“To be a champ you have to believe in yourself when nobody else will.”~Sugar Ray Robinson
I was listening to a podcast the other day, and the guest was saying that the only way to increase confidence was to do something over and over and over again, until you know you can do it.
That does make sense, and I also found myself disagreeing.
A classic, “Yes, and…”
I do agree that doing something over and over and over, even if you don’t do it well to start, is a pretty sure way to increase your confidence. I also agree with Sugar Ray Robinson that sometimes we need to start with a simple belief – a kind of “fake it ‘til you make it” confidence – to get us going.
Keeping going, especially all the way to champ-hood, takes a lot. A lot of time. A lot of effort. A lot of getting over hurdles when things get rough. On the road to a goal we care about, there will be times when our success may not look imminent, may not even look possible. It’s at those times when we need to have a resource deep inside of ourselves that we can tap into when we might lose our way – or lose our faith in that great outcome. We may also want to have a good smattering of select people who will help us believe in ourselves.
We need to keep trying and trying and trying and allowing ourselves to fail and learn and try again along the way.
And we need to believe in ourselves along the way.
When have you believed in yourself, and how has it helped you succeed?
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