How Do You Build Self-Confidence?
Years ago while running an at-home daycare, I came to realize
that we're all born with an innate sense of self-confidence.
Every single child under the age of five that I have ever
observed has had a strong self-confidence in at least one area
of their life. Most kids had confidence in all areas of their
lives. It seems to me that they systematically lose that
confidence and it's replaced by an inner critic. Quite often
it's the child's home life, but sometimes it's the schools,
neighborhood kids, extended family, or some other person who
unknowingly destroys the child's belief in themselves. Children
have to be told they aren't good enough, strong enough, smart
enough, talented enough to accomplish whatever it is they're
trying to do. Unfortunately, most of us are told exactly that.
So, how do we rebuild that sense of self-confidence?
The first thing I want you to do is to imagine that you had an
ideal loving emotionally supportive childhood. Think about what
kind of person you would have been if you had been raised to
believe in yourself and in your natural gifts and talents. What
were those gifts and talents? What were you really good at? What
kinds of activities came easy for you? Now write down a list of
talents, traits, attributes, and gifts that you loved and
probably excelled at before you were convinced that you weren't
any good at them. Choose items from that list for the next step.
Self-confidence is broken a piece at a time. So you're going to
rebuild it a piece at a time. Pick things from your list and
plan out tiny baby steps. Were you meant to be a great artist?
Then start out by doodling. Just start carrying a pencil and
paper around with you and allow yourself to absentmindedly
doodle little pictures. Eventually, allow the passion to find
it's way through you and you will begin to draw bigger and
better, adding paints or whatever medium you were always meant
to use. Were you supposed to be a musician? Then start humming
little tunes in your head, begin playing around with an
instrument. If it's possible, carry an instrument around with
you and whenever you're bored or have some downtime, just sit
and absentmindedly allow your fingers to play with it until the
music within you begins calling to you again. Whatever the
thing, pick something from your list and begin to play with it
without paying a lot of attention to being perfect or talented
or anything else. Just hold the tools and space out awhile so
that you can get out of your own self-consciousness and just
play with the tools. Nobody has to know if you don't want them
to.
Repeat this process as much as you can. Keep picking up pieces
of yourself on that list and adding them back into your sense of
self. Don't wait until you've become really good at the first
new skill before picking up another one. Just play with each
item on your list as the mood crosses you. There's no need to
beat yourself up for not being super talented because in reality
all you are doing is simply playing with toys that remind you of
your childhood. Allow your inner child, inner teenager, inner
artist, inner musician to simply play. Eventually, you will come
to realize one day that you do have natural gifts and talents
and that will go a long way towards building your
self-confidence.
That's all good and well if your confidence problems center
around skills, but what if your lack of self-confidence happens
to be in the interpersonal relationships area? Are you painfully
shy? Too afraid of rejection to even reach out to connect with
others? Do you beat yourself up for not looking just so?
Depending on the severity of your self-sabotaging belief system,
you may want to get a professional therapist to help you with
this. If it's not too bad, but you have less self esteem then
you would like to have, then ask someone that you trust to help
you with this part. Ask your friend to point out examples of
other people who look or act like you. For example, if you think
you're fat and everyone says you're not, then have your friend
point out to you other people who are built like you. Have them
compare your figure to someone famous. Chances are they won't
say Orson Wells! Few people are really horribly fat. Eventually,
it'll sink in that you are not really as fat as you think you
are. If you're really worried that people will think you're
stupid or dull when they first meet you, then have your friend
rehearse with you so that you can feel comfortable making small
talk with new people.
What if through practicing a new skill or through working on
social skills and your personal image with a friend, you find
out that you need to actually work on something? Maybe you do
have a few pounds to lose. Maybe you need singing lessons. Okay,
so be it. That's not a reason to quit moving forward with
building upon your fragile new sense of confidence. Just go get
the help, the lessons, the workout routine, the coaching or
whatever else it is that you need to continue moving forward.
There will always be teachers and coaches of some sort because
there will always be people reaching beyond where they already
are. The only problem with a low self-confidence is that we stop
giving ourselves permission to learn new things. The fact that
we don't know how to be or do everything perfectly is not a good
reason to lose confidence in ourselves. As long as you can play
at new things and can learn, then you are able to improve and
grow. At some point, turn around and look at how far you have
come. Pride will show itself.
Copyright 2004, Skye Thomas, Tomorrow's Edge