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<\/p>\nAs you strive to attain your goals and dreams, there are bound to be times when you suffer self-doubt.\u00a0 “Can I really make a living doing what I love? Am I smart enough?\u00a0 Talented enough?\u00a0 In my search for a loving partner, do I have the grit to face rejection, to get through the dry spells, and never give up?”<\/p>\n
Having self-doubt is more the norm than an aberration.\u00a0 An estimated 70% of people experience the “imposter syndrome” at some point in their lives.\u00a0 And a whopping 85% of people around the world are affected by low-self esteem. So instead of stigmatizing yourself for having it, put your energy and focus into overcoming your self-doubt.\u00a0 That’s a critical determinant of your success and well-being in any area of your life.\u00a0 But it’s not just a matter of giving yourself a pep talk when it occurs or repeating a series of affirmations to bolster your confidence, although they can help.\u00a0 If you want to conquer self-doubt, you need to figure out what it’s about, what triggers it, and what you can do to recover your confidence.<\/p>\n
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Set aside some quiet, private time to engage in self-reflection.\u00a0 To start, ask yourself: “In which areas of my life–career, relationships, finances, health, etc., do I too often lose confidence and second-guess my decisions and my actions. In which domains am I lagging far behind where I need to be?<\/p>\n
Think back over your life experiences and look for self-defeating patterns.\u00a0 Do you tend to avoid making important decisions about your career<\/strong> because you’ve made some bad ones and don’t trust your judgment?\u00a0 Do you rush into romantic relationships<\/strong> and too often regret it because you doubt you can be happy living on your own? Do you fear you’ll never be able to finance<\/strong> a house because you mismanage your money, running up credit card debt by overspending on indulgences. Do you fall short when it comes to\u00a0self-love<\/strong>\u00a0by sacrificing your self-care<\/strong>\u00a0and your health: <\/strong>for example, do you\u00a0exist on junk food, skip exercise, not sleep enough, smoke or drink too much when you are facing deadlines\u00a0 at work?\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong>Answering “yes” to these kinds of questions helps you identify your personal hot buttons.<\/p>\n Without countermeasures, when your hot buttons are pushed, you can get stuck dwelling on all the “good reasons” for doubting yourself.\u00a0 You may fuel the flames by calling up memories of similar situations where your mistakes or failings led you to doubt yourself and dragged you down into an emotional abyss that nearly snuffed out your confidence in yourself and your abilities…or so it seemed.\u00a0 But by using counteractions that you develop, practice, and find effective, you can calm the inner turmoil more quickly, regain your emotional equilibrium, and move forward.<\/p>\n It’s been two years since Jack graduated college as a biology major.\u00a0 In his senior year, all the medical schools he applied to rejected him.\u00a0 Determined to realize his dream to become a pediatrician, Jack has been working a day job to save money to fund it, while re-taking chemistry, math, and physics courses at night.\u00a0 His plan was to study diligently to add A’s in these courses to his transcripts, get stronger recommendations from his teachers, and better scores on the entrance exams.<\/p>\n It’s now several weeks since he finished his classes and the envelope with the report of his grades arrives.\u00a0 When Jack sees two B’s and a B-, he feels like he’s been kicked in the stomach, hard.\u00a0 His heart is pounding, he’s on the verge of hyperventilating. His emotional state is one of anxiety, deep disappointment and extreme self-doubt.\u00a0 His negative self-talk (that hypercritical, sometimes downright nasty voice in his head) kicks in: “Forget the dream to be a pediatrician. No way that’s gonna happen. Not only did you fail miserably to get the grades you needed, but you must have deluded yourself about how well prepared you were, and severely misjudged how well you grasped the material.” Now he feels even worse, adding guilt, anger with himself, and shame to the other painful feelings and emotions.\u00a0 He is consumed with a generalized self-doubt–doubting his ability to ever get into any grad school now, doubting his work ethic, his intelligence, his ability to accurately assess what he’s capable of, etc.\u00a0 Finding out he scored two B’s and a B- on his finals pushed a hot button that triggered Jack’s\u00a0<\/strong>self-doubt about getting into medical school and becoming a pediatrician.\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n When your hot buttons are pushed, and self-doubt strikes, you need countermeasures to avoid getting stuck, dwelling on all the reasons why you can’t or won’t succeed.\u00a0 Instead of fanning the flames by deliberately calling to mind similar situations where you undermined your progress and clobbered your self-confidence, you can turn the tables on your insecurity.\u00a0 You can apply a counteractive technique you developed and held ready for just such an occasion to stop your negative self-talk, restore your emotional equilibrium, formulate a constructive mindset and take action to move forward.\u00a0 By doing this, you gain a sense of control over your feelings and behavior, which dissolves the self-doubt and replaces it with self-confidence.<\/p>\n Devising a countermeasure is best done during quiet time, when you are relaxed, comfortable, alone and undisturbed.\u00a0It involves using a technique that works best when you are in a natural state of hypnosis, (right before you fall off to sleep at night, or right when you first awaken before getting out of bed), since you have direct and immediate access to your subconscious mind where positive change originates.<\/p>\n I suggest taking notes on blank cards, in a journal, or an online file so you don’t need to worry about remembering the technique you came up with when you need to use it.<\/p>\n The more you practice using this kind of technique, the more confident you become in your ability to find creative ways to lift yourself up out of the darkness of your uncertainty.\u00a0 You come to see yourself as empowered to prevent, weaken, or at least recover more easily from, self-doubt, making it far less likely to become chronic. And in doing that, you become… more self-confident overall.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Hot Buttons for Self-Doubt As you strive to attain your goals and dreams, there are bound to be times when you suffer self-doubt.\u00a0 “Can I really make a living doing what I love? Am I smart enough?\u00a0 Talented enough?\u00a0 In my search for a loving partner, do I have the grit to face rejection, to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1957,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48,32,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2027","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-self-doubt","category-self-sabotage","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nA Case of\u00a0 Self-Doubt<\/h2>\n
Devising a Countermeasure to Your Self-Doubt<\/h2>\n
The Set-Up<\/h3>\n
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Identifying the Content of Your Self-Doubt and Its Trigger<\/h3>\n
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Reducing the Intensity of Your Self-Doubt<\/h3>\n
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