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Post by booklady on Jul 10, 2008 12:23:54 GMT -5
What do you do when you need to boost your confidence?
Last year, at the beginning of the school year, I was given a "word" of wisdom by someone who was praying for me. That word was "confidence." At Christmas time, when I was shopping, I came across a little white stone with the word "confidence" printed on it. I bought it.
I know just where that stone is and I'm fixin' to go get it right now.
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Post by booklady on Jul 10, 2008 12:35:51 GMT -5
Of course, the best thing to do is to get very organized and be well prepared.
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Post by slb2 on Jul 10, 2008 14:57:46 GMT -5
I go back and read all those laudatious words where y'all have petted me insanely until I've purred.   You know, Pam, I just looked up the word "confidence" in the dictionary. Your picture was right next to it. |
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Post by booklady on Jul 10, 2008 15:30:07 GMT -5
Not if I have to appear in person.  |
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Post by michael on Jul 10, 2008 17:14:05 GMT -5
Confidence is fine; being yourself is important.
Confidence is only a small part of the complete package. I know plenty of people that don’t know the difference between spit and Pinesol, but you can’t tell them anything because they’ve got confidence (in abundance).
The qualities I value in a person are things like sensitivity, wit, humor, loving & caring, intelligence, trustworthy and thoughtful. What good is having confidence if it leads to ill-informed and thoughtless decisions?
Bookie, perhaps all you need are some nerves. I draw a lot of strength from Emi. With her by my side I can do anything. When I’m off and alone, facing difficulties or just facing new and unfamiliar things, I have to tell myself, “just be yourself and everything will be alright”. Bookie, if you can stand in front of a group of elementary school kids by yourself, well, you have the confidence to do anything!
Good luck!
Mike
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Post by booklady on Jul 10, 2008 17:48:52 GMT -5
That is good advice, Mike. Thank you.  |
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Post by joew on Jul 10, 2008 18:37:15 GMT -5
What do you do when you need to boost your confidence? … I wish I could help, but my problem is too much confidence. Mike's advice sounds good. I'd only add that depending on the exact circumstances, you can remind yourself that you were chosen to do what you are doing because you are capable, or that what you are asking for is entirely reasonable, etc. In other words, you belong where you are, doing what you are doing, at that particular moment. |
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Post by booklady on Jul 10, 2008 18:52:12 GMT -5
What do you do when you need to boost your confidence? … ... you can remind yourself that you were chosen to do what you are doing because you are capable, or that what you are asking for is entirely reasonable, etc. Yes, well, I hate going to schmooze with people to try to convince them that they should choose me to do what I want them to choose me to do.  |
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Post by booklady on Jul 10, 2008 18:53:00 GMT -5
Of course, the best thing to do is to get very organized and be well prepared. This still speaks to me as the best way to have confidence in what you have to do. Hey! Maybe I should make some biscuits. |
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Post by slb2 on Jul 10, 2008 22:58:19 GMT -5
A few weeks ago in a counseling session I recalled my earliest memory where I lacked confidence (I failed miserably giving a speech on squash in 2nd grade - I know, a tough topic on which to thrill your classmates), and then I reimagined it as if I had been a confident and capable young lad giving a brilliant speech. It took about 10 minutes to think back and reimagine it, and I've been more noticably more comfortable and confident at work since then. I have a friend who gave me similar advice. I was bemoaning a terrible joke I had told someone I care about and how I couldn't seem to quit thinking of that moment in time. She said that what she did was to imagine the moment, but then have it turn out the way she wanted it to or would have wished it to turn out. I still can't do that, but I've quit obsessing about that awful joke. And if you must know, I told it to a seminarian friend. It was about sex.  |
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Post by slb2 on Jul 10, 2008 23:01:00 GMT -5
What do you do when you need to boost your confidence? … I wish I could help, but my problem is too much confidendence. Yes, joew, I sail the same cocky seas! Too much confidence. |
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Post by michael on Jul 10, 2008 23:26:25 GMT -5
Perhaps one asset that I seem to have that is good for self confidence is a poor memory. I can’t remember anything about second grade. Ace, did you go to elementary school in Minnesota? Giving speeches about squash in second grade!!! My goodness, were they grooming the students for a life in agribusiness?
I don’t think I had to give my first speech until at least third grade. I think it was on the use of nuclear weapons for insuring world peace, or something along those lines; typical kids stuff.
Mike
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Post by michael on Jul 11, 2008 8:10:04 GMT -5
Ace, you really are a breath of fresh air. I don't know why you decided to join us, but we are so fortunate that you did. Enjoy Savanna, I hear it's a great place for an anniversary.
Respectfully,
Mike
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Post by liriodendron on Jul 11, 2008 12:36:27 GMT -5
And if you must know, I told it to a seminarian friend. It was about sex. I once came within a hairsbreadth of telling the father of one my youngest son's Little League teammates, who was, at the time, sitting in a University of Michigan folding chair, that at the University of Illinois they sold t-shirts that read, "Muck Fichigan". I later learned that he was the priest at the Episcopal Church in town. YIKES! |
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Post by gailkate on Jul 11, 2008 15:49:21 GMT -5
Yikes, indeed! You do realize that the true sacrilege is in telling such a joke about my alma mater, don't you? Mine and many of my family for nearly a century. Harumph.
I'm so delighted by Ace's exercise in re-imagining his squash speech that from now on all I'll need to boost my confidence is to say,"Squash!"
In fact, I'm practicing right now. You can smile broadly and say squash like a ventriloquist. Relaxed and smiling, whatever confronts you will be bowled over by your confidence and good humor. So go ahead, Bl, walk boldly into every interview thinking of Ace's squash speech and you'll knock'em dead.
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Post by joew on Jul 11, 2008 17:41:57 GMT -5
I'm glad we clarified that Ace wasn't telling the 2nd graders about squash, the game. That would be harder to reimagine as a success! |
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Post by booklady on Jul 11, 2008 20:40:25 GMT -5
I brought Ace and his squash story along with me as went in pursuit of a couple of jobs today. Unexpectedly, I ended up with two impromptu interviews. Thanks, Ace, and all "confidence builder" advisors.
They both went very well, if only to make a couple of important contacts. One was not an official interview in any sense of the word (they won't even be having formal interviews for at least 5-6 weeks), and the other one is for a job that might not even be available. We'll see. I was happy just to be "back in the saddle," as they say.
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Post by slb2 on Jul 11, 2008 21:30:01 GMT -5
Yes, I'm happy to be back in the saddle, too.  |
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Post by booklady on Jul 12, 2008 8:00:39 GMT -5
 You are so baaaaad.
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Post by Gracie on Jul 12, 2008 9:35:13 GMT -5
I wear red. And unless it's a scorcher out, I wear my hair down, because it's so often pinned up or French-braided, and I've been told that my hair is my one true beauty.
This doesn't mean that I think beauty equals confidence, just that when I feel beautiful I feel confident, and wearing red makes me feel powerful.
And no one ever forgets the lady in red....
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Post by gailkate on Jul 12, 2008 13:33:27 GMT -5
Clothes as a confidence builder hadn't occurred to me, but I bet we all have something we think of as lucky or special. A friend of mine had a knock-out suit that made the rest of us wish we could look so put-together and powerful. She said it was her divorce suit - the one she went to court in. |
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Post by Gracie on Jul 12, 2008 14:15:36 GMT -5
Oh yeah.....when my first marriage was ending my two best friends (gay, alas, and gorgeous, dammit) came to my house on THE day and chose my clothes and Randy did my hair and my makeup (that was his career and he was good at it) and then JT took me to court. In no way, looking at him, would you ever know his orientation...I mean we're talking GQ model gorgeous, and when I asked him why he and Randy were doing this for me, he said it was because if you know you look good you don't take sh*t from anybody.
And knowing that my soon-to-be ex had his VERY pregnant mistress waiting to marry him the minute our divorce was final....it did help. A lot. My ex did a double take when he saw me, since it had been three years. That was one of the best moments of an otherwise horrific day.
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Post by gailkate on Jul 13, 2008 9:56:05 GMT -5
Great story, Gracie! I mean, of course it was a horrific day following a horrific marriage, but this has the makings of a fine scene in a movie. You looking dynamite on the arm of a GQ hunk and the preggers girlfriend looking slouchy and puffy. Probably unwashed hair and, lessee, maybe swollen feet in dollar store rubber thongs. My apologies to all the brave women who have endured the discomforts of pregnancy, but this is Gracie's moment of triumph. I'm thinking Rupert Everett for JT: www.imdb.com/media/rm1492162560/nm0000391 |
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Post by gailkate on Jul 13, 2008 10:02:05 GMT -5
Just the right look for divorce court:  |
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Post by booklady on Jul 13, 2008 12:23:53 GMT -5
Oh, yes! Rupert Everett. Sigh. How can he be that handsome and not like women "that way"?
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Post by Gracie on Jul 16, 2008 16:21:26 GMT -5
Well, not too far off. JT was what you call black Irish....very pale skin, very dark hair, the bluest blue eyes God ever made. He did tell me once that he WANTED to want me, and did I know what a compliment that truly was, and I did; if he had been able to want a woman in all the ways, I would have been the one. And lest you think he said that to all the girls who loved him (and we were legion) his mother, father, roommates, and others all said the same thing--they had never seen him connect with a woman the way he did with me.
He was also the one who introduced me to the joys of margaritas on a scorching summer night....when he ordered the first ones, he announced that we would save the straws, so that by the end of the evening, when we had had many too many to know how many too many we had had, we would know how many too many we had had. (Yes, it actually made sense.) The next morning I awoke to a cocktail table in my living room that was COVERED in straws. I don't THINK we had that many too many....but I don't know.
And he was the one who encouraged me to kick off my shoes and dance, which I did, with great abandon and enjoyment, and also the one who--when the black lights went on--immediately covered my behind with his hands, because my white lace underpants were GLOWING THROUGH my green dress. And he was the one who named me the lady in red, because he'd request that song for me when we danced together.
And he was the one who sent me roses with 'to a battered rose who blooms again,' and the one who, when I couldn't sleep during those divorce days, would sit on my bed and play his guitar and sing me to sleep. And when I woke up he'd still be there, holding me.
You see why I said gay, dammit?!!
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Post by gailkate on Jul 16, 2008 18:01:40 GMT -5
Damn right we do. I'm in love with JT. I want to leave all my worldly goods to JT. I would follow JT to Kyrgyzstan. Darn good thing I'm married.
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Post by Gracie on Jul 17, 2008 16:17:49 GMT -5
Ah, and he would LOVE you. He had a great, wicked sense of humor, and he made me laugh so hard and so much that I would practically choke, and then he'd say, "Breathe....breathe!" And then I would laugh again.
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Post by joew on Jul 17, 2008 18:06:25 GMT -5
He sounds like a wonderful person. You were fortunate to have him for a friend at that period of your life. Actually, he seems like a good person to have as a friend at any time.
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Dopey Member
You are so baaaaad. 