Confidence is HUGE!
There are times in life when we feel really confident.
Other times, not so much.
Some skills we are born with,
while others are learned.
Although there are many ways to be confident,
it is something we see, hear, and feel.
Maybe it is found in something so subtle no one notices,
and maybe it is something more substantial.
It begins…
When we are young, we don’t know what it means to feel sure of ourselves.
Only through experimenting and evaluating do we learn.
We might not have a name to it, but we know.
That is when we begin to “feel” something different.
Growing up, I played a lot of different sports.
In fact, if you were to give me a basketball, tennis racket, or softball glove,
I would feel pretty confident that I could perform well.
(Although it has been some years, muscle memory would pick everything up again.)
However, if you were to tell me I had to conduct a training session
entirely in Spanish, I know my comfort level would quickly diminish.
Over the years, we learn to know where our “comfort level” ends.
Confidence grows when you:
Challenge yourself
If you never try anything new, you will not grow. You have to take even just ONE step outside your comfort zone to extend what you already know. So often people never step into this mode of building confidence because they are afraid of failure. They are perfectly okay with the steady and stable.
Become a beginner
Speaking of failure, no one likes to fail. And it is only with the “beginner” mindset that we will truly succeed. Let go of everything you think you know and understand you are starting fresh. No one gets it right the first time…just ask any parent who has watched their child learn how to walk.
Trust your instinct
We know when something doesn’t feel “right.” Maybe jumping out of a plane at 10,000 feet as skydiver (tandem or not) doesn’t get you excited enough to try it enough to perfect it. Sometimes, it doesn’t matter how much we want to be confident in doing something, we need to listen to what our body is telling us.
Practice, practice, practice
No expert was born an expert. They tried something and failed. They tried again and failed. It would have been easy to quit. But if you really want to get better, you are going to have to do one more IMPORTANT thing besides practice…keep doing it until you get it right. You naturally get better the more you do it.
It comes from within
Having a fortitude to find whatever skill and experience we have to make us feel the best we can possibly feel
takes looking deep within ourselves.
Most people will never do that.
They are most afraid of what they will find there…
Yet it is not just what they find that matters.
It is how they feel about what they find and how they use it.
We build our confidence when we look our fears in the face and choose to succumb to them.
When we get that fierce look and the determination we feel is unstoppable.
Every body knows it.
No other attribute matters as much…
because if you do not believe in yourself, why would anyone else?
Michelle A. Homme
