S.R. Crawford's Blog, page 53
August 29, 2019
Comfort Zones and Confidence
“A ship in harbour is safe, but that’s not what ships are made for…”
Firstly, let me just say that we are allowed comfort zones. We are allowed to live and enjoy and value them, but it’s advisable not to cling so tightly to your comfort zone that you never challenge yourself or grow.
Stepping out of your comfort zone and cultivating confidence is all about the following…
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Letting go of control
We need to recognise that there are things in life that we just can’t (or shouldn’t) control. I know that not being in control is scary, especially if you’re a bit of a controlling person like myself. But stepping into situations where you have little to no control is healthy for you (especially if you struggle with control).
Letting go of the wheel every now and then teaches you:
Other people may be able to handle a situation better than you, let them.
You learn new things about yourself and life when you aren’t controlling every little thing.
Great things can happen through spontaneous action, exploring, and just going with the flow
Big life lesson: not everything can be planned, predicted or prepared for.
Self-trust
Do you trust yourself to be safe and get through the unknown?
Cultivating self-trust is key to confidence in uncertain situations. It means that even if you’re not in control; even if you have no idea what’s going on; even if the rug is pulled out from under your feet, you will be OK because you trust yourself to deal with it.
Yes, sometimes scary or truly uncomfortable things happen outside your comfort zone and when thrown into the unknown, but the more you get through situations like that, the more strength and resilience you build-up resulting in confidence and self-trust.
Your new mantra: “I can handle the unknown; I can handle failure or setbacks; I trust myself.“
Bravery
Feel the fear and do it anyway! As scary as this sentence is, it’s an important one if you want to build confidence. As we’ve said in other posts during the Challenge: the more you face scary, challenging, or out-of-comfort-zone things, the more confidence you will cultivate for yourself.
Bravery is a muscle to be flexed often if you want to live a life without limits, prove yourself wrong and keep being the best, most confident you.
Channel your inner Gryffindor!
Growth Mindset
Stepping out of your comfort zone is all about cultivating a Growth Mindset over a Fixed Mindset.
A Fixed Mindset is where you are not open-minded and decidedly stick to your guns about what life is, who you are, and what one should do. Growth Mindsets are all about looking for ways to grow and find solutions and improve instead of feeling stuck and helpless.
I see a Growth Mindset as deciding not to think small. To push the boundaries and see what you can achieve despite your fears. It’s choosing to do more, be more, and see yourself as an experiment, in a way.
To say, “what if?” to life and just see what happens when you give the things you care about a try!
Your comfort zone grows with the more things that you do outside of it. You prove to yourself that you’re capable of many things. Growth, challenges, goals, purpose and passion, and curiosity are all key parts of a big life and one lived with confidence.
Vulnerability
Of course, when you are outside your comfort zone, you feel vulnerable. You feel uncomfortable, on edge, on display, and afraid because the unknown is, well, unknown, and that’s unnerving to most of us.
But there is a real power in vulnerability.
Brene Brown talks all about vulnerability, so I recommend that you read or listen to her work. As she says, yes vulnerability feels bad but it often leads to the best things in life.
Love, creativity, connection, self-expression, daring, innovation – these are all born from vulnerability.
So, step out of your comfort zone every now and then, feel the vulnerability and the fear, but keep going until you get to the other side where all the best feelings lie!
What exists outside your comfort zone:
New cultures, tastes, people, experiences
New opportunities and challenges
Growth and self-exploration
A list of badass things you have achieved
A life better suited to you and your desires; life outside of fear and limits
Self-trust, self-knowledge and self-worth
CONFIDENCE!
Today’s challenge, should you choose to accept it, is to tell a story to a group of people. Don’t shy away, don’t make it short; tell the full story with glee!
This week’s worksheet to complete: Confidence Challenge Week Five Worksheet
Checklist for the whole challenge: Confidence Challenge Checklist
August 28, 2019
How to Make Better Decisions: Making Better Decisions for Confidence
How to make better decisions. Making better decisions helps with confidence. Today we’re talking about the importance of decision-making and how to make better decisions.
Blog post about this topic here: How to Make Life Decisions
Podcast episode on decisions here: Podcast or Apple podcasts
Click to play!
This week’s worksheet: Confidence Challenge Week Five Worksheet
Checklist for the challenge: Confidence Challenge Checklist
August 27, 2019
Overwhelm and Stress on Confidence
The well-organised, prepared, and fully focused individual is more confident in themselves and what they can achieve. The downtrodden and broken-spirited person doesn’t feel strong, in control, or confident.
Overwhelm and stress can be demons that jump on top of you and make you feel powerless. This feeling leads to low confidence and poor self-worth.
Mental Health and Emotional Health
It’s important to manage stress in order to maintain good mental and emotional health. Stress is a normal part of life and can be good for us, but too much stress or not handling it well can make us ill.
Knowing why you feel stressed is important.
Is it because you’re doing what you don’t want to be doing? Is it outside pressures? Not enough help or resources? Overwhelmed with too much to juggle and not enough time? Are your expectations of yourself or perfectionism causing you to feel stressed out due to impossible standards?
Spot the signs of being overstressed and deal with it head-on. Don’t hide, ignore, or deny the problem; fix it.
Here are some signs of high levels of stress:
Sleeplessness or oversleeping
Low appetite or emotional/ stress eating
Muscle pain and tension
Sore eyes
Rapid heart rate
Sweating excessively
Hair loss
Gnawing teeth or biting nails
Fatigue
Nausea
Anxiety
Restlessness
Spontaneous outbursts, irritability, crying, or anger (emotional instability)
Here’s how to manage stress better in order to feel more confident in yourself and what you’re doing.
Get Help
Some people try to do it all, but the fact is, we’re all human. We have our limits. Trying to do everything yourself is a fast-track to overwhelm, stress and burn out. Instead, delegate tasks to other people and get help.
Ask your partner to do the chores or ask a colleague to pick up on some of the project’s tasks. Speak with your boss about how much is on your plate and explain that it’s making you stressed. Take some time off if you need to.
Give yourself a break!
Confident people aren’t ashamed of saying, “I need help with this.“
Boundaries
Say no when you need it. Confident people don’t people-please just because they’re afraid of letting people down or being disliked. Stressing yourself out for other people all the time is not healthy. It’s good to try to help if you can, but if you can’t, your loved ones and friends should understand that.
Respect yourself, your health, and your time by saying no when you want or need to.
What you love
Doing more of what you love, what feels good, helps you to destress and maintain balance in all areas of your life. We all need to work jobs, and sometimes that involves stress or doing things you don’t particularly want to do, and that’s OK. But allowing that to take over your life is not good.
Make time for the things you love and enjoy. Even if it’s only a short amount of time, taking a moment to indulge in pleasures and play is important for balance, health, and happiness.
What do you love? How often do you do it? Make time for it in your schedule; there will be a small pocket of time, you just have to find it and use it wisely.
Trust
In order to reduce stress levels and feel more confident in your abilities, you need to learn to trust more (video coming in week five).
Trust that you got this. Trust that everything will work out one way or another. Trust in a higher power. Trust in your support system. Trust that things can be done at a later date!
Trust, it’s an exceptional thing that gives us power, strength, courage, perspective, and wellness.
Organise
And the most important thing for reducing or avoiding high stress levels is to be more organised. Organise, prioritise, prepare for work, home life, and the self.
When you are organised, you have more faith in your ability to get things done. You know how to make things work. You’re prepared each day.
Organisation tips:
Get a calendar, diary, journal, app
Take notes and set reminders
Get into a routine: wake at this time, do this before work, do this at work, do this after work etc.
Get folders, storage units, boxes for organising your space (it helps clear the mind)
Try to know how long it takes to do things and be logical with your timeslots and time management
Prioritise tasks that are most important. Schedule time to breathe.
Adulting 101 means knowing (at least roughly) what needs to happen in your day so that you stay on top of things, feel less overwhelmed, less stressed, healthier and happier and thus feeling more confident!
Today’s challenge, should you choose to accept it, is to repeat the phrase “BUT I’VE GOT THIS” anytime you complain, get stressed or worried. Trust that yes things might be hard, but you’ve got this!
This week’s worksheet to complete: Confidence Challenge Week Five Worksheet
Checklist for the whole challenge: Confidence Challenge Checklist
August 26, 2019
Vulnerability and Confidence in Discomfort (Podcast)
Let’s discuss the power of vulnerability and how discomfort is where we gain strength, trust and confidence in ourselves.
Click to play!
https://srcrawfordauthor.files.wordpress.com/2019/08/vulnerability.mp3
This week’s worksheet to complete: Confidence Challenge Week Five Worksheet
Don’t forget that you can follow the Mindset Managed podcast on Spotify and Apple Podcasts!
Check back tomorrow for another Confidence Challenge post!
August 25, 2019
Learning to Laugh At Yourself
Happy Sunday, everyone! I hope it’s one filled with laughter and good vibes only…
Click to play!
This week’s worksheet to complete: Confidence Challenge Week Four Worksheet
Checklist for the challenge: Confidence Challenge Checklist
August 24, 2019
Confidence Challenge: Day 24
It’s almost the end of week four already! Here’s the Saturday challenge, and it’s a fun one.
Happy bank holiday weekend, all!
Click to play!
This week’s worksheet to complete: Confidence Challenge Week Four Worksheet
Checklist for the challenge: Confidence Challenge Checklist
August 23, 2019
Confidence and the Fear of Being Seen (Video)
Well, no more!
Click to play!
https://youtu.be/RFdik8yZ314
This week’s worksheet to complete: Confidence Challenge Week Four Worksheet
Checklist for the challenge: Confidence Challenge Checklist
August 22, 2019
People Are Mirrors
Confident people don’t tear others down. They don’t highlight their weaknesses and imperfections. Think of a bully; anyone who harms others or jokes at their expense is just insecure about themselves, but hopes you won’t notice if you see the weakness in another person.
The reason I bring this up is because the way I see it, people are mirrors. What we pick at and judge in them is a reflection of our own insecurities. Or, when they comment (or just live their lives, really) and it affects us emotionally, this is a reflection of our deeper issues.
How we see and treat others (or our encounters with them) is a mirror to how we feel inside.
Let me explain…
The Bully Paradox
What bullies highlight in others truly highlights their own insecurities. Their weaknesses, fears, wonky beliefs, shame and so on. But it’s not just bullies. We all do this from time to time.
You see yourself in someone and that’s scary and upsetting and so you tear them apart. It’s like a way of taking out your rage towards yourself on them. Or bringing another person down so that you don’t have to feel so bad about yourself.
Aha, look at how funny they look!
Aha, what a stupid thing to say?
Aha, you’ve put on so much weight!
Or, you simply judge them (which we’ll touch on later).
Emotional Reactivity
A key indicator of our Emotional Health is in paying attention to what triggers us. What causes us quick emotional reactions. Comments, situations, people in general, tasks, whatever – What makes you feel something deeply upsetting?
My triggers are things like my intelligence, my finances, my education, and my fitness. I have shame around the fact that I dropped out of university, so I will be triggered at the mention of it.
I learned this about myself by studying E.Q. (Emotional Intelligence). It has given me a newfound emotional awareness that highlights where I have emotional wounds that are easily touched, thus causing me pain.
So, what are your emotional wounds? What causes you pain? What makes you feel shame, sadness, fear, anger, defensiveness, or anxiety? What feels like judgement and criticism that you can’t handle?
The thing is, even when people say things that are mean or uncalled for, we need to understand that if we were truly confident in ourselves and our choices, it wouldn’t affect us much. We’d tell them that they were rude, but we wouldn’t let it hurt us so deeply.
And really, it’s not personal.
As I said before, if someone is trying to tear you down, judge you, or hurt you, that is probably is a key indicator that they have insecurities and pain inside of themselves.
A confident person does not tear others down; they lift others up.
Judge Not Lest Ye Be Judged
What you judge others for shows what you may feel judged for yourself or wish you did yourself.
“It takes one to know one!”
I used to think this was a childish way to call someone who called you an idiot and an idiot back. But in reality, this is such a true statement. For someone to judge someone else, it is often the case that they feel judged for the same thing.
Someone has said to me, “You should just go for your run, stop wasting time!” (which triggered me) but they were someone who has struggled with their fitness and weight themselves. This means that they were judging me/ criticising/ commenting because they have felt the same from others themselves.
It’s the push the pain onto someone else mentality.
“I’m not so bad because they do it, too.”
Or, someone may criticise you for how you’re doing something, purely because they wish they had the nerve to do it. Like, “you’re running wrong” when really, they wish they ran too, even in the “wrong” way!
Like for me, I’m very good at giving advice. I’m very good at helping others make decisions. I’m good at telling people to do the things that they want to do despite their fears. But I fail to follow my own advice at times!
It takes one to know one! I can recognise fear and self-sabotage in others because I’m afraid and I self-sabotage myself.
But as they say, judge not lest ye be judged…
Hold up the mirror
So, hold up the mirror and listen to what it’s telling you.
Who or what makes you feel angry, sad, defensive, ashamed, or afraid? Why might this be? What deep insecurities or fears are your emotions trying to show you?
When you snap at others or joke about them, what might that be telling you about yourself?
What do you judge others for? What might that mean?
Don’t look away. Look in the mirror and accept what you see. It’s the first step to fixing it.
Today’s challenge, should you choose to accept it, is to write a list of your Failures. Don’t let it feel too bad, just get them down on paper to remind yourself that despite your failures in the past, you survived. You’re ok. We all make mistakes and fall down.
Don’t judge yourself for it, and don’t judge others for theirs either.
This week’s worksheet to complete: Confidence Challenge Week Four Worksheet
Check out my other workbooks for help with deep emotional issues.
Confidence Challenge Post: People Are Mirrors
Confident people don’t tear others down. They don’t highlight their weaknesses and imperfections. Think of a bully; anyone who harms others or jokes at their expense is just insecure about themselves, but hopes you won’t notice if you see the weakness in another person.
The reason I bring this up is because the way I see it, people are mirrors. What we pick at and judge in them is a reflection of our own insecurities. Or, when they comment (or just live their lives, really) and it affects us emotionally, this is a reflection of our deeper issues.
How we see and treat others (or our encounters with them) is a mirror to how we feel inside.
Let me explain…
The Bully Paradox
What bullies highlight in others truly highlights their own insecurities. Their weaknesses, fears, wonky beliefs, shame and so on. But it’s not just bullies. We all do this from time to time.
You see yourself in someone and that’s scary and upsetting and so you tear them apart. It’s like a way of taking out your rage towards yourself on them. Or bringing another person down so that you don’t have to feel so bad about yourself.
Aha, look at how funny they look!
Aha, what a stupid thing to say?
Aha, you’ve put on so much weight!
Or, you simply judge them (which we’ll touch on later).
Emotional Reactivity
A key indicator of our Emotional Health is in paying attention to what triggers us. What causes us quick emotional reactions. Comments, situations, people in general, tasks, whatever – What makes you feel something deeply upsetting?
My triggers are things like my intelligence, my finances, my education, and my fitness. I have shame around the fact that I dropped out of university, so I will be triggered at the mention of it.
I learned this about myself by studying E.Q. (Emotional Intelligence). It has given me a newfound emotional awareness that highlights where I have emotional wounds that are easily touched, thus causing me pain.
So, what are your emotional wounds? What causes you pain? What makes you feel shame, sadness, fear, anger, defensiveness, or anxiety? What feels like judgement and criticism that you can’t handle?
The thing is, even when people say things that are mean or uncalled for, we need to understand that if we were truly confident in ourselves and our choices, it wouldn’t affect us much. We’d tell them that they were rude, but we wouldn’t let it hurt us so deeply.
And really, it’s not personal.
As I said before, if someone is trying to tear you down, judge you, or hurt you, that is probably is a key indicator that they have insecurities and pain inside of themselves.
A confident person does not tear others down; they lift others up.
Judge Not Lest Ye Be Judged
What you judge others for shows what you may feel judged for yourself or wish you did yourself.
“It takes one to know one!”
I used to think this was a childish way to call someone who called you an idiot and an idiot back. But in reality, this is such a true statement. For someone to judge someone else, it is often the case that they feel judged for the same thing.
Someone has said to me, “You should just go for your run, stop wasting time!” (which triggered me) but they were someone who has struggled with their fitness and weight themselves. This means that they were judging me/ criticising/ commenting because they have felt the same from others themselves.
It’s the push the pain onto someone else mentality.
“I’m not so bad because they do it, too.”
Or, someone may criticise you for how you’re doing something, purely because they wish they had the nerve to do it. Like, “you’re running wrong” when really, they wish they ran too, even in the “wrong” way!
Like for me, I’m very good at giving advice. I’m very good at helping others make decisions. I’m good at telling people to do the things that they want to do despite their fears. But I fail to follow my own advice at times!
It takes one to know one! I can recognise fear and self-sabotage in others because I’m afraid and I self-sabotage myself.
But as they say, judge not lest ye be judged…
Hold up the mirror
So, hold up the mirror and listen to what it’s telling you.
Who or what makes you feel angry, sad, defensive, ashamed, or afraid? Why might this be? What deep insecurities or fears are your emotions trying to show you?
When you snap at others or joke about them, what might that be telling you about yourself?
What do you judge others for? What might that mean?
Don’t look away. Look in the mirror and accept what you see. It’s the first step to fixing it.
Today’s challenge, should you choose to accept it, is to write a list of your Failures. Don’t let it feel too bad, just get them down on paper to remind yourself that despite your failures in the past, you survived. You’re ok. We all make mistakes and fall down.
Don’t judge yourself for it, and don’t judge others for theirs either.
This week’s worksheet to complete: Confidence Challenge Week Four Worksheet
Check out my other workbooks for help with deep emotional issues.
August 21, 2019
How Age and Status Affects Confidence
I’ve found that our obsession with age and what we think we should have achieved by certain stages in life can directly affect our confidence levels.
Here are some of my ideas about this topic…
Click to play!
This week’s worksheet to complete: Confidence Challenge Week Four Worksheet
Checklist for the challenge: Confidence Challenge Checklist
