When One Doesn't Believe in Their Own Capabilities
Confidence isn’t always a given. Even when the facts of someone’s work orpersonal success proves otherwise, it doesn’t mean they are confident or believe in what they do or who they are. Sometimes there are stories or talk tracks on repeat in our heads thatreinforce negative perceptions or flat out lies, but because they are on repeatin our heads, we believe the lies more than we believe the facts.
There have been times in my life I have struggled with confidence, so I get it. Early in my career I made a pretty big mistake and suffered the consequences. Even though it was my own doing, the experience shattered my confidence.
It took some solid work and success to override that huge mistake in my mind. I felt like I deserved every moment, and then some, of beating myself up. Interestingly, however, other people were much quicker to move beyond my mistake and realize good people can make a bad decision.
I share my personal experience because I now know that during that period of “recovery,” I recognize I was surrounded by people who believed in me, but I refused to believe them or feel about my experience the way they did.
Over the last year of Career Coaching and in the years I was in Human Resources roles, I have encountered people so deep in their own pit of hell consisting of no confidence, negative stories and talk tracks on repeat in their heads without the ability to see through their own fog to the truth. At one point in my career, I was hell bent on changing the negative way one person felt about himself. It. Was. Exhausting.
There are a variety of reasons people end up in this pit of hell about their capabilities. There are definitely times when it is just part of someone’s makeup to constantly focus on the negative, be the victim in every situation, and refuse to look for anything positive. Those people are sometimes impossible to help.
There are other people part of a negative work environment that has impacted their confidence, one may report to a manager who isn’t able to acknowledge goodness in their work and instead focuses on the negative, or there may be someone, like I was, who made a mistake and feel like they will forever have to pay for that mistake. These scenarios can beat anyone down.
We all likely know someone, or maybe it’s you, that is in a place of lacking belief in one’s capabilities. To be clear, I am not a Licensed Therapist, although I do play one on TV (just kidding!). I do not pretend to know how to scientifically work through lacking confidence in the truth of your capabilities. What I would like to offer is some easy to execute tips that helped me and have helped my mentees and clients over the year.
Is it true? When you are in a cycle of negative thoughts or beliefs, stop and pressure test them. Ask yourself if what you’re saying is really true. Then, pressure test that next thought with the same thing, is it true? When we’re in the midst of negative thoughts, we likely believe them to be true, but over time we begin to see that the things we tell ourselves aren’t true and we can begin to shift the stories and talk tracks on repeat.
Believe someone else. Even in our darkest days, there is someone in our life believing in us. That person is likely someone you respect and value their opinion. If you can’t believe in yourself, believe in the judgment of that person. Clearly they see something in you and believe in you and you don’t think they are stupid, so there must be something to it. The truth is that there are likely many people who believe in us and it is impossible for all of those people to be crazy or stupid, so take comfort in trusting their judgment in what they see in you.
List the positive. When you’re in those quiet moments with yourself, maybe on the drive home from work, and you’re listing all of the crappy things about that day or how you feel about your capabilities, list two positive things for every one negative thing. Yep, we’re going cheesy with this one. When we are in a negative space, the reality is, we rarely focus on the positive. Force yourself to do this. Even if it helps temporarily remove the gray cloud of darkness from your day, it’s worth it!
The bottom line through all of this is that at some point in life, we all experience a crack in our confidence. No matter how deep the crack or how long you’ve spent in your own pit of hell, we all understand the reality that it happens. When it happens though, it’s about clawing your way out of it and getting back to the reality of acknowledging the goodness of what you bring to the table every day.
