Why You Hate Being on Video (And What’s Really Going On)

Why do humans hate the way they look on camera so much?

In this episode of The Human Experiment, Sharon unpacks one of the strangest contradictions of modern life: we want growth, visibility, influence, and connection… but we often want all of it without the discomfort of being seen.

This is not really about cameras.

It is about identity, self-worth, fear of judgment, belonging, and the strange psychological mismatch between how we see ourselves and how the world sees us. Sharon explores why humans freeze, overanalyse, re-record, and criticise themselves so harshly on camera — and why women, especially over 40, often carry an even deeper discomfort around visibility. 

Blending personal insight, psychology, behavioural patterns, and practical encouragement, this episode is a warm, honest reminder that confidence usually comes after action, not before. 

In this episode we cover:
• Why humans hate the way they look and sound on camera
• The psychology behind why video can feel emotionally “wrong”
• The mere exposure effect and why unfamiliar versions of ourselves feel uncomfortable
• Why women over 40 often carry deeper discontent around visibility
• The contradiction between wanting growth and avoiding cringe
• How being on camera activates deeper fears around worth, judgment, and belonging
• Why humans were never designed to watch themselves this much
• The subtle ways women apologise for existing before they even speak
• The role of social rejection, tribal wiring, and nervous system fear
• Why authenticity matters more than polish
• The line between helpful AI polish and losing yourself completely
• Why confidence is built through exposure, not perfection
• Sharon’s practical experiment to help you feel better on camera 

Key insights:
• Humans prefer what feels familiar, not necessarily what is true
• Camera discomfort is often about identity and self-worth, not appearance
• Perfectionism quietly kills growth
• People connect more deeply with humanity than polish
• Confidence comes from doing the thing enough times to realise you can survive it
• You do not need to feel ready before you begin 

Mentioned in this episode:
• Tribes by Seth Godin 
• Faada Freddy - Senegalese singer

🎧 Listen now wherever you get your podcasts
https://www.sharonfrancisco.com/podcast

Connect with me on LinkedIn and Facebook
 Questions for the podcast? hello@sharonfrancisco.com

---
👉  Also: The Entrepreneurial Bookkeeper — grow your business without sacrificing your health: sharonfrancisco.com/program

Connect with me on LinkedIn, Facebook.

Have a question for the podcast? Email hello@sharonfrancisco.com

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Hello and welcome back to the Sharon Francisco show. As you know, I am doing a series called The Human Experiment. And today I'm going to be talking about why humans hate the way they look on camera. Now, as you know, a while back I read a book about irrational human behavior. And ever since then, I haven't been able to stop noticing the strange contradictions humans live inside of every day. And today, this one absolutely fascinates me because I've been the one behind the camera freaking out too. And I've worked very, very hard at not letting that own me. And I'm going to share a little bit of insight into what I've learned about this over the years. And hopefully this will help you if you have a business or if you need to get on cameras more often. Either the, you know, getting photos or going and booking yourself a photo shoot for your website or shooting videos for reels or whatever for Instagram, Facebook, or what have you. Why do humans hate the way they look on camera so much? Well, because the reaction people have to seeing themselves on video is honestly quite extreme when you think about it. People tend to freeze, they panic, they re-record like 47 times, they analyze their face like a forensic investigator. And we obsess, obsess over one weird angle or how we might look. We'll hear our own voice and immediately think, oh, I just want to disappear into the earth forever. And if you can relate, I think you'll enjoy this episode. Women tend to especially seem to carry this real deep discontent around visibility, particularly women over around 40. And the reason why I think is because we weren't born with a telephone in our hand. We didn't grow up filming ourselves constantly, and we didn't spend our teenage years talking into in front of cameras. Most of us grew up in a world where there was still some privacy, which I think is why we find it so tricky to have ourselves out on social media and be uh having our lives so exposed. Just that level of anonymity that perhaps isn't so much now. You could just be good at your job back in the day. You didn't necessarily have to become become a personality or a brand or content. And suddenly humans are expected to film themselves, market themselves, position themselves, watch themselves back, compare themselves, and somehow still feel natural while they're doing it. Which honestly is psychologically bizarre when you stop and think about it. And I notice this myself too, as I said, I still sometimes record things and think, oh my goodness, is that really me? Do I really look like that or sound like that? That's why I never listen to these podcasts back because I just think, you know what? This is me. This took me a long time to get to this stage, though, I've got to tell you. So this isn't coming from a place of me being an expert in this area by any stretch of the imagination. I'm just genuinely fascinated about this. And I want to help women get in front of the camera more, even if it's just for a photo shoot for your website and just feel fantastic in your own skin when you're getting those photos done. Or if you really want to start, you know, doing more reels and posting more regularly, and maybe even starting your own podcast one day. And I just think humans are fascinating and I love researching this sort of stuff. And I read a lot of books in this area. So humans were never designed to watch themselves this much. I honestly think part of the problem is humans were never designed to see themselves so constantly. For most of human history, we barely saw ourselves. You might catch your reflection in a mirror occasionally, or maybe a photograph every now and again. Do you remember? I'd I often think about this. We had those like little throwaway cameras, or sometimes just regular cameras, where we'd take the film out, we'd take it, you know, in my case, we used to take it to the chemist. And by the time you finished your, you know, year 12 or your 24 or your 36, and those are who are my age will know what I'm talking about. That took a few months, sometimes a year or so. Then you'd go and you'd put it in to get it developed. And then that took, you know, two or three or four weeks sometimes, then you get them back, and then you realize that you've half of them were blurred and you had your finger in the way. And that was just how we did it. So now humans watch themselves more than any other generation in history. And not just casually either. We're critical, we repeatedly look at it, we're emotional about it. It's like we've all become our own little tiny film directors. And what's fascinating is the version of ourselves that we see on camera often feels emotionally wrong to us. There's actually psychology around this too that I'd like to share. Researchers have talked about this, and it's something called the mere exposure effect. Humans tend to prefer what feels familiar. So when we look in the mirror every day, that becomes the version of ourselves our brain then recognized. But cameras flip things, voices sound different, expressions look unfamiliar. So humans instantly think that doesn't look like me, even though everyone else thinks that literally looks exactly like you, which is kind of hilarious when you think about that. So humans want growth, but we want that growth without the cringe effect. And this is like the contradiction we keep noticing, right? Humans want growth, opportunity, influence, money, connection, respect, all the things that come with obviously growing a business and the things that we we want out of life. But many humans also want to avoid that cringe feeling at all costs. And unfortunately, those two things often collide because visibility can feel exposing. It feels a bit like standing on stage emotionally. You suddenly become aware of yourself in this really strange way. Your voice, your face, your mannerisms, your intelligence, your value, your worth. And it all raises the bigger question underneath all of this. Do I sound intelligent? We think. Am I worth listening to? Who even cares what I think, anyway? What if people judge me? What if I look stupid? These are all the things that go on and certainly have gone on with me in my head before I've tried to get myself out there. That's why this topic actually isn't about cameras at all. It's about our identity, it's about our self-worth. It's about our belonging in the tribe, and it's about our fear of judgment. I remember once telling a speaking coach when I first started trying to get myself out there in 2017, I got myself a speaking coach to learn how to speak more confidently on stages, and obviously with videos and things like that too. And I remember here's a German guy, a lovely, lovely man. And I said to him, Is it normal if I record myself like to do one video like 30 or 40 times? And he said, Is that all? And I remember thinking, oh my goodness, he's just validated the fact that I've just recorded myself over and over and over and still not happy with it. And looking back, he was probably just being nice to me, I suppose. I don't know. But he seemed to genuinely validate the fact that that was a normal thing. And all of a sudden, I felt normal. I thought, oh, this is just part of the process. I've just got to work through this. But weirdly, it kind of did work for me because suddenly I realized, oh, humans do this. This is what's normal. And once I stopped expecting that perfection and getting the video right on the first go, it started to become a little bit easier and easier and easier. And now I still want things to be good, but not perfect. No sort of perfection. I'm not chasing that perfection anymore because perfectionism, I think, is quietly killing that growth that we have. I if I sort of recorded myself 30 or 40 times and thought, oh man, I'm just not good at this. I just can't do it. Give up, go back to my what I did before. But I didn't. I sort of pushed through and was curious enough to ask somebody. He validated it. Then I just kept going until I thought, okay, well, I can, I'll just learn this. The other thing I noticed is women apologize for existing far too often. This is another thing I just can't stop noticing over and over because I do predominantly work with women. And women apologize before filming videos. Women apologize for how they look, how they sound, for their hair, for their lighting, for their age, for the background, for their confidence levels. Honestly, you know what? Sometimes women apologize before they've even said anything. Have you seen that with people? Like women will go, oh, I'm sorry, do you mind? Like that's the first thing that comes out of their mouth. I'm sorry. And I know I've been guilty of this too, but being aware of it is the first thing to changing it. And again, it's fascinating. I remember, and and just remember, as I said, I'm not immune to this. And I'm just as guilty as this as anyone, but I'm trying to become more and more aware of my behavior to not do that. Because capable, intelligent women will sit in meetings, they'll run households, they'll manage businesses, they'll solve so many problems for so many people. The second a camera appears suddenly, it's, oh, I don't like the way that my voice sounds, or I hate the way that my face looks on that, or I look awful, I haven't done my hair, or I can't post that. Behavior tells stories. And I think many women have spent decades learning to observe themselves through imagined judgment. Not necessarily because people are even judging them that harshly, but because humans are deeply tribal creatures. We care enormously about fitting into the tribe. Evolutionary psychologist talks about this a lot. Thousands of years ago, rejection from the tribe genuinely meant it mattered for your survival. So if you were cast out from the tribe, it almost certainly meant death for you. So that's why a lot of our behavior is around this. We feel like if we're we're doing something that doesn't meet people's criteria, we could die. And we know that's logically not true, but that's not what we're talking about. We're not talking about logical stuff, we're talking about emotional stuff, and that's why we fear it. So even now, humans still fear social rejection at the nervous system level. And even if it's logical, we know it's literally just an Instagram story. The nervous system doesn't always care about logic. Humans are emotional before they are rational, and that's why we fear it so much. So the internet has created a very strange world for us people, and especially us women over 40. Also, I also think we're living through a very strange transition period in historically, because it's not the old days anymore, where most humans quietly went through their work, they did their job, they came home, and we stayed relatively anonymous. Those were the days, weren't they? Now humans can build entire careers just from their personal brands, which I think is so cool. And I'm embracing it with open arms because who wants to go back and work for a boss and do stuff for somebody else and make somebody else rich? Let's do it ourselves. Let's build our own brand and start getting our thoughts and our opinions and what we believe is helpful for people in our world and get our voice out there. And this is exciting for some people, but it can be terrifying for others. I get it. There's this really cool book I read years ago by a guy called Seth Godin. He is just a master at marketing. Seth Godin, I'll put the details in the show notes. Um, it's called Tribes. I remember, it's funny when you remember where you were when you read it. I was on a place called Stradbroke Island. My husband Pierre took me over there for a picnic. He always likes to take me places for picnics. And I took this book and I, it's only a small book. And if you do get a chance to read it, it's awesome. It's called Tribes by Seth Godin. Um, it's very tiny and it's a very impactful book. He talked about how now anybody can build an audience. Anybody can lead and anyone can create connections around ideas. And remember, these days, we can build connections globally, not just locally. I remember realizing when I was reading it, oh, maybe I do have something to say. And I kind of, it was back then, it was years ago, it would have been about eight, nine years ago, maybe. And I dared to believe that perhaps one day I could get my voice out there. And goodness gracious, I haven't written a book yet, but that's on the list. But certainly starting this podcast is a big thing and starting to get more presence online is what I've been aiming to do. So getting my voice out there hasn't been easy. And I've had all the critical thoughts, self-critical thoughts that everyone else has, and I've worked hard to try and get over those. I'm not there yet by any stretch of the imagination, but I'm getting closer. And that was a massive shift for me when I thought, you know, I read that book and I thought maybe I do have something to say. And that shift for me was pretty huge because no one is us. There's no other Sharon Francisco, and there's no other you. And I think that's actually what people connect with online now, not perfection, authenticity. It's almost like finding a really good shop where you know the quality will always be solid and predictable. There's a safety net in that consistency, authenticity, familiarity. And honestly, I think humans are getting pretty exhausted by the overpolished content now. It's like the sheen version of a personality, sheen, like you know, that cheap shop online, Sheen. It's like the Sheen version of personality. It looks really impressive initially, you know, when you see them online, you think, oh, that's a pretty dress, and you order it, and goodness gracious, it's never like it looks, is it? But something feels a little bit off underneath. It's a little bit off, that's for sure. Even now, humans are using AI to polish their emails, and I'm one of those, of course, and content and caption and thoughts. And again, as I said, I'm one of those, so there's no judgment with this with anyone. But I do wonder where the line is between improving communication and slowly removing ourselves from um ourselves from it altogether. So we there's none of us in it, it's just all AL, I AI generated content, and there's nothing of us in there, which is just ludicrous, isn't it? Because humans don't actually connect most deeply through perfection, they connect through humanity, and I think there's going to be a big part of this as we move more and more into the AI version of you know, content and videos and even videos now that I saw one this morning um online where you don't even have to do the video yourself. There's an AI bot that looks like you, sounds like you, and speaks like you that you don't even have to do the content yourself. Wow. And I also recently read about um, there's a book by this guy called David Hawkins and his work around consciousness and energy, where he suggests authenticity and truth sit at a far higher energetic frequency than emotional states humans chase externally. And honestly, whether you fully believe in the science or not, it makes sense to me absolutely because humans can feel what's real. You know it in your heart when you meet somebody or you hear something and you go, that feels a little bit off. And we know it, we can feel it. And you know, AI is going to get better and better. And I think the more us we can be in this whole transition, the better it's going to be because the more now we're sort of chasing, oh, that's going to make life so much easier. And AI can do this, and AI can do that. I think there will be a turning point with this at some point where people go, I just want to be, I just want to hear a human. I just want to hear that imperfection. So confidence is built through exposure. I think this is the part where humans hate hearing this. Confidence usually comes after action. Doing is the key, not before. Humans often think I'll do the video once I feel confident or I look better, or I get my hair done, or I get my eyelashes done, or whatever's after I'll get the video done once. But confidence tends to come from surviving the things, thing repeatedly and realizing, oh, I didn't die doing that, or I didn't get completely humiliated. That's really what exposure therapy is psychologically. Gradually teaching the nervous system, this is safe now. I can do this. And eventually something will start to shift. You stop obsessing over yourself so much, and you stop watching every video back 19 times to make sure that it looks okay. You stop, that's one thing that I don't do now. I never watch my videos back now because you know what? It is what it is. But it took me ages to get there, I've got to tell you. And that's it. Practice. You've got to have that exposure therapy where you do it over and over and over again. And it doesn't matter if you don't post the first ones to begin with, just keep doing it and doing it, doing it until you start feeling comfortable just talking on an iPhone into a video, and then you've you've done it and you do it enough, and it feels great. You stop treating every piece of content like a performance review of your worth as a human. And honestly, you become so much more freer when you do that. Not perfect, but just a little bit freer. Because I think humans take themselves a little bit seriously sometimes. A little bit of healthy vanity is probably normal. A certain amount of self-love absolutely matters, but at some points, human humans also need to laugh at themselves a little bit. We can tend to take ourselves a little bit seriously sometimes. Otherwise, we just stay trapped in this self-consciousness forever. And we don't want to do that. And as always, with this uh human experiment, I am going to get you to take some action. So, this is what I encourage you to do. This week's human experiment. The next time you see a camera, so if somebody comes out with a camera to take a picture or a video, put your hand up. Instead of shrinking back, I want you to physically change your posture, how you're standing. This is what I do. Whenever I see somebody taking a picture or getting a camera out, I literally put my shoulders back, put my hands on my hips, turn sideways and smile. And do you know the first time I did that, I thought, oh, Sharon, really? And now I just do it subconsciously. And the way I feel is it's just incredible. And do you know what the best thing is about it? It rubs off on other women. When you do it, they're like, oh, what do you what do you do that for? I remember clearly when I met my now husband's sister for the first time, and we're at this concert. A Fadar Freddy, if you've never heard of Fadar Freddy, he's such a cool singer. Well, he's not a singer, he's a he doesn't have any uh any musical instruments. He does everything with his his voice, and he does all this amazing instrumental stuff with his own sort of uh voice and the way he hits his test. He's it's incredible. I will put his details in the show notes so you can have a listen to it. So we were seeing this show in France, and my husband got out his phone to take a picture of uh his sister and I, and I just stopped straight away, put my hands on my hips, turned sideways, and put my shoulders back and smiled. And she looked at me like, because French women have come across very confidently, she looked at me like, really? You do that? I'm like, Yes, I do, you do it too. And she did, and now she does it. It's so cool. So it's pretty fun. So if you give this, if you see a camera and if you give it a go, see how it makes you feel and see if it rubs off on other women. So, yeah, so that's that's today's experiment. I'd love you to give it a go. And I would love, if you're open to it, to send your picture or video through to me on Sharon at Sharonfrancisco.com. I would love to hear from you to see how you went with the experiment. Hopefully, today's podcast has been helpful. If you've got any questions, of course, feel free to reach out. And until next time, talk to you soon. Bye.