“How come you’re so confident?”
I have never really thought of myself as confident, so this question, asked of me on Saturday night has played on my mind a bit since then. It struck me as similar to one of those philosophical questions.. you know the sort - “what is the sound of one hand clapping”, “if a tree falls in the forest...”, and “if you choke a Smurf...”, – one that unless you’re being overly facetious really has no answer.
It got me thinking though about exactly what the term “self-confidence” means, and whether it really could be applied to me. I’m no psychologist, and not having an awful lot in the way of research material for this topic I decided to look up a quick definition on Wikipedia to decide whether any sort of response would have been appropriate.
“The socio-psychological concept of self-confidence relates to self-assuredness in one's personal judgment, ability, power, etc.,”
The short answer to both questions in that case is no I’m not, but apparently I give off the impression that I am, indeed, a self-confident person. Like almost all other people, I have my fair share of insecurities, but recently I made the conscious decision to hide these and the effect they have on me as best I can, as I’ve come to realise that they’ll never be of any benefit.
The quotes below are from two of my favourite comedy programmes (one British and one American as it turns out – just to be diplomatic of course!) and whenever I think of self confidence they are always the first things to spring to mind:
My Way or the Highway - Scrubs (S01 E20)
Carla's response to Elliot asking for relationship advice:
“It's all about hiding the crazy and acting like the most confident girl in the room”
The Grapes of Wrath – Black Books (S01 E04)
When Fran tells Bernard how she is going to act on her date – he responds by saying:
"Yes, on no account must he see the real you”
So, for the moment I feel quite pleased. If someone has thought, even until the moment I opened my mouth, that I was a self confident person then I have achieved my goal. Besides, it's better to be having good conversation with someone than to stand around moping because you think you wore a top that showed off too many bumps, or that your hair looked like you'd 'just stepped out of a lunatic asylum'...
Isn't it?
ST
