Dear Anne
Ever since I spilled a cup of coffee on one of my boss's clients during a meeting I am now overcome with nerves every time I have to make it for his clients. I can't stop my hands from shaking. It's so embarrassing for both myself and my boss and it's getting worse and worse. I try telling myself how stupid I am being but it doesn't work. Is there anything I can do to stop these nerves? I love my job but am now thinking of looking for a new one. Please help. Iona
Dear Iona
I'm sorry to hear that you're feeling so anxious. The good news, however, is that you now want to do something to regain your confidence and poise. As you can see, just telling yourself it's stupid isn't working. If you want to recover confidence, here's a couple of techniques that do work if you apply them!
Find five minutes to sit quietly on your own somewhere. Then just close your eyes and think of all the thousands of times that you have made coffee and carried it through perfectly fine. Think of all those tea-breaks, your breakfasts, your lunches and evening meals. Your free time watching TV. Thousands and thousands of times you've carried out this action with no problem. Presumably you will also have made lots of coffee for previous clients and managed that OK. The more you think of occasions that show youcan do this because you have, the quicker your confidence will come back.
I now invite you to to consider the realities of this one-off hiccup in your success rate. Your boss may have been cross but has he given you the sack? No! Has he said, You're not good enough for this job? No! He thinks you can do it just fine. Because you can. Is he going to reject you? No he's not. Are you good enough? Yes you are.
Are you willing to track down the negative thoughts you have about yourself? You might like to take a piece of A4 paper and draw a line down the middle of it. On the left-hand side you can note those bad thoughts down briefly. It helps to separate thoughts from feelings. It's the thoughts you're after. On the right-hand side, look for all the positive evidence that discounts the negatives. For example, if you've been thinking, I'm not good enough so I'll never get another job, write beside it on the right-hand side, I have these skills.... and list them. Having those skills means you're employable after all, you have a job, don't you? Also words like never and always are crystal-ball predictions. You can't see the future. You've also been discounting your abilities and your possibilities for doing things differently. Moreover, such all-or-nothing thinking distorts reality. Nobody is all bad!
You could also think about people who like you or have a positive opinion of you. It's worth saying out loud, So-and-So likes me. Thingie says I'm kind and Mrs Bloggs at school said I'm smart, or whatever other positives you have garnered over your life.
A moment ago I invited you to separate out thoughts (which are about facts) from feelings (which are about reactions to those facts). It can be easy to fall into emotional reasoning which goes, I feel embarrassed and useless therefore I must be embarrassing and useless and everybody must see me that way. Chances are they don't! Most people think far more about themselves than about other people! It's also likely that other folks have a less distorted view of you and see the things you can do as well as the one error you have magnified out of all proportion.
Lastly you might consider working through books such as Gael Lindenfield's Super Confidence, Brian Roet's The Confidence to Be Yourself and Dr David Burns The Feeling Good Handbook. Adult Education and Leisure Centres also run confidence-building and assertiveness courses which may be just what you need.
I hope you enjoy your job and build it into a rewarding career. But most of all I hope you learn to love and value yourself for the great person you are.
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