The Power of Self-Belief | Layne Beachley | TEDxStHildasSchool

good morning am i on yes I'm on don't fall asleep down there okay girls you look very comfortable so I'm thrilled to be here today and I'm going to talk about the power of self belief so you are the most magnificent being you will ever be is you and if you're not going to take my word for it then maybe take it from dr. Seuss because today you are you it's truer than true and there's no one alive it's more u're than you so if you were to open up your mind and believe in yourself a lot more what would your world look like if you believed you are magnificent if you believed in your ability to overcome challenges and obstacles if you believed in unlimited potential and possibility and if you believe that you have the ability to shape and create your reality what would your world look like and are you willing to step into that aspect of yourself are you willing to give yourself permission to be the best versions of you that photo on the screen behind me is the moment I claimed my seventh world title I had to step into believing to be the best version of myself it's the moment I actually stepped into the history books I became the most successful female surfer of all time permission to brag I did something that not even the king of surfing Kelly Slater can do I won six more titles in a row and so I had to believe in myself but it's our self-limiting beliefs that actually create the lives that we live and if you want to understand what you believe you just have to ask yourself what you want and then the thought that follows that is actually what you tend to believe your yeah buts your but ifs are your beliefs winning my seventh world title taught me a lot about myself it taught me a lot about getting out of my own way it taught me a lot about believing in myself it taught me a lot about trusting in my instincts and ability and it taught me about trusting in ease and grace because like you I used to think that success required a whole lot of struggle and trouble and challenge Oprah Winfrey once said and all thought leaders say this you don't manifest what you want you manifest what you believe now to give you a little bit of background about my life I grew up on the northern beaches of Sydney I actually grew up at a beach called manly anyone familiar with manly Beach yes it's the most appropriately named Beach in the world and I grew up is the only girl surfer down at manly beach these photos of me is a four year old surfing down at man town I refer to it as this is actually on the harbour side I'm waiting for the fairies to come in to create boat wake for me to surf on I started surfing as a four year old down at manly and it was a place that I felt truly connected to the ocean is something I still feel truly connected to it's where I resort to every day to get a sense of balance and a sense of freedom and so when I started surfing as a four year old it wasn't an environment that was very welcoming or a place that was very encouraged for women to to consider and so I started to find a place where I felt comfortable by surrounding myself with people that believed in me sometimes more than I believed in myself I started surfing as a four year old right there in the corner of manly and then by the time I was six or seven I was paddling out the back on my own and I was dominating the lineup but I realized that it was my beliefs that were holding me back but it was also my beliefs that were actually propelling me forward let me give you an example of what I mean when I was 8 years old my dad sat me down and told me I was adopted and now for anyone in this room that's ever experienced adoption on any level from my own personal experience when my dad told me I was adopted it was that moment in time that I believed that I wasn't worthy of love I believed I had been rejected by my own mother I believed that I was worthless loveless and I believed I had been abandoned that was the I that was the belief system that I had in my mind is an 8 year old and that gave me a choice and that's what obstacles and challenges and setbacks do they provide you with an opportunity to determine what's a really important course of action now what is it that you want to do with this information because when you feel abandoned when you feel rejected you have a choice you can become a victim of your circumstances or you become a master of your destiny the choice is yours and it's the choices that you make that determine the realities of your life or determine the quality of your life so I made a choice as an eight-year-old that I'm going to become a world champion because I thought if I become a world champion everyone will love me now we realize it doesn't work like that that that is essentially what drove me to become a six-time consecutive world champion it was that fear of abandonment that fear of rejection that fear of being worthless is essentially what drove me to become so successful I didn't allow those setbacks to define me I didn't allow those setbacks to hold me back that was when I clarified my vision that I have to become a world champion now at the time it was anything and everything anything I was good at I thought I could become a world champion at now obviously my beliefs are a little bit skewed I obviously believed in myself a little bit too much but I had the conviction to clarify what my vision was and that was to become a world champion now if you want to become successful in anything here are the three things you have to do number one you have to be willing to clarify your vision number two you have to surround yourself with a great team of people people who support you people who believe in you people who are there to encourage you and people that actually believe in you sometimes more than you believe in yourselves not the ones that try and drag you down and pull you down and tell you that you can't that you won't that you never will because I was surrounded by those at Manly and I refer to those guys as my dream thief's my life vampires the guys that would paddle out and growl in my face and harass me in the end in the water and intimidate me they'd look at me and go you're a girl get out of the water and I look back at them ago what are you doing out here then they didn't like the fact that I stood up for myself and fought for what I believed in now I believed I had just as much right to be in the water as they did but what gave me the strength and the conviction and the courage to stand up and fight for them and fight for myself was my clarity of vision I wanted to be a world champion now you become the some of the top five people you spend the most amount of time with do you spend too much time with life vampires and dream please do you spend too much time with people that want to suck the life out of you do you spend too much time with these people that are referred to as flames because if you think about a flame the more oxygen you give it the more fuel you deliver to it the brighter it becomes so I don't give these dream feasts and lone flame part life vampires very much oxygen i deplete them of oxygen i deplete them of fuel I actually removed myself from their presence and spend more time with people who are positive who are uplifting because for the three guys that was sitting here telling me to get out of the water there was another one sitting here saying I said I think you're a really good surfer I believed in you yes you have work to do yes you can make it these people are my honesty barometers these people are my dream face now it's up to you as to who you want to listen to and these are the things that you have to do to achieve a goal the first thing you have to do is write it down and when I has established that goal of becoming a world champion I started pinning my goals down I started writing them down because science has proven that you have 39 percent more likely to achieve your goal if you write it down these are all measures that you have to take to ensure that you are held accountable for achieving it then you post it somewhere now as a kid there was no social media there was no Facebook so I used to post it on my bathroom mirror and my wardrobe and I had all these daily reminders around my room about what my goals were I had my big goal which is to be a world champion and then I had my smaller goal or the steps that I had to take to achieve that ultimate goal of becoming a world champion and these are daily reminders these are reminders and are my actions complementing my goal are the actions that I'm taking is getting me one step closer to achieving my ultimate dream and then lastly I had to proclaim my goals because you're not actually going to get the best out of yourself until you share what it is you want with others and if you share your goals now you're truly held accountable now these days you can post it on facebook you can post it on Twitter and you can be held accountable by millions of people you don't even know it's a little bit daunting but share it with the people that are going to support you not the ones that are going to knock you down so when I posted my goals on my windows and my mirrors and I shared my goals with my mentors and my friends and my coaches I realized that I was increasing the likelihood of achieving my goal but I still had that underlying fear of rejection I still had that underlying fear of abandonment and growing up in an environment where I'm surrounded by life fiefs and dream vampires surrounded by people that telling me you're not smart enough you're not good enough you're not talented enough you're not pretty enough you're never going to make it was frightening was intimidating it was a place where I found myself sometimes cowering in a state of fear and hopelessness but that's when I had to rely on the people around me I had the gold and I had the conviction to proclaim to the world that I'm going to be not only a one-time sword champion I'm going to be a multiple time world champion and the amount of people around me that said hang on you haven't even won an event yet quiet down pipe down Gidget keep it down I had to rise above that because it's our setbacks and our obstacles that provide us with a foundation of resilience it's the resilience that's going to enable you to overcome these challenges time and time and time again when I was a 16 year old that's what I decided I'm going to become the world champion surfer up until that point I was a world champion tennis player hockey player surfer cricketer obviously none of the sports that had money I wasn't driven by the dollar I was driven by my passion to succeed and surfing was the one place that I just truly reverted back to it's the one place where I just felt so nurtured and connected it's one place that I was so passionate about that's what drew me back to it so announcing to the world is a 16 year old I'm going to be a world champion held me entirely accountable but here's the other part of the of the plan or the model to achieve your goals you have to understand what your beliefs are behind it and it's your beliefs that dictate or govern your behaviors your habits and then it's your habits that will enable you to achieve your dreams but my beliefs at the time sometimes sabotage my outcomes sometimes habitat my habits were demonstrating a bit of self sabotage so for example I'm reading my Diaries from 1992 I was twenty years old I'll let you smart girls do the maths is how old I am now and when I was twenty years old I had this dream still of becoming a world champion I'd been on the Pro Tour for two years and I was constantly complaining about being fat and see what you believe you will always seek proof of and so I was complaining about my body weight and then there was actions that I was taking to correct that I was training really hard I was surfing two to three times a day but then after winning a heat I would reward myself with cheesecake or apple pie now is that action supporting my ultimate goal no you know what that action is doing it's proving what I believe I'm believing I'm fat and therefore I am actually creating that because I'm constantly seeking proof of what I believe now if you want to know what you believe have a look at your life you are all self fulfilling prophecies believe it or not and if you start using the words I am which are really powerful because what you put after them shapes your reality it changes your life now I use those words to enable me to become a history maker and a record breaker this is the moment I claim my sixth consecutive world title now I must admit my first six world titles were driven out of fear I also believe that I had to passionately dislike my competition to beat them I used to believe that I had to get everybody out of my way now with someone that has a fear of rejection I'm actually rejecting people first or I'm giving them a reason to reject me that make sense I'm actually seeking what I believe I'm seeking proof of what I believe but I succeeded doing that but you know what that success did it cost me my quality of life it costs me my happiness and it cost me a lot of friendships that were never being able to rebuild it's really important that you understand that the steps you're taking are fulfilling your life in a holistic way not just achieving your goal but making sure that when you're on your path to success that you're not stepping on people you're actually relying on people because all of us are here because we've stood on the shoulders of others every successful person has another successful person who has supported them to achieve my six consecutive World title required a lot of resilience a lot of discipline because halfway through the year I lost my mojo I fell into a state of depression I was in the state of hopelessness and I wasn't willing to acknowledge it because we can all go through life thinking everything's great everything's fine I'm okay but deep down you know it's not and I had that deep down sense of restlessness and uneasiness and then one day one of my friends a guy called guy leach he's a World Ironman champion he walked into my house unannounced without a shirt on which is standard for litchi and he actually knocked on my door walked in sat himself down and he said hey gidge that was my nickname growing up and he still calls me Gidget he's like hey kid how's it going and I said yeah great you guys I don't think so now obviously lychee is one of my honesty barometers and I said what do you mean I don't think so and he said well you really down on yourself you're really negative you're not motivated you're not training you're not surfing there's something going on what's happening like why aren't you weren't you surfing how hard can it be and all I could say was thank you thank you for bringing to my attention something I'm not willing to bring to my own who in your life brings the best out in you who in your life is that honest with you has that much respect and compassion for you that they're willing to bring those things to your attention to enable you to get past them and become a bigger more capable more confident human being do you have anyone in the in your life that can do that with you because if you do I suggest you maintain a strong connection with them and if you don't I suggest you find someone because everyone in our life has somebody that maybe we're not choosing to listen to I chose to listen to lychee because my desire to become number one in the world to become a record breaker to become a history maker to get out of my own way and fulfill my dream of becoming a multiple time world champion was way more important than failing are you focusing on losing or you focusing on winning and when I say are you focusing on losing it actually sounds like this I'm trying not to lose whereas if you're using the words I hope so I'll try I think so I guess so there's no confidence there's no conviction there's no belief in those words I am I can I will I trust I believe these are all words of belief and conviction these are all words that will fuel you towards future success the day I won my sixth consecutive world title was overwhelming because I was actually sitting in the water I'd gone through months of preparation and planning and 15 minutes before the final 15 minutes before I was about to submit myself in the history books I'm sitting in the water and this is what the internal dialogue sounds in my head I'm tired I'm sick of the roles and responsibilities of being a world champion I'm fed up with the expectations of my shoulder I'm tired of being victimized I'm tired of the of the intrusion into my life I'm just fed up so what am i doing I'm talking myself out of success I'm self sabotaging my moment and I am actually getting in my own way and preventing myself from achieving my goal and so many of us do this on a day-to-day basis so what did I have to do the only way you can change your beliefs is to become aware of them and I had to become aware of the words that I was using in my mind I'm tired I'm fed up I'm a victim poor me is really not the Foundation's to achieve them so I had to become aware of what I was saying and flip it and use words I am in a positive way I am going to get out of my own way I am going to trust in my instincts I am going to trust in my ability I am good enough I am going to believe in myself and I am going to catch this next wave and I am going to be a six times consecutive world champion now the great thing about our subconscious mind is it can not differentiate between what's real and what's imagined so don't underestimate the power of visualization I've visualized every aspect of this victory I visualized what bikini are waring I visualized what hand I'd hold the trophy in I visualize how the salt would feel in my skin and I visualize what the champagne would taste like once it's been sprayed in my face I visualized every component of it because I wanted to manifest it what you think about expands so become aware of what you're thinking about and if it's a reality that you don't like then start thinking something different but you can't change it until you become aware of it I'm proud of the fact that I was able to get out of my own way and stop sabotaging my my beliefs by changing my habits and my behaviors but I can't do that until I become aware of what my beliefs are my ultimate goal to become successful was to actually be able to make a positive difference from humble beginnings growing up in Manly Beach to becoming a multiple time world champion and leaving a lasting legacy has enabled me to create my own foundation called the aim for the Stars foundation I'm extremely grateful for the girls at this school today for supporting the foundation and raising money for it today it provides financial and moral support for young girls to dare to dream and pursue their passion and aspire to achieve over the last 13 years we've invested over 700 thousand dollars into young girls and women to invest in their own future and fulfill their own potential don't underestimate the impact you can have on someone else's life when you say you want to lead by example choose the word positive before it choose the word positive example leave a lasting legacy believe in yourselves surround yourself with people that believe in you more than you believe in yourself and never give up on your dreams because they never give up on you ultimately it's choice not chance that determines our reality if you want to change your current reality please start making different choices thank you

Channel: TEDx Talks

Views: 359,154

Rating: 4.8706799 out of 5

Keywords: TEDxTalks, English, Australia, Life, Achievement, Championship, Education, Success

Id: CKVSjIIt8t0

Length: 19min 46sec (1186 seconds)

Published: Fri Jul 17 2015