“You’re either confident or you’re not” — sincerely, the unhelpful BS academy
Everyone is talking about confidence.
How to get it, how to keep it, grow it and, eventually… sell it.
Oh yes, confidence. Ever elusive, yet seemingly simple. All the advice on the subject tends to melt down into — you either got it or you don’t; and if you want it, you have to push a lot of buttons and then perhaps it’ll snap into place — switch, snap! You’re confident now, how does it feel?
Personally I’ve evolved and receded through several levels and layers of confidence. When I was a kid, I was confident enough to dream of having the world, but not confident enough to ask for it. As a teen, I felt I was at confidence rock-bottom, though now I’m not sure I was. As a fresh adult I was seemingly rolling in confidence, but now I’m quite certain I was confidence-poor. Confidence, like any other sought-after anything is complex and needs to be nurtured with love.
Throughout my personal journey with confidence and my professional experience in life coaching and teaching, I started to define some stages of confidence I could grasp in myself and in my students:
As a coach, you’d think that I sit strongly in stage 5. But the truth is, I’ve simmered along stage 3–4 for way too long. When I shared this on instagram the first time, a follower of mine commented, “wow I would have never guessed, you seem so confident — like you post anything!”
People have a funny way of hiding their problems in plain sight. We know we should be confident, so we find ways of ‘portraying’ confidence, or use our confidence in one thing to invalidate our ability to be confident elsewhere. Say you get good at sewing clothes. You confidently share all about it, and you’re not shy to show someone your latest creation. They love it and mention that you should try making a catalogue for your stuff, or getting more into design. You get kind of itchy and say, “I’m great at this kind of stuff, but I wouldn’t know where to begin with…”
Stage 1: I don’t believe in myself, I can’t do anything
This is the stage of complete non-confidence. This is the part of the hero arc where we secretly hate ourselves and blame everything we can for why we can’t.
This is a place we can get stuck in for a long time. Especially when we’re young, and when we experience blame and harsh criticism over and over. We feel heavy with a dark cloud and hide the, “I don’t believe in myself, I can’t do anything” with “why bother do anything anyways?”
This is not a good place to be, and if you’re experiencing it, my advice to you would be:
Don’t live your life based on others’ opinions of you.
In the end, you’re responsible for your own happiness. These thoughts aren’t coming from you, build up some courage and reject them.
It will take time, a lot of self-love, compassion and if applicable, understanding and love from your community.
Stage 2: I don’t believe in myself much, I can do mediocre things
This is where I find most people sitting.
“Yeah… maybe I can do something…but nothing that I’ve tried yet…”
“I tried that thing you suggested… I didn’t do to great. I’m not sure if it’s my thing”
“Trust me, I’ve been at this a long time and… this is basically what I can do. Here are my limits”
In stage 2, your issue is that you believe there is some great reason why others are great. Whether it is money, nepotism, talent or work ethic — you, consciously or not, have accepted that confidence and excellence are bestowed upon you, and not earned. The world is cruel, and has handed you a set of shitty cards. Maybe you believe that because you were always compared to others when you were trying your best. Or maybe you believe that because it’s easier to think that than to feel you’ve wasted time being mediocre.
Whatever your reason, you must eventually face the truth:
You are able to grow. You just haven’t given yourself your best chance.
Your struggles, set backs and challenges are all very real. You owe yourself to know that until now this has been your best, because until now, you let yourself believe you were small. But this isn’t your reality, your reality can be whatever you want — once you accept a growth mindset, that excellence is just a matter of resolve, you’ll find yourself at stage 3.
Stage 3: I do believe in myself, but only in my room
This one is for all my burnt out gifted kids and one-talent wonders. You have allowed yourself to believe! To believe that there is something in you, that you can do great things. But the world outside is cruel. The world screams for excellence, and your capabilities now are too small for anyone to appreciate. Sure, you might do things that are unique and interesting for some, but not many.
Personally, I visit this stage of confidence a bit too often. I’m so confident that I have skills and that I could be of value in any endeavour, but that confidence dies the second I have to voice it outside of the comfort of my own mind.
Then, subconsciously, we start to dim our own light. Hiding, so that no one questions it. “Don’t ask me about my future, don’t ask me about my plans! I’m not sure… but.. but.. I’ll figure it out eventually”
More often then not, we already know what we want to do. We may have not admitted it to ourselves yet, but we know what we want. Our soul is already getting used to the self-love we’ve been feeding it here at Stage 3. There’s a quiet voice pointing us in some direction and we feel meek to follow it, so instead we voice confusion, stuck between the ‘comfortable’ or ‘safe’ space we’ve created to nurture our confidence, and the adventure or conquest we yearn to embark to fulfil our personal legends*.
Confidence takes practice. You’re on the right track. Practice voicing your confidence in more space.
Say something bold to your friends, apply to an opportunity you’d absolutely love but that makes you feel some resistance. Keep gnawing at your walls with purpose and you will make it to stage 4.
Stage 4: I do believe in myself and what I do up to X a point
You are confident. You have a thing. You believe in small incremental growth, slow but steady growth. You’re able to make little strides, tell people what you do and expect people to listen.
You’ve seen yourself do some pretty cool stuff, and it now stands as strong evidence — you are now allowed to be confident.
Stage 4 is a great place to be, but please do not stop here. You would be depriving yourself of your full potential for confidence. At this stage, your confidence is backed up by the evidence of your work, your deeds and dares. It is reliant on your abilities, on your track record. This is all good and jolly until you are not in your area of expertise, or you start to face some very unknown challenges.
Your confidence and your trust in your innate value should not be based on your awards and accolades. Your value is natural to who you are as a person. You are the value.
Once you can start to feel like you, above all else, are valuable — you will have achieved stage 5.
Stage 5: I can create whatever reality I want. I am powerful.
The goal of confidence isn’t just to overcome being insecure. The goal is to be a version of yourself that believes that you could do anything if you put your mind to it.
Let’s review the lessons of stages 1–4. At Stage 5, you now know:
- Others’ opinions and assumptions about you, are just that assumptions.
- Growth mindset > Fixed Mindset
- Life is tough! But you can handle it (if you believe you can!)
- Everyone starts at the beginning. Progress is to be celebrated, not hidden.
- Confidence takes practice; the wider the comfort zone, the wider your opportunities in life.
- Value is innate.
With these truths in your heart, something magical happens. You are not only ‘acting with confidence’ you have begun to feel like ‘a confident person’. It’s no longer a total of all your accomplishments and visible capabilities, you are a confident, because it has become part of your identity. You now believe you are a confident person.
With all habits and mindset shifts, our greatest goal is not to see them as prizes to be won, but to shift our identity to align with our goals. Our identity shapes our beliefs. Our beliefs shape our actions. Our actions become our habits — and our habits create compounded excellence over time.
You sit in the chariot chair. You are powerful and unique, your future is yours to make it.
Looking back at everything I’ve created and all the different ways I’ve attempted being a creator I can see that I was stuck at the lower levels of confidence for a long time. I’ve had so many things going on but I always missed what was most important or what would give the most value — because I was on a deeper level, afraid of failure. I didn’t trust that who I am and what I want to create would be interesting to anyone else. So I rebranded myself over and over trying to be what I thought others might want, which ended up being a helpful, but hollow representation of myself.
Confidence is something that builds over time, and is complex. It touches every part of your life and your insecurities, likewise, appear in places you may have not noticed before. Then you have to start the process of cultivating confidence in that area all over again.
However, confidence is not just a ‘you have it’ or ‘you don’t’ situation. Even if you are at stage two, you have confidence. You are confident. You just have more progress to make. Instead of focusing on your insecurity, lean into how confident you are now and continue to foster that confidence. It will grow, and you will be unstoppable.
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