“Doubt is a killer.  You just have to know who you are and what you stand for,” Jennifer Lopez.  In the concept of going for it and pulling the trigger, it makes it far easier if we know who we are and what we stand for.  When the opportunities arise that align with those values and that identity, it makes it easier to take the shot.  When we doubt who we are or our capability, it’s easy to convince ourselves that we can’t do it.  Doubt stops more people than actual circumstances do.  And the more we deny ourselves the opportunity to try things, the more comfortable we become with not doing.  It becomes easier and easier to convince ourselves that it’s safer to just not go for it, that it wouldn’t work for us, or worse, that it wasn’t meant for us. No one is perfect out of the gate.  Not to say that innate talent doesn’t exist—it really does—but even that talent needs to be honed and developed.  So we need to get ourselves to the point of having enough confidence to take that first step.

Doubt and fear kill more dreams than closed doors.  Impatience, people pleasing, and perfectionism are all part of that too—cousins, close seconds, I’m not sure, but they all prevent us from moving forward and contribute to keeping us right where we are.  And here’s the thing: as much as we believe that we are playing it safe, sometimes the very thing we think is keeping us “secure” is the very thing strangling us.  We build our homes and our lives around a concept of security, still trying to buy into a mentality of decades ago.  And we know that isn’t the reality any longer—so if we don’t know who we really are, it’s easy to let the world fill in the blanks.  That’s when we start missing our shot, that’s when we feel the so-called safety promised by others is safe instead of building our own foundation. The only person we have with us our entire lives is ourselves—so that is the standard we need to live by.  What is our strength?  What can we bring to the world?  How can we do good by being who we are instead of assuming a role in a machine that would spit us out anyway? 

Identity isn’t about deciding on something and trying to fit the mold.  Identity is innate and something we simply accept.  It’s when things feel right, like they fit.  I won’t say that we can’t change who we are because it’s always possible, but the successful change comes down to the things that FEEL right.  Identity is about wearing what fits.  It’s easy to know who we are when it feels right, when the outside matches the inside—then we know the steps.  When dealing with doubt we need to remind ourselves that it’s only us who stop progression.  While that can be a comforting feeling because that means we can always change the narrative, it’s also a sobering feeling because anything we’ve wanted to do becomes fully our responsibility.  And that’s a good thing.  This isn’t about being perfect, it’s about doing what is perfect for us.  And even if something feels right, it can still take some time to break it in to the point it becomes natural.  Some level of self-doubt is natural because from a survival stand point we have to make sure we don’t end up dead when we try something.  But we are meant to squash that voice that tells us we aren’t able.  Break that self-imposed barrier and be who we are meant to be—give ourselves and the world no doubt about who we are.