I’ve been traveling an ungodly amount lately and when I’m unable to affix myself to the Webs I just drift off into random thought. Sometimes I think about things I have to do, other times I’ll re-live frustrating situations and get re-pissed about them and still other times I create fractious, hypothetical situations out of thin air wherein I mentally argue with made up people in public settings. Recently, however, I somehow fell into a constructive thought-river and started contemplating the concept of confidence. What is it REALLY? How do people get it? Why do some people crumble so easily while others persevere and succeed? Nothing original there, but I had an uncanny feeling that maybe there was more to it than what’s on the surface.
Then, while desperately trying to find a cab in another city, it hit me. Confidence in any scenario isn’t about trying to convince yourself, “Hey! I’m awesome-squared!” It’s about feeling like you have options. Whenever you have at least one other option in life, you feel relaxed, safe and cool because if the one thing doesn’t work out, you’re not going to die. Literally. It’s all that limbic system/survival mechanism shit. The brain is more like an onion than an apple. In other words, layers and layers of higher evolution still clamp down onto a primitive brain stem and the core of everything we do gets processed the way a lizard would.
Using the taxi example, if there were tons of them readily available I would take my time and casually grab whichever one happen to suit me. With only one or even an absence of them altogether, I feel desperate and needy. That one damned cab suddenly becomes very important because I believe it to be my only option for moving toward what I want. Next comes the “what if” game: What if I can’t find another one? What if I can’t get to where I’m going? The “what if” game is largely pointless and stems from panic & irrational fear, i.e., Lizard T. Brainworth. How many “what if” worst-case scenarios actually come true? My guess is almost none of them.
“Well how do I get options if they don’t seem apparent?” might be your next question if you bothered to read this far. It’s simple: Strive for excellence in something you love. When you commit yourself to a higher principle of excellence, that will always be at least one other option for you to fall back on. When you’re learning how to do something you enjoy and ultimately doing it well, that becomes mental currency that you can use as armor for a variety of seemingly unrelated situations, and therein lies the cool mind sorcery of it all: the options you create DO NOT have to relate to the situations in which you want to be confident. You don’t have to be an ace with the ladies to pick up more ladies—you can excel at something entirely different and still get the action you so richly deserve. The key is for you to feel safe and comfortable.
Options→Safety→Comfort→Confidence
For me, when I have a run of particularly good stand-up shows I feel like I have that as a cushion no matter how else I get rejected anywhere else. The mere option of being able to do comedy fuels my confidence in virtually every other aspect of my life whether it be in professional or social situations.
Why is this important? Because the more confidence you are able to cram into your heart, the more you attract good stuff in life. It’s kind of a cold economy of Nature to reward those who don’t seem to need it. I think it stems from the idea that if an organism is strong, it’s worthy of passing on its genes. If said organism is desperate and needy, it must be flawed and its spreading must be limited.
So find a thing! Learn it, like it, live it. Give yourself the gift of options. Then bask in the warming cascade of feeling comfortable in your own skin and the good things that await you! Exclamation points!!!!
{ 65 comments… read them below or add one }
Very well written, you wise jedi.
Having a huge penis also helps, but that’s not an option available to everyone.
Thank you.
i’m still at the hypothetical arguement stage, but it does give me options of things to write about
cheers for the advice – i think you are onto something there!
That’s something I definitely needed to hear. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
Awesome post there Mr. Hardwick.
I’ve never really thought of it this way, but I’ve definitely experienced it. I used to teach programming classes, and was always nervous that something would break while I was standing in front of a few dozen peers. Finally it broke, and it wasn’t bad. I realized that there were ways to make the class work even when a mistake was made and every class after that was 100% easier.
I knew that the code breaking because of a type or error wasn’t a failure, it was another way to accomplish my goal. Once it became an option instead of a consequence, I was 100% better at my job.
Thank you!
I love these moments of clarity that you share with us!
Chris nice post, it’s good to throw in one like this every once in a blue moon…
Wow Chris. Nicely said- and inspiring. A few years ago I discovered the “thing” I want to excel in- what I wanted to love to do, and it’s amazing what a positive and fulfilling effect it has had in my life. Thanks for your thoughtful, and always clever, words of affirmation. Happy travels to you.i
I actually dig it. Though, I’d have said the brain was like a nice parfait, rather than it being like an onion. While both have layers, a parfait is, like a brain, squishy – whereas an onion, unless fried, is not. And who wants a fried brain? *End Shrek yoinkery*
Look at Mr. Hardwick, dropping the philosophy bombs.
Great post, you don’t see a lot of people breaking down thought like that. I enjoyed the read.
Interesting, thanks for the article.
Thanks. Excellent blog..very insightful.
As crackpot theories go, I’ve read worse. Well written!
And people say no one uses a Philosophy degree! Also, it’s nice to know that other people stage imaginary arguments in their heads.
Thanks for a truly thought provoking article! Confidence always seems such an abstract and ephemeral concept when trying to “get” it. It’s always an internal thing that you either have or have not (with the associated feelings of each), and you seem to immediately lose it when you need it most. (Public Speaking, anyone?!)
This idea makes it more concrete. Grow your confidence in what you love, then watch it spread to the rest of your life. Like with money, you get a little, then attract a lot. Great article!
You drop these little life experience blog bombs every once and a while. They’re really great… profound. Well written Chris. Thanks.
Very timely post for me to read. As others have said, it’s just a matter of finding your ‘thing.’ I think I’ve found it, but I’m not quite in a position to strike out and do it, so right now almost every aspect of my life is suffering from a lack of confidence. I just need to convince myself that even finding my ‘thing’ should be enough to give me the confidence to get through this limbo period until I’ll be free to pursue my dream! Great post. Thanks.
Thank you so much for posting this. Well thought out, well written, very comforting and really made me think about all the things I worry about in life and whether they’re worth worrying about. Most of them aren’t.
I love the fact that you re-think of arguments and get re-pissed off. And the hypothetical arguments you have with imaginary people. That just shows you have an excellent imagination!
Great read, thanks for your words of wisdom!
Chris, that was absolutely fantastic… and literally exactly what I needed today, as I have an existential crisis of mass proportions, in a new and unfamiliar city. Thank you so much. This blog continues to enrich my life, both as a Nerdist and as lizard brained human thing.
Another gem of advice. If you ever fail as a comedian you so have the option of being a good influence on people, like a cool Dr Phil without the bullshit – wait, what does that leave?, (well Phil at his best lets say).
This is actually not too far off from some self-help programs I’ve read up on – you see, this line of thinking works with how your brain is ‘wired’, so much so that you would more readily accept the possibility of positive outcomes. Also, more obviously you observed the futility of having and keeping those frustrating hang-ups.
‘Fess up, Chris – have you been reading Wayne Dyer or Robert Kiyosaki?
This is why we all love you Hardwick.
No hating, btw – it’s novel that you came up with it. Just saying you might have to backtrack yourself to check if you didn’t come up with it on your own.
Thanks, all!
And I have read Wayne Dyer, plsbury, but not for years. What you notice, though, if you plow through a lot of these books is that they all basically repackage a lot of the same simple concepts. I interviewed Richard Branson today and he talked about not being afraid to fail, something that is paramount to self-help philosophy. It didn’t occur to me to say, “What book did you take that from??”
So, yes, I’m sure there are bits of Dyer and countless other works swimming around in my noggin but I didn’t pull from anything specific for this article.
My seventh grade pre-algebra teacher would always say “Ignorance is bliss” which I never fully appreciated until I my son became a teenager. He thinks he is invincible. He tries every stunt (back flips off cars onto pavement, for example) assuming he won’t get hurt and so far he’s only broken his nose. He’s confident because he’s ignorant to the cost of an ENT visit.
Many of us are confident because we’ve never experienced failure. A close friend commented before a recent job interview that he had been hired for every job for which he ever applied. He DIDN’T get this job and was devastated. His confidence is now damaged.
So, I think there is a parallel formula to yours about confidence. It’s far simpler:
Inexperience- –> Confidence.
I’m all about personal confidence as a cultural currency but I totally disagree that ‘doing something you love’ is the best way of gaining it. I think something more along the line of ‘do something you’re really good at’ is a better bet.
I think we’ve all had (or been) that friend who didn’t date the low-hanging fruit because they held absurdly high standards for women they wanted to date. That guy gave himself a lot of less options and in turn less confidence to use as the fuel to take down that prize caribou of a lady he spent his days thinking about.
Great stuff, as always!!! So, did your show get picked up? If so, do you need anymore PA’s?
Brilliant work, Chris. Very well constructed argument. Somewhere a Jesuit is smiling.
Well said, Hardwick. I had a similar come to J moment when I realized that the most negative emotion I ever felt was powerlessness. So having, or better yet making options whenever possible seems like a great distancing mechanism from powerlessness. And watching our laid back mutual buddies the Shannons in action was always a great lesson in confidence for me. No matter what was dealt, they could make something good out of it, and knew it. Good stuff.
Dude.. way to go blowing the secret and telling how everybody can be successful and happy in life. Sheesh!
On second thought, okay, yeah.. you are awesome
I believe the brain is MUCH more like a cake (a parfait, perhaps?) than it is an onion.
Haha, but in all seriousness, great, great post. I wholeheartedly agree with everything you’ve said, and I feel filled with a burst of confidence after gaining this insight. I just hope this confidence will actually hold up when I’m in any given trying situation requiring it.
Whenever I’m lacking confidence, i go out in public and yell the f word as loud as i can or walk into the woman’s bathroom
loved the post! i often obsess about things – confidence being one of them. mostly because it baffles me that i have none, while other people have gobs of it – and i mean average people, not picture perfect, uber successful, oozing with confidence people. i’ve often said it is the ever elusive constant in my life – the more i chase it, the further it is from me. even more frustrating is, as soon as i taste the smallest bit of it – WHAM! – i am smacked with a proverbial baseball bat in the side of the head, just to be sure i do not savor the taste for too long.
your theory is very interesting though and i am sure it will work for most people. i, on the other hand, could be doing what i love, but because i am consumed by my imperfections i don’t know that i would ever gain confidence out of my love for it or by excelling at it (consequently i don’t know that it would be possible to say i excel at something – but digression is another flaw of mine). honestly, i could have driven mother teresa to b**tch slap me – that’s how ridiculous i am – which, of course, is a painful realization in and of itself because knowing you are insanely annoying is much worse than being blissfully unaware.
but please keep up the great insights chris! you are a rock star!
thanks for this. its like the verbal equivalent of that unicorn script. all happy making.
People want to write books on this kind of thing, its so nice to just have a simple formula like this. Thanks!
Oh and options are relative too. One might think they don’t have any options with their wife, but I can think of at least two or three good ones.
Very nice, thoughtful read, Chris!
BTW, did you share your theory with Richard Branson?
Wow…that was amazing! I agree 100%.!!! You should write a friggin self help book and title it, “Help Yourself”! On the cover you can have a picture of yourself with your hands out; blue pill in one hand and a red pill in the other. At the bottom it can read, ” Only YOU have the power to help yourself!”….(thats a freebe from me to you Chris)
Come to Louisville. We don’t have a comedy club with a cool name like “Crackers” or “Chuckles”, but Louisvillians do party!
I like your theory! And nice to “meet” you via Lifehacker and twitter today!
From a psychological point of view you’re saying it’s more of our nature that influences confidence than nurture, which there is always a battle over what influences people more, the whole nature vs. nurture argument. For me though I like to think that both can have major influence over every aspect of our lives including confidence. When you get someone in an environment that they are comfortable with they will naturally be more confident no matter what. They might have some apprehensions about something that may be tossed their way but they deal with it and go on. People usually think the so called environment is naturally based. This is understandable because when you think of environment you mostly think of physical surroundings like an office, desk, movie theater, etc. and they all are. I think though there is another environment all together most people don’t even think of when it comes down to it and that is your mind. For many confidence is a learned behavior we are all confident in our own rights to very degrees, especially depending on what we are doing and where we are at that time. For you it’s up on the stage doing comedy or on TV on AOTS, for others it’s in a lab, office, or somewhere else entirely. Now I’m not saying that in those situations everyone is 100% confident in anyway because that is just not true. Except for maybe on rare occasion like the pilot who landed a jet in the Hudson River because he had no time to not be confident. For most people the more times you do something the more confident you become even if it’s a bad experience you do have. Probably the first time you got on stage and did your routine you were a little shaky if not a lot but overtime became more comfortable and confident as you did it over and over again. Have you ever thought about where that behavior comes from, the need to do something over and over again until you become comfortable and confident in doing it? Think Back, way back to the very first thing you can remember learning and then go even further back. Past those memories to times you can’t remember and most likely you go back to 3 maybe 2 years old, maybe even 5 years old. Think how I learned to walk, were my parents holding me by the hands and holding me up while I waddled to one side of the room, always encouraging me and saying how good I was doing. Maybe to the first time I learned how to eat with utensils by myself, were my parents there encouraging me to use the spoon I had even when I made a mess. How bout to when you were learning to tie your shoes, was someone again not there showing you and saying how good you were doing at it. If you didn’t have anybody doing any of those, first I would like to say how sorry I am for you and second how amazed I am that you have gotten this far and have the confidence you do. For those of us that had those times back then it wasn’t all about saying “Yay I get to learn something new”, it was more “Wow look at how much they like it when I do this and on my own.” When that happened we had a little psychological marker laid down that said whenever we do something and become good at it we will be rewarded by the praise and encouragement of others and also be able to do something new. That is the environment that was created in our minds. I agree that the more times you do something the more confident you will become in it. Here’s the kicker though, you can do something over and over and over again and not be totally confident about it but if you have friends, family or someone just to say “Hey keep it up, I know your going to get it.” How much more confidence is gain in that experience than just repeating it over and over with no encouragement at all. As I seat here today I can guarantee you that you will gain so much more that way and want to do it more than just repetitively doing something with no encouragement at all. So I agree with you that for us to be able to become more confident we need to keep at it, but I would also like to say try to get your friends, family, a mentor, somebody that will be there to encourage you as well. For then your confidence gained and maintained will be bountiful.
Huzzah! Well said, sir. I hadn’t considered it quite in that way before.
wow
thats insanely help for me right now thanks Chris Hardwick
thanks
very motivating Mr. Hardwick, awesome job! Coolest Theory I’ve read about so far.
Very cool idea and very well written. I find this to be true in my every day life!
I see. Makes sense.
You and Adam Carolla are my Socrates and Plato. Great clear thinking. We are talking about chemical dump emotions barring us from being at our best. It’s funny this lucidity came on the heels of a mental process similar to schizophrenia.
Hope to hear you on Carolla again soon. i used his link to get here.
Your articles remind me to re-love my thing i am doing. I started doing that thing, strive for more and more successes there, and that’s where I built up my confidence.
However, getting more to do, I feel tired.
But, now, I read this article, and re-found where my energy comes out!
This sounds like something that will be good. 3.141592653589793238462643383279502884197169399375105820974944592307816406286208998628034825342117067982148086513282306647093844609550582231725359408128481117450284102701938521105559644622948954930381966
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