confidence is key
Mid-week hump day! On Monday I wrote a post called “listen to your peaceful thoughts,” which focused on listening to what your heart is telling you when you're feeling most like yourself. When you remove external factors like others’ doubts or opinions, you make space for true happiness. And true happiness is built on trust.
Confidence goes hand-in-hand with happiness. When you’re happy, you’re confident, and when you’re confident, you’re happy. There’s nothing more attractive in this world than a person who is confident and comfortable with himself. When I was in Santa Barbara this past weekend, I was walking down State Street minding my own business when a man stopped me in my tracks. He struck up a conversation out of the blue, which led to asking me for my phone number and for a dinner date that night.
Now, I don't want to come off as shallow, but that man was not the most handsome man I’ve ever seen. He just wasn't my type. That being said, however, I seriously considered going on the date because there was something undeniably sexy about his self-ease and his confidence. His only goals in our conversation were to get me to talk to him, to get my number, and to take me to sushi. Listen, I don’t hate sushi, but it wouldn’t be my first choice for a date. And yet when he asked me to go to dinner with him for sushi, I found myself nodding that I liked sushi.
It was an interesting experience, being approached on the sidewalk like that, but it was an experience I needed to have in that moment. They say the best things and people happen to you when you're not looking for them, which is something I truly believe. When you actively go looking for something, you’ll find it, but you’ll ignore a bunch of red flags because you’re so intent on achieving the result instead of enjoying the process.
There is no set timeline for anyone’s life. I had dinner a few months ago with my professor from USC to catch up, which is something I enjoy and that we do every few months. His opinions are some that I truly respect (even if we don’t always agree), and we were on the topic of dating in the modern world. He may not even remember saying this, but he told me “over all my years, I’ve learned that there’s no formula for what works. It’s different for everyone.”
People so often get tied up in what something should look like or how something should be that they miss the point entirely when it comes to getting to know someone. When you’re attached to the idea of how something should look or feel, you might miss out on something entirely perfect for you because you’re striving for perfect. Perfect doesn’t exist.
There is no such thing as a perfect person - only a real person who is perfect for you (flaws and all). I believe that life is a series of high and low tides that ebbs and flows, which means that things are constantly changing. Even if things seem to be content and status quo, they’re not because there’s an entire world of life happening around you that affects yours in one way or another. You may feel like things aren’t going your way, but each setback just makes you stronger and more willing to take a chance to go after the thing you want. That’s why timing is so important in life and why it’s so important to let things unfold naturally. Nothing can be forced that does not want to be forced. With enough time and attention and care, you can have everything you want if you let yourself have it.
And no, I didn’t go on that sushi date. Although the attention was nice and the encounter caught me off-guard, I was listening to my heart, and my heart was elsewhere. And when you realize where your heart wants to be, you work hard on yourself to make sure you can let your heart have that happiness when the timing is right.
Thank you so much for reading, and, as always, if you have any pressing questions or if you want to discuss something further with me, feel free to subscribe below or reach out to me on the “contact” page. I’m so grateful you're here and that I’ve been getting a lot of really challenging questions and even better feedback from a community all over the world. I couldn’t do this without you! So THANK YOU! I’m here for you, and I love hearing from you, too! You’re the best, and you have everything you need inside of you! Please believe it! Starve your ego, feed your soul - and follow your heart!