Thursday, January 29, 2009

Word of the Year

con⋅fi⋅dence

–noun
1. full trust; belief in the powers, trustworthiness, or reliability of a person or thing: We have every confidence in their ability to succeed.
2. belief in oneself and one's powers or abilities; self-confidence; self-reliance; assurance: His lack of confidence defeated him.


I think my word of the year is confidence. I've been thinking a lot about it recently. I never had much of it until recently. I had little trust in myself, in my own abilities. When I was younger, my dad tried everything to boost my self-confidence. He enrolled me in sports, encouraged me to try out for the school plays, I was a peer counsellor in middle school. Nothing seemed to work. (I wasn't very good at team sports, I had no talent for acting and I didn't counsel anyone in an entire year.) I've always been quite shy, hardly likely to speak up for myself.

And this lack of self-confidence has just continued to grow and transform into this monstrous thing that's threated to take over my entire life. And it has to stop. For me, for my children. And somehow, in small little ways, it has. I'm unable to recognise the person I'm becoming. I start conversations with other mothers at toddler group and don't stumble over my words. I phone people I know without rehearsing the conversation in my head beforehand.

And here's the big one. At my first tutorial for my university course this week, I didn't have a panic attack when I walked in and I introduced myself straightaway. I spoke in front of everyone without digging my fingernails into my palms out of nervousness. I didn't turn bright red or forget my words. When it came time to break into groups and discuss our hopes and fears for the course, I became the unofficial team leader and volunteered to go first. I'm amazed. Who am I?

I think everything is connected. The running that I'm doing (nearly three miles a day!), the driving, this blog and all of your lovely comments, everything is helping. Every little thing is making me feel more confident and instead of being afraid of what that means, I feel excited. Energised. What new thing can I accomplish next? I feel like a door and a window has been opened and it's up to me to decide what great things happen next.

5 comments:

  1. That's awesome honey!! Keep on going...am proud of you!! Specially for speaking up in tutorial...I'd rarely do that after three years with the same people!!!
    x

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  2. and what A great word it is too.. It suits you well :o) x

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  3. Way to go! Congrats on your confidence!!

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  4. Your post is so full of promise and hope! That's the way to do it.

    I used to get a bit nervous about phone conversations too. Then I realized I was just overthinking how the phone call would go, and I forced myself to stop thinking and just make the call! :) It works.

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