The Confidence Myth — Learning Vs Thinking
Why you don’t have a confidence problem, you just have to drop the mind game, and play the courage game
Confidence is a word that used to create a ton of insecurity for me, for all of my life i wished i could have it so i tried to analyse what it takes to become that person. That person who can speak in front of a room while being as cool as a cucumber, or that person who is able to take actions without thinking much about them.
I am going to dive into this article by sharing my insights on working on confidence in the psychological world (memories, analysis, thoughts) vs the existential (presence, action, wisdom)
THE PAST — PUZZLE SOLVING
Its a huge mental blocker for a person when they are fearful of not having enough confidence, so they will try a number of things to get the confidence that they desire. It becomes like searching for an easter egg in a forest, going on a journey of discovery, searching through all of the books, the instagram posts, the youtube videos. Then they realise that this “confidence issue” is because of something that happened in the past…
So then the person feels relieved, like being given a clue for a puzzle — “OK ! I know what it is, i know its a inner block from my psychological history”. So then they will go on a “healing journey”, to work out everything that is stopping them from having confidence, every memory, every reaction, every meaning they took from a situation.
It feels great, i know it does because i did the same thing. Once i figured out the past i felt some relief, like watching a Zen fountain (or Joeys artificial waterfall below!), peace in knowing how i became to be this way.
THE PRESENT
Ok now what? Picture me sitting there with my conclusions and ideas of why i am not confident. Now let me go back to feeling scared about public speaking, am i ready to go and do it? No!
Do i feel “confident” enough to take on every new challenge, no! This is because confidence is not something you can magically have just because you’ve understood why it creates tension for you. You earn confidence after you take action and prove your past-created beliefs wrong.
e.g Imagine i was scared of speaking to woman, so i spent a lot of time understanding the past and why i am scared of speaking to woman, and went on a healing journey to try to overcome this fear…. then perhaps one day i declare that “i am ready” to speak to women.
It sounds like way too much unnecessary work in the illusory mental world to me. Instead — If i start speaking to woman no matter how difficult it feels (even if I’m sweating and stuttering), the experiences will create a greater amount of wisdom and i will then begin to accumulate confidence.
Think of it like this, we have karmic energy from the past, but we must also create new karmic energy by taking actions in the now. We are so nice to a child when they make a mistake because we know the child has the potential to grow, but with adults we believe that “people cant change” — that’s a bitter defeated and life sucking mentality to me. If someone believes that then then they are saying no to life itself.
Being in an adult meat suit (your body), but restircting the evolution of wisdom. Its like going to disney land but only riding the teapot ride over and over, that’s the deluded mind at work — stuck in comfort and routine.
COURAGE
Courage is something different all together, because its allowing yourself to be with the initial discomfort of the experience and take action anyway, rather than letting the mind stop the experience from even starting
Courage comes from latin word Cour, which means heart. This suits me well (read my other story about Love) because we have to go to this deeper place in order to create courage, it also isnt something you can blend up into a smoothie and drink! (no whiskey doesn’t count!)
It comes from within, and its beyond the mental mind games that are telling you that you “need confidence”, or you “don’t feel ready”. What is that anyway? Its an excuse.
Its like driving down a sunny road called “inspiration” in your mind, and then suddenly the scene changes into clouds and a huge sign appears saying “ROAD CLOSED”, with a crowd of people in uniforms (who all have your faces), saying “sorry sir” you don’t have the confidence badge, you must turn back.
What happens next? You cancel your entire trip and you go home disappointed and your soul gets imprisoned. Its like if your flight gets cancelled, nobody likes that do they? So why must you cancel the flights of your life just because you didn’t have the feeling of confidence before you went ? What if you its OK to feel scared, tense but have the courage to do what you want to do anyway? Because you know how good you will feel after doing it, that’s when the confidence reward will come.
And while we are on the subject of flights, you are fully aware that when you board a flight your plane may crash or disappear, there’s a chance right? But do you need to have this thing called “confidence” to board your flight? No, you just have enough wisdom and courage to say “hey i can board this flight even if its a fact that i can die on this plane”
I took bachata and salsa classes in Peru during my travels, i was the most awkward and sweaty mess during it, the instructor said why are your palms so wet!! They laughed at me, i felt bad, but i continued and eventually i learnt some basic moves and was dancing in the nightclub a few weeks later!
Confidence came as a reward, after i had the courage to feel uncomfortable
GOALS
We are only willing to go through the discomfort if we have a reward right? So when working on yourself, you have to start with knowing what you want, but not being overwhelmed and “headily attached” about knowing how to get there. I have seen within myself and when working with clients that it instantly channels this voice of “OH NO I CANT DO IT”
You have to be in the existing “I am” mode first before you venture out into the planning and how to — “i Do” and “i achieve” mode.
A goal is a place to come from, not a place to get to. Read that again… and once more..
If you see it this way then it doesn’t feel overwhelming and you tackle it using an inside out approach, rather than outside in.
If i told you that on the top of this mountain would be the most beautiful views you’ve ever seen, but it would take you 5 boring hours to walk there. What would be your initial reactions? Doesn’t sound like fun to me. What if instead i told you that throughout the entire walk, there would be rare birds, flowers, unique shrines, gurus who bless your spirit, one of a kind dancing monkeys and waterfalls along the way — Would you be excited to go? (an exaggerated example with intent!)
So with your goals — How can we make it fun, dooable, and on your own terms. So that the reward isn’t just the end goal (the top of the mountain), but the reward is the entire present moment experience.
Courage appears when we know we are living an experience, not thinking an experience, courage is the energy flowing, not the mind spinning. Its heart, not head.
And here’s the thing — you must take the shaking, the sweating, the pain, the worry, the fear, because on the other side is that magical realisation that everyone has experienced of “It wasn’t as bad as i thought”.
These realisations birth wisdom, because your body and mind register that you took action despite fear, therefore it will learn that the fear is not required as much in the future, and you will notice that the physical and mental sensations begin to reduce over time. You don’t need to go into past memories and play detective with them, its way more fun to be in the existential mode of experiencing and learning through action
Everything i have done in my life has been based on having an experience and learning from it. There’s not been one time in my life when thinking through something was more insightful than trying and experiencing it. This is because the mind is limited to what it knows, it doesn’t know what it doesn’t know! Its like asking a computer to dance — it doesn’t understand because its limited to what it knows — just like our past memories and beliefs. We must teach the computer new commands by creating them in the present
Would you ever tell your child to go and read a book about the theory of life, or show them how to live it?!
HOW DO I MOVE FORWARD
Here’s something which has worked well for me — Make everything into a game.
If you are with a bunch of adults and you say “LETS PLAY A GAME”, i bet you that they will be at least curious, and at most excited. Games take the edge off because we tap into the wonder child that is full of creativity and potential, we get out of the intellectual memory based living. When we play, we aren’t tense or worried about “will i be good enough” or “i know exactly what will happen”, all of this is nonsense assumptions and fraudulent wisdom.
Imagine life to be a 100000 piece jigsaw puzzle and your intellect is saying I have 10 pieces so i assume what the image will be, let go of that calculating and you will tap into the greatest version of yourself.
The child in comes out if we treat our personal growth as a game because it takes the seriousness off. Have you ever met someone whos serious and tense 100% of the time? And even if its 90% of the time, is that fun for anyone?
We grow up and forget the creative and evolving nature of a human that we only believe children have. That’s life being lost, because if life was treated experientially without tensely analysing outcomes, then we can meet any goals and bath in a state of present moment bliss everyday.
I don’t care how serious your challenge is, from breaking up, to business challenges, i don’t care, if you can challenge your thoughts then you will maximise every area of life in the way that a company booms when they get an influx of finances
And here’s the thing which totally threw me off, when i removed the mind fog I realised that the fear was really my soul dressed up in order to drive me to do what i really wanted to do and reach my full potential. It was like being tapped on the shoulder saying “hey, if you don’t do this then you will imprison me — your soul!”. I reframed the voice in my head from being a bad thing, to being the spark which fueled me to shut it up by taking action!
Doing the thing that my mind is resisting feels greater than any high on the planet
To Close
I haven’t written any specific how to’s because I believe that you must change the way you see the world, for your world to change.
If you can really see beyond your current process and let everything i’ve said sink in deeply, you will find courage, you will “go into battle with wet pants” as the US Army would say. You will not let the mind stop you, and you will create massive change all around you. We are not a floating head, we are a living organism and a spiritual being, these untapped lakes of potential are sleeping within you, its your job to give them a kick to wake them up!
Existing Vs Thinking. Action Vs Reaction. Thriving Vs Surviving
If you’ve found this article useful then send me a message and let me know what your 1 key take aways was.
If you are a curious person then I’d happily send you a video i made about this called “Love vs Fear and Presence Vs Planning”. I have also created some other resources which you may find interesting, send me a message and i will share them with you
The information from this article may help you to move forward, but if you really want to implement and act on it (as I’ve said) but are unsure how to go beyond the mind and “feel the fear and do it anyway”, then I invite you to write to me and we can have a conversation
Where to find me
I regularly make content on instagram, facebook and Insight timer. These are often videos, live sessions, and i share images and quotes. Everything i share is based on experiences i am having, so if you are interested in seeing more of me then check out the links below
https://www.instagram.com/rajgorsia/
Have a powerful week
Mucho Amor. Raj
