From what I can remember, I have always been a fairly confident person. I may have been more shy and reserved in my younger years, but I never really had an issue with holding a conversation, walking into a room or presenting myself in a strong way. From the outside, I believe I presented myself in a way that I knew who I was.
As I got older, I did realize that there is a difference between being "confident" and being "secure" in who I am. Confidence and security are not necessarily the same thing. To me, Confidence is how you present yourself to the world, how you show up and security is how you feel about yourself when it's just you (when no one is watching).
Confidence to me can be bold, loud, and the way you speak up for yourself. Security to me, is subtle. It's not about proving anything to anyone, it's just about knowing who you are. It's about knowing what you are willing and not willing to tolerate and it's about knowing what you stand for. Most importantly, it's not needing everyone else to agree with it.
That is the part that took the most time for me...security.
You can be confident and still:
Question yourself after making a decision.
Feel insecure when people misunderstand you.
Look for validation in quiet, reserved ways.
Change who you are depending on who you are around.
All of these are not a lack of confidence, but a lack of inner security and that is what I needed to work on.
Nowadays, social media has also been a factor or an influence in how young people are perceiving themselves. They are questioning if they are doing enough, comparing their lives with other people, wondering if they should be further along and questioning if people would approve of them or their lives.
Surprisingly for me, it was not social media that had me working on my inner self, but comparing my real life with others' real life and also remembering all of the expectations and milestones I reached or did not reach that had me questioning my inner security and how I felt about myself.
When you are truly secure in who you are, you can see all of the flaws, you can see other people living their lives and none of that will make you question yourself, how far you've come or the decisions you make.
You can absolutely appreciate someone else's life without needing to reshape your own to match it.
Security isn't just about having it all together and having it all figured out (trust me, there's so much I am still figuring out).
But security can look like:
Standing by your choices, even when others may not agree.
Being okay with being misunderstood. ( I definitely struggled with this, I felt like people were misunderstanding me purposefully).
Living a life that aligns with you and not what looks good to others.
Trusting yourself enough to pivot, grow and change without the validation of others.
Showing up the same way, regardless of who's watching.
It's a deeper kind of confidence, confidence that doesn't need reinforcement or validation.
Things change when you stop focusing on how you are being perceived and start focusing on how you are choosing to show up for yourself. It doesn't matter what people think about you if you're not even solid in what you think about yourself.
I'll always be a confident person, that's just who I am. But the version of me I'm growing into now? She's secure.
She doesn't need to pretend or mask.
She doesn't need constant validation.
She doesn't need to explain herself to everyone.
She knows who she is.
She stands on what she believes.
And she's building a life that feels good to her and not just one that looks good to others.
That's the goal.
Not just to be seen as confident but to feel secure in who I am, no matter who's watching.
If you love this Canvas Tote pictured, I am linking it below!
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