Video summary
The video addresses a common struggle where individuals feel they lack confidence because they fail to follow through on their promises, such as going to the gym or growing their business. The speaker explains that this failure is not due to laziness or a lack of discipline, but rather stems from a deep-seated lack of self-trust. When people do not achieve their goals, they often engage in harsh self-criticism, telling themselves they are worthless or inadequate. Conversely, even when they succeed, they continue to criticize themselves for not doing enough. This constant negative feedback loop causes the brain to associate the activity with danger and pain, similar to how a dog might become aggressive due to past trauma. Consequently, the mind develops a protection mechanism that avoids the action entirely because it is perceived as "bad," regardless of whether the person actually performs the task or not.
A crucial insight presented is that belief in oneself is not a prerequisite for taking action; in fact, expecting to feel confident before acting can prevent progress altogether. The speaker argues that you do not need to believe you will succeed to start working toward a goal, just as a salesperson does not need to believe a customer will buy before making the call. Instead, confidence is built incrementally through the act of doing what one says they will do and even pushing through difficult tasks despite the desire to quit. By consistently showing up for oneself and following through on commitments, individuals begin to rebuild trust in their own abilities. This process transforms the subconscious association of an activity from negative to positive, allowing results to naturally follow consistent effort rather than magical thinking or forced affirmation.
The relationship between confidence and competence is described as a reciprocal loop rather than a linear sequence where one must come first. Since neither confidence nor competence exists in isolation, taking action is the only way to initiate growth in both areas simultaneously. As a person takes action, they gain competence through experience and skill development, which in turn boosts their confidence. This increased confidence then fuels further action, creating a positive cycle that continues to strengthen self-belief over time. The speaker emphasizes that there is no shortcut, such as reading a book or meditating, that can instantly generate this belief; it must be constructed brick by brick through real-world actions and the resulting achievements.
Ultimately, the path to genuine confidence lies in abandoning the wait for inspiration or a sudden feeling of self-worth and instead focusing on immediate, tangible steps toward one's goals. By consistently acting in alignment with desired outcomes—whether that is losing weight, making sales, or writing a book—individuals will inevitably see results that validate their efforts. These results provide the evidence needed to shift one's identity from someone who quits to someone who follows through. Over time, this accumulation of small wins and the practice of positive self-talk during action leads to what the speaker calls "superhuman confidence." This is not an innate trait but a developed state achieved by repeatedly proving to oneself that one can be trusted to take action and achieve results.
Read the full video transcript
I was running a Zoom call, two different
Zoom calls this week. In both of them,
somebody asked me, "How do I believe in
myself more?" And whenever someone asked
a question in both of them, I'm like, "I
need to do a podcast episode on this cuz
that's the universe telling me I need to
do this." You know, one of the things
that the one of the women said, she
said, "I don't have confidence." Like, I
feel like I don't have confidence in
myself. She said, "I I lie to myself. I
lie to myself because I I tell myself
that I'm going to do something and I
don't do it. And so I I tell myself I'm
going to go to the gym and I don't don't
go to the gym. I tell myself I'm going
to wake up early and I don't wake up
early. I tell myself I'm going to put
time into growing my business and I
don't grow my business. And we dove a
little bit deeper and I asked more
questions. And what we ended up finding
out and what she said was I I have found
that I don't trust myself. And that was
what was behind all of it was I don't
trust myself. And then I asked her I
said so what's the opposite of not
trusting yourself? And she said, 'Well,
probably trusting myself. And I was
like, sure, yeah, I guess the opposite
of not trusting yourself would be
trusting yourself. But another way of
saying trusting yourself would be what?
She said, having confidence in myself. I
said, exactly. And you have to
understand when you say, I'm going to go
to the gym say 10 times, how many times
do you go? And she's like, I don't know,
maybe two or three. And I say, and when
you don't go to the gym, what do you say
to yourself? So you say you're going to
go to the gym 10 times. you go to the
gym two or three times, then when you
don't go to the gym, what do you say to
yourself? And she's like, I say stuff
like, "What the hell are you doing?
You're worthless. You look like No
wonder why you're still single." I said,
"Okay." And when you do go to the gym,
what do you say to yourself? Like, even
when you do go to the gym, those two or
three times, what do you say to
yourself? And she said, "I say stuff
like, I'm not working hard enough.
You're still overweight. You still don't
look good in a bathing suit." I was
like, "My goodness,
you're like beating yourself up whether
you do what you want to do or you don't
do what you want to do." And I want you
to think about this. I'll give you
another example, right? Let's say that
you go and you you go to someone's house
and they have an aggressive dog. Most
people are like, "Oh my gosh, there's
something wrong with that dog. It's
aggressive." I want you to understand
that dog was not born aggressive. That
dog has been through something in the
past and now it associates something
that has two arms and walks on two legs
as dangerous.
And so the dog associates the silhouette
of a human with danger. If you talk down
to yourself when you don't go to the gym
and you still talk down to yourself when
you do go to the gym, what do you think
you're associating in your mind? the gym
as you're mentally beating yourself up
every single time you go to the gym and
every single time you don't go to the
gym. Of course, your brain is going to
want to avoid that thing because it
associates, is this thing good? Is this
thing bad? Well, whether I do go or I
don't go, I still beat myself up about
it. So, it's bad. And you have to
understand that's a protection
mechanism. The same way that the dog is
aggressive whenever it sees a human is
the same way your brain tries to avoid
going to the gym. And it could be the
gym. It could be relationships for those
of you that have been heartbroken or
that have messed up or someone cheated
on you or something like that. You can
place whatever it is and you want to in
that space. And so she was beating
herself up whether or not she did
something. And we will be right back.
Hey, real quick. If you're someone who
sets a goal, gets really fired up for a
couple weeks, and then somehow ends up
right back with the same habits that you
swore that you were done with, this is
for you. Listen to me for just a second.
It's not because you're lazy. It's not
because you don't have enough
discipline. It's because you're trying
to create a new life with the same
identity that you've always had. See,
you have to understand you will always
act in alignment with who you believe
that you are. So if deep down you see
yourself as somebody who quits, someone
who never follows through, someone who
always falls back into the same old
patterns, then you will keep proving
that story true over and over again. And
until you change that old identity
underneath it, nothing will change.
That's why on August 27th, I'm hosting a
completely free live workshop where I'm
going to show you how to identify the
patterns that have been controlling your
decisions without you even realizing it.
how to break those patterns and then how
to shift your identity so that the
actions that you want to take finally
match the life that you say that you
want. So, if you're ready for change and
you don't want to stay the old version
of you, go to 2026workshop.com
right now or scan the QR code that's
right here to save your free spot for
August 27th. So, go ahead, save your
seat and I'll see you there. And now,
back to the show. And it's like we all
have brains that associate something
with something else. That's one of the
great things about brains is when
something happens, we associate it with
something else. When something happens,
we associate it with something else. You
know, every time if I just even take it
down to my dog Bear, every time I open a
package in the kitchen, that dog runs as
fast as he can to me because his treats
come in a package that makes the same
noise. So that sound he associates with
treats. He runs to us. Our brains
associate good or bad to everything. My
question is that thing that you avoid,
the gym, relationships, growing your
business, do you associate that thing as
good or do you associate that thing as
bad?
And I'm not talking about what you
consciously associate it. Like you can
go, yeah, well, I know that going to the
gym is good. Okay, that's not what I'm
asking. I'm asking behind the scenes,
the subconscious, the 95% that's working
behind your conscious mind. Are you
going good? Are you going bad? And
that's the first way that I want to
start off today to help you kind of
realize why it might be hard to take
action towards something. So then the
natural question from there is, how do I
start believing in myself to take
action? Which is asked to me all the
time, Rob, how do I believe in myself so
I can start taking action towards what
it is that I want? But here's the deal,
and I've said this before, and I really
want people to understand this. Who said
that you have to believe in yourself in
order to take action? Like, it's a
prerequisite. Belief is a prerequisite
to taking action. It's not. Belief is
not a prerequisite to taking action at
all. In fact, if you're doing something
that you've never done before, if you're
doing something that you're not good at,
if you're doing something that you're
still a beginner at, you should not
believe in yourself.
You shouldn't. It would be actually kind
of crazy to believe in yourself when
you've never done something or you've
never done it well. But here's the
beautiful thing about taking action is
you don't have to believe in yourself at
all in order to take any bit of action.
Right? So if you're a a salesperson, I
when I was younger, I used to train
sales people. I trained over 2,000 sales
people. Right? If you're a salesperson,
you don't have to believe somebody is
going to buy. All you have to do is talk
to enough people, follow the script,
eventually somebody will buy. Now, I
understand the more belief and
conviction that you have in yourself and
the product will help you make more
sales, but just in general, you don't
have to believe in yourself in order for
someone to buy. You just have to do what
you need to do. You need to knock on the
doors and talk to people, or you need to
pick up the phone and just hit 10
numbers and talk to somebody. None of
that requires you brainwashing yourself
into magically believing in yourself.
Now, does belief help? Yeah, absolutely.
Is it required? No. And it's definitely
not a prerequisite to taking any action.
Now, I'm not saying don't do
affirmations, don't be kind to yourself,
any of that. I love those. I think
they're definitely important. We're
going to talk about positive selft talk
today as well. I'm not saying don't talk
positively to yourself. It does help.
Like for me, even when I I do it for
myself all the time. When I was writing
my book, Level Up, and I was sitting in
Sedon and I was about to start it, I was
like, "Oh my god, this is going to be so
hard and I I noticed that I was I was
taking this idea that it was going to be
so hard to to write a book because I had
heard from so many people that it's so
hard to write a book and I said, "No,
screw that. I've been preparing my
entire life to write this book.
Everything that I need is inside of my
brain. This is going to be easy and
effortless. It's going to be easy and I
started repeating it easy and effortless
and easy and effortless." So then when I
sat down to write it made it so much
easier. So I'm not saying don't speak
positively to yourself, right?
definitely do that. What I'm saying to
you is belief or positive thinking or
positive speaking to yourself is not
required to take action. And those
definitely help you rewire your thoughts
and build your self-belief, but it's not
required.
But do you know what helps you build
belief in yourself more than anything
else?
doing what you say you're going to do
and doing what you don't want to do but
doing it anyways. If you do what you say
you're going to do, when you say, "Hey,
I'm going to do this thing and you do
it." Guess what you start doing? You
start believing yourself more. When you
do something that is hard that you
really don't want to do and you do it
anyways, even if you don't succeed, you
still build belief in yourself. It's not
about success or not being successful.
It's about you showing up for yourself
and that
builds trust in yourself. There's always
someone that's watching you and that's
you. There's always someone that's
watching you. Results are great, but
action and doing what you say you're
going to do way better. Showing up for
yourself, following through with your
word, with your actions. If you get
results better than you've achieved
before in your past, you will start
believing yourself more. And if you do
it over and over and over and over
again, your belief continues to raise.
So most people want to read a book about
how to believe in themselves or how to
have more confidence. They want to, you
know, take some magical pill of how to
believe in themselves. It doesn't exist.
You've got to take action. You've got to
do what you need to do and eventually
you will get the results that you want.
How do you get results? take action in
the direction that you're trying to go.
It's pretty simple, right? Like let's
I'll give you a couple of example. Let's
say that you want to lose weight. You
don't have to believe in yourself or you
don't have to believe that you will lose
any weight to show up at the gym. You
don't have to believe that you lose any
weight in order to do a workout that
makes you sweat. You don't have to
believe in yourself and believe that you
will lose any weight to cut out your
junk food. You don't have to believe
that you lose any weight to consume more
water. You don't have to believe that
you will lose any weight in order to
rest. You don't have to believe in
yourself and believe that you'll lose
any weight to cut out sugar.
But if you do all of those things over
and over and over again for a consistent
amount of time, guess what happens?
Eventually,
you will jump on a scale and you will
see a lower weight in a few weeks. It's
just going to happen. When you take the
right action, you get the right results.
Belief not required for that. And when
you see a lower weight, do you think you
start to believe in yourself a little
bit more? Yes. Just a little bit more.
And a little bit more. And a little bit
more. That's the belief that you were
hoping you could brainwash yourself
into, but you can't if you don't get
your ass off the couch. If you're a, you
know, another example is you're a
salesperson because we were talking
about earlier and you know that X amount
of calls will equal Y amount of people
picking up which equals Z amount of
people will buy because you've you've
been working there for a while and you
know your statistics and your numbers
and you break it down. You're like that
means that I need to make 50 calls per
day for the entire year and I will hit
my goal of $100,000 that I made this
year. You don't have to believe that you
can make $100,000 in order to pick up
the phone. You don't have to believe
that you make $100,000 in order to read
the sales script. You don't have to
believe that you make $100,000 in order
to read how to overcome objections. You
don't have to make believe that you make
$100,000 in order to do that job or
anything required in that job. And if
your math is right, as long as you take
the action, as long as you make the 50
calls and talk to everyone and overcome
objections and follow the script and
follow up, you will make that $100,000.
But you didn't have to believe in
yourself. You just had to take action.
And when you take action, you get
results. And every time you get results,
you start to believe in yourself a
little bit more. Let's say that you want
to write a book. So many people write
into me and they're like, "Rob, I want
to write a book. What did you do? How do
you do it? What's the what's the tips?"
Well, you don't have to believe in
yourself in order to write 500 words a
day. You don't have to believe in
yourself in order to outline your plot.
You don't have to believe in yourself in
order to set a timer and write for 20
minutes. You don't have to believe
anyone will ever want to read your book
in order to edit your first draft. You
don't have to believe that anybody's
going to like your story or your book in
order to share your draft to a friend or
critique group.
You don't. But when you take action, you
eventually get the results that you
want. And just the getting the results
will build confidence. But even just the
seeing yourself take action will build
confidence.
When you just go to the gym and you
don't stop and you don't worry about
believing in yourself, guess what?
You'll eventually get to the point when
you look to look into the mirror and
you'll start to visually see yourself
looking better, losing weight. you will
get onto the scale and you will see a
lower number than the last time that you
jumped on it. And when you see that, do
you think you'll believe in yourself a
tiny bit more? Yes. In week after week,
you'll start to look better and you'll
get a little bit more confident. And
week after week, the scale is going to
be a little bit lower and you'll be a
little bit more confident.
In sales, when you get your first sale,
do you think you believe in yourself a
little bit more? Yeah, a tiny bit. Your
second sale? Yeah, a tiny bit. Third
sale, a little bit more. your 40th sale,
do you think you're going to believe in
yourself a little bit more than you did
on your first sale? Absolutely. So,
what's the key takeaway here? You don't
have to believe in yourself in order to
take action. If you're waiting to take
action until God bestows upon you
confidence and belief, you're going to
be waiting forever.
You just have to take the right action
and eventually the results will come.
And when the results come, you'll start
to believe in yourself a little bit
more. And one day you'll wake up and
you'll realize that you have way more
confidence than you did a year ago or
two years ago or three years ago. Not
because you wanted to believe in
yourself or because you waited to
believe in yourself, but because you
took action towards the results that you
wanted to get. A confident person is not
born. Like when I go downstairs and hang
out with my son, I'm not like, "Wow, he
is so confident."
confident person is built brick by brick
by brick, action by action by action,
results by results by results. All of
those come from them taking some form of
action. And now when you look at it, I
I'll talk about this real quick. I did
an episode on this thing earlier this
year. It's called the confidence
competence loop. So a lot of people are
like, well, how do I get better at this
thing? How do I get more confident?
Right? So when you look at competence
and confidence, right? So confidence
means you believe in yourself.
Competence means that you have the skill
set to do what you need to do. And that
skill set's growing. So most people are
like, "Okay, do I get confidence first
or do I get competence first?" Because
when I have confidence, it's easier for
me to take action. And when I take more
action, I get more competence. And when
I have more competence, it makes me take
more action, which then makes me have
more confidence. And so it's this loop
that happens where they both play into
each other. More confidence I have, more
confidence I have. More confidence I
have, more confidence I have. Which one
comes first? It's like the chicken or
the egg. Do I get confident first or do
I get confidence first? And it's a trick
answer. You don't get either one first.
It's not the chicken or the egg. You
have to take action in order to give
yourself a chance to become more
confident. start to believe in yourself
more and to become more competent, which
is starting to actually have the skill
set and the knowledge to do what needs
to be done. So, if you want to be
confident, if you want to be competent,
if you want to believe in yourself, you
have to get your ass up and take some
action. There is no book that you can
read. There's no meditation that you can
do. There's none of those things. Now,
if you do want to add fuel to the fire,
I recommend this. Stop being such an
to yourself in your own head.
And with the action that you're taking,
actually start to talk positively to
yourself. If you take action towards the
goals that you want and you are in your
own head speaking positively to
yourself, being your number one fan,
it's like superhuman confidence because
what happens is we unconsciously, most
of us over our lifetime have brainwashed
oursel into not believing in oursel and
not thinking that we can do something,
which makes it harder to take action.
But when you start taking action and you
start really paying attention to
rewiring your thoughts to believe in
yourself, to be nicer to yourself, to
speak positively to yourself, and you're
taking the action and you're getting the
results and you're getting more
confidence and you're getting more
confidence, then you start to develop
this real superhuman confidence over a
year, two years, three years, 5 years.
So if you really really want to develop
the confidence and the belief in
yourself, you have to understand the
only way to get there and I've coached
thousands of people over the next last
19 years. I've never seen somebody
meditate their way into confidence into
believing in themsel. The number one way
is to take action to do what you say
you're going to do and to do the things
that are tough but you know you should
do. If you do that, eventually
confidence and self-belief will come.
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