Self Confidence

Even swathed in layers of black, you can tell which women have it. Even utterly unadorned, their presence is unmistakable. I'll find myself turning to admire, in passing, women who possess the space they inhabit. It's not about what they own. It's about what they've got. They've got it.

I can fake it. Perfect belly dance posture, the torso elongated, ribcage isolated, long neck, a deep breath taken and held. Walk that way. Move through the world that way, proud, tall, conscious of the flesh you inhabit, grateful for it, entirely present in the gifts you were given. If I walk that way, I can believe for a moment that i've got it.

But I've never had it. It was never taught to me. I learned other lessons. Obedience.Intelligence. Logic. But never self-confidence. Is it too late to learn? Can I become another woman in the second half of my life? I think about the women with whom I went to school, like Alex Kuczynski, Style writer for the New York Times, and marvel at her. It helps that she's a six foot tall goddess -- but Alex always had style and self-confidence; an easy wit, a sly sense of humour, a ribald and glittering disposition. She was always so perfectly there, in her school chair with that small attached writing table, singing "Don't Go Back to Rockville", loud and laughingly, on a late spring day before English class. And look at her now, New York Socialite, author, columnist, cause celebre in her own right, married to a smart, rich entrepreneur and able to ship her entire entourage to Idaho for a weekend retreat. Lesser mortals are actually disgusted that the Divine Mz. A. would actually raise her glass of Pinot Noir and gleefully declare, "Orgy! Orgy! ...oops, wrong weekend," I have to laugh... it's so quintessentially Alex, and anyone maligning her is simply in possession of a bunch of sour grapes. I marvel at the kind of woman she is and think, but of course. This is the life she was always meant to possess.

What life was I meant to possess? Bereft of confidence, it's hard to tell who I might have become. Singer, perhaps. Published writer, oh very fine. Artist? It could have been. But my reticence has won the day; I'm no go-getter. I should learn how to pretend to be that vivacious, outgoing, confident woman until I get the hang of it. Fake it til you make it, baybee.

I listen to my son say silly things like, "I don't know how" when I ask him to do something simple: put on his shoes, put away his toys. I hope it's because he doesn't want to do it, not because he lacks the confidence to do it. How do we teach children confidence? Especially our girl children? Too much of the 'good job, good kid' praise and you raise a child with a Pavlovian reflex for praise. Too little aknowledgement of a child's accomplishments, or worse, too much criticism of his or her actions, and you create an adult who is unwilling to try, terrified of failure. Confidence is a quiet lesson for parents to impart: recognize accomplishments with simple reinforcement, encourage efforts with simple faith, and commiserate failure with simple honesty.

What does this mean, in real life? Well, my son has a temper. We've been working to give him the skills to manage that temper, and one day, as I watched him play with another child, I noticed him getting angry. To my amazement, I saw him stop, take a deep breath, and the anger went away. Did I jump up and down and squeal about what a big boy he was? No. I gave him a big hug and said, "I saw what you did just now, sweetie. Do you know what you did? You took a deep breath and made the angries go away, all by yourself. What a wonderful thing to be able to do!" and he beamed like a headlight. I try to let him know I see his successes, sometimes with nothing more than a, "Wow, look at what you did!" -- allowing him to own his own success and share his joy in his accomplishments without looking to me for approval. I don't tell him I'm proud of him; I was always too dependent upon my parent's approval. I do, however, tell him how proud I am to be his mama, and how lucky I am that he chose me.

Harder still is to allow him to fail sometimes. We want the best for our children, we want to protect them from pain... but pain is necessary, in non-lethal doses. So my kid's allowed to try, allowed to fail, allowed to brush off his own knees, have a good cry, and try again. No "I told you so's!". No criticism. We do not call him a crybaby when he is unhappy and wails. We do not pressure him with the awful choice: "Are you a big boy or a little boy?" We do, however, sit down after the tears are dry and try to figure out what went wrong, what tools he has already in his possession to succeed the next time. We allow natural consequences to teach life lessons as much as possible. We give him love and comfort for life's disappointments, and then help him right himself for the next adventure. We honour his emotions. We have faith in him. I hope this teaches him to have faith in himself.