(6) SELF-CONFIDENCE

Confidence is built upon an experience of success. When we first begin any undertaking, we are likely to have little confidence, because we have not learned from ex­perience that we can succeed. This is true of learning to ride a bicycle, speak in public, or perform surgery. It is literally true that success breeds success. Even a small success can be used as a stepping stone to a greater one. Managers of boxers are very careful to match them care­fully so they can have a graduated series of successful experiences. We can use the same technique, starting gradually, and experiencing success at first on a small scale.
Another important technique is to form the habit of re­membering past successes, and forgetting failures. This is the way both an electronic computer and the human brain are supposed to operate. Practice improves skill and suc­cess in basketball, golf, horseshoe pitching, or salesman­ship, not because "repetition" has any value in itself. If it did we would "learn" our errors instead of our "hits." A person learning to pitch horseshoes, for example, will miss the stake many more times than he will hit it. If mere rep­etition were the answer to improved skill, his practice should make him more expert at missing since that is what he has practiced most. However, although his misses may outnumber hits ten to one, through practice his misses gradually diminish and his hits come more and more frequently. This is because the computer in his brain remembers and reinforces his successful attempts, and for­gets the misses.
This is the way that both an electronic computer and our own success mechanisms learn to succeed.
Yet, what do most of us do? We destroy our self-con­fidence by remembering past failures and forgetting all about past successes. We not only remember failures, we impress them on our minds with emotion. We condemn ourselves. We flay ourselves with shame and remorse (both are highly egotistical, self-centered emotions). And self-confidence disappears.
It doesn't matter how many times you have failed in the past. What matters is the successful attempt, which should be remembered, reinforced, and dwelt upon. Charles Kettering has said that any young man who wants to be a scientist must be willing to fail 99 times before he succeeds once, and suffer no ego damage because of it.
Prescription: Use errors and mistakes as a way to learn­ing—then dismiss them from your mind. Deliberately re­member and picture to yourself past successes. Everyone has succeeded sometime at something. Especially, when beginning a new task, call up the feelings you experienced in some past success, however small it might have been.
Dr. Winfred Overholser, Superintendent of St. Eliza­beth's Hospital, has said that recalling brave moments is a very sound way to restore belief in yourself; that too many people are prone to let one or two failures blot out all good memories. If we will systematically relive our brave moments in memory, he says, we will be surprised to see we had more courage than we thought. Dr. Overholser recommends the practice of vividly remembering our past successes and brave moments as an invaluable aid when­ever self-confidence is shaken.