Believing
in Yourself:
It Starts with One Question
Believing
in yourself is a key factor in staying
positive and developing self
esteem and self love. Use this one question to easily train
yourself to...
Automatically bolster your
confidence...
Leading to a
stronger belief in yourself...
Leading to a deeper
love for yourself...
Leading to more
success and happiness in life!
And it's happiness
we're seeking, right?
Well, believing in yourself
gives you a foundation for ultimate success in life because you know
you can rely on yourself to do whatever it takes to make your dreams
come true...
And when your dreams come true...
You're
happy!
Okay, so what's the one question that starts
the process of instilling more confidence in yourself?
“What
did I do right?”
Sounds
simple, yet most
of us miss it.
Ask
yourself, “How
many
times have I automatically 'apologized' for myself
without thinking twice before the words came rolling out?”
If
you're like most, that answer is a depressing, "Lots of times."
Yet,
you
can't help it because your
mind naturally defaults to the negative.
Now,
I know, that's not something we want to hear, nor do we want to
believe, yet when I heard positive
psychology lecturer say that our
minds default to the negative...
It made sense.
Think
about it...
To say good things out loud about
yourself goes “against the grain.”
It's
seen as arrogant or prideful.
So, we continually
“discredit” ourselves to avoid
standing out from the
crowd...
Constantly apologizing for ourselves
“out loud.”
This creates an
“internal map” of discrediting ourselves
because
that “internal map” follows what we
“announce” verbally to the world...
Our
brains are also "wired" to think critically...
It's
just the way they're built.
Which makes the task of
believing in yourself take extra focus and effort to
cultivate, but it can be done, and we're going to cover a few things
that help you right now.
So, “What Did
You
Do Right?”
Let's look at that
question,
plus a few others, that sets you up mentally to start believing in
yourself more and more.
Believing
in Yourself
"WHAT
DID I DO RIGHT?"
Now
that I've brought the “discrediting yourself” issue
to your mind's attention, you'll be noticing it when you begin
disparaging
yourself...
That's the first step: To
notice...
Step
1: Become aware that you're about to say
something negative
about yourself (internally or externally).
Step
2: Stop mid-sentence or mid-thought and ask, “What
did I do right?”
Step 3:Congratulate
yourself!
This is a great exercise
to strengthen your “believing in yourself” muscle.
Why?
Because
it trains your perception of yourself to “default”
to the positive.
For example, if your habit right
now is to continually “badger” yourself over
something you “perceived” that you did wrong, you
are automatically
programming yourself to default to not believing you
can do something.
By shifting your response to “What
did I do
right?” you can re-set your default
response to an, “I'm okay feeling.”
And
when you reinforce it
with congratulating yourself, you create a
positive mind frame which does two other things...
Enhances
your belief and confidence in yourself every time, and
Puts
your mind in a very nice receptive state for another question...
Believing
in Yourself
"HOW
CAN I IMPROVE?"
Now
that you're in an "I'm okay" state of mind, your "defenses" are down
and your creativity
muscle
opens up...
This
puts you in a better place mentally
and emotionally to
figure out ways to improve.
It
effortlessly inputs positive affirmations that help you trust your
inner wisdom and instill greater confidence and belief in yourself.
It uses guided imagery meditations and
"invisible" subliminal recordings plus a PDF Quick Start
Guide in an easy-to-follow format.
Most importantly, it
teaches you how to find your limiting beliefs that stop your daily
affirmations from working.
All
of this helps in maintaining
positive attitude and staying
positive,
but more importantly, it's fundamental to developing self esteem.
You'll
also notice that once you've given “permission to your
critic” to talk, he/she will be kinder to you...
It's
like you gave your “critic” space to be creative
and heard and be a part of who you are instead of letting him/her
“run the show.”
Your critic may
put up a fight because he/she isn't "top dog" anymore, but that's
okay. Let your critic throw its fit. It'll get over
it.
You're integrating the different parts of
yourself together...
To work as an internal team...
Keeping
balance among them.
Who we're trying to
coax out
more is your
cheerleader.
Believing
in Yourself
"WHAT
DID I LEARN?"
Life
asks us to constantly change and adapt. By asking
“What did I learn?” you're
promoting a positive
mindset...
Which in turn helps you in maintaining
positive attitude...
Which in turn helps
you in
believing in yourself...
Which in turns helps you in
staying positive!
It's
a great cycle to get rolling
because it will gain momentum.
How?
Your
mind will not only learn to default to the positive, but your body will
become addicted
to the new thoughts.
If you'd like to learn
a bit more about the addiction, click here to
quickly ready
about it. Then hit the
back button and I'll be
here waiting for you...
One
more thing worth
mentioning,
which the field of positive psychology has
found, is that when your brain is inclined to be positive, it becomes
more creative...
And it's building neural networks
faster too!
So
by starting our sequence of
questions with “What
did I do right,” you're
initiating a positive mind and all of its powers
and benefits.
Now
when you ask, “What did I learn?” you
continue expanding your neural pathways...
Because
every time you learn something, your brain responds by building new
neural infrastructure to support the learned behavior.
Pretty
cool, huh?
Our
brains adapt...
No
matter how old your are, your mind is very powerful and
can be reshaped
according to what you feed it.
Which means that your
brain will continue to adapt as you ask the fourth question...
Believing
in Yourself
"HOW
HAVE I INCREASED MY
BELIEF IN MYSELF?"
Again,
you're
pointing your mind toward looking for and actively searching for the
positive,
which is building new neural networks to support even more positive
thinking
and a stronger belief in yourself!
In fact, you're
actually programming yourself to look for ways to “find
evidence” as to why you can believe in yourself.
Here's
an easy exercise to do:
EXERCISE:
Once
a day (or whenever you need a boost), ask yourself to name five things
that you did “right” that day or the previous day...
And
give yourself permission to find anything at all...
Like
getting out of bed....
Brushing your teeth...
Not
yelling at the dog!
And be aware of the secondary
voice
that will come up and say, “Oh, of course you got out of
bed... You have to go to work, etc.”
Ignore
it...
Instead, acknowledge that you
got out of bed because you choose to go to work because you choose to
have enough money to live, because you want to eat...
Get
the point?
Everything is a success in the
beginning.... Everything!
All of these
acknowledgments are self
esteem affirmations that shape a more positive picture of yourself...
To
yourself!
And
then congratulate yourself...
I
know it sounds silly, but I'm always catching myself saying, "Good
girl, Suzanne." It's automatic for me now.
Don't
wait for others to acknowledge you...
You
acknowledge you!
After
awhile, this process becomes a very fun game. You'll turn it
into
a treasure hunt to find better and better things to acknowledge that
you did so you can congratulate yourself again!
Once
you're
finding really cool things to feel successful about, you can add the
other
questions I've posed above. In the beginning, though, it's
better to just start out with the one question...
“What
did I do right?”
Post it
somewhere in your
purse, wallet or other private place so you're not answering questions
about it...
But post it!
What
did
I do right?
Believing in yourself is
easy when
you're congratulating yourself often!
Be sure to check out
the tips in
these staying positive articles:
Maintaining
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