Do you struggle with self-doubt and insecurity? Self-doubt is a special kind of hell. A small failure makes you question yourself and your abilities and, next thing you know, you feel like you aren’t good enough or smart enough to do anything. And that’s about the time you stop trying. You of course have these big goals that you want to accomplish, but you just don’t seem to make any progress. That voice in your head is causing you to question you ability to get stuff done. It’s preventing you from moving forward because it constantly feeds off of your insecurities and vulnerabilities. You just kind of feel stuck right now. You want to move forward but can’t seem to find the confidence you need to take proactive action. And you desperately want to overcome self-doubt, but you just don’t know how. The answers though may lie in this post, but before we talk about how to overcome self doubt, let talk about ***how self-doubt keep you stuck and causes of self-doubt.
How self-doubt keeps you stuck
Imagine:
Your boss has assigned you an important task because he thinks you are the most suitable person in the room. But instead of taking it as a recognition of your work performance, you started to panic.
You panic about whether you are capable of doing a great job and failing to perform well will become a big joke at work. You spend time stressing over every single decision you made and picture how things might go wrong.
It’s not surprising that fear will then play a big role in your own little drama. It brings you to his best friend named procrastination. You delay your work and feeling demotivated.
At the end of the story, you hand in your work at the very last minute and of course, it’s not hard to guess you will have the feeling of I can actually do better than this.
Why would you doubt yourself?
What causes self doubt? There’re plenty of reasons behind this evil and I’m going to explain each of them here:
1. Past experience and mistakes
Past experiences can have a huge impact on how we react, especially if you have had bad experiences before like a really broken relationship or being fired without a concrete justification.
Past experience can shake and rattle our beliefs. However, you have to understand that your past cannot be altered but you need to stay stuck with it.
Keep referencing to past experiences without learning from them is just a waste of your bright future!
2. Comparisons with other
It’s not surprising for us to compare ourselves with others because we are living in a world of competition.
We can easily compare our work performance with colleagues or simply in the overwhelming world of social media. It’s easy for us to envy others’ lives and thinking that we are not doing just as great as they are.
3. The rise of new challenges
This is a pretty normal case because we have no experience on how to react or what are the things that we need to do. The feeling of uncertainty and insecurity will make you feel uncomfortable.
4. Childhood upbringing
Our upbringing plays a big role in shaping our habits and personalities.
If you are raised by parents that constantly telling you that you are not good enough or natured by schools that judge students heavily on their grades, you might have already internalized the habit of questioning yourself since you were a child
How to overcome self-doubt
So what can you do to overcome self doubt and be confident again no matter how tough things go?I’ve discovered a few things that help with self-doubt and boost my confidence that may help you too:
* Stop comparing your accomplishments to your friends’ and colleagues’ accomplishments.
I find that I doubt myself the most when I’m comparing what I’m doing with what other people are doing. When I compare my accomplishments to a colleague’s, I start feeling inadequate. Your colleague’s accomplishments are not a litmus test to grade your own success.
One key thing to remember when you find yourself in this mental pattern is that everyone is on his or her own journey.
I find that I am most successful in my personal and professional life when I am following what works for me and what makes me feel good, even if it is different from what someone I look up to is doing.
* Take a break and get a boost of optimism.
Sometimes the longer we feel stuck in a situation or emotion, the harder it is for us to come out.
Just take a moment to relax and shifting your focus to something totally different. By doing so, it can allow us to clear out mind and look at things from a new and fresh perspective.
* Forget about what everyone else is thinking of you.
When you care about what everyone else is thinking of you, you inhibit yourself. You’d rather do nothing and not get judged than do something and risk criticism.
Worrying about what other people think of you will continue to hold you back from doing something potentially huge for yourself.
If you hold dreams for your future—which you probably do if you’re reading Tiny Buddha—then at some point you have to let go of everyone else’s opinion; otherwise, you’ll find yourself in a constant state of self-doubt.
* Don’t be afraid to seek help.
While it is important to work on ourselves, it’s also a good idea to get support from your loved ones.
They can be your partner, family members, friends, mentors, supervisors or even a coach.
Getting advice and reassurance from others can also improve our self-confidence and keep us motivated.
* Outline What You’re Uncertain About
At the moment you are struggling with self-doubt because you feel uncertain about something. You might for instance have a goal that you would like to achieve, but the road to accomplishing that goal is somewhat challenging and unknown. This of course creates uncertainty and makes you question whether or not you are capable of moving forward. To overcome self-doubt you need to first get very clear about what exactly it is you are feeling uncertain about. Begin by identifying the goal you would like to achieve, and then describe what uncertainties exist along that path
* Write in a gratitude journal at the end of each day.
It’s far too easy to wallow in pity and focus on what we don’t have rather than what we do have. Giving those feelings energy will only create more situations in which we come up empty handed.
Instead of focusing on what you are lacking, focus on what you do have and what you have accomplished. This fosters a feeling of gratitude, and when you invest energy into gratitude now, you’ll start to find that you’ll be rewarded in the future.
Feelings of gratitude put you in a positive frame of mind. When you’re feeling positive, you’re feeling good. And when you’re feeling good, good things happen.
Final thoughts
Overcoming self-doubt is an ongoing process that we need to consistently work through while pursuing a goal. As long as uncertainty exists, there will always be doubts.
To overcome self-doubt requires successfully working through these uncertainties. Self-confidence of course often comes from experience. With experience we figure out what works and what doesn’t work. This helps us make adjustments and move forward in a better way. But in order to get that experience we need to face uncertainty, and where uncertainty exists there will always be some level of self-doubt. However, if you’re committed and have a compelling reason for moving forward, then self-doubt will never stand in your way.