‘Want to know how to overcome self doubt? Here are the time-tested mind hacks you need to know about.
When it seems that bullies attack you from every direction, it doesn’t take long for you to begin doubting yourself. As someone who’s been there and triumphed, I’m giving you the proven steps you need to know to overcome self doubt.
In this post, you will learn all the mental tricks you need to go from doubting yourself to believing in yourself.
Once you learn all these clever mind exercises, you will slowly develop the self-belief you need to stand up to bullying and gaslighting. Moreover, you will feel more confident than you thought possible.
This post shows you how to overcome self doubt using the psychological techniques below so that you can grow more confident and live a happier and more productive life.
How to Overcome Self Doubt
Before we get into the mind hacks, let’s discuss the relationship between being bullied and doubting yourself and how it can negatively alter your life.
Many victims of bullying are filled with self-doubt. However, it isn’t only bullying victims that suffer this malady.
Self-doubt ranks right up there with fear. It’s a close second to it as it kills your dreams and causes you to live in mediocrity. Therefore, fear and self-doubt are the catalysts to life-failure. So, please don’t let this happen to you.
Many have been bullied so long that doubting themselves has become like second nature. Understand that abuse has a way of resetting your default mode from confident to diffident.
And once that default has been changed, it’s much more difficult to change it back. Therefore, this is one of the reasons why bullying is so devastating for a target.
To put it simpler, once you’re bullied, it changes you. Either it turns you into a scared, helpless victim, an angry and bitter monster, or an empty shell.
You can overcome it and still, you won’t be the person you once were. Moreover, even if you do the inner work, get to know yourself again, win back your confidence, and manager to heal, you’re still not the same.
You’re stronger, yes. You’re a winner, yes. But I’ll say again, you’re still never the same as you were before you were bullied. Therefore, there will be times when you’ll feel self-doubt creep back in and have to fight it.
How to overcome self doubt: It’s an ongoing battle.
In other words, you don’t just conquer bullying, get confident again and say, “Whew! I won! I’m glad I don’t have to worry about self-doubt or bullying again!”
Why? Because you will at some point. There will be times when that unwelcome and uninvited guest, Mr. or Ms. Doubt will quietly try to slither their way back. Situations in life will trigger it and you will have to fight it.
It’s an ongoing battle. You might experience lulls, where you feel so self-assured that you don’t believe you could ever doubt yourself again. Moreover, these feel-good periods may last days, weeks, months, even years
However, circumstances will arise and unsavory people will come into your life to bring that old devil back again. And, once again, you will have to fight with everything you have to kick that pesky, uninvited guest out.
Self-doubt comes with many symptoms. They include lack of confidence in yourself, your appearance, your abilities, and your potential.
Additionally, lack of self-belief breeds lack of self-determination or, Learned Helplessness. It also comes with anger, sadness, depression, feelings of jealousy, and later, regret.
Giving into self-doubt is dangerous because it has a huge negative affect on your life. In fact, it can absolutely destroy your future. So, how does self-doubt effect your life? It does so in several ways:
1. It zaps your motivation and inspiration.
When you think you can do nothing right or can’t be very effective, you won’t want to try at anything. Why? Because you’ll be so fearful of failing.
Without motivation nor inspiration, you’ll either never do anything at all or you’ll do just enough to get by and that’s it. Instead of living, you’ll only end up existing.
Instead of being successful at life, you’ll only squeeze through it by the skin of your teeth. In other words, you’ll end up in toxic relationships that don’t fulfill you. Also, you’ll bust your tail in dead-in job after dead-end job.
Consequently, you’ll have nothing to show for it in the end.
2. If you don’t learn how to overcome self doubt, It Will cause you to miss opportunities.
When you constantly doubt yourself, you’ll be blind to your chance opportunities and let them pass you by. This will only lead to a mountain of regret later.
There’s nothing that feels worse than knowing you had an good opportunity and missed it because you didn’t see it.
3. It gives you a defeatist attitude.
Self-doubt can morph into the acceptance of failure. Moreover, it can cause you to give up too soon and forfeit success.
Understand that challenges are the most difficult right before your breakthrough and this is when most people give up. In other words, most throw in the towel when success is just around the corner.
Also, once you get into the habit of giving up, you’ll see no point in trying at anything anymore. Therefore, you will only see more failure and defeat.
Finally, you’ll end up with the attitude that you can never reach success. You’ll feel that nothing meaningful or positive can ever come your way.
Moreover, you’ll feel as if God has cursed you, is punishing you and that His will is for you to suffer without ceasing.
This is the absolute wrong attitude to have.
4. Not knowing how to overcome self doubt only stunts your growth, and keeps you feeling “stuck.”
If you don’t believe in yourself, you can’t grow as a person. You’ll only feel like a victim of circumstance. As a result, you’ll feel helpless to change any of the things you don’t like about your life.
In other words, you will feel that no matter how hard you try, you can never accomplish anything.
5. It causes you to procrastinate.
Because you think you’re going to fail anyway, you dread even trying. Therefore, you put off everything until tomorrow. And, day by day, you keep putting off the things you know you need to do.
Consequently, you let it all pile up until the problem becomes so big it overwhelms you.
So, how do you stop doubting yourself? And how do you continue to work bravely on your goals no matter how long it takes to achieve them?
Overcoming self doubt starts in the mind.
Here are the 7 mind hacks to help you stop doubting yourself.
1. Remember how far you’ve come.
In other words, congratulate yourself for making it this far. Doing this will encourage you to go the entire distance and finish the race.
2. Remember the battles you’ve fought and won.
This includes the small wins that are barely noticeable. Moreover, keep in mind that little victories lead to big victories!
3. Remember the fears you’ve faced and overcome.
For example, if you were afraid of water when you were five and you overcome it by taking swimming lessons. Go back to that memory anytime you feel scared of doing something you know you must do.
Remember the quote, “Courage is not the absence of fear, it’s acting in spite of fear.”
4. Remember all the bullies and mean people you’ve overcome.
In other words, remind yourself that you’re still standing even after so many people tried to bring you down. That is a victory in and of itself!
5. How to overcome self doubt: count your blessings.
This means counting the good things that have ever happened to you in your lifetime. You’ll be surprised when you find that they are so many that you can’t count them all.
6. Remember all the things you’ve accomplished- even the tiniest of assignments and projects you’ve completed.
Whether you finish the Fall cleaning of your house, got a good grade, or learned to ride a motorcycle, it’s a win and you must see it as one. Therefore, count your victories, no matter how insignificant they may seem. A win is a win.
7. lastly, believe that if anyone else can do it, you can too.
Seeing someone else succeed can be a huge motivator. Therefore, instead of being envious, let the other person’s victory give you encouragement to keep trying.
Understand that we all come to roadblocks and hit brick walls. Moreover, we all have our down times and, sadly, sometimes those bumps in the road can cause us to doubt ourselves from time to time.
However, don’t you dare quit. If you need to rest, than rest. Even the Energizer Bunny has to recharge his batteries at some point.
The trick is to get up, dust yourself off, and keep pushing on. The difference between those who succeed and those who fail is whether they give in to self-doubt and give up or push it away and keep going.
In conclusion
No matter what bullies have told you nor how many times you’ve faced adversity, you can overcome self-doubt. It may take a while and you make need to work hard and fight many battles but you can overcome it.
Know that you have the power to change the way you think. Many people who grew up in extreme poverty or abusive homes have gone on to become doctors, lawyers, famous writers and inventors. Therefore, know that the same power is within you too.
You can change your life.
This post was all about learning how to overcome self doubt so that you can change your life for the better.
Related posts you’ll enjoy:
1. Knowing Yourself: Why it’s the First Step in Building Confidence
2. Bullying is Abuse: 9 Ways Bully and Abuse are The Same
3. How to Overcome Victim Mentality: 5 Proven Mind Hacks