Latest / Behind Every Great Man / EP 54: The Everyday Things That Build Real Confidence
Transcript
- Jessica Zubchevich: Behind every great man is a great confident exceptional woman. Hi, and welcome to Behind Every Great Man. I am Jessica, your host. Behind every great man is a great woman who stays connected to herself and what she needs. Today we're talking about confidence, and confidence isn't something that you either have or you don't. It's something we protect, it's something we maintain, and it's something that we build through the way that we live. I also don't think that confidence is something that we can neglect for six months. And then suddenly summon it and it's there. We have to continually do things that keep us connected to ourselves. If someone were to ask me, how do I stay confident? My answer is, I work hard on myself. That's the truth. And when I say that, I mean I actively take care of the things that make me feel like me. I have about three hours to myself when my son goes to his preschool. And in that time, I work out, I take care of my body, I strength train 80% of the time, 20% cardio. On a daily, I pay attention to my energy. Am I getting good sleep? Am I nourishing my body? I take NAD, I take hormones. That's another episode that we can talk about. Because for me, confidence is connected to how I'm caring for myself. And I think sometimes we make confidence about think better thoughts, believe in yourself, not saying that these things are important, but sometimes it looks like the way that you actually live. Confidence for me is less about convincing myself that I'm amazing and more about living in a way that makes me feel strong and capable and like myself. And confidence isn't just about the way that we look. It's I know I can handle myself. I know I will take care of myself. I know I will follow through for myself. If I get hit and something tries to take me out, I know how to get back to myself. I know how to return to feeling like myself again. And honestly, a lot of the things that I do for myself that deal with confidence doesn't have anything to do with confidence, actually. It's about keeping promises to myself. It's going to the gym, getting outside, taking care of my appearance because it matters to me, doing something I said I was going to do, having interests that I love, learning something new, keeping my body strong. Taking care of my health, taking the time to put myself on the schedule. Because every time I show myself that I can do something hard, that I can learn something, that I got stronger that day, I put a little bit more evidence toward knowing that I'm capable. And I got this. This is a quote that I came across. I'm not sure who wrote it. Confidence isn't only something you think yourself into. Sometimes you behave yourself into it. I firmly believe that. Behave your way into it, discipline your way into it. Psychologist Richard Ryan talks about two important human needs, competence and autonomy. Competence is I can do things, I can improve, I can handle this. Autonomy is This is my life. I have ownership over the way that I live it. And what I find interesting about that is as women, we can be incredibly competent taking care of other people while slowly losing touch with what makes us feel capable as individuals. A big way that I do protect my confidence is staying out of the comparison trap. When we are looking at social media. Every single day it's creeping in. And you may say, I don't compare myself to other women, Jess. That's not something I do. Okay, maybe, maybe that's true. Social media gives us a window into other people's lives and how they are operating, their homes, their lives, their homemade lunches they make for their children, their dinners that they make from scratch, their beautiful home, their beautiful decor. How beautifully their kids are dressed, the amazing vacation they are on while you sit in a cubicle at work or at home folding laundry. And little by little, it can chip away at your spirit. And you don't even really realize it. I keep my social media as inspiration and for fun. If you looked at my feed right now, if I pulled it up, I would have puppy videos. I would have bloopers of reporters doing something crazy on live television. I would have monkey videos and just funny farm animals, stupid stuff, and also inspiration, people that inspire me, people that make me want to do better. And I get motivated when I see it. If it starts to cross over into comparison. I block it, I hide it, I don't watch it because it's not serving me anymore, it's not inspiring me anymore, it's crossed over now into comparison. So this is how you know if it's inspiration or if it's comparing. If you look at a woman on social media and your inner dialogue is, I love the way that she dresses. Wow, she's got great style. How can I implement that in my wardrobe? Versus, why don't I look like that? I don't have that body. I can't wear something like that. Look at her home. It's beautiful. I don't have things like that in my home. I don't know how to decorate like that. I can't do that. Look at her life. Look at her marriage. She gets to go to work. She gets to stay home with her children. They get to go on vacations. When it turns into that. Man, that is a red flag, and you need to cut it. You need to delete, you need to block, you need to hide whatever you need to do, because that is slowly chipping away subtly at your spirit, at your confidence, of what makes you feel good about yourself. I pay attention to how something leaves me feeling. Whether that's something on social media, whether that's A friend, a conversation that I have. When I leave, how do I feel? Do I feel energized? Do I feel depleted? Do I feel bad about myself? And I just don't endure that. I cut things out of my life. I do the things that bring me joy. I do things that make me happy. I do things that make me laugh. Is it always like that? No. But the things that I control, I do. There's a study that I found that actually explains comparison in such a simple way. Researchers looked at how people evaluated their own performance after seeing somebody else do better or worse. And for some people, their own evaluation changed dramatically based on what the person next to them did. Think about that, because nothing about your own performance changes. You just saw somebody else's. So nothing about your life changed. Your body didn't change, your parenting didn't change, your marriage didn't change, your home didn't change. What changed is simply that you saw somebody else's. Would we have been dissatisfied if we didn't see how she was doing it? Would we be critical of ourselves if we hadn't seen how she keeps her home? Did something all of a sudden just become wrong with my life? Or am I simply now just comparing it to this person? These are things that we need to stay aware of and work on every single day. These are the things we need to protect. It's time for our weekly pause, wherever you are, whatever you're doing. If you could take these couple moments just for you, close your eyes if you can. Let's all take a deep inhale together through your nose. Exhale it out through your mouth. Another deep soothing inhale. Exhale it out. One more deep breath in. Sister, I want you to think about what makes you feel confident and capable as woman. ⁓ What makes you feel alive? And then ask yourself, what have I slowly stopped doing that used to make me feel confident and capable? Maybe it's physical working out, maybe it's creative work. Maybe it's work. Learning something new dressing up. Taking care of your skin. Maybe it's having time that actually belongs to just you. What have you been allowing in your space? Or allowing yourself to compare. That's been chipping away at your confidence. What can you do to protect us again? How can you get back to feeling like yourself again? Let's all take one last inhale together. Exhale it out and open your eyes. Sister, every time I keep a promise to myself, every time that I live in a way that reminds me of who I am, where I come from, what I'm capable of, I build a little bit more trust in myself and that. For me, is really what confidence is. Thanks for taking the time to join me on this week's podcast episode. You can find more episodes of Behind Every Great Man on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And if this spoke to you, please subscribe and share it with a friend. Thanks again, and I'll see you next week.