And why that moment of forgetting might be the most human thing about you
You’ve been here before.
Standing at the edge of something you need to do. Something you’ve probably done variations of before. Something that, objectively, you should be able to handle.
And yet.
There’s this strange paralysis. This simultaneous knowing and not-knowing.
Part of you whispers: I’ve handled harder things than this.
Another part counters: But what if I can’t pull this off?
The question we don’t ask
We treat these moments like personal failures.
I should be more confident.
I need to just do it.
Why am I like this?
But what if we’re asking the wrong question?
What if the issue isn’t that you’ve forgotten how to be brave—
but that you’ve temporarily forgotten the evidence?
When evidence disappears
There’s an ancient story that’s been sitting with me lately.
A warrior named Hanuman. Extraordinary abilities. Divine heritage.
But cursed to forget his own power.
So he sits by an ocean he needs to cross, convinced he can’t make the leap.
Every single day: the same shore, the same doubt, the same paralysis.
Until someone older and wiser—Jambavan, a bear-king and mentor who’s watched him grow—says something simple:
“Remember what you’ve always been capable of.”
Not “You can do this” (empty encouragement).
Not “Just believe in yourself” (meaningless platitude).
But: Here is the evidence. Here is what you’ve already done. Here is what already exists.
And the warrior remembers.
Then he acts.
The scientist who built in darkness
Centuries later. Paris. A different kind of forgetting.
Marie Curie, mixing radioactive ore with her bare hands, burns covering her fingers.
Everyone tells her she’s wasting her time.
The establishment won’t let her in because she’s a woman.
Then her husband—her partner, her believer—dies suddenly in a street accident.
She could stop. No one would judge her.
Instead, she does something quietly radical:
She shows up the next day.
And the day after that.
One small experiment. One tiny test. One fragment of proof.
Not because she felt confident.
But because each small result became evidence.
And evidence, it turns out, is more powerful than motivation.
Years later, she becomes the first person to win two Nobel Prizes. The only person to win them in two different sciences.
Not because she never doubted.
But because she kept collecting evidence even when she did.
What your brain is actually doing
Here’s what fascinates me:
In the 1970s, a psychologist named Albert Bandura discovered something that explains both of these stories.
Confidence isn’t a personality trait.
It’s not something you either have or don’t have.
It’s a calculation your brain runs in real-time.
And that calculation is based on four specific data points:
Have I done this before? (Personal history)
Have I seen someone like me do it? (Vicarious experience)
Does someone I trust believe I can? (External validation)
How does my body feel right now? (Physiological state)
Your brain takes these inputs, runs the numbers, and outputs a result:
Can I handle this? Yes or no.
The problem isn’t that this system is broken.
The problem is that we forget we have agency over the inputs.
The forgetting isn’t failure
What strikes me about both stories—the warrior and the scientist—is this:
Neither of them acquired new capabilities.
They remembered existing ones.
Neither of them waited to feel confident.
They acted, and confidence followed.
Neither of them did it alone.
Someone helped them see what they couldn’t see themselves.
We think of confidence as something we need to generate.
But maybe confidence is something we need to recognize.
The evidence already exists.
We just stop seeing it.
A different question
So instead of asking:
How do I become more confident?
Maybe we should ask:
What evidence am I not seeing?
What have I already done that I’ve forgotten counts?
Who could help me see what I can’t see alone?
The video (if you want to go deeper)
I’ve been exploring this in more detail—the psychology, the stories, the practical approaches—in video form.
It’s about eight minutes. It goes deeper into Bandura’s research on self-efficacy and how to actually work with these principles.
Watch: From Forgetfulness to Fearless
But the video isn’t the point.
The point is the pause.
A pause for you
Take a breath right now.
Ask yourself:
What’s one thing I’ve done in the past month that required courage—even small courage?
Really think about it.
It counts.
Document it somehow. Write it down. Screenshot it. Tell someone.
Because that’s evidence.
And evidence is what your brain needs when it’s running the calculation.
Not inspiration. Not motivation.
Evidence.
Until next time…
Notice the moments when you feel simultaneously capable and frozen.
That’s not confusion.
That’s your brain running a calculation with incomplete data.
The capability is already there.
You’re just temporarily forgetting to count it.
What evidence are you not seeing about yourself right now? I’d love to hear your reflections in the comments below.
Sources & Further Reading
The themes explored in this post and video draw from mythology, psychology, and neuroscience:
Ancient Narratives:
The story of Hanuman forgetting and remembering his powers appears in Valmiki’s Ramayana, particularly in the Kishkinda Kanda. Jambavan’s role as the one who reminds Hanuman of his capabilities represents an ancient understanding of mentorship and external belief as catalysts for action.
Historical Context:
Marie Curie’s work conditions and her continued research after Pierre’s death in 1906 demonstrate the power of accumulated evidence over sustained doubt. She remains the only person to win Nobel Prizes in two different scientific fields (Physics in 1903, Chemistry in 1911).
Psychological Research:
Bandura, A. (1977). Self-efficacy: Toward a unifying theory of behavioral change. Psychological Review, 84(2), 191-215. — The foundational paper establishing that confidence operates as an evidence-based calculation rather than a fixed trait.
Bandura’s four sources of self-efficacy (mastery experiences, vicarious experiences, social persuasion, and physiological states) explain why certain interventions work while others don’t.
Self-efficacy theory overview — Comprehensive resource on how beliefs about capability develop and change over time.
Related Concepts:
The distinction between outcome expectancy and efficacy expectancy helps explain why positive thinking alone rarely changes behavior—your brain needs evidence, not just optimism.
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