Do you have lots of big dreams, but even more fears and self-doubts? Do you look at your heroes and wonder how they manage to feel so confident all the time?

That’s what today’s post is about, in response to this question from Rachel:

What are your “secrets” to consistently have the self-esteem/confidence to go for it?

Well, Rachel, here’s my secret — are you ready? Drum roll please…

 I don’t wait until I have the self-esteem or confidence!

Yep, it’s really that simple. I guarantee that the only real difference between you and your heroes — the ones who seem to consistently have the self-esteem/confidence to go for it — is that they don’t let their fears and self-doubt stop them.

Trust me, your heroes feel the same kinds of self-doubts that you do. They hear gremlin voices telling them they aren’t good enough, that they’ll surely fail, that they’ll fall on their face…

They just don’t let those voices stop them!

I’m sort of pleased that I come across to you as consistently having the self-esteem/confidence to go for it, Rachel, but I’m also vaguely surprised, because that perception is rarely how I actually feel inside! The truth is, it’s really not a matter of self-esteem or confidence. If anything, it’s a matter of self-compassion and imperfectionism.

In short, I practice allowing myself to be imperfect, and treating myself with kindness and love even so. 

The Truth About Self-Esteem

Self-esteem is based on how we think other people perceive us – it’s all about self-image, really. A gold star means we’re okay; a black mark means we suck.

Since we can never control how other people perceive us, however, guess what happens when we run our lives in the pursuit of high self-esteem? We’re permanently strapped to an emotional roller coaster: happy when we garner lots of gold stars, and miserable when we get black marks.

We’re never able to relax into our true selves, because we’re always trying to manage our self-image. Anything less than perfection makes us feel lousy, and since we can never be perfect, we end up feeling lousy quite a lot.

That’s the first half of my life in a nutshell!

Self-compassion takes a totally different route. Instead of managing our self-image, always aiming at perfection to try and make ourselves “acceptable” and worthy of love and belonging, self-compassion honors the fact that all of us have strengths and weaknesses.

To me, it feels like a much softer way to live. And it’s what allows me to create much more prolifically now than I ever did in my perfectionist youth!

In fact, this is my simple, secret formula for being prolific: imperfectionism + effort + time. I guarantee it works!

[Tweet “@a_creative_life ‘s simple, secret formula for being prolific: imperfectionism + effort + time.”]

I don’t have to wait until I’m perfect! I can be messy and real. I can try things, make mistakes, and not feel like the sky is going to fall!

Yet, even for an avowed imperfectionist like me, I freely confess that it’s still so easy to find ways to stall, and not go for it.

The Truth About Why We Stall

Tell me, do any of these sound familiar?

“I’ll wait until I have another credential.”

“I’ll just polish this thing until it’s perfect, and then I’ll try putting it out in the world…”

“I’m not good enough yet. I need to take some classes/practice five thousand more hours/prove that I’ve achieved some level of expertise first.”

Or worst of all, “I’ll never be good enough, so why bother trying?”

I’m not immune to these tactics! I wasn’t even going to make a ketubah for my recent wedding, because unconsciously I’d set a ridiculously high bar for myself (the “perfect” ketubah), one which I’d never reach.

Same thing for the poster of my Keys to Creative Flow: I stalled for over a year, because I wanted to make something awesome, and I just knew I couldn’t make anything as good as I wanted it to be.

Thankfully, in both cases (and many more I could share with you!) I eventually realized that I’d gotten stuck (once again!) in perfectionist paralysis. So I set the conscious intention to approach each goal as a Creative Sandbox project — I put myself in the mindset of a 4-year old playing in a sandbox.

I would use my Keys to Creative Flow to help me create a poster of my Keys to Creative Flow! (How meta….)

I consciously decided to be an imperfectionist, to focus on having fun, rather than on being impressive. No more trying to be amazingly awesome — my goal was to have fun!

Guess what? I got the projects done!

Are they perfect? No way! But I had a blast creating them, and I’ve decided I like the feeling of “done” way better than the feeling of perfectionist paralysis.

So the next time you notice yourself not going for it because you lack self-esteem or confidence, I challenge you to do what I do: notice your fears and self-doubts, but don’t take direction from them. Practice allowing yourself to be imperfect and treating yourself with compassion, and see how that changes things.

Remember my Golden Formula: self-awareness + self-compassion = the key to everything good.

[Tweet “@a_creative_life ‘s Golden Formula: self-awareness + self-compassion = the key to everything good.”]

Do you have a question you’d like to ask? Email me and I may use it in a future Question Time! blog post.

PS — Pssst! Know someone who might benefit from seeing this today? Pass it on!