Hello friends!
Do you ever feel unconfident? How about feeling like a loser? Perhaps you feel completely useless! Ah yes, the ever-present internal dialogue letting us know our own inadequacies. We hate that voice. But it’s a useful voice, and listening to it might just put us on the right path.
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I have felt all of these feelings. You have felt all of these feelings. So what are we going to do about them? It’s been my experience that the more confident you become, the more life opens up to you. The opposite is also true, meaning the more unconfident you become, the more life closes up on you. And it isn’t shocking that this would be the case.
Let’s make up an example:
Meet Timmy! Timmy is a young adolescent male. He’s weak, he’s super skinny, and he’s insecure about his body. He doesn’t know how to talk to women and is terrified of rejection. He drinks alcohol to reduce his anxiety and smokes cigarettes out of habit. He dresses like a bum and eats shit food all day. He’s uneducated. Timmy you might say is a hot mess.
But Timmy doesn’t want to feel this way. He wants to be confident and smooth with the ladies! He wants to look and feel better and be more secure about his body. He wants to be strong. He wants to be intelligent. He doesn’t want to be anxious and drink and smoke just to make it through each and every day. What can Timmy do?
The short and sweet version:
Timmy can become competent. And competence leads to confidence.
Let’s say Timmy finally decides enough is enough and gets his shit together. He starts training at his local gym religiously. He feels awkward and uncomfortable at first, but after a few consistent days of showing up, he begins to settle in. Not only does he begin to gain weight and put on muscle, solving his “skinny” problem, but it also simultaneously reduces his anxiety, mitigating his urge to drink and smoke.
He cuts out the alcohol and cigarettes and starts drinking water instead. He begins to eat clean and suddenly has more energy. He throws out all of his old oversized dingy mismatched clothes and purchases an entirely new wardrobe. He shaves. He gets a haircut. He whitens his teeth. He feels good. He begins to seek out intellectual pursuit, formulating his own opinions and solidifying his identity. He feels sharp. Sharp enough, that he can maybe talk to a woman and not feel completely unworthy of her. Maybe he can even deal with rejection because he’s beginning to seek his own approval and not the approval of others.
In this example, it’s clear to see that the more competent our dear friend Timmy becomes, the more confident he becomes as well. It’s been my experience (and Timmy’s) that this is indeed true. We can’t necessarily fake confidence. Maybe we can come off more confident than we actually are, but that isn’t really solving the problem, it’s more a bandaid solution.
If you want to become a confident individual, you’re going to need to become a competent individual. And competence requires everyday discipline and effort. It requires struggle. It requires failure and adversity. It requires being uncomfortable and awkward and not satisfied with yourself. Perhaps it even requires to you feel like our friend Timmy, like a loser.
When these feelings come to the surface, be glad. Be glad you’re recognizing that you’re capable of more than you’re currently doing. Be glad that there’s room to grow. Be glad you have a skill set that needs further developing. Be glad. Because in doing so, not only will you become more competent, but you will also become more confident.
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Until next Monday.
Your friend,
Trevor
(Note: If you enjoy this newsletter, please consider sharing it with someone who would get a lot out of it. If this was shared with you, you can sign up here to receive it each Monday morning. It’s free, plus you get a handful of special "thank you's" when you sign up).