A KAJAL MEHTA Blog: Little things
Confidence Matters
Confidence Matters, I have been fond of singing ever since I was introduced to music. In my head, I sung pretty well. Back in 8th grade, my school had a cultural event where my friend and I decided to sing a song. This was the first time I was going to showcase my singing to the world (well, I meant the school). But just the idea of going on a stage and performing gave me panic attacks even before stepping on the stage. I was scared to death, nervous and extremely anxious. My friend kept trying to boost my confidence levels but nothing helped. And then the time arrived, time to go on that STAGE! I was so nervous that despite memorizing the song and knowing it by heart, I wrote down the lyrics on a piece of paper so that I can look at it if I forgot the lyrics while performing. All the eyes were targeting us, teachers, students, peons, everyone. Those eyes made me even more nervous. We finally started with the song. We had picked “Imaan ka Asar” from the movie Dor, since the song was apt for two singers. It was sung by Shreya Ghoshal and Sunidhi Chauhan. I sung the entire song staring at the piece of paper that I had brought with me. My voice reflected my nervousness and that somewhere affected my performance. The song came to an end, our performance came to an end. Oh, what a relief!
We stepped off the stage and went to join our classmates. My best friend could see the sense of relief on my face. She came to me and said, “Don’t worry, you did well. Your voice was just a little thin and shivery but you did well.” I was relieved and disappointed at the same time. I knew that I could have performed better. The next performance was also a singing performance by one of the 9th graders. She walked up on the stage and started singing. She had picked “Yeh Ishq” from the movie Jab We Met. I am usually not a mean person by nature, but to be honest, her singing was really bad. Her voice was tearing apart and after a point, it felt like she was just screaming through the microphone. Her performance was finally over and everybody clapped. Yes, they even clapped for my performance but this girl was actually smiling at those claps.
That’s when I realized something great. I knew that I was good at singing, and I actually was. But I ruined my performance because I lacked that self-confidence. On the other hand, this 9th grade girl, sang horribly but she didn’t lose her confidence even for a second which made her performance better than mine. You have to be a hero in your own head first. Confidence means everything. You can create something magical, something out of this world but if you lack the confidence to showcase it to the world, you have lost your battle right there. And human beings are thirsty for confidence because we all lack it in some or the other form. Anything told with confidence becomes a fact, even if it’s actually not. But lack of confidence can make other people doubt your talents. So, always remember, whatever you do in life, do it with confidence! Because you deserve to be recognized and appreciated for what you have. If you won’t believe in yourself, how will anybody else?
