Confidence, it’s so elusive, isn’t it? Sometimes we have masses of it, other times we are quivering wrecks. Despite being an ‘expert’ on confidence (ie telling others how to acquire it) I am not immune to the odd confidence wobble myself. So, let’s take a look at how you can increase your confidence.
Let’s talk about making a mistake. That should be easy enough, eh?
Seriously, you can become much more confident by learning from your mistakes. I am learning Italian on Duolingo. Every time I make a mistake (hardly ever, honestly) a little green bird pops up and says, “mistakes help you learn”. Flippin’ annoying.
However, the little green thing does have a point. Mistakes do help you learn.
Internal Spam Mail
In my RenewYou course for women, I have a section called ‘Internal Mail’. This involves looking at all those messages we have internalised over the years telling us what we should, could, can, and can’t do.
There is a certain inevitability that participants focus on the messages that they want to change. Messages like ‘You need to have a secure job‘ or ‘Girls don’t do that kind of work‘ or ‘You’ll never amount to anything’.
Today, however, I’d like you to think about those messages you have in your head which have helped you – which motivate and inspire you and which you’d like to pass onto others.
Increase Your Confidence – Significant Others
Much of the internal mail that pops up unbidden into our consciousness will have come from the people who brought us up – our parents, family, guardians or teachers . And it won’t all be of the positive variety. However, I suspect if you stop to think for a while you can find a few sayings, thoughts, or expressions which over the years have served you well.
I particularly remember a piece of wisdom that my father gave me. I’ve repeated it often when coaching. I had just left school and made a particularly unwise choice about which college to attend and ignored all the advice offered to me. I went to London because I was sure I had met the love of my life. Turned out I hadn’t. Living in a bedsit was not a great experience, nor was doing a course I didn’t really want to do but had chosen because it was near him (how I am blushing for my youthful self, dear reader).
After a term and a bit I returned home with my tail well and truly between my legs. Within the year I went on to study at a great University and all was well, but at the time there were all sorts of issues about money, changing courses etc and the prospect of ever getting it resolved seemed impossible. I felt that I had made a real mess of my life.
Paternal Advice
My Dad took me aside and said:
‘Well, you’ve made me a mistake, and everyone has to make their own mistakes. The clever thing is not to make the same mistake twice’.
It was a really good piece of advice, and so very true. We learn, grow and develop by actually trying something out, doing something. Pure or intellectual knowledge of something does not actually mean we really know it and have learned from it.
That piece of advice has served me well; it has taken away for me much of the fear of making a mistake. I can’t in all honesty say that I have never made the same mistake twice (I have, of course), but I know that making mistakes almost always leads me onto greater wisdom and better decision making in the future.
Now, as a coach and trainer I often work with people who are stuck in unhappy situations, relationships, jobs, locations and so on, but who are so worried about making the wrong decision that they choose not to make any decision at all. They’re paralysed by the fear of getting it wrong.
Get it Wrong, Sometimes
Ask yourself these two questions: How do you learn? How have you ever learned anything in your life?
You weren’t born with all your qualities and skills in place. You needed to do something to acquire them and I imagine that you didn’t do everything perfectly first time.
Take learning to walk, for instance. Human beings don’t arrive in this world with fully developed walking skills. We needed to be allowed to learn. If you get an opportunity, watch a small child learning to walk. They frequently fall over, get up and start again. Without any self consciousness at not having done it perfectly first time, they persevere. Eventually they make that lurch unaided from chair to sofa and bask in the admiration.
As we get older most of us lose that confidence to simply give life a go and not worry about getting it right first time. We stay crawling, frightened of looking silly, failing, and doing the wrong thing. And we miss out on so much of what life can offer us.
Review Your Past
Think for a while of all the masses of skills and qualities you have acquired over your lifetime. There will be loads and I’m sure you can think of at least ten.
Driving, for example; you learned that because someone taught you, you watched other people driving, and finally, in UK at least, you took a test. You might have had to take it several times, you drove around with L plates on, you crashed the gears, and you probably stalled once or twice at a junction. But for most of us the inconvenience of not driving outweighs the fear of failure and so we plough on until we get what we need, a driving licence.
Are there areas of your life where your fear of getting it wrong, of making a mistake is holding you back? Maybe you want a new job but think to yourself ‘better the devil you know’.
Maybe you want a better relationship but are fearful either of tackling the issues in your present one or of actively seeking a new one for fear of rejection or of making a mistake. It seems easier to stay not happy rather than risk losing what you have. You’re still toddling through your life instead of walking, striding, or running ahead.
Try running.
Some tips to help you on your way:
1) Owning up to making mistakes can be immensely liberating. If you get it wrong say so. In most cases this won’t be the end of the world.
2) Think of all that you have learned in life through having a go at it yourself. Make a list.
3) Imagine if you had a second, third, even fourth spare life to live. What would you choose to be doing? Would you pursue your unspoken dream of becoming, for example, a ballet dancer? Well, probably that is an option no longer open to you but there are, for example, dance classes for every age and also classes in poise and deportment. You could try them and give yourself some of the benefits!
4) Think back to your internal mail messages; some should be deleted, but there will be some that it’s worth keeping and acting on. Decide on yours and write it inside your diary, or a place where you’ll see it often and go for it!
5) And now think what you would be doing this month if you knew that making a mistake was not the end of the world, but simply contributed to your learning and development. Making you be the best you can possibly be.
Now do it.
RenewYou, My Tried and Tested Career Booster!
RenewYou has helped thousands of women make positive and lasting change in their lives. I deliver it one-to-one as part of a bespoke coaching package for women looking to move into leadership, to progress their career, or who wish to be the absolute best version of themselves.
Posted on October 21st, 2022 by Jane
