Being on which side is Right???

Choosing to write my candid opinion on this topic, I am in a way volunteering for a probable chance of winning many “Dislikes” for my article. But I had been deliberating long enough to pen this down and today finally decided to hit the “Publish” button.

As the header image must have already triggered your brain cells to decode the essence of the article, so without trying to explain more, I straight away shoot this question to all my readers

What is important - Self-Belief OR Self Awareness???

 Left side of the image has kind of become a very popular and “Must Go In” image for most of Management programs/lectures delivered to convey a strong message on self belief, or in other words ~Self Confidence .This image must have broken lot of records in being highly circulated image during election times when many social media and political writers chose to relate it to winning political leaders since according to their school of thought “The major reason behind any win lies in the contender’s self confidence” .In other words a conscious effort to see yourself as a Lion to become a Lion ….

Now comes the other side of story, which is more close to my school of opinion. Scroll back on top and see the right side of image. Don’t you think that is Critical? And hence the debate …

If the Confidence was all it takes to win a game, then why would anyone lose ever? If every cat starts believing that it can be a Lion, will it really make her become and act as a Lion?

Wouldn’t it become suicidal for this kind of over rating oneself for mere thought of achieving confidence to win? If this was true then every rat should see himself as Dog and give an open challenge to cat by standing erect in front of cat? Do you think just seeing yourself differently in mirror (mind mirror) will do the magic?

My answer is NO

It is good and imperative to be Confident but I always found this image to be a wrong example for labeling it as “Being confident” rather according to me it qualifies to be called as “OVER CONFIDENCE” which can do more harm than doing any good!

If confidence was the only attribute then every Tom Dick & Harry would feel no end to him/herself and believe him/herself to be a Winner.

Another compelling thought is if this belief is true then why do we need SWOTs? Why do we need all the tools to understand our strengths and weaknesses, since if we go by this belief, then just stand in front of mirror and start believing & seeing yourself as Winner, that’s it? Isn't it?

But in my opinion, it is cheating yourself, Fooling yourself, it is masking the reality about yourself from yourself .It is over confidence and it may work at times but it can’t be relied upon always.

Instead tell me ,wouldn’t it be better to KNOW YOURSELF, in other words Self Awareness?

Isn’t is wise to look in mirror (mind mirror), understand your strengths and weaknesses and then choose to Work on those weaknesses to turn them to strengths! Is that not a better and more reliable way to see yourself at winning stage?

Rather than building a wrong perception about oneself, one should not shy away to read the realities about oneself. Everyone wants to be a winner, but by mere self belief of becoming and behaving like a winner won’t make you a winner! At least not for a Long run

 Rather ,own your weaknesses and turn them around to convert them to your strengths 

To summarize my belief

~ Look at yourself with open minds and open eyes

~ Own your weaknesses

~ Work on your weaknesses to turn around to convert them to your strengths

~ Be Confident but don’t be OVER CONFIDENT

~ Regularly watch yourself in your mind mirror

~ Work forever towards your self-betterment, for which first required step is to see yourself, identify your shortcomings, understanding your personality gaps, skill gaps or any other shortcomings and having the courage to Own them work on them!

Hence I feel instead of choosing to be either side of the header picture, it is better to

“Correct your mirror image for all the current flaws and your mirror image will in- turn help to correct you ” You will automatically WIN :)

Happy to know your views

Bhawna Prabhakar

[email protected]