Self-Doubt

CATEGORY: PERSONAL

Why:

We all experience self-doubt. Through discussion we can normalize it and learn to live with it, so that we don't hold ourselves back in order to avoid it.

Warm-Up:

When do you tend to have the most self-doubt? This could be any time you’re not sure of yourself.

Exploration:

Nearly everyone experiences self-doubt, no matter how accomplished they are. We all sometimes think we aren‘t "good enough" in some way. Explore and connect participants’ experiences of self-doubt. How do you usually respond to it, and how would you ideally like to respond? If even the most successful people often still have it—and they do— then maybe the goal isn't actually to make self-doubt go away completely. Instead, we can become friends with it. Like a familiar person on the street, we can acknowledge it, say hello, but keep going on our path. The fact that it exists does not need to stop us. By revealing our individual experiences of self-doubt, we make it less scary and more of a manageable, normal experience.

Additional Resources

NASA Astronaut Raja Chari, selected in 2020 as part of a new class of astronauts to go back to the moon, has an incredible story and career. One of the things that makes him remarkable is actually his honesty about self-doubt. Check out his NASA video here, and look for how he describes the role of self-doubt in his life. Clearly, it has not stopped him from achieving great things. And clearly, achieving great things does not mean self-doubt goes away. He's learned to live with it and manage it so that he can still reach his dreams. And now he's the first Indian-American astronaut.