The Curiosity Click: Issue 38 - I Used To Think I Hated Selling

Like, I genuinely thought I was just "not a sales person." Not built for it. Too introverted. Too whatever.

But that's not it.

It's the damn playbook

You know the one. The one everyone swears is "proven." The one taught like you have to turn into a hype machine with a ring light and a calendar full of fake urgency.

Countdown timers. "Only 3 spots left." "Doors closing at midnight." The same little digital carnival tricks, over and over, like we're all supposed to pretend we don't see the guy behind the curtain yanking the lever.

And the worst part is the voice.

"I'M SO EXCITED!!!"

Meanwhile you're sitting there staring at your screen like a corpse with Wi-Fi.

I tried that funnel-bro template once. Once. I did the whole "Hey friend!!" thing and the "quick question…" thing and the perfectly timed urgency thing.

It felt like selling used cars.

But worse.

Because at least used cars are real. This was like… digital feelings. Manufactured emotion. Bottled enthusiasm. Christ.

And here's the annoying part: that stuff works sometimes. It does. Which makes you feel even crazier when you can't do it. Because then you start assuming it's a character flaw. Like you're missing a gene. Like everyone else got handed the "be shameless online" chip and you got… whatever you got.

But here's what messed up my whole theory.

The emails that actually sold stuff were never the ones I spent three days perfecting.

They were the throwaway ones. Someone telling a story about getting locked out of their house in socks. Or their kid deleting half a sales page. Or burning dinner while trying to write launch copy.

Just regular human disasters.

And then a PS at the bottom. Something like: anyway, if you're tired of duct-taping your shit together, I made a thing that might help.

That's it.

Those sold better than the polished promo emails.

Which means the whole "I'm bad at selling" thing might just be "I'm bad at pretending."

Selling feels gross when you're using someone else's voice.

Someone else's script.

It's like wearing shoes three sizes too small, then wondering why walking hurts.

If you'd rather eat glass than DM strangers.

If typing "SO excited!!!" makes you want to vomit into your keyboard.

If fake scarcity makes your skin crawl.

Then of course selling feels like shit.

Because you are faking it.

And your body knows it.

That's the whole thing. Everyone treats "sales resistance" like it's some mindset problem. Like you need to work through your blocks. Like you need more confidence.

No. Sometimes you just need to stop doing the embarrassing stuff you don't believe in.

The story thing works because it's the opposite of a billboard.

Billboards yell. Stories just… talk.

They let people lean in instead of getting ambushed.

They show something real, in context, with a little human mess in it. No polished perfection. No fake posture. Just: here's what happened, here's what I noticed, here's what I did.

People don't want perfect.

They want real.

And "real" doesn't mean oversharing your trauma on the internet. It just means you're not doing a performance.

So what does work?

You lead with a story. Not a pitch.

You show one real problem somebody is stuck on. Not forty-seven features.

You invite. You don't corner people.

Even the opening changes.

The usual bad version is that business-robot stuff. "Struggling to grow your list?" "Are you tired of feeling stuck?"

Boring. It's like reading the back of a cereal box.

The better version is something like: my cat stepped on the keyboard and deleted my sales page and it got better.

Why? Because something happened. There's a pulse. There's a human on the other end. I'm paying attention.

Same with the promises.

"Get clarity, confidence, conversions!" makes me want to throw my laptop into traffic.

But "you'll finally know what to say in that promo email" is a real thing. It's specific. It's the actual stuck point. It's what somebody is sitting there staring at at 11:47pm, rewriting the same sentence 14 times like it's going to magically become less embarrassing.

And the call to action doesn't have to be a marching band.

It can be a quiet corner.

No noise.

If your head's spinning, here's one clear next step.

That's it.

People buy from humans they trust. Not perfect people. Not hype machines. Humans.

Which is kind of a relief, if you think about it. Because you don't need to become louder. You don't need to become shinier. You don't need to become a different personality.

You just need to stop pretending.

And if you want something stupidly simple to try this week, do this:

Delete one draft that makes you cringe. Like, the one you keep "tweaking" because you can feel it's fake. Kill it. It's not going to get better.

Then write the next one like you're talking to a friend. Not your audience. Not your niche. A friend. The same tone you'd use if you were sitting there with a drink and they asked, "So what are you working on?"

And send one email that's mostly just a story. No pitch. No hype. Just you being a person. Then tack on a PS with a soft offer, like you're leaving the door open, not setting a trap.

You'll learn more from that than you will from another funnel template.

Because the selling problem isn't you.

It's the costume you've been wearing.

Take it off.

Until Next Time,

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I wrote down the 13 specific traps I hit over 12 years and $50K worth of "solutions" that didn't solve anything.

Not theory. Just the actual patterns that ate years of my life.

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