Confident New You!

If a lack of confidence is holding you back from going for that new job, starting online dating or taking up a new hobby, fret no more. Follow these six steps and become a more confident you!

1) Make a list
A list of reasons why you can be confident may include your talents, achievements and successes. Read them every day to remind yourself of your strengths. If you find yourself focusing on your failures, stop, and think instead about what went well. To develop further, reframe your ‘failures’ into opportunities to learn a new skill or improve an existing one.

2) Act ‘as if’
Or ‘fake it till you make it!’ Act as if you were already confident. How do you appear? What do you say? How do you feel? If you find this hard to imagine, think of someone you know who is confident. How do they act? Practice acting that way too. It may feel a bit scary or even false at first but over time the behaviour will get embedded into your natural way of being.

3) Keep a journal
Get a journal and at the end of each day write down three things that you are pleased about and the reasons why. This helps to focus the mind on what you are doing well. Do this over three months and notice the impact on your confidence levels.

4) Change the feeling
Remember that confidence is just a feeling. And you can decide how you want to feel at any given moment in your life. Think of a time when you have felt confident, re-imagine that feeling and apply it to your current or upcoming situation. Spend ten minutes each day resurrecting that feeling of confidence. Over time it will start to feel more natural.

5) Gain perspective
If you have an upcoming situation or event that will require confidence ask yourself ‘What’s the worst that could happen?’ When you look back years, months or even only weeks from now, how big of a deal will this have been? Instead of dwelling on what could go wrong, re-channel your energy to take action on what you have control over and minimize risks for what you don’t. And then get on with it.

6) Be your best friend
Are you your own worst critic? We often use much harsher language towards ourselves than we use with others. Be kind to yourself and give yourself a break. If you wouldn’t say it to a good friend, don’t say it to yourself. Make sure the goals you set are broken down small enough to be achievable and congratulate yourself when you reach them, just as you would congratulate a friend.