Saturday 11 June 2016

Confidence training - doing one thing every day that scares me.

Do one thing each day that scares you.

For me, that could consist of numerous activities.  Most of all, anything which exposes my 'real' self.   To share anything which I have created from my heart scares the absolute shit out of me.

Why?

Lack of self-belief; the fear of being rejected, ridiculed, told point blank that what I have created is complete shit.

I surmise at times that my efforts at writing are utter crap.

I mean, what is my message?  What point am I attempting to get across?  Sure, I love writing, putting my chaotic thoughts down upon paper and attempting to make sense of the mess.

But am I actually any good?  Does anyone actually benefit from what I write, or ought I just keep my words hidden away in a private journal, stashed under my pillow?

Being deemed good, or shit for that matter, is all relative.

Yet being aware of this does not lessen the insecurity felt from within.

In an attempt to grow in confidence, I have decided to set myself the task of doing something each day that scares me.  Something that causes me to feel a little nauseous, but ultimately empowers me.

I am not talking about grand things; no bungee jumping or anything like that.

Just little things, things which may seem insignificant to an outsider, but which are huge deals to me personally.

For little over a year now I have been putting my poems to music.  I think I have around five poems which I have crafted into songs.

I love singing.  However, to sing my own songs in front of anyone causes me to have a complete meltdown.  Karaoke I can do, belting out another's song is fun (and usually happens after a shot or five of dutch courage).  But performing my own songs?  Shit, that's like peeling back the skin of my chest to expose my heart.

If someone tells me I can't sing, well that's cool, it's a matter of opinion.  To be told you can't sing and that your song sucks?  Well that's just fucking murder of the soul right there!

Okay, so I'm being over dramatic, but the fear of ridicule combined with a lack of self-belief has meant that none of my songs/poems to music have ever been heard by anyone other than myself (and my mum!)

So, in the spirit of "Project Confidence Boost", yesterday I decided to record myself singing one of my songs and post it to my Facebook profile.

Now my Facebook profile is locked down private, and only those who are on my friends list can view anything I post.  So it was not like I was putting myself out there for the criticism of complete strangers.  Still, it terrified me just as much as it would have done if I had been posted it on an open profile.

Still I did it.  As I pressed post I thought 'fuck it, what's the worst that can happen?' followed by a distinct sick feeling.

Why the fuck would anyone want to watch this?

Why not?

The accompanying caption to the video stated that I was in no way delusional or attempting to be the next Lianne Le Havas, but I felt the need to share a little bit of me.

The song/poem writing is a hobby, it brings me joy.  The point of sharing wasn't anything more than an exercise of putting myself out there, to show myself that the consequences of doing so would not be as dire as I had imagined.

It also brought me to a significant aha moment.  Without feedback how can I improve?  And this isn't restricted to the music, but to everything we create in life.  Without sharing, we never get the opportunity to receive feedback (good and bad), and without feedback we will never know if others like or dislike something we have created - in a way, we stunt our own growth.

I also discovered that I felt a sense of power in doing something that scared me.  Even if no one had seen or bothered to comment on my little video; the act of putting it out there felt good.  I did it.

Now to decide on what today's 'scary thing' will be.

Eye contact with strangers?


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