Humans have a unique and incredible capacity for experiencing a wide range of emotions. But if you let your emotions dictate your experience of life without figuring out why you feel a particular way, you let your emotions control you. Building confidence, over time affects how you feel and act every single day. If you’re fuelled by a sense of well-being, you’ll exude happiness and calm. If you’re bogged down by negativity, those around you will sense your unhappiness and fear.
“Once we believe in ourselves, we can risk curiosity, wonder, spontaneous delight, or any experience that reveals the human spirit.” – E.E. Cummings
- Get Things Done – Follow through
Confidence is built on accomplishment. If you achieve small and big goals, you’re going to feel much better about yourself. The best way to reach your goals, big or small, is break them into smaller goals and to monitor your progress.
If you set big goals and have big dreams, you’re going to feel overwhelmed, and you’re inevitably going to feel like you can’t do it. So break them up into smaller milestones and celebrate each little accomplishment.
People respect people when they say they’re going to do something and they do it. More importantly, you will respect yourself if you say you’re going to do something and you do it, and belief in yourself will come easier, because you know you are not afraid of the work.
- Live by your values – Be self aware
Most confident people live by a value system and make their decisions based on that value system, even when it’s hard and not necessarily in their best interest, but in the interest of the greater good. Your actions and your decisions define your character.
When you’re learning how to build confidence, it’s tempting to focus on your “ideal self” – the person you wish you were, a superhero who never experiences fear or doubt. Accept yourself as you are, with your flaws. Own up to the mistakes you make. Failing isn’t your enemy, it’s fearing failure that truly cripples you. When you accept yourself unconditionally, you’re able to look at your feelings objectively and appreciate what they teach you about yourself.
People change the world every day, despite everyone around them telling them it can’t be done. If you think you can do it, you can do it. Don’t listen to them, believe in yourself and keep going.
- Know and use your Superpowers (Strengths)
We as a society are weakness focused. We look for faults, areas of improvements and that’s well and good. But, knowing, acknowledging and leveraging our strengths enables success quicker. It helps build confidence. So as you continue to work on your areas of improvement, make time to lean into your strengths as well.
- Practice positive thinking & doing
Feeling confident starts from within with positive thinking. When you’re building confidence, learn how to reframe your mindset to start thinking more positively and feel more self-assured as a result.
What do you love to do in your spare time? Is it to get outside, hike, kayak and enjoy the outdoors? Or do you live for lying on your couch and watching all the excellent television that’s available? Whatever it is you love, create space for it, because life is short- you need time to enrich your life and to recharge to be your best self.
- Embrace a solution oriented & growth mindset
If you are a complainer, or focus on problems, change your focus now. Focusing on solutions instead of problems is one of the best things you can do for your confidence and your career.
Discovering self-confidence requires consistent action and thought. When you’re overcoming your self-doubt, having a growth mindset is key. When you view your challenges as opportunities, you’re able to approach them with assurance.
- Use confident body language
Even if you don’t feel confident all the time, you can appear confident when needed by adjusting your body language. Research suggests that, when you project confidence through your actions, the degree to which you “feel” those actions makes the confidence feel real, too.
Confident people aren’t only willing to practice, they’re also willing to acknowledge that they don’t — and can’t — know everything. “It’s better to know when you need help, than not,” says Gruenfeld.
While you don’t want to completely rely on others’ opinions to boost your ego, validation and working on self development with a coach can also be very effective in building confidence. Gruenfeld suggests asking someone who cares about your development as well as the quality of your performance to tell you what she thinks.