Self Confidence
Feeling like you're not good enough
It's exhausting feeling like you always have expectations to meet, and that you're constantly at risk of falling short. How good you're supposed to be. How much you're supposed to know. How quickly you're supposed to work. It can feel like you're constantly trying to meet these expectations, while underneath it all fearing that maybe you're not actually good enough. And what if people find out?
There's a fear of making a mistake. Of not knowing what to do. Of getting something wrong. It can leave you feeling anxious, overwhelmed, or constantly overthinking what you say and do, as though one mistake would say something about who you are rather than simply what happened.
Over time, it stops being about making mistakes. It starts to feel like we're the mistake. Like we're flawed, not good enough, or somehow less worthy than everyone else. Shame can become overwhelming, leaving us wanting to disappear or make ourselves as small as possible.
It doesn't have to feel this way.
Caring too much about what other people think
It can feel like your confidence depends on what other people think of you. We look to others for validation, hoping their approval will show that we're good enough, likeable enough, or worthy enough. Because what other people think feels so important, we can spend our lives trying to meet other people's expectations. Sometimes we even change who we are to gain their approval. And when someone disapproves of us, it can feel like a rejection of who we are, as though we aren't acceptable.
Over time, our self-confidence can begin to rise and fall depending on how we think other people see us. We replay conversations, second-guess ourselves, and wonder whether we've said or done something wrong. We can spend so much time overthinking to work out what everyone else thinks of us, that we lose sight of what we think about ourselves. Caring too much about what other people think can become crippling, leaving us disconnected from who we are and what truly matters to us.
Cang too much about what other people thi
Comparing yourself to other people
Comparing ourselves to other people can become so automatic that we hardly notice we're doing it. We might look around and feel like everyone else has achieved more than us, or has things we don't. They're further ahead than we are, and we're behind in life.
Maybe they seem to have everything figured out. A successful career. A higher income. More friends. Maybe they seem more attractive or desirable, or more confident and capable than we feel. Meanwhile, we find ourselves wondering why we can't have that too.
It's easy to start measuring our lives against everyone else's. We focus on everything we haven't achieved, the opportunities we've missed, or the person we think we should have become. Looking back at our own lives, we can feel inadequate and it can feel like we don't have enough to show for where we are.
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