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The fear of being seen learning can go unnoticed for years when you are usually the most capable person in the conversation.
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The Fear of Being Seen LearningYou are good at being the one who knows. You have been for years. Being the one still learning is a different thing altogether, and you have had very little practice at it. So you work around it. You say no to the invitation where you would be new. You hold off on the market you have been watching. You look things up after everyone has gone home, so no one sees the gap. The cost is not knowledge. You are very good at gaining knowledge. What it costs you is what sits on the other side of looking unsure for a while. The venture you have not started. The field you have not stepped into. The growth you passed on until you knew more. The conversation you keep pushing back, because in it you would have to say “I am not sure.” Over the years, those add up, and you end up doing far less than you are capable of. You are not afraid of learning. You are afraid of being seen learning. Learning, you can do on your own. Being watched while you do it is the hard part. Somewhere back there, being the authority and having it all worked out became one thing for you.
Where the Fear SitsThe not knowing is not the threat. What you have made it mean is. You have put it all on one side. Being the one who knows holds your worth, your safety and your place. Not knowing holds only exposure. That is one side of the picture, and while you only see one side, it keeps making your decisions for you. Not knowing has given you plenty too. It is where every skill you have began. And it started long before the business. A home where being capable got you noticed. An early job where not knowing did not feel safe. The expert in you is not something you switch on at work. It is a part of you that has been looking out for you for a long time.
What Moves the Fear of Being Seen LearningStart with what the expert in you is protecting. What are you afraid would happen if you did not know? Who are you afraid would see it? Then look at authority and knowing separately. They are not the same thing. If your authority did not come from how much you know, where would it come from? How would you want people to feel it, when it is not resting on knowing it all?
What Happens When It Lets GoA leader I worked with had wanted to build a second business for six years, in a field that was completely new to him. When we looked closely, the fear was not the new field. It was being seen not knowing by a team who had only ever known him as the expert. We did not give him a technique. We balanced the way he saw it until not knowing stopped feeling like a threat. Then he sat his leadership team down, told them he was new to this, and asked three of them to teach him. Within a month the business was underway. His team trusted him more after that. They had seen where his knowledge ran out, and he was still the same leader. Most of what is worth doing next will have a stretch where you are new at it. The sentence you have been avoiding is smaller than all you have built around it. I do not know this yet. Who would you say it to first? If you are ready to look at the expert position you are defending, book a 15-minute Strategy Call and we will look at what it has been costing you. To your brilliance, Tanya Cross Industry Leader Coach & The Coaches’ Coach BAppSoSc (Counselling) |
