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1. Criticizing yourself<\/em><\/strong> And usually, this toughness takes the form of harsh, judgmental, and overly\u00a0negative self-talk:<\/p>\n Why do you always get so nervous before presentations \u2014 just suck it up and be confident! Criticizing yourself is never a sustainable source of genuine motivation.<\/p>\n Unfortunately, we\u2019re often lazy, especially when it comes to building genuinely helpful sources of motivation. So we rely on our default motivational strategy of self-criticism which keeps us feeling insecure.<\/p>\n If you want to truly work through your feelings of insecurity, take the time to develop\u00a0genuinely helpful sources of motivation\u00a0and encouragement for yourself.<\/p>\n 2. Criticizing others<\/strong><\/em> When you feel chronically insecure, you\u2019re starved for good feelings about yourself and often desperate to find ways to make yourself feel better \u2014 even if it\u2019s short-lived.<\/p>\n So, many insecure people get into the unconscious habit of being critical of others as a way to boost their own egos.<\/p>\n For example:<\/p>\n When you criticize a coworker\u2019s outfit, you\u2019re implying that you have good fashion sense. And that feels good. Remember:<\/p>\n Helpful criticism is about making the world a better place. Unhelpful criticism is about making yourself feel better.<\/p>\n If you want to feel less insecure and\u00a0boost your self-esteem\u00a0in the long-run, give up the habit of criticizing others and find healthier ways to feel good about yourself.<\/p>\n 3. Asking for advice<\/strong><\/em> When you\u2019re really stuck, you\u2019ve have tried everything you can think of, and you still don\u2019t know how to move forward with something, sometimes advice can be helpful.<\/p>\n But here\u2019s the problem: asking for advice feels good \u2014 sometimes too good.<\/p>\n Psychologically speaking, the habit of asking for advice anytime you feel stuck, frustrated, or nervous, can become a crutch. When you go to someone else for advice about how to move forward, it alleviates your own anxieties and insecurities \u2014 and that feels really good!<\/p>\n But you can get addicted to this anxiety-relief.<\/p>\n Because it feels so good to be immediately relieved of your anxiety, it becomes harder and harder to try and manage your anxiety on your own \u2014 to push through problems yourself despite your fears and insecurities.<\/p>\n But here\u2019s the thing:<\/p>\n The only way to build true confidence is to tolerate your fears and anxieties and do things anyway.<\/p>\n On the other hand, when you habitually ask for advice before trying anything yourself, you\u2019re basically telling yourself that you\u2019re incompetent. And tell yourself this enough and your mind will start to believe it. This is the habit that maintains insecurity.<\/p>\n If you want to feel less insecure, ask for advice only when it\u2019s absolutely necessary \u2014 not just because it will soothe your anxieties.<\/p>\n 4. Reassurance-seeking<\/strong><\/em> Here\u2019s an example:<\/p>\n Suppose you just told your spouse that you\u2019d prefer Italian food over Thai for your monthly date-night. Even though they said they were fine with that, you\u2019re worried that maybe they\u2019re secretly upset about it.<\/p>\n So you ask them on the way out of the house:\u00a0Are you sure you\u2019re okay with Italian? We can do Thai if you want\u2026\u00a0They say it\u2019s fine and you keep going.<\/p>\n But as you drive, you keep thinking about it, convincing yourself that they don\u2019t actually want Italian and are irritated with you. So, as you\u2019re pulling into the restaurant, you say:\u00a0No really, honey, we can just go get Thai across the street if you want\u2026\u00a0Again, your spouse says Italian is fine. But you detect a hint of irritation in their voice, which you attribute to your theory that they secretly don\u2019t want Italian (and not that you\u2019re constant reassurance-seeking is getting annoying). But here\u2019s the problem:<\/p>\n When you rely on other people to make you feel okay, you never learn how to make yourself feel okay.<\/p>\n We all have doubts and insecurities. The difference is most people are willing to tolerate a little fear and\u00a0self-doubt\u00a0because they know it\u2019s normal and they\u2019re confident that the feeling will go away if they leave it alone.<\/p>\n If you want to feel more confident and less insecure all the time, you must be willing to tolerate your self-doubt instead of immediately looking for reassurance from other people.<\/p>\n 5. Second-guessing yourself<\/strong><\/em> Questioning your own decisions isn\u2019t necessarily a bad thing. In fact, genuine reflection on previous decisions \u2014 especially mistakes \u2014 can be a powerful source of growth and learning.<\/p>\n As usual, the problem is when this self-questioning becomes habitual \u2014 something you just do instinctively anytime you\u2019ve made a decision you\u2019re uncomfortable with. Because it teaches your own mind to think that all your decisions are dubious and probably incorrect.<\/p>\n So why do we do it? Why habitually second-guess ourselves?<\/p>\n Second-guessing yourself distracts you from the uncertainty around your decisions.<\/p>\n See, when you\u2019ve made a decision especially a big one it\u2019s normal for the outcome to be uncertain. You won\u2019t know if it was a good decision for a while. This uncertainty leads to some very normal anxiety.<\/p>\n But if you can\u2019t tolerate that anxiety and get on with your life, and need to distract yourself from it by endlessly replaying the decision and what led up to it, you\u2019re slowly chipping away at your self-confidence. And over time, this strengthens your feeling of chronic insecurity.<\/p>\n If you want to feel more secure in yourself and your decisions, stop second-guessing them all the time.<\/p>\n 6. Catastrophizing<\/strong><\/em> For example:<\/p>\n Your boss sends you an email asking you to stop by her office after work, so you immediately imagine that you\u2019ve screwed something up and you\u2019re going to be reprimanded. When you constantly tell yourself how everything is going to turn out terribly, don\u2019t be surprised if your brain starts telling you everything is terrible.<\/p>\n People often get into the habit of catastrophizing because they don\u2019t want to be surprised when things go badly. So they figure if they imagine the worst, they\u2019ll always be pleasantly surprised.<\/p>\n But here\u2019s the problem with that strategy:<\/p>\n If you\u2019re constantly catastrophizing, you won\u2019t have any attention left over for all the things in your life that are going well.<\/p>\n And that\u2019s the real tragedy of this mental habit of catastrophizing: It robs you of all the joy and positivity that\u2019s already in your life.<\/p>\n And when your world seems terrifying and devoid of good things, what could be more natural than to feel insecure about yourself and your place in the world?<\/p>\n To start feeling less insecure, put the brakes on your habit of catastrophizing, and imagining the worst.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" 1. Criticizing yourself From a young age, most of us learn that to properly motivate ourselves to succeed, we need to be tough on ourselves. … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":920,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[59],"class_list":["post-919","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-psychology","tag-insecure"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tipsforahealthylife.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/919","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tipsforahealthylife.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tipsforahealthylife.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tipsforahealthylife.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tipsforahealthylife.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=919"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tipsforahealthylife.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/919\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":921,"href":"https:\/\/tipsforahealthylife.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/919\/revisions\/921"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tipsforahealthylife.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/920"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tipsforahealthylife.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=919"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tipsforahealthylife.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=919"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tipsforahealthylife.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=919"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nFrom a young age, most of us learn that to properly motivate ourselves to succeed, we need to be tough on ourselves.<\/p>\n
\nI don\u2019t want to be a screw-up so I better get my sh!t together and study harder.
\nI wish I had Tom\u2019s work ethic. That guy\u2019s a machine. Why am I always so lazy?!
\nIn Hollywood movies, the tough-talking drill sergeant quickly \u201cmakes a man out of\u201d the timid new recruit by telling them how \u201csoft\u201d and \u201cweak\u201d they are. But in real life, criticizing yourself constantly only leads to shame, inadequacy, and even more insecurity.<\/p>\n
\nBeing overly-critical of others is a subtle defense mechanism designed to boost your own ego.<\/p>\n
\nWhen you criticize your spouse for using bad grammar, it makes you feel smart. And that feels good.
\nThe problem is \u2014 in addition to ruining your relationships \u2014 being critical of others only makes you feel worse about yourself in the long-run. Deep down, we know that we\u2019re trying to make ourselves feel better at the expense of others and we dislike ourselves for it.<\/p>\n
\nIt\u2019s easy to rationalize asking for advice as a good idea because often it is.<\/p>\n
\nLike asking for advice, reassurance-seeking is a subtle habit that trains your brain to see yourself as weak and not confident in the long-term. But we do it anyway because it feels so good in the short-term.<\/p>\n
\nThe key is to realize that the object of reassurance-seeking is anxiety relief. You have some doubts about yourself and you want someone else to tell you it\u2019s okay so you won\u2019t feel anxious anymore.<\/p>\n
\nLike asking for advice and reassurance-seeking, the habit of second-guessing yourself feels good at the moment but leads to chronic insecurity over time.<\/p>\n
\nCatastrophizing is the mental habit of imagining the worst.<\/p>\n
\nYour husband looks irritable after work, so you start imagining all the things you could have done to make him unhappy.
\nYour kid is sad after losing their championship soccer game, so you start imagining how she\u2019s going to quit soccer forever and never find a passion in life.
\nCatastrophizing is such a nasty habit because it makes the world look far scarier and bleak than it really is.<\/p>\n