“True confidence is not needing anyone else’s approval because you already have your own.” -Albert Hailey III

This is quote has served me well over the past few years. It’s a feeling and notion that came as the result of a lot of thinking on my past experiences. Confidence is something I’ve struggled with for a large part of my life. A visceral fear of failure, rejection, and mockery lead to me to approach life with a guard raised too high. It was safer to not try for things, to not put myself out there. The reward paled in comparison to the risk.

Or so I thought.

I came to realize that if I wanted to try for something but opted not to on account of my being worried about not succeeding then I never truly learn if I was able to accomplish that thing. Without that knowledge, I’m largely left to wonder what I’m truly capable of. Of what’s possible. How could I ever feel confident under those circumstances? With so much inconclusiveness floating around it felt borderline impossible to really feel good about myself.

And so I began on an emotional and spirit journey. I aimed to better connect with myself. Better see the value within, and better acknowledge who I was and who I wanted to be. I realized I spent a lot of my life not really thinking much of myself, let alone loving myself. Looking back, there’s a bit of irony in that I feared what others might think of me when nothing they could say could hold a candle to the constant barrage my inner monologue bombarded me with.

As I ventured down this path, I was able to gain a better appreciation for myself. In turn, I started to feel more confident. That slow progression is what lead to the quote at the start of this post. I had placed so much of my potential worth on the perception of external factors that I robbed myself of a lot of joy and confidence. I sapped my own potential before I took the first step toward anything.

Previously I wrote about a concept of there being a ratio to wisdom. The more I learn about myself and the human condition the less I feel I actually know. Learning about the extent of the proverbial solar system just makes me realize there’s an entire galaxy out there. The more known knowns I’ve gathered I’ve also come to understand that there are exponentially more known unknowns, and that doesn’t even count the unknown unknowns. A strange paradox, but anyway.

The above quote, which has been so integral and important to my personal development, now feels wholly obsolete. The ratio dynamic again has presented itself, as I’ve started to learn more about myself and the concept of confidence.

I render this judgment on my once coveted quote because it is inherently flawed. Not needing anyone else’s approval is great, but what if you lost the approval of yourself you once had? That’s a pretty damn big Jenga piece to yank out of the stack.

There have been a few instances of late where I would go into something with my hard-earned sense of self approval and, by extension, confidence. Should things go as I hoped, great. It all works out. However, anything short of success would trigger a host of feelings and thoughts of doubt, listlessness, sadness, and everything else. It then takes time to get back on my feet and try again.

In a lot of ways, that return to a fighting stance was even more difficult than it was in life before my thoughts on true confidence. A building built too rigid collapses mighty fast if it’s pushed past a certain point. My confidence was no different.

But life is an iterative progression. We are forever works in progress, and I made a pretty big realization last night. I have a new definition of true confidence.

True confidence is believing in one’s self in spite of successes or setbacks.

When I think about my previous definition, its intent was sound but its execution was ultimately doomed. Its scope was simply too narrow. To merely place its entire definition on the concept of people is short-sighted and, when I think about it, somewhat spiteful. It, at least for me, carried a measure of “I’ll show them” to my approach towards confidence. Its subtext largely aimed to diminish the value of hypothetical negative opinions from people who I originally feared in a bid to empower myself. Living in opposition to something still deeply roots it in your life.

There is another aspect of confidence that has always looked me right in the face that my original quote refused to acknowledge. Success or failure, for my entire life, has been used as conclusive proof of my capability and self-worth. Success sometimes would lead to a temporary sense of elation, but most of the time it felt like a maintenance of the status quo; a still running fear from failure. Failure was the culmination of fears and doubt come to pass.

I threw six touchdowns but one interception. I failed. I haven’t gotten as far as I’ve hoped to with streaming. I failed. I put everything I had into a relationship and it didn’t work out. I failed. I didn’t get every opportunity in esports I wanted. I failed. I’m not a multi-millionaire. I failed. I haven’t made the time to jump far into web development. I failed.

Things like this weigh on my very soul, and it can be so very hard to keep moving forward sometimes. Every setback is just more debris to clear from the path. It’s more ammunition for my negative self-talk.

But, conceptually, what if I took value away from success or failure. What if, instead, I more focus on the idea that in spite of my doubts and fears I acted. I went for something. I strived for something. I sought to accomplish something. At all. I opted not to be a bystander in my own life. I tried to make something happen. Is that not worth some measure of confidence?

The courage to act, in and of itself, is not easy. And while each time I’ve acted has not left me batting 1.000 I am much further along in life and towards my goals than if I never tried at all. That’s worth something. At the very least it should be.

If I put myself out there for something I’d like to get to a place where that’s the metric on which my sense of self-worth and confidence hinges. Because success and failure are, much like the hypothetical opinions I dared to rebel against with my previous quote, external factors. And conceptually I don’t want external factors to affect me past a certain point.

In my recent aims to learn from both my successes and setbacks I see the added benefit in how that pursuit can and should make me feel. If I try for something, whether it works out or not, I endeavor to feel proud of the effort I’ve put in, to assess the details on the outcome, and to learn from those observations. All the while I want to remain confident that I am capable of accomplishing my goals with enough time, practice, and persistence.

In this, only giving up on something I truly want should result in a loss of confidence.

Bear in mind this is merely a proof of concept. While I would love to magically evolve to such a point where this is my approach to confidence, I am not there. Yet. Having a compass of this magnitude and caliber helps a lot, though.

I may not get everything right every time, but I know my intentions in life are good, and that I’m capable of great things. I just have to keep trying.