Chris Mance II - Mental Skills Coach

There is a simple truth about confidence that people who continue to struggle with it need to know. The amount of confidence you have in the future is 100% within your control. On the other hand, there is little you can do about the amount of confidence you have right now. Therefore, all your energy must be on the amount of confidence you will have tomorrow and into the foreseeable future.

With this in mind, there are three things that impact your future confidence.

1. Experience
2. Preparation
3. Anxiety

Rarely will anyone have confidence as a novice. It’s normal to lack confidence the first few times you experience something. If you lack confidence because you lack experience, then you must suck it up and focus on investing your time and money on experience.

If you have experience and still lack confidence, then you must evaluate your preparation. Winging it, shooting from the hip, or cutting corners will cause performance issues that lead to a lack of confidence. Confidence doesn’t come from luck and it doesn’t come as a result of natural talent. Confidence comes from the preparation process. This process starts with setting goals, creating a plan to reach those goals, and then following-through with that plan. Until you do this then you will always lack confidence.

Finally, if you have experience and you consistently prepare, then the only thing left is your ability to manage anxiety. Other than clinical disorders which are outside of the scope of this article, typically anxiety stems from unhealthy self-talk. When you constantly speak negativity into your life this leads to negative outcomes. Moreover, whispering negative messages to yourself either verbally or in your head can become habitual. So, the only way to break this bad habit is to replace it with a good new habit. Here are a few tips for doing this:

• First, make sure there are no outside influences putting negative thoughts in your head. If so, remove yourself from this environment or kindly ask those people to stay away while you work on breaking negativity as a habit.
• Create a daily routine of saying positive affirmations to yourself throughout the day. In the morning, in the car, and before bed are good times. Consistency is key.
• If you have trouble being positive, then just be neutral. No need to fake positivity if that’s not what you’re feeling. Neutral thinking is more about being positive about the reality of the situation. It’s being a realist without letting negativity of what you can’t control impact the reality of what you can control. When you use neutral thinking, you focus on sticking with the facts. Facts that are not necessarily overly positive or negative, they just are.
• Do some research on the connection between intensity and anxiety. Understand that not all anxiety is bad, as anxiety can also be a performance enhancer when reframed into the right amount of intensity for your personality and situation. You must learn what level of intensity works for you and what are the triggers that push you beyond a healthy level of intensity which in turn triggers negative anxiety.
• Lastly, make sure you understand the sources of confidence your self-talk is depending on. If your self-talk focuses on sources of confidence that are outside of your control you must identify this. Then, practice directing your self-talk towards the sources of confidence you do control.