By Leo Babauta

Day after day, we often erode trust in ourselves by not taking action when we feel overwhelm, avoidance or resistance.

These kinds of difficult actions require us to summon our innate courage, which we let lie dormant because it’s more comfortable to avoid.

But what if we could cultivate unshakeable self-trust to face difficult or scary things, through simple, daily practices?

Courage is not only something dramatic we draw upon in our hardest times … it’s also something found in small, consistent actions. And if we can cultivate it through consistent practice, then we can get better at facing all of the difficult things in our lives.

Let’s talk about those daily practices:

1. Keeping small promises to yourself. Get into the habit of making small promises to yourself. Don’t just say, “Yeah, I’ll probably do that today,” but rather, “I promise that I will do that today.” Make the promises super easy, so you can’t fail to keep them. And then be very committed to your promises. This is a practice that could take weeks to really solidify, so give it your best shot.

2. Facing things in small doses. If you have a difficult task that feels too much … see if you can face it for just a minute. You have enough courage to face it for a minute. Breathe, and take it on!

3. Delaying certain actions. There are certain kinds of actions, like scrolling on social media or getting lost in YouTube or Netflix, or eating junk food … that aren’t necessarily bad, but maybe aren’t aligned with your best intentions. What I’ve found useful is delaying them. You can still do them, but give yourself a few minutes before you do them. You’ll find that sometimes, you don’t need to do them, and even if you do … you’ll have more choice. It won’t be as automatic. That makes a huge difference, and it helps you to see that you don’t need to give in to these urges every time.

4. Speaking your truth. That phrase might sound a bit cringey to some, but basically it means sharing something that you believe or feel even when it’s uncomfortable. Often we hold back because we’re afraid of how the other person will react, but that leads to us not being able to express important things. It’s a practice of courage to share how you feel or what you think, even when it’s uncomfortable. I suggest you do this in easy ways to start with — just share things that are slightly uncomfortable. Eventually, you’ll build up the courage to share harder things.

5. Sitting with uncomfortable emotions. We often have an underlying belief that we shouldn’t feel uncomfortable emotions (like sadness, overwhelm, anxiety, etc.) … but we are stronger than we believe. Build up your belief in yourself by letting yourself feel uncomfortable things … but just a little. Just for 10 or 20 seconds. Sit there and feel them, and breathe, and tell yourself it’s OK. You got this.

You don’t have to do all of these practices every day. I recommend choosing one practice and focusing on it for a week. Then add a second practice and see how that goes.

We build self-trust little by little, when we consistently show up for ourselves and what matters to us. This takes time to develop, but the good news is that it’s doable in small steps.

If you’d like to dive deeper into these practices with me — check out my Fearless Living Academy, where I’ll be teaching on the theme of courage in October!