Self Confidence
It’s a funny thing, confidence. Like money, we all feel at times that we could do with more of it and those who have plenty never give it a second thought. It’s an elusive feeling, one that evaporates under the spotlight of attention, but when you’ve got it, you feel you can do anything. What does ‘confidence’ mean?
By ’self-confidence’, people usually mean the feeling of knowing that things will go well. This immediately gives us an idea of why it can be such a problem - we cannot know the future!
Confidence in your own abilities
The essence of self confidence is having faith in your own abilities. Being able to trust that, whatever happens, you’ll be able to deal with it. Why is it then, that we spend most of our time imagining what things will be like when they go wrong, and seeing ourselves being embarrassed, humiliated or failing in some crushing way?
Self Preservation
One reason why we do this is to avoid danger to ourselves. Contingency planning is where you imagine what could happen, and make plans to deal with it. This is fine in business, government or project planning, but in many other situations, such as social occasions or presentations, the possibilities of ‘what might happen’ are far too numerous to deal with in this way.
Confidence, the myth
People often say things like “I can’t do that, I just don’t feel confident”. By this, they seem to mean one of the following. Either “The fact I feel under-confident is some kind of message that I shouldn’t be doing it” or “Before attempting anything new, I have to feel confident about it first.” Both of these leave us less likely to be able to tackle new situations in a comfortable way. As stated previously, what we need more is a sense of ‘whatever happens, it will be OK’.
Self Confidence can be learned
Another common idea about confidence is that you are either born with it, or not. Things you hear are “I’m just not a confident person” or “People who are super-confident are just lucky”. This is obviously untrue, as anyone knows who has seen a friend or colleague grow in confidence. Confidence is a way of approaching things, and it can be learned.
Catch 22?
Now obviously, what builds our confidence in the long-term is doing things that we are a bit scared of and surprising ourselves with our abilities. So is this a no-win situation? If we can’t do the things that we need to feel confident, how can we grow in confidence? Well, we can learn the strategies, approaches and thinking of confident people and, perhaps most importantly, how to mentally prepare ourselves for new or frightening events. Once we do this, it’s like rolling a snowball down a hill. The things that made us under-confident no longer do and we feel more able to tackle bigger things, which in turn raises our confidence levels.
What can I do to be more confident?
If you truly want to be more confident, you can learn how. How long it will take before you are as confident as you want to be depends on what stage you are at now. Very under-confident people are more likely to notice a difference most quickly when they learn how to be more confident. Those who need more confidence for particular situations only may only notice the difference when they go back into that situation.
Above all, to become more confident, we have to do something. It’s one thing thinking different, but that’s only one part of the picture
Blog Archive
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2008
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Juni(77)
- Shake It Up: Alternative Meeting Strategies
- Firing and the Law
- Five Myths of Managing Up
- Self Confidence
- Low Self Esteem
- Learning Self confidence
- How panic attacks spread
- The Secret Of Success
- Getting to know ‘you’
- Public Speaking
- Ten Politically Incorrect Truths About Human Nature
- 9 Basic Human Needs for Good Mental Health and Emo...
- How to understand what your dreams mean
- Hypnosis for Success
- How hypnosis can build self confidence
- Worry your way to a solution
- Learn to worry well and benefit from stress
- How to quit smoking
- Telecommuting Has Mostly Positive Consequences For...
- Clear the clutter
- Train your brain
- Roll the dice to relieve the monotony
- Breathing for health - Noise removal breathing
- When We Are Fools to Ourselves
- Schopenhauer’s Extreme Self-Help for Pessimists
- What is Happiness?
- Examining Human Behaviour: Learn About Quandaries
- Mental Self-Defense Strategies
- 37 Stress Management Tips
- Psychology - The Study of the Human Mind
- 101 ways to cope with stress
- What is Forensic Psychology? It’s Not Silence of t...
- Psychology Degrees
- Exercise Elevates Mood - Until And Unless You Stop
- Experiences Beat Possessions: Why Materialism Caus...
- 7 Tips for dealing with confrontation
- Remember your dreams
- The art of listening
- 90 minute sleep cycle for a better life
- How to Get Your Child to Do What You Ask - The Fir...
- Child Discipline Series
- The Twelve Disciplinary Elements
- Provide Related, Respectful, and Reasonable Conseq...
- Seven Ways to Discipline Effectively
- Be Reasonable, Gentle, and Firm
- The Three Times Rule
- Ain't Misbehavin': Discipline Tactics That Work!
- How to Be More Consistent with Your Children
- How to Punish Without Punishing Yourself
- Be a better partner
- Solutions to Parents' Top Discipline Problems
- Using Punishments Effectively (2)
- Using Punishments Effectively (1)
- Your One-Year-Old: Beginning Discipline (2)
- Your One-Year-Old: Beginning Discipline (1)
- Disciplining Your Toddler
- Should Toddlers Ever Be Punished?
- Disciplinary Techniques That Work for Toddlers and...
- Disciplinary Techniques That Work for Toddlers and...
- Disciplinary Techniques That Work for Toddlers and...
- Disciplining Your Toddler: Put the Brakes on Aggre...
- Ten Questions to Ask Before You Punish
- Effective Punishment
- "Counting Out": An Easy Technique to Reduce Bad Be...
- The Basics of Discipline
- Good Kids, Bad Behavior
- Parenting Your Negative Child
- Letting Go of a Relationship That Stresses You (3)
- Letting Go of a Relationship That Stresses You (2)
- Letting Go of a Relationship That Stresses You (1)
- Stress and Family Life
- What if your child doesn't do what you tell him? T...
- Child Discipline Series
- The Big List of Consequences
- When Parents Disagree about Discipline
- Parenting Traps
- Spending Time with Children
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