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At the early stages, learning is a series of first attempts. The nascent action is fueled by desire, interest, and a sense of unknown possibility. As accomplishments accumulate, however small, the sense of identity starts to pivot. The skill begins to feel not so much something I’m doing as something I am. It’s not just an activity I’m doing, it’s a part of me I’ve activated. I am becoming someone who knows how to do this. The new skill is no longer simply a technique, but an identity I’ve forged with my own effort.
I have evidence of it. I have artifacts. I have finished something. I have completed something. I have solved something. And each one of those somethings provides evidence to me that I am making progress. Where before I may have felt a kind of uncertainty and self-doubt, now I have experience. I have enough experience that I can start to recognize patterns in my own progress. I can rely on myself to find ways to solve problems. I can trust myself. The building of that trust is creative confidence.
As learning progresses and I become more confident, my ability to decide on the color palette I’m going to use, the type of paint I’m going to use, the type of brush I’m going to use increases. I’m not just doing what the teacher says. I’m starting to use my judgment to make choices about how I’m going to do this. I’m starting to feel ownership of it. I’m not just being told what to do. I’m determining how I’m going to do it. The more I learn, the more I am able to assert my judgment and ownership over the things I am doing. That’s one of the ways in which confidence builds.
If I don’t encounter setbacks, I won’t really know how hard I’m willing to push myself to overcome them. But when I do encounter setbacks and I don’t give up, when I work through them and find my way to the other side, I build my confidence. That’s where confidence really starts to accumulate. It’s not the absence of setbacks, it’s the presence of persistence. It’s the presence of my ability to solve my way through it. And the more I do, the more I realize I can.
This is what makes creative confidence so powerful. As learning increases, fear decreases. Learning is the antidote to fear. The things I once found daunting no longer seem so scary. In fact, they seem quite normal and accessible. Learning makes my intuitive abilities automatic. Things I used to have to force myself to do are now things I do without even thinking about them. My newfound abilities are hardwired into my identity. I feel like I can do new things, and I can push through when things get difficult. When things seem daunting, I now know I can conquer them. When I feel like I’ve failed, I now know I can find a way forward. When I feel stuck, I know I can find a way out. And I know all of this because I have learned it, because I have evidence, because I have proof. Learning has transformed me. It has changed how I feel about myself. It has altered my sense of what is possible. Learning is the path to creative confidence, and it is an essential tool for becoming the person you are meant to be.