09-10-2012, 01:10 PM
Fearlessly Communicating and Talking with Confidence
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Introduction
I am going to start off by telling you about the problems I had in communicating confidently. I have
not seen much variation between people who lack confidence when talking with others so if you are
short in the confidence department or just want to have more confidence in your conversations, you
will definitely be able to relate and learn from my experience. You do not need to go through life
lacking confidence and feeling dominated by others and situations.
From an early age, I was always the quiet boy. I’d sit in school knowing the answers to a question
but would be too afraid to answer. I couldn’t talk to someone new. I wouldn’t look someone in the
eyes if they looked back at me and I’d hardly argue with anyone. Yes arguing is a bad thing, but I
avoided arguing not because it was the right thing to do, but because I was too afraid to speak up
and voice my opinion. I was passive and unconfident in letting people verbally trample over me.
Being so passively accepting like I was is dangerous for your mental health. A fear to speak from
poor confidence can manifest in huge forms of resentment, ill will, and anger which in turn destroys
relationships, happiness, and success. You can probably see that talking with confidence is strongly
related to assertive communication. Rarely do you see a person who lacks confidence asserting
themselves. I’ll try to stick to the confidence side of things as you can read more about assertion in
the assertive skills section.
There’s a difference with not engaging in an argument for the sake of the relationship and not
engaging in an argument because you are afraid. When you have an unhealthy fear you will avoid
communicating yourself, become emotionally hurt, and nothing good will result. You’ll know the
truth in side of you if an unhealthy fear and a lack of confidence exists. You’ll be unhappy,
extremely frustrated, scared, and feel like you want to explode. You’ll hardly voice your opinions
and emotions in conversations because of fear. That was me. I was miles from communicating
confidently.
Birth of Fear
The hidden psychological barrier I earlier referred to is fear. The primary attribute in you that is
stopping you from communicating confidently is fear.
Like kryptonite to superman as fear is to communicate confidently. Fear is the acid that eats away
confidence. Fear is the one tonne bolder that holds back a person from being confident. Fear is the
Achilles of self-confidence.
You will build more confidence once you remove the “kryptonite, acid, or one tonne bolder” that is
fear. To become confident you need to have little or ultimately no fear. To remove your fears the
first step is to look at your fears and understand their “birth” to see what created them.
As a baby you entered into this world in a neutral state of mind. You did not fear people looking at
you or staring back at people. You did not constrain your actions because of what other people
thought. You were spontaneous without a care in the world as to what other people were thinking of
your actions. I think the only fear a baby has is loud noises.
This neutral state of mind changed as you aged. When you were growing up, your parents would
tell you, “Watch out!”, “Don't go there!”, “Don't do that!”, and “You're not allowed that!” Your
parents conditioned your behavior. After being conditioned, what actions you took after that would
be conditional on how you thought your parents would respond. You lost your independence to do
as you wish and became dependent on your parents. What you could and couldn't do became more
and more determined by your parents. This stimulated the creation of your fear of failure or fear of
success.
As you became an adult, the memories of your parents telling you “Don't do that!” were implanted
into your subconscious mind. This guides your current actions. These childhood experiences
manifest into forms of “I can't do that!” When an opportunity comes to meet someone you see who
looks really interesting, powerful, or attractive, you subconsciously reaffirm to yourself “I can't do
that!” When a business opportunity arises, you don't even have a go at starting it up because you
reaffirm to yourself “I can't do that!” You begin to give up without even trying.
Perceptual Process
According to psychologists, the psychological process known as “perception” where we interpret
the world around us has three stages. You are firstly exposed to the information. When in a conversation, exposure is being next to the
person whom you can hear. Exposure is just a matter of coming within range of the stimulus.
Secondly is attention. It occurs when a stimulus activates one or more of our human senses. In our
conversational example, you have attention to the person when you think about what is said. If the
person begins to bore you or you are afraid of what the person is thinking of you, you are not
thinking about the exposure and so the perceptual process would stop at this stage as you are not
paying attention.
The third stage of perception is interpretation. It is the process of adding meaning to the stimulus
through your thinking or feelings. The thinking often analyzes the stimulus against past experience.
As a conversational example, if a guy recently abused you, you will interpret what he is saying
differently than someone who is a great friend with him. You can see how interpretation and
experiences can affect your confidence in situations.
You are better equipped in becoming more confident by identifying what experiences and thinking
is affecting your interpretation of the situation. It is analyzing the situation as to why you are not
confident.
Also, if you are feeling unhappy or other “negative” emotions when interpreting the situation with
your feelings, you are more likely to experience negative actions such as poor confidence. It is the
interpretation stage of the perceptual process which is the major focus in overcoming fear and
building confidence; how you derive meaning from or “interpret” the world. The unconfident
person interprets a person's unwillingness to communicate as he or she being hated. In the exact
same situation, the confident person interprets a person's unwillingness to communicate as
independent of himself or herself provided that is the truth.
Real or Fake Threat
The perceptual stage of interpretation leads us nicely into the second point in the definition of fear
which is a “real or fake threat”. We fear because threats are damaging to our mental and physical
well-being. Fear is a safety barrier used to protect us psychologically and physically. If it was not
for fear, we would all walk into a pit of snakes without a concern for safety. We fear pain and
suffering. Fear protects us but too often it holds us back from reality and excelling in performance
with whatever we do. We are especially held back when a psychological fear is present like fearing
rejection when meeting a new person.
The interpretation stage in perception tells us that different messages and understandings can be
drawn from the same situation. How we interpret the world around is entirely dependent on our
perception. We see the world through our perception. Gustave Flaubert said, “There is no truth.
There is only perception.”
Say there is a car accident with many witnesses whom are asked to recall the event. Each witness
will most likely have a different recollection of the event to each other because of interpretation.
While some interpretations of the situation will be true, most interpretations will be fake or
completely wrong.
Prepare for the Worst Case Scenario
Almost all us guys are petrified in approaching women we find attractive. Guys get petrified stiff in
a way most women will never understand. A million “what ifs” rush through the guys mind. He
fears rejection, being humiliated, and turned down. What this relates to and how it ties in with the
interpretive stage of perception is most guys let these “threats” dominate their thinking. Just about
all psychological barriers we feel or rather “make up” are entirely fake. We think about the most
wackiest worst possible situation and let it control us. This is a fake understanding and destroys our
confidence.
One of the greatest pieces of advice in becoming brave no matter what is to think about the worst
situation that will occur than psychologically deal with it beforehand. For guys approaching girls,
unless she is sulking over the balcony, holding a knife in her hand, or just had a fight, the worst
thing that will happen to you is her giving your the cold-shoulder. She will just ignore you.
Anything worse is entirely her problem which must not concern you. It becomes her problem and
not yours. Think of how this example can be applied to your life in other situations.