You Can Do It. Confidence 2

One characteristic I adore about confident people is their inner resourcefulness. I love the can do attitude and the belief that they might not know the answer yet, but they will figure it out.

Your inner resourcefulness comes from simply trying new things for yourself. Our childhood has a great deal of influence over our belief in ourselves, but what is really brilliant about us is that we can learn resourcefulness at any stage of our lives.

So let’s go back to our childhood to demonstrate how our resourcefulness starts to grow.

As a child I was lucky enough to live in a rural town, where our playground was unlimited…. Fields, streams, woods and miles of country roads formed my early experiences of resourcefulness. My parents let me walk to school whilst at primary school, of course in a group, but still I learned to get myself up, dressed and out of the door. We had no mobile phones, so it was up to me to make sure I came home from the park, the streets or whatever I was up to, on time. School holidays were building damns, having picnics or going for long bike rides to where ever we fancied.

Sounds idillic doesn’t it? Well it was, but that doesn’t mean that I didn’t get into some scrapes along the way. Whether I was stuck in the mud and came home with only one welly, or with a flat tyre miles away from home. The fact was, stuff happened. The great experience was that only me and my friends were going to get us out of the pickle we were in.

We learned to figure things out, try and fail. We had brainstorming sessions, collaboration and creative thinking. We all learned that we had the inner resourcefulness to get ourselves out of most problems.

Now think of the opposite spectrum. A child is not allowed to make a cup of tea or make some toast, just in case they get scalded or cut themselves. A mother picks up and drops their child off at school everyday, even though they can walk, in the sunshine, wind and rain. A Dad steps in an helps his child with the school science project, just to get it done properly/quickly/neatly…. you choose the word. A Grandparent stops the child climbing to the top of the climbing frame, just in case they get stuck or fall. The examples could go on and on.

Stopping our children from trying new stuff, learning through experience and embracing failure and success stops them gaining their inner resourcefulness. We are actually creating an unconfident child.

The good news, as I said, is that it is never too late to learn. If you want to.

1. If you believe you can, or you can’t, you are probably right. This is the time to change your mindset. If you have a problem, an opportunity or project and believe you can’t do it, then you won’t. Switch your perspective to “hey I don’t know how I will do it, but I know I will figure it out along the way”. Believe that you can do it, or will find the people and support along the way, and you will achieve.

2. Try something new. Even the little things can create great learnings. Every time you try something new and put your hand up and say yes to the unknown, you will discover your inner resourcefulness. You will find that you can succeed and this builds confidence.

3. Take a risk. You know what, fear of the unknown is healthy. It is there to keep us safe. However, we need to look at probability when looking at a new opportunity. Really, what is the worst that can happen? If there is a high probability of failure, danger or death, then you may want to mitigate that risk. In reality, the risks are minor compared to the gains made from getting on and doing whatever it is you want to do. Start building confidence in your risk appetite and you will grow your inner resourcefulness.<