Dr. Aziz (host) presents Step 2 of a five-step program to "Unleash Your Inner Confidence." The video teaches that people constantly narrate events (day-to-day stories) and hold a larger identity narrative (big 'S' story) that shapes confidence. He gives everyday examples (missed smile, quiet in meetings, delayed text replies), urges viewers to notice and reframe unhelpful small stories, and offers a concrete 10-minute writing exercise: write a paragraph describing your old (negative) identity and a paragraph describing the new identity you want to become. The clip ends with a preview of Step 3: "Do what scares you."
Chapters
Hey, Dr. Aziz here. Today is the second step of the Five Steps training program. Five steps to unleash your inner confidence. And today is about how you can change your life by changing the story and the stories that you're telling yourself. You can change your life by changing the story that you're telling yourself. So that's a very important distinction. If you've never learned that, that in this moment, right now, you're telling yourself a story. We all are. We're doing it all the time. For example, what kind of story are you telling yourself about watching this? Maybe you're saying, this guy maybe knows some things and maybe he can help me. That's one story. Maybe I don't know this guy. I'm not really sure about him. I don't know if I really trust him. Maybe he's just an Internet huckster. Maybe there's another story you're telling yourself of like, oh, my God, I gotta figure this out in my life right now because I'm so desperate and I need to make a change right now. This guy might be able to help me. So whatever you're doing, you have a story about it. And that story might make you feel inspired, that story might make you feel skeptical, might make you feel scared. But it's really important to start noticing two levels of stories, and that's what I'm going to cover in this video. There's two levels of stories that you have to change if you want to overcome shyness and social anxiety and maximize your confidence. And the first level of story is your day to day stories. Little events in your life that happen through the course of the day that you give meaning to without even really thinking about it. So you're walking down the street. This is a really subtle, small example. But this kind of stuff happens all the time. You're walking down the street and you see someone walking the other way, and for whatever reason, they catch your eye. And so you look at them and they look back at you and you smile and they just go. As they walk by, no response. What story happens right there? Well, if you're stuck in shyness like I was, the story I'd come up with, that person doesn't like me. I'm an idiot. That was so weird. I shouldn't have smiled. They think I'm a creep, think I was invasive or intrusive or bothering them, or how would they think I'm this, they think I'm that. They. So if your story is full of. They think I'm. And it's bad. That's a story that's going to really get in your way. The story's going to really trip you up, you know? And we have stories all day long. You have an experience in a meeting where you're quiet. What story do you have about that? I'm too quiet. I don't have anything to say. I'm never going to get out of this. I'm never going to overcome this. I really should be talking more. You know, maybe you got a woman's number and you texted her or you called her and she took a day before she responded. What stories are you telling yourself in the meantime? She doesn't want to hang out with me. I've ruined it. I shouldn't have said that last thing. I'm an idiot, right? So those stories, you have to start catching them and say, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. That's a story. That's a very disempowering story, that story. And just a great question to ask. Is this. Is this story helping me or is this story hurting me? And if it's hurting you, change it. Really start to challenge it. Even if you say, well, I can't change it because it feels true. Yeah, but Hitler's propaganda felt true because they repeated it loud enough, long enough, and with enough repetition and volume that it just gets into the mind of people. So your own inner critic, their own garbage stories, they feel true, but it doesn't matter. They're still propaganda. They're still bs. They are not true. You've just been telling yourself that so long that it feels true to you. So the best way to start is you notice this story is hurting me. Is to say, what's another way of looking at this? What's another story I could tell myself about this situation? What's another story that would actually help me out? And if you use those stories to understand the world around you, then you'll start to feel better about yourself and have more options. So that person who didn't look back, what are three other stories you could come up with off the top of your head? Remember the person where you smiled at them and they didn't smile back? What are three other ways you could explain that experience? Three other stories you can have about it that don't involve you being a total loser. Don't just look for me for the answer. You got to think of this stuff yourself. Because when you're out there in the world really working on this stuff, really overcoming your shyness and social anxiety and developing confidence, I'm not going to be there, it's just going to be you. So think about that right now. What are three stories you could come up with? Well, one would be they didn't see me. Two, they were in their own thoughts and didn't really react in time. Three, they noticed, but they were in a sour, foul mood and didn't feel like connecting with someone. You can come up with three things off the top of your head and just start to reinforce those. Because the reality is life is the story that we make up about it. There's so many things happening at any given time that we can focus on one aspect, one lens and, and feel a lot better about ourselves, a lot more inspired. And the second level of story that you absolutely have to change is even more important than the day to day story. The second level of story is the big story. This is a capital S story. This is the story of you and your identity. This is the story of who you think you are in the world, all the stuff you think about yourself. Like, am I attractive or not attractive? Am I funny or not funny, intelligent or stupid? Am I capable or not capable? Can I do what I believe I set out to do in the world? Or will I fail? Do I have what it takes or I don't? That is the identity story, the biggest story you have about yourself. And pretty much across the board, anyone that I work with who has shyness and social anxiety and I had this for years, you have a terrible big capital S identity story. You think you're not good enough, you think you're not attractive, you think you can't make it, you think no one's going to like you. And that's a big one. And you have to change that, that one. So to do that, I mean, one of the most powerful ways is do a written exercise which I'll offer to you right now. If you want to take the action to do it, it'll have a powerful result, which is to spend just 10 minutes and write out what is my old story about myself? What is my old identity? And put all the negative crap that you say about yourself in there. What do I want it to be? Write another paragraph. What's my new identity? This doesn't have to be like a 20 page treatise, just a short paragraph about what your old identity is and a new paragraph of what do I want my identity to be? How do I want to see myself? You know, if I was, if it was my eulogy and someone was giving a talk about me and how I lived, you know, eulogy is what they say at a funeral. When you die, what do you want them to say about you? You know, Aziz, he was always a little frightened. He was never very attractive. He never really did much with his life. He would have. He could have been a contender. But he was scared, so he stopped. Is that what you want people to say about you? What do you want your identity to be? You know, you construct this, you create this, and you can generate this. And I'm going to show you how in following videos. But for now, you have to see what do I want my identity to be? I am attractive. I'm an attractive man. I have so much to offer. I'm intelligent, I'm compassionate, I can help people. I'm a great husband. I'm a great father. Create the identity that you want for yourself. And if you say those things and they're not true yet, make them true. Change your behavior and who you are in the world so you live up to that. You don't have to live up to it right away. It's something that you're going to grow into. But if it's, I suck, I'm not good enough, no one likes me, I have nothing to offer. Jeez, it's not too hard to live up to that, is it? So change your big story. Change your identity. Write out those two paragraphs and change the small stories throughout the day. And that's going to start to dramatically shift your anxiety into confidence. So stay tuned for the next video, which we're going to talk about. The most powerful, important step of all of them. I put it right in the middle. We're building towards it. Step three, do what scares you. So stay tuned for that, and I'll talk to you soon.
