Building Confidence - Talent

It may not always be apparent, but a lack of confidence has a very profound effect on your daily life. Lots of people do not even realize that there is a need to build more self-confidence within themselves. Nearly every situation in your life has something to do with self-esteem/confidence in some way or another. You will need faith in yourself and your abilities when meeting new people, starting new hobbies, or getting a promotion. It may seem that you lack certain skills and that you feel unqualified to do certain things, and you are correct. A lack of skill is related to a lack of confidence, but more importantly, this can be seen in the vice versa.

Here is an example of someone who rarely goes out. He can be outgoing and jubilant with his close friends, but never in public. He is usually seen as quiet and introverted, and hardly ever makes eye-contact. There could be a number of reasons for why he is like this. Maybe he was scolded when he talked to strange folks as a child. Perhaps he had an altercation and was humiliated in school. Maybe he did not grow up with the finest of amenities, and was laughed at about his "choice" of clothing. Whatever the cause, the end result is that he doesn't like to go out much, and it's probably because he lacks confidence in himself.

This fellow can and will make himself confident in many ways. He could be a prolific artist. When others see his work, they may be amazed at the size of his portfolio. It would seem that he could make a decent living from his work.

But there is an inherent problem: No one ever sees his work.

His friends are baffled as to why he does not go public with his work. It's obvious he loves doing it, why doesn't he create a huge portfolio and submit it to a gallery or something?

That's a problem many of us have. You can have all of this potential in the world and it wouldn't mean anything if you are unable to act upon it because of your fear of the unknown. What is there to be frightened of? Normal people do not understand the dilemma faced by people with low self-esteem. They can't see the crippling effect of a lack of self confidence, and don't realize that as the sufferer is further crippled, he could spiral into depression, drug use and crime.

What is the fear? It is fear of humiliation, fear of failure, fear of rejection, fear of meeting new people, even fear of success. This person has been predisposed in someway to thing that anything he does is never good enough. He was not taught to fight for what he believed in, and to take loss as a lesson to learn.

Defeating this disposition is no easy task. A person has to constantly remind his or herself that the thoughts that pop into their brain automatically are irrational, and usually untrue. It takes a lot of time to start to chisel away at the rigidity of the mind and start to see results. For the duration of this therapy, the person in question must be constantly reminded that only through persistence and patient can the mind be changed. Small wins turn into big wins, and the sufferer will eventually begin to understand that it is possible to give up the negative thoughts and build more confidence. -Rocky Moses