Confidence

[ygolo]

How do you gain confidence in your ability to do what needs to be done?

Whether it is self-care, meeting new people, accomplishing tasks on a job, doing well enough in school, or something else...

how do you gain the confidence in your ability to do it?

 

[sammy]

I gain confidence by giving myself mini peptalks about how I've dealt with such a situation before or something similar to it, if not worse, and so what's there to fear?

 

[Kiddo]

Experience. I look back on my life, and my past experiences provide me with all the ambition I ever need. No one can take your real life experience away from you and no amount of persuasion, manipulation, or lying will change how those experiences have affected you. The memories of your pain and joy should be all the assurance you need of choices you make in life.

As I do new things, I gain experiences, and I learn from those. Life is the only true cure for doubt.

 

[alcea rosea]

I am being myself.

 

[The_Liquid_Laser]

You have to give yourself the freedom to fail, and then give it all you've got. After that experience contributes a lot.

 

[swordpath]

Successes give me confidence. Failures damage my self esteem.

 

[Athenian200]

How do you gain confidence in your ability to do what needs to be done?

Whether it is self-care, meeting new people, accomplishing tasks on a job, doing well enough in school, or something else...

how do you gain the confidence in your ability to do it?

Well, I'd suggest learning as much as you can about the process ahead of time first. And then if you can, try to find a way to "practice" and see where your skills in these things are, building them up to a good level. And then, just go out knowing that you are able to do it, and that it's just a matter of choosing to and focusing on getting it done.

 

[ThatsWhatHeSaid]

Stand up to the fear of fucking up, any way you can. Rationalize it, notice it, let go, whatever works. Just take the pressure off yourself of doing a perfect job. Patience, Danielsan.

 

[FDG]

By doing something more difficult than the task I want to be confident in. Obviously this is restricted to the domain of tasks that have an objectively defined difficulity and not to those that deal with very fuzzy elements of reality. As an example, the strategy works for both school related and sports related taks, but it does not necessarily work for love-related ones, also because in this case going through something more difficult might need more recovery time than an equiparable differential in, say, sports effort.

 

[ygolo]

I just realized that I relate to all the responses given.

Self-pep talks.

Experience.

Telling myself "I am who I am"

Feeling the fear and doing it anyway.

Learning as much about the process.

Practicing in harder situations.

Telling myself it's OK to fail.

But still taking a hit when I do.

I also do breathing exersices, pray, do something fun to feel better, take baby-steps, listen to music, or just vent to family. All of it helps a little.

Experience is definitely the most effective, however.

Time-pressure is my biggest confidence sinker. Given enough time, I tend to belive I can do anything. I used to say, "I never fail, I just run out of time."

 

[snegledmaca]

Indifference gives me confidence. The more indifferent I am to something the more I am able to do with it.

 

[Xander]

Previous success and realising that no matter what the outcome, it won't kill me.

Rationalisation of what is being risked has often helped me to bypass my initial fears. It's often more a question, with me, of finding out what something is really like and not just going with my initial assumptions/ mental model. Once I've gotten a fair grounding usually I'm more confident. I think that with us NTs it's more a fear of being incompetent than really screwing up that stops us.

 

[LostInNerSpace]

How do you gain confidence in your ability to do what needs to be done?

Whether it is self-care, meeting new people, accomplishing tasks on a job, doing well enough in school, or something else...

how do you gain the confidence in your ability to do it?

Confidence is about setting and achieving goals. Think about that for a minute and it makes sense. By setting and achieving a goal, you are basically proving to yourself that you can do it, whatever that may be.

 

[LostInNerSpace]

Write the goal down and take small incremental steps towards the goal. It takes time for your brain to adjust, but it will adjust over time. The brain is actually quite plastic in that it changes all the time. The brain you have now is different from the brain you had six months ago.

I have been allergic to math for most of my life. A few years ago I decided I needed math and that it was just a confidence problem. So I started easing my way into it. I've done it for many other things, why not math? It initially seemed like a humongous daunting task and a little scary. But I said to myself, no damn it! I can do this. One thing about me is that I am a rebel. I routinely ignore the existing rules and make up my own mind about things. I knew my fear over math was a result of my having internalized other people insecurities. I took small steps initially. I started by reading the simplest math texts I could find, and progressively worked my way up to increasingly more complex topics. Now I love math! It is making sense, and it really is quite beautiful. Looking back I'm thinking, what they hell was I afraid of? The answer is that it was other people's fears I had internalized that I feared. Crowds can make you dumb! Do some of your own thinking.

 

[elfinchilde]

How do you gain confidence in your ability to do what needs to be done?

Whether it is self-care, meeting new people, accomplishing tasks on a job, doing well enough in school, or something else...

how do you gain the confidence in your ability to do it?

I simply throw my hat over the fence, and with a 'what the heck' attitude, throw myself into the situation, being prepared to adapt to anything at anytime.

Having enthusiasm and a positive, receptive attitude to the situation helps.

In three words, "wing it, baby."

Note: this is a serious response. Have realised that as INTPs, sometimes, we tend to consider too much: we overthink things and set impossibly high standards, thereby adding stress to self and taking away the pleasure of learning--which is crucial for an INTP to succeed, since we like systems very much.

So the way out for me, is simply to heck it, and just do it. Have found that I learn better this way, and it's a refreshing change.