It came to me when I was bending down in the middle of a room holding something that resembled a spoutless teapot.

Furtively I looked up to survey the scene. I saw a middle-aged man skipping. There was a lady pretending to ski a slalom and a young man walking around with exaggerated strides doing an impression of John Cleese’s silly walk.

In the midst of this outtake from One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest, I appreciated the value of a personal trainer.

If you have someone standing next to you counting while you are striving to execute absurd contortions in public, you feel less embarrassed by actions that otherwise would properly attract the attention of concerned helping professionals. Embarrassment is the enemy of progression.

It is dangerous to over-extrapolate the characteristics of successful people, thinking that by imitating what we perceive to be their secrets for success, that we, too, will enjoy an uptick in our career fortunes.

On the other hand, it does seem that many successful people appear to have become the master of their embarrassment, or for some of these stars, embarrassment has never figured prominently in their search results.

I think it is incontrovertibly true that no one would ever consider trashing a world recognised brand name complete with a distinctive logo, and replace it with the letter X. Elon Musk who has done just that to the social media app formerly known as Twitter does not appear in the least embarrassed by this move.

Prince, aka the musical artist formerly known as a symbol, appeared to have been similarly immunised from embarrassment. Indeed, it is a rule of celebrity that one must demonstrate one’s triumph over embarrassment by naming one’s children Bubbles McFizzlepop, Quirkington Whifflefluff and Fluffernuffer Puddleflop.