Start off your day by KILLING Self-Doubt!

Have you ever wondered how far you could be right now in your life if only you could shut up that one voice in your head that tells you, you can’t do it? It’s natural! You barely start getting some work done and a voice from the back of your head reminds you of your recent failures or embarrassments. Then you have to fight this war inside your head before you can do anything else and it becomes monotonous to deal with on a daily basis. If that seems like you, hear me out!

You are in charge of your life to the degree you take charge of your thoughts

Earl Nightingale

Erasing self-doubt means being unstoppable. If you can shut your mind to that one noise, you have possibly more control over your mind than 60% of the world and that is insane. Luckily, it is not hard to do this, the reason so many people feel self-doubt is that they do not try to solve it.

The two main ingredients of the poison that is self-doubt are; Lack of self-confidence and feeling incapable. So let’s dive into them one by one.

Self Confidence

Self-confidence is not a talent that a few lucky ones possess. Rather, it is a skill that can be developed and trained. I’ll give you an example, try this right now. I want you to lean back on your chair and take a deep breath. Then, join your hands such that your fingers of one hand meet the fingers of the other hand while the palms do not touch. You will feel more confident. This is obviously temporary but it is a cool trick that works more than 90% of the time. It puts you in a calm state and tricks your mind into thinking you have everything under control, even if you don’t.

People that do not have that belief of reliance/trust in themselves tend to have lower self-confidence. This can be attributed to feeling a lack of approval from one’s social group. What happens in these situations is that people tend to change their personalities to better fit their groups and no longer feel isolated. This approach would work wonders but personality traits aren’t easily changed and trying to change them can result in feelings of unhappiness.

So, what one should do, in my opinion, is to really focus on the different factors of your personality. Maybe your social group likes things you do not and you have to fake interest. Once you know really what it is you are looking for in your ideal social group, it is a hundred times easier to find it. This is because you are actively seeking it. You can do this by discovering yourself. The reason you stay with that group is that you misjudged yourself in the first place, thinking that is what you want and there is nothing wrong with that. But if you are unhappy do not pretend to be happy as that can cause severe mental health problems. What is great is, you do not need to abandon the group you are already in. Just be actively seeking people more like you and start spending more time with them once you find them.

Another problem comes from different fears (embarrassment, failure, being judged, being left behind). These fears can be controlled by small changes. One of them is a change of posture. Don’t have your back slouched, rather have your chest out and back intact. Try consciously doing this for a few days and you will start doing it unconsciously as well. It has amazing benefits and improving confidence is one of them. Another thing you can do is, exercising better control over your emotions. To do this, start easy as it can be overwhelming. Try making an account of what you do in certain emotional states. For example, I used to punch a wall when I got angry. I started doing this so much that I started enjoying this as it has that strong aspect. I made myself feel angry just to do it again. When I found what I was doing subconsciously, I stopped punching. Fast forward to today, I don’t feel close to as much anger as before! Thus practice discipline over your thoughts this way.

The size of a man can be measured by the size of the thing that makes him angry

Kenfield Morley

One of the best ways is ironically the most controversial. Hypnosis. Yes, I know what people think about it, and no, it will not make you kill someone. Try listening to hypnosis recordings. Try being consistent with them and they will produce great results for you.

Feeling Incapable

This problem is very easy to cure, but it requires consistency. If you lack consistency it will not be possible. There is a short way and a long way here.

The short way includes taking up easy tasks and completing them. For example, making up your bed when you wake up or making your breakfast every day at the same time, or sleeping/waking up at the same time. If you know or are aware of certain tasks you think you cannot do, then great! Take those tasks and break them down into smaller subtasks and give as little as 5 minutes a day to them even. If you are consistent you will have great progress in a very short period. But remember, consistency is key. Even if you decide to take 5 minutes out for this, do it every day. Try this by blocking out that period specifically for this.

The longer method includes discipline through a strict routine you follow daily. This is obviously going to be overwhelming for someone who has not limited himself before but that is not a problem. Start with small habits like the short way I described above and pair other habits on top of it. You will see that any day you complete your tasks you will have great energy, but do make sure the tasks are possible. An ideal case includes easy and challenging tasks. If you put in only easy things, that require little or no resistance to do, you will have that false feeling of satisfaction. At the same time, if all the tasks are challenging, you will stop doing them altogether. So, keep a variation. Watching TV or hanging around with friends is not a problem as long as you can control the amount of time you spend consciously.

Exercising is a great help in feeling more capable. Once you complete a workout, be it at the gym or a run, you feel revitalized and have that great feeling of satisfaction with it. Even going for small jogs can help out a lot. Heck, even a walk can work a great deal.

Another cause of feeling incapable is when stressful events occur in life that you can do nothing about. But, it is illogical to worry about what you can not control and the reason for that is if you worry about what you cannot control you end up screwing up what you can as well. That is not a good approach.

Next time you have to deal with a stressful event, try this. Take a piece of paper and write about the event on it. Then, cross out what you can not control and focus on what you can. This way you will know what not to worry about and what you need to focus on.

We have to understand that feeling incapable is just that, a feeling. It can be rectified by completing tasks.

When these two feelings are there, they make us feel self-doubt. No one likes to live in self-doubt. Luckily, these methods can go a great deal in helping you beat that voice that constantly devalues you and go after what you want to with a positive mindset, with the feeling of being unstoppable.