the spectrum, neither are the hyper-inflated goals.

I’m not saying don’t run a marathon if that’s your thing. And if you want kids, please do that. What I’m saying is that whether or not you ever run a marathon or a triathalon or an ironman or a tough mudder, you still matter.

You don’t have to do anything to prove that.

You are enough.

So the next time you see a post with one of those horrible titles, do yourself a favor and click “unsubscribe.” I know I will.

Last call for alcohol!
Don’t forget to click here to sign up for the teleclass.
It’s BYO alcohol.

Credit where credit is due: the phrase “Ludicrous Fear Popcorn” was yoinked from Havi Brooks.

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