Alice Draper: I Feel Like An Imposter!

Note: This is a rough transcript, and some errors may be present.

Alice Draper (00:25)
It has officially been three months since my rejection story launched. three months and two days, and it is an award winning podcast. So I don’t know if you can see that behind me. fact, let me bring it up.

This is my rejection stories first award podcast champion from female fusion that I received last week Thursday at an award ceremony. And I felt like such an imposter getting this award. Of course, it’s not the Emmys or cans. It’s entrepreneurship community, a global entrepreneurship community, but predominantly based here in the UAE Dubai, where I am.

but there are some really impressive people, people with much, much bigger podcasts, podcasts with millions of downloads in that community. So I felt like a giant imposter getting this award. but then also I kind of, I was trying to rationalize like why me? and I was like, well, I’m the most vocal. I’m the one that’s always talking about my podcast, which made me feel like an imposter, but I also think it’s something to be proud of.

I take a lot of agency, I guess, and I act like this podcast is a really big deal, even though I know it’s not yet the kind of big deal that I want it to be. But I show up every day talking about it as if it’s already like this huge, giant, successful thing. And it’s scary, it’s vulnerable. And it’s something I want to kind of talk a little bit about today.

in the theme of rejection. So I was asked to do a little bit more solo episodes after I shared the solo episode a few weeks ago about moving back home to look after my dad. So this is a sort of wrap up end of year episode, even though there will be a few more episodes going out before 2024 comes to a real close. I want to chat about some of the themes that come up a lot.

And I was tagged in a LinkedIn post yesterday by Eva Genoto, who is on my network. And she shared a Substack post by someone called Kate Hall called How to be more agentic. And it was just a beautiful kind of, it was beautifully written and it captured so many of the things that I think that I deal with on this podcast. And it also got me thinking about ways in which I still struggle.

So anyway, the article, should totally read it. It’s linked in the show notes. But she opens up with the kind of thesis question of like, is agency an inherent trait? And she says, you know, she always thought that some people are just have more agency than others. Some people, we kind of know these quotes like fortune favors the bold. We know that people who are audacious and put themselves out there and do things that

we may not even think of doing are gonna be more successful. And so that’s a big kind of part of why I advocate building a rejection resilience muscle is to normalize putting ourselves out there and normalize getting rejected because putting ourselves out there does mean a lot of rejection. And so this question of whether agency is inherent, she argues it’s not and I completely agree with her.

because it’s something that I have cultivated within myself alongside building a rejection resilience muscle. And her very first subheading is court rejection. So, you know, of course, it doesn’t need much explaining. It’s really putting yourself in the way of a lot of potential rejection by making a lot of big asks. And that is something that I’ve been doing a lot with this podcast.

is putting myself in the wake of a lot of rejection. And something that I don’t think creators talk about enough is how absolutely silly it feels. I had the privilege of hearing Stephen Bartlett talk about two weeks ago at Live here in the UAE. And he was talking about his own journey with, you know, sharing, becoming, I guess, a content creator and

the point at which he started posting regularly on social media. think he made a commitment to post a social media post at end of every day. And he was like explaining how absolutely silly he felt, you know, that he has his cousins and his college friends and like his aunt following him on Instagram being like, who the heck do you think you are? Mahatma Gandhi? Like, why are you telling me that to succeed, I need to…

follow my values or whatever it is. And it truly does feel that way. You know, it’s very easy to look at someone who has a big platform and is now established as a thought leader and think, well, of course they can post because everyone respects them, but they started somewhere. And it’s embracing that kind of starting point that feels really silly. I, course, you know, I’ve been posting long before I started this podcast and I had a newsletter. So I am.

quite comfortable with content creation, but I came to my team with the vision of a podcast that was gonna be really big. Like I will say it here, I am delusional, extremely delusional. I don’t just want an average podcast, I want a really big podcast. And so the creation of this podcast has been humbling because I don’t have tens of thousands or millions of followers.

And so I didn’t immediately have tens of thousands of downloads, even though we had the good fortune of partnering with a lot of people to distribute the show. And I have battled with sort of feelings of being an imposter, like who do I think I am to be showing up in this way and to make this the most interesting thing about me, because that’s kind of what I’ve been doing. I don’t want to have a podcast that is

just a lead magnet for ideal clients. I want to grow something big. I want to grow a media entity of some sorts. And so pitching really big guests, trying to position the podcast in a way that seems interesting to them, pitching partners. I’ve been dealing with a lot of imposter syndrome, a lot of like, who do you think you are? But I also have been dealing with this other side, which is that I have so much conviction about this idea. I am so…

sure that this is something that people will be interested in that I have been pushing through all of that imposter syndrome. mean, acknowledging it’s there and then taking action anyway, because I just have to see this through. Like I am prepared to look silly for this, which is something that Haley Jacobson, if you haven’t listened to episode, actually talks about in relation to rejection resilience is that

She didn’t care enough about acting to put herself in the wake of rejection, which is why she didn’t pursue acting even though she went to film school, but that she cared enough about her writing to be rejected. And I guess I also feel that about this podcast is that I care enough about this podcast to look silly and be rejected. So I guess the takeaway there is find something that you care enough about that you’re prepared to look silly for.

And then.

Another point that was covered in that Substack article is increasing your surface area for luck. And so that’s really been the goal with rejection in the context of this podcast for me has been every audacious ask I make every time I put myself out there in a ridiculous way. It’s that I think that I’m

opening up the chance for something really lucky to happen, whether it’s having an amazing guest or an amazing person share it on social media or whatever it is. You know, if I am championing this in a really audacious, ridiculous way, I think that the chance of lucky things happening is much higher.

When

we’re not terrified of rejection, or we’re not self-rejecting, when we’re not stopping ourselves before it even got started. But the other thing that she writes about is this idea of embracing the moats of low status. So if anyone’s built a sand castle as a kid or helped a kid build a sand castle, you’ll know that you kind of make the castles and then you build this moats around the castle. And the moats is almost that like

rarely, mean, in the context of a castle, it’s a thing that stops intruders from getting to the castle. In the context of us, I guess, building our own castle is we have to go through that like murky water, uncomfortable, maybe we don’t know how to swim to get to the other side. And that’s the point where many people give up because it can take longer. And that’s what I’m reckoning with with this podcast is that

It’s not like, you know, three months in, it’s suddenly as millions of downloads. It’s nowhere near where I want it to be. And I am swimming, wading through that moat, prepared to do this for a long time to try and get somewhere. Because I so, hold so much conviction with this show. So yeah, so I think that so many of us avoid that moat of low status and I am such a champion for growth.

and like kind of embracing a beginner’s mindset that I thought that I’m like the queen of the motor flow status and reckoning with how, humbled I’ve been with this podcast and that it’s not exactly what I envisioned straight away in terms of growth has taught me that maybe this is something that I, I guess it’s a discomfort that anyone would feel, but that I’m not as evolved as I thought I was in that respect.

And I also have other evidence that I’m not that evolved. I went to play paddle recently and I self declared, you see self declared I have no ball skills and I’m doing it again. So I’m not a sporty person in terms of the fact that like I was never picked for sports teams. I was always the least athletic person and like everything I did basically I was always the back.

not a good swimmer, not a good runner, that there wasn’t really much that I was, had much talent in the kind of athletic world. so when I was playing paddle, the person I was playing paddle with was saying, you know, it’s not very encouraging to play paddle with you when you keep, you’ve always, for as long as I’ve known you, said that you have zero hand-eye coordination and that there’s no hope for you. And that was…

a really shocking moment for me because I, because I believe I’m such a like growth mindset, beginner mindset type person where I’m willing to do anything and try anything for the first time was yeah, actually like, you know, having that mindset, yes, sure. I’m willing to get onto the paddle court, but am I willing to really put my all into it? Am I willing to really try become a better paddle player? Because

If I’m saying that and it’s discouraging to someone else, they think there’s no hope in teaching me or helping me get better, then it’s also probably discouraging me before I’ve even begun. And so it’s interesting to me because there was a time where I avoided things I was bad at. And I thought that I’d moved past that. I’m learning Arabic, I’m running.

I am not a runner, but I running 5Ks regularly, which is such a huge achievement for me. I’m the back of the running group, but still I’m doing it. So, yeah, I still do this. I still self-sabotage and it’s really helpful to have people point out the ways in which we self-sabotage. And it makes me really want to reflect on ways that I could be doing this in the growth of my business.

It’s easy to play safe and to think I can do this certain thing. I can serve these certain clients and not go for the bigger, more audacious goals. It’s easy to do that with whatever passion project we have. It could be like, I have a micro podcast that only a couple of people listen to. And I’m putting it out there right now that I’m so grateful, so grateful that you are listening to this right now.

in only month three because apparently it takes like 18 plus months to really grow something. I’m so grateful that you’re listening right now, but mark my words, I really, really want it to be a big, big production. That’s the goal. And it’s very scary to admit these things because if it fails, you look silly and I’m prepared to look silly for this.

I am prepared to try get better at paddle because it would be a fun sport to play. think it seems really fun. And if I could just start hitting the ball more and not missing it, it would be a nice thing to do for fun. So thank you for listening. Thank you for being here from the beginning. I would love to hear your thoughts on the podcast. I really, really am receptive to feedback and

harsh feedback too is more than welcome. So if you want to tell me that certain episodes are not that interesting or that you want to see more of something or less of something or that certain things could be improved on, I welcome this. My email is media at hustlingwriters.com. And also if you want to subscribe.

That’s really, really helpful. I’m very grateful for the number of people who have already subscribed. So yes, this is a short and sweet episode. I will see you next week. We’ll have a few more episodes and then we’ll round up for 2024 and then have some really exciting things in the new year. So thank you for being here from the very beginning.