What could change if you became a little more willing to put yourself out there?

My guest on this episode of Leading You, Nick Bendel, set himself an unusual challenge: to have lunch with 500 complete strangers.

For an introvert who preferred staying home with a book and a cup of tea, it wasn’t the most obvious choice. But after starting a business, Nick realised that if he wanted different results, he needed to become more willing to connect, initiate and put himself out there.

What began as a networking experiment became something much bigger.

Over six years and 500+ lunches, Nick built an extraordinary network, developed greater confidence and discovered the power of what he calls social courage – taking action even when you don’t feel completely ready and despite the possibility of rejection, judgement or embarrassment.

We talk about why social courage is like a muscle, why confidence often comes after taking action, and what happened when around 95% of Nick’s lunch invitations received no response.

But perhaps the biggest change wasn’t his network. It was Nick himself.

He became more proactive, more willing to ask and more prepared to create opportunities rather than wait for them.

In this episode, we explore:

• Why an introvert decided to have lunch with 500 strangers
• What social courage is and how we can develop it
• Why confidence often follows action
• How repeated exposure changes our relationship with rejection
• Why we reject ourselves before giving other people the opportunity to say yes
• How curiosity creates more meaningful conversations
• Why small, sustainable actions can create significant change
• The increasing value of human skills in an AI-driven world
• How social courage can strengthen leadership, connection and opportunity

You don’t need to start with 500 lunches.
You simply need to begin.