Cathy Liska By Birgit Rohm www.mediocoaching.com
Because confidence influences our success in many different ways, coaches learn during their coaching certification about supporting confidence through awareness, acceptance, and affirmation. In the previous blog, four pillars of confidence were identified and here we dive into the first of the pillars.
Connection: The connection to ourselves – Self-reflection. That means perceiving ourselves. To get an answer to the reasons I think what I think, what is behind saying what I say, and acting the way I act. Sounds easy and often it is so difficult because every thought, expression, and action comes with emotion – and emotions are often pushed away. I can only get a clear head and react rationally and thoughtfully when I am aware of my emotions. We often wish we didn’t feel something and want to push it away, according to the motto, I don’t mind. However, anatomically this is not possible at all, because our vegetative nervous system absorbs every feeling from the outside. It has to because that serves us for survival. Every feeling is tested there to see if a flight-fight-freeze-reaction is necessary. If we are not in acute danger, the information goes on to the brain and our intellect decides what to do. At the same time, while our body receives signals from the outside it also receives signals from the inside. Every thought is accompanied by emotion, i.e. every emotion from outside or inside passes through our body, whether we like it or not. If the intellect has been trained not to want to admit this, then emotions accumulate in the body over time. A mental repression consumes a lot of energy. The managers in our inner team who suppress this emotional stress are anger, frustration, dissatisfaction, etc. This can sooner or later result in exhaustion and pain.
What can we do to avoid this damage and learn to process our emotions?
This leads us to the next pillar – acknowledgement. Come back for the next blog and to continue learning.
