Strategies and tips to help you become more confident than you ever thought possible!

First off, what is confidence?

Confidence is the willingness to try. It is the ability to push through your fears, your doubts, your perfectionism and TRY. To believe in yourself, to take action and give it a go. Confidence is built by experiencing achievement. Because when you take a step forward, no matter how small, you step out of your comfort zone, push past the doubts, fears and past failures and mistakes (rather than letting them paralyze you) and you open the door to freedom.

Being confident means that if you do fail, you can get back up, dust yourself off, and try again. When you are willing to try and take repeated action, you inevitably make progress and suddenly begin to see yourself succeeding and achieving the things you once though were impossible. This gradual process increases your belief in self, your ability to execute tasks, take control and follow through with your goals. This also allows you to develop a strong faith in yourself, a feeling of certainty: I can accomplish whatever I set my mind to, and a quiet knowing: I can do this.

Are we born with confidence?

Absolutely not! Confidence is very much like a muscle, you’ve got to work at building it day, after day, after day. You must step into the unknown and lift those weights of courage. Whilst many think confidence is something we are born with, unfortunately I must inform you that it is not. The true secret behind confidence is that it comes from within. It is not something you have, but something you have to create. It is a learned skill, one which you have to consistently work at. 

Developing confidence is a journey which takes time and effort, but I can assure you from my own personal experience and experience working with women from around the globe, that the rewards are absolutely worth it! My clients have been able to take control of their life, develop the courage to design their ideal career, fall in love with themselves and to finally take back their power.

What confidence is not.

Confidence is not about knowing everything or being completely sure of yourself all the time. Many people who exude confidence in one area of their life, lack confidence in another. Confidence, rather is about trusting yourself and believing that no matter what happens in any particular situation, you will be able to pick yourself up, handle the challenge and even learn from the outcome.

Why do I need to build confidence?

When you set out to take control of your life and make major changes, you need to feel confident and self- assured. Confidence is a crucial skill that helps you to be resilient during the challenging times and it motivates you to keep moving forward, even when you feel like giving up.

From my experience from working with women around the globe, I have come to realize that if you want to take the leap into the unknown, overcome failures and learn from them and go after your aspirations, you must believe in yourself and your skills and abilities. You must truly fall in love with yourself, your perspective, your personality and your unique journey/experiences in order to set out to make major (or even minor) changes in your life. And for this you must develop self-confidence!

How do I build confidence?

This is the million-dollar question, isn’t it? The big secret to gaining confidence is that you can infact become confident in any area of your life at any moment in time. You just need to put these tips and strategies into practice and take action!

My top strategies and tips to help you become more confident than you ever thought possible!

1. Eliminate and conquer the negative chatterbox in your head.

Do you wrestle with an inner critic, a voice that constantly berates you, questions your talents and abilities and reminds you of your faults and imperfections? If so, you are not alone. Many women struggle with this. However, if you allow these negative thoughts to take charge, you will end up living restricted, frustrated and joyless because no matter how hard you try to develop a belief in self, your self- doubt will always win. It will rob you of your confidence and power and prevent you from making any significant changes in your life.

Strategies:

a. Monitor your negative thoughts for an entire day. Write them all down. Review them at night. What percentage of your thoughts were empowering? Does this way of negative self-talk and thinking serve you?

b. Develop an inner cheerleader/ally who will stand up for you! Make a list of positive affirmations that will serve you better and consciously choose to read/refer to them whenever your negative inner critic appears.

c. Make peace with your inner critic. Thank it, and then get curious about what important information it may be trying to tell you. What could it teach you? Are you fearing something?

2. Remember a time when you felt supremely confident.

Think all the way back to childhood if you have to. What were you doing then? What routines/habits were in your life then, that are not now? What was it about that time in your life that made you feel confident? Relive this moment in time. Journal about it. Or if you have a photo of that moment, hang it up, preferably in a place you will see every day. Reminding yourself that you were once self-confident will give you the motivation and proof that you have what it takes to build self- confidence again.

3. Acknowledge the fear and uncertainty that holds you back.

You must recognize your deepest fears. Ask yourself: “How is my life limited by fear? What am I not doing that I would really like to do? Why?” Understanding your fears and hesitations can help you feel more confident. Once you do this, you will no longer have to second-guess yourself over and over again, or try to avoid experiences and situations in life. You will instead be able use fear as a tool to build confidence and courage and finally be able to say “yes” to your life.

4. Be proud of who you are.

As I said above, if you want to take control of your life, you’ve got to fall in love with yourself. If you don’t, who will? Embrace your strengths, your unique journey in life, and be proud of who you have become. Stop comparing yourself to others and appreciate the true, unique, special you. Learn to love all of yourself, faults and all, and be proud of what you believe and stand for. Know your values and begin to truly love your unique personality. What would it take for you to feel truly proud of yourself? If you are struggling in this one area, ask a friend for help or set up a free coaching session with me to discuss how you could begin to truly love yourself.

Strategies:

a. Mirror exercise. Look in the mirror and give yourself a compliment. Or high- five yourself. Or, if you want to really be bold, say, “I love you” to your reflection. Whilst it may at first feel (and sound!) awkward to do so, this simple evening routine can be the first step towards accepting and loving your beautiful self.

b. Write down your five best qualities. Review them daily.

c. Remind yourself of your achievements to date. Write down fifty of your top achievements on a small slip of paper or a folded post-it and pop them into a jar. Jot down everything from graduating from university, to learning a language, running a 5k, moving houses, giving birth, or landing a job. Every day pull one slip out and read it out loud whilst making your cup of tea or before going to sleep.

d. Think of your biggest accomplishment- one thing only YOU did. Close your eyes and relive the moment. Celebrate it. This will immediately elevate your mood and it will highlight that beautiful, powerful you that you truly are.

5. Know your why.

Ask yourself: Why do I want to achieve confidence? How will this serve me? Why is this important to me? What does confidence mean to me? Awareness is an important step in your journey to becoming confident. 

6. Body Language! Act confident.

If you want to present yourself as a confident person, you will need to work on your body language. What do you think you could do to come across as more self- assured? When you walk into a room, do you make eye contact and breath deeply? Take a quick inventory of your body. Could you stand up straighter, look up, put your shoulders back or stop fidgeting? How are you breathing- low and shallow or deep and strong? You have the power to control how your body moves. You may have to “fake it until you make it” for a while, but this step is crucial. Once you start moving with confidence, your mind will mirror your body language and you will start to trick your brain into feeling confident.

Strategy:

Powerpose! How do Superwoman and Superman stand? Do they shuffle down the street with their head down? No way! They stand with their chest out, and their arms on their hips. Stand up now and give it a try. Stand up like Superwoman and put your hands on your hips. It may sound silly, but research at Harvard Business School proved that people who stand in this so called “powerpose” for as little as two minutes had a hormonal shift- lowered levels of cortisol which is our stress hormone, and increased levels of testosterone- our power and dominance hormone. The participants who stood in this powerpose also had an increased feeling of power and a greater tolerance for risk taking. So go ahead, next time your self-esteem drops or you are feeling powerless – make a Superwoman pose!

7. Eliminate negative habits.

Perhaps you procrastinate, deflect compliments, ignore your health, break promises to yourself or even keep yourself so busy that you never get to do what you truly want to do. These negative habits do not serve you. Come up with more empowering habits that will uplift you, fill you with energy and motivate you.

8. Grow. Develop a growth mindset.

Research has shown time and time again, that humans need to grow and progress in order to feel happy and fulfilled. When you learn a new skill you increase your self-efficacy- your ability to execute future tasks in your personal and professional life and ultimately attain your goals. Research has shown that learning is directly related to happiness- so why not have a go? Having a growth mindset is a simple way to help you see the results and progress. Who knows, you may develop a new skill or ability, or perhaps even learn about a strength you never knew you had.

Strategies:

a. Pick up a new hobby or learn a completely new skill. Take up piano lessons, teach yourself how to code or learn a new language. Commit to not judging yourself on how good you “should be” at it. Being courageous enough to trying something totally new- and perhaps even being bad at it- can be liberating.

b. Learn a new skill for work or seek out a new opportunity that will foster your professional growth in your free time. Spend time deepening your knowledge in an area where you feel slightly less confident. This newfound knowledge will also help you feel confident in the workplace.

c. If you are feeling overwhelmed with where to start, please read some of my tips on how to motivate yourself to start taking action!

9. Learn to state the truth with conviction.

Confident people take a bold stance and use confident statements like I am, I can, I will and I do. When you know you have completed a project or task well, state, I know I did a good job, instead of I think I did a good job. Pay attention to the words you are saying and next time you use phrases like: I think, I’ll try, maybe, I’m not sure, remind yourself of the facts and consciously choose to revise your vocabulary.

Strategy:

Turn your “shoulds” into “musts.” To learn how, listen here.

10. Decide to take full responsibility of your life.

You are the creator of your life and of your success and happiness. So often we forget this. We think instead that life is happening to us. Reminding yourself that you are in charge of your destiny will help you change your perspective from that of a victim to one of a heroine. Doing so will unleash an inner power that will fuel your journey to becoming truly self-confident.

Strategies:

a. Change your perspective. If you are thinking about the times you failed or could not accomplish what you wanted, get over it. Please remind yourself that you can no longer look in the rear-view mirror of your life. You must drive onward. Commit to becoming more resilient in the future, learning from failures and seeing mistakes as opportunities rather than obstacles. This new perspective will hopefully help you to become more self-assured and confident.

b. Story writing. Ask yourself “If my life was a book and I was the author (and you are!) how would I like my story to play out?” If you do nothing in your life, you have a default future. If, however you decide to take action and consciously create your story and the ending, you could create an extraordinary life.

c. Ask yourself: “What would it take for me to get into the driver’s seat of my own life and take control? What would I need to think? How would I need to act? What steps would I need to take?” Find my top success strategies here.

11. Take an accurate self-assesement.

After years of negative self-talk and self-doubt, you may in fact have a distorted self-perception. Are you accurately describing who you are? How would a stranger describe you? How would your best friend or biggest fan describe your personality, appearance and strengths? Remind yourself of your achievements and your experiences in life. What values do you admire about yourself? Take some time to block out those negative voices and really assess who you are.

Strategies:

a. Put your hand on your heart and close your eyes. Breathe deeply, in and out. With your hand on your heart, think of everything you are grateful for in your life. Then begin to thank different parts of your body. Thank your heart for beating 100,000 times a day, your eyes to help you see the beauty in your world, your arms to wrap around those you love, the feet that take you to new places. Get really quiet and ask yourself who the real you is. Spend 5-10 minutes on this and then open your eyes and write down what you are feeling and thinking.

b. Write down all of your strengths- personal and professional. What do your friends and colleagues constantly tell you that you are good at? What skills come naturally to you- communication, drawing, editing, memorizing? What strengths may you be forgetting about? Think about previous jobs or roles you have had- what did you excel at? Make a comprehensive list and re-read it often to remind you of your innate strengths and skills.

12. Stop comparing yourself to others.

This is one of the most important tips. Please stop comparing your career, relationships, finances, health, level of fitness or size of your house to those around you! Be happy with YOU. And if you are unhappy, frustrated or dissatisfied with your life right now, make a conscious decision to take action and change your life. Remember you are in control of your life.

You, however cannot control what others think of you. Playing the game “Keeping up with the Jones’” does not serve you well. Jealousy and comparison will just drain you of your power and energy. Instead spend time focusing on gaining self-belief, knowing your values, and deciding what exactly you want to achieve in your lifetime. If you need help getting started, creating a new vision and taking control of your life, then please do sign up for a coaching session with me to discuss how I could help you develop the courage and confidence you need to change your life.

What would your life look like if you had more self-trust and inner confidence?

What do you think you could achieve in your health, finances, fitness, relationships and career if you had more self-confidence? How would that be a benefit to you? What opportunities would be available to you? How would you act and perform at work? What kind of relationships could you have? The key to remember is that self- confidence is within. And it is up to you as to whether or not you decide to tap into it and to start taking action. It’s your life. What are you waiting for? You know you are made for more. You can create confidence!

Ready to rid yourself of self-doubt and become truly confident? Contact me at [email protected] to set up a free coaching session about how I could help you!