Shoulda, coulda, woulda

SHOULDA, COULDA, WOULDA

Several years ago, I was asked to be a guest on a local business radio show. It was hosted by two highly respected women in the business community, and every night they welcomed executives and local business leaders onto their show.

I was, admittedly, nervous about going on air. I’d never done radio, so my former life in newspapers and magazines didn’t help. At all. Not even a little bit. But, facing challenges big and small is par for the course for a business owner, so I chalked it up to one more thing I’d force myself to face and, eventually, overcome.

I figured it would be like facing my fear of QuickBooks.

The show itself was meant to introduce listeners to a local business (which was my category), an emerging industry, or a newsworthy person. As you can imagine, it wasn’t generally intended to be highly charged with controversy or conversation that’s too difficult. It’s friendly banter between hosts and guests, with a little education thrown in for good measure.

Imagine my surprise when the host of the show was this close to grilling me.

“Why do you think you can charge so much? I don’t think I’d pay that much for assistant services.”

“Who would pay for such a service?”

“I don’t think I’d be able to trust someone else to manage my marketing processes and business administration tasks. Where’s the confidentiality?”

“How do you know who’s really in business in this industry? Are you incorporated as a company?”

Don’t get me wrong. These are all good, legitimate questions. In fact, I happily discuss this stuff with people all the time. I just don’t talk about these things in 10-second sound bites, with someone sitting across from me giving frantic “Wrap it up!” “Finish your sentence!” “Stop talking RIGHT NOW!” signals.

Turns out, my natural need to think before I speak and my tendency to talk too fast when I’m nervous makes me a crappy candidate for radio.

After the interview, I drove back to my office with the same three words screaming at me. “You shoulda said this!” “You coulda said that!” “If you woulda said this, it would have better explained that!”

Shoulda. Coulda. Woulda.

Three words I hate. By their very nature, there’s absolutely nothing you can do about shoulda, coulda, woulda. They remind us that an opportunity just passed us by. They infuriate the perfectionist in all of us, and they haunt even the most confident among us. There are entire bookstore sections dedicated to avoiding the shoulda, coulda, woulda … it’s called the self-help section.

How many arguments have we won in the shoulda-coulda-woulda dialog we’ve had with ourselves after a fight?

All things being equal, the interview I did actually went fine. In fact, the perceived “grilling” was probably mostly in my own head and, if you were to listen to it now, you’d probably think, “It’s fine.”

But, that’s just it. It’s fine. Not good. Not great.

Just…fine.

That’s the problem with shoulda, coulda, woulda. It results in “It’s just fine.” Greatness is not achieved with “just fine.”

In fact, I was so annoyed with myself that I accepted an invitation to be on another radio show a few weeks later, just to see if I could overcome the shoulda, coulda, woulda that evidently arises when I do a live interview. When the day came, I walked into the studio with my talking points rehearsed, determined to think fast and talk slow, say what I mean in 15 words or less, and end each sentence before the “wrap it up” signal.

Nope. Still not cut out for radio.

I once again caught myself thinking slow and talking fast, rambling when I didn’t need to, and making the guy in the booth give me an “Any time now…” signal every few minutes. More to the point, I again wandered away thinking about all the things I should have, could have, and would have said given a second chance.

Every so often, things arise that require you to act before you think, and shoulda, coulda, woulda sneaks up on you, taunting and torturing you. But I also think it does have its purpose; it’s an extremely effective reminder to not be afraid to grab opportunities by the horns, if for no other reason than to spite the shoulda-coulda-woulda voice in all of us.

If I’m ever asked to do a live interview again, I plan to be more preemptive. I should be OK with the fact that broadcast will never by my gift, then I could save myself from my self-imposed post-interview chastising, and I would be a lot happier.