What does it take to believe in yourself?
Restored from the Empower Network archive (2011–2017), lightly edited to meet our current advertising standards. Views are the original author’s.
I held a contest on my facebook page and asked everyone a question: what should I write my blog post about? I got answers, but my multiple choice answers were:
– Believe in yourself
– how to change bad habits
– motivation
There were 3 others that were added too, and I’ll show you the results later.
Believe in yourself
One way to believe in yourself; get over to this link and watch this video. You’ll be introduced to a self improvement program, disguised as a marketing product. I’m serious, there’s more content about getting your head right in this series than there is about marketing. Just watch and you’ll see.
Now back to the blog post.
I have to say that I was honestly surprised that the votes came in with the first item “believe in yourself”
It made me think about me. And here’s why. I’ve never had a strong self image. I’ve never thought I could do the amazing things. I’ve never thought I could be successful or rich. These things were always a far reach for me. In the past 2 years, I’ve had to push past challenges from losing a job 2 times, finding a job, being a contractor with a finite term, and starting a marketing company.
So, challenges of self belief, self image and self confidence were hard characteristics for me to think about, much less master or work to strengthen. It got to the point where I was struggling to get up each day and push through it. And to top it all off, I’ve struggled with giving up when things got a little bit hard. I had a lesson in that tonight and I’ll tell you the story;
I was out for a ride with the cycling team, and today’s ride was all about learning how to ride with a team. This is different for me because I’ve never been on a team before, it’s always been me riding on my own. Here’s a tip, if you’re doing something and you’re doing it alone, take note of how well you’re doing. Then find the person that does it the best, and do the same thing right along side them. If you know what I mean, you’ll appreciate the next sentence. I thought I had done pretty well until I got on the road with these guys tonight. They’re strong and conditioned. I got my tail handed to me and I worked harder than I’ve ever worked. I had a personal best for speed tonight and they were just cooling down from a race this weekend.
Here’s where believing in yourself comes into play. Tonight, I thought I could kinda keep up. I struggled. I struggled hard. Trying to keep up with this group took everything that I had and I worked hard to do it. As I was riding beside one of them, I asked what his heart rate was….. 127 bpm. Mine…. 170.
To believe in yourself has nothing to do with what others are doing. I’m using this story because I didn’t believe that I could ride as fast as I did tonight. I seriously had no idea how I could do what I did tonight, but I was surrounded by a team that carried me when I was struggling and a team that pushed me when I needed to be pushed.
Sometimes you increase how much you believe in yourself only if you keep going through what you think is the hardest thing you’ve ever done. It may seem like there’s no way you can finish. It may seem like there’s no way that you can give anything more, but some how when you get done, you look back and say, holy shit, I did that.
Tonight that was my thought. I had no idea I could ride over 20 mph for anything more than 5 or so miles. My average tonight for over 27 miles was 20.4. This was with a 14 mph wind that we rode straight into for the first 7 miles.
What does it mean to believe in yourself
Belief in yourself comes from surrounding yourself with people that also believe you can do it and surrounding yourself with people that DO do it. People that have accomplished the goal you’re going after. People that want you to succeed as much or sometimes more than you want to. And then you need to kick ass no matter what comes in your way. If you feel like puking, you better either spit or swallow it because you’re going to keep going.
The best way to believe in yourself is to commit to finishing your goal. Finish the race, no matter how hard or how slow you think you’re going, you’ve gotta push past what you THINK you can do to find out what you actually can do. NO ONE will do that but you.
So, here’s how my request for a blog post topic ended up.
Now I’m not really sure how I’ll kiss someone’s ass or write about it, but I’m going to scratch those 2 votes off my list!
Remember…
TAKE ACTION and Never Stop Learning
Larry