Quick one:
This newsletter is themed around having the “audacity”.
So, to kick this off, I had the audacity to ask the Atomicon team to let me speak at their event.
And as a result… They gave me a top speaker spot! and an insane deal for you (and me).
If you want a discounted ticket and free access to a meet and greet with me…
they made it possible! Come hang out with me 1:1 on June 16th in Newcastle.
Register here.

The beautiful problem about having high-performing friends is that they don’t let you find excuses for yourself. Ever.

And it’s deeply uncomfortable.

Because it’s easier to deny someone’s thoughts about what you’re doing wrong if they’ve never achieved what you’d like to achieve.

But if you’re around people who’ve done it, it’s hard to think that they’re wrong.

And to be honest, it’s even harder to ask them for advice…they’ll always hold you accountable for following it.

Turns out growth after going 0 to 1 isn’t about learning new things.

It’s about unlearning the stories you’ve been telling yourself to stay the same.

The Audacity to Ask Explained by a Millionaire:

Jodie Cook (Forbes 30u30, Author, Serial entrepreneur) taught me this lesson.

I’ve known Jodie for over 8 years now; she’s essentially seen me go from broke student to becoming an entrepreneur, moving to London and gaining an audience.

When I hit my first 6-figure month, Jodie asked me, “What’s next then?”

And I said to her: “Well, I think I need to get out there more, find new opportunities, make more friends in London… but I’m sure that will come…”

Jodie looks at me straight in the eye and tells me, “No, Lara, you make it happen - you ask for these things.”

But, ladies and gentlemen, the mere thought of asking someone for something made me want to throw up.

We’re talking about the girl who preferred to spend hours on LinkedIn writing content rather than dare to ask anything, ever.

Jodie knew this. So she sat down at my desk, and she pulled a piece of paper out.

Labeled it “audacious asks” and every day for 2 weeks in this sheet of paper, she had 3 boxes I needed to tick.

“3 “audacious,” asks a day - that’s your homework bab”

Back then, it looked like the equivalent of death. Today, I call it micro-dosing failure.

Here’s a list of what those audacious can look like:

And many more similar to the above. Some smaller, some bigger.

But they all had 1 thing in common: I was just waiting for these things to happen.

The audacity to want more and the work ethic to earn it.

At all times, we always want more.

We want more money. We want more success. We want more resources. We want more happiness. We want more of the same but faster.

And what I noticed after going after the audacious asks list is that it’s not that we can’t have whatever we want.

It’s that we need to be ready to back the big ask up with.

One of the big audacious asks on my list was reaching out to Timothy Armoo.

I knew he lived nearby, we had lots of friends in common, including Jodie, he seemed to have similar interests to me and he just seemed cool.

But look, reaching out to a multi-millionaire while I saw myself as a small fish was nerve-racking. Truly.

But I had an “in”.

I’d built my personal brand to be one of the biggest in the UK.
I worked tirelessly for it and my ability to build social-first businesses online.

As a result, he followed me. I knew his content team was aware of me.
And his friends also knew me or of me.

That was my in.

So on a random afternoon, after hours procastinating I wrote “hey timothy - i hear you train at my gym sometimes, would love to catch you whenever you’re around next”

I sent the text and threw my phone into my bed - I was 100% he’d say no.

“He’s busy Lara” “He’s got better things to do”. I told myself to prepare for the upcoming rejection.

10 minutes later, he said yes let’s meet at 4:30 on Thursday.

A single ask I’d been avoiding for months turned out to be as simple as sending a message on LinkedIn…

We are always one message away from a desired outcome.

Long story short - Today, Timo is one of my best friends.

Without being dramatic, I can categorically say my life has become 100x better since being around him. He embodies what this newsletter is about.

Audacity and becoming an undeniable entrepreneur.

I actually asked Timo why we ended up being a great duo…

Something you’ll find with successful people is that they’re always seeking ways to gain momentum, velocity, and speed. This is done through people, not just actions.

And a BIG reason why working on who you are, not just what you’re building ends up being an unfair advantage and a token to successfully go for an audacious ask.

And a note from me:

What a privilege it was to have someone to push me out of my comfort zone and people who let me prove to myself that in reality, nothing is ever that deep.

Building The Audacity Muscle.

In my head, being able to ask for bigger things had to be a mere result of effort.

“I need to get to 100k followers to prove my worth”
“I need to never ask for help to show how good I am”
“I’m too much or too direct if I go for it unprepared.”

But then I saw what people were doing who were categorically “less” prepared.

I hesitated while they acted.

They weren’t better, but they moved forward despite any uncertainty.

Didn’t ask for permission, they created it by doing, by moving, by winning.

If you believe:

“I’m not ready” → you hesitate → no results → belief confirmed

If you believe:

“I deserve this” → you act → opportunities increase → belief reinforced

You do things faster.

My next on the list for my audacious asks was to drop a $15,000 offer which was frankly very similar to my $999 offers but with a lot more time with me.

Ideally, for busy CEOs and Entrepreneurs who didn’t have the time to go through my programmes which can be time-intensive.

So one day while I doubted myself, my COO “Lara you have what it takes and more, these people [our competitors] sell air, you have more testimonials than anyone in our industry.”

But I still thought they were better than me.

Despite the fear, I launched the offer. 1 email.

We closed 5 clients in a week.

I gave myself 2 days to build the offer.
One day to ship it to our list.

The rest took care of itself.

But a thing worth mentioning here is that…

I had the skills. I had the warm list. I had the tools.

Work ethic is essential for these things to “happen”. The myth of the overnight success is that on paper these things look simple, and they are in essence.

But they require consistency. They require proof.

They require you to have done the reps before you make the ask.

Audacity doesn’t come first. Because the muscle of it is built on evidence.

Not perfect evidence. Not “I’m the best in the world” evidence.

Just enough proof that you’re not starting from zero.

A habit that never died:

It’s been 3+ years since Jodie gave me the audacious ask routine.

I haven’t stopped since. When I see an opportunity, I go for it.

I’ve known about Atomicon for a few years now. This year's lineup includes Daniel Priestley, Timothy Armoo, Jamie Lang… and now also… Me 😉

320k followers and I STILL face rejections… but it’s fine.

Because I figured out what strings to pull. I made myself SO visible to their network, my ask became undeniable.

Because if you never quit trying, you truly cannot lose.

Find what you want, find ways into it… win.

Like my friend Timo says… “winners always win. So go win.”

So, ladies and gentlemen, if you want to come to Atomicon and see the fruits of audacious asking… join me in Newcastle June 16th for an amazing 2 day event.

Grab your discounted ticket here.

Big shoutout to Jodie Cook for having the most delusional belief in me, to Timo Armoo for amplifying it and to people like Andrew who allow me to (shamelessly) try.

That’s literally it for today, this lesson is set to prepare you for next weeks newsletter on “Vertical Stacking” being the best business playbook I found (read here).

Thanks for reading.

Love you.

PS: What audacious ask are you going after this week? Reply to this email with it! Make it happen!