‘Confidence’ is a just a word to think of. It is never taken seriously as far its meaning and importance is concerned. As the rule of (human) nature, importance of anything is realized only when the thing is lost.
Here we are talking about confidence or self-confidence. It is directly connected to our self-esteem. So, to it give a new perception, a prolonged low self-esteem causes loss of self confidence.
You may have read the article “ways to raise your lowered self esteem”, so this article is more of a continuation to it, the next step for self betterment.
To fight with any problem, it is necessary to know its roots or causes. Once we have a clear understanding of the problem, only then it’s possible to tackle it successfully.
The root cause of losing confidence is that particular miserable failure after the first attempt or first try.
Also, the main cause of gaining back the lost confidence is that first success, either big or small, after so many failures. By implication, the confidence, losing or gaining, it’s all our mind at work. In other words, it’s human tendency.
No confidence and full confidence are two ends of an invisible spectrum present in our minds. The mind transits from one end to the other end of the spectrum, slowly or rapidly.
It depends on the size of success or failure, small or big, which is directly proportional to the speed of transition, slow or rapid.
Hold on readers. This article will not miss out any real life relatable fictional scenarios to prove the objective, which the headline offers.
Most of the life learnings and experiences start when we are in an age of college education and that continues till the end. That’s the reason why there is at least one scenario narrated when the subject is a college student.
Scene -1: You are college student who appeared for class tests and when the results are out, you come to know you failed. That’s a big set back. You not only lose your confidence to face tests again to that particular subject, but also it will affect your performance other subjects too.
Scene - 2: You are appearing for a job interview. You are partly excited and partly nervous about it. Seated among other candidates, you are called when it’s your turn. All through the interview, you fail to exude confidence and mess up. Right from introducing yourself, to answering the technical questions you spoiled it all.
Scene - 3: In your company, you have finished your project work and delivered it within the deadline as set by your manager. At the client end, there is a major project failure much to the embarrassment of your manager and company. During investigation in a meeting, it is revealed that there is a small human error you made. Half of the day will be spent justifying, explaining and apologizing to your managers and client alongside getting scolded. Second half will be wasted in rectifying the error and rechecking. It’s late evening when all your colleagues have left and you are the last one to leave the office. You have to arrive the office on time the next day too.
These are the most common happenings in real world. As mentioned before, one failure, and your confidence starts declining. Also it is said that one success, and your confidence is back.
Now, you readers might think that the solution is already there. What’s there to read? Just succeed in your endeavors and gain your confidence back. Right? Nope. That’s the cause what you are telling and not the solution. The solution lies in causing that first success after a series of failures and it is not easy at this point.
A sense of fear is created by the past failures in your minds. It is necessary to face them and certainly, there will be a time when you will have no choice, but to face your fears and fight them back.
The moment your fear disappears, a success opportunity arises. You are lot more conscious about your past mistakes and you move ahead. You can also learn more about facing and fighting your fears in the article transform yourself from fearful to courageous.
Scene - 1: You are now well prepared for the same subject. You know where you went wrong. You have assessed your areas of strength and vulnerability. You write the tests and when the results are out, there is a massive improvement. You have not only cleared all your subjects but also scored in many of them.
Scene - 2: Now, you are a lot more aware about the interviewer and the possible questions when you appear for another interview. When you are called in, you now enter in. With a very formal tone and slight smile on your face, you greet the interviewer a “good morning” or “good afternoon”. This will show your confidence as well as courtesy. You are now correctly answering questions from the interviewer and also, not losing pace due to any difficult question. And guess what, the interviewer is happy with the interview and said that you are selected.
Scene - 3: Aware of your past encounter with the error, this time you complete your work much before time by working extra. You now have enough time to check the project for any possible errors, specifically the past one. You have your senior or a colleague to review your work as to do a double or multiple checks. Project is is delivered to the client, it worked perfectly and the client is happy. Your company receive an appreciation email from client. You are called by your reporting manager and congratulated for the good work.
So to each of these incidents, there is also a counter incident which will make up for wronging you.
What are your views about losing confidence and gaining it back? Do you have any such real incident to narrate? If yes, then do share them in the comments section.
