You’ve probably been told to believe in yourself multiple times in your life. While you may not have taken it too seriously, there is power in that advice. Believing in yourself sets the foundation for your journey on the road to success. It can be the motivation you need to get yourself out of a funk.
When you believe in yourself, you:
1. Talk yourself up internally
When you believe in yourself, you reinforce the notion that you can accomplish anything you set your mind to. This may seem fairly obvious, but so many of us are filled with crippling self-doubt that hinders us from even taking the first step toward success. Rather than having an inner monologue revolving around whether you can accomplish a certain task, your positive mindset reaffirms the belief that you’re a fully capable human being with many talents.
2. Talk down your fears
Just as you talk yourself up by believing in yourself, you also erase any self-doubt you have in your mind. When you stop talking yourself up, your mind wanders to questions that may stop you in your tracks: What if I don’t succeed? What if something goes wrong? What if people don’t like my idea?
Yes, there are a million things that could go wrong, and trying something new might not always work out. Without believing in yourself, it can seem like there are a million ways to fail and only one way to succeed. Don’t sabotage yourself before you even get the ball rolling.
3. Reflect on past success
No matter how much you’ve failed in your life, you’ve undoubtedly experienced success in a variety of ways. When you believe in yourself, you constantly look back on all the times you’ve used your talents to do well in your life. Not only do you recognize your successes, but you also frame your failures simply as times your efforts didn’t pay off. Those that constantly look down on themselves often let their failures haunt them, prohibiting their ability to try something new and improve their lives.
4. Think realistically
When you believe in yourself, you see your actions from a variety of perspectives. You’ll see how your efforts impact others in a positive way and you’ll understand how important you are to your community. Furthermore, you’ll also see how little your mistakes matter. Nobody truly cares enough to laugh at you or judge you when you mess up. People have enough problems of their own. Most people are just too busy with their own lives to waste time thinking about anyone else. When you believe in yourself, it’s okay to inflate your own self-esteem and worthiness, but you should never exaggerate the way that others perceive you.
5. Count your victories
Just as you reflect on your past successes, you’ll also start to see how many small victories you really have had throughout your life. Every time you make progress in life, you’ve won. In fact, every single day you’re alive is a day that you have won. Just because you fail at times does not mean you’ve lost. This just means your victory has been put off for the time being. When playing a game, you either win or lose. In life, even when you fall short of your goal, you can find a small victory in your efforts.
6. Celebrate yourself
When you talk yourself up and believe in yourself, you’re celebrating your life. When you count every small victory you’ve ever experienced, you’re throwing yourself the opposite of a pity-party. Too many times, we focus on the negative aspects of ourselves and get caught up in a loop of detrimental thinking. Believing in ourselves helps break that cycle. We begin to see all of our weaknesses as aspects to be improved, all our strengths as reasons to celebrate.
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