How I gained confidence through my acceptance of self doubt
You would never know who I am now if you look back and see who I was then. It’s nothing physical, there isn’t one big event that suddenly made me open my eyes and see what I’ve been lacking. To be honest, I don’t how I became this way. I guess you’ll just have to read, and don’t worry I’ll include visuals for everyone that doesn’t want to read.
I was born in Manila, Philippines to two amazing parents. I was always surrounded by family and boy did I receive the love being the first born from my parents. As you can tell from the picture below I was loved and cared for. I was surrounded by people that loved me, even if I don’t remember who they are now. I moved to states at young age and I’ve bounced around since.
With that it was hard getting my footing in the ground whenever we moved. I had to figure out how to make new friends, but I had to dump who I really was for acceptance. At the same time I didn’t know who I was, I didn’t know if I was really the person I was trying to be. I was just trying to have a normal life. That wasn’t in the cards for me.
The strangest time in my life is when I lived in North Carolina. I never questioned who I was, even when I hung out with the Puerto Rican/Colombian crowd in high school in Connecticut [my real name is Jose btw], it was strange to be in North Carolina. I didn’t know where to go, where to turn to. There was no one like me. Did that deter me from making friends? No. Why? Because for me to have a normal life I had to make friends, I had to accept not who I was, but where I was.
I guess that’s where I got my confidence from. It’s not about who I was, it was accepting that I wasn’t like everyone else. It was my self doubt that got me to where I am. I had a lot of hard times. At times it was hard time after hard time. It was a teenage nightmare, followed by another teenage nightmare, followed by another teenage nightmare. I just never doubted myself during those times. Why? Because I came to realize that my faults, not my strengths, is what made me better. I will continue to have that mindset throughout my life. One day I’ll get it right.
This story is published in The Startup, Medium’s largest entrepreneurship publication followed by 289,682+ people.
Subscribe to receive our top stories here.
