450: Build more confidence now

You can do anything. It's just a habit. I had to break a pattern, I had to break a belief and I had to do that through action. And you can absolutely do it too. Welcome to the earn your happy podcast. I'm Lori Harder, founder of The Bliss Project, 3 Time Fitness World champion, fitness expert and cover model turned self love junkie, lifestyle entrepreneur and author. Each week I'll bring you a guest or a thought that will help you bust through your fears, connect to your soul and get focused and clear so you can elevate your life, business and relationships. We don't wait until we're ready for someone to tell us we're good enough. We take what we want and we anoint ourselves, get ready to earn, own and unapologetically rock your happiness every single day. Are you with me? Here we go. Welcome back to the podcast. It's time for another quickie because there's always time to fit in Inspiration. And Eleanor Roosevelt says, you gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You're able to say to yourself, I have lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along. You must do the thing you think you cannot do. And I think that perfectly describes life. So looking back on that quote, I think that the thing that I want to get across about courage, and that is what we're going to talk about today, courage and self confidence is that it is built. And courage is not something that you are born with. Self confidence is not something you were born with. It is built. And it's not something internal, then it is something external. So when you are building it, that means it's built from your beliefs, your environment and the people that you're around and what you're listening to and what you're choosing to think. Right? Because as Wayne Dyer says, a belief is just a thought. We keep thinking everything in our life is just a pattern. Yes, we're human beings, but we are living, functioning pattern machines. And in each moment we have the choice to keep repeating a pattern or to break it. And this can often feel like this is just built into our DNA, that maybe because of the way that we were raised and the way that we think that this is who we are. But it's proven over and over again now scientifically that we can break patterns, but it has to be through choice. And oftentimes our environment needs to be worked on first. So even though we might be making new choices, if we have not changed what we are hearing, seeing Believing and what is being re being reinforced. And I believe that the people around us are our reinforcers. It's not just our thoughts, but the people around us are our reinforcers. So if we're not working on simultaneously changing our thoughts and our environment, then we might be falling back into the pattern because we're getting reinforced that that negative thought is in fact tr or that that is in fact how the world is functioning. Right? So if we have people around us who believe in, lack and believe the world is hard and believe that you're going to work hard and not get paid enough or whatever that looks like, or there's not enough to go around and we're trying to change our beliefs, yet every time we open our mouths or share a conversation, it's reinforced that yes, it's hard and you shouldn't believe that way and you're a dreamer and that's not realistic. Then guess what's going to happen. You're going to go back to the easiest thing, which is to repeat a pattern. The hard part is to break a pattern. It's going to take all of the environmental shifts, all of the thought process and all of the willpower that you have in order to shift that pattern. But what I want to chat about today is the idea that self confidence is actually not even coming from you. Self confidence is going to take a few things, right? Self confidence is external, it's not internal. You're not like, oh my God, I'm such a self confident person. I just feel amazing. It's absolutely something that is built. So if it's external, what does that mean? It means that yes, it will take courage in order to even start this momentum. Because when momentum happens, you have to just go full force to gain any momentum. The hardest part is starting. So what that means is that in order for you to even begin, it's going to take courage, which courage is just the willingness to face your fear and move ahead with your fear. That's it. That's all you have to say right now, is that I am willing to face this even though my hands are going to be shaking, I'm going to feel awful, I might faint, I might pass out, I might look stupid. And all of it is going to be for my highest evolution. All of it is going to be for my happiness. All of it is going to be for something bigger than I can see right now. So that's where faith comes in. You just have to go and do the thing and face it and have courage to know that no matter what it's for you, and that's the belief that really gets me going, is that no matter what happens, whether this new thing that I want to do fails or succeeds, it's all for me. So why not begin? Why not start? Because the type of life I want to live is a life that is lived fully. I don't want to be in indecision. Indecision is exhausting. Indecision going back and forth takes more energy than actually just doing the thing and failing altogether and getting that feedback and being able to move forward. I am going to live a life that is so full and so full of action that I have zero regrets on my deathbed that I'm like, I'm ready. I'm ready to meet my maker. Let's do this. Because I did everything knowing that God had my back, that spirit, that source had my back. And the only way that you can truly prove that you have faith and that you know that the universe or God and God has you is to take action and be courageous and know that all of it is for your evolution. So first of all, self confidence takes courage. And courage is something that you just choose. It's not like you're like, I'm so courageous. You just say, I'm going to choose to be courageous today and I'm going to do this anyway. And next, self confidence takes courage in action. So now you have to put that into action and do things that you can now say, oh my gosh, I did that and I didn't die. I say that all the time. I'm like, okay, I did that. It didn't quite turn out maybe as amazing as I wanted, but I didn't die and I can do it again and now I can get better. And I do that over and over and over again. And I can't tell you how many times I had to say that when public speaking because I didn't even have the option to like work on getting better. Like the first, the first 30 times I did public speaking because I didn't even remember. I was having such an out of body experience and I was so nervous that I didn't even remember enough to know how to get better because it was like I wasn't even present in my body to even know how to get better. I was just working on showing up. So sometimes we have to put things into perspective and be like, okay, this is just about showing up and proving to myself that I can do it and then I'll work on getting better. What happens is we put so much pressure on ourselves that it's like, yeah, of course you're gonna be freaked out and say no or not do it at all. If you think you have to be good and show up. Like, that's not even right. It's like the first time you put your kid on a bike you're like, ride this amazingly or you suck. That's not how it works. Just ride it. That's all you want out of your kid the first time. Like just be willing to even get on the bike right. So you have to give yourself that type of grace and that type of love and self. Love really is a lot of days for me. A conversation with myself that is very graceful. Like, I'm so proud of you. Can't believe you even showed up when you were so nervous. Like I knew how nervous you were and you still did this. I'm so proud of you. That's confidence building to me. So confidence is courage in action and that's how you start building it. And self confidence is positive reinforcement. So self confidence is building a tribe around you of people who are also either going for their dreams or who are like minded or who love you. No matter what self confidence is when people, you have people in your life who are like, who cares if you do or don't do that? I still love you because that is where you truly are going to still feel good. So I talk about this with tribe all the time. Tribe is a soft place to land. Tribe are those people who say, you know, doesn't matter. Like no matter what happens, we're here and we're going to tell you how awesome you are. Whether you achieve that thing or not or whether you suck at it or whether you change your mind 500 times, it doesn't matter. Still here. And that is another way to build self confidence is because you truly don't even have to do the thing to know. Like, it doesn't really matter. Like I can still love myself and people still love me even if this thing doesn't work out. So that's another reason why you're like, okay, you know what, I'm more willing to take risks. And honestly, that's what self confidence is. Willingness to even take risks and to show up. And people look at people like that and they're like, oh, they must be so confident. Or is it because they are being courageous and perhaps they've built this really strong tribe. Maybe they didn't even start with it, but perhaps they've built a tribe of people who still absolutely love them. And are there for them even if they fail. So self confidence is also a huge building block of that is knowing that you have people and building up that tribe of people who are going to be there for you. And lastly, self confidence is the willingness and ability to have grace in self love. Like we mentioned before, we apparently am two people today. I brought, I've invited all of my personalities onto the podcast today, so you're welcome. You get like three for the price of one. So self confidence is also just grace and self love. I mean, I can't tell you how many times a day I have a conversation with myself from like, a really loving self because I'll hear hear myself being like, are you good enough for that? Do you really think you're smart enough? What's changed? Are you're in way over your head? And then I stop and I'm like, okay, you've done hard things before. You need to just, like, go sit back down in that chair, let it feel uncomfortable. Let yourself not feel the smartest and know that this is what the beginning feels like and just stay here. And I'm so proud of you for taking these huge things on and allowing yourself enough grace to not get freaked out or so overwhelmed that you run or retreat. Like, I'm just observing how awesome you are that you're not completely falling into your old habits of running, retreating, going and beating yourself up. Instead, you're going to go for a walk and you're going to say, I can do this. This is just what the beginning feels like. I will find all the people. I will have the faith and I will figure it out. I will figure it out. So I will figure it out till I can't figure it out, and then I'll ask some more and I'll figure that out. So it's just having so much faith and so much love for yourself and stopping and recognizing when you need to support yourself. Self confidence is the recognition of where you need support and giving it to yourself. So can you give yourself what you need? And that's my question every day. Can I give myself what I need in every situation to feel a little bit better and a little bit more supported? And if I'm not feeling, feeling confident, why is that? Is it because I need to reach out to some people and I need to really be reminded that I'm loved or that I'm supported in this? Is it because I'm not asking enough questions? Is it because I'm not asking enough people? So we have to be our own advocates for self confidence. We have to be our own advocates for self love. We have to be our own advocates for support. Nobody can go and do that for us until we do it for ourselves and we reach out and we say what we need. So if you're in a place where you are in a rock bottom place or you don't know what to do, you need to ask people questions, you need to join groups, you need to join networking, you need to go and support, not just asking. Right? Because asking and not getting an answer is not truly supporting yourself. If you're like, yeah, I asked but nobody helped me, okay, well that might mean that you might have to take the next step and support yourself. Go join that coaching group and show up to the coaching and do the things that they're telling you to do. That's how you truly support yourself. Go to the event, show up at the event, participate 100% and start implementing the things. After the event, go listen to the podcast, actually take massive action on what they're telling you and asking you and implement that slowly into your life and know that these things take a lot of time. We want results so fast and it's just not how it works. Can you shift your perception in your life in an instant? Absolutely. But a lot of times life is catching up with, with what we've been thinking. So start shifting and life and your reality and what you see around you will start catching up. And it doesn't mean you can't shift things instantly. And certain things can change immediately. I do believe that we can heal immediately from certain things if we really, really choose to and we got the correct help. I do believe we can shift things in our life immediately. Things can dramatically shift, things can dramatically change, but majority of things do happen slower. So you guys self confidence is built and you know, you can start building it right now. You can start talking to someone in the Starbucks line, you can start, you know, reaching out to people that you wouldn't normally reach out to to ask questions. You could join something you don't feel ready for. These are all ways to build self confidence. And you go, whoa, I did that. And that's how it starts. I was the mo least, least confident person ever when I first started out on my fitness journey in competing. I mean like to the point where I'm, I couldn't even go out and socialize with my husband's friends without drinking cocktails at home first. I'd have to have like two or three drinks to even feel like I could say sentences and talk about my life because that's how much anxiety I had. I had so many things negative related to when attention would be on me that I would feel like I was either gonna get made fun of that people would ask me questions I didn't know and that I wasn't smart enough and I wasn't good enough and I wasn't adequ quit for, you know, the friend group or whatever that looked like. So that's just a place that I was at. It was that low that I needed to have alcohol and a lot of it before I could even go and open my mouth around people that I didn't know. So let me tell you a thing or two about building confidence. I had to go and do things that I didn't think I could do. And that was, you know, putting myself on an airplane and signing up for a fitness camp and saying if, if I don't do this, you know it's only going to get worse and I'm not going to live my life as a recluse that can't leave her home. So I have to start taking drastic measures because that's where it was headed.

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So you guys, you can do anything. It's just a habit. I had to break a pattern, I had to break a belief and I had to do that through action. And you can absolutely do it too. So I'm sending you guys. So much love as always. I would love for you to share this on your Instagram on social. Text it to a friend who, who needs it right now, who's in a place of maybe like I don't know if I can do this or not, who needs to remember how confidence is actually built. And as always, I love, love, love when you actually share what your takeaway is on Instagram so I can really know what I should speak life into for the next podcast. So share this on Instagram, maybe do a swipe up to it, text it to a friend, go rate and review any or all of the things. It's what actually keeps a podcast alive you guys so I'm so grateful for you. You are the heartbeat of this P.O. you sharing it. So if you've gotten any value from the podcast please share it or go rate, review and subscribe to this podcast. I'm so grateful for you guys and as always earn your happy. Bye everyone. Thank you guys so much for spending this time with me on the earn your happy podcast. I am so glad that you stopped by. If you could take one second to share this this episode with someone you think would love it that would be absolutely amazing and we would be forever grateful. Also please leave us a review if you feel so moved by going to itunes and leaving us an honest thought, an honest comment. Tell us what you think, tell us what you want to hear more of it would really help us out on our journey to helping thousands and thousands of people. Until then, don't forget to yet to earn your happy. Thanks again guys. Bye bye.