Being Confident In Who You Are vs. Improving Yourself

There are two popular thoughts in the realm of self-improvement that I consistently hear. Initially, the two ideas sound contradicting to each other. Both are great points on their own, but I have struggled in the past to see how they can be true at the same time:

1. Be (confident as) yourself
2. Work towards improving yourself (basically the whole idea of my blog)

Don’t get me wrong, I have always understood both of these points on their own. Both of these self-improvement concepts make a great amount of sense on their own. You should be confident in who you are! You should accept yourself for all your faults and imperfections as well as your talents, skills, and personality that make you, you.

The second point is also true. You should constantly be working each and every day towards improving yourself. Becoming a better version of yourself than the day before. After all, you are not in competition with anyone, except for your former self.

How They Seem to Contradict

The first point, be confident in who you are, assumes there is no change on your behalf. You are who you are, so don’t change and try to become somebody else aka somebody you are not. Learn to accept yourself and love yourself.

The second point assumes there is a tremendous amount of change going on. You are trying to change your mindset, your habits, your routines, your attitude – a lot of the core of who you are. You are what you repeatedly do, after all.

So, if these two concepts seem to contradict one another how can they both be great self-help advice? Surely, one must be wrong. Well, not exactly. Once you explore these ideas on a deeper level, you can see that they actually can work together coherently.

How They Work Together

It took a lot of pondering on my end to understand these two points together, in conjunction with one another.

Just because you are comfortable in your own skin and accept yourself for who you truly are does not mean that you cannot keep growing, improving, and becoming the best version of yourself.

In fact, being confident in who you are will allow you to leverage your strengths and abilities to help make the world a better place to live and your life more enjoyable. Here are two examples of how these two ideas can go hand in hand:

Example 1: In the past, I spoke about the secret superpower that is being an introvert. Now, if a person never was willing to accept that they are introverted, they would not be able to take advantage of so many of the great benefits associated with being an introvert. Ultimately, they would try to be someone they are not; they would try to act extroverted. Accepting you are an introvert (no change) and then using that as a secret weapon to help enrich both your lives and the lives of others around you (change) allows these 2 concepts to go hand in hand with one another and align together perfectly.

Example 2: Todd is a very angry person with a short fuse. The smallest things that most people will brush off have him fuming. Luckily, he at least has the maturity to acknowledge this. Now, this doesn’t mean that he should just accept this and constantly yell at people. He can, however, acknowledge that he gets angry quickly, and redirect that emotion towards something positive. Maybe he will use that anger to have intense workouts and get into the best shape of his life. Or he might repurpose that anger into a creative outlet of his choosing such as painting or working on cars. Whatever it is that he finds works for him and matches his interests and passions.

Accepting yourself is one of the crucial steps towards becoming the best version of yourself. Once you are comfortable in your own skin, you will be able to more effectively help others, get things done, do more of the things you enjoy, and just overall be happier!

Ultimately, It is accepting yourself that will allow you to improve and grow as a person.

What do you think of these two concepts? Have you been able to successfully combine them together? Let me know in the comments or email me directly at eric@ericgolban.com!

Best,

Eric