4 Steps To Making Yourself A Better Person4 Steps To Making Yourself A Better Person

We all experience them, setbacks. Professionally, within relationships, when trying to make ourselves a better person. The experience of things either not going as planned or failing as a whole.  It’s not a good feeling, and it can even keep us from moving forward in our lives in many ways.
But through a simple shift in how you handle a setback no matter if it’s a large or small set back, can change many things. You might not always be able to recover or fix what got you to where you are, but with a few simple steps you can make things better moving forward.

Here are the four steps on how to overcome a setback while making yourself a better person:

1. Let yourself experience the negative of the situation

Negative emotions and experiences often get a bad rap. It’s natural to want to maintain or obtain the natural high that our positive emotions give us and eliminate the negative

emotions we feel. However, our negative emotions have a very real need in our lives. Our negative emotions inform us of when something (or someone) in our environment might need more attention, they help us build empathy as well as better connect with others.
Putting yourself in and staying in a negative state isn’t healthy, but allowing yourself to feel a very natural and normal part of something (the good and the bad) is the first to understanding what it means to you and your perspective on life. If you don’t allow yourself to have those feelings and process them during a setback, you won’t know how to move past them in the future. This is the real strength, understanding your negative emotions.

“Our greatest weakness lies in giving up. The most certain way to succeed is always to try just one more time.” – Thomas A. Edison

2. Give yourself some easy wins

If it’s important to let yourself experience the negative side of things, what do you do when it’s time to move past a setback or negative experience, but you can’t? Change your focus and give yourself some easy wins. Giving yourself some easy wins is different than simply doing something that makes you feel happy. It’s focusing on doing something that makes you feel as if you have accomplished something (even if it’s just a little bit).
This could be anything from cleaning up around the house, beating a level in a video game, or even volunteering. The idea is to do something with an end goal that’s in sight, and you can easily reach. Make it a little bit of a challenge, of course, but give yourself a short term win.Giving yourself an easy win allows you to think of something more positive and get some of those feel good hormones going in your brain, making it easier to move past a setback.

3. Look at what didn’t work

It’s not the winning that teaches you how to be resilient. It’s the setback. It’s the loss. – Beth Brooke It’s important not to look at your setbacks as if they are ultimate failures, but instead just a learning experience. You might not have the same opportunity available to you immediately, or ever, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t lessons to be learned.
If we as humans are anything, we are an accumulation of our experiences at any one moment. So taking the time to look at those experiences, especially when we have had setbacks, to learn from them is priceless. You not only open up the opportunity to avoid the same negative experience in the future but to learn more about yourself.

4. Make a plan and give it another go

The biggest hurdle in dealing with a setback is giving things another go. But if you don’t (especially right away) it’s likely you won’t. Getting clear on what didn’t work is great, but what good is that if you don’t give things another try? The difficult part might be that circumstances aren’t going to be the same as before, and that’s okay.
That’s why it’s important to make a plan and be aware of how things have changed. By looking at new circumstances, understanding how it changes things, and then also why and what failed before you can create a plan of action or intention to give yourself a better outcome in the future.

“It’s not the winning that teaches you how to be resilient. It’s the setback. It’s the loss.” – Beth Brooke

Handling any setback isn’t easy, it can hurt emotionally in many different ways. It brings forward many feelings of failure and highlights some of the worst parts of ourselves. It’s not an easy thing to move on from the past, but when you take the time and effort to treat it as a learning experience instead, that setback just might be the lesson you needed to experience something great. As long as you allow yourself.

Here are 10 powerful ways to build unstoppable confidence:

It’s a scary thought isn’t it?– “I don’t have what it takes to make my dreams come true” Success, fame, wealth – all your dreams might remain…well, just pipe dreams. You wish you were more confident. Like all those really successful people you have heard about.
Newsflash – these people are not fundamentally more confident than you are. They have developed it along the way. You, yes you, can do the same! Where does tis confidence come from? Confidence is a feeling, an emotion, that helps you take challenges head on, gain the respect of important people and become more productive.
But what’s the source of this confidence? True confidence that comes from taking action – doing the right things that get you real results. It’s having the knowledge that you are on the right track. And here’s the best part…Taking these confidence boosting actions is far easier than you think.

Here are 10 powerful ways to build unstoppable confidence:

1. Find your tribe

Are you trying to win this on your own? Wouldn’t it be easier if you had friends who share your dreams, as well as your fears and frustrations? People who will support you through your ups and downs. To find your tribe, join a community of ambitious people who are on the same path as you are. If you have a start-up, go to entrepreneur meetups; if you want to be a successful blogger, join an online blogger community. You will gain access to the collective experience of dozens of smart people. You will pick up amazing hacks and avoid unnecessary mistakes. You will also realize: If other people like you can become successful, why can’t you too? Your tribe will be an enormous source of confidence that will propel you towards success. You are not alone!

“Confidence comes not from always being right but from not fearing to be wrong.” – Peter T. Mcintyre

2. Choose the right battles

Do you spend too much time trying to ‘fix’ your weaknesses? For example, you might be great at marketing, but technology is your worst nightmare. Trying to solve tech problems might make you feel helpless and you could end up procrastinating. Devoting time and energy without results will affect your overall confidence levels. Instead, why not just outsource or delegate it? Sometimes, the key to better confidence is to avoid something, rather than do something. Focus on your strengths and you will see your confidence soar

3. Embrace failure

How many times did Edison fail before he succeeded in inventing the light bulb? Over a thousand! All super-successful people have experienced numerous failures. They won because they persisted. They learnt from their mistakes, changed their approach and kept trying until they got it right. Simple fact: Anytime you do something new, you are bound to make mistakes. Accept this fact, and you will transform failure into a source of determination, not disappointment.

4. Take tiny steps

Do you ever feel overwhelmed by your goal? Does it seem too difficult? The best way to deal with a massive undertaking is to break it up into smaller goals – small projects that you know you can achieve. Jack Welch, GE’s legendary former CEO, used to stress on the importance of small daily achievements. These small wins will fire up your confidence to take on bigger goals head on!

5. Start right

How you start your day has tremendous influence on your mood for the rest of the day. Begin your day by tackling the most important task. Decide what you want to work on the evening before, so that you can kick off first thing in the morning. Scratching off the most important task is like scoring the first goal of the game! It pumps you up for more action!

“Successful people have fear, successful people have doubts, and successful people have worries. They just don’t let these feelings stop them.” – T. Harv Eker

6. Get real

Are you trying to do too much? One of the biggest blows to your confidence happens when you continually fail to meet your own targets. Instead, set targets that you know you can accomplish. As Steve Jobs used to say, “rather than try to do everything, focus on a few things that yield the maximum results”. It’s important to push your limits, but don’t push yourself (and your confidence) off the edge!

7. Make a movie

Is the thought of an upcoming project, client meeting or presentation giving you the jitters? Try this hack that helped Michael Phelps win 22 Olympic medals. Close your eyes for 2 minutes and play a mental movie of the upcoming task. Anticipate the challenges and visualize yourself tackling them successfully. Michael Phelps used to do this every time before a swim. This simple visualization can fill you with a champion’s confidence.

8. Get physical

Your body has a powerful influence on your mood. Whenever you feel the pangs of doubt, get up and do a few pushups or spot jogging. Pumping adrenaline into your system is a sure-fire way of switching on your fighting mode. If you really want to notice a permanent improvement in confidence, start exercising for just 10-15 minutes a day. The Eastern Ontario Research Institute concluded from a study, that people who exercised twice a week for 10 weeks felt more competent in several areas of life – socially, academically, and athletically. No wonder billionaire Richard Branson swears by exercise.

9. Get a coach

Do you have someone to guide you personally? Someone who will help you set the right goals and targets, support and push you to execute those goals and correct you when you are going wrong? Eric Schmidt, former CEO of Google said that his best advice to new CEOs is to have a coach. A coach can give you the confidence that you are on the right track, help you make far fewer mistakes and seriously speed up your success. Why not try this?

10. Make fear your friend

Ever heard of ‘Productive Paranoia’? It’s a term bestselling author Jim Collins uses in his book, ‘Great by Choice’. It means that if you are afraid, you will take action to address the cause of fear. Bill Gates said that he used to worry about what an unknown teenager might be working on in his garage that might make existing technology obsolete. He channelled that fear into working even harder. Use your fear to take action. You will no longer feel helpless, but in control. That’s when your confidence will take a huge leap. You can take it on!

“The path to success is to take massive, determined action.” – Tony Robbins

Confidence doesn’t come out of thin air. It’s earned by the things that we do, by the small actions that we take every single day. You can build unstoppable confidence. You do have what it takes to make your dreams come true.