At some point in our life, we all find ourselves facing our insecurities, it is a natural way to try to understand if our initiatives will succeed or if they will end badly. If you are trying to figure out whether or not it is a good idea to jump off the Grand Canyon on a motorcycle, it is a very useful quality, because it protects you. However, in day-to-day life, being too insecure to try even the little things, like talking honestly with a friend, limits your ability to live well. Life is constantly changing and everything stable today could be destroyed or go away tomorrow. But if you can become confident, you can always rebuild, overcome problems and keep going on your own, seeking happiness wherever you go. Read on to stop feeling insecure once and for all.
Steps
Part 1 of 2: Changing Your Perspective
Step 1. Practice objectivity
If you feel you cannot achieve something, distance yourself for a moment and imagine that you are a completely different person. Think about what you would say to another person in the same situation as you. For example, if you are nervous about going to a party where you hardly know anyone or if you are going to interview for a new job, think about the advice you would give to someone in a similar situation. Seeing it this way, you will understand that there is nothing to be afraid of and that you will be successful if you aim for it.
Step 2. Write down your fears
Write down everything that worries you and any factors that make you feel like you can't get what you want. Read them again and ask yourself how many of them are rational and how many are just a product of negative thoughts. Take some time to really think about what's at the root of your fears, whether it's making a fool of yourself, letting your parents down, or not having the life you want. Try to figure out how many of these fears you can cross off the list and how many solutions are there to stop worrying about these things.
Being afraid of failure or making a fool of yourself is perfectly normal. Everyone has these fears from time to time. However, it's not natural to be so paralyzed by fear that you think you can't get anything done
Step 3. Remember all your successes
Instead of obsessing over the times when you got embarrassed, something didn't go right or you seemed silly, you should focus on what you did particularly well. Think about the success you had in school, the great friendships you maintained, or just the various moments you made a group of people laugh out of your sparkling sense of humor. The more good times you remember, the more confident you will be of being able to experience more in the future.
It may be helpful to write down your every success immediately after you hit it. Dedicate a diary to this; write down when you are proud of what you do or want to write a nice memory. When you feel unable to do something and think you are not happy with one, you can review the list and remember that you are a wonderful and competent person
Step 4. Ask yourself "What's the worst that could happen?
, and respond in a realistic way. If you try a new haircut and people don't like it, it's not the end of the world. In case you hate it deeply, do you know it's there? Hair grows back. Don't let it these silly worries keep you from doing something different. Once you understand that the worst is not too bad, you are more likely to become a dynamic and risk-taking person.
If you can't figure out when your answers stop being reasonable and start being ridiculous, try talking to someone who has common sense and who you trust. It should be able to tell you if the worst case scenario could occur or if you are exaggerating
Step 5. Now, ask yourself "What's the best thing that could happen?
Insecure people don't ask themselves this question often enough. We assume you are nervous about a first blind date. The best thing that could happen is that you and this person get along well and enter into a meaningful and satisfying relationship. Isn't it worth trying? While not always going for the best, thinking about this opportunity can help you have a positive approach to new experiences.
Before you decide to do something new, you can also write down the best thing that could happen or the three best things that could happen, so you can refresh your memory at the right time
Step 6. Remember your good qualities
To continue to feel safe, you need to keep your best features in mind. Make a list of everything you love about yourself, from your sociability to your intelligence, and keep them in mind whenever you find yourself talking to someone. Insecure people tend to focus only on their worst parts, which leads them to feel dissatisfied with who they are.
By looking only for your negative characteristics, you focus on them and neglect the good qualities. If you've been hard on yourself for a long time, it can be hard to think of a positive trait of yours at first glance
Step 7. Talk to yourself in a positive way
It is especially difficult to notice the bad things you say to yourself if you have been inflicting this pain on yourself for a long time. If you repeat to yourself that you are a loser or a failure and never do anything good, you force yourself to feel this way all the time. Instead, try to tell yourself positive things about yourself so it will be easier to approach new experiences feeling good and willing to give your all.
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A useful exercise to feel more comfortable as you repeat your strengths to yourself and to stop abusing yourself is to say something positive to yourself for every offense you inflict on yourself. They don't have to be related to each other.
For example, if you burn your tongue because you didn't wait long enough to drink your coffee and exclaim "Idiot! You're a fool!", You have to remind yourself "But I can play tennis well and I have a great sense of humor.". It might sound odd, but your attitude changes when you compliment yourself
Step 8. Think about why you are denying yourself something
Start saying yes more often. Instead of telling yourself all the reasons why you want to say no to a new experience, try to think about what might happen if you say yes. Not all answers have to be true, but imagining a yes could lead you to something new and unexpected. If an experience you said yes doesn't satisfy you, you can still recover. Not to mention that you will have tried something new, which would not have happened if you had said no. If you don't get anything out of it, you can rejoice in thinking that you are the kind of upbeat and sociable person you've always wanted to be, willing to try new things.
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Let's assume that a friend of yours from the music school approaches you and tells you that he wants to form a band, inviting you to join. Your automatic response might be "Forget it, I've never been a member of a band and I definitely don't know how to create a successful one. Besides, I don't think I'm a good musician, I don't have time and…".
By thinking this way, you have already withdrawn into yourself and denied any exploration of the potential of the idea, before you have even really evaluated it. You could bond with this mate and his friends, have an interesting experience, and have a new story to tell. Say yes and see where you will get
Try applying some of the tips outlined above when you have doubts about your relationship. It's okay to find your own happiness too. If you are generally a happy person, it is very likely that you will make the people around you and your partner happy, which will make you feel more confident and keep you away from any insecurity.
Part 2 of 2: Take Action
Step 1. Surround yourself with interesting people
Pay attention to the friends you hang out with and the attitude they have towards others and themselves. If you start to notice that most of your companions are particularly and constantly critical and judge everything - everyone's clothes, body, decisions, speeches, and behaviors - you should seek out different friends. Try to find people who always have a good word for others and who don't express contempt after a second.
While having negative friends isn't a problem, it's not good for you to surround yourself with this atmosphere, even if it doesn't concern you directly. In fact, you still absorb the effects. If your friend points out someone's hairstyle to laugh about it but you like it, their opinion makes you feel wrong and makes you lose faith in yourself even more
Step 2. Try to forgive others
Don't hastily judge people. Trying to demoralize people might make you feel better. The truth is, whenever you criticize someone, you are poisoning yourself. Instead, give compliments. Not only will it be easier to make friends and have relevant relationships, you will also be able to improve yourself.
- If you find yourself condemning the failures or decisions of others, think about why you do it. In case your initial thought is “Why they are wrong”, think about it longer. Why are they wrong? In what context? Does your judgment depend on your cultural background or how you were raised?
- Would a person from another country or from a different cultural background feel the same way? Just because someone does something differently than you or lives in a way you don't care doesn't automatically mean they're wrong.
Step 3. Do an activity every day that makes you happy
It doesn't have to be dangerous. For example, go alone to a part of the city you've never visited and enter a random shop. See what you can find us. Try talking to the saleswoman. The more new and exciting experiences you accumulate, the more you will be able to feel stimulated by life, instead of being frightened by new things or people. If you know that you are capable of trying something new once a day, then you will stop thinking that everything you try will end badly.
If your self-image makes you uncomfortable, try walking into a clothing store that sells clothes that are different from your style and try on a variety of clothes, even if they don't suit your tastes. Laugh at your appearance as you mirror yourself. You may find clothing that looks unexpectedly good on you. Otherwise, you are left with your clothes, which will seem less ridiculous to you after this experience. Try something new as often as possible
Step 4. Fix any defects you can mitigate
If you hate your freckles or the sound of your own voice, then you can't do much about it. You have to work on accepting the imperfections that you cannot change. However, if there is something you can change about yourself, such as the ease with which you stress, your lack of compassion, or your insecurity, then you need to try to succeed. Of course, we are all born with a certain predisposition and it is difficult to completely transform ourselves, but we can certainly work to improve our strengths.
- If you work hard to improve what you don't like about yourself, you will be on the right path to feeling more confident, faster.
- No one ever said it would be easy to figure out what you want to change about yourself and then go to work to do it. But this alternative is preferable to always complaining about what you hate about yourself, without lifting a finger to improve.
Step 5. Stop comparing yourself to others
Your insecurity can only increase if you compare yourself to the people you know or those you see on TV. If you do, you will surely find an excuse to feel ugly, poor, incapable or any other unfavorable adjective, because you feel like you can never measure up to others. Instead, focus on what would make your life better based on your standards, not those of others.
If you put in the effort, you will always be able to find someone healthier, richer and wiser than you. But probably there are many people who want to be like you, in more ways than one. The neighbor's grass is always greener, and that person who you think is perfect and who has everything may want to be like someone else in turn
Step 6. Talk to a good friend
An effective way to overcome your insecurities is to talk to someone who loves you. Discussing it with a friend who knows and understands you can help you have an unbiased perspective, and allows you to understand that your worries or fears are irrational. A good friend will lift you up, remind you that you can achieve what you aim for, and help you throw away the negativity and doubts that clog your life.
Sometimes, talking about a problem is half the battle to solve it. Keeping insecurities inside could make you feel worse
Step 7. Strive to excel at something
If you want to feel better in your own skin, then you can try being good at an activity. This can be dance, story writing, painting, jokes or a foreign language. No matter what you choose, what matters is putting in enough time and energy to be able to say "Hey, I'm really good". Making the effort to shine in an activity and making a commitment to do it regularly will certainly help you feel good about yourself.
To be clear, you shouldn't aim to be the best player on the pitch or the best student in the class to impress others. You should do this to make yourself proud
Step 8. Learn to laugh at yourself
In general, insecure people take themselves quite seriously. They are always worried about the possibility of failing or embarrassing themselves. People with a good sense of humor and who understand that it is normal that they sometimes make a fool of themselves tend to be safer, because they accept that sooner or later they will make mistakes and have no problem with that. You should learn to laugh at yourself and make jokes if something doesn't go to plan. Do it instead of worrying about always looking perfect. It will be a great relief to face life with more laughter and fewer dark looks, because you will stop wanting everything to be flawless.
This does not mean that you have to criticize yourself day and night and laugh at yourself all the time. It means that you should take life more lightly and forgive yourself. By making fun of yourself, people will feel more comfortable around you because they won't have the constant fear of offending you. Plus, you'll feel better in your own skin too
Step 9. Find out as much as possible
Maybe you feel insecure because you hate dealing with uncertainty. You don't know what to expect from a party, a new class, a trip, a situation where you don't know many people. While you can't predict what might happen, you can be better off by informing yourself as much as possible so that you feel more in control. This will help you be more confident about the future.
- For example, if you are going to a party, try to find out who organized it, what kind of people were invited, what the dress code is, etc. This way, you will know more or less what to expect.
- If you are concerned about giving a public presentation, be sure to inquire about the total number of attendees, the layout of the room, other people who will attend, and so on. This way, there will be fewer X factors to worry about.
Step 10. Remember that you are not alone
Maybe you think you are the only person in the world who doubts himself and who can't stand comparison with anyone. However, you have to remember that everyone has felt insecure at one time or another, even supermodels or financial sharks. Insecurity is part of life, and if you stop feeling disheartened about this problem you will be well on your way! Everyone is uncertain for some reason, and having doubts is perfectly normal. Knowing this will direct you to the right path to get better.
Step 11. Try mindful meditation
Sit or lie down, close your eyes and just focus on your breathing for 10 minutes. Try to clear your mind of any thoughts that are stressing you and relax the physical tension in your body.
Meditation can take your thoughts away from worries and insecurities, leaving you with a feeling of peace and serenity
Advice
- Pick a hobby or activity that interests you and pursue it as often as possible. You can do it alone or in a group. While not being particularly good at first or not feeling like a pro even after some time, you will give yourself a new chance. If you have companions, you will make new friends. Regularly play a sport, hike, knit, read, take pictures, paint, play an instrument, collect bugs, learn a new language or programming language, or volunteer in your community. These are just a few good examples.
- If someone criticizes you, take a step back and objectively think “Does what he says make sense? Did you evaluate it from another point of view? Do you understand how I see it? Is he offering me a solution or is he just trying to make me feel inferior?”. Put yourself in his shoes.
- If you feel embarrassed, have a laugh and try to be happy. Getting angry or constantly blaming yourself in silence will only destroy your opportunities to appreciate what you do and make you feel bad in general. If you laugh, you can move on and keep trying to feel good.
- Try to help others, even by making small gestures. This makes you feel safe and useful. Communicating, sharing a project and so on give you motivation and make you feel good. Let others appreciate you and learn to appreciate yourself.
Warnings
- Self-esteem must be cultivated and it takes time to recover it and to feel good. It may take years before you realize you haven't changed at all. Believe in change and do your best.
- Life isn't always plain sailing, and that's always true, whether you embrace the situation or run away. You can't change it, but you can change your attitude, just so you can have a different life.
