The first topic I would like to talk about is "self-image." To me this is the most important aspect to life. Self-image is the type of person who you think you are. Take a minute and think about your image of yourself.
From the beginning. When we're first born we have no knowledge of the world. The culture, environment, and people we grow up with teach us about the world. Everything we like, want and morals are based on these experiences. These thoughts of ourselves have been formed unconsciously from our successes, failures, experiences and how people reacted to us especially when we were children. Everything about our life is consistent with our self-image. My favorite quote "The brain is everything, what you think you become." Means you will act based on who you think you should be.
The self-image is a foundation of who we are; our behaviors, emotions, and personality. A person who thinks they're a failure will by any means achieve the results they expect to get. Someone who fails math class in school receives a report card. That is then considered proof to the individual as failure. It all depends on how that person reacts to it. A negative minded and doubtful person would then accept the report showing they failed. The individual now believes they are no good at math. At this point this person hates math. Can't catch a grip on it simply because they think they can't do it. A girl who thinks she's ugly, either created in her own mind or told she was ugly by someone else. Appearance is just based on opinion. The opinion of someone else and the opinion of your own. Someone told her she was ugly. She took it terrible. She hates looking in the mirror because she keeps thinking about being ugly. But it's just opinion and this can greatly affect her social life. Her depressive expressions, over anxiousness, or hostility will show and push people away.
If a determined and positive person would then learn from their failures. If they failed then they would just practice to get better. A confident person told they were ugly or not liked by someone, would just forget them and move on. The problem is that when someone fails rather than thinking I failed that class or test, would just consider themselves as failures.
Ugliness is imaginary. We should be happy, cheerful and confident. If there is something that you are uncomfortable with caused from a birth defect or a car accident that you feel like you should fix, then it's still possible. Worst case scenario surgery can be used to fix this, it's expensive, but it's still possible and a goal. However, even in many cases like these it's just in your head. If you're cheerful, positive and confident then you can have a very happy life.
One imaginary situation of ugliness is when you feel like you don't compare to someone else. This is mostly caused by television and media. Super models on TV are considered the most beautiful people. Imagine all the work they do to achieve this. They had goals and dreams to be in that position and they work very hard for it. But when people are watching these models on TV, they compare themselves to them. Start to think they're ugly and they could never become that beautiful, complete nonsense.
To have a satisfying life you must have a self-image you can accept. The one person that you have to live with your whole life is you. Most people doubt themselves that I have noticed. When people say they can't do something. I ask "who said you couldn't?" Everyone has the potential to do anything they want except for those who doubt themselves.
How has this affected my life? When I first started reading on this material it brought up all of the memories in my life. I been playing piano for 2 years now. When I got 2 new roommates that were in a band they wanted me to join. I felt highly intimidated because I am still learning and they've been playing their instruments for over 10 years. I really wanted to do it. But, through the fear of embarrassment that was all in my head, I started thinking of excuses to miss band practice. I knew I had to do it eventually. The first practice went great they loved what I did with the music. It was all in my head. Well, now looking back at it. One of two things could've happened. They think it's great or they criticize me. Failure or success. If I had failed how would I react to it? I don't know but I know now that it's all based on what you think about it. If they criticized me then I could've considered myself a failure as keyboardist or determination to get better. But I succeeded the first time. This is an example of how our successes and failures make us who we are.
We actually learn more from failure than success. But when the universe throws positive and negative experience we tell a story to ourselves about it. We all want to be successful in life and we are all successful. Even successful at failing. If you really believe you're a failure then you'll succeed as a failure. Success shows you that you are on the right track with what you want. Failure tells you that you need to improve. After looking into self-image when we played our first concert as band, every band member has already played multiple shows in previous bands. This was my first show of all time and everyone but me was nervous. I realized that there is no reason to be nervous. I just wanted to play, knew I could play and didn't care what other thought and everyone loved it!
We all have the potential to achieve greatness with what we want. You just need to take down those barriers of doubt. If someone else doubts you that means nothing more than the fact that they doubt themselves. Otherwise why make the comment? If you doubt yourself then you will doubt others. I don't doubt myself and I don't doubt the potential that everyone reading this has.
