I recently came across a YouTube short by content creator Christi Newrutzen that resonated with me. In it, she says: “Do it messy. Do it scared. Do it unprepared.”

For much of my career, I’ve been responsible for creating content on social media. A decent part of that role has been supporting team members in creating content too. Those conversations can follow a similar path – there’s an exciting idea brought forward, we might shape it together, tighten the writing, clarify the message, and work towards completing the final draft.

Christi’s quote got me thinking about how somewhere between the last review and clicking *Post* sometimes the conversation with the content author shifts: “I don’t know if this is good enough. Should I re-write…?” or “What if people think I’m trying too hard?” or “I don’t want to sound like I think I know everything.”

We want to be confident without sounding self-important. We want to share what we know without sounding like we think we know everything. We want to contribute something meaningful without feeling like we’re simply drawing attention to ourselves.

It’s a strange tension, and one that seems to catch almost everyone. Including me! Which feels a little ironic, considering writing and posting content is literally part of my job.

Every time I press “Publish,” there’s still a tiny voice that wonders whether this one will miss the mark. Whether it’s saying too much, or not enough. Whether people will scroll past it without a second thought.

What’s interesting is I’ve had these conversations with people at every stage of their careers: someone publishing their very first LinkedIn post, a consultant sharing niche expertise, executives with years of knowledge and real-world experience, or subject matter experts who’ve forgotten more than I’ll ever know 😉. The feeling really doesn’t discriminate.

I think many of us believe that unshakable confidence is something we eventually earn; something that solidifies in us and is inevitable. And that if we become experienced enough, accomplished enough, or successful enough, we’ll stop second-guessing ourselves or feeling exposed when we share an idea, speak up in a meeting, or try something new.

But I don’t think that’s exactly what experience gives us. I think experience gives us evidence that we’ve felt uncertain in the past, that we’ve had our finger hovering over “Send” while we’ve questioned ourselves… and we did it anyway. That’s a very different kind of confidence.

Christi shares another line in her video that has stayed with me just as much as the first: “Embarrassment is your birthright as a human being. No one is immune.”

We often mistake confidence for certainty. We assume that because someone is experienced, presenting with ease, or leading a room, they must no longer wrestle with self-doubt.

But I wonder how differently we’d lead – and how much more grace we’d extend to ourselves and others – if we remembered that confidence and vulnerability aren’t mutually exclusive. They often exist at the same time.

What if confidence isn’t the absence of vulnerability, but the willingness to move forward alongside it? I’ve stopped waiting for the day pressing “Publish” feels effortless (I don’t think that day is coming!) and maybe that’s okay. Maybe the confidence isn’t in knowing you won’t feel vulnerable, but it’s in knowing you’ve been vulnerable before, and you’ve done great work anyway.