Building Confidence
When you were a tiny baby, what if your carers had said to themselves, "There is no way this child is ever going to be any good with their legs. I think they should forget about walking altogether. As for their vocal chords - total lost cause. Talking is off the agenda too." Except for a very small minority born with conditions that make these tasks difficult or impossible, it seems ludicrous when you put it in those terms. The people who raised you would never have had an expectation that you wouldn't learn to walk or talk. Rather, each milestone towards upright perambulation and understandable speech was greeted with excitement, and every fall with a comforting hand and reassurance that you just needed to keep trying.
So why have I heard so many times, "I'm no good with my hands", or the marginally less critical, "I'm not very good with my hands". Of course you are good with your hands! You use them every day to live and interact with the world around you. In fact, the range of activities your hands undertake automatically is nothing short of mind blowing. Today for example my hands have prepared food and drink, fed me, cleaned and dressed me, turned the pages of several books, packed bags and boxes in and out of my car, written notes on paper and a whiteboard, driven to work and home again, reached out to hold and comfort family and friends, and interacted with at least three different pieces of digital technology. Each one of those everyday activities engages finely tuned circuits that have been honed to perfection with decades of practice. Even without any craft or art practice in my life, I can safely say that my hands are doing a pretty good job.
Even basic chores require pretty skilled hands! (Photo by cottonbro)
What someone really means when they say "I'm no good with my hands" is "I don't think I am good with my hands", and that's altogether different. That's no longer about what's actually possible - it's about what they think is possible. That's about confidence and expectations.
I've revisited a favourite book this week - “Humankind” by Rutger Bregman. I can't find the words to express just how much I love this book, so not only have I read it but I've listened to the audio version as well. In the opening pages Bregman writes, "This is a book about a radical idea...That most people, deep down, are pretty decent". The book is a carefully structured analysis that works through numerous research studies to demonstrate again and again that whilst we might expect that people "are selfish, that we're beasts, or worse", in fact the complete opposite is true. Research and real world experience demonstrate over and over again that most people are decent and kind with boundless potential.
One part of Bregman's argument centres around expectations. He recounts research conducted in 1963 (yes - almost sixty years ago!) by Bob Rosenthal that showed that rats randomly assigned to "smart" and "dim-witted" categories performed differently in a maze test. There was absolutely no difference between the two rat populations apart from the label on their cages, and yet the "smart" rats typically negotiated the maze faster than their "dim-witted" companions. Rosenthal himself doubted the result of his experiment at first, but he came to understand that the students performing the experiment handled the so-called "bright" rats more warmly and gently, thus enhancing their performance.
Dubbed the Pygmalion Effect, numerous research studies since have demonstrated over and over again that this positive expectation effect works in classrooms, workplaces, healthcare, and many other settings. So what if we applied that same positive expectation to working with our hands? What if we turned off the voice in our heads that says, "I'm no good with my hands" or "I could never do that"?
When I first thought about this post, I struggled to find the title. I knew I wanted to write about confidence but it’s such a big topic! How should I approach it? “Building confidence” is a phrase that gets bandied around quite a lot, but in the context of my ideas "building" is indeed the perfect word. When you make something with your hands, not only are you bringing something real into the world, you are also scaffolding your own confidence. And the wonderful thing about confidence is that it’s contagious - build it in one area of your life and pretty soon it is cascading into other areas too. If we link that to the idea of positive expectations from our teachers, fellow makers, family and friends then we can safely say that we have a pretty heady mix of potential.
A few weeks ago I wrote about James Otter teaching people to make wooden surfboards in Cornwall. In his book "Do Make" he says, "Every now and then, someone comes into the workshop believing that they can't make a surfboard". This gradually changes as they have a go, become familiar with the materials and the tools, and learn to trust the process. And then the magic happens. He writes, "In front of them is a surfboard. It is an undeniable physical representation of their own abilities and it often far exceeds even their greatest expectations." This is a perfect example of what I mean by "building confidence".
In a decade of teaching embroidery I have lost just two students part way through a class who "didn't think they could do it". In both cases I was utterly gutted, because I knew without the shadow of a doubt that had they given it an extra day or two, they would have found their feet (or more accurately their hands!). They might still have decided that canvaswork embroidery was not their thing, but it wouldn't have been because they didn't believe they could do it. Unfortunately, a few hours of positive expectations in my classroom wasn't enough to counteract the years of accumulated self-doubt they were carrying.
Conversely, I have had some wonderful experiences with watching confidence grow and develop in my students. One of my favourites very nearly quit at the end of the first day of a five day class. I convinced her to come back the next morning and try working the embroidery a little differently. At the end of the week she wrote me a letter.
"Thank you Ann-Marie for an enjoyable week of colour, beauty and challenge. Though not your best student, I have enjoyed the start of my journey into embroidery....The stitches make more sense as I find my rhythm. It will take me a long time to finish, but I will."
I was so touched and happy for her. It’s these kinds of experiences that started me on The Hands Manifesto track. This wasn’t really a letter about learning embroidery. It was a letter about confidence.
There are lot of arenas in our life that are subjected to societal judgement (rightly or wrongly – I’ll avoid that soapbox for now!): our grades at school and university; the success or otherwise of our relationships; whether we are doing a good job as parents; how much money we are earning; whether we got that promotion; how fit we are; and the list goes on. We are surrounded by advertising that makes us feel that we are not good enough without that new car, better home, fantastic new lipstick, gorgeous pair of shoes, etc.
What we need is a place where we can turn off all that judgement and just be ourselves. Where instead of our activities being linked to external expectations and measured outcomes, they are linked to building an internal sense of well being and confidence. I can think of few better ways to achieve this than by making something with your hands. It doesn't really matter what hands activity you choose just so long as it links to something that you enjoy and makes you feel good. Maybe for you it is cooking or baking - the simple pleasure of chopping, measuring, and mixing ingredients to create something you love to eat. Or perhaps it is the lure of stationery that makes your fingers tingle - making a beautiful card, colouring in, or simply doodling. For my teenage daughter, it is painting dinosaurs. She scours second hand shops for good quality denim and then paints beautiful dinosaur images on them. The great thing about these kinds of activities is that the barrier to entry is low. Some simple materials, an open mind, a few decent YouTube videos, and you are well on the way.
Dinosaur images painted by my daughter (@not_quite_a_chicken)
At the beginning of this post I suggested that claiming to be "not good with your hands" was akin to saying that you couldn't walk or talk. I'm pretty sure that some of you are now thinking, "This is all very well Ann-Marie, but what you are suggesting is that instead of asking my hands to just walk, you want them to dance. Or instead of just having them talk, you are telling me they can sing." And my answer to you is..... "Exactly right!". Because in our Western society we are equally limited by the idea that only some people can dance and sing.
A few weeks ago my husband and I attended "A Day of Ideas" as part of the annual Perth Festival. I love to dance (with my feet and my needle equally!) so I was particularly interested in the panel of five speakers talking about the benefits of dance. One man's story really stuck with me. Mubanga migrated from Zambia to Perth as a young man. Coming from a culture where everyone danced, he was surprised to find that many people in his new hometown professed that they "couldn't dance". In response he started an Afro Fusion dance school that welcomes everyone. He says it’s a pretty simple recipe - you just have to get up and move your body to the music.
Similarly, as a young child, I was fortunate to spend a little less than a year living in Fiji. One of my most enduring memories is the music - the sound of Fijian voices raised in song is not easily forgotten. I returned to visit Fiji with my husband and children in 2012. They were somewhat bewildered and embarrassed when I burst into tears as we arrived at Nadi International Airport. The sound that had triggered this emotional response was a Fijian man singing and playing guitar to welcome us to his country. It took me straight back to my childhood. Fijians sing constantly - it doesn't occur to them that they can't, any more than the Zambians think they can't dance.
In making things with our hands, just like singing and dancing, it's our expectations that limit us - not our abilities. You just need to start, giving yourself the gift of a positive outlook. The more you do, the more proficient you will become, and pretty soon, the confidence which started as a tiny cottage will grow into a magnificent castle.
This Week’s References
Do Make: The power of your own two hands by James Otter (2020). Published by The Do Book Co - ISBN 9781907974861
Humankind: A Hopeful History by Rutger Bregman (2020). Published by Bloomsbury Publishing - ISBN 9781408898949
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