Confidence in your environment

I recently joined a new forum – Personal Development Partners – which, although in its infancy, does seem to have the makings of a very useful place to share ideas. Do check it out (its free, although you can pay for more enhanced features). This post was inspired by a thread I contributed to this week, as I realised I hadn’t mentioned an important element in improving self confidence.

One of my previous jobs involved working in a prison that had been built in 1856. Working with the prisoners was generally fine, but the building was incredibly noisy and dirty, overcrowded and cramped. I also commuted by train – and my journeys were also in an environment that was noisy (occasionally dirty), overcrowded and cramped! This gradually wore me down and took away other satisfactions from the job.

How much does your environment affect your state of mind? Look around you, what else is in the room you’re sitting in? Is it cluttered, dirty, noisy or smelly? Forgetting people, just concentrating on physical things, are the things you see either useful or nice to look at? If you were planning to compose a comment for this post, are there things around that distract you, inspire you or depress you?

Its amazing how we can allow the environments over which we have some control, particularly our home, to become very “negative”. We let clutter build up, we let noisy televisions dominate our rooms, we can let drab colours or pictures fill our walls. I can recall visiting a friend at home, who was suffering from depression. The colours in his room were a pale green/grey – on the walls and the furniture. He blended into the room and whilst I’m not suggesting this was the cause of his depression, it wasn’t helping to lift his mood.

Confidence is very much influenced by the way we think, and I have discussed positive thinking on previous occasions. And our thinking is influenced by how we feel – which is affected by our environment. You can introduce positives into your environment – uplifting photographs, bright & cheerful colours, remove (or keep out of sight) clutter and mess. If you need noise, make it pleasant music rather than television. Ultimately its down to what makes you feel good.