Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Imagine sitting in front of group of people at your first retreat, super excited, you have your books bound. It's like given professional excitement, exclusivity, and then finding out that, like, the pages in the book on chapter two were actually put in backwards.
[00:00:21] Like, this isn't a little thing where it's like, oh, there was a typo or there was a little smudge on the COVID I mean, like, backward. Everything from chapter two on was backward. And that, like, the odd and even pages were on the wrong side and nothing was in any order anymore. And, like, every single guest on my retreat was holding their book at the exact same time that I noticed, like, this was all put together backward. I had checked the content, you guys. I had made sure that that thing was put together. But, you know, I didn't check. I didn't check chapter two to ensure that it looked like chapter one.
[00:01:05] And in that moment, I literally wanted to die. Not just disappear. I mean, like, die. And I'm not exaggerating. I literally looked at the door trying to plan my escape, and. And I thought to myself, like, what would it look like if I said, just kidding, sorry, clearly not really ready, let's just enjoy each other and I will refund your money? Like, this is literally what happened at my retreat. But I didn't do that, although I wanted to.
[00:01:33] And I'm going to tell you, the retreat went on anyway.
[00:01:39] And here's what I found out. There's a lot to be learned in simply doing the thing instead of waiting until it's perfect.
[00:01:47] If you're new here, my name is genv Evascori. I have spent more than several decades in the C suite sales executive role. I've built teams, I've rebuilt teams, and I've sat across from more people who were good at this than I can count. I have been there.
[00:02:06] Every episode is something to fix so that you can grow fast. And what I want to tell you today is about the eight things that went wrong at my first retreat. Not because they're funny, so some of them are, but because honestly and truly, we all struggle in this particular capacity.
[00:02:22] And I want you to know what I learned, what it cost me, and also what it didn't cost me. I actually found out that I believe that somewhere between the idea that I wanted to do something and actually the delivery of the thing is a space called the rehearsal room. I actually.
[00:02:41] I didn't know that. I believed in my heart that this rehearsal room is the key to everything.
[00:02:47] It's a private space, you guys, where I would have become competent. I would have worked out the wrinkles, I would have gotten the pages facing in the right direction. And then when everybody arrived, everything would be perfect, finished, ready, perfect.
[00:03:07] And I did. I prepared and I planned and I built this thing over and over in my head. And every time there was some reason that I told myself I needed more time in the rehearsal room.
[00:03:22] And this is the place where most of us actually live. We have a great idea, we know what we want it to look like, but then we just go over and over in our head all the things that could go wrong, all the things that we're not prepared for. And we want to spend time in this rehearsal room. But. But here's what I want you to know. There is no rehearsal room.
[00:03:43] There is only the room, like the place where you are supposed to be doing the thing.
[00:03:52] That's it. Like, that's the whole discovery. There's no version of you that actually arrives, finished, ready, like done and perfect. And I want you to hear that second half again. There is no version of you that arrives already perfect, polished and finished. Because honestly, arriving is the finisher.
[00:04:16] Arriving is what makes it better.
[00:04:20] We all know there is no perfect. But what most people don't understand is there's no rehearsal room. You actually have to be in the space, seeing the things, doing the things to figure out. Oh my gosh, I never would have gotten that little bit of insight if I hadn't actually started.
[00:04:38] So let me ask you a quick question, an honest question. What are you currently still rehearsing? What's the one thing that you've gotten ready to multiple times, but you haven't actually stepped into it?
[00:04:54] So here I am at the retreat with my crazy booklets and the pizza arrives and I'm like, okay, cool, let me take this pizza. Because we're in the middle of sharing right now and people like are shedding some tears because we're having some really meaningful conversations. I grab the pizza and I turn on the oven to keep it heated and I shove it inside and we continue to work.
[00:05:20] Now we're sitting at a table, people are writing on sticky notes. They are really sharing. It's like going really well. And as I am literally mid conversation, my brain is in four places, by the way. That's where my brain lives. And literally someone says with their out loud voice, something's burning. And then of course, everybody turns their head, looks into the kitchen, I spring up from my chair, and lo and behold, yes, I have put the boxes of pizza and into the oven and the top box was indeed charred. And listen, I, like, I felt the thing that honestly and truly was the most humiliating.
[00:06:15] And what I was revealing was this side of myself that I don't often talk about. That. Yeah, I'm like, totally an ADHD girly. It was like a reveal. It was this private moment that got kind of revealed in a way that now I had to react to publicly in front of people who paid money to be there.
[00:06:37] And honestly, I stood in the kitchen and there was a few seconds where I was beating myself up and being like, stupid, stupid, stupid. Why are you so stupid?
[00:06:48] Because if I'm being honest, I do this a lot.
[00:06:52] I have literally put pizza boxes in the oven before.
[00:06:58] But I actually remember distinctly saying to myself, I was made for this. And I gotta be honest with you, it's not about comfort and it's not about affirmation. It's something that I've learned to say that keeps me squarely in the room feeling mortified.
[00:07:21] Which brings me to another little cooking snafu.
[00:07:25] Listen, I realize now that nobody was coming for my cooking.
[00:07:31] Nobody booked a retreat with a former sales executive because they heard the food was going to be transcendent.
[00:07:37] But I had decided that every good host cooks like, it's like a thing, it's kind, it's human. So I cooked. I cooked a ravioli cake casserole. Now listen, let me tell you what happened prior to the ravioli casserole being served. So it's about 4, 34, 45. I am putting the ravioli casseroles in the oven. I'm super excited. It looks pretty good. And then my husband, who is also an intricate part of the retreat, texts the group chat and says, hey, ladies, I just want to let you know that there are currently cookies waiting to be cooked.
[00:08:19] Yes, raw cookie dough in the freezer waiting to be popped into the oven. For any moment that you feel like you would like to have a nice hot chocolate chip cookie, you deserve a treat.
[00:08:36] I. I literally was like, listen, listen, dude, I got like the casseroles in the oven and then I looked at everybody and they were like, oh, cookies, that sounds great.
[00:08:52] And so.
[00:08:53] Well, we're grown adults. We had cookies before we had dinner. No regrets, but it just didn't really go as planned. And honestly, the ravioli casserole didn't really taste so great after three hot, delicious chocolate chip cookies.
[00:09:13] But wait, there's more.
[00:09:16] There was this massive Steven Spielberg looking dust cloud in Arizona. We call them haboobs. And they're literally These huge, huge way in the sky walls of dust that, like, envelop neighborhoods at a slow rate, but also very alarming rate.
[00:09:42] Well, we all got the signals. We all got the emergency signals at the same time on our phone and it said, hey, danger, stay inside. Dust storm coming. What did we do? Well, we did what any responsible human being would do, and we got up and we ran outside to take pictures. And there it was coming, and we were taking pictures, and we were in awe of the sight of this. And we were so busy looking at the storm that we didn't prepare for the storm.
[00:10:18] So what had happened was the umbrella in the backyard by the pool that we had been sitting under literally flew out of the stand across toward the hot tub, landed on its head, broke in the middle, and, like, was completely discombobulated.
[00:10:44] And listen, I know there is another whole podcast here about watching the thing instead of preparing for the thing, just saying. But here's what happened.
[00:10:56] Nobody went, you know what? You really are stupid. I'm just going to leave right now before you further embarrass yourself. Nobody threw their book down on the table and went, that's it.
[00:11:09] And nobody had a fit because we were eating cookies before we were eating dinner. And here's why I'm telling you this.
[00:11:18] You have one of these.
[00:11:21] You have these moments, maybe it's not a pizza box, but there are moments where you're on a call and you say something and you think it feels stupid, or there's a live video that you lost the thread, or your launch link doesn't work, or the zoom link didn't work, or you forgot to close at the end of the presentation.
[00:11:46] And you've been carrying all of this around as evidence.
[00:11:51] Evidence that you are not ready. Evidence that the rehearsal room isn't finished with you yet and that you need to stay inside of it. And it's not evidence.
[00:12:07] You see, all of these mistakes cost me nothing. Well, nothing except maybe my dignity.
[00:12:15] But you get dignity back. Unless, of course, you didn't actually plot the bathrooms out right in the Airbnb.
[00:12:24] You see, I had made sure there were enough bedrooms for everyone. But what I didn't check is where the bathrooms were.
[00:12:32] So three of us shared one bathroom while two people had their own.
[00:12:39] I didn't think to check. I didn't know to check. I looked at the property, I looked at the beds, I counted the rooms. And I didn't think about the fact that three people would be having to coordinate shower times and potty times while two people are Not. And listen, now I know, like forever. There's. There's literally no course that teaches you this.
[00:13:06] You learn it by being in the moment and realizing you just didn't know. And let's circle back to the cooking thing, shall we? Because it didn't cost me my reputation, but it did cost me hours. Like precious hours at the retreat where, by the way, nobody was coming for me to cook.
[00:13:30] Like, the whole product was my attention and I spent the most valuable asset on the thing that nobody really cared about. And then, just like every good salesperson, we came to the part at the end of the retreat where I was like, listen, while you are all here, it would be fantastic if you felt like you had a testimonial that we could record it while you were here. You see, part of the retreat, because it was a content and systems retreat, was that my daughter, who's a very influential and successful YouTuber and Instagrammer, was there to help women with their social media content. And while she was there, I wanted her to record some testimonials.
[00:14:16] And I looked at her and I said, hey, listen, would you be open to just recording some testimonials before you leave? And she said, of course.
[00:14:25] But then I had to turn around and look at the room and I had to figure out, how am I going to ask all these women to do a testimonial? Like, in my head I was like, you're such, you're such a hot mess. Do you even really think anyone here actually got some real value out of this? Now in my head, I knew it. But, but when you're actually in the thing, making the mistakes, it's very easy to doubt yourself, but that's exactly where you need to be.
[00:14:56] So I had to ask for referrals in the room, like with my out loud voice right to their faces, not in an email afterward where I could like draft it 11 times and make it soft. I had to like do it right there in front of them. And honestly, I mean, like, I didn't really want to do it. I had thought, you don't have to do this. It could be really weird.
[00:15:22] But underneath all of this, the same sentence came to mind, which is, I was made for this.
[00:15:29] And so I asked, and in not too long a time, someone actually chimed in and said, yes, and I'll go first.
[00:15:40] What I want you to know is there's no courses, there's no coaching, there's nothing that prepares you for some of these things.
[00:15:50] Only running the thing, doing the thing teaches you all this valuable info. And I really especially want you to know about the referral, because I know that this is a muscle some of you are completely avoiding.
[00:16:12] And I want you to know you have people who love you. You have people that are so thankful for the results that you've helped them with. These are people who would say yes in a heartbeat. And you haven't asked them because you're still rehearsing your ask.
[00:16:32] But here's what I want you to actually take a look at.
[00:16:36] Is it that you're still rehearsing, or is it that asking out loud in the moment means finding out this isn't like a rehearsing problem or a confidence problem.
[00:16:50] It means finding out that maybe they didn't like the product or service. It means finding out that maybe they're not comfortable with it, but it's you and them in that moment, and there's a feeling there that you're avoiding, that absolutely no amount of rehearsing is going to help you with.
[00:17:13] Now, I want to stop and say something plainly because I've said it several times when I say I was made for this. It's actually really important that you understand that this isn't a claim of competence.
[00:17:26] Because, I mean, let's be honest, if I was saying I'm good at this, I had tons of evidence that would disprove it immediately and land in my nervous system as something I shouldn't do or say. Again, even if I said I have this handled, that that actually wasn't true either.
[00:17:48] It doesn't mean I'm good at it. It means that I belong in this space or while it's going on.
[00:17:58] And that distinction is everything, because competence is conditional.
[00:18:03] It can be disproven on any single day.
[00:18:07] But belonging, y', all, belonging is what lets you stay in the room long enough to become competent.
[00:18:19] And a lot of people have that backwards.
[00:18:22] And I say that gently because I had it backward, too, right up until the charred pizza box.
[00:18:30] And my favorite night, my favorite night of the entire retreat was the last one. And it was the night I wasn't teaching.
[00:18:38] Like, there wasn't really a structured session. There was no content for me to deliver.
[00:18:45] I didn't have to perform in any way. We just sat together and connected.
[00:18:51] And it was the best thing, honestly, that happened all week.
[00:18:55] And there was a period of time during Departure Day that I was in the house by myself, and I had time to sit and contemplate.
[00:19:04] And it really was interesting for me because I had prepared this whole retreat around what I was going to do.
[00:19:15] And the peak part of it had to do with just showing up authentically. And then I really understood.
[00:19:24] Now, go back with me through my crazy little list. The pizza box, the cooking, the cookies before dinner, the broken, crazy umbrella, a bunch of people in the same bathroom, the pages in the book being wrong.
[00:19:42] Every single one of those things in my head was a performance failure.
[00:19:50] Every one of them was me not executing well. And the best night was the one where performance just wasn't even there. And that's not coincidence, y'. All. That's actually the answer. That's the answer when were all looking for. And it also proves the sentence I was made for this as being true. Because if it wasn't true, then the best night wouldn't have been the night where I actually didn't have an agenda. Because if I was made for this was about performing, well, then that last night, which was the emptiest night in terms of performance, well, it just wouldn't have felt the way it did. Which, by the way, which solidifies in my head, the thing I was made for was never performing. It was never about being someone that I'm not. It was never about trying really hard. So here's what I want you to hear. The thing that you're protecting while you wait to be ready. It's a performance.
[00:21:00] And, friends, nobody is asking you to perform.
[00:21:05] You have people who are waiting for what you have, and they don't care if it's polished. They're just literally waiting for you to open the door and step in the room with them, where they are. And then through all of it, I heard another voice say, I literally can't wait till the next retreat.
[00:21:27] And that's honestly and truly where I got to collect the receipts. Eight things went wrong at my first retreat. I just listed them for you. I probably listed closer to 10. And I could actually continue to tell you stories. And nobody asked for their money back. Nobody left. And, like, nobody left disgusted. And I want to share. I was made for this.
[00:21:53] Not because we need to do things well, but because we need to be willing to be in the room specifically when things are going wrong.
[00:22:05] Because staying in the room is the part that matters the most.
[00:22:11] That is indeed where the growth happens and only the place where the growth happens.
[00:22:20] You're not waiting until you're ready, you guys. Most of you are waiting so that you can't be embarrassed. And I don't know that that's never going to happen.
[00:22:34] Actually, I do. Now.
[00:22:35] You have to be willing to be bad in order to get good.
[00:22:41] So if any of this landed with you, if any of this resonated, if you're like, oh my gosh, this makes so much sense, let's connect. I do these free one on one consultations. I promise. No pitch, no script. You bring me the one thing that you have been rehearsing and we'll just look at it together. And if it makes sense after that, there's room for you to apply for our Sales Confidence Studio program. And I just want you to know the studio isn't a better version of what you're already doing.
[00:23:12] It's literally a different way of building and one where you stop waiting to be in the room and waiting for it to be safe and just start being the person who's literally in it because you deserve to be in it. It's the kind of investment that high performing women make when they've decided that they're just done rehearsing.
[00:23:35] The link is below.
[00:23:37] I'll see you there. Until next time. Fix it and you will grow fast.
