Having a confidence breakdown?
Low confidence a problem?
“Your thoughts are incredibly powerful. Choose yours wisely.”
Ever had your Inner Critic take control? Maybe your inner voice said something like…
Who do you think you are to imagine you could..?
Everyone else does it better than you.
Everyone else is more successful than you.
Maybe it’s time to throw in the towel and quit trying.
Anything like that ever happen to you?
Maybe it was confidence in your ability to have a successful business.
Maybe it was confidence in your parenting skills or losing weight.
We all have our Achilles heel. Because everyone has those days eventually.
What brings on low confidence ?
Lots of things can set the stage for low confidence days. A new job, a new environment and the need to develop a new skill set can do it. Or practicing an old skill or system that just isn’t working any more can set the wheel in motion. Before you know it, your inner critic has taken over your thoughts and is running the show. Much like a toddler let lose without supervision your inner critic can get into a lot of trouble.
How can you tackle low confidence?
Begin with your mind: so often we think that feelings or emotions just descend upon us from nowhere. In actuality, we can always trace them back to our thoughts and especially stories that we tell ourselves. The mind is a great storyteller. And once it comes up with a story, it loves to tell it over and over. It actually creates neural pathways in the brain that make it easier to repeat the same story than to change it to a new story.
Maybe your story is that you’ve never had any confidence-its just the way you are. Or maybe your story is that you’ve never been able to succeed at anything. Maybe your story is that you’ve always been disorganized. You get the idea. The trouble is that our brain doesn’t think of these as stories. Our brain treats them as fact or reality and it creates emotions to match.
Create a different story and review it regularly: Is it possible to overcome these messages? The answer is yes but it’s probably not in the way that you might think. It’s not just positive thinking or repeating an affirmation that makes the difference. While that is helpful, it takes changing the message along with visualizing the positive result to create change. Just as athletes spend time visualizing winning the race, it’s important for us to set our goals and regularly imagine ourselves successfully completing the task.
Act as if: Stop waiting for the emotion to disappear. Instead, act as if you already felt confident and successful or healthy and fit. The behavior will help correct the false message in your brain, which will create the new and positive feeling. Every time you take action in the positive direction it is like one more vote for the positive mindset. The end result? You will continue practicing the same behavior with much less effort and forethought because it will now be obvious that it gets results.
Develop a support system: It’s hard to change old stories on our own. They are literally wired into our system. I have an accountability partner that I regularly consult with. I also have friends on speed dial who help get me back to reality when I have a confidence breakdown. You need resources that you can count on too.
