Monday, August 13, 2012

Confidence And Inspiration

I owe my inspiration for this post to my good friend, Jen, over at When Pigs Fly.

So thanks, girl. X ya!

Last week, Jen shared a very honest and eloquently expressed post about confidence, and how at times we seem to misplace it; wondering where it’s hiding.

I know this feeling all too well because of the various careers I’ve had in my life, which have involved wavering levels of confidence – stage acting, being the most challenging.

It becomes like a vicious cycle because after auditioning time and time again and not getting cast, you start to lose your confidence; questioning….do I really have talent? And that in turn causes you to lose your inspiration, so then you’re tempted to just stop auditioning altogether.

I had a lot of hard knocks when I first started in the theater – people telling me that I was a limited actor and could only do certain roles; never giving me the chance to show my ability. There were many times I wanted throw in the towel and walk away, but something kept pushing me to do it.

If there is one thing I’ve learned from stage acting, which really pertains to anything we do in life, is that confidence must come from within. We can’t look to the world to validate us because let’s be honest, there are a lot of people in this world who, due to their own insecurities, will never validate us because they don’t want us to “be” confident. They somehow believe that if we’re confident, it will make them feel less confident.

I would like to bring this post topic to blogging, because most of us can identify with that.

We all blog for different reasons. Some of us blog as a means of journaling our lives or to practice our writing skills. Others blog because of a passion they have for a particular topic. Some of us blog to entertain. Some of us blog to allow others to think. And then there are others who blog for all those reasons combined, like myself.

Blogging is not easy because it’s similar to life – it continually moves forward and needs to be updated - so it’s not always effortless to come up with something to share on the days that we blog. There inevitably comes a time when we feel dry, unmotivated and uninspired, which can cause us to lose confidence.

And this is where my training in the theater helps me.

You see in the theater, whether there were times on a particular night when I felt uninspired and less confident to perform, it didn’t matter, because the show MUST go on. So I had to get out there and just do it.

I use to think that as a creative person, I had to wait to be inspired or it wouldn’t be authentic.

But I realized that sometimes I have to push myself to take the first step, so that inspiration can be ignited.

Now I’m not saying that we shouldn’t take occasional breaks from blogging, or take time off to attend personal matters away from the Internet. But what I am saying is that blogging takes a strong commitment and that we might not always feel like doing it because we go through periods of feeling less inspired.

I myself have gone through this many times. But it’s ironic because when I made myself do it, sure enough, I discovered a post. And often times those posts ended up giving me a wonderful feeling of accomplishment; restoring my confidence.

I would like to conclude this post by sharing that whenever you feel uninspired or less than confident about something, try giving yourself a push and do it anyway. Because the longer you shy away, the harder it becomes to regain your confidence.

It’s kinda like giving birth to a baby and going through labor.

You gotta push sometimes to get to the creation.

Have a faaaaabulous Monday everyone!