Fake It Until You Feel It Not Fake It Until You Make It

Have you ever been told to fake it until you make it and thought “I wish it was that easy”?

Maybe you were preparing for an interview, presentation or some other anxiety inducing event when someone suggested it. The truth is, how can we fake it until we make it if we do not know what we should be faking?

For example, take confidence, it is not as simple as just switching on the confidence button and suddenly being more confident, especially in situations that elicit a fight, flight, or freeze response. Let’s look at interviewing for example, lacking in confidence can impact how well we focus while preparing and subsequently our ability to answer questions in interview. This knocks our confidence more as it feels like an exhausting loop of being nervous, not performing well in interview which ultimately means that we might have to go through the process for longer than someone who can access their confidence and is successful sooner. 

As someone who has coached people for interviews for the last 12 years, I have seen that despite preparing well, nerves just always seemed to get the better of some people in an interview.

So, what is the answer?

The answer is that we should instead aim to fake it until we feel it.

Let me show you how powerful a tool your mind and body are.

I want you to imagine a situation that was stressful recently, nothing upsetting just mildly stressful, close your eyes and think on it for a moment.

Now notice what you are feeling in your body, I bet that you are starting to feel the symptoms of stress, notice how they show up for you, is your chest tighter, do your shoulders hunch over, sweaty palms, hot/cold, what else are you noticing? What are you thinking?

Isn’t it interesting and a little frustrating how easily we can access that feeling of anxiety and stress whenever we want, the situation is in the past, yet we can reconnect with the feelings and thoughts associated it with it so easily?

Now imagine doing the same for confidence.

Think of a time that you were confident, anytime in your past will do, close your eyes, notice what were you thinking, what were you feeling in your body. Spend some time there exploring it.

Did you find it difficult?

Generally, it is harder for people to think of a time that they were confident and to really recognise their thoughts and feelings, that is because we spend more time paying attention to the stressful situations then we do banking  our confident moments.

However, if we can even think of one situation in life where we felt confident then we can access that feeling again. It just takes a little work. Imagine now going into an interview or another situation that required you to be your most confident self, imagine if you could access those feelings as quickly as the anxious feelings came to you and you can with a little help.

I’m Carmel Morrissey and I am a Career and Mindset Coach and I can show you how to access your own confidence and cultivate it so that you can reach it when you need it, feeling calm, relaxed and confident in difficult situations. Whether you are preparing for an interview or a difficult conversation or you would just like to have more confidence, get in touch for an initial chat.

As a career coach for the last 12 years, I am also trained in solution focused hypnotherapy and mind coaching which allows me to work with clients like you who want to reach their specific career goals including confidence building using tools from career coaching, hypnosis, creative imagination, and mind coaching.

If you know someone that would benefit from help with their confidence, please share this with them.