Hello and welcome to five minutes in nature with me Liz Scott out and about on Dartmoor really enjoying a quiet spell.
It's very windy but oh my goodness today have we had some downpours heavy heavy downpours short sharp showers so heavy that the roads become like rivers and then suddenly it blows away the cloud blows away and there's a rest bite and then it comes in again and I'm looking all around me on this moorland looking at the sky and I feel like I'm surrounded by grey clouds and that the rain might come in any minute so I'm really hopeful that I get away with it but I'm dressed up in my waterproof trousers and my waterproof coat just in case the rain tumbles in.
Today's reflection is about confidence and it was a conversation I had with my husband we were talking about clients that we work with and that one of the things that comes up often with the clients that we work with is they talk about confidence and they talk about confidence as a thing that they need to get so let me give you an example there was one client that said she felt really herself and natural and normal when she was around friends but that when she went into work she felt that she lacked confidence so she needed to build up her confidence and that's a very familiar way that we hear confidence talked about and in a way in the past before I came across the three principles and the inside-out understanding well I used to get busy trying to build confidence it seemed like that was the thing to do it was a thing that you needed to get and you needed to build it a little bit like a muscle I don't see that that is what confidence is anymore it makes no sense for me to talk about that to myself or to clients because there's something more fundamental going on and there's something that if you understand it about confidence means that you change your relationship to it the way that I see confidence is that confidence is who we are we are made of confidence we are made of resilience and resourcefulness and confidence and we don't need to build it it's not like there is this resilience and resourcefulness out there that we need to find and gather and build up like we would maybe build a house of bricks it's the opposite resilience and resourcefulness and confidence are the innate essence of who we are that's what we're made of and when we feel a lack of confidence that's not because it's gone anywhere that's because our thinking has crowded in and clouded over our natural innate confidence it's a little bit like the sky that I'm looking at at the moment with all these ominous dark clouds covering the blue of the sky the blue sky hasn't gone anywhere it's just been covered over by clouds and it really does something when you see that in yourself when you realize that your confidence doesn't go anywhere and that it does get covered over by thought by those clouds when you start to see that you start to realize that the cloud of thought the cloud of insecurity comes with a feeling the cloud of insecurity might turn up as overwhelm it might turn up as frustration or anxiety you'll know how it turns up because the feeling will let you know if it's a feeling of overwhelm that you've got the cloud of overwhelm covering your blue sky if you feel stressed you've got the cloud of stress covering your blue sky and you don't get rid of the clouds you don't need to all you need do is remember and feel the blue sky within you and recognize that it's temporarily covered over by thoughts over the last few days we've been looking at the power of thought the power of thought to create images and imaginings and futures that don't exist thought is a powerful mechanism it creates scenarios and has them look real so when someone lacks confidence all that's happened is that thought has come into play and thought has created an unstable story an insecure story that looks and feels real when you know not to trust the story when you know that the answer doesn't lie in the story then what you do is you bring your awareness back to confidence so today I'd love you to reflect on confidence can you see this in yourself can you see that confidence isn't something to be built it isn't out there it isn't something you need to capture and grow on the contrary confidence is who you are and it gets covered over by thoughts and insecurities and stories it doesn't go anywhere and if you want to find your confidence bring your awareness back to it it's there it's within you it is who you truly are
