Tag Archives: self-doubt

The Habit Of Self-Doubt Eroding Your Natural Confidence – Lillian Ogbogoh

There is nothing more awe-inspiring to witness like a woman rocking her natural confidence; it’s a heady mix of alluring, powerful, inspiring and mesmerizing. Just look at Jill Scott when she takes the stage, Michelle Obama, Sheryl Sandberg all these women are almost electrifying to watch. Now this natural confidence is not only for a select few but most of us have allowed nasty little habits to erode our confidence.

There are a few things in life that are truly “sad to see”:

A gloomy, grey Saturday,

A baby crying,

Ugly architecture,

The most important one is a woman minus her vivaciousness because all her confidence has been sucked out of her by this nasty habit called self-doubt.

No matter what she wears and regardless of the makeup she puts on, she can’t hide the fact that her confidence has gone on a sabbatical and it hangs about like that gloomy grey day or a bad stench.

Eau de self-doubt is not a nice smell; I’ve had to wear it on a few occasions so I know how it feels and it can linger. Self-doubt is really a one way street to giving up and giving away your most glorious self. It dulls your shine as you end up blending into the background hoping no one will see you.

Self-doubt robs you of being in your own power, as you second and third guess yourself through life. In some cases, I’ve found myself fourth and fifth guessing myself. The habit of self-doubt creeps up from time to time; it takes our lives hostage and slowly sucks the joy and vivaciousness out of us.

The major way the self-doubt habit shows up is by us looking through the not enoughness mirror

This is when you see yourself through a screwy mirror where all you see is what you don’t have, along with what you should have and should have done and why you are not enough. You even hide the mountain of vast experiences and numerous skills that you have acquired on your life journey.

This habit is like having a mean and cruel version of the enchanted mirror from Snow White, so instead of revealing the fairest in the land, it’s showing you as the ugly step-sister who smells and pulls the wings off butterflies. This screwy mirror reflects your flaws and insecurities around who you feel you are when you show up in the world.

When you look at yourself all you see is the you who is not enough. The you, that you feel is lacking in some way. The you who is incapable and that feeling sends you running from pillar to post looking for something, anything to make that feeling go away, to make that hole that only you can see go away.

For some it’s chasing qualification after qualification, to validate your knowledge and sense of worth, so you feel like you are worth the money you are paid by your employer or clients. For others, it’s looking for someone to validate who they are so their sense of worth is determined by how others see them and they will do anything to maintain their fix of validation feeding the not enoughness.

In the same way the step-mother from Snow White constantly asks the mirror “Who’s the fairest in the land?” to cover up feeling inadequate, we constantly question who we are and whether we are good enough. Oh this sin is high up there among the cardinal sins of self-doubt as it’s self-inflicted and the only cure lies within, but this can’t be done with a faulty lens on as all you see is the not enoughness, in the same way a person with anorexia sees themselves as fat. This, not enoughness causes you to look at others in your business environment and see what they have done or haven’t done, which again leads you to an inadequate and a diminished version of yourself. And don’t get me started on the personal arena, as we compare our lives with theirs and their lives become a yardstick for measuring our lives without knowing their back story.

Giving up on the habit of not enoughness comes in two parts. The first part requires you to change the looking glass. We are so programmed to look at the gaps and void within us rather than the greatness of us. So it’s time for an amazing self-audit for the next week; take one day to list three things about you that is totally amazing. You can do this in the morning or evening. If you are finding it hard to list three things, get a trusted friend or someone in your family to help see you for the amazing human being that you are.

Changing the focus on what we normally shine the light on changes how you see yourself. The law of attraction states that what you focus on is what you will attract, so if you see yourself as not being enough you will attract more situations into your life that will reaffirm that opinion. In the words of Henry Ford, “The man who thinks he can and the man who thinks he can’t are both right”.

The next step is often an overlooked, undervalued action. I’m talking about celebrating you, the little things and the big things that make you a unique, amazing woman.

Some of you are so used to the self-flagellation approach to living, where you rip chunks out of yourself constantly with your beliefs that you are not enough. So take a deep breath in and say, “I am enough and amazing!” and celebrate that fact as often as possible.

 

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