There’s a particular kind of silence that comes after you do something mortifying in public. It’s not actual silence—cars still pass, people still chatter—but internally, everything goes mute. Your brain pulses with heat. You can feel your own heartbeat in your ears. You stare at the ground, retreat inward, hope invisibility might somehow be an option.
Maybe you said something awkward on a first date and watched the air shift. Maybe you bombed a presentation. Maybe you tried to dance at a wedding and forgot every move. Maybe you posted something on social media that didn’t land the way you thought it would. And now you’re awash in that strange mix of shame and regret, promising yourself: never again.
But I’m here to argue for the opposite. You should do it again. Maybe not that exact thing, but something equally risky. Something with stakes—social, emotional, personal. Because embarrassment, uncomfortable as it is, is not just an occasional tax on living. It’s the cost of entry to a full, engaged life.
We live in a culture obsessed with polish. We curate our personas. We triple-check texts. We rehearse, pre-frame, filter. And to some extent, that’s understandable—we’re human, and we want to be liked. We want to avoid the sting of being seen and judged in a moment of mess.
But what we miss in our effort to avoid embarrassment is what embarrassment represents.
Embarrassment means you cared.
Embarrassment means you tried.
Embarrassment means you showed up.
Think about it: you can’t be embarrassed by something you didn’t put some part of yourself into. You can’t be embarrassed if you never took the mic. Never stepped on the stage. Never asked the question. Never confessed your feelings. Never made the leap.
The people we admire most—artists, athletes, entrepreneurs, activists, lovers—are the ones who routinely court embarrassment. They pitch big ideas that might be laughed out of the room. They sing off-key in early rehearsals. They write messy first drafts. They say “I love you” not knowing if it’ll be returned.
And yes, they fail. Spectacularly, sometimes. They get roasted, rejected, overlooked. But they also grow. They find their people. They land breakthroughs. They become themselves in fuller color.
Because on the other side of embarrassment is confidence, clarity, and real connection. But you don’t get to skip the swamp. You have to wade through the awkward.
Let me tell you a secret about the inner lives of people who seem effortlessly cool: they’ve made peace with embarrassment. They’ve felt it, survived it, and realized it didn’t destroy them. That the world kept turning. That no one is thinking about their mistake as much as they are. That grace is only possible when you first allow yourself to stumble.
Children know this instinctively. They fall down, say weird things, ask big questions. They learn by bumping into the edges. Adults, on the other hand, become allergic to discomfort. We start to believe that dignity requires perfection. But that’s a lie. Dignity comes from integrity, not control. From being real in a world that begs us to be polished.
Embarrassment isn’t failure. It’s feedback. It’s aliveness. It’s evidence that you’re still stretching, not sleepwalking.
There’s this beautiful concept in Japanese aesthetics called wabi-sabi—the beauty of imperfection, of things incomplete and slightly off. The cracked tea cup. The asymmetrical pattern. The weathered wood. We are all wabi-sabi people, whether we admit it or not. Full of quirks, cracks, and glorious flaws.
What would change if you started seeing your embarrassing moments as badges of participation? As proof that you didn’t stay on the sidelines? As brushstrokes on the canvas of a vivid life?
Start the conversation, even if your voice shakes.
Post the poem, even if it’s not perfect.
Wear the outfit, even if it’s “too much.”
Ask the question, even if it feels dumb.
Dance, even if you’re offbeat.
The alternative is emotional paralysis. A life of safe silence. Of staying small to avoid the cringe. And that’s its own kind of humiliation—one you feel at 2am when you realize you’ve let another year go by without letting the world know who you are.
There’s a quote I come back to often, attributed to writer Danielle LaPorte:
“Your new life is going to cost you your old one.”
I’d add:
Your real life is going to cost you your pride.
Your magic is going to cost you your cool.
Your joy is going to cost you your composure.
So pay the toll. Take the hit. Get embarrassed.
It means you’re doing it right.