Overcome Self Doubt to build Self Confidence. And it’s not easy. We can trust others probably more easily than we do ourselves. We can cheers others easily but we always keep on doubting our own worth.
Self Doubt is that creepy little shadow of ours that sneaks in when something doesn’t go as we expected it to go or we fail at something. It reminds us of all our limitations at once and takes control of our emotions.
Each one of us experiences self-doubt on a regular basis and these days it has not left even the younger generation including kids of 4-5 years of age. Why is this even happening?
Today we will discuss:
Why do we have Self Doubt
Is something wrong deep within us?
Do you often ask yourself this question, am I not enough? What is wrong with me? Can I ever even achieve this? Can I ever create my dream life!
We all go through millions of questions of doubting our worth and comparing ourselves to other people who have achieved more (according to our thinking) than us
But have you ever asked yourself, why am I even comparing myself to others? Is this comparison good enough?
Did they have the same circumstances as I did? Did they have the same experiences as mine?
Did they experience the trauma that I did? Not saying that they don’t have their own fair share of trauma but not exactly what you went through
Your circumstances were different, you grew up different, you had different experiences in life than them, whether good or bad which shaped you to the person you’re today.
You’re not less, you’re just different.
You’re unique in your own flawed way. You’ve your own little quirks in you, that makes you, YOU!
You’ve different strengths than anybody around you, you’ve different perceptions than others, you’ve different set of intelligence than others but that doesn’t mean you’re not intelligent, just your knowledge of the world is different.
Root Causes of Self Doubt
Before we get onto how to overcome self-doubt, let’s discover what are some of the causes of Self Doubt:
1. Past Experiences:
Our mind mostly confirms the situations of the present in a comparison to the past.
It will make judgements and conclusions based on our past experiences; so they play a major role in every decision we take and everything we believe about ourselves or the world around us.
For example; If someone broke your trust in the past, it will be hard for you to make new friends and have faith in them for little things. Your past experiences shape your perception.
So, any failures you experienced, or you made a promise to yourself but didn’t fulfil; it all makes you believe that you’re someone who always fails or who can’t take up things to fulfil which creates even a stronger foundation for self-doubt.
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2. Fear of judgement:
We also doubt ourselves when we fear what others will think of us if we say this, or if we do that and so on.
Yes, the world is brutal, it will always judge us no matter how good of a person you’re.
And this fear of being judged harshly by the world puts so much pressure on us that we self-doubt even more.
This fear of being judged by the world is so ingrained in us since childhood when we’re stopped for every single thing we would want to do that ultimately, it becomes second nature and we self-doubt even for the things we should do which could actually take us further in the future or make our future bright at the very least.
3. Comparison:
Since our childhood we are not only stopped from doing certain things but also compared to our peers. Whether it is through the general education system or at our home.
At schools, we’re always compared with different grading systems, we’re being constantly judged upon who is better than us.
At home, we might be compared with the kids in our neighbourhood or our cousins.
And this constant comparison becomes second nature and as we grow older, we start comparing ourselves to everyone around us and that’s where self-doubt creeps in when we feel that we can’t do better than others around us.
4. Perfectionism:
The need to be perfect can do two things to you; One it can stop you from taking action, because you don’t believe that you’ve the best resources, options, etc. available yet to take that step.
For example; you want to start a youtube channel, but you don’t have a camera, studio lights, a cool looking background to start the channel and you won’t start it until you have all that.
The second thing it can do is, you’re never satisfied with the work you do.
Since, you want everything to be perfect looking when you do it, that you keep on refining it until it may stop making sense and you ruin the work for everybody and then again you’re unsatisfied because it turned completely different from what you wanted it to be.
Understanding these major factors can help you to actually work through overcoming self doubt.
5 Ways to Overcome Self Doubt
Let’s uncover some techniques to understand how you can stop doubting yourself:
1. Bring awareness to the pattern of self doubt:
The first and foremost step to overcome self-doubt is to bring awareness to the kind of thoughts you’re having about yourself on a regular basis.
Ask yourself these questions;
How do I define success?
Do I see myself successful?
How much do I value my own opinions?
Do I see myself as a failure?
If answers to most of these questions are negative; then ask yourself this:
Do I see myself becoming successful though in the near future?
If not, why?
If yes, why?
2. Challenge Negative thoughts related to Self Doubt:
Once you’ve become somewhat aware about your thoughts regarding yourself, you need to challenge the negative thoughts you’ve in your head because negative self talk never helps, it only drowns you deep in self doubt.
Imagine: You’ve a close friend and all you tell them is you can’t do anything! You’re nothing! You can never be successful! You’re worse than others! Can you even wonder how it would impact them? How bad their mental health could be if they would hear constant words of discouragement.
Consider yourself to be your friend. Talk to yourself as you would talk to a close friend. Think about how you would want to maintain this friendship?
I’m sure you would want your friend to hear something like; hey bestie you can do anything you put your mind to! if you need any help I’m there for you! you’re amazing at what you do, keep working! you will get there! I’m always rooting for you!
Don’t you think these words will give them hope in their low times?
Most often when something doesn’t work out the way we want, we often discourage ourselves by feeding more negative words in our heads by becoming our own worst critics. We won’t criticise others as we would ourselves.
From now on, whenever a negative thought appears in your head, consider yourself as that close friend who needs some hope and little TLC.
In the beginning, that may not come easy to you, so just go in front of the mirror and talk to yourself as a friend and give them the best friend advice they need. as you start doing this more and more, you will see a change.
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3. Build New Belief System to Overcome Self Doubt:
Our brain works on pattern recognition and past experiences.
Whatever has happened in the past, if that happens again, your brain recognizes that pattern but instead of you observing it, you go into the deep loop of negative thinking that so and so happened again.
That has primarily become your belief system. Brain shows you patterns to keep you safe but we drown in the well of limiting beliefs.
To change that pattern or belief system, you have to show your brain something different to make a new pattern.
Your brain needs to see proof to believe that you can do something different than usual.
You’ve to make a new belief system, firstly by challenging your thoughts, as you learned in the previous step and secondly, by taking a different action.
You’ve to take just a small simple step to break your regular pattern.
For example, if you make a particular dish which turns out to be bad all the time, would you still keep on making that dish? You will think I can never make this right!
But what if you try a different method of cooking or tweak a few ingredients and then see how the dish turns out.
Your brain needs to see something different than it usually does to make new neurological connections and understand that something different is possible and that’s what you have to do next time.
This will help you develop a new new belief system and your self limiting beliefs will start dissolving.
4. Set realistic Goals to gain Self Confidence:
When we start something new, we’re highly motivated and we want to go all in and in return we give ourselves work overload which leads to not only unrealistic goals but also unrealistic self expectations.
And then, you know if that doesn’t work, you blame yourself. I’ve done that myself so many times.
Thinking, I’ll do everything by myself, considering myself to be jack of all trades without understanding that I’m setting high standards for myself and unrealistic goals where I’m setting myself up for failure!
Haven’t you done that? I’m sure you’re smiling if you’ve!
You’ll have to understand that you would always want to do more than you can because our sweet little brain loves an ego boost wherever it can. By giving itself more tasks, it boosts its ego but then we all know the actual results!
Having big goals are great but not forgetting that to actually achieve them you have to be realistic.
I know you may want to be a millionaire, as soon as possible so you give yourself one year to become a millionaire but bestie have you thought it through?
Are you having too high expectations or do you have a set plan even if that is possible?
You will need to break that big goal of yours into small separate goals.
Like xxx amount of dollars in 3 months and then further breaking it down to earn xxx amount of dollars in one month.
Accordingly, devise a plan for everyday, weekly and monthly tasks to actually achieve that goal which will not only seem more workable but also you will not drop the very next week.
And along the way, working through and refining your plan to suit your goals. This will not only help you achieve your goals but also build your self confidence, motivating you further and building your new belief system.
And when you’ve new and strong belief systems, it’s easier to overcome self-doubt.
5. Celebrate small wins to build Self belief:
We often ignore the little achievements we have everyday and only give more weight to the big events or things in our lives which not only puts more stress & pressure to do well for that one thing but also ignores the fact that to reach there we’ve taken tons of mini steps.
Journey is more important than destination.
Start enjoying your journey. We may want to lose that 10lbs but how we are going to reach it depends on the little steps we take every single day.
If there is no fun involved in that everyday journey, you may soon drop out of going to the gym or do any exercise or even eat healthy food.
Having a clear goal is important but don’t underestimate the action steps you will need to reach there and whenever you take those small daily actions, celebrate that! give yourself words of encouragement on a regular basis.
Not only that, give yourself little credits weekly or bi-weekly. For example; eating your favourite dessert or spending more time with your loved ones or joining that workshop that you always wanted!
Not only will you start enjoying your journey but you will have more confidence that you’re able to achieve your goals further building your new belief system banishing your self limiting beliefs.
By taking these steps regularly, you will start becoming more confident, feel more empowered and have a sense of self belief where you’re no more undermining yourself but understanding your true power.
This was you can say Good-Bye to your Self Doubt.
It was not you who was failing but you just had some negative belief systems which you now know how to change.
If you need little more step by step guidance to get rid of your Self Doubt, checkout my 21 Day Self Doubt Detox Workbook
This post was about understanding where does Self Doubt comes from. We also understood the root causes of self doubt and then we discovered 5 ways to overcome self doubt in our lives.
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