It was a Friday, which meant no work. I wanted to spoil myself a little since I hadn’t been sleeping well. I massaged my hair with an oily lotion and put a green face mask on. I also did some exercises to try losing some weight because my colleague had told me that I was getting fat.
Although, I said that I was okay with my weight, I came home and looked at my reflection in the mirror only to see that I had definitely gained weight! That reminded me of a story I had read in one of Paulo Coelho’s books about Adam and Eve who were walking in the Garden of Eden when a serpent slithered over to them:
“Eat this apple,” said the serpent.
Eve, who was properly instructed by God, refused.
“Eat this apple; you need to look more beautiful to your man.”
“No I don’t,” Eve replied. “He has no other woman but me.”
The serpent laughed. “Of course he has.”
The serpent then led her to a well and when she leaned over to see her reflection in the water, she immediately ate the apple.
The moral of the story is that “a return to paradise is guaranteed to anyone who recognizes his or her reflection in the water and feels no fear”. Confidence is the key.
I was always fascinated by people who had strong beliefs and didn’t change their views whether they were right or wrong. They didn’t follow other people, they didn’t care what other people thought, and they fought passionately to defend their beliefs and principles. And recently, I realized that fighting passionately about something doesn’t mean that it is a right cause…or this person wants to add value; sometimes it is just a rebellious action to make a stand and say “I am here”.
It has nothing to do with confidence; it has something to do with the strong belief that you adopt and take it as a believer. Some people become very strict in their beliefs and with a controlling personality they might use violence to “make peace”; others can moderate and I classify myself in this category of people, and the last, the liberal ones, who in my opinion have great confidence, they are not controlled by others opinion, they have huge respect to other beliefs and way of living. They are living life as free spirits and focus on themselves. They are harmless and give and accept freely.
Confidence is allowing people to be whoever they want without being intimidated by them. Confidence is to give yourself the chance to make a mistake and when you do that mistake, laugh at yourself and learn from it. Confidence is respecting yourself and respecting others. Please own your confidence and never allow someone to take it from you…who like you, will accept as you are. You don’t have to change; you don’t have something in return of his/her acceptance.