I think a lot about communication,  storytelling, and self-expression.

And despite all that thinking (for years and years), this short 1 minute long self-introduction video was STILL hard to create.

How difficult was it?

It took 63 attempts to shoot this video… so what that really means is that 62 times I tried and failed… 60+ times across 3+ hours earlier this week. And that’s on top of the previous few weeks of shooting two other longer videos, which required similar effort… let’s estimate that it to be about 100 attempts.

Which was on top of the 50/times per year when I gave keynote speeches, on stage in front of an audience… And the hours and hours of practice and preparation before each of those… which I did continuously for the past 10 years…

And 5 years before that of facilitating workshops, delivering training and coaching sessions.

And before that, another dozen years of preparing presentations in my first few jobs, business school, and the American education system.

Oh and I guess we should also include the daily writing, daily reflecting and regular sales pitches and networking events across the 18 years of my career so far…

All of this is to say… that communication is difficult! 👀

And even now, after all that thinking, practice, and upskilling... I will still mess up, make mistakes, and lose my train of thought mid-speech.

And even now, I wanted to add GIFs to the video to distract you from the main message… because I’m afraid you’ll find a flaw!

So please be patient with yourself.

Evaluate yourself against your own progress… not against some random person online… your friends or colleagues… or some impossible ideal expectation!

It takes time (years and decades) and practice and failure… so *self-compassion* is the only way to get through that "effortlessly."