Self Confidence And Believing In Myself

Sometimes I struggle daily with myself.  Sometimes, no matter what I feel like I'm biologically wired to see the negative, instead of the positive.  Self confidence and believing in myself often take a beating.  One such example happened yesterday.  Instead of burying into this like I normally do, I'm going to write about it and shine the light of day on this struggle in my life.

What may seem like a routine repair to some, is like an accomplishment the size of flying to the moon for me.  Our pool pump motor had gone out in the lightening storm a couple of nights ago.  After much time trying to figure out what I needed to do and not wanting to spend any more money than we absolutely needed to, I realized I had to replace the motor.

I'm not a mechanical person and I dislike doing repair work so much that I'd rather not do it.  On top of that, I'm often afraid that I will just mess things up and so I can talk myself out of doing the repair work quicker than a snake can shed its skin.  Ugh.. I hate that analogy.  However, I am usually able to figure out many things and will generally find a way to fix something, within reason of course.


Yesterday though, I managed to change out the pool pump with one slight error that a pool store helped me solve.  I could not believe it, that I actually got this done.  It did take me hours to complete, but with some moral support, I got it.  I didn't even get extremely angry at the stuff like I normally do.

The point of this blog post is that I actually got this done.  I actually changed the pool pump out, all the while thinking that I could not do this. It was the first time I have ever taken on something like this, but I proved to myself that I could do it.

Yet, I find myself struggling to accept the accomplishment.  It is like part of my mind says, "it really wasn't a big deal" or "you didn't really do anything exceptional".  It is like I self sabotage myself and even when I accomplish something exceptional, I find a way to downplay it.  I used to do that with my piano playing where I would criticize myself hard for some minor mistake that only I could hear, while others were basking in the beauty of what I created.

I'm sure this goes back to my childhood.  Nothing I ever did for or around my father was good enough.  When I was a kid, you could try to be as perfect as you could be, only to be criticized for something so insignificant that took away from what you did.  NO matter how hard you tried, it was never enough and so I learned in life, that I had to keep striving towards perfection in order to not be beat for failing to do so.

This is difficult to let go of at times and I know I'm not the only one that struggles with this in life.  Self confidence and believing in myself are two difficult things I endure in life.  If I had greater self confidence and if I believed in myself a little more, my life would be drastically different.

I still remember when I was in the hospital from the conversion disorder, my therapist told me that if she could give me a shot of self confidence, things would drastically improve for me.  She was right, because it was hard to think I could heal and recover from the paralysis and memory loss of the conversion disorder.  Yet, I did do that and none of it was easy.

I need to lighten up on myself and learn to accept the good moments more.  If I berate myself and beat myself down just like my father did to me, than I'm still allowing him to control me.  It isn't easy and I keep attempting to take steps forward.  In fact, just by writing about this, it is a step forward for me.  Thank you for sharing a part of my journey.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Blog Post And Images (c) 7/27/12 by Don Shetterly

• Permission required before any part of this blog post is reprinted, reworded or used in any form. 
• You are welcomed to share the LINK to this blog post.  

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------