Do you recall that morning when you woke up and thought, “YES, I got it, I so got it, I will, I will, I will do this, I will thrive, I will sell, I can do it, I AM doing it, I’m a success: I think I’m a success!”
– And that’s actually how it is, what you think, what you believe in, it’s what’s driving you and how you’re living your life?
That’s the time of my life right now, it took me forever to get here, I’m only in process and if you didn’t get to that point yet yourself you might be blocked by doubts.
While, in all my enthusiasm, I’m getting ever more focused on how to optimize and get a whole bunch of stuff done (because business wise, that is what you need to do if you wish to go and get somewhere), thus figuring out when I have my greatest days -e.g. when I get through my lists, one of my success criteria- compared to when my days are just normal/good (I force myself to insist on good days only as a minimum, life’s too precious to settle with less), others might think:
“Well, first of all I didn’t yet get to the “I think I’m a success”-point. And I do have good and great days but I sure too have all the bad, terrible and mediocre ones as well”
They’ll keep coming back
Stop it
You just jumped off
Failure and rejection versus reinforcement of self-esteem
They’ll keep coming back
Right – you have great and good days but so absolutely too terrible, bad and mediocre ones. What do you do about those days? – Or let me re-phrase that; what do you do about those feelings, those thoughts? Do you just lean over, waiting for another sunrise to come along, hoping they’ll pass by themselves?
They won’t. They’ll keep coming back until you throw them out. And that’s of course all in your mind-set. It’s in your thoughts. Your thoughts control your feelings, your feelings your days and your days – how do you wanna put this? – How much stuff you get done? Or ‘how much s… you can handle’?
And if you don’t get a lot of stuff done and if you can’t handle a lot of s…, but you’d like to, then it could be because you have too much doubt towards yourself. That’s what I used to have. Combined with not exactly being sure of what I really wanted to succeed in!
If you choose the first phrase: How much stuff you get done? Can you hear there’s a kind of positive ring to it? Negativity is not present, of course it depends on the tone, but it’s quite an easy question to ask in a calm and tranquil way. And asking in a calm and tranquil way is wise to go with, because as you probably know, it’s best when negativity is absent. Negativity is unable to be alone and draws anything down with it.
“How much stuff do you get done”, is a rather polite, direct and ok question to ask yourself, wouldn’t you say? It’s not nagging, un-engaging or disrespectful, which is unfortunately ‘normally’ often a way many people doubting themselves happen to discuss matters like these, with themselves. Being drawn by negativity will never get you anywhere near the places positivity will bring you, be it wherever you wish to go in life. Numerous scientific studies have proven this for decades, over and over again.
The second phrase: How much s… can you handle? There’s a kind of edge to it. It’s more dynamic. ‘In-your-face’. Kind of driven by adrenalin of some sort. And even if a ‘dirty’ word is present I wouldn’t call it offensive.
I would rather categorize the line as a positive-meant comment to help you react or at least think. So think about these two ways of approaching yourself when looking for answers; use the first one if you’re more fragile and the second if you’re ready for a loving but firm kick in the butt to push you ahead.
Stop it
Doubting is a double-edged sword, it can both be good and act as a trigger to make you think powerful stuff like “I’ll show you, I’ll show them – or even better; “I’ll God d… it show ME – I can HANDLE this”!
When doubt is bad it captures you and keeps on holding you in a grip of iron repeating doubtful sentences created by your own doubtful thoughts often created by other’s doubtful opinions. And ‘the others’ doubtful opinions are often created in their own minds due to other of their acquaintances doubtful opinions about them and so on and on and on.
Do you know what to do about such situations?
Stop it!
Just Stop It. Stop those doubtful thoughts, if you have them. That can be difficult. You’re right, that’s why I’m writing this:
Imagine you, a bunch of doubtful people around, a trampoline, no security net, no knowledge of destination, only an assuredness to anyone setting off that it’ll be a soft landing somewhere out there. And why is a soft landing? Well, why shouldn’t it be? Thinking anything else is negative and the wrong lane to pick.
All the doubtful people; you can see them. They can’t see you. Until you jump.
Get out on your imaginary trampoline.
Start tiny-jumping, just a little. The trampoline starts to move, just a little. Have a good look at all the doubtful people. Now your jumping’s intensifying. You feel comfortable. You feel safe, you trust yourself. You believe in yourself; you managed to get out on the trampoline.
Your jumping is getting higher. Your adrenalin starts pumping. You’re… getting there. You’re getting ready to jump. You keep jumping higher and higher, you really want to jump now.
But you also want to cherish this incredible moment of fearlessness, power and feelings of freedom. Your freedom, your own will power, your fearlessness.
You just jumped off
As you jumped all the doubtful people saw you. They saw a courageous individual. They don’t know you, they just saw somebody who had the guts to jump off the trampoline without knowing where to land.
So doubt is good when there’s an imaginary trampoline forcing you to jump forward in your life. As you get your butt up on that trampoline ‘doubt’ is kicked off the same moment you jump, I promise! Because you just beat it.
It will show it’s doubtful face once in a while, but that’s ok, now you have an imaginary trampoline, it can not cope with an imaginary trampoline.
Doubt is bad when it keeps you from making it to the trampoline. When you don’t make it to the trampoline it’s because doubtful questions has been put on repeat in your mind. Turn them off.
So doubt will come back. Absolutely, it will. Doubt is basically human, humble and requires patience, very important traits to have -in my opinion, some of the most important basics for a successful life personally and professionally. Doubt is normal and important to our processes. It’s just not meant to be your boss. You are your own boss, features like doubt are not supposed to control who you’d like to be or where you’d like to go, doubt is present to make you understand better if something is right or wrong. And when you get out there, ahead and up, doubt returns to keep you from becoming a jack*ss.
It’s all in the balance of how you use doubt because in the end it will or add to or take from the total sum of (y)our self-esteem.
Failure and rejection versus reinforcement of self-esteem
Psychiatrist and philosopher (& wine lover <3) Neel Burton has written an excellent book “Heaven and Hell: The Psychology of the Emotions” where he among many other things explains the meaning of “self-esteem” (this peace is an adaption from the book and part of an article he wrote for Psychologytoday.com) :
“Esteem” is derived from the Latin aestimare, meaning “to appraise, value, rate, weigh, estimate,” and self-esteem is our cognitive and, above all, emotional appraisal of our own worth. More than that, it is the matrix through which we think, feel, and act, and reflects and determines our relation to ourselves, to others, and to the world.
People with a healthy self-esteem (…) treat themselves with respect and take care of their health, community, and environment. They are able to invest themselves completely in projects and people because they do not fear failure or rejection. (1)
The words speak for themselves.
One thing I consider poison when it comes to doubt is the lack of self-esteem dressed as fear of failure and rejection, fear of getting up on the trampoline and jump off.
In order to defeat ‘others’ doubtful opinions, in order to get rid of bad, terrible and mediocre days and get to good, great and the I believe I’m a success-stage, it’s crucial to consider this important link;
How much of (your) doubt is bounded in fear of failure or rejection, whether or not you know in what you’d like to succeed in life? And if it’s a lot, maybe the trampoline exercise can help you face such fears.
Remember, if you can visualise it you can do it. You learn light years of life experience from your failures and much less from your successes. People –all the doubtful ones, will forget about your failures, if they ever notice them in the first place. Doubtful people are busy being doubtful. They don’t matter. Get on that trampoline!
(1) https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/hide-and-seek/201510/self-confidence-versus-self-esteem)