On Friday night I was enjoying the best vegan cheese fries and Korean tacos on the planet after taking my first ever spin/weight training class with my best friend.
She asked to see the link for the new project I’m working on (more on that very soon) but in order to get the link I had to go into my email.
I tentatively paused as I considered the possibility of receiving an email that would thrust me into work mode allowing the energies of stress and planning to bubble up through the cracks of my evening.
I went ahead and sure enough there was an email that did exactly that. (Following my intuition only works when I actually FOLLOW it).
The contents of the email isn’t important. What is important is the path of insecurity it took me down.
I began to question the purpose and power and impact of this new project that I have been working on for the past several months.
Just like that I let a few valid yet different opinions derail my entire focus and excitement for all I have created.
I started to question my integrity. My authenticity. My voice. My worth.
The spiral is real my friends. And yes, it can take even confident and self aware people like myself on a very bumpy and self deprecating ride.
I tend not to hop on this ride all that often but when I do it’s usually very fast, very intense and quite unforgiving.
I find that when I am in the throes of a new project and as a result out of my comfort zone, that this way of thinking can come in with a force that if I’m not grounded in my own sense of self can knock me right off my feet.
When this happens I do two things…
First I acknowledge that it’s happening.
As in yes, I know my ego/fear based self is on fire right now and while there is some truth and validity to how I am feeling and perhaps even some action steps I need to take, it’s not as wild or dramatic as this part of myself is making it out to me.
Next I give it space without feeding it.
I allow myself to feel the icky feelings that are there knowing that if I try to fight them or change them when they are in high alert that I will only be feeding them.
So instead I simply let them be and stay as present as I can until that initial intensity falls away.
This I believe is where people get stuck. They wrestle with this piece of themselves as an attempt to stop it but instead it only makes it bigger and stronger and more palpable.
I was recently working with a client who was going through something similar.
She told me she was feeling super confident but at the same time was experiencing moments where she felt so insecure and as a result she let that cancel out her confidence.
But I offered her the idea that just because we are feeling insecure in a moment doesn’t mean we are void of confidence. In fact when we can acknowledge and own our insecurities without letting them consume us we are able to tap into a piece of our confidence that is more rooted in our sense of self than anything external could ever be.
And this is exactly what I did this weekend when I was feeling the dangerous weight of my own self doubt.
I remembered my confidence. Even though I wasn’t feeling it in the moment. I knew it existed. I knew that it didn’t just go away because my insecurities were present. I acknowledged that both can take up space at the same time inside of myself.
And because I was able to do this, the doubts didn’t consume me. I rode them out, took the actions I needed to take and moved on.
In less than 24 hours it shifted and I went back to believing in myself but with a little extra awareness of my blind spots and where I can also improve.
Now of course each situation and person is different but the point is that when it comes to self doubt, often times there are things that will push us more deeply into the spiral and and ways of being that can help get us out.
It’s so easy to get caught up in the tornado of emotions and doubts when our worth is in question but the less we let our worthiness stem from outside of ourselves and the validation the world gives us the more we will be able to handle those moments when the world isn’t quite up to speed or simply challenges us in some way.
How do you handle those moments of a self doubt spiral? What have you found helpful? I’d love to know in the comments below.
2 comments
Your article came just at the right time. I’m passing through my own spiral at the moment. Usually what I do to combat it is to take a step back, acknowledge that it’s happening, then look for the root cause. While I’m searching I tell myself it’s okay to pause and that I am definitely not quitting. Self doubt can be a beast, but it always passes. Pressing through it is not always the answer. Sometimes a mental break is the best thing for me. But there’s always a solution. Thanks.
So happy to hear this post found you at the perfect time. “Self doubt is a beast but it always passes.” I love this. You’ve got this.
Comments are closed.