We’ve all experienced times of low self-confidence and low self-worth. So many of us want to know how to be more confident. If you’re feeling low self-confidence or if you’re feeling like you are not enough or you’re not worth it, then this blog will insha Allah be very beneficial to you. I’ll be sharing the one thing that has helped me become more confident and also we’ll be talking about a beautiful insight I got from one of the common adhkars we repeat every day that will insha Allah help boost your self-confidence just like it did for me.
So many women struggle with self-confidence. Especially Muslim women living in a non-Muslim country. There are many aspects to a person’s confidence, or so I thought. A person’s clothing, way of speaking, way of interacting, etc. I thought all of that was what confidence was about. And so because I wore hijab and dressed a certain way I thought I could never be as confident as the other women around me.
I used to think that some people were naturally confident. And if you weren’t naturally confident, then you could never be confident. I thought, yes you could work on your confidence but never to the point that you actually become confident.
But the truth is, confidence is a Skill anyone can learn.
Confidence comes from within. It’s how you think and feel about yourself. It’s how you feel about yourself. The difficult part is that we as women are so influenced by what people say to us. If someone tells us we look beautiful then we think, oh wow, maybe we are beautiful. If someone tells us we’re smart, only then will we think it’s true. And even then, so many of us have the habit of rejecting compliments. I used to actually do this a lot. If someone told me I was really smart, I’d say, no there are so many people smarter than me. Or we respond to a compliment with a compliment so for example if someone told me they liked my dress, I’d say aw I love your dress too.
Taking a compliment was so uncomfortable for me. Now whenever someone compliments me, I say: “thank you, that’s so nice of you to say.”
Another aspect of confidence is how you treat yourself. Do you put yourself first or do you put others first? This also means, do you value your own opinion over others?
I truly thought I was confident in how I presented myself to people until a close relative of mine told me I didn’t present myself as confident. I started to doubt myself all cause of someone’s opinion. I completely disregarded my own opinion of myself and listened to someone else’s.
Just like that, I never really cared for my height. I thought I was a normal height until again someone pointed out to me that I was short. So then I started to think I was short and started to lose confidence in my height.
The point is, is that people will always give you their opinion. The question is, whose opinion do you value more, your own or someone else’s?
I quickly learned that I was valuing other people’s opinions. I needed other people to validate me. I wasn’t doing it for myself. I didn’t want to feel rejected. I didn’t want to feel disapproved of. And so if someone thought something was wrong with me, I quickly wanted to change it.
So many of us women think so little of ourselves. We let other people’s opinions of us impact us so much. And just a side note, if someone is criticizing something about you, it’s because they are insecure about themselves. It says more about them than it does about you.
You may have noticed that in a lot of social situations, guys often seem more confident than women. This difference in confidence might come from the way each gender deals with emotions. Generally, guys don’t seem to show their feelings as much as women do. But this doesn’t mean they feel less.
there are Two possible reasons for this. biological factors and sociocultural influences.
Research suggests that hormonal differences can influence emotional responses. For example, estrogen and progesterone, which are more prominent in women, can affect mood and emotionality. Testosterone, which is higher in men, can influence aggression and competitiveness.
This is why men will usually have more ego and think they are better than others. Also, cultural norms and expectations greatly influence how men and women are ‘allowed’ to express emotions. For example, many societies encourage or expect men to be more reserved with their emotions, viewing emotional expression as a sign of weakness, whereas women are often allowed more freedom to express a range of emotions without the same level of judgment or stigma.
This is why confidence is harder for women to acquire in their life. We allow our feelings to impact our lives so much. But just like anything, confidence is something we can all learn.
And the one thing that if you can do in your life, you’ll be extremely confident is, have the ability to experience any feeling.
What does that mean? It means you’re okay with feeling shame, rejection, fear, happiness, exclusion, loneliness, sadness, grief, loss, excitement, embarrassment, and all other feelings.
So when the person mentioned my height or my physical presence, I felt judgment, shame, and rejection. That made me not have a response back to them. That made me feel paralyzed. That made me think about the conversation on repeat for days. That caused me to lose confidence in myself.
Now if I was okay with feeling judgment, shame, and rejection, I would not have been impacted as much by this other person’s comments. Why, because I am open to feeling anything. I do not care if I feel rejected. In fact, I want to feel all the feelings possible. Why?
Because once you’re not afraid of something, it loses all power over you.
If you’re not afraid of rejection, you’ll never actually feel rejected. It’s crazy how it works.
A good example of this is imagine you’re walking through the crowded streets of NYC. You’re on your way with your boss for a client meeting in a coffee shop. Both of you are dressed nicely and looking forward to the meeting. When suddenly, you trip and fall and get some mud on your dress. As you get up all you can feel is a massive sense of embarrassment and judgment. Not only are you embarrassed cause your boss saw you fall, but also that there are so many people around who stopped to see if you were okay. And on top of that, now your dress is ruined and you have an important client meeting with your boss.
If you’re not okay with feeling embarrassed and judged, guess what will happen. Your face, energy, and presence will all change. How you show up in front of your boss will change. How you show up in front of the client will change. How you are during the meeting will change. You will be in your head the entire time. Now a domino effect will take place. Not only did you just fall and maybe hurt yourself, but you’ve now acted differently in front of your boss and you’ve probably not performed the best at the client meeting.
Imagine now if you were completely okay with feeling embarrassment and shame. You’d get up, dust yourself off, and maybe even make a funny comment like ‘didn’t see that coming, or else I would have brought a change of clothes.’ You’d then laugh about it a little with your boss and then proceed to the client meeting and explain to them how you fell and ruined your clothes. You’d maybe make some jokes with them about it as well. You’d proceed with the meeting like nothing happened and everything would go smoothly.
In both scenarios, you fell and felt embarrassed. The difference is how you react afterward.
If you walk around expecting to feel a wide range of feelings, no feeling will ever throw you off your game. You will always be authentic and true to yourself and show up how you want to show up.
That is what true confidence is. It’s when you’re content with yourself. It’s when you’re content with the ups and downs of life. It’s when you just be yourself and not let anything get to you at your core.
Because guess what, you deserve to have this life that you have.
Why? Because Allah SWT chose to give you this life. Allah SWT chose to put you on this earth. You matter to Allah SWT. That is where so much of our confidence can come from. It’s knowing that you matter because Allah SWT said you matter by putting you on this Earth. Your face, your body, your life, all of it was given to you by Allah SWT.
One of the common adhkars that we read is SubhanAllah. We say it after every salah and frequently throughout the day. We also say it in Salah in Ruku and Sujood when we say سُبْحَانَ رَبِّيَ الْعَظِيمِ and سُبْحَانَ رَبِّيَ الأَعْلَى, respectively.
What does SubhanAllah mean? It means that all glory, all perfection belongs to Allah and anything that is imperfect or deficient cannot be attributed to Him.
Nothing can be attributed to Allah because He is perfect in every way.
When we say سُبْحَانَ رَبِّيَ الأَعْلَى and سُبْحَانَ رَبِّيَ الْعَظِيمِ in Salah, we are saying Glory be to MY Lord, the Greatest, Glory be to MY Lord, the Most High. We are saying Allah is OUR Lord. Allah SWT has allowed us to call Him Our Lord.
Our confidence should come from the fact that we are Allah’s creations and that He SWT has given us the honor to call him Our Lord. When you say my friend, my parents, my husband, my kids, my brother, my sister, you feel a different sense of connection. You feel closer and you feel a sense of belonging. So the fact that we are instructed to call Allah by saying My Lord in Salah, is beautiful. Allah wants us to feel like He is Our Lord. That sense of connection and belonging is there.
So the next time you don’t think you are worthy of being on this planet, think again. Allah SWT has made the decision for you. You are worthy according to Allah SWT.
And remember, if you are okay with experiencing all feelings and actually expect to have a wide range of feelings, you’ll always be confident. You’ll always feel confident in yourself. You’ll become resilient because you’re okay with any challenge that comes your way.
Just let yourself go through all the feelings. Let yourself go through the discomfort.
Because at the end of the day, you will be okay no matter what because you have Allah SWT always.
Until next time my friend,
Remember you got this because you have Allah.
Your sister,
Mariam
