The Getting of Confidence

I’ve been getting fitter and healthier lately.  Having finally established eating and exercise routines with some consistency I am beginning to feel the results.

Energy, strength, that sort of thing.

And confidence, as self-belief begins to bleed back into my being.

That’s a problem.

As confidence creeps up on me, I start Wanting what I Want.  I am confronted by my life and my fledgling self-belief starts asking “Is this what you want?  What about this?  And this?  And this?”…

I have developed enough belief to express dissatisfaction with facets of my life, but not enough (yet) to know I can overcome them.

It is rather like stretching your leg after sitting on it for hours.  The tingling starts and you know you are in for some pain before the blood is flowing freely and your leg finally gets back into full operating order.

At least with a leg you know the pain is temporary and you know you want to use it again.

As I ask questions like “Do I want this job I have?  Am I satisfied in my relationship?  Can I do better?  What would I rather be doing?” I honestly have no idea what the answers will be, how long they will take to come and how much pain I will have to endure to get there.

The choice is to let my life stretch out and regain feeling, or squash it again until it is numb and I am safe from painful, disruptive change.  I wonder how many people cycle, as I have done over the years, through those tingly first tastes of self-confidence before letting fear squash them down and numb them again, round and round…

The squashing can be done in all sorts of ways.  Drugs, alcohol, overeating, addictions are all the obvious ones.  Others are more subtle; burying your own life under the lives of your family, for example.  That’s a good one, because you can actually be receiving praise (“Oh what a nice man!  Do anything for his family.”) while submerging your self, your dreams and your goals under a cosy, safe blanket of sacrifice…

They all achieve the same goal though – safely putting you back into a place where you feel you don’t deserve anything better, protecting you from all the pain of achieving transformation and success.

Sigh…

Something inside me knows that whatever I do or don’t deserve, I still WANT.  I want to be a stronger, more decisive, happier, more engaged, motivated, inspiring kinda character.  I want to go to bed each night feeling successful, loving and loved.  Looked up to.  Respected.

That something is stubborn and keeps driving me out of the numbness, no matter how many times I succumb.

Confidence.  Belief.  Pain.  Change.  They’re coming.  I can feel them.  Time to try something new.

“Persistence”…