Bluster.

I am a confident person.

But I also have low self-esteem.

It’s taken me a while to realise that both those things can be true but I’ve been working through some stuff and I’ve realised the difference between the two.

Confidence is learned. You can fake it. You can put on the brave face. Activate the bluster. Self-esteem is a whole different ball-game. You can’t fake that. In fact, to go one step further, those people who come off as the most confident are often the ones with the lowest self-esteem.

We need a mask. We need to hide our true selves from the rest of the world because, in our heads we believe, that no one really wants to see that. No one is interested in who we really are so we create a persona that’s warm and bubbly and yes, confident.

Don’t get me wrong - there’s nothing wrong with confidence. It’s just that, I’m starting to realise that if you have tons of confidence, but no self-esteem the balance is off and that’s when you start to look for things to silence the nagging voice in your head that tells you:

• you’re not good enough

• you’re not worthy

• you’re not interesting

• you’re not funny

• you’re not creative

…and so on. And for me, that ‘thing’ was alcohol and drugs.

Now that I’ve taken those things away, I have to confront these feelings of inadequacy as a human. I know my confidence isn’t grounded in solid self-belief. It’s on shaky ground and if I don’t work on building a solid foundation, I know that I’ll pick up a drink again and I really don’t want to do that.

If you’re waiting for the answer here, apologies! I haven’t got it and even more bad news…when I do figure it out I’ll only be able to figure it out for myself. Your story is different. Your needs are different. Your traumas, experiences and approaches are different but even just making this realisation has been huge for me. But, I will let you know what works for me and maybe, maybe, we can all figure some shit out along the way.

Cat x