Self-Doubt as an Ally?

I Googled self doubt today. It’s a state of mind that drops in on me occasionally and, frankly, I wanted to know how to get rid of it.

The Google search results didn’t disappoint me.

I found links for “squash self doubt,” “overcome self doubt, ” and “break-through self doubt.”

Dealing with self doubt started to sound like a life-long quest and not something I could get rid of in a day. Bummer.

Deflated, I decided to pick up my copy of The War of Art by Steven Pressfield. I knew there had to be something in there. And there was something. Something radical!

Pressfield says suggests and idea about self doubt so opposite of where I was headed that it just might work. On page 39 he writes:

Self-doubt can be an ally. This is because it serves as an indicator of aspiration. It reflects love, love of something we dream of doing, and desire, desire to do it. If you find ourself asking yourself (and your friends), “Am I really a writer? Am I really an artist?” chances are you are.

I was shocked and then convinced all in one breath. Can the plague of self doubt actually be an ally?

It’s true that any yearning desire is the one most easily doubted.

I often ask my clients what they see themselves doing in their wildest dreams and the truth is always buried deep beneath a stash of more responsible or acceptable answers. When we are at last able to uncover the real thing, it is often quickly dismissed or peppered by self-doubting question that vaporize it into “just a silly old idea.”

But those deeply doubted desires are actually the solid truth.

Why do we doubt what is so solidly true and real? Pressfield gives one answer in the final line of the excerpt, which reads:

The counterfeit innovator is wildly self-confident. The real one is scared to death.

I get it now. We doubt what is true because doubt is a compass whose job it is to steer us in the direction of our dreams — a direction that feels uncertain, new and impossible. A direction that often supplies us with feelings that show us what it is worth the fight.

There is no fight in something that is easy, fake or a rip-off.

Self doubt is a natural reaction for the warrior who lives her dreams and defends them from herself.