We all have days when we doubt ourselves. Everyone struggles with self-doubt at some point in their life. No matter how smart you are, no matter how hard you work, there are times when you feel like you’re a failure. How to stop doubting yourself?
Self-doubt is a constant companion. We all have doubts about our abilities, we all have fears.
But self-doubt is a normal part of being human. It’s not something to be ashamed of. And it’s not something you can control.
The good news is that you don’t have to live with this feeling forever. In fact, you can learn how to overcome it.
In this article, I’ll be sharing with you my personal strategies for getting over self-doubt. So, how to tackle self-doubt? How to overcome doubting yourself?
1) To Combat Self-Doubt, First Acknowledge It
How to combat self doubt?
When I think about self-doubt, I always find myself looking at the negative side of things and wondering whether my ability or talent is good enough or whether I will be able to do this. I think about the things that I don’t enjoy doing and what others will think about me.
The world is full of people who don’t believe in themselves. They don’t believe they are capable of anything. They think their ability or talent is nothing special and that they have no chance of being successful. They don’t believe they will get where they want to be in life.
To stop doubting yourself, the first thing to do is to acknowledge your self-doubt. If you are asking yourself how to heal self-doubt, this is the first step.
If you find yourself in that situation, then stop it immediately.
If you find this quite hard, I have a simple exercise for you – I call it the “Dump and let go exercise”. It can take quite long, but I find it really therapeutic and it will help you to tackle self-doubt:
- Take a sheet of paper
- Write down all your doubts, every negative thought you are having.
- Do it until you are exhausted and don’t know what else write.
- Then drop this paper on the waste basket.
Remember, what you resists, persists. You won’t be able to get forward if you don’t acknowledge your self-doubt. This will allow you to put it in perspective, get along and create some space for different thoughts.
So, to fight self-doubt think about what you are good at and what you enjoy.
What do you enjoy? What do you like? What do you feel passionate about?
You may be surprised. You are already better than a lot of people out there. There is no reason why you can’t succeed. This is the first step to overcome doubting yourself.
Get more at Overcoming Self-Doubt: Discover How to Get Over Your Roadblocks to Self-Belief.
2) To Stop Doubting Yourself, Silence Your Inner Critic
One of the major sources of self-doubt is your inner critic.
Silencing your inner critic plays a major role in healing your self-doubt.
You can overcome your self-doubt by learning to silence your inner critic.
Your inner critic is the voice in your head that tells you that you’re not good enough, that you can’t do it, or that you’re not worthy.
But you don’t have to listen to it.
The simplest way to silence your inner critic is to replace negative thoughts with mental silence.
Just close your eyes breathe deeply for 5 seconds, then repeat “I am calm now; I will be happy later.” When you feel like giving up, remind yourself: “It’s okay if this feels hard right now because eventually everything gets easier.”
To combat self-doubt, learn how to quiet your inner critic and let yourself shine!
Get more at Silencing Your Inner Critic to Boost Confidence and Your Personal Power.
3) To Heal Your Self-Doubt, Be Honest With Yourself And Accept You Are Not Perfect
A lot of times we tend to be perfectionists and self-conscious. We think about how our life looks like from the outside, or how other people may see us. When something fails our expectations, self-doubt will kick-in.
As we have just seen, the first step is to acknowledge it. But you can also learn to tackle self-doubt.
So the next time you feel your doubt kick in, pause and ask yourself: “Is this real?”
If you’re honest with yourself, you’ll realize you’re not the failure you think you are. You just need to dig deep to find the truth.
To stop doubting yourself you have to accept you flaws, because if you have flaws then you can accept also your strengths.
Accept yourself for who you are, don’t compare yourself to others. If you find you are falling short of your expectations, the best way to combat self-doubt is to focus on what you have just learned, adjust your goals accordingly and restart.
To heal your self-doubt and overcome doubting yourself you have to accept that you may be not perfect, but for sure, you are enough.
4) Be Proud Of Your Strengths And Stop Doubting Yourself
Think about the things you are really good at and the things you enjoy doing.
When I think of self-doubt, I always think about the negative side of things. Your job is to focus on your strengths and not your weaknesses. It is not what others will think about you that counts, it is what you think about yourself.
To combat self-doubt, you have to focus on your strengths. When you focus on your strengths, you’ll find that your self-doubt will melt away.
What are your strengths? What do you do well? If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?
Write down the answers to these questions and use this list as a guide to focus on your strengths.
So, to fight self-doubt start by thinking of something that you are really good at and focus on that. Remember the positive attributes that you have. Focus on your own abilities, your own talents and get your head around that.
Focus on your strength, not your weaknesses. You are talented; acknowledge your talent, accept them and exploit them to give your direction to your life.
5) To Fight Self-Doubt, Do Not Be Afraid To Make Mistakes
You don’t have to be perfect to succeed. To get rid of doubt and fear you have to understand that the only way to get better at anything is to make mistakes.
Mistakes are the price for taking action, but a good one: when you make mistakes, you learn. And when you learn, you improve and you’ll overcome doubting yourself. And that’s what matters most.
If you have a goal in life, and you’re willing to work hard to achieve it, then you have nothing to fear. Remember, the more you achieve, the more you can achieve. So the more you do, the more you learn, the more you’ll improve and the more you’ll be able to achieve.
So, want to know how to tackle self-doubt? Make mistakes and learn from them. Don’t worry about the mistakes you make, because you’ll learn from them.
As long as you’re willing to make mistakes, you can’t fail. And if you can’t fail, you’ll stop doubting yourself.
6) To Combat Self-Doubt, Do Not Allow Your Feelings To Rule Your Life
The emotions you feel come from your thoughts. It’s easy to get lost in your emotions and think they’re real. But this is a trap. To stop doubting yourself, you must learn to separate your thoughts from your emotions.
Similarly, you can experience your self-doubt as it were an emotion, but in reality it’s just a negative thought.
Like every other thought, it has a real power on you and your life only if you allow it. The point is that you are not your emotions, and you are not your thoughts.
So you have the power and the choice to move forward, whatever emotions and whatever thoughts you are having right now. You have the power to choose, you can choose your behavior.
To fight self-doubt, you have to exploit this power.
As soon as you realize this, you’ll no longer be ruled by your emotions. You’ll be able to choose your thoughts and make decisions based on what you know to be true and, with this, get rid of doubt and fear.
And you’ll be able to take steps towards your goals.
7) Practice At Being Positive To Stop Doubting Yourself
Self-doubt will creep up on you at inopportune times.
According to the previous point, I believe it’s important to practice being positive, even when things aren’t going your way. In order to succeed, you have to be able to stay positive and focused. When you are feeling down, the last thing you want to do is think about all the things that could go wrong. But if you can stay positive, then you will be able to make the most out of any situation.
Being positive is skill you can acquire. Like any other skill, it’s acquired with practice.
To combat self-doubt, you have to practice at being positive. You need to practice at staying positive when you’re feeling negative. Practice believing in yourself instead of doubting. This is the way you overcome doubting yourself.
Keep in mind that, in any situation, you may be right or wrong and, upfront, you don’t know in which side you are on. So why not take the positive approach first?
So the best way to fight self-doubt is to purposely try to look on the bright side of any situation. Ask yourself what is good and what you are doing right. Go ahead, practice positivity and develop your believe in yourself muscles.
Get more on setting a positive mindset for your life at 4 Questions to A Positive Future You Can Believe In.
8) The Most Powerful Way To Combat Self-Doubt Is To Learn, Improve And Keep Moving Forward
Practice makes perfect and is the key to mastering all the previous points.
We all have to start somewhere and we can’t expect to be the best in the world straight away. We all have the ability to learn and practice.
As we have seen, there is no better way to master something than by practicing and learning from your mistakes.
You may not be able to get rid of your self-doubt completely. But that doesn’t mean you can’t beat it down.
To tackle self-doubt, just don’t give up. Keep going, keep practicing and keep trying to improve: this is the way you fight self-doubt.
The more you practice, the more you are going to get better. And this will make you stop doubting yourself.
When you start out, don’t expect perfection. Just start.
9) Getting Over Self-Doubt Starts From You
The truth is, you don’t have to be someone else to succeed. As obvious as it may seem, to stop doubting yourself you just have to believe in yourself.
You have to be confident. You have to be able to see and grasp your opportunities. You have to be able to sell yourself. You have to be able to create the small and big things in your life.
You have to believe in yourself and know that you can go forward and do it even if your feelings and your thoughts are telling you “no” right now.
To combat self-doubt, everything starts from you.
Conclusion – Overcome Doubting Yourself & Live Your Dreams
Self-doubt is one of the biggest barriers in our lives. We all have doubts about our abilities. We all have fears. We all have doubts about what other people think of us.
To heal your self-doubt, you have to acknowledge it, silence your inner critic and accept you are not perfect, but you are enough.
This leads the way to getting over self-doubt. To get rid of doubt and fear you must have the courage to be yourself, in spite of the fact that it’s not the popular thing to be. Most people would rather not think of themselves as brave, confident or courageous. But if you are truly honest with yourself, you know that you have strengths and abilities that you are not aware of.
You need to understand that there are things you can do to overcome self-doubt and start living your dreams.
Don’t let those doubts stop you from doing what you want to do. Get your head around them and stop dwelling on them.
You are the only person who can decide to be positive. You are the only one who can make a choice to do what scares you. The choice is yours to make and you must own it.
You don’t have to be perfect to succeed. To combat self-doubt, you just have to believe in yourself and start.
Just focus on what you really enjoy and what you are good at. Start now. Just keep moving forward, learn from your mistakes and improve your skills. To fight self-doubt you just have to be willing to keep trying until you get it right.
That’s all what it takes to stop doubting yourself. It’s a life long journey.
For a quick help on your journey, get my free 5 day start believing in yourself challenge workbook, where you’ll learn daily simple activities and exercises to unleash your inner belief. Just click on the image below and sign up.
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