Stories of Confidence
Confidence
I get a lot of calls from women who want to work on their confidence.
I looked this word up in the dictionary (google) just now. It says: “The feeling or belief that one can have faith in or rely on someone or something.”
In this case, ourselves. The belief that you can rely on yourself.
That you can have faith that you will do, or say, or behave in the way you want to. That your powers will be there for you when you need to call on them.
So why is it that so many of the women who call me don’t have that belief in themselves? Why aren’t they conscious of all that they are capable of?
It comes down to the stories that you are telling yourself about what is or isn’t possible for you.
Those stories are the ones that can shape your attitudes, how you show up in the world, the relationships that you create for yourself within it. With others and with yourself.
The stories that exist under the surface have the power to bless your life, or to curse it. They can bring joy, or they can bring destruction.
As women, the seeds of our stories are watered by the fully-grown narratives that are told to us by the world around us that we grow up in. The cultural messages about our worth, our position, our value, our potential.
Why is it that women frequently express that they don’t deserve their job, that they feel like impostors as they climb higher on their professional ladders? Why will men apply for jobs when they meet only 60% of the criteria, but women apply only if they meet 100%? Why do women underestimate their abilities and performance, while men overestimate both?
This story of inequality is being re-written every day, and the women I work with are taking steps to become the authors of their own new narratives.
To be a part of this, you must enquire deeply into your own personal mythology. What are the ideas that you have about who you are and what you are here for?
What is the story that you are telling yourself, and how is that impacting on your life?
Where are you acting from beliefs that were given to you long ago about your worth? Where are those beliefs trapping you in a life you want to grow beyond?
When you make decisions based on the values and stories that other people gave to you, that were never yours in the first place, you’re letting others be the authors of your life story. You have given your power away.
Its time to create a new story.
Take it all the way back. Reconnect with your imagination. Dare to dream.
Ask yourself: What story are you telling yourself that you want to change the ending to? What new story will you start to write, through the choices you make today.
Love xx
