Accumulating Confidence

You don’t just wake up confident in your ability to flawlessly execute a new skill in front of people who will be judging you (and a few who will secretly be hoping you’ll fail). You accumulate confidence overtime (not overnight) and you steadily increase your talent for performing a skill by basically failing a bunch of times first.

When you’re just starting out you have to be willing to totally stink at whatever you’re trying.

If you’re going to the gym for the first time to try working out, or attending a yoga class (it doesn’t matter if these are in-person or virtual online classes) your body doesn’t know which part is supposed to do what, your form is all wrong, you’re self-conscious about everything, all the machines are confusing, and it feels like everyone is staring at you and thinking you’re an idiot.

Truthfully, if the other people have an ounce of empathy they’re actually looking at you and are painfully reminded of their own first day and feel sympathy for you That’s the real reason why they’re pretending they don’t even see you — they don’t want you to feel embarrassed.

On your second attempt, you recall a few things from your first time… you remember not to bark when doing “downward dog” and you remember to set the incline and speed settings on the treadmill correctly.

On the third visit you feel the start of a pattern emerging. Like learning the words to a song, you can almost remember what comes next and you might even smile while you’re working out this time.

When you’re tempted to berate or belittle yourself because you’re not an automatic expert at something, remember this:

No one is born knowing how to do anything

You don’t even know how to cry until the doctor slaps you on your butt.