Create Calm & Confidence on Your Fertility Journey with the Circle of Excellence

It’s no mystery that infertility can wreak havoc on your self-confidence. With societal norms that tend to associate fulfillment and success with parenthood, women dealing with infertility find themselves grappling with their beliefs about their ability to conceive, often developing feelings of inadequacy, shame, self-doubt, and profound loss.

Although there’s currently not a lot of research on the importance of interventions focused on reinforcing self-esteem when dealing with infertility, one 2021 study did explore the effects of self-esteem on the associations between infertility-related stress and depression and anxiety among women dealing with infertility, noting in its conclusions: “A high prevalence of psychological distress was found among infertile women. Self-esteem mediated and moderated the effects of infertility-related stress on depression and anxiety. […] Therefore, interventions that focus on self-esteem may be effective and should be used as a resource to combat mental health problems.” (Cui et al., 2021).

In sum, being mindful of actively building your self-confidence while trying to conceive can help reduce, and even prevent, anxiety and depression that may arise from the stressors of infertility. 

Incorporating self confidence

There are a number of ways to reinforce your self-confidence throughout the challenges of infertility such as surrounding yourself with positive emotional support from friends, family, and support groups that will lift you up through the challenging times. Also, you may seek out professional support for tools to better cope with fertility-related stress, and rebuild your sense of self-worth.

Incorporating regular mind-body practices into your daily life is also a wonderful way to bolster your self-esteem. Establishing a daily practice does take time and intention, but it doesn’t have to be complicated or overwhelming. 

I recommend starting with one simple, manageable practice until you feel comfortable and building your routine from there. You can switch things up depending on the day and your mood, making your daily practice as unique as you and your journey.

The Circle of Excellence

A tool I find truly impactful for building up your self-confidence is the Circle of Excellence, an NLP (neuro-linguistic programming) technique originally developed by Dr. John Grinder, that allows you to tap into your own inner strengths and resources, and anchor yourself to a state of self-confidence. This is a quick and simple exercise that you can really do anywhere, anytime.

Here is what a Circle of Excellence visualization looks like:

1. Close your eyes down and begin to focus inward, observing your breathing and allowing yourself to relax. Then in your mind’s eye, imagine or think about drawing a circle on the ground right in front of you, making sure the circle is big enough for you to step into

2. Now, think about or imagine taking every good thing about yourself and placing it inside the circle in front of you; good actions you’ve taken, goals you’ve achieved, all of your strengths and good qualities, all of the things you’re grateful for in life, and any and all other sources of positivity within yourself. Give all of those positive resources you’ve placed in the circle the colors, shapes, sounds and feelings that resonate, and allow all that positive energy to build as you watch from outside your circle

3. Once you’re ready to experience all of the positivity that’s inside your Circle of Excellence, you can go ahead and step right into it. Observing and breathing in deeply all of the positive energy and light that surrounds you. Taking a moment to stay there and fully enjoy all of the sensations

4. When you feel ready, imagine yourself shrinking your Circle of Excellence all the way down until it’s small enough to fit in the palm of your hand, then go ahead and drop it into your pocket (just imagine a pocket for yourself if need be). Your Circle of Excellence is always with you, whenever you need to call on all of the inner strengths and confidence you hold

You can absolutely get creative with the Circle of Excellence and make it your very own! 

To take your experience of the Circle of Excellence even further, I have put together a short guided audio version especially for the fertility journey that you can access using the following link (6-minute listening, perfect for a busy schedule): https://bit.ly/TheCircleOfExcellence

(Please do not listen to this recording while driving or operating heavy machinery.)

I hope you find this technique useful on your fertility journey and I would like to conclude with a heartfelt reminder that your self-worth is never determined by your ability to conceive.

References: 

Cui, C., Wang, L., & Wang, X. (2021). Effects of Self-Esteem on the Associations Between Infertility-Related Stress and Psychological Distress Among Infertile Chinese Women: A Cross-Sectional Study. Psychology research and behavior management, 14, 1245–1255. doi.org/10.2147/PRBM.S326994