Leave the Steering Wheel to Self-Confidence
March 2nd, 2007 by Cristina Favreau
A hockey coach on “Making the Cut” (a Canadian reality show) this week gave his team a lesson about putting confidence and performance in their respective places. He compared it to a person steering a boat while pulling a water skier. When the driver steers the boat to the left, eventually the water skier will follow to the left too.
Using that illustration, he showed how most young or inexperienced players allow their performance to take the wheel of the boat, thus dictating what direction their confidence takes. This is all fine and good when you’re on top of your game and doing well – the result is your self-confidence increases and you play better. But the danger occurs when your performance takes a turn for the worse – your confidence decreases and you begin to create negative momentum.
The hockey coach gave his players a simple solution – change the order. Put your self-confidence in the driver’s seat and your performance will follow.
This is a good lesson for entrepreneurs. Some will allow a bad month or a negative occurrence to affect their self-confidence. As their assurance wanes, so do their accomplishments thus creating a destructive downward spiral effect. If you change up the order – letting your self-confidence direct your performance – you’ll find that you can more easily get unstuck during low periods and more quickly regain momentum.
How do you put your self-confidence in control? Easy. Remember why you started your business in the first place. Do whatever it takes to remind yourself that you really are the best at what you do and you really do make a significant positive impact in your clients’ lives – why else would you be doing it?
You hear me speak a lot about attitude and how it really does make a difference. You attract what you think about. If you dwell on negative experiences or on what you DON’T want, guess what the results will be? Negative and what you don’t want, which WILL negatively impact your performance and productivity.
Each morning starts a new day, full of possibilities. What’s more, you can choose to start your day all over again if you notice negativity creeping in. Even if you’re a new entrepreneur, you have a lot of optimistic and constructive points to help build and sustain your self-confidence – like the fact that you actually took the leap to starting your own business.
Like the person steering his boat, look ahead more than you look behind. Put your self-confidence in control and your performance WILL follow.
Copyright. Cristina Favreau. All rights reserved.
ABOUT CRISTINA
Cristina Favreau specializes in teaching independent service professionals who struggle with marketing, so they get more visibility, build their credibility and increase their self-confidence. Get her complimentary “12 Mistakes To Avoid in Your 30-Second Intro” ecourse at http://www.cristinafavreau.com/index.htm
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Franca
