The confidence killers

©Joyce Vincent via 123RF

The problem with doubts and fears is they can become a regular part of your thinking and can continually undermine your confidence. Learning to fight doubts and fears is a critical skill in building confidence. Here are just two of the biggest confidence killers and how to avoid them:

Stop trying to be perfect

One of the biggest confidence killers is our desire to get everything perfectly right. Seeking perfection allows us to put off decisions we should make immediately, so we end up doing nothing at all.

Behind waiting for the 'right' time is an unconscious desire to do nothing, because some good fortune, or someone, will come along to put it right and everything will be completed perfectly. Too many people get stopped by trying to be perfect. They think they have to be perfect instead of good enough.

But think about it for a moment, perfect is an impossible standard, you can never get there, and if you keep trying to be perfect you will never be fully confident. Take the pressure off yourself. Don’t try to be perfect, just be yourself. And remember, being yourself is always good enough.

Don’t compare yourself with others

When you compare yourself with others it can trigger a shame reaction, and your self-confidence starts to plummet. Shame fills the gap between what we would like to be, do and have, and what we see ourselves as actually being, doing, and having. The bigger the gap, the greater the pain.

When comparing we become blind to our own value, while devaluing or dismissing the real worth we have. We’ve be taught to compare ourselves with others from a very young age, we do it all the time. We compare houses, cars, clothes, money, relationships, physical features, social popularity — the list goes on and on. But nothing good comes of it.

No one in the entire world can do a better job of being you than you

Here are a few tips to help you move away from comparing and build self-confidence:

1. Realise you’ll never win — you’ll always find someone else in the world with more possessions than you, or is better than you at something, or is more physically attractive than you — accept that the only person who is going to lose this game is you.

2. Only compare yourself to yourself — instead of comparing yourself to other people. See how much you have grown, what you have achieved and what progress you have made towards your goals. You’ll feel good about yourself without having to think less of other people.

3. Be kinder towards other people — if you stop caring about what other people do; if you stop judging them. Then you will quickly stop worrying about them judging you.

4. Focus on your journey — life is not a competition. It’s a journey. Your journey has nothing to do with how well other people are doing, or what they have. It has everything to do with what you want to do, and where you want to go. That’s all you need to worry about.

You are already aware at some level how naturally confident you are. When you stop trying to be perfect and stop comparing yourself to others, it starts to shine through.

You have the power to easily become the confident person you want to be. Because you already are.

“When you are content to be simply yourself and don’t compare or compete, everybody will respect you.” - Lao Tzu