When it comes to achieving what you want and being the best version of YOU, how much thought have you given to believing in yourself first?
If, like most of us, you haven’t given it much thought so far, this scientifically proven insight will surprise you.
So, keep reading to learn 4 ways to start believing in yourself. Plus:
- #1 benefit of believing in yourself.
- Why believing in yourself is the first step to achieving any goal you have — whether you want to stop feeling overwhelmed, eat healthier, exercise more or be more confident.
- How to change your thoughts — and be happier and more positive.
- The difference between wishing and believing when it comes to getting what you want.
- How self-belief helps you be more successful — and deal with mistakes and failures better.
Believing In Yourself Is An Untapped Superpower
The wonderful thing about this superpower is that we all have it within us.
We can all learn to believe in ourselves. It doesn’t cost anything or rely on any particular circumstances to work.
Believing You Can Do Something Is Different To Wishing You Could
Some people dismiss the idea of self-belief — suggesting you can’t believe your way to what you want. But I think they’re getting mixed up with wishing. If so, they’re right.
You can’t wish yourself to achieve anything.
Wishing you could stop feeling overwhelmed, eat healthier, exercise more or be more confident but not believing you can is different to knowing in your heart you can do it with focus and effort.
When people wish, they don’t learn what it takes to reach their goals — the behaviour, actions, habits and skills — to get them to where they want to be. They believe deep down it’s impossible, so their mind doesn’t look for solutions and they don’t put in the work needed.
WISHING SOUNDS LIKE THIS:
“I wish I could lose weight and stop putting it back on. But it’s impossible. I’ve tried so many times and never do what I say I will. I’m just not meant to be happy and healthy like “that girl”.”
BELIEVING SOUNDS LIKE THIS:
“I want and know I can lose weight and keep it off. I’ve tried in the past but now know what I really need is to build healthy habits into my life and find someone to keep me accountable. I appreciate I’ll make mistakes but that’s okay because I’m not aiming for perfection. I’m aiming to get a little bit better every day.”
What’s Believing in Yourself?
Believing in yourself is knowing deep in your heart with hard work, dedication, and focus, you’ll make your dreams a reality. And contrary to popular belief, it’s not about never failing.
It’s knowing when you fail — because we all do at times — that you have the ability within yourself to learn what you need to get back up and try again.
Believing in yourself is effectively a mantra you say to yourself along the lines of “I know I can”.
A positive attitude towards yourself creates the internal determination, focus and energy required to achieve what you want. And is the first step you need to take for any goal you want to achieve.
In other words, for any goal you have, make sure you truly believe in yourself and your ability to achieve it. And if you find you don’t, work on your beliefs before working on your goals!
Something as important as believing in yourself, if not more important, is the belief you can improve.
The belief you’ve got what it takes to learn, master and implement the skills you need to achieve your goals.
This is called having a growth mindset, and research shows those with it — those who believe they can improve — do.
They choose to believe in the continuous improvement of their skills, achievements and success — and ultimately reach their goals.
The Benefit of Starting to Believe in Yourself
The More You Believe in Yourself the More You’ll Succeed
Learning how to start believing in yourself triggers your mind to figure out ways and means to achieve what you want through a “can-do” attitude. And, science supports this.
With studies showing, that simply believing you can do something or make positive changes in your life increases your motivation, energy levels and action-taking.
If You Believe You Can’t Do Something You Won’t
The opposite of this is that negative beliefs trigger our minds to find ways to back up our negative thoughts.
In other words, when you don’t believe in your chances of success, your mind finds as many reasons as possible to support that belief.
Change Your Beliefs
Your mindset about your ability affects your happiness and success more than anything else. So, train your mind to work for you instead of against you. Decide why you can achieve something — not why you can’t.
When you do, your mind looks for and finds evidence to support your positive beliefs rather than your negative ones.
You might be thinking that’s not possible — but it is! Research shows you can train your brain to think in new ways and create new neural pathways that replace old thinking patterns with new ones (how cool is that!).
At the end of the day, beliefs are just thoughts. Thoughts you’ve decided are true — or have repeated enough times so you think they are!
And all thoughts can be changed over time with repetition.
This means you can literally hard-wire new beliefs into your mind. And whatever thoughts you no longer use or reinforce will weaken and eventually fade.
Now, please know I’m not saying this is easy. I’m saying it’s possible. And knowing that fact, it’s exciting — isn’t it?
Permanently changing your neural pathways requires conscious effort, repetition and dedication, but it’s so worth it.
And what could be more important than dedicating your time and energy towards creating a new neural pathway of self-belief so you can achieve everything you want?
How To Start Believing In Yourself
#TIP 1
Your Mind Believes What You Repeatedly Tell It
So tell your mind you believe in yourself. Write it down. Set a daily reminder on your phone. And repeat to yourself every single day until it becomes an automatic belief.
#TIP 2
Remove Negative Beliefs
Write down five negative beliefs holding you back. Then draw a line through them (this is fun!). And replace them with positive beliefs.
E.g. “My negative beliefs are thinking I’m not good enough and never do a good job.” My new positive beliefs are: “I’m more than good enough and better than I think I am.”
#TIP 3
Challenge Your Thoughts
Try to catch yourself whenever you say “I can’t”. Consciously pause and replace it with “I believe I can”.
#TIP 4
Focus on All the Reasons You’ll Succeed Rather Than Fail
When faced with a difficult challenge or task, think about all your skills and past experiences that’ll help you now. Research shows a specific and purposeful focus on what you’re good at when facing hard tasks leads to the best results.
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Please know that healthy and happy people are not superhuman. They’re ordinary people who’ve developed belief in themselves and their ability to succeed.
Never sell yourself short. Success doesn’t require super-intelligence, magic or luck. It requires tapping into your mind and resetting your beliefs — believing in your heart you can learn, improve and take action towards what you want.
Believing in yourself, combined with action can lead to amazing things. By changing the way you see yourself, you can dramatically improve your life.
Have You Ever Thought About How Much Believing in Yourself Affects Your Life?
Learning how to start believing in yourself is an essential ingredient of a happy, healthy and successful life. The best bit? It’s free and available to everyone.
Imagine how good you’d feel if you truly believed in yourself. If you believed deep down you could do what it takes to reach your dreams — to be happy, healthy, confident and successful.
Now it’s over to you. Which tip are you going to try (from the list above) to rewire your brain to believe you can succeed?
Because remember, when you believe you can, you will!
I truly hope you enjoyed this post and can now see why and how to start believing in yourself.
I’d love to know what it changed for you. So, please email me at becky@beckyholliday.com and let me know.
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Keep believing in yourself.
With love,
Becky x