The Perception of Confidence

Confidence is an amazing thing don’t you think? How people have it in abundance and it just oozes out of them. Take a local Park Run or race for example; you rock up, hover at the back wondering why you’re there, completely out of your comfort zone, think everyone is staring at you and then everywhere you look you see them – the confident army. With their smiles and laughter and ‘good lucks’ – who are these people? Are they really real?

Those uber confident ‘athletes’ strutting their stuff on your streets, in your pools, on your cycle lanes etc. weren’t always confident. Like an oak tree growing from an acorn, they weren’t always super confident, they became or learnt to be confident…

Me, I’m one of these people. I’m super confident, loud, mouthy northern girl. I’ve never felt more comfortable and confident in my own skin than I do right now. No one likes a show off and that is in no way how I want to be perceived. If I told some of my best friends that rewind ten years and I was the shy girl stuck in the corner too afraid to socialise or even go out in the first place they’d laugh in my face.

I vividly remember my first ‘grown up’ run – ran too fast, felt like death, never again. After my first run I quit for a good six months.  Desperate to get fit I then started stalking a local running group for about three more months until I built up the ‘guts’ to join them on a run. They were the most friendly, lovely bunch of people that I’d ever met AND super-duper confident. So this confused me, how can lovely people be so confident – in my world I had yet to marry the two. So I continued on this journey, returning to the club regularly and I continued to become me – the true me.

Through sport and exercise I have been encouraged and supported to have a go. As my ability has grown so has by self-confidence. But it’s not a direct link, there is a key step in the middle – “exercise buddies”. Sub consciously my exercise buddies over the last ten years have turned me from a shy Susan to a confident Clara. This isn’t a free relationship, what you take out you give back. Not at the same time, just when it’s needed. So this is me giving a little back to you – yes you reading this right now. You’re not alone and what you see as confidence is also friendliness.

Perception intrigues me. What I think may be completely different to what you think and vice versa. So who is right? Both! You see perception is such a personal thing, it’s your voices in your head – how you see the world. I just wanted to point out that whatever we think there is always another side.

At work I’ve often been caught swimming down corridors (stroke practice) and doing exercises in the office – people in this environment aren’t as encouraging. I don’t get a smile suggesting I should continue, more a grimace to suggest I should be in a ‘looney bin’ and that’s not professional behaviour.  It’s not as easy to gain confidence here so my advice to you is fake it until you make it, if you pretend you will become. (Look up Amy Cuddy Ted Talk).

So fake it until you become it – be more oak tree than acorn. Be proactive in the world of exercise buddies – spot the shy one and make them feel at ease, we were all shy and scared once because our perception was different.

I know it’s not as simple as this, but it kinda is. I too shrink back to my unconfident self. After starting back at the pool I had a practice session where I quickly switched form the fast lane to a lane that was too slow for me because the other guy in the lane was a little quicker than me but more importantly not smiley! Although the lady in the next lane was a little slower than me, that’s OK as I paced myself so not to clash and also had a lovely encouraging chat with her (both ways!).

Thanks for taking the time to read and as my late father-in-law always said Keep Smiling, it goes a long way.