Confidence

Having no confidence can really really hold you back in life, it's crazy really, you'd prefer to sit indoors where it's safe rather than make a phone call or speak to someone in a shop etc, I say this from cold hard experience. I am the utter worst when it comes to dealing with strangers or having to make a phone call or just doing something out of the ordinary. It makes it 110% worse for me though when someone is pressuring you, especially the confident people, they think they're helping you by pushing and pushing and pushing, but honestly there is literally nothing worse than that, there is nothing more soul crushing than someone being like 'Go on, go on, GO ON, GO ON YOU CAN DO IT WHAT ARE YOU SCARED OF, SERIOUSLY JUST DO IT.'

It quite literally makes you want the floor to swallow you up, and they just think they're helping. In my experience, the confident people don't know how to do deal with the unconfident people, because in their eyes it's just easy, just something you have to do and they believe we just need to be put on the spot, but really no, it makes it so much worse and puts us off those certain situations even more! It's not always easy for some people and the pressure is actually worse! I have been like that for a long time, especially with phone calls, when it comes to ringing companies and the like I just cannot handle it, I have to make sure no one can hear me on the phone, I hate knowing someone could be listening and I try to make sure I'm home alone if possible! I also don't like it if people are around watching me cook a meal or something, I feel like they're gonna be like 'Oh that's not how I would do it.' even though they probably don't give two shits haha. I don't like people watching me write emails or essays either, and I especially do not like people seeing my CV! I just feel like people are gonna judge and just tell me it's all wrong and what not, although I understand it's just advice and I know they're just trying to help, it's crazy haha. Pressure is literally the scariest part of being unconfident, the people think they're helping you by pushing you into it whereas it's the most terrifying thing, seriously. I can't even explain the feeling, for me, it feels like my insides are literally closing up, you can see the person who's trying to 'help' you actually start to get increasingly frustrated, and you just start to get frustrated at them for not just doing it for you if it's apparently so easy for them. Pressure is scary, and it makes it worse.

Maybe not all the time, there has been the odd occasion where I'm actually more scared of what the pressure is going to bring and how it's going to make me feel that I just tell them to shut up and then do what they want me to do (that doesn't mean to say the pressure is a good thing, it just means I'm scared of the attack I'm about to endure from being unconfident in the first place and then feeling guilty that I'm just a bit unconfident with some stuff!) In fact I've always said to myself and to a few others, if someone is unconfident, pushing them into it will actually make it worse and make them over think it too much, sometimes we just need a few moments to assess the situation and take the plunge ourselves, and then we feel a lot happier that we've managed to overcome that small hurdle of unconfidence.

I've always got the impression however that the confident people just don't understand it, to them it's so easy to do, and they just get angry at us, but it just doesn't help, everyone deals with things differently at the end of the day! For example, my dad doesn't know the meaning of unconfidence, (love you dad I'm not slating you I swear haha it's actually a good thing :P!!!) he would always be confused when any of us were too scared or unconfident to do something that just seemed soooo easy to do. One example is my mum needed to ring someone about a job (which is the one phone call which is now why they live in Gibraltar so yay mum for making the phone call proud of you haha!) and she, like I would be, was a bit nervous about doing it, but my dad was like 'Just do it Jayne! Just do it! If you don't do it you are wasting such a good opportunity you'd be stupid not to do it!' Or something like that. And although I 100% know my dad was being 100% supportive and encouraging in his eyes, it's difficult for the person on the other end who is dealing with the nerves and unconfidence, but when the confident person sees us nervous lot not wanting to do something they just don't get it! (Dad it's a great thing you're confident I'm not blaming you haha! And mum made the phone call in the end well done mum :P!!! Maybe dads pressure did work hahah! Love you guys!)

Anyways, I'm here writing this post today because lately I feel like my confidence has been getting better, and honestly it's a relief, when you learn that things aren't actually that scary (although you 100% know that already even when you aren't confident, you just can't explain why something is so f***ing difficult for you to do.)

Basically, it got to the point one day for me where it was kinda like 'shit aint gonna get done unless I get it done' and that was it, even if it was something small, like taking the plunge and asking a lecturer a question because your friends are also too scared to, or asking someone a question in a shop or *gasp* making a phone call without wanting to throw up! (haha!) It's just kinda like, if I don't do this I aint getting anywhere, the phone call thing is a big deal to me, I had to ring up a random actor for our short film, a completely random guy who we had put out a casting call for online, and I rang him without even questioning it! I mean, I still went upstairs on my own where no one would hear me haha, but usually I would've tried my very best to avoid that, it would make me all nervous and feel sick usually, but this I was just like look we need an actor, this guy has applied I am going to ring him, so I did! He didn't want the bloody part when I did ring him however! Haha, making my big brave phone call turn out to be nothin' :P!! But the point is I thought to myself, we're desperate for an actor, this guy has applied I'M GONNA DO IT RIGHT NOW, and I did, and it was easy and not scary and nothing happened!

And lately with the very small things, I've been happy to take that step that I usually wouldn't take or would get VERY worked up about it before actually doing it, it's nice really, I do feel a bit of freedom from it, I do feel like I might have opened up a few small things for myself because of it. It's nice. I still think I have a long way to go though, and I still CANNOT handle pressure from people, if everyone had been like 'Amanda ring this person, Amanda do it, Amanda you have to you just have to just DO IT!' I probably would've struggled a lot more. To get over the scariness I need to take the plunge myself without giving it too much thought and also knowing that I was the one who made the decision to get over the hurdle rather than being pressured into it, especially if the pressuring person is like 'I told you so.' Don't shoot down the scary hurdle I just got over by making it out like it shouldn't have been difficult in the first place because *news flash* it obviously was difficult for me!

But the main point here is that I do feel a bit more confident in myself to do the scary things that aren't actually all that scary, it really did just get to a point where you learn 'Ok, if I don't do this it's not gonna get done.' 'If I don't do this I'm going to be disappointing a lot of people.' And most importantly 'If I don't do this, I'm actually making my life more difficult.' I recognise when people aren't sure of doing something, and I feel like I am kinda good at saying 'I completely understand how you feel, I'm not going to pressure you, take your time but I understand if you don't wanna get over that hurdle today.' I feel like the time will come for anyone who is unconfident to finally realise 'I can do this!'

I'm worried about making this post just in case the few people who do read it might be like 'BUT AMANDA YOU'RE CONFIDENT NOW YOU SAID SO IN YOUR BLOG WHY ARE YOU TOO SCARED TO DO THIS?' I don't want it to be like that, I still want people to understand that giving pressure makes it wayyy more difficult, and I need them to say 'Ok I'll give you time to think about this and I don't want you to feel pressured.' Even if it's literally as small as making a phone call or asking someone a question, they're HUGE DEALS to unconfident people like myself, but I can do it, I can do it if I'm not pressured and don't have to over think it.

Anyways, I don't wanna repeat myself, but basically, I am pleased I can very slowly see myself getting out of this shell, but I still need time to be fully confident in stuff and I hope people understand that and don't just think after this blog post I'm ready to take on the world!

Sorry this is a crazy long post, I hope it's given you some food for thought or made you feel better about yourself if you too are unconfident! It's been nice to get this off my chest!

Until next time, bye! xx