Looking for ways on how to be confident in your personal and professional life? It can be a more difficult proposition than most of us think — especially regularly, given all of life’s stresses and responsibilities.
Most of us don’t have the confidence of Steph Curry or Rihanna, and, unfortunately, some of us don’t have any confidence at all — which is a real concern, especially given all the mental health issues bring brought into the mainstream. Yes, this sucks, but it makes it even worse when you’re trying to start your own business, find a career or work your way up in an industry.
If you’re wondering how to be confident whether you’ve just been rejected or you’re always in need of a little pick-me-up. These nine tips are good starters on working your way toward consistent confidence.
Learn How To Do Positive Self-Talk
Affirmations and positive self-talk might sound like a laughable way to build confidence. Yeah, you might feel cheesy repeating happy quotes and intentions to yourself, but the end result will make it all worth it. Repeating a simple “you’ve got this” or “I am successful” to yourself easily becomes a habit, and, after hearing it so often, it’s much easier to believe it. This also moves you away from your confidence levels being dependent on others’ approval.
When you hear positivity coming from yourself to yourself, you’ll begin to recognize your skills, talents, and positive traits.
Find Confidence Boosting Exercises
This doesn’t mean you have to sit down with a workbook and focus on learning how to be confident for an hour each day (though you could, and kudos to you). There are a lot of easy things you can do to change the things you think about yourself.
For example, try changing small habits and setting goals. It doesn’t have to be an overhaul of your lifestyle, but giving yourself more time each day for a hobby or choosing to wake up a little earlier can help.
When you see yourself reaching goals that you’ve set it gives a sense of accomplishment that will certainly help your self-esteem.
Understand The Difference Between Being Confident And Cocky
Sometimes people are afraid to be confident because they don’t want to come off as egotistical. This is a valid concern, as no one really likes that jerk who thinks he’s all that — but the line between the two is pretty distinct. Confidence comes from internal affirmations and personal growth. When you’re confident, you can see everything you can bring to the table, and what everyone else can, too.
According to Lisa A. Bailey, PhD, when you’re arrogant you only focus on your talents and think highly of yourself while never giving credit or recognizing others wonderful attributes. Being cocky only benefits you, and you’ll do whatever it takes to appear better than others (and think that you are).
It’s important and healthy to be confident, just don’t become heartless — easy enough.
Forgive Yourself For Mistakes And Negative Self-Talk
We can’t be perfect 100 percent of the time. Negative thoughts (and things) happen, allow them to, but be easy on yourself. When all of this happens, it’s easy to follow that downward spiral and continue beating yourself up. Doing this though won’t make you feel any better.
You must recognize that no one is flawless, and you must forgive yourself for those harsh comments your mind might be barking at you. Learning to be easy on yourself during difficult times will boost your confidence and help your self-esteem.
You wouldn’t yell at someone else if he or she was feeling down, you’d most likely want to help build them up or offer nice words and compliments. When it comes to being confident, reverse that famous saying and treat yourself the way you treat others.
Find Someone You Can Talk To
Your best friend, a cousin, a therapist, your dog; it doesn’t really matter too much as long as you trust them and they’ll listen respectfully. Low confidence can skew your view of yourself and situations you’re going through. Having a neutral soundboard to bounce things off of will help you shed some light on where you’re being too hard on yourself. It always helps too, to have someone who cares about and thinks highly of you.
While being confident shouldn’t be reliant on outside opinions, it’s always nice to get a positive boost now and again.
Research Options If Lack Of Confidence Is Impacting Your Life And Work
Low self-esteem can affect everything in your life; from your decision making abilities to the quality of your work, and even your health. Having a bad confidence day is a lot different from a consistent feeling of self-loathing or a strong difficulty in trusting your talents and capabilities. When it’s getting in the way of your daily routines all the time, it’s better to get help for it.
If this happens, there’s no shame in reaching out to a counselor or looking into some group therapy sessions. It will help you figure out coping mechanisms and give you a hand in working towards a healthy, confident attitude. We can’t do everything on our own, and there’s plenty of people who can help you out.
Learn How To Handle Rejection In A Healthy Way
For many ambitious hard workers out there, the thought of failure can easily make you want to run for the hills. Fun fact: failure and rejection are natural and essential for growing. Despite all the scary things we were taught in school about failing, we can’t learn much from everything going right all the time. And as cheesy as it sounds, after being rejected or messing up on something, there’s usually always something better around the corner.
There are a lot of articles and books you can read on the subject, but it really comes down to being reflective on what happened without tearing yourself down in the process. You can work through what you’d like to do better, then move on and focus on making your next assignment, application or interview that much better.
Figure Out A Game Plan For When You Have Those Off Days
Off days happen, and, when they do, it’s best to have a plan for how to handle them than simply suffering through them. Face it, these days are inevitable, and it takes a little bit of effort to make them bearable.
Here are a few suggestions:
- Try your best to focus on the positive (even if it’s not about yourself)
- If you messed up or didn’t do your best on a project or assignment, consider what you could do differently next time, then move on. Dwelling on what-ifs is easy, but it’s harmful, and we can’t go back in time.
- Know that things will be better tomorrow. While today might feel like crap, you can only go up from here.
- Write it out. It may sound dumb, but spilling your thoughts and frustrations on paper is a physical way to release that negativity and may even help you stop dwelling once you get it all out.
Trust Yourself, Dammit
You’d be surprised at how much trusting yourself can help your self-esteem and help make you a more confident person. We often forget to bat the thoughts away that say things like “you can’t do this” or “what if you’re wrong or mess this up?” and reversing this self-doubt habit can really change how you view yourself and situations. A simple way to start kicking this in the butt is questioning your thoughts.
If you hear that annoying echo about not being able to do something, respond back with what if I can? If your mind mentions that you’re not good at something, answer back with actually I am. No one has to hear you say any of this, but it’s a helpful way to train your brain to not jump to negative thoughts right away.
All images via Pexels