Since I was a little girl, for some reason, I’ve never believed in my own abilities and skills.
When I went to the first grade I already knew how to read, but I still cried while I was doing my homework and I was telling my mom that I will never ever learn how to write, I will never learn all those grammar rules. When I started learning piano I immediately gave up. “I will never ever learn how to play, never!“ I kept telling my parents. But they kept pushing me to practice and somehow after seven years in music school I earned the highest grade after performing in front of the whole school. I still don’t know how this happened. I still think I was pretty bad.
This disbelief in my own abilities followed me into my adult life as well. First I was too scared to even try and get into journalism, because I was sure I would fail an entrance exam. So I started to study another thing, but became bored and disappointed so dropped it and got into journalism. Even then I thought I didn’t belong. I was sure that everyone was smarter and better than me.
During my second year, I was an intern for one news website and I met a girl I knew from the university who had already finished her journalism studies and worked there full time. I read a few of her articles before and she was a very professional journalist. She looked so exhausted from work, and she said she writes five to eight articles a day. I was impressed. I asked, “How do you do this?” She replied, “Oh I’m so dumb at this.”I said that no way - I read your work and you are really good. She said, “oh no, my editor edits me so much. I’m really an idiot.” I was shocked that even those who are way better than me don’t believe in themselves sometimes.
I realized nobody is perfect, even when it seems they succeed so naturally.
I remember my arts teacher back in high school. She always told us that everyone, absolutely everyone, can learn this skill. It’s a skill and you don’t need to be born with it. I thought she just tried to be nice, but I was wrong. After my artsy best friend forced me into going to the drawing classes with her, I spent the last two high school years with the most motivated and talented kids in my school. I realized that I could draw almost on the same level as they can. I didn’t even try too hard, I just did what I liked. The teacher was right - it’s just a skill that can be learned. I think everything else in life is the same. I just should stop stressing and constantly comparing myself to others.
So it’s important to believe in yourself because nobody can do it for you. No matter how many mistakes you will make and how many times you’ll fail, if you are willing to learn you can achieve amazing things. Nobody is born with extraordinary abilities, so it’s only practice and learning from your own mistakes that makes you extraordinary. This I believe.