up, it’s an opportunity to explore. When you’re not sure you can make a difference, don’t beat yourself too hard because already you’re different, there is none like you.

I don’t know what your struggles are, but for the fact you’re alive and reading this, I know you have been through a lot and has somehow overcome. I believe you have the ability to withstand any kind of pressure, but sometimes you allow fear to take over your mind and you start having doubts. As a human, we have the unique ability to imagine ourselves in the future. This is one of the greatest characteristics of the human mind. The picture you create for your future gives you hope and that hope gives you the power to survive and continue to live no matter the nature of the challenges before you. That hope empowers you never to give up no matter what.

The imagination you have for the future is extremely helpful as it enables you to create goals and dreams for yourself. It allows your mind the opportunity to think of all the different positive and negative scenarios and results that could happen as well. If you allow your mind to dwell more on the negative, it might accept the negative, it will give your negative thoughts credibility and before you know you will start to cast a shadow of doubt over your ability to accomplish your goals and dreams. It is not a crime as human to have doubts, but it is a crime if you don’t shake the doubt away. Don’t allow your doubts and fears to consume you.

Doubt is common for both the successful and the unsuccessful. The only difference between those successful and unsuccessful people is that the successful don’t allow their doubts to become more powerful than their goals.  Their goals and dreams have a stronger pull on their future than their doubts.  They believe that the achievement of their goals is more important than any fear or doubts they may experience along the way. You need to realise that nobody can give you wiser advise than the one you give to yourself. This is why you must believe in yourself, you must overcome your doubts and believe in your capabilities.

Believing is defined as to have confidence in the truth, the existence, or the reliability of something, although without absolute proof that one is right in doing so: Only if one believes in something can one act purposefully.

Most success does not exclude fear and doubt. If you have tried to reach your goal and stopped because you encountered a seemingly insurmountable obstacle, don’t give up. That is the nature of goals. They take you into new territory and bring you face-to-face with your own fears and doubts. The issue is not about how to avoid fear, but how to make positive decisions that boost your confidence while fear is present. Every day, many people give up on their dreams due to self-doubt and fear. You need to be aware of your fears and doubts and make a conscious decision not to allow your fears and doubts overshadow you.

If you have a goal or a dream you’re chasing, you need to be committed. You need to honour your commitment to self. You need to realise that no one can let you down more than you let yourself down. Don’t let fear get in your way. No matter how challenging, how fearful, or overwhelming it may seem, decide you are going for it for no other reason than because you want it. This is something you want for yourself and a choice you have made. Fear is not all of who you are, rather it is an emotion that you’re experiencing. The key is to recognise your fear, avoid becoming identified with your fear, and keep breathing. You breathe to stay alive, don’t stop breathing.

There is no crime in failing. You’re not a failure because you failed. You’re a failure if you accept failure and refuse to do anything, you give up. You need to make this very personal. Forget about all the definitions out there, rather redefine failure in a manner that it will allow you to see failure as information. Failure is really just feedback telling you to evaluate your experience, utilise the information gained to adjust your plan, and then try a new approach. When you experience a failure – get up, dust yourself off, access the information gained, revise your course, and begin again.

Failure, not being perfect, mistakes, not having people agree with me, not being completely accepted: these are not negative things. They’re positive. How is failure positive? It’s the only way we truly learn. You see it as negative because the society we live in only celebrate success. They tend to forget that to be successful failure is part of the process. The best way to learn something is to study it a bit, then try it, take practice tests, make mistakes, then learn some more.

How are mistakes positive? They’re little pieces of feedback necessary to grow and learn. How is being rejected positive? It means I’m growing beyond the absolutely socially acceptable realm.

Don’t be scared of the challenges before you. It’s the challenges of your journey that offer hundreds of opportunities to develop your confidence muscle and gain mastery over your experiences. Every obstacle, setback, or failure offers you a new chance to believe in yourself instead of falling into doubt and fear.

It is time you stop looking down on yourself. You probably spend more time being your own worst enemy instead of being your own best friend. You deserve to treat yourself better. After all, you have the rest of your life to spend with yourself, you can’t avoid yourself. I know that you won’t mentally abuse or look down on those whom you love. You won’t let them suffer in their time of need. Then why would you do it to yourself? You must be kind to yourself. You are more capable and worthy than you give yourself credit for.

It really doesn’t matter if you failed, you need to give yourself the opportunity to try again. Self-doubt never disappears. Over time, you just get better at dealing with it. It will greet you every time you fall out of your comfort zone and whenever you strive to do something great. Your doubts are only thoughts, not your future.

Push past your discomfort. Learn through repeated attempts. It’s OK to fail. Learn from the failure as quickly as you. Learn through repeated experiments and you will be stronger than you think, you will be more capable and more tolerant of discomfort than you think. It is only in practice you get better. When you get better, you can remove the things that holds you back.