The only way to overcome fear is to do the thing you fear to do!

On Friday evening I compered a charity Fashion Show organised by Marks and Spencer at the Marriott Hotel in Leicester, close to the M & S Fosse Park Store. It was a great event and I hope that all 300 guests enjoyed their evening of entertainment in aid of a local arthritis charity called CLASH as much as I did.

But it was a fashion show with a difference. None of the models were professionals as all the models – men and women - were employees of M & S, and the child models were children of staff members. One of the children, ten year old Joel Whitfield, even performed a dance solo. He was good enough to be an aspiring Billy Elliot. They all did a splendid job!

For the last eight weeks, since the idea of a charity fashion show first sprang to mind, each Sunday the volunteer models have been meeting to practise their choreographed routines. I have no doubt that over those weeks their self-confidence grew and grew and on Friday it was their big day. Day-wear, evening-wear, children’s wear – you name it, it was on that catwalk.


At the interval I visited the ladies’ cloakroom to find young female staff members getting dressed in M & S lingerie – the next set of fashions to be modelled. They looked fabulous in their undies but you can imagine their last-minute nerves! Suddenly, what seemed like a good idea last Sunday suddenly hit as reality. They were going to be parading in front of their colleagues – male and female – and 300 guests in next-to-nothing! This was a seriously scary situation!

Anyway, after the interval and the auction and other fund raising activities, it was their turn. Bravely – if looking slightly ashen – they mounted the catwalk and strutted their stuff like true professionals. They were accompanied by some of the young male staff who stripped down to their boxers to much applause from the appreciative, mainly female, audience. I think everyone in that room was full of admiration for their bravery and envy at their gorgeous figures.

Once they had done their first routine, they were relaxed and thoroughly enjoyed it and no doubt their initial nerves were completely diminished as they stepped on to the stage and did the thing they feared to do. And that is the only way to overcome fear. Everyone who appeared in the Fashion Show will never forget that evening and everyone of them will have grown in self-confidence. Brilliant!