Betting on myself

The key to happiness is believing in yourself

So much of my life has been spent questioning myself and wallowing in anxiety that I can’t even take a moment to celebrate how far I’ve come and what I’m capable of doing. I wake up anxious every day even though everything is fine. It’s a travesty really because it holds me back from enjoying life, doing my most productive work and living my best life. What do I really fear? Worst-case scenarios of all sorts. Losing a job, a loved one or just being a failure in general. Not being good enough or enough. But what if I flipped the paradigm and bet on myself?

I have so much in life to be grateful for and should be confident about the life that I’ve built. I’ve moved continents and re-built my life from scratch multiple times. I’ve survived a failed marriage and thrived in a good one. I have a beautiful daughter and healthy parents. I’ve found success in multiple career tracks for over a decade and a half. I’m capable if only I choose to believe versus question.

Why don’t we believe in ourselves? That’s a question as old as time itself but it’s the key to unlocking the joy in the journey. We will do what we have to do every day but if we believe in ourselves, we can actually enjoy the process and realise that we are living the life of our dreams. I’m happy. There, I said it. I’m actually happy. But I don’t let myself feel happy. That’s a mental war crime against myself. I have a happy family life, play tennis with friends twice a week and am fulfilled at my job. What else do I want? A guarantee that I’ll be happy forever and that this moment won’t end? How about beginning by actually enjoying this moment?

I’ve tried affirmation exercises and gratitude journals. They’re great. But why do I need to do this every day? Why can’t I just believe in myself once and then let it roll continuously versus living like I wake up every day from ground zero? There must be a missing piece but what is it?

Even the act of writing this column — seeking catharsis by pouring out my soul — is a strange one. How does saying everything out loud help one to believe in oneself? The one thing that does boost my confidence is when someone else compliments me. Says something nice or recognises a strength. I always try to build a life where I seek internal validation only, but does external validation feel good when it comes. Should I just stop fighting myself and chase external validation if I know it works? Is that the secret to believing in myself that I’ve been missing? Is external validation the final piece of the jigsaw puzzle?

Perhaps betting on oneself begins by accepting oneself. With all our beauty and all our flaws. To say it’s okay to be yourself. To be lazy one day — or for many days — and to be our best on other days. That our belief in ourselves isn’t linked to the outcomes we drive in our life that are externally validated as ‘success’ from society. But in between all of that, it’s okay to chase external validation as a dopamine hit to keep us going as a milestone. That these thoughts are self-contradicting is also okay because that is what the human experience is: confusing and contradictory. But confusing and contradictory don’t need to be negative emotions, they can simply be the midwives to curiosity. That beautiful human emotion that’s led to all progress since the beginning of time itself: curiosity.

While I was in the process of writing this article (took me two days), I got a call from a friend that provided significant external validation and offered a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to pursue a dream I always had. This made me feel good momentarily and increased my belief in myself serendipitously. Writing about believing in yourself doesn’t automatically make you believe in yourself but it can manifest things in strange ways. Here’s to betting on manifestation.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 20^th, 2023.

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