How To Be Confident After Failure – Part 3

Let’s face it.  Failure sucks.  It feels bad, it makes us question ourselves, and it has a sinister way of seeping into different parts of our lives.

This isn’t the most fun topic to read about, but it’s an important one.

I want you to know that you CAN be confident after failure.

I’m going to give you Tips 11-15 for overcoming failure.  If you implement these insights into your life, you will become more confident and equipped in facing any challenge that life throws at you.

If you want the first five tips, click here.

If you want the second set of tips, click here.

Tip #11 – Be Patient

You read earlier about the dangers of setting expectations too early.

Now I want you to know how important it is to be PATIENT.

It takes time to skill up.  Don’t expect to master your weaknesses overnight. 

Seek out the small, daily improvements.

Make sure to celebrate these improvements – you’ll keep your dopamine levels up, motivate yourself to keep going, and you’ll skill yourself up sooner rather than later.

Tip #12 – Put Your Skill To Use

You’ve been working on your weaknesses.  You’ve been keeping your thoughts positive.  And you’ve been slowly, but surely, rebuilding your confidence.

Remember when we ripped off the Band-Aid of failure, which allowed you to open up about your failure to someone else?

Now, we’re going to heal your wound.  No more bleeding.  No more pain.

We’re going to have new skin replace the dead skin, and your inflicted area is going to look even better NOW than it did before you failed in the first place.

Here’s the golden ticket: Heal your wound by putting your new skill to use.

Have you been working on writing?  The next time your boss asks someone to communicate something to a potential client, raise your hand and WRITE that communication.

Have you been working on public speaking?  The next time your work group needs to present its findings to an executive committee, raise your hand and deliver a hell of a presentation!

Once you put your new skill to use, your confidence will beat an all-time high.  You’ve identified your weakness.  You’ve worked on it.  And now, you’ve actually USED your new skill professionally and publicly.

THAT is the definition of confidence.  Just like you talked about your failure openly, now you’re showing your improvement openly.  Your ability to implement your skill, especially in front of others, displays your new-found confidence and does wonders for your self-esteem going forward. 

You’ve finally got your confidence back!  Now build on it, use it as momentum, and let your confidence SOAR as you take on new challenges and opportunities!

Tip #13 – Setup A Support System

When you were rebounding from failure and battling self-doubt, you reached out to loved ones and eventually opened up to someone.

To continue building your confidence and prepare for future challenges, you need to cultivate a support system.

Make a support system full of positive, loving, and thoughtful people.  These people can be in your family, some of your closest friends, or even an acquaintance at work.

What’s important is that you can communicate regularly and openly with your support system. Positive, thoughtful people will help keep you in a positive headspace and pick you up when feelings of self-doubt reappear from time to time.

Tip #14 – Reflect On The Journey

There’s no magic pill to recovering your confidence after failure.  There’s rarely a clear point in time where you can identify precisely when you regained your confidence or when you started to become even MORE confident than ever before.

And that’s totally okay.

When you feel like you’re in a good place mentally, with your new skill already in use, your confidence starting to boost, and your support system in place, take a little time to think about your journey.

Think about your initial failure.  Think about what you did to start gaining your confidence back.  Think about learning your new skill. 

When you reflect on your journey, from your initial starting point to where you are now, you can better appreciate your progress and your regained confidence.  You’ll become more self-aware, more confident in how much you’ve developed, and equip yourself to maneuver future failures a little more smoothly.  Failure will always suck, but if you get progressively better at overcoming failure, you’ll become that much more confident in your ability to bounce back and get back to success.

Tip #15 – View Failure As Future Success

Your entire journey, from failure to regaining your confidence, is really about turning a weakness into a strength.  It’s about overcoming your own self-doubt and putting in the work to rebuild your self-esteem and move forward in your life.

In those dark times where your self-doubt is really low, or you don’t know where to turn, I want you to remind yourself that you WILL come out of this, and that you WILL be a success.  In fact, you can look back at a past failure and remind yourself that if you overcome that failure, you can DEFINITELY overcome this one.

If you view failure as future success, you’ll be more motivated to skill up, open up to people, and find the light at the end of the tunnel.  By looking at failure as impending success, you’re automatically spinning failure in a more positive light and giving yourself a goal to achieve.

Viewing failure as future success will naturally set you up for success.  It will help you keep perspective as you battle self-doubt, and it will help you regain confidence more quickly.  And when you do see success from overcoming your failure, your confidence will soar and keep you motivated to reach your desired level of success.

There you have it!  15 tips to help you be confident after failure.

Reach out to your loved ones.  Do something fun.  Do something you’re good at.

Build momentum.  Don’t set expectations.  Talk it out.

Understand that everyone fails.  Look at why you failed.  Skill up.

Shut up.  Be patient.  Put your skill to use.

Setup a support system. Reflect on your journey.  And finally, view your failure as a future success.

As you go through your journey in overcoming failure, let your actions gain momentum and your confidence build over time!

I truly hope these tips add value to you.  Let me know which tips you plan on executing TODAY!  And if you missed the first 10 tips, you can find them here and here.

God bless you and your journey to regaining your esteem 🙂