You're not being overlooked. You're being quietly disqualified, and you don't even realize it. Welcome back to Speaking with Confidence, the podcast that helps you build the soft skills that lead to real results. Communication, storytelling, public speaking, and showing up with confidence in every conversation that counts. I'm Tim Newman, a recovering college professor turned communication coach, and I'm thrilled to guide you on your journey to becoming a powerful communicator. You think you're being polite. You think you're being professional. You're following all the unspoken rules you picked up to fit in and not make waves, especially early in your career.
Tim Newman [00:00:46]:
But what you're actually doing is training everyone around you to see you as nervous, unsure, and someone who doesn't really belong in the room yet. These aren't obvious, cringy mistakes. They're the subtle, safe habits we adopt because we're terrified of looking arrogant or confrontational. I see it all the time with interns, new grads, and young professionals. You use these behaviors as a shield to avoid conflict or disapproval, but the shield is made of tissue paper. It doesn't protect you. It just erodes your authority bit by bit, meeting by meeting. The result is you feel like an imposter, and worse, you start to look like one.
Tim Newman [00:01:31]:
Your voice gets smaller, your ideas get prefaced with apologies, and you physically make yourself take up less space. So we're going to dissect seven of these safe habits. Why they completely backfire on you and to do instead. This isn't about becoming aggressive or arrogant. It's about finally stopping the behaviors that make you apologize for simply having a voice and a thought. The first habit is all about the verbal tics that signal before you've even said anything, a substance that you expect to be a burden. It's starting your sentence with I'm sorry, but or this might be a stupid question, but or the classic quick question when you slide in someone's DMs, and on the back end, it's finishing your thought with does that make sense? Or you know what I mean. We do this because we're trying to soften our entry into a conversation.
Tim Newman [00:02:26]:
We think we're being considerate, making ourselves seem less confrontational or demanding. But here's what it actually communicates to the person listening. That opening sorry or disclaimer says, I'm not sure I should be speaking right now. That trailing does that make sense? Says I doubt my own clarity, so I need you to validate that I'm not an idiot. You're handing them a megaphone and asking them to announce your insecurities for you. The psychological effect on the listener is immediate. You train them to question your competence before you've even made your point. You frame your contribution as a potential problem they have to solve instead of a value they actually get to receive.
Tim Newman [00:03:08]:
The fix is to state your intention plainly, but without the cushion. Replace Sorry to bother you. Do you have a second? With Hey, I need five minutes to run something by you. Replace this might be wrong, but with here's what I'm thinking and kill does that make sense? Dead. Instead, use a confident pause. There we go again, the power of the pause. Let the silence sit for a beat after you finish speaking. If you need to hand the conversation back to them, ask what are your thoughts? Or how does that land with you? This isn't about being rude or blunt.
Tim Newman [00:03:52]:
It's about assuming from the very first word that your contribution has value and it doesn't require a preemptive apology from existing. The next habit has two sides, and they're two sides of the same insecure coin. You either sound unsure of yourself or you try way too hard to sound smart. And both have the same root cause. The first side is upspeak. Remember, I talked about this a couple weeks ago, and that's the rising inflection at the end of the sentences that make every statement sound like a question. You know what I'm talking about. It turns the report is due Friday into the report is due Friday.
Tim Newman [00:04:34]:
It's a vocal plea for validation, a constant check in to see if the listener is still with you and still approves. The other side is what I call the expert facade. This is when you hide behind jargon and complex language. You use a $5 word when a $1 word would do the job so much better. And you basically violate the eighth grade rule, which is that if you can't explain your idea to an eighth grader, you don't understand it well enough yourself. We use upspeak because we're seeking approval in real time. We're scared of the finality of a period. We use jargon because we think perceived intelligence will mask our underlying insecurity.
Tim Newman [00:05:19]:
We want to sound like we belong in the room with the experts. But what both of these communicate is a lack of conviction and a deep fear of being seen as simple or wrong. Upspeak tells people you're not certain of your own facts. The expert facade tells people you're more concerned with sounding smart than being understood, which is a huge red flag. The fix for up speak is mechanical at first, you have to practice ending your sentences with a period, not a question mark. In your low stakes conversations, talk to your dog, your roommate, your family, and start consciously dropping your pitch at the end of a sentence. Make it sound final. The fix for the jargon addiction is to apply that 8th grade filter.
Tim Newman [00:06:10]:
Before you speak, especially about a complex topic, ask yourself, how would I explain this to a 14 year old? If you can't simplify it, you don't own the idea yet. And that's why you're not confident. Real confidence isn't complexity, it's clarity. Simple, clear language that comes from a place of true understanding is unshakeable, and people will lean in to listen to it every single time. Now let's talk about the body language of submission. Because your voice can say one thing, but your posture screams something completely different. This is all about making yourself small and agreeing too much. And it comes in two classic forms.
Tim Newman [00:06:52]:
First, you've got the invisible man posture. That's when you're hunched over, your shoulders rolled forward, arms crossed or tucked in, literally trying to take up as little physical space as possible. You're trying not to be too much and not to intrude. Then you've got the nervous nod. That's the rapid, constant head bobbing you do while someone else is talking, like a dashboard ornament in a car going over gravel. You think it shows you're engaged and an active listener. We do both of these because we're trying to be non threatening and show we're compliant, easy to work with team players. But here's the brutal translation.
Tim Newman [00:07:31]:
The invisible man stance communicates my physical presence. Here is an intrusion that I need to minimize. And the nervous nod screams, I agree with everything you're saying because I desperately need your approval. And I'm afraid of the silence if I stop moving. It's your body physically manifesting that don't screw this up voice in your head. The fix is to start owning your physical space. Deliberately sit or stand with your shoulders back, not pinned. Your ears.
Tim Newman [00:08:01]:
Uncross your arms. If you're at a table, rest your forearms on it. Take up the room your chair is meant for. For listening. You need to kill the bobblehead. Nod slowly and only when you genuinely agree with a point or truly understand a complex idea. Your silent, still focused attention is infinitely more powerful and and reads as more confident than frantic. Universal agreement, it says.
Tim Newman [00:08:28]:
You're processing, not just pandering. And the final habit is entirely mental. And it might be the one that steals more of your voice. Than any other. It's the rehearsal loop. You're in a meeting, someone makes a point and you think of a response. But instead of saying it, you start mentally editing it. You search for the perfect phrase, the flawless data point, the exact moment to jump in.
Tim Newman [00:08:56]:
And while you're running through that draft number four in your head, the conversation moves on and the moment is gone. You are waiting for the perfect entry point, the polished way to phrase it, and you missed your window. This ties directly into the myth that confidence comes from perfect practice. We do this because we're terrified of saying it wrong, of that micro moment of failure where our idea comes out as messy. But what this habit communicates is that your contribution isn't worth the risk of a slightly imperfect delivery. You're telling yourself your thought only has value if it's perfectly packaged. And here's the brutal truth, and I've seen it proven again and again, and it connects back to a simple idea. Confidence is built by speaking, not by rehearsing in your head.
Tim Newman [00:09:46]:
You cannot think your way into being a confident speaker. You have to actually speak. So the fix is to give yourself a three second rule. When you have a relevant thought, you have three seconds to jump into the conversation. It doesn't have to be elegant. You can start with just to build on that or the one thing I'm thinking is your goal isn't to deliver a flawless monologue. It's to make a genuine contribution. A messy point offered to the room is worth 10 perfect points stuck in your head because one of them moves the conversation forward and the others just simply vanish.
Tim Newman [00:10:24]:
All these habits are a security blanket. They feel safe in the moment, like you're following the rules, but they're quietly holding you back. You don't have to tackle all seven at once. That's really kind of a recipe for feeling overwhelmed and fake. Your job this week is simple. Look back at these seven habits and pick the one you saw yourself in the most. The one that made you nod and think, yep, that's me. But just one.
Tim Newman [00:10:51]:
Your challenge is to kill that single habit in your next meeting or important conversation. Once you notice what happens, you'll feel a jolt of anxiety when you don't say sorry, or when you stop nodding or when you speak up in that three second window. And then you'll realize that the world didn't end, the person kept listening, and your point probably landed more clearly than ever. Confidence is built one broken habit at a time. It's the decision to stop acting like you need permission to be in the room. But for now, remember, just pick one and break it and watch how people start to listen to you differently. That's all for today. Remember, we're looking for progress, not perfection.
Tim Newman [00:11:39]:
Be sure to visit speakingwithconfidencepodcast.com to get your free eBook, the Top 21 Challenges for Public Speakers and How to Overcome Them. You can also register for the Formula for Public Speaking course. Always remember, your voice has the power to change the world. We'll talk to you next time. Take care.
