Dust off your confidence.
Seven soul reminders to help you trust yourself again.
Hello everyone,
Welcome.
I'm so glad you're here.
I am Ana Barreto.
I suspect you found me because there is something you need to do but are hesitating to do.
If so,
You are at the right place.
Today,
We are going to talk about confidence,
Not the kind that performs,
Pretends,
Or tries to prove something to the world.
But the kind of confidence that quietly returns when you begin trusting yourself again.
By the end of this talk,
You will have 7 soul reminders to help you move beyond fear,
Reconnect with your inner strength,
And take steps toward the life your spirit keeps calling you toward.
So before we begin.
.
.
Make yourself comfortable.
Grab a cup of tea or coffee.
A notebook to write down reflections.
And if possible,
Give yourself this time without distractions.
Silence your phone.
Close the email tabs.
Let the world wait for you a little while.
Yes.
Today we tell the world we have a soul appointment.
This is your time,
And I believe this conversation will meet you exactly where you are.
This is for you if perhaps lately you've been doubting yourself.
Maybe you have been overthinking decisions,
Second-guessing your abilities,
Feeling stuck between who you are and who you know you could become.
Or maybe life disappointed you somewhere along the way.
Sometimes we lose confidence after heartbreak,
After betrayal,
After burnout,
After criticism,
After years of putting everyone else first.
And sometimes confidence slowly seems to disappear without us even noticing.
We stop speaking up.
We stop trying.
We stop trusting ourselves.
We stop going for the things we truly want.
We may have concluded that life brings disappointment,
Rejection,
Or failure,
And feels unsafe.
I understand that feeling deeply.
There were periods in my own life where I felt disconnected and uncertain.
I had moments where I questioned myself,
Moments where fear became louder than my intuition,
Moments where I knew I wanted something deeply,
But hesitated before taking the next step.
And what I eventually realized is this.
Confidence is not something we magically receive one day.
No angels are coming from the sky with a magic wand to sprinkle it over your head.
But don't despair,
Because you don't need it.
Confidence is something we never lose,
But from time to time,
We need to remember it with one choice.
One brave moment,
One aligned step at a time.
So today I want to share seven soul reminders that helped me and many others reconnect with themselves and reignite their courage.
It was not perfect or overnight.
Honestly,
I don't know how that arrived.
It's an energy.
This knowing finds space in your third chakra and expands.
Today,
I ask you to trust your own knowing.
Then imagine your spirit sitting across from you at a beautiful cafe,
Sharing these seven insights we all need to remember.
Let's begin.
Number one,
If you don't go for it,
You may regret it later.
The cost of regret is often much heavier than the cost of disappointment.
Disappointment hurts for a season.
Regret can stay in the heart for years.
Many women and men spend too much time trying to avoid disappointment without realizing they are also avoiding their own life.
Sometimes we already know what we want to do.
We want to start the business.
Write the book.
Leave the unhealthy relationship.
Move to another place,
Go back to school,
Share our voice,
Love again,
Begin again.
But fear talks us out of it.
And fear is very convincing.
Fear says,
What if you fail?
What if people judge you?
What if it doesn't work?
What if you embarrass yourself?
But rarely does fear ask.
What if this changes your life beautifully?
The older I get,
The more I realize something very important.
Most people regret the chances they did not take far more than the ones they did.
Not every decision will work out exactly the way we planned.
But every courageous step strengthens the spirit and lands you exactly where you need to be.
Trust that wisdom.
Number two.
There are no failures in life,
Only learning opportunities.
I know some moments in life feel like failures.
A divorce,
A business setback,
A friendship ending,
A financial struggle,
A dream that didn't unfold.
But life is always teaching us something.
Sometimes what feels like failure is actually redirection.
Sometimes life closes a door because your soul has outgrown that season.
And there is a better door for you.
A client of mine was complaining about a job she used to love.
She was planning her departure many months down the road until she got fired.
She was a great manager,
Loved by her people.
And committed to her success.
First,
She was upset,
Worried about the finances,
And angry at the boss who let her go.
Then she fell relieved.
She had job offers immediately,
But she turned them down.
Then three weeks later,
She was offered a great job that she was super enthusiastic about.
If she hadn't been fired,
She wouldn't have been looking for a new job.
I truly believe that nothing is wasted.
Not the painful years.
Not the confusing seasons.
Not even what we call mistakes.
There are no mistakes from your soul perspective.
Everything carries wisdom if we are willing to reflect instead of only resent.
One of the biggest shifts you can make today is to stop defining yourself by what did not work out.
Did you hear me?
No more defining yourself by what people call setbacks.
You are not your worst moment.
You are not your rejection.
You are not your mistakes.
You are learning,
Evolving,
Growing,
And becoming wiser through experience.
And when we stop fearing failure so much,
We become free enough to try again.
That freedom changes everything.
Number three.
Trust the flow of your life.
There is something greater moving through your life.
Even when you cannot fully see it.
Some people call it God,
Some call it the universe.
Some call it divine intelligence.
Others call it higher consciousness.
What you call it is not important.
What matters is understanding that a life force is always moving through you.
Always.
And many times when you feel stuck,
You may believe life has abandoned you.
But often.
Life is not stuck.
It's only you resisting.
We resist change.
We resist endings.
We resist uncertainty.
We resist letting go of control.
And resistance drains enormous amounts of energy.
Are you exhausted?
Just check on what you are resisting.
I used to believe that if I pushed harder,
Worried more,
Overthought more,
Controlled more,
I would feel safer,
Avoid disappointment,
And be fully prepared for what comes my way.
But eventually.
I learned that peace does not come from controlling life.
Peace comes from trusting it.
Yes,
You can trust your life exactly where you are today.
What would it take for you to trust it?
Sometimes confidence is not forcing your way forward.
Sometimes confidence is surrendering long enough to hear where life is trying to guide you.
If things feel blocked right now,
Ask yourself gently,
What part of me is resisting?
Because life flows naturally.
And when we reconnect with ourselves,
Our energy begins flowing again too.
Number 4.
Paralysis is often a form of protection.
Many people judge themselves for procrastinating,
Hesitating,
Freezing,
Or overthinking.
But often,
Paralysis is not laziness.
It is a misguided protection that your younger self devised long ago to avoid disappointment.
At some point in your life,
Rejection felt painful.
Criticism felt unsafe.
Embarrassment felt unbearable.
Being seen felt dangerous,
So your nervous system adapted.
Yes,
That powerful energy system flowing through your body,
The one that helps regulate your organs,
Emotions,
Stress responses,
And sense of safety,
Became accustomed to stress,
Fear,
And emotional protection.
Over time,
Survival became familiar,
Even when peace was what you truly needed.
It learned to stay small,
Avoid taking risks,
Not to speak too loudly.
Not to try too much.
Avoid disappointing people.
And perhaps those patterns protected you once,
But you are no longer that younger version of yourself.
You are stronger now.
You have survived difficult days before.
You have endured heartbreak before.
You have rebuilt yourself before.
Actually,
If you're listening to this talk,
You have 100% success rate in everything you had to overcome.
And I have news for you.
Nothing got easier.
But you became stronger.
And today,
As we begin to heal,
Confidence is simply reminding your nervous system that it's safe for you to move forward.
Very often,
You may be waiting to feel fearless before taking action.
But confidence does not arrive first.
Action comes first.
Confidence follows later.
Most people believe confident people act because they already feel ready.
But the truth is they acted while feeling nervous,
Uncertain,
And uncomfortable.
They simply stopped waiting for fear to disappear before moving forward.
Confidence is built through evidence.
Every time you take a step,
Your mind learns,
I survived.
I can do this.
I am stronger than I thought.
Fearlessness is rarely the beginning of the journey.
It is usually what develops after walking through fear enough times that it no longer controls you.
Number 5 Energy flows where your focus goes.
Whatever we focus on repeatedly begins shaping our emotional experience.
If we constantly focus on fear,
We strengthen fear.
If we constantly focus on lack.
We strengthen the lack.
If we constantly focus on worst-case scenarios,
The nervous system begins living inside imagined disasters before anything has even happened.
Are you someone who rehearses your failures?
Do you plan your reactions to disappointments?
Do you imagine the worst case scenario?
But what if you shifted the mindset?
What if you began asking,
What if this works out?
What if life supports me?
What if I win?
The mind is powerful.
Your mind is more powerful than you imagine.
And your focus either feeds your fears or feeds your future.
I am going on a limb here and assume you want to feed your future.
This does not mean pretending life is perfect.
It means becoming intentional about where your energy goes.
Your attention is sacred.
Just protect it.
Number six.
Trust your intuition.
Intuition is one of the greatest gifts to humanity.
But many women stopped trusting themselves because they were taught to trust everybody else first.
The voice of intuition is quiet,
Gentle,
Non-threatening.
It does not scream.
It nudges.
And usually,
It repeats itself,
The thing you keep thinking about.
The dream that keeps returning to.
The idea you cannot let go of.
The change your soul keeps whispering toward.
That is not random.
Life speaks softly before it speaks loudly.
The more you ignore your intuition,
The more disconnected you feel from yourself.
And the more disconnected you feel from yourself.
The harder it becomes to feel confident.
I learned long ago that confidence and self-trust walk together.
Two best friends walking the streets of life with joy.
One of the reasons I love meditating is that meditation has helped me strengthen my intuition tremendously.
Quiet moments help me hear myself again.
And little by little.
I began trusting the inner nudges that were guiding my life.
Your intuition is not trying to betray you.
It is trying to guide you back to yourself.
Number seven.
Preparation builds confidence,
But nobody is ever fully ready.
Every woman you admire started before she felt fully prepared.
The writer,
The entrepreneur,
The speaker,
The healer,
The artist,
The leader.
None of them woke up one morning completely fearless and fully ready.
If anyone tells you that,
They are lying.
But they started anyway.
Preparation matters a lot in building your confidence.
Marathon runners train before the race.
Musicians rehearse before the performance.
Pilots practice before flying.
Preparation builds confidence,
But eventually there comes a moment where you simply have to begin.
And at first,
Most people walk on emotional tiptoes.
We do it all the time.
They feel nervous,
Uncertain,
Awkward,
But time gives them footing.
That is how confidence grows.
Not through perfection,
Through repetition,
Not by avoiding life.
By participating in it.
Many people often believe confidence is something other people naturally have,
But confidence is a muscle,
And muscles strengthen through use.
So,
If you have been waiting to feel 100% ready before taking the next step,
This is your sign.
This is your reminder.
It will never happen.
And that is OK.
How do I know?
Because confidence is one of your natural powers connected to your third chakra.
This beautiful energy center located in the middle of your chest,
Just below your breast,
Is energized by your actions.
I fully described in my book,
The Nine Powers of Women.
Men have them too,
But on a different level.
It's highly linked to willpower.
Take the step anyway,
My friend.
Do it.
You can do this and you know what I'm talking about.
There is much more available for your life.
My dear one,
You were born confident.
Life may have covered the confidence with fear,
Disappointment,
Criticism,
Heartbreak,
Exhaustion,
Or self-doubt.
But your confidence is still there.
Waiting.
Waiting for you to trust yourself again.
Waiting for you to stop abandoning your dreams.
Waiting for you to stop shrinking your voice.
Waiting for you to say yes to your life.
Your soul did not come here to play small.
It came here to experience life fully.
To love,
To create,
To grow,
To heal,
To share your gifts,
To become.
So trust yourself enough to begin.
Even if your voice shakes.
Even if the path is unclear.
Even if the first step feels uncomfortable,
Because every courageous step reconnects you with yourself.
And perhaps confidence was never about becoming someone new.
Perhaps confidence is simply remembering who you were before fear convinced you otherwise.
Trust that inner voice.
Thank you so much for spending this time with me.
Oh,
One more thing.
Invite your soul for a conversation more often.
It's just a great company.
This is Anna Barretto signing off.
