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I've never had "self-confidence". I've always been told what I do isn't good enough or that I can do better, or that someone will always be better than me.
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If you aren't walking around with self-doubt are you considered confident? Most people I have talked to seem to think so. I'm not so sure. "Confidence" seems to be an attitude (not negative or positive) that people seem to think they need. But do you need confidence to pass a test? No, you just need to know the information and to be able to communicate it to pass the test. My wife once told me how confident I was. I told her I wasn't confident at all, but that I just didn't walk around with self doubt. Why would someone need confidence if they didn't have doubt?
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I think we tell our kids that "you can be anything, as long as you have the means." We tend to have a mentality that if you are poor you don't get an equal chance to achieve your dreams, it's always a lot more work for someone with less. Giving someone an equal shot ends up being called a "handout." I think that may be our problem, we focus on the individual, but not in a way that says we're only as good as the weakest player. We think the team is as good as our best player.
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I think in general people have a lot different ideas about what confidence is. To me Confidence is faith in our ability to respond effectively to anything that happens to us. It's faith in our ability to learn and grow stronger in difficult times, faith in our potential as unique individuals to make an important contribution to the world. When we are confident in our individual self worth and ability, we strive to be the best we can be, we strive to make the most of the gifts we are given for the good of all, and because we are confident not just of our own worth and ability, but in everyones, we have no need to be better than our fellow man, our wish is to be OUR best FOR our fellow man. When we are free of the fear of not being good enough, we are free to be all we can be and free to encourage our fellow man to be all that they can be as well.
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Typically the stress is on individuality, but it seems to rarely be the individual contribution to the whole. I'd say that you're on to something when you ask "Could this be our problem?" I'm thinking that it could be. All of the parts of a clock are different, but they're not going to do much on their own.
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the fact that we have been instilling confidence since the 40s is the reason america has been successful as a nation. if you grow up believing you have limits then those limits will always exist, regardless of how much potential you actually achieve.
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the fact that we have been instilling confidence since the 40s is the reason america has been successful as a nation. if you grow up believing you have limits then those limits will always exist, regardless of how much potential you actually achieve.
as for individualism vs teamwork: teamwork is good when you really really cant do it yourself. otherwise it teaches you to rely on other people to get things done. and sometimes one persons vision is great enough that teamwork would just corrupt it. i believe in strong independence and individualism before collaboration and team work.
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It's a double edged sword. I never grew up hearing that I could be anything that I wanted to be, my parents didn't want to build my hopes up for the future just to see them destroyed and neither did my grandparents for that matter (and believe me, a lot them have), instead, I was taught to work in a team and not to work as an individual (this is what happens when you're raised by a military grandfather and a Turk). On a larger scale, the United States has become an over confident nation, this whole you can be anything you want mentality only makes us believe that after we get a high school diploma, under graduates degree, graduates degree, etc. that the possibilities are endless, and with this over confidence, we don't have any thing to back up our reasons for being so over confident.
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It's a double edged sword. I never grew up hearing that I could be anything that I wanted to be, my parents didn't want to build my hopes up for the future just to see them destroyed and neither did my grandparents for that matter (and believe me, a lot them have), instead, I was taught to work in a team and not to work as an individual (this is what happens when you're raised by a military grandfather and a Turk). On a larger scale, the United States has become an over confident nation, this whole you can be anything you want mentality only makes us believe that after we get a high school diploma, under graduates degree, graduates degree, etc. that the possibilities are endless, and with this over confidence, we don't have any thing to back up our reasons for being so over confident.
However, on the other side, without this mentality a lot of things would not have been created that we take for granted today.
In order for the United States to be more competitive, we shouldn't be instilling this idea in our children, but should rather be instilling in them the fundamentals of team work (this could also explain the high divorce rate in America as well and spousal abuse issues). What this country needs...is a big dose of humility
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Well, the other side of the argument is that the whole "you are special, find your own path" thing that is drilled into us is actually really detrimental. I've heard it suggested that it's the reason for a lot of 20-somethings confusion and inability to commit to major life decisions. A lot of, "this career is nice but does it make me feel special enough?"
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Well, the other side of the argument is that the whole "you are special, find your own path" thing that is drilled into us is actually really detrimental. I've heard it suggested that it's the reason for a lot of 20-somethings confusion and inability to commit to major life decisions. A lot of, "this career is nice but does it make me feel special enough?"
The emphasis this country puts on the individual's rights and success is unique. Yes, some people do community service and some people try to help others, but there is less a sense of community than other countries. I think confidence in an individual is a great quality as long as a person can still show some humility. Confidence can easily become arrogance and stubbornness. Confidence should make someone an excellent leader and teammate, not an isolated success.
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I think it's more the pigheadedness, that creates the inability to work well with others, with regard to confidence...
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Overconfidence can definitly be a major weakeness, but without any confidence at all, what would you be....I think there has to be some sort of middle ground...I think it depends on your environment also. Marines are trainned to be extrmely overconfident, which is what has given them their bloody history, but they also learn to work as a team, to overcome seemingly impossible odds...
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Ah. And then we hit 80 and have to review our lives and see what was true and what was a sham. I think it is generally good to be confident. To try to reach your goals and all. But I`m not sure how many people do this to the point of being unrealistic. But: better to have tried and lost than never to have tried at all. Eh?
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Ah. And then we hit 80 and have to review our lives and see what was true and what was a sham. I think it is generally good to be confident. To try to reach your goals and all. But I`m not sure how many people do this to the point of being unrealistic. But: better to have tried and lost than never to have tried at all. Eh?
As for America`s problems - I`d say there are more levels to the problem. BUT. The plutocracy that America has become is scarey. Really scarey. Maybe it is because each man for himself wants to believe that he can become that "dish washer to billionaire". I think the problem actually might be in the inability to see that only one in a million will actually make that- and it might be better to have MORE people living a normal, somewhat comfortable life than sit in the dredges of utter poverty. That would mean perhaps having to dream more realistic dreams. Not that of becoming a billionaire- but having health insurance, education for our kids, and a roof over our heads. What is the american dream? Is it really becoming a billionaire? Or could it be revised to having basic necessities and with that- human rights?
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I think it is a little misleading to tell your children "you can be anything you want". America is an highly competitive nation. No one can really claim to be the cream of the crop. There will always be someone better than you. Acting as an individual works for some situations, while working together works in others.
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"If we all reacted the same way, we'd be predictable, and there's always more than one way to view a situation. What's true for the group is also true for the individual. It's simple: overspecialize, and you breed in weakness. It's slow death."
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"If we all reacted the same way, we'd be predictable, and there's always more than one way to view a situation. What's true for the group is also true for the individual. It's simple: overspecialize, and you breed in weakness. It's slow death."
Not my words, but I agree with them. I suspect quite a few people here will be able to recognize where they come from.
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I have always been told that Americans as a general rule, are over confident and over compensate. I am fortunate enough this August to L.A for a month (from Australia). I am hoping to ask some big questions to a few people that I will be working with over there.
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I have always been told that Americans as a general rule, are over confident and over compensate. I am fortunate enough this August to L.A for a month (from Australia). I am hoping to ask some big questions to a few people that I will be working with over there.
Until then, I reserve m,y opinion until I understand the American lifestyle.
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This is one of greatest strengths. We have a society that encourages individual initiative, without it Bill Gates would have never dropped out of college and made these computers for us.
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I am confident that being self-confident without good reason to be will make me look like an idiot.
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In some areas yes in others no, I think to challenge is believing you have to be confident always and at all times or you are a wimp or a pushover blah blah blah, just be
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I read this amazing post about an American businessman ex-pat living in France, and it concerns this "self-confidence" that Americans carry around.
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I read this amazing post about an American businessman ex-pat living in France, and it concerns this "self-confidence" that Americans carry around.
“For both the Republicans and the Democrats, it’s always 1945," he said. “They really do think that America is always on top of the world, and it always will be that way — that we just have to make a few adjustments, and everything will stay this way forever. And you know, the politicians act this way because the voters would punish them if they tell them the truth."
The businessman said that in his travels, it’s startling to see how much better prepared work forces in other countries are for economic life as it’s actually going to be lived in this century. He said too that there is a conviction among the international business elites — including Americans, and not just Europe-based, but all over the world — that at a certain point in your career and the life of your family, you don’t want to be transferred to America, because you don’t want your children to be ruined by American culture. He said that generally, the intellectual laziness and sense of entitlement (e.g., that the world owes them a high standard of living without much effort), is at the heart of it.
He worries for America's future, because of what he sees as imperial decadence, and an inability, or unwillingness, of the American political system to confront the real problems facing the nation.
SO - - - - - - this "self-confidence" may be hurting us in the long haul.
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I think we are generally pretty hasty in our aggrandizement of confidence, particularly in the western world. Confidence is nice, but I view it as a concept best present as an effect and frequently serving poorly as purely a cause.
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