Topics: Comparison trap, Imposter Syndrome, Fear of Putting Yourself Out There

 

 

Let’s talk: Imposter Syndrome, Rejection and Fear of Putting Yourself Out there…

 

“I’m not ready yet.” Or are you hiding?

Hiding from fear, rejection and all the discomfort that comes from putting yourself out there?

You sit there waiting. Seeing so many others do what you want to do. And still you hesitate. Because what if you don’t have the experience, the ability or what everyone else does?

This is the episode to tear all that BS down and give you more confidence to raise your voice and be visible.

We’re talking about how to stop letting Imposter Syndrome hold you back and start pitching, posting, and showing up—even when it terrifies you.

 

From stuck in the Comparison Trap to pitching, posting, and leading with courage— I reveal how one messy action habit can transform your visibility, voice, and growth mindset.

If you’ve ever felt frozen by self-doubt, perfectionism, or fear that you’ll fail in public, listen for motivation to go for the challenge that feels impossible, the one you’re most scared of…

 

TIMESTAMPS

00:01  Stop Letting Imposter Syndrome Hold You Back
05:50  Why the Comparison Trap Keeps You Stuck
10:10  Unhook Your Self-Worth from Business Outcomes
16:40  The Psychology of Fear and Putting Yourself Out There
19:00 How to Build the Visibility Muscle (Before You Feel Ready)

 

LISTEN TO NEXT: Episode 1 of Private Podcast

 

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MORE ABOUT THIS BUSINESS MINDSET PODCAST EPISODE

 

“Comparison is the worst trap—it distorts your reality and convinces you everyone else started big. They didn’t.” – Chardét Ryel, Podcast Coach & Visibility Mentor 

 

• Your ego isn’t the enemy, but it is keeping you stuck.
• Visibility is a muscle—train it messy.
• Rejection is not a verdict, it’s feedback.

 

 

Have you ever sat with your finger hovering over the “post” button… and not pressed it?
Or stared at that pitch email draft… and never sent it?

If you have, you’re not alone.

Every woman entrepreneur I know—whether they’ve just started their business or they’re three years in—has wrestled with this invisible force: the fear of putting yourself out there.

Here’s the tricky part: the voice that tells you “I’m not ready yet” feels protective. Rational, even. But more often than not, it’s fear dressed up as logic. And if you listen to it too long? You’ll stay stuck on the sidelines watching others move forward in ways you deeply want to.

In this blog, we’ll unpack what’s really going on beneath that hesitation—and how you can stop letting imposter syndrome hold you back and finally show up for the business you want to build.

 

 

The Real Reason “I’m Not Ready Yet” Keeps You Stuck

Let’s get this out of the way: “I’m not ready yet” doesn’t actually mean anything.

As I shared in a recent episode of Her First 3 Years, the voice that whispers “wait” is often your ego trying to protect you from rejection.

“The ego is trying to protect you. But if you want to grow, you have to show up anyway and face the rejection.”

When we fear failure, or fear that our effort will confirm our worst beliefs about ourselves, we hesitate. But the truth is: no one starts ready. Everyone begins with imperfect action.

And you? You’re more ready than you think. The only way to prove it to yourself is to take the next step—even if your voice is shaking.

 

Why the Comparison Trap Will Keep You Playing Small

One of the biggest forces amplifying imposter syndrome is the comparison trap.

It happens when we scroll and see others launching products, landing collaborations, speaking on big podcasts—and we immediately think: “They’re ahead. I’m behind.”

“Comparison is the worst trap—it distorts your reality and convinces you everyone else started big. They didn’t.”

Here’s the truth: you are almost always comparing upward. We don’t compare ourselves to people a few steps behind us—we compare to the highlight reels of those ahead.

But growth isn’t linear. And no one starts at the top. The more you can anchor back to your own lane, the more capacity you’ll free up to actually move forward.

 

How to Stop Letting Imposter Syndrome Hold You Back

Here’s the mindset shift I wish someone had taught me earlier:

Your self-worth is not tied to your business outcomes.

“Your self-worth has to be unhooked from your outcomes. The irony? When you stop caring about the results—you get them.”

When you believe your worth is on the line with every pitch, every post, every launch—you will hesitate. You will edit yourself. You will avoid the bold actions that create growth.

The entrepreneurs who build momentum aren’t the ones who avoid failure. They’re the ones who’ve trained themselves to be OK with it—and to see rejection as data, not a verdict.

If you can embrace that mindset? You’ll take exponentially more action than most.

 

How to Build the Visibility Muscle (Before You Feel Ready)

Here’s the truth I share often with my clients: visibility is a muscle.

“Visibility is a muscle. Every failed rep, every time you keep trying something—that’s what gets you there.”

You cannot build confidence first and then act. You build confidence by acting.

The first post you write that really shares your voice? It might flop.
The first podcast you pitch? It might get a no.

That doesn’t mean you stop. It means you’re strengthening your visibility muscle—learning how to be seen and heard even when the outcome isn’t guaranteed.

And the more you do this, the more natural it feels. The more resilience you build. The more authentic your voice becomes

 

 

You’ll Never Feel Fully Ready—Do It Anyway

If you take one thing from this post, let it be this: You’ll never feel fully ready. And that’s OK.

“I’m not ready yet doesn’t actually mean anything. It’s just about having the courage and confidence to move forward.”

At some point, you will have to leap before you feel ready. The entrepreneurs who succeed are not the ones who feel 100% prepared—they’re the ones who take the leap anyway and figure it out as they go.

That pitch you’ve been sitting on? That post you’ve been drafting? That offer you’ve been refining for months?

It’s time to move.
Messy, imperfect, courageous action is the only thing that will get you out of your own head and into growth.

If this resonates—if you’ve been holding yourself back from being more visible in your business—I hope this gave you a nudge.

Stop letting imposter syndrome hold you back.
Break free from the comparison trap.
Say yes to the bold, messy actions that will stretch you and grow you.

Your dream clients and collaborators can’t find you if you stay hidden.

 

 

Want more?

If you want practical ways to build visibility before you feel ready, check out my private podcast Secrets to Standing Out – episode 1 is here now! 🙌

 

 

 

FULL TRANSCRIPT WITH CHARDÉT RYEL

Chardet Ryel (00:04.394)
Welcome to her first three years. From breakdowns to blunders, learn what worked and what didn’t. I’m your host Charday and whether you’re a new entrepreneur or you’re just starting something new, this is your space to learn and feel little less alone. I’ll see you inside.

want you to have some courage, some inspiration, some motivation to not let imposter syndrome, know, fear of failing, fear of getting the no, the rejection, stop you from what you really want most.

for your business and all of the creative stuff that you wanna put out there, but maybe your mind is stopping you. So this episode is to go deep into that because I know so many of us, you you’ve been thinking on this post that you wanna share on Instagram for weeks or months maybe and you’re hesitating or the pitch you wanna send to a brand or to be on a podcast or to have a collaboration and you just don’t do it. And again and again, you tell yourself, I’m not ready yet.

And as you say that, you see so many other people growing and doing what you want to do. And so this is to give you that drive to go for it. This is for you. So we’re gonna unpack why it’s happening, you some of the psychology behind why we feel imposter syndrome, why we stop ourselves from doing the things that we know would help us to succeed, but there’s really just this

fear of rejection at the very base of it and how we can manage through that. the biggest thing I can say that will help you after this episode is feeling more confident in your message, in your positioning. That is gonna help you really have the confidence to go and pitch and put yourself out there. And if that’s something where you don’t know where to begin, I really suggest listening to the episode called

Chardet Ryel (01:57.966)
Private Podcast Peak, it’s on here. Secrets to Standing Out, because I’ve got a private podcast called that, and it is all about episodes to help you take actions to stand out. You can find the link to get all those episodes or just listen to the one on her first three years or in the show notes. Let’s begin. We’ve got three big concepts to go over here. Now, the first one, the ego self-worth loop.

Now you might know it as I’m not ready yet. And that is a huge brain trap that we put ourselves in. I remember this happening to me so many times, the feeling of like, I’m not ready yet. I don’t feel like I can do this. Who am I to put myself out there and do it? And I think what made the biggest difference for me, where I got lucky, is when I was really young, just out of university, I was working with a woman who…

was the best person at putting herself out there when she wasn’t ready, when she didn’t have the credentials. And so this was a woman who was creating a book and interviewing very top leaders. We’re talking about founders of PayPal. We’re talking about many, many famous nonprofits, politicians, et cetera, in the world. And she was someone who honestly didn’t have the credentials, as you would think, to go and talk to these people.

but she was so confident and she found a way and it is amazing how she got them to sit down with her and do this. In some of those interviews I was there for that I’m not ready yet doesn’t actually mean anything because it’s just about you having the courage and the confidence to move forward. And the mistake we make is assuming that everyone else who’s doing it, everyone else who you look at who’s

doing the Instagram posts you wish you would have created or has the collab or is on the podcast or created the product. All of those people have been in a position where they also were not ready yet, where they didn’t have the credentials. So that was a really big thing that showed me what’s behind the curtains, so to speak. Here’s where it comes from though.

Chardet Ryel (03:59.053)
We have this fear of putting ourselves out there and it’s almost ego preservation. So if you think of ego as your identity, the way you see yourself, it is something that we try to protect so much. And so this is why we often avoid getting hurt, getting rejected, being wrong. And in terms of this visibility issue, in terms of just trying before you’re ready or before you’re big enough or whatever, the ego is often saying this to you. If I try and fail, it

confirms my unworthiness. So if I don’t get the results I want, then I’m right in assuming that I’m not good enough. I’m not big enough. My worst fears about who I am are proven. And I have felt like this so many times, quite honestly. It is only in the last two years of 12 as an entrepreneur that I have been able to separate the results in the outcome, the failures from my self-worth.

because I was also trained like you probably to think if my performance is good, then I am good enough. And so this is the loop that we fall in that really stops us from trying new things because our ego is saying, don’t do it, don’t do it. And instead of telling us why we shouldn’t do it, you know, it’s never going to say because you’ll feel unworthy. It will say things like, you don’t have enough experience. Maybe you should wait a little bit longer. And it’s fueled even more by the comparison trap.

And something that’s so interesting about the way we compare ourselves is you’re not going to compare yourself to someone who is doing worse than you. Almost never. You’re going to compare yourself to someone who is doing better. You’re comparing upward. And so if you compare upward, you are always going to feel like you are falling behind. This is what fuels a lot of times that imposter syndrome is the feeling that, wow.

Look at how good these people are doing. We don’t stop to think, but they’ve had X amount of years of more, or they’ve had this experience previously. It’s just they are doing better. And while imposter syndrome is very much a part of the growth process, because there’s no way you can do something new and not feel this, it’s important to understand how to manage it and how we really tend to compare always upward. Think about something that you don’t care about.

Chardet Ryel (06:21.815)
it honestly, it doesn’t matter to you at all, that people can be ranked in. So for example, for me, I don’t care about most sports. So I don’t even watch them. Like let’s use American football as an example. I don’t even know who the players are on the teams at this point or whatever the teams are. If I were looking at an American football player and they’re doing really well, I really wouldn’t care that I’m not at that level. I would never compare myself to that person because I don’t care about.

excelling there and I understand the differences we have. But we do that in the spaces we do care about. So I used to do it in the fitness space. I would compare myself to the top fitness influencer, to the top instructor, even though it is the same thing, right? Like how can I possibly expect to get to where they are without doing the work and it often stops you from doing the work because it feels so far away and it’s easier to just say, let me wait. Because if you say, me wait,

It tricks you into believing that one day you’ll try. And if you’re saying, me wait, that’s basically the same as saying, I probably won’t do it. So we want to shift away that. So let’s stop for a moment here. And I want you to imagine something you’re pitching, something really bold, either to be on a podcast, to do a collaboration, to work with a brand, to create an offer. Think of something that would be so bold for you.

You can’t even imagine doing it for three years from now. What does fear tell you will happen if it’s rejected?

What is your fear saying to you will happen if the product, whatever it doesn’t work?

Chardet Ryel (08:05.601)
This is the story your ego is trying to protect. And so for me, there’s been a lot. This is a very vulnerable share that, you know, I’m only doing because I really want to help you. I don’t really feel comfortable sharing it, but I think this podcast is about the uncomfortable. My big fear for a long time, the ego story I had around this, where I would sometimes not put myself out there, even though I had this early experience of seeing it’s necessary. I still had fears, of course. I’m going to find out.

that I’m not as good as everyone else there, that I’m lacking something. All these people at the top of whatever I wanted to achieve has some secret ingredient that I just don’t have. And part of that was driven by having a background that was non-traditional. Family structure and everything, I felt like…

From the beginning, I was the misfit, the outsider lacking something. And that has carried on for years and years and years. And it’s really hard to remove that. But when I realized that, I could say, OK, me not trying is not because I don’t have enough information. It’s not because I don’t have time. It’s not because I want more experience. It’s because I don’t want to find out that I’m lacking something they have. And what I discovered, which you might see too, is that I was lacking something.

that all successful people had. And that was the willingness to try, experiment, and fail. That was the only difference. So I want you to name your ego. And you might hear this and think that is the most cliche thing. I’ve heard it so many times. How is that possibly going to help me? So let me explain a little bit how this works in your mind. For years, I worked in behavioral change psychology, and it was helping people shift

really difficult lifestyle habits. So we’re getting people to do things that they haven’t done most of their lives. And what you see again and again here is that they have one voice in their heads, which is the ego. And when you have one voice in your head saying, you can’t do this habit or look, you failed again, there is nothing to counteract it. And so how can you create a second voice?

Chardet Ryel (10:12.173)
That is by you naming the first one. Because when you see like you are not that voice in your head, it becomes like it opens doors because then you add a second voice. In the case of the behavioral change I used to do, the second voice says, you know what? I can do this now. I have the support and tools I needed. So it’s going to be different this time. Same thing for you. Really, really think about that. And leaving you with this thought before we go into the second of the three ideas here is that your ego, it’s basically like a

clingy clingy friend that is worried and panicking about you getting embarrassed. It wants to save you, this friend wants to protect you so you can listen and you can still do the thing. Now on the second idea, this is something that I said just a little bit earlier in this episode, I don’t know if you noticed it. Stop letting imposter syndrome or the self-doubt hold you back by unhooking your self-worth.

from outcomes. This is the biggest lesson that exists in business and in life. And the irony is, is that when you stop caring about the results is when you get them. I’ll explain why that happens, the psychology, the science of it in a moment. But I want you to first think about if you need to fail 10,000 times, which I’m not saying you do, but you probably need to fail at least a few. How can you do that if you allow yourself to get so upset?

and so damaging your self-worth every time you fail, you can’t get ahead. Where this made a difference for me was first in my early work experience when I saw a lot of these politicians and leaders said no, right? But we still got some because we kept trying. And then it was also where I have thought about how many times I have pitched myself to do something. And in the beginning, it was really difficult to hear no, to get ghosted. And I would often associate a meaning with that.

such as, it’s because they don’t think I’m good enough. They don’t think I can do this, which is possible. And so the more I did it, the less hurtful it became. Because when you hear no once every couple months, stings. When you hear no every day, it doesn’t. Because you understand that as you go through these nos, you get a yes.

Chardet Ryel (12:29.389)
And this is the biggest thing for you to think about here. Often when people say no to you, they’re saying no to the way that you have positioned or pitched them. They’re not actually saying no to you and maybe not even to your idea. It’s the way that you have done it. This is where I’m going to call you again that if that’s something you struggle with, like you don’t understand how to position yourself differently.

Listen to the secrets of standing out private podcast that first episode one is on this one You can listen there and you can also get the full series because I have found that you get so much more confidence and you can really hear the know when you realize that you’re actually putting yourself forward with your best foot because when we don’t do that when we’re not fully confident in our message our positioning people sense that

This is also by the way, separate topic, but something that I saw with when we have money issues and issues around pricing our products, et cetera, it’s because we have not firmly figured out our positioning, our offer, whatever it is, and we don’t feel comfortable charging the price. And people pick up on that. One of the most helpful things to understand around this is that people are not actually motivated and driven by external validation.

So the likes, the approval, it seems like that is the thing that moves you forward and you have trained yourself to do that. We’re taught in school how to do that. We’re taught as kids, you did so well at this. To really keep moving towards what we’re already good at because we get that external validation. But the truth is, is that what you really thrive in is when you have intrinsic inside motivation.

Because when you have the inside motivation, when you’re fully aligned, you understand your positioning, you know your messaging, you can do stuff and keep going and getting better even when people don’t give you the likes, when people don’t comment, when they don’t share, when they even sometimes control you. It doesn’t matter if they’re trolling you because you already believe what you really want to say.

Chardet Ryel (14:33.559)
I know that’s hard for a lot of people listening. It was hard for me too to imagine that the criticism and the ghosting won’t matter. But really when you start to build up this sense of what you really want to say and doing the work that you really love, it will not bother you. And again, if you don’t know what that is, there are resources here to help you, to help you figure that out. How I could hear no hundreds of times or ghosted or being ignored was from creating and building

intrinsic inside motivation because when you do that you have a barrier, a resilience to rejection. But we’re taught instead a lot of times to pursue extrinsic motivation. This is the likes, this is the comments, this is the pat on the back.

This is the person buying the product. We’re really trained for that. And what that does is it amplifies imposter syndrome, amplifies the shame cycle, because if you don’t get the yes or the result that you want, you tie it to your self worth and you continue to fail because you don’t keep trying and getting better. So that shift from external, please like me to intrinsic internal, I’m going to find what’s aligned with me and I will say my voice message makes the difference.

entirely. Here’s something to help you shift rejection. Think about three places, three things that you currently tie your self-worth to the outcomes. So examples could be my follower count, my likes, my sales, my responses. What are three things that you tie your self-worth to in your business? What you create? How could you maybe shift away from that?

So for example, if I am obsessed with likes, I wanna then go away from that and say, okay, could I instead make sure that every post I make is so aligned with what I believe and not what I think they want? Then when I release that post, I am motivated by the fact that I have just done what I really wanted to do and said what I needed. And I can be okay with no one or very few people liking it.

Chardet Ryel (16:42.347)
It’s a hard shift to make. I know I will tell you right now that the posts that I make now about finding your true voice and really saying what you want never get as much attention as the ones where I really looked at the trends and I was doing the dancing or the fitness thing, but they feel so much better to put out there and I don’t care as much about the likes.

Think of your three and really get to know what is your inner true voice that you want to share because the less you fight that, the easier it’s going to be. And I’m going to leave you with one more image to think about before we go into the third idea here, third and final. Rejection is feedback. It’s not a verdict. It doesn’t mean you’re not worthy. It’s just feedback that might mean it’s not the right person to buy, to work with you, not the right time.

Maybe you said it is not the right way. It’s almost as if you think about someone who creates a cupcake, right? Like they bake a cupcake. If someone doesn’t like your cupcake, it might just be they don’t like chocolate. It might be they don’t like how much flour. It might be your cupcake sucks, but you learn to make it better next time. So really trying to not attribute so much heaviness to what other people accept about you in your business or don’t.

Now our last idea is this, putting yourself out there before you feel ready. This is a very difficult thing for me to do even now, but it was a lot harder before. And I have this moment whenever I do something that I don’t feel ready for where it’s like looking at the edge of a cliff and saying, am I really gonna jump this? That’s how it feels. And I still go and I do it because what happens when you trust yourself?

enough times is that you know that you can make that jump. If you go away from the cliff every single time because you’re scared, then you never build that confidence. We’ve heard that so many times. You’re not going to be ready for the things you want to do. The people who succeed are the ones who keep pushing even when they’re not ready. I was not ready to launch my first podcast. I actually did wait two years, but I probably could have waited at another five. I wasn’t ready to start my own business.

Chardet Ryel (18:58.731)
or any of the businesses, I wasn’t ready to move countries, I wasn’t ready to start the relationship, I wasn’t ready to do all of these things and I still did them anyway. Because the thing with being ready is that it is essentially perfectionism and that is just the idea that you either are good at something or not. You either can pitch this or you can’t. And it doesn’t really work that way in life.

And oftentimes the idea in your head or the thing you want to do, the first version is not great, but the only way it gets better is by putting it out there. There’s actually an amazing interview I have coming up with an incredible woman named Emily, and she is the founder of Robe Curls, which you might have seen in the TikTok sensation there. And she was saying how they released that product before it was perfect how she wanted it.

Before the packaging was exactly as she wanted, etc. because then they could get feedback and keep making it better and better. And she only learned that lesson from having released the product previously that she tried to make perfect first. So it really is this idea of I can only make this actually good if I put it out there. You know, I’ve been on a lot of podcasts as a guest, but I have pitched probably hundreds. They don’t all say yes, even now.

Even if it makes sense and there was a time where that would bother me, but now it doesn’t. So now think about what is one pitch post opportunity that you’ve delayed because you don’t feel ready. Think about one of those. What is the smallest messiest step you could take this week towards that? So let’s say it’s a post that you really believe strongly about. Write it. You don’t need to release it even yet. Just write it. You want to start a book.

Write the first sentence, don’t worry about if it’s crap. You know, I wrote a book in three months and the only reason I could do that is because every day I told myself if it’s not good, it doesn’t matter. Can always get good later, but I don’t need it to be perfect this first time. So thinking about what have you been delaying on, what’s the tiniest step you can take forward for that. Ultimately, you being out there, you having opportunities, collabs, being known, being bigger is all about

Chardet Ryel (21:20.547)
building a muscle. Visibility is a muscle. But there’s no way that you can be strong, that you can be big, that you can be out there before doing the exercises, lifting weights. That is what gets you stronger. Every failed rep, every time you keep trying something, that is what gets you there. Trying to wait and sit at home and hope that it happens or that one day you’re ready, it just doesn’t work that

And if you’re sitting here thinking okay, I get it. I need to be more visible I see I need to train this but I really don’t know where to begin This is where again I’m gonna say go download secrets to standing out online that private podcast You can find out on her first three years because that is gonna show you ten different ways Little mini things you can do right now to be more confident Even if you’re not ready if we sum up what this episode is all about

what you’ve learned here, what you can walk forward and do, and I really hope you feel more fired up and ready, is ego is there to protect you. This identity you have that stops you that says, not yet, can’t do it yet, is there to protect you. However, if you wanna grow, if you wanna be bigger, if you wanna have more impact, then you have to show up anyway and really face that rejection. The way that you can feel better about rejection is if you start…

cultivating that inner confidence and really say the outcome doesn’t matter. It’s just that I did it, that I tried. Other point we talked about here is that comparison is probably the worst thing about this because it’s gonna distort your reality. It’s gonna make you think all these people got the yes, all these people started big, recognizing that we have all gone through this in one way or another. It’s about refining, putting yourself out there. It’s not about perfection.

you will be rejected. You’ll also be received and told yes. Neither of those define you. What does is you continuing to consistently show up. And again, if you want to make this whole process feel a little bit easier, just standing out, get that private podcast. It will help you. It’s quick. It’s easy. Thank you so much for listening. If you find this episode helpful, it stirred your energy, please share it with someone else because all of us are feeling self-conscious.

Chardet Ryel (23:35.091)
Like we can’t go forward and with a self doubt and sometimes hearing these words can make all the difference. Share it to empower those you love and I will see you in the next one.

 

 

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