The Elusive Connection Between Self-Esteem, Confidence, and the Challenge of Setting Goals

In case you are lacking all of the above components at this time and wish to change your circumstances, or a day comes when you feel confronted by the dire need to do a 180-degree turn on your current life situation, self-searching with integrity is the place to start in a self-esteem and self-confidence-building process. For the twenty-plus years in which I struggled with low self-esteem and poor self-confidence, I sincerely thought I knew what I wanted from life. It took me quite some time to come to the realization that, what I thought I wanted, had largely been determined by others’ opinions over a long time period. Simply put, I had become accustomed to those opinions to a point where it felt as if there were only one way to productively spend my time, a way already predetermined on a day before I was capable of clearly and objectively thinking for myself.

Pushing through the years of my music career, with many good and just as many tough moments along the way, I slowly began to sense that, while my early, highly specialized music education had taught me important principles such as dedication and self-discipline, it had also limited me in pretty much every other aspect of education, including science, communications, and technology. This gap in knowledge became unequivocally apparent in early 2008 when I found myself at a professional and, shortly afterwards, personal crossroads in life.

At the time, changing a career at age thirty-two was exactly what fit my definition of being a professional failure and a late starter in life, meaning someone who, up to that point, had gone through life in a complacent, latent state of denial, hoping for things to somehow work out. It was then that I could no longer find anyone to blame but myself, which meant I finally had to accept hundred-percent responsibility for my life choices and decisions.

Many people who knew me well kept wondering why I thought and said I had been sleeping through my life and, therefore, being irresponsible with my future. All they knew was someone who spent seven to nine hours daily practicing the violin and who had earned a doctoral degree in a foreign country, using a foreign language. How could this possibly be an irresponsible way to spend time? They saw a hardworking individual who had already sacrificed thousands of hours of parties, coffee meetings, shopping for fun, you name it; and now, this same individual had decided to turn the page and pursue a career in science and medicine! Some midlife crisis!

Not unlike many other people, I used to believe that the big and cool goals were for the highly confident only. And, because I hadn’t felt confident for so many years, I thought that setting high expectations for myself was simply unrealistic. Little did I know in my twenties that the truth was exactly the opposite of what I believed! I just could not have been more mistaken even if I tried! We become confident by aiming high and making all of our goals a reality in a consistent and organized manner, one step at a time, instead of the other way around!

When it comes to self-esteem and self-confidence, I have found that the most successful people are the ones who are also self-reliant and independent in terms of thinking, planning, and implementation. They often think differently from the crowd, test widespread popular opinion, and question dominating political narratives, religion, or tradition. They plan their lives for the long term, which helps them better differentiate the essential from the non-essential and set important priorities early on. And, they take action by implementing their plans instead of just talking about them.

When I became a nurse in 2011, my world changed entirely. I suddenly found myself in a field where I knew absolutely nobody and, of course, nobody knew me. This was quite the opposite situation from my growing up as a violinist in Bulgaria, in a family of musicians who knew everybody and were known to everybody, respectively. I had zero connections in medical circles. The most reliable and trustworthy person nearby was my boyfriend, Jeff, who, at the time we met in 2008, had already been a nurse for fifteen years. I could never adequately express the gratitude I feel for everything I have learned from him professionally during our soon-to-be fourteen-year-long relationship.

I just recently had the honor and pleasure of being interviewed by Dr. Tony Hampton on his podcast, Protecting Your NEST with Dr. Tony Hampton. During the interview, Dr. Hampton surprised me with the statement that he had listened to another interview with me as a guest, namely the fun and inspirational conversation with Todd Andrewsen on TODDTalks! Design Your Best Life, where I had quoted Jeff from years ago telling me during my first steps as a professional nurse that, the main job of the nurse is to make sure the doctor doesn’t kill the patient. Dr. Hampton was quite intrigued by Jeff’s take on the nurse’s mission and, while he graciously agreed that there are doctors and then, of course, there are doctors (the same is true of nurses, by the way), I, in turn, agreed with him that Jeff has an unusual teaching approach at times. Suffice it to say that, somehow, he succeeds in presenting important concepts in a variety of memorable ways.

Upon deciding to embark on an investment career in 2013, I started reading a great deal of books written by tremendously successful people. They all had different stories to tell yet their methods for success had one important detail in common. Each and every one of these achievers was adamant about setting precise, concrete goals, writing them down, and setting a deadline for the completion of each goal. For over two years, I could not make myself write my goals down, let alone place a deadline next to each and every one of them. Why was this so hard to do, I wondered?

Well, first of all, the goals I really but timidly aspired towards seemed impossible at a glance. I knew there were people who could accomplish these goals, and I knew there were also people who had accomplished way beyond. The problem was, I had no faith in my ability to fulfill any of these goals, which created a sense of embarrassment even thinking about them, but much more so upon actually writing them down. The next, just as hard a step, was to make a decision on a completion deadline. It slowly dawned on me that I did not believe in any of the goals I had put in writing because I was still calculating what others would think about my goals. I was still preoccupied with their imaginary opinions. I hadn’t shared any of my thoughts with friends for months yet my mind continued recycling its habit of concerning itself with others’ opinions. I then figured, the items on the paper weren’t really my goals. Those were the items that were likely to be approved of by others, should a discussion have ever taken place. It was a very slow game changer for me to unlearn the constant craving for approval and then replace it with my own, unique prioritization process.

The above discussion does not imply that we shouldn’t seek inspiration, search for guidance, or get influenced by people whom we respect and admire. What it does imply, though, is that, more often than not, we tend to shape our goals and aspirations to fit in or secure support from people we don’t necessarily admire or even respect. If our goals are based on fear of disapproval, fear of hurting others’ feelings should we choose to deviate from a seemingly predetermined path, or fear of failure if we try to pursue a goal that seems too ambitious in the eyes of those in our immediate circle (which perception on their part may well be stemming from their own mediocrity), then we have built our plan on the wrong foundation and on the entirely false motives.