Bulletproof Confidence Part 3..Dont talk about it, BE it

Happy Tuesday Everyone!!

Its great to "speak" with all of you. First of all, thank you for all the feedback on the confidence series! Its always great to talk about something that resonates with friends, family and strangers. With that, we move to the third and final part of our series

Stop talking and BE..

Congratulations on this journey! We started together at zero confidence. Nobody wants to exist there so the goal was to achieve Bulletproof, Unflappable, Moviestar, No F*****g doubt Confidence..(sounds cool don't it?). So lets review the steps that got us here..

Step 1..Fake it till you make it
Step 2..Build the skills to build real confidence

Now what? Whats the mind state you need to graduate to in order to use what you have done so far to push your confidence forward? You might be surprised to hear that its about being less, as opposed to more. Let me tell you a quick story..

A few years ago, I was keeping myself in shape at a local LA Fitness. Some of you know, I also do a lot of Muay Thai to keep myself in shape and my mind/fight instincts sharp. Anyhow, I just got done with the treadmill and weights and this LA Fitness had a workout room with heavy bags. So I went in to work on my knees and elbow strikes. I was alone for a while honing my art when these two young guys came in. Talking loud. They started working on a bag next to me and doing silly jumping kicks. The whole time talking about "Dude, ill totally kick "joe" in the neck" or "ill spinning kick "mike" in the back of his head". Just loud ridiculous stuff. I wasn't worried because seeing the stuff these guys did on the bags, if it came to it, I knew that I would easily kick their asses. Then another guy walked in, said hello and started gearing up. He had a much different presence that the other guys. He sat in the corner while these two clowns were pantomiming a bad kung fu movie (i know the difference) and started stretching and wrapping his hands. I took a double take and recognized him as a cast member of The Ultimate Fighter..a television show where a group of mixed martial artists live in a house and fight each other for a professional contract. He eventually gets to work on the bag, he was super calm and nice and even helped me out with my kicks. Whats the moral of this story? Simple...The TOUGHEST guy in the room doesn't talk about it, he IS IT. He was a professional fighter at that time. He would have definitely smashed me or those other guys. He didn't need to say anything about it. His confidence in his ability was apparent.

Real confidence is about knowing with every fiber of your being what you are and what you can do. Confidence is the state of feeling certain about the truth of something. Certain..absolutely sure of that truth. When your confidence is real, it affects every move you make. You walk and talk differently when you are fully immersed in your bulletproof confidence. When you enter your field of play be it a basketball court, audition room, cage, recording studio or open mic that confidence is palpable to everyone else in that space with you. This level of confidence can change your life, y'all! When it is clear that you are really that confident in yourself, others will subconsciously and automatically have confidence in YOU. Again, its no longer about you explaining how confident you are its about you EXISTING in a state of full confidence in yourself. The most handsome guy in the room doesn't announce it with his words when he hits the door..he announces it with his demeanor and aura and everyone else just acknowledges what is already there.

The BIG reason that your confidence must eventually evolve to this point is because so much of what we do in life involves nonverbal communication. In other words, what are you saying without saying a word? If your mind, body and spirit is screaming confidence at the people you interact with, things will start falling your way a lot more than they did when you had less confidence in yourself and your abilities. For us actor and artist types, the confidence is essential because we get so many no's. That is the nature of the beast but you cant start doubting yourself and your abilities because you havent booked a job in a week, a month, a year for that matter. Every time you walk into the audition room you have to be at top confidence but not so that you can be protected from the no, but so that you can pull the director, casting director into your world of confidence in you. Who knows, you might just get that job :)

Its a long journey guys. Wherever you are at on the scale (Faking it, Building Skills, Bulletproof) it takes work to get to the next level and to maintain it. Its so worth it guys. Especially when you look back on your less confident days with your new more confident mind. A few things to remember guys

The best basketball player on the court doesn't talk about it, he just does his thing
The hottest person in the bar doesn't yell about it because everyone else knows it
The best actor doesn't tell you they are, they are because they show you

Show, don't tell your skills now. Others will see and when THEY talk about you and how great you are, that's what legends are made of. BE LEGENDARY!

As ALWAYS I welcome your comments and questions. Thanks for reading and for going with me on my journey to moviestardom :)

Our inspiration for this week?

"You cant wait for inspiration, you have to go after it..with a CLUB"

Bulletproof Confidence Part 2..Step your game up

Hello folks!

As always thanks for joining me on this journey. Seems like the first part of the series on confidence was well received. To quickly recap; Fake it til you make it. Well now we are going to talk about the "make it" part of building that confidence. Essentially, how YOU are going to take your confidence from the facade state to a more solid foundation. Yeah I'm talking to YOU! :)

Step your game UP

So you have been faking this recent confidence. In a lot of cases you are creating and believing your own hype, ignoring Flavor Flavs famous warning. This at least starts you on the path of thinking confidently about yourself IE you CAN do it instead of CANT which is the standard answer for those lacking confidence. At your core you are aware that this "confidence" is more smoke and mirrors than substance. So how do you get that substance? Its time to step your game up and acquire skills that you can be confident in. Leave the ego and get to work. Start with whatever you are best at, because everyone is best at something, and seek out knowledge, training and teachers in that pursuit. It can be anything. It can be a sport, a foreign language, poetry or writing, singing, cooking anything that you look at and definitely want to be better at. When you are studying and training it is VERY important to leave this new growing ego out of it because nobody likes a student who thinks he/she knows more than the teacher. Study...LEARN with an open mind because that type of mind will soak up the knowledge and skill that you are seeking. As you are learning build that confidence by seeing honestly how good you were at this thing when you started and realize how much better you are it after a month or 6, for example. You will surprise yourself

Basketball was one of my first foundations of confidence. Sure I played but my junior year in HS I was honestly pretty so-so. I started talking a good game, sure. That helped moving up from my Sophomore year. I didn't quite have the season that I thought I would but it wasn't because of lack of effort. It was because I just didn't have the skills..straight up. I had some, but not enough to help the team as much as I wanted to. Between my junior and senior year I sought teaching from new coaches, better players to compete against and I put in time on my game. I played every chance I could that off season (with a small break to perform in Much Ado About Nothing :)) and the work paid off in new skills, better performances and a new higher level of confidence EVERY TIME I stepped on the court. The hidden benefit, at the time, was that I had a higher level of real confidence when I stepped off the court. I had no idea that doing my thing on the court would make me walk with my head up higher but it did! Ahh, to be 16-17 and not know how things interconnect :)

Anyway, when you start to get that first bit of solid real confidence or what you KNOW you're really good at you can attack your learning of other things with a much more confident edge. You still need to learn and build skills to continue building your confidence. At the same time you now have a higher baseline of confidence than you did when you were completely in your faking stage. The reality is that I have constantly picked up new skills for my life tool bag and whereas they are things I want to learn they all help my confidence in that I always have more skills at my disposal than the previous year. Its like a big long chain of added skills... Basketball-Acting-French-Volleyball-Public Speaking-Football-Management-People Skills-Golf-Cooking-Fitness-Portuguese-Muay Thai-Philosophy-Brazilian Jiu Jitsu-Fashion-Wine Tasting. The list goes on

I'm sure some of you think some of these things aren't skills. That's fine. They are all topics that I am confident IN MY ABILITIES and KNOWLEDGE. Am I the best in these things? Certainly not but when you can walk through life and know that you can "do" these things, it makes you more comfortable in all situations. Confidence on some level is about that..being comfortable in your own skin in all situations.

Stay tuned for part 3 in the confidence series!

Our inspirational quote for today..

"Challenge is a dragon with a gift in its mouth...tame the dragon and get the gift"

Stay positive y'all and have a FANTASTIC week!