If you asked a confident person where confidence comes from they'd most likely tell you "from inside". It's a feeling of certainty, of belief. That feeling is in someone or something else (like a ladder or the person holding the ladder) or it's in yourself (whatever happens with the ladder, you'll be ok). You can feel it just there, in the centre of your body below the solar plexus, in your gut. The feeling that whatever happens, you'll be ok.
But how did it get there? It gets there through experience. i don't use the phrase "trial and error" but "trial and success" - TEFCAS - sometimes you win, sometimes you learn but you don't leave empty handed. TEFCAS is one of those tools that i practice with my clients to reframe the attitude of "going for it" because confidence is learned, not from getting things right all the time but from learning how things went wrong. To put it a way that really resonated with me - Rory McElroy, ranked the world's top golfer, has probably taken more bad shots than i have taken shots in golf. His swing rate is so high that his sum of bad shots probably eclipses the total amount of that of an amateur player. So if your are committed to being confident in an aspect of life e.g. decision making, public speaking or interpersonal relationships, or just life in general, you have to want to take the bad shots in order to learn from them. Because we, as humans, are programmed to avoid uncomfortable situations "for our protection" we exercise risk avoidance. While this may be a short term gain it is counterproductive for long-term growth. Consider this; birds don't just fly from nests. They have to practice first and even fall. Some won't make it. Don't take it that 100% of birds can fly. Now consider the power of this: “A bird sitting on a tree is never afraid of the branch breaking, because her trust is not on the branch but on its own wings. Always believe in yourself” – Unknown
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AuthorHoward Hughes Archives
November 2023
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