Our Greatest Confidence Comes From Beating Ourselves

​Earlier this week, Elliott sent me a text letting me know he'd found out he was running in an invitational track meet today at Christopher Newport University. He was going to run the 400 meters, a race he'd only run once in his life.

He told me he wasn't excited about it; "I don't like this race," he said. Then he told me his only goal was to beat the 1:09 time he had at this distance last year as an 8th grader.

Yesterday, the day before the race, he told me he wanted to run a practice run up at Randolph Macon's track. I knew in an instant what this was - it was Elliott's way of making sure he was going to be able to beat that time. It was his way of making sure he'd accomplish his goal before he had to set out to actually accomplish his goal.

This was my kid who isn't always the most confident kid.

I met him at the track. I held the timer. I said go.

I watched him blaze around the track. I looked at the timer and thought, he's going to smash his record time. But then halfway, he stopped. He just simply stopped.

He walked slowly back to me. When he reached me he said, I decided I didn't want to take a chance of overdoing it.

I said, Ok - that's probably a good idea.

Then, shortly after, he told me, "even if I don't beat my 400 time from last year in this race, I'm sure at some point I can still beat my 100 and 200 times from last year."

This was my kid who isn't always the most confident kid.

This morning, I met him at the edge of the track. I told him, listen to me, don't race the guys in your race. They are faster than you. If you try to keep up with them you're not going to beat YOU. You're not going to beat your 1:09.

Let those guys go, I said. Run your even splits through the first 300 meters. Then in the end, try to catch one of the guys in front of you.

I stood at the finish line. I watched Elliott take off. I watched him run a nice even race the first 300 meters - in the back of the pack. Then, I watched him come out of the final turn and run hard down the stretch toward the finish line, and pass another runner. And oh I knew he was going to do it.

I could literally feel it.

Sure enough, the scoreboard at the end of the track said, Elliott Cartwright: 1:03.4 - he'd crushed his time from last year.

We were sitting in the stands. He was drinking some Gatorade. He said, I could have run that race faster. Then he told me, I don't know if I can ever take enough time off my 100 time to win a race, but I think I can take enough time off my 400 to win if they'll let me keep running it.

And suddenly, I was talking to my kid who is a more confident kid.

On the way home I was thinking, we don't grow confident by beating someone else, we grow confident when we beat ourselves. We grow confident when we beat our self doubts. We grow confident when we start discovering we're better than we think we are.

I was thinking, once again one of my kids made me better today. He challenged me to get better at beating myself.

I'd told Elliott when we walked to the car - just keep beating yourself buddy. You keep beating yourself - one day you're going to look behind you and see you're beating everyone else too.

Confidence just seems to have that effect.