Our doubts are our traitors: Self-doubt is a horrible thing! But it isn’t useless. Self-doubt can help us more than fake confidence. In this debate, we explore the meaning of our doubts are our traitors and discuss how to eliminate doubts to succeed. Doubts have a powerful way of telling us something. The purpose of doubts is not to weaken us. Instead, they’re trying to warn us of something.
Ignore is not bliss. It is a painful escape route. But we have to take care to ensure that our doubts don’t overtake us completely.
Our Doubts Are Our Traitors Meaning
The most important question to ask when you have doubts is
- How much of this doubt is real?
- What is it trying to tell me?
- Is there something productive out of this doubt?
Is the doubt real?: Before worrying about your doubts, the first step is to validate them. Are these doubts real at all? Do they have any value for you? If they don’t – what is the purpose of these doubts and the best way to handle them? Related: Worry is a rocking chair, it won’t take us anywhere!
What is the meaning of doubt?: Doubts are often the first enemies of faith and self-confidence. However, they serve the purpose of caution through fear. It is the worst advice to ignore doubts! Self-doubts usually are a call for action or an emotional response. Before ignoring them, try to understand the meaning of these fears and the best way to work through them.
How can I use this constructively? Instead of ignoring these fears, face them and find alternatives. What will you get by heeding this fear? Is there a way you can reduce this fear by creating risk mitigation? Ultimately, the best way to respond to fear is through action to reduce it. Distraction does the exact opposite, it makes the fear grow uncontrollably.
In this quote, Shakespeare says – Our doubts are our traitors. They need not be our enemies. These doubts can be great allies to make something happen!
What is your self-doubt telling you?
If you have any doubts, first listen to what they mean. What are these doubts telling you? And the answers which tell that you’re not enough or incompetent are blatant lies. Don’t fall into that trap. But actively listen to get a constructive response. These doubts are present for a valuable meaning. They can’t just be about abusing you or calling you incompetent. Related: Understanding the meaning of your fears!
Once you have the real reasons, you can at least plan a strategy to work around your doubts and find a solution. Our doubts are our traitors only if we let them. They can easily be your allies if you choose them to be.
Your doubts can’t always hold you back from taking action. They are only present as a precaution and sometimes they are meaningless too. We need to find a way to be objective to avoid the trap of these doubts taking you into a vicious cycle of not doing anything at all.
Focus on what you want
Our doubts act as spokes in the wheel and reduce our movement. But you can’t be planning just to avoid these doubts and miss the big picture. Your big picture and dreams always tell you where to go. The doubts only tell you to be careful. Focus on what you want, not what you fear. Your outcomes are based on what you do – not what you hold back from!
Instead, treat doubts as just feedback and find a way to work around them. This is indeed a call for your strategy to define how you target your goals and build confidence. If your doubts are making you rethink your capabilities, then focus on building your self-confidence.
- Plan for your success and not your doubts or fears
- Adjust your strategy, don’t let doubts ruin your dreams
- Doubts are just feedback, treat them objectively and move forward
Your doubts are a way to move forward
Don’t fall into the traps and lies which everyone around you professes. Your doubts, fears and confidence are all impactful emotions. Listen to what they are telling. Normally, they ask you to take action and move forward. Don’t just ignore them because these emotions will find a way to come back. Also, don’t try to be a perfectionist – you will not find all answers, but you can find a solution that can work.
Our doubts are our traitors in the sense that they don’t allow us to do all the work. But if they are constructive, these doubts are the best things that can happen to us to move forward. Remember, everything we encounter can be a very good way to move ahead with our lives. They just have to be positioned in the correct manner to give us the best benefits.
Our doubts are traitors. And make us lose the good we oft might win, by fearing to attempt.
– William Shakespeare (Source)
Discover more from Inspire99
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Pingback: Our Doubts are traitors - William Shakespeare - Inspire99
Pingback: What to say while talking to yourself? - Inspire99
Pingback: Our Doubts Are Our Traitors – Shakespeare — REID INVESTMENT GROUP
Pingback: It is not enough to have a good mind - Rene Descartes - Inspire99
Pingback: Top 8 Characteristics of an Entrepreneur to Build a Startup - Inspire 99
Vinay, the line “We probably have to do the hard work of segregating which ones are useful and which ones are to avoid..”..explains all…
Great, you are the one who has deep understanding of things and that’s the reason I keep reading your blogs…you really make things so clear. I feel glad to tell you that today I was reading about’s Gopal Krishna Gokhale budget speech of 26th March’1902, explaining British Hypocrisy, After reading it one thing immediately stuck my mind was about your thoughts and writing, you explain things the way Gokhale explained British Hypocrisy in India. I keep praising time and again about your thoughts and writing, mind you :) I really mean it…..To be frank I really like to let people know how good they are, so they keep doing what they are doing….
Thanks
Mayuresh, I think it is words like these which make me feel what we do here is really worth doing. I can’t tell you how good it feels reading such encouraging words and feeling so good about it. I am really happy to know that we are able to connect with our words – one goal which I have always had as a great aspiration and so happy to know we are able to do it to a certain extent.
Thanks so much for the generous words Mayuresh. Very happy to include your suggestions as we go on with a few more of our articles. Please do share the Gopal Krishna Gokhale speech address and I would love to include that in one of our main posts. Since it comes highly recommended from you, I can’t wait to share it out here. Thanks so much for constantly encouraging us Mayuresh, Will very much look forward to your opinions and thoughts..
Vinay… actually I read part of that speech in the book “India’s Struggle For Independence – Bipin Chandra”. If you can manage the copy of it, please refer – Chapter 9, Pg 121, 3rd Para
Or
Will try to search online and if I get it will forward you the link…
Ah I have read that book. I really liked how he has conveyed the message, very simple and straightforward without making a hero or villain of anyone. Quite simply one of the best history books I have ever read.
Thanks so much mate, that will be very helpful if you can spot it. Would love to share it over here :)
Sure…will send it to you if I can spot it….
Thanks Mayuresh, that will be wonderful :)
I think the more than “doubt” main traitor is our own “Mind”…..it’s the mind where they are born……So most important thing is to keep your mind happy and free from so called traitors. Doubts are like rolling chair, it will keep you busy but will take you nowhere
But still I think “introspective doubt” are not the problem in fact they are best to make us prepare for worst situation…The problems are those doubts which are 200% useless and keeps us occupied for no reason…
Actually currently I am somewhat in a doubtful situation, hence the above lines are haphazardly written….I hope you get my point…..
Thanks
Hi Mayuresh,
Great to hear from you. Very interesting views, it reminds me of the quote by shakespeare – the mind maketh the man. And also Mark Twain who says I have faced many a terrible things in my life – most of which never occurred. I could not agree more with you, the doubts most time take the destructive role and very little useful comes out of it.
I think it helps to look at doubts in the perspective you explained. When the doubts are about our capacities you are right, we should keep them as away as possible. At the same time, we might be able to use these doubts as pointers to something to prepare for eventualities. I guess each of these emotions are pretty useful in their own ways. We probably have to do the hard work of segregating which ones are useful and which ones are to avoid..
Thoughts?
Cheers,
Vinay