Recipe 5: Loss of Confidence

Occasions
Having had one too many knocks
Picking yourself up after an illness
Recovering from a bad review

Ingredients
Collection >> Equilibrium >> Deduction

We all have to take knocks in our lives and it's not always easy to take them. Just telling yourself to get over it sometimes isn't enough. If someone else says it to you at the wrong time or in the wrong place, it can even generate feeling of anger.

This feeling should not be underestimated as it's all too easy for someone to tell you not to worry about it and to pull yourself together. The fix is more subtle than this and only works when applied from within.

First you must collect both the evidence and yourself. Take some time to assess what exactly has pulled the rug from your feet. Then think back to when this has happened before. If you are able, go right back to the first occurrence.

Next you must bring in balance. This is not the balance of just offsetting a list of things you do feel confident or good about. It is about achieving a permanent state of balance such that your confidence cannot be knocked again.

This recipe needs all the flavours to be applied in parallel as opposed to in sequence. The key is in the deduction of what has unsettled you.

What does the sapping of your confidence really tell you about you?

What also does it tell you about the person or the circumstance from which the situation arose?

When you have these answers, you will learn to ask these questions first the next time it happens as opposed to taking the situation personally. •

Renaissance Man and Imagineer Tom Evans is the author of four books and counting about creativity. More »

12/30/11