The ‘Secret’ Behind SELF CONFIDENCE

 Though confidence is ideally universal, it is practically not so. It is ideally universal because it can be acquired by anyone in any field. But, it is not practically universal because all could not possess it and no one could possess it in all fields. It clearly indicates that self confidence is extremely strict in its selectively universal and conditionally practical nature. This realisation by itself speaks about the secret of self confidence that it is so public. Then, what is that public secret about self confidence? Let us look into that. The one who is confident in public speaking may not be so in creative writing. The other who can paint a picture well may not be confident in driving a car. Even the one who is confident in fishing may not be that confident in swimming, the skill very close to a fisherman. The confidence in fishing with a net is different from the confidence in fishing with a hook and they both are even different from the confidence in fishing with a spear. Then, how does our self confidence work? Let's start with a few questions and you just see the difference in your confidence to answer them.

1. How many of you can speak about the evolution and development of Homo sapiens on this planet for 30 minutes on the stage?
2. How many of you can speak about the political situation in your country for 15 minute on the stage?
3. How many of you can speak about your school/workplace and your roles and responsibilities there for 5 minutes on the stage?

For my first question most of your mind said, “I cannot” or “I will not”, and a very few of you had a self-talk within, “I can” or “I will”. Here is the division of those who are confident and those who are not. Why? For my last question most of you had that self-talk, “I can do that” or “I will do that”. Again, why? Simply because you have confidence to speak about it. This exercise indicates that your SELF generates the self-talk of ‘I can’ or ‘I will’ when you are exposed to a situation where you have CONFIDENCE to act upon. You can remember those days in school, you raised your hands quickly to the questions of your teacher who taught your favourite subject with the same self-tack ‘I can’ or ‘I will’. Because you know that you can say or do the correct answer. Feeling good about yourself in a given situation is the immediate foundation of self confidence. This feeling good in a context is what we call SELF ESTEEM. Before your self-talk of self confidence you get the self-talk of your self esteem, “I am good” or “I am okay” for that situation or thing. Because of your self esteem on the context you grow to self confidence to act upon. So your inner feeling of ‘I am good’ is the reason for your gut feeling of ‘I can’.

Now, where have you got your self esteem from? You can’t feel simply good about yourself with no reason or without any cause. No effect without a cause. Here is the actual ‘secret’ of self confidence unveiled. You have that self-talk of ‘I AM GOOD (Self Esteem) to sing that song’ because of your KNOWLEDGE and SKILL in doing that. Again, you have that self-talk of ‘I CAN drive that car’ because of you have the knowledge and skill in how to do that. Hence, though your self confidence is built immediately upon the foundation of self esteem, the actual foundation of your confidence is your SELF WORTH. Self-talk of your self worth can be ‘I know/not that’ or ‘I have/not that’ based on your knowledge and skill that situation demands. “I know the political situation of my country” and “I have the skill to catch fish with a spear”. These self-talks of self worth is the key player to make you self confident in any life situations. “I CAN do that” because “I am GOOD at that” because “I KNOW how to do that”. Your WORTH begets your ESTEEM and your esteem begets our CONFIDENCE.

Then, what is that I mean to say here? Work only on your self worth to improve your self esteem and self confidence. Whenever you come across someone positively confident in any field, make sure that he worked hard to achieve that level of confidence in doing that. Don’t believe such irrational motivational talks that proclaim your mere self affirmation can give you self confidence in a fraction of a second. Absurd! Work really hard for a reasonable amount of time to acquire your confidence in that craft you do. There is no short cut or easy road to self confidence or to success. The only way is work on your worth by adding knowledge and skill one after the other and increase your value to such a grade that no one can avoid you. Success at once is just a probability of luck happened to a very rare few by chance even without their proportionate knowledge or skill but just due to the circumstantial favours that usually don’t come to those who wait for.

If you want to develop your self confidence in something, study that more, practice that more and excel in that more. Apart from your smart work, spending time with focused interactions, building alliances with experts and collaborating with likeminded aspirants are very crucial to speed up your success in any field of work. Just do that.