SHATTERED!!
That’s how your confidence will look like when you fell from the top, wings clipped off, diving head down, and hitting rock-bottom with a shattering impact. Or it could be a slow painful process of trying and failing repeatedly over countless time before finally chipping off any confidence you have left. But how you fall does not matter in the long run, it’s how you regain your confidence that matters.
It could be very disheartening when everything you tried seems to show a lack of success. And you soon found that fear and doubt crept in, whispering words of uncertainties, as you now found yourself covered in doubt even when making a simple decision.
I’m not talking about losing confidence after one or two attempts. I’m talking about after trying for years, using up every resources and wit, and in the end, you found that every single step brings you back to square one.
I will share 5 quick tips that I personally used to recover my confidence each time I encountered major setback in my life.
1) Change Your Mindset
One of the main reason we suffered from confidence breakdown is that we depend on others to validate our action. We let others define our success and our confidence built from there. If you are building your confidence from the validation of others, I suggest you stop doing that.
Why? Because confidence that depends on others is fragile, and could easily be broken when it matters most. And because if you build your confidence from within, it will be much stronger. When your confidence comes from within, you do not seek acceptance from others and is always self-assured and comfortable.
2) Face Your Mistakes
Self-confidence is the absence of ego. Note that ego and self-pride are very different. Ego blocks our senses whereas self-pride pushed us to give our best. There could be many reasons that cause our failure. Most are related to our ego-issue, our unwillingness to learn and take heed of sound advice.
There is a fine line between persistence and pure stubbornness. Sometimes we forgot where the line is. If your downfall is caused by your own mistakes, admit to it and face it right on. As this is the only way to learn and grow. Rebuilding your confidence is everything about learning and growing. And the faster you acknowledge your mistakes, the faster you will bounce back.
3) Embrace Learning 
Identify your strength and weakness. Give full focus on your strength, continuously develop it stronger until you have an edge over others. Do not ignore your weaknesses either. Keep working on them one at a time.
Self-confidence comes from learning, continuously gaining new knowledge and TRYING it out in the real world. Knowing your limitation of strengths and WEAKNESSES is the sign of your confidence that rises from within.
Thinking that you have no weaknesses is pure foolishness. And learning comes from every single source. If you want to learn effectively, remove the words “I know” from your mind. These two words block any effective learning subconsciously. Remember, even the master could learn from the students.
4) Get Uncomfortable
“There is no growth in the comfort zone”
When you stay in the comfort zone for too long, you become complacent, and you start to doubt your abilities and skills. As insecurity crept in, you start making decisions that are guided by emotion, to compensate for these insecurities. It is no surprise that the results are often disappointing.
Always try something new that will put you out of your comfort zone. This is a process that needs to be repeated constantly. It is our nature to lean towards what’s comfortable. Everything becomes a comfort zone after a while.
5) Celebrate Your Win
Big or small, you need to celebrate it. Winning makes you feel good and there is absolutely no reason not to celebrate that. I know, there will be some people who will try to play it down, indicating this could be “Showing Off Your Victory”.
But let me put this straight, any success or victory, no matter the size, takes hundreds or thousands of combined hours and resources to achieve. Plus, you will need the emotional high of success as momentum to drive you in your next challenge. So please, celebrate it, you at least deserve that.
“It doesn’t matter if you fall down, it’s whether if you get back up” – Michael Jordan
So if your confidence is on the low, I hope you stop all the overthinking that keep you down. Stand back up. Stop feeling sorry for yourself and take action now. And if you have your own way to boost up your confidence, I will be delighted if you can share in the comment section.
Hi, Kenny. What a powerful post! I think we’ve all been there a time or two where it seems everything that could go wrong, does! It is so important to change our thinking processes! I noticed (here lately) that I am always focused on things from my past that did not go well. I am learning to train my mind to view those happenings as learning experiences. It’s not easy, but it’s do-able! Great post!
Hi Audra,
Our past always have a way to revisit us, often when unexpected. It is easy to get dispirited and overwhelmed when things are not working. But it always is about building our mental capacity. That’s where our confidence should come from. Our worldview and success is the manifestation of our thought and action. And thought is always the originator. Thank you for reading.
Kenny
What a fantastic post, I love self-help as I have experienced a lack of confidence for years now.
I tend to live in the past reminiscing about the days I was super confident.
Iknow this don’t help and this post has given me something to focus on, thank you very much.
Do you have any advice on depression?
Hi Steven,
I hope you regain back your confidence, and it shall be derived from your inner self. Right now do not have a post on depression and it is about time I do one to. It is a challenging and tricky situation to be in. But i have something that you may find quite relevant to here How To Calm Your Mind From Stress.
Thank you for reading.
Kenny
Hey Kenny great post!
I like #1, change your mindset! A lack of confidence is ultimately stemming from a bad mindset. Stop gaining confidence and drive from external validation from not only others but from success. You have to have the mindset of I believe in the process not the outcome. We seek reward whether it be money, sex or fame but often ignore the process of being more confident, better, charismatic or what have you.
Yes Matt,
I believe #1 is vital, for without changing our mindset, what is being done thereafter may turn out to be a waste of effort. There are definitely low-self esteem people who managed to gain fame and wealth, but is deprived out of true happiness as they do not work on their own self-esteem.
Thanks for reading.
Kenny
“Get uncomfortable.” That’s powerful. And hard. As humans, we want to make our lives MORE comfortable, not LESS. But you’re right, without discomfort we don’t grow, and without growing and learning, how can we gain confidence?
Hi,
The path to grow and learning is never easy, and yet knowing we can do the difficult things is one that will build our confidence from within.
Kenny
This is great! Your point about comfort zones is the absolute truth. When we get comfortable we stop growing. This has always been one of my biggest challenges – reading this post has inspired me to try something new today!
Kenzie,
It is a reminder for myself too. We have to be alert as a new ‘uncomfort’ zone could very soon turn into another comfort zone once we have mastered the challenges. Growth is a lifelong journey.
Kenny.
I think for me, associating with the wrong people has been my biggest downfall in life because it’s affected my confidence levels. But now it’s time for me to start to regaining my confidence once more. 🙂
Yep, I certainly feel shattered but nothing that can’t be put back together.
Thanks ever so much for the tips. Mindset and becoming uncomfortable are the main things I want to focus on.
Neil
Neil,
All the best in moving on. We will only get stronger as we rebuild.
Kenny
Shattered is definitely how I feel about my confidence right now, in fact it’s how I’ve felt for past few years and I have been unable to piece it back together.
Great post I definitely need to get out of my own comfort zone, change my mindset and face my mistakes head on. It will be a long and challenging process but I am confident I can make it happen someday.
Hi Kevin,
You will get pass the rough patch you’re in now. I’ve no doubt about it.
Cheers,
Kenny