Everyone feels doubt. But hardly anyone knows where doubt comes from or how it works. So, here's a little insight for anyone who needs it: Doubt shows up when you’re uncertain about something emotionally important to you. That's all doubt is: uncertainty about an outcome and the expectation of something disappointing. It's every unpleasant scenario you imagine in a future that hasn't happened yet. Everyone feels doubt throughout their life. They just don't share it or show it. The difference is not whether we experience doubt (we all do), but how we respond to it. Doubt tests you from the inside more than anyone or anything ever can from the outside. If your discipline is weak, your doubt will convince you to back away. If your discipline is strong, your doubt will trigger the courage to step forward. No matter how much confidence you have or build, you will feel doubt. You cannot eliminate doubt from your life experience. Your only option is to decide how to respond to doubt when you feel it. You can hide doubt from everyone else, but you can’t hide it from yourself. You are aware of all your doubts. And you are the only one who is aware of them all. What's tricky about doubt is it goes with you no matter what you accomplish. Overcoming one doubt pushes you higher into a new arena where you encounter new doubts. It's as a never-ending companion. Always poking. Always calling for your attention. Always testing your resolve, your courage, your discipline. If you give in to doubt, it’s not because the doubt is accurate. It’s because your focus was off, your discipline was weak, and your courage was fragile. Every taste of doubt is a test of courage. And finally, remember this: just because a doubt is strong, doesn't mean it's accurate. You have doubted many things that ended up working out great. You have also been supremely confident in many things that ended up going poorly. Strength of a feeling is not a measure of its accuracy.