If you’ve watched any of my videos or seen me in person, you know I am very cheerful and have an upbeat personality. But, that doesn’t mean that getting on camera was easy for me, or that I love to do public speaking.

Actually, I’ve always had really bad stage fright. I remember back in 2019, I was going to speak for the first time in front of powerful marketers, sharing my story and what we do in our business.

It had to be done. YET, I was scared! I mean, I was so scared of getting on stage in front of so many people. Especially with so many big names in the crowd…

And of course, “what ifs” started to bombard my brain.

What if I faint?

What if I forget what I want to say?

What if my speech sucks?

What if I don’t get my point across well?

And the list went on…

But I couldn’t back out since it was my good friend Declan Mc’s who had invited me to speak at his live event in Dublin, July 2019. Besides, I had up to 4 months to get ready.

Luckily, I had kept in touch with a public speaking coach who I met at one of Declan’s previous events so I was able to schedule a call with him.

I told him what was up and hired him right there. The plan was to work for 5 weeks straight to prepare me to deliver the best speech ever. My first assignment was: Record yourself as you were presenting in front of the real audience.

I was nervous throughout the entire experience. But I did it and sent it off to him.

He said, “Ivana, you are not bad at all, we just need to structure what you need to say a little better.” And he started to train me on the structure and delivery.

So daily, I would work on what I needed to say, and I practiced everyday for 5 weeks.

Then, on the 7th of July, 2019, I got on that stage. I was nervous a bit, and it was a bit hard to breathe at first… But after the first minute, I started to really enjoy it.

And the first comment I heard from Declan was, we saved the best for the last. You could just imagine the joy I felt.

The point of the story is, if you are constantly in your comfort zone, you are not growing, your business is not growing and you are not living your best life.