“Success, Optimism and Self Confidence”

Success, optimism and self confidence are tied together tightly. Increase one of these three and the other two will also increase. A couple of days ago, while visiting my brother, my car wouldn’t start. I had just bought new batteries while visiting Texas. My first thought was “I must have left on a light inside the car while I was packing it the day before.” I didn’t even look under the hood. I just went looking for the jumper cables.

My brother opened the hood and said “Here’s your problem. The cable was loose on the battery post. The whole experience was great learning. I’m writing about learning optimism, and got to see first hand what my first thoughts were. My self confidence got boosted, and I felt successful as I reflected on my thought pattern.

I did realize it was only temporary. I could jump my car. I contained the issue to just those few minutes and future trips. While I assumed I contributed to this situation, I didn’t beat myself up with negative self talk. It was all over and done with in five minutes. That is very different than how it would have been five years ago. It was an opportunity to evaluate my own thoughts for optimism, self confidence and success.

How do you feel and what do you think when you someone says “well done?” What goes through your mind when you’ve bought a new couch, gotten a promotion, or when your beloved says “I love you?” Do you feel self confidence, optimism and success or do you wonder when the other shoe will drop.

People who are successful have self confidence. They believe in themselves. They have optimism. They talk to themselves positively.

In Optimists’ Success Secrets, we looked at the thinking patterns of optimism and pessimism. These thinking patterns were outlined by researchers who were working with school children to see if optimism is learnable. Trainers worked with children who were depressed, low self confidence and little success in school for twelve weeks.

They taught the children to not blame themselves, to realize that feelings are temporary, and to contain their thinking about one problem to just one small area of their life. The children learned success, optimism and self confidence. When tested two years later, these same children had retained what they learned and were able to problem solve because they had learned a different way to think using the four cornerstones to optimism, self confidence, and success..

If you change the way you talk to yourself (and to others) you can change how you feel and act. You will have more success, optimism and self confidence. So let‘s take an example. This morning you found that your car won’t start. What do you think?

If you immediately think you must have left on a light in the car and therefore are at fault, you lose problem-solving capabilities. What if the problem is a loose battery connection? Let’s look at a few thoughts to use instead that will help build self confidence, enhance optimism and success.

In the beginning you might have to re route old thinking by making statements around the three things that optimists do. People who have optimism, success and self confidence talk to themselves that:

1. The problem is outside of self. This is a situation.
2. It is temporary. It does not predict the future.
3. The problem does not affect every part of my life.

Self talk (what you think to yourself) has a huge impact on your optimism and self confidence. For more optimism, you could successfully think:

“This is a situation. It is outside me.”
“My car is not starting NOW. This is not permanent. It is temporary”
“My whole life does not revolve around my car starting now.”
“I probably am not going to lose my job because my car isn’t starting.
“Now I can begin to figure out what to do next.”

A pessimistic pattern weakens your self confidence and undermines optimism and success. When you are not thinking the thought patterns of pessimists, you have more mind capacity to use. You are not focused inside on who is at fault or asking why this always happens. This frees up energy to figure out what to do. You might be able to think something like:

“I can focus on fixing the problem.
“I wonder what’s causing this car not to start.
“Who could help me this morning?”
“What do I need to do about getting to work?
“Who can I call at work to let them know I might be late?

To review, success optimism and self confidence are intertwined. The more optimism you generate, the more self confidence you feel. The more self confidence you have, the more success you will have. For quotes on positive attitude go here.

Here are THE FOUR CORNERSTONES of the thought patterns for optimism, self confidence and success.

HAVE NO FAULT THOUGHTS

If your thoughts are consumed with who is at fault – either yourself or someone else, your creativeness is gobbled up with feelings that result from fault finding. When you reframe the negative event as “just a situation that is temporary” your mind is freed up to look for solutions. If you constantly are thinking that it is your fault, it undermines your self confidence. If you look for someone else who is at fault, again your mind is tied up by emotions that will not support optimism, self confidence and therefore success.

From a law of attraction perspective, if you focus on the negative things, you draw more negative things to yourself. Once I get on a roll of a series of what I see as negative thoughts, I can guarantee that perhaps even within the hour, more negative events will occur. It happens very quickly. I laugh at it now and try to see how soon I can switch out of those thoughts, because I don’t want any more “car issues” for example. Since I prefer “positive events; the law of attraction is great motivation to have better self confidence, more optimism, and reap success.

IDENTIFY IT AS A SITUATION. In work environments it is much more helpful to look for a problem with the system, than look for the problem with a person. Your employees will be far more productive, more self confidence and be more successful, if you are looking at the issues, not the people. You’ll feel better too. It just off loads some of the emotions that gunk up our thinking works.

THIS WILL PASS. IT IS TEMPORARY. This situation does not predict the future. To have optimism, success, and self confidence, I need to contain the problem to now.

THIS IS ONLY A SMALL PIECE OF THE PUZZLE. Any issue is only a small slice of the whole pie. To have optimism, success, and self confidence, I need to contain the problem to a small area of my life.

Write these four cornerstones of optimism, self confidence and success thinking on a 3 x 5 card and carry it with you. When an event is happening in your life and it doesn’t feel good, remind yourself:

HAVE NO FAULT THOUGHTS
IDENTIFY IT AS A SITUATION
THIS WILL PASS
THIS IS ONLY A SMALL PIECE OF THE PUZZLE

This will give you enough perspective to reframe your thoughts. If you can do this for just thirty days, you will find you have more optimism, self confidence and success.

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[tag]Success,Optimism,Self Confidence[/tag]