Saving Yourself the Cost of Insecurity | Chantelle Anderson | TEDxVanderbiltUniversity

when I got to Vanderbilt to join the women's basketball team I was expected to do me the interviews except that I was super shy and so I told our media director Tammy that I wasn't doing any so she told coach Foster and he left right before he made me take a speech class the day of my first speech I walked up to my classroom door holding my notecards looked in that little window at everyone I had to talk to turn around and walked right back to my dorm room totally skip the class top recruit all-american it didn't matter I chickened out and I ran away we all have confidence issues if we're honest about it it's not just the girl walking with her head down or the guy that's quiet in the back of the class it's also those with the longest resumes and the pretty faces and the biggest personalities it's because we all have fears and we all have dreams and so we all struggle with confidence sometimes but we didn't start out that way I remember in the first grade my class is going on a field trip to the city pool and I was so excited that I wore my brand-new bathing suit it was a one-piece with a cutout right here that showed my belly button kind of risque for first grade my parents didn't care but my seventh-day adventists private school wasn't having it my teacher told me I had three options one changing to another suit to wear a t-shirt over or three not go but I didn't like any of those options and I told my teacher that in front of the whole class probably should have skipped that speech though because it landed me in the principal's office calling my mom not a good look but we all started out confident do you remember when you were fearless before you questioned if you could do something or worried about what anyone else thought about it I do that's how we know that we all started out confident but then something happened that changed the part of us that didn't hesitate or question or doubt do you remember what that was what taught you not to be confident for me I learned that I wasn't pretty when I realized the pretty pictures around me didn't look like me I learned that we were poor and that it was it made me less when the lady at the grocery store looked down on me when I handed her the money my mom gave me I later found out they were food stamps I learned that speaking up was pointless when my no meant nothing to him and I learned that being an athlete was the only thing that made me valuable when I retired from the WNBA and people stopped treating me as valuable there were a lot of lessons that taught me not to be confident in who I was and we all have them so what were yours the great thing is that if we learned it we can learn differently and even though I didn't really want to think about all those first lessons I realized that the alternative was spending the rest of my life in doubt and I thought about what that insecurity would cost me did I want to be part of the 67% of women who don't feel qualified to be leaders or sacrifice hearing yes because I was too scared to ask the question did I want to be part of the 96% of women who wouldn't call themselves beautiful did I want to spend eight hours a day five days a week at a job I hated because I didn't believe I could get better or died holding my dream of starting a business the exact cost of insecurity is different for all of us but that was when I decided mine was too high I refused to spend the rest of my life questioning my talents and hating Monday through Friday and the day came where the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom Anais Nin said that and we all have that moment in life where we decide to go for it in some area from there we need to sustain that decision by relearning how to be confident and like all good learning it starts with asking the right questions Simon T Bailey author of shifter brilliant said that the quality of your questions exhibits the quality of your thinking and determines the quality of your answers rebuilding your confidence is a question and answer process you go through with yourself you ask yourself the right questions listen to your answers and then take intentional action based on what they are ask listen act and so today I'm gonna go through seven questions that helped me and will help you to so question number one has to do with your relationship with fear how do you see fear and what do you do with it when I was in high school my dad was in the hospital getting a kidney transplant I drove 45 minutes to go see him and then sat in the car because I was too scared to go in and see him like that I ended up driving all the way home without even going in there are so many people telling us to be fearless but that's not realistic and it's never gonna happen life makes sure of it what matters more in the confidence-building process is not how much fear you feel but what you do with it when you feel it do you chase fear instead of running from it question number two has to do with your perception of appearance how do your thoughts and feelings about your looks impact what you do so I'm six foot six when I don't wear heels and I hated being tall for the longest I was bullied a ton and my confidence was shot because of it it wasn't until I learned to embrace my height and really see the value in it that I could start to build confidence in who I was as a person do you appreciate how you look while fighting influences that say it's not good enough question number three has to do with your level of self-reliance how much of your confidence comes from inside instead of outside last month I cut my hair and this guy when I posted a picture on Instagram this guy commented on it and he said please don't cut your hair I don't like seeing you like that now before before I would have been like oh my gosh should I get a new weave but now I was like umm did I ask you does your confidence come from who you are instead of what you do who you're with or what anybody else says about it question number four has to do with your applied work ethic if how hard you work was the only factor in your success would you bet on yourself my first league game freshman year the girl I was guarding threw me on the ground stepped over me and said welcome to the SEC Freshman I was like oh my gosh how rude there was so many times I wanted to quit and run right back to the west coast but instead I got in the gym every single day after practice and I worked to make sure I got what I wanted are you willing to step up your work to build your confidence question number five has to do with your discernment in relationships do the people you surround yourself with help you to be more confident so I was never one of the cool kids like ever I had glasses that took up my whole face I was on the math team yet math team um but when I got to college and even onto the pros I decided that I wanted to be and so I started going out and dating and partying to make sure that I could really fit in with that in-crowd and it was awesome until I realized that most of those people didn't really care anything about me it was a really hard lesson to learn we will never be confident if we surround ourselves with people who don't want us to be no matter how we feel about them are you willing to let go of sentimentality and relationships for the sake of your confidence question number six has to do with your execution of standards do you enforce your non-negotiables after I retired from the WNBA I got into college coaching for three years and I loved my first job but in my second job I found myself in a situation where I wasn't respected or valued and since respect is one of my non-negotiables I knew I couldn't stay there and so I did some research made a plan and I left the sports industry for the first time are you willing to change a situation that doesn't meet your standards question number seven is the last question and it's probably the hardest of them all and it has to do with your resolution of history how are your past experiences impacting your present view earlier on in my career I had a really hard time dealing with women in positions of authority without it feeling like an attack like a man could say something to me and a woman could say the exact same thing and I would take it better from the man and I could trace it all the way back to my difficult relationship with my mom it was something that I really had to address and work on but it's not just me too many of us are walking around seeing the world through the lenses of our past experiences not realizing how it's changing our view it's limiting our opportunities and our ability to be confident in every situation are you willing to examine your view to build your confidence rebuilding your confidence is about asking yourself these questions listening to your answers and then taking intentional action based on what they are ask listen act the result is you'll be able to live confidently no matter where you are before becoming a confidence coach I spent almost four years in medical device sales and when I was interviewing to get into it with no experience there was one exchange that showed me how far I had come in my confidence journey it was at the end of an interview and I had spent the whole reps the whole day shadowing the rep and visiting his accounts and he turned to me and he said Chantelle you're great but you don't have any experience how do I know that you can do this job and I looked at him and I said Tom when I was coming out of high school one of the few coaches who didn't recruit me was the legendary Pat Summitt from Tennessee rest in peace and so when I can't got to Vanderbilt it was my goal to make Pat wish he had recruited me every single time we played and at the end of four years she said I was one of the best she'd ever seen Tom I can count on my hands the amount of people who have not believed in me and I've proven every single one of them wrong so just let me know if I should add you to that list he offered me the job shortly after I want to leave you with three things number one confidence is a skill you can build it and when you do it will change everything in your life number two you will be paying the cost of insecurity until you intentionally focus on building your confidence and number three you have everything you need to get everything you need including confidence especially confidence because you started out that way it's about asking yourself listening to your your to yourself and taking intentional action to get back to the person you were created to be thank you and God bless [Applause]

Channel: TEDx Talks

Views: 265,868

Keywords: TEDxTalks, English, Life, Achievement, Behavior, Change, Decision making, Dreams, Education, Failure, Faith, Fear, Freedom, Friendship, Goal-setting, Happiness, Higher education, Identity, Impact, Learning, Motivation, Personal education, Personal growth, Positive Thinking, Purpose, Self, Self improvement, Self-help, Success

Id: ts9GazDNkuY

Length: 11min 19sec (679 seconds)

Published: Tue Dec 19 2017