Minor revelation

In a shamanic journeying class, I went through a guided meditation to bring your true self into you.

And my true self is confident... in movement and thought and action. And when he melded with me, I had this revelation, which I thought I would share.

Everyone has probably heard there's a bit of a trick to confidence. Fake it until you make it; pretend to be confident, and eventually, you'll become more confident, right?

And I had this sudden silly idea... what does this confidence look like? What does it mean to pretend to be confident?

And it just hit me. It doesn't *look* like anything. When I had absorbed him, I had this, "how can I show the other people this huge outpouring of confidence?" and the answer was "I don't have to. That's the entire point."

No one had to know I was confident, because I was. And if someone didn't see that, well, they weren't looking, or hadn't seen me in a situation where it would show.

The idea of faking it made me think that I should do something to appear confident, but that's not the right way... or at least, isn't the right way for me.

There are things I might fake. If I find myself nervous about speaking, I could stop, think about what I was going to say, and if it still made sense, say it. And if I blew it... what then?

Well... what happened? What did I do? Did I say something hurtful? Well, I could apologize. Did I say something incredibly stupid? Well, I could laugh about it (and/or apologize if necessary). Did I just say something that, in the end, doesn't make any sense? Eh. It's part of being human. The point is, there's things that could happen that I don't like... but it's not like I can't handle each of those circumstances. I don't *want* to... no one wants to have to apologize or laugh at their own sudden attack of stupidity. But that's confidence in a nutshell... it's not that you know that everything will come up roses, it's that you know that you can handle things if they don't.

So there were two parts to what happened. First, I got a taste of real confidence (which I recognized, having felt it before, but this time I knew what it was). And second, I got what it means to appear truly confident, and realized I'd never have to try to "appear" confident, in and of itself, ever again.

Minor revelation

In a shamanic journeying class, I went through a guided meditation to bring your true self into you.

And my true self is confident... in movement and thought and action. And when he melded with me, I had this revelation, which I thought I would share.

Everyone has probably heard there's a bit of a trick to confidence. Fake it until you make it; pretend to be confident, and eventually, you'll become more confident, right?

And I had this sudden silly idea... what does this confidence look like? What does it mean to pretend to be confident?

And it just hit me. It doesn't *look* like anything. When I had absorbed him, I had this, "how can I show the other people this huge outpouring of confidence?" and the answer was "I don't have to. That's the entire point."

No one had to know I was confident, because I was. And if someone didn't see that, well, they weren't looking, or hadn't seen me in a situation where it would show.

The idea of faking it made me think that I should do something to appear confident, but that's not the right way... or at least, isn't the right way for me.

There are things I might fake. If I find myself nervous about speaking, I could stop, think about what I was going to say, and if it still made sense, say it. And if I blew it... what then?

Well... what happened? What did I do? Did I say something hurtful? Well, I could apologize. Did I say something incredibly stupid? Well, I could laugh about it (and/or apologize if necessary). Did I just say something that, in the end, doesn't make any sense? Eh. It's part of being human. The point is, there's things that could happen that I don't like... but it's not like I can't handle each of those circumstances. I don't *want* to... no one wants to have to apologize or laugh at their own sudden attack of stupidity. But that's confidence in a nutshell... it's not that you know that everything will come up roses, it's that you know that you can handle things if they don't.

So there were two parts to what happened. First, I got a taste of real confidence (which I recognized, having felt it before, but this time I knew what it was). And second, I got what it means to appear truly confident, and realized I'd never have to try to "appear" confident, in and of itself, ever again.