Great Self Confidence

...to live the life you want

Pier to Pier update

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About 6 weeks ago I posted in Come for a swim? my intention of doing a challenge. In this case swimming 1.4 miles in the cold English sea between two piers! I also said I would raise £150.

In my mind, I’ve never regarded myself as a great one for raising sponsorship. As an adult I’ve only done it once before (Dublin Marathon 2003). On that occasion I did raise £1500 for the Alzheimer’s Society, as my father had died from that disease. But my mother was quite a driving force, holding a coffee morning and generally “forcing the pace”.

I think some of my negative attitude regarding sponsorship was down to my belief that asking someone to give you money, for doing something difficult, physically challenging, unpleasant and possibly life threatening (tragically so in April) was a bit silly. Why run 26 miles, when its quicker and more pleasant by taxi?!

My attitude now is more relaxed – asking for sponsorship for a challenge is an acceptable social formula for encouraging people to donate to a worthy cause. Consequently I feel quite confident asking people to sponsor me. I only started this week and have already I’ve got £50. Not feeling slightly embarrassed about asking friends and colleagues for money has made the process a lot easier!

As for swimming, I’ve been in the sea a few times, but its so cold and rough at the moment its hard to do any distance. And I find swimming in pools are so boring. But having made a commitment – and now got people to pledge money – it does ensure I’ll keep at it.

A 1000 year old Gnarled Giant!

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chestnut tree

My wife and I have just been away for a couple of days, staying in a hotel in the county of Gloucestershire. We enjoy walking, but now give this a focus by geocaching. which involves using a Gps unit to find hide caches.

The joy of geocaching is that the hider of caches generally takes you to places that they think are attractive and worth visiting for some reason – places you wouldn’t normally find as a visitor.
We were not disappointed – apart from stunning scenery we happened upon this tree less than a mile from our hotel.

The photograph doesn’t do it justice, but coming across a chestnut tree that is documented to be over a thousand years old is quite an experience. Nature has a way of putting life and our day to day worries into perspective.

Taking the plunge

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Reflecting on the blogs I have made to date it occurred to me that my own confidence in “blogging” and running a website has been transformed over the past couple of months. Like many, many others I had toyed with the idea of setting a site like this up for years. But until I actually started, made the commitment, I had no real idea how it would work out.

In my last blog “New situations can throw us” I was saying we need to practice an activity, building our confidence, until we know we have the skills to perform. But, like with this blog, sometimes you have got to take the plunge with limited experience to draw on.

I would like to add that in this age of the internet, there is so much information readily to hand. I purchased a book on WordPress – but have hardly opened it. There are excellent blogs like Internet Home Business that having given me free advice on how to build a blog. Whatever your field, it should be easier than ever to build your knowledge base and self confidence. But there always comes a time when you need to jump, and let your inner belief system can carry you forward.

New situations can throw us!

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flower.jpgOne simple issue that can throw us is coping with new situations. Last week my employers were making a DVD about changes happening, and needed “volunteers” to ask questions on camera for the Chief Executive to answer. Having “volunteered” I prepared a question and thought nothing of it.

When the time came to speak for about 10 seconds to the camera, it became more difficult. The cameraman, who was also directing, suggested a variation on my question, and found us a spot to film. Suddenly confronted by a camera lens, I became very tongue tied and spoke absolute rubbish!

There was no pressure, the cameraman/director was very helpful, but it took me several attempts to overcome my sudden fear created by talking into a camera lens – for 10 seconds!

You hear it is now customary for potential politicians to go through media training and get familiar with answering questions and appearing in front of camera. But any new situation requires practice. We cannot expect to perform in new situations perfectly, without practice.