Ways of Boosting Self Belief

Self belief is my new focus these days because as I look at my own inner conversations, I find many admonitions followed by non-compliance. This can only means lack of self belief. Or there is self belief but it is being outweighed by other forces…temptation, diversions or others’ expectations to name a few. Self belief is there, but it is weak.

So the question arises: How do you boost self belief?  I take this to mean the same thing as how do you boost self confidence or self esteem.

In review of the literature, and my own notes, I have formulated the following list of how  higher levels of self belief can  be accomplished.

Belief in one’s skills and capabilities is increased by accomplishment and success in pursuit of one’s goals. Some of the factors that optimize the chances of reaching goals are: role models, record keeping, reward rituals, and public accountability. See my essay on this topic.

Self belief is also boosted by: l. receiving other’s encouragement, especially from a person with  whom  you have a trusting relationship and whom you respect and admire.

2. Looking a the past record of success and achievements. “Think about your life so far and list the ten best things you’ve achieved in an ‘Achievement Log’. Perhaps you came in top in an important test or exam, played a key role in an important team, produced the best sales figures in a period of time, did something that made a key difference in someone else’s life, or delivered a project that meant a lot for your business.”

3. There is an old  in psychology the origin of which I cannot find.”Act and belief will follow.” In other words, act “as if” you had the necessary belief and belief will follow.

4.  Testimony of others regarding your productions. If others value your contribution in however this is manifested…money, compliments, rewards…then this  is a powerful vindication of your worth.

Self belief mediates between an idea and action as Albert Bandura has persuasively demonstrated. See especially his bock Self Efficacy: The Exercise of Control (1997). The book is based on Bandura’s theory that those with high self-efficacy expectations-the belief that one can achieve what one sets out to do-are healthier, more effective and generally more successful than those with low self-efficacy expectancies.

Bandura demonstrates how belief in one’s capabilities affects development and psychosocial  functioning during the course of life. Whether by accomplishment or acquired traits, boosting self-efficacy and boosting self esteem appear to be one and the same.

Self Belief, Accomplishment and the Vagaries of Self Promotion

Self beleif  is key to many personal changes, i.e., take yourself seriously, acting on your ideas, and honoring your long term goals and projects. In researching this topic, I came across the risky step of presenting yourself as a virtuous person and the possible misstep of humiliation that it may bring.

I know this topic well having achieved a modest level of virtue by overcoming call reluctance, losing a significant amount of weight and mastering writer’s block. These were all  struggles in self discipline and by no means do I remain a champion but there has been modest success.

 My thinking about this topic has been challenged by the work of M.R. Leary on self-presentation and impression management.  In this work, Leary argues that : “Exemplification involves presentations that convey an impression of virtue. Often, exemplification involves fostering public images associated with moral virtues, such as honesty, integrity, and generosity. At other times, people exemplify by demonstrating other virtues such as conscientiousness, dedication and self-sacrifice.” Self Presentation: Impression Management and Interpersonal Behavior, Westview Press, 1996, p. 202.

 The author shows that you better be sure to document your record as an accomplished achiever for otherwise you are open to charges of hypocrisy. That is, one of the risks you run of boosting your self-belief by achievement it is considerable humiliation if you should back slide.

I find that in marketing my book  on weight loss, wherein I tell the story of losing fifty pounds, I am leary of figuratively raising my hand to publicize this accomplishment. It is unseemly in a way to brag about this achievement; I feel that is a boundary I do not want to cross. I would rather just have the results speak for themselves. However, I did write the book so apparently the wish to help others trumped my timidity about telling my story.

Not assertively promoting the book led to a monetary loss which I seem powerless to recover. The word is not getting out due to my own reticence and the sheer number books already published covering this topic.

 The good thing personally for me is that by writing the book, it has become my defense against regaining those lost pounds. In effect, the book is my shield against relapse. It works because of shame driven fears of discovery and hypocrisy.. I can think of nothing worse than being a false paragon but then the likes of Madoff and Elliott Spitzer indicate it is not uncommon.

Shyness Alleviated by a Script

Shy people withdraw into their own private world while wishing for the ruthless murder of the internal policeman that so cripples them.

To be shy is to be forever coerced into a life one dislikes. The shy are forever frustrated at their own failings; they are forever self-conscious about their egregious self-consciousness. In being mistaken for being aloof, or condescending, or for having a superiority complex, and so on, the shy person’s frustration with himself is only compounded.

Psychoanalysts studying shyness have asserted that the state of mind known as shyness is the ego’s obsession with itself and that the fear of social action is rooted in a more profound dread of rejection, aloneness and failure. That shyness is the child of inner power struggles seems, to me at least, self-evident.

All human relationships are preceded by a subtle cost-benefit analysis-”is the reward great enough to suffer the embarrassment of approaching this girl?”-that determines how humans act.

The shy person can be regarded as he who is both overly sensitive to this cost-benefit analysis and also cognizant of a greater plethora of possibly ‘inappropriate’ behavior. Being aware of all that could go wrong, the shy person opts to withdraw to the safety of inactivity and bears, in silence, its attendant miseries. What the shy fear is not so much social interaction but social interaction that does not come with a script.

The shy, myself included, can testify that when one is able to follow some sort of routine, can reduce oneself to an automaton, whatever pressure one feels is attenuated.  I have little problem with standing on stage and reading a prepared speech, but ask me, one to one, what I am feeling and I am like jelly.

It is when the rituals fade, the props fall, the stage collapses and one’s naked self is asked to act independent of any script, that shyness strikes its most vicious blows. As Erving Goffman argues, shyness can be understood as what one feels when on is unable to project a desired impression.

Shyness is, perhaps, the consequence of wanting to foster a particular front but not having faith in one’s ability to do so.

Those of a nervous disposition cannot perform upon the stage that is society with the lightness that is expected of them. In being timid, the little stages of every day life are questioned by the shy, and the shy person can be regarded as something of a social deviant, being as he is a kind of reluctant actor.

Shyness is, therefore, a social as well as individual phenomenon: it relates to social scripts, or the lack thereof, and to the inability to accept the assumptions of a social siuation.

Perhaps labeling reluctant actors as ’shy’ is really a way in which more competent actors can maintain a belief in the ‘normality’ of their performance-it is’normal’ to smile when one is unhappy, to be loquacious, to get lost in the rituals of everyday life.

The shy are inept actors unable to pretend that, say, Karaoke is fun when it is torture: to label such types as shy, of course, says something also about our ability as performers to force ourselves to sing when we are sad.

Although many people are unaware of its existence, social anxiety disorder is the third most common psychiatric disorder, after depression and alcoholism, accord to the Medical Research Council on Anxiety Disorders.

To quote the DSM’s definition of social anxiety disorder or social phobia, it is:”A persistent fear of one or more social or performance situations in which the person is exposed to unfamiliar people or to possible scrutiny by others. The avoidance, anxious anticipation or distress in the feared social situations interferes significantly with the person’s normal routine.”

Although those who suffer from social anxiety disorder (SAD) are often perceived as shy, their condition is much more extreme than shyness. Unlike shyness, it is not simply a personality trait; it is a persistent fear that must have deeper roots than environmental causes.

Self Change Through Mirroring

Although I am a coach myself and advise people who wish to change or pursue goals to hire a coach, I also know that most people change by themselves alone…more

False Ideas Deterring Action: Always Test to Verify

According to attribution theory in psychology, the nature of the helplessness (including procrastination) effect depends on the attribution of causality that people make when they are confronted by an outcome that is conceived as uncontrollable.

Individuals who perceive events to be within their control are more motivated in future tasks than those individuals who perceive the causes of events to be related to events over which they have no control.  

When individuals believe that their ability and efforts are the source of their failure, they are internal attributers. External attributors perceive that some characteristics of the situation, such as task difficulty or luck, are the source of their failure. Attributions to internal factors are characterized by low self esteem (Abramson, Garber & Seligman, 1980 as quoted in Self-theories: Their Role in Motivation, Personality, and Development (Essays in Social Psychology) by Carol Dweck (Paperback - Jan 1, 2000), while attributions to external factors are not. Consequently, for internal attributors, failure has more negative impact. 

In terms of self belief, then, attribution theory draws attention to how one understands causality in human affairs.  Too often, in my experience, people who are socially anxious are needlessly anxious because the threat they think is real, is actually very harmless, but they don’t know it, not having made an attempt at interaction. 

Similarly, with procrastinators, they make an assessment of themselves that they are lacking in skill or expertise, or knowledge of a subject and they use this assessment as an excuse not to act. This self-limiting is often based on false ideas, which, again, the actor doesn’t know are false, but makes that assumption. 

I recall thinking in my days and months of writer’s block that no writing project on my part could possibly result in a favorable evaluation by readers, so why bother? Instead, what happened when I finally produced an end product was that, lo and behold, I garnered many positive testimonials! 

This willfulness to look at negative scenarios predicts failure and lack of trying. The canumdrum is: false ideas remain false unless tested; but testing doesn’t happen because of false fear. The result is a perpetuation of negative patterns until, hopefully, it become so costly that new understandings move things forward.

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