The Power of Habits to Rob You of Confidence - What are yours like?

We know that the three pillars of personal confidence are our sense of achievement, belonging and self-esteem. If we do not feel we belong, or have achieved enough, our self-esteem tends to suffer. When it comes to achievement, in particular, there are numerous ways to lose confidence and many of them relate to the limits we unwittingly put on ourselves particularly relating to routine habits, and not knowing what we want. Each new day we consciously put artificial barriers on what we can achieve; we tell ourselves we cannot do a particular act, and then we don't. Our confidence sinks, we feel even worse and our low self-esteem ensures that we really can't achieve, just as we said we wouldn't.

1. Unconsciously limiting achievement
To limit our achievements before we've even begun is to damn ourself to the worst. Our actions are controlled by our thought processes. If we are in a car driving to an unfamiliar destination, we mentally talk ourselves into getting there while remaining alert to avoid wrong turns or accidents. We are likely to have a route map in our mind, or a mental picture of the destination, and to follow it to the end. We might get slightly lost along the way, but, having the basic idea of where we are going, we can either retrace our steps and get back on track, or stick to the wrong turning with the hope that it will join with the right route in the end. Either way, we will only have a temporary loss of orientation and discomfort because we know our destination and can always ask for help. Not so for our lives and careers.

We tend to head off in no direction at all, have no idea of where we are going or what our main objective is and actually expect to get out the other side feeling completely fulfilled or in the dream job of our choice. Yet this short-sighted approach is like asking a blind person to find his/her own way in totally unfamiliar territory. One guaranteed to reduce their sense of competence.

2.Not knowing what you want
To get where you want to go in your own life, and ensure a high self-esteem you have to know what you want and at least the direction you should take which will lead to it. Otherwise you will not achieve your desires. You also have to be flexible with your habits. Nothing happens by accident. Your present knowledge and actions are dictated entirely by your general education and social background: and this includes everything you learnt from your parents, family, people you met and everything you did. All those aspects would have influenced YOU as the individual and moulded your current perceptions and character. They would have formed your identity - the person you are, and the things you do. If you are still in confusion about that, it suggests a conflict between what you aspire to be and your actual background.

For example, if you are used to seeing people stealing to survive, you will come to see that kind of action as the only acceptable way to live because everybody you know does it. This belief would not change unless you are shown a different way or you begin to mix with people who survive by other means. But old habits die hard and it would take a lot of convincing, or to be socially excluded, before you eventually change. That is the main reason why some people never recover from a traumatic or unhappy childhood, particularly if others reinforce their negative experience in later life. They get into a pattern of behaviour, which includes certain key habits, and that drives their present while they are stuck in the past. Needless to say habits are the third thing which hampers achievement and lowers esteem.

3. The power of habits
If you want to know what future you are likely to have just look at your habits NOW and the kind of thoughts you dwell on. Negative, inflexible, habits which are dictated by fear produce negative results which keep us feeling low and inadequate. Most important, they limit achievement dramatically through constantly reinforcing inappropriate behaviour. Positive, flexible habits which respond to change give flexible, and often unexpected, results which we can use to our advantage.

What are your current habits? Do they indicate what you want and where you are going? Or do they tell more about where you are coming from and where you are stuck at this moment?

Nothing will change without you changing those habits and your ways of dealing with your world. Neither will you feel better about yourself or achieve any more than you're doing without you establishing who you really are and where you're heading.