Mirror mirror on the wall…. Aahhh!
Dude! Every day is a chance to start new, so if you don’t like what you see… You have the ability to change it. Let’s talk about how.
And we’re not just talking about our looks. The Brainiacs of the world say that there’s nothing more important to our happiness than how we feel about ourselves. In other words, we can’t be better than we believe we are. If you don’t believe that you’re worth anything, then you won’t build yourself up to be what you’re actually worth…. Uhh?
What I mean is, if you believe you have this much talent then you’ll grow to this point, but if you believe you have this much talent you’ll grow to this point. So if you lack confidence then you’re not only putting a limit on yourself but you’re also labeling yourself for the rest of the world to see. And you might be looking for other people for validation but they won’t be able to increase the value that you place on yourself.
Number one: Shut out the evil one.
I bring my kids to toddler music classes, and there is no better place to see this in action and is so amazing. The little kids… if you watch them, they might be a little nervous or hesitant to get started right away but once they do, once they come out of their shells, they will be as silly as they want to be and they don’t care who’s watching at all. But the parents… the parents have had years of negative thoughts just slamming through their heads and the parents start to question everything about themselves and everything about what they’re doing.
Am I playing with my kids enough? Am I being to expressive and I just look like an idiot? Do I look like a good parent? Like my kid really loves me? Or do I look like a horrible parent who is disengaged?
So whether you are a parent walking into a toddler music class or you are going into meetings with high executive VPs all day, you must tune out the negative voice and turn up the volume on the positive voice. When you do something great, when you believe positive things about yourself, celebrate that! Dude rock on with your accomplishments!
Number two: Comparison is the thief of joy.
Teddy Roosevelt said it and you know it! When you start comparing yourself to others, it steals your joy. It’s why we are so self-conscious isn’t it? We look around like who’s taller than me? Who’s thinner than me? Who looks like they’re on better shape than me? Who’s more talented than me? Who’s farther along than I am? Am I better than anyone? … But that’s the wrong focus. Do not conform to the pattern of this world. Don’t try to be like everyone else. Instead, allow your mind to be transformed and when it is, that’s is where you’ll find God’s good, pleasing, and perfect will for your life. So the next time you find yourself comparing to other people, stop and ask yourself two questions: How do I feel about me, am I proud of myself? And how does God feel about me right now? That is what matters, not the crazy lady on the street.
Number three: Push your limits.
Hold your nose cuz we are going down deep on this one. So remember those negative voices that we talked about? Choose one of them and now ask yourself, why do I believe that? Why do I think that? Why do I say that to myself? Why, why is that? Keep asking why. Eventually you’ll go back to some ball of mess that happened when you were a kid, and whether is something really dramatic and painful or is some silly little encounter on the playground. So let me give you my example, in elementary school one day I went to school wearing the exact same shirt as the most popular girl in our school and I was terrified because I knew that I meant that I was gonna have to talk to this girl and I was painfully shy.
So we walked by each other in the hall and she said, “Hey! Nice shirt!” And I said, “da dah da bah ba bah.” And to make matters worse I saw her again later that day and tried to play it off. So I made fun of myself by going “da dah da bah ba bah.”
I did it again! So from that day forward I knew that I could no longer talk to the cool kids because I was just turned into a mumbling idiot. It wasn’t until I could go back and look at that same scenario with my adult brain and realize that it didn’t make me any less of a person. And I can still get intimidated by people, but I no longer believe that I’m not good enough to talk to someone who’s a cool kid.
So find those stories from your past and take another look at them with your adult brain. What do you wanna believe about those scenarios and what have you learned about yourself? What false beliefs have you been telling yourself this whole time? You can change those! Start to retrain your brain with more positives messages. Is important that we find even the silly little stories like this because we’ve been telling ourselves these lies for years, but when we find these places where we’re limiting ourselves, that’s how we can push past our limits.
Number four: Build others up.
Sometimes the people who feel the worse about themselves are people who’ve been victims in the past. They’re looking so internally and they are used to that because they had to do that as a way to protect themselves. Is a way of life. It’s a matter of survival for those people. So if you relate to being a victim and you’re no longer in that scenario, where you’re being victimized, then it’s time to move to a more external focus. It will free you up and help you push past your limiting beliefs. You can do that by just starting to help other people. Add value to their lives because it’s really hard to feel badly about yourself when you’re helping other people.
Number Five: Hold your integrity high.
I don’t think anyone ever felt better about themselves after telling a lie. I think it’s the opposite. We feel better about ourselves when we do something good, when we make the right decision even if it’s a hard decision. If you’ve made that decision with intentionality, based on your values then that builds character, and character builds confidence.
Alright this is getting long and I promised to keep these videos short, sweet and to the point. So I’ll continue with the other five ways that you can build your confidence next week, so make sure that you subscribe to the Life Lounge so that you can get the next video delivered right to your inbox.