This Is Super Embarrassing...
A huge opportunity came along this week, where I totally BOMBED.
I was pretty jazzed as I kept getting callbacks to be part of this baller docuseries that will be on a major streaming platform ;) ( tehe can’t disclose certain deets just yet ) I was super excited for this particular sets of auditions, because this show is in my wheelhouse. It’s a documentary about dating, sexuality and pleasure. Hello?!
The first few rounds of auditions, I crushed it. I was on top of my game, I was talking about We The Light, my personal journey, my work and my client’s transformations. Easy Peezy. It wasn’t till the last round of callbacks where I got totally blindsided by the casting director. As I prepped for these auditions, I was discussing why and how my work works, so it took me by surprise when they wanted to scrap the business angle. The casting director interrupted me and said “Erica, we know you are a top coach in the industry, we’ve done our research and that’s why you are here. But just for now let’s put all of your client’s success stories to the side… let’s talk about YOU.”
Okay, I thought, I’m flexible, I can absolutely talk about myself, gimme what you got. Well, let me say this... the questions were relentless, deeply personal, intimate and went THERE. As I was awkwardly responding to these questions I was thinking “If I book this job, do I really want every personal detail of my life on blast?” I tried my best, but I was squeamish as all hell. We ended the zoom, I closed my laptop and literally went from grief to rage to shock to embarrassment. “WTF this is my work, why was I just such a weirdo? What happened?” Not only do I have a business that is based around pleasure, dating and intimacy but I have been on this personal journey for years! I am someone who prides myself on doing the damn work every day.
I am sharing this story not for shits and gigs but to show how shame lies deep within us. I had no problem talking about my clients results and yet, when confronted with these brutally honest questions, I choked. A woman who is committed to setting others free, a woman who is already pretty open and wild. How in hell was this woman getting jumbled? I reverted back to a child and thought would I be judged? Be made a mockery of? It goes back to that primal flight, fight or freeze mode. If I say something weird will I be kicked out of “my tribe” aka family and friends.
Shame is a tricky bitch, that so often is connected to our sense of safety and belonging. If I am radically myself will I still belong? As I saw a spot for healing in myself I saw how DEEP purity culture lives within us. How it has been passed down from generation to generation of how a “good girl” should behave. Don’t get me wrong, in certain situations playing out the good girl archetype has served me, but more often than not it hurt and muted me. This good girl was obedient, didn’t stand up for herself and played small. Many of my biggest “regrets and mistakes” were made from the place of the obedient good girl archetype. Doing shit I hated, saying yes when I meant no, putting my needs and wants on the back burner for someone else. That behavior had to go. As frustrated as I was after getting off the call, I saw this as an opportunity to heal all the places where I have been continuing to play small.
