Overcoming Self-Doubt

Overcoming Self-Doubt

Self-doubt is nothing but a paralyzing feeling within our minds that stops us from doing things or taking the risk to do stuff that may yield great rewards in the future. There is no single individual on this earth who has not come across this feeling of self-doubt. We all come across self-doubt daily in our life. Having said that it comes to my mind, is self-doubt a good thing or a bad thing? Or is it a positive feeling or a negative thought or emotion? I am sure you guys have given that thought at some point in time in your lives.

Self-doubt is often introduced to us during tough times, challenging times. Mostly, when we are supposed to make a life-changing decision, help someone with their struggles or make a decision for the better of our lives. In my opinion, self-doubt arises due to two major reasons:

• Lack of Confidence
• Lack of Experience
  
  

Let’s take a closer look at each of them. How they make us feel and how they are a part of our lives even though we are not consciously aware of them being a part of our lives. 

Lack of Confidence: Since childhood, we have been told time and time again that we should have confidence in everything we do and that will lead us to success. Confidence is considered to be a good feeling, but if you have confidence in anything and everything then you are missing out on something big in life. Even though confidence is a good thing, a lack of confidence is not that bad after all. We need to understand one simple concept in the term CONFIDENCE. Confidence comes only when there is clarity in what we are doing or what we are about to do. It’s also true that we cannot have clarity over everything in life. It's okay if your cup of confidence is half full, only then you can fill the rest of the half and move on in your life and achieve success. Similarly, it’s okay to have less clarity on any subject after all when you study and research on that subject clarity is inevitable and so is confidence.

Lack of Experience: Our age and our existence on this planet are forever moving in the forward direction and not the other way around. We live, we get older and then we perish. This is the cycle of nature for any living being on the planet. As we get older, we accumulate various experiences in life. It’s a constant practice of learning. It’s practically basic that the younger we are, the less experience we have of life. We remember the good experience and never forget the bad ones. In case, we have come across a situation that we never experienced in life that’s where the self-doubt creeps into us.

Now, both the above reasoning of self-doubt comes across as a negative aspect of life. However, there is a positive edge to the feeling of self-doubt as well. It is the most amazing realization you can ever have in your life. Some will be surprised they have never thought of it that way earlier. Self-doubt is good. Without self-doubt, we would be crazy to do things the way we felt. Further, the consequences could be even worse. By self-doubting ourselves, we are gauging our confidence and our experience while making a decision. If we have the confidence and the experience to handle the situation we will go ahead with it else we may take another course. 

If there was no self-doubt, we would not understand our existence. Self-doubting does not mean we are discouraging ourselves or taking a back seat in our fast-paced lives. Instead, we are spending time to realize where we stand and make a wise decision. Self-doubt can greatly contribute to either not making a bad decision to making some of the best decisions of our lives. Self-doubt is proof of active intelligence that is constantly looking for better possibilities. There is nothing in this world that exists with no doubts. 

Try this exercise. We all drink water from either a glass or a bottle. Stare at the still water within it. Do you know what it’s made of? Do you know the origin of its existence? Do you know everything about it and what it can do? The answer is doubtful right. Yet you will have that glass or bottle of water when thirsty.

We need to keep this in mind that there is nothing 100% known or unknown. There is no need to be hard on oneself. It is vital we encourage doubt and not treat it as a negative feeling or thought or emotion. The more doubts we have, the more are the possibilities to explore ourselves. There is nothing better than knowing ourselves to the fullest. If taken positively, it will no more be the cause of your failures but a blessing to an enormous successful possibility.

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Written by Jaison Noronha
Idea Source : Personal Experiences & YouTube