 first impressions can really make or break your business. But it's not because of what other people think of you. It's what you think of first impressions. So let me explain. If you are concerned about first impressions, you will tend to be nervous about putting yourself out there because, well, it's going to be a first impression for the people who see you on video or to read your thing or to go to your website for the first time or to receive your email. And so therefore there's a lot of performance anxiety. Like if I were to think, gosh, some people are watching this video, watching me for the first time ever, I better please them, I better attract them, I better seem impressive to them, first impressions, then I'm going to need to please you which is coming outside being out of my authenticity. That's the definition of authenticity. Authenticity is not having to please other people, but rather to be true to your higher expression now, whether or not it pleases other people, right? So don't worry about first impressions, but you might say, well, George, you're a marketer. Aren't you supposed to tell me to be worried about first impressions? So if you let go of the need to make a good first impression, you create the freedom to create more, okay? So what we typically think of, which is I think an erroneous way of thinking is you post something out there, you publish a book, you make a video, you reach out to somebody, and then if it's not a good outreach or a good video or a good writing, then step two, you damage your reputation with that person forever. That makes sense, right? Okay, first time I'm seeing some of you, first time you're seeing this video, if you don't like it, am I gonna lose you forever? That's what people usually think, but that's not how reality works. I've been coaching entrepreneurs for 10 years, building my own businesses for 10 years, building, especially my business is audience related, meaning having new people discover me and then follow me. Here is what the reality is, okay? You publish something, you put something out there. If it happens to be a bad, if it happens to please some people, great, but it might not please some people, and you might lose some readers or viewers for a while. It's true, I'll be honest with you. Of course, I lose people all the time. However, here's what happens. If you then keep going, if you ignore the fact that, oh, I might lose some people, ignore that, okay? If you get some good reactions and some good comments, you can take note of what's working, and you will naturally, if you course all of us, as we see the good comments come in, we're gonna notice, oh my gosh, that particular video was good, or that particular piece of writing, people really liked it. So we will naturally notice what's working, and we'll naturally want, because we're human beings, and no matter how much we wanna be authentic, we still are influenced by other people's reactions of us. We'll naturally want to do more things that people are reacting well to. It's just a natural thing, okay? But if people don't react, or people really don't like it, we lose them, like I'm losing some viewers right now, live, but that's okay, I don't care, because what happened, I've trained myself, of course, to keep going and to keep making more and more videos and articles no matter if I'm losing people, okay? And it's very interesting, I've noticed, whenever I talk about this topic, people don't tend to like it. I think people are very tied to first impressions, so of course I have to make a good first impression, though I'm not gonna listen to George talk about this nonsense, but let me talk about this nonsense anyway, and see if you'll get something out of it. When you don't make a good first impression, right? Here's what happens, and you practice ignoring that, and just keep going, because the fact is, the first impression is really your own judgment of yourself. Let me explain. Especially when it comes to online content, when you don't make a good first impression, people won't let you know. People aren't, we wish, we all wish that people would let us know immediately how something went for them, but almost entirely 90%, 95, maybe 99% of the people who will watch your video, or read your article, maybe, for me, it's not 90%. I would say, gratefully, now I'm getting reactions from about 10 to 20% of my viewers giving me some kind of reaction or comment or something, but still, even for me, with an audience already, I still have 80 to 90%. 80 to 90% of the people who watch any of my videos, or read any of my blog posts, will never even touch like or comment or nothing. So I have no idea what they're thinking, what you're thinking, no idea, right? And that's gonna be true for you too. When you're first starting, it's gonna be more like 90 to 95 to 99% of the people that you touch are not gonna even tell you at all whether they loved it, liked it, hated it, thought it was dumb, whatever, they won't. Just silence, that's all it is, silence. And so you've got to practice ignoring the silence and only valuing the process of creating, the process of continuing to just day after day or week after week or whatever your rhythm is, share what's real for you right now. That is the secret. If there is a secret to success online, it's the practice of consistency. It's not really a secret. You've heard this a million times, but that's why you've heard it a million times because it's true. The practice of consistent creating is the secret to becoming a confident creator, confident communicator, a confident writer, a confident video maker, becoming smarter. I mean, how do you become smarter? Not by reading, reading, yes, reading and watching, learning from other people, gain your knowledge of it, but you really actually become more skillful and more wise and effective when you create, not when you consume. When you consume, it's easy to just let those things accumulate and fester even, but when you create, that's when you really become good. So like I said, reality doesn't work like, make a bad first impression, lose people forever. It's make a bad first impression, which by the way, you almost certainly will when you're first starting to create. Do you think you're gonna put your first video up or even your first 20 videos up and then you're gonna be a good video maker? No. I mean, come on, be objective here. Excellence doesn't happen just by taking a course and go, now I'm excellent at making videos or at writing or at reaching out or at speaking or at writing a book or whatever it is you're trying to do. Excellence doesn't just happen by taking a course. Excellence happens, sure, you can take courses or read books or read articles, fine, but excellence happens when you embody the things you're learning and actually practice it. So when you practice it, of course your first 20 or 100 videos are not gonna be that good. Of course your first book or two or three is gonna be okay. Do you think that your first book was gonna be a best seller? You can try, you can hope, you can do your best to market it, but it's your first book. You're not that skilled of a book writer yet or an article writer or whatever it is you're trying to create. You're just not that skilled yet. So how can you ever escape making a bad first impression? I don't understand. Now, once you become skilled and new people are discovering you, then you might be lucky enough to make a good first impression, but really, in your first year, in your first two or three years or in your first whatever, I don't know how long it takes you to become excellent. It's different for everybody, of course. But in your first efforts, you are bound to not make a very good first impression. Does that make sense? So what are you gonna do? Are you just gonna stop? You're just gonna, oh, therefore, if I'm not gonna make a good first impression, I just better not start. Well, if you don't start, you won't ever have a chance. You won't ever have a chance to make a good first impression on the new people who discover you a year, two, five, 10 years from now. I'm 10 years into my business. And really only now do I feel like I'm getting into a way of writing that I feel comfortable with. Now, I'm sure if I look back 10 years from now, 10 years from now, I'll look back at my current writings and videos and I'm like, oh my gosh, I'm back then, I wasn't very good. I hope I think that. I hope I think that because then that means I'll be a lot better. Do you see what I mean? So now when I look back on my writings from 10 years ago, which I barely did any writing from 10 years ago, I look back on my videos, I'm like, wasn't very good, right? I must have made terrible first impressions for years, right? But I'm still here and I'm still making videos and I'm still writing and I'm still creating courses. And when I look back on my courses from 10, even when I look back on my course a year ago, right? Like my Facebook course right now versus my Facebook course a year ago, I'm kind of embarrassed at my Facebook course from a year ago, right? My Facebook course now I think is, well, I'm sure next year's Facebook course will be even better than this year's, right? But it's, oh my God, how many bad, I've made bad impressions on hundreds of people who bought my first Facebook course from, I taught my first Facebook course years and years and years ago. But you see what I mean? I have made so many bad impressions on people. I have probably lost tens of thousands of readers and viewers over the years. But here's, let me continue the reality of this. Okay, the reality of it is you're going to make bad first impressions, the first 100 videos you make or the first 100 articles, not all 100 are gonna be bad. What I'm saying is some people who are gonna read it or watch it are not gonna like it. And they won't ever tell you, that's the problem. 90% of the people don't, 95% of the people don't even say anything. Don't even click like or react or anything at all. And those are just silence, right? That's normal. So you don't know if you're making good or bad first impressions, but almost certainly there's some of them gonna be bad. That's why you have to practice and learn to just ignore. Ah, some are gonna be good, some are gonna be bad. I don't know what's important. I'm just gonna focus on creating consistently. That's all. So as you keep doing that, here's what happens. Your excellence will grow over time, especially if you deliberately practice yourself like, oh, every month you look back and go, what's one more improvement I can make this new month? What's one more improvement on my writing or my videos or my whatever it's I can make this month? Okay, let's practice. It's all practice. It's all practice. You never get to the point where you're like, I am now the best video maker I'll ever be. Because if you ever get there, that means you will now have stopped learning. So it's always practice because you'll always have the opportunity to get better, which means you'll always look back and go, wow, I could have been better, right? That's just the reality of it. So you'll get better and better and better. And here's the miracle. The people you had lost before, if they are meant for you, I've talked about this before, your ideal audience senses an energy signature within you that cannot be explained. I don't know if it's spiritual. I don't know if it's psychological. I don't know if it's cultural. I don't know how to explain it, but your ideal audience people, even though they might dislike the first impression or the second or the 10th impression from you, they will eventually come back again to check on you. Yes, that's true. So whether they just remember to come chat back and check or a lot of times they will hear about you again from somebody else because you've been consistent. You've continued onward. 100 bad first impressions, you've continued onward to create. And so as the more excellent you get, the more people will hear about you. And even the people you lost in the first years, well, if they're meant for you, if they're your ideal audience and that energy signature, they felt like there was something there, but they're like, I thought I would like this person and I was hoping I would like this person, but it just, I didn't like it. I didn't like what I read. I didn't like what I saw, but they'll hear about you again. A year, two years, five years, 10 years later, and they'll go, yeah, that's right. Something about that person I like, I will forgot what it was. They even, here's the other miracle. The first, the bad first impressions. Okay, I know this might sound strange. The bad first impressions will be forgotten. Will be forgotten and forgiven. That's the thing about the internet. Okay, it's the strangest thing. I don't know how to explain it, but people forget and forgive your bad first impressions on the internet. Now in person, that's a little different because there's a lot more signals in person. Everything from the, you know, there's smells to the weather that day to whatever, there's a lot more signals, okay? But on the internet, reading an article, even watching a video, bad first impression, don't worry about it because they're going to come back when they hear about you years later or they'll just remember you or somehow they'll find you online and now you're better at creating now. They'll be like, oh, I like this now. But again, you can't ever get there until you make a bunch of bad first impressions. That's just a reality. But even in the first hundred bad first impressions you make, some people will like you. A few people will like you. And that's the blessing. That's the grace that we're given, okay? So don't be afraid to make a bad first impression. Or the bad first hundred impressions. Will you create regardless? That is the practice that will allow you to become excellent and therefore have the opportunity to make many good first impressions in the future. Got it? I hope this helps. Thanks for those who were able to join me here. I'm still recovering from the cold here. Third week, it takes me a while to get over cold. Thankfully, I don't get sick very often these days but when I do, I guess I catch up for a while. Let's see here. Just looking at some of the comments. Ida says, yes, thanks for the encouragement to keep creating. Tracy says, I needed this today. Thank you. Thank you, Tracy. Yes. And Ida says, it's all practice. Yes. Timothy says, yep, never thought of it that way. Good point. Thanks, Timothy. And Laura says, yes, this is helpful. Thanks for all of you who are joining me live. Ida, Lisa, Cassania, Tracy, Suban, Linda, Caroline, Captain, Michelle, Laura. So thank you all so much for joining me and I encourage you to go forward and make your next impression because you have an unlimited number of opportunities and there's an article that I'll attach this later but I'll end with this. The reality of the universe is abundance. The reality of this life is abundance. The reality of your creativity is unlimited, okay? So with the internet, you basically have unlimited numbers of people you can reach. You said, George, that's not true. There are only seven billion people and only four or five are on the internet. Yeah, I know, but for all intents and purposes, you're not even gonna reach. Most of us aren't even gonna reach 10 million people in our lifetime. I mean, God, if you didn't even reach 100,000 people, you're already probably a New York Times bestseller but it doesn't matter. I have reached probably, my guess would be something like 50,000 people in my lifetime. That's how many people I've reached. Probably 49,000 of those were bad first impressions or 49,500 were bad first impressions but some of them kept coming back again and again just over the years they hear about me because I keep going, I keep on staying out there. So remember, there are probably 10 million people for you out there on the internet. They're like, would probably enjoy your creations, probably 10 million and you would be lucky to even reach a million of them in your lifetime. No matter how hard you try with all the Facebook ads you do, Google ads, whatever partnerships you do, you'll be lucky to reach a million people out of the 10 million who would love you. So don't be afraid to make bad first because there are no bad first impressions. There are only impressions that you need to keep making and becoming more excellent at. All right, be well and go for it. Take care.