Hello, everyone!

This is Jhalak (dustychalks) and this is my first time celebrating Wattpad Block Party with you all as a participant! Thank you so much KellyAnneBlount for this wonderful opportunity. It means a lot to me!

So, while I was selecting the topic for this post and managing my daily routine activities (pursuing 3 academic courses, freelance content writing and Chartered Accountancy articleship) along with writing, everything in my life suddenly started falling apart.

It all came to a point where I could no longer perform daily chores without exhausting myself out completely. I had to force myself to wake up each day and somehow things ended up getting even worse - I started missing my due dates, deadlines and one day I decided I was no longer going to write. I deleted all my wattpad & writing related social media accounts - Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat and declared a hiatus on Wattpad after unpublishing all my books.

And the reason behind all this mess I created?

SELF DOUBT.

Long story short. I was sitting and cribbing about the mess my life had become till one day I accidentally opened an old email and started reading this speech I had written long ago for my cousin's event. This worked like a ray of hope in the dark for me as if I were reading a letter I had written to my future self and since that day, I've kept moving ahead, one step at a time.

My original post here was going to be related to my current writing project '27 Bowls of Ice cream' but that day when I read this speech I had written, I somewhere knew this is what my Wattpad Block Party post is going to be. The tips below aren't extraordinary or super touching. They're just a simple bunch of words that made sense to me when I was broken and I will put this here for you, hoping that it could be of some help to at least one person reading this.

With my intention now revealed, I present to you...

5 BASIC TIPS TO OVERCOME SELF DOUBT :

1. Say No to Comparisons

Life becomes just so easy when you decide not to compare yourself to anyone else.

I know it's tempting especially when the world out there is achieving new heights and you're sitting here with all the negativity in your head, a huge number of pending bills and a very huge life ahead of you which is going in a direction you don't know but please remember that the people you so easily idolize are here today because of all that they've done. They've made number of sacrifices, fought battles you know nothing of and given so much, probably everything they've had, to reach where they are today.

Everyone has success written for them, just the journey for each person is different and unique. Don't take a turn just to follow someone else's route. Instead, let your mind be the GPS and it'll work wonders if you just let it guide the way.

2. Maintaining a gratitude journal

Maintaining a gratitude journal is one of the most crucial things and I cannot stress this enough.

I very strongly believe that at every point in life we have at least 3 wonderful things to be thankful about, and no, I am not talking about the basic things like your senses or your ability to get an education and be reading this on such a wonderful platform and I'm not asking you to keep up with your gratitude journal only because it's trending or because it's so full of positivity but because it's about time you start valuing all that you have in life.

How, you ask? It's very easy. To learn the value of something you have to first pretend you don't have it and when you start understanding how important it is for you, that's when you'll start feeling grateful for it. Take this moment for an instance. You don't have a headache? You don't have a blocked nose? Damn, feel grateful for that because you don't know for how long that'll last. Enjoy each moment and feel it and live it because it might not come back!

3. Accepting failures like a pro

The way I see it, everything is either a success or a lesson and a memory to carry while you're walking on your road to success.

While this one might be difficult especially because of how the society has taught us to see failures, it is very rewarding if you see failures the way I do because failures are not merely stepping stones, they're a real-life reality check. A failure is what will make you realise how bad you want something. A failure will make you keep motivated, either out of fear of not giving your best or out of the undying passion to prove yourself that will surely push you till the finish line. Life becomes very simple when you start believing that everything in life happens for a reason.

Amidst a failure, you may not be in the mindset to understand the silver lining when all you can see is the dark cloud before you, but there will be a day when the clouds will spread out and you'll finally be able to see the rainbow hiding behind and know why it was important for the failure to come in your life and that day, everything will make sense again.

4. Forgive yourself and quit overthinking

Come on, let's be real. How many times have you spent endless sleepless nights beating yourself up over something stupid you did years ago? How many times do you keep playing that one scene over and over again in your head and feel the same level of embarrassment as if everyone is watching you while in actuality, you're alone in the room with all lights off and you're lying on the bed, trying to sleep. This is the time for you to start questioning yourself about all the times you did something stupid and honestly let's face it, this is the time when the most what ifs are born in our head.

But you know what? Never ever live your life in regrets and wondering what ifs because by doing that, you're indirectly telling life it's not good today and that's not fair... Because life is beautiful in every single way. Take it like life is like a kaleidoscope. The beads inside are a mess and everything seems confusing but have you ever noticed how suddenly everything settles and the pattern before you is such a unique and amazing pattern you've never seen before?

Life's something like that because the moment you find your order from your overthinking chaos you will realise its beauty and that's possible only and only if you forgive yourself for the past and eagerly look forward to living the next day when you wake up.

5. Taking chances

One of the worst things you and I is do is running away from our fears.

Fears are to be faced and only then will challenges be won. We always spend our life in what ifs which is why we tend to stick to the safer option and never take chances. We always cater our attention and efforts to the open door but never dare to open the closed door that's being knocked. The world today is a world full of innovation and creative ideas and not taking chances is probably the most stupid thing you might be doing today. Each day, make it a goal to do one thing out of your comfort zone so that you'll gain new experiences each day and also because it'll improve your sense of self worth. Take all the chances you have before you because life is too short to be spent in regrets.

You are a unique masterpiece and you are a sum total of all the decisions you've ever made in your life so own it up for you're a unique masterpiece in your own way and you, right here, can never be replaced or replicated.

My best wishes are with you. Leave your self doubt behind. Go ahead and make all your dreams come true! I believe in you <3

SHARE YOUR STORY + GIVEAWAYS :

To celebrate #WattpadBlockParty and my victory against my self doubt, I have set up two giveaways:

I. Share your self doubt experience here (via inline comment only). One random winner will be picked by me and he/ she will win the prizes mentioned in the image below:

II. Hosted on Rafflecopter by KellyAnneBlount. The link to the same can be found at the end of this post. He/ she will win the prizes mentioned in the image below:

Thank you so very much for reading my post! Hope it was helpful. All your votes and comments are much appreciated. Feel free to talk to me and visit my profile whenever you need an ear.

Till then,

Jhalak (dustychalks) <3

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ENTER THE WATTPAD BLOCK PARTY GIVEAWAYS BY CLICKING HERE: Shortened Link to Blog: https://goo.gl/2c6YUP

OR HERE:

Regular Link to Blog: http://kellyanneblountauthor.blogspot.com/2018/07/wattpad-block-party-giveaways-summer.html