For people with high inner standards, perfectionism can prevent conf idence either through resistance to trying anything until you feel you will be perfect, or lapsing into the fear of failure discussed above.
voice of judgement and standards. This social checking mechanism tells us when we are getting too much and need to pull things in and, ideally, can also bring us up when we are feeling down. Unfortunately, this ability to self-regulate, lift up out of low-energy emotions, and calm down high arousal levels, doesn’t always work optimally.
Self-compassion is more important in this case than conf idence, and it’s hard to have one without the other. When we have compassion for ourselves we can forgive the mistakes of ourselves and others. Compassion can calm the critical voice replacing the sympathy we may not have got as a child.
When the punishing and frightening aspect of the superego is dominant, anxiety and avoidance of shame ruin self-conf idence. An inner voice echoes, ‘why try when I am likely to fail and ruin things?” All the external support and evidence to the contrary will not Tolerance for the frustration of trying is silence this inner tyrant. This is the voice of another signif icant component of conf idence. How can you try if you can’t bear the effort? limitation.
How Do We Overcome The Voice Of Also, gaining awareness of, and letting go of our need to try and make other people happy Limitation? at the expense of ourselves. Always identify Inscribed on the temple of Delphi were the your needs in a situation, then you are far words “Know Thyself ” and this is the best more likely to make sure at least one person is option in understanding one's inner conf licts. taken care of ! Negative self-talk in any form needs to be uncovered and neutralised. If we don’t have the ability to know ourselves and identify our own inner inhibitory voice then not only can it take over, but it can get projected out and seen as coming from other people. A belief that they are judging you.
When the voice of the inner critic is recognized as a destructive or damaging internal dialogue, the person has a chance to change. But, when the voice takes over and scares one into a state of immobility, self-esteem and conf idence goes down the tube. A good idea is to externalise the arguments, speak them out as if you were having a conversation with two parts of your-self (because this is exactly what is happening within you). In this way you get the fear fantasies out in the open so their power is not going around in your head and then you can start to get evidence against them.
Our reality is ours. It is better we know and give ourselves the attention, compassion and encouragement we need. The more we understand about who we truly are, the less we operate on an automatic level. Our conf idence then is based in knowing who we are, being okay with failing and succeeding, being able to give it a go and forgive ourselves if we don’t Building greater self-conf idence is a multi- succeed. tiered approach. It includes knowing ones’ self and being relatively okay with who you are, pushing boundaries of behaviour, and dealing Clarissa Mosley with the inner voice of limitation. This Psychologist, Psychotherapist entails letting go of perfectionism, or, more importantly, the idealised image we think we Click here to work with me. should be. 18
