You can be right and still feel nervous
The following is an excerpt from my weekly email called Freelancers Only! Interested? It goes out every Tuesday at 2pm. You can sign up here. Over 2,000 other freelancers already have.
You can be right and still feel nervous.
I’ve been learning to play poker recently. I’m not very good, but it’s been teaching me how to negotiate with clients better.
One thing poker is teaching me is that you can be right, but still feel nervous about it. When money is on the line (even just the few dollars my friends and I stake), my nerves kick in. My heart beats faster. My knee gets fidgety. I get scared.
This makes sense when I’m bluffing. When I don’t have good cards, but I’m trying to make my opponent think I do have good cards. The nerves add up. But nerves don’t make sense when I do have good cards. I could have the best possible hand, that would beat any other hand, and I still get nervous.
“What if I’m wrong?”
“What if I’m forgetting about something?”
“This is a lot of money I could lose…”
Even in scenarios when I can’t lose, or I have a microscopic chance of losing, I still get nervous and second guess myself.
When I think back on pitches with clients, I see the same mechanics at play. I might have knowledge that I am the best option they have right now. I might know that they have the budget to pay me. I still get nervous, and second guess myself. I talk myself out of taking a big swing. I doubt myself.
Part of my poker woes come from still being a relative novice at the game. Many of my freelance pitching woes come from the same issue. Inexperience.
Being nervous isn’t a sign that you’re wrong. It might just be a sign that you don’t have much experience yet. Keep going. Keep pitching. Keep trying. The nerves settle in time. You can be right, and still feel nervous.
