Nurturing MORE Confidence

This post is about nurturing MORE confidence in your children. It is also about nurturing your own confidence. How you view the mistakes you make influences your confidence. Developing your ability to encourage yourself when you feel discouraged influences your confidence as does recognizing and understanding the many parts that compose who you are. Your confidence is a model for others. Stay buoyant!

Confidence is an embodied, integrated sense of who we are that allows us to expand what we reach for, enjoy what we do, and rebound during challenges.  In our last column, we explored three ways to nurture confidence in our children.  Here are three more ways to nurture even more confidence!   

Please note that confidence is not arrogance, a desire to overpower or out do others, or smugness.  A confident child is not “full of themselves”.  A confident child is secure enough to move through something challenging or to move towards something that they desire.  Even if they may feel afraid, they are willing to “go for it”.  

Support mistakes as a way of learning rather than seeing them as failures or reflections of one’s character.  The way that you handle mistakes is your child’s first glimpse into beliefs about mistakes, learning, and failure.  If you are slapping your forehead, making critical remarks about yourself either out loud or internally, or getting angry with yourself, your child may believe that mistakes are things to be avoided at all costs.  If you punish your child for making mistakes, they may not only believe that mistakes are bad but that they themselves are bad, too. 

We all learn through making mistakes, whether it is hitting a wrong note on a musical instrument, not turning in a homework assignment, or spilling the proverbial milk.  We learn the concept of cause and effect.  We learn the consequence of our actions, which is the basis of responsibility.  We can then decide how to handle it differently the next time. 

When mistakes are not such a threat, children will dare to take healthy risks with confidence.  If the possibility of making a mistake is viewed as dangerous, children will stay well within the safety of their comfort zones.  

Notice when your children are discouraged, then encourage them and guide them to encourage themselves.  Being discouraged means that a need is not being met.  When our needs are not met, we tend to “misbehave” more.  We may be grouchy, withdrawn, resistant, defensive, or not interested in the people or things we are typically interested in. 

Two key needs that we all share – children and adults alike – are the need to be powerful and the need to belong. 

Decision-making and leadership are great ways to meet the need to be powerful.  Being heard, recognized, and acknowledged are ways to meet the need to belong.    

As children grow, they become more and more responsible for meeting their own needs.  They become a resource for themselves, and the more they see their own resourcefulness, the more confident they become. 

Encourage your children to recognize and understand the many parts of themselves.  There may be a part of them that is confident in certain situations.  There may be another part that shows up when they are not confident.  Often, we want to make those uncomfortable or fearful parts go away.  Although we may ignore them or encapsulate them, they remain a part of us.  Getting to know that under-confident part can provide big insights.  Understanding and befriending that part can be integrating and confidence building.   

Being confident does not mean that you never feel afraid.  It means that you are aware of feeling afraid, feel it, and befriend it.  You get curious about what fear can share with you.  Will it assist you in being more discerning?  Will it be a motivator?  Will it help you become more comfortable with discomfort?  Is it letting you know that what you are undertaking may be unsafe or not in your best interest?  We can listen to our feelings and then confidently decide how to move forward. 

Here’s hoping that you are moving towards even more confidence in yourself and even greater ease in nurturing confidence in your children!