I've been lucky to have befriended some terrific people who just by being in their presence have inspired me to strive for more self improvement and motivation. I mention many of these in detail in my book. One of them is named Trevor.

About 20 years ago I was sitting in the Wild Horse Truck Stop in the town of Barstow, on the highway between Los Angeles and Las Vegas. I was on a 7 week climbing trip around the USA with my two friends, Ken and Trevor. Now Trevor’s a very enthusiastic, excitable sort of person. He has the enthusiasm of an eight year old on Christmas morning and a never ending inquisitiveness. This is matched by an eagerness to ask why?

So we’re sitting there in the diner and in walk two highway patrol cops, with shiny sheriff badges and big guns on their sides. Trevor says "It’s just like you see on TV. I’m going to ask them if I can have look at their guns." I jumped in, "No way Trevor you can’t do that." Trevor asked why?? And I said, "You just don't do that sort of thing." It took a millisecond for Trevor to ignore my lame answer and lean towards the officers to begin a charm offensive. His outstretched hand led the charge. In his best Australian accent he caught them off guard, "Gidday, I’m Trevor from Australia, can I have a look at your guns?" Well by now I'm cringing, expecting these guys to spread eagle Trevor across the bar and provide him with a closer look at their guns than Trevor had bragained for. They said, "You say your name's Trevor, from Aust-ra-lia, hey my sister’s been to Australia, what part? ... Brisbane, heck, my sister’s been to Brisbane. Yeah sure you can look at my gun!"

To cut a long story short, the police gave us the grand tour of their guns, their cars, their police station, their seized machine guns, their police dogs and their town of Barstow. If I had stopped my mate Trevor asking what I thought was a dumb question, I would have missed out on what was one of the best hours of my life. I’m really passionate about this because I’ve seen wonderful things happen to people who weren’t afraid to ask, where had it been left to me, we would have missed out simply because I was the only one who thought it was a dumb question.

Please quote me on this one: There is no such thing as a dumb question. Once you accept this and start practising it you will find it is like casting off manacles that have been holding you back your whole life. This one thing, above all else, has helped me to overcome shyness. Self improvement and motivation are natural by products.

A few things are for sure here:

1. If you don’t ask it’ll never happen anyway or as I like saying It's amazing what you don't get when you don't ask

2. The worst thing that can happen is people can say No ... ahh! That word that scared me for so long but when I actually stopped and thought about it, never once have I started to bleed or been cursed with a rare disease. Funny that. Why are we afraid of that little word?

3. You can’t know everything. It's ok not to know everything. It’s ok to be a beginner. (I'll tell you a great story about this in another article)

Now I actually make a point of asking dumb questions now and I have become a bit of an expert at it. My life is so much better for it now. I’ll let you in on a really good tip that I’ve learnt from asking lots and lots of these “dumb” questions:

Next time you want to ask a question but feel embarrassed, just preface it with this

You’re going to think I’m a bit stupid asking this - PAUSE - but I’m going to ask it anyway

What this does is it immediately makes the person you are asking feel empathy for you; they remember the times they have felt the same way and they will probably say something like this, "Oh no, go on, ask me." So now you’ve turned the situation around to them wanting you to ask the question. That put's you in such a good position. So don't waste the opportunity, launch in and ask the question. Remember the worst thing that can happen is they will say no.

I want to help you overcome shyness but you need to start setting yourself challenges, small ones, today. This is a great way to achieve self improvement and motivation which will build self confidence which will chip away at those concrete shoes of shyness that are holding you back.