What Do You Do In A Crisis Of Confidence?

Published September 8th, 2007 by Adam Kayce | 12 Comments

Crisis of Confidence Ever have one of those times where life’s events lead you to question the course you’re on?

(Of course, we could philosophize that you think you’re on one course, but life has you on another, and you’re just figuring this out as you go…)

But what I really want to get to is this idea of a crisis of confidence: the feeling that perhaps the path you’re on isn’t the one to be walked… that a course correction is being called for.

Anyone in business for themselves — shoot, anyone in business at all — has got to feel like this from time to time. If you read Po Bronson’s book, What Should I Do With My Life, then you know that no matter who you are, or where you’ve come from, the idea that the profession you find yourself in could/should/must change is an idea that’s alive and kicking in us all.

There’s no way I could write a post like this one and not talk about the potholes in my own road, so, here goes:

I’m loving my blog, I’m loving my clients, and I’m jazzed about the work I’m doing. And yet, doubts still enter my mind… “am I doing the right thing?” “should I be doing healing work in business, and not bother with all this purpose/potential stuff?”

I know that one some level, I’ll always have these thoughts. I’m someone who has a wide variety of interests, and new and exciting mind candy always grabs my attention now and again. It’s too tempting not to think about jumping in whole-hog and making a go of some new passion that I’m exploring.

And, I realize that it’s common to have passion be something that not only matures from the exciting-phase-of-newness to the simmering-phase-of-familiarity, but also something that waxes and wanes along with the tides, seasons, and other bio-rhythmic cycles of life and business.

But when the hot, fiery passion of one particular way of relating to my business fades, I can’t help but wonder, “Did a bubble just burst? Did I lose something? Am I still going in the right direction?”

Thank God For Intuition…

And the only way I have to answer that question is to go into my heart and sit in the feeling… as I do, I see the greater architecture of my business, and the point I find myself at in this moment in time, and how, in this juncture of structure and time, the answer I’m looking for hasn’t ripened yet. Well, that’s good to know; no wonder I’m feeling so pregnant…

sails on a tall ship I’m also reminded that many aspects of the course I’m on are still holding true; it’s as if I’m sailing a 179-foot frigate, and while the majority of the twenty-plus sails are full, one is sadly luffing.

It’s that one loose sail that gets our attention, though, doesn’t it?

Images by Syma Sees and Bruno Girin at Flickr, by Creative Commons licenses (here and here, respectively).

And thanks to all those who commented on the previous post: MichelleVan, Joanna Young, Adam, Erin, Thom Rutledge, Jean Browman, dailytri, Charlene

12 Comments... Want To Jump In?

Dean
September 8, 2007, 9:21 am

Monk @ Work -

Interesting post. Out of several thoughts after reading this, one stands out: is our life supposed to be like the shot of an arrow … a straight and true trajectory that one can trace or is more like the flow of a river (pre-Army Corp of Engineers) and flows in the contours? In examining my own thinking on this I believe I immediately think it should be like the arrow shot and understand that in reality know that it is more like the river. Does this underlying script or something similar play out in your thinking? And if so, is is a crisis you face or just a bend in the flow?

Dean
September 8, 2007, 9:23 am

Monk @ Work - Pardon my sloppy editing. I hope the gist comes through.

Jean Browman--Cheerful Monk
September 8, 2007, 1:16 pm

Steve Jobs in “Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish,” his famous 2005 commencement speech at Stanford, said you can only connect the dots afterwards:

“Again, you can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backward. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something— your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.”

So maybe it’s not sad that one sail is luffing. It may well turn out to be a blessing.

Jean Browman--Cheerful Monk
September 8, 2007, 3:19 pm

I just came across a blog with the intriguing name my soul speaks softly; take good notes. The blog itself might not be relevant, but the idea of listening deeply to that one part of yourself and perhaps writing about it is a powerful one.

Joanna Young
September 8, 2007, 4:50 pm

Hi Adam, in answer to your first question - yes, many! I guess how I deal with them comes back to the intuition point - it’s knowing yourself well enough or listening well enough to be able to pick up when it is time for a change (and you know that it is)… or when it’s just a question of accepting that some sails will always flap a little loosely…

At those times I find these words of Louis MacNeice a great comfort:

“And if the world were black or white entirely
And all the charts were plain
Instead of a mad weir of tigerish waters
A prism of delight and pain
We might be surer where we wished to go
Or again we might be merely
Bored but in brute reality there is no
Road that is right entirely.” Joanna

Matthew Roberts
September 9, 2007, 10:25 pm

Almost every single day I ask myself if I’m on the right path in life.

But like you said, the things that make us doubt are usually only a small piece of the bigger picture… and all it takes is a little faith to overcome them.

Matthew http://www.InspirationToAchieve.com

Judy Martin
September 12, 2007, 8:30 am

Greetings Sri Monk Adam!
Greatly enjoyed your post. The “crisis of confidence” that you speak of indeed triggers the intuitive intelligence that we all have deep within, but I think that it also forces us into a place of “creative friction” with our soul’s purpose. It can be that very chaotic exchange from which emerges a new consciousness about who we are and what we need to do toward that goal of personal development. I’m going to post on this really soon… all the best - judy at worklifemonitor.com

###

Ed’s note: here’s a link to Judy’s post…

Jean Browman--Cheerful Monk
September 12, 2007, 12:20 pm

I agree with Judy, only I call it “creative discontent.” My career was as creative problem solver, so the one thing I learned was to appreciate that state of confusion. It wasn’t always pleasant, but it was just part of the process. I learned to have faith that the insight would come and would be worth waiting for.

Adam Kayce
September 12, 2007, 12:34 pm

Dean, I agree — life is much more a meandering river than an arrow’s flight… and what we see as crises are just unmet expectations, I think. Thanks for the comment, and the metaphor.

Jean, how could I disagree with Mr. Jobs? I think it’s all a blessing.

Joanna, great quote! It reminds of me of a song, Apple a Day, by my friend David Wilcox. Same gist — that if life was always what we wanted, it’d get boring, fast.

Matthew, I agree. Faith is a godsend.

Judy, your point about “creative friction” is a perfect one. And I agree — it’s that friction that makes the transformation possible. Thanks for sharing!

Judy Murdoch | Highly Contagious Marketing
September 15, 2007, 11:51 am

Hi Adam,

I have a crisis of confidence anywhere from once a week to once a month depending on where my business is at and what I’m working on.

I can be breezy about the topic right now because I only just recovered from one that came up last week around my being the ONLY person against a marketing idea that came up in a dicussion forum.

Everyone who liked the concept argued logically and elegantly on their position. They were also very civil in their arguments. This made me feel totally insane and unreasonable.

I thought, “omigod, everyone on this forum is going to be thinking, ‘I would never refer anyone to Judy Murdoch, she’s such a Luddite and she would never help anyone get results.”

What helps me get to the other side is remembering my mission for my business which is to help connect small business owners who have really cool products and services with customers who truly need what they sell. And to do it through honest, effective communication.

My mission is the rudder that keeps my ship afloat to alude to an earlier post you made.
Believing that I got my marching orders from a higher power helps me remember that my “crisis” is probably self-manufacturered and to do the next right thing to get me back on the path.

PS, about intuition. I consider myself to be extremely intutive although I don’t always listen to my intuition.

One thing that is tricky and perhaps you’re already addressing this elsewhere in your blog or in a class or book is that intuition is not something that lends itself to logical arguments. Intuition seems to be a “knowing beyond words,” so in situations where people are giving wordy, logical arguments, an intuitive position can come across as weak because I can’t always craft an elegant rebuttal.

Love to hear more thoughts about this.

Warmly Judy

Adam Kayce
September 19, 2007, 5:17 pm

Judy, thanks for sharing about your recent battle with conventional thinking…
If you haven’t yet seen the book “Zag” by Marty Neumeier (I mentioning it in this post, too…), I think you’d love it. He talks about the amazingly successful ideas that tested poorly, that no one said they wanted, and that were thought to be losers right out of the gate.

You’re right, too, about intuition… there are times when logic doesn’t support our intuitive insights right away. It always seems to, but sometimes it’s apparent only after the fact.

I do talk about this in Black Belt Business Intuition, because it’s a pretty involved dynamic. There are ways to go further with intuitive insights until they often do make rational sense (in case they don’t right away), because truth is truth, and “all roads lead to Rome”…

It’s a great conversation; thanks for bringing it up.