316: One room changes *everything*

So if we rewind to the first event I ever went to, the first business event I ever went to, it was in 2016.

I was one year into my business and back then I was a journalist and social media manager.

And I just remember seeing people on Twitter being like, oh yeah, you need to go networking.

So I found one in Bristol and I remember driving to Bristol thinking, what the fuck, how is this gonna work? What are people gonna ask me? Am I gonna get judged? Are people gonna pick apart my business? How do I introduce myself? What the fuck is a 60 second pitch? Like I had no idea about any of it.

And I remember I rocked up and I parked outside and I walked in and said, can I have a flat white, please? And we then had to do like this round table, 60 second pitch.

I was shaking.

Like I could feel my fucking heart racing because I was like, I haven't, I haven't done one of these before.

Like, what do you say? What's, what's the quote unquote right thing to say? What if somebody thinks that I just look like I haven't got a fucking clue what I'm talking about? What if somebody, you know, calls me out and says, well, you're not really a business owner.

You've only been playing it like social media and journalism for like a year.

like get out you're not worthy of being in the room I had every single fear going that you could probably imagine then it came to my name and they said Tara tell us about what you do I was like oh I just do you know equestrian social media and I'm an equine journalist the remaining 55 seconds I was just like uh I have nothing else to say because I didn't know at that time who I was what I stood for I didn't know about bringing your own personality into your pitch You know, I met a guy last week who's Italian and I said, tell me Steph, what do you do? And he was like, I like making pizza.

Now that is so much more memorable than I have an IT company.

Then we got chatting about Italy and pizza and all the good stuff.

But back then I didn't realize that I could bring my own personality.

into my 60 second pitch.

So nobody probably remembered that pitch.

Nobody probably remembers me from the room because I didn't have my own energy.

I wasn't in my own personality.

I wasn't being high vibe and sparkly.

I was this full of self doubt, monotone, shy human that was just like, I do equine journalism and social media management and I live in the Cotswolds.

People were like, huh? Like it was awful, but I survived.

Now at that first networking event, I met two people.

Number one, I met a website designer.

She was called Amy and she was just really cool.

Like she had this vibey personality.

She had a web design company with her husband, Rich, and honestly I just hit it off with them.