I agree with this. In all areas of MA, real confidence tends to come from the experience of losing and surviving. From knowing you're actually challenging your skills, putting them to the test, and re-proving them as you do so. To do that, you have to expose yourself to the chance to lose (otherwise, you end up never really putting them to the test). And if you expose yourself to that chance enough, you're going to lose some.
Actually, as you correctly elaborated in this same post, poor self-esteem means you will think you do EVERYTHING poorly.
Self-consciousness (focusing on self, as Steve is pointing out he does) is actually directly related to confidence issues. For him, trying to not think about himself would be like asking you to not think about what your left leg is doing when it has fallen asleep and is numb, and you're trying to walk - it takes a supreme effort to focus attention somewhere else. Doing things that develop confidence is often the quickest path to losing that self-consciousness.
I feel a surge of evil glee!
Interestingly, yes and no. It will hold you back from higher performance in some ways, and can cause some self-sabotage (giving up avoids the anticipated failure). But mostly, you'll just keep thinking you're doing awful, even when things are going fairly well. There's a confirmation bias issue here - any flaw confirms your belief that you suck, and your mind ignores evidence to the contrary (to avoid cognitive dissonance).Yes, and it seems to me that if you think it long enough, you will make it true...that whole "self-fulfilling prophecy" thing.
Speaking of things a person thinks, *I* think I am long overdue to break the cycle of willing my lack of skills into reality. It is happening.
Yes, but it can also be a spiral down. You try so hard that every perceived failure makes you more and more self conscious and rigid.
It's definitely best to do so at times. Unfortunately, it's also most difficult to do at precisely those times.
?? And how does that make any of the things I said less true? You lost me. I think you're reacting to things I didn't write.
Competition can be a powerful anodyne. It is not the only approach, nor the best approach for all folks. Someone with very low self-confidence will likely perform poorly in competition. That poor performance will not improve their confidence.
Fear of losing, fear of failure. That's the piece. Sorry I used a politically incorrect word.
Sounds like you might consider that some people fear success as much as they fear failure. You mention promotion, but if I recall correctly, you did get a promotion, hated it, threw your boss and your coworkers under the bus and retreated to the comfort of a job you know doesn't even occupy your entire work day.
False confidence is dangerous and fragile. Confidence based on nothing is not helpful to anyone.
