As we head into the new year, I want to share an article by Andy Warfield called “A Little Uncomfortably.”
Andy writes about something we don’t talk about enough – vulnerability and the relationship between fear and growth. His reflection on years of public speaking anxiety gets bigger. The idea that discomfort is not something to be avoided, but a signal worth paying attention to. The bigger the fear, the stronger the signal that it actually matters. As you think about what lies ahead, ask yourself what is bothering you right now. This may be exactly where you need to go.
This was originally reported in The Kernel. If you haven’t had a chance to check it out, I suggest you do. It includes original insights from an amazing collection of Amazons such as Clare Liguori, Colm MacCárthaigh, Byron Cook, Marc Brooker, Amy Herzog and Arron Bailiss.
Now go build.
–W
A bit annoying
“I can scare you, it’s something I do.
If you are ready, I suggest doing this.’— “Fear,” The Tragically Hip
I have a reasonable fear of public speaking.
It used to be much worse – I used to be terrified of it. When I was a master’s student just starting research in computing, I went to a small workshop in Bertinore, Italy, to present a paper I had written. It was the first time I had ever presented my own work in front of an audience that wasn’t a class of other students, and I went back to my room and threw up every day after lunch Monday through Thursday. I threw up with anxiety at the thought of how bad it could get.
And I’m sure you think you know how this story goes; that I actually spoke and it was a great moment of personal development. But I was actually talking and it wasn’t right. After a week of fairly monotonous talks from the other students, mostly about math and distributed systems, I got up and talked about a few ideas about how I think operating systems should be built differently. It turns out that the writers of Plan 9, Bell Labs’ operating system, were in the audience and thought, “Finally, here’s an article we can fight for,” and gave me a reaction to an article that can very generously be described as “firmly critical.” It was a bloodbath. They spent a solid ten minutes telling me all the flaws in my reasoning, and as I left the stage shaken, I was reasonably sure that I never, ever, wanted to speak in public again.
But, wow, I loved building systems and I really loved doing research and learning about the absolute latest things that were happening in our industry. And there was no real way to move forward in this career without having to present my work to an audience. So I thoroughly researched many ways to speak poorly. I froze awkwardly during the interrogation. I was going back and forth on taped speeches, spending most of my time off camera, and every 45 seconds I was flying across the center of the shot like a tennis ball. At one point I actually fell backwards off the stage into the curtains. But the worst were always the hours before going on stage. It was leadership that caused me the most anxiety and I still feel it to this day.
Since I’m being honest for a moment here, I can also admit that it’s not just talk that scares me. In fact, I spent much of my career bouncing from one anxiety-inducing event to another. There are all the social things you’d expect an introvert to freak out about: talking to people in the hallway at conferences, meeting very senior people, interviewing and speaking in group discussions. But there are also non-social things: pushing for important changes in system designs, starting a company, escalating help because I know something in the team isn’t working right. It’s a thing that may be obvious in retrospect, but I think every single moment that my abilities – and probably my character – have moved forward has made me at least a little bit uncomfortable.
In hindsight, these scary (and sometimes scary) moments are the ones we all learn the most from.
This is not a very new observation. In fact, more than a century ago, the Yerkes-Dodson law noted that there is a clear relationship between arousal (say, stress) and performance. And that there is a bell-shaped curve where we perform optimally under increased stress, but then performance declines because the anxiety becomes overwhelming and distracting. I’m sure we’ve all experienced the range from adrenaline-fueled clarity to chilling panic. But the bottom line for me is that fear is actually a pretty good signal that you’re pushing into the unknown, that real growth won’t happen without a little discomfort associated with it, and that it’s worth recognizing when it happens. Aware enough to consider actually leaning into it.
As we progress in our careers and into leadership roles, our relationship with fear shifts. It’s no longer just about your own bravery, but also about helping others take risks. If you think back to those anxious moments that shaped you, I’m sure you’ll agree that they also helped you grow. This is an observation that I find very useful in management and mentoring. Even asking simple questions like “What scares you right now?” or “How do you stretch?” can be a great starting point for encouraging the people you invest in to push themselves.
Likewise, being attuned to your own fear response, whether it’s locking down, fighting, or changing the subject, is something you need to learn to recognize in others, as this is often a critical moment when you can step in and really help move the conversation forward. People won’t lean into anxiety unless they feel excited about the outcome, so as a leader there’s almost always something to it.
Bravery is not loud. It’s a quiet kind of persistence. I think it’s important to realize that these moments are rarely impulsive, reckless or full of courage – it’s the fact that we have to choose the difficult path with our eyes open that almost exactly defines the pursuit of improvement, and when you start thinking about it, I think you start to see these moments all around you. Just watch, for example, a person who rarely asks questions in a meeting when they speak with a challenging question. It’s a wonderful thing once you notice it, and it’s also a meaningful opportunity to support in the moment or compliment afterwards.
After a week at re:Invent, a bit detached from the routine for the rest of the year, I think it’s worth reflecting on this fact – growth happens at the edges of discomfort. And as you think about it, maybe ask yourself what is the one thing that scares you this week and whether or not you can just do it.