{"id":37698,"date":"2015-12-27T21:42:49","date_gmt":"2015-12-28T05:42:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/?p=37698"},"modified":"2016-01-01T20:15:12","modified_gmt":"2016-01-02T04:15:12","slug":"5-prime-blockers-developing-confidence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/5-prime-blockers-developing-confidence\/","title":{"rendered":"5 Prime Blockers To Developing Confidence"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>

<\/p>\n

On the surface, it may appear that confident people never make mistakes and know what to do in any given situation. But when I started to pay close attention to the actions of someone I perceived as confident,\u00a0 I realized just how many times they failed during a single day. And yet, no one, including myself, seemed to take any notice of their failures. How did they get away with it? And what are the five prime blockers that stop most of us from developing that kind of confidence?<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Perfectionism<\/strong><\/h1>\n

If I were to picture perfectionism as a person, it would work as a respectable gynecologist during the day, but at night he’d be performing illegal abortions to make some dirty cash on the side. He\u2019d be there, scalpel in hand, coldly amputating any idea before it\u2019s even born, or had a chance to develop a nose or an ear, or determine its own gender. \u00a0Many of us have ideas, but they never get past the sharp scalpel of Dr Perfectionism. And the more we sacrifice our own ideas to the vicious doctor, the more we grow dissatisfied with ourselves, and start demanding perfection of others around us. In the words of Liz Gilbert, the best-selling author of Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear\u00a0<\/em>\u2018perfectionism is just a high-end, haute couture version of fear.\u2019<\/p>\n

Fear<\/strong><\/h1>\n

Most often our confidence is knocked down by fear. And, more specifically, it is the fear of an unknown outcome which can disguise itself as fear of failure. I\u2019ve often wondered why people who like to proclaim that they \u2018live in the real world\u2019 where dreams are useless when trying to secure a good pension fund, argue that \u2018the unknown\u2019 will necessarily lead to a bad outcome. And that\u2019s enough of a reason for them to never take a single risk. They fiercely believe that they live in \u2018reality\u2019, despite the fact that the odds between a good and a bad outcome in any given situation are pretty much 50\/50. Why do we give into fear more than we give into faith that things will work out, if the chances between either outcome are fairly equal? And our biggest fear of the unknown manifests itself in the fear of dying \u2013 we are so afraid of death, although in reality we have no idea what lies on the other side. Quoting Socrates (allegedly the wisest man who ever lived) \u2018No one knows whether death may not be the greatest of all blessings for a man, yet men fear it as if they knew that it is the greatest of evils.\u2019<\/p>\n

Mistakes<\/strong><\/h1>\n

Let me say it again. Confident people make mistakes and fail ALL THE TIME. I we suppose for a moment that the term \u2018mistake\u2019 is nothing more than a myth, then believing in this myth reveals something about our own values. A mistake for one person could mean success for someone else, who grew up in a different family or cultural context. Believing we made a mistake implies that we also believe that there is a \u2018right\u2019 and a \u2018wrong\u2019 outcome. It suggests that we believe our system of judgement to be \u2018the right way\u2019, that we live in a largely \u2018black and white\u2019 world. We see mistakes in ourselves and in others \u00a0– actions\u00a0that disagree with our inner set of acceptable behavior. But it may be that none of our judgements even belong to us in the first place \u2013 most are just ideas we have inherited from our family or culture, and keep repeating because we don\u2019t know any different. But when you push your comfort zone (which confident people seem to do a lot), you begin to discover what views are truly yours and what are the product of your past. Then you can at last have the confidence to build a life that will make you <\/em>happy, rather than satisfy your family or serve the culture you come from.<\/p>\n

Negative thoughts<\/strong><\/h1>\n

There\u2019s nothing hugely wrong with them. It\u2019s just that they are absolutely useless, serving as one of the\u00a0prime blockers in our capacity to learn, develop and become more confident.\u00a0 Thoughts we probably all recognise, such as \u2018I don\u2019t get it, I\u2019m too slow, I\u2019ll never be an expert in this\u2019 are actually the root cause that stops us from progressing and becoming experts at whatever it is we are trying to master. I\u2019ve often had the desire to learn the piano but before I even sit down at the keyboard, I have to fight off\u00a0a whole battalion of negative thoughts. Each has a different flag they are boasting as they rush towards me: \u2018You\u2019re too old to learn,\u2019 one of them says. \u2018You\u2019ll never get it,\u2019 declares another. \u2018You\u2019ll never be able to compose music.\u2019 Patiently, I let them argue and run their course, as I try to match each key to its depiction on the piano score \u2013 a rather dull and mundane task, with little creativity or positive thinking involved. But really, that\u2019s all there is to becoming an \u2018expert\u2019 in a field \u2013 a desire to learn, persistence and patience.\u00a0 Remember Aesop\u2019s classic\u00a0tale about the hare that lost the\u00a0a race to a tortoise? The tortoise didn\u2019t have a positive mental attitude, or a distinctive personality – and yet he beat the hare to it.<\/p>\n

The feeling of uselessness<\/strong><\/h1>\n

Have you ever thought to yourself \u2018why am I doing this, who is going to care if I do this or not?\u2019 Well, I have for sure. Even as I write this post, I am consumed with the feeling that no one is going to read it, so why waste my time writing it at all? And the truth is that a lot of people probably won\u2019t read it and won\u2019t care. But someone<\/em> just might. Either way, I\u2019ve enjoyed the process of writing the post \u2013 it has helped me to identify and define my own blockers to confidence more clearly. And why should anything we do have much more purpose than simply the enjoyment of doing it? If we pictured the life-span of our planet as a clock, then we as humans would represent a fraction of a second \u2013 if that. Just picture what a tiny part of that fraction is your own individual life, thrown into the vast pool of all the others. Of course, our individual lives are important and we can make them very meaningful \u2013 but in the grand scheme of things, we are all doing useless things. So we might as well keep doing them!<\/p>\n

What do you understand with the term \u2018confidence\u2019? What qualities would someone need to have in order for you to perceive them as confident? We are all learners here, students in the grand school of life, so feel free to share your views in the comments!<\/p>\n

——–<\/p>\n

Ieva is a Bristol-based freelance writer, originally from Latvia. Having finished an MA in Creative Writing from Bath Spa University, she hopes to feed her love of writing by completing novels, non-fiction, short stories and poetry, some of which can already be found on her blog at www.ramblings-of-a-latvian.blogspot.co.uk<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On the surface, it may appear that confident people never make mistakes and know what to do in any given situation. But when I started to pay close attention to the actions of someone I perceived as confident, I realized just how many times they failed during a single day. Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12163,"featured_media":37732,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0},"categories":[205,32,6],"tags":[4653,1921,4641,4631,66,4629,4640],"yoast_head":"\n5 Prime Blockers To Developing Confidence<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"It may appear that confident people never make mistakes. But they fail ALL THE TIME. And yet, no one seems to notice. How do they get away with it?\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/5-prime-blockers-developing-confidence\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"5 Prime Blockers To Developing Confidence\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"It may appear that confident people never make mistakes. But they fail ALL THE TIME. And yet, no one seems to notice. How do they get away with it?\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/5-prime-blockers-developing-confidence\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"http:\/\/www.facebook.com\/pickthebrain\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2015-12-28T05:42:49+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2016-01-02T04:15:12+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/Screen-Shot-2015-12-27-at-9.42.36-PM.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"575\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"401\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@pickthebrain\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@pickthebrain\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Erin Falconer\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"6 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/\",\"name\":\"Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/5-prime-blockers-developing-confidence\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/Screen-Shot-2015-12-27-at-9.42.36-PM.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/Screen-Shot-2015-12-27-at-9.42.36-PM.png\",\"width\":575,\"height\":401,\"caption\":\"5 Prime Blockers To Developing Self Confidence\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/5-prime-blockers-developing-confidence\/#webpage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/5-prime-blockers-developing-confidence\/\",\"name\":\"5 Prime Blockers To Developing Confidence\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/5-prime-blockers-developing-confidence\/#primaryimage\"},\"datePublished\":\"2015-12-28T05:42:49+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2016-01-02T04:15:12+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/2da8ae162c097bdb749ab098472b4cc5\"},\"description\":\"It may appear that confident people never make mistakes. But they fail ALL THE TIME. And yet, no one seems to notice. How do they get away with it?\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/5-prime-blockers-developing-confidence\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/5-prime-blockers-developing-confidence\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/5-prime-blockers-developing-confidence\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"5 Prime Blockers To Developing Confidence\"}]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/2da8ae162c097bdb749ab098472b4cc5\",\"name\":\"Erin Falconer\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/1173c63284b173ff225e5f87a1af5028?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/1173c63284b173ff225e5f87a1af5028?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Erin Falconer\"},\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/author\/erin\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"5 Prime Blockers To Developing Confidence","description":"It may appear that confident people never make mistakes. But they fail ALL THE TIME. And yet, no one seems to notice. How do they get away with it?","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/5-prime-blockers-developing-confidence\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"5 Prime Blockers To Developing Confidence","og_description":"It may appear that confident people never make mistakes. But they fail ALL THE TIME. And yet, no one seems to notice. How do they get away with it?","og_url":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/5-prime-blockers-developing-confidence\/","og_site_name":"Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement","article_publisher":"http:\/\/www.facebook.com\/pickthebrain","article_published_time":"2015-12-28T05:42:49+00:00","article_modified_time":"2016-01-02T04:15:12+00:00","og_image":[{"width":575,"height":401,"url":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/Screen-Shot-2015-12-27-at-9.42.36-PM.png","type":"image\/png"}],"twitter_card":"summary","twitter_creator":"@pickthebrain","twitter_site":"@pickthebrain","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Erin Falconer","Est. reading time":"6 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/","name":"Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement","description":"","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/5-prime-blockers-developing-confidence\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/Screen-Shot-2015-12-27-at-9.42.36-PM.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/Screen-Shot-2015-12-27-at-9.42.36-PM.png","width":575,"height":401,"caption":"5 Prime Blockers To Developing Self Confidence"},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/5-prime-blockers-developing-confidence\/#webpage","url":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/5-prime-blockers-developing-confidence\/","name":"5 Prime Blockers To Developing Confidence","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/5-prime-blockers-developing-confidence\/#primaryimage"},"datePublished":"2015-12-28T05:42:49+00:00","dateModified":"2016-01-02T04:15:12+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/2da8ae162c097bdb749ab098472b4cc5"},"description":"It may appear that confident people never make mistakes. But they fail ALL THE TIME. And yet, no one seems to notice. How do they get away with it?","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/5-prime-blockers-developing-confidence\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/5-prime-blockers-developing-confidence\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/5-prime-blockers-developing-confidence\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"5 Prime Blockers To Developing Confidence"}]},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/2da8ae162c097bdb749ab098472b4cc5","name":"Erin Falconer","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/1173c63284b173ff225e5f87a1af5028?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/1173c63284b173ff225e5f87a1af5028?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Erin Falconer"},"url":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/author\/erin\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37698"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12163"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37698"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37698\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/37732"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37698"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37698"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pickthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37698"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}