Are you ready to shift from self doubt to self empowerment? The first step is understanding where your self doubt originated. In this clip, I’ll shed some light on that so you can begin to overcome self doubt and move into self empowerment.
If you struggle with self doubt and self criticism, chances are you picked it up from your childhood environment.
Adults often use negative motivation to help kids learn new skills.
Negative motivation is at play when we do things to avoid pain or fear. It is not a self-empowerment tool.
Here’s an example of a negative motivational statement:
“If you don’t do your homework, you might fail and then you won’t be able to move to the next grade with all your friends.”
Here is another statement that may encourage self criticism in a child:
“If you had practiced more, maybe you would have performed better (in the play, concert, game, etc.).”
Anything that makes a child feel inadequate has the potential to be carried into adulthood as a habitually unhealthy way of thinking.
Adults who use tactics like this are not bad people.
So, whether it’s a parent, a coach, a teacher, or just the general environment, understanding that being exposed to negative motivation as a child could be the root of self doubt is not an occasion to start assigning blame and judgment.
It’s just helpful to know.
It’s also helpful to understand that children who carry punitive teaching tools into their adulthood tend to be even more punitive than the adults who used them when they were kids.
They habitually self-criticize and self doubt, often to the point of exhaustion.
If you are overly critical of yourself, there’s a good chance something happened in your childhood that set this habit in motion for you.
Those of us who were lucky enough as children to have our basic needs met, like food and shelter, were likely more focused on the next most important need, which is love/acceptance and/or safety.
Acknowledgement from an adult a child looks up to is one way of getting this need met.
The habit of using negative motivation on yourself as an adult could just come from one incident that occurred between the ages of 5 and 8, because these are the years when our emotional intelligence comes into play.
At this young age, we are prone to internalize negative motivational tools because we think they will help us get more of what we want.
And then, we carry them into adulthood because we think they will motivate us to be more successful in our lives and careers.
So, while this is not about judging the adult who used negative motivational tools, it is about acknowledging the little one inside us that picked up the habit before our emotional intelligence was fully developed.
If you struggle with self doubt and self criticism, realizing you have this habit (and where it came from) is the first step to self-empowerment.
Is your work situation frustrating you? Do you hate your job, but have no idea what to do instead? Attempting to navigate those waters without support is not fun (yes, I do know, but that’s another story). I’m excited to announce that I’ve created The Job I Love Toolkit, with all the resources you’ll need to finally clarify how to get paid to do you.TM To be the first to hear more details, join the VIP Wait List.
And if you know a friend or neighbor who could use hearing the advice in this article or needs The Job I Love Toolkit, please forward this to them.
