We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Meagan Mitchell a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Meagan, we’re so appreciative of you taking the time to share your nuggets of wisdom with our community. One of the topics we think is most important for folks looking to level up their lives is building up their self-confidence and self-esteem. Can you share how you developed your confidence?
I would say one of the most important tools that has personally helped me develop my confidence and self-esteem is by having the awareness of my inner critic & inner dialogue towards myself. I feel that when your’e conscious of your own inner dialogue and you don’t feed into the negative stories or beliefs that you tell yourself then your not as easily effected by external interactions with others that you might have perceived as hurtful or judgmental towards you because you have a stronger, grounded foundation of your own self worth, so your not easily triggered. For example, lets say if I were to look at myself in the mirror everyday and only focus on how bad my skin looks or how it’s not good enough etc. then read a comment from someone on social media that I might perceive to be negative about my skin. I am more likely to believe what everyone else is saying about my skin and will feel really insecure because they are reassuring the stories and beliefs that I had already created in my mind about myself as oppose to if I were to look at myself in the mirror and perceive my flaws as part of my beauty & have love and appreciation for who I am; then anyone who has negativity or judgement towards me wouldn’t affect me. I wouldn’t care because I know that their opinion isn’t aligned with the beliefs that I tell myself. I have learned that this is one of the most important tools for my self esteem because at the end of the day your’e going to have life experiences that will try to knock you down or test your confidence and you can’t control what others do or say but what you can do is strengthen your inner self so that you don’t react out of insecurity, low self esteem or believe the negativity. I also feel that taking some time to nurture and take care of myself is really important as well. I like to meditate, read self development books, yoga, spending time in nature to reflect, spending time with animals, family or friends and simply doing things that make me smile or up lift my spirit. I feel that self esteem or confidence isn’t just about how you look or act but also how you feel within yourself and that means nurturing your mind, body and spirit. Nobody is perfect and there are some moments or even days where I will feel less confident and that’s normal and okay. I allow myself to feel those feelings but try not be stuck in them for a long period of time.
Thanks, so before we move on maybe you can share a bit more about yourself?
I grew up in a very small town in Northern California and left my home town at the age of 16 to peruse modeling. I am so grateful for what modeling has taught me, the places I got to travel to and the ability to work with so many great creative people and I still model til this day but with social media having such a strong presence, I decided to then use my platforms to collaborate and work with companies and brands that are aligned with who I am. I would say in the past two years I have been more committed & making more of an effort with my presence on social media by just sharing my personal life with the world. For me what has been so exciting as a model merging with social media is that I get to be myself and live my life how I want to live and receive many opportunities from brands which allows me to have the creative freedom in making income from anywhere in the world and that has really been a blessing for me. I would say I am more focused on learning more about marketing, advertising and developing more skills in that area to dedicate myself more professionally to my social media platforms because they have so much to offer. I hope that in the near future with my presence and social media that I can have either my own brand or a nonprofit organization to help others 🙂
Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?
Looking back, I think for me, staying optimistic with a positive mindset, having discipline and knowing when to listen to what your body needs would be my top qualities or skills that were most impactful for my journey. My advice to anyone who is early on their journey would be to have an open mind and heart, try to always look at the positive side of things in life even through the most painful, difficult challenging times because those challenges teach you so much about your growth as a person and most of the time those challenges are actually just blessings in disguise and to be committed to your passion, dreams or goals. To go after what you want with no fear and to know when you should to be disciplined with yourself.
What is the number one obstacle or challenge you are currently facing and what are you doing to try to resolve or overcome this challenge?
I would say the number one challenge I currently face today is being too hard on myself. I am a very driven person and when I don’t meet certain expectations or don’t achieve certain goals, I am too hard on myself lol. I am currently working with my mentor on this issue by learning to not put extremely high expectations on myself so I don’t feel let down, meditating more to stay focused and centered, writing in my journal to express more of whats going on in my internal world so its out of my mind and to have more gratitude for the progress of my life as well as being at peace with where I am at in my life and to try to not compare my journey with other peoples journey.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/meaganjmitchell/
- Other: Tiktok: https://www.tiktok.com/@meaganjmitchell
Image Credits:
The main cover shot is by Ellis ; @ellis_au
