A few days ago I heard this phrase:
Don't doubt yourself, doubt your doubts.
At first it can sound like a new-age, simplistic way of looking at our moments of confusion and hesitation.
But, for some reason, I heard this differently. I heard it more profoundly, as if my intuition was pointing me to a deeper truth underneath this saying.
This short text is my best attempt now to share what I saw. Enjoy!
What doubt really is
We all feel doubtful. Many times during the day even. Heck, for certain things and situations we don't even know anything ELSE but to doubt our choices. Doubt may start as a smart way to simply take a step back and think twice before doing something, but soon it can turn into a muddled up mind and a lot of frozen inactivity.
Doubt can be appealing because the more we doubt the less we need to deal with that fear of making a wrong choice. Even though we may have huge amounts of disbelief towards ourselves, we can keep being comfortable with where we are, resisting that simple desire to expand and grow.
We can get so caught up in the fear of a wrong choice that we think we MUST find the right heavenly choice in order to move forward, whereas in actuality all we truly want is the freedom to keep moving with the confidence of knowing we can always make the best with what we got and learn from our mistakes.
And here's the thing:
We are made to keep moving forward
We naturally make a million of effortless decisions every single day without even noticing. We find ourselves in various scenarios, dealing with different people, attempting things we never done before, every, single, day.
Whether you are cooking, cleaning the house, creating a game for your children, telling a story or writing that report you need for tomorrow.
There's always a decision in place, every moment, with every activity. Most of the time we just don't see these decision as a big deal, we are just going with the flow right? Just following our common sense.
However, even with decisions that really seem important because we may have a lot at stake to lose or a big change ahead (such as getting into a new relationship or firing an employee), at these times of doubt we can only imagine how much we will lose, but we can't measure how much we will get.
We forget that the same intelligence that has always been there to help us make thousands of decisions each day will also be there to assist us in whatever direction we chose to undertake. We forget that we are incredibly resilient, we are born to bounce back to a clear mind and overcome our struggles - we always do.
When we don't have a lot in our minds we basically run freely and loosely. We are not worrying if something goes wrong or if we don't get what we want. We just act intuitively in the best way we know at that moment, not much thinking, just flow.
We may fuck things up, make mistakes and not know what to do next. That is fine, happens all the time. Just as a kid learning how to walk, when we are not so caught up in our thoughts we just naturally dust off and keep trying, keep using that innate and unlimited capacity of creativity to figure out new ways to move forward.
When we feel doubtful it is just our mind having insecure thinking about our choices in that moment, it doesn't mean that we need to listen to it. It's just more noise in our heads as we look to make a decision.
Whether you take on the path A or B, you will never fully know what will happen anyways. Our best bet is on a future based on our past experiences, but when we let go of trying to bring our past to the future and get open for a whole new way of thinking and being in the world, we will often find that being lead by insight, common sense and without paying much attention to that noise in our heads can take us places we never imagined.
So, "Don't doubt yourself, doubt your doubts" for me means: you don't need to pay attention to what you can or cannot do, because you can always rely on your innate, intelligent capacity to get over and make the best out of any situation; whenever in doubt, see how that's just a mix of muddled up noises coming from insecure thinking, you don't need to worry about those neither, give it space and it will clear out.
If I may invite you for something it would be this:
As you go through your days, notice all the little decisions you make and things you do within a split second. Notice how you do them as best as you know how, just because that makes sense for you at that time. Lastly, just notice how you naturally overcome things, how many of the thousand things you already overcame in the past, and if given space, how effortless it is for your low moods and negative emotions to pass and you come back to a clear mind.
Much love,
Felipe.
If you would like to explore this topic with more depth so you can start letting go and letting life guide you, coaching might be good for you. Contact me for an inquire about it.