Beyond the Reading: How Confidence Leads to Success

Today’s reading brings with it an intoxicating confidence sure to lift anyone’s energy. The King of Pentacles not only represents achieving the type of success everyone wants, but also encourages the type of confidence that allows you to offer advice to others.

You know these people. These are the people that seem to always have things figured out. They remain calm under pressure and they somehow, at the end of the day, end up on top. Even when things don’t seem to go their way, they aren’t bothered, they fix it. The question is how? What is it about these people?

Markway (2018) believes it is self-confidence. Yeah we’ve heard this before – dress for the job you want, not the one you have; fake it til you make it; believe in yourself and other people will believe in you too. Tips and tricks to bolster yourself up when you just aren’t feeling it. But is that really self-confidence? Do we trick ourselves into believing and suddenly it is true?

In Why Self-Confidence is More Important Than You Think, Markway (2018) states that self-confidence is a part the aspects people list as important to having a happy, fulfilling life. Basically, without self-confidence, we wouldn’t be able to achieve the things we want because fear, anxiety, and a lack of motivation would hold us back. We don’t believe we have what it takes, or we think it will be too hard, or we aren’t sure where to start.

And what about situations where we were previously confident? In these instances, we have an unfortunate case of limiting beliefs being triggered. In How Does a Lack of Confidence Affect Your Life and Career, Marcus (2017) explains that when a limiting belief is triggered – for example someone says something that confirms one of your fears (e.g., you aren’t as smart as you think you are) – you believe it because it was ‘confirmed’ and then you spend your time validating it because you look for examples of how it is true. This happens consciously and subconsciously, regardless of whether this limiting belief is true or not. This in turn has the ability to send you into a spiral of sorts – think self-fulfilling prophecy.

So some of us can trick ourselves into having self-confidence and some of us can trick ourselves into believing we can’t accomplish much. Where’s the line? Positive outlook, determination, meeting obstacles head on. The people that have the confidence to achieve what they want don’t give up. It isn’t that these people are lucky and somehow have figured out a magical way to make dreams come true. They go through the same insecurities, issues, and obstacles. They just then keep going. They believe they will find a way to get past wherever they are.

Having confidence isn’t the only way to reach success. It’s a culmination of things that also includes confidence. You bolster yourself up to meet challenges. You overcome those challenges which gives you more confidence. You take on more and aren’t afraid of new opportunities. Those opportunities lead to things that weren’t possible when you were first starting. You believe you deserve it. You believe you can do it. You make it happen.

Bottom line – start small if you have to. And don’t listen to the haters – they have their own limiting beliefs.

Image by Avi Chomotovski from Pixabay