A mind troubled by doubt cannot focus on the course of victory
In these times when we feel nothing less than prisoners of war cooped up in our houses, some with their loved ones and some apart – we cannot thank modern times and its inventions enough to allow us to connect with the outside world more often than ever. For some people like me and my roommate who are stuck in the smallest room possible, Netflix has especially become the knight in shining armor.
Recently I watched this series on
Netflix which has taken India (and probably the world) by a storm – Money
Heist. It has all the elements to keep you glued to your screens for hours –
the planning, the brains, the preparation, the negotiations, a little action
and lots of drama. And let’s admit it, who doesn’t love to admire an
intelligent heist? Don’t worry, I won’t give any spoilers.
It was while watching this series
that got me thinking that if – a big if – it were all true, what is it that
would impress you the most about these thieves? Their moral code or their
planning? Or the idea in itself? I don’t know what would strike you, but for me
it has got be the confidence. The confidence instilled in their brains that
they are going to get away with it. No matter however bad things get, they are
so confident that they actually get through with it. It reminded me of
something that I read once –
A mind troubled by doubt cannot
focus on the course of victory
Nobody could have threaded it
together more beautifully. We always talk about self-confidence. We all know
that we need to be confident at all times – whether talking in an interview or
whether taking a decision. We preach it to the people around us. Yet none of us
has ever asked the most important question – Why? Why do we work so hard to boost
our confidence? This one sentence provides the answer to the most complicated
question in the simplest way.
Coming back to Money Heist, it
comes out as impeccable example of how at least 60% of our victory depends on
your confidence. Not that I am asking everyone to pick up a Salvador Dali mask
and red jumpsuit and attack their nearest bank. But let’s not discuss boosting
confidence here. There are in-numerous Self-help books to boost our confidence
in the world. The challenge is how do we face a person who has read most of
those books? (Not that only reading can make someone super-confident – but it
does help)
It is not about why you have to
defeat someone. It is always about the how. How do we win? Hard work is always
the number one rule in the rule-book but sometimes hard work only works for the
80%. What about the 20%, you ask? Confidence. It has to be. And not just ours,
but our opponent’s as well. We lack confidence, it is called self-doubt. But
when we lack confidence while looking at our opponent, it is called fear. And
fear is the biggest anti-body for confidence. Confidence for once can breathe
in the air of self-doubt, but can never be ignited when our minds and hearts
are covered with fear.
A few years ago, I had an
experience which no one should have had to go through. Throughout the whole
experience, there was a siren going on in the back of my mind, telling me to
call the bluff. But the fear has engulfed me so much so that I kept ignoring
it. Only if I would have listened to myself! The lesson that I did take away was
that someone was smart enough to mess up my confidence in order to win. It is
then that it made sense to me, the person would have never been able to defeat
me if he/she didn’t beat my confidence.
And it’s not just me, we all have
been there, in some form or the other. We have all at some point questioned
ourselves whether we are good enough or capable enough to face the
uncertainties of life. The thing is that a little self-doubt is always good,
but it should never become a fact of our lives. Because when it does, we panic.
We panic and we mess up our performance and following that we end up doubting
all our decisions for a long time.
The good part about all of this
is that it works the other way round too. You may defeat a person by showing
your intelligence, your hard work, your smartness, your assertiveness and most importantly,
by being unpredictable. But you truly defeat a person when you beat his confidence.
And once you do, the others just follow. This may sound very villainy but we say
it with the right confidence, we feel like heroes of our lives.
It’s never about defeating a man,
but his confidence.
GeekChic
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