1. Realize that insecurity is normal human emotion
Everyone feels insecure about certain aspects of themselves. That’s normal.
I think in our day and age, we want to eliminate all negative things in life — insecurity, self-doubt, fear, etc.
These parts of our life are needed and shouldn’t be eliminated.
It is in overcoming these feelings, that we gain anything in life. For example, for most dating situations, it is in overcoming fear, that someone asks someone else out and see if they’d go on a date.
All good things in life usually require us to overcome some sort of adversity.
While we need negative feelings, we also definitely need to be monitor them in terms of making sure they are a measured healthy amount and not an unhealthy, big amount.
Sometimes judging whether you’re having a healthy normal human amount of insecurity or whether you’re overthinking things can be tough. In those cases, go to #2.
2. Try and get a 3rd party objective perspective
Often, our self-awareness is not as good as we think it is. It’s important to get a 3rd party objective perspective in these situations.
Say, you’re having insecurity about your relationship. Ask a couple friends or ask a therapist –this happened, and I’m feeling/reacting this way as a result, do you think I’m overreacting?
In situations where we are involved in, our brains aren’t the best objective judge.
Asking a 3rd party person who doesn’t have emotions in the situation, they’ll be able to give you better insight on the situation.
3. Use Insecurity as a Motivating Tool to Better Yourself
Say, you have a financial insecurity. Think about this as a problem that needs solving rather than a stress or burden.
How much more money would you like to make a month?
If you have a job, are you doing the job you can? If so, can you speak to your boss and ask how you could get a promotion or a raise? If your job probably won’t give you a raise anytime soon, what are other income streams you could pick up based on your skills?
4. Live in the present, and ask yourself, what do you control?
A lot of times people will have an insecurity for a future outcome.
A lot of my friends have the insecurity of ending up being single and not marrying someone.
Stay in the present and think about what you control.
You control your effort — in terms of meeting up with people, being on dating apps, etc. After that, things are out of your control. If you’re doing everything you can, that’s all you can ask from yourself.
5. Ask someone who has expertise in the situation if you can
Say, you’re preparing for a job interview and you’re feeling insecure about whether you’re ready.
Objectively, write down what you’ve done to prepare for the interview.
And then ask someone in the role you’re in whether they think the prep you’ve done is sufficient? For example, you could say I’ve researched the company, the role, and done mock interviews with friends to simulate my nerves in the situation. I think I’m good, do you think that’s good enough preparation?
Some situations you have to just rely on yourself. For preparing for an exam, you’ll probably have to rely on yourself and/or classmates in the class.
Before preparing for the exam, write down what you think is enough prep.
Then, after you’ve done a lot of studying, check your list and see — have you done all the things you said you wanted to get done? If so, give yourself credit for the hard work you’ve done in preparing. If not, do whatever else you think is necessary to be wholly prepared.