How to overcome self-doubt. Or 13 Powerful Ways (So You Can Finally Move Forward in Life)

How to overcome self-doubt. 13 powerful ways

Our doubts are our traitors.
They make us lose what we could possibly win if we weren't afraid to try. William Shakespeare

Self-doubt can be an alarming and persuasive voice that holds you back. And it keeps you from taking advantage of your opportunities. She makes our life difficult.

Of course, sometimes this can be helpful, as it helps you see your current limitations in perspective or simply recognize a half-bad idea. But mostly, it keeps you in life.

So how can you work around it, how can you overcome those times of self-doubt to move forward again?

In this article, I'll look at 13 tips and habits that helped me reduce this destructive inner voice.

Say stop

First, when your inner doubts surface, act quickly. Don't let them get out of control or grow from a whisper to a stream of discouraging suggestions. Instead, talk to the doubtful part of yourself.

Mentally say or shout something like: No, no, no, we will not go down this road again.

By doing this, you can break the thought pattern and stop that inner self-doubter from taking over.

Look into the past and immerse yourself in memories

Be honest with yourself and ask yourself:

How many times when I doubted myself or was afraid that something would happen, that negative thing came to reality after I was still acting? The answer for me—and probably for you too—is not very common.

Self-doubts are most often just monsters in your head that your mind can use to hold you back from making changes and keep you in your comfort zone .

If you look back and see how well things have gone many times despite these self-doubts, then it will become easier to let go or ignore them and focus on the more likely positive outcome and take action.

Bottom line

Shyness can be overcome - add some effort to your desire and soon you will see a positive result!
Be active, decisive and open to people. You can overcome shyness, self-consciousness, and lack of self-confidence only through painstaking work on yourself, positive thinking, and getting rid of fears or complexes. Fight your weaknesses, prejudices, negativity - and you will definitely become a successful, attractive person!

Elizarova Lilia · May 21, 2021

Talk to someone about it

When you keep your thoughts inside, they can become distorted, exaggerated, and not very consistent with reality or reasonable expectations. This is true when it comes to questionable thoughts. So release them into the light. Talk to someone close to you about your self-doubts.

By simply letting them out and saying them out loud, you can often hear how exaggerated the thoughts have become. And talking about these doubts with someone who supports you can give you a change in perspective.

4.You are definitely capable of more

Maria's parents always had pessimistic views on life. They never allowed their daughter to even dream of a prosperous and successful life. On the contrary, they instilled in her that “every cricket should know its nest,” “one should enjoy little things and not demand more from life.” As an adult, Maria never dared to go to college or quit her unfulfilling job.

Our internal ideas force us to change, grow and look for ways to develop. But to build these ideas, we need parents who will encourage us to listen to our desires.

Parents have their own path in life. Perhaps when they were young, changing jobs really was too much of a shock. But you don't have to inherit their fears and insecurities. You have your own life, in which there are many opportunities to become happier.

Don't fall into the comparison trap

If you compare yourself too often to other people, to their successes and especially to the highlight videos/photos they share on social media, then self-doubt can quickly creep in.

The best way to act is to compare yourself to yourself. To see how far you've come. To see what you've overcome. And watch you continue to live, succeed and grow as a person.

Know how to relax in any situation.

If you feel that at important moments in life (at an interview, speaking in front of an audience) you cannot control yourself and worry until your knees tremble, learn to manage your emotions. To master this skill, you need to practice. There are a number of special psychological techniques for this. And which one to choose for yourself is up to you. One of the simple options is to abstract yourself, imagine yourself in a different, most comfortable situation for yourself.

Start keeping a diary

Journaling can be a beneficial habit for many reasons. When it comes to self-doubt, this may help you:

Keep a realistic account of your life. And help you remember positive things, successes you've had and how you overcame obstacles if you tend to remember things with a negative slant.
Getting clarity is easier. It is often easier to let go of fears and doubts and gain clarity if you have a problem laid out on paper or in a computer document rather than if you try to work through it all in your mind. By making pros and cons lists, analyzing your thoughts, emotions and similar events from the past, and writing down different perspectives on a problem, it becomes easier to find solutions and see your problem in a clearer and more balanced way.

Learning to deal with uncertainty

As mentioned above, if you know how to overcome complexes and self-doubt, then it is not at all as difficult as it might seem at first glance to cope with this task.

Let's look at the simplest, but nevertheless effective ways to achieve this. They will help both women and men:

Try to better understand people. Observe their facial expressions, movements, emotions. This way you can understand what mood a person is in. After all, it is quite possible that when you try to talk to him, he is simply out of sorts and may respond rudely. Thus, you will think that the reason for his intonation is you. And remember, you need to speak convincingly.
In addition, you should remember that the only thing that matters to you is what you say and do, and not those people who surround you. Do not pay attention to what they say behind your back, to what others think you are. The only thing that matters is what you think about yourself, and everything else shouldn’t worry you too much. Of course, you can listen to advice, but it’s up to you to decide what to do right. After all, this is your life, and no one but you knows better how to manage it.
If you don’t know how to overcome complexes and self-doubt, use this method - throw away all the fears and experiences that may be observed in your life. It will help a lot if you take a piece of paper and write down all the positive things that you can achieve thanks to this.
Now think about how your life could change if you deal with uncertainty. How many positive things can you get? Just compare what you are now and what you can become. After all, by changing, you can achieve everything that you cannot achieve now. You will be able to climb the career ladder, achieve the love of a girl who means a lot to you, realize yourself in something that interests you, etc. You will be able to prove that you are a real man or woman. Set yourself this goal and with a little effort, you can achieve it. All this can be obtained after you understand how to overcome self-doubt.
Forget about all the failures, grievances, troubles that you had. They are a thing of the past. If you know how to overcome self-doubt, everything will work out. Moreover, you cannot change anything. Live in the present and do everything to make you different in the future. The past only interferes with this, it pulls you back and does not allow you to move forward. Step over it and just forget. This is very important for gaining self-confidence. After all, if you don’t do this, you will continue to remember all your past mistakes, and nothing will work out for you.
A great way to overcome self-doubt is to start journaling. In it you can record all your victories, all the positive changes in your life. Records should be kept regularly. They should be analyzed.
You also need to stop comparing yourself to someone else. Remember, each person is unique in his own way and no two people can be the same. The one who is more beautiful, richer, etc. also has his own problems, perhaps even more than yours, you just don’t know about them yet. You must remain yourself, but get rid of the shortcomings that you have. So you will understand how to overcome self-doubt.
Learn to believe in yourself and take action. Don't be afraid that things won't work out or won't turn out the way you want. By thinking this way, you are pre-programming your brain for failure. You should do the opposite. Just imagine that what you have planned will work out, you will be able to achieve what you wanted. This will make it much easier for you to overcome self-doubt and achieve any goal you set. But if you still didn’t succeed, don’t dare get upset and give up. Perhaps you made a mistake in some way. Analyze all your actions, find it and try to fix it next time. And most importantly, believe in the success of your plan. As statistics show, it is faith that gives strength to achieve many achievements and helps to understand how to regain self-confidence.
Learn to communicate with people you don't know. This is a great way to overcome self-doubt. These could be neighbors in turn, fellow travelers on public transport. Anyone, anyone. Try to talk to them first or support the conversation they started, try to speak convincingly. You can, for example, ask to change money, find out how to get to this or that place, or something else. This is necessary to learn to believe in yourself and speak confidently.
You must understand that you may be interesting to strangers, they may begin to listen to what you say or argue. It doesn’t matter, the main thing is to overcome your own fears and put them aside.
But there are a few rules here. Remember, you must be confident in yourself. Cast aside all fears, speak loudly and clearly. Don't be shy, look the person in the eyes so that eye contact is established between you. Remember to say “I” when asking a stranger for something. If something doesn’t work out for you at first, don’t worry. More practice. Try to do this more often, and you will succeed. Believe in yourself and your success and speak with confidence.
Learn to trust yourself. After all, if you are confident in your knowledge and skills, you should do what you think is right, and not what others want. After all, if you listen to their advice and it doesn’t work out, you will be the one to blame. This is especially true at times at work when you have been assigned to do a certain job that you are capable of doing, but your colleagues advise you to do otherwise. Remember, if you are sure of the correctness of the decision, do not change it. Do everything as you see fit and everything will work out. Believe only in yourself.
To gain self-confidence faster, you cannot do without regular praise. But if the people around you don’t do this, praise yourself. This is completely acceptable. The main thing is that you know that you praise yourself for doing something, and not just like that. That it's all deserved.
Now we need to say a few words about goals. It is very important to place them correctly, and you will realize that it is not at all difficult to understand how to regain self-confidence. Choose a main goal that you will devote the bulk of your time and effort to, and secondary goals that you will do from time to time. Remember that goals can be changed. Having achieved your main goal, you can make it secondary or forget about it altogether, and put some other goal in place of the main one.
Don't be upset if you didn't get everything you wanted. After all, in any case, significant changes have occurred to you for the better. Everything else can be achieved at the next stage, or you can leave everything as it is, devoting yourself to another goal. If your goals are set correctly and you regularly work on their implementation, everything should gradually work out for you, and you will understand how to overcome complexes and self-doubt.

If you do everything as stated above and understand how to regain self-confidence, you will definitely succeed. Even if not right away, you may need to make some efforts and spend time, but the result will be worthy. You will no longer feel self-doubt. You will feel your importance to others, you will understand that you can be valued and respected, and listen to what you say.

The main thing is to work at it, believe and not give up, and everything will definitely be fine. Of course, all this is not entirely simple, but if you work every day, all difficulties can be overcome. Many people have gone this route and succeeded. This means that everything will work out for you. After all, you are no worse than them. Remember this, believe in yourself and believe in your success.

Remember: People don't really care what you do or say.

When you worry about what others might think or say if you do something, self-doubt can quickly become stronger and you become stuck in inaction and fear.

When this happens, remind yourself that the truth is that people don't really care much about what you do or don't do.

They are preoccupied with thoughts about themselves, their children and pets, work and upcoming sports matches, and worrying about what people might think about them.

3. Find the courage to take risks

“We will never buy you a scooter, you will get into an accident.” For anxious parents, life is completely dangerous. That is why they tend to overprotect children.

This feeling of pervasive anxiety turns out to be very contagious. If parents are constantly battling imaginary dangers, their children are likely to internalize this mistrust of the world. The child begins to avoid any activity, especially those associated with emotional or physical risks. As a result, the necessary social skills are simply not trained, and the person gains self-doubt and self-doubt.

Anxiety can easily transform into fear of new people or bosses. Received inhibitions and habitual fears can also manifest themselves in those areas of life that are not directly related to the original cause of anxiety - in problems at work, in relationships with friends and with a loved one.

The world is not as dangerous as my parents told me. You've probably wanted to try something for a long time, but haven't dared - perhaps now is the right time.

What someone said or did may not be about you (or what you think)

When someone criticizes you, then it's easy to start doubting yourself.

When someone rejects you and you don't get a second date after the first one, which you thought went pretty well, then it's not a reason to doubt yourself. But what if what he or she said or did actually has nothing to do with you?

Perhaps your coworker who verbally lashed out at you may be having a bad day, month, or marriage.

And you may not have gotten that second date because the other person's mom got sick and he had to focus on that, or because he got back together with his ex-girlfriend and wanted to give their relationship another chance.

You don't know everything that's going on in another person's life. And the world doesn't revolve around you. Therefore, be careful not to make a mistake and build guilt and doubt within without any reason.

What are the external signs of self-doubt?

A person's behavior reveals an insecure person. Please note that it varies. For example, in the first case, a person is afraid to say a word or take an action, speaks with downcast eyes, in a barely audible voice.

In the second case, the person speaks quickly and loudly, trying to attract attention and make a good impression in order to mask low self-esteem.

Outwardly, a person who is insecure looks like he prefers to remain invisible to everyone. He slouches, hides his eyes, walks along the edge or along the wall, lowers his head. The whole appearance shows a desire not to be discovered.

View failure as temporary

When you have a setback, that's when you may start to see things through a negative and dark lens. You may see this current setback as something that will simply be your new normal.

This way of looking at things may lead you to believe that there is no point in continuing to act.

So instead:

Remember: you are not a failure just because you failed. Failure happens to everyone who takes risks. It's just part of living a full life. Sometimes things go well and sometimes they don't, so don't make failure a big deal.
Ask yourself: What can I learn from this failure? Use a mistake or failure to your advantage and move forward once again in a smart way.

Don't beat yourself up over it

A common way to deal with self-doubt is to get angry at yourself and your lack of movement. To try to beat yourself as a way to force yourself to move forward. In my experience, this doesn't help much.

I have found that being kind and constructive when you feel unsure of yourself is the best choice. So I use kind and understanding words towards myself, but I also ask myself:

What is one very small step that I can take to move forward in this situation?

Then I take that very small step and start moving step by step to where I want to go.

Remember: You can course-correct along the way.

Trying to plan every step you take towards a goal or dream can become draining and lead to quite a bit of self-doubt.

And it usually doesn't work out that well anyway, since the best laid plans often start to fall apart a little or need some changes when they hit reality.

So do a little rough planning and then start your journey.

And remember that you can always course-correct along the way to what you want. Inspired by the new knowledge, experiences and feedback you will receive as you continue down this path.

Several important nuances of achieving success

Psychologists highlight several key aspects of how to stop being shy in company and at the same time win the favor of strangers.
The list of such conditions invariably includes:

acceptance of constraint (excitement, isolation) as a given fact;
positive thinking, smile, neat appearance;
lack of comparison of oneself with other people;
training in slow, intelligible speech.

It is necessary to clearly understand that it is quite normal to feel shy, nervous or withdrawn in certain situations. Don't try to hide your emotions, because it always looks unnatural and repulsive. At the same time, the initial impression of a person is influenced by his appearance, facial expression, and voice intonation, so try to always look brand new, exude positivity, and don’t forget to smile.

There is no need to constantly draw parallels with more successful people in the company, otherwise this can lead to negativity, detachment, and the desire to quickly go to a quiet, secluded place. A huge problem for many people is slurred, rapid speech, which not all participants in the conversation can understand. Learn to express your own thoughts clearly, clearly, slowly, which will allow you to attract the attention of others, avoiding caustic ridicule.